Healthcare Reform or Overhaul...Still No Plan

After listening to B-Rock Opompus on last night I had the sinking feeling that we have been here before. It all sounded too familiar. It all sounded like the pressure that B-Rock put on Congress and the American public for his stimulus plan.

Take these words from an op-ed piece that the president wrote on February 5, 2009:

"Because each day we wait to begin the work of turning our economy around, more people lose their jobs, their savings and their homes. And if nothing is done, this recession might linger for years. Our economy will lose 5 million more jobs. Unemployment will approach double digits. Our nation will sink deeper into a crisis that, at some point, we may not be able to reverse."

Now compare those words to these words uttered last night:

"So let me be clear: If we do not control these costs, we will not be able to control our deficit. If we do not reform health care, your premiums and out-of-pocket costs will continue to skyrocket. If we don't act, 14,000 Americans will continue to lose their health insurance every single day. These are the consequences of inaction. These are the stakes of the debate that we're having right now."

If any of you really listened to the president you all would have heard what I have been hearing from him since last August. Plenty of ideas and no true plan to get these ideas working. If you recall he once thought about taxing the benefits of the those wage earners who make over $350k annually but now has support for creating a surtax for those Americans who earn $1M annually.

When asked if he and Congress would abide by the same plan that he is proposing, Opompus made the mistake of telling Americans that he wanted them to have the same plan that Congress currently has. O.K. They pay about 25% of the premiums and the taxpayers pick up the rest of the tab. In short, the taxpayers will pay for the plan. The other problem with this is that members of Congress have no waiting period to enroll and they are offered a myriad of plans to choose from which are through private carriers and provide for no pre-existing conditions clauses. Plus Congress has its own doctors, nurses and technicians standing by. They don't even have to leave work to get a physical exam or x-rays. Unless we work in healthcare field we gotta go to the doctor's office.

What is wrong with this idea? First, the government subsidizing 75% of premiums already indicates that companies will choose to drop coverage for their employees and turn them over to the government plan because not many companies choose to pay 75% of their employee premiums without tax incentives. Secondly, no private insurer can compete with the government when it comes to the ability to impose taxes and penalities on the populace to keep their premiums low thus eliminating competition.

To further bolster the presidents take over of healtcare was hidden in his response to a question posed by Steve Koff, of the Cleveland Plain Dealer.

"But having a public plan out there that also shows that maybe if you take some of the profit motive out, maybe if you are reducing some of the administrative costs, that you can get an even better deal, that's going to incentivize the private sector to do even better."

He seeks to remove the profit motive from private health insurers. Then there will be no private health insurers if they cannot make a profit. No one will be in the business of assuming risk without rewards. I know that health care costs have continued to rise but so have the cost associated with the advancements in treatment. Companies and researchers that come up with new and innovative ways to fix our ailments have to be compensated for their research and development. I really don't think we can wait on Pakistan to come up with a new treatment for any new malady that exists. Most money is recouped in the early stages of use.

I don't hear an outcry about how much money Microsoft makes off of its suites of Office 2007 or Windows Vista software. They are still charging the same rate that they did when the products launched 3 years ago and by now I am sure that they have recouped all of their research and development costs for that product launch( and you can bet that Windows 7 will be launched with the same pricing structure). And take a look at the Apple iPod. The prices never really go down. You get some new features, first color, then video, then smaller size, then touch and wi-fi capabilities but the prices remains constant within a few dollars. But I digress.

As I mentioned earlier, the president is full of ideas and no plans. His ideas are disguised as plans but if you examine closely you will see that there is no substance to grab hold to. Contrary to what he says, B-Rock wants to nationalize healthcare. He wants a complete overhaul of our healthcare system without looking to see what is broken and needs fixing. If my car were to run out of gas while driving; I would not rebuild the engine to fix the problem. I would call the motor club to bring me gasoline or tow me to a gas station. Let's remind our elected knuckleheads in Congress that overhaul means tearing down to rebuild. Do we need to rebuild or just fix what is broken and remove what is not working?

These are my words! Please post yours!