Senators Move To Shred Public Option, Fool Progressives While Unions Fight Back

[Omaha Steve]

http://www.inthesetimes.com/working/entry/5278/senators_move_to_shred_public_option_while_unions_fight_to_save_it_block_ex/

Monday December 7 4:15 pm

By Art Levine

Moderate, conservative and even some liberal Senators moved away Monday from the Senate leadership's already-modest public option to faux "compromise" proposals that would leave private insurance companies in charge of any health reforms.

Jackie Shechner, the communications director for Health Care For America Now, told In These Times, "These proposals would just allow private insurance companies to compete against each other to jack up rates."

As first reported in Politico, most of these bogus alternatives, as denounced by the originator of the public option, Yale Political Science Professor Jacob Hacker, would empower nonprofits to offer additional plans to the public. But as Shechner says, "Just because it's a nonprofit doesn't mean that it's operating for the public good; it just means it doesn't have shareholders."

Union groups, including the AFL-CIO and the Communication Workers of America, are fighting back with a lobbying blitz and ads, focused on the excise tax on high-cost plans along with preserving some form of a public option. Health Care for America Now and Moveon.Org are also sponsoring Tuesday "Cost of Delay" vigils outside the Senate and in swing Senators home states to raise awareness on the need to keep alive a robust public option.

As Politico summed up the latest apparent sell-out:

Senate Democrats in search of a health reform compromise Sunday zeroed in on a new alternative to a government-run insurance plan — signaling that the chances a final bill will include a pure public option are diminishing.

The new idea — for the government to create a national health insurance plan similar to the Federal Employee Health Benefits Plan — seemed to gather momentum as the weekend went on, and the differences between liberals and moderates on the public option became even clearer.

The proposal would take the place of a new government insurance plan currently included in the Senate version of the bill, according to officials involved with the negotiations.

The plan would be administered by the Office of Personnel Management, which oversees the federal plan for members of Congress, and all of the insurance options would be not -for-profit ones offered by private companies...

If the Senate goes in this direction, the challenge for Reid is framing this alternative as an acceptable compromise for progressives. Politically, the idea holds appeal for moderates, who have opposed establishing a new government insurance plan, but might also satisfy liberal demands for more choice and competition for private insurers.

FULL story at link.

[rateyes]

1. Senate Democrats, for the most part, are goddammed cowards.