Democrats Raise Re-Imbursement Rates For Medicare Doctors Over Determined GOP Opposition

July 30, 1965, LBJ signs Medicare bill, Truman looks on, Republicans start plotting how to kill the program

Yesterday the House voted 243-183, only one Republican, Michael Burgess (R-TX) joining the Democrats, to pass John Dingell's Medicare Physician Payment Reform Act of 2009 (H.R. 3961). The bill will "revise the Medicare sustainable growth rate (SGR) payment system for determining the annual updates to the Medicare physician fee schedule." In plain English, it is meant to protect health care for seniors and military families, the two groups who would have suffered in Republicans would have had their way on this. It prevents a 21% cut in Medicare physician payment rates scheduled for January. Instead of temporarily overriding the cut as Congress has done six times before, this bill replaces the broken Sustainable Growth Rate (SGR) formula with a permanent, sustainable solution.

Although Republicans and several conservative Democrats who habitually vote with them, opposed the bill, it was vigorously supported by the American Medical Association, AARP, the Military Officers Association of America, the American Academy of Family Physicians, the American College of Physicians, the American College of Surgeons, the Center for Medicare Advocacy, the Medicare Rights Center, and the National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare. Still 11 right-wing Democrats crossed the aisle to vote against the bill. The Republicans, who never seem to have a probelm spending money on wars and bailing out banksters and giving billions of dollars in tax cuts to the wealthiest Americans, claim that this is too expensive. They opposed Medicare from the day it was introduced and have never stopped trying to undermine it.

Brian Baird (D-WA)
Dan Boren (Blue Dog-OK)
Jim Cooper (Blue Dog-TN)
Chet Edwards (D-TX)
Stephanie Herseth Sandlin (Blue Dog-SD)
Suzanne Kosmas (D-FL)
Dan Lipinski (D-IL/TN)
Michael McMahon (D-NY)
Collin Peterson (Blue Dog-MN)
Adam Smith (D-WA)
Gene Taylor (Blue Dog-MS)

Highlighted members also joined the GOP to vote against the healthcare reform bill that passed the House a week and a half ago. Like the Republicans, their answer to healthcare is "Don't get sick or, if you do, do quickly."