Hobbled Lobby and the Supremes

President Clinton's Convention Speech: highlights from the prepared text

Highlights from the prepared text for President Clinton's Convention Speech:

"It turns out that advancing equal opportunity and economic empowerment is both morally right and good economics, because discrimination, poverty and ignorance restrict growth, while investments in education, infrastructure and scientific and technological research increase it, creating more good jobs and new wealth for all of us."

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"In Tampa, the Republican argument against the President's re-election was pretty simple: we left him a total mess, he hasn't cleaned it up fast enough, so fire him and put us back in."

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"I like the argument for President Obama's re-election a lot better. He inherited a deeply damaged economy, put a floor under the crash, began the long hard road to recovery, and laid the foundation for a modern, more well-balanced economy that will produce millions of good new jobs, vibrant new businesses, and lots of new wealth for the innovators."

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"The Recovery Act saved and created millions of jobs and cut taxes for 95% of the American people. In the last 29 months the economy has produced about 4.5 million private sector jobs.  But last year, the Republicans blocked the President's jobs plan costing the economy more than a million new jobs. So here's another jobs score: President Obama plus 4.5 million, Congressional Republicans zero."

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"Now there are 250,000 more people working in the auto industry than the day the companies were restructured.  Governor Romney opposed the plan to save GM and Chrysler. So here's another jobs score: Obama two hundred and fifty thousand, Romney, zero."

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"The Republicans call it Obamacare and say it's a government takeover of health care that they'll repeal.  Are they right? Let's look at what's happened so far. Individuals and businesses have secured more than a billion dollars in refunds from their insurance premiums because the new law requires 80% to 85% of your premiums to be spent on health care, not profits or promotion.  Other insurance companies have lowered their rates to meet the requirement.  More than 3 million young people between 19 and 25 are insured for the first time because their parents can now carry them on family policies.  Millions of seniors are receiving preventive care including breast cancer screenings and tests for heart problems.  Soon the insurance companies, not the government, will have millions of new customers many of them middle class people with pre-existing conditions.  And for the last two years, health care spending has grown under 4%, for the first time in 50 years."

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"Both Governor Romney and Congressman Ryan attacked the President for allegedly robbing Medicare of 716 billion dollars. Here's what really happened. There were no cuts to benefits. None. What the President did was save money by cutting unwarranted subsidies to providers and insurance companies that weren't making people any healthier. He used the saving to close the donut hole in the Medicare drug program, and to add eight years to the life of the Medicare Trust Fund. It's now solvent until 2024. So President Obama and the Democrats didn't weaken Medicare, they strengthened it."

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"Remember, Republican economic policies quadrupled the debt before I took office and doubled it after I left. We simply can't afford to double-down on trickle-down."

Are We Seeing a Healthcare Cost Bubble?

Jeffrey Sachs' "Entitlements Hysteria" discusses the rising healthcare cost obsession common among politicians as well as the "punditariat". Their beliefs remind me of the folks who thought housing prices would always rise. Haven't we had enough reason to learn it's folly to bet on prices always rising? It makes no difference whether it's housing or healthcare, just because it rose over some past years doesn't mean it necessarily will over all the years to come.

Past price increases beyond inflation don't guarantee future price increases beyond inflation any more than past performance guarantees future earnings. In fact, if we do implement a public option or a single payer system with price negotiation, we could very well see a drop in prices! So why do so many people seem to be so convinced healthcare prices couldn't possibly stop skyrocketing? After all, everything else that goes up out of step with the rest of the economy eventually stops rising faster and usually falls back down.

What saved the 9/11 first responder bill?

Great news: a 9/11 health bill passed the Senate! But wait, what changed? Why did GOP opposition go away? Most reports on the new version of the 9/11 bill appear content with the low-hanging fruit and what the Republicans want you to see as their main objection. If you just skim the headlines, you might think it was John Stewart shaming Congressional Republicans combined with the new version lowering the cost estimate versus the original version.

Dig deeper. The big, hairy deal for the Republicans was the change in how we're paying for it ... and not in an entirely good way. The old bill was paid for by closing a tax loophole benefiting foreign corporations. As the Financial Times put it, "But the revenue offsets could prove to be significant irritants in economic ties with China and India." So the Chamber of Commerce, with significant dues coming from China and India, lobbied against the bill for that reason. As previously detailed, the GOP listens to the Chamber. Pressure from John Stewart or no, the Republicans weren't about to accept any bill closing that tax loophole and making the Chamber -- by far the top spending lobbying group -- less eager to campaign for the GOP. The new version instead sets up a fee on government procurement contracts with countries that haven't signed onto a WTO agreement and extends visa fees. That's less offensive to the Chamber, so it's OK with the Republicans.

I suppose the new way of paying for it is OK. At first glance, it at least sounds better than not implementing those fees. But imagine if the GOP weren't so influenced by the Chamber. Maybe in that alternate world we would have done both: closed the loophole and implemented the fees.

After the photo op (how the GOP turned their backs on 9/11 first responders)

The story in the House of the bill to care for 9/11 first responders is well told by the folks at Crooks and Liars in "Republicans to 9/11 Responders: Die, and Die Quickly". They include a list of the mostly Republican set of House members who voted against it. There's also a good video of Rep Weiner standing up for what's right, not just in supporting the bill but also in how things should be done.

"If you believe that it's right, you vote yes. You don't hide behind procedure and give cover to your pals." -- Rep. Anthony Weiner

Here's are the Republican Senators who effectively stood against the 9/11 first responders by filibustering the James Zadroga 9/11 Health and Compensation Act of 2010:

NAYs ---42
Alexander (R-TN) Barrasso (R-WY) Bennett (R-UT) Bond (R-MO) Brown (R-MA) Bunning (R-KY) Burr (R-NC) Chambliss (R-GA) Coburn (R-OK) Cochran (R-MS) Collins (R-ME) Corker (R-TN) Cornyn (R-TX) Crapo (R-ID)	DeMint (R-SC) Ensign (R-NV) Enzi (R-WY) Graham (R-SC) Grassley (R-IA) Gregg (R-NH) Hatch (R-UT) Hutchison (R-TX) Inhofe (R-OK) Isakson (R-GA) Johanns (R-NE) Kirk (R-IL) Kyl (R-AZ) LeMieux (R-FL)	Lugar (R-IN) McCain (R-AZ) McConnell (R-KY) Murkowski (R-AK) Risch (R-ID) Roberts (R-KS) Sessions (R-AL) Shelby (R-AL) Snowe (R-ME) Thune (R-SD) Vitter (R-LA) Voinovich (R-OH) Wicker (R-MS)

Not Voting - 1

Brownback (R-KS) While the majority leader also technically voted against closure, he's the one Senator who had good excuse. With the abuse of the filibuster, it has become common for the majority leader to switch his vote to "no" at the last minute in order to retain the ability to reintroduce the bill later. The rest of them -- all those Republicans -- should have their names inscribed and displayed as the main exhibit in a museum of shame and hypocrisy.