Yes, WaPo's got Cecily covering the health insurance companies' totally awesome and extremely trustworthy offer on "savings." (She's a piece of work.)
And her latest, at WaPo, here. Feel free to read before wrapping the fish with it.
Look, there's a basic test for the honesty and integrity -- and yes, the legitimacy -- of any press coverage, any hearing, any proposal, and any Presidential speech or presser on health care policy, and any policy process. It's very simple:
Is single payer mentioned?
They don't have to agree, they don't have to accept, they can attack all they want. They just have to mention it. They just have to put it on the table. That's the test.
Why?
Single payer has been used, by many other countries, and they have not only lower costs, but better health outcomes, than we do. Any other course of treatment is experimental -- certainly not the gold standard. And, from the medical ethics standpoint, imposing any other solution on the American people without their informed consent is simply unethical.
So, does Ceci mention single payer? Let me check.... Why, no! I'm shocked.
NOTE The insurance companies offer is good not from a policy standpoint, as Krugman says, but because it's a sign of weakness everywhere except inside Versailles
. It would be nice if Obama muscled them into at least the public option. But it looks like the administration is already caving. Our Cece has an anonymous quote!
"I don't think there can be a more significant step to help struggling families and the federal budget," a senior administration official [Hi Rahm! Waves.] said in a conference call with reporters. The official spoke on the condition of anonymity because the offer remains tentative.
There can't be a more significant step? Wow...
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The Daily Howler has 265 Ceci citations to choose from
http://www.google.com/custom?q=ceci&sa=G...
If you can't wait for the The Prisoner remake to get your Village
fix.
we need a copy of the proposal
does it prohibit states from enacting their own single payer systems?
DeParle says bill won't be ready until July--WH not letting on
to any details. Have to maintain "plausible deniability" for when the public blows up over what little is being done.
It'll all be the fault of Pelosi and House Dems.
Coverage already become less hagiographical...
Latest from AP:
Such a deal!
"First they ignore you, then they ridicule you, then they fight you, then you win." -- Mahatma Gandhi
Wow, just a-hundred-and-change (as it were) days in...
And he's accomplished so much!
Cop out
This is all incredibly disappointing. Obama's goals appear clear:
1) To create any reform, even if meaningless, for a contrast to the last failed attempt.
Logic: A plan which does nothing is politically preferable to no plan.
2) To set the bar low enough (i.e. slow the rate of rise in health care costs even if it still greatly exceeds inflation) that it can still be referred to as a success.
Logic: Meaningless political discourse is better for re-election than genuine reform with industry wrath.
Pretending to listen to the public and paying lip-service to reform based on science is disingenuous.
They've sold out the public so blatantly that they even refer to industry and special interests as 'stakeholders.'
This isn't change I can believe in.
Damn straight, Dr. Jess - Today was a kick to the gut--first,
Schumer very likely bamboozling his voters and the public, and second, The Obama Pronouncement.
"reform based based on science"
Exactly. We can always hope, but this process is awful. However, it's a house built on sand, as it were. What we at least have to do us keep the record, delegitimize the perps, hope for public option or at least state option, and keep pushing on whatever does get passed. See my sig.....
"First they ignore you, then they ridicule you, then they fight you, then you win." -- Mahatma Gandhi
Meaningless political
Meaningless political discourse is better for re-election than genuine reform with industry wrath.
bingo.
Julie Ravner discussed the Obama pronouncement and Big Insurers'
offer to cut a little out of costs over 10 years (1.5%) in order to manage the outcome on All Things Considered tonight. Oh, yeah, I said the bit about "manage the outcome."
In the leadoff discussion, Nancy Anne DeParle said the savings were "huge," and that a a bill could be ready in July with a vote coming toward the end of July*. (Update: When pressed, she said voted on by end of the summer, in at least one house. So, that takes us to September 21st.)
Ravner was asked by Michelle Norris whether the amount of possible savings on offer was really a large amount; Ravner said no, it wasn't.
Then Norris asked what would lead to big savings. I said, "Single payer, dammit!"
But Ravner said it was in "bending the cost curve" over time. Or words closish to that, "ish" meaning I'd like to be a lot more precise.
Ravner said in an appearance on The Diane Rehm Show that she never can appear where the public can ask questions without at least one person asking about single payer...and she tells them it would save money, but it's a non-starter. Just not politically feasible....
Please note that Ravner does not say that on NPR's broadcast news, that single payer is what would save money. She says that only in appearances with far less reach. Interesting, huh?
Or, as I wrote in my comment about her appearance on Rehm's show, later that day I heard Simon Johnson on Fresh Air, talking about "cognitive regulatory capture":
NPR reporters suffer from the same disease as the MCMers: "cognitive journamalism capture." They simply dare not say anything which strays by too many degrees from what the powerful say, want, do.
Maybe there's better wording for that condition...?
*July. Hey, prog bloggers who think there's time to influence Obama, please note that timeframe. Time IS running out.