What the hell is the rush? Fear to face voters soon after folly!

http://tinyurl.com/kshd2h
Health care overhaul racing against the clock
By RICARDO ALONSO-ZALDIVAR, AP
WASHINGTON – ...Obama is struggling to show progress in a race against the clock to revamp the nation's health care system this year.Problems threaten to overshadow a White House event Wednesday designed to boost Obama's health overhaul...hospital industry trade groups were expected to ...announce that hospitals are ready to give up about $155 billion over 10 years in government payments....But Congress, not the health care industry, is the source of Obama's troubles.Lawmakers returned Tuesday from their July 4 break with lots of questions...and deep misgivings...Democratic senators in particular are having second thoughts about a proposed new tax on generous health insurance benefits provided by some employers....Timing is critical because lawmakers might be reluctant to vote on such a charged issue as health care next year, when all House members and one-third of senators face elections....surveys reviewed by senators showed at least 59 percent of the public opposed to taxing health care benefits to "pay for reform."
...the idea has drawn strong opposition from organized labor, a core Democratic constituency...and Obama campaigned hard against it in last year's run for the White House.****Obama EXCORIATED McCain for saying similar things!****...The deal with the hospitals ...on shaky ground....Of the $155 billion in projected savings, about $40 billion to $50 billion would come from reducing federal payments hospitals receive for providing care to uninsured and low-income patients...payments now made through the Medicare and Medicaid programs. The Medicaid cuts...10 percent annual reductions beginning around 2015.****Kick the can down the road!**** About $100 billion more would come from reductions in planned Medicare payments to hospitals. A small amount of savings would come from trimming the money hospitals get for preventing patients from being readmitted for additional care.****An incredible program.*** Hospitals...won an agreement that if the...legislation includes a public health insurance plan, it would reimburse hospitals at above the rates Medicare and Medicaid pay, which hospitals have long complained are insufficient....It's still unclear whether the difficulties are enough to imperil Obama's objective of signing a health care bill this fall,...House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has set a target of month's end to enact health care legislation, while in the Senate, Reid hopes to complete legislation by the end of the first week in August.
****Unions resist modifying employer-based healthcare because it's a transfer to them at present. Wal-Mart now SUPPORTS EBH because they're already doing it and it hobbles smaller competition. What makes sense is to SEPARATE healthcare from employment so that insurance moves with the individual and its costs made transparent ( now, unions like the UAW think it's free! ). This could be done by simultaneously taxing health insurance as a benefit of employment AND providing everyone a tax credit for health insurance up to a maximum. WHY should "certain" perks be tax-free and others, not? The rest of the Obama "pay" plan is extortion: who believes the healthcare industry will deliver on $2Trillion of promised savings? The most vulnerable parts of the industry are health practitioners but they will react with their feet: retiring early and making entry to the health professions less attractive ( already, veterinarians and dentists are doing better because they are not involved in the health insurance system.) ****