A step toward a conclusion on healthcare reform

Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., left, talks with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid , center, and Senate Majority Whip Richard Durbin of Illinois  prior to President Obama's speech on healthcare to a joint session of Congress.
(AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais) 

The national debate on health care reform moves slightly closer to reaching a conclusion today when the full Senate Finance Committee debates and is scheduled to vote on their vision of change. This is a good thing. Senator Max Baucus (D-Montana) has done his best to negotiate out a bi-partisan solution to the nation’s health care woes.

Some Conservatives in Gang of Six less than helpful:

The conservatives on the six member “gang” who have been talking with Baucus have proven that they don’t work and play well with others. While Sen. Baucus has attempted to inch toward agreement, Sen. Grassley (R-Iowa) has been warning the folks back in Iowa that they need to be concerned about “pulling the plug on Grandma.”

Sen. Mike Enzi (R-Wyoming) has made it quite clear he has no intention of participating in any compromise. He absorbed criticism of his participation in the talks as simply a “blocking action” designed to delay and remove some provisions from the bill reported out of committee.

The third Republican member of the group Sen. Olympia Snow (R-Maine), while not turning handsprings, seems to have offered some constructive alternatives to move the process forward.

Seven proposals on the table:

At any rate, there will be at least seven proposals on a very large table – three from House Committees, two from Senate Committees, one from the President, and one waved in the air by Republicans while the President was trying to speak last week.

If a giraffe is the result of a committee attempting to agree on the standard design for a horse, imagine the reformed animal designed by five committees, an executive, and a group of partisans.

Conjuring up the immortal words of Winston Churchill, “Now this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning.” Let the games begin.

A good partial comparison of the various proposals is presented by Health Care Examiner Sheila Guilloton in a referenced link at the bottom of this column.

President Obama’s contribution:

President Obama’s speech last week before Congress struck all the right chords, but it remains somewhat mystical how all those divergent goals and ambitions are ever going to come together. A summary from The White House Press Office left me with more questions than it answered.

On the other hand, perhaps brevity forced The White House talking memo to omit necessary details, but with the “devil firmly entrenched in those details” more explanation is needed. The White House document is linked below.

Parsing already tortured language:

We know the Congress is oversupplied with an abundance of lawyers, so it is likely that portions of all seven versions can be twisted in a way to justify any tortured meaning that opposing political expediency requires. This is disingenuous at best and dishonest at worst.

It seems Congress is making the solution to health care reform more complicated than the problem itself. And what is the actual problem? Our system is much too fragmented and, well, too complicated.

Rather than write a straight forward document, the new legislation builds on existing law by amendment.  This makes the end product difficult to understand and works as an employment stimulus program for attorneys years into the future.  

One cannot help but be amused by some of the silly season maneuvering going on. For example, there is a passage in the HELP committee proposal (H.R. 3200) which requires that all health insurance policies be written in plain language and so they can be easily compared feature to feature. What makes this feature so funny, is that it is stuck in the middle of a 1018 page piece of legislation.

This language oxymoron ranks right up there with the southern city council that closed a homeless shelter in the downtown area on the grounds it violated local zoning requirements that required sufficient parking.

Wedge Issues:

The President made clear in his speech that illegal aliens (whether they be from other countries or outer space) will be barred from participating in the new health program (whatever it turns out to be) and that the Federal government will go not go out of its way to fund abortions except in the cases of sexual assaults or when the life of the mother is at stake.

A public option is reportedly not included in the Senate Finance bill.  Instead a system of coops is recommended.

Next: The final bill Senate Finance passes out of committee.

As America searches for solutions leading to a reformation of its own health care system, knowing the successes and shortcomings of health care regimes in other developed nations will be essential in negotiating the most palatable and efficient design for all concerned. This series attempts to connect the dots and explode the talking points in hopes that the folks who actually have a vote might come to a conclusion.

Al Portner is a former daily newspaper editor and publisher in seven states and author of the forthcoming “Mark Twain and the Tale of Grant’s Memoir.” Portner is also the proprietor of The Assignment Desk, LLC and provides writers, editors, and photographers for numerous kinds of contract projects from proposals and speeches to public relations and journalism. Reach him at alanportner@gmail.com.

For more info: 
Partial comparisons of some of the seven proposals
Grassley still warning about pulling the plug on Grandma
Mike Enzi on health care reform
Obama talking points plan