Watching C-Span

Okay people, I'm starting strong on my recent resolution. I just watched C-Span for one hour. (Yes it's Friday night. Ben's at the hospital for school tonight, okay?) Anyway, I learned something.* Well, a few things. Here:

You can watch The State of the Union address. You can also watch this:

And you can watch that:

And you might find it interesting or enlightening or a bunch of lies. You probably wonder what to believe. But it's when you watch C-Span that you get a real feel for what's going on in our government. And you get specific ideas and form more opinionated opinions about what's going on. I suggest you watch it. Though, maybe not on Friday night.

*For those interested, I watched one of the top Medicare/Medicare officials, Richard Foster, respond to questions of members of the House in Budget Committee hearing about Health Care and Federal Budget. Here's what Mr. Foster admitted in the hearing:

- not true in all cases that "if you like your plan you can keep it"

- currently not enough physicians to take on the estimated 20 million new medicaid patients

- no specific plan or provisions how to pay for 20 million new medicaid patients

- states and federal gov't expected to pay through general revenue, but he admits he doesn't know how states are going to pick up their portions of that cost

- Mr. Foster concerned about putting intensified pressure on private providers

- costs for Medicare and Medicaid in new health plan were analyzed for next 10 years, but didn't look beyond 10 years

Note: This is not what Republican house members thought; this is coming from the "chief actuary" of welfare health services.

Noted with concern: Democrat House member from my home Portland, Oregon, very critical of lack of specifications, planning and provisions.

Noted with even more concern: Mr. Foster seemed scarily confused and unable to feign any confidence about this healthcare plan.

I wish I were a great economist so I could fully understand this whole healthcare deal and brilliantly mend it! I should put Lisa Christensen on the task. I bet she could do it if she had a free afternoon.