Tag Archives: Health Care

April 4, 2011 · 7:27 pm

Republicans to Call for Ending Medicare

It’s rare for me to be stunned by anything in Politics, but this one is a stunner…

The GOP is actually going to proposed doing away with Medicare- one of the most successful and beloved programs ever created- and replacing it with private insurance.

If this one doesn’t kill them off, they have more lives than the average cat…

How can they even think about doing away with a program that benefits so many elderly Americans- who generally vote more dependably than another group and tend to vote Republican?

I hope the Democrats finally find their voice and stand up to this….

If saving Medicare isn’t a winning political issue, I don’t know what is…

House of Representatives Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan is set to outline a budget plan on Tuesday that is expected to propose phasing out traditional pay-for-service Medicare and instead provide government subsidies for the elderly to obtain healthcare through private insurers.The change would be for future retirees. Anyone currently over 55 would be enrolled in the current system.The proposal represents significant political risk for Republicans who made big gains in last years congressional elections running against Obamas healthcare overhaul, which they said would cut benefits for Medicare recipients.”The Ryan plan is likely to become a lightning rod for Democrats in the 2012 elections,” said Chris Krueger, political strategy analyst at MF Globals Washington Research Group.

via Republican to call for sweeping Medicare changes | Reuters.

Leave a comment

Filed under Elections, Politics, The Economy

Tagged as , , , , ,

April 2, 2011 · 5:21 pm

The End of Compassionate Conservatism

The House Republicans have done the almost impossible:  Made George W Bush look good compared to themselves…

Most Progressives, like me, always thought the concept of Compassionate Conservatives was Public Relations BS.  And it was…

But we obviously had not anticipated this heartless bunch of new GOP House members…

And of course the Democrats don’t now how to fight this- either in Congress or with a coherent message strategy.

The good news is I think the GOP over reach will eventually be their undoing.  At least for a while…

We will just have to hope they don’t kill too many people in the meantime….

From the New Republic:

House Republicans want to cut funding for health programs abroad and for community clinics here at home. And although the projected savings are small, at least relative to the size of the federal budget, the philosophical shift they signal is big. This is the end of compassionate conservatism.

You remember compassionate conservatism, don’t you? It was George W. Bush’s slogan, going back to the late 1990s, when, as a candidate, he told audiences that “Prosperity without purpose is just materialism” and vowed to “rally the armies of compassion in our communities to fight a very different war against poverty.”

Cynics saw it as empty rhetoric or, worse, a deliberate distraction from policies that were actually quite harsh to the nation’s least fortunate. The cynics had a pretty good point. Bush raided the treasury, in order to give wealthy people huge tax cuts, and the resulting budget crunch has forced all sorts of cuts to vital programs over the years.

Still, Bush never gave up the rhetoric of compassion. And on at least a few occasions he lived up to it. Community clinics were one example: As president, he doubled their funding. According to an account by Kevin Sack in the New York Times, that led to the creation or expansion of more than 1,200 clinics around the country. “This is a really good use of the taxpayers’ money,” Bush said at the time, noting that good primary care helps keep people out of the emergency room

AND

Today, by contrast, Republican leaders are perfectly content to walk away from these programs and many others without so much as acknowledging the consequences, let alone addressing them. Poor people in the U.S. might not be able to get basic medical care? Victims of HIV abroad might lose their life-sustaining drugs? If Republicans have paused even a moment to think about these things, they sure haven’t shown it.

 

via House Republicans Turn Out The Lights On President Bush’s Compassionate Conservatism | The New Republic.

Leave a comment

Filed under Elections, Politics, Social Commentary

Tagged as , , , ,

March 29, 2011 · 6:33 pm

Cost shift seen in raising Medicare age to 67 – Yahoo! Finance

There are some interesting facts here…

If Congress raises the Medicare age, it would reduce government expenses, but cause each individual- including the young- to pay much more for health insurance.

I guess this is what the Republicans really mean by “trickle down” economics.

It’s worth clicking the link to read the detailed article…

Employers and even some younger people would pay more for health insurance if lawmakers raise the eligibility age for Medicare, a study to be released Tuesday concludes.

The findings suggest that the emerging debate over Medicare’s future matters not only to seniors and those nearing retirement, but to a broad cross-section of Americans.

The report from the nonpartisan Kaiser Family Foundation shows that federal taxpayers would save billions if the Medicare eligibility age, currently 65, is increased by two years. But people ages 65 and 66, employers — along with states, Medicare recipients and even some younger families — would see ripple effects that add to their costs.

Those costs could total more than $2,000 a year for some individuals.

via Cost shift seen in raising Medicare age to 67 – Yahoo! Finance.

Leave a comment

Filed under Health Care, Politics

Tagged as , , ,

March 28, 2011 · 8:05 pm

GOP Puts AARP in its Sights

Now the GOP is going after the AARP…

This could be fun– and it could be the straw that breaks the camel’s back for the Republicans….

The elderly are the most dedicated voters out there and have predominately supported Republican Candidates lately…

The elderly and southern white men are about the only base the GOP has outside of Religious Conservatives and the Rich…

I truly hope the Republicans stick to their guns and go after the AARP…

Whatever issues I may have with the AARP, they will not go down without a fight and they can really rally the older Americans against the GOP if the GOP pushes them too hard…

They aren’t Acorn….

They will fight back and they have the resources to do it….

Let’s just hope the GOP thoroughly pisses off the AARP Members….

They can’t win elections without them…

The Republican chairmen of the House Ways and Means Health and Oversight subcommittees have trained their sites on AARP, the nation’s largest advocacy group for older Americans.

Health Subcommittee Chairman Wally Herger, R-Calif., and Oversight Subcommittee Chairman Charles Boustany Jr., R-La., said they plan to press AARP over its insurance products, revenues, governance, and lobbying expenditures.

“This hearing is about getting to the bottom of how AARP’s financial interests affect their self-stated mission of enhancing seniors’ quality of life,” Herger said in a written statement. “It is important to better understand how AARP’s insurance business overlaps with its advocacy efforts and whether such overlap is appropriate.”

In 2010, AARP spent $22.05 million on lobbying efforts, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.

The hearing, set for April 1, comes a little more than a year after the group helped Democrats pass the expansive health care reform legislation, and just weeks before Congress is expected to begin in earnest a debate over entitlement spending.

Over the years, the group has ticked off lawmakers from both sides of the aisle. In 2003, its support of then-President George W. Bush’s effort to create a drug benefit in the Medicare program angered some Democrats who were opposed to the structure. It was the Republicans’ turn in 2005, when AARP lobbied hard against efforts to privatize Social Security.

“AARP is committed to transparency, and the hearing will provide us yet another opportunity to answer any questions as we continue to be a champion for the wants and needs of Americans” older than 50, said AARP spokesman Drew Nannis.

via NationalJournal.com – GOP Puts AARP in its Sights – Friday, March 25, 2011.

Leave a comment

Filed under Health Care, Politics, Tea Party, Uncategorized

Tagged as , , , , , , ,

March 9, 2011 · 9:47 pm

Top 10 Worst Things about the Republicans’ Immoral Budget | | AlterNet

Electi0ns have consequences…

People really need to understand what they are really voting for when they vote for Republicans….

From AlterNet and Move on:

The Republican budget would:

1. Destroy 700,000 jobs, according to an independent economic analysis.

2. Zero out federal funding for National Public Radio and public television.

3. Cut $1.3 billion from community health centers—which will deprive more than 3 million low-income people of health care over the next few months.

4. Cut nearly a billion dollars in food and health care assistance to pregnant women, new moms, and children.

5. Kick more than 200,000 children out of pre-school by cutting funds for Head Start.

6. Force states to fire 65,000 teachers and aides, dramatically increasing class sizes, thanks to education cuts.

7. Cut some or all financial aid for 9.4 million low- and middle-income college students.

8. Slash $1.6 billion from the National Institutes of Health, a cut that experts say would “send shockwaves” through cancer research, likely result in cuts to Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s research, and cause job losses.

9. End the only federal family planning program, including cutting all federal funding that goes to Planned Parenthood to support cancer screenings and other women’s health care.

10. Send 10,000 low-income veterans into homelessness by cutting in half the number of veterans who get housing vouchers this year.

via Top 10 Worst Things about the Republicans’ Immoral Budget | | AlterNet.

Leave a comment

Filed under Politics, Tea Party, The Economy

Tagged as , , , , , ,

March 9, 2011 · 9:42 pm

Female Sexuality Still Terrifying to Conservative Lawmakers | | AlterNet

Amazing…

But not really…

The Republicans screamed about jobs and deficits  before the elections, then focused on enforcing their social agenda and personal morals once the election was over…

These folks seem to now be really focusing in on controlling women and their behavior.

I guess they really are getting back to the basics.

They temporarily gave up on the Gays and decided to go back to the beginning to try to drive women back to 1962….

They can come back to the Gays and other minorities once they have women safely back in their place prior to the Women’s  Liberation Movement….

 

The Republican attack on Planned Parenthood, in the form of the House zeroing out funding for the organization in the continuing resolution on the federal budget, seemingly came out of nowhere. For decades, the kinds of services provided with federal dollars by Planned Parenthood—contraception, STD testing and treatment, cancer screening—had been assumed non-controversial by the Beltway media. The reproductive rights debate was framed mainly as a fight over bodily autonomy versus fetal life, between secular humanists and religious folks who believed fertilized eggs had souls.

So why then an attack funding STD treatment and contraception? Why, all of a sudden, do you have politicians like Rep. Steve King railing against Planned Parenthood not because of fetal life—after all, depriving women of contraception access will likely increase the abortion rate—but because Planned Parenthood is “invested in promiscuity”? Why do you have a conservative figurehead like Sean Hannity arguing not that abortion is wrong because it’s taking a life, but because teenage girls shouldn’t be making out in the back seats of cars in the first place? Why is Gov. Scott Walker not only attacking collective bargaining rights in the state of Wisconsin, but trying to eliminate contraception coverage (but not erectile dysfunction medication) on the grounds of “morality”?

The dusty old argument that female sexuality is a subversive force that needs to be strictly controlled isn’t as dead as we thought.

via Female Sexuality Still Terrifying to Conservative Lawmakers | | AlterNet.

Leave a comment

Filed under Health Care, Politics

Tagged as , ,

March 9, 2011 · 9:30 pm

Two-thirds of states cut mental healthcare funds: advocacy group | The Raw Story

This is not good…

Aside from the inhumanity of not helping the helpless, this will have big downstream societal impacts….

Crime, Homelessness…

More short sighted decision making….

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Two-thirds of states cut mental health funding from their general fund budgets over the last two years, according to a report released by a mental illness advocacy group on Wednesday.

Kentucky with 47 percent, Alaska with 35 percent, and South Carolina and Arizona both with 23 percent made the largest percentage cuts to mental health spending in their general fund budgets, which do not include federal Medicaid funding, the study by the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) found.

“Cutting mental health means that costs only get shifted to emergency rooms, schools, police, local courts, jails and prisons,” said NAMI executive director Michael Fitzpatrick. “The taxpayer still pays the bill.”

via Two-thirds of states cut mental healthcare funds: advocacy group | The Raw Story.

Leave a comment

Filed under Health Care, Politics, The Economy

Tagged as , ,

February 24, 2011 · 6:38 pm

DEA to legalize marijuana only for ‘Big Pharma,’ NORML claims | The Raw Story

Money talks….

Especially from the Pharmaceutical Industry…

A Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) proposal to reclassify the main psychoactive chemical in marijuana as a Schedule III substance would allow pharmaceutical companies to market the drug while still penalizing common recreational use, according to marijuana law reform advocates.

The main psychoactive chemical in marijuana, delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), is currently a Schedule I substance within the US Controlled Substances Act, the most restrictive schedule with the greatest criminal penalties.

In November 2010, the DEA proposed reclassifying dronabinol, a synthetic THC, as a Schedule III substance, which would place it among substances such as hydrocodone and allow it to be dispensed with a written or oral prescription.

“The DEA’s intent is to expand the federal government’s schedule III listing to include pharmaceutical products containing naturally derived formations of THC while simultaneously maintain existing criminal prohibitions on the plant itself,” Paul Armentano, the deputy director of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws (NORML), wrote at AlterNet.

With its proposal, the DEA is responding to the demands of large pharmaceutical companies, he claimed.

Marijuana plants and THC extracts would remain illegal under the proposal, but companies would be able to purchase THC from a government-licensed provider to develop pharmaceutical products.

“While the DEA’s forthcoming regulatory change promises to stimulate the advent of legally available, natural THC therapeutic products… the change will offer no legal relief for those hundreds of thousands of Americans who believe that therapeutic relief is best obtained by use of the whole plant itself,” Armentano added.

“Rather the DEA appears content to try to walk a political and semantic tightrope that alleges: ‘pot is bad,’ but ‘pot-derived pharmaceuticals are good.'”

THC can help cancer patients regain their appetites and sense of taste, according to a study published on Wednesday.

“This is the first randomized controlled trial to show that THC makes food taste better and improves appetites for patients with advanced cancer, as well as helping them to sleep and to relax better,” Dr. Wendy Wismer, associate professor at the University of Alberta, said. “Our findings are important, as there is no accepted treatment for chemosensory alterations experienced by cancer patients.”

Fifteen states and the District of Columbia have passed legislation to legalize the medical use of marijuana.

via DEA to legalize marijuana only for ‘Big Pharma,’ NORML claims | The Raw Story.

1 Comment

Filed under Health Care, Politics, The Economy

Tagged as , , , , , , ,