CacheGOP Blog

Hello Friends:

I started writing a review of congressional action on health care several days ago, but I am finishing it after the vote last Saturday night.  I shall preface my report by saying I am ashamed of the US House of Representatives.  At least the Utah delegation got it right.

What I find bizarre was that over 200 years ago, the Founding Fathers foresaw this health care debate and provided a solution.  We call it FEDERALISM.  If something has to be done the exact same way, at the exact same time, by all people, only the national government can orchestrate that.  The feds are good at one-size-fits all.  However, if one wants creativity, innovation, justice or consideration of unique circumstances, the states are, as former Justice Louis Brandeis once called them, the true laboratories of democracy.  The Founding Fathers understood that the federal government should be limited, not for the fun of it, but because the federal government has limitations.  The national government is, always was, and always will be too big to be efficient. And we certainly shouldn’t be consolidating more power here now.

In the Federalist Papers, Madison wrote that “powers delegated to the federal government are few and defined.  Those to the state governments are numerous and indefinite.”  Why?  States are more effective and the federal government can’t and shouldn’t try to solve all problems.  Justice Scalia wrote, “The Constitution protects us from our own best intentions.  It divides power…among governments…precisely so that we may resist the temptation to concentrate power in one location as an expedient solution to the crises of the day.”  He wasn’t writing about Pelosicare, but if there ever was a bill that sought to concentrate power as an expedient solution to the crises of the day, it is Speaker Pelosi’s health care bill.  If it ever goes into effect, we lose sight of the structure the Founders put in place to ensure reforms were done at the most appropriate and useful level.  Balance is the key, and this bill is a massive shift in power balance.

Our health care system needs reform, but the reforms needed in California are not the reforms needed in Massachusetts.  Massachusetts has a program; they appear to like it even though it’s expensive, but it won’t work in Utah.  What Utah is trying to do wouldn’t fly in Boston. 

Like every state, Utah’s demographics are unique.  We have a young population and more small business firms.  In Utah, 32 percent of small businesses offer insurance, but that is 10% less than the national average – a unique challenge to Utah.  Reforms in Utah need to take the burden off small business and give competitive, affordable pricing to consumers.  That is why I am excited about reforms taking place in Utah right now.  The changes taking place right now in our state are based on consumer options, stable costs for business, worker affordability and portable choices – and all tailored for our demographics.  This Pelosi bill stops all of this – and innovations in any other state.  If this becomes law it would be the true health care tragedy. 

I am sure you have heard of all the problems with Pelosi’s bill.  It is impossible to list them all here.  However, allow me to list a few:

• It grows the bureaucracy.  It creates a new Health Care Commissioner (czar) over a Health Care Administration with a Health Care Advisory Committee.  This group will mandate all insurance standards – private as well as the so-called public option.  It will approve which private plans are allowed to compete with the public option.  The word “regulate” is used over 190 times and the word “shall” is used over 3,000 times.
• It is expensive.  It will cost the federal government $1.3 trillion dollars.  It will cost the states around $35 billion.  The Senate version funding formula was concocted by adding up 10 years of potential revenue to balance off the first 6 years of costs – not great accounting principles.  Pelosi’s version is even more creative.  It starts collecting premiums in 2011 and starts paying benefits in 2016 and runs out of money in 2029.  It is great only if the Mayan calendar is accurate.
• It raises taxes.  It will increase taxes by $730-745 billion.  That is a tax increase for people and business.  Business will either provide an “approved” insurance plan or pay, depending on size, a 2 – 8% tax.  Taxes are passed on to consumers.  Medical devices will have an additional 2% tax.  If one uses an insulin pump or heart pacemaker, the cost just increased.  Seniors will see a $425 billion cut in Medicare benefits – especially for anyone on Medicare Advantage.
• It gets cuter. Health Savings Accounts will be gradually eliminated.  Community organizations like ACORN will be allowed to establish local programs.  Nutrition labels have to be placed on all vending machines next to the product to be purchased.  It even demands communication be done in “a linguistically appropriate manner,” whatever that is.  Of course, Congress is exempt from the program.
  It abandons school funding for abstinence programs under Title V and replaces it with “teen pregnancy grants.”  I won’t use the word “death panels,” but the door is opened.  It does require end-of-life planning materials.  Washington and Oregon already define euthanasia as “death with dignity” and not assisted suicide.  It provides a watered-down protection for health professionals who reject performing abortions as a right of conscience.  Although the House passed a strong amendment to prohibit government funding of abortions, it can be removed.  When asked on the Floor by the Republican Leader, none of the committee chairs who would be the participants on a conference committee would guarantee to keep the amendment in a final version, and today one Democrat lawmaker declared, “I am confident the (pro-life) amendment will not be in the final version of the bill.”
  The Pelosi bill does nothing for tort reform, nothing for allowing interstate insurance competition and nothing for block grants to states for high risk pooling.
• There is so much more that is wrong.  Details notwithstanding, the biggest problem is the idea that health care decisions can be dictated by Washington bureaucrats – a health care czar.  To paraphrase P.J. O’Rourke, the Pelosi bill would have the same effect as giving alcohol and keys to the car to a teenage boy.

The federal government can play a role, but real health care reform must happen at the state level.  Real reform must be based on giving consumers options and choices.  We know what our unique health care needs are, and our ability to choose will be lost if we fail to allow individual states to address their unique and diverse needs.  When Washington chooses, individual choice loses.
 
We’ll continue to fight for federalism and for empowering individuals.  It is the solution.  I hope we’ll be succesful.
 
Rob