Intention

Intention to do something is an interesting thing. I was thinking about this as I was reading through the transcript of Obama's speech tonight to the Congress. From top to bottom it all sounded very good, a program that cracks down on insurance company shenanigans, is fully funded and provides a way for everyone to be covered. Pretty simple, straight forward, ideal, you pick the word. Anyone arguing with his speech is a fool as there really isn't anything to argue with.

His intention to pass this plan is noble. What happens to this plan how it all comes out is what I will be interested to see. He even eluded to all the presidents in the past that tried to get this sort of legislation passed. None of them did it and the ones that did pass something passed a very watered down version or flawed version of what they intended to happen.

Was it their fault - yes and no. No because the president doesn't write the bills and vote on them, yes because they had to sign the bill in order for it to go into effect.

Take for example the Wellstone Mental Health Parity Bill - a lot of people missed it because it went through on the coattails of the now infamous TARP bill. Mr Wellstone had noble intentions when he began to write the legislation - he wanted insurance to pay for mental health issues the same as medical problems. Something that doesn't really happen now.

What did end up passing was a very watered down version of the bill. Yes the spirit of what Wellstone wanted was in the bill, BUT there were about two or three loopholes written into the bill so that companies could opt out of payment for mental health treatment if the costs became too great.

What that says to me is that yes we will treat "those people", but only if it doesn't cost too much.

So yes I am really hoping the Presidents intentions go from being just good thoughts to a good health care plan.

Just because everyone else seems to want to argue about it I will add one disagreement with his plan. The only thing I think that he and the Congress need to do is have to use the same plan. If that was the case I KNOW we would have the best plan in the entire world without question.