If Government Regulation is Bad, Who is the Good Guy In Wellpoint's Masectomy Policy Change?

You hate government regulation, don't you, Mr. Republican?

It stifles "the market," costs jobs, suppresses freedom, creates burdens through untold numbers of government forms and red tape, and leads to totalitarianism/socialism/ communism/vegetarianism and every other "ism" that is reprehensible to the talking points that undergird your political belief system.

I will let you in on a little secret. I'm not keen on regulations either. But here's the problem. Just the threat of government regulation consistently achieves more things the public wants than what the market (and your party) ever deliver.

Let me give you an example.

You've heard of Wellpoint, the insurance giant based in Indianapolis? Well, you might know that they're taking magma-hot PR heat lately for raising premiums up to 33% in California, for rejecting claims because of ultra-technical disclosure violations not in any way related to the claims the denied patients file, and most recently, for a policy of not covering 48-hour, post-op hospitalizations for masectomy patients even when the physicians say it's necessary for recovery.

So I read today in the Indianapolis Business Journal that Wellpoint has pledged to extend this coverage, which is the primary provision of the Breast Cancer Patient Protection Act, authored by Representative Rosa De Lauro (D-Conn).

Michael Steele, Representative Mike Pence, Governor Daniels, Mayor Greg Ballard, or any other GOP mouthpiece intent on bashing "government," can you answer these questions for me:

1. Do you want women to be able to stay in hospitals for 48 hours after a masectomy if their physicians say it's necessary?

2. Which do you think is more accurate: (1) these women are at fault for not putting aside extra savings for that boob amputation they always wanted; OR, (2) they probably weren't expecting cancer so they got "insurance" from their employer to cover the hazards of the unknown, which is, as you may know, why people buy insurance?

3. Which do you think is more accurate: (1) these women are at fault for not putting their extensive medical knowledge into practice to realize the average stay time for a masectomy recovery is longer than what a Wellpoint policy provides and then going out to buy an extra-day-stay masectomy policy rider; OR (2) they probably took whatever policy their employer offered and lived under a now-exposed-as-delusional-belief that their insurance carrier might follow the lead of somebody who's actually been to medical school?

4. Assuming you answered "yes," "they didn't expect cancer," and "they thought their doctor would make the call," here's my last question: who can all the women who have Wellpoint policies thank in the future if they get breast cancer and are permitted to stay in a hospital for 48-hours, as their physician recommended?

Would that be the people who bring the threat of government regulation or the market?

Actually, sorry to Colombo you, but I do have just one more question.

If "the market" would have compelled Wellpoint to adopt a modicum of humanity with respect to breast cancer patients, do you think there would even be a Breast Cancer Patient Protection Act?

The Democrat rests.

If Government Regulation is Bad, Who is the Good Guy In Wellpoint's Masectomy Policy Change?

Random Thoughts on "The Market," Racinos, Carl Brizzi's Amazing Luck, and Larry Brodeur's Bad Fortune

For the second time this year, insurer Wellpoint announced that it will delay rate hikes on individual policies in California. Did “the market” make Wellpoint wait, or was it fear of government scrutiny or regulation? Even those who despise “government” have to admit that it’s a useful vehicle for reigning in prices when the market doesn’t (which is a strange notion because isn't the market already supposed to deliver the lowest price?) Sometimes the thing that drives “the market” to innovate quickest is the fear that if it doesn’t, government will step in. This is probably why after President Clinton took a swing for the fences in 1993 but failed, medical inflation still slowed.

Regarding “the market,” if Republicans so detest government bailouts, why would any self-respecting GOP member vote for slot machines (or anything else) for racing tracks to “keep horseracing viable” (i.e., to keep an unprofitable product afloat)? Why don’t Republicans let this industry fail? Does it have anything to do with the fact that a lot of wealthy Republicans are the ones who raise and race the horses? Seriously, can you envision in your wildest dreams Republican legislators voting to let Navistar put up slot machines?

Speaking of hitting the jackpot, this weekend Carl Brizzi did an interview on WIBC with Steve Simpson. It was too maddeningly incomplete and evasive to recount blow by blow, but the most intriguing tidbits are these:

1. When Carl Brizzi and Paul Page bought a building in Elkhart for $825,000 as co-owners, they didn’t put any money down.

According to Brizzi, the purchase “was collateralized by the building and the lease(s).” But only one lease has been disclosed – the one with the State of Indiana for over one-quarter of the entire purchase price per year. Friends, would any bank give you a loan in such a circumstance without a signed lease? No? Then wouldn’t that mean that BEFORE Brizzi even obtained the building, the State had a deal with him? If so, the State could have bought the building itself and saved hundreds of thousands over the building’s life. If anybody in real estate can explain how something doesn’t smell rotten in this transaction, I’m all ears.

Also, I'm still waiting for Brizzi to explain how he happened to be trolling around Elkhart looking for office space. My thinking is that if I had a really good friend (cough - John Bales - cough) in real estate whose job is to get governmental units office space, he might know about an agency looking for some space, and he might know where and when they need it.

2. When speaking about the Mobarecki plea deal (you know, the one where Brizzi gave a guy with five pounds of dope, sixty thousand worth of drugs, and sixteen thousand in cash in bags of chicken in his freezer just a D felony plus ten of his cash back), Brizzi threw an unnamed John Doe on his staff under the bus.

What Brizzi said was that he had to be so lenient because "serious allegations" had been made against somebody in his office about what the deal for Mobarecki's cooperation was. Can anybody envision how that could be anybody but Larry Brodeur, the prosecutor who was on the case whose e-mail went public on Brizzi's bad decision? How awesome for Brizzi. By pulling the old "I can't say why because it's a personnel matter," Brizzi leaves us to infer, and there's only one person we know of who could be under that microscope - the guy whose e-mail hosed Brizzi publicly.

Random Thoughts on "The Market," Racinos, Carl Brizzi's Amazing Luck, and Larry Brodeur's Bad Fortune

Wellpoint....Well Beyond Point of Honesty

The Star reports that legislators grilled Wellpoint personnel today over average rate hikes of 21% for over 100,000 Hoosiers who own individual policies.

Herein lies the problem with the Republican counter to the Obama plan. There isn't one. Without action, expect premiums to explode as well for employers even though many insurance companies continue to post record profits.

I've never understood Republican blind faith in "the market." When Wellpoint decided to hold off on rate increases, it wasn't because "the market" dictated that result; it was because of political pressure. Respectfully, if my options are A Republican-endorsed unrestrained insurance industry kicking pregnant moms out of hospitals and jacking up rates 39 percent in California, I'll take a Democratic-led effort to create a Patients' Bill of Rights and the threat of further intervention.

Wellpoint....Well Beyond Point of Honesty