The Healthcare Legislation Debate

The largest cause of the outrageous costs for healthcare and medications in this country is the fact that America's health insurance companies have been exempt from antitrust regulations since 1945. This luxury enables insurance companies to pick and choose their customers, deny coverage to anyone with pre-existing conditions and cancel your coverage when you get sick.

Insurance costs are a useless layer on top of healthcare services. They subtract around 30 percent of the industry's income for their own profit and don't provide any healthcare. Ideally, the insurance industry should not be involved in healthcare, but the industry has such a firm grip on today's corrupt Congress that hopes for separating it from the industry by the politicians currently in office are pretty hopeless.

Our government needs to protect consumers from anti-competitive business practices. We have all seen what happened when the usury laws controlling American industries were eliminated. Prices were increased at will, competition decreases and criminal activities become commonplace. Wall Street, our financial institutions and the petroleum and energy industries are among the worst examples of this. While the leaders of these companies grow filthy rich, our citizens are suffering the consequences of their greed.

As the debate on Healhcare Reform degenerates into the typical drivel we have grown to expect from this failed Congress, a light in the darkness has been offered by Senator Pat Leahy (D-Vt.). who has filed the Health Insurance Industry Antitrust Enforcement Act, an amendment to the Senate healthcare bill. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid is supporting it. The House has included a similar bill in its healthcare legislation.

The healthcare industry should be able to compete on a level playing field without the entanglements of the insurance industry. Consumers should benefit from services offered in a free and fair marketplace. The egregious anti-competitive practices of the insurance industry must be curtailed. Senator Leahy's amendment will not produce the sort of free healthcare for Americans that is offered by all of the other major democracies in this world, but it will be a step in the right direction.

Insurance reform must be an essential part of any health care reform bill if we have any hope of bringing down the costs of services. The current "discussions" on Capital Hill are little more than the typical ranting and raving of the uninformed followers of the hard right -- the art of distractions and misdirection so frequently practiced by the Bush Republicans.

Any Congressional opponents to this amendment are obviously in the pocket of the insurance industry and dependent on them for political contributions. Voters should take notice of their role in this issue and throw them out of office at the next election.

Dave Satre
12/04/09
All Commercial Rights Reserved