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The Spectacle Blog
With today's health care summit set to begin at the top of the hour, the Wall Street Journal reports that the Obama administration has already crafted a fallback plan that it would pursue if Congress can't pass a comprehensive bill.
The bill would cover 15 million people by expanding Medicaid and S-CHIP and imposing a national "slacker mandate" that would force insurers to allow "children" to stay on their parents' policies until age 26. The price tag would be about one-fourth of the $950 billion the administration claims its current bill costs, according to the article.
Politically, many of the Republican proposals I've seen include a slacker mandate, even though it would increase premiums and represent more government command and control, but the expansion of the other entitlements is likely to set off alarm bells.
Such a proposal would not do anything to reform the health care system or contain costs, and it would be hard to claim that it does anything to help the 85 percent of Americans who already have insurance. Instead, Obama would have to sell an expanded welfare program.
Another big obstacle would be getting liberals on board with scaled-down ambitions. Such a proposal would have to start back at the committee level and pass both chambers. At every level, lawmakers will try to insert new measures that they believe are essential. Pretty soon, it wouldn't be a scaled-back bill any more. Not to mention that the whole process would drag things out further into the election year.
I wouldn't be shocked if Obama did roll out some sort of smaller bill if the comprehensive effort fails -- if nothing else, to try to portray Republicans as opposed to any sort of health care legislation -- but I don't see it going anywhere.
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More Blog Posts by Philip Klein
http://spectator.org/blog/2010/02/25/wsj-obama-prepares-plan-b
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Oldefarte| 2.25.10 @ 11:38AM
Once again, their whole agenda is WELFARE, not INSURANCE PRICE REDUCTION!!!!
Margie| 2.25.10 @ 1:39PM
Yep. It is the REDISTRIBUTION of wealth Plan. STEALING money from the citizens and giving it to the rest. It is NOT free health care insurance.
A Socialist scheme if ever there was one.
Executed by the Alinskyite-in-Chief.
S.L. Toddard| 2.25.10 @ 2:39PM
What about STEALING money from the citizens and... giving it to Israel? Is it okay to STEAL money from American citizens to give to Israel but wrong to do so to benefit actual Americans?
Chris B| 2.25.10 @ 3:18PM
A) What..? ;B) It's wrong to do a wholesale redistribution of wealth, period. Check with Lenin&Co;, Mao, Castro, et al. See how well it worked for them; A') Where the he** did you get Israel inserted into this, and what is your problem with our strong ally, whose values reflect our own (well, most of us) MUCH more than any other state in the ME??
J4140| 2.25.10 @ 4:22PM
You're right Chris. Plus they do the "dirty work" in the Middle East that we can't stomach. Thank goodness.
Nick| 2.26.10 @ 12:24AM
Mr. Toddard,
Your liberalism is showing again.
Does it "benefit actual Americans" to give them something for nothing?
And, what about STEALING money from the citizens and... giving it to Indonesia? Or to Peru? Or to Ethiopia? Or Haiti?
Why do you single out Israel? You seem to be obsessed. I know it's not because you're anti-Semitic, because you have assured many of us here at AS that you are not.
So, why the obsession? Inquiring minds want to know.
Al| 2.26.10 @ 2:17PM
I never understand comments like this. Yes, attempting to make sure that every resident of this country has an equal chance to live a reasonably healthy life is such a crime. On the other hand, when private insurance companies (Wellpoint, BCBS and so many others) take your money and they give it to their millionaire CEO's in the form of raises, it's ok. I wish we would all be a little more "conservative" and spend our time and energy fighting things that really are tragic and fix things that too often mean life or death for the currently (and growing) uninsured in this country.
Dein| 2.25.10 @ 11:43AM
Nancy and Harry say they're not starting over/it's now the unofficial kickoff of Obama's 2012 campaign.This is all about him;what's new.
Brian| 2.25.10 @ 1:59PM
On Jan 20, 2009 could we have ever imagined that the Democrats would be such utter and complete failures?
A floundering agenda and the prospects of getting thrown out en masse next November, just beautiful.
For once Obama's complete lack of qualifications benefit the American people.
Georgie| 2.25.10 @ 2:36PM
I did--because of Democrats' arrogance and hubris.
They became drunk with power and over-reached.
Liberals are their own worst enemies. lol
KK| 2.25.10 @ 2:05PM
The difference is: if Plan B fails, he can blame it in the Republicans because they fell into his Summit trap.
Georgie| 2.25.10 @ 2:33PM
The Republicans have been brilliant--if anyone fell into a trap it's Obama.
Chris B| 2.25.10 @ 3:24PM
Obama's non-qualifications for the job were glaringly apparent. But his incredible inability to recognize it, indeed, his sense that he IS the culmination of some kind of prophesy makes the slow motion collapse just so fascinating to watch, terrible as it is. Painful as it is, we are living history, folks, that'll be discussed a century from now. If he leaves us enough to recover from...
Meryl| 2.25.10 @ 4:04PM
I'm happy to admit that my personal opinion that the Republicans would cave the minute the cameras turned on was wrong. They have had an excellent day. Absolutely excellent. And the boyking had a horrible, no good, nasty, incompetent day~~in public, lights on and cameras running. Absolutely excellent.
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