Government Tries to “Gag” Insurance Company on Medicare Cuts
As recently reported in the Wall Street Journal, Sen. Max Baucus is furious at Humana for exposing the Medicare Advantage cuts contained in his health reform bill.
It all started when Humana sent a letter to its customers noting that the Baucus health reform bill could hurt many Medicare beneficiaries, primarily because of Medicare Advantage spending cuts proposed by Senator Baucus. Sen. Baucus complained to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), which promptly suspended Humana and other Medicare-contracted health insurance providers from sending similar mailings to beneficiaries about health care and insurance reform.
Rep. Dave Camp wrote to CMS demanding an explanation and asking whether CMS plans to issue a similar gag order on AARP’s campaign to support the Medicare cuts. I’m not holding my breath.
This is truly shameful.
The Democrats get the insurance companies to meet and negotiate behind closed doors for nine months. All the while, the industry agrees not to oppose Obama Care. No Harry and Louise ads, for example. And while they are doing this, the advocates of Obama Care are using the insurance companies as a whipping boy in all their TV ads.
I don’t know which is worse, the intellectual dishonesty of Obama or the cowardice of the insurance companies.
Smacks of fascism.
Apparently the Dems aren’t backing down on this. There was a Kyl “free speech” amendment in the Senate Finance Committee the other day to allow insurers to tell seniors how their benefits are going to be jeapordized under Obama Care and it was voted down along party lines.
[…] the debate over ObamaCare last fall, the Administration threatened health insurance companies who were informing seniors of potential losses of Medicare Advantage (MA) benefits. As far as I […]