2010 Passage of Healthcare Reform in the US: What REALLY Happened?

[iNow]

For regular readers here, many of you know I am a big fan of the PBS program FRONTLINE. In fact, based on many of my exchanges with several of you (of ALL political leanings and ideologies), I'm inclined to believe that many of you are fans/appreciators of the show, as well.

 

 

Tonight on FRONTLINE was a special dedicated to exploring the real story behind how healthcare reform passed in the US.

 

Fans of the show know, like me, that no matter how much you have read or paid attention to the issue they discuss and explore, viewing their specials always leaves you in a position of being more knowledgeable of the topic than you were prior to watching. They pick up on nuance and thread chronologies together better than pretty much any other program out there, and they do so in an incredibly fair and neutral manner.

 

 

So, with that said, here it is... Tonight's special on the 2010 passage of healthcare reform in the US: OBAMA'S DEAL:

 

 

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/obamasdeal/

A sobering look at the push to reform health care, revealing the realities of American politics, the power of special interest groups and the role of money in policy making.

 

 

From the Introduction:

In Obama's Deal, veteran FRONTLINE producer Michael Kirk (Bush's War, Dreams of Obama) takes viewers behind the headlines to reveal the political maneuvering behind Barack Obama's effort to remake the American health system and transform the way Washington works.

 

<...>

 

"The process was messy, and so it turned people off," says Communications Director Pfeiffer. "It ended up being behind closed doors. It was filled with partisan wrangling, people yelling at each other across the table. We ended up having a process that represented a lot of what the American people hated about Washington."

 

 

I encourage you to watch for yourself, and note that this discussion will be much more robust if you do so prior to commenting (however, you are most certainly welcome to comment despite not having watched and not making yourself more familiar or aware of what inspired me to open this thread).

 

 

Obama's Deal: Watch Online --> http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/obamasdeal/view/

 

 

 

What is your key take-away from this?

What do YOU think REALLY happened?

How do you feel about it?

 

In short... What are your thoughts?

[Icefire]

My thoughts are:

While Healthcare reform was all the rage in the 60's or so, the USA was in the middle of the war and never got in vogue. By the time that the war was finished, healthcare reform dropped out of style and so the States never got on the bandwagon. After that the two parties continued to try to use anything possible to colour the opposing party as evil, so anything significant was never passed because the parties would never agree and they would try to paint the New Change as something evil. Then after The Era of Bush the US citizens realized that their president was an idiot and some got the impression that the country was falling apart, so they elected a president that was obviously different then the rest and promised change. Then when the new president came in power, he went on to tackle the biggest change in the history of America, which the opposing party tied to convince the people that it was an evil attempt to take over the lives of the people. now the wars with [del]socalist[/del] Totalist USSR, [del]socalist[/del] Totalist Vietnam, [del]socalist[/del] Totalist Iraq, etc the majority of the american have been inflicted with propaganda that painted everything socialist as evil, so they tried to reject the reform as much as possible. then the president modified the more extreme parts, and then finally managed to get it passed.

The End.

Edited April 14, 2010 by Icefire

[Phi for All]

Thanks for setting this thread up this way, iNow. I'll be very interested to follow it.

 

My key take-away from this is that too much of politics is concerned with the immediate benefits (which often includes appearing productive to the voters) and not enough with the long-term benefits (which are really what the voters need from their governments). Running a close second, I'm also struck by how powerful we voters are, and how we usually meekly give up that power at election time, choosing instead to allow our votes to support those who will ignore what is good for the people in favor of what is good for special interests.

 

I think what really happened is that change in healthcare happened while change in political policy did not. We got some reform in healthcare but we got it through the same old back-room deal making and partisan stonewall poll-vaulting.

 

I feel like health insurance is like no other business on the planet, and therefore having the government compete against it with a public option won't affect our overall capitalistic view of a market economy. Many Americans view this as the government "running" healthcare, but I view it as something that is of national interest and also something we deserve to give ourselves, like interstate highways that benefit everyone (even if you don't own a car to drive on them, prices on many goods and services you use are lower because they exist).

 

I'm convinced there is a way to have the government hold our healthcare dollars until our doctors need them, and use what the health insurance industry takes as profit to insure everybody with no exemptions for existing conditions. If the politicians in debt to the special interests can be voted out, we can achieve universal healthcare within a very few voting cycles. Mostly though, the voters need to understand why they hold the ultimate power, and why they've got to stop giving it up so easily through ignorance.

[bascule]

The result is a step forward albeit a rather poor compromise. I just hope having something in place will be a motivation for further reform. The process by which it came about was certainly a clusterf*ck

[Pangloss]

Honestly the more I ponder it the more content I am with it, at least for the near future, and the more I see it as a change for the better. At the very least I'm going into it with an open mind and high hopes.

 

I am concerned about the potential loophole of a moderate-income worker's no-insurance penalty being less expensive than the price of health insurance, leading to currently-humorous scenarios like an iPhone app that lets you quickly buy insurance from the ambulance on the way to the hospital. But if that does somehow pan out into reality, it's such an obvious loophole that one would assume that it would be high on the list for corrective legislation.

[iNow]

I am concerned about the potential loophole of a moderate-income worker's no-insurance penalty being less expensive than the price of health insurance,

I'm not...

 

 

http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/03/29/good-news-on-mandates/

One big concern about health reform has been the argument that the individual mandate — which is essential to keeping the risk pool broad enough — won’t work, because the penalties for noncompliance are too weak. But Austin Frakt does some calculations which seem to suggest that the penalties for noncompliance under Obamacare are, if anything, slightly stronger than under Romneycare — and that since gaming of the system doesn’t seem to be a large problem in Massachusetts, it probably won’t be a big problem nationally.

 

 

More on the numbers, here: http://theincidentaleconomist.com/individual-mandate-penalties-are-not-too-low/

[Mr Skeptic]

I think someone said it best: It needs fixing, but at least now we have something to fix.

[Pangloss]

Finally got this off the Tivo tonight. Fantastic show.

 

One thing I think Frontline seemed to confirm is that opposition to the House bill (with public option) last summer was not a simple matter of crackpots and CTR slogans, but in fact a massive grassroots movement that Republican politicians actually had no choice but to acknowledge and respond to. It seemed to completely undermine the notion that misguided, CTR-lead morons drove out the country's best hope for health care reform, and instead offered a much better-reasoned analysis about the will of the people and the complexity of modern politics. Frontline also strongly supported the notion that the September fight over the Senate bill was not a bipartisan effort at all, and the subsequent, unexpected battle was primarily between liberal and moderate Democrats.

 

At one point one of the interviewees (a Democrat) accusingly called Chuck Grassley's response "not a profile in courage". I just love it when political operatives accuse politicians of being cowardly for not supporting what everyone just knows is the right thing to do. And from there the program went down an even goofier rabbit hole, suggesting that nobody could understand why some Republicans didn't jump on board out of sympathy after Kennedy died. (WTF? That is some serious space-cadet reasoning there.)

 

But on the whole this was a well-done report, with both sides getting their points across. I was surprised at how many Republicans were interviewed, and that they included Orin Hatch's condemnation of the "you lie" outburst. I was also surprised to see the White House Communications Director on the interview list -- major kudos have to go to the Obama administration for providing such a high-level participant for this story (especially given how tight and close the previous administration kept things).

 

On the whole, massive kudos to Frontline for another terrific job.

[iNow]

Thanks for setting this thread up this way, iNow. I'll be very interested to follow it.

You're quite welcome. Thanks for your interest. Unfortunately, the thread does not seem to have found much traction.

[Pangloss]

I could re-subject it into a general Frontline thread if you want. The "bacha bazi" ep was pretty fascinating, and the one next week is on the fight over vaccines, which has been good fodder for discussion here in the past. I'm also somewhat dreading the 5/4 ep on the for-profit education sector (as I work for one).

 

(Then you and I can do a joint video promoting the show to SFN members: "The only thing iNow and Pangloss agree on is that you should watch Frontline!")

[iNow]

(Then you and I can do a joint video promoting the show to SFN members: "The only thing iNow and Pangloss agree on is that you should watch Frontline!")

Bah... That's hardly the only thing, friend. It's just that the disagreements tend to be much louder.

[ecoli]

Good vid. It doesn't surprised me and I've been calling it all along.

 

While liberals and progressives have been hailing this thing, it was all about preserving the private interests, greasing the wheels and getting the populist vote.

[DrDNA]

Drop that bar of soap and I'll show you..................