Prime minister takes more cautious approach than White House, telling MPs that Britain needs to know there is an end point The UK will withdraw another 500 troops from Afghanistan next year, as armed forces begin to transfer combat duties to the Afghan security forces, the prime minister announced on Wednesday. The decision comes a fortnight after President Obama said he intended to withdraw 33,000 US troops from the country by the end of next autumn. This announcement was a controversial move that went against the advice of commanders on the ground. David Cameron had also been under pressure to consider a more radical drawdown from the areas in Helmand province where the British are currently stationed, but he has taken a more cautious approach than the White House. Following advice from the National Security Council and military officials, who have warned that the situation remains fragile, Downing Street has chosen to keep troop numbers high until the end of 2012. Explaining to MPs why 500 extra soldiers could be withdrawn next year, Cameron told MPs that Afghanistan was entering a “new phase” and that “the country needs to know that there is an end point … This is right for the UK and it’s right for Afghanistan too.” Cameron said there was evidence that al-Qaida’s strength had been diminished and there was tentative signs that the Taliban was weaker too. “Afghan forces now stand ready to take over security … there has been real progress over the last two years.” In his statement to the House of Commons, Cameron said he was committed to ending the UK’s combat role in Afghanistan by the end of 2014. “It has given the Afghans a clear deadline against which to plan and has injected a sense of urgency into their efforts,” he told MPs. It is thought only 2,000 UK troops will be in the country by 2014, meaning there will be a sharp acceleration of the withdrawal process in 2013. The UK currently has 9,500 troops in Afghanistan. Ministers have already announced 450 troops will come home this year – almost half of them have already left. Later this month, the UK will hand over responsibility for security in the districts where British troops are based to the Afghan army and police. Earlier this week during a trip to Afghanistan, Cameron indicated there would not be a significant reduction for the next two summers, which are traditionally the “fighting seasons” for the military. “You have the enduring number of 9,500. You’re not going to see a radical change for the fighting season of next year,” Cameron said. “That’s not what this is about. 2014 is a deadline – be in no doubt. This is a matter of judgment. It is my judgment that it is right. The British people and the British military deserve to have some certainty.” The prime minister’s visit coincided with the death of another British soldier, the 375th to have been killed in the country since 2001. Scott McLaren, 20, disappeared from the vehicle checkpoint where he was stationed, early on Monday. His body was found 4km away after an extensive search . He had gunshot wounds, including one to the back of the head. Reports from Afghanistan continued to suggest that McLaren, a rifleman from the 4th Battalion the Royal Regiment of Scotland had left his post, possibly to go for a swim. However, the MoD remains sceptical of the stories. It is understood that CCTV footage of the checkpoint, in the Nahr-e-Saraj district, shows McLaren leaving the base on his own. Military Afghanistan David Cameron House of Commons Nick Hopkins guardian.co.uk
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Prime minister says he is ‘appalled’ by revelations about behaviour at News of the World, but BSkyB deal can go ahead David Cameron has bowed to pressure to hold public inquiries into the “absolutely disgusting” allegations of phone hacking by journalists at News of the World, and into the original police investigation into the scandal. The prime minister responded to the outrage provoked by the phone-hacking crisis at the Sunday tabloid after it emerged that Scotland Yard has started to contact the relatives of victims of the 7 July 2005 attacks to warn them they were also targeted by the paper . Pressed by the Labour leader, Ed Miliband, to conduct a full public inquiry, the prime minister said he was “appalled” by the revelations and agreed that it was important that inquiries were conducted that were “public, independent, and have public confidence”. He also signalled that News Corporation’s takeover of BSkyB would be allowed to go ahead. He rejected Miliband’s call for the matter to be referred to the Competition Commission, which he suggested would be illegal. Miliband told Cameron he had made a “catastrophic error of judgment” when he hired Andy Coulson as his director of communications. In a dramatic prime minister’s question time dominated by the hacking scandal, Miliband also accused Cameron of being out of touch with public opinion on the issue of BSkyB. Cameron told the Commons that the inquiries could not be started immediately because of the major police investigation currently under way, though he conceded it “may be possible” to start some of the work earlier. “We do need to have an inquiry, possibly inquiries, into what has happened,” Cameron said. “We are no longer talking here about politicians and celebrities, we are talking about murder victims, potentially terrorist victims, having their phones hacked into. It is absolutely disgusting, what has taken place, and I think everyone in this House and indeed this country will be revolted by what they have heard and what they have seen on their television screens.” He said there were two “vital areas” that needed to be considered: why the original police inquiry failed to “get to the bottom of what happened”, as well as the behaviour, practices and ethics of journalists and media organisations. Cameron said it was important that lessons were learned from “what has become a disgraceful episode”. The Labour leader called on Cameron to appoint a senior figure, possibly a judge, to lead the inquiry, which should have the power to call witnesses under oath. Miliband said the investigation should cover “the culture and practices of the industry, the nature of regulation … and also the relationship between the police and the media”. Cameron said he did not think it would be possible to investigate the original police inquiry until the new one had concluded. “Clearly, we can’t start all that sort of inquiry immediately because you must not jeopardise the police investigation, but it may be possible to start some of that work earlier,” he said. He offered to hold talks on the matter with other party leaders, attorney general Dominic Grieve and the cabinet secretary, Sir Gus O’Donnell. But he resisted separate calls by Miliband that the bid by News International to take control of BskyB be referred to the competition commission, saying that to do so would be “illegal”. Miliband said the public would react “with disbelief” if the deal went ahead in the next few days when News International was the subject of a major criminal investigation. But Cameron said the government had followed the correct legal processes, with Jeremy Hunt, the secretary of state for media, culture and sport, handling the matter in a quasi-judicial role. Only yesterday Miliband himself said that plurality issues were separate from News International ethics. The prime minister also refused to be drawn on whether Rebekah Brooks, News International chief executive, should stand down. Confronted by claims by Miliband that he had made a “catastrophic error of judgment” by taking on Coulson, the former editor of the News of the World embroiled in the latest wave of revelations, the prime minister said he took “full responsibility” for everyone he employs and appoint to work for him. The ramifications of the scandal continued to be felt by the News of the World through other channels as Halifax bank and Virgin Holidays cancelled adverts due to run in this Sunday’s paper. They followed in the footsteps of Ford which said on Tuesday it was suspending its advertising in the paper. Other companies, including the UK’s biggest advertiser, Procter & Gamble, have said they are reviewing their positions amid an online campaign urging firms to withdraw their advertising. The Metropolitan police commissioner, Paul Stephenson, also revealed that members of his force face investigation after it was reported on Tuesday night that News International had handed over details of payments made by the News of the World to police officers. He said the documents appeared to “include information relating to alleged inappropriate payments to a small number of MPS officers”. Stephenson said the matter would be investigated by deputy commissioner Sue Akers in conjunction with the Met’s Directorate of Professional Standards. He added that no senior officer had been implicated. Given that the reports relate to police payments allegedly made between 2003 and 2007, when Andy Coulson was editor, many commentators have suggested they are an attempt to relieve the pressure on Brooks, also a former editor. One of those put on alert that his phone may have been hacked, Graham Foulkes, whose son David was killed in the 7 July 2005 bombings, expressed his horror at the alleged intrusion and said he wanted to meet Rupert Murdoch . He told BBC Radio 4′s Today programme: “I’d really like to meet him face to face and have a very in-depth conversation with him about responsibility and the power that he has and how it should be used appropriately.” Simon Greenberg, director of corporate affairs at News International, told the Today programme that a meeting between Foulkes and Murdoch was “certainly something we would consider”. Greenberg insisted that News International was being “highly co-operative” with the police. In an interview with BBC Radio 5 Live, he said the organisation was “very close” to discovering who commissioned the alleged hacking of Milly Dowler’s phone. Asked whether he was clear that the hacking was not commissioned by Brooks, who was News of the World editor at the time, he said: “We are clear.” Phone hacking Newspapers & magazines National newspapers News of the World News International Newspapers David Cameron PMQs House of Commons David Miliband Hélène Mulholland Haroon Siddique guardian.co.uk
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Vinny Leaves the Jersey Shore After Fight – He Won’t be Returning! Sleeping In Shower & Eating Soap dgibb011 says: This is not OK. @SarahCBougie @lbbucklin Oh no!! RT@1013kdwb: REPORT: Vinny leaves “Jersey Shore” http://t.co/DiT0Cmt
Continue reading …The media pandering on behalf of the Obama Re-election camp already is astonishing. During the George W. Bush years, everything bad that happened in America somehow was connected to the malignant reign of “The Decider.” Last year, CBS even sought out journalist Sally Quinn to
Continue reading …The media pandering on behalf of the Obama Re-election camp already is astonishing. During the George W. Bush years, everything bad that happened in America somehow was connected to the malignant reign of “The Decider.” Last year, CBS even sought out journalist Sally Quinn to
Continue reading …Tea Party Already Looking To Purge Their New Congress Members For Having The Audacity To Compromise
July 5, 2011 No Comment
enlarge I’ve known some really good politicians in my time, people who really knew how to hammer out coalitions and get things done. It wasn’t always pretty, of course, but they managed some semblance of actual governance and moved the ball down the field. The Tea Party gang has an entirely different problem: A base made up of voters who don’t accept that compromise, by definition, is inherent in a political process . That sort of binary thinking is killing this country. Now, you have a group of freshman Congress members who won election by promising that things were black and white, and they’re going to be punished for illustrating that, as extreme as they were, they have to compromise on at least some things. It would be funny if I wasn’t dreading an even more extreme crop the next time: It is miles to go before the 2012 Congressional races begin in earnest, but already some of the 87 freshmen who helped the Republicans win back the House last year are bracing for a challenge from within the party. At least half a dozen potential primary challengers to freshmen are considering a run, and there is heated chatter about more. In some ways, the freshmen are responsible for their own predicament. Many won their seats after successfully challenging establishment Republicans in primaries, proving that a combination of gumption and the right political climate could overcome the advantages of incumbency. Now, to some of the impatient and ideological voters who sent them to Washington to change things, the new House members may be seen as the establishment, and they face the disconcerting prospect of immediately defending themselves in the political marketplace. The 2012 primary “started the day I took office,” said Representative Blake Farenthold, who won last year in a heavily Democratic district in South Texas but is now likely to face a Republican primary challenger. “There is this constant pressure for fund-raising. I mean, you’re always worried about who is going to run against you, but I am willing to stand up for what I believe and on my record.” On the flip side, groups aligned with the Tea Party movement, which helped push many new-to-politics candidates into House seats, are disenchanted with some of their new hires and are pondering if they can raise the money, and the firepower, to find someone to take them on. “I do think it is going to be more competitive,” said Jenny Beth Martin, a co-founder of the Tea Party Patriots. “With the freshmen who claim to be Tea Party or claim to support the ideas of the Tea Party movement but haven’t kept their promise, I think it will be tough for them.” Ms. Martin said she regularly fields e-mails from New York Tea Party groups, as well as others in Georgia and Mississippi, complaining about freshmen House members who voted for a disappointing short-term spending agreement with President Obama that fell short of the party’s budget-cutting goals. “They have broken their promises,” she said. “People are dissatisfied.”
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Florida jury acquits mother of killing 2-year-old toddler who went missing in 2008 and was found dead six months later A Florida jury has cleared a young mother, Casey Anthony, of murdering her two-year-old daughter, rejecting the prosecution’s portrayal of her as “a lying, no-good slut” who would rather go nightclubbing than rear her child. The jury unanimously found Anthony, 25, not guilty on murder, manslaughter and child abuse charges in a case that has gripped US talkshows and cable news television. She was, however, convicted on charges of lying to the police after claiming that her daughter, Caylee, had been abducted by a nanny when Anthony was driving around with the body of her child in the boot of her car. Anthony would have faced a possible death sentence had she been convicted of first-degree murder but will serve no more than four years in prison when she is sentenced on Thursday. Prosecutors had alleged that Anthony murdered Caylee because she stood in the way of her party lifestyle and interest in men. Prosecutors told the jury that Anthony killed her daughter with chloroform in 2008 and then buried her body in woods near the family home in Orlando several weeks later. Caylee’s corpse was found with three strips of duct tape over her mouth and nose. Anthony’s father, George, told the court that his daughter left home in June 2008, taking Caylee with her, and did not return for a month. Anthony’s parents asked repeatedly to see the child but their daughter told them she was too busy with work. Anthony also claimed that Caylee was being looked after by a nanny. It was later established that the nanny did not exist. Anthony maintained that claim until her parents received a notice that their daughter’s car had been towed. When they went to pick it up, George Anthony said he noticed a strong odour from the boot that he and a worker in the tow yard told the court smelled like a decomposing body. Anthony’s mother, Cindy, then called the police and reported Caylee missing. “There is something wrong. I found my daughter’s car today and it smells like there’s been a dead body in the damn car,” she told the emergency operator. The prosecution homed in on Anthony’s failure to report her daughter missing during those 31 days. “Responses to grief are as varied as the day is long, but responses to guilt are oh so predictable,” the lead prosecutor, Linda Drane Burdick, said. “What do guilty people do? They lie. They avoid. They run. They mislead, not just to their family, but the police. They divert attention away from themselves and they act like nothing is wrong. That’s why you heard about what happened in those 31 days.” The defence said Caylee had accidentally drowned in the family swimming pool and that her mother then panicked. It claimed that Anthony’s father knew about the accident and helped his daughter dispose of the body. It said George Anthony, a former police office, placed the tape over the dead girl’s face to make it look like murder in an attempt to cover up the failure to report the death. The man denied his daughter’s account. The defence also claimed that Casey Anthony had been sexually abused by her father and brother and that was a factor in her erratic behaviour. Anthony’s lawyer, Jose Baez, said the prosecution had attempted to portray his client as “a lying, no-good slut” who murdered her daughter in order to go nightclubbing when in fact Caylee’s death was “an accident that snowballed out of control”. Another prosecutor, Jeff Ashton, said the defence failed to present any real evidence to back any of its claims and, in closing arguments, said the claim that George Anthony staged a murder to cover up a lesser crime made no sense. “That’s absurd. Nothing has been presented to you to make that any less absurd,” he said. But the jury was not persuaded that Anthony killed her daughter either deliberately or by accident. After the verdict, one of Anthony’s lawyers, Cheney Mason, condemned the “media assassination” of his client since her arrest, including by other lawyers who appeared on television talkshows to pronounce her guilty before the trial was over. United States Florida Chris McGreal guardian.co.uk
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Channel 4 says News International chief executive Rebekah Brooks was challenged by police in 2002 over claims that News of the World had a senior Metropolitan police detective under surveillance. 8.37pm: More on advertisers reviewing their links to the News of the World. My colleagues Sam Jones and Mark Sweney report that mobile phone firms Orange and T-Mobile are joining Ford, nPower and Halifax in considering their position. A spokesman for T-Mobile said: “We’re currently reviewing our advertising position with News of the World, following the recent allegations, and await the outcome of the ongoing police investigation.” Orange put out a similar statement, saying: “We’re currently reviewing our advertising position with News of the World, following the recent allegations, and await the outcome of the ongoing police investigation.” The latest advertising boycotts came as companies including Co-operative, WH Smith, EasyJet, Butlins and Renault came under heavy pressure from internet campaigners to sever their links with the Sunday tabloid. A one-stop page has been set up to allow people to automatically tweet their concerns. 8.15pm: More details from the Channel 4 News website on claims that Met detective Dave Cook was placed under surveillance by News of the World. The report quotes Alistair Morgan, brother of Daniel Morgan, whose murder Cook had been investigating at the time of the alleged surveillance. “Dave told me about it, he told me about it then but I didn’t realise who the newspaper was at that point. … “Dave told me that he was out walking his dog, he was taking his dog for a walk one evening when he noticed a van in an odd location. I think he said behind some trees near his house. The following morning he noticed he was being followed.” 8.04pm: Back to the Milly Dowler Case. Press Association reports Labour MP Keith Vaz, chairman of the Commons Home Affairs Select Committee, has written to Brooks and Scotland Yard acting commissioner John Yates asking what prior knowledge there had been of hacking in the Milly Dowler case. This is what Vaz says on the matter: These allegations are extremely shocking. It is now essential that any parties involved criminally are prosecuted and that we uncover who knew what at which point in time at both the Metropolitan Police and at the News of the World. The committee will be raising this issue with police officers involved in the current and previous investigations. We will also seek to clarify why a significant variance of action was taken by mobile phone companies in the aftermath of the phone hacking revelations. 7.44pm: Channel 4 News has made claims about how the News of the World placed senior Metropolitan police detective under surveillance at a time he was investigating the murder of a private eye with links to individuals who worked for the paper. Here’s an outline of its report : It said a Detective Chief Superintendent Dave Cook, a senior police officer who appeared on Crimewatch, claimed he was told by colleagues that he was under surveillance by News of the World when he was investigating the 1987 murder of Daniel Morgan, a private investigator. The C4 report said police discovered that vans leased to News of the World had been witnessed tailing Cook. It said NoW was investigating whether Cook was having an affair with Jackie Haynes, a Crimewatch presenter who was in fact his wife. C4 says the timing of the NoW surveillance was disturbing because suspects in a case being investigated by Cook were private investigators with close links to NoW. C4 added that Brooks was challenged by police over this at a meeting in 2002. News International was quoted saying it was not aware of the claims but would investigate. It said it could not confirm or deny Brooks’ meeting with police. It said Cook and Haynes were informed two months ago about documentation of surveillance found among notes seized from Glenn Mulcaire. It said they were both considering legal action. 7.14pm: News International’s Simon Greenberg said he is confident the company can come through the phone hacking scandal. Speaking on Sky News he said: “We’ve found some new information that helps us get closer to the facts of the case about who is involved.” He added: “I’m not going to be naming individuals. We’re liaising with the police. We met with the police this morning… It was a routine meeting… It is going to get us closer to establishing the facts.” Greenberg said he was not aware of any claims of phone hacking in the case of Sarah Payne. “We’ve not shied away from the fact that when the allegations were made, Rebekah (Brooks) was editor of the NoW… and she’s going to lead us through this investigation.” He said: “There are things in the past that are highly regretful,” and described the Milly Dowler incident as an “appalling shocking case”. He said during his time at the News of the World he had no idea where the phone-hacked stories were coming from. 7.00pm: Simon Greenberg, News International’s director of corporate affairs, is appearing on Sky News to talk about phone hacking. 6.52pm: Cathy Newman of Channel 4 News tweets: Did News of the World team up with Sara Payne to campaign for Sarah’s Law – and then have her phone hacked? Watch C4News at 7 6.28pm: Glenn Mulcaire, the private investigator at the centre of the scandal, has issued a public apology to those upset by his activity . The statement, released exclusively to the Guardian, makes no reference to hacking Milly Dowler’s phone, but says he never intended to interfere with police inquiries. He said he had been operating under a “constant demand for results”. I want to apologise to anybody who was hurt or upset by what I have done. Much has been published in the media about me. Up to now, I have not responded publicly in any way to all the stories but in the light of the publicity over the last 24 hours, I feel I must break my silence. I want to apologise to anybody who was hurt or upset by what I have done. I’ve been to court. I’ve pleaded guilty. And I’ve gone to prison and been punished. I still face the possibility of further criminal prosecution. Working for the News of the World was never easy. There was relentless pressure. There was a constant demand for results. I knew what we did pushed the limits ethically. But, at the time, I didn’t understand that I had broken the law at all. A lot of information I obtained was simply tittle-tattle, of no great importance to anyone, but sometimes what I did was for what I thought was the greater good, to carry out investigative journalism. I never had any intention of interfering with any police inquiry into any crime. I know I have brought the vilification I am experiencing upon myself, but I do ask the media to leave my family and my children, who are all blameless, alone. 6.21pm: Some companies say they will continue advertising with the News of the World pending police investigations into the voicemail hacking. Tesco, responding to customers on Facebook and Twitter, said: “We know that you have a lot of questions surrounding recent News of the World allegations. “These latest allegations will cause huge distress to a family which has suffered enough. “It’s now a matter for the police. Like everyone, we await the outcome of their investigation.” A Virgin Media spokeswoman said: “We’re not taking any action at this point. We’re just waiting for the outcome of any investigation and then we will look into what to do.” 6.00pm: Good evening and welcome to our live blog on the latest developments and fallout from the Guardian’s revelations about how the News of the World illegally targeted the missing schoolgirl Milly Dowler and her family in March 2002, interfering with police inquiries into her disappearance. • The stakes have been dramatically upped in the last number of hours after the Labour leader, Ed Miliband, suggested that Rebekah Brooks, the News International chief executive, should resign . • Labour are also demanding an public inquiry into illegality in the newspaper industry, while John Bercow, the Commons Speaker, has approved an emergency three-hour debate on phone hacking in the Commons tomorrow. David Cameron has meanwhile criticised the News of the World – “this is a truly dreadful act”, he said. • Brooks has told employees it is “inconceivable” she knew that the News of the World hacked into Milly Dowler’s mobile phone. The News International chief executive said she was “sickened” by the events, but insisted she was “determined to lead the company” – despite calls for her to resign. • Press Complaints Commission chairman Baroness Buscombe has meanwhile said that she was lied to by the News of the World over phone hacking. She said she did not know the extent of the scandal when she came on board the PCC in 2009, but admitted she had been “misled by the News of the World” – after she had previously concluded just the opposite. • Separately from the political fallout, Cambridgeshire police have said that the parents of Holly Wells and Jessica Chapman, the two children murdered by Ian Huntley, were contacted by Scotland Yard detectives investigating phone hacking at the News of the World. • Ford has pulled ads, reports the BBC, and the energy firm Npower said it is “reviewing” its advertising in the News of the World following the Milly Dowler revelations. According to Sky News, Halifax are also considering withdrawing advertising from the paper. Phone hacking News of the World News International Rebekah Brooks Newspapers & magazines Barry Neild guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …If You Really Want To Fix Medicare, Help These Dems Repeal The Sweetheart Deal With Big Pharma: Medicare Part D
July 5, 2011 No CommentThe Nation’s John Nichols talks about the great things Medicare has accomplished — and how to lower costs without gutting it. As you can imagine, he doesn’t think much of Rep. Paul Ryan’s approach: Forty-five years ago this week, the first Medicare checks were delivered, and the United States made a great leap forward. Before Medicare was implemented—as a social-welfare program designed not just to deliver care but to poverty— one in five Americans lived below the poverty line. After the program was implemented, and after related “War on Poverty” initiatives were developed, that number was cut almost in half. Poverty among seniors dropped by two thirds. Why? Before Medicare, millions of elderly Americans could not afford to buy healthcare. They did not have access even to basic care. When they needed treatment for the inevitable ailments that are associated with aging, they and their families spent down what meager savings that retained and a stumble into poverty soon followed. Medicare broke the vicious cycle for the elderly, as Medicaid did for disabled Americans and their families. “For more than four decades, Medicare has kept millions of our senior citizens from living out their days in poverty,” explains one of the program’s steadiest champions, Congresswoman Tammy Baldwin, D-Wisconsin. Medicare continues to serve the purpose for which it was created. Indeed, so much good continues to come of this program—and of Medicaid—that it is difficult to imagine why anyone who seek to dismantle the program. But that is precisely what House Budget Committee chairman Paul Ryan, R-Janesville, is trying to do. The right reform now is not the Ryan plan. It is the proposal by Representatives Henry A. Waxman, Sander Levin, Pete Stark, John D. Dingell, George Miller and Rob Andrews that would save the government billions by reducing Medicare Part D drug costs for taxpayers. This legislation, the Medicare Drug Savings Act of 2011 (H.R. 2190), would save more than $100 billion. How? By eliminating the sweetheart deal for brand-name drug manufacturers that was developed by the Bush-Cheney administration and its congressional allies and that allows these multinational corporations to charge Medicare higher prices for millions of low-income enrollees in the Medicare Part D program. “Instead of making devastating cuts to programs that help low-income and middle-income Americans, as Republicans keep putting on the table, we should do what every other industrialized country does and ask the pharmaceutical industry, one of the wealthiest in the world, to chip in,” says California Congressman Stark, the ranking member of the House Ways and Means Committee’s Subcommittee on Health. “What’s more, the savings from this legislation could pay for a multi-year ‘doc fix’—something we tried to do in a comprehensive way but have had to address yearly so Medicare’s payments to doctors aren’t slashed.” Medicare can be reformed the right way. It is not broken. And it is not broke. Contrast this approach with that of the Administration and Congress members : ¶ Gradually eliminate Medicare payments to hospitals for bad debts that result when beneficiaries fail to pay deductibles and co-payments. Medicare reimburses hospitals for 70 percent of such debts after the hospitals make reasonable efforts to collect the unpaid amounts. ¶ Reduce Medicare payments to teaching hospitals for the costs of training doctors, caring for sicker patients and providing specialized services like trauma care and organ transplants . Medicare spends $9.5 billion a year for its share of those costs. ¶ Reduce the federal share of payments to health care providers treating low-income people under Medicaid and the Children’s Health Insurance Program. The administration wants to establish a single “blended rate” for each state. The federal government now reimburses states at different rates for different groups of people and different services in the two programs. Representative Henry A. Waxman of California, the senior Democrat on the Energy and Commerce Committee and an architect of Medicaid, said he was “very concerned” that this proposal would reduce the federal contribution to Medicaid and shift costs to states.
Continue reading …If You Really Want To Fix Medicare, Help These Dems Repeal The Sweetheart Deal With Big Pharma: Medicare Part D
July 5, 2011 No CommentThe Nation’s John Nichols talks about the great things Medicare has accomplished — and how to lower costs without gutting it. As you can imagine, he doesn’t think much of Rep. Paul Ryan’s approach: Forty-five years ago this week, the first Medicare checks were delivered, and the United States made a great leap forward. Before Medicare was implemented—as a social-welfare program designed not just to deliver care but to poverty— one in five Americans lived below the poverty line. After the program was implemented, and after related “War on Poverty” initiatives were developed, that number was cut almost in half. Poverty among seniors dropped by two thirds. Why? Before Medicare, millions of elderly Americans could not afford to buy healthcare. They did not have access even to basic care. When they needed treatment for the inevitable ailments that are associated with aging, they and their families spent down what meager savings that retained and a stumble into poverty soon followed. Medicare broke the vicious cycle for the elderly, as Medicaid did for disabled Americans and their families. “For more than four decades, Medicare has kept millions of our senior citizens from living out their days in poverty,” explains one of the program’s steadiest champions, Congresswoman Tammy Baldwin, D-Wisconsin. Medicare continues to serve the purpose for which it was created. Indeed, so much good continues to come of this program—and of Medicaid—that it is difficult to imagine why anyone who seek to dismantle the program. But that is precisely what House Budget Committee chairman Paul Ryan, R-Janesville, is trying to do. The right reform now is not the Ryan plan. It is the proposal by Representatives Henry A. Waxman, Sander Levin, Pete Stark, John D. Dingell, George Miller and Rob Andrews that would save the government billions by reducing Medicare Part D drug costs for taxpayers. This legislation, the Medicare Drug Savings Act of 2011 (H.R. 2190), would save more than $100 billion. How? By eliminating the sweetheart deal for brand-name drug manufacturers that was developed by the Bush-Cheney administration and its congressional allies and that allows these multinational corporations to charge Medicare higher prices for millions of low-income enrollees in the Medicare Part D program. “Instead of making devastating cuts to programs that help low-income and middle-income Americans, as Republicans keep putting on the table, we should do what every other industrialized country does and ask the pharmaceutical industry, one of the wealthiest in the world, to chip in,” says California Congressman Stark, the ranking member of the House Ways and Means Committee’s Subcommittee on Health. “What’s more, the savings from this legislation could pay for a multi-year ‘doc fix’—something we tried to do in a comprehensive way but have had to address yearly so Medicare’s payments to doctors aren’t slashed.” Medicare can be reformed the right way. It is not broken. And it is not broke. Contrast this approach with that of the Administration and Congress members : ¶ Gradually eliminate Medicare payments to hospitals for bad debts that result when beneficiaries fail to pay deductibles and co-payments. Medicare reimburses hospitals for 70 percent of such debts after the hospitals make reasonable efforts to collect the unpaid amounts. ¶ Reduce Medicare payments to teaching hospitals for the costs of training doctors, caring for sicker patients and providing specialized services like trauma care and organ transplants . Medicare spends $9.5 billion a year for its share of those costs. ¶ Reduce the federal share of payments to health care providers treating low-income people under Medicaid and the Children’s Health Insurance Program. The administration wants to establish a single “blended rate” for each state. The federal government now reimburses states at different rates for different groups of people and different services in the two programs. Representative Henry A. Waxman of California, the senior Democrat on the Energy and Commerce Committee and an architect of Medicaid, said he was “very concerned” that this proposal would reduce the federal contribution to Medicaid and shift costs to states.
Continue reading …