Tuesday, January 27, 2009

not cool, obama. not cool

Look...I get that Obama's trying to reach across the aisle and all that jazz, but are Dems going to cave in every time the GOP gets their briefs in a twist?

The stimulus package proposed in the House wasn't going to pay for contraception!

From the actual text of the Act's summary:

State Option to Cover Family Planning Services. Under current law, the Secretary has the authority under section 1115 of the Social Security Act to grant waivers to states to allow them to cover family planning services and supplies to low-income women who are not otherwise eligible for Medicaid. The bill would give states the option to provide such coverage without obtaining a waiver. States could continue to use the existing waiver authority if they preferred.

So, if states want to participate in this option, they will not have to be subject to loads of red tape (the current waiver process is lengthy apparently) and administrative costs. Yeah, OMG...cutting costs and reducing wasteful spending is such a bad thing.

It's literally a small part of the bigger health care package included in the stimulus, but the GOP was up in arms over this?

Someone please explain to me why Obama and Pelosi caved in on this. Don't the Dems have a majority in both chambers? Why are we taking the GOP's criticism to heart when they didn't give a damn about Dems' interests over the last 8 years? Did we cave in because provisions regarding women's health are going to be part of some larger health care reform package that is TBA? If the answer to that is yes, then that's the only way I can be ok with this.

Talk me down, peeps!

Source: LA Times

UPDATE: a nice easy-to-read summary of the entire bill can be found here.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...
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Capitol Hill 20210 said...

I think this stimulus package is a joke, he gave a boatload to the arts. I totally agree with this post.

an orange county girl said...

mberenis: sorry, but i don't appreciate spam on my blog (not like you'll be coming back or anything...).

zipcode: well, if you are referring to the provision restoring our national monuments and to save the smithsonian...i maybe agree with you. also, a boatload is only $50 million (ONLY!) which is small compared to the other items in the bill.

honestly, i question the ability of the bill to provide jobs for all of those millions of people who are unemployed out there. however, i can appreciate the expansion of health care coverage for the unemployed with the COBRA and medicaid provisions.

i believe the narrative of the bill states that this is only a start. and that's exactly what the bill looks like to me--a beginning, but not the solution.

Anonymous said...

I too have a problem with stripping that provision specifically, and the Obama administrations seeming overly eager to capitulate to the right generally.

Oh and regarding arts funding, it can never be defended to those who think it needs defending.

an orange county girl said...

RR: i'm trying to be patient with the obama administration. after all, it's only been a week and there's a huge ass mess to clean up. however, it PISSES me off that women's health (particularly low income women) can be so dispensable.

regarding the arts, yeah, it's really not a significant portion of the entire pot and, considering the smithsonian's troubles as of late, it's probably necessary.