Schumer: Co-Ops are No Substitute for Public Option
Chuck Schumer (Wikimedia)
CBS News reports that some Democrats are feeling emboldened by recent polls showing overwhelming public support for providing people with a public-sector alternative to for-profit health insurance.
Behind-the-scenes attempts to get a deal with Republicans on nonprofit co-ops as an alternative to a public plan have led only to frustration, complains a key Democrat. He and his colleagues may have to go it alone, said Sen. Chuck Schumer. The co-ops were seen as perhaps the last hope for compromise on a contentious issue that threatens any remaining prospects of bipartisan support for President Obama’s sweeping plan to remake the health care system.
“I don’t think I could say with a straight face that this (co-op proposal) is at all close to a nationwide public option,” Schumer, D-N.Y., told The Associated Press on Sunday. “Right now, this co-op idea doesn’t come close to satisfying anyone who wants a public plan.”
I think this is arguably the virtue of having different kinds of bills wending their way through congress. I think a robust public option is very important. But there are a lot of moving parts to health reform, and it’s not the only important thing. The bill the Senate Finance Committee’s written, which has no public plan but does have a lot of virtues, provides an important test. Will Republicans actually flock to support the bill? If they will, then that’s something worth thinking about. A public plan is important, but if you could get leading Republicans to sign on to the idea of tough new regulations on insurers, on an expansion of Medicaid, on subsidies to ensure that insurance is affordable for everyone, and on higher taxes to pay for the whole thing that would be no small achievement. You’d have to think seriously about whether it isn’t worth cutting a deal. But thus far, for all the whining about the public plan I’m not seeing the evidence that they’re actually willing to embrace the rest of the health reform agenda, either. In which case, you may as well go forward with a robust public plan. And I think it’s important for Democrats to stop hiding behind Republicans on this. People who say they’re leery of a public plan because they want a bipartisan bill need to either produce some Republicans who are willing to support their ideas, or else admit that it’s they themselves who are blocking the public option.
33 Responses to “Schumer: Co-Ops are No Substitute for Public Option”
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June 22nd, 2009 at 10:09 am
Yep. Generally, as I noted before, the only way for a health care reform bill without a public option to get through Congress is for a bunch of marginal Democrats to openly defy the “progressive” Democrats and join with a bunch of Republicans in passing such a bill. And the odds of that happening are extremely low–even if the marginal Democrats would be willing to do that, the Republicans have shown no sign of being willing to play their part in such a plan.
So, I think it comes down to a bill with a public option, or no bill at all. And although this is a little more uncertain, I personally don’t see much chance of no bill at all either.
June 22nd, 2009 at 10:10 am
Who cares if the health-care bill isn’t bi-partisan? A public plan is supported by 65-75 percent of voters; if the Republicans want to just ignore that fact and spout platitudes about market efficiency then let them.
And another thing: if a legitimate health-care reform bill cannot be passed by this president, with his current political capital, because of a Democratically-controlled Congress’ inability to stand up to the special interests of the health care industry–well then this is only another argument for the essential sameness of both parties when it comes to confronting the oligarchs who really run the country.
June 22nd, 2009 at 10:19 am
sorry matt but you’re wrong about the value of supposed reforms that are based on “tough” regulation. you can bet that at least one state – mississippi, louisiana? – would emerge as the delaware of the health insurance industry, a place where insuerers would flock to take advantage of more lax rules or enforcement.
any so-called reform that simply attempts to reign in the existing industry with new rules is destined to fail.
after all these years of watching the industry, it’s surprising that anyone would doubt that.
June 22nd, 2009 at 10:20 am
A public plan is important, but if you could get leading Republicans to sign on to the idea of tough new regulations on insurers, on an expansion of Medicaid, on subsidies to ensure that insurance is affordable for everyone, and on higher taxes to pay for the whole thing that would be no small achievement.
With the size of the problem, that would be a small achievement. Worse, it would probably doom the public option forever (”We already did health care reform, let’s move on.”).
June 22nd, 2009 at 10:22 am
Any Democratic member of Congress who thinks Republicans (aside from maybe Snowe and Collins) will do anything other than vote No on any health reform bill is kidding himself. The solution to all this is pretty simple. Harry Reid should revive the Republican’s nuclear option and get the parliamentarian to declare all supermajority votes not expressly required by the Constitution to be un-Constitutional. It would then require only 51 votes for cloture. The Republicans would then be free to offer a Constitutional amendment to require a supermajority for cloture (which hopefully would fail) while the Democrats would be free to pass legislation with a simple majority like the Founders intended and idiot DINOs like Ben Nelson wouldn’t be able to singlehandedly prevent major legislation from coming to a vote in a Senate where Democrats on paper should have 60 votes and the ability to pass whatever they want.
June 22nd, 2009 at 10:22 am
any so-called reform that simply attempts to reign in the existing industry
Rein in, like a horse. My small crusade continues.
June 22nd, 2009 at 10:25 am
Any Democratic member of Congress who thinks Republicans (aside from maybe Snowe and Collins) will do anything other than vote No on any health reform bill is kidding himself. The solution to all this is pretty simple. Harry Reid should revive the Republican’s nuclear option and get the parliamentarian to declare all supermajority votes not expressly required by the Constitution to be un-Constitutional. It would then require only 51 votes for cloture.
None of that is necessary. Just pass the bill through the budget reconcilliation process. You wouldn’t even need the “moderate Dems”.
June 22nd, 2009 at 10:32 am
” Will Republicans actually flock to support the bill? If they will, then that’s something worth thinking about.”
You keep saying this over and over again, but why?
What is the advantage of a bill that actually gets GOP support? We don’t need the GOP to pass the bill since 50 Senate votes will suffice, and there are political benefits for the Democrats in fully owning a good healthcare bill.
Politically, if anything, you’d want to write a bill in such a way that makes it impossible for Republicans to support.
You need GOP votes for political cover on issues that have an electoral downside, things like cap’n'trade for example, but you don’t need GOP votes for political cover on a good healthcare bill.
June 22nd, 2009 at 10:34 am
It would be far better to compromise with conservative Democrats and tell the GOP to STFU. However, I’ll be pleasantly surprised if Baucus, Nelson et al get on board without a credible primary challenge to focus their priorities.
June 22nd, 2009 at 10:34 am
oopps…
right.
i’m drinking coffee, half-asleep and sending these notes via my blackberry. always a bad combination for spelling. but then, i’m really trying to carry on matt’s tradition…
June 22nd, 2009 at 10:34 am
If reform efforts break down completely, I would be happy opening Medicare (or SCHIP) to anyone who wants to pay full premiums. It would take years, but a pretty good health care system could be built on that one step and it doesn’t cost the taxpayer one dime. I have been watching the fighting on this since the Nixon administration. Real reform looked like a done deal at times before and never happened (I’m looking at you, Carter and Kennedy).
June 22nd, 2009 at 10:37 am
However, I’ll be pleasantly surprised if Baucus, Nelson et al get on board without a credible primary challenge to focus their priorities.
How the hell do you mount a “credible primary challenge” against a senator who out-polls his own party by 20+% in his state?
June 22nd, 2009 at 10:38 am
“I don’t think I could say with a straight face that this (co-op proposal) is at all close to a nationwide public option,” Schumer, D-N.Y., told The Associated Press on Sunday. “Right now, this co-op idea doesn’t come close to satisfying anyone who wants a public plan.”
I heart Chuck.
The guy knows precisely how to pick his battles.
June 22nd, 2009 at 10:42 am
there’s so much wrong with this post there isn’t enough time in the day to dissect it all.
June 22nd, 2009 at 10:43 am
“It would be far better to compromise with conservative Democrats and tell the GOP to STFU. However, I’ll be pleasantly surprised if Baucus, Nelson et al get on board without a credible primary challenge to focus their priorities.”
We don’t need the votes of folks like Nelson, the two Dems from Arkansas, and Landrieu, We can lose 9 Democratic Senate votes and still pass the final bill.
(Baucus, OTOH, is a reliable vote, I believe. It was Baucus getting on board several months ago that made passing a good healthcare bill likely.)
June 22nd, 2009 at 10:50 am
Recently we’ve seen young healthy bloggers who have a leg up in DC, and presumably have health care paid for by employers, deciding that “other considerations” could make a health care plan without a public option worthwhile.
Baloney. Everything else will get nibbled to death by ducks.
And at this point you might as well start thinking ‘Plan B’. Stop smoking, start exercising, and do your drinking at home. Read the papers and see how people end up in hospitals- and then don’t do those things. You can’t make your risk zero, but you can make it a lot less than 1%, and your quality of life will be, if anything, better, for having lived in moderation.
‘Plan B’ for a serious and prolonged depression is a different matter, but the two plans share one component- learn to live without money. Stop spending and you’ll see some changes around here- I guarantee it.
June 22nd, 2009 at 10:51 am
obama’s strategy should be really simple.
craft a strong bill that includes a public option, put it up for a vote – through reconciliation if necessary – and then dare democrats to vote against it.
timid dems have been trying to bluff their way around such a possibility by constantly screaming about not having the votes to pass such a plan. in reality, they don’t want to face the possibility of having to vote against a bill with a public option.
call their bluff.
let’s have a vote.
my guess is that several of those fence-sitters would suddenly see the wisdom of voting for such a plan.
June 22nd, 2009 at 10:56 am
Health care is proving to be surprisingly divisive amongst Democrats. The moderate Dems have painlessly supported health care reform in an environment in which it would never pass. Now, they are trying to worm away from facing a choice between good policy and their insurance/medical community donors/overloards.
Progressives have leverage over the moderate Dems by posing third party challenges. The threat of losing 10-20% of their support would help motivate them to please their left flank, in my opinion. In general, I find Naderism repulsive, but health care reform really is a deal-breaker.
June 22nd, 2009 at 10:58 am
But thus far, for all the whining about the public plan I’m not seeing the evidence that they’re actually willing to embrace the rest of the health reform agenda,
And that’s important, because before Dems(liberal bloggers included) started advocating for the public plan rather than merely defending it, the thought was that it was being used only as a bargaining tool.
Now we see that it keeps costs down and it’s popular, and Dems are advocating for it. The problem is that the GOP won’t push for any serious plan, so that makes thinking of the public plan as a negotiating tool that much more dumb.
June 22nd, 2009 at 11:05 am
Yes. And Democrats need to start flat out attacking the Republican Party for being against the Public Plan. GOP doesn’t want you to have a guarantee of affordable, quality health care. GOP is out to protect big insurance companies. When public plan becomes a phrase that puts the Republicans on the defensive, that’s what is going to get Ben Nelson and Mary Landrieu on our side.
June 22nd, 2009 at 11:13 am
frankie d,
That plan works even better if key people in Congress draft the bill.
June 22nd, 2009 at 11:24 am
dtm,
that is probably true.
the most important thing is to force them to go on record.
all of this noise about not having the votes for such a plan is because lots of folks don’t want to go on the record opposing a public option.
and they are doing their best to make certain it never comes up for a vote.
June 22nd, 2009 at 11:25 am
Wouldn’t it make more sense to get everyone covered and then figure out how to get the costs down.
Make coverage required would be a great start. It would compel the 1/3 of the 40 million uninsured who are already eligible for various government programs to enroll. It would compel the 1/3 who earn enough to buy insurance on the private market to enroll. Then we can figure out subsidies to help out the 1/3 in the middle.
If people complain about the cost we can discuss ways to fix it after everyone is covered.
June 22nd, 2009 at 11:55 am
For all those who blythely assume that Reconciliation is the way to go on this because it only requires 51 votes and can’t be filibustered – there is such a thing called the “Byrd Rule” that is part of the Reconciliation Process. The Byrd Rule limits anything passed under Budget Reconciliation to only remain in effect for the length of time of current CBO budget forecasts – 10 years. This is why the Bush Tax Cuts – passed by Reconciliation in 2001 and 2003 – are due to be “sunsetted” – they can’t be in effect for over 10 years.
So we are just going to completely rework the nation’s healthcare system – and then expect the whole thing to expire in 10 years? That is why Reconciliation is not appropriate for healthcare reform.
June 22nd, 2009 at 12:14 pm
So we are just going to completely rework the nation’s healthcare system – and then expect the whole thing to expire in 10 years? That is why Reconciliation is not appropriate for healthcare reform.
i would pity the congress person who attempted to block an extension of any health care legislation that would be passed this year. as long as it is good, strong legislation.
as all republicans know, the legislation will be very popular, which is why they do not want it enacted. (if you don’t believe me, go back and read bill kristol’s memo on the issue from back in the ’90’s.) once it is in place, voting against it will be like voting against social security.
it ain’t gonna happen.
put it up for a vote. get it passed. get it in place. it will perpetuate itself, because of its popularity and success. which is exactly why republicans fear its passage, however it is accomplished.
June 22nd, 2009 at 12:16 pm
Well, it would certainly be a great start for the insurance companies. Nothing says private marketplace like having the government force people to buy your product. It would do nothing about retroactive rescissions, and it would encourage the proliferation of crappy policies designed only to evade the mandate without providing real coverage. Insurance companies would still be competing with each other to find new and creative ways to deny care.
So no, I don’t think it would be a great start. I think it would be an awful start, a huge special interest give away to a corrupt industry of health insurance executives who should collectively go fuck themselves.
June 22nd, 2009 at 12:17 pm
btw, comparing tax cuts that everyone understands to have been extraordinarily unfair and tilted to the rich, with health care legislation for all is laughable.
sorry, but most americans understand the difference and would eagerly support the latter while gladly saying good-bye to the former.
June 22nd, 2009 at 12:17 pm
Ha. Once this thing is in place, and millions of people are enrolled in the public option, it will never be repealed. Not even the slightest chance in hell.
June 22nd, 2009 at 12:22 pm
And actually, that’s one area where Democrats should appear open to compromise. Incremental steps or triggers are an awful idea. But sunset clauses or other provisions that would purport to cancel the public option if there are developments in the future are free “compromises” in which we effectively don’t give anything away but might give a little more political cover to the centrist dems. What you’d be taking advantage of is the clear political fact that once this is in place it will be as invulnerable as the NHS system in Britain.
June 22nd, 2009 at 12:22 pm
As I’ve said before, once the public experiences single payer, it would be political suicide to suggest going back. Cheaper, better, easier.
That there’s an issue here is proof that we’re not Nature’s Last Word.
June 22nd, 2009 at 12:41 pm
It would do nothing about retroactive rescissions,
Yes it would as community rating is part of every plan for mandatory coverege I’ve ever heard.
June 22nd, 2009 at 6:47 pm
Re: So we are just going to completely rework the nation’s healthcare system – and then expect the whole thing to expire in 10 years?
After ten years, any attempt to let healthcare revert to what we have now would be the equivalent of axing Social Security or Medicare. Moreover the whole system would be organized around the reform and there would plenty of lobbyists bribing congressmen to continue it. There might even be a fair number of Republicans supporting the new system.
Re: Nothing says private marketplace like having the government force people to buy your product.
Should we junk the anti public nudity laws because they force people to buy clothing? Maybe get rid or child abuse laws insofar as they force people to buy food, and other necessities for their kids?
As for the issue of recissions and so forth, even the most scaled down bill that emerges from Congress will end these outages. Recall that back in the 90s we did get HIPAA (and from a GOP Congress) to end job lock even though nothing else got done on healthcare. I don’t think you will find the GOP putting up a fight to let insurers keep their more unethical practices legal.
June 23rd, 2009 at 1:00 am
Why believe Schumer the bank killer?
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/07/11/regulators-seize-
indymac_n_112278.html
The banking regulator said it closed IndyMac after customers began a run on the lender following the June 26 release of a letter by Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., urging several bank regulatory agencies that they take steps to prevent IndyMac’s collapse.