Blog - House Passes Historic Health Care Bill 
House Passes Historic Health Care Bill
November 8, 2009 - by Donny Shaw
The House of Representatives on Saturday night approved landmark legislation designed to accomplish President Obama’s goals of reducing health care costs, increasing choices for consumers and guaranteeing access to quality, affordable insurance for all Americans. The final vote tally was 220-215. Thirty-nine Democrats broke with their party to vote against the bill, and only one Republican, Rep. Anh Cao [R, LA-2], voted in favor.
Previous Congresses and Administrations have tried several times over the past 40 years to revamp the U.S. health care system, but they have never come this far. The bill passed in the House represents the biggest change to the health care system and the biggest expansion in coverage since Congress created Medicare and Medicaid in 1965.
The bill’s passage was secured in large part by a vote that took place earlier in the evening on an amendment from Rep. Bart Stupak [D, MI-1] to strengthen language in the bill banning the use of federal funds for abortions. The amendment, which was approved by a vote of 240-194, essentially restricts all low and middle-income people purchasing insurance with federal subsidies from buying a plan that covers abortions besides those resulting from rape or incest, or in cases where the mother’s life is endangered. A bloc of about forty conservative Democrats had been threatening for weeks to vote en masse to kill the bill if they weren’t allowed to vote on Stupak’s amendment.
President Obama also threw his full support behind the bill today in a plea to help House Democrats round up the final few votes they needed to get it passed. Speaking to the full House Democratic Caucus but gearing his remarks towards conservative Democrats, Obama said that voting against the bill wouldn’t protect them from partisan attacks. “None of you can expect the Republicans not to go after you if you vote against this bill,” Obama said at the meeting according to Rep. Henry Waxman [D, CA-30]. “They want this bill to go down for their own partisan reasons.”
The bill – known as the Affordable Health Care for America Act – seeks to expand health care coverage to the approximately 40 million Americans who are currently uninsured by lowering the cost of health care and making the system more efficient. To that end, it includes a new government-run insurance plan to compete with the private companies, a requirement that all Americans have health insurance, a ban on denying coverage because of a pre-existing condition and, to pay for it all, a surtax on individuals with incomes above $500,000. More thorough summaries of the bill can be found here.
The Senate is still weeks away from beginning debate on their own health care bill. The final details of their bill are still being negotiated, but whatever bill comes out of the Senate will be more conservative than the House’s bill in several ways. It is not clear that the Senate bill will end up containing a public option, and if it does, unlike the House bill it will allow individual states to opt out of offering it to their residents. The Senate’s bill will also provide fewer subsidies to help low and middle-income people buy insurance, and it will not include a surtax on the rich to offset its new spending.
The abortion issue that threatened to bring down the House bill so far has not been a problem in the Senate. Pro-choice Democrats are hoping to keep the Senate’s bill containing language that would allow people to use affordability credits to buy insurance that covers abortions, provided that the abortion part of the plan is fully paid for by individual premiums. The Senate language would then have to be reconciled with the House’s more conservative language by a joint-chamber conference committee that would be in charge of producing a final, merged bill. The final version will need one more vote from each chamber before it can be sent to President Obama to be signed into law.
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Displaying 1-30 of 88 total comments.
nlb99: By county hospitals, are you referring to the public, not-for-profit hospitals that receive significant funding from local, state, and/or federal governments operations? About 20% of the hositals in the U.S. are public hositals that provide care to mostly the poor and uninsured. Public hospitals have been in serious decline over the last few years due to growing losses. County Hospitals and Regional Medical Care in Texas: An Analysis of Out-of-County Costs: http://www.texmed.org/Template.aspx?id=1255#footnote
Is Texas the only state that has county hospitals, that a person w/o insurance can walk in and get treatment? I have had 2 major surgeries, w/o insurance, paid for both of them and did not go bankrupt. Want to talk about infant mortality: My son was born 2 months premature, 3lbs 4 ozs. We did not have insurance, we paid the bill and did not go bankrupt, that was 33 yrs ago. I have had melanoma, I have never been turned down for insurance. The insurance needs to be regulated, NOT overhauled. The other point that came from Obama's mouth is "cutting medicare $500 BILLION to help pay for this reform." They don't even know how much its going to cost. Would you go buy a house, car, groceries, or furniture without knowing the price?
Continued…EMTALA was “passed to combat the practice of "patient dumping", i.e., refusal to treat people because of inability to pay or insufficient insurance, or transferring or discharging emergency patients on the basis of high anticipated diagnosis and treatment costs.” EMTALA is Section 1867(a) of the Social Security Act, within the section of the U.S. Code which governs Medicare. http://www.emtala.com/faq.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emergency_Medical_Treatment_and_Active_Labor_Act
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consolidated_Omnibus_Budget_Reconciliation_Act_of_1985
Like I have written before, hopefully you won’t have another accident or get seriously sick before paying off your $100k medical debt.
One more thing I would like to point out that I have neglected to do thus far, the Preamble of the Constitution is NOT enumerated. The document is quite specific in the powers it grants to Congress, and "provide for the general welfare" is most certainly not among them. It is the Preamble, and gives purpose to the rest of the document. Congress is limited to those powers which are enumerated (i.e. the amendments) and NOTHING MORE.
LeMat: It’s amazing that I need to make this distinction but in stating you “have been left hanging by the system” wasn’t referring to the care you received following your accident but to the means to pay for it and your ineligibility for coverage today leaving you very venerable. But there was a time not that long ago when a hospital might have denied emergency care to someone like you with no means to pay for their care. It was a practice known as “patient dumping.” Perhaps you might have gotten your wish and left behind like road kill. Legislation, the “Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor Act” (EMTALA) was passed as part the “Consolidated Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1985 (COBRA)” signed into law by President Reagan in 1986...
Sorry..my question was for LeMat...made a typo...
LeMat:
Are you referring to Meidcal insurance...you said it was a car accident...did you have auto insurance?
Yes, but it was not my car. (you are also becoming a bit too curious for my likeing)
LeMat:
I’m sorry my questions irritate you. But in either case, what you have shared here is you suffered serious injuries in a car accident, had no coverage while in between jobs, and are now saddled with a $100,000 in medical debt that will take more than a lifetime to pay back, plus are now ineligible for coverage. I applaud you for committing your life to paying it all back. I imagine you are hoping you never get a serious illness or have another accident, this could add another lifetime of medical debt to your ledger.
LeMat: (continued)
No system is perfect as your case demonstrates. As a casualty of the current system you have really been left hanging. If you fully understand the reforms in HR 3962 you know that had it been enacted prior to your accident you would have maintained coverage in between jobs. And if it were enacted now you would no longer be denied coverage for pre-existing conditions. I would think that should offer some consolation for your future and your family. You told someone in an earlier posting to stop being a martyr for the state. Perhaps you should heed your own advice and stop being a martyr of the current system; it has not served you too well.
Oh please... I am hardly a 'martyr for the current system'.
The problem with medicine is Government involvement and the ruination of the Courts (which no longer allow true trial by jury). I have not been 'left hanging', but have been provided the best service without which I would have DIED, much like my friend. I fear neither further damage to myself nor debilitating illness... such fear is beneath me.
The Government has no business looking after me with property of someone else. I would have much rather bled to death on the pavement than take that which rightfully belongs to someone else. In point of fact, I would have rather died than become indebted in the first place... but that was never an option.
Take your sap-peddling elsewhere; I have no need for empty promises or platitudes. The Government has no money of it's own... remember that.
Zac your should move to Russia or China if that is what you want. During the early days of the original colonies it was a law that if you worked then you and your family could eat from the community supply. If you did NOT work then you and your family could NOT eat from the community supply. Another word carry your own weight. To want the Government to run our health Care is asking for nothing but a take over of our civil liberties. From the way it sounds you liked Hitlers plan for health care also, kill'em all and make some glue from them if they are old or sick and will need some care. How about Stalin's state run health care, he tested bio-weapons on the people that used the government health care system which was everyone. Just between these two Monsters millions were killed for the "good" of the nation. People like you could do us all a favor and eat a bullet or move out of the USA.
LaStat: Why didn't you have insurance?
I was between jobs at the time, and waiting to go through the hiring process for the police force. I am now ineligible.
LeMat:
Sorry about your accident and your friend. Your situation is tragic yet not unique. I don't know all the details of course but even if you pay 1000. a month your talking more than a lifetime of payments. Have you some plan in place as to what will become of this debt wnen you die? Your case demostrates a need for some sort of reform at the very least and in many respects proves my point about the unpredictable high cost nature of health care.
No it doesn't.
I certainly didn't ask to be scraped off the pavement by those people, but they did save me. I owe them, and I will work to pay them back.
I am neither a weakling looking for someone to take care of me nor a coward unwilling to give it my all. The problem in health care right now is the frivolous lawsuits jacking up prices, that people expect their insurance to pay for everything, and Government involvement and regulation jacking up prices.
If you want to fix health care, you have to concentrate on what is actually wrong. To do that, you need to turn it over to the states who can test 50+ solutions and not send out entire country deeper into bankruptcy. Oh, did I mention it would actually be LEGAL this way?
LeMat, I agree with everything that you have stated. Our so called representative only represent themselves and to hell with what "We The People" want! The housing market collapsed because of government forcing banks to make loans to people would really should not have had them and then couldn't afford to pay for them. We have a cap and trade bill that will drive our energy cost through the roof. Now this damn health care bill that we will be taxing the crap out of the insurance companies of which will be passed on to the end user because they will not eat that cost. Every year I pay more for medical care as it is! I don't know how I will afford this additional tax. I firmly believe there is another revolution coming because we again have no representation. Funny how history repeats itself because some of "We The People" like to have thing given to use instead of work for the things we have. God Bless & long live the United States of America!
I'd second that, but we're the united States of America. Little 'u', because we are united by choice *grin*.
Well, until it is implemented, I do not know what can be done. Once it is implemented and someone is "fined" or whatever consequence for non participation, then it can be taken through the court system. See Schechter Poultry Corp. v United States.
Indeed, this is what I am waiting for in my case.
Your argument based on the 10th Amendment would be stronger if there wasn't already a provision in the act that allowed states to opt out.
What part of "all powers not enumerated" is so hard to understand? Acting at all on health care is acting on powers not enumerated, and thus it is unconstitutional. The argument is black and white. There is no room for gray area in law.
That ia an outright LIE! It is not in the HOUSE bill. It may be put in the SENATE bill. And for your info, even if your state opts out YOU ARE STILL RESPONSIBLE FOR ALL TAXES< FEES< FINES< REGULATIONS. How is that opting out?
I believe that if this is actually made into law, constitutional lawyers will jump on it and take it to the Supreme Court where they will HAVE to toss it out. If I can figure out that it is unconstitutional they should. Until they do, the law is suspended. Also, is Obama is proven to not have a valid birth certificate in the court case pending in January, ALL the things he signed into law are NULL AND VOID. Good news for us but what a mess. Will this make him a traitor? Don't traitors against this country foreign and domestic get, and I hate to say it, fryed?
(cont'd from above)
From Hale v. Henkel [201 U.S.] Supreme Court Ruling, page 74:
"Upon the other hand, the corporation is a creature of the State. It is presumed to be corporated for the the benefit of the public. It receives certain special privileges and franchises, and holds them subject to the laws of the State and the limitations of its charter. Its powers are limited by law. It can make no contract not authorized by its charter. Its rights to act as a corporation are only preserved to it so long as it obeys the laws of its creation."
A far cry from how we do business today, would you not agree? Who perpetrated this? Why... the Government of course.
(cont'd from above)
You see, corporations no longer need to work for the public good because the Government took away the charters. Now, the corporations now work only for their own profit while still receiving special privileges from the State. Also, the private citizen has been denied his RIGHT to do business without the consent of the Government. So they have loosened the restrictions on business, all the while putting the squeeze on the private citizen.
This is why we can't afford health insurance! The Government has twisted its rules all around to screw us over. Now we're told handing them a power screwdriver is all they need to make it better?
(cont'd from above)
From Justice James Kent's "Commentaries on American Law; Volume 2"
"When the spirit of liberty has fled, and truth and justice are disregarded, private rights can easily be sacrificed under form of law."
(cont'd from above)
From "American Jurisprudence"; Volume 16 — Edition 2 [16 Am Jur 2d]:
"A written Constitution is not only the direct and basic expression of the sovereign will, it is also the absolute rule of action and decision of all departments and offices of government with respect to all matters covered by it, and must control as it is written until it is changed by the authority which established it. No function of government can be discharged in disregard of or in opposition to the fundamental law. The state constitution is the mandate of a sovereign people to its servants and representatives."
(cont'd from above)
Continued from "American Jurisprudence"; Volume 16 — Edition 2 [16 Am Jur 2d]:
"No one of them has a right to ignore or disregard its mandates, and the legislature, the executive officers, and the judiciary cannot lawfully act beyond it's limitations. Disobedience or evasion of a constitutional mandate may not be tolerated even though such disobedience may, at least temporarily, promote in some respects the best interests of the public. Neither emergency nor economic necessity justifies a disregard of cardinal constitutional guaranties."
As you can see, what the Federal Government is doing right now is quite plainly illegal, as I have stated. Health care, is not an enumerated power of the Federal Government, and as such is the sole right of the States or the people. Government is best which governs least. It should be your elected representative (that guy who knocked on your door when he was trying to get elected) rather than someone one thousand miles from your door who decides what would work best for your State. All power is inherent in the people. They cannot decide which health care works best for YOU because your life is your own. Once they decide to start paying for your health care though and you start receiving special privileges of the State, are you not then a creature of the State?
In legal terms they would, essentially, own you. No thanks.