Answers Citizens’ Questions
by Alex Brooks
Congressman Scott Murphy held a Town Hall meeting on Labor Day, Monday, September 7, in Petersburgh. It was supposed to start at 11:30 am, but the Congressman had a larger than expected turnout at his first event of the day in Clifton Park, so he arrived at 11:55 and stayed until about 1:30. He arrived with his wife and three children and introduced them to the crowd. There were about 50 to 60 people there, coming from as far away as Cambridge, NY, and Troy.
Murphy began by making a few remarks before taking questions. He commented on the extraordinary deficit that the Federal government is running this year. He recalled that the federal government had run a surplus for a few years in the late nineties and said, “I’m committed to moving us back in that direction.” He cautioned that it can’t be done in one year and it wouldn’t be wise to try to get back to a balanced budget so fast while the economy is still recovering from the recession.
He noted that he is on the Armed Services Committee. He said he is working to bring our soldiers home from Iraq, and he wants to help the vets to re-integrate when they get home. He has sponsored legislation to help vets to start their own businesses.
On health care, he made a few introductory remarks in anticipation of people’s comments and concerns on the issue. He said there is a good consensus that there are things that need to be improved in our current system. There is also a consensus that at the high end our health care system is the best in the world. The problem is that our public health statistics are pretty mediocre and on average we pay more for health care than other countries do.
Murphy said the overriding principle in his view is choice. Some people don’t want to have a profit-making insurance company in charge of their health care, and others don’t want to have a government entity in charge of their health care. Murphy is in favor of the public option because he feels that people should be able to choose. But he adds the proviso that the public option shouldn’t have any subsidies or special advantages over the private insurance companies that it will be competing with.
At this point Murphy opened the floor for questions and comments. About 15 people lined up to speak, and all of them were heard. They were all courteous and respectful.
Bob Iseman from Cambridge was the first to speak. He said we are seeing “the systematic destruction of our country by a radical fringe that has taken over the Democratic Party.” He asked Murphy to reconsider his support for the public option, saying, “there will not be a level playing field.”
Murphy replied that he has a lot of constituents who say to him, “I don’t trust private insurance companies because they might want to maximize their profits rather than my care.” By creating a public option, it gives those people a choice. Murphy said he is confident the public option will not be given unfair advantage.
Richard Hickey of Petersburgh said there are 47 million uninsured Americans (which is close to 16% of the population), but if you “boil it down” there are only 4% uninsured. He didn’t go into much detail about how he boiled it down, but his question was, “Why are we willing to scrap what we have now just to cover the 4% who don’t have coverage?”
Murphy said he is not willing. He said the measures before the Congress do not get rid of the existing health care system, they just make some changes to the way it works. The big change, said Murphy, is that everybody has to have health insurance.
Murphy said current law requires hospitals to treat people who come there seeking care, whether they can pay or not. When there are a lot of uninsured people, it puts a tremendous financial burden on the hospitals. He said Albany Medical Center does about $40 million of uncompensated care every year.
Another important thing the health care bill would do, which Murphy called one of the best things in it, is establishment of a national insurance market. Insurers who participate would be required to offer their lowest price to everybody, rather than negotiating deals with large employers and offering far more expensive plans to small businesses and individual purchasers.
Next to speak was Rebecca from Petersburgh. She asked, “If we do not get a public option, what are we going to do about these private companies that are getting away with murder?” She said she had a friend who died because she had no health insurance. By the time her illness was diagnosed, it was too late. Rebecca also said that she has a pre-existing condition which has made it impossible for her to get health insurance.
Murphy replied that he has heard a lot of stories similar to hers and assured her that whether there is a public option or not, the legislation will do something about the “pre-existing condition exemption.” He said one of the main goals of the legislation is to create some rules to curb some of the unfair practices of the insurance companies.
Peter Schaaphok was the next to speak. He said he was worried about the “unfunded obligations” of the federal government, which he said are about half a million dollars per family, and he was concerned that a public option might add to these government liabilities. Murphy replied that the public option will be self-funded through premiums paid by subscribers, so it will not add to government obligations. He said there is some start-up money for it, but that is to be paid back over ten years.
Petersburgh resident Bill Curley asked what’s being done to reform the rules on malpractice suits, and he also asked for Murphy’s views on illegal immigrants. Murphy said malpractice reform is not in the house bill, and he thinks it should be. Murphy said he thinks immigration reform is urgently needed. He said two years ago John McCain and Ted Kennedy got together on an immigration reform bill, and it is a mystery to him why it wasn’t passed, since it was endorsed by the leading figures in both parties.
Petersburgh Town Councilman Bill Seel spoke next. He said he wants Congress to “give us our country back.” He said with the government taking over more and more of the economy, he believes we are headed for “statism.” He asked Murphy to comment on that trend and also to comment on provisions in the health care reform bill relating to end of life care.
Murphy said people sometimes ask him, if he is a small business, venture capital guy, why is he a Democrat? The answer is that he believes there are certain things government has to guarantee for everybody. Public education is one, and in the areas of food, housing and health care, he believes there must be a minimum standard for everybody and it is a government responsibility to make sure everyone has access to that minimum standard. But other than that, “I want to see free markets run things.” He also said he doesn’t get the feeling that his fellow Democrats in Congress are interested in having the government take over more of the economy – in fact quite the opposite. They’re not saying now that we’ve got a foothold in the banks and the car companies, let’s get more control – they’re saying how do we get out of the car business and the banking business. He said they got in because the economy was about to fall off a cliff but are now interested in finding private interests to take over the equity position that the government was forced into and are happy to see some of the banks paying off their TARP loans.
Concerning end of life provisions in the health care reform bill, Murphy said what’s in there is this: under current law doctors cannot be reimbursed by Medicare for time they spend with patients discussing end of life options. The bill would now allow Medicare to reimburse doctors for that time. Murphy said he is disappointed that major public figures and elected officials are encouraging the spread of misinformation on this issue when they should be talking about the pros and cons of things that actually are in the bill.
Morgan Hartman spoke next, saying he has a small farm in Berlin, and he would like to offer health insurance for his employees, but he finds it prohibitively expensive. He asked if there is anything in the bill to help small businessmen like himself to offer health insurance. Murphy said there is a provision that would give a tax credit for half the cost of health insurance for small businesses.
At the end of the session, Murphy asked the crowd to raise their hands for one of five options for how much government should be involved in health care. The first was to get government out of health care completely and privatize Medicare, Medicaid, and the V.A. Very few hands. The second was to leave things pretty much the way they are now. Not too many hands. The third was to reform the health care system through new regulation but with no public option. A lot of hands. The fourth was the same but with a public option – a lot of hands. The fifth was a single payer system, in which the government handles all health care payments. More than a few hands went up but not as many as options three and four. Murphy said, “so you see – I can’t possibly please everybody.”
During the course of Murphy’s talk, some of the speakers, including some who clearly disagree with his views, praised him for coming out to Petersburgh and forthrightly answering everybody’s questions and listening to what they have to say. It appeared that Murphy made a good impression on the crowd, and with that he was off to the Schaghticoke Fair with his family.