[Peace-discuss] Fw: [cchcc-l] Saturday's Health Reform Update &Take Action!

[Laurie Solomon]

Hope springs eternal, doesn't it.  Only an optimist would think that if the 
bill fails the masses will insist on Medicare-for-all or anything like it 
and generate a big enough demand to overcome the vested interest parties.  I 
am not that optimist.

 I had hopes but no expectations that anything would ever come of the 
rhetoric about health care policy reform much less radical change in the way 
the health care system grounds its operation.  The hopes stemmed from the 
fact that the corporations themselves were complaining about the costs of 
furnishing health care benefits in terms of insurance to their employees; 
but when they collapsed  and entered into an "I'll scratch your back on this 
issue if you scratch mine on my issues" bargain with the insurance industry, 
the pharmaceutical industry, and the health care equipment manufacturers, 
the hope died a painful death.

--------------------------------------------------
From: "C. G. Estabrook" <galliher at illinois.edu>
Sent: Sunday, March 21, 2010 5:34 PM
To: "Laurie Solomon" <ls1000 at live.com>
Cc: "peace-discuss" <peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net>
Subject: Re: [Peace-discuss] Fw: [cchcc-l] Saturday's Health Reform Update 
&Take	Action!

> If the bill(s) pass, the Democrats will say, "We've taken care of 
> healthcare,"
> and nothing more will happen.  The bills have all the flaws that Nader 
> described
> on Democracy Now last week.
>
> If the bills are defeated, expectations have risen high enough that a 
> serious
> cross-party demand for Medicare for all can be mounted, against the 
> furious
> resistance of the insurance companies.  --CGE
>
>
> Laurie Solomon wrote:
>>
>> CCHCC feels that, despite all its limitations (which are too numerous to 
>> mention and quite profound), it is the best that we can get; and it will 
>> help
>> a large number of their clients.  I, for one, seriously question that 
>> assessment given that the devil is in the details of how it is going to 
>> be interpreted and implemented and not in the written details of the bill 
>> itself
>> as well as its lack of any real enforcement provisions.
>>
>> For example, there is nothing in the bill that I can tell which 
>> establishes a
>> standardized set of criteria and methods that  (1) define the 
>> underwriting policies and decisions that an insurance company makes 
>> regarding individual claims, which currently are deemed by the companies 
>> as proprietary so as to be kept from customers and state regulators;  (2) 
>> no provisions for making said policies, criteria, and processes 
>> transparent and challengeable non-proprietary information; and (3) no 
>> provisions for monitoring, enforcing,
>> or punishing non-compliance with said stipulated provisions.  It does no 
>> good
>> if insurance companies can establish and implement their own secret
>> proprietary rules, criteria, methods, procedures, and practices which 
>> they
>> then use to deny claims and reject the full payment of the claims of 
>> claimants.  It is meaningless to have a set of statute driven standards 
>> and criteria if regulators have no authority to control, monitor, and 
>> enforce them on a practical everyday basis with respect to their 
>> implementation in daily organizational practices.
>>>
>>> -------------------------------------------------- From: "Karen Medina"
>>> <kmedina67 at gmail.com> Sent: Sunday, March 21, 2010 1:02 PM To:
>>> "Peace-discuss List" <Peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net> Subject: Re:
>>> [Peace-discuss] [cchcc-l] Saturday's Health Reform Update &Take Action!
>>>
>>>> I am with you, David. This is not reform. This bill will hurt people 
>>>> and
>>>> help the insurance companies. The people need universal health care.
>>>>
>>>> I am surprised and confused as to why the CCHCC supports the bill.
>>>>
>>>> I am pretty sure Jim Duffet's group members (for health care reform) do
>>>> not support the bill.
>>>>
>>>> -karen medina
>
> 

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