Word: optioning
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...because his amendment to the Senate Finance Committee's current health-reform bill was doomed to fail. It was voted down, 15 to 8, with five Democrats - including committee chairman Max Baucus - joining all 10 Republicans on the committee in opposition. Baucus, who agrees with Rockefeller that a public option would save the Federal Government money and lower costs for consumers, nonetheless believes that a bill with such an option will not garner enough support to overcome the threat of a filibuster and make it for a vote on the Senate floor; almost all Republicans and many moderate Democrats believe...
...despite evidence that Baucus is right - currently the Senate does not have 60 public-option supporters - the public option may not be dead yet. A subsequent public-option amendment offered by New York Senator Charles Schumer called for negotiated reimbursement rates - in contrast to Rockefeller's amendment, which would have pegged reimbursements to Medicare rates for the first two years - and as a result garnered support from two Democrats whose position was not previously known, Senators Bill Nelson and Thomas Carper. It still failed, 13 to 10, but the new tally indicated that there may be some room to negotiate...
...most likely way that a public option could end up part of the finished product is as a backup plan. Maine Republican Olympia Snowe, who has been publicly courted by the White House as the most probable member of her party who might vote for reform, has offered an amendment that calls for a public option to kick in down the line only if private insurers don't do enough to offer affordable health-insurance choices. According to the text of her amendment, a public option would be offered if at least two private insurers didn't offer plans that...
...some health-policy experts, this so-called trigger plan would be offered state by state rather than on a nationwide basis. If insurers were determined not to offer an affordable choice in a given state, they would still have a second chance to meet affordability standards before the public option would kick in. Snowe, in her amendment, refers to the public option as a "safety net" plan, without specifying whether such a plan would have to meet the minimum standards for adequate insurance coverage defined elsewhere in health-reform legislation. She also does not specify what entity would evaluate affordability...
...House, where many conservative Blue Dog Democrats have said they will not vote for a bill that contains a public option, wrangling over the proposal is not quite so public. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is in the process of merging bills from the three committees there with jurisdiction over health care, and the design of the public plan is one of the sticking points. The original version of the House bill contained a public option that would have set its reimbursement rates above, but still tied to, Medicare rates. But an amendment that passed in the House Energy Committee would...