WASHINGTON — After a half-day of animated debate, the Senate Finance Committee on Tuesday rejected efforts by liberal Democrats to add a government-run health insurance plan to major health care legislation, dealing the first official setback to an idea that many Democrats, including
All of the other versions of the health care legislation advancing in Congress — a bill approved by the Senate health committee and a trio of bills in the House — include some version of the government-run plan, or public option.
But the Finance Committee chairman, Senator Max Baucus, Democrat of Montana, long ago removed it from his proposal because of stiff opposition from Republicans who call the public plan a step toward “socialized medicine.”
The committee on Tuesday afternoon voted, 15 to 8, to reject an amendment proposed by Senator John D. Rockefeller IV, Democrat of West Virginia, to add a public option called the Community Choice Health Plan, an outcome that underscored the lack of support for a government plan among many Democrats.
Mr. Baucus voted no, as did Senators
Senator Charles E. Schumer, Democrat of New York, who voted in favor of the proposal, said supporters of the public option would keep on fighting. After the vote on Mr. Rockefeller’s proposal, Mr. Schumer was scheduled to put forward his own public option amendment and it, too, was expected to be defeated.
“We are going to keep at this and at this and at this until we succeed, because we believe in it so strongly,” he said.
Advocates of a public plan say it would provide crucial competition for private insurers and that the larger goals of the legislation, to extend coverage to more than 30 million uninsured Americans and to slow the steep rise in health care costs, cannot be achieved without it.
The debate came as the Finance Committee resumed debate over the health care bill after a three-day weekend because of
In the emotionally charged debate, Mr. Rockefeller railed against the practices of private insurers, who he suggested were largely preying on a defenseless American public. “They’re getting away with terrible things,” he said.
But Senator Charles E. Grassley of
“A government run plan will ultimately force private insurers out of business,” Mr. Grassley said, adding that supporters of the public option were trying to open a back door toward a fully government-run, or single-payer, health system like those in Canada or England.
“Public option is a step toward a completely government run plan that they are hoping for,” Mr. Grassley said.
And he rejected assertions by Democrats, including Mr. Rockefeller, that the public plan would compete fairly because it would have to follow the same rules as private insurers.
“The federal government will not only be running the plan, it will also be running the market in which it competes with the private plans and that doesn’t sound like a level playing field to me,” Mr. Grassley said.
Democrats quickly rose up to answer the charges, including Mr. Schumer, who challenged Mr. Grassley to spell out his views on Medicare, the government insurance plan for Americans over age 65 and for the disabled.
“I just want to know what you think of Medicare, which is a much more government-run program,” Mr. Schumer said.
“I think that Medicare is part of the social fabric of
“But it is a government-run plan,” Mr. Schumer shot back.
Mr. Grassley, a veteran Senate debater, insisted that Medicare did not pose a threat to the private insurance industry. “It’s not easy to undo a Medicare plan without also hurting a lot of private initiatives that are coupled with it,” he said.
Mr. Schumer pounced. “You are supportive of Medicare,” he said. “I just don’t understand the difference. That’s a government-run plan and the main knock you have made on Senator Rockefeller’s amendment, and I am sure on mine, is that it’s government-run.”Continued: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/30/health/policy/30health.html?_r=1&hp
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