From The Independent:

The Demise Of The Dollar
In a graphic illustration of the new world order, Arab states have launched secret moves with China, Russia and France to stop using the US currency for oil trading.

By Robert Fisk
October 6, 2009

In the most profound financial change in recent Middle East history, Gulf Arabs are planning – along with China, Russia, Japan and France – to end dollar dealings for oil, moving instead to a basket of currencies including the Japanese yen and Chinese yuan, the euro, gold and a new, unified currency planned for nations in the Gulf Co-operation Council, including Saudi Arabia, Abu Dhabi, Kuwait and Qatar.

Secret meetings have already been held by finance ministers and central bank governors in Russia, China, Japan and Brazil to work on the scheme, which will mean that oil will no longer be priced in dollars.

The plans, confirmed to The Independent by both Gulf Arab and Chinese banking sources in Hong Kong, may help to explain the sudden rise in gold prices, but it also augurs an extraordinary transition from dollar markets within nine years.

The Americans, who are aware the meetings have taken place – although they have not discovered the details – are sure to fight this international cabal which will include hitherto loyal allies Japan and the Gulf Arabs. Against the background to these currency meetings, Sun Bigan, China's former special envoy to the Middle East, has warned there is a risk of deepening divisions between China and the US over influence and oil in the Middle East. "Bilateral quarrels and clashes are unavoidable," he told the Asia and Africa Review. "We cannot lower vigilance against hostility in the Middle East over energy interests and security."

This sounds like a dangerous prediction of a future economic war between the US and China over Middle East oil – yet again turning the region's conflicts into a battle for great power supremacy. China uses more oil incrementally than the US because its growth is less energy efficient. The transitional currency in the move away from dollars, according to Chinese banking sources, may well be gold. An indication of the huge amounts involved can be gained from the wealth of Abu Dhabi, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Qatar who together hold an estimated $2.1 trillion in dollar reserves.

The decline of American economic power linked to the current global recession was implicitly acknowledged by the World Bank president Robert Zoellick. "One of the legacies of this crisis may be a recognition of changed economic power relations," he said in Istanbul ahead of meetings this week of the IMF and World Bank. But it is China's extraordinary new financial power – along with past anger among oil-producing and oil-consuming nations at America's power to interfere in the international financial system – which has prompted the latest discussions involving the Gulf states.

Brazil has shown interest in collaborating in non-dollar oil payments, along with India. Indeed, China appears to be the most enthusiastic of all the financial powers involved, not least because of its enormous trade with the Middle East.

China imports 60 per cent of its oil, much of it from the Middle East and Russia. The Chinese have oil production concessions in Iraq – blocked by the US until this year – and since 2008 have held an $8bn agreement with Iran to develop refining capacity and gas resources. China has oil deals in Sudan (where it has substituted for US interests) and has been negotiating for oil concessions with Libya, where all such contracts are joint ventures.

Furthermore, Chinese exports to the region now account for no fewer than 10 per cent of the imports of every country in the Middle East, including a huge range of products from cars to weapon systems, food, clothes, even dolls. In a clear sign of China's growing financial muscle, the president of the European Central Bank, Jean-Claude Trichet, yesterday pleaded with Beijing to let the yuan appreciate against a sliding dollar and, by extension, loosen China's reliance on US monetary policy, to help rebalance the world economy and ease upward pressure on the euro.

Ever since the Bretton Woods agreements – the accords after the Second World War which bequeathed the architecture for the modern international financial system – America's trading partners have been left to cope with the impact of Washington's control and, in more recent years, the hegemony of the dollar as the dominant global reserve currency.

The Chinese believe, for example, that the Americans persuaded Britain to stay out of the euro in order to prevent an earlier move away from the dollar. But Chinese banking sources say their discussions have gone too far to be blocked now. "The Russians will eventually bring in the rouble to the basket of currencies," a prominent Hong Kong broker told The Independent. "The Brits are stuck in the middle and will come into the euro. They have no choice because they won't be able to use the US dollar."

Chinese financial sources believe President Barack Obama is too busy fixing the US economy to concentrate on the extraordinary implications of the transition from the dollar in nine years' time. The current deadline for the currency transition is 2018.

The US discussed the trend briefly at the G20 summit in Pittsburgh; the Chinese Central Bank governor and other officials have been worrying aloud about the dollar for years. Their problem is that much of their national wealth is tied up in dollar assets.

"These plans will change the face of international financial transactions," one Chinese banker said. "America and Britain must be very worried. You will know how worried by the thunder of denials this news will generate."

Iran announced late last month that its foreign currency reserves would henceforth be held in euros rather than dollars. Bankers remember, of course, what happened to the last Middle East oil producer to sell its oil in euros rather than dollars. A few months after Saddam Hussein trumpeted his decision, the Americans and British invaded Iraq.

Update: Suddenly, involved parties are denying the secret meetings took place. We'll see.

From the New York Post:

AP - Ground Zero one week after the terrorist attack

Betraying Our Dead
Forgetting The Vows We Made

By Ralph Peters
September 11, 2009

Eight years ago today, our homeland was attacked by fanatical Muslims inspired by Saudi Arabian bigotry. Three thousand American citizens and residents died.

We resolved that we, the People, would never forget. Then we forgot.

We've learned nothing.

Instead of cracking down on Islamist extremism, we've excused it.

Instead of killing terrorists, we free them.

Instead of relentlessly hunting Islamist madmen, we seek to appease them.

Instead of acknowledging that radical Islam is the problem, we elected a president who blames America, whose idea of freedom is the right for women to suffer in silence behind a veil -- and who counts among his mentors and friends those who damn our country or believe that our own government staged the tragedy of September 11, 2001.

Instead of insisting that freedom will not be infringed by terrorist threats, we censor works that might offend mass murderers. Radical Muslims around the world can indulge in viral lies about us, but we dare not even publish cartoons mocking them.

Instead of protecting law-abiding Americans, we reject profiling to avoid offending terrorists. So we confiscate granny's shampoo at the airport because the half-empty container could hold 3.5 ounces of liquid.

Instead of insisting that Islamist hatred and religious apartheid have no place in our country, we permit the Saudis to continue funding mosques and madrassahs where hating Jews and Christians is preached as essential to Islam.

Instead of confronting Saudi hate-mongers, our president bows down to the Saudi king.

Instead of recognizing the Saudi-sponsored Wahhabi cult as the core of the problem, our president blames Israel.

Instead of asking why Middle Eastern civilization has failed so abjectly, our president suggests that we're the failures.

Instead of taking every effective measure to cull information from terrorists, the current administration threatens CIA agents with prosecution for keeping us safe.

Instead of proudly and promptly rebuilding on the site of the Twin Towers, we've committed ourselves to the hopeless, useless task of rebuilding Afghanistan. (Perhaps we should have built a mosque at Ground Zero -- the Saudis would've funded it.)

Instead of taking a firm stand against Islamist fanaticism, we've made a cult of negotiations -- as our enemies pursue nuclear weapons; sponsor terrorism; torture, imprison, rape and murder their own citizens -- and laugh at us.

Instead of insisting that Islam must become a religion of responsibility, our leaders in both parties continue to bleat that "Islam's a religion of peace," ignoring the curious absence of Baptist suicide bombers.

Instead of requiring new immigrants to integrate into our society and conform to its public values, we encourage and subsidize anti-American, woman-hating, freedom-denying bigotry in the name of toleration.

Instead of pursuing our enemies to the ends of the earth, we help them sue us.

We've dishonored our dead and whitewashed our enemies. A distinctly unholy alliance between fanatical Islamists abroad and a politically correct "elite" in the US has reduced 9/11 to the status of a non-event, a day for politicians to preen about how little they've done.

We've forgotten the shock and the patriotic fury Americans felt on that bright September morning eight years ago. We've forgotten our identification with fellow citizens leaping from doomed skyscrapers. We've forgotten the courage of airline passengers who would not surrender to terror.

We've forgotten the men and women who burned to death or suffocated in the Pentagon. We've forgotten our promises, our vows, our commitments.

We've forgotten what we owe our dead and what we owe our children. We've even forgotten who attacked us.

We have betrayed the memory of our dead. In doing so, we betrayed ourselves and our country. Our troops continue to fight -- when they're allowed to do so -- but our politicians have surrendered.

Are we willing to let the terrorists win?

From CBS, of all places:

Democratic Health Care Bill Divulges IRS Tax Data

By Declan McCullagh
August 26, 2009

One of the problems with any proposed law that's over 1,000 pages long and constantly changing is that much deviltry can lie in the details. Take the Democrats' proposal to rewrite health care policy, better known as H.R. 3200 or by opponents as "Obamacare." (Here's our CBS News television coverage.)

Section 431(a) of the bill says that the IRS must divulge taxpayer identity information, including the filing status, the modified adjusted gross income, the number of dependents, and "other information as is prescribed by" regulation. That information will be provided to the new Health Choices Commissioner and state health programs and used to determine who qualifies for "affordability credits."

Section 245(b)(2)(A) says the IRS must divulge tax return details -- there's no specified limit on what's available or unavailable -- to the Health Choices Commissioner. The purpose, again, is to verify "affordability credits."

Section 1801(a) says that the Social Security Administration can obtain tax return data on anyone who may be eligible for a "low-income prescription drug subsidy" but has not applied for it.

Over at the Institute for Policy Innovation (a free-market think tank and presumably no fan of Obamacare), Tom Giovanetti argues that: "How many thousands of federal employees will have access to your records? The privacy of your health records will be only as good as the most nosy, most dishonest and most malcontented federal employee.... So say good-bye to privacy from the federal government. It was fun while it lasted for 233 years."

I'm not as certain as Giovanetti that this represents privacy's Armageddon. (Though I do wonder where the usual suspects like the Electronic Privacy Information Center are. Presumably inserting limits on information that can be disclosed -- and adding strict penalties on misuse of the information kept on file about hundreds of millions of Americans -- is at least as important as fretting about Facebook's privacy policy in Canada.)

A better candidate for a future privacy crisis is the so-called stimulus bill enacted with limited debate early this year. It mandated the "utilization of an electronic health record for each person in the United States by 2014," but included only limited privacy protections.

It's true that if the legislative branch chooses to create "affordability credits," it probably makes sense to ensure they're not abused. The goal of curbing fraud runs up against the goal of preserving individual privacy.

If we're going to have such significant additional government intrusion into our health care system, we will have to draw the privacy line somewhere. Maybe the House Democrats' current bill gets it right. Maybe it doesn't. But this vignette should be reason to be skeptical of claims that a massive and complex bill must be enacted so rapidly as its backers would have you believe.

From The Wall Street Journal:

The Death Book for Veterans

Ex-soldiers don't need to be told they're a burden to society.

By Jim Towey

August 18, 2009

If President Obama wants to better understand why America's discomfort with end-of-life discussions threatens to derail his health-care reform, he might begin with his own Department of Veterans Affairs (VA). He will quickly discover how government bureaucrats are greasing the slippery slope that can start with cost containment but quickly become a systematic denial of care.

Last year, bureaucrats at the VA's National Center for Ethics in Health Care advocated a 52-page end-of-life planning document, "Your Life, Your Choices." It was first published in 1997 and later promoted as the VA's preferred living will throughout its vast network of hospitals and nursing homes. After the Bush White House took a look at how this document was treating complex health and moral issues, the VA suspended its use. Unfortunately, under President Obama, the VA has now resuscitated "Your Life, Your Choices."

Who is the primary author of this workbook? Dr. Robert Pearlman, chief of ethics evaluation for the center, a man who in 1996 advocated for physician-assisted suicide in Vacco v. Quill before the U.S. Supreme Court and is known for his support of health-care rationing.

"Your Life, Your Choices" presents end-of-life choices in a way aimed at steering users toward predetermined conclusions, much like a political "push poll." For example, a worksheet on page 21 lists various scenarios and asks users to then decide whether their own life would be "not worth living."

The circumstances listed include ones common among the elderly and disabled: living in a nursing home, being in a wheelchair and not being able to "shake the blues." There is a section which provocatively asks, "Have you ever heard anyone say, 'If I'm a vegetable, pull the plug'?" There also are guilt-inducing scenarios such as "I can no longer contribute to my family's well being," "I am a severe financial burden on my family" and that the vet's situation "causes severe emotional burden for my family."

When the government can steer vulnerable individuals to conclude for themselves that life is not worth living, who needs a death panel?

One can only imagine a soldier surviving the war in Iraq and returning without all of his limbs only to encounter a veteran's health-care system that seems intent on his surrender.

I was not surprised to learn that the VA panel of experts that sought to update "Your Life, Your Choices" between 2007-2008 did not include any representatives of faith groups or disability rights advocates. And as you might guess, only one organization was listed in the new version as a resource on advance directives: the Hemlock Society (now euphemistically known as "Compassion and Choices").

This hurry-up-and-die message is clear and unconscionable. Worse, a July 2009 VA directive instructs its primary care physicians to raise advance care planning with all VA patients and to refer them to "Your Life, Your Choices." Not just those of advanced age and debilitated condition—all patients. America's 24 million veterans deserve better.

Many years ago I created an advance care planning document called "Five Wishes" that is today the most widely used living will in America, with 13 million copies in national circulation. Unlike the VA's document, this one does not contain the standard bias to withdraw or withhold medical care. It meets the legal requirements of at least 43 states, and it runs exactly 12 pages.

After a decade of observing end-of-life discussions, I can attest to the great fear that many patients have, particularly those with few family members and financial resources. I lived and worked in an AIDS home in the mid-1980s and saw first-hand how the dying wanted more than health care—they wanted someone to care.

If President Obama is sincere in stating that he is not trying to cut costs by pressuring the disabled to forgo critical care, one good way to show that commitment is to walk two blocks from the Oval Office and pull the plug on "Your Life, Your Choices." He should make sure in the future that VA decisions are guided by values that treat the lives of our veterans as gifts, not burdens.

From Politico (letter from House Minority Leader John Boehner to Billy Tauzin, president and CEO of PhRMA) :

Dear Billy,

Appeasement rarely works as a conflict resolution strategy. This is as true in the arena of policymaking as it is in schoolyards across America. When a bully asks for your lunch money, you may have no choice but to fork it over. But cutting a deal with the bully is a different story, particularly if the “deal” means helping him steal others’ money as the price of protecting your own.

The simple truth is, two wrongs don’t make a right. And the short-sighted health care deal PhRMA struck with the Obama Administration at your urging provides confirmation of this time-tested maxim on an epic and tragic scale.

The “bully” in this case is Big Government. At your behest, PhRMA has chosen to accommodate a Washington takeover of health care at the expense of the American people in hopes of securing favorable treatment and future profits. It’s a short-sighted bargain that leaves your own customers and employees behind. And it now has all the markings of a deal gone sour.

The Obama Administration tacitly acknowledged last week that the President will not be bound by the $80 billion limit PhRMA and its board of directors were led to believe had been secured in exchange for your organization’s support of the Administration’s health care takeover, and key Democrats in Congress, including Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) and Energy & Commerce Committee Chairman Henry Waxman (D-CA), have said explicitly they will not honor the agreement. In other words, now that the deal is publicly known and would be messy for you to reverse, Big Government is changing the terms… because it can. Consequently, the jobs of PhRMA workers are no more secure than they were before, the threat to PhRMA’s groundbreaking medical research remains, and the American people – including PhRMA’s customers and the families of PhRMA employees – face the prospect of higher costs and reduced quality in health care.

You will inevitably object to this letter and quarrel with its premise. You’ll no doubt argue PhRMA has publicly opposed the version of the bill backed by Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA). But the simple press release your organization issued objecting to the House bill is dwarfed by the $150 million advertising campaign your organization has launched in support of ObamaCare with the assistance of well-funded political organizations on the Left.

PhRMA would do well to halt this short-sighted, misguided campaign and listen to the American people, rather than continue to collaborate on an effort to spin them.

Republicans across the nation have listened, and here’s what we’ve learned: Americans are frustrated with their government in Washington and skeptical of those who run it. They want health care reform that lowers costs and increases choice – not government-run health care that increases costs and limits options. They want legislation that helps families and small businesses with their problems, not legislation that adds to their problems while empowering an elite few. They’re worried about the debt being piled on our children and grandchildren, and they want the spending and borrowing spree in Washington to stop. They want policies that support job creation and protect freedom, not bills that force responsible citizens to subsidize bad behavior from those who insist on being irresponsible.

The millions of American families who are PhRMA customers and the hard-working professionals who work for PhRMA companies deserve better than the government takeover of health care being forced upon them. I urge you to rethink your organization’s stance, listen to the American people, and join the call for responsible bipartisan health care solutions that truly reflect their priorities.

John

Here’s the “strategery” (read it all), from The New York Post:

Behind The ‘Bash Insurers’ Strategy

By Scott Gottlieb, MD
Resident Fellow, American Enterprise Institute

August 12, 2009

President Obama and his allies are shifting their health-reform rhetoric into an attack on the insurance industry -- but their goal remains universal government health coverage. Speaking on Capitol Hill two weeks ago, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi called America's health-insurance companies "immoral."

"They are the villains in this," she said, referring to the industry's role on health-care reform. "They have been part of the problem in a major way."

That broadside was foreshadowed by a subtler Obama shift during his July 22 press conference, when he repeatedly referred to his health-care plan as "insurance reform." Gone was his usual pitch about the need to cover America's uninsured.

The president hit the same theme yesterday at a town-hall meeting in Portsmouth, NH, telling the audience "right now we have a health-insurance system that works better for the insurance industry than it does for the American people."

The new language suggests a clear shift in strategy: When Congress returns, expect the White House and Democratic leaders to recast health reform as "consumer protection from insurance companies" rather than "providing coverage for America's uninsured."

But the new "marketing strategy" is a pitch for the same final product -- a single, government-run insurance program.

Reportedly, Obama's top advisers gather every Wednesday night to discuss the latest polling on health-care reform and how to use the results to advance the president's agenda. And public sentiment is clear: People trust their doctors and are generally pleased with their medical care's quality -- but mostly distrust insurers. Most voters also care more about their own out-of-pocket medical costs and the portability of their coverage than about the uninsured.

Surprise: The White House is said to be busy this month crafting its own draft on health-care reform -- with an emphasis on regulation of insurers designed to tap into consumer distrust and discontent with existing coverage.

Having chosen insurers as its designated villains, how will the administration craft a plan that "just happens" to wind up producing a form of nationalized health care? Simple: Call for supplanting state regulation of existing insurance plans in favor of federal regulation -- which will extend even to the employer-provided coverage that's now free from most regulation.

Specifically, the White House plan will force insurers to cover all applicants, regardless of lifestyle or prior health conditions (known in industry jargon as "guaranteed issue") and to charge everyone the same general price regardless of their health factors ("community rating"). The Obama team will also call for federal formulas to limit insurers' profits and a Washington regulator to set minimum plan benefits.

The package will also aim to supplant federal ERISA law, which now lets large employers offer uniform health plans across state lines, free from costly federal and state regulation. (The White House has already endorsed the House bill that would gut ERISA after a five-year grace period.)

In short order, this regulatory regime would bring a federal takeover of the private-insurance market. Remaining insurers would operate as utilities at the behest of new regulatory agencies and a White House-anointed "health choices commissioner."

In the long run, most insurers will simply fold -- limiting the choices people have and leaving a government-run plan the only option. Private insurance will exist only as wrap-around policies available to the well-to-do.

The government-run, "public" insurance option remains the most controversial piece of Obama's plan, but this tactical shift could entice a handful of squishy Republicans on board -- enough to coat the final program with a veneer of bipartisanship.

By any measure, a "public" health plan will create a death spiral for insurance companies by "competing" on an uneven playing field. The "public" option would be unburdened from costly regulations and capital requirements imposed on private plans and free to tap the Treasury to subsidize its own business operations.

That has made Republicans wary of the "public option." So the administration may hide this government-run plan when it unveils ObamaCare 2.0 next month. One rumored scenario is for Obama to couple new regulatory burdens on private insurers with a "public" plan that's a "fallback" option in markets where not enough private insurers choose to -- or can -- compete.

But this is an end-run to the same goal. Private insurers will, over time, be bludgeoned out of business by federal regulations. The last plan standing will be the public insurance, whether it's offered as a "fallback" or an up-front option.

The result will be the same. Only the timeline to get there will have changed.

From The Town Talk:

Louisiana's Vitter backs 'insurance associations,' prescription drug imports

By Roy Pitchford
August 9, 2009

PINEVILLE -- U.S. Sen. David Vitter told an audience of just under 1,500 people Saturday that he is "totally and unalterably opposed" to health care reform legislation proposed in Congress, but he said he has some ideas of his own on the subject of health care, and discussed three of them.

The Louisiana Republican spoke at what was billed as a town hall meeting at Louisiana College's Guinn Auditorium. It was a friendly audience but there was little chance for disagreement to be expressed.

The panel of speakers all joined Vitter in opposing the reform package being debated in Congress. Questions from audience members were screened and selected in advance of the event.

Vitter said he wants to allow the creation of "health insurance associations" with authority to act across state lines to negotiate lower health insurance premiums.

While some such organizations now exist, Vitter said, they cannot "legally act across state lines."

He said a restaurant in Pineville with 10 employees doesn't have a lot of bargaining power when seeking health insurance for its staff, but said it would be different if they could join thousands of other businesses in an association organized by a national restaurant association.

Vitter also said he favors legalizing the re-importing of safe, effective drugs, in an effort to lower the costs of prescriptions.

Mention of that idea was the only time Vitter aroused any opposition from the very supportive audience, as he drew some spontaneous comments suggesting that the government might not be able to guarantee the safety of drugs brought in from other nations.

Vitter said "large pharmaceutical companies" now charge different prices for the same drugs in different countries, with customers in the United States paying the highest costs.

He said he would only favor importing drugs which were monitored "from manufacturer to delivery."

Vitter also called for programs to promote preventative medicine and healthy living, saying activities like smoking and conditions like obesity drive up the cost of health care.

The senator told the audience that the proposed health care legislation would require employers to offer medical insurance to employees, or pay a $750 per-employee, per-year penalty.

Because of the high cost of health insurance, Vitter said he believes many employers would pay the penalty, rather than provide insurance.

Vitter also assembled a three-man panel who spoke and answered questions.

Alexandria physician Jay Badeaux called for targeting specific programs, rather than an overhaul of the existing system, saying he feared a government-controlled system would not be efficient or effective.

He said current systems like Veterans Administration hospitals and state-operated hospitals are often "slow and ponderous," and said he favored a market-driven approach.

Badeaux also endorsed control of medical tort lawsuits which he said increase costs in several ways including over-use of medical tests in so-called defensive practice, higher insurance premiums for doctors and higher costs of treatment due to the number of tests often used on patients when doctors already "have a good idea" of the patient's problem.

He also said he feared government supervision of medical practice would limit access to health care.

Grocery store owner Reggie McDaniel of Columbia said that he, like most people, wants better health care, but said that should not be something we should expect the government to do.

McDaniel said he offers health insurance to employees, but said many of them, especially younger people, don't use it.

Saying he doesn't want "a government bureaucrat to come between me and my doctor," McDaniel said Congress should "only fix what's broke," and not attempt massive change.

Jeb Bruneau, of the Louisiana-based Pelican Institute of Public Policy, said the administration proposal tracks a comprehensive health plan in Massachusetts which he said has raised insurance premiums, increased the state government deficit and raised treatment costs, while leaving many people still uninsured.

He called for measured study of existing problems and seeking "market-oriented solutions," rather than adopting "bad changes."

When Vitter began addressing written questions from the audience, Dr. Bradley Toucet said that there are not enough primary care doctors.

Vitter called such doctors a necessity for an effective health system, but said they are not compensated as well as specialists. He said a system must be devised to encourage doctors to entire primary care practice,

In response to questions on the cost of health care insurance, Vitter repeated his call for insurance associations and endorsed health care savings accounts which he said will reduce personal taxes and allow people to opt for insurance plans which have higher deductibles and thus cost less.

Vitter took time to address a statement that President Barack Obama often repeats, that if people like their present health plan they can keep it.

He said that is true, but said he fears that if employers have the choice of spending thousands of dollars per employee for health insurance or paying a few hundred dollars for the non-insurance penalty, they will quit providing insurance and a public plan will soon be the only survivor.

Vitter corrected some in the audience who said they fear that Medicare would be abolished, but said he believes Medicare funds will be raided to help fund health care reform, and said that could ultimately affect the care received by Medicare patients.

And while he stopped short of repeating statements by some Republican members of Congress that the plan would allow government officials to restrict or deny treatment to elderly people based on age and predicted benefit, he said such a plan already exists in several countries, including England.

Some of those present referred to news coverage of unruly town hall meetings in other places, and said he had been advised to have "security" for his meetings.

"I told them the best security is to do what the people want you to do," Vitter said, drawing a round of applause.

From The Town Talk:

Congressman Alexander wants 'improvement' -- not 'reform' -- of health care

By Stephen Largen

La. Gannett News

August 4, 2009

MONROE — U.S. Rep. Rodney Alexander, R-Quitman, said the United States has “the best health-care system that the world has to offer,” and he opposes any major reform of the existing system.

"I don’t like the public option at all,” Alexander said Tuesday, Aug. 4, in an interview with The News-Star of Monroe.

“I think it’s going to slow down anyway because the public is going to demand that. I think that we need to improve the existing health care. I don’t like the word ‘reform’; I like ‘improvement’ of health care.”

In the most recent World Health Organization health-care survey published in 2000, the U.S. is ranked 37th in overall performance and 72nd in overall level of health of the 191 nations included in the study. Most estimates say at least 40 million Americans do not have health insurance.

Alexander said any tax increases that could follow reform are a significant sticking point for him.

According to a Louisiana Health Insurance Survey, which is conducted by the Louisiana State University Public Policy Research Lab, there were 575,011 uninsured adults and 62,329 uninsured children under age 19 statewide in the fourth quarter.

“There are things that we can do,” he said.

“I’ve got a bill that would give a tax credit to people that pay your health insurance premiums. Right now, we have a bill lying before us that says to an employer, ‘If you don’t provide your employees with health insurance, we’re going to punish you by raising payroll taxes, and tell the employee if you don’t participate in this health-care plan, we’re going to punish you by raising your taxes.’

“We ought to do the opposite. We ought to say, ‘Hey, if you’ll provide this insurance, we’ll give you a credit for the amount that it takes to buy that insurance and that would lessen the burden on the taxpayers at some point. And long-term care insurance, I think we ought to give a tax credit there.”

Alexander added that a key to improving health care in Louisiana is to make sure more students going into health-care fields work in high-need areas.