Ohio is second only to Missouri for the most counties with potentially no available subsidized plans for sale next year on the federal Health Insurance Marketplace, the Kaiser Family Foundation reports.
Reported by bizjournals 5 hours ago.
Ohio and Missouri have biggest bare spots for 2018 ACA individual health coverage
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Now Republicans Are Blaming Democrats For Secret Health Care Negotiations
Republicans say you shouldn’t blame them for the rushed, secretive way they are writing health care legislation. They say you should blame Democrats.
White House press secretary Sean Spicer on Tuesday got multiple questions about the legislation, now under consideration in the Senate, that would repeal the Affordable Care Act. Almost nobody, including most Republican senators, knows exactly what the bill would do, because leaders have tapped a small group of members to write the legislation and have done their best to keep the details out of public view.
They’ve submitted a version to the Congressional Budget Office for analysis and, supposedly, they will share text with their full caucus later this week ― which means details are likely to leak out to the public shortly thereafter. But the current plan is to hold a vote as soon as next week, with a minimum of formal public deliberation.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and his allies have come under withering assault for writing such an ambitious and consequential bill in this manner. They are responding by saying that Democrats are to blame, because ― as this argument goes ― Democrats have made clear they won’t work with Republicans on a repeal bill.
Here’s what Spicer said Tuesday ― speaking about Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) ― in response to a question from MSNBC’s Hallie Jackson:
If you look at what Senator Schumer said, both in February to a MoveOn.org call, where he said no Democrat’s going to go near this, and what he said in a letter May 9, that no Democrats would be part of an effort that would repeal Obamacare, so they have chosen … not to make themselves part of the process.
Spicer also said this was a key difference between the process Republicans are using to repeal the Affordable Care Act now and the process Democrats used when they first wrote the law, back in 2009 and 2010. This has always been one of the GOP’s favorite talking points ― that, according to the party narrative, Democrats wrote the bill in secret and then rushed a vote before anybody really knew what was in it.
“We were very polarized because the Democrats did, frankly, exactly the same thing,” Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) told reporters on Capitol Hill Tuesday. “So we had a very polarized bill that the public debated for years and years. I don’t think the parties are any different. I would give criticism equally to the parties.”
It’s true that, this year, Democrats indicated early that they wanted no part of a bill that would take away health insurance from millions of people, as every repeal proposal being discussed would do. (The House bill, on which the Senate has based its legislation, would take away coverage from 23 million people, according to a Congressional Budget Office projection.) Of course, it’s also true that Schumer and Democrats made it clear they would happily work on bipartisan reforms, even major ones, that would make coverage more secure or affordable without causing the number of uninsured to rise.
But the really important context for this debate is the Republican claims about what happened in 2009 and 2010 and how those claims hold up to scrutiny.
They don’t hold up well.
In reality, Democrats spent more than a year debating their proposal out in the open. Five separate committees, three in the House and two in the Senate, held literally hundreds of hours of hearings and produced testimony from experts representing multiple philosophical views and officials from pretty much every group or industry involved with health care. Republicans had opportunities to question those witnesses and to propose amendments, some of which actually ended up in the legislation.
You don't have to mythologize the 2009-2010 process to see how different the 2017 process has been.
McConnell, as it happens, made his own vow of noncooperation ― later telling The Atlantic’s Joshua Green he wanted no GOP “fingerprints” on Democratic legislation. Even so, Democratic leaders tried desperately to win over a handful of moderate Republicans who seemed most likely to support health care reform. Then-Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus (D-Mont.) and former President Barack Obama personally invested hours in one-on-one meetings with individual Republican senators, especially then-Sen. Olympia Snowe (R-Maine) ― who ultimately voted for the Finance Committee’s bill, even though she voted against the final Democratic legislation on the floor.
Before the final Senate vote, in December 2009, Republicans warned they hadn’t seen final details before voting on the bill. But by that point nearly a year had passed and the big questions were all settled. Later, as the debate dragged into early 2010, Obama personally engaged Republicans ― at length ― on two separate occasions, one at a Republican Party retreat in Baltimore and then at a daylong bipartisan session at the Blair House.
Writing legislation is almost never elegant and there was plenty of negotiation that went on behind closed doors. The result was some famously ugly deals, such as the “Cornhusker kickback” that would have boosted federal Medicaid payments to Nebraska to secure the vote of then-Sen. Ben Nelson (D-Neb.). Many Democratic leaders were happy not to work with Republicans. (They were furious at Baucus for dragging out negotiations.) And of course the final legislation violated some key promises its supporters made ― chief among them, a vow to let people who liked their existing health care plans keep them.
But by and large the architects of the law were clear about what they were trying to do and how they proposed to do it ― in part because they’d been promoting and defending these ideas, in detail, ever since Obama had started his presidential campaign years before. And once in power they used the traditional committee process ― if not so much to write the legislative language then at least to give the media, interest groups and ultimately the public an opportunity to understand what was up for discussion and eventually form an opinion on that.
You don’t have to mythologize the 2009-2010 process to see how different the 2017 process has been. (Take it from other reporters who covered the Affordable Care Act, like Sarah Kliff and Julie Rovner, who have made this point already.) And it’s not hard to figure out why Senate GOP leaders are proceeding in the way they are.
Although those leaders haven’t indicated how they intend to resolve some key issues, the ultimate impact of the bill is already clear, as HuffPost’s Jeff Young has written. That proposal would take away insurance from millions, remove consumer protections that people value, and push insurance in the direction of greater exposure to out-of-pocket costs.
None of this is popular. None of this is what Republicans promised to do. Debating their bill openly would force them to admit that, and so they are trying to avoid public scrutiny for as long as possible.
Igor Bobic contributed reporting.
-- This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website. Reported by Huffington Post 5 hours ago.
White House press secretary Sean Spicer on Tuesday got multiple questions about the legislation, now under consideration in the Senate, that would repeal the Affordable Care Act. Almost nobody, including most Republican senators, knows exactly what the bill would do, because leaders have tapped a small group of members to write the legislation and have done their best to keep the details out of public view.
They’ve submitted a version to the Congressional Budget Office for analysis and, supposedly, they will share text with their full caucus later this week ― which means details are likely to leak out to the public shortly thereafter. But the current plan is to hold a vote as soon as next week, with a minimum of formal public deliberation.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and his allies have come under withering assault for writing such an ambitious and consequential bill in this manner. They are responding by saying that Democrats are to blame, because ― as this argument goes ― Democrats have made clear they won’t work with Republicans on a repeal bill.
Here’s what Spicer said Tuesday ― speaking about Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) ― in response to a question from MSNBC’s Hallie Jackson:
If you look at what Senator Schumer said, both in February to a MoveOn.org call, where he said no Democrat’s going to go near this, and what he said in a letter May 9, that no Democrats would be part of an effort that would repeal Obamacare, so they have chosen … not to make themselves part of the process.
Spicer also said this was a key difference between the process Republicans are using to repeal the Affordable Care Act now and the process Democrats used when they first wrote the law, back in 2009 and 2010. This has always been one of the GOP’s favorite talking points ― that, according to the party narrative, Democrats wrote the bill in secret and then rushed a vote before anybody really knew what was in it.
“We were very polarized because the Democrats did, frankly, exactly the same thing,” Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) told reporters on Capitol Hill Tuesday. “So we had a very polarized bill that the public debated for years and years. I don’t think the parties are any different. I would give criticism equally to the parties.”
It’s true that, this year, Democrats indicated early that they wanted no part of a bill that would take away health insurance from millions of people, as every repeal proposal being discussed would do. (The House bill, on which the Senate has based its legislation, would take away coverage from 23 million people, according to a Congressional Budget Office projection.) Of course, it’s also true that Schumer and Democrats made it clear they would happily work on bipartisan reforms, even major ones, that would make coverage more secure or affordable without causing the number of uninsured to rise.
But the really important context for this debate is the Republican claims about what happened in 2009 and 2010 and how those claims hold up to scrutiny.
They don’t hold up well.
In reality, Democrats spent more than a year debating their proposal out in the open. Five separate committees, three in the House and two in the Senate, held literally hundreds of hours of hearings and produced testimony from experts representing multiple philosophical views and officials from pretty much every group or industry involved with health care. Republicans had opportunities to question those witnesses and to propose amendments, some of which actually ended up in the legislation.
You don't have to mythologize the 2009-2010 process to see how different the 2017 process has been.
McConnell, as it happens, made his own vow of noncooperation ― later telling The Atlantic’s Joshua Green he wanted no GOP “fingerprints” on Democratic legislation. Even so, Democratic leaders tried desperately to win over a handful of moderate Republicans who seemed most likely to support health care reform. Then-Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus (D-Mont.) and former President Barack Obama personally invested hours in one-on-one meetings with individual Republican senators, especially then-Sen. Olympia Snowe (R-Maine) ― who ultimately voted for the Finance Committee’s bill, even though she voted against the final Democratic legislation on the floor.
Before the final Senate vote, in December 2009, Republicans warned they hadn’t seen final details before voting on the bill. But by that point nearly a year had passed and the big questions were all settled. Later, as the debate dragged into early 2010, Obama personally engaged Republicans ― at length ― on two separate occasions, one at a Republican Party retreat in Baltimore and then at a daylong bipartisan session at the Blair House.
Writing legislation is almost never elegant and there was plenty of negotiation that went on behind closed doors. The result was some famously ugly deals, such as the “Cornhusker kickback” that would have boosted federal Medicaid payments to Nebraska to secure the vote of then-Sen. Ben Nelson (D-Neb.). Many Democratic leaders were happy not to work with Republicans. (They were furious at Baucus for dragging out negotiations.) And of course the final legislation violated some key promises its supporters made ― chief among them, a vow to let people who liked their existing health care plans keep them.
But by and large the architects of the law were clear about what they were trying to do and how they proposed to do it ― in part because they’d been promoting and defending these ideas, in detail, ever since Obama had started his presidential campaign years before. And once in power they used the traditional committee process ― if not so much to write the legislative language then at least to give the media, interest groups and ultimately the public an opportunity to understand what was up for discussion and eventually form an opinion on that.
You don’t have to mythologize the 2009-2010 process to see how different the 2017 process has been. (Take it from other reporters who covered the Affordable Care Act, like Sarah Kliff and Julie Rovner, who have made this point already.) And it’s not hard to figure out why Senate GOP leaders are proceeding in the way they are.
Although those leaders haven’t indicated how they intend to resolve some key issues, the ultimate impact of the bill is already clear, as HuffPost’s Jeff Young has written. That proposal would take away insurance from millions, remove consumer protections that people value, and push insurance in the direction of greater exposure to out-of-pocket costs.
None of this is popular. None of this is what Republicans promised to do. Debating their bill openly would force them to admit that, and so they are trying to avoid public scrutiny for as long as possible.
Igor Bobic contributed reporting.
-- This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website. Reported by Huffington Post 5 hours ago.
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Senate Republicans Don't Really Care About The Loathed AHCA Process
WASHINGTON ― Senate Republicans are speeding toward a vote next week on their Obamacare replacement bill, even as GOP lawmakers can’t answer simple questions about the legislation, express frustration with the brazenly secretive and closed process, and don’t appear to have the votes yet for passage.
Republicans expected to get more details on their Affordable Care Act rewrite during a closed-door meeting Tuesday with Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price. Instead, they got more vague happy talk from Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and a speech from Price on what HHS has been doing to rein in Obamacare.
With Senate Democrats badgering Republicans about how they’re ramming this bill through ― no hearings, no markups, hiding the bill from members ― some GOP lawmakers are now acknowledging that the process has been less than stellar.
When Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) was asked whether this bill should be a template for lawmaking in the future, he sarcastically answered that “this is exactly the kind of legislative process our Founding Fathers had in mind,” going on to explain that he was obviously concerned the Senate may be voting on a health care bill next week that members won’t have seen.
But when reminded that he could withhold his support for the legislation until the process had improved, McCain said he couldn’t “say no to something I haven’t seen.”
It was a similar story with Sen. Bob Corker (R-Tenn.), who told reporters that he’s advocated for an open process from day one. “But again,” Corker said, “when you’re dealing with things which are being done here in a totally partisan way ― which is understandable ― I mean, that’s the way reconciliation works.”
After all their complaints about the way in which Democrats passed a second part of the Affordable Care Act in 2010 ― the first part of the legislation passed with 60 votes and was the product of more than 100 hearings ― Republicans have turned around and proceeded to use a legislative process that the Senate historian says has not been so secretive nor so partisan since World War I.
And if any Republican actually cared that the Senate GOP was acting in this manner, the senator could stand up and refuse to vote for the bill until the process improves.
Conversely, part of the reason the Senate is in this procedural position is because Democrats have been clear that none of them will vote for this bill, and even with the brazen GOP attempts to shut them out of the process, Democrats have struggled to mount an effective response to the legislative railroading, resorting to stunts and dilatory tactics in hopes of blocking a bill they have not seen.
On Tuesday, Democratic Sens. Chris Murphy of Connecticut, Cory Booker of New Jersey and Brian Schatz of Hawaii took a cab to the Congressional Budget Office to search for the legislation. They ended up, as they expected, empty-handed.
At a late-night Senate session Monday, Democrats decried the process on C-SPAN2, but it seemed to do little to win over their Republican colleagues or whip up the kind of outrage Republicans managed in 2010. In fact, even as Senate Republicans acknowledged the poor process, they maintained that their process was still somehow better than the Democrats’ in 2010 ― a blatant mischaracterization of how Obamacare was actually passed.
But all the GOP congressional shenanigans will be for naught if McConnell can’t get the bill through his chamber. And if McConnell really is intent on a vote next week, he will have to work expeditiously to build a coalition of 50 votes ― a coalition he doesn’t appear to have at the moment among the Senate’s 52 Republicans.
McConnell faces vote problems from both conservatives and moderates. Sens. Rand Paul (R-Ky.), Mike Lee (R-Utah) and Ted Cruz (R-Texas) have all expressed frustration with a number of provisions that they deem insufficient toward repealing Obamacare. They want a quick phaseout of the Medicaid expansion, the removal of certain regulations (like the protections for people with pre-existing conditions) to lower premiums and the abolishment of the taxes created under the Affordable Care Act. Paul has also resisted the creation of new tax subsidies to help pay for health insurance, a signal that his vote may not ever be gettable, though he and his staff have worked hard to not be written off in the negotiations.
If the three conservatives stick together, they alone have the votes to sink the Senate’s chances of an Obamacare repeal. But giving in to those demands would jeopardize many more votes from other parts of the GOP conference, and McConnell has basically said the pre-existing condition protections will not be dropped from the Senate bill as they were in the House version ― a condition for the support of many Senate moderates.
McConnell is basically gambling that he can get Paul, Cruz and Lee (or at least one of them) to accept a partial repeal as a step in the right direction, and he may, at least partially, be right. None of those conservatives has taken a hard line on what he needs at a minimum to support the bill.
Cruz repeatedly told HuffPost on Tuesday that “the most important issue” with the health care bill is that it lower premiums. “That’s my No. 1 priority on Obamacare, because it’s the biggest reason that people are unhappy with Obamacare,” Cruz said. But asked repeatedly whether he would vote against a bill that didn’t lower premiums and kept those so-called community rating provisions that ensure sick people are charged the same as healthy people, Cruz dodged the question, again and again, coming up with new ways to restate that his central focus was on lowering premiums.
That unwillingness to take a firm stance on any issue could be gamesmanship, as conservatives seek to avoid marginalizing themselves, but it also may be a recognition that they ultimately won’t be the ones who derail an Obamacare repeal.
Asked if he would really stand up to President Donald Trump on this health care bill, Cruz returned to his central focus: “From the beginning, I have been very clear with the president, the vice president and with members of both houses that our focus has to be on lowering premiums.”
Cruz’s refusal to be tied down may be a reflection of the political reality. He is up for reelection in 2018, and, despite his popularity in Texas, he faces stiff competition in Rep. Beto O’Rourke (D-Texas), meaning he will need the Republican base’s support ― something that may have already been jeopardized with his up-and-down relationship with Trump.
Lee and Paul may have more latitude to vote against the president’s wishes, but they also may be withholding support just to force the legislation further to the right. As Cruz noted Tuesday, Senate GOP leadership hasn’t decided how much of the Obamacare taxes will be repealed, and it’s still in flux how fast the Medicaid expansion would be phased out. Senators desperately want a seat at the table as those questions are sorted out.
On the other side of the conference, some moderates may also be playing a similar game. From the beginning, Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) has looked like one of the toughest votes to win over, and yet she has seemed more amenable in recent weeks, narrowing some of her problems with the legislation to its cuts in Planned Parenthood funding and its quicker phaseout of the Medicaid expansion. Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) has also expressed similar reservations, along with some Alaska-specific issues, but she hasn’t ruled out voting for the bill.
“You don’t know until you see it, right?” Murkowski said Tuesday about specifics in the bill. “What we’re trying to do is get a health care system that’s not only good for Alaska, but it’s also good for the country.”
And then there are the concerns of other senators ― particularly the ones from states that greatly benefited from the Medicaid expansion. Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.) and Rob Portman (R-Ohio) have both shown willingness to end that expansion, but they want to do it over seven years, not the three that McConnell and conservatives favor.
Just how long they would go for, and whether a shorter timeline might cost McConnell their votes, is unknown, but they, too, want a seat at the table.
Which is all to say there are many Republican senators who could potentially vote no, especially if it’s clear McConnell doesn’t have the votes. Would Sen. Dean Heller (R-Nev.), perhaps the most vulnerable Republican up for reelection in 2018, really vote for the bill if it’s going down?
McConnell has said he will put the bill on the floor with or without the votes. But a failed vote would almost certainly make it more difficult for senators to change their votes later ― a fact that may cause McConnell to pull the bill at the last minute next week.
Part of the reason the House was successful in passing its health care bill was that Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) didn’t force members to go on the record until leaders were sure they had the votes. In fact, one of the reasons the bill may have gotten through the House was that Democratic opposition let up after Republicans didn’t seem to have the votes, with leaders then able to speed the bill through the chamber once they had an agreement between conservatives and moderates.
In the end, that may be the real legislative template McConnell is using.
Jonathan Cohn contributed to this report.
-- This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website. Reported by Huffington Post 3 hours ago.
Republicans expected to get more details on their Affordable Care Act rewrite during a closed-door meeting Tuesday with Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price. Instead, they got more vague happy talk from Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and a speech from Price on what HHS has been doing to rein in Obamacare.
With Senate Democrats badgering Republicans about how they’re ramming this bill through ― no hearings, no markups, hiding the bill from members ― some GOP lawmakers are now acknowledging that the process has been less than stellar.
When Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) was asked whether this bill should be a template for lawmaking in the future, he sarcastically answered that “this is exactly the kind of legislative process our Founding Fathers had in mind,” going on to explain that he was obviously concerned the Senate may be voting on a health care bill next week that members won’t have seen.
But when reminded that he could withhold his support for the legislation until the process had improved, McCain said he couldn’t “say no to something I haven’t seen.”
It was a similar story with Sen. Bob Corker (R-Tenn.), who told reporters that he’s advocated for an open process from day one. “But again,” Corker said, “when you’re dealing with things which are being done here in a totally partisan way ― which is understandable ― I mean, that’s the way reconciliation works.”
After all their complaints about the way in which Democrats passed a second part of the Affordable Care Act in 2010 ― the first part of the legislation passed with 60 votes and was the product of more than 100 hearings ― Republicans have turned around and proceeded to use a legislative process that the Senate historian says has not been so secretive nor so partisan since World War I.
And if any Republican actually cared that the Senate GOP was acting in this manner, the senator could stand up and refuse to vote for the bill until the process improves.
Conversely, part of the reason the Senate is in this procedural position is because Democrats have been clear that none of them will vote for this bill, and even with the brazen GOP attempts to shut them out of the process, Democrats have struggled to mount an effective response to the legislative railroading, resorting to stunts and dilatory tactics in hopes of blocking a bill they have not seen.
On Tuesday, Democratic Sens. Chris Murphy of Connecticut, Cory Booker of New Jersey and Brian Schatz of Hawaii took a cab to the Congressional Budget Office to search for the legislation. They ended up, as they expected, empty-handed.
At a late-night Senate session Monday, Democrats decried the process on C-SPAN2, but it seemed to do little to win over their Republican colleagues or whip up the kind of outrage Republicans managed in 2010. In fact, even as Senate Republicans acknowledged the poor process, they maintained that their process was still somehow better than the Democrats’ in 2010 ― a blatant mischaracterization of how Obamacare was actually passed.
But all the GOP congressional shenanigans will be for naught if McConnell can’t get the bill through his chamber. And if McConnell really is intent on a vote next week, he will have to work expeditiously to build a coalition of 50 votes ― a coalition he doesn’t appear to have at the moment among the Senate’s 52 Republicans.
McConnell faces vote problems from both conservatives and moderates. Sens. Rand Paul (R-Ky.), Mike Lee (R-Utah) and Ted Cruz (R-Texas) have all expressed frustration with a number of provisions that they deem insufficient toward repealing Obamacare. They want a quick phaseout of the Medicaid expansion, the removal of certain regulations (like the protections for people with pre-existing conditions) to lower premiums and the abolishment of the taxes created under the Affordable Care Act. Paul has also resisted the creation of new tax subsidies to help pay for health insurance, a signal that his vote may not ever be gettable, though he and his staff have worked hard to not be written off in the negotiations.
If the three conservatives stick together, they alone have the votes to sink the Senate’s chances of an Obamacare repeal. But giving in to those demands would jeopardize many more votes from other parts of the GOP conference, and McConnell has basically said the pre-existing condition protections will not be dropped from the Senate bill as they were in the House version ― a condition for the support of many Senate moderates.
McConnell is basically gambling that he can get Paul, Cruz and Lee (or at least one of them) to accept a partial repeal as a step in the right direction, and he may, at least partially, be right. None of those conservatives has taken a hard line on what he needs at a minimum to support the bill.
Cruz repeatedly told HuffPost on Tuesday that “the most important issue” with the health care bill is that it lower premiums. “That’s my No. 1 priority on Obamacare, because it’s the biggest reason that people are unhappy with Obamacare,” Cruz said. But asked repeatedly whether he would vote against a bill that didn’t lower premiums and kept those so-called community rating provisions that ensure sick people are charged the same as healthy people, Cruz dodged the question, again and again, coming up with new ways to restate that his central focus was on lowering premiums.
That unwillingness to take a firm stance on any issue could be gamesmanship, as conservatives seek to avoid marginalizing themselves, but it also may be a recognition that they ultimately won’t be the ones who derail an Obamacare repeal.
Asked if he would really stand up to President Donald Trump on this health care bill, Cruz returned to his central focus: “From the beginning, I have been very clear with the president, the vice president and with members of both houses that our focus has to be on lowering premiums.”
Cruz’s refusal to be tied down may be a reflection of the political reality. He is up for reelection in 2018, and, despite his popularity in Texas, he faces stiff competition in Rep. Beto O’Rourke (D-Texas), meaning he will need the Republican base’s support ― something that may have already been jeopardized with his up-and-down relationship with Trump.
Lee and Paul may have more latitude to vote against the president’s wishes, but they also may be withholding support just to force the legislation further to the right. As Cruz noted Tuesday, Senate GOP leadership hasn’t decided how much of the Obamacare taxes will be repealed, and it’s still in flux how fast the Medicaid expansion would be phased out. Senators desperately want a seat at the table as those questions are sorted out.
On the other side of the conference, some moderates may also be playing a similar game. From the beginning, Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) has looked like one of the toughest votes to win over, and yet she has seemed more amenable in recent weeks, narrowing some of her problems with the legislation to its cuts in Planned Parenthood funding and its quicker phaseout of the Medicaid expansion. Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) has also expressed similar reservations, along with some Alaska-specific issues, but she hasn’t ruled out voting for the bill.
“You don’t know until you see it, right?” Murkowski said Tuesday about specifics in the bill. “What we’re trying to do is get a health care system that’s not only good for Alaska, but it’s also good for the country.”
And then there are the concerns of other senators ― particularly the ones from states that greatly benefited from the Medicaid expansion. Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.) and Rob Portman (R-Ohio) have both shown willingness to end that expansion, but they want to do it over seven years, not the three that McConnell and conservatives favor.
Just how long they would go for, and whether a shorter timeline might cost McConnell their votes, is unknown, but they, too, want a seat at the table.
Which is all to say there are many Republican senators who could potentially vote no, especially if it’s clear McConnell doesn’t have the votes. Would Sen. Dean Heller (R-Nev.), perhaps the most vulnerable Republican up for reelection in 2018, really vote for the bill if it’s going down?
McConnell has said he will put the bill on the floor with or without the votes. But a failed vote would almost certainly make it more difficult for senators to change their votes later ― a fact that may cause McConnell to pull the bill at the last minute next week.
Part of the reason the House was successful in passing its health care bill was that Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) didn’t force members to go on the record until leaders were sure they had the votes. In fact, one of the reasons the bill may have gotten through the House was that Democratic opposition let up after Republicans didn’t seem to have the votes, with leaders then able to speed the bill through the chamber once they had an agreement between conservatives and moderates.
In the end, that may be the real legislative template McConnell is using.
Jonathan Cohn contributed to this report.
-- This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website. Reported by Huffington Post 3 hours ago.
↧
Republicans Hold On To Mick Mulvaney's Old House Seat In South Carolina
Republican Ralph Norman won Tuesday’s special election in South Carolina for a U.S. House seat, defeating Democrat Archie Parnell in the solidly GOP 5th Congressional District, according to The Associated Press.
Norman, a 63-year-old real estate developer and former state lawmaker, replaces fellow Republican Mick Mulvaney, who left Congress to become President Donald Trump’s budget director.
Parnell, a 66-year-old tax attorney, mounted an unusually ambitious challenge in the district where the conservative Mulvaney cruised to re-election in 2016. His scrappy campaign, and the support it received from the national Democratic Party, excited local activists accustomed to being written off by party leaders.
Michele Horne, 42, a Rock Hill-based supporter of Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) who volunteered for Parnell, blamed the outcome on her fellow constituents’ strong identification with the Republican Party.
“South Carolinians still have not gotten to the point where they can look at issues versus keeping it strictly partisan politics,” said Horne, a co-founder of the progressive #DemEnter group. “On the issues, Archie is clearly a better choice for anybody who lives in the state other than very wealthy people.”
Norman is likely to add to the strength of the House’s contingent of fiscal hard-liners. He has said he would consider joining the House Freedom Caucus, a group Mulvaney helped found and which is comprised of the chamber’s most conservative Republicans.
Norman campaigned heavily on his commitment to helping Trump enact his agenda, including the repeal of Obamacare. He has also embraced raising the Social Security retirement age and, following last week’s shooting of House Majority Whip Steve Scalise and others at a baseball field, said he believes more members of Congress should carry guns.
In addition, Norman touted the endorsements of high-profile national conservatives, including Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) and Fox News host Sean Hannity.
Trump recorded a robocall for Norman over the weekend and tweeted his support for the GOP candidate on Monday:
Ralph Norman, who is running for Congress in SC's 5th District, will be a fantastic help to me in cutting taxes, and....
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 19, 2017
....getting great border security and healthcare. #VoteRalphNorman tomorrow!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 19, 2017
The district, a largely rural swath of the state that stretches from Sumter in the south to the suburbs of Charlotte, North Carolina, was always going to be difficult territory for a Democrat.
Mulvaney was re-elected there in 2016 by 20 percentage points, and Trump defeated Hillary Clinton among the district’s voters by 18.5 points.
But in a year where Democrats have been chomping at the bit to humble Trump with upset victories in special election races, Parnell ran his party’s most formidable campaign in the district since 2010. That was when Mulvaney unseated veteran Rep. John Spratt, ending the Democrats’ more-than-century-long hold on the seat.
Parnell raised $763,000 for his bid, including $305,000 that he either lent or donated to the campaign. Norman raised $1.3 million, much of which also came from his own pocket.
The national attention and resources showered on what polls showed to be a neck-and-neck special election Tuesday in Georgia’s 6th congressional district overshadowed the race in South Carolina.
But Democrats in Washington, D.C. did not ignore Parnell entirely.
Shortly after Parnell released an internal poll at the end of May showing that he had narrowed Norman’s lead to 10 percentage points, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee contributed $275,000 to his bid.
Democratic National Committee chairman Tom Perez, DNC Associate Chairman Jaime Harrison and American Federation of Teachers President Randi Weingarten canvassed for Parnell as part of the kickoff of the DNC’s “Resistance Summer.” Former Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley and Ohio Rep. Tim Ryan also campaigned for Parnell in person, while fomer Vice President Joe Biden taped a robocall for him. Parnell was previously a tax adviser for Wall Street giant Goldman Sachs. Before entering the private sector, he served as a tax attorney for the Department of Justice and staff director of the House Ways and Means Committee.
Rather than shy away from his lucrative Hong Kong-based stint at Goldman Sachs, Parnell claimed that experience gave him the expertise needed to cut middle-class families’ taxes and close corporate tax loopholes. He even laughed about it on more than one occasion.
“I know enough about our crazy tax code to absolutely bore you to tears,” Parnell said in “Know-How,” one of two ads he aired on television.
“You have no idea,” Parnell’s wife Sara deadpanned.
Seeking the support of Republicans and independents, Parnell emphasized his commitment to compromising with lawmakers on the other side of the aisle and rejected a push for single-payer health insurance in favor of fixing Obamacare.
At the same time, he didn’t back away from more progressive Democratic positions, such as calling for importation of safe prescription drugs and opposing all cuts to Social Security benefits. He also went on record supporting the Dodd-Frank Wall Street reform law, abortion rights and closing the “default to proceed” loophole that allows guns sales without background checks if the FBI fails to complete the screening within three days.
With positions like those, Parnell managed to attract the enthusiastic backing of the local Sanders supporters.
“I like the idea that he understands how business works,” said Susan Maxson, a 54-year-old Sanders enthusiast and campaign volunteer. “I’m not gonna hold his previous employer against him by any means.”
-- This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website. Reported by Huffington Post 1 hour ago.
Norman, a 63-year-old real estate developer and former state lawmaker, replaces fellow Republican Mick Mulvaney, who left Congress to become President Donald Trump’s budget director.
Parnell, a 66-year-old tax attorney, mounted an unusually ambitious challenge in the district where the conservative Mulvaney cruised to re-election in 2016. His scrappy campaign, and the support it received from the national Democratic Party, excited local activists accustomed to being written off by party leaders.
Michele Horne, 42, a Rock Hill-based supporter of Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) who volunteered for Parnell, blamed the outcome on her fellow constituents’ strong identification with the Republican Party.
“South Carolinians still have not gotten to the point where they can look at issues versus keeping it strictly partisan politics,” said Horne, a co-founder of the progressive #DemEnter group. “On the issues, Archie is clearly a better choice for anybody who lives in the state other than very wealthy people.”
Norman is likely to add to the strength of the House’s contingent of fiscal hard-liners. He has said he would consider joining the House Freedom Caucus, a group Mulvaney helped found and which is comprised of the chamber’s most conservative Republicans.
Norman campaigned heavily on his commitment to helping Trump enact his agenda, including the repeal of Obamacare. He has also embraced raising the Social Security retirement age and, following last week’s shooting of House Majority Whip Steve Scalise and others at a baseball field, said he believes more members of Congress should carry guns.
In addition, Norman touted the endorsements of high-profile national conservatives, including Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) and Fox News host Sean Hannity.
Trump recorded a robocall for Norman over the weekend and tweeted his support for the GOP candidate on Monday:
Ralph Norman, who is running for Congress in SC's 5th District, will be a fantastic help to me in cutting taxes, and....
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 19, 2017
....getting great border security and healthcare. #VoteRalphNorman tomorrow!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 19, 2017
The district, a largely rural swath of the state that stretches from Sumter in the south to the suburbs of Charlotte, North Carolina, was always going to be difficult territory for a Democrat.
Mulvaney was re-elected there in 2016 by 20 percentage points, and Trump defeated Hillary Clinton among the district’s voters by 18.5 points.
But in a year where Democrats have been chomping at the bit to humble Trump with upset victories in special election races, Parnell ran his party’s most formidable campaign in the district since 2010. That was when Mulvaney unseated veteran Rep. John Spratt, ending the Democrats’ more-than-century-long hold on the seat.
Parnell raised $763,000 for his bid, including $305,000 that he either lent or donated to the campaign. Norman raised $1.3 million, much of which also came from his own pocket.
The national attention and resources showered on what polls showed to be a neck-and-neck special election Tuesday in Georgia’s 6th congressional district overshadowed the race in South Carolina.
But Democrats in Washington, D.C. did not ignore Parnell entirely.
Shortly after Parnell released an internal poll at the end of May showing that he had narrowed Norman’s lead to 10 percentage points, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee contributed $275,000 to his bid.
Democratic National Committee chairman Tom Perez, DNC Associate Chairman Jaime Harrison and American Federation of Teachers President Randi Weingarten canvassed for Parnell as part of the kickoff of the DNC’s “Resistance Summer.” Former Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley and Ohio Rep. Tim Ryan also campaigned for Parnell in person, while fomer Vice President Joe Biden taped a robocall for him. Parnell was previously a tax adviser for Wall Street giant Goldman Sachs. Before entering the private sector, he served as a tax attorney for the Department of Justice and staff director of the House Ways and Means Committee.
Rather than shy away from his lucrative Hong Kong-based stint at Goldman Sachs, Parnell claimed that experience gave him the expertise needed to cut middle-class families’ taxes and close corporate tax loopholes. He even laughed about it on more than one occasion.
“I know enough about our crazy tax code to absolutely bore you to tears,” Parnell said in “Know-How,” one of two ads he aired on television.
“You have no idea,” Parnell’s wife Sara deadpanned.
Seeking the support of Republicans and independents, Parnell emphasized his commitment to compromising with lawmakers on the other side of the aisle and rejected a push for single-payer health insurance in favor of fixing Obamacare.
At the same time, he didn’t back away from more progressive Democratic positions, such as calling for importation of safe prescription drugs and opposing all cuts to Social Security benefits. He also went on record supporting the Dodd-Frank Wall Street reform law, abortion rights and closing the “default to proceed” loophole that allows guns sales without background checks if the FBI fails to complete the screening within three days.
With positions like those, Parnell managed to attract the enthusiastic backing of the local Sanders supporters.
“I like the idea that he understands how business works,” said Susan Maxson, a 54-year-old Sanders enthusiast and campaign volunteer. “I’m not gonna hold his previous employer against him by any means.”
-- This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website. Reported by Huffington Post 1 hour ago.
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ALC Health Approved as Lloyd's Coverholder, Opens Hong Kong Office
HONG KONG, June 21, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- A la carte healthcare (ALC Health), an award-winning international medical insurance provider, is pleased to announce that it has been confirmed as a Lloyd's Coverholder in Hong Kong.The company has been granted binding authority with underwriters at Lloyd's in Hong Kong, and is registered locally with the Insurance Agents Registration Board (IARB) as ALC Health (Hong Kong) Ltd. All new and renewal Hong Kong business will transfer to this binder from 1 July 2017.
"Our status as a Lloyd's Coverholder gives clients and brokers even more confidence in ALC Health and our products," said Founder and CEO Sarah Jewell, MBE. "With tightening regulations for the health insurance industry in Hong Kong, this will afford us more opportunities for growth and increased flexibility in serving the market."
ALC Health, a subsidiary of global benefits and assistance services provider International Medical Group® (IMG®), has also opened an office in Hong Kong, appointing Harry Amende as business development executive.
Amende, who has several years of experience in the Hong Kong insurance market, is responsible for increasing broker lead sales and establishing customer support functions at the newly established Hong Kong office.
ALC Health is seeking a claims handler to join Amende in the Hong Kong office. Candidates should be bilingual in English and Mandarin/Cantonese, with experience in the health insurance industry.
"Although we have served the Hong Kong market for many years, we are thrilled to finally open an office and establish our local presence," Jewell said. "We look forward to continuing to provide our clients and brokers the first-class support they have come to expect from ALC Health."
*About ALC Health*
A la carte healthcare (ALC Heath) is an award-winning international medical insurance provider who, for over 15 years, has been protecting the health of private clients, companies and organisations across the globe. ALC Health was built and continues to grow on a philosophy of ensuring that private clients, corporate and intermediaries are all offered a high-quality personal service. For more information, please visit www.alchealth.com.
*About International Medical Group*
International Medical Group^® (IMG^®), an award-winning provider of global insurance benefits and assistance services for more than 25 years, enables its members to worry less and experience more by delivering the protection they need, backed by the support they deserve. IMG offers a full line of international medical insurance products, as well as trip cancellation programs, medical management services and 24/7 emergency medical and travel assistance — all designed to provide members Global Peace of Mind^® while they're away from home. For more information, please visit www.imglobal.com. Reported by PR Newswire Asia 12 hours ago.
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Ralph Nader: Closing Democracy’s Doors Until The People Open Them – OpEd
In 2006 a book was published called Losing Our Democracy by civic leader, Mark Green. His 21^st book, it was the usual Mark Green brand of meticulous research with memorable examples. One would have thought such an important subject would have received wide coverage and circulation. In fact, it was almost completely ignored by reviewers and the media interviewers. In 2017, the danger of having the door shut on the practice of democracy by its citizens is more important than at any other time in recent history.
Republicans prefer to use the words “liberty” and “freedom,” not “democracy.” Why? Because democracy includes these rights but adds “justice,” which holds those in power accountable and brings them down to earth where people live, work and raise their families.
Look at some ways democracy’s doors are closing. Thirteen Republican senators (all men) are now meeting secretly behind closed doors to further deny American families access to affordable, accessible healthcare. They arrogantly (or cynically) have refused to hold a single public hearing. In 2009-2010 the Senate held over 100 bipartisan public hearings and 25 days of floor debate before passing The Affordable Care Act, having accepted numerous Republican amendments.
Today, Mitch McConnell (R-KY), the dictator of the Senate, aims to jam this cruel and vicious legislation through the Senate by the end of June, a bill which would take away health insurance from 23 million people, many of whom will die or remain sick, and destroy many critical protections for vulnerable Americans. The legislation also gives a huge tax cut for the rich at the expense of America’s sick children and adults with disabilities.
This is just one example of Americans being denied access to justice in “the land of the free.”
Voting suppression and gerrymandered one-party districts exist in many states. More doors closing. Your right to your day in court against the perpetrators who caused your wrongful injuries has been rolled back in the House of Representatives and in many state legislatures, literally closing democracy’s door to your local courtrooms.
The US Supreme Court, with a 5 to 4 corporatist majority, thrives on closing doors on workers organizing through labor unions, consumers standing up for their rights and citizens demanding environmental health and fair taxation for corporations.
Astonishingly, the Trump White House suggests that its federal agency heads do not have to respond to inquiries from members of Congress, while Congressional leaders are trying to hold back reporters’ access to legislators on Capitol Hill.
At the Federal Communications Commission, Chairman Ajit Pai is pushing to shut out or make more expensive the people’s access to the Internet and to their own public airwaves. Of course, this will benefit big business.
The Securities and Exchange Commission, led by former Wall Street executive Jay Clayton, is moving to make it even more difficult for shareholders – the owners of publicly traded corporations – to exercise their rights of ownership. Many shareholder rights have already been nearly stripped bare by previous corporatists. Closing doors to the owners in favor of corporate bosses in a touted capitalistic economy is what is partly meant by the corporate state – using government to further entrench the corporate supremacists.
The mass media is shutting out the works of citizen groups who are the advocates for more open doors for justice on behalf of consumers, families, marginalized groups, workers and the environment. See breakingthroughpower.org and ask why, over eight days last year, this historic gathering of civic leaders and justice builders was blocked out by the big print and electronic media. In an age of narrow and sensationalized coverage, it is more difficult than ever for the civil society to participate in mainstream discourse via the media.
Doors are closing on small individual debtors. Fees for regular people to file court cases are going up and judicial procedures are reversing their historic purpose and closing doors on the powerless.
Many consumers are closing doors on themselves by not fighting for their existing rights or to create new rights Buying from giant absentee companies like Amazon closes the doors on Main Street, with its community-binding small businesses that pay property taxes for schools and other public facilities.
What used to be heralded as our sacred right to “freedom of contract” has been frozen by the fine print contracts that we either sign on the dotted line or click to accept. These inscrutable contracts strip us of our consumer rights, block our right to go to court, including banding together in class actions, and often give the vendors the power to change the terms, unilaterally claiming terms buried in the fine print give them the ultimate power of control.
Third political parties that wish to give the voters more voices and choices are held down by the big two-party duopoly. Independent new parties know what closing democracy’s door is like from ballot access obstacles to exclusion from the candidate debates.
Citizens of America, the Fourth of July is coming up – the day in 1776 when American patriots rebelled against King George III’s closed doors and exclusion from justice. Then and now, everyday people find themselves shut out by the powers that be. Today, millions of shut out Americans face daily denial of healthcare, secretive companies repeatedly telling them to get lost and bureaucrats invoking government secrecy.
Raise your voices, Americans! Shake off the clever slogans and lies of the craven politicians and the intricate chains enveloping your credit/debit economy. Challenge an educational system that avoids giving the next generation the citizen skills and experience necessary to open the doors of democracy and secure its many blessings.
Start with the Congress to whom you have delegated, but not surrendered, your Constitutional power. This Fourth of July, you can make your voices heard in front of your senators’ and representative’s local offices, and call on your friends and neighbors to do the same through social media. No one can stop you from opening that door, at least not yet. Visit breakingthroughpower.org for a Citizen Summons to your legislators that can start opening the doors. Reported by Eurasia Review 12 hours ago.
Republicans prefer to use the words “liberty” and “freedom,” not “democracy.” Why? Because democracy includes these rights but adds “justice,” which holds those in power accountable and brings them down to earth where people live, work and raise their families.
Look at some ways democracy’s doors are closing. Thirteen Republican senators (all men) are now meeting secretly behind closed doors to further deny American families access to affordable, accessible healthcare. They arrogantly (or cynically) have refused to hold a single public hearing. In 2009-2010 the Senate held over 100 bipartisan public hearings and 25 days of floor debate before passing The Affordable Care Act, having accepted numerous Republican amendments.
Today, Mitch McConnell (R-KY), the dictator of the Senate, aims to jam this cruel and vicious legislation through the Senate by the end of June, a bill which would take away health insurance from 23 million people, many of whom will die or remain sick, and destroy many critical protections for vulnerable Americans. The legislation also gives a huge tax cut for the rich at the expense of America’s sick children and adults with disabilities.
This is just one example of Americans being denied access to justice in “the land of the free.”
Voting suppression and gerrymandered one-party districts exist in many states. More doors closing. Your right to your day in court against the perpetrators who caused your wrongful injuries has been rolled back in the House of Representatives and in many state legislatures, literally closing democracy’s door to your local courtrooms.
The US Supreme Court, with a 5 to 4 corporatist majority, thrives on closing doors on workers organizing through labor unions, consumers standing up for their rights and citizens demanding environmental health and fair taxation for corporations.
Astonishingly, the Trump White House suggests that its federal agency heads do not have to respond to inquiries from members of Congress, while Congressional leaders are trying to hold back reporters’ access to legislators on Capitol Hill.
At the Federal Communications Commission, Chairman Ajit Pai is pushing to shut out or make more expensive the people’s access to the Internet and to their own public airwaves. Of course, this will benefit big business.
The Securities and Exchange Commission, led by former Wall Street executive Jay Clayton, is moving to make it even more difficult for shareholders – the owners of publicly traded corporations – to exercise their rights of ownership. Many shareholder rights have already been nearly stripped bare by previous corporatists. Closing doors to the owners in favor of corporate bosses in a touted capitalistic economy is what is partly meant by the corporate state – using government to further entrench the corporate supremacists.
The mass media is shutting out the works of citizen groups who are the advocates for more open doors for justice on behalf of consumers, families, marginalized groups, workers and the environment. See breakingthroughpower.org and ask why, over eight days last year, this historic gathering of civic leaders and justice builders was blocked out by the big print and electronic media. In an age of narrow and sensationalized coverage, it is more difficult than ever for the civil society to participate in mainstream discourse via the media.
Doors are closing on small individual debtors. Fees for regular people to file court cases are going up and judicial procedures are reversing their historic purpose and closing doors on the powerless.
Many consumers are closing doors on themselves by not fighting for their existing rights or to create new rights Buying from giant absentee companies like Amazon closes the doors on Main Street, with its community-binding small businesses that pay property taxes for schools and other public facilities.
What used to be heralded as our sacred right to “freedom of contract” has been frozen by the fine print contracts that we either sign on the dotted line or click to accept. These inscrutable contracts strip us of our consumer rights, block our right to go to court, including banding together in class actions, and often give the vendors the power to change the terms, unilaterally claiming terms buried in the fine print give them the ultimate power of control.
Third political parties that wish to give the voters more voices and choices are held down by the big two-party duopoly. Independent new parties know what closing democracy’s door is like from ballot access obstacles to exclusion from the candidate debates.
Citizens of America, the Fourth of July is coming up – the day in 1776 when American patriots rebelled against King George III’s closed doors and exclusion from justice. Then and now, everyday people find themselves shut out by the powers that be. Today, millions of shut out Americans face daily denial of healthcare, secretive companies repeatedly telling them to get lost and bureaucrats invoking government secrecy.
Raise your voices, Americans! Shake off the clever slogans and lies of the craven politicians and the intricate chains enveloping your credit/debit economy. Challenge an educational system that avoids giving the next generation the citizen skills and experience necessary to open the doors of democracy and secure its many blessings.
Start with the Congress to whom you have delegated, but not surrendered, your Constitutional power. This Fourth of July, you can make your voices heard in front of your senators’ and representative’s local offices, and call on your friends and neighbors to do the same through social media. No one can stop you from opening that door, at least not yet. Visit breakingthroughpower.org for a Citizen Summons to your legislators that can start opening the doors. Reported by Eurasia Review 12 hours ago.
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Health Insurance Marketplace Leader Educates Local Agents About Changes
Health insurance marketplace leader, Empower Brokerage, is educating local agents in preparation for the upcoming changes to the health insurance laws.
Southlake, TX (PRWEB) June 21, 2017
This year, Empower Brokerage, located in Southlake, Texas, has organized 23 live seminars – all well-attended – across the state of Texas with many more scheduled through summer. Each seminar expounds on industry news and explores upcoming opportunities. Equipped with the latest tools and products on the market, Empower Brokerage teaches insurance agents how to navigate the ever-changing health insurance industry.
Live seminars are nothing new to Empower Brokerage. In fact, they have hosted thousands of educational lunch seminars over the past twenty years. DeWayne Long, National Sales Director, says, "It's best to get in front of the agents and really get to know them. Only then can we truly help them become successful."
To illustrate how popular these educational seminars truly are, close to 150 independent insurance agents attended the Houston gathering last week. Agents are hungry for the kind of thoughtful guidance Empower seems to offer. Anyone, looking to better their career, seeks useful knowledge from other experienced professionals. It seems refreshing to hear of a company willing to spend the time and money to bring that experience, in person, to the masses in this way.
Empower Brokerage believes in finding out what really matters to insurance agents, researching the best solution, and then teaching that solution. "It's a win / win situation," says William Bronson, Marketing Director. "We want agents to work with us because we're good to them and give them good advice. Not because we have the best sales pitch. So, we try to be the best partner we can be. We give agents tons of tools, resources, training, and access to any carrier they need, without any commission splits. In return, our national contract levels give us our profit. That's it. It's simple and everyone wins. In the end, the consumer benefits because they get a knowledgeable, confident, and well-equipped agent. An agent like this can provide better answers, better service, and be in the business longer than any other."
Andrea Hektner, New Business Development Manager, adds, "There's something for everyone at our seminars. Our speakers cover the latest industry news and the best sales tactics and resources to grow one's business. And if that's not enough, we make sure everyone is well-fed."
The Texas live seminars are slated to be held in: Amarillo, Austin, El Paso, Harlingen, Houston, Laredo, Lubbock, McAllen, San Antonio, Southlake, Texarkana, and Tyler.
As rates continue to soar and insurance companies continue to exit the marketplace, the Affordable Care Act grows increasingly unstable. It's future is further marred by the new CMS ruling, as well as the American Health Care Act, currently under review by the Senate. With the coming changes new opportunities arise. Families, who want more choice, should have it. Families, who were financially struggling with the skyrocketing Obamacare premiums and deductibles, should have options to overcome that situation. People, who liked Obamacare, should still have similar choices. It's really more what you think of when you hear the word, "marketplace."
"Every time we have change, opportunity is not far behind that change. We will be successful and we will teach agents to do the same," says Rodney Culp, CEO.
With so much uncertainty, in the area of health insurance, Americans will certainly benefit from the resources Empower Brokerage is investing. Whether you are a consumer or an insurance professional, knowledge is a powerful thing.
For more agent information, visit https://www.empowerbrokerage.com
For consumer Health Insurance information, visit https://empowerhealthinsuranceusa.com Reported by PRWeb 11 hours ago.
Southlake, TX (PRWEB) June 21, 2017
This year, Empower Brokerage, located in Southlake, Texas, has organized 23 live seminars – all well-attended – across the state of Texas with many more scheduled through summer. Each seminar expounds on industry news and explores upcoming opportunities. Equipped with the latest tools and products on the market, Empower Brokerage teaches insurance agents how to navigate the ever-changing health insurance industry.
Live seminars are nothing new to Empower Brokerage. In fact, they have hosted thousands of educational lunch seminars over the past twenty years. DeWayne Long, National Sales Director, says, "It's best to get in front of the agents and really get to know them. Only then can we truly help them become successful."
To illustrate how popular these educational seminars truly are, close to 150 independent insurance agents attended the Houston gathering last week. Agents are hungry for the kind of thoughtful guidance Empower seems to offer. Anyone, looking to better their career, seeks useful knowledge from other experienced professionals. It seems refreshing to hear of a company willing to spend the time and money to bring that experience, in person, to the masses in this way.
Empower Brokerage believes in finding out what really matters to insurance agents, researching the best solution, and then teaching that solution. "It's a win / win situation," says William Bronson, Marketing Director. "We want agents to work with us because we're good to them and give them good advice. Not because we have the best sales pitch. So, we try to be the best partner we can be. We give agents tons of tools, resources, training, and access to any carrier they need, without any commission splits. In return, our national contract levels give us our profit. That's it. It's simple and everyone wins. In the end, the consumer benefits because they get a knowledgeable, confident, and well-equipped agent. An agent like this can provide better answers, better service, and be in the business longer than any other."
Andrea Hektner, New Business Development Manager, adds, "There's something for everyone at our seminars. Our speakers cover the latest industry news and the best sales tactics and resources to grow one's business. And if that's not enough, we make sure everyone is well-fed."
The Texas live seminars are slated to be held in: Amarillo, Austin, El Paso, Harlingen, Houston, Laredo, Lubbock, McAllen, San Antonio, Southlake, Texarkana, and Tyler.
As rates continue to soar and insurance companies continue to exit the marketplace, the Affordable Care Act grows increasingly unstable. It's future is further marred by the new CMS ruling, as well as the American Health Care Act, currently under review by the Senate. With the coming changes new opportunities arise. Families, who want more choice, should have it. Families, who were financially struggling with the skyrocketing Obamacare premiums and deductibles, should have options to overcome that situation. People, who liked Obamacare, should still have similar choices. It's really more what you think of when you hear the word, "marketplace."
"Every time we have change, opportunity is not far behind that change. We will be successful and we will teach agents to do the same," says Rodney Culp, CEO.
With so much uncertainty, in the area of health insurance, Americans will certainly benefit from the resources Empower Brokerage is investing. Whether you are a consumer or an insurance professional, knowledge is a powerful thing.
For more agent information, visit https://www.empowerbrokerage.com
For consumer Health Insurance information, visit https://empowerhealthinsuranceusa.com Reported by PRWeb 11 hours ago.
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Florida Realtor Carl Marzola Raising Awareness of and Funds for Parkinson’s
Carl Marzola, of Atlantic Properties International, accepts appointment to the Board of Directors of the Parkinson’s Assistance Foundation.
Fort Lauderdale, FL (PRWEB) June 21, 2017
Carl Marzola, owner and CEO of Atlantic Properties International, a globally connected, locally respected real estate company, was recently appointed to the Board of Directors of the Parkinson’s Assistance Foundation. The goal of the foundation is to help with the day-to-day issues Parkinson’s patients face.
“There is a tremendous need for assistance to the many people who are afflicted with this disease and are unable to receive sufficient basic treatment due to their insurance, or they simply do not have that extra $50 or $100 a month to obtain their necessary medicine,” said Marzola, a friend of the founder of the Parkinson’s Assistance Foundation, Dan O’Brien, since high school.
O’Brien, a professional musician, was diagnosed with Parkinson’s in 2012. During clinical trials, a sense of calm came over O’Brien that continues to this day. The stress of daily life became a non-issue and his compassion and tolerance levels increased dramatically.
It was during this time that O’Brien came up with the idea for the Parkinson's Assistance Foundation, and at the end of 2016 it became a 501 c3 non-profit foundation. Through the direct involvement of generous donors, the Parkinson’s Assistance Foundation has been able to provide financial assistance to several individuals in the community struggling to pay for their medications. It has assisted in finding health insurance for some and is currently in the process of developing music therapy, exercise and counseling services to those in need.
“Dan reached out to me and asked if I was able to give any assistance financially no matter the amount to help those in need. Without hesitation, I began to brainstorm just on my immediate contacts whom I thought could bring their talents to the table,” concluded Marzola. “It’s been overwhelmingly well-received, from the personal physical trainers, massage therapists and magazine editors that I know who can spread the word. I just began and will be non-stop. I truly believe in giving back to the community.”
To volunteer at or donate to the Parkinson’s Assistance Foundation, please visit https://parkinsonsassistancefoundation.com/.
About Parkinson’s Assistance Foundation
Parkinson’s Assistance Foundation staff is comprised of a caring group of tireless volunteers dedicated to the well-being of Parkinson’s patients. It provides financial assistance and a strong base of support to those in need. For more information, please call (954) 351-9728.
About the NALA™
The NALA offers small and medium-sized businesses effective ways to reach customers through new media. As a single-agency source, the NALA helps businesses flourish in their local community. The NALA’s mission is to promote a business’ relevant and newsworthy events and achievements, both online and through traditional media. The information and content in this article are not in conjunction with the views of the NALA. For media inquiries, please call 805.650.6121, ext. 361. Reported by PRWeb 10 hours ago.
Fort Lauderdale, FL (PRWEB) June 21, 2017
Carl Marzola, owner and CEO of Atlantic Properties International, a globally connected, locally respected real estate company, was recently appointed to the Board of Directors of the Parkinson’s Assistance Foundation. The goal of the foundation is to help with the day-to-day issues Parkinson’s patients face.
“There is a tremendous need for assistance to the many people who are afflicted with this disease and are unable to receive sufficient basic treatment due to their insurance, or they simply do not have that extra $50 or $100 a month to obtain their necessary medicine,” said Marzola, a friend of the founder of the Parkinson’s Assistance Foundation, Dan O’Brien, since high school.
O’Brien, a professional musician, was diagnosed with Parkinson’s in 2012. During clinical trials, a sense of calm came over O’Brien that continues to this day. The stress of daily life became a non-issue and his compassion and tolerance levels increased dramatically.
It was during this time that O’Brien came up with the idea for the Parkinson's Assistance Foundation, and at the end of 2016 it became a 501 c3 non-profit foundation. Through the direct involvement of generous donors, the Parkinson’s Assistance Foundation has been able to provide financial assistance to several individuals in the community struggling to pay for their medications. It has assisted in finding health insurance for some and is currently in the process of developing music therapy, exercise and counseling services to those in need.
“Dan reached out to me and asked if I was able to give any assistance financially no matter the amount to help those in need. Without hesitation, I began to brainstorm just on my immediate contacts whom I thought could bring their talents to the table,” concluded Marzola. “It’s been overwhelmingly well-received, from the personal physical trainers, massage therapists and magazine editors that I know who can spread the word. I just began and will be non-stop. I truly believe in giving back to the community.”
To volunteer at or donate to the Parkinson’s Assistance Foundation, please visit https://parkinsonsassistancefoundation.com/.
About Parkinson’s Assistance Foundation
Parkinson’s Assistance Foundation staff is comprised of a caring group of tireless volunteers dedicated to the well-being of Parkinson’s patients. It provides financial assistance and a strong base of support to those in need. For more information, please call (954) 351-9728.
About the NALA™
The NALA offers small and medium-sized businesses effective ways to reach customers through new media. As a single-agency source, the NALA helps businesses flourish in their local community. The NALA’s mission is to promote a business’ relevant and newsworthy events and achievements, both online and through traditional media. The information and content in this article are not in conjunction with the views of the NALA. For media inquiries, please call 805.650.6121, ext. 361. Reported by PRWeb 10 hours ago.
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RMACT Joins RESOLVE and ASRM to Express the Needs of the Infertility Community on Capitol Hill
Surgical Director Dr. Spencer Richlin and Patient Advocates, Carrie Van Steen and Lisa Rosenthal, of Reproductive Medicine Associates of Connecticut (RMACT) met with delegates from all seven of Connecticut’s representatives’ offices, including Senator Christopher Murphy, Representative James Himes and Representative Rosa DeLauro, to discuss the importance of infertility treatment.
Norwalk, CT (PRWEB) June 21, 2017
Reproductive Medicine Associates of Connecticut (RMACT) joined the American Society of Reproductive Medicine (ASRM) and RESOLVE: The National Infertility Association at Advocacy Day in Washington, DC on May 18. RMACT’s Surgical Director Dr. Spencer Richlin and two of its Patient Advocates, Carrie Van Steen and Lisa Rosenthal, met with delegates from all seven of Connecticut’s representatives’ offices, including Senator Christopher Murphy, Representative James Himes and Representative Rosa DeLauro.
Based on direction from RESOLVE and ASRM, RMACT’s Advocacy Team delivered three messages on Capitol Hill: the importance of access to infertility care, the need for lasting in vitro fertilization (IVF) coverage for wounded veterans and the understanding that infertility treatment is pro-family. This last message is intended to directly contrast personhood laws; while Connecticut does not have personhood laws, it is important to educate legislators and to discourage other states from implementing personhood laws that would directly affect the ability to use fertility protocols to build families.
Along with these messages, RMACT’s Advocacy Team delivered impassioned letters on behalf of RMACT patients, friends and family. RMACT gathered more letters than any other practice nationwide and because of these efforts Connecticut had more letters than any other state. The letters acted as an important vehicle for patients who wanted to add their voices but were not able to attend the activities in Washington, DC. RMACT collected over 300 letters during the practice’s letter campaign kick off event alone.
“Although Connecticut has comparatively progressive policy, it is important for our representatives to understand how and why this positively affects residents,” says Dr. Richlin, a partner at Fairfield County’s leading fertility practice. “About 50 – 60 percent of our patients have coverage provided by Connecticut’s State Mandate, which makes fertility treatments like IVF more accessible and affordable.”
RMACT considers patient advocacy part of its responsibility. In addition to annually participating in Advocacy Day, RMACT spreads important messages about infertility, including its prevalence and how patients can find treatment. Dr. Joshua M. Hurwitz recently met with representatives to explain the urgent need of fertility preservation for cancer patients. Earlier this month, there was unanimous and bipartisan support in the Connecticut state legislature Bill 7124, which requires health insurance providers in the state to provide fertility preservation treatments for patients diagnosed with cancer starting in January 2018 .
“Fertility care is pro-family, it enables every person the opportunity to have a family,” said Lisa Rosenthal, Connecticut State Team Captain for Advocacy Day. “This is a powerful message, and one with a strong voice behind it as ASRM and RESOLVE joined forces for the first time this year. RMACT was grateful to have the opportunity to represent our patients, our RMACT team members and our state.”
About Reproductive Medicine Associates of Connecticut (RMACT)
RMACT specializes in the treatment of infertility, including assisted reproductive technologies (ART) such as intrauterine insemination (IUI), in-vitro fertilization (IVF), and Pre-implantation Genetic Screening (PGS). RMACT, Fairfield County’s largest fertility clinic and egg donation center, is one of 11 leading In Vitro Fertilization (IVF) centers nationwide chosen by In Vitro Sciences to participate in its Centers of Excellence program. RMACT has offices in Norwalk, Danbury, Stamford and Trumbull, and an affiliate office now in Poughkeepsie, NY. RMACT also offers infertility treatment financing and support services, such as nutrition counseling, individual and couples psychological counseling, acupuncture and yoga, through RMACT’s Integrated Fertility and Wellness Center.
The RMACT team includes lead physicians Drs. Mark P. Leondires, Spencer S. Richlin and Joshua M. Hurwitz, as well as fertility specialists Drs. Cynthia M. Murdock, Shaun C. Williams and Ilana B. Ressler. All six physicians are Board-Certified Reproductive Endocrinologists and are members of the American Society for Reproductive Medicine (ASRM). Five of the doctors are Castle Connolly "Top Doctors" and members of the Society for Assisted Reproductive Technology (SART), the Fairfield County and Connecticut Medical Societies. RMACT’s IVF laboratory is accredited by the College of American Pathologists (CAP), and CLIA; other accreditations include the Accreditation Association for Ambulatory Health Care (AAAHC) and the American Institute for Ultrasound in Medicine (AIUM). For more information visit http://www.RMACT.com or find us on Facebook. Reported by PRWeb 9 hours ago.
Norwalk, CT (PRWEB) June 21, 2017
Reproductive Medicine Associates of Connecticut (RMACT) joined the American Society of Reproductive Medicine (ASRM) and RESOLVE: The National Infertility Association at Advocacy Day in Washington, DC on May 18. RMACT’s Surgical Director Dr. Spencer Richlin and two of its Patient Advocates, Carrie Van Steen and Lisa Rosenthal, met with delegates from all seven of Connecticut’s representatives’ offices, including Senator Christopher Murphy, Representative James Himes and Representative Rosa DeLauro.
Based on direction from RESOLVE and ASRM, RMACT’s Advocacy Team delivered three messages on Capitol Hill: the importance of access to infertility care, the need for lasting in vitro fertilization (IVF) coverage for wounded veterans and the understanding that infertility treatment is pro-family. This last message is intended to directly contrast personhood laws; while Connecticut does not have personhood laws, it is important to educate legislators and to discourage other states from implementing personhood laws that would directly affect the ability to use fertility protocols to build families.
Along with these messages, RMACT’s Advocacy Team delivered impassioned letters on behalf of RMACT patients, friends and family. RMACT gathered more letters than any other practice nationwide and because of these efforts Connecticut had more letters than any other state. The letters acted as an important vehicle for patients who wanted to add their voices but were not able to attend the activities in Washington, DC. RMACT collected over 300 letters during the practice’s letter campaign kick off event alone.
“Although Connecticut has comparatively progressive policy, it is important for our representatives to understand how and why this positively affects residents,” says Dr. Richlin, a partner at Fairfield County’s leading fertility practice. “About 50 – 60 percent of our patients have coverage provided by Connecticut’s State Mandate, which makes fertility treatments like IVF more accessible and affordable.”
RMACT considers patient advocacy part of its responsibility. In addition to annually participating in Advocacy Day, RMACT spreads important messages about infertility, including its prevalence and how patients can find treatment. Dr. Joshua M. Hurwitz recently met with representatives to explain the urgent need of fertility preservation for cancer patients. Earlier this month, there was unanimous and bipartisan support in the Connecticut state legislature Bill 7124, which requires health insurance providers in the state to provide fertility preservation treatments for patients diagnosed with cancer starting in January 2018 .
“Fertility care is pro-family, it enables every person the opportunity to have a family,” said Lisa Rosenthal, Connecticut State Team Captain for Advocacy Day. “This is a powerful message, and one with a strong voice behind it as ASRM and RESOLVE joined forces for the first time this year. RMACT was grateful to have the opportunity to represent our patients, our RMACT team members and our state.”
About Reproductive Medicine Associates of Connecticut (RMACT)
RMACT specializes in the treatment of infertility, including assisted reproductive technologies (ART) such as intrauterine insemination (IUI), in-vitro fertilization (IVF), and Pre-implantation Genetic Screening (PGS). RMACT, Fairfield County’s largest fertility clinic and egg donation center, is one of 11 leading In Vitro Fertilization (IVF) centers nationwide chosen by In Vitro Sciences to participate in its Centers of Excellence program. RMACT has offices in Norwalk, Danbury, Stamford and Trumbull, and an affiliate office now in Poughkeepsie, NY. RMACT also offers infertility treatment financing and support services, such as nutrition counseling, individual and couples psychological counseling, acupuncture and yoga, through RMACT’s Integrated Fertility and Wellness Center.
The RMACT team includes lead physicians Drs. Mark P. Leondires, Spencer S. Richlin and Joshua M. Hurwitz, as well as fertility specialists Drs. Cynthia M. Murdock, Shaun C. Williams and Ilana B. Ressler. All six physicians are Board-Certified Reproductive Endocrinologists and are members of the American Society for Reproductive Medicine (ASRM). Five of the doctors are Castle Connolly "Top Doctors" and members of the Society for Assisted Reproductive Technology (SART), the Fairfield County and Connecticut Medical Societies. RMACT’s IVF laboratory is accredited by the College of American Pathologists (CAP), and CLIA; other accreditations include the Accreditation Association for Ambulatory Health Care (AAAHC) and the American Institute for Ultrasound in Medicine (AIUM). For more information visit http://www.RMACT.com or find us on Facebook. Reported by PRWeb 9 hours ago.
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Why the White Worker Theme Is Harmful
This article appears in the Summer 2017 issue of The American Prospect magazine. Subscribe here.
“After all, if every economic issue is framed as a struggle between a hard-working white middle class and undeserving minorities, then workers of all shades will be left fighting for scraps while the wealthy withdraw further into their private enclaves.” —Barack Obama, Farewell Address, Chicago, January 2017
After three losses to Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush, a trifecta last accomplished by Presidents Harding, Coolidge, and Hoover, there was much hand-wringing among Democrats about the loss of the South and the vanishing loyalty of Southern whites. William Galston and Elaine Kamarck at the Progressive Policy Institute argued that the electoral math made the South the true presidential battleground; that Democrats could not win by being more liberal or hoping to motivate black and poor voters to increase their voter participation. Thomas Edsall and Mary Edsall similarly warned in the pages of The Atlantic that the South was key, and it was lost because the liberal orthodoxy was too tied to race, and out of touch with white working-class voters.
“Liberal” candidates like Tom Harkin, Dick Gephardt, and Michael Dukakis were out. Their message was deemed too Northern, elite, and alien to the needed Southern white voter. In was a candidate who could rebrand the Democratic Party and break liberal orthodoxy, proving the party could be tough on crime and defense, and reinvent welfare and the social state. This turned out to be Bill Clinton. Now, the defeat of Hillary Clinton has once again caused Democrats to argue about what is needed to win the white vote.
Countless articles have focused on what Democrats have done wrong. And much of the theme remains the same as in 1989—that there is a noble white worker who has been betrayed. Here is how the Edsalls portrayed one such voter back in 1989:
The White House
Bill Clinton's pursuit of white voters led to attacks on the Social Security Act, first on the premise that budget discipline was more important, and second on the assumption that Social Security’s aid to the poor was too generous and too much of a handout to black women.
“You could classify me as a working-class Democrat, a card-carrying union member,” says Dan Donahue, a Chicago carpenter who became active in the campaign of a Republican state senator in 1988. “I’m not a card-carrying Republican—yet. We have four or five generations of welfare mothers. And they [Democrats] say the answer to that is we need more programs. Come on. It’s well and good we should have compassion for these people, but your compassion goes only so far. I don’t mind helping, but somebody has got to help themselves, you’ve got to pull. When you try to pick somebody up, they have to help. Unfortunately, most of the people who need help in this situation are black and most of the people who are doing the helping are white. We [white Cook County voters] are tired of paying for the Chicago Housing Authority, and for public housing and public transportation that we don’t use. They [taxpayers] hate it [the school-board tax] because they are paying for black schools that aren’t even educating kids, and the money is just going into the Board of Education and the teachers’ union.”
As President Barack Obama warned in his farewell address, this depiction of whites as hard-working, noble, and beset (compared with whom?) is nowhere to start a dialogue about an economy in which the real problem is that all economic gains have gone to the top 1 percent. The language presumes that there are not black workers who lost out to trade deals that sent thousands of auto-parts jobs from Flint, Michigan, to Mexico or shut steel mills in Baltimore, Maryland. Richard Trumka, president of the AFL-CIO, echoed Obama on the risks of reinforcing Trump’s cynical manipulation of race and the white working class:
Anyone who talks about dividing people in the country as a solution is a threat to the country, to democracy, the economy, and to working people, and we take every one of those seriously.
Oddly, much of the hand-wringing comes after victories by Presidents Clinton and Obama, each of whom demonstrated both the complexity of the white vote and the fact that the black vote matters. A core challenge is that many voters misunderstand basic economics, leading them to vote against the interests of working America as a whole. Many Americans still hold the view articulated by the Edsalls’ late-1980s white voter that government is not the solution. And their misunderstanding has been reinforced by actions of recent presidents.
One of those was Bill Clinton. The pursuit of white voters by Clinton led to attacks on the Social Security Act, first on the premise that budget discipline was more important, and second on the assumption that Social Security’s aid to the poor was too generous and too much of a handout to black women. Clinton supported partial privatization of Social Security pensions. Even Obama, pursuing deficit cuts, flirted with cuts in the cost-of-living formula.
The Social Security Act, let’s recall, was intended to protect the income of working-class American families. Yes, it was an entitlement, and proudly so. Social Security was first denied to most black Americans, but then extended. Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) was a core part of Social Security. Clinton’s view that single mothers should be written out of the act—for that is what the end of “welfare as we know it” meant—was not viewed as an attack on working people. But it was. Black women, who have historically had the largest labor force participation rate among all racial groups, and who work more hours than any racial group among women, were stigmatized as being made lazy because they finally had access to that part of the Social Security Act which had initially been denied them when it was passed.
Temporary Assistance for Needy Families, the feeble successor to AFDC, removed a class of workers from Social Security protection. Because of the “Nannygate” scandal surrounding Clinton’s attorney general nominee, protections for domestic workers within the Social Security Act were watered down. Despite the ravaging effect of the Reagan-era downturn on unemployment insurance, the Clinton administration offered little to repair a state-based system that had gone bankrupt and then refinanced itself by cutting access to benefits and benefit levels.
*THE HARD REALITY OF TODAY'S* level of inequality is this: For an increasing share of the population—black and white—the market no longer works to serve basic needs like housing, health insurance, child care, or college education. As the share of income held by the middle 60 percent declines, the top 10 percent’s share continues to grow, and within that, the top 1 percent.
The effect of heavy concentrations of money in fewer hands means that market-based allocations of resources are dictated by a smaller set of decision-makers. Businesspeople react to where the money is, whether they are home-builders, college presidents, or day-care providers. In the market, price is used as the rationing device, and prices follow where the money is.
When the middle class dominated the economy, it meant that prices for key personal investments followed increases in the incomes of the middle class. The government stepped in with housing, health, and education policies to subsidize those in the bottom 20 percent whose incomes were not keeping pace, and who would be rationed out of housing, health, and education by a market outcome. Worsening income inequality meant rising demands on government programs to ensure fair access to health and education, as prices rose faster than low income. Through the 1990s, the effect of discrimination made blacks synonymous with the bottom 20 percent, as they were overrepresented in the bottom income group.
AP Photo/Mary Altaffer
*Working-Class Rainbow: *All workers—black and white—benefit from union bargaining power in the fight for economic justice.
What has happened to more whites now is that the market has moved past them as well. Pricing for child care and college education, essentials for their children, are outstripping their income growth; instead, prices are tied to the growth in income for the top 1 percent in the case of college tuition. And whites in the bottom 20 percent of income, who hold considerably more wealth than blacks in any part of the income distribution, can no longer self-insure themselves against the bumps in the economy.
As it took almost 40 years to get to this point, in the near term no recipe of policy fixes will sufficiently remedy the effects. Democrats need to focus on reversing those long-term trends, but also must have something to offer workers now. But every year that Trump is in office, that goal becomes more difficult.
Union representation, a key element in reversing those trends, continues to fall. More states are likely to adopt “right to work” laws. It will be increasingly difficult to rebuild workers’ voice in deciding how corporate output will be divided between wages and profits. That is the greatest source of the rising inequality. The hollowing out of the middle is not the result of automation. Rather, it reflects the relative advantage of those workers more closely tied to management, who squeeze down the income share for the middle and below.
What Reagan achieved in the 1980s was the illusion that by letting the floor fall, the middle could be protected. Unfortunately, too many white workers still have a view of the economy fed by the Reagan framework of government’s role. The unabated concentration of income will make after-tax methods of redistribution more vital so that Americans can have access to housing, education, and health. The Affordable Care Act, a market-based approach to health access, is one example where the fix is inadequate to rising income inequality, and made worse because it naïvely assumed that states would expand public access to address the gap in affordability.
*UNDER TRUMP, RACE WILL *complicate the effort to devise palliatives to rising inequality until more effective remedies can take effect. His dismantling of anti--discrimination offices within the federal government will create new downward pressures on an already stressed black working class. And the decline in union membership is more dangerous to black workers, who have higher union density than white workers and who rely far more than whites on union bargaining power to get higher wages. Further, black union density is more heavily reliant on public-sector bargaining than is true for whites, and public-sector unions are a target of Trump, who will abet the attack on public-sector unions taking place at the state level.
Under Trump, the gap between the experience of black and white workers will grow. Trump has already changed the political discourse. He has revived a strain of Southern populism that allows for asserting white privilege.
Michael Vadon/Creative Commons
Progressive forces in the Democratic Party have been too uncritical of Bernie Sanders’s inability to lay the proper foundation with the party’s African American base ahead of the primary season. Here, Sanders addresses a campaign rally in Conway, New Hampshire.
For Democrats, the problem with language that emphasizes the white working class as a separate problem from rising inequality of income and wealth is that it will racialize the debate rather than emphasizing the common assault on all who are not rich. It evokes the negative part of Bill Clinton’s presidency. Hillary Clinton had a hard time convincing young black workers that welfare reform and mass incarceration weren’t key to the Clinton legacy. The lack of black enthusiasm for Clinton is as much a part of the story of 2016 as the enthusiasm of white voters for Trump.
Further, progressive forces in the Democratic Party have been too uncritical of Bernie Sanders’s inability to lay the proper foundation with the party’s African American base ahead of the primary season. It was curious during the 2016 primary season to see Republicans all hopped up about the “SEC primary” (so-called because the Southern states involved have flagship universities in the Southeastern Conference), but no mention among the Democrats of the SWAC primary (the Southwestern Athletic Conference, a complementary athletic conference of public historically black universities).
So, while in the fall of 2015 Republicans fawned over attending games between the University of Alabama and Auburn, not a peep was heard on the need for Democrats to be at a game between Alabama State and Alabama A&M. Black voters often determine the victor in the Southern Democratic primaries, but spending time in Iowa and New Hampshire would be a likely outcome of a party worried about white working voters.
Democrats need to spend more time developing a frame to combat inequality. They need to do a better job of explaining that income inequality is a threat to economic growth. They need to be spending time helping Americans take the blinders off and see that workers, of all races, are being given the shaft by a system where corporate greed has become an elite “entitlement.” They need to pull the Band-Aid off a false sense there is some white privilege that can spare some workers the wrath of America’s war on working people. They must fess up to their quiet, and sometimes vocal, support of an agenda that attacked America’s workers. They need to stop believing the problem confronting American workers is that they are uneducated or unskilled. They need to stop defining the white working class as the less-educated. Those are the perennial excuses meted out to black workers. Young black workers reacted angrily in 2016 to a perception that their pain was being ignored. They didn’t vote for Trump, but Clinton lost as much because they didn’t vote for her either as Trump won because white voters voted for him.
The Democrats won’t solve their electability issues repeating the debate about white voters that they had in the late 1980s. They need to focus on the urgency of the effect of income inequality on American democracy. They need to sound the alarm. And they need to wake up and see who they are in bed with. The power elite of the party think they have freed themselves of a dependency on union support. But the Wall Street vision of the economy is poison for workers of all races and for Democrats.
When the Republican Party of the 19th century cut its deal to end Reconstruction and concentrate on winning the white vote, it launched the Gilded Age and the unremittent growth of inequality that collapsed in the Great Depression. It was accompanied by a Southern populism that entrenched a harsh racial code. Trump’s victory puts us within reach of repeating that mistake in history. Democrats need to be wary, and shrewd. How they handle this could entrench the dystopia of more Trumps—or create a new multiracial coalition of class uplift.
Reported by The American Prospect 9 hours ago.
“After all, if every economic issue is framed as a struggle between a hard-working white middle class and undeserving minorities, then workers of all shades will be left fighting for scraps while the wealthy withdraw further into their private enclaves.” —Barack Obama, Farewell Address, Chicago, January 2017
After three losses to Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush, a trifecta last accomplished by Presidents Harding, Coolidge, and Hoover, there was much hand-wringing among Democrats about the loss of the South and the vanishing loyalty of Southern whites. William Galston and Elaine Kamarck at the Progressive Policy Institute argued that the electoral math made the South the true presidential battleground; that Democrats could not win by being more liberal or hoping to motivate black and poor voters to increase their voter participation. Thomas Edsall and Mary Edsall similarly warned in the pages of The Atlantic that the South was key, and it was lost because the liberal orthodoxy was too tied to race, and out of touch with white working-class voters.
“Liberal” candidates like Tom Harkin, Dick Gephardt, and Michael Dukakis were out. Their message was deemed too Northern, elite, and alien to the needed Southern white voter. In was a candidate who could rebrand the Democratic Party and break liberal orthodoxy, proving the party could be tough on crime and defense, and reinvent welfare and the social state. This turned out to be Bill Clinton. Now, the defeat of Hillary Clinton has once again caused Democrats to argue about what is needed to win the white vote.
Countless articles have focused on what Democrats have done wrong. And much of the theme remains the same as in 1989—that there is a noble white worker who has been betrayed. Here is how the Edsalls portrayed one such voter back in 1989:
The White House
Bill Clinton's pursuit of white voters led to attacks on the Social Security Act, first on the premise that budget discipline was more important, and second on the assumption that Social Security’s aid to the poor was too generous and too much of a handout to black women.
“You could classify me as a working-class Democrat, a card-carrying union member,” says Dan Donahue, a Chicago carpenter who became active in the campaign of a Republican state senator in 1988. “I’m not a card-carrying Republican—yet. We have four or five generations of welfare mothers. And they [Democrats] say the answer to that is we need more programs. Come on. It’s well and good we should have compassion for these people, but your compassion goes only so far. I don’t mind helping, but somebody has got to help themselves, you’ve got to pull. When you try to pick somebody up, they have to help. Unfortunately, most of the people who need help in this situation are black and most of the people who are doing the helping are white. We [white Cook County voters] are tired of paying for the Chicago Housing Authority, and for public housing and public transportation that we don’t use. They [taxpayers] hate it [the school-board tax] because they are paying for black schools that aren’t even educating kids, and the money is just going into the Board of Education and the teachers’ union.”
As President Barack Obama warned in his farewell address, this depiction of whites as hard-working, noble, and beset (compared with whom?) is nowhere to start a dialogue about an economy in which the real problem is that all economic gains have gone to the top 1 percent. The language presumes that there are not black workers who lost out to trade deals that sent thousands of auto-parts jobs from Flint, Michigan, to Mexico or shut steel mills in Baltimore, Maryland. Richard Trumka, president of the AFL-CIO, echoed Obama on the risks of reinforcing Trump’s cynical manipulation of race and the white working class:
Anyone who talks about dividing people in the country as a solution is a threat to the country, to democracy, the economy, and to working people, and we take every one of those seriously.
Oddly, much of the hand-wringing comes after victories by Presidents Clinton and Obama, each of whom demonstrated both the complexity of the white vote and the fact that the black vote matters. A core challenge is that many voters misunderstand basic economics, leading them to vote against the interests of working America as a whole. Many Americans still hold the view articulated by the Edsalls’ late-1980s white voter that government is not the solution. And their misunderstanding has been reinforced by actions of recent presidents.
One of those was Bill Clinton. The pursuit of white voters by Clinton led to attacks on the Social Security Act, first on the premise that budget discipline was more important, and second on the assumption that Social Security’s aid to the poor was too generous and too much of a handout to black women. Clinton supported partial privatization of Social Security pensions. Even Obama, pursuing deficit cuts, flirted with cuts in the cost-of-living formula.
The Social Security Act, let’s recall, was intended to protect the income of working-class American families. Yes, it was an entitlement, and proudly so. Social Security was first denied to most black Americans, but then extended. Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) was a core part of Social Security. Clinton’s view that single mothers should be written out of the act—for that is what the end of “welfare as we know it” meant—was not viewed as an attack on working people. But it was. Black women, who have historically had the largest labor force participation rate among all racial groups, and who work more hours than any racial group among women, were stigmatized as being made lazy because they finally had access to that part of the Social Security Act which had initially been denied them when it was passed.
Temporary Assistance for Needy Families, the feeble successor to AFDC, removed a class of workers from Social Security protection. Because of the “Nannygate” scandal surrounding Clinton’s attorney general nominee, protections for domestic workers within the Social Security Act were watered down. Despite the ravaging effect of the Reagan-era downturn on unemployment insurance, the Clinton administration offered little to repair a state-based system that had gone bankrupt and then refinanced itself by cutting access to benefits and benefit levels.
*THE HARD REALITY OF TODAY'S* level of inequality is this: For an increasing share of the population—black and white—the market no longer works to serve basic needs like housing, health insurance, child care, or college education. As the share of income held by the middle 60 percent declines, the top 10 percent’s share continues to grow, and within that, the top 1 percent.
The effect of heavy concentrations of money in fewer hands means that market-based allocations of resources are dictated by a smaller set of decision-makers. Businesspeople react to where the money is, whether they are home-builders, college presidents, or day-care providers. In the market, price is used as the rationing device, and prices follow where the money is.
When the middle class dominated the economy, it meant that prices for key personal investments followed increases in the incomes of the middle class. The government stepped in with housing, health, and education policies to subsidize those in the bottom 20 percent whose incomes were not keeping pace, and who would be rationed out of housing, health, and education by a market outcome. Worsening income inequality meant rising demands on government programs to ensure fair access to health and education, as prices rose faster than low income. Through the 1990s, the effect of discrimination made blacks synonymous with the bottom 20 percent, as they were overrepresented in the bottom income group.
AP Photo/Mary Altaffer
*Working-Class Rainbow: *All workers—black and white—benefit from union bargaining power in the fight for economic justice.
What has happened to more whites now is that the market has moved past them as well. Pricing for child care and college education, essentials for their children, are outstripping their income growth; instead, prices are tied to the growth in income for the top 1 percent in the case of college tuition. And whites in the bottom 20 percent of income, who hold considerably more wealth than blacks in any part of the income distribution, can no longer self-insure themselves against the bumps in the economy.
As it took almost 40 years to get to this point, in the near term no recipe of policy fixes will sufficiently remedy the effects. Democrats need to focus on reversing those long-term trends, but also must have something to offer workers now. But every year that Trump is in office, that goal becomes more difficult.
Union representation, a key element in reversing those trends, continues to fall. More states are likely to adopt “right to work” laws. It will be increasingly difficult to rebuild workers’ voice in deciding how corporate output will be divided between wages and profits. That is the greatest source of the rising inequality. The hollowing out of the middle is not the result of automation. Rather, it reflects the relative advantage of those workers more closely tied to management, who squeeze down the income share for the middle and below.
What Reagan achieved in the 1980s was the illusion that by letting the floor fall, the middle could be protected. Unfortunately, too many white workers still have a view of the economy fed by the Reagan framework of government’s role. The unabated concentration of income will make after-tax methods of redistribution more vital so that Americans can have access to housing, education, and health. The Affordable Care Act, a market-based approach to health access, is one example where the fix is inadequate to rising income inequality, and made worse because it naïvely assumed that states would expand public access to address the gap in affordability.
*UNDER TRUMP, RACE WILL *complicate the effort to devise palliatives to rising inequality until more effective remedies can take effect. His dismantling of anti--discrimination offices within the federal government will create new downward pressures on an already stressed black working class. And the decline in union membership is more dangerous to black workers, who have higher union density than white workers and who rely far more than whites on union bargaining power to get higher wages. Further, black union density is more heavily reliant on public-sector bargaining than is true for whites, and public-sector unions are a target of Trump, who will abet the attack on public-sector unions taking place at the state level.
Under Trump, the gap between the experience of black and white workers will grow. Trump has already changed the political discourse. He has revived a strain of Southern populism that allows for asserting white privilege.
Michael Vadon/Creative Commons
Progressive forces in the Democratic Party have been too uncritical of Bernie Sanders’s inability to lay the proper foundation with the party’s African American base ahead of the primary season. Here, Sanders addresses a campaign rally in Conway, New Hampshire.
For Democrats, the problem with language that emphasizes the white working class as a separate problem from rising inequality of income and wealth is that it will racialize the debate rather than emphasizing the common assault on all who are not rich. It evokes the negative part of Bill Clinton’s presidency. Hillary Clinton had a hard time convincing young black workers that welfare reform and mass incarceration weren’t key to the Clinton legacy. The lack of black enthusiasm for Clinton is as much a part of the story of 2016 as the enthusiasm of white voters for Trump.
Further, progressive forces in the Democratic Party have been too uncritical of Bernie Sanders’s inability to lay the proper foundation with the party’s African American base ahead of the primary season. It was curious during the 2016 primary season to see Republicans all hopped up about the “SEC primary” (so-called because the Southern states involved have flagship universities in the Southeastern Conference), but no mention among the Democrats of the SWAC primary (the Southwestern Athletic Conference, a complementary athletic conference of public historically black universities).
So, while in the fall of 2015 Republicans fawned over attending games between the University of Alabama and Auburn, not a peep was heard on the need for Democrats to be at a game between Alabama State and Alabama A&M. Black voters often determine the victor in the Southern Democratic primaries, but spending time in Iowa and New Hampshire would be a likely outcome of a party worried about white working voters.
Democrats need to spend more time developing a frame to combat inequality. They need to do a better job of explaining that income inequality is a threat to economic growth. They need to be spending time helping Americans take the blinders off and see that workers, of all races, are being given the shaft by a system where corporate greed has become an elite “entitlement.” They need to pull the Band-Aid off a false sense there is some white privilege that can spare some workers the wrath of America’s war on working people. They must fess up to their quiet, and sometimes vocal, support of an agenda that attacked America’s workers. They need to stop believing the problem confronting American workers is that they are uneducated or unskilled. They need to stop defining the white working class as the less-educated. Those are the perennial excuses meted out to black workers. Young black workers reacted angrily in 2016 to a perception that their pain was being ignored. They didn’t vote for Trump, but Clinton lost as much because they didn’t vote for her either as Trump won because white voters voted for him.
The Democrats won’t solve their electability issues repeating the debate about white voters that they had in the late 1980s. They need to focus on the urgency of the effect of income inequality on American democracy. They need to sound the alarm. And they need to wake up and see who they are in bed with. The power elite of the party think they have freed themselves of a dependency on union support. But the Wall Street vision of the economy is poison for workers of all races and for Democrats.
When the Republican Party of the 19th century cut its deal to end Reconstruction and concentrate on winning the white vote, it launched the Gilded Age and the unremittent growth of inequality that collapsed in the Great Depression. It was accompanied by a Southern populism that entrenched a harsh racial code. Trump’s victory puts us within reach of repeating that mistake in history. Democrats need to be wary, and shrewd. How they handle this could entrench the dystopia of more Trumps—or create a new multiracial coalition of class uplift.
Reported by The American Prospect 9 hours ago.
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Oscar Health files to expand insurance coverage in several states
(Reuters) - Despite uncertainly over the future of U.S. healthcare that has prompted major health insurers to pull out of several markets, upstart provider Oscar Health on Wednesday said it has filed to sell health insurance to individuals through Obamacare exchanges in a total of six states in 2018.
Reported by Reuters 8 hours ago.
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14th Annual Edition of AIS Directory Offers Enrollment and Contact Information for All U.S. Health Insurers
AIS’s Directory of Health Plans: 2017 is the all-new edition of an annual resource containing enrollment data and contact information for all health plans in the U.S.
Washington, DC (PRWEB) June 21, 2017
AIS Health is pleased to announce that AIS’s Directory of Health Plans: 2017 is available for immediate delivery. The all-new edition of AIS Health’s annual survey contains current and comprehensive health plan enrollment data and key executive contact information for all health plans operating in the United States.
Users of AIS’s Directory of Health Plans: 2017 can:· Analyze current enrollment data and market share — including plan population changes and regional plan mix — for every health plan offered in the U.S.
· Identify growth opportunities for products and services across every market (commercial, Medicare, Medicaid and health exchanges).
· Simplify sales team prospecting with detailed executive contact information by plan and state.
To produce the Directory, AIS Health’s in-house researchers personally interview or survey a knowledgeable person at all known health insurers in the country — including subsidiaries and parent companies — to get a clear picture of product offerings, contracts and markets, ensuring that each covered life is counted only once, and is categorized by plan models that are defined in a consistent and meaningful manner which reflect the current industry. By maintaining impeccable research standards and strict methodology through 14 annual editions, the Directory offers extremely accurate and sensitive insight into developing trends.
AIS’s Directory of Health Plans: 2017 is available in various formats —an interactive website, data files on a USB flash drive or a printed book. For more information and to order the Directory, visit https://aishealth.com/marketplace/aiss-directory-health-plans. For more information on the online version, including an interactive demo of the features of the website, visit https://aishealthdata.com/dhp.
About AIS Health
AIS Health is a publishing and information company that has served the health care industry for more than 30 years. AIS Health’s mission is to provide objective and relevant business and strategic information for health care executives, by developing highly targeted news, data and analysis for managers at health insurance companies, pharmaceutical organizations, providers, purchasers and other health care industry stakeholders. AIS Health, which maintains journalistic independence from its parent company, MMIT, is committed to integrity in reporting and bringing transparency to health industry data. Learn more at http://AISHealth.com and http://AISHealthData.com. Reported by PRWeb 7 hours ago.
Washington, DC (PRWEB) June 21, 2017
AIS Health is pleased to announce that AIS’s Directory of Health Plans: 2017 is available for immediate delivery. The all-new edition of AIS Health’s annual survey contains current and comprehensive health plan enrollment data and key executive contact information for all health plans operating in the United States.
Users of AIS’s Directory of Health Plans: 2017 can:· Analyze current enrollment data and market share — including plan population changes and regional plan mix — for every health plan offered in the U.S.
· Identify growth opportunities for products and services across every market (commercial, Medicare, Medicaid and health exchanges).
· Simplify sales team prospecting with detailed executive contact information by plan and state.
To produce the Directory, AIS Health’s in-house researchers personally interview or survey a knowledgeable person at all known health insurers in the country — including subsidiaries and parent companies — to get a clear picture of product offerings, contracts and markets, ensuring that each covered life is counted only once, and is categorized by plan models that are defined in a consistent and meaningful manner which reflect the current industry. By maintaining impeccable research standards and strict methodology through 14 annual editions, the Directory offers extremely accurate and sensitive insight into developing trends.
AIS’s Directory of Health Plans: 2017 is available in various formats —an interactive website, data files on a USB flash drive or a printed book. For more information and to order the Directory, visit https://aishealth.com/marketplace/aiss-directory-health-plans. For more information on the online version, including an interactive demo of the features of the website, visit https://aishealthdata.com/dhp.
About AIS Health
AIS Health is a publishing and information company that has served the health care industry for more than 30 years. AIS Health’s mission is to provide objective and relevant business and strategic information for health care executives, by developing highly targeted news, data and analysis for managers at health insurance companies, pharmaceutical organizations, providers, purchasers and other health care industry stakeholders. AIS Health, which maintains journalistic independence from its parent company, MMIT, is committed to integrity in reporting and bringing transparency to health industry data. Learn more at http://AISHealth.com and http://AISHealthData.com. Reported by PRWeb 7 hours ago.
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Insurers make Obamacare deadline decisions, but can still drop out
Oscar, a relative newcomer to health insurance, says it's entering some new states.
Reported by USATODAY.com 7 hours ago.
Reported by USATODAY.com 7 hours ago.
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HealthEdge And Remedy Partners Launch Bundled Payments Initiative
BURLINGTON, Mass.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--#HCIT--HealthEdge®, provider of the only integrated financial, administrative and clinical platform for health insurers, and Remedy Partners, the nation’s leading bundled payment company, today announced a collaboration to deliver a transformational platform to the market, capable of administering an entirely new category of health insurance benefit plan based on episodes of care and bundled payments. This innovative offering provides a turnkey opportunity for payer
Reported by Business Wire 2 hours ago.
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Tech: Execs offer Trump advice during 'tech week'
Data liberation. A tech venture capitalist urged President Donald Trump during a “tech week” roundtable to be the “data liberation administration” and free up more government health-care information for use by private companies. Investor John Doerr said one of his holdings, Nuna Health, is among companies that would benefit from more access to government medical data Recode reported. Nuna Health helps companies formulate their health insurance benefits. The company is run by Jini Kim, who…
Reported by bizjournals 4 hours ago.
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Anthem will stay with Colorado health insurance exchange -- but in what counties?
Anthem Blue Cross Blue Shield has signaled it will continue to participate in Colorado's state-run marketplace for individual health coverage, but the insurer has not revealed yet whether it will pull out of some parts of the state. "Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield filed preliminary rates in Colorado [Monday]. We are not commenting further on the specific details of our filing until the information is made public by the [state] Division of Insurance," Anthem spokesman Tony Felts said in an email…
Reported by bizjournals 1 hour ago.
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Veto The Cold-Hearted Health Bill
Donald Trump is right. The House health insurance bill is “mean, mean, mean,” as he put it last week. He correctly called the measure that would strip health insurance from 23 million Americans “a son of a b*tch.”
The proposal is not at all what Donald Trump promised Americans. He said that under his administration, no one would lose coverage. He said everybody would be insured. And the insurance he provided would be a “lot less expensive.”
Senate Democrats spent Monday and Tuesday pointing this out and demanding that Senate Republicans end their furtive, star-chamber scheming and expose their health insurance proposal to public scrutiny.
So far, Republicans have refused. That’s because their plan, like the House measure, is a son of a bitch. Among other serious problems, it would restore caps on coverage so that if a couple’s baby is born with serious heart problems, as comedian Jimmy Kimmel’s was, they’d be bankrupted and future treatment for the infant jeopardized. Donald Trump has warned Senate Republicans, though. Even if the GOP thinks it’s fun to rebuff Democrats’ pleas for a public process, they really should pay attention to the President. He’s got veto power.Republicans have spent the past six years condemning the Affordable Care Act (ACA), which passed in 2010 after Senate Democrats accepted 160 Republican amendments, held 110 bipartisan public hearings and conducted 25 consecutive days of public floor debate. Despite all of that, Republicans contend the ACA is the worst thing since Hitler. That is what they assert about a law that increased the number of insured Americans by 20 million, prohibited discrimination against people with pre-existing conditions and eliminated the annual and lifetime caps that insurers used to cut off coverage for sick infants and people with cancer.
The entire cavalry of Republican candidates for the GOP nomination for President promised to repeal the ACA, but Donald Trump went further. He pledged to replace it with a big league better bill.
In May 2015, he announced on Twitter: “I’m not going to cut Social Security like every other Republican and *I’m not going to cut Medicare or Medicaid*.”
In September 2015, he said of his health insurance plans on CBS News’ 60 Minutes, “I am going to take care of everybody. I don’t care if it costs me votes or not. Everybody’s going to be taken care of much better than they’re taken care of now.”
In another 60 Minutes interview, this one with Lesley Stahl last November, he said, “And it’ll be great health care for much less money. So it’ll be better health care, much better, for less money. Not a bad combination.” In January, he told the Washington Post, “We’re going to have insurance for everybody.” He explained, “There was a philosophy in some circles that if you can’t pay for it, you don’t get it. That’s not going to happen with us.”
But then, the House Republicans betrayed him. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office said the measure they passed, called the American Health Care Act (AHCA), would cut more than $800 billion from Medicaid. It said people with pre-existing conditions and some older Americans would face “extremely high premiums.”
Extremely high is an understatement. Here is an example from the CBO report: A 64-year-old with a $26,500 income pays $1,700 for coverage under the Affordable Care Act (ACA), but would be forced to cough up more than half of his or her income – $16,000 – for insurance under the House Republican plan. Overall, premiums would increase 20 percent in the first year. And insurers could charge older people five times the rate they bill younger Americans.
House Republicans said states could permit insurers to squirm out of federal minimum coverage requirements, and in those that did, the CBO said some consumers would be hit with thousands of dollars in increased costs for maternity care, mental health treatment and substance abuse services.
In the first year, the House GOP plan would rob insurance from 14 million Americans.
So much for covering everyone with “great health care at much less money.”
It’s true that President Trump held a party for House Republicans in the Rose Garden after they narrowly passed their bill. But it seems like he did not become aware until later just how horrific the measure is, how signing it into law would make him look like a rank politician, a swamp dweller who spouts promises he has no intention of keeping.
By last week when President Trump met with 15 Senate Republicans about their efforts to pass a health insurance bill, he no longer was reveling in the House measure. He called it “cold-hearted.” He asked the senators to be more “generous,” to put “additional money” into their version.
Senators told reporters that President Trump wanted them to pass a bill that is not viewed as an attack on low-income Americans and provides larger tax credits to enable people to buy insurance.
Now that sounds a little more like the Donald Trump who repeatedly promised his health insurance replacement bill would cover everyone at a lower cost. Still, those goals remain amorphous.
The House bill is stunningly unpopular, almost as detested as Congress itself. President Trump seems to grasp the enormity of that problem. But even his calling it a “son of a bitch” doesn’t seem to have been enough to persuade senators that he’s serious about getting legislation that achieves his promises to leave Medicaid intact, cover everyone and lower costs.
Republican senators secretly deciding the fate of millions of Americans must hear from Donald Trump that passing a health insurance bill that doesn’t fulfill his campaign promises is, shall we say, a cancer on the Presidency.
A veto threat would get their attention.
-- This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website. Reported by Huffington Post 46 minutes ago.
The proposal is not at all what Donald Trump promised Americans. He said that under his administration, no one would lose coverage. He said everybody would be insured. And the insurance he provided would be a “lot less expensive.”
Senate Democrats spent Monday and Tuesday pointing this out and demanding that Senate Republicans end their furtive, star-chamber scheming and expose their health insurance proposal to public scrutiny.
So far, Republicans have refused. That’s because their plan, like the House measure, is a son of a bitch. Among other serious problems, it would restore caps on coverage so that if a couple’s baby is born with serious heart problems, as comedian Jimmy Kimmel’s was, they’d be bankrupted and future treatment for the infant jeopardized. Donald Trump has warned Senate Republicans, though. Even if the GOP thinks it’s fun to rebuff Democrats’ pleas for a public process, they really should pay attention to the President. He’s got veto power.Republicans have spent the past six years condemning the Affordable Care Act (ACA), which passed in 2010 after Senate Democrats accepted 160 Republican amendments, held 110 bipartisan public hearings and conducted 25 consecutive days of public floor debate. Despite all of that, Republicans contend the ACA is the worst thing since Hitler. That is what they assert about a law that increased the number of insured Americans by 20 million, prohibited discrimination against people with pre-existing conditions and eliminated the annual and lifetime caps that insurers used to cut off coverage for sick infants and people with cancer.
The entire cavalry of Republican candidates for the GOP nomination for President promised to repeal the ACA, but Donald Trump went further. He pledged to replace it with a big league better bill.
In May 2015, he announced on Twitter: “I’m not going to cut Social Security like every other Republican and *I’m not going to cut Medicare or Medicaid*.”
In September 2015, he said of his health insurance plans on CBS News’ 60 Minutes, “I am going to take care of everybody. I don’t care if it costs me votes or not. Everybody’s going to be taken care of much better than they’re taken care of now.”
In another 60 Minutes interview, this one with Lesley Stahl last November, he said, “And it’ll be great health care for much less money. So it’ll be better health care, much better, for less money. Not a bad combination.” In January, he told the Washington Post, “We’re going to have insurance for everybody.” He explained, “There was a philosophy in some circles that if you can’t pay for it, you don’t get it. That’s not going to happen with us.”
But then, the House Republicans betrayed him. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office said the measure they passed, called the American Health Care Act (AHCA), would cut more than $800 billion from Medicaid. It said people with pre-existing conditions and some older Americans would face “extremely high premiums.”
Extremely high is an understatement. Here is an example from the CBO report: A 64-year-old with a $26,500 income pays $1,700 for coverage under the Affordable Care Act (ACA), but would be forced to cough up more than half of his or her income – $16,000 – for insurance under the House Republican plan. Overall, premiums would increase 20 percent in the first year. And insurers could charge older people five times the rate they bill younger Americans.
House Republicans said states could permit insurers to squirm out of federal minimum coverage requirements, and in those that did, the CBO said some consumers would be hit with thousands of dollars in increased costs for maternity care, mental health treatment and substance abuse services.
In the first year, the House GOP plan would rob insurance from 14 million Americans.
So much for covering everyone with “great health care at much less money.”
It’s true that President Trump held a party for House Republicans in the Rose Garden after they narrowly passed their bill. But it seems like he did not become aware until later just how horrific the measure is, how signing it into law would make him look like a rank politician, a swamp dweller who spouts promises he has no intention of keeping.
By last week when President Trump met with 15 Senate Republicans about their efforts to pass a health insurance bill, he no longer was reveling in the House measure. He called it “cold-hearted.” He asked the senators to be more “generous,” to put “additional money” into their version.
Senators told reporters that President Trump wanted them to pass a bill that is not viewed as an attack on low-income Americans and provides larger tax credits to enable people to buy insurance.
Now that sounds a little more like the Donald Trump who repeatedly promised his health insurance replacement bill would cover everyone at a lower cost. Still, those goals remain amorphous.
The House bill is stunningly unpopular, almost as detested as Congress itself. President Trump seems to grasp the enormity of that problem. But even his calling it a “son of a bitch” doesn’t seem to have been enough to persuade senators that he’s serious about getting legislation that achieves his promises to leave Medicaid intact, cover everyone and lower costs.
Republican senators secretly deciding the fate of millions of Americans must hear from Donald Trump that passing a health insurance bill that doesn’t fulfill his campaign promises is, shall we say, a cancer on the Presidency.
A veto threat would get their attention.
-- This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website. Reported by Huffington Post 46 minutes ago.
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Health Care, Taxes, and Everything Else: Secrecy in the Service of Trump’s Plunder
(AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell speaks after a closed-door session at the Capitol on June 20, 2017. He is joined by Republican Senators John Barrasso, John Thune, and Majority Whip John Cornyn.
In a republic such as that we are rumored to have, looting the nation’s resources, and the money of its people, can be a little complicated. Sunlight can poison the plot; darkness is critical to its successful execution. Just ask Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, or White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer. Oops, never mind, what was I thinking? Their lips, of course, are sealed. The Trump-branded Project Plunder is well under way.
As the week began, Spicer told reporters assembled for one of his press briefings that they could not record it, on either video or audio. Note that this June 19 briefing was held in lieu of what was once a daily, open briefing that has been a staple of White House communication with the public for decades. (Spicer and his deputy, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, have taken to keeping the press corps off guard by convening the briefings only intermittently.) Meanwhile, news reports abound that Spicer is soon to leave the role.
Not that Spicer, when he deigns to stand before the news media, ever sheds much light on White House operations. For instance, he cannot confirm whether President Donald J. Trump believes that climate change is a real thing, or if the president accepts the conclusion of all of the nation’s intelligence agencies that Russia interfered with the 2016 presidential election.
As Stephen Colbert quipped: “Sean, I have so many questions. If you go, who will not answer them?”
Oh, no worries, Colbert, there are many who will not answer—McConnell, for instance, who is determined to yank access to health care from millions of America by ramming through a bill designed without allowing a single public hearing before it is written. This is being sold as an improvement on “Obamacare,” which it is intended to replace.
At a June 20 press briefing—if you can call it that—following a closed-door gathering of Senate Republicans, the majority leader was asked how long the American people (or other senators, for that matter) will have to examine the “discussion draft” of the bill that he said he expects to unveil on Thursday, June 22. He plans to schedule a vote before the Senate leaves town for the July 4 recess, without having conducted a single public hearing. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer told reporters that McConnell told him a total of only ten hours of debate will be allowed the 48 Democratic senators. That’s 20 minutes, total, per senator, to make his or her case during the official business of the body. Ordinarily, a major bill is hashed out in the relevant committees, proposed features interrogated during official proceedings at which the opinions of experts are solicited.
But this is no ordinary time. The health-care bill is currently being drawn by McConnell and 12 other senators, all of them white men, behind closed doors. They are the only ones who have an inkling of what will be in it.
McConnell bristled at the reporter’s question. “Everybody pretty well understands it,” McConnell said of the bill that no one has seen. “Everybody will have an adequate time to take a look at it. I think this will be about as transparent as can be. No transparency would have been added by having hearings at which Democrats offered endless single-payer system amendments. That is not what this Republican Senate was sent here to do.”
Never mind that the American people did not seat a “Republican Senate”; there is no “Republican Senate” written into the Constitution. Simply consider the fact that the Republicans hold a mere two-seat majority in what was once known as the United States Senate.
What McConnell apparently sees himself and his partisan colleagues as having been “sent here to do” is to screw everyday American people on behalf of his overlords: the pashas of private corporations such as Koch Industries and Amway, the kings of quantitative funds such as Renaissance Technologies, the sultans of shell companies like DJT Operations II LLC (one of many owned by the president of the United States). These are companies whose financial dealings, even the names of their shareholders, are hidden from the public because their shares are not traded on public stock exchanges. They operate in secret and, having provided the capital required to elect that “Republican Senate,” their ethos of opacity has now become the ethos of what can now only mockingly be called the world’s greatest deliberative body.
“In my entire career in politics, I’ve never heard of a more radical or a more reckless process,” Schumer told reporters at a press briefing called by Democrats that same day.
The health-care bill being crafted by Mitch and his minions is the Senate’s counterpart to the bill already passed by the House of Representatives, which, as described by the New York Times editorial board, “would rob 23 million people of health insurance and make it harder for millions of others to get the care they need, according to the Congressional Budget Office. It would cut federal spending by about $1.1 trillion over 10 years while giving the wealthy big tax cuts.”
Meanwhile, House Speaker Paul Ryan made an appearance before a conference convened in Washington, D.C., by the National Association of Manufacturers, at which he asked the business leaders to mobilize their employees to call their elected representatives to demand massive tax cuts for their bosses, on the pretext that this will save their jobs.
Many of the manufacturers represented there, the speaker noted, were private companies who, he said, were unfairly penalized in multiple ways by the U.S. tax code—for instance, when they are taxed for bringing capital back into the country that they’ve been growing in offshore accounts. Of course, we’ll never know just how unfair or not that tax code is to such companies, since they are not required to share their balance sheets or tax filings with the public. We’ll just have to take the speaker’s word for it, I suppose.
Ryan also hyped the need for the reduction of regulations on businesses, which experience teaches us includes everything from environmental protection to financial oversight and then some—including protections for the very workers Ryan asked business leaders to coerce for political action in the guise of job protection. Among the “bureaucracies” whose regulations Ryan claimed needed to be “clean[ed] up,” he called only one by name: the Department of Labor.
The tax-gutting program promised by the White House, Ryan said, must take place by the end of the calendar year. He spoke with a great sense of urgency, calling the present time “a once-in-a-lifetime transformational moment.” After all, the 2018 midterm elections will soon be upon us, and the overlords want their pound of flesh. Reported by The American Prospect 51 minutes ago.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell speaks after a closed-door session at the Capitol on June 20, 2017. He is joined by Republican Senators John Barrasso, John Thune, and Majority Whip John Cornyn.
In a republic such as that we are rumored to have, looting the nation’s resources, and the money of its people, can be a little complicated. Sunlight can poison the plot; darkness is critical to its successful execution. Just ask Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, or White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer. Oops, never mind, what was I thinking? Their lips, of course, are sealed. The Trump-branded Project Plunder is well under way.
As the week began, Spicer told reporters assembled for one of his press briefings that they could not record it, on either video or audio. Note that this June 19 briefing was held in lieu of what was once a daily, open briefing that has been a staple of White House communication with the public for decades. (Spicer and his deputy, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, have taken to keeping the press corps off guard by convening the briefings only intermittently.) Meanwhile, news reports abound that Spicer is soon to leave the role.
Not that Spicer, when he deigns to stand before the news media, ever sheds much light on White House operations. For instance, he cannot confirm whether President Donald J. Trump believes that climate change is a real thing, or if the president accepts the conclusion of all of the nation’s intelligence agencies that Russia interfered with the 2016 presidential election.
As Stephen Colbert quipped: “Sean, I have so many questions. If you go, who will not answer them?”
Oh, no worries, Colbert, there are many who will not answer—McConnell, for instance, who is determined to yank access to health care from millions of America by ramming through a bill designed without allowing a single public hearing before it is written. This is being sold as an improvement on “Obamacare,” which it is intended to replace.
At a June 20 press briefing—if you can call it that—following a closed-door gathering of Senate Republicans, the majority leader was asked how long the American people (or other senators, for that matter) will have to examine the “discussion draft” of the bill that he said he expects to unveil on Thursday, June 22. He plans to schedule a vote before the Senate leaves town for the July 4 recess, without having conducted a single public hearing. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer told reporters that McConnell told him a total of only ten hours of debate will be allowed the 48 Democratic senators. That’s 20 minutes, total, per senator, to make his or her case during the official business of the body. Ordinarily, a major bill is hashed out in the relevant committees, proposed features interrogated during official proceedings at which the opinions of experts are solicited.
But this is no ordinary time. The health-care bill is currently being drawn by McConnell and 12 other senators, all of them white men, behind closed doors. They are the only ones who have an inkling of what will be in it.
McConnell bristled at the reporter’s question. “Everybody pretty well understands it,” McConnell said of the bill that no one has seen. “Everybody will have an adequate time to take a look at it. I think this will be about as transparent as can be. No transparency would have been added by having hearings at which Democrats offered endless single-payer system amendments. That is not what this Republican Senate was sent here to do.”
Never mind that the American people did not seat a “Republican Senate”; there is no “Republican Senate” written into the Constitution. Simply consider the fact that the Republicans hold a mere two-seat majority in what was once known as the United States Senate.
What McConnell apparently sees himself and his partisan colleagues as having been “sent here to do” is to screw everyday American people on behalf of his overlords: the pashas of private corporations such as Koch Industries and Amway, the kings of quantitative funds such as Renaissance Technologies, the sultans of shell companies like DJT Operations II LLC (one of many owned by the president of the United States). These are companies whose financial dealings, even the names of their shareholders, are hidden from the public because their shares are not traded on public stock exchanges. They operate in secret and, having provided the capital required to elect that “Republican Senate,” their ethos of opacity has now become the ethos of what can now only mockingly be called the world’s greatest deliberative body.
“In my entire career in politics, I’ve never heard of a more radical or a more reckless process,” Schumer told reporters at a press briefing called by Democrats that same day.
The health-care bill being crafted by Mitch and his minions is the Senate’s counterpart to the bill already passed by the House of Representatives, which, as described by the New York Times editorial board, “would rob 23 million people of health insurance and make it harder for millions of others to get the care they need, according to the Congressional Budget Office. It would cut federal spending by about $1.1 trillion over 10 years while giving the wealthy big tax cuts.”
Meanwhile, House Speaker Paul Ryan made an appearance before a conference convened in Washington, D.C., by the National Association of Manufacturers, at which he asked the business leaders to mobilize their employees to call their elected representatives to demand massive tax cuts for their bosses, on the pretext that this will save their jobs.
Many of the manufacturers represented there, the speaker noted, were private companies who, he said, were unfairly penalized in multiple ways by the U.S. tax code—for instance, when they are taxed for bringing capital back into the country that they’ve been growing in offshore accounts. Of course, we’ll never know just how unfair or not that tax code is to such companies, since they are not required to share their balance sheets or tax filings with the public. We’ll just have to take the speaker’s word for it, I suppose.
Ryan also hyped the need for the reduction of regulations on businesses, which experience teaches us includes everything from environmental protection to financial oversight and then some—including protections for the very workers Ryan asked business leaders to coerce for political action in the guise of job protection. Among the “bureaucracies” whose regulations Ryan claimed needed to be “clean[ed] up,” he called only one by name: the Department of Labor.
The tax-gutting program promised by the White House, Ryan said, must take place by the end of the calendar year. He spoke with a great sense of urgency, calling the present time “a once-in-a-lifetime transformational moment.” After all, the 2018 midterm elections will soon be upon us, and the overlords want their pound of flesh. Reported by The American Prospect 51 minutes ago.
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Insurer started by Jared Kushner’s brother seeks expansion
TRENTON, N.J. (AP) — The health insurance company co-founded by the brother of President Donald Trump’s son-in-law says it wants to return to New Jersey’s health exchange marketplace and expand in four other states. Oscar announced Wednesday that it has applied to return to 14 of New Jersey’s 21 counties in 2018. It didn’t offer […]
Reported by Seattle Times 2 hours ago.
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Remy Ma To Start Fund For Women Who Want Kids But Can't Afford Health Care
Remy Ma is advocating for women whose financial situations prevent them from conceiving children naturally.
In January, the “All The Way Up” rapper opened up about her ectopic pregnancy, which resulted in a miscarriage. After having an emergency surgery, her doctor told her that her fallopian tubes were damaged and she wouldn’t be able to have any more children naturally.
“First I was distraught, I was embarrassed, I was ashamed, I felt less than a woman and [the doctor] assured me that was no way to feel and that for a certain amount of thousands of dollars, it can be fixed. And because I have the finances, I never even thought twice about it,” she told Essence.
Motivated by her own experience, the Bronx native thought of the many women who face a similar issue but don’t have the same wealth as she did. She told the publication that she intends on starting a fund for women who don’t have the financial means to get pregnant but long to have children.
“It wasn’t until I publicly spoke about it that I realized how many women are in the same predicament as me where they actually can have children, they just need an assist from medical procedures and they can’t because they are not financially stable enough to do it,” she said.
Medical procedures like in vitro fertilization could cost anywhere from $12,000 to $17,000 per treatmen*t*. Though more women are starting to use these methods to expand their family, many still can’t afford it.
Remy called out the health care industry and lawmakers for being silent on this issue.
“It’s just weird to me that if you want to terminate a pregnancy, you could use your health insurance; however, if you wanted to conceive, health insurance doesn’t cover that,” she said. “So I’m looking at all of these politicians that claim that they’re pro-life and they want to eradicate women having the choice to terminate their pregnancies, but if you’re pro-life, why would you not set up something so women who can’t conceive and women who want to be mothers can do so.”
In an Instagram post Remy shared at the top of the year, the rapper said she and her husband Papoose will try to conceive again using in vitro fertilization.
Watch the full interview in the video above.
-- This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website. Reported by Huffington Post 2 hours ago.
In January, the “All The Way Up” rapper opened up about her ectopic pregnancy, which resulted in a miscarriage. After having an emergency surgery, her doctor told her that her fallopian tubes were damaged and she wouldn’t be able to have any more children naturally.
“First I was distraught, I was embarrassed, I was ashamed, I felt less than a woman and [the doctor] assured me that was no way to feel and that for a certain amount of thousands of dollars, it can be fixed. And because I have the finances, I never even thought twice about it,” she told Essence.
Motivated by her own experience, the Bronx native thought of the many women who face a similar issue but don’t have the same wealth as she did. She told the publication that she intends on starting a fund for women who don’t have the financial means to get pregnant but long to have children.
“It wasn’t until I publicly spoke about it that I realized how many women are in the same predicament as me where they actually can have children, they just need an assist from medical procedures and they can’t because they are not financially stable enough to do it,” she said.
Medical procedures like in vitro fertilization could cost anywhere from $12,000 to $17,000 per treatmen*t*. Though more women are starting to use these methods to expand their family, many still can’t afford it.
Remy called out the health care industry and lawmakers for being silent on this issue.
“It’s just weird to me that if you want to terminate a pregnancy, you could use your health insurance; however, if you wanted to conceive, health insurance doesn’t cover that,” she said. “So I’m looking at all of these politicians that claim that they’re pro-life and they want to eradicate women having the choice to terminate their pregnancies, but if you’re pro-life, why would you not set up something so women who can’t conceive and women who want to be mothers can do so.”
In an Instagram post Remy shared at the top of the year, the rapper said she and her husband Papoose will try to conceive again using in vitro fertilization.
Watch the full interview in the video above.
-- This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website. Reported by Huffington Post 2 hours ago.
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