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Speaker Nancy Pelosi just unveiled the House Democrats' health care bill, which is 1,990 pages (PDF here). You'll forgive me if I haven't yet read all of it, but the clear takeaway is that as expected, the bill is to the left of the Senate version. It includes a mandate that forces individuals to purchase insurance or pay a tax, as well as a requirement that employers provide insurance or pay a tax. It also creates government-run insurance exchanges on which a government-run plan would be offered alongside privately-administered plans that would be subject to heavier government regulation.

Pelosi said that the bill would cost less than $900 billion over 10 years, wouldn't add to the deficit, and would expand coverage to 36 million who do not have health insurance. The problem with the $900 billion estimate is that it doesn't include over $200 billion in costs for a so called "doc fix" which was included in the initial bill that was priced at over $1 trillion. Instead, as the Senate tried to do, the House will move separate legislation to prevent scheduled cuts to doctors' payments under Medicare.

Scanning through the bill, I noticed that the bill would add a new section to the federal tax code: "PART VIII:HEALTH CARE RELATED TAXES." Among the new taxes are penalties for individuals who don't purchase insurance and employers who don't provide insurance, income tax surcharges of up to 5.6% to those earning more than $1 million, and a 2.5% excise tax on medical devices.

Will provide updates as I read through the bill.

View all comments (6) | Leave a comment

Dan| 10.29.09 @ 2:05PM

Just thumbing through it, I didn't see if "Botox" was covered?

mrpeabody| 10.29.09 @ 7:13PM

How do I read this POS??? The PDF is just a bunch of jibberish. Maybe Nancy P will mail me a copy?

eternalboomer| 10.29.09 @ 10:50PM

Has anyone tried to read this dribble? - what a crock of Sh-t. Wake the f--k up America. We are being taken to the cleaners.

Nick| 10.30.09 @ 10:34AM

At 1990 pages, that comes out to $500+ million a page!

John| 11.1.09 @ 12:23AM

Wow, If you wonder if the why the radio pundits are barking fowl, read this. Folks if you think its bad now, hold on if this passes.
Download this and read it, 1990 pages, at least scan it.

John Wallace| 3.17.10 @ 6:48PM

CONGRESS MIGHT PASS THE HEALTH BILL WITHOUT VOTING ON IT: A STEP CLOSER TO TYRANNY

There was a time when I wouldn't believe that members of congress would be so out of touch with the American people that they would have to resort to underhanded tactics to thwart the will of the people.

Well, Nancy Pelosi, the Speaker of the House of Representatives, is thinking of doing just that. Representative Louise Slaughter (D-NY) came up with what is now known as the “Slaughter Solution” or "Deem and Pass" that will let the House of Representatives deem the Senate Health Bill as passed in the House without any representative voting on it. Once they use this outrageous procedure, the house leadership can then have additional language inserted into the bill that will satisfy those House Democrats who oppose the bill in its original form.

Meanwhile, in order for Senate Democrats to be able to use the Reconciliation procedure – a procedure that circumvents the 60 votes needed to overcome a filibuster – the House must pass the Senate Bill 'as is', with the exact same wording, before changes can be made. However, the Democratic leadership in the House doesn't have enough votes to do that and one of the biggest reasons is that the Senate Bill has a provision that allows for taxpayer funded abortions.

I believe that the Slaughter Solution is not only dishonest and smacks of dirty tricks, but I also believe that it is unconstitutional as is most of the legislation that congress has passed in recent years. Article I, Section VII, Clause II of the U.S. Constitution clearly states: "...the Votes of both Houses shall be determined by Yeas and Nays, and the Names of the Persons voting for and against the Bill shall be entered on the Journal of each House respectively..." This newly invented "Slaughter Solution" clearly does not allow this type of procedure.

The Democratic leadership in the Senate has tried to assure the Democratic leadership in the House that if the House simply passes the bill as it is, the Senate will make changes amenable to the House after the fact. Pro-life House members, led by Bart Stupak (D-MI) are balking at this assurance and pointed to the hundreds of House bills that are currently still wallowing in the Senate. He also wants to see the changes in writing as he doesn't trust his own party's leaders.

If the Democratic leaderhip in the Senate imposes the 'Reconciliation Rule' to pass this bill, unfortunately for them, that alone will not be enough to get the bill passed. The reconciliation procedure, also known as the 'Byrd Rule' named after Senator Robert Byrd, is already extremely controversial. Senator Byrd is on the record in Congress saying his rule was “Never intended” to pass this kind of legislation, so the House leadership appears ready to adopt the Slaughter Solution instead. If the Slaughter Solution is instituted, the House of Representatives will actually pass the almost $875 billion bill without the members of the House actually voting on it. This is outrageous and smacks of something we would expect from the Russian politburo or a marxist dictatorship.

Although the "Slaughter Solution" or the "deem and pass" rule has been used in the past, it has never been used to pass legislation as momentous as the $875 billion health-care bill. It is one of three options that Nancy Pelosi said she is considering for a House vote, but she added that she prefers this method because it would politically protect lawmakers who are reluctant to publicly support the measure. What an outrageous statement, particulalrly in view of constitutional requirements of Article I, Section VII, Clause II previously mentioned in this article.

There is also a 1998 Supreme Court ruling, CLINTON v. CITY OF NEW YORK (97-1374), that said each house of Congress must approve the exact same text of a bill before it can become law. A self-executing "deem and pass" rule would sidestep that requirement, former federal appellate judge Michael McConnell said in a recent Wall Street Journal op-ed and it would be unconstitutional.

The American people have overwhelmingly rejected this bill, but the President and the Democrat leaders in both houses of congress seem intent on using misinformation, lies, deceit, bribery and any other questionable and unconstitutional procedure to ram this socialist legislation down the throats of the American people without a public discussion of the merits. Why?

We are fast approaching a point of no return in America. If our Marxist President and the Democratic-Socialist leadership in congress are successful in passing this Health Bill, they will be emboldened to pass other critical legislation on their agenda to bring a free America to its knees. If the Health Bill is passed, they will quickly move to pass an all-encompassing Amnesty Bill, followed by a massive Cap and Trade Bill, a National biometric ID Card Bill and then the takeover of America will be almost complete. All that will be left is for them to come for our guns.

Let us remember that at critical points in human history, only a few generations have been given the honor and privlege of defending 'Freedom' in its maximum hour of danger.

In 1776, our founders' generation were given the honor and privlege of defending 'Freedom' in its maximum hour of danger, which resulted in the birth of this great nation that is still a beacon of hope to the freedom loving people of the world.

The generations of World War I and World War II were also given the honor and privlege of defending 'Freedom' in its maximun house of danger.

Today in America, we again find ourselves in a critical point in history, for 'Freedom' once again is in mortal danger, just as it was in 1776 and in WWI and WWII. Our generation is facing a different kind of mortal danger to our "Freedom' because that danger is not coming from some foreign country, king, dictator or enemy combatants, but it is coming from our own federal government.

Our Founders told us that “Governments get their just powers from the consent of the governed and whenever the government becomes destructive of these ends, it is not only the people's Right, but it is their sacred Duty to change the government. “

In 2010, we are now the generation that has been given the honor and privlege of defending 'Freedom' in its maximum hour of danger and this is our time to perform that sacred duty. We must stand up, speak up and be willing to actively resist the growing unconstitutional actions of the our federal government that puts the interests of government leaders and the oligarchy ahead of the interests of the people. By definition, this is tryanny.

Let us act before it's too late, not just for ourselves, but for our children and our children's children. I pray to God that we will be successful, for the free people of the world are depending on us.

GOD BLESS A FREE AMERICA!!!!!!

John Wallace
www.TeaPartyRep.com

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More Blog Posts by Philip Klein

http://spectator.org/blog/2009/10/29/pelosi-drops-1990-page-health

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