Gephardt, robbing the rich to pay the powerful

[MORTARDUDE]

http://www.hernandotoday.com/MGA432EB4FD.html

Gephardt, robbing the rich to pay the powerful
JOHN HALL
Published: Apr 30, 2003


It all comes rushing back. The Harry and Louise commercials day and night. Ira Magaziner and Hillary Clinton in deep West Wing conversation. Employer mandates, managed care, universal coverage, blah, blah, blah.
Is this what the battle for the 2004 Democratic presidential nomination is to be fought over - health care? Seems so. War appears to be a losing issue for Democratic doves. The economy is a crapshoot. Few in the party seem to really care much about budget deficits.
The Democrats' core, labor-liberal coalition wants red meat. National health insurance - first proposed by Harry S. Truman -- appears to be it...again.
When Richard Gephardt announced his $240 billion-a-year plan for subsidized care last week, it created a stir in a campaign that has stirred up mostly trouble. Sen. John Edwards' fundraising irregularities have led to an investigation by the criminal division of the Justice Department. Sen. John Kerry's call for "regime change" in the United States resonated horribly.
Gephardt hasn't been able to attract any attention except among Democratic doves angered at his backing of war against Iraq. But his timing last week on what he called the "moral issue of our time" was impeccable.
With war news shrinking, attention has started to turn back to the home front. The Gephardt health care solution became the first policy blockbuster of the campaign.
His proposal is a re-plate of the one he offered in the House. What really got everyone's attention was how he would finance it. He would repeal all the tax cuts President Bush has gotten through Congress and any he might get through in the future.
That is such a thumb-in-the-eye position that Republicans called out the National Federation of Independent Business - chief nemesis of the Clinton plan -- to condemn Gephardt.
Gephardt's opponents were flabbergasted at all the headlines.
Outflanked on his left, former Gov. Howard Dean of Vermont charged that Gephardt had aimed for "pie in the sky" - an unusual position for someone who had been deriding his opponents as too timid. But Dean's assessment of the chances for the Gephardt proposal is on target. Even a Medicare prescription drug benefit bill is foundering in Congress.
Dean, a physician, has a much more modest proposal that would guarantee only major medical coverage for the uninsured. That doesn't have any chance either.
So far, none of the Democratic hopefuls has offered the solution liberals really want except former Vice President Al Gore - and he decided not to run again.
Gore endorsed "single payer" health insurance - which means government-run insurance for everyone young and old.
Gephardt's plan is more like the concept First Lady Clinton, now a senator, and Magaziner came up with a decade ago. Their task force wanted to build on the existing network of private health insurance plans, rather than turning everything over to the government.
Their report resulted in a crushing defeat in Congress for President Bill Clinton.
What's most striking about Gephardt's idea is how much of it -nearly half of the annual cost -- goes to finance health insurance now being picked up by employers. Companies would get tax credits for 60 percent of their health costs.
His critics are whispering that one of Gephardt's objectives is to take health care costs off the table as a bargaining issue in labor-management contracts. Union leaders, who largely are united in support of Gephardt's candidacy, would like to be able to get higher wages from companies that save money on health insurance.
The big Gephardt idea, however, is a kind of government Robin Hood concept - robbing rich individuals to pay rich institutions. He would abolish the Bush tax cut and send all the money to corporations, small businesses, Medicare and Medicaid to cover 97 percent of the nation's 41 million uninsured workers.
By doing this, Gephardt put a big "kick me" on his rear. But he got some attention and demonstrated to the rest of the field that he is a wily veteran not to be trifled with.