Blunt: Medicare, Medicaid ‘distorts the marketplace’
Roy Blunt
WASHINGTON — Rep. Roy Blunt, an academic before he got into politics, can get wonkish on you if you’re not careful.
Blunt was sounding professorial this morning in remarks about Medicare that could come back to haunt him.
Interviewed on 93.9 FM in Columbia, Blunt, R-Springfield, said that one could argue that government shouldn’t be involved in health care at all.
“The government did get into the health care business in a big way in 1965 with Medicare and later with Medicaid. And government already distorts the marketplace. A government competitor would drive all of the other competitors away. What we should be doing is creating more competition,” he said.
Blunt, the GOP’s likely U.S. Senate candidate next year, is leading the House Republicans’ effort on health care reform. Up to now, that has consisted primarily of relentless criticism of what the White House and Democrats are proposing along with a list of principles that should be followed.
In the interview, Blunt sounded his refrain about a “government takeover of health care” — a reference to proposals for a so-called government option in which a public-financed entity would compete with insurance companies in an effort to bring costs down.
“The government competing in health care would be like an elephant in a room full of mice,” Blunt added in the interview.
Democrats in Washington were quick to call attention to Blunt’s remarks. The seven-term congressman may have been speaking hypothetically about competition. But it’s a good bet that his remarks will be construed one day in political ads to say that he opposes the popular Medicare program, the way America sees to the health needs of people 65 and over.
Medicare is “popular”? Probably true for those on it but not necessarily generally popular. It’s accepted as a government given but hardly popular.
Blunt may be on to something here.
If we eliminate Medicare, think of how insurance costs for millions of retirees will decrease as the frenzy of the free-market competes for monthly Social Security payments.
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That is a stretch even for the Democrats. Roy Blunt did not say those programs were a mistake. He was discussing the current health care debate and discussing his belief that government would be better off organizing health care, as we did with the Medicare prescription drug program, rather than operating health care systems like the Obama-Carnahan health care plan.
Government run systems create fewer choices, but government-organized systems like Medicare Part D get the right options to the right people. Roy Blunt wants more reforms, not fewer.
The plan Robin Carnahan supports is a $1 trillion big government health care program that will limit options and ration health care.
Government is as Government does…
…it is expected that $36 Billion will be raised by fining people as much as $1000.00 for not having health insurance.
“The Congressional Budget Office estimated the fines will raise around $36 billion over 10 years. Senate aides said the penalties would be modeled on the approach taken by Massachusetts, which now imposes a fine of about $1,000 a year on individuals who refuse to get coverage. Under the federal legislation, families would pay higher penalties than individuals.”