The Gang of Six Will Talk at 9

The Gang of Six — the three Democrats and three Republicans on the Senate Finance Committee who are writing a health care bill — have set their first formal August recess teleconference for 9 p.m. on Thursday.

“Bipartisan progress continues,” Senator Max Baucus, the Montana Democrat and chairman of the committee, said in a statement.

“The Finance Committee is on track to reach a bipartisan agreement on comprehensive health care reform that can pass the Senate,” he added. “Our group will be meeting tomorrow, and our staffs continue to meet as well. I am confident we will continue our steady progress toward health care reform that will lower costs and provide quality, affordable coverage to all Americans.”

The committee may be the last best hope for a bipartisan agreement on a health-care overhaul, although some Democrats say increasingly that they may have to go it alone.

The Thursday call comes as the Republicans in the gang — Senators Charles E. Grassley of Iowa, Olympia Snowe of Maine and Mike Enzi of Wyoming — are under increasing pressure to buck the Democrats. The conservative Club for Growth plans to run TV commercials in the three senators’ home states urging them not to “cave in” to what it says is the left’s push for an expensive big government overhaul.

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I think bi-partisanship is very overrated. It seems to me to mean that Democrats always give Republicans their way. If there is not a public option to the health care reform bill, I will consider President Obama to have failed in his first major test. He seems unlikely to me, to be the transformational leader he claimed he would be; he is to eager to be liked by everbyody.

A totally disallusioned former Republican core voter I say ditch the GOP. What’s the point of the Democrats controlling the White House and congress if all health care reform really means to them is business as usual?

Bipartisanship doesn’t exist. Sen. Grassley’s comments during the last week is proof of that.

“What’s happening, I think where the president has some more responsibility is to give the Congress more direction. I find it strange that we have—the American people have decided that there will be a lot more Democrats in Congress than Republicans. The Democrats have a huge 60-seat majority in the Senate, and therefore they’ve got big majorities on every committee, too.

But Max Baucus, who is a Democratic senator, has decided on the Senate Finance Committee, which has this key role in what’s going to happen next, that they won’t have the whole committee do it. It’ll just be three Democrats and three Republicans who are going to make that decision. One of those Republicans is going around the country giving out copies of Glenn Beck’s book and saying that healthcare reform will pull the plug on grandma, Senator Grassley.

So for the Democrats in Congress to be essentially giving up their majority, deciding the way this is going to pass, I think is something that the president ought to weigh in on. There’s a reason that Democrats have a 60-seat majority. The American people voted for it, and I think they’d like a Democratic bill.” (Rachel Maddow, Meet the Press)

Im tired of hearing about the gang of six. Who picked these guys anyway? Why are they so important?

Only one I like is Olympia Snowe.

So why are there 3 Republicans and three Democrats? The last time that I looked there were 60 Democrats and 40 Republicans in the Senate. That would give us 3.6 Democrats and 2.4 Republicans.

We could round for 4 Democrats and 2 Republicans and dispense with Grassley.

The national health care debate is a stunning reminder of how bitter and divisive American national politics has truly become. Many people, including myself, voted for President Obama last November because he promised voters that he would try to change this situation. Disillusionment seems to be a common response these days, but I still carry some hope that this debate will end in a constructive manner. Otherwise, the political consequences will be great for the President and, I think, for the country at large.

We don’t need a bipartisan plan. We need a plan void of corporate interests. These are not the guys to give us that. They might as well have their lobbyists take the call.

Too late for talk. The White House has been very patient while the Republicans and their corporate sponsors had lied to and misled the American people. It is time for the Dems to act and get it done. There is a related post at //iamsoannoyed.com/?page_id=588

Sounds like a shootout at the OK Corral. Wonder if this is a real meeting or just for show. Have the Dems already decided to ditch bipartisanship? This wouldn’t surprise me, but then they face the risks and wrath of the public when they understand what Obamacare really means for them They may find that the cure is worse than the disease. //www.MDWhistleblower.blogspot.com

Why will no one, the press, the white house,democratic senators call a liar, a liar? A Republican senator goes around telling hill wide-eyed rable what they want to hear when he KNOWS its a lie and no one will call him down about it. The democrats stand around with their finger in their moutn, say “Oh Dear, Oh Dear, What shall we do?” If they don’t wake up and stand toe-to-toe with them, the best opportunity we have to get good health care will pass us by. We have 60 Senators, they have 40, but they are in the driver’s seat. WHY? We should have been prepared for this when we KNEW that it would be coming. Give the devil his due. Chris McLeod

The President made a tactical blunder that put him too far at the OTHER end of strategy towards creating health reform. If we look at the appeals that Roosevelt and Johnson made towards health reform, they let the proposal die in favor of other bills or allowed popular opinion to govern policy dictation, respectively.

In the case of Clinton, policy was controlled too tightly within the executive.

Obama went the other extreme and ceded policy control to the legislature.

Furthermore, a true level of understanding of health policy and its details is absent in this administration. They didn’t have a clear vision of what they wanted.

There is an Iron Triangle in healthcare: cost, access, quality. You can only get 2 at once, and it is impossible to increase 2 without decreasing the third. The Obama administration’s claim that we can magically get all 3 is not true. In the socialized countries, they compromise on the 3 factors to have them all be relatively strong, and this is enough to have the best health outcomes in the world.

I discuss these ideas at much greater length and depth on my website:

The site includes past health reform failures, key issues for discussion, news, research, videos and other discussions of how reform should have gone and what the key issues of focus should have been.

Don’t mistake me, I am heavily liberal, but I would have done this quite differently.

I promise you won’t regret it.

Amir Satvat
MBA in Healthcare Management, Wharton School (In Progress)
MPA in Health Policy, New York University
Former Healthcare Investment Banker, Goldman Sachs

Baucus the the problem not the solution. No public option NO legislation.

The issue is what is best for the American people; not what is best for insurers, providers, advertisers, snake oil medical care, dog catchers and so forth.

This bill is not best for America or Americans and is not a step in the correct (but is in line with the right) direction.

A National Wellness and Health Plan is needed and then the issues related to ineffective, unsafe and expensive medical care services and products and medical care insurance will have real solutions due to a real external medical care model competitor.

The Committee of Six needs to change to the Committee of 60 to 40. What is Majority worth if you don’t use it? The President needs to get out of the back seat of the Limo, take his gloves off, and reclaim the driver’s seat. To this challange we elected him. Chris McLeod

Here we go President Obama, your time to lead has come.

Because President Obama is an honorable man who would like nothing better than a bipartisan solution to the healthcare disaster America must confront today, and since he is willing to spend all the political capital necessary to accomplish his promise of healthcare reform, Republicans have decided that they will use this moment and this issue to promote chaos and paranoia in order to turn the healthcare crisis into what they called the President’s political “Waterloo”. In other words, Republicans are only interested in discrediting the President and diminishing his popularity by defeating healthcare reform and using it as a wedge issue among the electorate.

The first victims of the Republican Waterloo initiative where the town hall meetings. The town hall meetings where intended to generate a dialogue which would bring about new ideas and consensus among Americans and their representatives. However, the town hall meetings where hijacked by a Republican cult, and turned into a fiasco orchestrated by Fox, Rove, Nute, Palin, and Rush, in order to galvanize the base of the splintered and discredited Republican Party. The usual Republican operatives have relied on the old Rove playbook in order to use issues like fear of big government takeover, Socialism, death panels and euthanasia, medical care and prescription drug rationing, they even went as far as to once again question the legitimacy of President Obama’s birth certificate. Issues of fear, hate, economic status, and yes, in some town hall meetings, racist remarks where the order of the day. In other words, attack Democrats, disrupt all meetings, address everything that has nothing to do with actual healthcare in order to distort the real legislation and derail any chance of consensus or reform.

Given the Republican’s attitude towards healthcare reform, the time has come for President Obama and the Democrats to bring about real reform, even without the Republican Party’s support. Despite the orchestrated loud noises from the Republican extremist minority, the American people overwhelmingly elected President Obama and elected a solid majority of Democrats in Congress, so that they could implement a total change in the direction of our nation. Healthcare needs reform, and the President has earned the right to spearhead that reform effort with or without Republican support. The American people are all the support the President needs and we are solidly behind our President. Now it’s up to President Obama to show his leadership skills and help Democrats implement the changes he promised and the changes we need.

Republicans have proven that they can’t lead; they can’t follow, so Americans will have to move them out of the way.

no need for a bipartisan panel. just do the right thing and drop the stupid and unnecessary public option clause. the bill will be formed in minutes if the option is dropped.

Enough of this. The courtesies of the Senate have been abused by Grassley, who is now afraid of his own constituents. Make it the gang of Five.
When Grassley stated that he wouldn’t support a bill that he couldn’t sell to Republicans, he took himself out as a serious player.
That may sell in Des Moines, but not in the country as a whole. How sad to see Chuck Grassley cave in to primary reelection fear.

Get clever, higher Carl Rove, make him work for the Democrats, after the Democratic plan is passed, kick his ass and dump him from a copter,i n Crawford, without a parachute.

The Entire Purpose Of The Health Care Plan Is Three Fold:

2) Provide Health Coverage To 46 Million Uninsured Americans.

3) Stop The Private Insurance Companies From Discriminating.

The Purpose Of A Private Company Is To Provide The Minimum Amount Of Service And The Maximum Price. Baucus And Grassley Know This. Why Do You Think They Call It The Senate Finance Committee And Not The Senate Health Care Committee? At The End Of The Day, He Who Has The Gold Rules And In America, It Is The Insurance Companies, Not The American People.

I think it’s great that small town America has a say in this legislation, but it might also be nice to have a senator who represents a state with a suburban middle class that is more representative of the country as a whole. It seems to me that the overwhelmingly rural nature of the states that these people represent will make it hard for them to understand the needs of the rest of us. If it becomes a case of ‘we have the power and we’ll serve our own’ then that is one way to guarantee a poor outcome.

The “gang of six” happens to be the same “gang” who used the same tactics to “give” us seniors the drug bill and donut hole and subsidized the pharmaceuticals and insurance companies mega bucks. Traditional medicare and supplements were signed over by the insured to “a choice” of an insurer. The interesting part was how that number of potential insurers grew after the deal was cast and now we are told the medicare trust fund is facing bankruptcy. Coincidence? Perhaps part of the greater plan is to completely dismantle Medicare which is efficient, well managed, and inclusive to all seniors. Grassley does not represent this Iowan; and Baucus does not represent Democrats.

True reform will never get even one Republican vote. This is a game to facilitate Democratic failure. Unless and until Obama realizes his opponents are not acting in good faith, he will squander a historic opportunity and condemn millions to unnecessary pain and suffering. This is not that complicated.

Democrats and the administration specifically seem to be spineless. In 1965 Lyndon Johnson personally went down to capital hill and browbeat a few US senators/knocked some heads together to make sure medicare/medicaid passed despite near universal opposition by republicans and the dixiecrats (functional equivalent of the current blue dogs). If Obama were really committed to the public option he could spend an afternoon down there and make it happen.

The entire purpose of the health care plan is three fold:
1) Lower Cost

2) Provide Health Coverage To 46 Million Uninsured Americans
.
3) Stop The Private Insurance Companies From Discriminating.

The purpose of a private company is to provide the minimum amount of service at the maximum price. At the end of the day, the insurance do not want a publuc option. So, how are you going to get health cost lower without a public option. It is HEALTH COST that is the main problem. Just follow the MONEY!!

Who cares anymore?

Obama’s abandonment of the public insurance option has destroyed the core principle that motivated health care reform and the prospect of (near) universal insurance coverage.

As far as I’m concerned, Obama and the Democrats have “blown it” by attempting some muddled form of “bi-partisanship” with an opposition party that is so far from being “loyal that it more seems to be interested in formenting insurrection.”

Tell me, during this so-called “tele-conference” will the Republican members of this Gang of Six be gun totin’ like the yahoos they sent to the town lynchings (er…meetings)?