Healthcare Bill. Now I get it!

(links indicated by color)

I have been pondering the healthcare bill in the Senate. It just didn’t add up. Finally, the proverbial lightbulb went off. Now I understand. Now I get it. It took a while to fit the pieces together but now I get it.

At least I think I do.

Am I missing something or are The massive tax increases required to Pay for Bribes needed to secure the votes to socialize medicine?

Yeah, that must be it.

What I still don’t understand is, How is it possible the federal government can favor some states at the expense of others? Don’t we have equal protection under the law?

Honest Leadership, Open Government, Oh Boy!

Honest Leadership, Open Government, Oh Boy! HAHAHAHAHAHahahahaha!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Taxes are Voluntary According to Open, Honest Harry Reid.

Who Wins, Who Loses in Senate Health Care Bill

Here’s a sample:

WINNERS

–Cosmetic surgeons, who fended off a 5 percent tax on their procedures.

–Nebraska, Louisiana, Vermont and Massachusetts. These states are getting more federal help with Medicaid than other states. In the case of Nebraska — represented by Sen. Ben Nelson, who’s providing the critical 60th vote for the legislation to pass — the federal government is picking up 100 percent of the tab of a planned expansion of the program, in perpetuity. Vermont and Massachusetts get temporary increases in the federal share of their Medicaid tabs. In Louisiana, moderate Democratic Sen. Mary Landrieu negotiated $100 million for 2011 before announcing her support for the legislation.

–Beneficiaries of Medicare Advantage plans — the private managed-care plans within Medicare — in Florida. Hundreds of thousands of them will have their benefits grandfathered in thanks to a provision tailored by Sen. Bill Nelson, D-Fla., that also affects a much smaller number of seniors in a few other states.

–Longshoremen. They were added to the list of workers in high-risk professions who are shielded from the full impact of a proposed new tax on high-value insurance plans. (Electrical linemen were already included, along with policemen, firefighters, emergency first responders and workers in construction, mining, forestry, fishing and certain agriculture jobs.)

–Community health centers. They got $10 billion more in the revised bill, thanks to advocacy by Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt.

–A handful of physician-owned hospitals being built around the country — including one in Bellevue, Neb. — which would be permitted to get referrals from the doctors who own them, avoiding a new ban in the Senate bill that will apply to hospitals built in the future. Without mentioning Nebraska or other states by name, the Senate bill pushes back some legal deadlines by several months, in effect making a few hospitals that are near completion eligible to continue receiving referrals from the doctors who own them. The provision was described by a pair of health industry lobbyists who spoke on condition of anonymity in order to speak freely. Chalk up another win for Nelson.

–AARP, the lobby for elderly people. The new Democratic bill has about $1 billion in extra Medicaid payments to states that provide visiting nurses and other in-home or community services to prevent low-income people from needing to be admitted to hospitals. In House-Senate bargaining, AARP also is expected to win one of their top priorities: a full closing of the so-called “doughnut hole,” the gap in Medicare’s coverage of prescription drugs.

–Doctors and hospitals in Montana, North Dakota, South Dakota, Utah and Wyoming, who will get paid more than providers elsewhere under formulas in the bill.

–The University of Connecticut, which could be the beneficiary of $100 million for construction of a hospital inserted at the behest of Sen. Christopher Dodd, D-Conn., who faces a difficult re-election next year. The legislation leaves it up to the Health and Human Services Department to decide where the money should be spent, but spokesman Bryan DeAngelis said Dodd hopes to claim it for his state’s university.

Is the CBO going to score that in terms of dollars per vote?

LOSERS

–Tanning salons, which are getting hit with a 10 percent tax on indoor tanning services, replacing the cosmetic surgery tax.

Anyone in congress use cosmetic surgery? Taxes are not for them.

–Progressives. They had to give up on their long-held dream of a new government-run insurance plan so that Democratic leaders could lock down the necessary votes from moderates.

I’m not so sure about that. There is this little parliamentary procedure that is oft-used during such  majestic congressional proceedings. Bait & Switch.

Harry Reid in his own words.

Senator Reid Discusses Start Of The Health Care Merger Process

And President Obama in his own words.

No public option? I wouldn’t bet on it. Any Senator objects, perhaps they will change their mind if they get a new hospital named after them, or some similar “sweetener” to make a “deal.”

–People making over $200,000 a year. A proposed 0.5 percent increase in the Medicare payroll tax was bumped up to 0.9 percent in the latest version, putting the tax at 2.35 percent on income over $200,000 a year for individuals, $250,000 for couples.

Isn’t the economy bad enough? Wait. They have to pay for all the “winners” (see above)

It isn’t about healthcare, is it?

---

What does Harry Reid say about it? Here is his defense!

Reid defends deals

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) offered a vigorous defense Monday of the deals in the Senate reform bill that benefit individual states, saying “it doesn’t speak well” of senators who didn’t secure such deals.

“There are 100 senators here and I don’t know that there’s a senator that doesn’t have something in this bill that isn’t important to them,” Reid said. “If they don’t have something in it important to them then it doesn’t speak well of them.”

Really? Is not Integrity a virtue? I don’t think that speaks well of Harry Reid.

He likened the legislation to the defense bill, which is thick with earmarks and other provisions benefitting individual members and even private corporations.

President Obama won’t sign any bill with earmarks. He will go through them line by line and… No. Wait. That was before the election.

“That’s what legislations all about,” Reid said of the compromises. “It’s the art of compromise. In this great country of ours, Nevada has many different problems than does New Hampshire. Michigan has many different problems than does Georgia.”

Oh, gosh Harry Reid. I was so wrong. Here I was thinking it was about the health of the American People. Thanks Harry Reid, I stand corrected.

By The Way, has the CBO “scored” the cost of that bill in terms of Billions of dollars per vote? (Have they no conscience?)

http://wp.me/pFeEj-cL