Sneaky, Sneaky Bailout
Remember how that bailout plan was supposed to shore up a banking system on the verge of collapse? Remember how it was absolutely necessary to pass it in Congress for the sake of the economy?
Well, unsurprisingly, lawmakers used the opportunity to ram through some other legislation. One such law that has absolutely nothing to do with rescuing the financial system is a set of new rules mandating that employers have to provide parity in coverage for treatment of physical and mental illnesses.
Interestingly, the Times article spends most of its article talking about the wonderful, bi-partisan consensus-building that went into passing the law, but spends virtually no ink explaining why this bill didn’t face a vote on its own merits. Instead, it was rather surreptitiously inserted into a bailout plan that the country was assured was absolutely necessary for the health of the economy.
Not that we should be surprised.
ACORN, a “community organizing group” with a history of election fraud problems was another one of the original beneficiaries of the bailout, and one of the major reasons that Congressional Republicans opposed the bailout the first time around. To my knowledge they were removed from the final draft.
In any case, the whole thing looks more and more like a boondoggle for taxpayers and a convenient way for members of Congress to pass legislation that would otherwise probably face more scrutiny.
E. Neil Trautwein, vice president of the “National Retail Federation”, was quoted as saying, “We built the [mental health insurance] bill piece by piece from the ground up. It’s a good harbinger for future efforts on health care reform.”
It’s a harbinger, alright. I’m not sure if it’s a good one.
