Bush (SOTU) to: Urge Health Care Improvements, Asks to Stay the Course

[papau]

http://ap.tbo.com/ap/breaking/MGAF49A6OPD.html

Bush to Urge Health Care Improvements, Asks Public to Stay the Course in Anti-Terror Fight
By Scott Lindlaw
Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) - <snip>Bush will open with remarks on national security, then move into domestic priorities, contrary to past practice, the aides said. He will urge Americans to back him on combating terrorism, arguing that the path he has chosen is the right one: using war to confront Iraq, diplomacy to urge North Korea to give up its nuclear weapons, persuasion to convince Libya to give up its illicit weapons.

Bush will propose steps to rein in the rising costs of health care, administration officials said. They include offering tax incentives to make high-deductible, low-premium policies more attractive, and to bring more people into the insurance system; offering health savings accounts, which allow workers to place money into accounts tax-free and withdraw it with no tax penalty for medical expenses; passing Bush's medical-malpractice award caps; and allowing businesses to pool their resources to get workers coverage. Bush will also call for a more aggressive use of medical technology to reduce the number of medical mistakes, which drive up health care costs. <snip>

The administration seeks to attack the costs of health care, rather than pouring billions of dollars in government money into bringing more people onto the rolls, White House officials said. The measures, taken together, could bring millions of uninsured people into the health care system.
<snip>

The second half of Bush's speech will focus on domestic priorities, with a special emphasis on the economy, which has rebounded strongly since the president declared the end of major combat operations in Iraq in May. Bush will seek to convince Americans that his series of tax cuts has turned the economy around, and that he is now turning his attention to job creation, aides said.
<snip>

Bush will call for new job-training grants channeled through community colleges to help prepare American workers for a changing economy. Democrats said they were determined to make sure the president does not get too much credit; he has cut vocational education and an array of job-training programs in recent years, they said. <snip>

This story can be found at: http://ap.tbo.com/ap/breaking/MGAF49A6OPD.html

[joeunderdog]

1. Talk is so cheap; programs are so expensive.

High cost of healthcare? Maybe you didn't see the built-in cost accelerators in that Medicare bill you just passed. How bout last year's promise for $15B in AIDS funding. Promises, promises...

The last thing I would do tonight is watch that a-hole spew his venom and lies in the SOTU.

[hlthe2b]

2. High Deductible, low premium insurance?

How the hell is that helping the poor and middle class?

[Lydia Leftcoast]

4. Yeah, high deductible low premium insurance

is already available.

It's like trying to eliminate hunger by building more grocery stores.

[Just Me]

3. Oh, yeah, let's keep those corporations REAL healthy!!!

[booksenkatz]

5. Stay the course? THIS course?

Surely you jest!

Um, no thanks, you miserable failure!

[papau]

6. From Reuters:on SOTU

From Reuters: With the U.S. death toll now over 500 in Iraq, Bush will defend the Iraq war as justified in that Saddam Hussein was removed from power and a chance for democracy in the heart of the Middle East was created.
``The president will talk about the action we've taken in Iraq, how it's made America safer, the world safer,'' White House communications director Dan Bartlett told NBC.
As part of a health care initiative, Bush was expected to revive a proposal to let small businesses band together to get a joint health insurance plan, and offer tax credits for the so-called under-insured, an estimated 40 million Americans with little or no health insurance.
To help unemployed workers learn new skills, Bush will propose job training grants for use at community colleges expected to top more than $120 million.
He will also revive a plan to allow workers to invest a portion of their contributions to the Social Security retirement program in the stock market and call on Congress to make his tax cuts permanent.

[aquart]

12. WHAT new skills? Make him list the new skills.

We have a very skilled workforce on the unemployment line.

That's going to go over like a lead balloon.

And he's giving it less than the marriage counseling garbage?

Maybe we can be trained to be marriage counselors.

[lovedems]

7. What course? The we don't know what the hell we are doing course?

Or does he mean the "let's just bully the Arab Nation until we get what we want" course. Or, does he mean the "we won't stop until Halliburton is in control of all the middle eastern oil course". Which one georgie?

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

8. Anything about a 1000 points of light?

Deja vu.

[The_Casual_Observer]

11. "It's that vision thang"

He has his own:

1. No child left behind
2. Tax Cuuutzz for ever' americun from the surpluuusss
3. Protecting our freedoms
4. Uranium from Niger


He has outdone those 1000 points!

[Stefkaskid]

9. Novelli the creep

Wonder if Georgie is going to invite Bill Novelli to sit in the gallery next to Laura? AARP is sending 5 members fromeach state to DC for the SOTU tonight. Your membership dues at work!

[The_Casual_Observer]

10. Oh boy! Just what we need, another place to put money!

"accounts tax-free and withdraw it with no tax penalty for medical expenses"

& just how much should we put in this a month? $600? $2000? How long would it take to save-up for a bypass operation? Where is the average citizen supposed to come up with money for this?


Yesterday Bush cast out a plan to send people to junior college to get trained in the health care industry, and on Saturday announced that everybody can have their own business. Perhaps the idea here is that everyone will learn how to treat their own illnesses, and if they can't they can go next door and get help from their neighbor.
I think I might convert that spare room into an out patient surgery
center!

[aquart]

13. Health care industry? Like attendants?

Or the kind of training that replaces skilled nurses with much cheaper labor?

[area51]

14. And ...

George W. Hoover said:

"... and that he is now turning his attention to job creation, aides said."

Wow, it only took three years for Shrub to notice that his job record is like Herbert Hoover's w/a huge net loss in jobs. He's only now noticing that he needs to do something about it (which won't help the problem). How about also turning his two-second attention span to extending unemployment bennies for those lucky enough to get them? Shrub's just now noticed that there are millions of us unemployed who will vote his ass out of office, & can't be fooled by BS words.

How about universal health care for the rest of us instead so that people won't be bankrupted because they need an operation, or because healthy workers are more productive workers, or workers w/healthcare won't need to keep working & spread germs around when they're sick. Nahhh... Paid-for healthcare (through our taxes) is only for vermin like Shrub & rich congress members.

[papau]

15. The 12 noon Tuesday Whitehouse SOTU leak below

SOTU will present Bush as a proven, unifying leader, in contrast to the Democrats, and will ignore the embarrassing failure to find Iraq's alleged weapons of mass destruction, so as to not remind the press of the assertions in the 2003 State of the Union address, that Saddam posed a "serious and mounting threat" to the US, and those infamous 16 words claiming he had been trying to buy uranium from Africa to build a nuclear weapon, which have been totally disproved by subsequent events. Instead, the President will point to the capture of Saddam Hussein, and to Libya's decision to give up its own WMD programme, as proof that the decision to invade was correct, and worth the 500 US soldiers' lives that have been lost so far. - Mr Bush will also claim significant successes in the war against terror -

and the press is not expected to challenge any Bush assertions/claims.

On economic themes, Bush will assert that the recovery is now well under way -

and the press is not expected to challenge his assertions/claims.

Bush will propose a part-privatisation of social security, with workers allowed to invest in the stock market some of the social security taxes they currently pay - and not mention how this is a cut in SS benefits and a wat to avoid an FIT increase when it comes time to return the payroll tax surplus stolen by Bush to finance his tax cut for the rich-

and the press is not expected to challenge his assertions/claims.

Bush health care proposals will claim to broaden coverage, and reduce costs -

and the press is not expected to challenge his assertions/claims.

[54anickel]

16. Man, I don't think I'll be able to watch it. Almost broke the TV once n/t