Posted by Gary Howard on 10/29/09 1:22 PM [Newer: GDP goes up, means good times--Not so fast] [Older: Misdirected protest: Why protest the ABA? The Fed needs to be held accountable.]

Democrats Unveil Health Reform Plan, C4L Has the Alternative

Washington, D.C. October 29, 2009 - Today, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and the House Democrats announced their health insurance reform bill. The unveiling was followed by a call for a vote on the legislation next week.

"We believe the Democrat's health insurance proposal is far from the answer to reforming health care for the better," said John Tate, President of Campaign for Liberty. "Their bill forces people to purchase health insurance, increases premiums, and creates a public option that will eventually go the way of other bankrupt government-run programs."

"Campaign for Liberty is proposing that Congress try passing legislation that promotes true health freedom," continued Tate.

Tate went on to propose an alternative package, which includes legislation introduced by Congressman Ron Paul. The cornerstone of the package is H.R. 1495, the Comprehensive Health Care Reform Act of 2009, which provides all Americans with a tax credit for 100% of health care expenses, a tax credit for premiums for high-deductible insurance policies connected with a Health Savings Account (HSA), and allows seniors to use funds in an HSA to pay for a medigap policy, as well as making all medical expenses tax deductible.

Also included are H.R. 2629, a bill that prevents the government from requiring people purchase health insurance, and H.R. 3217, introduced by Congressman John Shadegg, which permits the purchase of health insurance across state lines and will ultimately lower costs due to the resulting competition.

Tate continued, "The same government that has given us trillions of dollars in unfunded liabilities for Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security is not going to fix our health care system with this latest bureaucratic scheme. It's time to vote health freedom."

Posted 10/29/09 1:40 PM BruceKoerber Cedar Rapids, IA

http://apoliticalpoliticalcommentary.blogspot.com/ Thursday, October 29, 2009 The Health Care Alternative That Is Not Coercive. Ask your representatives in the House and Senate to read each of these Acts (HR2629, HR1495, HR1498, HR2630, and HR3394). Contact them immediately and let them know that you will be watching their voting record. In other words, there is a very good alternative and so there is no excuse for them to vote for the socialist/fascist plan. H.R. 2629, the Coercion is Not Health Care Act, stops government from taking even more of our money and railroading us into its health care scheme by preventing any individual or agency in the federal government from requiring anyone to purchase health insurance. H.R. 2629 also prohibits conditioning the receipt of any government benefit or participation in any government program on the purchase or maintenance of health insurance. H.R. 1495, the Comprehensive Health Care Reform Act of 2009, allows all Americans to pay their health care bills through the method that suits them best by providing all Americans with a tax credit for 100% of health care expenses (fully refundable against both income and payroll taxes), allowing individuals to roll over unused amounts in cafeteria plans and Flexible Savings Accounts (FSA), providing a tax credit for premiums for a high-deductible insurance policy connected with a Health Savings Account (HSA) and allowing seniors to use funds in an HSA to pay for a medigap policy, as well as making all medical expenses tax deductible by repealing the 7.5% threshold for the deduction of medical expenses. H.R. 1498, the Freedom from Unnecessary Litigation Act of 2009, addresses rising medical malpractice costs by providing a tax credit for negative outcomes insurance purchased prior to medical treatment and by preventing medical malpractice awards obtained through binding arbitration from being taxed. Relying on negative outcomes insurance instead of litigation will also reduce the costs imposed on physicians, other health care providers, and hospitals by malpractice litigation. H.R. 2630, the Protect Patients and Physicians Privacy Act, allows patients and physicians to opt-out of any government-mandated or -funded system of electronic health care records and repeals the federal law creating an “unique patient identifier.” It also denies the use of federal funds to advance the use of standard unique health identifiers in any federal, state, or private health care plan. H.R. 3394, the Freedom of Health Speech Act, requires the FTC to actually prove health care claims are false before preventing those claims from being made, and H.R. 3395, the Health Freedom Act, ends the FDA’s attempts to censure truthful health claims.

Posted 10/30/09 7:16 PM TruthSaga San Jose, CA

It'll be interesting if we can push this as hard as we have with HR1207 and s.608