[ OUR OPINION ]
Congress now must
mend Medicare billEnactment of a flawed Medicare prescription drug plan was assured last night after sponsors fought back attempts to derail the bill, endorsed by President Bush and the AARP, the retiree advocacy group. Congress now must address those flaws. At the top of the list of subsequent actions is the repeal of tax cuts to provide the revenues to help pay for the bill's $400 billion price tag over the next decade. The bill's enactment is important because it begins to help low-income seniors cope with expensive drug costs.
THE ISSUE
An addition of prescription drug coverage to the Medicare program is on its way to the White House for President Bush's signature.The Republican-sponsored legislation received bipartisan support as well as bipartisan opposition. A month ago, Sens. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., and Don Nickles, R-Okla., co-authored an op-ed column in the Washington Post supporting its enactment as "a good starting point." Feinstein finally voted for the bill while Nickles cast a dissenting vote, saying, "We are building a new expansion onto a house that's teetering on a cliff. We are saddling future generations with enormous liabilities."
Hawaii's congressional delegation opposed the bill, although Rep. Ed Case indicated he was torn, acknowledging that it contained "the germ of a desperately-needed and long-overdue prescription drug benefit.
"In the end," Case said, "I had to choose between supporting a bill with some good points and a lot of bad points and fixing it later, or opposing it and going back to the drawing board." He chose the latter. We place hope in the former, which now is all that remains.
A major point of criticism is a provision that will provide $12 billion in subsidies to insurance companies in six selected cities to compete against Medicare. AARP, formerly called the American Association of Retired Persons, has been accused of having a conflict of interest because it receives more than $150 million a year -- nearly half of its revenue -- in commissions on insurance, mutual funds and prescription drugs sold to members.
Greg Marchildon, executive director of Hawaii AARP, said Democrats were "playing politics," adding that "the notion that we ought not to do something about drug costs for the poorest is unconscionable."
The most criticized section prohibits the federal government from interfering in negotiations between drug manufacturers and pharmacies and prescription drug plan sponsors. However, Tommy G. Thompson, the secretary of health and human services, said he is open to legislation next year that would give him the power to negotiate drug prices. That would be in time to allow such negotiations by the time the bill takes effect in January 2006.
Close votes in both the House -- 220-215 -- and Senate -- two votes short of blocking the bill by imposing arcane budget rules -- indicate Case has plenty of company in being torn between favoring a faulty bill as a good beginning or starting over from scratch.
