Bipartisan stimulus proposal

Open discussion about the world we live in today. Topics in here can get heated, but please keep it civil.

Moderator: Priests of Syrinx

zepboy
Posts: 6760
Joined: Fri Nov 10, 2006 6:42 am
Location: Lookin for a place.
Contact:

Post by zepboy »

Listening to him now, one must wonder what ever happened to all that "HOPE" Obama was offering during his candidacy.


Hmmmmmmmmmmmmm . . . .
User avatar
ElfDude
Posts: 11085
Joined: Wed Dec 31, 2003 1:19 pm
Location: In the shadows of the everlasting hills
Contact:

Post by ElfDude »

Just a few current headlines:

Biden Sees Risk of Voter Backlash...
Pelosi dismisses bipartisanship calls...
Kennedy flying in from Florida to vote on Stimulus...
Inhofe: 'Bill is 93% spending and only 7% stimulation'...
Harry Reid Admits Stimulus Bill 'Approaching A Trillion Dollars'...

And just for fun, a blast from the recent past...
Remember how angry so many were with the Bush administration for deficit spending?

http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/ ... /index.htm
By Shawn Tully Reporter associate Christopher Tkaczyk
March 8, 2004

(FORTUNE Magazine) ? When Alan Greenspan testified before congress in mid-February, the Fed chairman delivered a Valentine's Day garland to the recent performance of the U.S. economy, lauding the "stunning increases in productivity" that have fueled the recovery. But that same testimony included a far darker message: Greenspan reminded Americans that the U.S. economy faces a giant threat in the guise of big budget deficits stretching far into the future. In the past, Greenspan had mainly warned of the looming dangers of deficits in a decade or so, when the baby-boomers start retiring en masse. This time he hinted strongly that raging deficits could derail today's recovery. "Deficits could cause difficulties even in the relatively near term," intoned the chairman in his usual courtly style. In Greenspan-speak, that means the wolf is at the door, and he could start biting in months, not years.

It is astonishing how quickly we've gone from big budget surpluses to massive budget deficits. Between 1998 and 2001, the U.S. generated some $560 billion in surpluses--including a $236 billion surplus in 2000--and it was widely assumed that the era of big deficits was over. Indeed, in 2000 the Clinton administration was giddily predicting that the country would pay off all of the debt held by the public--some $3.4 trillion--by 2010.

But a year later the budget fell into deficit, and it's been spiraling downward ever since. Last year the deficit was $375 billion, and this year it is projected to be a staggering $521 billion. (The government's fiscal year ends in September.)
Where are these critics today?
Aren't you the guy who hit me in the eye?
Image
User avatar
ElfDude
Posts: 11085
Joined: Wed Dec 31, 2003 1:19 pm
Location: In the shadows of the everlasting hills
Contact:

Post by ElfDude »

At least the CBO is being honest. From the Washington Times:
President Obama's economic recovery package will actually hurt the economy more in the long run than if he were to do nothing, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office said Wednesday.

CBO, the official scorekeepers for legislation, said the House and Senate bills will help in the short term but result in so much government debt that within a few years they would crowd out private investment, actually leading to a lower Gross Domestic Product over the next 10 years than if the government had done nothing.

CBO estimates that by 2019 the Senate legislation would reduce GDP by 0.1 percent to 0.3 percent on net. [The House bill] would have similar long-run effects, CBO said
Aren't you the guy who hit me in the eye?
Image
User avatar
awip2062
Posts: 25518
Joined: Thu Nov 13, 2003 9:15 am
Contact:

Post by awip2062 »

ElfDude wrote:
http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/ ... /index.htm
By Shawn Tully Reporter associate Christopher Tkaczyk
March 8, 2004

(FORTUNE Magazine) ? When Alan Greenspan testified before congress in mid-February, the Fed chairman delivered a Valentine's Day garland to the recent performance of the U.S. economy, lauding the "stunning increases in productivity" that have fueled the recovery. But that same testimony included a far darker message: Greenspan reminded Americans that the U.S. economy faces a giant threat in the guise of big budget deficits stretching far into the future. In the past, Greenspan had mainly warned of the looming dangers of deficits in a decade or so, when the baby-boomers start retiring en masse. This time he hinted strongly that raging deficits could derail today's recovery. "Deficits could cause difficulties even in the relatively near term," intoned the chairman in his usual courtly style. In Greenspan-speak, that means the wolf is at the door, and he could start biting in months, not years.

It is astonishing how quickly we've gone from big budget surpluses to massive budget deficits. Between 1998 and 2001, the U.S. generated some $560 billion in surpluses--including a $236 billion surplus in 2000--and it was widely assumed that the era of big deficits was over. Indeed, in 2000 the Clinton administration was giddily predicting that the country would pay off all of the debt held by the public--some $3.4 trillion--by 2010.

But a year later the budget fell into deficit, and it's been spiraling downward ever since. Last year the deficit was $375 billion, and this year it is projected to be a staggering $521 billion. (The government's fiscal year ends in September.)
Where are these critics today?
I suppose one could run a search on these people and see what they are saying. Perhaps they are now in the camp of, "This is such a bad mess we need to go more in debt to get out of debt"?
zepboy
Posts: 6760
Joined: Fri Nov 10, 2006 6:42 am
Location: Lookin for a place.
Contact:

Post by zepboy »

We are mired in nothing more than party politics. As long as the party that complains the most has the majority of power, there will be very little critical press.

Notice how when Bush was in office, he could do nothing right, yet now O is in, and he can do nothing wrong? Yet it is O that is getting a bigger debt shovel out and is flailing madly to create greater trouble.
User avatar
ElfDude
Posts: 11085
Joined: Wed Dec 31, 2003 1:19 pm
Location: In the shadows of the everlasting hills
Contact:

Post by ElfDude »

Feb. 9 (Bloomberg) -- The stimulus package the U.S. Congress is completing would raise the government?s commitment to solving the financial crisis to $9.7 trillion, enough to pay off more than 90 percent of the nation?s home mortgages.

The Federal Reserve, Treasury Department and Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation have lent or spent almost $3 trillion over the past two years and pledged to provide up to $5.7 trillion more if needed. The total already tapped has decreased about 1 percent since November, mostly because foreign central banks are using fewer dollars in currency-exchange agreements called swaps. The Senate is to vote early this week on a stimulus package totaling at least $780 billion that President Barack Obama says is needed to avert a deeper recession. That measure would need to be reconciled with an $819 billion plan the House approved last month.

Only the stimulus package to be approved this week, the $700 billion Troubled Asset Relief Program passed four months ago and $168 billion in tax cuts and rebates approved in 2008 have been voted on by lawmakers. The remaining $8 trillion in commitments are lending programs and guarantees, almost all under the authority of the Fed and the FDIC. The recipients? names have not been disclosed.

?We?ve seen money go out the back door of this government unlike any time in the history of our country,? Senator Byron Dorgan, a North Dakota Democrat, said on the Senate floor Feb. 3. ?Nobody knows what went out of the Federal Reserve Board, to whom and for what purpose. How much from the FDIC? How much from TARP? When? Why??
If this part doesn't send shivers down your spine...
"The remaining $8 trillion in commitments are lending programs and guarantees, almost all under the authority of the Fed and the FDIC. The recipients? names have not been disclosed." I'm glad to see Senator Dorgan pointing this out. But I have this sinking feeling that no one is listening.
Aren't you the guy who hit me in the eye?
Image
User avatar
Big Blue Owl
Posts: 7457
Joined: Thu Aug 17, 2006 7:31 am
Location: Somewhere between the darkness and the light

Post by Big Blue Owl »

I know that sinking feeling! I remember you trying to placate me in 2004 when that Texas poopbrain was re-elected and everyone around me with a conscious was all "doom and gloom, the country is going to hell, how can we survive 4 more years of this, I wonder how much houses cost in Canada, somebody please shoot me in the head."

It's better now. :-)
(((((((((((((((all'a you)))))))))))))))
User avatar
ElfDude
Posts: 11085
Joined: Wed Dec 31, 2003 1:19 pm
Location: In the shadows of the everlasting hills
Contact:

Post by ElfDude »

National Survey of 1,000 Likely Voters

Conducted February 6-7, 2009

By Rasmussen Reports



1* Generally speaking, do increases in government spending help the economy, hurt the economy, or have no impact on the economy?


35% Help
48% Hurt

7% No impact

10% Not sure


2* Generally speaking, do decreases in government spending help the economy, hurt the economy, or have no impact on the economy?


45% Help
29% Hurt

16% No impact

10% Not sure


3* As Congress debates the economic stimulus plan initially proposed by President Obama, would you like to see the plan include more tax cuts and less government spending, more government spending and less tax cuts, or would you rather see the plan pass pretty much as it is today?


62% More tax cuts and less government spending
14% More government spending and less tax cuts

20% Pass pretty much as it is today

5% Not sure


NOTE: Margin of Sampling Error, +/- 3 percentage points with a 95% level of confidence
Aren't you the guy who hit me in the eye?
Image
User avatar
awip2062
Posts: 25518
Joined: Thu Nov 13, 2003 9:15 am
Contact:

Post by awip2062 »

I would be in the majority of each answer.
User avatar
ElfDude
Posts: 11085
Joined: Wed Dec 31, 2003 1:19 pm
Location: In the shadows of the everlasting hills
Contact:

Post by ElfDude »

More info worth sharing...
February 05, 2009, 4:00 a.m.

50 De-Stimulating Facts
Chapter and verse on a bad bill.

By Stephen Spruiell & Kevin Williamson


Senate Democrats acknowledged Wednesday that they do not have the votes to pass the stimulus bill in its current form. This is unexpected good news. The House passed the stimulus package with zero Republican votes (and even a few Democratic defections), but few expected Senate Republicans (of whom there are only 41) to present a unified front. A few moderate Democrats have reportedly joined them.

The idea that the government can spend the economy out of a recession is highly questionable, and even with Senate moderates pushing for changes, the current package is unlikely to see much improvement. Nevertheless, this presents an opportunity to remove some of the most egregious spending, to shrink some programs, and to add guidelines where the initial bill called for a blank check. Here are 50 of the most outrageous items in the stimulus package:


VARIOUS LEFT-WINGERY
The easiest targets in the stimulus bill are the ones that were clearly thrown in as a sop to one liberal cause or another, even though the proposed spending would have little to no stimulative effect. The National Endowment for the Arts, for example, is in line for $50 million, increasing its total budget by a third. The unemployed can fill their days attending abstract-film festivals and sitar concerts.

Then there are the usual welfare-expansion programs that sound nice but repeatedly fail cost-benefit analyses. The bill provides $380 million to set up a rainy-day fund for a nutrition program that serves low-income women and children, and $300 million for grants to combat violence against women. Laudable goals, perhaps, but where?s the economic stimulus? And the bill would double the amount spent on federal child-care subsidies. Brian Riedl, a budget expert with the Heritage Foundation, quips, ?Maybe it?s to help future Obama cabinet secretaries, so that they don?t have to pay taxes on their nannies.?

Perhaps spending $6 billion on university building projects will put some unemployed construction workers to work, but how does a $15 billion expansion of the Pell Grant program meet the standard of ?temporary, timely, and targeted?? Another provision would allocate an extra $1.2 billion to a ?youth? summer-jobs program?and increase the age-eligibility limit from 21 to 24. Federal job-training programs?despite a long track record of failure?come in for $4 billion total in additional funding through the stimulus.

Of course, it wouldn?t be a liberal wish list if it didn?t include something for ACORN, and sure enough, there is $5.2 billion for community-development block grants and ?neighborhood stabilization activities,? which ACORN is eligible to apply for. Finally, the bill allocates $650 million for activities related to the switch from analog to digital TV, including $90 million to educate ?vulnerable populations? that they need to go out and get their converter boxes or lose their TV signals. Obviously, this is stimulative stuff: Any economist will tell you that you can?t get higher productivity and economic growth without access to reruns of Family Feud.

Summary:
$50 million for the National Endowment for the Arts
$380 million in the Senate bill for the Women, Infants and Children program
$300 million for grants to combat violence against women
$2 billion for federal child-care block grants
$6 billion for university building projects
$15 billion for boosting Pell Grant college scholarships
$4 billion for job-training programs, including $1.2 billion for ?youths? up to the age of 24
$1 billion for community-development block grants
$4.2 billion for ?neighborhood stabilization activities?
$650 million for digital-TV coupons; $90 million to educate ?vulnerable populations?



POORLY DESIGNED TAX RELIEF
The stimulus package?s tax provisions are poorly designed and should be replaced with something closer to what the Republican Study Committee in the House has proposed. Obama would extend some of the business tax credits included in the stimulus bill Congress passed about a year ago, and this is good as far as it goes. The RSC plan, however, also calls for a cut in the corporate-tax rate that could be expected to boost wages, lower prices, and increase profits, stimulating economic activity across the board.

The RSC plan also calls for a 5 percent across-the-board income-tax cut, which would increase productivity by providing additional incentives to save, work, and invest. An across-the-board payroll-tax cut might make even more sense, especially for low- to middle-income workers who don?t make enough to pay income taxes. Obama?s ?Making Work Pay? tax credit is aimed at helping these workers, but it uses a rebate check instead of a rate cut. Rebate checks are not effective stimulus, as we discovered last spring: They might boost consumption, a little, but that?s all they do.

Finally, the RSC proposal provides direct tax relief to strapped families by expanding the child tax credit, reducing taxes on parents? investment in the next generation of taxpayers. Obama?s expansion of the child tax credit is not nearly as ambitious. Overall, his plan adds up to a lot of forgone revenue without much stimulus to show for it. Senators should push for the tax relief to be better designed.

Summary:
$15 billion for business-loss carry-backs
$145 billion for ?Making Work Pay? tax credits
$83 billion for the earned income credit


STIMULUS FOR THE GOVERNMENT
Even as their budgets were growing robustly during the Bush administration, many federal agencies couldn?t find the money to keep up with repairs?at least that?s the conclusion one is forced to draw from looking at the stimulus bill. Apparently the entire capital is a shambles. Congress has already removed $200 million to fix up the National Mall after word of that provision leaked out and attracted scorn. But one fixture of the mall?the Smithsonian?dodged the ax: It?s slated to receive $150 million for renovations.

The stimulus package is packed with approximately $7 billion worth of federal building projects, including $34 million to fix up the Commerce Department, $500 million for improvements to National Institutes of Health facilities, and $44 million for repairs at the Department of Agriculture. The Agriculture Department would also get $350 million for new computers?the better to calculate all the new farm subsidies in the bill (see ?Pure pork? below).

One theme in this bill is superfluous spending items coated with green sugar to make them more palatable. Both NASA and NOAA come in for appropriations that properly belong in the regular budget, but this spending apparently qualifies for the stimulus bill because part of the money from each allocation is reserved for climate-change research. For instance, the bill grants NASA $450 million, but it states that the agency must spend at least $200 million on ?climate-research missions,? which raises the question: Is there global warming in space?

The bottom line is that there is a way to fund government agencies, and that is the federal budget, not an ?emergency? stimulus package. As Riedl puts it, ?Amount allocated to the Census Bureau? $1 billion. Jobs created? None.?

Summary:
$150 million for the Smithsonian
$34 million to renovate the Department of Commerce headquarters
$500 million for improvement projects for National Institutes of Health facilities
$44 million for repairs to Department of Agriculture headquarters
$350 million for Agriculture Department computers
$88 million to help move the Public Health Service into a new building
$448 million for constructing a new Homeland Security Department headquarters
$600 million to convert the federal auto fleet to hybrids
$450 million for NASA (carve-out for ?climate-research missions?)
$600 million for NOAA (carve-out for ?climate modeling?)
$1 billion for the Census Bureau


INCOME TRANSFERS
A big chunk of the stimulus package is designed not to create wealth but to spread it around. It contains $89 billion in Medicaid extensions and $36 billion in expanded unemployment benefits?and this is in addition to the state-budget bailout (see ?Rewarding state irresponsibility? below).

The Medicaid extension is structured as a temporary increase in the federal match, but make no mistake: Like many spending increases in the stimulus package, this one has a good chance of becoming permanent. As for extending unemployment benefits through the downturn, it might be a good idea for other reasons, but it wouldn?t stimulate economic growth: It would provide an incentive for job-seekers to delay reentry into the workforce.

Summary:
$89 billion for Medicaid
$30 billion for COBRA insurance extension
$36 billion for expanded unemployment benefits
$20 billion for food stamps


PURE PORK
The problem with trying to spend $1 trillion quickly is that you end up wasting a lot of it. Take, for instance, the proposed $4.5 billion addition to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers budget. Not only does this effectively double the Corps? budget overnight, but it adds to the Corps? $3.2 billion unobligated balance?money that has been appropriated, but that the Corps has not yet figured out how to spend. Keep in mind, this is an agency that is often criticized for wasting taxpayers? money. ?They cannot spend that money wisely,? says Steve Ellis of Taxpayers for Common Sense. ?I don?t even think they can spend that much money unwisely.?

Speaking of spending money unwisely, the stimulus bill adds another $850 million for Amtrak, the railroad that can?t turn a profit. There?s also $1.7 billion for ?critical deferred maintenance needs? in the National Park System, and $55 million for the preservation of historic landmarks. Also, the U.S. Coast Guard needs $87 million for a polar icebreaking ship?maybe global warming isn?t working fast enough.

It should come as no surprise that rural communities?those parts of the nation that were hardest hit by rampant real-estate speculation and the collapse of the investment-banking industry?are in dire need of an additional $7.6 billion for ?advancement programs.? Congress passed a $300 billion farm bill last year, but apparently that wasn?t enough. This bill provides additional subsidies for farmers, including $150 million for producers of livestock, honeybees, and farm-raised fish.

Summary:
$4.5 billion for U.S. Army Corps of Engineers
$850 million for Amtrak
$87 million for a polar icebreaking ship
$1.7 billion for the National Park System
$55 million for Historic Preservation Fund
$7.6 billion for ?rural community advancement programs?
$150 million for agricultural-commodity purchases
$150 million for ?producers of livestock, honeybees, and farm-raised fish?


RENEWABLE WASTE
Open up the section of the stimulus devoted to renewable energy and what you find is anti-stimulus: billions of dollars allocated to money-losing technologies that have not proven cost-efficient despite decades of government support. ?Green energy? is not a new idea, Riedl points out. The government has poured billions into loan-guarantees and subsidies and has even mandated the use of ethanol in gasoline, to no avail. ?It is the triumph of hope over experience,? he says, ?to think that the next $20 billion will magically transform the economy.?

Many of the renewable-energy projects in the stimulus bill are duplicative. It sets aside $3.5 billion for energy efficiency and conservation block grants, and $3.4 billion for the State Energy Program. What?s the difference? Well, energy efficiency and conservation block grants ?assist eligible entities in implementing energy efficiency and conservation strategies,? while the State Energy Program ?provides funding to states to design and carry out their own energy efficiency and renewable energy programs.?

While some programs would spend lavishly on technologies that are proven failures, others would spend too little to make a difference. The stimulus would spend $4.5 billion to modernize the nation?s electricity grid. But as Robert Samuelson has pointed out, ?An industry study in 2004?surely outdated?put the price tag of modernizing the grid at $165 billion.? Most important, the stimulus bill is not the place to make these changes. There is a regular authorization process for energy spending; Obama is just trying to take a shortcut around it.

Summary:
$2 billion for renewable-energy research ($400 million for global-warming research)
$2 billion for a ?clean coal? power plant in Illinois
$6.2 billion for the Weatherization Assistance Program
$3.5 billion for energy-efficiency and conservation block grants
$3.4 billion for the State Energy Program
$200 million for state and local electric-transport projects
$300 million for energy-efficient-appliance rebate programs
$400 million for hybrid cars for state and local governments
$1 billion for the manufacturing of advanced batteries
$1.5 billion for green-technology loan guarantees
$8 billion for innovative-technology loan-guarantee program
$2.4 billion for carbon-capture demonstration projects
$4.5 billion for electricity grid


REWARDING STATE IRRESPONSIBILITY
One of the ugliest aspects of the stimulus package is a bailout for spendthrift state legislatures. Remember the old fable about the ant and the grasshopper? In Aesop?s version, the happy-go-lucky grasshopper realizes the error of his ways when winter comes and he goes hungry while the industrious ant lives on his stores. In Obama?s version, the federal government levies a tax on the ant and redistributes his wealth to the party-hearty grasshopper, who just happens to belong to a government-employees? union. This happens through something called the ?State Fiscal Stabilization Fund,? by which taxpayers in the states that have exercised financial discipline are raided to subsidize Democratic-leaning Electoral College powerhouses?e.g., California?that have spent their way into big trouble.

The state-bailout fund has a built-in provision to channel the money to the Democrats? most reliable group of campaign donors: the teachers? unions. The current bill requires that a fixed percentage of the bailout money go toward ensuring that school budgets are not reduced below 2006 levels. Given that the fastest-growing segment of public-school expense is administrators? salaries?not teachers? pay, not direct spending on classroom learning?this is a requirement that has almost nothing to do with ensuring high-quality education and everything to do with ensuring that the school bureaucracy continues to be a cash cow for Democrats.

Setting aside this obvious sop to Democratic constituencies, the State Fiscal Stabilization Fund is problematic in that it creates a moral hazard by punishing the thrifty to subsidize the extravagant. California, which has suffered the fiscal one-two punch of a liberal, populist Republican governor and a spendthrift Democratic legislature, is in the worst shape, but even this fiduciary felon would have only to scale back spending to Gray Davis?era levels to eliminate its looming deficit. (The Davis years are not remembered as being especially austere.) Pennsylvania is looking to offload much of its bloated corrections-system budget onto Uncle Sam in order to shunt funds to Gov. Ed Rendell?s allies at the county-government level, who will use that largesse to put off making hard budgetary calls and necessary reforms. Alaska is looking for a billion bucks, including $630 million for transportation projects?not a great sign for the state that brought us the ?Bridge to Nowhere? fiasco.

Other features leap out: Of the $4 billion set aside for the Community Oriented Policing Services?COPS?program, half is allocated for communities of fewer than 150,000 people. That?s $2 billion to fight nonexistent crime waves in places like Frog Suck, Wyo., and Hoople, N.D.

The great French economist Fr?d?ric Bastiat called politics ?the great fiction through which everybody endeavors to live at the expense of everybody else.? But who pays for the state bailout? Savers will pay to bail out spenders, and future generations will pay to bail out the undisciplined present.

In sum, this is an $80 billion boondoggle that is going to reward the irresponsible and help state governments evade a needed reordering of their financial priorities. And the money has to come from somewhere: At best, we?re just shifting money around from jurisdiction to jurisdiction, robbing a relatively prudent Cheyenne to pay an incontinent Albany. If we want more ants and fewer grasshoppers, let the prodigal governors get a little hungry.

Summary:
$79 billion for State Fiscal Stabilization Fund
Aren't you the guy who hit me in the eye?
Image
User avatar
ElfDude
Posts: 11085
Joined: Wed Dec 31, 2003 1:19 pm
Location: In the shadows of the everlasting hills
Contact:

Post by ElfDude »

Okay, one more. I really didn't think this was coming just yet, but here it is hidden in the "stimulus" bill...
Commentary by Betsy McCaughey

Feb. 9 (Bloomberg) -- Republican Senators are questioning whether President Barack Obama?s stimulus bill contains the right mix of tax breaks and cash infusions to jump-start the economy.

Tragically, no one from either party is objecting to the health provisions slipped in without discussion. These provisions reflect the handiwork of Tom Daschle, until recently the nominee to head the Health and Human Services Department.

Senators should read these provisions and vote against them because they are dangerous to your health. (Page numbers refer to H.R. 1 EH, pdf version).

The bill?s health rules will affect ?every individual in the United States? (445, 454, 479). Your medical treatments will be tracked electronically by a federal system. Having electronic medical records at your fingertips, easily transferred to a hospital, is beneficial. It will help avoid duplicate tests and errors.

But the bill goes further. One new bureaucracy, the National Coordinator of Health Information Technology, will monitor treatments to make sure your doctor is doing what the federal government deems appropriate and cost effective. The goal is to reduce costs and ?guide? your doctor?s decisions (442, 446). These provisions in the stimulus bill are virtually identical to what Daschle prescribed in his 2008 book, ?Critical: What We Can Do About the Health-Care Crisis.? According to Daschle, doctors have to give up autonomy and ?learn to operate less like solo practitioners.?

Keeping doctors informed of the newest medical findings is important, but enforcing uniformity goes too far.

New Penalties

Hospitals and doctors that are not ?meaningful users? of the new system will face penalties. ?Meaningful user? isn?t defined in the bill. That will be left to the HHS secretary, who will be empowered to impose ?more stringent measures of meaningful use over time? (511, 518, 540-541)

What penalties will deter your doctor from going beyond the electronically delivered protocols when your condition is atypical or you need an experimental treatment? The vagueness is intentional. In his book, Daschle proposed an appointed body with vast powers to make the ?tough? decisions elected politicians won?t make.

The stimulus bill does that, and calls it the Federal Coordinating Council for Comparative Effectiveness Research (190-192). The goal, Daschle?s book explained, is to slow the development and use of new medications and technologies because they are driving up costs. He praises Europeans for being more willing to accept ?hopeless diagnoses? and ?forgo experimental treatments,? and he chastises Americans for expecting too much from the health-care system.

Elderly Hardest Hit

Daschle says health-care reform ?will not be pain free.? Seniors should be more accepting of the conditions that come with age instead of treating them. That means the elderly will bear the brunt.

Medicare now pays for treatments deemed safe and effective. The stimulus bill would change that and apply a cost- effectiveness standard set by the Federal Council (464).

The Federal Council is modeled after a U.K. board discussed in Daschle?s book. This board approves or rejects treatments using a formula that divides the cost of the treatment by the number of years the patient is likely to benefit. Treatments for younger patients are more often approved than treatments for diseases that affect the elderly, such as osteoporosis.

In 2006, a U.K. health board decreed that elderly patients with macular degeneration had to wait until they went blind in one eye before they could get a costly new drug to save the other eye. It took almost three years of public protests before the board reversed its decision.

Hidden Provisions

If the Obama administration?s economic stimulus bill passes the Senate in its current form, seniors in the U.S. will face similar rationing. Defenders of the system say that individuals benefit in younger years and sacrifice later.

The stimulus bill will affect every part of health care, from medical and nursing education, to how patients are treated and how much hospitals get paid. The bill allocates more funding for this bureaucracy than for the Army, Navy, Marines, and Air Force combined (90-92, 174-177, 181).

Hiding health legislation in a stimulus bill is intentional. Daschle supported the Clinton administration?s health-care overhaul in 1994, and attributed its failure to debate and delay. A year ago, Daschle wrote that the next president should act quickly before critics mount an opposition. ?If that means attaching a health-care plan to the federal budget, so be it,? he said. ?The issue is too important to be stalled by Senate protocol.?

More Scrutiny Needed

On Friday, President Obama called it ?inexcusable and irresponsible? for senators to delay passing the stimulus bill. In truth, this bill needs more scrutiny.

The health-care industry is the largest employer in the U.S. It produces almost 17 percent of the nation?s gross domestic product. Yet the bill treats health care the way European governments do: as a cost problem instead of a growth industry. Imagine limiting growth and innovation in the electronics or auto industry during this downturn. This stimulus is dangerous to your health and the economy.

(Betsy McCaughey is former lieutenant governor of New York and is an adjunct senior fellow at the Hudson Institute. The opinions expressed are her own.)
Aren't you the guy who hit me in the eye?
Image
User avatar
awip2062
Posts: 25518
Joined: Thu Nov 13, 2003 9:15 am
Contact:

Post by awip2062 »

ElfDude wrote: But the bill goes further. One new bureaucracy, the National Coordinator of Health Information Technology, will monitor treatments to make sure your doctor is doing what the federal government deems appropriate and cost effective. The goal is to reduce costs and ?guide? your doctor?s decisions According to Daschle, doctors have to give up autonomy and ?learn to operate less like solo practitioners.?
So, the doctor needs to learn to take his direction from a politician, someone who doesn't know medicine? And this is to help me medically, how?
ElfDude wrote: Hospitals and doctors that are not ?meaningful users? of the new system will face penalties. ?Meaningful user? isn?t defined in the bill. That will be left to the HHS secretary, who will be empowered to impose ?more stringent measures of meaningful use over time?
And my doctor will be penalized if he does what he thinks is best when a politician disagrees with him.

ElfDude wrote: slow the development and use of new medications and technologies because they are driving up costs. He praises Europeans for being more willing to accept ?hopeless diagnoses? and ?forgo experimental treatments,? and he chastises Americans for expecting too much from the health-care system.
Ah, right. Does this include all diseases? Forget curing AIDS or cancer or childhood epilepsy, diabetes,...? We were making headway, but the new meds and technologies are just driving up costs so the university students doing research are gonna have to choose another field and the patients are going to have to just "deal with it" and the families are going to have to watch their kin suffer, although we might have found that cure? *pulls out her herbal folklore books and hopes*
ElfDude wrote: Daschle says health-care reform ?will not be pain free.? Seniors should be more accepting of the conditions that come with age instead of treating them. That means the elderly will bear the brunt.
And what about when he gets some age-related condition? He will just pay for it himself, I guess. :roll:
ElfDude wrote: Medicare now pays for treatments deemed safe and effective. The stimulus bill would change that and apply a cost- effectiveness standard set by the Federal Council (464)...This board approves or rejects treatments using a formula that divides the cost of the treatment by the number of years the patient is likely to benefit.
Yeah, they're old. Not worth it. So, Mr. Kennedy, I guess you'll just have to go quietly because you are old and obese and not worth the government paying to help you. Shh...remember what Mr. DAschle said, "Seniors should be more accepting of the conditions that come with age instead of treating them."

ElfDude wrote:Hiding health legislation in a stimulus bill is intentional.
Yeah! Because if this were a bill of its own, it would get more press and scrutiny and might not pass. But if "we" are "convinced" we "need" this bailout, we will swallow the bitter pill of the healthcare changes along with our other medicine and go quietly.

ElfDude wrote:The bill treats health care the way European governments do: as a cost problem

Frightening, isn't it? Healthcare is a cost problem. *shudders*
zepboy
Posts: 6760
Joined: Fri Nov 10, 2006 6:42 am
Location: Lookin for a place.
Contact:

Post by zepboy »

^^^^^^^^^
Looks like t has a tude . . . .


Ya know, I agree with her entirely. (go figure).

This administration is going to make its mark in history unlike anything we've ever seen before. But mind you, that's not always a good thing.
CygnusX1
Posts: 17306
Joined: Wed Oct 05, 2005 12:53 pm
Location: We don't call 911 here.

Post by CygnusX1 »

Place your ad here
Last edited by CygnusX1 on Tue Feb 10, 2009 1:05 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Don't start none...won't be none.
zepboy
Posts: 6760
Joined: Fri Nov 10, 2006 6:42 am
Location: Lookin for a place.
Contact:

Post by zepboy »

A major step to ushering in the socialist government . . . control of the media.

And to think, does this show he believes in the "fairness Doctrine"?

I don't think so!
Post Reply