I hope the health care bill can be salvaged with the parts that actually do some good intact.
Is the bill perfect? No. Does it accomplish a few good things? Yes. Can it be improved by future smaller bills? Of course.
It is a beginning. I hope in the future some of these issues can be de-linked from each other and voted on as separate bills in a less contentious way. It almost seems like this bill was designed to give the GOP a big giant thing to oppose.
Well, conservatives opposed it, and for what? To look like they’re afraid of expanding Medicaid to meet medical inflation, or starting health insurance exchanges for those of us who aren’t fortunate enough to work for the federal government?
The GOP had plenty of chances to pass useful laws in this arena and did not. To cry that they need to be listened to now looks like sour grapes. The smart move on the right would be to own reform instead of playing to those who romanticize the 1800s and social Darwinism by opposing even moderate reforms.
A Republican who actually stood for giving American citizens in general the kind of freedom to choose from health insurance plans that federal employees get (a policy toward which this bill is a baby step) is the kind of Republican who could regain some credibility for himself, if not the party.
This bill is a giant stew of reforms, some only incremental, to substitute for actual radical change. And a little more radicalism would have actually sold better. In the future, I hope we find some modifications that will make this bill better, or add some new ideas that better help the American people. For now, why not at least get more citizens into the exchanges, or spend more money on building medical labs or training nurses? We can “compromise it to where you can vote for it” by making it serve the American people better.
Philip Wilson
Joplin
Opinion
Voices: Health bill worth saving
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