Posts by Mike Lillis

After months of marathon hearings, partisan bickering and fiery floor debate, Democrats in both the House and the Senate have passed expansive health care reform bills. Now comes the hard part.

Senate Democrats on Thursday approved a sweeping $871 billion proposal designed to extend coverage to tens of millions of uninsured Americans and slow the growth of runaway costs.

As hard as the Senate debate promises to be, many of the thorniest conflicts will likely be re-contested when Democratic leaders in both chambers meet to iron out the differences between their bills.

To hear the Democrats tell the tale, the extension of jobless benefits enacted over the weekend will provide those living in high-unemployment states with an additional 20 weeks of insurance. But that’s impossible because of a glitch in the law.

A protracted and very partisan Senate skirmish has left hundreds of thousands of jobless Americans without unemployment benefits — an impasse that Democrats leaders are hoping to break this week.

Health insurance companies, for decades exempt from federal anti-trust laws, are exploiting that privilege to churn profits at the expense of patients, a number of Senate Democrats charged Wednesday. The lawmakers — including Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) — want to repeal the exemption as part of broader efforts this year to overhaul the nation’s dysfunctional health care system.

In a major victory for the pharmaceutical industry, the Senate Finance Committee on Thursday shot down legislation to provide seniors full coverage through the controversial coverage gap in Medicare’s prescription drug benefit. The proposal, sponsored by Sen. Bill Nelson (D-Fla.), would have closed Medicare’s so-called “doughnut hole,” which forces millions of seniors each year to pay full prescription costs after annual expenses have reached a certain threshold.

As conservatives continue to warn that the Democrats’ health reform plans would stick government bureaucrats between doctors and patients, a number of consumers, physicians and former insurance industry employees told lawmakers Wednesday that such bureaucrats are already in place: they’re called private insurance companies. And, bound to shareholders above patients, the witnesses said, these companies [...]

As Congress jousts over how to reform the nation’s health care system, many experts say that the Massachusetts model, which has reduced the state’s uninsured rate to the lowest in the nation, is a good place to start.

As the Obama administration begins winding down the $3 billion cash for clunkers program, stories of consumer frustration are popping up nationwide. While a great deal of ink has been used to chronicle the trials of the auto dealers — many of whom have become rankled by the slow pace of federal reimbursement — much less has gone to point out that there are consumers out there feeling roughed up as well.

In the year’s first high-profile legislative setback for the gun lobby, the U.S. Senate on Wednesday shot down legislation to scrap state and local laws dictating who can carry concealed firearms.

On its surface, it sounds like a wonderful environmental benefit: A program providing thousands of dollars to drivers who scrap their gas guzzlers in favor of more fuel-efficient models. Yet critics on and off Capitol Hill say the so-called “cash-for-clunkers” initiative has morphed into a billion-dollar industry handout.

In March, a bipartisan group of lawmakers proposed legislation to overhaul the way congressional campaigns are financed. The measure would allow congressional candidates to access public funds in exchange for disavowing large contributions from individuals, and all contributions from lobbyists.

Last week, as the U.S. Senate was poised to kill legislation allowing homeowners the option of bankruptcy to prevent foreclosure, one senator provided a grave assessment of Congress’ relationship with the finance industry.

Although then-Sen. Barack Obama voted in 2006 to approve the fence strategy, he said on the presidential campaign trail last year that he would “reverse” Bush-era fence policies in favor of a “better approach,” like deploying more border guards and installing better surveillance technologies.