Even Warren Buffet Thinks Congress Should Scrap This Bill And Start Over

Grace-Marie Turner on President Obama's Health Care Summit

A healthcare reform expert warns that the healthcare legislation Democrats are pushing will be a major expansion of a welfare program that is already being administered poorly.

Congressman Peter Roskam (R-Illinois) last week pointed out that over half of the health insurance expansion obtained by Americans through the Democrats' health bill is accomplished by putting them on Medicaid.

Grace-Marie Turner, president of the Galen Institute, served for a year and a half on a commission that studied Medicaid. She feels that in many states, Medicaid has become the "ghetto of our healthcare system," and adds that far too often, people are promised access to care but cannot find a doctor or dentist to see them because the program pays so little.

"How dare we think of putting another 15 million of the 30 million that would allegedly be covered through this bill, expanding Medicaid, on a program that already is having a hard time serving the people who are on the program," Turner contends.  "The other 15 million that would get coverage would be in these government-required policies that would be hugely expensive.  And many of them will be required to pay for some -- or in many cases, a large portion of -- their health coverage."

One of President Obama's economic advisers, Warren Buffet, suggested yesterday that Congress should scrap the current healthcare bill and start over with the main goal of addressing rising healthcare costs.