Which the Democrats have cheerfully supplied. When members of the Senate health committee were asked to vote on an amendment – supplied by Republican Tom Coburn – that would require all Senators and their staffs to enroll in the exact, same health care plan they are forcing onto the American public, the Democrats declined. (Not all did, for various procedural and political reasons and one Republican refused on Humanitarian grounds – read the whole thing to get that last one. Which is a true classic one liner.)
On Tuesday, the Senate health committee voted 12-11 in favor of a two-page amendment courtesy of Republican Tom Coburn that would require all Members and their staffs to enroll in any new government-run health plan. Yet all Democrats — with the exceptions of acting chairman Chris Dodd, Barbara Mikulski and Ted Kennedy via proxy — voted nay.
In other words, Sherrod Brown and Sheldon Whitehouse won’t themselves join a plan that “will offer benefits that are as good as those available through private insurance plans — or better,” as the Ohio and Rhode Island liberals put it in a recent op-ed. And even a self-described socialist like Vermont’s Bernie Sanders, who supports a government-only system, wouldn’t sign himself up.
Of course, they also qualify now for generous Congressional coverage. Most Americans won’t have the same choice. Some will be transferred to the new entitlement as it uses its taxpayer bankroll to dominate insurance markets. Others work for businesses that will find it easier to dump their policies and move employees to the federal rolls. Democrats also know that the public option will try to control health spending by squeezing payments made to doctors and hospitals, and by not paying for treatments that Washington decides are too expensive, which will result in inferior care.
The amendment will, of course, never survive any conference vote but it gives Chris Dodd some political cover without actually being a danger to the Senator’s (and their staff’s) cushy coverage. But the Democrats – and the avowed socialist – who declined the coverage should tell you all you need to know about the merits of the health care plan.
It sucks and they know it – after all, they wrote it.
The plan is only for those who will be forced to pay for it. Not for the ones cramming down America’s throat.
Give a round of applause for Tom Coburn on this - he got them on record.
Mad leet skills…. big BZ to Senator Coburn!
Ya know, I read a description of how things were run by the Politburo. Seems that they made no bones about it – serfs are serfs, and that’s how it is. Can anyone explain How the democratic refusal to accept the same insurance is any different?
It’s not just the Democrats in Congress. When he was interviewed just prior to the All Barack Channel Obama Health Care infomercial, the Obamessiah told the interviewer that it would not apply to him or any member of his family either.
PPB, you are exactly right, there is no difference. Democrats have always considered themselves the rightful rulers because they know what’s good for all the rest of us.