Did we just agree to dis Teddy Kennedy?

[Savannahmann]

Apparently President Obama gave up the CLASS act, which was a pet project of Teddy Kennedy (RIP) and part of the ACA.

Tucked inside the "fiscal cliff" deal is a provision repealing the CLASS Act, a giant unfunded mandate that was part of President Obama's health care law.

The Community Living Assistance Services and Supports program was a priority of the late Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, Massachusetts Democrat, and was designed to create a program for long-term care for the functionally disabled.

Please tell me we didn't just shit on the disabled to fund the Military Industrial complex. After all, most of the "sequestration" cuts would have come from there.

[Zen Democrat]

1. Tsk tsk, reading the Washington Times again?

Read the very end of it:

Mr. Obama also won a new commission to look at long-term care. The commission is supposed to come back and report on ways to boost health coverage for those the CLASS program was designed to reach.

The CLASS program had already been suspended because it wasn't working. This just ended it and granted a fresh opportunity to fix long-term care.

[Savannahmann]

2. OK, so fixing it meant tearing it down, and starting all over?`

Baloney. We just gave up on a cornerstone of the ACA, and won only an agreement to start a commission to see if we can do something like that in the future. Is the ACA only for the healthy among us? Because we just shit on the disabled and promised them that we'll look at it in the future, sometime, way off in the future.

[Liberal_Stalwart71]

3. I'm having so much fun with the Trash Thread option.

[lamp_shade]

4. Me too. I've been "housecleaning" for the last 2 days.

[stevenleser]

5. As I said in the other thread, "You Realize CLASS was problematic from the start, right?"

http://www.cnn.com/2011/10/14/politics/health-care-program/

Mon October 17, 2011

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Citing cost concerns, the Obama administration said Friday it has halted a long-term care insurance program that was part of the massive health care law passed in 2010.

Called the CLASS Act (Community Living Assistance Services and Supports), the program was canceled by Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius after a 19-month effort to find a way to make it financially viable.

In a letter to Congress, Sebelius wrote, "Despite our best analytical efforts, I do not see a viable path forward for CLASS implementation at this time."
.
.
.
But a senior administration official told CNN that there were big questions whether CLASS could be self-sustaining even when the health care reform law was being considered by Congress. And as a result, lawmakers specified that the HHS secretary had to determine that the program would be sustainable for 75 years before certifying it.
------------------------------------

The administration later said they would try to revive it, but the sustainability of this part of ACA was a major issue right out of the gate.

[Savannahmann]

8. And I said in the other thread, that we shit on the disabled, and fund the Pentagon for billions.

The Osprey program, took twenty years, a few lives, and a billion dollars. Because Helicopters are just too darned last century. We paid for F-22's, which cost a $7.3 Billion for 60 aircraft. This was to replace the F-15 which has never been shot down in combat. Sure, they've crashed, but they've never been shot down in combat. For that matter, the F-22 has crashed, and is reported to have major problems with the oxygen delivery system. At least it is stealthy for the money right? We're buying F-35's, for at least $200 million per aircraft, and that is obviously very low. That is to replace aircraft like the F-18 and F-16. Which are excellent, but so last century.

My point is this. As I am married to a handicapped woman, I don't understand how we can shit on the disabled, while we shove money by the truckload at defense contractors for crap we don't need. If we needed it, that would be one thing. But we don't need the crap. We could have kept buying replacements of the existing aircraft for years for the cost of one F-22. We could outfit a squadron of F-18's for the money we've poured into the F-35. We're buying a stealth Destroyer. Hello? Seriously? A Stealth Destroyer? Are you sitting me?

It cost a small fortune to care for a handicapped person. I know, I'm doing it. So I can only imagine how someone who makes less than I do is managing to care for their loved one. Yet, it just isn't manageable. It is just too hard. We can shovel billions into defense, but fuck the disabled. Oh we'll have a meeting in a couple years, where we discuss options to replace the CLASS ACT. Oh the replacement? None, it's just too hard to do that then too.

We can do what we choose to. We can buy billion dollar aircraft, ten billion dollar stealth ships, hundred billion dollar stealth submarines, and trillion dollar aircraft carriers. But we can't take care of our disabled, it just isn't manageable.

Fuck that. Tell me how much safer we are with twelve aircraft carriers over eleven? The cost of one carrier would pay for the health care of every man, woman, and child for years. But we can't afford health care, especially for cripples right?

The great news about Sequestration was that we would finally cut the Military Industrial budget. But we won't do that, it might upset some of those dorks who sell fear and panic to the people.

None of that shit we spend billions of dollars for does one god damn thing to protect us. The Islamic Nutjobs are not flying stealth aircraft into our buildings. They aren't using anything like that. They are using the same thing the NVA used, guile, intelligence, and determination. Our answer in Viet-Nam was more people, more money, and more technology. It didn't work there, but this time, this time we'll win because our technology is even more awesome. Why we now have stealth underwear. How can we lose with stealth underwear? Right wing nutjobs are shooting up our schools. Where were all those stealth drones and billion dollar planes? Did it help protect our children? Nope. Fuck them. We need stealth desks for the generals.

None of you get it. This is Democratic Underground, we should be influencing our party, the Democratic Party to do the smart things. Instead, we just parrot the party line. We actually say that things are unsustainable, when it comes to caring for our citizens. That isn't a Democratic Party policy. That is our party parroting the fucking Rethugs.

[Iggo]

6. No.

Why on earth would you agree to that?

[Rex]

7. Why indeed!

.