Senator Max Baucus (D-Montana), the chair of the Senate Finance Committee, announced yesterday that his compromise health care bill will be released Wednesday. The bill, the result of ongoing negotiations between the Senate's "gang of six"(3 Democrats and 3 Republicans on the Finance Committee) is expected to cost $880 billion over the next 10 years and be representative of the most moderate proposal going through Congress currently.

Though Baucus expressed optimism that his plan would ultimately be signed into law, two of the principle Republican negotiators came out last night with a laundry list of issues that they feel must be addressed before they can support the reform. Chief among them are concerns about states paying 10% of Medicaid expansion funding, the necessity of legislative language to prohibit abortions using Federal money, and a proposed $3,800 fine for families that choose to forgo health insurance.

While these are important topics to debate as part of this reform package, they are not the direction to take the bill and are representative of irresponsible political posturing that will increase the deficit over the long term. As the bill stands now it has been negotiated down from an initial price estimate of $1.6 trillion to Baucus' quoted $880 billion. Part of the reason for that reduction is the tough choices made by the Senate Finance Committee, and other Congressional committees, to identify creative ways to achieve and pay for our goal of universal health insurance. To simply turn our back on those tough choices is the politically easy way out, but it is not what is best for health reform in this country.

In particular the proposal to remove the $3,800 fine for families who elect to not purchase health care is a problem. It has been proven that when people do not have health care the rest of us end up paying more into the system for their irresponsibility. As the bill will almost certainly expand medicaid to cover anyone with an income below 133% of the poverty line, there is no excuse for people who could afford health care not to purchase it (especially if a low-cost government alternative is created). Just as we buy auto insurance because it is a public necessity, owning health insurance must be looked at in a similar light.

By removing this provision, Republicans would be increasing the overall price tag of the proposal, and would be taking away the incentive for Americans to purchase health care -- costing all of us more money. It will hurt the efficiency of our health care delivery system in the long term, and potentially allow the chronic problem of the uninsured to continue past this hard fought reform effort.

Congressional Democrats must fight these proposals, as health care is too important of a subject to simply water down because it's political easy. That's not what you went to Washington to do. This bill must be representative of real reform.

--Newell for Congress Campaign