Lessons from European health systems

Today's column from Trudy Rubin is great:

One of the most bewildering aspects of the current health-care debate is the failure to learn key lessons from health systems abroad.

Conservative talk show hosts decry the alleged evils of "socialized medicine" in countries with universal health coverage; they warn grimly of rationed health care. Yet there's nary a peep from Rush Limbaugh or Glenn Beck - let alone Congress - about countries such as Germany, France, Switzerland, or Japan, where coverage is universal, affordable, and top quality, and patients see private doctors with little or no waiting.

And, oh yes, their health costs are a fraction of our bloated numbers: The French spend 10 percent of GDP on health care, the Germans 11 percent, and they cover every citizen. We spend a whopping 17 percent and leave tens of millions of Americans uninsured.

Editorial comic roundup

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Clueless in Kentucky

Today's New York Times ran this must-read editorial:

Kentucky has lost about 60,000 jobs since the end of 2008. In December, its unemployment rate stood at 10.7 percent, the highest since 1983. So what exactly is going on in the minds of Kentucky’s two Republican senators, Mitch McConnell and Jim Bunning?

This week, Mr. Bunning single-handedly shot down a one-month extension of unemployment benefits, along with a federal subsidy for the unemployed to maintain health coverage. Two weeks earlier, Mr. McConnell, the minority leader, objected to a one-week extension to give senators time to draft a longer-term package.

...Democrats must now defeat Republican attempts to lace the benefits extension with things like protecting the rich from the estate tax. To avoid a repeat of this nonsense every few weeks, unemployment benefits should be extended until the end of the year. Perhaps by Monday somebody can educate Senators Bunning and McConnell about Kentucky’s unemployment rate.

President Obama's weekly address

Discussing the unity and pride Americans feel in cheering our Olympic athletes on, the President relates that sentiment to his own desire for bipartisanship in Washington.

Bunning blocks unemployment benefits

Today the DSCC issued this press release:

Kentucky Senator Jim Bunning single-handedly blocked a thirty day extension of unemployment benefits for 1.2 million Americans last night, telling fellow senators on the floor of the Senate “tough sh--,” in response to their objections. Due to Bunning’s out of touch tactic, unemployment benefits will now end or be disrupted this Sunday for 1.2 million Americans. The two leading Republicans running to take Bunning’s seat, Trey Grayson and Rand Paul, have remained silent on Bunning’s tactics. With Kentucky having a 10.7% unemployment rate and 221,052 Kentuckians out of work, will Trey Grayson and Rand Paul condone Bunning’s block, or will they do the right thing and speak out against it?

“Trey Grayson and Rand Paul want to replace Jim Bunning in the Senate, but do they want to follow his approach in blocking a critical unemployment extension for Kentucky’s unemployed?,” said DSCC National Press Secretary Deirdre Murphy. “With thousands of unemployed Kentuckians at risk, the people in the state deserve to know where Grayson and Paul stand on Bunning’s out of touch tactic – will they speak up to condone or denounce his actions?”

Governor Beshear followed up with this plea to Bunning:

FRANKFORT, Ky. – In a letter regarding an extension of unemployment benefits, Gov. Steve Beshear today urged Senator Jim Bunning to allow passage of H.R. 4691, a vital extension of unemployment benefits to 1.2 million Americans.

“These unemployed Kentuckians come from hard-working families that have struggled for months to find new employment in the greatest economic recession in our lifetime,” wrote Gov. Beshear. “They are mothers and fathers who are trying to put food on the table for their children and seniors who are trying to pay the rent.”

Kentucky currently has an unemployment rate of 10.7 percent, and 119,230 Kentuckians are currently receiving benefits through the federal extension program. Without a further extension, 14,206 claimants will exhaust all extension benefits within two weeks. By the end of March, a total of 22,797 will exhaust their benefits; by mid-April, 31,521 will exhaust their benefits; and, by July 31, the remainder of those receiving extension benefits will exhaust them. Beyond the number of those receiving extension benefits, another 90,000 Kentuckians currently on unemployment insurance will not be eligible for the federal extension program at all.

“I urge you to reverse your position on this bill and would welcome any opportunity to provide you with further information on its tremendous necessity,” said Gov. Beshear.

Governor Beshear's weekly address

Click here for a version of this video with closed captioning for the hearing impaired.

Another Michael Steele gaffe

Via Think Progress:

Today, the White House is hosting a bipartisan meeting on health care reform, featuring President Obama, Congressional Democrats and Congressional Republicans. On MSNBC this morning, RNC Chairman Michael Steele mocked the summit, saying that it is something that should have happened a year ago.

...Host Chuck Todd immediately pointed out that in fact the White House did host a televised, bipartisan health care forum almost exactly a year ago on March 5, 2009. “Does that one not count?” asked Todd. “Well, apparently it didn’t,” replied Steele, flippantly adding, “because we don’t have health care and we don’t have the reform that everybody’s been talking about.”

If health reform fails, then what?

Republicans: Highway Hypocrites

There's just no pleasing the Party of No

Via Think Progress:

For months now, Republicans in Congress have been complaining that health care reform legislation put forward by congressional Democrats is too long. “All you need to know is there are 1,990 pages,” said House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-OH) of the House health care bill in October. “That should tell you everything.” But when President Obama released a proposal yesterday bridging the differences between the House and Senate bills, Boehner’s office changed its complaint and argued that it was too short.

The President’s Plan for Health Reform

Today's New York Times includes this great editorial:

In all, the administration estimates the cost of Mr. Obama’s [health care] proposals — $950 billion over 10 years — would be more than offset by new revenues and would reduce the deficit by $100 billion over the next decade and by about $1 trillion in the decade after that.

As they consider all this, Americans also need to keep in mind what Republican leaders mean when they talk about health care reform. All of their ideas have these basic facts in common: they would not reduce the number of uninsured Americans substantially; they would not guarantee affordable coverage for people with pre-existing conditions; they make only feeble attempts to rein in medical costs; and their proposals to slow the rise in the cost of premiums would mostly benefit the healthy. That is not enough.

Mr. Obama’s proposals provide a firm basis for both the Senate and House to move forward with comprehensive reforms. If the Republicans resort to filibusters to block passage, the Democrats should use a budget reconciliation procedure that requires only a majority vote for passage in the Senate.

The Bankruptcy Boys

Today's column by Paul Krugman is a must-read:

...the beast is starving, as planned. It should be time, then, for conservatives to explain which parts of the beast they want to cut. And President Obama has, in effect, invited them to do just that, by calling for a bipartisan deficit commission.

Many progressives were deeply worried by this proposal, fearing that it would turn into a kind of Trojan horse — in particular, that the commission would end up reviving the long-standing Republican goal of gutting Social Security. But they needn’t have worried: Senate Republicans overwhelmingly voted against legislation that would have created a commission with some actual power, and it is unlikely that anything meaningful will come from the much weaker commission Mr. Obama established by executive order.

Why are Republicans reluctant to sit down and talk? Because they would then be forced to put up or shut up. Since they’re adamantly opposed to reducing the deficit with tax increases, they would have to explain what spending they want to cut. And guess what? After three decades of preparing the ground for this moment, they’re still not willing to do that.

McConnell Insists the GOP Isn't Obstructionist

Via Think Progress:

Today on Fox News Sunday, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell tried to insist that his party has not been obstructionist. To prove his point, he quoted recent remarks by President Obama and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid [that this Congress has been productive].

...Any progress Congress has made has been in spite of most Republican lawmakers, not because of them. Republicans in the Senate, led by McConnell, have “threatened to filibuster at least 100 pieces of legislation this session, far more than any other since the procedural tactic was invented,” aggressively trying to block more than just major legislation on health care and energy. They have tried to hold up Obama’s well-qualified nominees for political reasons, voted against pay-as-you-go rules (despite Republican support for the measure in the past and the GOP’s supposed interest in fiscal responsibility), flip-flopped on support for a deficit commission, and whined when Reid scrapped a jobs bill that the GOP said would “not create one job.”

Of course, one of the most significant pieces of legislation was the Recovery Act. As Norm Ornstein of the conservative American Enterprise has written, “Any Congress that passed all these items separately would be considered enormously productive. Instead, this Congress did it in one bill.” But this legislation passed without any Republican support in the House and with just three Republicans in the Senate.

Editorial comic roundup

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President Obama's weekly address

The President points to outrageous premium hikes from health insurance companies already making massive profits as further proof of the need for reform.

Governor Beshear's weekly address

Click here for a version of this video with closed captioning for the hearing impaired.

Road to Recovery

We still have a long way to go, but one year after President Obama signed the Recovery Act into law, it's clear that we are now on the road to recovery.

McConnell: CityBeat's Loser of the Week

CityBeat has a weekly feature called "Winners and Losers." Our own Mitch McConnell has made this week's list of Losers:

The Republican Senate leader from Louisville recently criticized President Obama’s plans for reducing carbon emissions by stating it would cost every household about $3,100 a year. Nevermind that Democrats pledge to include tax rebates in the plan, especially for the poor, and aim the measure mostly at large polluters.

No, we suspect McConnell’s opposition has nothing to do with taxes on everyday Americans. Rather, it might be because he's accepted $474,658 from oil companies in the 2000-08 period, making him a leading recipient of oil money, according to Source Watch.

Assessing the Recovery Act

Vice President Joe Biden penned a column for this morning's USA Today. Here's an excerpt:

A year ago today, President Obama signed the Recovery Act into law. Time and again I am asked, "How can you say that the Recovery Act has worked when the unemployment rate is so much higher today than it was when the act was signed?" It's a fair question — and one worth answering on this anniversary day.

First, we think the Recovery Act is working because of the progress we've made in slowing job loss. In the three months before the act took effect, America lost 750,000 jobs a month. In the last three months, we've lost about 35,000 jobs a month. That's progress — not good enough, not where we need to be, but progress. And most economists agree that that progress is thanks in a very large part to the Recovery Act.

Independent economists believe that, thanks to the Recovery Act, about 2 million people are on the job today who would not have work otherwise. Is that good enough in an economy that has lost more than 8 million jobs? Of course not. But it is a lot better than the alternative.

Republicans: Recovery Act Hypocrites

Mitch McConnell is featured in this ad that details Republican hypocrisy on the Recovery Act:



Let's not forget that Geoff Davis is also being shamelessly two-faced on the stimulus:

[Geoff Davis in December 2009] issued a press release trumpeting a stimulus-funded grant for a school district in his state. "I am pleased that our office was able to assist them in obtaining these funds," Davis stated.

...on the very same day he was taking credit for stimulus funds, Davis put out a separate statement in which he claimed that the stimulus had "failed."

Tell Congress to hold Wall Street accountable

Kentucky Receives Nearly $10 Million for eHealth

Today Governor Beshear issued this press release:

FRANKFORT, KY - Kentucky has been awarded funding to expand and build a statewide health information exchange, receiving nearly $10 million in American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) funding to enhance the state’s health information technology efforts. The funding will be administered by the Governor’s Office of Electronic Health Information Technology and will bolster initiatives to build a state health information exchange.

Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Kathleen Sebelius and Labor Secretary Hilda Solis announced the award to Kentucky as part of a total of nearly $1 billion in ARRA funds awarded across the country.

“This is a tremendous award for the state of Kentucky in terms of advancing our efforts to build a statewide health information exchange,” said Gov. Steve Beshear. “The funding is a great economic opportunity for Kentucky and will result in many high-tech jobs for our state.”

“We believe Kentucky is poised to be a leader in the effort to advance electronic health information technology,” said Kentucky Cabinet for Health and Family Services Secretary Janie Miller. “The funding will help Kentucky improve coordination of care, deliver health care more efficiently, and improve patient health outcomes.”

This award will allow Kentucky to expand the Kentucky Health Information Exchange (KHIE), which is being funded by a Medicaid transformation grant. Plans call for the KHIE to be piloted this spring by six hospitals and one clinic.

Sec. Sebelius announced $761 million in HHS grant awards, part of a federal initiative to build capacity to enable widespread meaningful use of health IT. (An additional $227 million in ARRA funds was awarded in Department of Labor grants, bringing the total of ARRA funds awarded to nearly $1 billion.)

This assistance at the state and regional level will facilitate health care providers' efforts to adopt and use electronic health records (EHRs) in a meaningful manner that has the potential to improve the quality and efficiency of health care for all Americans.

Of the over $761 million investment, $386 million will go to 40 states – including Kentucky - and qualified State Designated Entities (SDEs) to facilitate health information exchange (HIE) at the state level.

“Health information technology can make our health care system more efficient and improve the quality of care we all receive," said Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius. "These grant awards, the first of their kind, will help develop our electronic infrastructure and give doctors and other health care providers the support they need as they adopt this powerful technology.”

Video: Biden on Sunday talk shows

If you missed yesterday's episodes of Meet the Press and Face the Nation with Vice President Joe Biden, the shows can be viewed below:

Editorial comic roundup

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Beshear keeps vow to include NKY

Be sure to check out the Enquirer's great write-up on Governor Beshear:

When Gov. Steve Beshear heard on the campaign trail in 2007 that the Northern Kentucky region felt ignored by Frankfort, he promised to change that if elected.

...Since he took office in December 2007, Beshear has appointed 121 residents of Boone, Kenton and Campbell counties to public office, boards and commissions, and to high-ranking posts within his administration.

..."It certainly does mean that when the governor's making decisions, he has a very broad and deep knowledge of the views of this part of the state, and those get incorporated into the policies of the administration," [former state senator Joe Meyer of Covington] said.

President Obama's weekly address

The President, having just signed the Pay As You Go law, discusses the importance of this fundamental rule to getting budget deficits in check.

Joe Biden to appear on Sunday talk shows

Vice President Joe Biden is scheduled to appear on a couple of the Sunday morning talk shows this weekend -- NBC's Meet the Press and CBS's Face the Nation. Locally, Meet the Press airs at 10:00 am on Channel 5, and Face the Nation airs on Channel 12 at 10:30 am. Please tune in!

Governor Beshear's weekly address

Click here for a version of this video with closed captioning for the hearing impaired.

Scoring points with hypocrisy

Yesterday's Herald-Leader contained this excellent editorial:

In his zeal to trash the Obama administration, Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell is politicizing national security and taking aim at a surprising target: the FBI.

During a couple of television interviews last week, McConnell said that talk show host Larry King would have done a better job than the FBI of interrogating Umar Farouk Adbulmutallab, the Christmas bomber who tried to blow up a Detroit-bound airliner with explosives hidden in his underwear.

...McConnell has shown that he will stoop to politicizing anything, even national security, if he thinks he can score points against a rival.

Mitch McConnell busted by fact-checker

The nonpartisan fact-checking site PolitiFact has caught Mitch McConnell in a flip-flop:

Earlier this year, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell was gung-ho behind an amendment intended to improve federal fiscal health.

The proposal -- a "Bipartisan Task Force for Responsible Fiscal Action" -- was co-sponsored by the top Democrat and the top Republican on the Senate Budget Committee, Kent Conrad, D-N.D., and Judd Gregg, R-N.H. It would establish an 18-member bipartisan commission to study the current and future fiscal condition of the federal government and make recommendations about how revenues and expenses can be brought into line. Those recommendations would be fast-tracked to the House and Senate floors under a special procedure.

...McConnell was not a co-sponsor of S. 2853. However, he is not only on record praising the measure just eight months earlier but is also on record saying that he had praised it on numerous occasions. We rate McConnell's stance on the Conrad-Gregg commission a Full Flop.

McConnell's course

Yesterday's Courier-Journal ran this must-read editorial:

What Sen. McConnell did the other day — when he accused the Obama administration of “a pre-9/11 mind-set” on national security that places “symbolism over security” and “is a very dangerous route” — is simply beyond the pale of responsible, patriotic leadership. He compounded the problem by threatening to block federal funds to try terrorist detainees in the United States.

The strategy is obvious. First, when a terrorist attack someday does occur, Republicans want to be able to pin it on President Obama — even though Democrats did not do that after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks occurred on the Bush administration's watch after pointed warnings about Osama bin Laden's intentions. Second, Sen. McConnell is exploiting polls that show nervousness about terrorist trials in American civilian courts and closing Guantánamo's detention center.

...Sen. McConnell and his party are betting — worse yet, hoping — that they can destroy a president with three years left in his term. That isn't leadership. It isn't even partisanship. It's reckless, shameful and dangerous.

President Obama's weekly address

Reiterating once again his commitment to small businesses as the engine of our economy, the President urges Congress to move forward immediately in steps to help them expand and create jobs.

New online ads

Several good new ads have hit YouTube this week. Here's a roundup:

Governor Beshear's weekly address

Click here for a version of this video with closed captioning for the hearing impaired.

Security At Stake As GOP Delays Nominations

Kentucky Submits Quarterly Stimulus Report

Governor Beshear issued this press release today:

FRANKFORT, Ky.—Gov. Steve Beshear today announced that 10,676 jobs were created or retained in Kentucky by federal grants, loans and projects funded by stimulus dollars received through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA) during the past quarter. To date, $797,289,164 of the expected allotment of nearly $3 billion in formula stimulus funding has been received.

“The primary goal of the recovery money is to get projects underway and to support programs that will put Kentuckians back to work and help families survive during this economic turmoil and this latest report shows it is working,” said Gov. Beshear. “We have been very aggressive in getting the stimulus money to work quickly, by putting it into needed projects and programs that will have immediate impact on improving our state.”

A complete summary of ARRA spending is available on the state’s nationally recognized transparency site, Kentucky at Work, located on the Web at http://kentuckyatwork.ky.gov/. In a recent study of every state’s stimulus reporting site, Kentucky at Work was ranked second in the nation for its transparency and accountability.

“During a time of difficult budget choices, it is more important that ever that the public have access to information about where and how recovery money is being spent,” said Gov. Beshear.

Information for all 50 states is also available on the federal government’s Recovery Act spending and reporting site at http://www.recovery.gov.

“We’re beginning to see some light on the horizon with occasional small signs of a strengthening in the national economy, but tough economic hardships continue to fall upon Kentucky,” said Gov. Beshear. “I will continue to direct the spending of stimulus dollars to the areas deemed most critical to help families put food on the table, protect programs that support our most vulnerable citizens and create investments in job creation and retention.”

Of the 10,676 jobs reported in the past quarter, 8,799 were created or retained by state-administered grants, loans and contracts. Those jobs were in eight categories:

• Education: 7,374.56


• Energy & Environment: 27.75


• Human Services: 320.19


• Housing: 128.83


• Community Services: 14.58


• Public Safety: 52.85


• Transportation: 728.03


• Workforce: 152.85


• Total jobs created or retained: 8,799.64

Fractions are a result of the number of hours worked / the total number of hours in the reporting period.

Examples of jobs saved by the strategic use of stimulus dollars include: teachers, social workers, bus drivers, teacher’s aides, engineers, construction workers, mechanics, carpenters, electricians, HVAC mechanics, plumbers, weatherization workers, substance abuse counselors, victim services personnel, police officers, career counselors and job trainers.

Gov. Beshear reminded citizens that more good news will continue to come from ARRA investments. “With the flow of stimulus dollars continuing in our economy, we’ve been able to pursue much needed infrastructure improvements, such as the more than $400 million in road projects that are being developed and built across the state,” he said.

For example, the restoration of I-264 is currently underway and has already employed more than 100 road construction personnel and local transit grants. Work on I-65, the reconstruction of US 68/KY 80 and US 150 are also creating dozens of jobs across the Commonwealth. Hundreds of additional jobs have been created through the construction of water and sewer projects and green construction jobs created by weatherization efforts.

The ARRA requires government agencies and recipients of Recovery funds to measure the plan’s progress with quarterly reports. The next reporting period ends on March 31, 2010 and will be available online in April 2010. In addition to the Kentucky at Work Web site, information on ARRA investments in Kentucky and other states is available on the federal reporting Web site at www.recovery.gov.

Taxpayers can also track detailed information on state government spending, budgets, contracts and employee salaries on Kentucky’s Open Door Web site at OpenDoor.KY.gov. Open Door was recently expanded to include expenditure records from Kentucky’s judicial branch.

Justice Alito's candid response to Obama's rebuke

Today's column by EJ Dionne is definitely worth a read:

[Justice Samuel] Alito's inability to restrain himself during the State of the Union address brought to wide attention a truth that too many have tried to ignore: The Supreme Court is now dominated by a highly politicized conservative majority intent on working its will, even if that means ignoring precedents and the wishes of the elected branches of government.

Obama called the court on this, and Alito shook his head and apparently mouthed "not true." His was the honest reaction of a judicial activist who believes he has the obligation to impose his version of right reason on the rest of us.

The controversy also exposed the impressive capacity of the conservative judicial revolutionaries to live by double standards without apology.