The Wall Street Journal’s health care blog has named nine members of the U.S. House of Representatives who have indicated they might change their vote on a health care bill. Thirty-nine Democrats voted against the health care bill approved by the House last year. Some House members who voted yes the first time are saying they would vote no this time on the Senate bill that may be presented to them, so every vote is vital for those trying to push a radical left version of health care reform.
Here are the names of those House members who have told The Associated Press that they would consider voting yes under certain circumstances:
Reps. Brian Baird of Washington, Bart Gordon and John Tanner of Tennessee, Suzanne Kosmas of Florida, Frank Kratovil of Maryland, Scott Murphy of New York, Glenn Nye of Virgnia, Michael McMahon of New York, and Rick Boucher of Virginia.
Please pray that these representatives would be able to resist arm-twisting and would again vote no on a federal takeover of the U.S. health care system.
Economist Thomas Sowell says that third-party payment for health care is what is keeping health care costs high.
Nothing would lower costs more than having each patient pay those costs. And nothing is less likely to happen.
Read it all here.
Tevi Troy has mapped out on National Review Online the path which health care legislation could take in March. It’s here. Everybody please be in prayer for health care sharing ministries as we arrive at this crucial juncture.
Judge Andrew P. Napolitano on Fox News Channel’s recently shared some of his thoughts on pending health care legislation’s constitutionality.
Since proponents of the existing proposals are fond of using anecdotal evidence, this anecdote from the other side was interesting.
4. Is there anything in the Constitution that empowers Congress to regulate health care or get between patients and their physicians or empower bureaucrats to tell physicians how to practice medicine? In a word, NO. Here is a kinky example. Last week, Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-N.J.) collapsed in his apartment in Cliffside Park, N.J., a few miles south of the George Washington Bridge. When he called an ambulance and it arrived, he directed the driver to bring him to Mt. Sinai Hospital in New York City. That direction is today perfectly lawful. Under all three health care proposals (the Senate, House, and presidential versions), such a direction would be unlawful; as an ambulance would be forced to take a patient to the hospital closest to the patient; in Sen. Lautenberg’s case, a small community hospital a few blocks from his apartment. Sen. Lautenberg voted for the Senate proposal that would have denied him the free choice that probably saved his life. (Emphasis mine.)
The likelihood of unintended consequences–quite apart from the unfortunately intended consequences–in the massive health care legislation on the table is immense. This is just one example.
Grace-Marie Turner of the Galen Institute discusses the likelihood of the Senate using the budget reconciliation process to pass some kind of health care legislation.
A former parliamentarian of the Senate concludes that it’s unlikely to happen.
Health care sharing ministries were the focus of a television news feature on WCNC, Channel 36 in Charlotte, N.C. The video was posted here on Feb. 12. Samaritan members Bob and Paula Singleton of Texas, featured in an earlier TV piece on a Dallas station, were included in this one as well.
The Virginia house, with bipartisan support, passed Senate Bill 417 which legislatively pushes back against a federally instituted individual insurance mandate. It is legally protecting the right of Virginia residents from being forced to purchase health insurance.
You can find the text of the bill, which Governor McDonnell is now expected to sign into law here, and more about national efforts to protect health care freedom through states acting under the 10th amendment here.
We applaud these efforts because they will also protect our members’ right to use non-insurance options like Samaritan Ministries. Americans need to have freedom of choice in their health care solutions, rather than a one-size-fits-all approach that will limit innovation and liberty.
You can track the recovery of a couple Samaritan members from injuries suffered in the Haiti earthquake at their Web site.
Even before an array of national groups and taxpayers mounted a brave and seemingly unwinnable challenge to nationalized health insurance, an Arizona doctor began the fight to strengthen protection for health care freedom at the state level. Three years later, his idea has spread like wildfire.
The Goldwater Institute has a great writeup on one doctor who started the health care freedom efforts that led to the Arizona ballot initiative and now the Virginia Senate passing the recent bill I mentioned last week.
