There were a couple of “money quotes” in today’s story in The Oregonian about President Obama’s response to the Healthy Americans Act proposed by U.S. Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.). Obama was quoted in the roundtable with The O’s Charles Pope and other reporters as saying he agreed with “90 percent” of Wyden’s thinking on the topic but that parts of the plan were too “radical” for the country.
Guess which part Wyden focused on when WW reached him this afternoon for his comment on the A-1 piece in The O.
“Whenever the president of the United States says he agrees with 90 percent of what you’re doing, I say with a smile, ‘Mr. President, that sounds pretty good. Let’s go get the other 10 percent,”‘ said Wyden, a former colleague in the Senate with Obama.
As for the president’s comment that the plan is too “radical,” Wyden pushed back by questioning how that could be when the Congressional Budget Office has concluded the bill — unlike other proposals floating around the Capitol — would be budget-neutral and has support from 14 Republicans and Democrats.
Obama is not alone among Democrats or their union allies in shooting down Wyden’s proposal, which would de-couple health insurance from employment by giving workers their health benefits in the form of a pay raise (along with tax deductions for that pay increase) — making them responsible for going out and buying their insurance.
When asked how his bill could survive given that the president wouldn’t support it, Wyden responded, “I’ve never said the legislative process is my way or the highway … The president says he’s for 90 percent of what we’re thinking and we’ve got 14 senators, I say we’ve got a lot to work with.”
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Tags: barack obama, Health, Ron Wyden
i bet that first 90% of the plan that obama liked was about taking a long satisfying drag on a cigarette in the shade, possibly while in a hammock and listening to The Beach Boys’ “Kokomo.”
also if anybody has any other favorite Kokomo-based songs i’d certainly like to know of them, i’m trying to fill a mixtape here.
Sick and sickerer. Both these back-stabbers are working their butts off to kill public medical insurance, which is the only solution to this outrageous lack of basic civilization in the troubled country.
ha ha, somebody hasnt heard “Kokomo” in a while…
I was struck by one thing: Pope seemed to completely miss the glaring disparity between Obama’s plan (public option to keep health insurers honest) and Wyden’s plan (no public option).
It doesn’t sound like the Senator is willing to consider the alternative–a polite but fairly obvious request to stand down and join the majority of the caucus. I mean, Obama compared Wyden’s plan to single-payer, which he’s also called too radical a change…and which notably he’s placed off the table. I don’t think it’s an unfair speculation to suggest that the President was speaking to the Oregonian about Wyden’s plan with the intent to throw cold water all over it, in the competing arena of plans. It doesn’t offer what a large majority of Americans say they want–a full and robust public option. If the Senator is open to that, and he appears to claim he is, however vaguely, if I’m the President I’d like him to start backing that explicitly and put the nonworkable plan aside finally.
I wouldn’t doubt that Obama wants nothing to do with anything from Oregon as long as Sam Adams is around. Sam Adams makes Democrats look bad. Here is a guy that lied to get elected, had others lie for him to get elected, gets caught, admits to it, but still thinks he can keep the job? The whole time he has been mayor all we have had was to suffer his scandal, no time to enjoy the Obama election, no moving forward, no nothing but this self-interested scandal plagued fraud of a mayor’s dramas. Sam Adams makes Democrats look real bad, he is a scab on the party that needs to be picked off.
It would be wonderful if we could get good medical care for everyone.
But first we need a plan we can afford.
Second, we need a plan that controls fraud by Doctors, Insurance Companies and Pharacuticals.
Third we need administrators that are better than the ones currently running Medicare.
Fourth, we need to maintain and hopefully improve the quality of medical care.
I doubt we can achieve these goals, but we should demand that congress kick the politicians and special interests out of the conference rooms and forbid congressmen and women from loading the bill up with the usual non-related earmarks.
Realistically this will never happen and we will end up with a system that you wouldn’t send your dog to for medical care. Too Bad isn’t it?
The large majority of Americans support a public option? I guess that depends which poll you’d like to believe and how the questions were presented.
Rasmussen Reports- 41% support a public option
2009 Health Confidence Survey- 68 to 88% either “strongly” OR “somewhat” support a public option. ???
I wouldn’t put too much faith in either, though the 09 HCS sounds contrived.
@John Williams. Maybe if you could join the comment thread in focusing on health care reform you’ll eventually be able to get the psychiatric help you need.
In the past nine months, the federal government has taken control of major banks, taken a stake in the restructuring of General Motors and Ford, and instituted salary caps on executives. Now Congress and the President have shifted their focus to health care and are considering a plan to offer publicly-run healthcare. I agree that health care reform is necessary, both for the benefit of covering the uninsured, and for reducing the spiraling costs of health care. However, I do not believe the government should be in the business of offering health care policies. For example, how does the federal government plan to reform one-sixth of the nation’s economy when it cannot control the fraud that occurs within Medicare and Medicaid. And what about the low-reimbursement rates our state receives for the already existing government run plans? Will Oregon continue to receive significantly lower reimbursements than other states under the new government plan? Reforming healthcare is obviously a very challenging goal—one that I do support. But the government offering its own plan to accomplish reform is just another instance of wasting our tax dollars in the name of unproven cost-savings, and the perpetuation of punishing states that already operate healthcare efficiently. I hope that Senator Wyden and Senator Merkley oppose a public option in a health care reform package, and draw a clear distinction between private businesses and government policy.