Another GOP Whip Team conference call on health care

Last week Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) held another GOP Whip Team bloggers' conference call. I took part, ironically I was in California, but I struggled with internet hook-ups while I was vacationing in the Yosemite area.

So a few days late, here is my report from that call.

McCarthy is the Republican Chief Deputy Whip in the House, and as always he kicked off the call. He almost immediately referred to a recent Mayo Clinic report critical of the Democrats health care reform bill. Part of it reads:

Although there are some positive provisions in the current House Tri-Committee bill – including insurance for all and payment reform demonstration projects – the proposed legislation misses the opportunity to help create higher-quality, more affordable health care for patients. In fact, it will do the opposite.

In general, the proposals under discussion are not patient focused or results oriented. Lawmakers have failed to use a fundamental lever – a change in Medicare payment policy – to help drive necessary improvements in American health care. Unless legislators create payment systems that pay for good patient results at reasonable costs, the promise of transformation in American health care will wither.

The real losers will be the citizens of the United States.

Kansas freshman Lynn Jenkins addressed the bloggers first, and the former state treasurer, viewing the financial big picture, said "I don't know how any of us can look our children in the eye and tell them that we're not responsible enough to pay for the things we are enjoying today."

Describing him as a "secret weapon," McCarthy turned the call over to an OB-GYN, Rep. Phil Gingrey of Georgia. The Democrats' plan, "will make (health care) more expensive for every American."

Gingrey passed the conversation on to a fellow southern doctor, Rep. John Fleming (R-LA), who like Jenkins, is a House freshman. Throwing more water on the falsehood that the Republicans are "the party of no," Fleming told us that he campaigned on health care reform. There are serious flaws with current government health care plans. "One of the most very plaguing problems in my observation, and that of my colleagues in medical practice," Fleming explained, "is how already existing public plans, called Medicare and Medicaid, are bankrupting our health care system now, driving the cost of private insurance to the tune of $1,800 per family per year."

Universal health care can only make that fiscal situation worse.

The Democrats' plan will pay for abortions. A majority of pro-choice Americans oppose taxpayer funded abortions.

Fleming is the author of House Resolution 615, which calls for members of Congress who vote for the health care reform plan to enroll in the government program.

Moving back to my assertion that the GOP is not the "party of no," the call's final speaker, Rep. Michael Burgess (R-TX), touted his site, the Congressional Health Care Caucus. I met Burgess at the Republican National Convention last fall, he's a smart and articulate man.

During the question and answer session, I asked the congressmen about the Democratic doctors in the House, and where they stand on their party's proposal for government run-health care. Gingrey said there are five of them, and that we shouldn't hold out much hope that they will bolt and speak out against it. Although Gingrey did say one of the quintet is pretty conservative.

Since this call took place, Blue Dogs are getting somewhat more vocal in opposing Obamacare. And as I've been saying for a while, the more the public learns about the Democratic health care plan, they less they like it.

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