Democrats have purportedly ended months of negotiations by agreeing on a new healthcare proposal to be formally unveiled by Nancy Pelosi Thursday morning. It includes the public option.
Who Said Only Republicans Were Fat and White?
Story from AP (Courtesy of Yahoo! News)
The rollout will cap months of arduous negotiations to bridge differences between liberal and moderate Democrats and blend health care overhaul bills passed by three separate committees over the summer. The developments in the House came as Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., tried to round up support among moderate Democrats for his bill, which includes a modified government insurance option that states could opt out of.
Republicans criticized the bill even before it was unveiled.
“Americans’ health care is too important to risk on one gigantic bill that was negotiated behind closed doors,” said Rep. Dave Camp, R-Mich. “The Medicare cuts will hurt seniors, the tax increases will kill jobs and the government takeover of health care will increase premium costs.”
File this under: “Journalist’s obligatory mention of minority party.”
The final product in the House, reflecting many of President Barack Obama‘s priorities, includes new requirements for employers to offer insurance to their workers or face penalties, fines on Americans who don’t purchase coverage and subsidies to help lower-income people do so. Insurance companies would face new prohibitions against charging much more to older people or denying coverage to people with health conditions.
Gooood……
The price tag, topping $1 trillion over 10 years, would be paid for by taxing high-income people and cutting some $500 billion in payments to Medicare providers. The legislation would extend health coverage to around 95 percent of Americans.
This still doesn’t guarantee anything, but at least it’s a question of getting swing-vote Republicans on one side, as opposed to getting swing-vote Democrats and Republicans on one side. The most likely swing is Olympia Snowe (Maine-R), although with the public option’s inclusion she may be out.
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