Obama says it's now Senate's turn on health care
WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama said Sunday it was time for the Senate to "take the baton" on health care reform after the House passed its plan for overhauling the nation's health care system.
"For years we've been told that this couldn't be done," Obama said in a brief statement from the Rose Garden. "But last night the House proved different."
The Democratic-controlled House on Saturday narrowly passed the far-reaching legislation, 220-215, but the road ahead in the Senate promises to be rocky. The president said the House vote took courage for many lawmakers because of the heated and often misleading rhetoric that accompanied debate over how the change the system.
"Now it falls on the United States Senate to take the baton and bring this effort to the finish line on behalf of the American people, and I'm absolutely confident that they will," Obama said. "I'm equally convinced that on the day that we gather here at the White House and I sign comprehensive health insurance reform legislation into law, they'll be able to join their House colleagues and say this was their finest moment in public service."
Republican lawmakers have vowed to do all they can to stop the Democratic plan, which they contend will cost jobs, raise insurance rates and lead to huge tax increases. The Senate has yet to schedule debate on its version of health care reform.
"The House bill is dead on arrival in the Senate," Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., said Sunday. "It was a bill written by liberals for liberals." A Democratic colleague, Sen. Jack Reed of Rhode Island, predicted an overhaul would pass the Senate because "it's essential" to the country's economic success and people's quality of life. "It will take time," he added.
House Republicans were nearly unanimous in opposing the plan that would expand coverage to tens of millions of Americans and place tough new restrictions on the insurance industry.
A triumphant House Speaker Nancy Pelosi compared the legislation to the passage of Social Security in 1935 and Medicare 30 years later.
Republicans detailed their objections across hours of debate on the 1,990-page, $1.2 trillion legislation.
"We are going to have a complete government takeover of our health care system faster than you can say, `this is making me sick,'" said Rep. Candice Miller, R-Mich.
In the run-up to a final vote, conservatives from the two political parties joined forces to impose tough new restrictions on abortion coverage in insurance policies to be sold to many individuals and small groups.
The legislation would require most Americans to carry insurance and provide federal subsidies to those who otherwise could not afford it. Large companies would have to offer coverage to their employees. Both consumers and companies would be slapped with penalties if they defied the government's mandates.
Insurance industry practices such as denying coverage because of medical conditions would be banned, and insurers would no longer be able to charge higher premiums on the basis of gender or medical history. The industry would also lose its exemption from federal antitrust restrictions on price fixing and market allocation.
At its core, the measure would create a federally regulated marketplace where consumers could shop for coverage. In the bill's most controversial provision, the government would sell insurance, although the Congressional Budget Office forecasts that premiums for it would be more expensive than for policies sold by private companies.
Graham said he thinks the government option "will destroy private health care. Nobody in this country in the insurance business can compete with a government-sponsored plan, where the government writes the benefits and politicians will never raise the premiums."
Sen. Joe Lieberman, an independent from Connecticut, said that "if the public option plan is in there, as a matter of conscience, I will not allow this bill to come to a final vote because I believe the debt can break America and send us into a recession that's worse than the one we're fighting our way out of today."
The House bill drew the votes of 219 Democrats and Rep. Joseph Cao, a first-term Republican who holds an overwhelmingly Democratic seat in New Orleans. Opposed were 176 Republicans and 39 Democrats.
From the Senate, Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada issued a statement saying, "We realize the strong will for reform that exists, and we are energized that we stand closer than ever to reforming our broken health insurance system."
To pay for the expansion of coverage, the bill cuts Medicare's projected spending by more than $400 billion over a decade. It also imposes a tax surcharge of 5.4 percent on income over $500,000 in the case of individuals and $1 million for families.
Graham and Reed were on CBS' "Face the Nation." Lieberman appeared on "Fox News Sunday."
Copyright 2009 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
View Next Article: Restored machine to explore mysteries of Big Bang
Most Popular News
-
Police: NC girl raped, killed on day she was taken
A 5-year-old North Carolina girl was raped and killed the same day she was taken from her home, according to an arrest warrant released Friday. Shaniya Davis was sexually assaulted and asphyxiated Nov. 10, the day her mother reported her missing from the trailer park where she was staying, accordin to the warrant.
-
Kidnapped Britons say Somali pirates may kill them
A retired British couple snatched from their yacht by Somali pirates said in an interview broadcast Friday they fear they could be killed within a week or handed to a terrorist group if a ransom demand is not paid.
-
Police seize more vids in Mo. sex abuse case
Several family members who say they were sexually abused as children by adult relatives remember being taken to various locations and photographed with naked men, police investigators said in a search warrant released Thursday.
-
Researcher: Faint writing seen on Shroud of Turin
A Vatican researcher has rekindled the age-old debate over the Shroud of Turin, saying that faint writing on the linen proves it was the burial cloth of Jesus. Experts say the historian may be reading too much into the markings, and they stand by carbon-dating that points to the shroud being a medival forgery.
-
Museum: Galileo's fingers, tooth are found
Two fingers and a tooth removed from Galileo Galilei's corpse in a Florentine basilica in the 18th century and given up for lost have been found again and will soon be put on display, an Italian museum director said Friday.
