Bingaman says health care a ‘human right’ — and he could support passing reform via budget reconciliation

U.S. Sen. Jeff Bingaman called access to “decent affordable health care” a ”human right” at a town hall meeting in Albuquerque yesterday

He also said that while he still hopes to craft a bipartisan bill in the Senate, if that effort fails he would support pushing a health care reform bill through this year using the budget reconciliation bill.

Reconciliation is a special process through which the Senate deals with budget issues. Only 51 votes are needed to pass a budget reconciliation bill on the floor of the Senate, whereas all other bills are susceptible to a filibuster which requires 60 votes to overcome.

“We made a provision in the budget resolution [earlier this year] that it [the reconciliation bill] could be used to try to enact health care provisions related to health care reform,” he said. “There are restrictions to what you can include in that… but I would support it if that’s the only way.”

A member of the bipartisan “Gang of Six” senators on the Senate Finance Committee, Bingaman said the group is working hard to come up with something agreeable to all sides. But, he said, the three Republicans in the group are all opposed to the creation of a public insurance plan — also known as the “public option” — to be offered alongside private insurance plans.

He repeatedly said during the town hall that he thinks a public option is the best way to bring down costs. But if such a plan didn’t make it into the final legislation, it wouldn’t prevent him from ultimately voting for a health care reform bill.

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chiknthief101

Get the Word Out NOW! ObamaCare will put Planned Parenthood clinics inside your child's school......

There are many reasons to oppose President Obama's push to take over the nation's health care system, but among the most important is this one: his plan will put Planned Parenthood clinics inside your child's school.
Yes, you read that right. Under an innocuous-sounding section titled "School-Based Health Clinics," H.R. 3200 will authorize Planned Parenthood, as a "sponsoring facility," to run a clinic during school hours on the grounds of public schools, with absolutely no accountability either to parents or school administrators.
Clinics would be accountable only to the Secretary of Health & Human Services, the radically pro-abortion Kathleen Sebelius, who was a fervent supporter of late-term abortionist George Tiller.
All this will be done at taxpayer expense. And unlike the rest of the bill, which isn't slated to go into effect until 2013, these clinics are scheduled to go into schools next fall.

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theGasman

Reflexively saying that the U.S. has "the greatest healthcare system in the world" while we deny 15% of our population access to that system is kind of like starving outside the best restaurant in the world. It is obscene and unconscionable.

What navigator seems to be unable to perceive is that insurance companies have priced consumers out of the market already. There is effectively no direct competition that benefits the consumers through competitive pricing and higher quality. You can choose you doctor only if they are accepted in your plan, if you get your insurance through work you can choose only among the companies and plans that your employer offers, and if the medication your doctor prescribes is not on your plan's formulary, too bad for you. These are all examples of rationing that exist today. What about preexisting conditions? How about the odious practice of dropping people if they have the audacity to file a claim? The insurance companies are in a perpetual quest to find ways to deny coverage. Without government intervention, the unchecked rise in healthcare costs will bankrupt our nation. Nearly 70% of all foreclosures occur due to people losing their insurance due to a medical emergency. That doesn't EVER happen in any other Western industrial country. That is unconscionable.

The free market has had six decades to produce competition and quality in the insurance industry and has not done so on either count. It will not do so in another six decades. A public option is the minimum standard needed to produce a system that will not bankrupt our nation. For profit insurance companies are not in the business of providing affordable, high quality, accessible healthcare; they are in the business of maximizing shareholder profits. In such a model, profits always will - and always have - trump(ed) the health of our nation.

Good for you, Sen. Bingaman. You have upheld my opinion of you. Keep on fighting the good fight and you will find that I and many others have your back.

The Republicans have made a mockery of any pretense of bipartisanship. Bipartisanship is a good thing if both sides are negotiating in good faith. The Republicans are not and they won't be for quite a while.

navigator

If health care is a human right, what about food, water, clothing and shelter? What about utilities? What about basic transportation and communication? Should there be a public option to acquire a Lexus and an iPhone?

I think the government should stick to life, liberty, and honestly gained property. The government can secure those by merely protecting citizens from those who would take them away. Governments can do protection and security well - but not much else.

When the government starts providing resources such as iPhones and health care, it can only do so by confiscating resources from others.

Let's not confuse rights and resources.

clj

For your information food, water, clothing shelter and utilities are all considered necessary enough to merit the subsidies from the government for those who can't afford them Right Now. Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness are impossible without health.
Equating health care to an iPod is like saying that a human life is only worth as much as a Lexus.

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Bingaman says health care a ‘human right’ — and he could support passing reform via budget reconciliation

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