As AP Notes:
Democrats hit GOP on support for Medicare cuts
[...]
Durbin, D-Ill., used a Saturday national radio address to call on Republicans to back the bill to stave off a 10.6 percent cut in Medicare payments to doctors.
It passed the House overwhelmingly last week in defiance of Bush's threat to veto it, but it fell just one vote short of the 60 it needed to advance in the Senate, with most Republicans voting "no."
Good headline, and for once blame for a bill not passing is accurately placed on the Republican minority. Another important graph:
The lower fees to doctors went into effect July 1, but Medicare officials are holding off processing new claims, hoping that Congress will act within the next few weeks to restore the higher payments. Many health plans, including the government program covering military personnel, tie their payment rates to Medicare's.
So already as you read this, doctors providing Medicare services aren't being paid because the Medicare administration is hoping Congress will act to restore the proper level of funding before they are forced to pay out at a reduced rate (and won't seniors love that).
The NY Times in a good editorial on the matter today:
Before leaving town for the Fourth of July recess, Senate Republicans thwarted a vote on a sensible Medicare bill that would benefit doctors and patients at the expense of overpaid private health plans.
[...]
That has inflamed opposition from the White House and Senate Republicans who seem determined to protect inefficient private plans from the rigors of competing fairly against traditional Medicare coverage. Medicare pays these private plans, known as Medicare Advantage, an average of 13 percent more to provide the same services as the traditional Medicare program.
The new bill would start reducing the payment disparity through some modest adjustments. It would also require the fastest-growing category of private plans - private fee-for-service plans - to organize networks of doctors and hospitals and report measures of quality, just as other private plans do, so that beneficiaries would have guaranteed access to capable medical providers.
So what is at issue here is insurance companies bilking taxpayers for services that can be provided cheaper under a bloated liberal, big-government entitlement program. So much for fiscal responsibility and market forces. Where is the yammering about "entitlement programs" when it is Republican business interests so entitled?
So let me link again to the Roll Call vote which John McCain skipped (remember, the House passed this with a veto-proof majority already):
YEAs 58
NAYs 40
Not Voting 2
[...]
NAYs ---40
Alexander (R-TN)
Allard (R-CO)
Barrasso (R-WY)
Bennett (R-UT)
Bond (R-MO)
Brownback (R-KS)
Bunning (R-KY)
Burr (R-NC)
Chambliss (R-GA)
Coburn (R-OK)
Cochran (R-MS)
Corker (R-TN)
Cornyn (R-TX)
Craig (R-ID)
|
Crapo (R-ID)
DeMint (R-SC)
Domenici (R-NM)
Ensign (R-NV)
Enzi (R-WY)
Graham (R-SC)
Grassley (R-IA)
Gregg (R-NH)
Hagel (R-NE)
Hatch (R-UT)
Hutchison (R-TX)
Inhofe (R-OK)
Isakson (R-GA)
Kyl (R-AZ)
|
Lugar (R-IN)
Martinez (R-FL)
McConnell (R-KY)
Reid (D-NV)
Sessions (R-AL)
Shelby (R-AL)
Specter (R-PA)
Sununu (R-NH)
Thune (R-SD)
Vitter (R-LA)
Warner (R-VA)
Wicker (R-MS)
|
Not Voting - 2
Kennedy (D-MA) McCain (R-AZ)
So note that:
1) Every Democrat voting YEA
2) All NAY votes are by Republicans (Reid votes "Nay" for procedural reasons so he can bring the bill back up again later)
3) Obama voted.
4) McCain's "YEA" vote would have been decisive and resulted in cloture, and the measure presumably passing a final vote.
Now it's possible Bush would veto the thing, and it's unlikely a veto override would pass the Senate as this stands, but then I think the Republicans are only doing this because they can get away with it. McCain's cowardice is calculated here, so as to avoid greater media coverage that a Bush veto would generate. Conservatives blocking the will of the nation in the Senate is routine and usually unnoticed, but vetoes are much rarer.
Even if Bush's veto is a certainty, McCain skipping the vote is not excused by that. The threat of a veto should not scare duly elected legislators from voting their consciences and letting the chips fall as they may. Legislators forgo their oaths of office to merely accede to every veto threat as if it were guaranteed.
Lest anyone want to give McCain the benefit of the doubt, he had a fundraiser that evening (June 26) in Ohio, so I don't think between him and his campaign jet (the Skip Vote Express) it would have been too difficult to attend an important Senate vote of immediate and meaningful consequence to his constituents.
Senator Obama should ask his esteemed colleague Republican John McCain about this. Durbin's foray generated a few good headlines for congressional purposes, Obama making an issue of this would only benefit him. The measure helps the elderly, is fiscally responsible, and is only failing because Republicans are fighting for the right of big companies to overcharge taxpayers |
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