On a vote of 66-32, the Senate passed a bill that would provide health insurance to more than 4 million uniinsured children. During his term, President George W. Bush twice vetoed similar bills. But President Obama was more than willing to sign this bill. Democrats fully supported this bill, declaring that their first priorities are women and children; in addition, Obama had just signed a bill that makes it easier for women to challenge pay discrimination at work. The bill would increase tobacco taxes to balance the increased spending, which is roughly more than $32 million over four and a half years. However Republicans criticize the bill, seeing it as a threat to replace private health insurance with government programs. They also fear that bill will cover children from higher-income families. Senator Jon Kyl (Republican-Arizona) complained about a provision that could cover children with family incomes three times over the poverty level ($66, 150 for a family of four). But no matter how hard the Republicans tried to propose amendments, the Democrats rejected them.
One of the most important parts of the bill was letting states use federal money to provide health insurance to children and pregnant women who are legal immigrants. Currently, legal immigrants are barred from Medicaid and the State Children's Health Insurance program for five years after they enter the United States.
Thursday, January 29, 2009
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
4 comments:
What's up with saying the first priority is women? Isn't that sexist?
Also, I don't really get how there could be "pay discrimination". People make a voluntary agreement with their employer to work for a certain amount.
Even with the added spending, an estimated 5 million children still would be without health insurance, so I don't really see what there is to complain about besides the fact that it might not be doing enough. I understand the Kyl's concern, but still, I understand where Obama is coming from as well. During his election campaign, Obama called for requiring all children to have health coverage, and this is just proving that he is going through with the promises he built his platform on.
~Kimiya Bahmanyar
I love that the Republicans complain that this bill is threatening to take away private health insurance and put it into a government program. Well, I say, more power to this legislation!
When in our history did the idea that "every citizen in this country should be healthy" become controversial? It is said that a society will be judged by how they treat the least among them. It's clear that private health insurance has not done the job in this regard, and it's about time that they get the pink slip.
Except that
1) Universal health care won't make everyone healthy, nice glittering generality
2) Universal health care will cost a lot of money (money we don't have) and be inefficient.
The reason our health care is inefficient right now is because of the government's interference in it. The government regulations drive up prices as well.
The fact that everyone with insurance can get most medical procedures done for free means that everyone goes to the doctor all the time, way more often than they would otherwise. Since someone has to pay the doctors regardless, this drives up the prices of insurance. This would only be worse if the government was paying for everyone.
If people went on plans where they have a limited amount of money, then they have to be a bit more frugal and decide whether they really need to get that procedure done or whatever. This type of insurance would consequently be much cheaper.
Post a Comment