In the interest of helping you understand how the new Obama-supported health care changes are going to help you, here is a flow chart from Kevin Brady of how the bureaucratic process will work (full-size in .pdf format):

Pretty colorful? It sure isn’t simple. According to Roll Call, there are some complaints raised by Democrats that it is inaccurate. The paper seem to have a copy that it hasn’t supplied us:

For example, Democrats argue that the chart depicts a “Health Insurance Exchange Trust Fund” that is “simply a recipient of IRS funds, with no outflow. ... This is false.”

If, and I stress if, that is not taken out of context, then this sounds like they are complaining that the flow chart is not complex enough. If you can find a full copy of the memo, please send it my way. I haven’t succeeded in finding it yet.

In a slightly unrelated (but related) issue, while trying to check the validity of the various claims Republicans are making, I found that John Carter’s office was told to change what he called this health care plan:

“What we proposed as language was as follows, ‘House Democrats unveiled a government-run health care plan,’” Carter said.  “Our response from Franking was, ‘You cannot use that language.  You must use, ‘The House majority unveiled a public option health care plan,’ which is Pelosi-speak or [sic?] ‘just last week the House majority unveiled a health care plan which I believe will cost taxpayers…’”

Senator Bob Casey believes that this “public option health care plan” is a good idea and attempts to justify the name they have given it. A transcript of a revised flow chart he created on CNN’s The Situation Room is available here (the only place I have been able to find video is from The Daily Show; there is some language but you can watch it here). It’s enough to drive me crazy, but near the end of the text you find this:

The—right. But the way it is in our bill is it starts with the government. The government provides it initial financing. But then it’s supposed to exist on its own. And it’s an apples to apples comparison. You’re not talking about some kind of program that just has government backing all the way.

So… the government is creating a business to compete with the rest of the health care industry. Does it have all the constraints that a regular business has to exist inside of—including profitability (covers its own costs)? Why in the world is a government getting involved in this instead of private individuals creating such a venture? Are they afraid the idea doesn’t really work and they would lose their money? They could learn a few lessons from BAM (Business As Mission) methods.

Even if there are problems with the full accuracy of the chart above, this bill is a mess. Please don’t fall for it. I have specifically chosen not to have insurance because it won’t benefit me in the future. What am I going to do then if I can’t live without it now? This current bill would require me to carry health insurance.

If you haven’t already, contact your congressman and senators. So far I’ve only gotten one letter back and it was a form-letter that hardly fit what I had written. Perhaps a phone call would shake them up a little more…

For those of you who want to round out your understanding of the arguments surrounding this issue, here’s an interesting explanation of France’s medical system (which they still admit needs to be reformed):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uNR_6UuVl4s