Why does the proposed Health Care Reform bill (HR3200) Need To Be 1,017 Pages?

[Rage for Order]

http://energycommerce.house.gov/Press_111/20090714/aahca.pdf

A few days ago I decided to try, as a layman, to read through a few entire sections of the proposed bill. I encourage each of you to try to read 10% of the bill (roughly 100 pages) and see how much sense you can make of it. There are so many references and amendments to other laws that it would nearly be a full time job just finding the excerpts to all of the other statutes that are amended, deleted, added, or changed by HR 3200.

I think the sheer size of this bill makes it much easier for the fear merchants to make any claim they want about the bill without having to prove it. All they have to say is "It's in the bill. Read it!" I don't have time to read all 1,017 pages of the proposed bill (and keep up with any changes along the way), plus the other laws that would be affected by language in this bill, and derive a truly informed opinion, and I suspect a large majority of my fellow Americans don't either. I work full time, come home to my family, want to spend time with the wife and kids, do bath and bedtime, and by then I'm pooped. I don't have 4 more hours each day to research the proposed bill to discern what it actually says or does not say.

Does health care reform really need to be done in so complex a manner that the average citizen has no chance of knowing what the final product will be?

ETA: For the snarkers, it only took Congress 169 pages to screw us out of $700 billion with the http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/getdoc.cgi?dbname=110_cong_bills&docid=f:h1424enr.txt.pdf">TARP legislation of 2008. What could possibly go wrong with their 1,000 page bill? Might there be items tucked away in there that they're not telling us about?

[lovuian]

1. So there can be loopholes

But the system has to stop

[BlooInBloo]

2. (facepalm)

EDIT: I'll rescind that facepalm, if the OP is like 6 years old. Otherwise it's just another fine example of Americans reveling in their stupidity.

[KittyWampus]

11. Look, if there were 1,016 there wouldn't be enough and if there were 1,018 there'd be one too many

This isn't rocket science but that's why we post on DU, correct?

[BlooInBloo]

18. This is law, not porridge.

:P

[Bleacher Creature]

30. Reminds me of a great quote about Sonny Bono from Chuck Schumer

It was from the mid-1990s, when both men were in the House. I couldn't find the article itself, but found the relevant paragraph when I Googled what I remembered:

" Bono's current legislative director, Curt Hollman, is charged with the Herculean task of summarizing complex issues in short, simple memos that Bono can comprehend. Unfortunately, Hollman can't watch during all of his
assignments. At one Judiciary Committee hearing, Bono complained, "Boy, it's been flying in this room like I can't believe today. We have a very simple and concise bill here, and I think it would be to everyone's pleasure if we would just pass this thing." This prompted New York's Charles E. Schumer to dryly reply, "We're making laws here, not sausages."

On another occasion, Bono complained that his colleagues were becoming needlessly bogged down in "technical" matters and legalese. This about the Judiciary Committee, which writes laws and deals with trifling matters such
as constitutional protections."

[babylonsister]

3. Here's a synopsis of the good stuff, but info is all over the place.

Go to 'the gavel', Pelosi's House website, to find a real synopsis.


http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=103x472073

[Rage for Order]

10. I don't doubt there is good stuff in the bill

That's the thing, though. I don't think I (and nearly every other American, and most members of Congress) should have to rely on someone's synopsis to tell me what is in the bill. It should be discernible by reading the text of the proposed legislation. Am I asking too much?

[babylonsister]

24. If you're serious, go to The Gavel. It's there in its entirety, also

with synopses.

[Teaser]

4. Agreed. Also satellites shouldn't be so complex that laymen can't build them.

.

[Rage for Order]

7. Snark all you want

But if you can't see the difference between satellites, which are completely optional (humankind got by for thousands of years without them), and something as fundamental as the way health care is delivered to every person in the country, then I suppose there's not much use in trying to have a conversation with you.

Would I be correct in assuming your position, then, is "Trust them, they know what they're doing"?

[BlooInBloo]

16. No, the positon is: Read what they're doing. Durr. 1000 pages isn't that much...

Maybe a week's worth of reading.

As always, the weakest part of a democracy is it's fucking idiot electorate.

[BlooInBloo]

14. They can use my new book: "Nonlinear Differential Equations For Idiots"

:rofl:

[ipaint]

5. They are setting up another costly massive beaurocracy

that will add to health care costs. It's hard work.

[charlie and algernon]

6. The important bills are ALWAYS huge

Especially bills that are sweeping and cover a wide range of groups and existing laws. Every bill also starts by listing all the existing laws that will be amended. A huge bill like health care obviously covers TONS of existing laws. In my last job, I've had to read hundreds of bills and I've found that most could DRASTICALLY shortened page-wise if you didn't need to write in all that legislative jargon. In order to cover up as many possible loop holes as you can, phrases and lists are repeated endlessly.

[Rage for Order]

15. That's reasonable and understandable

However, that being the case, I think the parts of each of those laws that are being changed by a proposed bill should be linked to (in the online version) or inserted (in the text version) to make it easier for people to see what is being changed.

[charlie and algernon]

27. what you're asking for would another 2,000 pages to it

if you know where to look, its fairly easy to find the referenced law. Find the chaper number, go to the section, sub-section, clause, etc.

[Davis_X_Machina]

8. Most major legislation looks like that...

...you have to change or repeal, in whole or in part, dozens of existing laws, one clause at a time, one law at a time. They're all interrelated.

Here's a 'simple' bill, the Revolutionary War and War of 1812 Battlefield Protection Act.

thomas.loc.gov makes linking to the text of a bill difficult...

The long and the short of it, unless you're naming a post office, amending the Constitution, or letting an independent -- and somewhat unaccountable -- Federal agency write all the regulations necessary to carry out a simple bill, this is inevitable.

[Cleita]

9. I personally think 700 of the BS pages can be eliminated and then

you might have a core of something from the Medicare reforms that can be built from. But all the different classes of plans like platinum, gold, silver, bronze and probably poop which is the plan most of us would get really are nothing more than industry boondoggle code speak.

[Stephanie]

12. Well once the amendments are incorporated won't it all get pared down?

[Cleita]

17. Will it? I wonder. I guess we will have to wait and see.

I have a bad feeling though, from the way things are shaping up, that the only real meaningful change is going to be good for corporate America and bad for the rest of us, doctors and patients alike.

[Cessna Invesco Palin]

21. Which specific 700 pages do you object to? n/t

[Cleita]

26. Specific pages? I am going to give you the benefit of the doubt that you

are joking with me. There are specific paragraphs that I would delete through the whole thing and the part left would be about Medicare and other programs that already exist, about three hundred pages worth, in my estimation. The rest is just a waste of language.

[Cessna Invesco Palin]

39. You said that 700 pages were BS.

I'd like to know which 700 pages you're talking about. It's a pretty simple request.

[spanone]

13. because it's not 2,500 pages.

[napi21]

19. In fairness to the legislators, I watched all the markup hearings that were on cspan or broadcast

later. It's very interesting when one amendmendment is discussed, several members ask how it would affect a law already in effect. I supose the final laws are very hard to read, but if you have the time to listen to how they are discussed and changed & the reasoning behind the thoughts, there really is a lot of logic to what they do. I can even tell you there were several good things put into the markups by Pubs who I used to think were complete idiots.

A great example is all the foolishness about the death panels that have been in the media the last few days. I listened to that hearing when it was discussed.The amendment was initiated by a Pub who is an MD. Murkowski asked about the cost to the individual. Some said they did their living will free online, Murkowski said hers cost $400 through a lawyer, but everyone agreed it was a great thing to have because it gives the power of the decision of what care THEY want to them. That's where the "paying for the consultation fees" came from.

Remember, you have a lot of lawyers writing these bills, and they are always very hard to read.

[Rage for Order]

23. That's the thing...having the time to follow it all

I leave the house for work by 7am, and am generally not home until 6 or 7 pm. Add in dinner, family time, and sleep, and how can one be expected to keep up with it all? I can look at sections of the bill that I hear referenced in discussions to determine what they say, but I don't the have time to study the entire bill.

[Cessna Invesco Palin]

25. You can't. That's why we elect legislators.

That's why legislators have teams of people in their employ to help them interperet the law. Do you seriously think most congresscritters sit down and read the entire thing for themselves? Do you think they understand it?

[Rage for Order]

36. So the legislators aren't expected to be able to read and understand it all...

But assholes on here are snarking at me for stating my opinion that the manner in which the bill is written makes it too difficult to understand all of the moving parts. And I don't have a staff of Congressional aides to write an executive summary for me.

I wonder how many of the respondents in this thread who are derisive towards my position have actually read the entire bill and understand the full scope of it, including all ramifications on every other statute affected by the proposed bill? If I were a betting man, I'd put the number at zero percent. And I'm highly confident that I would win that bet.

[Cessna Invesco Palin]

40. Have you ever read a bill before?

I'm guessing no. They're all written like this.

[napi21]

32. You're right. I'm retired so I have the time to watch. It really

aggravates ne when I hear the summaries the MSM gives to the hearings. I'm no journalist, but I can think and understand what I hear. I even gained a bit of respect for some of the Pubs when I heard their logic. They're not as crazy as they sound on the Senate floor!

[Cessna Invesco Palin]

20. You're right.

Obviously it should be written in the form of haiku, instead of actual law.

[lapfog_1]

22. Let's go through this...

First off, it's hardly 1000 pages of "normal" text for, say, a Harry Potter novel.

It's center justified, and with wide margins, the lines are all numbered. This is so the various congress persons and staff members can make notations in the margins. Printed in a normal sized text for 8 1/2 by 11 paper with small margins, it's probably no more than 400 pages (also, it should be noted that there are lots of footnotes and references).

Second, it is modifying parts or whole sections of existing law. Therefore it needs to reference the existing law and explain how it is changing it.

Third, it's written in "legalese", i.e. by lawyers for lawyers. Is that great? No... but that's why your home mortgage contract runs to dozens if not hundreds of pages as well. Not a great system, but it's what we have.

[Rage for Order]

28. I've read my fair share of legalese

I did commercial mortgage servicing for a while, and the Loan Agreements were easily a couple hundred pages long, with all of the circular references...you know, this clause has this effect, except in situations where Section 5.4.17, subsection d applies, in which case Section 8.4.1 shall apply...you spend lots of time flipping back and forth, marking up margins, trying to discern the intent. It's very time-intensive even when you're getting paid to do it. Trying to find the time when it's not your full-time job is much more challenging.

[4lbs]

29. Did you see everything it covers? It's not just the "public option". That would be about 10 pages.

The public option is only about 5% of what President Obama wants to reform in health care. He said so himself today in the CO town hall meeting.

Yet, the public option is what has been getting 90% of the media coverage.

This bill also adds back in the 265,000+ veterans that were kicked out of the VA coverage during the Bush Administration for earning more than $40,000 a year.

It talks about how to cover 50 million uninsured people, and 10 million under-insured.

There's Medicare and Medicaid reform.

There's prescription drug coverage reform.

There's administration, procedures, etc. reform.

There's methods on various methods on how to fund the changes and additions. Unlike the Bush years, where they passed programs without funding them (making them useless), President Obama wants to make sure each thing is properly funded, so we don't add to the deficit.

Because of that, there's an inclusion of subsidy and tax changes.

It also deals with how NOT to violate all the various state regulations on health care. CA's healthcare regulations may be different from Texas', which is different from Ohio's, which is different from..., etc.

If the President and Congress aren't mindful of the various state regulations on healthcare, then this bill if passed, could be struck down by a federal court as unconstitutional because it violates one or more state's rights. You know, the 10th Amendment and all.

[abumbyanyothername]

31. HR676 is 27 pages. nt

[EC]

33. Yeah, and why don't divorce papers just say you're divorced instead

of 10 pages of non-readable stuff? :sarcasm:

[Rage for Order]

34. I've reviewed several hundred divorce decrees

If HR 3200 was written with half of the straight-forwardness (is that a word?) of your average divorce decree, then I wouldn't be complaining about it.

[lapfog_1]

35. Hardly a fair comparison.

Divorce decrees are not modifying existing law (even if it seems that way sometimes :rofl: )

[Rage for Order]

37. I was responding to a particular poster

I didn't think it was a relevant comparison either, but that person brought it up.

[blondeatlast]

38. I'm a paralegal. No problem for me--it's my job to read and write legalese.

There's a reason that stuff is written that way, too--so that lawyers WON'T spend time pointing out the vagueries and such.