Feds can’t provide health care … except they do
Under bills being considered in the House and Senate, federal intervention into health care would be much less intrusive than conservative critics prefer to pretend. The much-maligned public insurance option, for example, would be required by law to operate on the insurance premiums it generates from the marketplace and could not rely on taxpayers’ money. Likewise, there is no mechanism by which the government could dictate medical practices.
However, more direct examples of federal involvement in health care do exist already, as the Wall Street Journal points out:
LEESBURG, Va. — Federally funded health centers, originally created to serve the poor, are seeing a surge of patients as more Americans struggle financially.
The centers are on track to handle more than 20 million patients this year, up by more than two million from last year and twice the figure of a decade ago, according to surveys by the National Association of Community Health Centers.
“They’re seeing lines out the door,” said the association’s research director, Michelle Proser.
On a recent afternoon at the Loudoun County Community Health Center here, patients came in at a rate of one every two minutes. Operating chief Stephanie Kenyon said the waiting list has jumped to 500 from 20 in a few months. Some of the new patients are college-educated and, until recently, held jobs that put them in the middle class.
By conservative theory, such federal clinics should not exist and could not operate effectively if they did exist. But as the WSJ story points out, funding for the clinics doubled under that socialist George Bush, and the clinics deliver basic health care much more efficiently than private clinics.
They’re also swamped by patients unable to get care through the standard health-care delivery system, which rations the treatment it provides based on the patient’s ability to pay.
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226 comments Add your comment
Scooter
September 28th, 2009
12:40 pm
Matilda
September 28th, 2009
12:30 pm
Very well said! I don’t always agree with you but I have to agree on this one.
Bruno
September 28th, 2009
12:41 pm
“if you feel you can help, I encourage you to try.”
I’ve offered two solutions which make sense to me:
(1) Capitalistic Solution: Return health care insurance to its rightful place as protection against catastrophic loss ( $10,000 deductible or more) and pay for routine care out-of-pocket in the same way that we pay for other necessities of life out-of-pocket such as food and transportation.
(2) Socialistic Solution: Move to a full-blown single-payer system ala Britain or Canada.
“They’re constantly chirping about their great ideas now, and pleading not to be shut out of the debate, but they’d have a lot more cred if they had cared when they had the opportunity to do something.”
I guess you have two choices then: Either look for reasonable solutions from whichever political corner they come from, or allow your political feelings make all your decisions for you. If you choose the latter, you will find a lot of company here on Jay’s blog.
Scooter
September 28th, 2009
12:42 pm
FIRST on the third page!
Bosch
September 28th, 2009
12:45 pm
Hef,
“I must admit I wonder when the FREE rides will end. Will it stop with Health Care? Why should it? If not, then why not offer FREE dental,auto,home,land,business,etc insurance. Why do we have to pay for food,gas,utilities,vehicle payments,mortages,the list can go on and on.”
Really? I took you as smarter than to fall into that trap.
Normal
September 28th, 2009
12:48 pm
Upstairs, y’all
Dusty
September 28th, 2009
12:49 pm
Well, how many times will Bookman hash and rehash this subject? It’s enough to make you SICK..Isn’t it time for Bookman to lay a few whacks on Palin again? Bush is so passe’. Hard to stir the pot with that one anymore.
By the way, Bookman is correct. Feds provide health care already. They surely do and they are GROWING! Did you see where there is a controversial pilot program in Virginia and Alabama to make VA HOSPITALS offer care to NON-vets right along with veterans? Yep, foot in the door. Use VA hospitals first.
Then regulate all “regular” hospitals into “everybody free” hospitals. Jack up funds for children, the elderly and then declare the “middles” either belong to some program or they get “charged for being illegal”. Voile’! You have socialized healthcare without even voting for it. EASY!! And send one half of your income to IRS.
Now, fight it out, you “always glued to your computer” experts and you “goof offs” at work.
Oh and THANKS, AmVet, for calling me an UBER-PATRIOT. That’s a real compliment. So much better than the politically correct UNDER-PATRIOT. Under cover that is, unrecognizable,. a condition well known to liberals. .
Bruno
September 28th, 2009
12:51 pm
“Really? I took you as smarter than to fall into that trap.”
Bosch, I agree with you that the “slippery slope” argument is overused, but I think Hef’s query as to what costs should be the responsibility of each individual vs. what costs should rightly be shared by all of us is a legitimate question and does strike at the heart of the health care debate. As a hard-core individualist, I side with the “individual responsibility” camp. At the same time, I am not opposed to contributing through tax dollars or private charity to create a “safety net” for the most unfortunate among us.
Doggone/GA
September 28th, 2009
12:56 pm
“Well, how many times will Bookman hash and rehash this subject? It’s enough to make you SICK”
maybe it’s time you took some personal responsibility for your own health…and stopped coming here, since it makes you so sick. See…it’s EASY to manage your own health.
Doggone/GA
September 28th, 2009
1:00 pm
“(1) Capitalistic Solution: Return health care insurance to its rightful place as protection against catastrophic loss ( $10,000 deductible or more) and pay for routine care out-of-pocket in the same way that we pay for other necessities of life out-of-pocket such as food and transportation.
My problem with this is that it does not solve the basic problem of giving coverage to everyone. It still leaves out those not able to afford even basic care.
(2) Socialistic Solution: Move to a full-blown single-payer system ala Britain or Canada.
This is my preference. But at this point I’m not fussy, as long as whatever is passed gives access to coverage for EVERYONE. And yes, I’m smart enoug to realize that MY “everyone” includes illegal immigrants and I’m also smart enough to realize THAT isn’t going to happen any time soon.
Marc
September 28th, 2009
1:04 pm
USinUK he is on the editorial panel of the AJC a local paper. There are issue that are effecting the people of Atlanta TODAY 12,000 homes were flooded last Monday were his commentary on that?
Bruno
September 28th, 2009
1:05 pm
“My problem with this is that it does not solve the basic problem of giving coverage to everyone. It still leaves out those not able to afford even basic care.”
Basic care is already available to anyone who asks for it, as was the topic of Jay’s Sunday column (though he “mistakenly” headlined the column to claim the opposite). Safety nets are already in place to care for the worst-off among us via Medicaid, PeachCare, etc. The big unaddressed concern is catastrophic care, not routine care.
Doggone/GA
September 28th, 2009
1:07 pm
“Basic care is already available to anyone who asks for it, as was the topic of Jay’s Sunday column (though he “mistakenly” headlined the column to claim the opposite). ”
And it costs us all more because it’s an “outside the system” form of providing such care.
Personally, I think we’re eventually going to catch up to the rest of the “civilized” world and end up with single-provider healthcare…but right now it’s more a case of: “I must hurry up and catch them, because I am their leader”
Bruno
September 28th, 2009
1:08 pm
Gotta run, but I hope folks on both sides of the political aisle give some thought as to why the Democratic idea of mandatory insurance coverage is a bad idea. Self-pay or single-pay are the only reasonable systems out there.
Matilda
September 28th, 2009
1:09 pm
“I guess you have two choices then: Either look for reasonable solutions from whichever political corner they come from, or allow your political feelings make all your decisions for you.”
Actually, as a private citizen sans big wads of campaign-donation cash, I do not make legislative decisions, nor do any of my legislative representatives at any level give a hoot what I think, so my “feelings” are not pertinent to this debate. I can only encourage others to discuss their ideas and how to implement solutions, which I do regularly. Trust that **I** am not standing in the way of anyone’s good ideas.
Richard
September 28th, 2009
1:14 pm
The government already runs some health care systems, specifically VA and medicare. How well are they working? People are dying in VA hospitals from improper care, and millions of dollars in medicare fruad are identified every year. Do you seriously want our whole health care system run that way? I don’t!!
Taxpayer
September 28th, 2009
1:17 pm
Say What??
September 28th, 2009
11:13 am
Taxpayer,
Being called out for what you are kind of stings, doesn’t it?
Well, actually I have not called you out yet. Then again, I hardly see the need given that you have done such an excellent job of showing everyone what you really are.
Hef
September 28th, 2009
1:23 pm
Bosch-”smarter than to fall into that trap”-sometimes. To be honest,I’m just plain tired of the “your side did this” or” your side did that”(me included). Right, wrong or indifferent,my parents taught me to work hard at all that I choose to engage in,there will be no guarrantee’s nor should there be.But if I do apply myself the odds of success rise greatly. Do not rely others to achieve,but if one/some offer assistance be thankfull but also wise. Me personaly am tired of my hard earned tax dollars wasted on those to lazy to help themselves or those to greedy to pay they’re fair share. I know there will alway’s be the have’s and the have not’s,and that I should’nt be judgemental. Simple,I just want a perfect life in a perfect world.IS THAT TO MUCH TO ASK??????? HA
Ladysable
September 28th, 2009
1:25 pm
“I guess they think the last 2 elections were a fluke.”
No, a mistake that will soon be corrected.
Gawingnut
September 28th, 2009
1:25 pm
It’s always intersting how Liberals, like Jay, point to miserable failures like Medicare, the VA, Social Security et al, to illustrate that the Federal Govt. already provides healthcare and other services.
It’s easy to understand: there is not one syllable of Constitutional authority for the Federal Government to ram government healthcare down our throats. Check the 10th Amendment.
I wonder if Jay ever reads these posts?
danjonglee
September 28th, 2009
1:25 pm
Once this nationalized healthcare is passed, when does it get implemented? I have heard next year and 2013…which is correct?
Brittancus
September 28th, 2009
5:17 pm
Our government panders to the 20 to 30 plus (?) illegal immigrants allowing them free subsidies from taxpayers in the US. California–a Sanctuary State has one of the worst records that currently languish under the immense burden of near bankruptcy, instead of –ATTRACTING–ICE to illegal business operations. Why wouldn’t certain legislators want health care for foreign labor, because they have an over abundance of illegal immigrant families to financially support? Our own government is so absorbed in protecting every other countries border? They remain unconcerned to our poor replica border fence that should have been a two-tier periphery, with border patrol surveillance lanes in between, as originally planned by Rep. Duncan Hunter. Every time a good enforcement plan is written, it’s methodically cut to pieces by pro-illegal worker politicians and open border fanatics. Though we spend billions on our armed forces in foreign lands, the rich countries in Europe just forward token troops and little money: while our nation is literary falling apart at the seams–or its rivets?
Any moment now I expect to hear of yet another collapsing ailing city bridge, deteriorating waterworks, the underground pipes and eroding highway. Our cities are already exhibiting inward decay, but years of neglect by the very people who’s supposed to protect us do nothing? I have reiterated watch “The Crumbling of America” on the History (International) channel in the next few weeks and learn? This is where your tax dollars should be going? We must not allow the Administration as in previous times keep sending our precious tax dollars to other countries. These politicians are deaf, dumb and intentionally blind to the rigors our industrial nation is going through. Not just Democrats, but the Republicans have had their sticky fingers in the bad apple–SPECIAL INTEREST–barrel, where money is plentiful. It’s like they are intentionally trying to turn our magnificent country into a third world nation, while making other cheap labor countries, on an even par with our sovereign society as US wages tumble? Then Again the Council of Foreign Relations have been amplifying its agenda of free movement of cheap labor through North America for years?
Most of these other lands have been at each others throats for centuries, so why do we expect any metamorphism into something any different? Only change can come from within, not by our nation expending billions of dollars, American lives? We must build our own borders fences, tall and strong and meant to keep out drug dealers, criminal aliens, terrorists and the never ending tracks of illegal aliens. Our politician’s noses are involved in too much foreign policy, while our aging infrastructure implodes. Trillions of dollars are spirited out the country, while we gain little in return. Washington–MUST–start giving back to the jobless American worker by placing a 5 year moratorium on all immigration, even legal? The next politicians should deliver us from any new sinister path to citizenship or better referred to as BLANKET AMNESTY? Follow the “Rule of Law” and not twist it into something else for their own convenience, as it will come back to haunt them at the voting booth. Unless ACORN steps-in with another fed contract and handles sign-ups for the ballot box? In that case will still see absentee ballots for the deceased people, pets and anybody who has learned that you need no government picture ID to sign on to vote.
The 1986 immigration reform bill dismally failed last time and all we inherited was 5 million illegal immigrants that still keep on coming with their impoverished hands out. Anti-Illegal immigrant forces are growing in numbers to stop another travesty. They acknowledge it could end up costing billions, perhaps even trillions of dollars. Nationwide we have seen the advent of closing hospitals and emergency rooms that have been submerged everyday by swarms by penniless foreigners and their families. Yes! We need health care reform. Americans are dying, going bankrupt , falling under the spell of debt collectors. The special interest lobbyists are causing mass hysteria by lying to the people. Many insurance companies are under this bombardment in television, radio and mass media. Their Status quo wants no change to their profits or high flying CEO’s making millions of dollars. on patients backs? I want health care reform, for the sake of my step daughter who died of Cancer, because the insurers said it was a pre-existing condition and they couldn’t continue to insure her?
It has become an enigma–THAT THE EMPLOYERS WHO HIRE THEM-LEAVE THE MAJORITY OF SICK PEOPLE ON THE STEPS OF EMERGENCY ROOMS. SO THAT THEIR RESPONSIBILITY ENDS THERE? THEY DRIVE AWAY WITH A CLEAR CONSCIOUS? THEN IS LEFT FOR THE TAXPAYERS CHECK BOOK TO PAY THE BILL? THOSE EMPLOYERS SHOULD BE HUNTED DOWN AND HELD ACCOUNTABLE FOR EVERY CENT. We have already been warned by the census bureau of overpopulation in the not too distant future. WE now have a very unique deterrent called E-Verify, that is a part of the SAVE ACT and our lawmakers should stop procrastinating and make it permanent for every worker? Washington knows their walking on quicksand, if the try to under fund or spirit away E-Verify this time around? The corrupting influences from the special interest lobby, have failed to induce many lawmakers to table E-Verify. In our future it could have many other uses other than extracting unauthorized labor from the workplace. Once fully installed it could check state drivers license applicants, insurance, school and higher education registrations and hospital admittances.
Americans have been unknowingly paying taxes to underwrite subsidies for the illegal population for decades. This is the biggest draw to American jobs, because the employers who hire them are sentient that taxpayers will foot the bills for education, health food stamps, housing and other government benefit consignments that even as citizens are denied. Keep the phone calls coming at 202-224-3121 LOOK FOR ANSWERS AT NUMBERSUSA, JUDICIAL WATCH & OVERPOPULATION AT CAPSWEB? These websites can identity politicians who actually work for the American people and others whose immigration grading level is unsatisfactory to stay in office? Have you heard about any large ICE raids lately? ICE got the order to cease and desist from the motley Democratic leadership. They are also using their influence to either weaken the federal training program 287 G that gives local police federal right to hold for questioning suspicious individual’s immigration status and to rescind the no-match-letter capability in determining a person’s right to work?
N.J.
September 28th, 2009
6:27 pm
Not only this when Republican attempt to compare disease cure rates of things like colon cancer, etc, they basically have to include the 90+ percent of those cure rates that are the result of Medicare, not private health insurance.
Problem is that Republicans are also fear mongering. Nothing in the current legislation closes hospitals at all. It relies totally on the private health care system. What it gets rid of is the useless element in the system, the private insurers. They do little to improve the heath care infrastructure at all. In fact its still the government that does that. 60 percent of all GOVERNMENT grant money goes to health research. Its not provided by the insurance companies.
N.J.
September 28th, 2009
6:28 pm
This is of course another situation in which the taxpayer pays for the research, and the insurance companies pick up the profitability of things that keep people healthier.
mike
September 29th, 2009
8:29 am
Hey Brad Steel,
You seem to have a thing for the word retarded. Have you ever considered how demeaning that word is to people with special needs? Plus, it does make you look like a try too hard to be cool 7th grader.
Feds can’t provide health care … except they do?
October 3rd, 2009
6:44 am
[...] is the solution? AJC-Under bills being considered in the House and Senate, federal intervention into health care would [...]
Jim Burton
October 14th, 2009
12:26 pm
We are country that was formed on the principle of law and not “mob rule”. Hence, the United States Constitution was drafted. Now I do not know about you, but I have read this document and am curious where in this document the executive and legislative branches are given the authority to take the property from those who have worked for it and give it to others who have not earned/worked for it such as the current debate on health care reform.
The Constitution provides for the rights and responsibilities of state governments and state officials in relation to the federal government. The federal government has certain express powers, including the right to levy taxes, declare war, and regulate interstate and foreign commerce. In addition, the “Necessary and Proper Clause” gives the federal government the implied power to pass any law “necessary and proper” for the execution of its express powers. Powers that the Constitution does not delegate to the federal government or forbid to the states – the reserved powers – are reserved to the people or the states.
Now with regards to expressed powers, when you read Article 1, Section 8 of the Constitution provides the legislative branch (congress) with the power to: lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts and excises, to pay the debts and provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States; but all duties, imposts and excises shall be uniform throughout the United States; borrow money on the credit of the United States; regulate commerce with foreign nations, and among the several states, and with the Indian tribes; establish a uniform rule of naturalization, and uniform laws on the subject of bankruptcies throughout the United States; coin money, regulate the value thereof, and of foreign coin, and fix the standard of weights and measures; provide for the punishment of counterfeiting the securities and current coin of the United States; establish post offices and post roads; promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries; constitute tribunals inferior to the Supreme Court; define and punish piracies and felonies committed on the high seas, and offenses against the law of nations; declare war, grant letters of marquee and reprisal, and make rules concerning captures on land and water; raise and support armies, but no appropriation of money to that use shall be for a longer term than two years; provide and maintain a navy; make rules for the government and regulation of the land and naval forces; provide for calling forth the militia to execute the laws of the union, suppress insurrections and repel invasions; provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining, the militia, and for governing such part of them as may be employed in the service of the United States, reserving to the states respectively, the appointment of the officers, and the authority of training the militia according to the discipline prescribed by Congress; exercise exclusive legislation in all cases whatsoever, over such District (not exceeding ten miles square) as may, by cession of particular states, and the acceptance of Congress, become the seat of the government of the United States, and to exercise like authority over all places purchased by the consent of the legislature of the state in which the same shall be, for the erection of forts, magazines, arsenals, dockyards, and other needful buildings; and, make all laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into execution the foregoing powers, and all other powers vested by this Constitution in the government of the United States, or in any department or officer thereof.
Whereas Article 2, Section 2 provides the executive branch (president) with the powers to: select judges and other members of the government; make treaties with other nations; pardon criminals; have a Cabinet for assistance; and, to be Commander-in-chief of the armed forces and of the militia (National Guard) of all the states. Article 2, Section 3 establishes the following duties for the President: provide a state of the union address; make suggestions to Congress; act as head of state by receiving ambassadors and other heads of state; and, ensure that laws of the United States are carried out.
No where in either of these articles, or any of the other of the articles or amendments to the U.S. Constitution, does it allow our executive or legislative branches to seize the property from one individual and give it to another (other) despite the need of the other individual. Somewhere along our history our legislative branch has decided that the word charity (benevolent goodwill toward or love of humanity; generosity and helpfulness especially toward the needy or suffering; aid given to those in need) is somewhere mentioned in the Constitution. This current crop of politicians are taking away more of our, and our children’s, property and freedoms than any other group in U.S. history – all based on a lie.
Fellow citizens, our fore fathers took a risk of forfeiture of property and life so we can have the ability to pursue life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. We are not entitled with these rights at the expense of others – we have to earn them.