I Weep At This Tale Of Woe

Filed in National by on November 3, 2009

Does anyone remember the McCain health care plan? Yeah, I didn’t either.

On the campaign trail, Holtz-Eakin promoted McCain’s plan to eliminate the tax exemption for employer-sponsored health insurance and give tax credits to individuals to buy their own coverage.

Republicans love them some tax credits! Anyway, McCain’s economic advisor Douglas Holtz-Eakin is still unemployed and his expensive COBRA benefits are about to run out:

Irony of ironies, it gets worse. Holtz-Eakin, who is about to start shopping for insurance on the individual market, is 51. And he has one of those pesky “preexisting conditions” that insurance companies often cite in denying coverage.

“A right renal autotransplant,” he said, pointing to his abdomen as he described the 1990 transplant surgery he went through after one of his kidneys was damaged in an accident. “They got rid of the artery, moved my kidney and rebuilt me for the 21st century. If you look at my file, any insurance company would go, ‘Hmm . . .’ “

I think Holtz-Eakin should be excited that he gets to experience the wonders of the free market. That’s what he wanted for us after all.

Tags: , ,

About the Author ()

Opinionated chemist, troublemaker, blogger on national and Delaware politics.

Comments (3)

Trackback URL | Comments RSS Feed

  1. pandora says:

    Oh yeah, I’m cryin’ here.

  2. nemski says:

    How’s them tax credits helping you, Holtz-Eakin?

  3. cassandra_m says:

    On the campaign trail, Holtz-Eakin promoted McCain’s plan to eliminate the tax exemption for employer-sponsored health insurance and give tax credits to individuals to buy their own coverage.

    Of the bills moving through Congress, Holtz-Eakin said: “I wish the policies were different, and I wish I could’ve somehow gotten us to a bipartisan place. I think McCain had the capacity to do that.

    Have Mercy. Still with the McCain bipartisan BS.

    But here is what is mind-boggling here — the Baucus’ exise tax on big-ticket health care plans pretty much gets to what the removal of the tax exemption was trying to get at anyway. This way is just more gradual as health care costs (and the price of plans) goes up. The other thing that is really missing here is why — if they are so concerned about cost controls — would repubs just sit on their hands here? Cost control was a clear goal set by Obama and I’ll never understand sitting back and saying NO to everything rather than jumping in and being heros on the one thing that people might stand back and give you credit for being better than Democrats on. Stupid.