What Is Happening to Health Care Reform Now?
January 23, 2010
After Scott Brown’s surprising victory to replace Senator Kennedy in Massachusetts, many people are scrambling to try and figure out what, and if anything, will happen with the health care reform legislations. While a cornerstone of the Obama Administration’s domestic policy plans, the White House, focused on several pieces of the overall health care reform bill that it hoped would survive, including measures to extend the life of Medicare, lower prescription drug costs for seniors and cap consumers' out-of-pocket medical expenses. Obama advisor David Axelrod raised the examples of cuts to health providers to extend Medicare's solvency beyond 2017, tax breaks for small businesses offering insurance, the closing of the Medicare prescription "doughnut hole" and protections for people with pre-existing conditions.
Speaking on ABC's "This Week," Axelrod said "The president will not walk away from the American people, will not hand them over to the tender mercies of health insurance companies who take advantage." Axelrod's remarks echoed strategy laid out by Obama's 2008 campaign manager, David Plouffe, in an LA Times opinion article Sunday as the administration took steps to save major healthcare legislation.
However, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell said President Obama should "start over" on health reform. And with Republican Scott Brown's Massachusetts' Senate seat victory, "Democrats appear to have little flexibility to push through their legislation. Either the House passes the Senate bill intact, or at least one Senate Republican would have to cross party lines to support a compromise between the versions that passed each chamber."
In the Sunday Washington Post, Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin stated: "'For those who say, start over, let's start at the beginning, let's do a little bit, let's maybe do nothing, some say, I would just tell them, if we do nothing, the Medicare trust fund will be exhausted in seven years," Durbin said, insisting that Republicans were allowed in the process but never seriously engaged.
However, the one thing that is clear is that the Congress is taking a break on health care reform right now. Senate leaders have said that they are taking anywhere from a one week to a six week break from health care reform legislative efforts and will refocus on the jobs legislation that will center on unemployment.
