Freda Wood Toups
August 4, 2009
Clara Arabie Hoskins
August 6, 2009
The healthcare reform debate engulfing Congress dominated Monday’s breakfast town hall meeting held by U.S. Sen. David Vitter in Houma.
Attendees shared their concerns over greater government involvement in medical care, including the so-called “public option” to private insurance.
Vitter warned that if the public option were passed, employers would simply dump their existing employee insurance coverage.
“What the president and Congress are doing is taking the worst parts of Medicaid and Medicare and instead of fixing the problems, they’re expanding them with this public option,” he said.
Hugh Caffery, president of Valentine Chemicals in Lockport, said insurance premiums for his 20 employees have risen on average 10 percent a year. Still, he feels a government-run insurance program would make the situation worse.
“I’m very much against any healthcare legislation that would have the government in charge,” Caffery said. “I don’t want employers to eventually have to accept the government option and eliminate the private insurance industry.”
The House Energy and Commerce Committee, which U.S. Rep. Charlie Melancon (D-Napoleonville) sits on, passed the America’s Affordable Health Choices Act (H.R. 3200) Friday night.
Although Melancon voted against the bill, Vitter took swipes at him for voting against amendments he claimed would have improved the bill such as removing the public option and not taking money from Medicare and Medicaid to pay for a public option.
Ironically, Vitter is sponsoring an amendment in the Senate to place all members of Congress in the public option.
“If this government option is so good, every representative and senator should be a part of it,” he said.
Vitter insisted the shots at Melancon were not about speculation that he would run for Vitter’s Senate seat in 2010.
“Everything isn’t politics,” he retorted. “This is a serious issue that affects every Louisianan.”
This was the second town hall meeting Vitter has held in Houma in the past month. He said participants are expressing concerns over federal spending and debt since President Barack Obama came into office in January.
“All this year, we have seen an explosion of government power and intervention in all sorts of ways – taking over banks, insurance companies, now the possible takeover of healthcare,” Vitter explained. “You can connect the dots. Americans are starting to see the trend.”
Other topics brought up at the town hall meeting included the Employee Free Choice Act, aka card check, the cap and trade bill and the administration’s proposal to cut tax incentives on domestic oil and gas production.
Vitter is against card check, in which employees can form a union if a majority signs authorization cards rather than vote by secret ballot.
Also in the card check bill, if a new union and management can’t agree on a first contract within 120 days, binding arbitration would settle the matter.
“There are no acceptable compromises,” Vitter said. “Even if the secret ballot issue is taken out, it is still very dangerous because it has binding arbitration.
Vitter called cap and trade, where pollution is controlled by providing economic incentives for businesses achieving reductions in greenhouse gas emissions, ‘cap and tax.’
He asserted the measure would amount to the largest tax increase ever.
“It would hurt our economy significantly, but it would devastate an energy-dependent economy like Louisiana,” Vitter said. “If something like ‘cap and tax’ passes, it would add five points to our unemployment just like that.”
Sen. David Vitter held a Monday morning town hall meeting in Houma with about 100 local residents. Stopping the current healthcare reform legislation before Congress was the main topic of the informal gathering. * Photo by KEYON K. JEFF
