“I call your attention to the fact that they don’t only take out what they need, they want to eliminate the Fund,”
–Nancy Pelosi (D-CA)
It’s not like Republicans want the interest rates on federally-backed student loans to double. They just want President Obama to stand on his head and spit $5.9 billion worth of Affordable Care Act nickels before they agree to keep them that way. We talk a lot about transparency in government, but how much more transparent can the Republicans be? USA Today reports:
Both parties broadly agree that the rate should be extended for one year, but they do not agree on how to pay for it. It is a scenario that has played out repeatedly in this Congress.
Republicans would pay for the cost of the loan extension by cutting funds from the Prevention and Public Health Fund (PPHF), a $15 billion fund created under the health care law to help states and localities pay for everything from anti-obesity campaigns to cancer screenings.
The cost of the student loan program is relatively small: $5.9 billion. The PPHF was originally slated to receive money in increments: $500 million in FY2010; $750 million in FY2011; $1 billion in FY2012; $1.25 billion in FY2013; $1.5 billion in FY2014; $2 billion in FY2015 and each fiscal year after. In other words, the Republican bill would wipe out 40% of the PPHF and cripple it for the next few years. The fund wouldn’t reach $15 billion until 2019. Due to the extension of payroll tax cuts, however, the fund “won’t hit the $2 billion mark until fiscal 2022, according to the conference report Congress cleared Friday.”
These kind of legislative tricks are tried and true and not limited to one political party, but the GOP choice is stark: student loans or cancer screenings. Fiscally, it’s a stupid choice. As the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services writes on its website Healthcare.gov:
Chronic diseases – such as heart disease, cancer, stroke, and diabetes – are responsible for 7 out of 10 deaths among Americans each year. They account for 75% of the nation’s health spending. Focusing on prevention can both improve the health of Americans and help control health care spending. In fact, a report from Trust for America’s Health entitled Prevention for a Healthier America concluded that investing $1 in proven community-based programs could yield a return of $5.60.
The Prevention Fund helps states tackle the leading causes of death and root causes of costly, preventable chronic disease; detect and respond rapidly to health security threats; and prevent accidents and injuries. With this investment, the Affordable Care Act helps states and the nation as a whole focus on fighting disease and illness before they happen.
You can’t have your cake and eat it with this GOP.
Democratic legislators are tying the GOP’s stark choice to women’s health, and while the GOP-led Congress isn’t intentionally targeting women with their proposed cuts in preventative care, they would almost certainly affect women as well as men.
“We would prevent screenings for breast and cervical cancer,” Rep. Rosa DeLauro (D-CT) explained. “This fund helps to prevent coronary heart disease — and that is the leading killer of women in America. It mitigates osteoporosis, arthritis, mental illness — which disproportionately effect women in the United States.”
It’s time to start calling the GOP what it is: the pro-cancer party. It’s more important not to increase taxes on gajillionaires than it is to screen people for cancer. Small government means more cervical cancer, more heart disease, more untreated osteoporosis. Liberty means being free to not be able to pay for college. The GOP has always pushed to extend reproductive rights to rapists. Now it’s fighting for the chance to live shorter.
…is the Speaker whining and stomping his foot over the idea that the President is supposedly making a partisan fight where none exists! Isn’t this exactly what bullies do when they get hit back?
… even popular legislation needs to pass filibuster now.
More here.