In an effort to save a health-care overhaul initiative, President Barack Obama has outlined a nearly $1 trillion, 10-year compromise that allows government to deny or roll back high insurance premiums.
In addition, the White House also asked for an immediate up-or-down vote in Congress on the plan. However, Republicans in Congress has held steadfast against any new health care proposals, and some Democrats who previously supported the initial legislation, are thinking twice about support in an election year.
The plan was released on the White House’s Web site just four days before Obama’s televised health care summit with both sides of the Congressional aisle.
Shortly after the release of the plan, the lone Kansas Democrat in Congress, U.S. Rep. Dennis Moore, welcomed the new idea.
“President Obama’s recently released proposal is built on many of the principles in the House-passed health care bill, including increased affordability, closing the Medicare Part D “donut hole," and ending abusive practices by health insurance companies,” Moore said. “I voted for that bill, because covering Americans without health insurance must be a priority, and I hope the President’s bipartisan summit yields a plan to do just that.”
However, Kansas Republicans on the Hill held to the party line of giving the plan a thumbs down.
“I’m concerned the president may be suffering from hearing loss,” said U.S. Rep. Todd Tiahrt, R-Kan. “The American people are yelling against the Democrat’s health care proposals, and the president comes back with a new plan that costs $79 billion more than the old one. It’s as if the town hall meetings and recent elections never happened.”
Tiahrt is co-sponsor of a Republican alternative health care bill that reduces costs, lets American’s who like their health care coverage keep it and puts patients first by ensuring medical decisions are made by patients and their doctors.
“Raising taxes, crushing jobs, funding abortions, and taking away American’s freedom to choose the health care plan that best meets their needs is not a plan we will support,” Tiahrt said. “The American people strongly rejected these massive tax-and-spend proposals last summer, and we are not about to accept them now.”
U.S. Rep. Lynn Jenkins, R-Kan., said that she will continue to support measures that bring down the cost of health care “without a government takeover.”
In the Senate, U.S. Sens. Pat Roberts and Sam Brownback, both Republicans, said that both Republicans and Democrats should be working together on the issue and Democrats should not use, what Brownback called “reconciliation” to force through health care reform.
Brownback cited a White House aide who alluded to plans that encourages Democrat leadership to pass the legislation using a procedural move known as “budget reconciliation” meaning that the bill could pass without a single Republican vote in support.
“I am disappointed that the President refused to start over on health care reform,” Roberts said. “Simply rehashing and expanding the back-room, partisan Senate bill is not the answer. Instead, we should be working together from scratch to find commonsense step-by-step solutions to our health care issues.”
The estimated cost of the Obama plan would be funded by a mix of Medicare cuts, tax increases and new fees on health care industries.
The Associated Press contributed to this report
Matthew Clark can be reached at matthew.clark@morningsun.net or at 620-231-2600, Ext. 140
