President (To Win Colorado)
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(D) Kamala Harris
(R) Donald Trump
80%
20%
CO-01 (Denver)
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(D) Diana DeGette*
(R) V. Archuleta
98%
2%
CO-02 (Boulder-ish)
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(D) Joe Neguse*
(R) Marshall Dawson
95%
5%
CO-03 (West & Southern CO)
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(D) Adam Frisch
(R) Jeff Hurd
50%
50%
CO-04 (Northeast-ish Colorado)
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(R) Lauren Boebert
(D) Trisha Calvarese
90%
10%
CO-05 (Colorado Springs)
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(R) Jeff Crank
(D) River Gassen
80%
20%
CO-06 (Aurora)
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(D) Jason Crow*
(R) John Fabbricatore
90%
10%
CO-07 (Jefferson County)
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(D) B. Pettersen
(R) Sergei Matveyuk
90%
10%
CO-08 (Northern Colo.)
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(D) Yadira Caraveo
(R) Gabe Evans
70%↑
30%
State Senate Majority
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DEMOCRATS
REPUBLICANS
80%
20%
State House Majority
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DEMOCRATS
REPUBLICANS
95%
5%
August 21, 2009 08:15 PM UTC
81 Comments
The business community has to be in a tough spot.
Do they support healthcare reform as it will allow small businesses, the economic engine of America, to spend money on innovation, hiring employees, etc. instead of spending it on increasing healthcare costs?
Or do they support the larger issue of no government in business at all- consequences be damned?
The later seems their course…
Even the NFIB indicates they don’t want the public option.
http://www.nfib.com/Portals/0/…
He told NCLA that he would not vote for a bill if it had a public option.
Morre can spin his BS all he wants. Those who were there know what Bennet said to the pointed question.
Bennet is on record supporting a reform only if it does not contain a public option. Asked and answered.
Too much of a boy for Crazy Town!
Libertad’s description of Bennet’s presentation to the NCLA is completely fictionalized. Bennet’s obviously made his position clear on public option in a number of settings, and he repeated it at NCLA. He believes more competition is better, and he believes the public option would provide that. But he made it clear that public option, co-op, etc. would not be the deciding factor on his vote. The deciding factor would be the four conditions he outlined in the story. “Those who were there,” which includes me and my trusty digital recorder, now that to be the case. I hate responding to nonsense like this because but …
Need my coffee.
but I really appreciate you doing it. Thanks, Bob.
It’s kind of what we do here.
Bennet again doesn’t care, he’ll deal the public option away like the 2nd kid entering DPS high school last week … what they had 2,000 incoming freshmen, but only 1,000 will graduate … sad.
demanding facts from someone else.
When you post some of your own, with sources, you’ll deserve equal treatment.
Established reporter or anonymous troll with no credibility?
Moore has a tape, lets put it on the web
I put an accurate report of the event out there for all the world to see, even attached my name to it. None of the 40 or so people in the room have any problem with what was reported, just a nameless troll on a Web site. I suppose I could post the recording, but next thing I know you’d be demanding my birth certificate. Let’s try it this way: I can post the audio if Libertad can get David May, Rulon Stacy or any of the other NCLA leaders present to support his delusions about what was said at the meeting. They have my phone number; just have them give me a call. If I don’t get such a call, I’ll accept that as an apology from Libertad.
Why won’t you post the audio big boy? Clearly it is an opportunity to share the Senator’s thoughts and words for all to hear.
Apology accepted.
Is that what all those embedded, auto-play clips are you’ve posted today? On the left, we value the choice to hear audio when we want. Apparently you want to take away that choice, you right-wing thug.
Sure he’s a centrist type, but he’s doing a good job of going forward with health care reform.
The key is in the requirements he lists. If someone can show that co-ops will help lower costs effectively, then I think a lot of people would support the idea. The problem is, the available data says they won’t be able to do the job. And the fact that the insurance industry seems to be pushing for them should be a dead giveaway.
If Bennet is really doing his job and using the criteria he lists, he’ll continue lean toward a public option.
Bennet is taking a totally different tack than everyone else by clearly demonstrating that HC reform is a deficit and budgetary issue as well. It’s creative.
In Bennet’s case I don’t think this is a ploy though, I think this is how he sees it. And it speaks well of him both that he sees how it’s destroying the economy and that he’s out there talking to business groups on these terms.
It doesn’t feel like a ploy coming from Bennet but rather a position that he has studied at length and come to some conclusions about.
Oh yeah, he tuurned around the theaters …. on the backs of debt restructure paid for by working employees.
He then took this trick to DPS when he laid off his (DPS) financial problems to all Coloradans via PERA.
Thanks CEA and Bennet – way to go on the +50% HS dropout rate!
Thanks for reminding me.
Remind me again why he is just such an awesomeness dude? My recollection of his claim to fame is that he isn’t Bob Shaffer.
is that he’s Mo Udall’s son, but that only works with people above a certain age anymore.
Oh hell – I TOLD YOU SO!!!
I’m not saying what you seem to think I’m saying, David.
Freudian slip, perhaps.
That people want to be spending money on healthcare?
…on anything. That’s the dumbest question you’ve ever posed.
If I went up to the average American and said, “hey, would you like to spend less money on health care?,” they would almost all say ‘yes.’ They’d be stupid not to. But our lives and our health are our most precious assets. As by far the richest nation on the planet, it reasons that we would be spending far more money on health care.
… we logically should spend more on luxuries, not necessities. So more for botox and face lifts – sure. But why should we spend more for regular care?
And as to things we want to spend it on – I was happy to spend money to buy an iPod. But paying a medical bill – no big thrill there.
You wanted the iPod, but did you truly WANT to spend money on it? Wouldn’t you have preferred to buy it for 99cents instead of $79-$399 (depending on the type of iPod)? Just like Americans would like to spend less than $1.6 trillion on health care every year…
And it’s not like we’re paying MORE money for the SAME care. We’re paying MORE money for MORE and BETTER care. I’m not saying we shouldn’t be paying less, but that the simple fact that we spend more than any other country is not, and should not be, shocking. If only we didn’t have to cover cold medication and pay the bill for malpractice insurance. Those are real cost-saving reforms. Negotiating $80 billion in savings (2% over ten years, yipee!) with pharamceutical companies while letting them continue to overcharge us is not. Maybe you should tell Barry O.
Since you so firmly believe that tort reform is the way to lower health care costs, I’d love to see the numbers:
Please show me a state where tort reform was passed and the cost of either health insurance or malpractice insurance declined.
thanks.
Tort reform is necessary, but by no means the silver bullet…
So there should be an abundance of evidence proving that tort reform reduces health care costs. I’m having a hard time finding any.
…capping awards for damages, but from cutting out the wasteful defensive medicine. As far as I can tell, it hasn’t been tried in any state. Unlike the health care systems in Massachussetts and Oregon, which are both awful (expensive) messes.
Just check out my favorite new video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v…
It took about 5 minutes of googling to find a CBO report that summarizes the many studies that look into the effect of tort reform on health care costs.
So how much did costs drop?:
Costs dropped all of 4% Hardly the silver bullet. Additionally, much of the drop in costs was due to rationing of care by HMOs. Who woulda thunk?
Now, I don’t expect this to change your mind BoulderRep. I think you’ve made up your mind and facts aren’t going to change it, but maybe you’ll be a little less confident in your assertions given that the CBO has dicredited your opinion.
The CBO was headed by Douglas Holz Eakin at that time http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/D… (should we call this McCain-onomics or Bushonomics since he worked for both?)
The report included no new data examination and instead rests on a single study which was based on a single study of elderly heart patients who were hospitalized. Other Studies were ignored.
In fact, before Bush took office, after examining the original study, the GAO concluded: “Because this study was focused on only one condition and on a hospital setting, it cannot be extrapolated to the larger practice of medicine. Given the limited evidence, reliable cost savings estimates cannot be developed.” In addition, the GAO, identified “revenue-enhancing motives” as one of the real reasons behind the doctors ordering extra diagnostic tests and procedures.
http://www.factcheck.org/presi…
The CBO failed to included studies of defensive medicine when they failed to find any similar finding. 1) A 1990 study by the Harvard University School of Public Health did not find a strong relationship between the threat of litigation and medical costs and 2) a 1999 study in the Journal of Health Economics found only tiny savings – less than three-tenths of one percent – when studying the cost of Caesarian sections in states with limits on lawsuits, compared to states without limits.
In one case they they included A 1994 study by the congressional Office of Technology Assessment but failed to include its conclusion that it was impossible in the final analysis to draw any conclusions about the overall extent or cost of defensive medicine.
But lets take it as fact that the CBO’s numbers are correct, Colorado should be a nirvanna for health care costs since the CBO cites us as having the most aggressive tort reform in favor of doctor protections and against patient rights
We are probably not the worst in patient rights, there is a study published in a Harvard Journal that places us 3rd worst. (I can’t remember the cite right now.
http://www.medicalliabilitymon…
If you average the states with malpractice caps v. the states without caps, states without caps have lower malpractice insurance rates (sorry its subscription only for the survey)
I’m not sure on costs, but I know that Minnesota has the lowest cost malpractice insurance, among the lowest per capita Medicare spending, and NO caps on damages.
On the other hand…
Texas just enacted very strong tort reform did healthcare spending go down? Actually it seems to be going up…
file:///F:/USERS/Dan/Issue%20Research/doctors/New%20Yorker.htm
We spend more just on government care (that’s not even counting what people spend on private insurance), yet 20% of the population is uninsured.
Besides, Democrats don’t mind paying for the things we get. If someone sold me an iPod for 99 cents, I’d assume it was stolen, and I’d feel a little icky about the whole thing.
I feel like a broken record, but let me say it again. The United States has the BEST health care system in the entire world. The End.
Republicans don’t mind paying for things either, but the logical human response to spending more money is ‘no.’ Doesn’t mean we wont if we have to, just that we’d rather keep as much as possible.
Also, quit lying about the extent of the uninsured. It’s not 20%. It’s 45 million, which is 15%. Of that 15%, there are millions of illegal immigrants, millions who qualify for Medicare, SCHIP, etc… who don’t take advantage of it, and millions who can afford it but choose not to. Estimates on those who cannot afford health care, are U.S. citizens, and are not eligible for some form of government health care range from 8.2 to 15 million. That’s somewhere from 2% to 5%.
All objective measures indicate our healthcare lags other developed nations. Life expectancy, infant mortality etc.
If you are arguing that we have wonderfully trained doctors that can do amazing things, you’ll get no argument here.
But having good professionals is different than having a good system. A system is judged by the performance of the whole, not single miraculous events (by the way France might even give us a run for our money in that area). As a whole our system just doesn’t measure up.
I think that the uninsured numbers are inaccurate–I think they are much worse. They don’t include the under insured, people whose policies are so skeletal as to provide almost no coverage.
Why do people think that adding the word “simply” means they don’t have to justify anything they say?
As for your wishful thinking on the number of uninsured, I think the 46 million figure undercounts the radical right-wingers who are poor, have tons of kids, and are paranoid about the census, and therefore refuse to answer questions about health care. It also undercounts the people who think prayer is all the health care they need. The actual number is probably closer to 57.3 million, or about 19%.
…I get the same reaction. You may want to believe America “lags” behind the rest of the world so that you can justify becoming exactly like them, but again, it’s SIMPLY not true.
#####
It’s obvious our system is not perfect. People need to be able to maintain their health care when changing employers, and need to be allowed to purchase insurance whether or not they have an existing condition. However, we need not throw out the baby with the bathwater. We have-by far-the best healthcare system of any country on the planet. A common response to that claim is that the U.S. life expectancy and infant mortality rate rank very poorly compared to other countries. These statistics are calculated differently from country to country however, and do not take into account other contributing factors. For example, the U.S. has a much higher rate of obesity than any other country, and also contains a larger percentage of smokers than any other country. As for infant mortality, many other countries discount children born under a certain weight or size, or who live less than 24 hours.
Statistics that compare mortality rates for particular diseases or other ailments paint an entirely different story. For example, breast cancer mortality-particularly important to my own family-is 52 percent higher in Germany, 88 percent higher in the U.K., and 9 percent higher in Canada. Prostate cancer mortality is also 184 percent higher in Canada. These are countries that are supposed to be examples of successful implementations of government run health care.
Another common claim is that health care represents a rising percentage of our income, and is rising at two to three times the rate of inflation. You might think, at first, that this points toward “obscene profits” for insurance companies, but rather it points at higher quality. To quote one Wall Street Journal economist, this is similar to comparing the cost of a 19-inch, black and white TV with the cost of a 50-inch, high-definition plasma TV today. There’s also a reason we spend more on health care than any other nation-because we can! Without our lives, our health, we can do nothing. So, naturally, we are spending more and more on making sure that we stay healthy and live longer.
If we have this great care, why don’t we live longer? You say that it’s because we’re less healthy (fat smokers dragging down the stats).
OK, we can quibble about that.
But, I’m still paying for the fat smokers in my insurance premiums. And I’m paying twice as much as a Canadian.
And your response to this is to enact tort reform. Danny and I have both posted quality refs showing that tort reform has little or no effect on healthcare costs. What else have you got? Deregulation? Eliminate fraud and waste? Any other conservative bromides?
…favorite lines.’ I have given this some thought recently, and though I do not claim to be a policy expert, here’s what I’ve come up with:
–Democrats say this is all about keeping insurance companies honest by “creating competition,” but there’s already 1300-some companies in the U.S. The problem is that there are significant road-blocks to buying across state lines, so the competition doesn’t really exist. If we could purchase from any company anywhere in the country, there would be true competition.
–Provide tax breaks to doctors who take on low-income/underprivileged Americans.
–Create a system where health insurance can be purchased on a multiple year basis, similar to term life insurance. This solves many problems, most notably ending the practice of insurance companies dumping unprofitable individuals (those who develop health problems) once their contract expires.
I’m really not opposed to reform. Three very close family members have been through “the system” recently, and I know what needs fixing and what doesn’t. The public option, if it were a true, fairly competing, public option, might be a good thing. But there is no way in hell it would compete fairly. It can’t actually, because being funded by a limitless supply of taxpayer dollars is an inherent advantage, among other things. I am open to hearing your suggestions as well. But I flatly oppose H.R. 3200 in every form.
In any case, it is fact that Americans live less healthy lives than those in other countries. Where the life expectancy is greatest (Japan) there is strong societal pressure on people to eat right, exercise, etc… Here, people do what they please, whatever the health consequences. That’s fine with me, as long as they pay for the extra risk in their health care premiums.
He has repeatedly said he is not willing to compromise on anything. You may not be opposed to change to reform, but your party’s representatives in Congress have no interest whatsoever.
Everyone else here has pointed out you are full of it on the main points. So I’ll jsut add in this one little one.
In constant dollars at HDTV today is cheaper than a 19-inch B&W was when it came out. You get a much better TV today – for less money.
One of the hallmarks of progress is the price of comparable things goes down.
Best:
Healthcare: sure, ok though I’m not sure how you measure that.
Health insurance and pricing- not even close. Outcomes compared to percentage of GDP – plenty of other countries’ systems have better outocomes and lower cost per patient and less % of GDP
We may spend the most, but the United States is ranked 37th in the world:
http://www.photius.com/ranking…
I suppose pointing this out brings into question my patriotism somehow.
Medical bills prompt more than 60 percent of U.S. bankruptcies
Could it be that many of the insured through work, who think that they have coverage, are actually underinsured? That one major illness pushes them to insolvency?
That number takes into account EVERY bankruptcy where the person pays for health care or health insurance of any kind. Over 99.9% of bankruptcies are related to food expenses, and I don’t even need a study to prove that. It’s just common sense.
The point was that most of the people had health insurance, but that it was insufficient to protect them from the bankruptcy.
That is without a doubt the stupidest thing I ever have or ever will hear again. Futures on the stupid economy have just crashed. Now investors in stupid are bankrupt. I hope you’re happy.
I had all my money in stupidity futures!!
I watched video of the town hall protestors and thought there was no way I could lose!
Turned out the stupid was just a bubble, and it burst. We mortgaged our children’s future on stupid that we thought would last forever. Now they’ll have to scrape together whatever stupid they can find from what remains of South Carolina.
“My parents were kind of stupid. I’m a total idiot. My children will be functionally brain-dead. And their children will be smart.”
From the article:
…feel support your argument. You must have missed the part where the article said:
Why can’t they tell us how many of these people put themselves in precarious financial condition and THEN were stricken with bad luck by acquiring a disease or being injured? I know it can get a bit boring, but you have to keep asking “why,” “why,” “why?” until you reach the end of the road.
I rarely name call, and had to edit my response.
Elizabeth Warren is a top flight researcher and I trust her methods
http://download.journals.elsev…
I don’t know if you are a religious man, but if you are consult your clergy, because whether or not you believe the government should be involved in healthcare is irrelevant to your expressions of cruelty towards the unfortunate. I understand conservatives believe people need to be responsible for themselves, but now the have to be responsible for the will of G-d as well?
I’m getting a beer now.
…misinterpreted my words. I was first and foremost trying to explain why these people were going bankrupt, and suggesting that it most definitely had to do (in very large part) with their own bad choices. Same goes for people who have been evicted in the past year and a half. How many of them were working full time or more, eating chicken and rice, biking to work, and shopping at the Salvation Army?
People have the ability to make choices in life, and what their life becomes is a result of those choices. In no case whatsoever should someone be denied health care, but in every case whatsoever they should be forced to pay the full price of that care, whether that is directly or in the form of insurance.
Facts mean nothing to you.
Next?
Well, then please tell me why my two options are an aspirin bottle or the E.R. if things are so perfect.
You know, I think your posts tend to be intelligent if ill-informed, but now I am reduced to calling you a moron.
BY EVERY MEASURE, OUR HEALTH CARE SYSTEM IS THE WORST IN THE WESTERN WORLD.
By the monies spent to the crappy place for so many measures to 40 million (I’m one) uninsured.
You can keep your fingers in your ears spouting platitudes that not only have any basis in fact, but are statistically, provably wrong.
What a maroon.
We are Americans therefore we are exceptional and everything is perfect the way it is and we will never have to change. We are bad as in good and any efforts to change the way we live is bad as in bad.
Keep that head firmly stuck in the sand BR. You wouldn’t want to be like Siddhartha and see a sick man as you merrily drive down the road. It totally changed his life to see the real world.
…that I believe “everything is perfect the way it is” and “we will never have to change.” That’s completely ignorant to what I have said. In fact, I believe one of my posts actually says explicitly that
That doesn’t flow with what you claimed, but I guess since you said it, it must be true.
To realize that your arguments are pure bullshit and that you don’t cite facts.
Go find a grownup to make your arguments for you. Maybe then we’ll read them.
I think Norway is. Maybe Finland?
You know, those socialist countries that stifle job growth and economic well being?
BTW, one has a better chance of moving upward economically now in the Netherlands than America, and the EU is creating more millionaires than we are.
We don’t need feel good myths, we need facts.
Luxembourg, population under 1/2 a million, Norway, a relatively oil rich country with a population under under 5 million, and Switzerland, just over 7 million and a federal republic.
I could find more of those “feel good myths” for you, if you like.
But it is incorrect to state that it is the richest.
1 Liechtenstein $ 118,000 2007 est.
2 Qatar $ 103,500 2008 est.
3 Luxembourg $ 81,100 2008 est.
4 Bermuda $ 69,900 2004 est.
5 Kuwait $ 57,400 2008 est.
6 Jersey $ 57,000 2005 est.
7 Norway $ 55,200 2008 est.
8 Brunei $ 53,100 2008 est.
9 Singapore $ 52,000 2008 est.
10 United States $ 47,000 2008 est.
https://www.cia.gov/library/pu…
…some weird concoction of estimates from any given year 2004-2008. In any case, we’ll accept this list as fact and I would again mention that not one of those countries has a population over 10 million, most of them are oil-rich, and others, like Singapore, for example, include major port cities that suck virtually all of their money from the rest of the world, for better or worse.
…most of these places have low income taxes on businesses and are therefore great places for companies (yes, many of which should be American) to set up shop. Another example of why conservative, low business tax policies improve the overall economy.
Thank you for helping me make that point.
you said we are the richest nation. No caveat.
The US used to be an oil rich nation, too, you know. However we sucked most of it out of the ground and now have to go begging.
Whatever the reasons those 9 nine nations in front of us have for being better off, the point is that they are better off.
Most of them are high tax nations and all have national health insurance. But they aren’t invading little nations to prove their pee-pee is bigger.
n/t
Although Bennet reiterated his support for a public option at the NCLA meeting, he also said that the public option isn’t a dealmaker or dealbreaker for him. Fort Collins Chamber CEO David May asked him about his stance on the public option, and Bennet made it clear that the outcomes of any reform plan, rather than methodology used, was the critical thing for him.
I think we all agree the outcome is what matters. With that said, he also is pointing out that he has not seen an alternative that meets those requirements.
His strategy of articulating the debt/HC connection was very well done. His presentation was thought provoking. Yes i support MB, but those i spoke with after the presentation who are not likely big fans, were equally impressed with the presentation.
Bennet isn’t and doesn’t come across as an ideologue, which is something we need more of in the health care reform debate.