I candidate with a preferred plan but realistic about it with a backup plan. That might be a first.
3
Although her rhetoric is still "Medicare for All," I believe Sen. Warren gets it: the goal is universal health care, regardless of label or path.
2
It wouldn't hurt my feelings if something were done for people in the 45-64 age range who make incomes in the 40th percentile. The ACA Exchange (Obamacare) premium AFTER the subsidy is $640/month. That leaves me with income JUST over the poverty line. It's not enough to get by on, much less pay my federal and state taxes, or anything else.
This is an untenable situation.
We NEED Single Payer. I don't really care how we get there. I am WAY too sick to go without medical insurance. I can't afford to buy it even WITH the subsidy.
1
Most drugs start out from publicly funded institutions. Warren is absolutely spot on here. Take away the patents, make them ourselves. Insulin would probably cost about $10.
3
His (Trump's) efforts to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act have been unsuccessful. Correction: His efforts to repeal have been unsuccessful. His efforts to replace have been nonexistent.
2
Can the NYT please provide pie diagrams of where the money for healthcare currently comes from and then who it goes to. Lets see who is really paying at present and who is benefiting.
I am guessing that the money comes from the feds, the states, the employers, the people...
I guess it goes to the hospitals, the doctors, the insurance companies...
Please expand on these lists and quantify the proportion in each sector.
Thanks
1
The elephant in the room is that if MfA is enacted, Medicare taxes must go up. So what will become of the money paying for my current healthcare plan - the large portion that my employer pays? That money is part of my pay - no different than wages. I work for the value of that benefit. Will legislation be enacted to return to me the portion of my compensation that goes to health insurance? And yes, part of my compensation is the dollar value of that benefit. Without that happening, MfA is an impossibly hard sell to employees who receive employer paid health plans.
@4eyedbuzzard The Medicare taxes are already too low versus the benefit they provide. A large driver of that is Part D. The benefit was added under Bush Jr. but the only funding added for it was the Part D premiums that enrollees pay. Currently, they only cover about 25% of the Part D expenses of the program each CY.
Especially during a time when corporate interests have a death grip on our government, MfA is too much too soon. For now, I would opt for a intermediate solution that won't ruffle so many feathers. Even as much as I think that the health insurers are mostly parasites, we will need their endorsement to produce a health care solution that actually works. An MfA solution that is riddled with kick backs and rent seeking accommodations for corporations would be worse than nothing.
I might instead propose a private system of major medical insurance that indemnifies our people from the crushing expenses of major illness. Out of pocket limits could be graduated by a means tests. Just as important, a private major medical insurance system with strong fraud enforcement, a uniform coding and billing system, provisions to enforce compliance and mediation processes to negotiate reduced costs might be achievable .
3
The tragic error of Obama was that he didn't use his "bully pulpit" to get things done that he could have. Instead, he refused to ramp down the executive privilege first instituted by Cheney and Rumsfeld under Nixon and accelerated under Bush. In fact, Obama increased executive privilege, which Trump then used to get us into the mess we are in today. Yes, I blame Obama.
4
And what would you have done instead? Smh head at dreamland misconceptions
Join me in a call for a televised discussion between the billionaires and populist. This should be a civilized discussion aimed at identifying agreed upon truths and potential solutions to problems faced by the United States and its people.
How about it CNN, MSNBC, C-SPAN, PBS, FOX? Put Bloomberg, Steyer, Warren and Sanders together in a two hour televised discussion and allow the American people can see and evaluate the pros and cons of their respective positions, along with alternatives and criticisms provided by their opponents.
1
Speaking as a medical social turned addiction and mental health counselor/program manager, if we can't get Medicare for All, then all of these alternative proposals should be enacted. Health problems multiply the longer people have to wait to treat them. People who live with addictions and mental illness also have physical illnesses as well, in addition to or due to their other illnesses. If we want to save lives and turn marginalized people in contributing citizens, healthcare is the place to start.
3
Medicare for all is a dead issue. Seniors will vote against it! We earned it and know it will erode quickly if open to all. Doctors abuse it already, like a blank check. Warren needs to stop talking in debates like a fanatic. When her time is up, wrap it up. Too much like watching drivers go thru stoplights.
4
@Timit I'm senior and I couldn't disagree with you more. Everyone who works pays into Medicare right now. And everyone who lives needs healthcare that doesn't bankrupt them. We can't deny coverage to children and younger adults just because we paid in longer.
13
@Barbara I couldn't disagree with you more. First Medicare doesn't pay for itself, now. Biden has the plan to extend and "fix" the Affordable plan. We can cover everyone w/o changing Medicare. Second, neither plan is "free". Warren is just piling up free programs that can't be paid for. EW Please focus on controlling corporations and shifting the tax burden. Elect more Dems and take back our Country.
2
Warren says that we ...people....pay $11 trillion for health care in premiums, copays, deductibles etc..The Feds, states and employers pay an additional amount for health care to insurance cos which amount they would continue to pay ..but only to Medicare...The Trump tax reduction on corporations and the 1% equal $1 trillion a year. That’s $10 trillion we can get back in 10 years just by going back to the tax code that we had before Trump. Her program is basically completely paid for by merely reforming the Trump tax giveaways. Oil and gas companies shouldn’t have any tax break such as depletion allowances which lessen their tax bill. And finally pass a comprehensive infrastructure bill that puts millions of people to work and produces billions in additional taxes feom workers and companies who benefit from those infrastructure projects. Health Care and Jobs In one easy lesson.
10
I have been thinking about this allot. Glad she has as well.
2
The Democrats need to dump the wealth tax idea. Just eliminate the Trump tax breaks, so everyone pays a fair share on their income, much easier than trying to find every billionaire's gold, jewelry, art collection, and international real estate holdings. A wealth tax is a fatuous idea that has been abandoned by most countries because it didn't work.
4
She has a Plan!
And plans B and C.
So smart.
7
This article states that ”Many presidents have failed to pass major health care legislation.” The entire rest of the article talks about medical insurance not health care. After 39 years in the healthcare industry I think it’s fairly certain that if the waste and other problems in the industry were addressed medical costs would be reduced considerably, consequently and dramatically taking pressure off the insurance needs of the population.
7
She's done . . . and she doesn't even know it.
Warren staked out a hard left edge. To back off it means she may be less than reliable. Becoming a 'realist' doesn't cut for someone who's long established herself as a crusader.
IF she's the Democratic nominee, Trump will feast on this.
Warren is cabinet post material -- she's not presidential. No more than Woodrow Wilson or Jimmy Carter. A 'one and done' president and that's provided Trump utterly craters -- and the economy takes a significant down turn in the next 11 months.
The Dems (and we the nation) NEED a stable, fair, common sense MODERATE to win next November.
5
@Hannacroix
Moderation is what got us trump in the first place. We need structural changes, starting from the top down.
9
We are in a sad state of politics of reversals. Trump reverses President Obama's, now Warren proposes to reverse Trump's, and the circle goes on. When will this spectator sports stop and taking care of the nation will begin again? It is not about the Democrats or the Republicans winning something but both of them working to make the nation, the people and the country win. What will replacing Trump with Warren change if they continue on the same path of proving why the other side is, was, and will be wrong rather than bringing the nation together?
I would very much like a Democrat win the Presidential election, not to have won a victory over the Republicans but to show the Republican politician that there is a way to get together on taking care of the nation's business. Not to beat them over the head for their mistakes.
2
These executive orders keep changing things and messing with peoples lives.
They need to stop.
Maybe, just maybe, if Congress would do their job and get together, compromise and pass some laws for everyone, we can move forward.
10
Enough stories about Warrens pipe dreams.
6
So Trump is a dictator, well respond by doing it to?
Haven't we learned anything about presidents bypassing congress ... come on ...
1
The Democratic candidates need to preach to the choir. It is absolutely essential that any Democratic presidential candidate understand that they can't govern meaningfully alone, and that they need to help elect Democratic senators and representatives to win the Senate and House.
5
"She shared a detailed list that doesn’t require congressional approval."
"But over all, she views executive authority in the same broad way that Trump does. "
The LAST thing that the U.S. needs is another authoritarian President like Trump who views executive authority in the "same broad way that Trump does". who plans to bypass Congress in order to achieve her goals.
This government was set up with three equal branches so that there could be checks and balances
Presidents are supposed to work WITH Congress. No individual who believes that he or she should do an end run around Congress to get what he or she wants is worthy of being President of the United States.
This is a slippery slope towards authoritarianism.
I hope that American voters are smart enough to vote NO to
authoritarianism. regardless of which candidate voters support.
7
@DJS I agree. Moneyed interests are so entrenched, one sincere President/Administration has little chance to "Reform" and "Regulate" in a way that will bring meaningful relief and solutions. The only way we will get anything done is through a mass movement of engaged citizens who rise up and demand change, constantly, at the local, state, and national level. We must have a movement (in my opinion a working class one) that will put pressure on our elected representatives to do right by the American people, not corporate interests: and if they won't, we will vote them out and put more responsive ones in. We need a President who will use the Bully Pulpit to facilitate such a movement, an Organizer-In-Chief. I believe most Democrats and Republicans in power now shudder at the thought of a truly engaged, informed, active citizenry. But that's what we need if we're going to survive.
I found the following article spot on in summing up the Theories of Change we are seeing championed currently. https://www.currentaffairs.org/2019/09/the-prospect-of-an-elizabeth-warren-nomination-should-be-very-worrying
1
Exactly, corporate money should not buy votes. Corporations get to operate like an individual for efficiency."They" want a say, let them pay Individual Income Tax! Get rid of the Electoral College. One person, one vote. The Presidental election is not ruled by the majority, so many don't vote.
1
@DJS: Your argument that the President is supposed to work with Congress only makes sense if Congress is working in the first place. For many years now Congress has been about as productive as a dead skunk in the middle of the road and you can't blame a President for going around it. I don't like what Trump is doing but in general I don't want a President who will do nothing simply because Congress is deadlocked. If you want to control the President (and I agree that Presidents may need to be controlled) the maybe the FIRST thing that America needs is a functioning Congress.
1
Whilst I support Ms Warren's proposals (anyone who lives in a country with a single Government run health system knows how they are far superior to the U.S.'s system), the reality is that most Americans don't. And with an expert fear-monger like Mr Trump relentlessly attacking her policies, there is no way Ms Warren could win the election.
4
Smart, patriotic, flexible and cut from the same cloth as those dedicated government professionals we have been watching in the House impeachment hearings. These people know how to explain things in an understandable way.
People are shocked about presidential abuse of power, attempted bribery, and the treasonable pro Putin foreign policy, Trump's self-dealing and profiting from the presidency; but along with climate change and rescue of our democracy, health care or lack of it for too many is the number one kitchen table issue.
Medicare for All, was scary and looked like pie in the sky. But now, that she has explained what she intends to do, first and later and why and how via executive order what can be at the outset and how the public by being given a series of choices of public and private options under the ACA we can get medical insurance for all.
9
By the new year, Warren's support will have faded behind Sanders.
3
The risk of implementing policy through EOs is that another President comes along and cancels all of them, as Trump has done to Obama. The consumer ends up whip-sawed by these changes which is no way to fix the problem we have.
I know this sounds insane, but somehow the two parties have to figure out how to work with each other and pass legislation. Both parties need to own the solution and both parties are going to have to give up some things to find common ground. A really good way to start is make the healthcare laws apply to the benefits Congress gets so they feel the pain that the rest of the public feels.
7
@Scott Werden I love your last line.
However, I think the idea of sincere Bipartisanship died in 2008, though the seeds of that death were planted by Gingrich in the 90s. When we really look at what McConnell did to Obama, we see that there is zero sincere interest in compromise on the Republican side - as when Democrats offered them the "Grand Bargain" (a Republican's dream come true!), they turned it down. Thank God for their blindly obstructionist spleen in that one case, I say! Democrats have started from the center to "compromise" for 40+ years. And the times that the two parties successfully worked together in that time have been disasters: NAFTA, the Crime Bill, Iraq War, massive tax cuts for the wealthy, deregulation of Banking, etc. etc.
It's time we return the Dem party to its working class roots and rebuild the party into one that will fight for economic justice, fearlessly. The charade that we have have had two distinct parties at economic/foreign policy loggerheads is falling apart. Even they know it: https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2019/3/4/18246381/democrats-clinton-sanders-left-brad-delong
2
@Scott Werden, I don’t understand what you mean by your last line. Congress is required to select their health plan from the Obamacare exchange, and all plans that are sold in this country must follow all the regulations specified under the Affordable Care Act. You make it seem as if Congress is exempt. That’s just not the case.
"As Democrats head into another debate next week, the moderators may want to consider asking candidates what’s on their health care regulatory wish lists."
So say we all.
Thanks for that and for this article.
1
@Judith
So now all the candidates are going to have to follow Warren’s lead and tote out a Plan B? That could get confusing at the debates as each candidate compares and muddles over each of their two plans. Not good. Like Rubio arguing in 2016 with that other Senator about some obscure amendment...
Agree with all of this.
And as a reminder for the general public: you have only until Dec 15 to renew or sign up. Surprised you haven’t heard that? You have Trump to thank for cutting the funding to publicize the sign-up program ... in his cruel effort to end Obamacare.
2
Medicine, in other words, health care, practiced for profit is antithetical to any standards of human decency, ethics or morality, not to mention the fact that most other major countries have determined to provide health care to all, as a right and a benefit. Meanwhile the U.S. continues to avoid taking responsibility, playing politics with lobbyists, big pharma, etc. This is a perfect example of the dangerous aspect of unchecked capitalism and government blatantly and insidiously persisting in defending a private health care system that leaves out the poor, denies medical care, and every day becomes less affordable, and all to often causes personal bankruptcies due to outrageous medical expenses. This is the result of the corruption that results when government and private business are in bed together, and as Americans we should be ashamed to have tolerated this alliance for our health care, so sadly it has been to the detriment of 'we the the people.'
5
Thank you Ms. Warren for trying to get me and so many of my friends, middle aged and younger, decent healthcare.
Right next to this article in the NYTimes is another amout the scary cost of your plan. Well guess what? I'm already facing scary costs and lack of affordable care. If they think the $29 trillion cost of your plan is high, wait till they see the cost of doing little or nothing
9
American presidents making and reversing executive orders reminds me of kings and queens of old. Congress should legislate. The power of the presidency should be curtailed.
3
This would be the entirely wrong course.
For what it's worth, I was speaking to friends in France last weekend -- we were comparing my "Medicare" to their "Mutuel." Turns out it's not so different.
If Dems are smart (please let's hope....) someone will point out that "Medicare for All" does not mean that everyone wins the jackpot -- it should mean that everyone has access to healthcare at something approaching a reasonable cost.
2
Amy Klobuchar has been advocating a non-profit public option all along including the funding to pay for it. Over time, the majority of Americans might/should prefer it.
If Warren had any of Amy's feel for the opinions of the bulk of voters, she would have made this her health plan at the start. Now, who needs this revised plan? Why trust its author? Klobuchar's a better choice.
4
Warren has lost my support, mainly because of her attacks against billionaires. If you want to do something good for the people, propose plans without name calling. What she is doing is a cheap trick used by politicians to divide people by demonizing a group and targeting them as the reason for our misery. Trump does that immigrants, Warren and Sanders are doing with successful people.
I think that Bill Gates is a decent person who is putting his money to good use, but attacking him because he does not agree with her plan is taking it too far for me.
This goes to show that the liberal left is no different from the extreme right when it comes to demonizing a group of people and I am sick of this. So I am going to stick with someone moderate and decent like Buttigieg or even Biden, yes despite his stumbles, Biden is still a decent person.
7
@John so, you equate offering to sit down with someone (gates) and have a discussion - to "attacking" them?
5
I love headline, presenting the idea that having Medicare for All would be “risky” for Warren. Don’t you mean risky for the insurance companies? I lived in France for a year and enjoyed the best health care access of my entire life. Don’t be fooled!
10
I would urge Ms. Warren to eliminate the unnecessary and incomprehensible letters I frequently receive from Medicare.
Besides the money they waste, they are annoying.
Mine go immediately into the shredder.
3
It is good that trump has been unsuccessful in enacting health care policies through legislation, for what is his agenda, and the republican agenda on health care? It is to make sure that the health insurance oligarchs who donated millions and millions of dollars to the republicans, can keep health insurance costs high, keep deductibles high, and deny as much health care as possible, ensuring that more and more Americans sicken, suffer, go into bankruptcy, and die. That is the trump/republican agenda on health care. God forbid they get their dirty, greedy, malicious hands on anything else, much less health care.
What about people who want to work hard and pay for their OWN healthcare instead of having the people from Washington running it?
3
Cute... but I cannot believe the utter stupidity of Americans... My MD was surprised to learn that a Medicare patient with supplemental insurance and drug coverage had to pay for a DPT vaccination. (The out of pocket expense kept going down: never pay the first bill.)
I am glad that Warren is smart but frankly why bother to insist people go to school when they only learn to be "individuals" and free to follow their dream and nothing about how the rest of the world lives.
To not denigrate the BUSH 2003 law that does not allow Medicare to negotiate drug prices, to not denigrate the awful Abominable Care Act institute by that great Republican Obama (sure he's doing very well under Trump) is to be an ostrich with its head in the sand.. do they actually do that?
The rest of the civilized world has some sort of reasonably priced medical care with decent outcomes. But in the USA we have to all be rich no matter how we hurt our fellow citizens.. and yes, a few illegal immigrants.. but unless you are in favor of seeing people dying on the sidewalk or spreading disease, you have to go along with medical care for all who are sick. BTW dialysis in the USA I believe a for profit industry costs 120K per person per annum. That's an important number to keep in mind when discussing medical costs for various treatments.
2
Warren is the only candidate giving details of her ideas. The NYT and the electorate should focus on the other candidate's (including Trump's) lack of detailed plans.
6
In other words nothing, other than a couple progressive tweaks
2
Why are you guys so scared of getting what the citizens of every other comparable western democracies take for granted? We have quite a right wing PM who would not dream of rolling back our medicare. He knows he would not win the next election. It seems like all you have to do to kill a healthy proposal in America is utter the magic word "socialism".
You are getting ripped off by a magic word. Someone has gotta be making some easy big money out of your naivity. That money could go into your government system ad benefit everybody. In case you haven't noticed yet; you can't believe anything Trump says about it. Remember when he said it would all be so easy? That should have been a warning sign. He is a rip-off con man... duh!
10
Amazing. No comments allowed for the idiotic trump healthcare transparency "law" that will do nothing for any American since we can ONLY go to the hospital our insurance is contracted with. Knowing what other hospitals charge means nothing if our insurance won't pay for it! How about FORCING our insurance to cover our health care needs whether in network or not? I can drive my car anywhere in the USA and be covered in the event of an accident or a hit and run. Yet if I get sick in another state requiring hospital care I am liable for the bill. How is this not extortion? I am forced to buy a product but the seller of the product is NOT legally obligated to provide it. If this was any other industry they would be up on charges of fraud.
Yet, here we have one more attack article on Elizabeth Warren where every critic is allowed to freely post. The disingenuousness of this "esteemed" news publication is concerning.
The cynic in me wonders if the goal is to re-elect trump. After all, he does sell a lot of papers! The money keeps on rolling in.
7
...and this plan is the plan of a patriot.
Warren's plan is a plan that cares about the health and well being of the American people.
Trump's plan is to reverse Obamacare because he hates Obama and knows he will never be the man Obama is.
Trump's plan is to align himself with the health insurance companies who will donate money to his campaign, along with their wealthy CEO's.
Trump's plan is to make it so that those with pre existing conditions can be denied health coverage by health insurance companies who do not want to enroll the sick.
No, Elizabeth is all about the American people.
Trump is all about his own narcissistic self, his brand, his money, and pleasing Putin, who clearly is holding something threatening over Trump's head, clearly is blackmailing him, but that is another comment.
If it's Warren, I will vote for her and be dang happy about it.
9
Looks like Mayor Pete could make a major difference in this campaign by demonstrating the gulf between its largely coastal activists and the voters of middle America -- most of whom have not tuned in yet.
1
Elizabeth Warren is very capable of good solutions.She could head a conference of multi billionaires to see how they could organize their financial power to save us from a class war. They could recieve unending gratitude from the rest of us for their help in solving the bitter conflucts and negative forces steming from desperation of those who are left behind. The billionaires have good access to resources of all kinds. They would get a different kind of status than they are used to, more lasting and more real. It would be a win,win situation. It would also become a more grounded and realistic proposal overall.
It is strange to read so many comments praising Senator Warren for being flexible about her signature "Medicare For All" plan after she admonished some of her competitors for not having bold ideas when speaking on the subject. Her flexibility on M4A seems to be more of a reaction to polls showing Pete Buttigeig's moderate and more achievable approach to healthcare as one that more Americans support.
2
It's interesting to examine whether Ms. Warren's short-term ACA expansion plan will solve the under-reported problem with the ACA as it interacts with the laws in many states: that the expanded Medicaid that provides about half of the ACA coverage, and is generally given to people with incomes up to 138% of the Federal Poverty Level, are, in many states (such as MA, NJ, IA, NV, NH, OH, RI, IN, ID, UT, MD) subject to full Medicaid estate recovery for people 55 and older.
That is, as pointed in an October Atlantic Monthly article, for people 55 and older in those states, the coverage is a bomb of a thing -- not actually insurance, but a loan until death for uninsured medical expenses. If $700,000 in medical expenses are accrued for a person 55 or older, the estate of the person is legally obligated to pay back that $700,000 when the person dies.
Looking at Ms. Warren's short term ACA modification plan, from the details on her site, let's take it quite literally that all people with incomes under 200% of the Federal Poverty Level will get free Medicare. This seems to be saying all Medicaid (except long-term-care) will be replaced by free Medicare in the first 100 days. Therefore, Medicaid, just a loan until death for uninsured medical expenses in many states, will be replaced by Medicare, which is real insurance.
O.K., if that's really EXACTLY what the law would be, it would solve the problem.
Of course, it still sounds politically impossible to me.
1
Americans generally don't understand that one big reason for a lack of wage growth in recent decades for US workers is the ever escalating cost of health insurance for employers, who have also weakened coverage. It makes US employers less competitive in the global market.
And in America, a 60 year old couple with a household income of $65,000 or more and no employer insurance has to pay unsubsidized ACA plan premiums of nearly $20,000, with another $10,000 max in out-of-pocket costs.
We have a major cost problem and throwing more taxpayer money at it is not a solution. Medicare and Medicaid are far more cost effective because of price controls on treatment introduced by Reagan. Providing an option to buy into Medicare, especially over age 50, would begin to address the cost problem. So would big employers or states banding together to negotiate better rates, as Amazon, JP Morgan and Berkshire Hathaway are doing with their Haven plan. All of this would be fought fiercely by the huge medical lobby, with their Harry and Louise tactics.
28
@Look Ahead why our candidates cannot explain it this well is beyond me.
1
Intensely involved in NYS Medicaid for almost 30 years I'm a fan of Universal Health care. What I am not a fan of Federal only control and responsibility. I believe its necessary to have a
broad consensus with State level and private insurance participation. This is for administrative an experiential considerations as well as fiscal. It is too important for his endeavor to succeed for one person or entity to try it alone.
8
Anything a President Warren can do herself to give more people access to health care without Republican votes (i.e. "death panels") the better. Twelve years after Obama was elected, Healthcare is still a huge issue.
President Obama gave healthcare to millions. Bernie made it possible to talk about for making Medicare For All.
Maybe, hopefully, Elizabeth Warren can finally give health care to everyone. It's always and only Democrats who do anything constructive about health care.
37
Ms Warren's 15 minutes as the democratic front runner are up and the infusion of Bloomberg and Deval Patrick into the democratic primary is a vote of no confidence in the candidates futzing around for months now. As Mark McIntyre from LA rightly said Warren has faded. The democrats have a serious problem in a possible path to the white house in 2020 and Trump is not the problem. Look at a mirror and the all the Dem. presidential candidates will see the problem. Obama shared some pearls of wisdom recently. Pay attention to what he and Bill Clinton say. These two 2 term presidents were the most successful and smart Democrats in the past 25 years. If the Dem candidates want to stay put in the basket of socialism they will meet the same fate as Maduro and Morales.
16
And what can they show for their pearls of wisdom? Stagnated salaries? Unaffordable childcare? Unaffordable education? Trump in the office? Morales significantly improve the lives of his people, brining the poverty and illiteracy down, can either of these Presidents honestly say the same? If the goal is to stay in the office for two terms, they are successful, but so G.W. Bush. If the goal is to improve people's lives is not so. Beside what they consider 'left' is the center of Europe for several decade without upheaval of the Latin America.
20
@Girish Kotwal
This is absolute nonsense, The punditry, the Democratic establishment and their wealthy donors are becoming unnerved not because Warren and Sanders are losing candidates but because their stranglehold on power is in mortal danger if either of one of these win the Presidency.
Sanders consistently beats Trump in polls with margins almost identical to Biden. Remember Sanders is identified with the Left and with Medicare For ALL, and he does well in the polls despite the negativism. marginalization and misrepresentation by the MSM. Warren, the same but to a lesser extent because she is lesser known and the media attacks are recent Medicare For ALL would remove I trillion in costs yearly from Americans. It will be effectively a huge tax cut . Detailed plans how it will be paid for have been released. That a single payer system is more cost effective has been proven in numerous countries.
As for Clinton and Obama, you fail to mention they both lost control of the Congress after their first term. They faced weak candidates and used Big campaign contributions to defeat them
3
@Girish Kotwal You equate the will of the party establishment, reflected primarily in the entry of Deval Patrick into the race, with the will of Democrats and voters in general. This was the assumption in 2016 and we know how well that worked out for the country.
1
Expanding mental health coverage to equivalence with coverage of other medical services seems on the surface to be a virtuous, easy to defend proposal. Because of that, it's likely to escape the scrutiny it deserves.
1. Without doubt, many are helped by mental health care. Yet compared with other medical interventions, it's notoriously ineffective with little notion of actually producing what might be called a cure. The science of mental illness is sketchy at best and even the diagnosis of maladies is subject to change based on the political fashion of the moment. There is often disagreement about the ethics and efficacy of course of treatment. Blindly expanding public expenditures on it could be enormously wasteful. We should look at what the model countries (UK, Denmark, Germany, etc.) do with regard to mental health coverage.
2. Even now there's a shortage of psychiatrists and other qualified mental health professionals. Where are all the providers going to come from that will be needed to meet demand?
2.
4
This is the reason Warren is the superior candidate and would make a great President. She understands how to use regulatory agencies to enforce existing laws better than any other politician. Recall her assistance with the CFPB and TARP. If the Senate remains in Republican control after the next election, she would be the most effective at creating change without new legislation.
42
If you've seen the most recent polls in Iowa, Pete Buttigieg is now the frontrunner at 25%, while Warren has faded to 16%. I'm a fan of Elizabeth Warren, but Democrats may be coming to the realization that the road to defeating Trump goes through the center, not the left wing.
18
that was a landline based poll of like 500 likely caucusgoers, hardly any sort of majority. we need to be more vigilant than just relying on these polls that come out with something new every day... remember 2016 when we thought Clinton had it made??
33
@Mark McIntyre
Oh really? In those states where you need to win, it does not go through the center. It didn’t last time and it doesn’t this time either.
3
@Mark McIntyre
Have you seen the recent polls of Trump against the main contenders. Mayor Pete by far performs the worst against Trump. So what! he leads in a poll or 2. He has obtained significant campaign contributions, many from wealthy donors, and he is spending significantly in Iowa. Remember the participants in a caucus are a small percentage of the actual electorate
6
Terrific. Medicare for all now becomes a bargaining position. In the end we may get a buyin, plus a strong public option competing with private insurance.
10
@Andrew Arato
With Warren, Medicare for ALL is not a bargaining position. She is just proposing a transitional period of 2 years, with full enactment in her third year,
The public option has 1 implementation in the state of Washington, and it is about as costly as private insurance The average costs of Medicare beneficiaries is 20000, of which approximately 25 % is paid by the beneficiary in medicare premiums, deductibles, and out of pocket expenses. The remaining 75% is paid for by a Medicare Tax on wage income, and by general revenue. A Medicare Buy In would entail significant additional costs by the person buying in, and would be unaffordable to many. It is NO magical solution. Medicare for ALL, on the other hand, would be paid for shifting health care costs to the wealthy, and would also save a significant amount of money as countries with single payer systems have proven
3
In Canada you have no idea what anything costs,you never see a piece of paper.Everything is computerized, the computers follow you around whoever you go. That has to be cheaper. Businesses medical coverage for workers is solved. Medications are far cheaper. The health care is good, general health is good, pre pregnancy care is good, anxiety about health care is way down. People don't go around complaining. The general attitude is one of gratitude that they are covered and gratitude that they live in Canada. No one complains about a 15 percent added value tax that supports health care. It is just the way it is. It works.,
That problem is solved, attention turns to other things.
3
yeah, Warren behaving like a chameleon, bargaining on things like any other mainstream politician without a spine or conscience
1
I am glad Trump got rid of the money to "publicize insurance options". All that is is tax payers paying for the companies having people call you ten time a day. Drove me crazy. Other that what Warren wants to do here is fine. But the truth is other than the expansion of Medicaid, the fact that companies can't deny insurance for pre-existing conditions, and children can stay on their parents plan longer, the ACA is not good. Tax payers are giving the insurance companies big money for subsidies and getting nothing for it. The insurance companies have to be taken out of the equation one way or another. There is no need for them. Government can dole out the money and doesn't need to make a profit. Sen. Sanders is still #1 when it comes to health care plans.
15
@Doctor Woo Health insurance. for all dies not work if people can opt out. Otherwise people just buy it when they are sick. That is not insurance.
And who made it “optional” and killed the subsidies? Republicans of course.
She obviously flunked the third grade as she can't add up cost and doesn't seem to understand the meaning of the word free .....these schemes would result and destroying the American economy and the Golden Goose that produces the wealth she wants to confiscate.
15
I am not sure as payment of hundreds dollars in premiums and thousand dollars in deductible generate wealth for people who pay it. Is it new math they teach in school: more you spend - wealthier you become
I can’t believe how much this article normalizes and excuses Trump. Was that its intent? Horrible.
13
I know Obama personally, from way back, and had advocated him using executive orders at the outset to implement some health care directives (something Trump has done, and something Warren proposes to do). The idea was then those orders could be made into law by the supermajority Obama enjoyed.
In particular, I advocated to Obama the so-called "Public Option". The idea was too offer Medicare at cost, to those who wanted it: families could have opted to join Medicare, modulo a premium that would reimburse Medicare for all the cost incurred. As Medicare is not for profit, and has economies of scale, such a "Public Option" would have been less expensive than private insurance to those enrolling in it. Thus that "Public Option" would out-compete with private insurance, thus allowing to gently ease private insurance out of insuring basic care.
That's the way it's done in France... The french Medicare-For-All is complemented by private insurance. This is also happening with US Medicare, which reimburses only 80%: private insurance is insuring supplementary care, or act as a deductible insurance...
It seems to me Obama could have imposed this by executive order, on day one, and Warren also could (because of the zero cost effect on Medicare, it needs no new budget). The effect would be a soft transition, over a decade or so, to Medicare For All... without outlawing private insurance, at the outset, a proposition that guarantees the failure of the Warren candidacy...
9
It is not like France. In France all people are ensured by the Government, and could by supplemental private insurance. Even with public option, the majority of the healthcare would be delivered by the private for profit insurance. That is very big difference, because in France the Government can control the price, in the US it could not. As result, the public option (in order to fully cover the members) will be only slightly cheaper than the private insurances, and, therefore, still unaffordable for many
7
@yulia
I agree about France. As for the public option, its 1 implementation in the state of Washington reflects what you say. The public option and the Medicare Buy In are not magical solutions. They have been given barely any scrutiny by the media, They are essentially ruses by ambitious politicians.
1
@Patrice Ayme Do you mean Germany? It’s across the Rhine from France. Private companies provide mandated insurance.
Putting together a comprehensive health care coverage is not all that difficult.
1. Put Medicare For All in place
2. Medicare A, the emergency type of care, to be run by the federal government. If I have a heart attack Medicare A kicks in, no questions asked because Medicare A will be paid for via taxes.
3. Now that I have had a heart attack any following treatment to be paid by Medicare B. Medicare B to be run by the states or by the federal government, no questions asked. Paid for via taxes.
4. What about preventive care? Doctors visits, mamograms, annual physicals? Here is where the individual will buy insurance. Again Medicare C will come into play. There will be premiums. Medicare C will be mandatory. Premiums will have a modification factor. If I do not smoke, I work out regularly at the fitness center, I do not smoke, my premiums will be modified to a lower level. Medicare C to be managed by the states.
5. Insurance companies can play a role but the individual citizen will never have to deal with them. All at the backend.
4
@Indian Diner
Capitalism is nothing but greed people should be allowed to die and just as long as the shareholders get there over the top share. Reading about Federal express not paying any tax makes me wonder why any American believes that it is ok for Hospitals, drug companies and the rest be billionaires off the backs of regular working people.
We need health care now, not next year or in two years, templates exist in other countries, we dont have to do anything from scratch How many white papers do we need to move forward.? Vote democrat down the ticket and lets get rid of the GOP and begin to address the needs of our lives.
2
Without pragmatism, Senator Warren wouldn’t have been able to create the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Medicare for all is a good national aspirational program. Healthcare is a right, not a privilege as everyone knows. As with the CFPB, Senator Warren will tackle those things in Medicare that are possible, but expand Medicare she will - in spite what hedge fund fraudster, Leon Cooperman and others claim.
14
@Ted
Rights are codified in law. There is a law that establishes a right to emergency health care services regardless of ability to pay - EMTALA. Citizens who qualify as medically indigent according to the different state-by-state rules can enroll in Medicaid and get free health care services. Otherwise there is no statutory right to non-emergency services on demand. Just asserting that a right exists doesn't make it so.
If a Bernie Sanders type plan is ever enacted, then health care services actually would become a right. The ramifications of that fundamental change in the relationships of patients with government and healthcare providers and government with providers are unpredictable, but could be enormous.
3
As a country we already spend more than enough to provide universal care. The total we spend, counting public and private funds, far exceeds the per capita costs our more civilized fellow democracies spend. The hard part will be separating the entities benefiting from the current system from the money trough. Warren is right to prepare the country for a transition period. Virtually everybody who has health insurance - even a Medicare recipient - has private insurance of some sort, whether as a direct policy holder or through corporate claims administration provided under contract to government. The Netherlands uses a hybrid system that permits regulated participation by private insurers, and there are plenty of good ideas to pluck from other countries. But, it's complicated, and the insurance octopus and its minions will not surrender easily. If we had a political consensus, it could still take a generation to implement fully. Given the GOP fixation on fomenting partisan chaos, it may take decades before a consensus emerges. We'll hear the usual bleating about "socialized medicine," as if that were a cogent argument against universal and better and cheaper health care.
6
One more symptom of the fundamental problem with this candidacy. (No, it's not our track record in nominating the most liberal Senator from our most liberal state.)
It's the belief that this is an election about policies. It's not. It's about the need to share an American value set that comprises the different cultures that make up our country.
Between the coasts, Senator Warren is identified as a Beltway insider, with all of the familiar touch points: Ivy League, the Senate, the rarefied heights of policy-making, IQ among the gods (nothing wrong with that!) with a seeming inability to not show it all the time (plenty wrong with that), and a colorless schoolmarmy affect no matter how vibrant is her speech.
A perfectly fine candidate for blue America. Outside of it, she might even lose net votes.
13
This is a poor plan and just puts/keeps the whole thing in limbo for people and insurance company. Just as Obama set a path that Trump reversed Warren will reverse again and a future president can change yet again. Congress must act and pass laws.
10
Many of the Senators who would oppose it are not up for re-election in the near future.
I am delighted to hear the steps of her health care program Elizabeth Warren can put in place with solely the powers of the Presidency, which is all she can count on having at this time. And it is a lot!
Even Democrats don't just fall in line with the programs put into place by a president of their own party. She will probably have to coax the votes for her health care policies out of the Democrats even if they win both houses.
This article shows that Warren is not just tossing out an idea without thinking through how all these wonderful policies can be implemented. And such thinking is comforting to me and hopefully to others who dare to hope for health care for all.
Thanks for sharing this with us, Ms Sanger-Katz.
10
@pajaritomt Warren (and her supporters) haven't quite thought through the consequences for an executive branch that seeks to rule on its' own ignoring democratic principles. Particularly disturbing as those consequences are currently staring us all in the face. Do we really want a "go it alone" type of president at this point in history? Time for cooler heads to prevail.
Approaching what she would do as president without a Democratic senate is a realistic step in the right direction for her.
7
@Joe Runciter
So lets go after every GOP politician who is up for reelection and realize that the GOP cant at this point help themselves. Its a sick cult and Barr, Trump are in charge with their lies.
Whoever is left standing after this impeachment inquiry need to explain why they wouldn't stand up for democracy and America. In this case the generals need to stop being so stoic and explain why they could sell books but couldn't tell the American people the truth.
This massive cover up has the fingerprints of all the GOP on it. How could this happen without their knowledge ,
We all want health care, benefits, fully funded pension plans and this election is not only getting rid of the rich GOP, TRUMP
Look, I like a lot of things about Elizabeth Warren and her campaign and I was toying with voting for her ... until she was foolish enough to put a $20.5 trillion price tag on her plan. It’s a number that puts Trumps $1.5Bn tax cut into stark relief. It’s a ridiculous number for anyone except one of her true believers. Its why her campaign has stalled and it’s why Mayor Pete is taking off in Iowa. Finally It’s why Bloomberg and Duval entered the race. It was a bold move by Elizabeth Warren ... spectacularly bold!
9
@James It is stunning that Democrats have never learned the difference between long term goals and promises and plans. All warren would have had to say is that she will always work toward a better fairer health care system and hopefully one day a single payer system. As it is she should just tell everyone that Mexico will pick up the tab for her plan.
8
@James Mayor Pete is a local boy who talks Iowa’s language. Senator Warren is in solid ground.
1
@j. g.
In effect, Warren practically did say that Mexico will pay for it. She plans to increase the number of immigrants to this country so they can pay more taxes to help cover the cost of Medicare for all. For someone who is supposed to be so smart, that's really dumb. It assumes that the immigrants will all get good paying jobs so they owe income tax and that they themselves, won't need health care, or any other services requiring government expenditures.
I guess we know what kind of President she will be. Not a uniter. No plans to work on bipartisan legislation. Just a "shove it down their throats" progressive strategy, paid for by other people. In the meantime, she is rolling back her plans to cater to the moderate wing of the party. Is she a progressive or a moderate? A former Republican or a Democrat? A bankruptcy advisor or a woman of the people? A native American or a bitter white lady? She'll be whatever it takes to get power it seems.
12
Last time a Democrat messed with my 100% employer provided medical insurance, I lost my Dr and started paying for half of it. Since then it has forced my employer to shop around every year and my coverage to basically change year to year. So no thank you, I don’t want Lizzy or anyone else messing with my healthcare. You know it’s bad when Obama tells 2020 Democrat Candidates to knock it off.
14
Before Dems 'messed' with insurance, the insurance routinely. denied the coverage to sick people, increased prices, introduce deductible. The large employees routinely change the insurances leading their employees to look for another doctors. The small employers could not even but reasonably price insurance. If anything, Dems didn't 'mess' with private insurance enough that is why affordability of healthcare is a problem for many. We need Liz to solve the problem once and for all.
9
@JOSEPH this is why you ought to look at Buttigieg’s Medicare for All Who Want It. No heavy-handed moving people from current plans they want to keep.
Bottom line: Warren believes in presidency by executive orders and bypassing congress at every turn.
Surest way to turn us into a communist dictatorship.
5
You have no idea what the word communism means! And if you claim Warren is an authoritarian, please look at Trump. He thinks he’s a king!
22
The lose the swing states, get Trump re-elected Warren check list:
1. Open borders, no border enforcement, those crossing will be advised it is a civil violation, and be given a court date years away, a free lawyer and free health care. Read the 15,000+ word plan. "A Fair and Welcoming Immigration System". It's on her website along with her 53 other plans. CHECK
2. Amnesty for all, now and in the future, for all who settle here. CHECK
3. The give everyone the same healthcare, including the "wrong" people. CHECK
4. Big government, big taxes (it doesn't matter for whom) CHECK
5. Elite east coast professor from Harvard. CHECK
6. Woman, ambitious, assertive. CHECK
7. A liberal's liberal. CHECK
8. Aside from the upend healthcare plan, and the open borders plan, 52 other plans. Which no one except opposition researchers will read. CHECK
18
Definitely the most competent of the candidates. We’ll see if competence means unelectable.
It's unbelievable how the New York Times has been a shill for Warren and her "plans." This newspaper has virtually been re-printing her plans and the spin that comes with them. It has gone all in with her reputation as a policy wonk and the assumption that any policy she throws out is the right one.
So after the Times embarrassed itself, fawning over her prior Medicare-for-All plan, until it became obvious how absurd the plan was (particularly in terms of estimated costs and funding), the same paper is now acting as if she has a new plan that is more realistic. Fine. Except this one is virtually the same thing that several other candidates have been talking about for months including Biden, Klobachur and Buttigieg. You gave little attention to those candidate's plans as they were overshadowed by Warren's bogus one. And now that she's come around to where other candidates have been all along, you give Warren credit for a new and realistic approach.
13
A Socialist Imperialist President! You go, Elizabeth! Anything’s better than a Fascist one in a Capitalist Democracy, I suppose.
1
This is called, study -> think -> options -> Apply (based on collaboration )..
Not a white male ego - which thumps and humps but no results except bully-ism like current GOP leaders.
6
New York Times’ reporting of Warren is extremely biased. In another article published today, it’s noted that healthcare has become a prime issue for Warren even though she has attempted to focus on many others.
Hmmmm...I wonder how that happened.
NYT ownership obviously backs Buttigieg. They hyped him for weeks as he was rising in the polls, which caused him to rise further. Most of the reporting on him here is akin to advertising for him and asks few tough questions...which is utterly lame.
6
@Danielle I also wonder why the NYT's doesn't allow comments on any of the articles written about Buttigieg, which I agree were all positive. I don't recall a single article on him where one could post a comment.
1
@Danielle your comment demonstrates that we each see things through our own lens. I've been frustrated that the NYT doesn’t take Buttigieg more seriously. An example: recently a survey was published that asked whether Biden, Warren, or Sanders had a better chance of beating Trump; no other candidate, including Pete, was included.
While you see the Times causing Buttigieg’s rise in the polls, I see them responding to his rise by covering him like a serious candidate, not a novelty. Chickens and eggs.
Things are heating up, and we are all going to see what we see.
@Danielle Funny, I'm a Buttigieg supporter and I feel the times is far more favorable to Warren. By volume alone there are many more stories about Warren as if Buttigieg is not to being taken seriously. Lately they've given more ink to Bloomberg and Patrick. A recent article focusing on Buttigieg and African American voters whitewashed the homophobia and didn't allow comments to defend him. Are we reading the same NY Times?
1
Since Warren wants to reward illegal aliens with health care or give childcare to people who can't afford kids but have them any, or nitwit who borrowed too money for college but don't want to pay it back let her start a charity. Leave the taxpayer out of it. Warrne is the typical bleeding heart liberal out to save the world. Always on someone else's dime.
12
@Reader In Wash, DC: There is no reason, other than to afford multi-million dollar salaries to health care oligarchs, that health care in this country should bankrupt people. There is no reason that a college education in this country should cost a small fortune, and people should be paying back loans for these educations for the rest of their lives. trump and the republicans have granted huge tax cuts to themselves, and to the very wealthy...on the dimes and the backs of the poor and the middle class.
3
@Reader In Wash, DC
This is exactly the mindset that is destroying our country.
2
Warren will never be president.
16
@RP
Warren will be our next president.
1
These discussions on health care always seem to devolve to abortion rights and transgender stuff. That's all well and good but most of us are dealing with more mundane realities, like cancer and heart disease and auto-immune diseases, the cost of prescriptions (my Synthroid just tripled in price from the manufacturer), the endless copays and deductibles and access to affordable insurance when it's not provided through your workplace. It seems like the people making the plans and talking about what should happen have no idea what many of us live with in terms of healthcare. They can pick up and go to the Mayo Clinic any time they have a problem, with no worries about cost.
8
My unscientific survey of "richer" people I know is that while they are ready to not vote for Trump, they purport to hate Warren. I can only concluded that they remain Republicans in sheeps' clothing: they don't want leaders to think about governing in a way unrelated to their personal aggrandizement, because at base they are really not on board with a government actually governing in the interests of the general population. That is the core of Republicanism today.
8
Sure bud. That's exactly it.
Naivete is not a strategy.
How lucky America is to have Warren. She should use her Executive power to bring in radical changes. The opposition, no doubt, will be vicious. But good visionary people like her can handle it.
Go Madam President Warren.
9
This is a move in the right direction - away from the socialist rhetoric of Sanders and toward a more mainstream approach to healthcare. However, it is not enough to convince me. I saw M4A not as an actual plan but as a dog-whistle against free markets. Since no country in the world outlaws private insurance, it was clear from the get-go that Warren’s plan was is a pure rhetorical ploy to attract Sanders voters who are just as intent on “burning it all down” as Trump’s supporters. Now as she is embracing a pragmatic approach, what am I to make if her? She was either lying then or she is lying now. She is either a socialist pretending to be a capitalist or the other way round. Neither is a good position for a presidential candidate. I think I’ll stick with Mayor Pete.
5
The more you push free health care, the greater of a chance Trump has to win.
7
Win or lose we are already better off by Elizabeth Warren's candidacy. She has provided a road map of doable items for the next Democratic President.
10
Who would have thought that Bernie Sanders has been fighting for this for years, and has a bill in Congress? Not the NYTimes, that's for sure.
4
In other words, she would shore up the ACA in the hopes of a very gradual shift towards Single Payer.
3
It's obvious that this country has a problem with soaring health care costs. We pay three times as much as other countries, with worse outcomes.
Most cruel, we require seniors to spend their final days exhausting all the wealth they managed to accumulate over their long working lives, with nothing to bequeath.
I would much prefer a candidate for president to recognize these problems and develop a plan for ameliorating them than to go all shucks and claim the problems are too complex.
Let's have a president with a vision. Then let's see what Congress can agree to.
5
How will Elizabeth address the issue of red states’ (like Texas) imperative not to participate?
Will Elizabeth make certain that those who are too old for affordable insurance, but too young for Medicare be provided with the opportunity for some kind of coverage?
Why is no Democrat saying: Medicare for all, and (if you are lucky enough to have employer provided coverage), currently insured employees could drop their basic health plans and instead be offered some kind of special, privileged health PLUS private plan that includes things like cosmetic surgery, vanity dentistry, vip status at hospitals, or special doctors and clinics where the upper middles don’t have to mix with those “below their station” at Medicare for all facilities?
The racists and those who don’t understand that a contagiously infected person ahead in the grocery line might be able to get behind an “exclusive” policy like that, where they feel like they are getting something “extra” rather than having their current benefit taken away.
2
You still have about half the country vehemently opposed to Medicare for All.
Those people live here and they vote.
6
The government manufacture needed drugs? I can just see the lawsuits piling up in our courts. Medicare part d needs to negotiate drug prices, especially insulin, inhalers and legacy generics.
4
@Harry B
" Medicare part d needs to negotiate drug prices, especially insulin, inhalers and legacy generics."
How does this help those under the age of 65? Those who are most in need of insulin are Type I diabetics, most often diagnosed in childhood.
And per the article there is already legislation that allows the government to manufacture certain drugs. Did you even read it?
@sharon They started insulin caravans north, (one was led by Bernie) until the Canadains put a stop to it. One does not a need a script to buy it but local inventories were being voided so now you must show your healthcard to prove citizenship. Insulin = $35.00Cdn vs $350.00 US
The Times is trying hard to pump up Warren but Buttigieg clearly has the momentum now. He fine tuned his position on universal heath care months ago while Warren was goaded into driving off a cliff trying to explain the costs of her plan. She gets into the weeds while the majority of voters just access the basics.
7
@FranknVA
Buttigieg's momentum: how long do you expect it to last?
I would say, a couple of weeks; after that, he will join Beto O'Rourke (who remembers Beto O'Rourke now?).
@FranknVA Buttigieg's plan is called "Medicare for Those Who Want It AND CAN AFFORD IT".
There's 28 million uninsured in this country. Healthcare costs have gone up $1 trillion since Obamacare was enacted.
People are still going bankrupt over medical expenses.
2
Warren is addressing concerns that she'll never get anything past Congress. Next she has to address concerns that her party will receive a "shellacking" just like democrats did after Obama rammed through Obamacare.
Face it. Warren lives in a progressive bubble. She has plenty of company. Just not out in the real world.
9
@AACNY President Obama was re-elected after Obamacare was passed. Neither was it “rammed through”. As I recall, there was talk of total non-cooperation, a one-term president. What do you remember?
2
My takeaway from this article is that we need legislative action. Executive orders are temporary, can be reversed by the next president, and can be challenged in court.
To get legislative action, Democrats need to take the Senate. The most vulnerable Republican Senators in 2020 are:
- Gardner (R-CO)
- McSally (R-AZ)
- Tillis (R-NC)
- Collins (R-ME)
- Ernst (R-IA)
7
@MidtownATL let’s not forget the increasingly vulnerable McConnell.
How lucky America is to have Warren. She should use her Executive power to bring in radical changes. The opposition, no doubt, will be vicious. But good visionary people like her must do what they are born for.
Go Madam President Warren.
6
OK Boomer! This is why we are going with Mayor Pete.
6
Ms warren would be better served by looking at the ACA and admitting what works, what doesn't, and coming up with incremental changes that improve health care rather than throwing out everything, including stuff many democrats like all at once. Like the lefts decriminalization of illegal entry, healthcare for illegals and never deporting anybody the democrats are playing into the republican game plan.
3
But she looked, that's why she came up with M4A, because the private insurance are the problem. They have no reason to lower the price of healthcare, and subsidies make them just more greedy.
Warren is the "shovel ready" president we need.
When democrats hit the beaches of Washington, we don't want to have a president that needs on-the-job training.
4
Is this new? Isn't this what Bernie has been saying all along?
2
@DC
Except that Bernie is forthright enough to say that taxes on the middle class will have to go up and he isn't promising net savings.
1
Finally Sen. Warren has released a transition plan on the way to universal healthcare, including things she can do with executive orders.
Now she has to sell this to her impatient followers who unrealistically expect Medicare for all to be adopted overnight, and convince some of those on the right that it will benefit them. You can expect thunderous lies from the Trump campaign that’s it’s just a cover for her true $20 trillion plan. Willfully ignorant right wingers will be hard to convince with something as elementary as the truth and facts.
2
I have yet to hear the other candidates’ detailed plans.
10
@Carrie they are out there. Check their campaign websites.
Love the picture of Elizabeth and the crystal chandelier. Definitely a voice for the “people.”
2
As she herself said, she's "just a player in the game."
True Jayapal/Sanders Medicare for All is the only solution. Allowing the profiteering to continue and the funneling of all the sickest/poorest people onto a public option to bankrupt the public system and "prove it can't work" is insane. Warren needs to stop attempting to triangulate.
And with Biden and Buttigieg: who needs Republicans?
Have some guts, Democrats.
7
I have a plan for that. Don’t like my plan? I have ANOTHER plan for that, and another, and another...
7
I always thought to have backup plan is good, I wish the other candidates do the same. After all their plans are not sure thing in Congress either. Biden should new that. He could not get 'public option' through Democratic Congress. Why he thinks he can do it now? Last time he just gave up and we ended up without public option at all.
The ACA is the epitome of governments inability to function as private companies are required. It’s main architect, Jonathan Gruber took pride in explaining the deceit needed to get the law passed, relying “on the stupidity of the American voter”. Dates of execution of the policy were delayed for years. People lost their doctors, their health care providers, and got anything but affordable. A Medicaid expansion, with exemption allowed to people with pre-existing illness, with a few tweaks would have worked. Unless your subsidized with a low income, or on Medicaid, the coverage is obscene. A young, healthy couple could pay $22,000 a year for coverage, with a $17,000 a year deductible. Deductibles are unaffordable for most getting subsidies. Other than a wellness visit, a yearly breast exam, or an every 5 year colonoscopy, every trip to a doctor is paid out of pocket, drugs included, until you hit your deductible. Got a cold, go to the doctor, get a prescription. Over a hundred bucks. Break a finger, go to an emergency room, $2,500, we can take Visa? If this is how the Affordable Care Act works for those without Medicaid, who in there right mind would give Democrats another chance that is mandatory, and run by same people who dreamed up this plan?
3
@Jay
"The ACA is the epitome of governments inability to function as private companies are required."
Tell that to the Heritage Foundation. It was their idea.
2
Ms. Warren? Isn’t she Senator Warren? She deserves to be called by her proper title.
7
One more reason I’m for Warren 2020. She responds to reality and push back with vision, detail, research, heart. Practical and far-seeing, constantly refining her plans and ideas with teams of intelligent, hard-working people. Imagine daily national leadership like this. She keeps revealing what true ‘greatness’ is. It’s not the combative kaga maga lie, that trickle of poisonous water drooling from a lead-infested pipe. Compare that to the mighty Mississippi of what she’s doing. Thank you team Warren!
6
Great information here. I admire Elizabeth Warren for a lot of reasons. But not for President (at least not this time). I just think she (and Bernie, BTW) is/are too easy a target to be "effectively (albeit untruthfully) misrepresented" by Trump, GOP and $$$ enablers in 2020. Maybe Secretary of Commerce, or Health and Human Services after the dust settles? But first things first. The dust has to settle in the blue corner before any "Who's gonna be in the Cabinet?" discussion. Unfortunately IMO for Ms. Warren and Mr. Sanders, and if I had to bet my two cents, it'd be on any of the four or five more middle of the roaders to eventually prevail. Biden? Buttigieg? Klobuchar? Bloomberg? Some other currently back-in-the-pack'er? Especially given the chaotic alternative, I could enthusiastically support any of them - with really no favorite at the moment.
2
Maybe I missed something, but no public option!!!?
2
@JLR in CT
Congress would have to pass a bill to provide it. She could not do it by herself.
1
There needs to be a differentiation between "Medicare for all" and a single payer national health insurance. Medicare is, and should remain, a health insurance for the elderly. Medicaid should be reserved for the indigent. A national health insurance plan should be reserved for all others, with a federal tax on the actively employed based upon income and family size.
A National Health insurance plan should be able to compete with the companies that offer health insurance, as it would not be strangled by the bureaucratic overhead that for profit insurances create.
6
@Michael
Medicare For All is a single payer system. It would reduce the nearly 1 trillion a year that Americans spend on employee premiums, deductibles, and other medical expenses to near zero, and would be paid for shifting the costs of health care to the wealthy. As a single payer system, it would reduce total health care costs as has been done in other countries with a like system.
What you are proposing is some confusing mesh that you cooked up yourself. Are you prepared to write full legislation of your idea comparable to Medicare FOR ALL ACT.
I think a public option is in there somehow, which some people regard as a magical solution and are clueless what it is and how it will be implemented.
I blame the press on this
2
@Michael sounds like Buttigieg’s plan, Medicare for All Who Want It.
There is no reason what-so-ever that we can't have Medicare for All. It is not a radical idea; it's not radical enough. If it works for people 65 and older, it will work for everyone. Most of the patients I see also have a supplement: not just Part D for Rxs, but an additional supplement to cover what Medicare does not. Often this supplement is through private insurance; sometimes the supplement is through Medicaid.
The primary reason healthcare in the US is often low quality and delivery is chaotic is because of insurance; not just private but public plans. It's a nightmare. Billing for services is absolute agony. Which services are paid by the various insurances is basically capricious dependent upon opaque and complex coding which is often just guesswork. Add in the required EHR (electronic health record) which is an entirely different subject which all clinicians could complain about for hours. EHRs definitely increase the costs of healthcare delivery.
One standard health insurance for everyone, one standard Rx formulary, and voila, we could move on to dealing with important problems. Such as climate change.
16
@Old Hominid
Just for the record, adoption by medical practices of electronic health records was an intervention that was required by the Medicare program - and Medicare paid billions of dollars to doctors and hospitals to install their systems. EHRs were supposed to increase practice efficiency and allow easy sharing of medical histories. Instead, like many government initiatives they ended up adding to doctors' burdens.
2
If Warren wants to address health care for all right out of the gate, she could start with plans to rebuild the EPA. Everyone has a right to clean water to drink, clean air to breathe, and an overall environment that is not laced with poison.
7
@David Warren goes way beyond rebuilding the EPA. In her first 100 days she promises to ban all fossil-fuel drilling on all public lands and waters, including in the Arctic National Refuge.
Warren has a lifetime score of 99 out of 100 by the League of Conservation Voters which tracks Congressional votes on environmental issues. In contrast, Obama had a 67.
Warren has a huge plan on cleaning up areas that have been impacted by pollution. She spoke about it a week ago at the Environmental Justice Forum led by Amy Goodman of Democracy Now. Most other candidates passed over it, but Warren and Booker made it a priority to attend.
It's sad that Warren's fantastic record on the environment is being overshadowed by this health care issue, which seems to be cooked up by the media and other candidates, perhaps to pull her down.
4
There real issue here is environmental responsibility, something that the government and most businesses conveniently ignore.
The issue is not climate change, it is the ravaging of the environment the we as individuals propagate with our greed and overconsumption of resources, and which companies propagate by catering to our personal greed and over consumption.
As Pogo so clearly stated, "we have met the enemy an d he is us".
1
@David , put a tax on sugar. That will cut health problems by 50%. Sugar is at the root of most diseases. especially cancer.
2
Putting together a comprehensive health care coverage is not an easy matter and may require years of effort and many compromises, but it is certainly a needed reform. Warren is right in concentrating on this problem although she may need to review her way of getting there. She should recognize that she will need to reduce its scope and lengthen the time she would need to bring it about. Her executive actions are a good place to start. She would be able to put them into place and show with their success that she know what to do and prove to skeptics that things can get better for many people. Anyhow, she should continue with her campaign whether or not she gets the nomination or get elected. The country needs visionaries in this and in other fields.
8
I'm for it. I'm for it. There are so many inequalities in health care. Study after study shows that poor people have poorer care and a lower life expectancy.
The first order of business should be equality of health care. It should be thought of as a basic civil right. Anyone who lives in the country is basically participating in the life of the country and should be eligible for medicare for all.
Come on people. Doesn't that make perfect sense?
8
@sheila
Absolutely!
I'm with you 100%!
5
I like Elizabeth Warren. But she puts out way too many details in her plans. Details matter when you legislate (which is Congress' job), but they do not matter in the same way in the Executive branch. Vision and broad goals are what matter for a president.
I would rather see her (or any candidate) tell us why we want Medicare for All, rather than telling us how it would be implemented.
1. End medical bankruptcy.
2. Stop using the Emergency Room as a Urgent Care Clinic.
3. Provide American workers the freedom to change jobs, work for a small company, or start a company -- without losing their health insurance.
9
In America we still have the most expensive healthcare in the world. Many other countries provide about the same quality for half the price. Yes, its important to talk about how we pay for healthcare. But we need to talk about how to reduce the cost of all the components of care (not just drugs).
What about:
1. Putting a lid on malpractice suits?
2. Creating sensible "death panels" -- for example, when grandpa is 95, will this $100,000 operation really extend his life for over 2 years? Note -- He is still free to pay for it out of his own pocket.
3. When are we going to ban TV advertising of perscription drugs?
4. etc. etc.
8
@Mark
A ban on TV advertising of prescription drugs - best idea yet! No one talks about it - why?
8
@Mark: Here is a interesting question: Why should 95 year old grandpa's operation cost $100,000? Answer: BECAUSE OF GREED. Why should immunotherapy drugs cost $15,000 per ONE session? (That is the price the government pays, apparently, when one is on Medicare.) So health care oligarchs and big pharma oligarchs can get even richer on the backs of people's suffering and misery? So republicans can get kick backs and donations from these oligarchs, for keeping the suffering, the misery and the astronomical costs exactly as they are, or even make them worse????? Even if the costs were cut in half, the profit would be enormous.
@Karen Powelson
We could start by contacting all of the candidates.
1
It's good to hear that Warren has a backup to take incremental steps toward what I think we all should have eventually: universal health care guaranteed as human right, not a privilege. But that will take some time coming, and considering that health care is about one sixth of our economy, we know that one can't turn such a massive part of GDP on a dime. Incremental change will allow us to see what the unintended consequences of the changes might produce.
I wish that Warren would emphasize her increments rather than her final goal. And I also hope that goal includes a notion that we will never do away entirely with private health insurers as supplemental providers. Almost every country that has government run health care also has a role for private insurers in some capacity or other.
12
@Wiltontraveler
And I also hope that goal includes a notion that we will never do away entirely with private health insurers as supplemental providers. Almost every country that has government run health care also has a role for private insurers in some capacity or other.
I agree and the health care industry should be regulated like utilities.
2
How about allowing Medicare to negotiate for drug prices, particularly specialty drugs? The US government is one of the biggest purchasers of drugs yet cannot negotiate its prices like commercial plans (unless you’re in a special managed plan), leaving tax payers to foot the bill for expensive specialty drugs whose prices increase substantially every year.
9
Well done, Ms Warren! Your list shows you are listening to voters and responding with practical solutions to our healthcare worries.
20
Let's face it, the ACA wasn't all that it was cracked up to be. Otherwise, 18 of the 24 candidates running for president wouldn't have campaigned on fixing our health care system in the first place.
Part of the reason for that is that, like Republicans, Democrats are owned by the health insurance industry.
What Obamacare did primarily was to reduce the uninsured from about 40 million Americans down to about 30 million uninsured Americans, where it is today. And of those 10 million more Americans who have insurance today but didn't have it a decade ago, half of them can't afford it. That's because the one thing Obamacare didn't do that the American people want more than anything is to reduce premiums.
All Trump's done is to eliminate the penalties that Obamacare imposed on these Americans. Democrats plan on re-imposing those penalties, but they have no plans for lowering premiums for anyone.
13
@sthomas1957
Only Bernie and Elisabeth touch the elephant in the room. They do tell us the elephant in the room is the private for-profit insurance industry.
In 2017 the nation spent $3.5 Trillion or 18% of GDP on health care more than twice the average of the developed countries. $1.5 Trillion of that is directly or indirectly financed by the federal government. That is nearly half the total of the nation's health care costs.
Still millions of people have no insurance and many people face bankruptcy in the most expensive health care system.
That is, we now have all the money we need and more, the nation needs to use the available money in a more effective way, starting with the insurance industry.
We need Medicare for all who earn less than say $120K and private insurance for all who can afford it or don't want Medicare for all.
It could be managed by not-for-profit insurance companies, people could purchase additional services if they can afford it.
Health care for all is a service and should not be for the industry and the shareholder's big profit.
8
@ARL
I couldn't agree with you more.
Thank you.
1
@sthomas1957 The first three paragraphs are accurate and I as a believer in the need for health care reform agree with them. The last paragraph is clearly false: ceasing to advertise the Obamacare plans, for example, is just one of his policies that bear his uniquely evil stamp.
3
This is exactly what I thought Warren would do - have a transition period. Why did I think Warren would do this? Because she makes decisions based on facts and focuses on systemic change. There is no practical way to go from private insurance to M4A without piloting the process first. That her plan reflects Mayor Pete's means that smart, practical people can recognize what will work and what won't and can adjust.
Besides, I think it will take between 8 to 16 years of consistent movement toward M4A before we get to a working system of universal non-profit heathcare.
I'm not supporting Warren because I agree with 100% of her plans. I am supporting Warren because she is intelligent, wants to improve the lives of all of the citizens, is capable of listening to wise and experienced people, and sees rooting out corruption as the starting point. Although I'm hoping it will be Warren, I am going to vote blue, no matter who.
68
@Mary Ellen Good thing you don’t care what the candidates stand for.
1
@Jackson: Mary Ellen said: " I'm not supporting Warren because I agree with 100% of her plans. I am supporting Warren because she is intelligent, wants to improve the lives of all of the citizens, is capable of listening to wise and experienced people, and sees rooting out corruption as the starting point. Although I'm hoping it will be Warren, I am going to vote blue, no matter who.starting point. " ~~~~~ Sounds like she cares deeply what a candidate stands for.
1
@Mary Ellen
The plan she released 3 weeks ago was not based on facts. It included lies about revenue streams. It included lies on projected costs. It included assumptions that no reasonable person (expert or otherwise) would accept. Because of the size of the plan, it received scrutiny and it ended up embarrassing her campaign to the point that she is offering this new approach just a few weeks later. If you read many of her other plans you will find many other deceptions. Her rise in the polls was enabled by those deceptions and a free pass from the media. The media has gotten a little tougher, as have the public and the other candidates. Scrutinize any of her other large plans and she'll have to back down on those too.
I have had it with a President using proclamations and signing statements to substitute for actual governance. The constitution is very clear. Trump and Warren both are obligated to make laws by use of constitutionally mandated processes. Not by proclamation. These proclamations and signing statements are not part of the democratic process. I see nothing in the constitution which allows the executive branch to engage in this behavior. If it is the intent of Warren to skip over the niceties of governing and to operate by feat, I am no more interested in her than I have been in trump
12
@jerome stoll
The healthcare industry likes the status quo and they have many highly-paid lobbyists. That is why efforts through the conventional process will never work.
2
@Les If we can take over the conventional process as you call it, the right wing can do that same thing when it is their turn. No Les, it is the conventional process that keeps us safe and secure. Look at what is happening! Trump subverts the conventional processes so that gives us the right to subvert it as well. I can never agree to that.
1
@jerome stoll You are talking about gridlock which is McConnell's key to power. It is also the fundamental tenet of the Tea Party – radical individuals who demonize government – don't believe in paying taxes – are skeptical of science, rarely argue in good faith, and have been largely funded by the Koch and Mercer organizations – the epitome of dark money's influence in politics: Citizen's United (McConnell's lovechild.) Gridlock doesn't do anybody any good. But until Americans wake up and vote politicians like McConnell out of office and demand real reform of our election laws, money in politics, and corruption in government, you will see presidents using executive authority to try to get around Congress.
2
Medicare for all who WANT IT is a winner. And it will evolve in to Medicare for all when people who have been propagandized against the idea begin to see the comparative experiences of their friends and families.
No one likes to forced to take medicine, but everyone wants the good stuff other people have. The people who currently have Medicare wouldn't trade it for much else.
18
In a perfect world, I would support Medicare for all. Having said that, a few things need to be emphasized:
1. As an American living in New Zealand, I am covered under a public/private hybrid with a small co-pays. My medical costs are nothing compared to the US. This system can and does work. I might add that it is also much harder to sue here, so malpractice insurance is not the same issue.
2. I am old enough to remember the Hillarycare debacle. It was Clinton's push to reform healthcare in his first term that ignited the right wingers. It could be argued that the 1994 congressional elections and Gingrich'es rise with the so-called "Contract With America" in part came out of this.
We are still reeling from the unfair, horrendous visceral reaction of the Republicans to this attempt at healthcare reform. Hillary was unjustly vilified and the whole thing was shelved.
The fact that Obama got the ACA passed is nothing short of a miracle. We won a big battle on that one, let's make sure we can continue that war for healtcare for all. If that means taking Buttigieg's or Klobuchar's plan, then fine by me.
15
@Jordan That's the problem it's a market in the US.
1
I am happy that Senator has articulated a very sound plan for public option followed by Medicare for all. For any one who follows the complexities and politics of health care in USA it would be impossible and sure way of failure to expect plan, legislations and implantation of single payer health care system in 100 days or even 2 years. The best hope is that public option will be successful and pave away for single payer as American to go back to polling booths in 2924.
7
@Hoshiar you got the date exactly right there, if it’s left to moderate Dems and Republicans, it will be 900 years from now before M4A is the law here in the USA. And left to the same crowd, there would be no Social Security, Medicare, or Medicaid until maybe that date either. If there are even human beings alive on an environmental catastrophe called Earth.
5
@Robert M. Koretsky
Maybe we moderates are kinda slow.
But very likely you have the choice between a moderate or Trump in the year 2020.
Which will be better for healthcare?
4
@Mark
A moderate establishment candidate will do nothing, he/she will only continue with the same old policies, nothing will change, he/she will not rock the boat.
Since the Great Depression, almost one century ago, the nation has been debating universal health care off and on. Does the nation need another century to do what needs to be done? How backward can the nation get?
2
The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act aka ACA aka Obamacare began as the conservative Republican Party Heritage Foundation free market capitalist alternative to Hillarycare which failed to launch during the Clinton Administration.
Thus there is no public option nor any effective meaningful controls on the costs of premiums, deductibles, pharmaceuticals, medical devices, hospitalizations and treatments.
That was the price paid for Obamacare. Obama was for a robust public option as a candidate and against forcing people to buy healthcare insurance. Ironically that tax aspect of Obamacare was the thin thread that garnered the vote of John Roberts in turning back the 1st challenge to Obamacare.
Barack Hussein Obama was a far more skilled politician than Elizabeth Warren will ever be. Operating with a two- term Electoral College and national popular vote majority that disappeared with a loss of a partisan political majority control of Congress he was barely able to get Obamacare passed.
Using the regulatory process aka executive orders and the administrative process is reversible by a subsequent executive from a different partisan political perspective and is ripe for delay in litigation.
6
Executive orders are reversible if they are not popular, it is much more difficult to dismantle popular orders.
4
@yulia
"Executive orders are reversible if they are not popular,"
Really? DACA is popular and has bipartisan support. Look at what is happening there.
2
@MidtownATL Look what happen there. After 3 years it is still here, and that considering it doesn't touch personally most of Americans. By the way, if it has such bipartisan support why Obama should do it by the executive order?
1
I know a lot of voters are nervous about electing a candidate who espouses bold positions after suffering through these last few years of Trump. I get that. Warren's policy positions are grounded in research though.
Surely not everything will work as proposed but when does that ever happen? We can only try. Some will work, some will not. For those who think Warren/Dems are out to take all their money through taxes...I'm sorry, that's absurd. Why would anybody do that? Create dependency? For what purpose? On whom? Our bipartisan government? Really, what would be the rationale? Striving for government services that work is laudable, not radical by any stretch.
39
@Aaron I agree some people try to make out Warren’s positions as populist. They are nothing of the sort. They are well reasoned, rational and grounded in decent values.
6
Whether or not Warren can make much difference in health care coverage she certainly could make a lot of difference in improving health, which would reduce health care costs, Trump is rolling back numerous environmental regulations that were put in place to improve air and water quality. It would not be an overstatement to say Trump is carrying out a campaign against environmental regulations that will poison America. Air quality and water quality are directly linked to health. Even some of Trump's most extreme white supremacist supporters must be parents with young children and are concerned about their children's health. Democrats should be able to make some inroads with conservative voters by pointing out how increased exposure to toxic substances could affect them and their families. Whether of not people have heath care coverage they are all very concerned about their health and should be increasingly concerned with Trump in office.
16
Wait—so we and our leaders are unable to walk and chew gum at the same time? We can't have a really aspirational vision or goal, but also hedge our bets with a backup to help it along or in case it doesn't work out as quickly or as well as we intended?
That's not lying, flip-flopping, hypocrisy, or pandering: it's called responsive—and responsible—planning. That's what a real leader does: envisions possibilities AND anticipates alternate possibilities to keep moving toward the vision, even if it takes more time or effort, or bumps up against unforeseen contingencies. Ask any CEO about that.
36
@Timothy
Or any scientist! Every successful grant application has a bold vision primary plan, backed up by alternative approaches if things don't turn out exactly as envisioned.
I'm increasingly impressed by Ms. Warren.
9
I am glad Ms. Warren is thinking this way. It emphasizes her flexibility rather than dogmatism.
The things she is proposing are truly valuable services that can help almost everyone without the choice of giving up your own private coverage and are much more likely to be possible under a new democratic administration.
It is sure to disappoint some, but nothing is written in stone and as we debate medical coverage we are stillonly dealing with possibilities.
For me Ms. Warren's new proposals make it much easier for me to support he.
36
@just Robert :_r.
1
Missing from this discussion is the biggest issue: the President should not have this kind of power. Congress has abandoned its duty to govern. I believe they did so in order to avoid making hard decisions. The power of the presidency under the 20th century american administrative state is overwhelming.
Not just in health care--we had one environmental policy under President Obama and a far different one under the current administration. We will almost certainly get another change in 2021. Obama famously used tax regulations to stop cross-border mergers. The list could go on as long as the Federal Register. Where was Congress?
Please don't bother to reply that it was because the Republicans (or the Democrats) refused to negotiate. The problem is much deeper than that. Either party will refuse to negotiate if they think they will take the White House, precisely because the president has so much power.
16
@william hayes
You will see a massive u-turn among democrats if Warren becomes president. Suddenly the Executive will reign supreme, and she will be officially appointed "Queen."
It's all about power. Trump has it now, and they cannot stand it. Give it to a democrat, however, and it's all good.
3
@william hayes
Where was Congress? Raising money for re-election. We the People have not been represented for a long time. Why should Congress care? They have a Cadillac plan.
2
Dental care attached to Medicare would be nice. The problem is that if Medicare won't pay enough to dentists, recipients won't have access to dental care no matter what the government does.
When will the government get power to negotiate prices with the pharmaceutical companies on bulk purchases of drugs for Medicare?
12
@Barbara Steinberg Some senior advantage plans under Medicare do allow you to buy dental, vision and hearing as a supplement. It isn’t. It isn’t very good, but some dentists do accept it.
1
@Vivien Hessel
As a retired physician who accepted medicare despite its low payments, I think a sense of duty helps, but as a universal solution, probably something like higher payments or fewer more generous alternatives will be necessary to make the plans better.
1
@Barbara Steinberg, paying only for the service of cleaning just to get you into the dentist’s chair only for them to corner you with your mouth open and be told of all the other things they could do but directly straight from your pocket. So much about health “insurance” seems like just a hook for dentists and doctors to get their claws into your wallet.
2
Explicit plans are futile when so much depends on passage
by the senate. How about more realistic appeal to day to day
working people who simply need common sense safety in their everyday lives ..which means their living expenses. Warren's "a plan for everything" is now working against her, by emphasizing the fight instead of the more needed assurance.
4
Please read the part about the plans that don’t depend on the senate.
2
Warren's back-up plan is what the Democratic platform should look like in 2020, whoever the candidate is. There should also be a platform to achieve affordable universal coverage for all citizens and legal residents of the United States within 10 years, without commiting to single payer. There are many different ways to get to universal affordable coverage other than single payer--read TR Reid's book about how different countries do it. Single payer as a short-term political goal could cost the Democrats the presidency, and it will make it more difficult to retake the Senate. Health care is the 3rd rail in politics. There are plenty of achieveable short-term goals that can help the Democrats retake the Presidency and the Senate: rebuilding infrastructure; making public college eduation affordable (not necessarily free for all); universal early childhood education; easy adjustments to social security to make it financially sound permanently; restoring our collaborative international relationships with European and Asian democracies; and many others. Single payer health care is a truly bad litmus test for Democratic candidates if retaking the Presidency and the Senate is the goal.
20
Shouldn't we start with definition 'affordable'? Affordable for whom? ACA is supposed to provide affordable healthcare but as many people realized it is not affordable even if you are qualified for subsidies because of deductible. We know that Warren's plan provides affordable care to all. I don't know how affordable healthcare under Biden's or Buttigieg's plans. Just because there is vague 'public option', it doesn't mean that public option is affordable to people. Sure, there could be other ideas beside the single-payer, but, please, describe these ideas in such details as Warren did, that we know the other plans are real plans not just a hook to win nomination
12
@MVonKorff
Just the other day Obama advised common sense, not over the top as the primary strategy. Why can’t candidates hear this? Please put your efforts on getting elected first. No one is reading thousands of pages of proposed policy. If it won’t fit on Twitter it’s too much. You’ve been warned.
2
@yulia Achieving more affordable health care will require lowering drug prices closer to European prices, getting hospitals in urban areas (non-profit and for-profit) to control their prices and costs, simplifying billing and other transfer payments, and changing the incentives within insurance plans to make them price and cost-conscious, rather than focused on making margin. Substantial progress can be made toward these goals expeditiously through incremental steps. Medicare for All will not lower costs without progress on controlling prices and costs. If a non-profit system has similar incentives and transfer payments to what we have today, Medicare for All will not control prices and costs just because it is non-profit. If it were only the evil insurance executives skimming profits off the top, it would be easy. Excess costs and exorbitant prices are baked into all transactions in the US health care system, in the non-profit sector as well as the for-profit sector. Changing this overnight would be difficult and painful, and it is not going to happen politically. People are not dumb. They know that no one can deliver on changing the US health care system overnight without causing big problems, so why should the believe someone who says they are going to do it? Incremental change is more likely to get the job done then promising single payer and then not getting the votes. Ask Ted Kennedy (in the 70's) and Hillary Clinton (in the 90's).
2
Yeah, she has (yet another) plan. As the wannabe National Overachiever in Charge he plans are largely using the very same tools that preserve these programs as political footballs (regulatory changes and executive orders) all of which can, and probably will, be overturned by the next Administration.
We need a leader who can "sell" the ideas to the American public and get the American public to hammer their elected officials to pass and implement the necessary legislation so that it is permanent, not just an executive order fest.
Congress and the Executive are where they are because We-the-People treat the government like a sports team or a reality TV show.
Executive orders are great for short term fixes but the successes have to be translated into legislation. Warren seems to want to perpetuate the Imperial Presidency instead of channeling the will of We-the-People to actually change things.
15
Why? I don't care who deliver affordable healthcare Congress or Executive order, but I do mind wait forever until Congress sold to private interests in
decides it needs to do something.
9
@George N. Wells you write as if Warren is president, and that she wants to maintain/create an imperial presidency when you know very well that the criminal bully in there now is actually acting as if he is already president for life, above the law, and the law unto himself.
So in essence, you are making very good argument to get rid of Trump.
2
Please review the part about the executive orders being the backup plan.
3
First Elizabeth Warren was criticized for going to far left on many of her proposals and now she is being criticized for moderating some of those plans.
The cost of US healthcare are out of control with no relief in sight.
Folks, let's keep our eyes on the prize.
160
@mlb4ever Health care will remain unaffordable until we re-define the system. We need to tackle the underlying causes of Americans' need for medical care - obseity, gun violence, traffic accidents, pollution, poor nutrition, etc. And, then we need to re-assess what we do for people at the end of life. Are we prolonging the agony of a cancer death or are we improving the quality of a life? Same with heart disease. Socialized medicine, in whatever form, triages care differently than we do. Maybe we need to learn from them.
7
@mlb4ever
There's just something about her that they don't like, that people can't admit to... what is it? Definitely it's about genuine political concerns & totally not about her wanting to President while feeeemale. Definitely.
4
@mlb4ever She is only moderating her plan to be more electable.
1
Now I can count the Senator from my other home as my current leading choice for President, joining Mayor Pete as second choice.
Back here in my birth home of New Zealand I have a full appreciation of MFA's benefits and some of its not-so-major shortcomings. I back up the state plan with the leading and virtually-only private provider, Southern Cross Healthcare. Our care is affordable, comprehensive, almost paper-free and easy to use. The dual coverage contrast with our 40 years in the US is blinding.
So yes, MFA for all, despite the potential cataclysmic upheaval to pull it off in the US. However I could never accept Sen. Warren's initial simplistic qualification-free embrace of coverage for all care at no cost. It was a non-starter and disqualified her from consideration.
Now we learn she has a graduated plan over four years to advance MFA. It is extensive, almost exhaustive. I skimmed through it in 10-15 minutes and it is, dare I say, exhaustive. Reading and comprehending will take lots more of my time. I commend it to anyone who ventures to add their two cents to the debate.
Critics dismiss Warren, saying she deliberately trawled for MFA, period, without a backup! Fooey! The level of detail she has now published was long in the making, embracing scholarly research, drafting and refinement. It is an eye-opener!
Remember it is only a plan and subject to skirmish, or voters with a different take. Regardless, it is a vision to take forward and fight and vote for.
64
Warren’s approach is very similar to what FDR did in his first term. In his “First 100 Days” he issued a slew of executive orders, then pushed for major legislative action on Social Security and Unemployment Insurance in his third year, after the mid-term elections.
FDR is Warren's inspiration.
In Warren’s First 100 Days, she will issue an executive order on health care. Her plan provides Medicare coverage for free to individuals who earn less than $25,000 or families who earn less than $50,000. In this way, her plan differs from Buttigieg’s, which is basically “Medicare for Those Who Want It And Can Afford It.”
Her transition plan allows people to buy a Medicare plan if they want it and forces their employers to chip-in to pay for it if they already provide health insurance.
Warren believes that by the third year people will have learned for themselves that Medicare is actually better than their current insurance, and that is why she will push for the broader Medicare-for-All plan at that time.
Medicare-for-All is not an economic problem, but a political one. Hillary Clinton admitted two weeks ago that it is the “right goal.” Al Gore knew it was the right goal back in 2000. The question is: How do we get from A to B politically?
Warren believes people will learn for themselves there is nothing to fear, that under her plan, there is much to gain. And that is how we get from A to B.
123
@Ed
I wish I could recommend your comment 100 times. Spot on.
2
@Ed You’re ignoring the millions who don't want to give up their current insurance.
2
@Ed when they asked her who her hero was, she said Theodore Roosevelt, not FDR. Bernie’s hero is MLK. Now that’s social justice and fairness.
1
Warren and her minders realize that she is losing ground to moderates like Pete.
She has decided to give a little ground in order to take the offensive and try to fool us that she really will permit private health insurance.
She says that she must give in order to get; make believe that you are a moderate, the means justifies the end.
Now she has angered the Bernie-ites who falsely believed that she would stand with their man and push this through regardless of whatever the electorate thinks.
Sanders people have little sense of humor. Warren's people have already planned to get these true believers to support her when Bernie crashes as he already is in the polls.
Now they accuse her of betraying the Revolution.
Sorry, Liz, you can't have it both ways.
We all knew you were a bit desperate and would do anything to take power. Now it is obvious.
Can't wait for next Wednesday debate when Pete, cool as a cucumber, and Amy, a former prosecutor, expose you for the hypocrite you are.
17
@Simon Sez Pete's changed his positions radically from the time he announced and been mostly vague about specifics. Not upset about that? He is the darling of the donor class, however, so perhaps he gets a pass on his slide into the middle after getting all that early attention for his progressive talk.
4
@Simon Sez How exactly could any president "push this through regardless of whatever the electorate thinks."? Senator Sanders talks as if he thinks he can put great pressure on someone like Senator Machcin from West Virginia. Which is just silly. Does Bernie think he can carry West Virginia?
Now Senator Warren has come up with a fall-back plan which would only need 50 votes in the Senate, not the 60 which MFA would need. Which shows that she's thinking. And if there aren't even 50 votes she's got some actions she can take without Congress.
Sounds good to me.
But you respond with churlishness. Come on man, make the case for your preferred candidate, point out the contrasts with other leading candidates. Don't trash your fellow Democrats.
I was unhappy with Senator Warren implying that Vice-President Biden should run as a Republican. I'm hoping she learned her lesson from that. If not she may have lost my vote.
3
@Simon Sez
The MRA faction of Bernie's base was NEVER. EVER. EVER. going to vote for Warren regardless. They're the Bernie/Trump voters & they'll throw a huge fit & do everything they can to spread lies about Warren (now &) after she wins the Primary. And they'll spite vote for Trump & brag about it.
If history has taught us anything imo, re advancements do it slowly but surely.
That is why Hillary failed in the 1990s with her massive health insurance plan.
The greatest example of this failure where the abolitionists who for 80 yrs. could not free the slaves with their break the constitution or even start a war to get it. Lincoln did it slowly but surely and ended slavery in a little over five yrs.
Improve ACA, gradually get a popular system like Canada but don't outlaw all private health insurance systems ASAP and throw the whole system in chaos.
26
@Paul That's not why Hillary "failed." After an initial great showing in the Senate, a Republican neophyte wrote an article which was published, without fact checking, by The New Republic. Said article posited various horrendous outcomes and became the bible of what would happen, picked up by the Republicans and the Insurance Industry, used as a cudgel in the infamous Harry and Louise advertisements and the halls of Congress in an alarming display of cynical dishonesty for the time.
A year after the fact, The New Republic issued an apology for publishing the lies in the first place; too little too late.
2
Yeah, I guess the civil war is now considered 'graduate' approach. Really?
1
@David F Thank you for your reply. You are using the old intellectualization defense.
As mentioned it was too quick and too massive at the time.
Obama learned that lessened and slowly but surely passed ACA which although incomplete will be viewed as the first step towards universal health care in this country.
1
I'm sorry but Warren has become the one Democratic candidate that I will have trouble supporting if nominated. Her continuous pandering and tweaking of her policies in response to the polls tells me that she has more interest in becoming President than she does in actually accomplishing something should she achieve her goal. She is a big disappointment.
17
@TrumpsGOPsucks
Only in this America is thoughtful nuanced considerations, tweaking your plans to envelope more information, considered pandering. Your black and white belief that policy and laws don't require compromise and adaptations. Never mind that the benefit of running a national campaign is to be exposed to many more voices and opinions, to take them in consideration is what every voter who asks a question on the trail wants them to do. This is both Bernie's and Trump's weakness, the only hear themselves and can't change/adapt to new information.
Bernie is admired for purity, as is Trump.
25
@weiowans I actually admire Bernie for his extremely clear and concise argumentation. I don’t care about his purity. That said he’s not my choice for the primary because I think he’s just too old.
I’m probably going to vote for Warren in the primary. I don’t agree with her 100% on everything and I have doubts about how she’ll respond to Trump’s insults but her thoughtful approach and ambitious vision is winning me over. We have so much in our society that needs improvement. We need a champion, like FDR was.
8
The question is, what does not supporting her nomination mean for you: would your disappointment in her be so great that you would vote for Trump or prefer to not vote at all? Is her changing approach worse than what we have right now?
3
This is where her political maturity becomes questionable. First, she promoted Medicare for All to compete against Bernie enterprise which gave a great tax kill propaganda fodder to Trump. Second, it is a pipe dream by all Bernie wannabes. They knew in their heart the impossible probability of making it happen in our current political and legal structure where megabucks rule the election. Trump also promised a lot and delivered Zero. Why would a candidate would knowingly deceive people by pipe dreams? She could earn support from many like me if she was honest and pursued the alternate plan from the beginning which she just proposed.
3
@Rm how would you recommend pivoting on a proposed plan?
The mere fact that she is able to work with feedback from the voters is not dishonesty, it's actually called listening, intelligence, and maturity. I take her pipe dream of MFA as an ultimate goal. Recognizing that it will take many steps to get there, is wisdom.
So she can only earn your support if she would have started without a plan then not really propose a plan, then not really have a plan, but say she has a great plan and you should just trust her plans.
Everyone who has alternate plans like you suggest either faded away for not having a plan, Kamala Harris, Amy Klobachar, Cory Booker.
Or was elected president with both houses of Congress and pushed through a budget busting but, you know, GREAT tax cut plan for the folks who have the best healthcare money can buy.
19
@Rm Warrens political maturity versus trumps? Oh dear.
@Rm
How dare she...try to win? ...adapt policy proposals to reflect the will of the people?
Or is she only allowed to do one, not both?
1
Warren is demonstrating her leadership - if presented with foreseeable roadblocks, she has a plan to get around them while still moving forward.
In contrast, if Biden, Klobuchar, Buttigieg, Patrick, Bloomberg and others were to accomplish half of Warren's backup list, they would claim exhaustion and say they can't do more.
Warren will keep leading toward a universal healthcare plan. If you only take half-steps, you never reach your goal.
More importantly, if you don't know what your goal is, you wander aimlessly.
49
What are any of these people going to do to our bottom line problem in the Individual payer market?!? This market’s offerings have gone from okay to a *financial disaster* for our family in 3 short years. In Minnesota: you Cannot Buy a policy with 100% coinsurance unless you accept a $16,000 deductible. We have to pay 30% coinsurance until we reach our out-of-pocket maximum of $16,000 for our family of 4. We pay $24,000/year in premiums out of pocket. Total= $40,000/year for us this year. We gross $150,000. Then pay taxes and health insurance. What Is The Plan for This?!?
17
@Susan LC
Warren's plan is to allow individuals and families access to Medicare, which is much less expensive than ACA plans.
Most people who think the ACA is great are either not buying the plans, or they qualifiy for subsidies. Those who pay the full price are being gouged, and depleting our savings until we turn 65 and qualify for Medicare.
4
@Susan LC Were at $27,000 for two people at gross $90,000 a year.
4
The Upshot writes: "President Trump was elected in part on a promise to transform the health care system. His efforts to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act have been unsuccessful, as Republicans in the Senate are unable to agree on any one solution."
Yes, Trump did promise a better healthcare system. That was just one of his thousands of lies. But the notion that the Republicans have been "unable" to "replace" the ACA has nothing to do with their inability to "agree on any one solution." In fact, they have offered no solutions, and have never even attempted to put together a viable alternative. And there's a good reason for it.
A working national healthcare system would, by definition, sharply reduce the profits of the for-profit insurance companies, the massive hospital systems, and the obscenely profitable drug makers. And the GOP has put profit over the health of the American people for decades.
Keep in mind that the GOP opposed the creation of Medicare, opposed universal healthcare many times, and opposed the ACA.
The GOP has no interest in "replacing" the ACA, only destroying it. We should be crystal clear about that point.
189
@Sean Thank you for hitting the nail squarely on its head.
8
@Sean
Health care & opportunity for a college education are also carrots the military uses to lure young poor people into a several year commitment to military service knowing that they may die doing it.
If you don't have to risk your life to access college or health care anymore, recruiting is going to get even harder.
Especially since apparently war crimes are back on the menu wherever the US is deployed. And we're all fat. And addicted. And use Texas chosen text books to educate our kids.
Recruitment is getting harder so we're all just going to have to accept an ever reducing quality of life for more & more people so we can meet the recruiter's goals.
:/
2
Ms Sanger-Katz writes: "(Trump's) efforts to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act have been unsuccessful, as Republicans in the Senate are unable to agree on any one solution."
Seriously? The Republicans have had ten years to come up with an alternative to the ACA, and Trump has had more than three years to come up with a replacement of his own. Not a single plan has been seriously proposed. And there's a reason for that.
In order to better the ACA, a national healthcare plan needs to control costs through the use of government bargaining, enroll most if not all residents in order to spread the cost of seriously ill patients and keep costs low to everyone, and eliminate for-profit insurance companies. And that is all required because that is the experience of every developed nation on the planet.
But since Republicans refuse to rein in drug companies by using the power of the government to negotiate far lower prices, refuses to reduce major hospital group profits by capping prices for procedures, and, most of all, refuses to eliminate for-profit insurance companies, opting for unrestrained profits over the health of the American people, they propose nothing.
So contrary to the assertion in this Upshot column, there have been no "efforts" by Trump or the Republicans to "replace" the ACA. All we've seen, and scores of times, is Republican efforts to eliminate the ACA, and return to unrestrained for-profit medicine.
40
Good for you, Elizabeth. I was assuming, given your practical problem-solving approach to big problems, that you would have a back-up plan for your health care goals if Congress wouldn't act.
Now people can take comfort in knowing what that would be. and it's a good plan, laid out in clear terms.
If you keep spelling out your plans, you'll bring more and more people on board with your vision. You can do it! Keep showing us how. Nothing can be taken for granted in this high-stakes election!
C'mon people, get off the fence. Elizabeth is the best candidate. Let's show her our support and get her elected!
America is in dire need of an honest, educated, caring leader who can unify our country behind common goals. Let's give her the chance to help us heal and move on.
111
@may
Elizabeth Warren is not a healer. She's a fighter. She's belligerent, disagreeable, unwilling to compromise, and unable to form coalitions. That's why I will not vote for her.
@Mimi
Our next president will help us heal by putting country before self. Picture the opposite of the current administration.
Elizabeth will get it right if she gets the chance. She is a decent, sincere, capable individual, and she's ready to work hard to change things for the better.
If you don't think it takes a fighter to get elected president as a woman in today's America, try it yourself.
2
Medicare For All is DOA. Despite my support for government health assistance for those who can’t afford it, I am dubious of supporting an additional federal benefit that will just be funded by blue states and be weaponized at the earliest opportunity against us.
We’ve been down this road far too many times. We will end up taxing our citizens to support a program that will probably deny us the ability to spend those dollars on our health priorities. We will pay to let the Trumpster preacher mob dictate our health policies. No Way!
2
@Jazz Paw three red stats just elected blue governors. Kansas And Wisconsin now have blue governors. The tides are changing. We don’t need a blue wave, just steady advances of progressive ideas that benefit the people
1
@Jazz Paw You appear all too ready to surrender to a Trumpster preacher mob. Buck up, they are a minority, one that is oh so slowly shrinking.
By your logic we should abolish Medicare and Social Security. "Just be funded by blue states"?! The stupidity of that statement would do a Trumpster proud!
I have no idea what your "health priorities" are. My medical priorities are being well taken care of by Medicare
2
In addition to details of the Warren's health plan, this article does an excellent journalistic service to dispel the myth being peddled by the billionaires like Gate and others appearing on CNBC that a Warren's presidency, especially with her wealth's tax, would be a disaster to the economy and the market. Why do they, the billionaires, just focus on Warren's wealth's tax? (And shame on the CNBC's anchors for asking only questions related to wealth and let the billionaires got away with false and not fact-based answers.) Because they care for nothing else except for preserving and expanding their wealth. Warren is the only presidential candidate who is courageous and smart enough to tackle the issues vital to the middle, lower and poor Americans. She is unafraid, unlike Biden, Obama, Clinton and others, to take on the entrench interests that for generations have enriched themselves on the back of working Americans.
17
What most of the commenters are ignoring IMHO is that Warrens original plan was strategic to allow her to establish herself as the leading progressive candidate by draining off some of Bernie Sander's support. Mission accomplished. Now she is showing that she is flexible enough to deal with the reality that Medicare for all is not likely to be doable on Day One and may not be doable at all. Presidents have to be flexible enough to not make the perfect the enemy of the good, as President Obama did in accepting the ACA as the best that could be done at the time even though it did not include a public option because key senators e.g. Joe Lieberman, were determined to protect the Conn. insurance industry. As a Warren supporter, I have had numerous conversations with friends who feared she would be pigeonholed as too far left, and my response has been either she would solve this problem by coming up with an answer to the Medicare for all problem or she wouldn't and would fail in her quest to get to the nomination. As for Mayor Pete, sorry I can't spell his last name. A small town mayor (Did he get 8,000 votes?) is not going to get the nomination. Let him win a governor's race or a Senate race and come back with some real accomplishments in 8 or 12 years!
41
@A Joseph Senator Warren, who is so experienced, has now actually come to the side of Mayor Pete Buttigieg, after she belittled her fellow candidates for their pragmatic proposals for achieving universal affordable healthcare; and after she put out a misleading plan (grossly underestimated cost) to pay for her initial promise of Medicare For All banning private options. At slightly over half her age, Mr. Buttigieg has already surpassed her in understanding issues and offering pragmatic policies. This, no doubt, has something to do with having been a mayor who has to get things done and meets the needs of his constituents. I supported Senator's Warren's bid to the Senate. She is a principled person with a big heart, and would be fantastic as an administrator for a Federal regulatory agency. Unfortunately Senator Warren, with her narrow frame of reference and one track mind, coupled with superb ability to alienate even people who agree with her in principle, would not be able to form the necessary political coalition to move this country forward. Mr Buttigieg has the best temperament, intellect, and governing experience to bring fundamental changes to this country. His proposals on healthcare, rural development, racial justice, etc. set him apart from other candidates - Mr. Buttigieg governs, whereas most others legislate.
10
@A Joseph
"What most of the commenters are ignoring IMHO is that Warrens original plan was strategic to allow her to establish herself as the leading progressive candidate by draining off some of Bernie Sander's support. Mission accomplished. Now she is showing that she is flexible enough..."
In other words, she lied to gain political advantage.
10
Harsh words. She is doing what she needs to do to fulfill the bigger goal of healthcare for all. I remember Obama changing his positions too over time on other issues like gay rights. We didn’t call him a liar.
28
This article should have been titled, "Warren Caves to Reality." Warren is now basically admitting that her original "Medicare for All" plan (in addition to being feared by many who get insurance through their employment) is unaffordable and will never pass Congress. So now she's proposing a plan pretty much the same as the Medicare for All Who Want It plan that Buttigieg's been proposing all along.
Of course, Warren also claims she's going to introduce her original plan in her third year. Yeah, right -- the year right after the midterms, when your opponent is probably going to gain seats, is the ideal time to introduce controversial legislation you didn't know how to pay for earlier.
So now that there's basically no difference between Buttigieg's and Warren's healthcare plans, why would anyone choose Warren? Wouldn't it be better to support the young, intelligent, charismatic candidate with roots in the rust-belt states we need to win and who proposed Medicare for All Who Want It in the first place, rather than the divisive, geriatric candidate who's essentially copycatting that plan?
Also, doing health care by executive order and regulation has a fatal problem, which you can see in the fate of DACA, the Paris Climate Agreement, and the Iran nuclear deal. We live in a country where the White House changes parties every 8 years. Something done by a Democrat's executive order can be undone instantly by a Republican's executive order. A LAW is much more durable.
12
@Chris NYC Warren called Buttigieg's plan in the last debate "Medicare for Those Who Can Afford It". His plan does not address the problem of affordability, only choice - you can have it if you want it AND can afford it.
Warren's transition plan provides Medicare coverage for free for individuals who earn less than $25,000 and families who earn less than $50,000.
Her transition plan also allows employees to buy a Medicare plan if they want it, and forces companies to pay Medicare what it otherwise would have paid to insure that employee through its company plan.
In the third year, after people have experienced the advantages of Medicare, she will push for her Medicare-for-All plan.
This is very similar to what FDR did in his first term - he used executive action to implement major policies in his first 100 days, and then pushed for major legislative action in the third year.
FDR is Warren's inspiration.
21
@Chris NYC
I love Mayor Pete and think he would be a good president but do you think America is ready for a Gay president?
He won't get most religious people, he won't get African American vote, he won't get millions of homophobic voters.
I really like the guy but just don't feel he could beat Trump.
Ignore anything I just wrote here if these hearings continue to destroy Trump and if 20 Republicans vote yes on impeachment.
5
@Charles alexander
We only reinforce homophobia by catering to it.
He has broad appeal.
Did this pivot to the middle have to do with concerns from Democratic insiders that Warren’s health plan was too extreme to appeal to more moderate voters? So much concern that we are getting new candidates like Bloomberg and Patrick who are more centrist? Or does she really think this smaller plan is better?
4
@Lark - perhaps its a bow to the reality that the giant changes actually need majorities in the House and Senate to actually become the law of the land. Last time I checked, McConnell's leading (forgive use of the word) the Senate because there are more Republicans there.
I'm happy to see a candidate plan on reality as well as on programs that might inspire the base, but have pretty low likelihood of becoming reality in what gives all signs of being a closely contested election.
And don't forget, the Dems won the popular vote last time, but need to win in the swing states to take the Presidency out of the hands of someone who is using it so badly. He might win. Preventing that is the key to any Democratic policy initiatives, and it won't be done with just the progressive wing of the party. Remember, please, that 40% of voters are not members of either party.
12
If Senator Warren focuses on this new plan, which indeed should not be a backup one but rather her "must do," she will definitely have my vote and that of many of our more moderate Democrats. Although to be honest, she has been and remains my first choice. However, my fear was that her Medicare for All vision would be too much, too soon for our present electorate. Even though I would like to see a single-payer system..eventually, it is simply not a reality for our present social and political paradigm. What she is doing is probably what a real president, Barack Obama, intended back almost ten years ago when the ACA became law: That is that his vision was and is meant to be built upon. There is room for improvement as the above's administration knew, but this nation had to start somewhere. And Obamacare planted the seed to be nourished for universal health care.
94
It is better late than never that Senator Warren finally understands and appreciates the challenges facing Medicare For All while banning private option. Her journey to this point, however, sheds light on the failure of her leadership style. She belittled other candidates when they advocated pragmatic approaches to achieving universal affordable healthcare. I supported her bid to the Senate. She is a principled person with a big heart, and would be fantastic as an administrator for a Federal regulatory agency. Unfortunately Senator Warren, with her narrow frame of reference and one track mind, coupled with superb ability to alienate even people who agree with her in principle, would not be able to form the necessary political coalition to move this country forward.
5
Another strong move from Warren, addressing the next criticism - that she would be challenged to act if Democrats don't control the Senate. The first proposal to strengthen Obamacare is a winner, and for insurance companies too. But they won't like where this is ultimately going. Pharma wont like it either but everyone has them in their sights. Next Warren will have to answer the questions around future job destruction. But at least the unemployed health insurance workers will have free healthcare.
14
@shyamela But what does she really stand for? Changing policies based on poll numbers means that she only stands for Elizabeth Warren, and nothing else.
11
@TrumpsGOPsucks Exactly.
Most politicians, including Bernie, do too.
People buy into the smiling face and attitude and think they are the best.
Most politicians are like car salesmen and should be seen as such no matter how they seem to be.
Some may have gotten into politics to actually get things done, but when they get in realize it's not that easy and many times end up just doing things for themselves.
Though even the well intentioned ones didn't go into politics because of poor pay and benefits either.
1
@TrumpsGOPsucks Getting things done. Considering how difficult getting ACA passed at all, I have very little hope that anyone could get M4A passed (however desirable that may be) and am very pleased by this new plan.
I very much doubt Warren has forgotten her work on debt and the role medical costs played in how many Americans went bankrupt. I don't think her values or goals have changed. This new plan seems to me a practical compromise.
34
Warren’s transition plan alone is more thoughtful, detailed and practical than some of the details we’ve heard from the other 2020 candidates.
Warren has been dogged by questions and details from the media that haven’t been asked for the others.
Let’s give the same scrutiny to the men who feel entitled to run for office.
For instance, the mayor from the 501st largest town in America gave a list of 400 African Americans who he claimed supported his Douglass Plan - when more than half were white... Of those who weren’t, many were shocked to learn they had endorsed his plan - when they clearly hadn’t (apparently he’d pioneered the use of the opt-out endorsement where people were given a limited time to opt out...!)
What’s the media doing? Still Riding on his bus...?
71
@Patrician The media indeed has failed. The Buttigieg's campaign touted supports for his Douglass Plan from more than 400 South Carolinians. They never claim "more than 400 African Americans," nor did they claim endorsement for the candidate himself - the endorsement was for the Douglass Plan. Whether Mr. Buttigieg is the eventual nominee, his Douglass plan is an important contribution to providing a blue print for realizing racial justice. Mr. Buttigieg has been an invaluable voice in the democratic primary, and has been attacked baselessly and mercilessly by extreme left wing media such as the Young Turks, and groups such as Justice Democrats. Yet, Mr. Buttigieg remains focusing on policies, and never engages in personal attacks.
6
@Patrician Indeed the media has failed in this instance. The Intercept's report misrepresented the claim from Mr Buttigieg's campaign. His campaign touted support from more than 400 South Carolinians, not African Americans as alleged by the Intercept. The endorsement is for the Douglas Plan, not the candidate himself. Mr. Buttigieg may be a long shot candidate, but his voice and vision have been invaluable to this democratic primary conversation about the future of this nation.
9
@Patrician
It appears that Warren is making s big pivot towards the plans of other candidates she ridiculed for having “small ideas.” I think she loses a lot of credibility for that.
3
This is both savvy and honest. She's not telling her primary voters that they will get everything they want on day one. Rather, she's telling them that she's in it for the long game, and that there is a lot of ground to cover between what we have now and the promised land of Medicare-For-All.
What should be lost on no one is that she is better equipped than anyone running to turn things in the right direction.
237
@Cmaize After touting having a plan for everything, belittling other candidates for advocating pragmatic approaches to achieving universal affordable healthcare, and putting out a misleading plan (grossly underestimated cost) to pay for her initial promise of Medicare For All banning private options, her present move may be honest, but hardly savvy. Indeed, this is a good example of her poor leadership style. At slightly over half her age, Mr. Buttigieg has already surpassed her in understanding issues and offering pragmatic policies. This, no doubt, has something to do with having been a mayor who has to get things done and meets the needs of his constituents.
5
I applaud Warren’s effort however the plan sounds like the Medicare for All Who Wants It Plan offered by other Democratic presidential candidates.
11
@Don P Nothing wrong with that. The difference between Warren and those other candidates is that they will tout their success as a complete victory, while she'll keep pushing for next steps until the real goal is achieved.
60
@Don P In the last debate, Warren called Buttigieg's plan "Medicare for All Who Can Afford It". Why? There are people who can't afford to buy a Medicare policy. Her plan offers health coverage for free for individuals with income below $25,000 or families below $50,000.
There are 28 million uninsured in this country because insurance is too expensive. Healthcare costs are up $1 trillion since Obamacare was enacted.
Warren’s transition plan is great news for entrepreneurs: people with creative ideas or ambition will be able to quit their jobs now to launch their own business without the fear of not having health insurance.
Warren’s transition plan also allows all employees to buy a Medicare plan and forces employers to contribute their share to the purchase of the policy. I would suggest to all M4A activists to immediately buy a Medicare plan when Warren makes it available.
51
@Don P “the most lifelike android that Democratic consultants have ever manufactured.”
@Don P In the last debate, Warren called Buttigieg's plan "Medicare for All Who Can Afford It". Why? There are people who can't afford to buy a Medicare policy. Her plan offers health coverage for free for individuals with income below $25,000 or families below $50,000.
There are 28 million uninsured in this country because insurance is too expensive. Healthcare costs are up $1 trillion since Obamacare was enacted.
Warren’s transition plan is great news for entrepreneurs: people with creative ideas or ambition will be able to quit their jobs now to launch their own business without the fear of not having health insurance.
Warren’s transition plan also allows all employees to buy a Medicare plan and forces employers to contribute their share to the purchase of the policy. I would suggest to all M4A activists to immediately buy a Medicare plan when Warren makes it available.
9
Excellent. I've agreed with Ms. Warren's dream plan for Medicare for all but believe it was pie in the sky. Not only was it doubtful that she could get elected on it, it is doubtful that she could get it past the Senate even with a Democrat majority. This backup plan in its breath and detail gives her and all the Democrat candidates some realistic meat to chew on that can dispel the snowflake charge. And it suggests a path to the center in the general election that Sen. Warren can take that will increase her electability.
176
@Susie I definitely have some concerns about Sen. Warren, but there's one thing she has that Pete Buttigieg doesn't: a clear understanding of the degree to which Wall Street has become a liability to the American economy and needs to be reined in. She has the expertise and the will to fight that battle.
On the other hand, the country also needs a healer, and she has shown that she is not that. I'm frankly still undecided.
2
@ScottLB Certainly Senator Warren has been a top critic of the Wall Street. But Mr. Buttigieg has spoken plenty about economic equity, and the plight of those left behind in the rust belt and rural area. His healthcare plan shows his willingness to aggressively regulate industries (e.g. seizing patents and steep tax to force pharmaceutical companies to negotiate price).
5
@Dan - Agree, we need to accept the reality of the Senate/House in changing the laws.
2
I have not liked most of the changes Trump has made by Presidential fiat First, most of them are bad for the health of the people of this nation. Second, some of them usurp the prerogatives of Congress.
Warren's back-up plan includes improvements to health care. There are parts that simply undo Trump's usurpations and that's good. Others use options that the President has but which have never or seldom been used before. Those are, depending on the definition of "public health emergency", likely legal but I do not think that they are all the best way to proceed. And a few, particularly those that involve spending federal dollars without the consent of Congress, are, even if they improve health, unconstitutional and to be opposed.
I do not want Trump acting as an Imperial President. Nor do I want Warren continuing that tradition. It prepares the nation for tyranny, even if her intentions are good.
12
@Marvant Duhon
I don't want a Queen Warren, either. It is up to citizens and Congress to pass legislation to shore up our democratic process -- we have relied far too much on "norms," which Dirty Donnie refuses to acknowledge. For example, each major Presidential candidate MUST provide at least 10 years' worth of tax returns. The Executive Branch has been gaining far too much power over the past decades, primarily as the result of Congress failing to do its job.
If I were in charge, my first priority would be to restore democracy in this country. Shore up voting rights, stop gerrymandering, overturn Citizens United, etc.
8
This plan demonstrates that she is willing to be flexible and compromise.
Equally as important, she will be focused on improving the lives of the average American--whatever it takes.
She will hit the ground running.
277
@Hope Senator Warren "is willing to be flexible" after putting out a misleading plan (gross underestimate of cost) to pay for her Medicare For All banning private options, without middle class tax hike. Her journey to this point, however, sheds light on the failure of her leadership style. She belittled other candidates when they advocated pragmatic approaches to achieving universal affordable healthcare. I supported her bid to the Senate. She is a principled person with a big heart, and would be fantastic as an administrator for a Federal regulatory agency. Unfortunately Senator Warren, with her narrow frame of reference and one track mind, coupled with superb ability to alienate even people who agree with her in principle, would not be able to form the necessary political coalition to move this country forward.
12
@Hope
But it looks bad for Warren’s credibility now since she berated other candidates for not having the same big ideas she had before this pivot.
6
@Susie I doubt anyone other than people voting in their first election in 2020 think Warren is going to accomplish everything she wants. We know that she will be flexible. Everyone is flexible when they get into office.
The problem is that the other candidates started flexing before there was any sign of opposition. If Joe Biden and Pete Buttigieg are willing to give away all the progressive goals in the primary then what are they going to give away when they face Republican opposition? If you want a public option then you need to start with Medicare for All so you have something to give away.
If you want another Republican presidency then vote for Biden or Buttigieg. Either of them winning would be no better than a generic Republican winning. If you want a chance at anything getting accomplished then you have to vote for Warren or Sanders.
15
This article brings up an excellent point - the grandiose plans that get all the headlines are not what is typically enacted. The regulatory powers of a president are immense because the laws Congress passes are so broad (ie: poorly written) that the executive branch needs to provide detailed regulations to enforce them. Which means the Executive branch can change those regulations at will.
We have certainly seen both Obama and Trump do this and they will certainly not be the last.
The list of things Warren would do in the regulatory arena for me are far more palatable than her medicare for all proposal. But these would surely increase our national debt, which does worry me.
14
@deedubs
Grandiose plans? That's what universal single-payer healthcare is? Or could we point out that every single developed country on the planet has already- indeed, decades ago- implemented universal government-guaranteed healthcare?
This is by no stretch of the imagination "grandiose," but indeed just America moving into the late 10th century.
Not rocket science. Not grandiose. Just everyday universal healthcare that works, and works extremely well, everywhere else on the planet.
13
@deedubs I know that this article didn't detail how she would get it funded, but it it does reference how she planned to fund M4A as a way to imply that Warren absolutely has a plan for that.
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@deedubs Plans are ideas and not legislation. Presidents can sign approved legislation from the House and Senate along with the House Budget to pay for it. A Presidential Proclamation is worth less than the paper to write it up. It's the only thing saving us from Donald Trump and even at that he gets away with much. He did not deconstruct Obamacare - because he didn't know how!
All these complex plans with even the plans to pay for them are worthless without building the consensus to make it happen. That is the hard work and that is the skill i want to see in the person I vote for in any office.