Less than 1/3 of Americans want this damaging Health Care bill, which is “expansion” (not “reform”) and doesn’t solve the problems (in spite of 100 bills introduced by Republicans that have been rejected: see Nov 4 NCN post)!  And apparently many senators couldn’t find enough merit in the Senate version of the bill to vote for it either.  Well, unless they had a little incentive—click here for an MSNBC video that gives a list of all the Sweetheart Deals given out in exchange for votes in support of the Health Care bill in the Senate. 

  • Nebraska: exempt (forever) from paying for the Medicare expansion.  Also: exemptions from the $6.7 billion in health insurance fees for Nebraska-based companies like Mutual of Omaha
  • VT: $10 billion for community health centers
  • CT: Dodd got $100 million for a hospital.
  • Louisiana: $300 billion
  • UT & WY: boost in Medicare rates (while other states must accept cuts in reimbursement rates)
  • FL: gets to keep $5billion Medicare Advantage (even though other states don’t) but only if you already have it.  “Presumably Arizona, also the home to many retirees, didn’t qualify because its two Senators are Republicans” according to Wall Street Journal article “The Price of ‘History’: Harry Reid delivers a bundle of special-interest favors.”  It went on to say, “This does mean, of course, that if you turn 65 next year and move to Florida and want Medicare Advantage, you don’t qualify for the Nelson Advantage. So some seniors will be more equal than others.”  WSJ concluded the article with this, “Thus does your United States Senate, the world’s greatest nondeliberative deliverer of special-interest favors, practice political medicine. Get used to it. As President Obama likes to say, it’s “history” in the making.” 

More about the deals: watch this video “Sweetheart Deals and Political Games”.   

Keep in mind, if one state is exempt from a cost, the rest of us pay for that state’s expenses, as well as those for our own state—in other words, the bribe for the vote comes from taxpayer dollars from you and me. 

Click here for video interview of Senator Lindsey Graham that tells it like it is. 

Even Nebraska Governor is embarrassed by the deal Nelson made: click here for video .

Harry Reid is making no apologies (click here for an MSNBC video), saying, in fact, “If a legislator doesn’t have something in the bill that is important to them, then that doesn’t speak well of them.” 

“This is not reform.  This is the transfer of $1billion from the taxpayers to the insurance companies,” said Senator John Cornyn, as he discussed the lack of transparency with these back-room deals and how this bill will reduce choice and access for patients.  The host of MSNBC’s Morning Meeting agreed that this is a mandate to monopolies, and that this is not “reform”, only “expanding coverage”.  How will THAT “save” us money?  It won’t.  The CBO site expresses concern that “cuts” proposed to save money have been in front of Congress MANY times before, and the “cuts” get overridden.

So…a Federal mandate that only applies to 49 states??  And another federal mandate that exempts another state or two?  Is that constitutional?  The Attorney General in South Carolina is investigating.

Critics include LA Times “Favors and exceptions may get a bill through the Senate, but that doesn’t make them good policy” , The Wall Street Journal “Cost-control and taxes for some, but not for others”  (“….In other words, controlling insurance costs is enormously important, unless your very costly insurance is provided by an important Democratic constituency” and “These 11th-hour indulgences make a hash of Mr. Orszag’s cost-control theories and Mr. Obama’s cost-control claims. Their spin has been that wise men would convene and make benevolent decisions about everyone’s health care based only on evidence and the public good. But as the Reid bill shows, politics will always dominate when Washington is directing a U.S. health industry that is larger than the economy of France.”