California's governor and healthcare terminator Arnold Schwarzenegger has proposed a $12 billion "universal" healthcare proposal that would impose new fees on doctors, hospitals, and employers, and require the uninsured to buy coverage.
Since Schwarzenegger's proposal involves tax increases it requires a two-thirds majority vote to pass.
The Democrat-dominated legislature plans to put it to a vote to show how little support it has. A Field Poll showed that only 33 percent of the public support it.
The Democrats have proposed an alternate plan, structured so that it needs only a simple majority to pass. This would force employers to spend at least 7.5 percent of payroll on healthcare or pay that amount into a state-run pool — almost twice the amount Schwarzenegger proposed. The governor has promised to veto this plan should it come to his desk.
Unions say the governor's plan "asks too much of the working poor." They complain that under the Democrat plan "the working poor will be asked to pay too much" and that employers will dump their workers into a state-run insurance pool.
The two proposals are "only inches apart" says Larry Levitt, a vice president of the Kaiser Family Foundation.
"If we fail, it will have the effect of a wet blanket on health reform nationally," said Robert Ross, president of the California Endowment.
Success in California is said to be crucial to the presidential hopes of John Edwards, whose national healthcare plan is a compromise between Schwarzenegger's plan and the California Democrat plan.
Failure (of the governor's plan) might be the best option for California in the opinion of Sen. Sheila Kuehl, chairman of the Senate Health Committee, and an advocate for the single payer plan. "I hope that none of these ill-conceived, quickly thrown together plans will pass this year" (Laura Kurtzman, Associated Press 8/29/07).
A similar opinion is expressed in the Journal of The American Medical Association. "Given the magnitude and complexity of the problem of ensuring access to health care and the need for comprehensive health system reform, it is clear that patchwork, short-term, and seemingly popular approaches will be insufficient to achieve the type of definitive, meaningful, and financially viable reform that is necessary . . ." (JAMA 2007;297:1128-1130).
To which we add that when the politicians enter the medical coliseum and decide what treatments and costs are right for you it is time to say, "Hasta la vista baby." Sometimes the best new health plan is no plan. The California insurance plan needs to be terminated with a massive show of public force.
The people have had enough bad treatment from Dr. Sam and all of the power grabbing political gladiators.
Editor's Note: Michael Arnold Glueck, M.D., submitted this week's commentary.
* * *
Michael Arnold Glueck, M.D., comments on medical-legal issues and is a visiting fellow in Economics and Citizenship at the International Trade Education Foundation of the Washington International Trade Council.
Robert J. Cihak, M.D., is a senior fellow and board member of the Discovery Institute and a past president of the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons.
© 2007 Newsmax. All rights reserved.
|
