Motley Moose – Archive

Since 2008 – Progress Through Politics

Health Care Reform Passes – Open Thread

Just now, the final vote requiring 60 to pass in the Senate was won – 60 to 39.

At 7am tomorrow the bill will be approved.  This will be the first time that a vote has been held in the Senate on Christmas Eve since 1895.

Ho, Ho Ho!  Merry Christmas!

Sen. Harry Reid addressed the Senate and the media:

We stand a few shorts steps from the most significant finish line we’ve had in Congress for many decades.  This debate has been dominated by partisanship and politics but I don’t see this as sixty Democrats vs 40 Republicans, I see it as 60 leaders who stood up to insurance companies and stood up for working families all across America.  I think it is long passed time we declare health care a right and not a privilege.  I see it as sixty leaders who refused to let fear overwhelm the facts.  I am honored to be here with members of this great Democratic caucus.  

You see, Health Insurance reform is about people.  It is about half a million Nevadans, 540,000 to be exact, who today have no health care, but will soon have the coverage they have long since needed.  It is about Nevada families fortunate enough to already have insurance but who will soon save as much as sixteen-hundred dollars a year in their premiums.  

We stand on the doorstep of history.  We understand that.  But much more importantly we stand so close to making so so many individual lives better.


Categories: Uncategorized.

/ 41 Comments

41 comments

  5. HappyinVT

    In an interview today with PBS, President Obama said he plans to begin working on merging the Senate and House health care bills before Congress returns from Christmas recess.

    “We hope to have a whole bunch of folks over here in the West Wing, and I’ll be rolling up my sleeves and spending some time before the full Congress even gets into session,” Obama said, “because the American people need it now.”

    snip

    Asked if he had a list of provisions that must be included to gain his signature, the President said the bill must improve care, reduce costs and reduce medical errors. But the public option is not a deal breaker.

    I’ve been in favor of the public option. I think the more choice, the more competition we have, the better.

    On the other hand, I think that the exchange itself, the system that we’re setting up that forces insurance companies to essentially bid for three million or four million or five million people’s business, that in and of itself is going to have a disciplining effect.

    Would I like one of those options to be the public option? Yes. Do I think that it makes sense, as some have argued, that, without the public option, we dump all these other extraordinary reforms and we say to the 30 million people who don’t have coverage, “You know, sorry. We didn’t get exactly what we wanted”? I don’t think that makes sense.

    http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo…

  8. Cheryl Kopec

    As far as I know, the existing bill includes mandates but no cost controls, no drug re-importation or negotiation. Sure, they might outlaw discrimination based on pre-existing conditions, but what’s to keep them from charging $10,000/month for that policy? And if the family can’t afford that, we just subsidize it with our tax dollars. Hell, why wouldn’t they just charge $1 million per month? Nothing’s stopping them, and they’ve now got a captive, bottomless market.

    ~~Cheryl

  10. QTG

    that all of us keyboarders could legitimately take some credit for this, or at the very least, graciously admit our spectator status and give our Democratic elected officials the credit they richly deserve – along with a sincere Thank-You.

    Merry Christmas everyone, courtesy of those spineless Democrats in Congress and the White House (can you believe he’s only been there for 11 months!).

    #1 Fanboy

Comments are closed.