Really Pissed Off!

I’ve been biding my time on this one as the Senate has continued to strip all of the “Reform” from H.R, 3962, passed on November 7, 2009. The U.S. Senate continues to obstruct any meaningful reform for the General Public, whether it is The Credit Card Holder’s Bill of Rights or the Health Reform Act of 2009. In nearly every case, 100 men and women, elected by their constituency, have blindly followed the money trail left by the Lobbyists of Corporate America to screw the American Public! We are a witness to the betrayal of the ‘Public Trust,” given to them by the Constitution and mandated by the people who placed them into office.

Let’s watch the Senate in action, or better still, reaction. On April 30, 2009, the House of Representatives passed H.R. 627, the “Credit Card Accountability, Responsibility and Disclosure Act” also known as the “Credit and Holder’s Bill of Rights.” This House bill had been passed on the fall of 2008, but the Senate let it die in committee. Reintroduced, the House Bill moved on to the Senate where it was dismembered. What emerged was a watered down version of the Bill. Removed was the most important provision of the House Bill. That was the limit of interest charged by the banking industry on credit cards. The House had attempted to remove the Depository Institution Deregulation and Monetary Act of 1980, which lifted the Usury limits, set by Congress in the 1930s. Up until then, banks were regulated by the Usury Laws, which limited the amount of interest a bank could charge. Once enacted, we witnessed the flood of credit cards issued to the general public. The Senate also placed the date of enactment to February 22, 2010! This gave sufficient time for the banks to crank up their interest rates. In case you forgot, all of you received letters from the banks servicing your credit cards raising the interest rates. What we witnessed last year was how much control the lobbyists in Washington have on any and all votes in the Senate! In short, the Senate is bought and sold!

Once again, The Senate has given into the K Street lobbyists have totally corrupted the Health Care Bill passed by the House. There are at least six lobbyists for each member of Congress regarding Health Care, which comes to a total of 3, 300 total! They have spent nearly $635 million dollars! With all that cash flowing into the coffers, how do you expect to get good government? In fact, you’ve been sold out by Congress, and particularly, the Senate. Let’s look at several provisions of the House’s Bill vs. the Senate’s Bill. The House would cover 96 percent of legal residents while the Senate would cover 94 percent….that’s close. The House would require all individuals to participate, enforced by a tax penalty and hardship wavers if unaffordable. The Senate requires all individuals to get coverage through their employer or on their own or through a government plan. Refusal would pay fines up to $750 a year. Now here’s the kicker. The House offers a Government Run Plan through insurance exchanges set up by the Health and Human Services Secretary, who would negotiate rates. The Senate eliminates the government run insurance option and instead sign up for the same plan of privately owned insurance companies now offered to certain federal employees and members of Congress, one of which would run on a non-profit basis. That sounds reasonable, doesn’t it? Actually, it’s the fatal flaw in this law as it removes any and all regulations in the House Bill. The only way you can cut health care costs appears to be by regulation, as the insurance companies have removed any and all competition in the health care industry. The House would strip the health care industry of their long protected exemption of anti-trust laws, covering Market allocation, price fixing and bid rigging. It would allow the Federal Trade Commission the ability to examine the health care industry on their own case by case initiative. The Senate maintains the anti-trust exemption!

There is much more to compare and to complain about, but I’ll be lucky if anyone gets through reading as far as this. The two most important factors of health reform have been removed by the Senate. Those two are the Government Run Plan, (I don’t dare use that awful word “Public Option”) and the failure to remove the anti-trust laws protecting the health care industry. We no longer operate in a “Market Economy” and we haven’t for the past thirty years. The only way to control health care cost is by competition and that is not going to happen. Using data compiled by the American Medical Association, “94 percent of the country's insurance markets are defined as "highly concentrated." Health Care for America Now reports that "a market failure where a small number of large companies use their concentrated power to control premium levels, benefit packages, and provider payments in the markets they dominate." Premiums have risen 87 percent over the past six years, while the profits from the ten largest health insurance companies, from 2000 through 2007 was 428 percent, reports HCAN. This now becomes the playing field for the Senate Health Care Bill, and it is definitely not tilted in the General Public’s direction. It will be interesting to see what happens when the Senate’s watered down Health Care Bill returns to the House of Representatives, when Hearings will begin on January 12, 2010. What’s worse, a Health Care Bill rigged to support the healthcare industry or no bill at all? My money is on its defeat!

Sen. Bernie Sanders on How Health Care Lobbyists Control Congress