Senator Ensign Makes Great Argument for a Public Option… Oops

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Wed Sep-30-09 09:51 PM
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Senator Ensign Makes Great Argument for a Public Option… Oops

It’s hard to say whether Senator Ensign (R-NV) planned it this way. Did he really believe that his argument against giving Americans the choice of government sponsored health insurance would make sense to anyone? Is he so blinded by ideology that he doesn’t realize that at least three quarters of Americans would welcome such a choice? Or has his mistress scandal simply turned off his thinking process?

Arguing against giving Americans the option of government sponsored health insurance – which would represent serious competition against the private health insurance industry – Ensign said that the public option is “a slippery slope into a government run single payer program”.

More revealing than the fact that Ensign said that is the reasoning he used to support his statement. Why would a public option lead to single payer health care in the United States? Actually, Paul Krugman made exactly the same point more than a year ago. But I certainly wouldn’t have expected Ensign to make that point. This is what Krugman had to say in his book, “Conscience of a Liberal”, about providing some competition to private insurance companies by giving people the option of choosing government run insurance plans over private insurance plans:

The evidence suggests that the government plans, which would have lower overhead costs because they wouldn’t devote large sums to marketing, would win that competition. When Medicare began requiring that Medicare Advantage plans – taxpayer-supported private plans for seniors – compete with traditional Medicare on an actuarially fair basis, the private plans withered away… If the government plans consistently out-competed private insurers, the system would evolve over time into single-payer, as private insurers lost market share…

So, how did Ensign’s opinion on this issue differ from Krugman’s? In all essentials, it didn’t? This is what Ensign said:

Why we think all of this is a slippery slope toward government-run – complete government-run health care, complete government takeover of our health care system, is that a lot of the things that we do around here, we put into place – and supposedly safeguards are put into place, but when we see the effects and people like government programs, they then defend those government programs and they make them want to compete and want to survive that much more.

So to summarize the difference between what Krugman said and what Ensign said, Krugman said that “Government plans… would win that competition (against private insurance)”, while Ensign said that “When we see the effects and people like government programs, they then defend those government programs…” Really, the only difference is that Krugman thinks it a good thing when people have access to government programs that they like and that benefit them, while Ensign thinks it’s a bad thing – which of course sums up Republican philosophy in a nutshell.

But why??

What was left unsaid by Ensign’s little diatribe is why it is bad when people have access to a government program that they like and that benefits them. Ensign – and Republicans in general – think it’s sufficient merely to note that something is run by the government in order to prove that it’s a bad program – even if the primarily reason for its survival is its “effect and people like government programs”. But WHY is that bad?

This brings to mind Ronald Reagan’s opposition to Medicare in the early ‘60s. Just put a label on it – call it socialism – and that should be enough to make the point:

Now what reason could the other people have for backing a bill which says we insist on compulsory health insurance for senior citizens on a basis of age alone… I think we could be excused for believing that… this was simply an excuse to bring about what they wanted all the time: socialized medicine.

There is a little difference between Medicare and the currently proposed Public Option. Medicare was compulsory – in the sense that all Americans who meet the age qualification are allowed to use it – whereas the proposed Public Option is not compulsory, in that you have to sign up for it and pay for it (with government subsidy for those who need it) in order to get it. But Reagan’s strategy was to call it “socialism” – just as today’s Republicans (and some blue dog Democrats) are doing. But at least Reagan had the good sense not to admit that the reason he was against it was because it would benefit people and they would like it. I guess that was just a little slip of the tongue on Ensign’s part.

Anyhow, since Ensign failed to explain what he has against the idea of a program that people like because it benefits them, I’ll explain it for him – and the rest of our Republican Congress: Republicans are adamantly opposed to government programs that benefit people because such government programs compete quite successfully against their corporate donors. Since the purpose of a government program is to provide its citizens with needed benefits, whereas the purpose of private corporate programs are to make a profit, it should be obvious that governments have a tremendous advantage in their ability to provide programs that people will like and that will benefit them. It’s like Senator McConnell (R-KY) said when he whined to President Obama about the “unfair” competition that a government program would provide to private insurance companies:

Forcing free market plans to compete with these government-run programs would create an un-level playing field and inevitably doom true competition. Ultimately, we would be left with a single government-run program controlling all of the market…

Corporate socialists

So there you have it. As Senator Ensign admitted (inadvertently, I’m sure), and as Senator McConnell before him admitted, Republican Congresspersons lambast government run programs because they compete with and cut into the profits of their corporate donors. And furthermore, they don’t need government programs that provide benefits to poor people or people of modest means. The kinds of government programs that they approve of are bank bailouts, government subsidies for powerful corporations, and legislation that helps their corporate donors gain monopoly control over … whatever they can. Essentially they are Corporate Socialists. And that should be quite clear from the above noted remarks of Senators Ensign and McConnell – regardless of how much the Republican Party endeavors to hide that fact with the use of such terms as “free market”. Is it not clear by now that they have no desire whatsoever for a truly free market? They are anti-competition to the core. They are Corporate Socialists.

What we need now

And let me say one more thing about the Public Option: Let’s not let them pull semantic tricks on us. If Congress passes a “Public Option” that is available to only a small fraction of the American people (such as people who currently have no health insurance), that is not sufficient. It should be available to ALL Americans. People who currently have no health insurance need it the most. But the rest of us need it too – to provide a true alternative to having to suffer along with the nasty tricks that the private health insurance industry plays on us.

And not only that. It must be made truly affordable to all Americans – which means that those who struggle to get by from paycheck to paycheck should get it for free. People need health care, and if a family can barely maintain financial solvency without putting out money for health insurance, then they certainly can’t maintain financial solvency when they have to pay for health insurance as well. And of course it is also essential that a Public Option provide decent quality health care.

Are we going to take seriously the Declaration that made us a sovereign nation? – The one that said that everyone has an inalienable right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness? Well, we can hardly pursue those things if we have no access to decent health care. I think that FDR said it as well as anyone when he proposed his Second Bill of Rights at his 1944 State of the Union address:

We have come to a clear realization of the fact that true individual freedom cannot exist without economic security and independence. Necessitous men are not free men. People who are hungry and out of a job are the stuff of which dictatorships are made.

In our day these economic truths have become accepted as self-evident. We have accepted, so to speak, a second Bill of Rights under which a new basis of security and prosperity can be established for all – regardless of station, race, or creed. Among these are:

Opportunity
 The right to a useful and remunerative job…
 The right to a good education.
 The right of every businessman, large and small, to trade in an atmosphere of freedom from unfair competition and domination by monopolies…

Security
 The right to adequate protection from the economic fears of old age, sickness, accident, and unemployment.
 The right to adequate medical care and the opportunity to achieve and enjoy good health.
 The right of every family to a decent home.
 The right to earn enough to provide adequate food and clothing and recreation.

I’m glad that Senator Ensign made it crystal clear how he and his Republican colleagues differ from FDR’s vision.