Contradictory Objections from the Blue Dogs
One thing that’s clear from reading today’s news is that Representative Mike Ross (D-AR) is very upset about the House health care bill and is planning to lead a bloc of Blue Dog Dems on the Energy & Commerce Committee to vote against it unless major changes happen. It’s also clear that said bloc is in fact large enough to join with the Republicans and kill reform. What’s not at all clear is what exactly Ross’ objections are. CNN’s report says Ross “didn’t give details on changes the Blue Dogs want.” Politico’s report, likewise, has no information about what Ross actually wants to see happen. He just says there should be “drastic changes.”
Fortunately, thanks to the internet I can sit here in DC and read Arkansas News’ coverage where they have more actual information about Rep Ross’s moment in the sun. Apparently these are the key bullets:
— The cost of health care reform, both for the explosion in the deficit they fear and the dearth of real savings for consumers they also fear.
— Whether to have a public plan and if so, how to design it. The Blue Dogs prefer it as a trigger if cost-reduction targets aren’t met and they do not want a reimbursement schedule like Medicare’s, which is less for rural areas. Actually, they want to change the Medicare schedule. The bill as written gives them a study commission, probably a mere brush-off. Is there a contradiction in the Blue Dogs, worrying about costs and then trying to jack up Medicare? Sure.
— Employer mandates, either to provide health care to employees or pay a fee. The Blue Dogs like the exemption for small businesses. But they don’t think it goes high enough in terms of payroll and employees. They want to expand it.
— And there’s the whole respect thing, with the Blue Dogs tired of being forced left by Pelosi while the Senate goes a more moderate way.
In other words, they’re concerned that the bill (a) costs too much overall and (b) will increase the deficit. And their proposed solutions to this are to (a) increase the cost of the bill by neutering the public plan and (b) decrease the quantity of revenue by fiddling with the employer mandate. Under the circumstances, it’s no wonder that Ross didn’t want to go into detail with CNN about how he’d propose changing the bill. Maybe Harry Potter knows a spell that could untie this mess of contradictions.
31 Responses to “Contradictory Objections from the Blue Dogs”
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July 16th, 2009 at 10:48 am
It’s not contradictory to say that they want the parts that will benefit them locally, but not the parts that won’t.
July 16th, 2009 at 11:13 am
@Christopher: No, it’s just irresponsible. But they’re called Blue *Dogs* for a reason: throw them a bone and they’ll shut up and go away. It sounds to me like the coalition just wants to whine until they “make a difference” no matter how small.
July 16th, 2009 at 11:13 am
Christopher, You are right, but that is not how they are framing it, therefore it is contradictory and dishonest.
It’s true that IF they were honest then they wouldn’t be contradictory, but that’s not currently the case.
July 16th, 2009 at 11:13 am
Maybe Harry Potter knows a spell that could untie this mess of contradictions.
Nah, only Dumbledore knew that spell. So it’s all Severus Snape’s fault that we can’t come up with a health care bill that will satisfy the Blue Dogs!
July 16th, 2009 at 11:14 am
Obviously Cyclist hasn’t read the books. Snape is innocent!
July 16th, 2009 at 11:17 am
benefit them locally
It’s false for them to just assume the socialism argument automatically outweighs the fact that it’s cheaper. If a strong public plan passed, some of these poor red districts would re-discover how much they used to love New Dealish programs back in the day.
July 16th, 2009 at 11:18 am
I thought personal responsibility was a big thing with these people. Mandating healthcare coverage is a way of taking personal responsibility for your health expenditures, instead of just dumping the costs on the rest of us.
July 16th, 2009 at 11:20 am
This is where the media absolutely drives me nuts. Blue Doggies and the GOP oppose health care reform if it costs too much and they also oppose all attempts to bring costs down. They oppose health care reform if it adds to the deficit and they also oppose all attempts to bring in more revenue. If someone calls them on this they say they are for health care reform and we can do better by eliminating wastefraudandabuse. They are never asked for any specifics, and they are never asked why they are opposed to the plans in front of them which go a long way towards eliminating wastefraudandabuse.
I understand that reporters don’t know much about this stuff, and are thus afraid to get into the weeds on this sort of thing, but you don’t need to be an econ PhD in order to see this crap for the transparent dodge that it is. Any idiot can see that. Also, if you’re “for” health care but against all attempts to pay for it, and also against health care that’s not paid for, then you’re not for health care. So call them on it!! I know Wolf and Anderson and Williams and Tweety and Chuck Todd the rest are a bunch of Ron Burgundys, but even they ought to be able to figure this out. For Christ’s sake, how hard is this?
July 16th, 2009 at 11:21 am
Oh I know, but charges of “hypocrisy” on these matters don’t generally stick very well. If they’re guilty of obstructing a bill through selfishness and opportunism and grandstanding, then that’s a much greater sin than just being intellectually incoherent.
July 16th, 2009 at 11:35 am
Shorter Blue Dogs: I will hold out against this wasteful, bloated bureaucratic nightmare of a bill until my constituency gets a bigger piece of the pie.
July 16th, 2009 at 11:39 am
Hearing this crap out of Ross makes me ashamed of my state (Ok, I realize that this is Arkansas that we’re talking about, so, more ashamed than usual…).
It also makes me happy that I don’t live in that clown’s district and that I have the only veteran and the only real progressive in our congressional delegation for my rep. I’ve already written to both Snyder and Ross about the latter’s obstructionism. I urge any other Arkansans to do the same.
July 16th, 2009 at 11:43 am
Already dead and in Hell. The only explanation.
July 16th, 2009 at 11:58 am
i swear that it often seems like the number of morons per capita in congress far exceeds the number of morons in the population as a whole.
July 16th, 2009 at 11:59 am
er, morons per capita in the population as a whole.
July 16th, 2009 at 12:05 pm
If someone believes that the desirable amount of health care spending (if such a thing can somehow be determined) is less than the amount that government can afford, it is not contradictory to say that the gov’t bill is too expensive and too restrictive.
July 16th, 2009 at 12:10 pm
I wouldn’t be shocked if Mike Ross is bluffing.
July 16th, 2009 at 12:12 pm
Can someone explain why this bill has to go through seemingly every committee in the House?
July 16th, 2009 at 12:26 pm
Obama is apparently pushing a different reform that might actually reduce costs, but will reduce the ability of Congressfolk to waste money in their own districts. We’ll see how many of the Blue Dogs bite.
My guess is not many.
July 16th, 2009 at 12:31 pm
I don’t know how long this person has been in office, but this sort of thing tends to be an unfortunate byproduct of big majorities (ie., ideologically suspect members of your caucus from competitive districts). Republicans had to deal with it, too. I wouldn’t get too overexcited. I have a feeling Pelosi and Company can buy his vote, or get him to knuckle under with threats. I also don’t think raising the payroll threshold by a one or two hundred grand would be the end of the world.
July 16th, 2009 at 12:34 pm
These assholes are only interested in fellating their campaign donors; their “reason” don’t need to make sense because they’ve merely excuses.
Political system money can buy, but certainly not the best.
July 16th, 2009 at 12:35 pm
I think I’m in spokeytown’s neck of the woods, frustrationally speaking, but I have to admit that I am woefully uninformed (please — this is not to suggest that spokeytown is likewise afflicted). No matter how much I want to be a wonk, I’m just not — I can’t pore over the details or differences between this and that health care proposal and come away with any confidence that I understand more than before I started.
I need some plainspeak. It’d be grand if reporters, with their access to sources of information (be those good, bad or nonsensical), spelled some stuff out for me.
Like with this:
…cost to whom? Taxpayers? Slavewagers? Executives? Stockholders?
“Cost” is such a bogyman-word (in the vein of ‘liberal’ or ’socialist’ or ‘anti-American’) slapped into arguments to non-specifically connote both expense and detriment, to vacuously denigrate opposing viewpoints.
Matt – I would love to understand what the hell they’re talking about. If you know or if you can find out, please tell me. If it won’t waste your time, please talk (down, if necessary) to the idiots like me.
I would love it, if someone were to nail some frigging specifics and define this crap for me.
July 16th, 2009 at 1:02 pm
Matt – I would love to understand what the hell they’re talking about.
I remember a Star Trek episode in which the alien spoke in metaphors. Think of congress as the alien race. Ross is signaling that he’s open to campaign contributions and pork, or in plain English – bribes.
July 16th, 2009 at 1:12 pm
DanM
It’s not you, Dan. Nobody knows what the hell is going on. There are currently 42 plans floating around (43 if you include mine). Each is more complex than the other.
My plan? Keep it simple. Copy Canada and install a Single-payer system. Quality health care for all, save the country trillions. My plan been brushed aside, however, because it doesn’t allow every Tom, Dick and Sally to weigh-in on the issue and muck things up.
July 16th, 2009 at 1:44 pm
Please don’t insult George Rodrique like that!
July 16th, 2009 at 1:46 pm
[...] Via Yglesias, we get more on Ross from Arkansas, who is grabbing his 15 minutes of fame with the gusto of an aging star who is reminding the leading man hunk that to make his movie successful it depends on how the guy billed second sets him up. [...]
July 16th, 2009 at 4:38 pm
[...] UPDATE: Speaking for the Blue Dog Dems (including our own Rep. Jim Matheson), Rep. Mike Ross (D-AR) threatens to kill the public option in committee. [...]
July 16th, 2009 at 5:23 pm
Hear, hear Max424.
All of the proposals being discussed at too complicated, and additional complexity plus more nearly universal coverage will likely result in large costs.
A public option plan is either a stalking horse for single-payer coverage or part of the problem as a plan that is no better than private plans.
The error being made is the thought that a small change to the current system can produce markedly better outcomes. Let’s go to single-payer and then tweak it from there.
-JLR
July 16th, 2009 at 5:30 pm
[...] Among other things, Ross reportedly objects to the surtaxes included in the bill. “I don’t like the idea of raising taxes in the worst economic crisis since World War II,” he said. [...]
July 16th, 2009 at 7:36 pm
[...] on, one the self-anointed guardians of vacuous centrism is angry. Why? Well, the House’s Tri-Committee health care bill apparently makes too much sense. He [...]
July 16th, 2009 at 9:47 pm
What do the Blue Dogs want? They want to make sure any attempt at health care reform happens. It’s impossible to stake a position that you would accept when your true aim is failure.
Can we at least stop using the word “moderate” to describe these guys?
July 16th, 2009 at 11:40 pm
Even a blind pig will find the occasional acorn
Not that I agree with all of their points, or the wisdom of raising any of them right now, but the dogs have a point about rural reimbursements.
Even if we were doing single payer right off the bat, as we should be, we should put off the question of setting reimbursment rates in the long run, to the long run. We could run off current rates, adjusted for inflation, in the short term. Since we’re not even doing single payer right off the bat, it’s not even any problem right off the bat, as rates will be set by competition among all the plans, not by fiat.
In the long run, it would be a bad idea to try to set rates by fiat. Reality would get ahead or behind what the central planners are trying to do with their fiat rates, and we would see mounting artificial scarcities and gluts in the supply of various services. The basic plan should be for the single payer (which is what a fair public option will evolve into within a few years) to run geographical markets for medical services which would match demand with supply, going from cheapest rates on offer up until demand is met. All by itself, this model would solve the problem of scarcity in supply of medical services in our rural areas, because the mrkets would bear up higher rates in areas with less competition, and these higher rates would attract more suppliers of services to rural areas until an equilibrium is reached.
Not only would this be a good public policy outcome, as it would solve the long-standing problem of dwindling rural medical services, which we currently address ineffectively by subsidizinf providers to settle and practice in these areas, it would be good politics. The Dems would be more than competitive in rural areas for two or three generations.