Discriminating Against People With Multiple Sclerosis and Two Stories, Two Members of the GOP and One Big, Bad Nightmare

I found this story yesterday and saw that Keith Olbermann talked about it on his show last night.  It's about the McCain campaign's  "top health-care guru" Doug Holtz-Eakin.  He's out of a job now and his COBRA is about to run-out.  But he's not worried.  Why?

"Let's not whine too much about me," he said. "I'm a wealthy, affluent American in the big picture."

Oh, that's why.  He can afford an individual policy despite a pre-existing condition.  One like Multiple Sclerosis.

Despite his personal trials, however, Holtz-Eakin said his conviction on the hot-button issue of health care is unchanged. He believes that reform is needed, but that President Obama and congressional Democrats are going about it the wrong way. The system is "broken," he said, but the bills now before Congress do not cut costs enough.

He thinks the Democrats are going about it the wrong way.  And I suppose Republican John Boehner (check out his campaign finances here and see who tops the list) has the right idea? Take a look at what the GOP has in mind. 

Boehner said Monday that the measure would not include language banning insurance companies from denying coverage to consumers with preexisting conditions, a prominent feature of Democrats' bills in both the House and Senate.

How typical of the GOP.  Let's ignore something like pre-existing conditions when we write our Bill. The Insurance Industry and their campaign contributions are waay more important than the health and well-being of our constituents. In fact, let's keep them uninsured so they get even more sick and die. They can't vote a Democratic ticket then.

Allowing pre-existing conditions to go on is a form of Discrimination.  The lawmakers, like Boehner and his GOP cohorts, are practicing Discrimination against people with Multiple Sclerosis and every other chronic disease. Yes, Discrimination: the willful and purposeful unfair treatment on the basis of the prejudice that a group of United States Citizens had the grave misfortune of becoming chronically ill.  They should be excluded from ever getting affordable health care coverage.  Discriminated against for getting sick and being sick. You can't help getting a disease like Multiple Sclerosis any more than you can help the color of your skin, Johnny.

And to address ending "junk lawsuits" as an issue to out-of-controls costs, let me site an excerpt from a blog written by a California lawyer, Richard Johnston.  His blog, Problem is Erisa, is a valuable resource of information.

As of now we have a situation where the law tells insurers they face no meaningful consequences if they deny care improperly or even commit outright fraud. As one federal judge has commented, "if an HMO wrongly denies a participant's claim even in bad faith, the greatest cost it could face is being compelled to cover the procedure, the very cost it would have faced had it acted in good faith. Any rational HMO will recognize that if it acts in good faith, it will pay for far more procedures than if it acts otherwise, and punitive damages, which might otherwise guard against such profiteering, are no obstacle at all." Insurance companies, of course, are not charities, but corporations; their boards are subject to a fiduciary duty to maximize shareholder value. If it is possible to accomplish this by mistreating insureds, then it follows insurers will do precisely that (and believe me, they do).

You have it all backwards, Boehner.  Backwards Boehner, has a ring to it. You and your fellow GOP Discriminators need to change the laws guarding the Insurance Industry from ever being held legally liable for the damages they inflict.

Going on about tort reform is old, hollow and it's been disproved as a mechanism to cost control.  It accounts for maybe, 5-9% of overall health care costs. From FactCheck.org:

But both the GAO and the CBO now question their sweeping conclusion. When the CBO attempted to duplicate the Stanford economists’ methods for other types of ailments they found found “no evidence that restrictions on tort liability reduce medical spending.”

How to fix health care?  Start a National Plan.  Open up that Federal Employees Health Benefits Program, that all members of the House and Senate enjoy, to the entire nation.  Repeal McCarran-Ferguson so that the Industry is now like every other corporation and subject to anti-trust laws and then get rid of ERISA laws for health insurance plans.  There's your reform.  End Discrimination, John.