Et tu, Denver Post! Then fall, Obamacare?
N.B. #1. “Et tu, Brute. Then fall, Caesar.” – Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar recognizing his friend, Brutus, as one of the forty or so conspirators who were ending his reign over Rome and the Mediterranean world by the pre-Christian method of stabbing him to death.
N.B. #2. The problem with political jokes is that too many of them get elected. – Will Rogers
Aside from the sleazy deals patching this bill together, its provisions add up to a poison pill for the country in that it fails to reduce costs.
From the wildly improper gifts to senators like Nebraska's Ben Nelson to this week's backroom deals for unions, the so-called health care reform emerging from Washington has become bad medicine for America and ought to be rejected. Quickly.
Unbelievably, the bill got even worse this past week when lawmakers agreed to exempt union workers from paying taxes that other workers will have to pay for years. [My emphasis]
From a Denver Post editorial, Dispatch health care reform bill , more below:
Just as a predecessor left undeniable evidence on a blue dress, our president’s fingerprints are all over this political “joke”. The scene of the “backroom deal” was closed “backroom” meetings in the White House. - js
Now thanks be unto God, which always causeth us to triumph in Christ, and maketh manifest the savour of his knowledge by us in every place. - 2nd Corinthians 2:14
Dispatch health care reform bill [/] The backroom deal to exempt unions from new taxes is a joke. Sen. Bennet should show his independence and kill the bill. [/] Saturday, January 16, 2010 [/] EDITORIAL [/] By The Denver Post
[...] Colorado Senators. Mark Udall and Michael Bennet ought to take a principled stand against the failed reform effort, even if it once held promise. [/] Bennet went on the record weeks ago saying he would support the bill even if it cost him his job. Well, it probably will. [/] His hard-line stance may have been noble at the time, but so much has changed with the legislation since then that the bill is now at odds with the stated goals of both Bennet and Udall. We think both senators have more than enough clearance to oppose it and ask for better. [/] Bennet faces a tough election in November. We understand the pressure Democratic Party leaders have put on him to ensure this stinker of a bill passes, but most Coloradans want an independent leader, and not doing right by Coloradans could be costly at the polls. [/] We'd like to think Udall, who campaigned as a moderate Democrat, could muster the courage to buck his party and vote against the bill, but we won't hold our breath.
Unions bitterly opposed the Senate's tax on the so-called "Cadillac" health insurance plans that many union workers enjoy. In private meetings with the White House and President Obama this week, union chiefs won a deal in which workers with high-end insurance don't have to pay the tax for five years. [/] The reasoning is that union members need the time to negotiate with management for contracts that adjust for the new taxes. Fair enough, but why doesn't that protection apply equally for those workers who aren't members of unions? [/] "The White House and congressional Democrats are picking one group of workers over another," a spokeswoman for House Minority Leader John Boehner told the Wall Street Journal. "If this sounds discriminatory, well, it is."
The Journal reported that the president of the AFL-CIO, Richard Trumka, made indications that unions would be less willing to help Democrats this fall. [/] The seedy pact Democrats reached now means that lawmakers must find another way to raise money to make up for the revenue lost to the five-year union waiver. Negotiators are said to be looking at increasing taxes on medical device makers, drug makers and nursing homes — costs which will almost certainly be passed on to consumers. [/] [...] Colorado's elected officials shouldn't accept it. [My ellipses and emphasis]
