Fix Health Care Policy

Health Reform That Breaks the Bank

During last month’s Blair House health care summit, President Barack Obama was forced to change the subject after Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) Blair House thoroughly refuted the President’s claim that his health care plan would reduce the deficit. It took over a week for the White House to respond to Ryan, but last Thursday they finally produced this blog post by OMB director Peter Orszag followed by a Washington Post op-ed Friday titled: Health reform that won’t break the bank. Ethics and Public Policy Center fellow James Capretta responded to the White House that same day at NRO:

“Orszag and DeParle start by agreeing with Ryan that delaying the start date of an entitlement expansion is a tried-and-true budget gimmick, designed to push the full cost of the additional spending outside of the ‘budget window’ covered by a cost estimate.” (more…)

Tags: bend cost curve, double-counting, Health Care Summit, health insurance exchange, high-cost insurance plans, Medicare, Rep. Paul Ryan

The Senate Bill’s Fiscal Madness: Rep. Ryan’s Damning Indictment

As Heritage analysts have noted time and again, spending from congressional liberals’ health care proposals would be in the trillions, growing the federal deficit. The President has proposed a modification of the Senate bill with provisions that would make it even more expensive. At last week’s Health Care Summit, hosted by the White House, Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) echoed these same concerns over the true cost of the President’s proposal for health care reform. Thus far, neither the President nor the leaders of Congress- not one- have responded to Ryan’s indictment:

• Budget Gimmicks Galore: “[W]hat has been placed in front of [CBO] is a bill that is full of gimmicks and smoke-and-mirrors…first off, the bill has 10 years of tax increases, about half a trillion dollars, with 10 years of Medicare cuts, about half a trillion dollars, to pay for six years of spending…Now, what’s the true 10-year cost of this bill in 10 years? That’s $2.3 trillion.”
• Double-Counted Savings: “It takes $52 billion in higher Social Security tax revenues and counts them as offsets. But that’s really reserved for Social Security. So either we’re double-counting them or we don’t intend on paying those Social Security benefits…It takes $72 billion and claims money from the CLASS Act. That’s the long-term care insurance program. It takes the money from premiums that are designed for that benefit and instead counts them as offsets.” Later, Rep. Ryan went on to point out, “You can’t say that you’re using this money to either extend Medicare solvency and also offset the cost of this new program. That’s double counting.” (more…)

Tags: CLASS Act, doc fix, Health Care Summit, Medicare cuts, President's proposal, Rep. Paul Ryan, Social Security tax

Buffett to Obama: Scrap Current Bill and Start Over

Last week’s bipartisan summit on health care reform seems to have done little, if anything, to build support for the President’s vision of health care reform. Strong opposition to the Democrats’ proposals remains the position of a majority of Americans. And now, even the President’s biggest fans are following suit.

In an interview‘ with CNBC, Warren Buffett, a Democrat and supporter of President Obama, advised the President to follow the wishes of the American people to scrap the current health care legislation and start over. Buffett highlighted the failure of Democrats’ proposals to address cost as his biggest concern:

“We have a health system that, in terms of costs, is really out of control…And if you take this line and you project what has been happening into the future, we will get less and less competitive. So we need something else.”

But concerning the current proposals before Congress, Buffett lamented that, “unfortunately, we came up with a bill that really doesn’t attack the cost situation that much.” Buffet’s concerns have been certified by the President’s own Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services who have reported that the Senate health care bill would raise national health expenditures by $234 billion by 2019. (more…)

Tags: Health Care Summit, ObamaCare, senate health care bill, start over, Warren Buffett

Video: The Four-Minute Guide to the Seven-Hour Summit

Yesterday’s health care summit may well come to be seen as an important turning point in the health care debate. While the future of health care reform remains in doubt, the debate yesterday helped demonstrate to the American people the sharp differences in ideology and substance that form the gap between liberal and conservative solutions to our current healthcare problems.

For those who did not watch all seven hours, we have compiled the day’s highlights into one video.

Tags: Blair House, Health Care Summit, ObamaCare

Video: Obamacare is Entitlement Expansion, not Entitlement Reform

One of the best kept dirty little secrets of Obamacare is that over half of the health insurance expansion obtained by Americans through the bill is accomplished by putting them on the welfare program Medicaid. Rep. Pete Roskam (R-IL) not only made this point yesterday, but also highlighted a great quote from Gov. Brian Schweitzer (D-MT) on why Medicaid is “one of least effective programs in terms of health care in the history of the country.” From the Blair House health summit transcript:

“And I think one of the problems, to get to this coverage issue, is that the premise of this bill is that coverage is expanded through Medicaid, welfare. Speaker Pelosi a couple of minutes ago — or a couple of hours ago, actually said that health care reform is entitlement reform.”

SPEAKER PELOSI: “Yes.”

REPRESENTATIVE ROSKAM: “Yes. I would put a brighter light on that and say it’s entitlement expansion. Think about what we’re doing. The CBO when they wrote to Harry Reid — wrote to Senator Reid a couple of months ago, they said, look, there’s about 15 million people that are going to be put on Medicaid. And Medicaid is a house of cards. Medicaid is not something that is serving the public very well.” (more…)

Tags: Blair House, Health Care Summit, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Medicaid, ObamaCare, Rep. Pete Roskam, start over, welfare reform

Video: Reconciliation Maneuvers Around the Will of the People

In yesterday’s White House health care summit, Americans heard some talk of “reconciliation” being used to pass health care through Congress, but the true purpose and history of the procedure is likely something of a mystery to most folks, except for a few inside-the-beltway wonks.

In this video, Heritage’s Director of Senate Relations, Brian Darling, explains that reconciliation – otherwise known as “the nuclear option” – is a procedural end-run around the will of the American people.

(more…)

Tags: abuse of power, Health Care Summit, nuclear option, ObamaCare, reconciliation, Senate filibuster

A Post-Health Summit Warning: Is Incremental Control Next for Obamacare?

In the wake of the White House’s health care summit, reconciliation is still seen as the likely route that congressional leaders and their liberal allies will take to jam Obamacare through Congress. Congressional Democrats and President Barack Obama already are using the summit as a public relations vehicle to help fast-track the Senate health care bill through a parliamentary process used primarily for budgetary issues.

But beware Plan B — the more “modest” plan. There’s a surer, well-worn path that the Clinton Administration took after the collapse of Hillarycare in 1994: A careful, well-coordinated, step-by-step march to the Left on federal health care policy.

The Republican congressional victory in 1994, even though it reflected public revulsion at the Clinton Administration’s proposed takeover of the private health care system, did not change the fundamental direction of federal health policy. It only changed the degree and velocity of liberal policy success. The Clinton team started taking baby steps to expand federal control over health care financing and delivery, lulling often clueless congressional Republicans into cooperation with long-term consequences for doctors and patients. In some cases, the GOP majority enacted provisions of the Clinton health bill word for word. (more…)

Tags: ClintonCare, Health Care Summit, HIPPA, Medicaid, Medicare, ObamaCare, reconciliation, schip, start over

Home Court Advantage Didn’t Help Obama

President Obama used his health care summit to gave his side every advantage possible. Whenever opponents spoke, he got to respond. By appointing himself the moderator, Obama gave himself the first word, the last word, and the most words.

Overall, Obama gave Democrats over twice as much speaking time as Republicans. The 17 GOP’ers attending received a collective 110 minutes. By himself, Obama hogged 119 minutes of microphone time and gave his 21 fellow Democrats an additional 114 minutes. When called to account for this, Obama proclaimed it fair because, “I’m the President.”

Obama exercised free rein to cut off opponents, speak sharply, and to pass judgment on which arguments were deemed legitimate or unworthy or even ridiculed. He wasn’t just a player; he also was the referee. (more…)

Tags: campaign promise, Congressional Budget Office, Health Care Summit, private health insurance, uninsured

Morning Bell: Someone Needs to Tell the President His Health Care Plan is Dead

The day before yesterday’s White House health care summit, Sen. Kent Conrad (D-ND) told reporters: “The only way this works is for the House to pass the Senate bill and then, depending on what the package is, the reconciliation provision that moves first through the House and then comes here.” When Conrad was reminded that Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) has repeatedly insisted that the House will not pass the Senate bill until the Senate passes a second bill that fixes the first, Conrad replied: “Fine, then it’s dead.”

This was the dynamic that President Barack Obama was trying to alter with his eventually-seven-hour meeting. And judging by pretty much every major news outlet, he completely failed. Rep. Jason Altmire (D-PA), who is one of the 39 House Democrats that the White House needs to switch from a “no” the first time around to a “yes” this time, told The New York Times: “I don’t see very many at all who voted no who are going to switch their votes unless there are substantial changes in the bill.” (more…)

Tags: bureaucratic control, Health Care Summit, ObamaCare, reconciliation, regulating insurance, start over

Reaction Roundup: Heritage Responds to the Health Care Summit

Following the President’s health care summit, several Heritage scholars provided immediate analysis of the day’s discussion.

Bob Moffit: The President’s Health Care Summit was an exercise in public education; it was enlightening. Particularly noteworthy was the threat of rising deficits to the nation’s future articulated by Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI).

Congressional Democrats and Republicans often used similar language in describing their broad objectives: lowering the cost of care, improving the treatment of patients, and expanding coverage to more Americans. Representatives on both sides also made it clear that they have sharply different methods of achieving these objectives. The polarization at Blair House reflected the polarization in the nation at large. But the Congressional Republicans can take solace in knowing that on the specific issue of the House and Senate health bills that they alone stand with the vast majority of their fellow Americans in opposition to these measures. (more…)

Tags: deficit threat, Federal Health Insurance Rate Authority, government control, Health Care Summit, mandates, ObamaCare, President's proposal