Now’s the time for President-elect Obama and Congress to seize the moment and enact health care for all Americans. ASAP.
Sen. is pressing a new strategy - shaped in bipartisan meetings - for one consensus bill that can be moved swiftly through the Senate and the House, perhaps even in Obama’s first 100 days.
Kennedy has courted and listened to allies on both sides of the aisle. Sen. Mike Enzi (R-Wyo.), ranking Republican on the Health Care Committee that Kennedy chairs, is working with Teddy. And Senate Finance Chairman Max Baucus (D-Mont.) weighed in this week with his own ideas on health care; ideas that look a lot like Kennedy’s and like the Massachusetts universal coverage law that Teddy touts as a national model.
Kennedy said Baucus’ White Paper “brings us closer to our goal.” Especially since the finance committee has to find a way to pay for a law that would cost billions, yet help tens of millions of struggling citizens, many without jobs now, pay their health care bills.
That is different from the early 1990s when then-Chairman Daniel Patrick Moynihan’s opposition doomed health-care reform championed by Kennedy and the Clintons.
And Obama - though treading carefully - said recently that health reform is “priority number three,” right after the economy and energy independence, adding, “I think the time is right to do it.”
Amen. Passage of universal health care would be the capstone on Kennedy’s legacy. And Obama owes him. The passing of the Kennedy torch to Obama by Teddy and niece Caroline just before Super Tuesday was a turning point in Obama’s path to the presidency. He also owes it even more to all those people to whom he promised relief.
In last Sunday’s Washington Post, Kennedy wrote, “it is no longer just patients demanding change. Businesses, doctors and even many insurance companies are demanding it . . . The cost will be substantial, but the need for reform is too great to be deflected or delayed.”
For those who would say, “That’s just a liberal talking,” hear this:
David Blumenthal, director of the Institute for Health Policy for the Partners Health Care System and an Obama adviser, said, “Some of the largest corporations in America are struggling to compete in the world marketplace because of high health care costs.”
Rick Umbdenstock, president and CEO of the American Hospital Association, said the economic turmoil, coupled with health care’s high costs, “will likely mean the loss of jobs and employer-related health coverage . . . and possibly even diminishing access to health care services.”
Nancy Nielsen, president of the American Medical Association, said, “The cost of doing nothing is much higher than the alternative” - the scuffling to pay for good care, including preventive care, and dooming millions to “live sick and die younger.”
These aren’t socialists. These are people who work with health care daily and know the crisis it is in.
Kennedy has worked behind the scenes to craft health reform since Memorial Day, by phone, by e-mail and even by face-to-face meetings despite his illness. He’s back in Washington, and he’s not slowing down.
As soon as Obama takes that oath that Kennedy’s slain brother took 48 years ago, he should start preaching and working for health care for all. And Congress, which Kennedy has served for so long, should do it for Teddy - and for the American people. It’s time to strike while those stars are aligned.
Sen. is pressing a new strategy - shaped in bipartisan meetings - for one consensus bill that can be moved swiftly through the Senate and the House, perhaps even in Obama’s first 100 days.
Kennedy has courted and listened to allies on both sides of the aisle. Sen. Mike Enzi (R-Wyo.), ranking Republican on the Health Care Committee that Kennedy chairs, is working with Teddy. And Senate Finance Chairman Max Baucus (D-Mont.) weighed in this week with his own ideas on health care; ideas that look a lot like Kennedy’s and like the Massachusetts universal coverage law that Teddy touts as a national model.
Kennedy said Baucus’ White Paper “brings us closer to our goal.” Especially since the finance committee has to find a way to pay for a law that would cost billions, yet help tens of millions of struggling citizens, many without jobs now, pay their health care bills.
That is different from the early 1990s when then-Chairman Daniel Patrick Moynihan’s opposition doomed health-care reform championed by Kennedy and the Clintons.
And Obama - though treading carefully - said recently that health reform is “priority number three,” right after the economy and energy independence, adding, “I think the time is right to do it.”
Amen. Passage of universal health care would be the capstone on Kennedy’s legacy. And Obama owes him. The passing of the Kennedy torch to Obama by Teddy and niece Caroline just before Super Tuesday was a turning point in Obama’s path to the presidency. He also owes it even more to all those people to whom he promised relief.
In last Sunday’s Washington Post, Kennedy wrote, “it is no longer just patients demanding change. Businesses, doctors and even many insurance companies are demanding it . . . The cost will be substantial, but the need for reform is too great to be deflected or delayed.”
For those who would say, “That’s just a liberal talking,” hear this:
David Blumenthal, director of the Institute for Health Policy for the Partners Health Care System and an Obama adviser, said, “Some of the largest corporations in America are struggling to compete in the world marketplace because of high health care costs.”
Rick Umbdenstock, president and CEO of the American Hospital Association, said the economic turmoil, coupled with health care’s high costs, “will likely mean the loss of jobs and employer-related health coverage . . . and possibly even diminishing access to health care services.”
Nancy Nielsen, president of the American Medical Association, said, “The cost of doing nothing is much higher than the alternative” - the scuffling to pay for good care, including preventive care, and dooming millions to “live sick and die younger.”
These aren’t socialists. These are people who work with health care daily and know the crisis it is in.
Kennedy has worked behind the scenes to craft health reform since Memorial Day, by phone, by e-mail and even by face-to-face meetings despite his illness. He’s back in Washington, and he’s not slowing down.
As soon as Obama takes that oath that Kennedy’s slain brother took 48 years ago, he should start preaching and working for health care for all. And Congress, which Kennedy has served for so long, should do it for Teddy - and for the American people. It’s time to strike while those stars are aligned.
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