What Happened at the Health Forum?

To the Editor:



Pete Ryan
Re “Health Meeting Fails to Bridge Partisan Rift” (front page, Feb. 26):

I was riveted to my seat for seven hours during President Obama’s health care forum on Thursday. What I saw was a masterful leader trying, with some success, to herd cats toward the goal of solving the huge health care problem this country faces.

Unfortunately, the president faced an opposition party stuck on the mantra “scrap the plan and start over with incremental changes.” He repeatedly demonstrated how this approach would lead to worsening health care and even larger budget problems in the future.

It became clear to me that, sadly, the Republican Party’s strategy is not to offer any viable alternative but to defeat this president at any cost. One wonders why.

Harry Lockwood
Newton, Mass., Feb. 26, 2010

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To the Editor:

I watched the health care summit meeting in utter fascination and came to the conclusion that this critical issue is no longer resolvable through bipartisan efforts.

What Congress believes is the right way to resolve this complex debate is immaterial; that’s politics, and this is about leadership.

President Obama must now do what he believes is the right thing to do for the American people. Right doesn’t necessarily mean perfect. It doesn’t necessarily mean popular. It doesn’t even necessarily even mean right as judged by history. It simply means right in his estimation at this time, under these circumstances.

That’s what we Americans have come to expect from our presidents; we elect them to do what’s right (in their estimation) for us.

If in the end people are dissatisfied with the decision he makes, with the results of this initiative, then go ahead and vote him out at the next election and give someone else a chance to do it better; that’s the way the system works.

But great leaders do something that puts them above everyone else — they lead.

Bob Falcey
Skillman, N.J., Feb. 26, 2010

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To the Editor:

Disappointed, yes; surprised, no. The Republican Party opposed the Social Security and Medicare programs from their birth.

For decades, the Republican Party has pursued a strategy of building up deficits by cutting taxes, howling at attempts to increase revenues in order to undermine, if not kill, both programs.

The Republican arguments (and philosophy behind the arguments) against the proposed Democratic health initiative can easily be used against the existing Social Security and Medicare programs. It is not surprising that, in fact, these same arguments were actually used in 1935 against Social Security and again in 1965 against Medicare.

The president is committed to a collegial, bipartisan approach. Democrats at large have no such problem. They should focus the electorate on the Republican permanent opposition to the very principles behind these two successful programs that are at the heart of a healthy and functioning democracy.

Charles J. Zwick
Peter A. Lewis
New York, Feb. 26, 2010

The writers are, respectively, the former director and assistant director of the Bureau of the Budget (now O.M.B.) in the Johnson administration.

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To the Editor:

Distinguished leaders went round and round on Thursday debating the problems of delivering and paying for health care for the American people without finding actionable agreement. Not one mentioned a simple known model to cut costs dramatically and deliver care efficiently to everyone — Medicare for all.

No one dared to recommend this common-sense way to extract the poisons of useless costs and unnecessary complexity from the system.

Connell J. Maguire
Riviera Beach, Fla., Feb. 26, 2010

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To the Editor:

Here’s an argument not expressed on Thursday that should give free-market Republicans pause: A lack of affordable individual plans that cover all pre-existing conditions is preventing potential entrepreneurs from striking out on their own to bring a creative new idea or business to market. Instead, they are chained to their present jobs for fear of losing insurance for themselves and their families.

Current health insurance policies are actually stifling what has made this country a financial powerhouse in the past — the possibility that anyone can make it to the top if he or she is smart and works hard enough.

Pamela D. Crooks
La Mesa, Calif., Feb. 26, 2010

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To the Editor:

Isn’t the real meaning of the health care summit meeting that we have a president who can debate extemporaneously for seven hours on policy substance?

I think that President Obama won in the short and long run because the difference between him and the previous president is so obvious.

Charlie Spiegel
San Francisco, Feb. 26, 2010

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To the Editor:

Re “Not as Dull as Expected!,” by David Brooks, and “Afflicting the Afflicted,” by Paul Krugman (columns, Feb. 26):

Here is a brief summary of Mr. Brooks’s and Mr. Krugman’s points of view on Senator Lamar Alexander’s presentation of the Republicans’ arguments against President Obama’s health reform plan:

Mr. Brooks praised Senator Alexander’s ability to lead the way “genially and intelligently.” Mr. Krugman pointed out Senator Alexander’s shocking “fibs” on both the cost of premiums and the process of reconciliation, which Senator Alexander claimed had “never been used for something like this.” (Mr. Krugman noted that President George W. Bush had used it twice for tax cuts.)

Methinks that verity is in the ear of the listener.

Carol Schlesinger
Livingston, N.J., Feb. 26, 2010

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To the Editor:

As I read Paul Krugman’s and David Brooks’s dueling Feb. 26 columns about the health care summit meeting, my faith in the ability of two people looking at the same set of facts and reaching diametrically opposed conclusions has been reinforced.

Orin Hollander
Jamison, Pa., Feb. 26, 2010

Health Care Reform

History shows that even modest cost-cutting has a significant impact over time and that inaction has a cost. The longer we wait to address the underlying problems in the U.S. health care system, the more health spending will continue on its rapid rise and the more drastic the measures that will be required to right our economy and our federal budget. Congress is right to move ahead. After 50 years of spiraling health care costs and the resulting price paid by American families, business, and government, we can no longer afford to postpone health reform.

Medicare and the Elderly

President Obama hopes to finance a health care overhaul in part by squeezing hundreds of billions of dollars in savings from Medicare through a crackdown on fraud and waste. An oft-cited example: Medicare Advantage, run by private insurers reimbursed by Medicare, costs the government 14 percent more per enrollee than traditional Medicare.

Republicans claim that Democrats will ultimately be forced to reduce Medicare benefits to seniors in order to finance health care for more citizens. Are the elderly being asked to shoulder the burden for universal coverage? Should Medicare, or something like it, be available to an even greater number of Americans?

10 year Health Care Plan

President Barack Obama is putting forward a nearly $1 trillion, 10-year health care plan that would allow the government to deny or roll back egregious insurance premium increases that infuriated consumers.

Posted Monday morning on the White House Web site, the plan would provide coverage to more than 31 million Americans now uninsured without adding to the federal deficit.

It conspicuously omits a government insurance plan sought by liberals.

But it's uncertain that such an ambitions plan can pass, since Republicans are virtually all opposed and some Democrats who last year supported sweeping health care changes are having second thoughts. After a year in pursuit of his top domestic priority, Obama may have to settle for a modest fallback.