Watch the health care summit and submit comments on facebook!

Today is the big day. No really, this time health care reform is really going to strap some wheels on and start moving (after all, abortion coverage is back in the news and you know it’s not a real political discussion unless the abortion debate is involved).  The President just had to get everybody together and tell them to stop their bickering and come to a compromise on health care reform.  Although the strategy behind the Administration’s moves to push health care reform thus far can be questioned ( i.e. why they foolishly gave up on the public option), the President is trying to stand strong and keep health care reform from falling apart as it did in ‘93.

Speaking of 1993, I can’t decide whether it’s a good thing or a bad thing that the current bill proposed by Democrats reflects that of the Republican bill during Clinton’s presidency.  I’ll let you marinate on that for a minute.

Either way, Congress and the Administration are trying to  move forward, because it is what has to be done in order to start the slow climb to actual health care reform.

The President released his new proposal for health care reform this week to be used as a basis for the discussion in today’s summit (yes we have already seen a proposal from him, yes the new one packs less of a punch, and yes it is pretty much the Senate bill with a few key improvements – surprise our powerful leader is starting from center again).

However, we find ourselves in a dire situation with the health of our nation, mounting deficit and the corruption that keeps rearing its ugly head in the health insurance industry (are we really shocked that huge companies like Wellpoint would raise rates, manipulate data to boost profits and then try to defend their insidious actions? After all they are behind the effort to kill this health care bill).  So, it is clear now more than ever that we have to keep fighting for strong reform.

Here are a few things the President’s proposal would do for America:

• Extending dependent coverage for young adults up to age 26
• Banning insurance companies from denying coverage based on pre-existing conditions
• Increasing subsidies to low-income families in order to purchase coverage
• Creating federal oversight to curb insurance industry abuses and unfair rate increases
• Giving tax credits to help small businesses afford health insurance

And that’s just naming a few, check out the full proposal here for more info.

So what will happen today? Well, tune in here to see for yourself. The Sunlight Foundation will be streaming the discussion live all day and will have some cool live blogging as well as links to the campaign contributions from health insurance lobbyists that members are receiving as each of them speaks. You can submit your own questions about the debate on the site.  One thing is certain, you can expect “party of no” members to give the same old attacks against health care reform, while not producing solutions themselves. Check out The Wonk Room’s guide to GOP ideas expected during today’s summit.

What will happen after today? It seems that Congress is firm in its decision to pass legislation within the next 60 days and use a political technique to pass the legislation without the 60 vote supermajority needed (since that supermajority was lost when Senator Kennedy’s seat was filled by Scott Brown). There is some opposition to using this technique, called reconciliation, but it is a very common technique that has been used many times in the past, even with health care.  So it seems this will be the way forward and, one day soon, Americans will make it to the first step in solving our health care crisis.

We are already seeing legislation pass that aims to clean up other parts of the health care system. Just yesterday the House passed a health insurance antitrust bill which Rep. Tom Perriello ( D- VA) concluded should make health insurers a bit scared of the long-needed regulations to come.

A recent article published by Metro Weekly reveals that the newest Obama health care proposal does not include any specific health provisions for the gay community that were initially in the House bill. What it does include is an $11 billion plan for “the operation, expansion, and construction of community health centers.” This plan could be beneficial for HIV and LGBT clinics throughout the nation. Representative Baldwin, however, called this only “an important step forward.” Because Obama’s health proposal is more in line with the Senate bill, it does not include protection against discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity – all of which were included in the House bill. Gay rights supporters such as Rep. Baldwin plan to continue to fight for increased provisions for the LGBT community in the final health care bill.

Related Articles:

http://metroweekly.com/news/?ak=4915

http://www.advocate.com/News/Daily_News/2010/02/23/Obama_Health_Plan_a_Mixed_Bag_for_gays/

http://www.365gay.com/news/obama-health-plan-lacks-lgbt-provisions/

*This post was written by CP Intern, Yosef Getachew

*This post was written by CP Advocacy intern, Yosef  Getachew

In a recent article written by the National Journal, it was revealed that the U.S. Chamber of Commerce not only spent the most money on health care lobbying last year but had also doubled what it had spent in 2008. As a result, the lobbying group spent $123.3 million in 2009 compared to $62.3 million in 2008 for all lobbying activities. Furthermore, a majority of this money was spent in the 4^th quarter of 2009, which was the height of the health care debate. The massive amount of spending done by the traditionally conservative lobbyist group demonstrates its efforts in derailing health care reform for millions of Americans:

The top-spending groups on health care reform generally spent about as much lobbying last year as they did in 2008 — with one notable exception. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce stood out not only for consistently outspending other groups, but also for nearly doubling its lobbying spending over the previous year. In the fourth quarter of 2009 alone, the group’s outflows easily topped the amount spent by any other group all year.

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce wasn’t the only one who spent millions of dollars to lobby against health care reform. An article written by Think Progress reports that health insurance companies spent a total of $38 million in 2009 to impede the progress of health care reform:

WellPoint: The Indiana-based insurer spent $4.7 million lobbying Congress last year, an increase of 21 percent from its expenditures in 2008.

UnitedHealth Group: The largest of all health insurance companies spent $4.5 million on lobbyists last year, an increase of 7 percent from 2008.

Humana: The insurance mega-company “showed the biggest increase in its lobbying spending among…insurers.” It spent $3.2 million lobbying in 2009, which is an 80 percent increase from 2008.

America’s Health Insurance Plans (AHIP): The health insurance industry’s lobbying group spent $8.9 million on lobbyists in 2009, a 20 percent increase from the previous year.

A protest lead by Health Care for America Now was held today to fight back against the U.S Chamber of Commerce.  Campus Progress attended the protest, which took place right on the steps of the lobbyist group’s building. Protestors shared stories and vehemently condemned the actions of lobbyist efforts as they urged Congress to finally pass health care reform.

The push for health care reform is possibly not moving anymore? But I am still trying to keep you in the loop with the debate over whether this bill has a chance of passing or not.  So for now, these semi-daily “Health on the Hill” updates will continue. Enjoy!

Today’s Updates – 1/22/10:

To be honest, I sat down to write a lengthy update on the madness and utter chaos this health care debate has turned into since the Massachusetts election on Tuesday, but Politico Pulse has summed it up perfectly, taking the words right out of my mouth:

DEATH WATCH — For the first time in this year-plus debate, Democrats are worried that health reform is in critical condition. House Speaker Pelosi can’t get 218 votes for the Senate bill. Senate moderates don’t want to take up another bill — skinny or reconciliation — and the White House isn’t yet calling the shots. “There’s a real possibility it doesn’t get through,” said a Democratic lobbyist who supports reform. “My guess is, for now, it’s over,” echoed another. There is a sense of anxiety and panic that has set in as Democrats ask, “What now?” Lobbyists familiar with the situation say officials are floundering to find a clear path forward. Reform’s passage, they say, has lost the sense of inevitability it had only a week ago. If Democrats are going to pass reform, Pelosi will need to find 218 votes for the Senate bill, Senate Majority Leader Reid will have to agree to take up budget reconciliation legislation to tweak a House-passed Senate bill — or both sides will have to go back to the drawing board to craft a slimmed-down reform bill. There was some talk among Senate leadership on Thursday of putting together a letter signed by 51 Democratic senators pledging to pass a clean-up bill if the House would pass the Senate bill. But that effort fizzled when support for it didn’t materialize, insiders said. Democratic leaders left the Capitol Thursday without answers and don’t expect any before next week.

Not sure you understand the reconciliation process? Or why are now in this position since Scott Brown took over Ted Kennedy’s seat in the Senate? You’re not alone, it’s a headache. But here’s an article from the Business Insider that attempts to break down the tricky process of reconciliation and sheds some light on how it might help with passing the health care bill:

The special election in Massachusetts has thrown the process into chaos. [The] Senate Democratic caucus [lost] “the Kennedy seat,” [and] the ability of the conference approved health care bill to overcome a filibuster [is] in doubt. Brown has made no bones about his plans to join a filibuster vote to block health care reform, campaigning as “the 41st vote” against it. That could mean the end of the death of health care reform.

In the 1970s the Senate adopted a rule that applies to the budget process that allows for limited debate, which means that there cannot be a filibuster. The process is called “reconciliation.” Here’s how reconciliation works.  Each of the Senate and the House passes a concurrent resolution  instructing one or more committees to report changes in a law affecting by a certain date. Those committees then support their reports to the budget committee, which combines them into a single omnibus bill. In the Senate, the reconciliation bill then gets only 20 hours of debate before the final vote. So there’s no filibuster risk and the bill can pass with support of just 51 Senators.

Health on the Hill is back!!!! And health care reform is still moving. Over the holiday break, we saw the legendary passage of the Senate health care bill and were confronted with the conflicting feelings of progress ( remember America has been trying to pass health care reform legislation for decades) and defeat (there were a lot of key compromises made on an already watered-down bill in order to get it passed). Nonetheless, Congress is charging forward to get the final bill completed and signed into law and we, as young Americans, should be ready to embrace the change it will create, while also continuing to push for the work that is yet to be done on reforming our health care system and ending the control insurance companies have over our health and our wallets. This reform bill will just be the beginning.

Today’s Updates – 1/15/10:

* The below post was written by CP Advocacy Intern, Christian Pittman

The Senate and House Democrats have eschewed formal conferencing to resolve the discrepancies between their respective health care bills and have taken to meeting with President Obama and aides at the White House. A desire to have a success story for the Dems before the State of the Union address (conveniently moved to not interfere with the season premiere of Lost) has set in motion Republican-free talks to make the needed compromises. We just have to hope that they don’t compromise all the beneficial parts out of the bill. As of now the public option is effectively dead. There’s no way to attract the votes needed in Congress with a government-run plan in either bill. As unfortunate as this is we can only hope that the reforms that do pass set us up as a nation to accept the public option in the future.

In order for the left to accept this, those in the House of Representatives are standing firm on their national exchange position where the whole country will have uniform laws and enforcement of coverage for as many people as possible, and where it will be easier for consumers to compare plans for purchase. While President Obama is leaning toward the national exchange, which the House adopted in its bill (as opposed to independently-run state exchanges adopted in the Senate bill), he seems to favor the Senate’s take on taxes (taxing high-cost insurance plans instead of taxing high-income individuals – both of which will generate revenue to pay for reform). This gridlock has seen lots of input from labor union leaders who have strong stakes in high-cost plans and therefore don’t want more taxes for their mostly middle-class members. So in order to convince the unions and House Democrats that those who gave up higher wages for better health care won’t be hit where it hurts, concessions were added this week in order to come to a compromise on the issue. Now just a few more sticking points, such as the expansion of Medicaid and the national vs. state exchange, are all that stand between the unified bill being completed and sent to the Congressional Budget Office for scoring.(a goal that Congress aims to accomplish by this weekend).

Meanwhile, while the Republicans in Congress have been mostly anti-reform, many of us on the other side were hearing how much the insurance companies (maybe some of the most influential players in this game) agreed with us and supported reform. They’re set to earn more money by gaining 30 million more customers (only a portion of the uninsured in the U.S.) so why wouldn’t they be happy to accept it? Apparently they’d rather gouge prices on their own terms than be regulated as competitive, fair institutions. AHIP (America’s Health Insurance Plans), a conglomeration of the most familiar names in health care, has been privately funding ads by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce against reform. A sum of $10-20 million was reportedly given to produce television ads attacking Congress’s reform bills.  So this just confirms our long-time suspicions that insurance companies are taking advantage of us in any way they can. This reform bill aims to curb some of the abusive tactics that insurance companies have used all these years, but we have to keep up the fight after the bill passes because there will still be a lot more work to be done.

As Campus Progress reported last fall, the youth are one of the largest groups of the uninsured and the Catastrophic Plan laid out in the Senate bill (which we are working hard to have improved before the bill is finalized)  is directed towards young people and severely lacking in comprehensive coverage options. As someone who has been lucky to not have any emergency treatments in my life (knock on wood) I can’t imagine having to go to the ER and fork over the bill in cash. Under the Catastrophic Plan for young individuals, that is precisely what I would have to do, unless of course I’d met my deductible of almost $6,000. I hardly make thousands of dollars in income. Not only that, but for those of us who have our regular check-ups or need prescription drug coverage, those services wouldn’t be covered under the Catastrophic plans. They are targeted at us with cheap prices and a conniving perception that we will now be insured, but the Catastrophic Plan is insurance in name only and we are fighting to improve this plan in order to give young Americans access to affordable, basic coverage (You can join the fight by taking action here!)

There is a lot yet to be resolved with this health care bill and not a lot of time to do it. So it will be up to us and our representatives to remember the real goals of health care reform and choose battles wisely –which means keeping the interests of the people in mind as opposed to the interests of the industry. However, this debate has gone on for a long time and as we watched the bill become more and more watered-down it has been clear that the industry tends to win out. As the next generation in power, and one that is dedicated to progress, we have to work to change that trend. 2010 offers up a great opportunity to start that work, by getting out to vote in the mid-term elections. The example of the power of one Congressional vote was clearly shown in the Lieberman debacle, and is about to rear its ugly head again as Massachusetts works to fill the late Senator Kennedy’s seat. Kennedy was a sure vote for health care reform and now the race to fill his seat seems it may result in Scott Brown, the running Republican, taking the seat, which means a sure vote against health care reform. The bill will need 60 votes to pass, so losing that vote could be the death of the bill. Just an example of how crucial our input is when it comes to electing those who represent our interests.

The push for health care reform is moving (or is it?) so I thought it’d be helpful to have semi-daily “Health on the Hill” updates that should help you keep track of the reform debate and get to the meat of the issue. Enjoy!

Today’s Updates – 12/15/09:

If it were up to Joe Lieberman, this is all we would have out of the health care reform bill: Free Band-Aids for All, courtesy of ol’ Joe, your favorite Senator. I mean, really?! What is the Obama Administration thinking? Cutting a deal with this (insert your favorite word here) to get a reform bill that has absolutely no public option, no wanna-be public option, no triggers; it is unfair and quite sad that our legislative process has come to this.

For those that don’t follow this health care drama regularly, this is where we are at: the Senate has one week to pass its health care bill, as the White House would like to see a bill before Christmas. However, in order to accomplish that, with all the crazy procedural steps it takes to pass a bill out of Senate, they would have to start voting to end debate this Thursday and hold the final vote on the bill on Christmas Day. Probably not gonna happen.

That just means the debate will continue into January, further prolonging the other equally as important pieces of legislation that Congress needs to focus on, such as the climate bill and the SAFRA bill, to name a few. On top of time line obstacles, the Senate is also being held up by a handful of senators who refuse to give health coverage to millions of Americans and instead just want their way. Like Joe Lieberman, who now looks to be getting his way, because in order to pass anything, the Senate needs 60 votes, and he is the lucky number 60.

This will be my last Health on the Hill update for 2009 – I am leaving the country, but will be back after the New Year — hopefully to a country that has decided to pass real health care reform for the good of its people instead of for one (insert your second favorite word here) from Maine.

News Links:

Sen. Reid bows to centrists,will drop Medicare buy-in to pass bill

Reid indicated at a closed-door Democratic Conference meeting on Monday that he would drop a controversial Medicare buy-in provision, which was offered as a replacement to the government-run health insurance option, to win the votes of Sens. Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) and Ben Nelson (D-Neb.).

Obama: ‘Last chance’ for health reform

White House Communications Director Dan Pfeiffer told POLITICO: “If President Obama doesn’t pass health reform, it’s hard to imagine another president ever taking on this Herculean task. For those whose life’s work is reforming health care, this may be the last train leaving the station.”

Sen. Lieberman’s Donors Benefit From Obstruction

Lieberman has now invented a new excuse for his intransigence every month since June, and this latest act of duplicity has left many observers musing about what motivates him.  The hypotheses include spite for the left, “sociopathic indifference” to the consequences of his actions, and plain lack of intelligence. But it’s also worth noting once again that Lieberman has friends in the insurance industry who will benefit from his obstructionism.

The current discussions in the Senate over how to come to a compromise on the public option (which by the way takes a new shape about every two hours; with ideas bouncing from an “opt-in” option, to an “opt-out” option, to a “trigger” option, to a “reverse-trigger” option, to a “hammer” option, maybe next will be a “chisel” option?) may have finally reached a resting place. But the new “public option” compromise will not even include all of the public.

The newest compromise idea is to replace the public option all together and expand Medicare.  Sounds great at first, after all Medicare is the government-run, public plan that the idea of a new public option available to all Americans was based on in the first place. So the media and progressives, like Howard Dean, are getting pretty revved up about this idea to simply expand the already existing public plan because it brings us full circle in the public option debate.

But I ask a simple question: Am I missing something?! Because this “expansion” of Medicare will only be for those Americans ages 55 -64.  So the rest of us –including young adults who are the largest group of uninsured–  will be left out of this new “public” option replacement. I will note, though, that discussions also involve the expansion of Medicaid to low-income adults that make up to 150% of the Federal Poverty Level — this is an increase from what is currently in the Senate bill and will benefit many low-income Americans.

What about the rest of us? We will be given yet another compromise: non-profit insurance plans offered in the exchange, that will supposedly be similar to the plans currently offered to federal employees. But they might not be that similar to what is offered to federal employees, and may not necessarily reduce cost or create competition as a government run plan would have.

So either I am missing something, or Congress is missing the point –and leaving out young adults–once again. The saga contines.