Newly-elected Congressman Andy Harris of Maryland won his election by being an outspoken critic of so-called "Obamacare". So, what was the first question he asked at freshmen orientation? Why can't I buy into government health care in advance of being sworn-in in January? He appeared to believe there would be a government program for congressmen similar to the public option Democrats tried to pass last year. Whoops.
He will get his government health care soon enough. When he takes office, he and his family will get the very generous Federal Employees Plan, known as FEP for short. He will most likely choose the Blue Cross plan which I wish I had! The benefits are wonderful! Every Congressional representative who voted against the public option should be ashamed if they based their vote on not wanting a "government" plan for citizens. I have worked in the medical insurance field for over 30 years and by far, FEP is better than any plan offered by private companies to their employees!
My feeling: the members of Congress that are opposed to government run health care should decline coverage in FEP for themselves and their families! Check out their government run pension plan as well!
We should all be so fortunate!
The FEP is BCBS and a lot of other insurance companies who want a share of the big federal employee market. If you work for the federal government, you can *SELECT* from a menu of insurance company options. (Remember the Health Care Exchanges in Health Care Reform? It's the FEHP system - made available to citizens.)
One other thing about he FEHP that major companies like BCBS fight to be a part of. The FEHP has ALWAYS prohibited discriminating on the basis of a pre-existing condition, and the participating companies are fine with that. But in the private sector, those same companies fight to be able to pick and choose their customers, and they claim they CAN'T do for the regular Joe - what they do voluntarily for employees of the federal workforce.
And now they have teabaggers fighting tooth and nail to repeal health care reform. This deny 30 million Americans access to care - and renew provisions which will allow companies to discriminate against people who had a previous health problem. So as a mailman, should I have a better insurance plan than you? Just repeal Obamacare and I will.
Yeah, my dad just retired after more than 30 years with the Park Service and he's always had fantastic insurance. The private options are complete s*** by comparison.
Kerry, I am really glad that your dad has great coverage! Wish we all had access to the same thing! What I am seeing currently is a tiered-retirement system being put into play for local, state and federal govt workers. The new hires (very few because most hiring is frozen) will not get the pensions or the health coverage that your dad has. Instead of moving forward, we seem to be all too willing to step back by lessening benefits. I know, everyone says that we can't afford it, but I believe that is an excuse for the real issue.
The real issue is that the private sector has allowed big business to reduce benefits and destroy pensions for private sector employees and now these private sector employees don't want anyone else to have benefits either! When the federal employees lose their pensions and retirement health care, then the population will figure out that military men and women can retire with a pension and family health care for life when they are as young as 38 years old. Go in at 18, serve 20 years and retire! They will be the next target, until no one in this country has retirement benefits! Of course no one would dare suggest that while we are at war, but when the wars are over, they will become the next expense to cut.
This is off the subject of the Congressman who knows exactly how important medical insurance is for his family, but doesn't want other peoples' families to have the same protections! He is despicable and has been quickly shown to be a hypocrite, as well as a liar. He wants his family to be secure, but other families? Hell, NO! Other families are not as important as his own family. What a great guy!
All of the advances made to labor laws and employee benefits in the 20th century are being eroded, slowly but surely.
It would be divine justice, indeed, if every member of Congress who voted against "Obamacare" were removed from FEP and allowed to see how the health care (insurance) industry REALLY works.
I just emailed Andy Harris to let him know what a hypocrite he is!
His email address is: info@andyharris.com
I am sure that he doesn't care what anyone thinks about his behavior or hypocritical attitude! Just goes to show you: they run on one thing and live another! During his campaign he stated that if someone has no health insurance they can go to the emergency room for treatment. Suggest since he is a doctor, he should just provide any needed treatment by himself! What a great cost savings!
Mighty Mom- I agree. Anyone who voted no should give up their government run health care benefits!
I personaly think that this country should of joined the rest of the industrialized countries and just plain go with universal healthcare. Our former brainchild presideent Bush told his audience that we have the best health care in the world. Actulay we rank #37 behind Costa Rica. France is #1 and Austria, Japan. and Spain are in the top 10.
We're suppose to be number one but we fail in health care, education, and so on. We need to stop saying it and start acting like it!
by Grace Marguerite Williams 6 years ago
Do you believe that the nuisance known as Obamacare will finally be repealed? Why? Why not?I believe that the government SHOULD NOT be in private affairs such as health care. I believe that health care is the sole responsibility of the individual. If individuals want health care,...
by Susie Lehto 8 years ago
HEALTHCARE REFORM TO MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAINSince March of 2010, the American people have had to suffer under the incredible economic burden of the Affordable Care Act—Obamacare. This legislation, passed by totally partisan votes in the House and Senate and signed into law by the most divisive and...
by scoop 11 years ago
What exactly is "Obamacare" and when does the law go into effect?
by Grace Marguerite Williams 7 years ago
Obama "care" for the most part has been a disaster. Premiums keep rising & for many, it has become exorbitantly expensive. According to the latest news, steps to repeal Obama"care" has been defeated. Trumpcare as it was proposed would have...
by Georgiakevin 15 years ago
I simply do not understand why people are fighting health care reform. I have heard the arguments against it and I keep saying how is that worse than being held hostage by the insurance companies? My insurance cost keeps going and in turn I get less and less coverage. They say the govt run...
by Judy Specht 8 years ago
I have been listening to how the government has a billion dollars for getting people to sign up for the Affordable Healthcare Act. Would that money have been better spent training more doctors and building new hospitals? New Jersey has closed how many community hospitals in the last few...
Copyright © 2025 The Arena Media Brands, LLC and respective content providers on this website. HubPages® is a registered trademark of The Arena Platform, Inc. Other product and company names shown may be trademarks of their respective owners. The Arena Media Brands, LLC and respective content providers to this website may receive compensation for some links to products and services on this website.
Copyright © 2025 Maven Media Brands, LLC and respective owners.
As a user in the EEA, your approval is needed on a few things. To provide a better website experience, hubpages.com uses cookies (and other similar technologies) and may collect, process, and share personal data. Please choose which areas of our service you consent to our doing so.
For more information on managing or withdrawing consents and how we handle data, visit our Privacy Policy at: https://corp.maven.io/privacy-policy
Show DetailsNecessary | |
---|---|
HubPages Device ID | This is used to identify particular browsers or devices when the access the service, and is used for security reasons. |
Login | This is necessary to sign in to the HubPages Service. |
Google Recaptcha | This is used to prevent bots and spam. (Privacy Policy) |
Akismet | This is used to detect comment spam. (Privacy Policy) |
HubPages Google Analytics | This is used to provide data on traffic to our website, all personally identifyable data is anonymized. (Privacy Policy) |
HubPages Traffic Pixel | This is used to collect data on traffic to articles and other pages on our site. Unless you are signed in to a HubPages account, all personally identifiable information is anonymized. |
Amazon Web Services | This is a cloud services platform that we used to host our service. (Privacy Policy) |
Cloudflare | This is a cloud CDN service that we use to efficiently deliver files required for our service to operate such as javascript, cascading style sheets, images, and videos. (Privacy Policy) |
Google Hosted Libraries | Javascript software libraries such as jQuery are loaded at endpoints on the googleapis.com or gstatic.com domains, for performance and efficiency reasons. (Privacy Policy) |
Features | |
---|---|
Google Custom Search | This is feature allows you to search the site. (Privacy Policy) |
Google Maps | Some articles have Google Maps embedded in them. (Privacy Policy) |
Google Charts | This is used to display charts and graphs on articles and the author center. (Privacy Policy) |
Google AdSense Host API | This service allows you to sign up for or associate a Google AdSense account with HubPages, so that you can earn money from ads on your articles. No data is shared unless you engage with this feature. (Privacy Policy) |
Google YouTube | Some articles have YouTube videos embedded in them. (Privacy Policy) |
Vimeo | Some articles have Vimeo videos embedded in them. (Privacy Policy) |
Paypal | This is used for a registered author who enrolls in the HubPages Earnings program and requests to be paid via PayPal. No data is shared with Paypal unless you engage with this feature. (Privacy Policy) |
Facebook Login | You can use this to streamline signing up for, or signing in to your Hubpages account. No data is shared with Facebook unless you engage with this feature. (Privacy Policy) |
Maven | This supports the Maven widget and search functionality. (Privacy Policy) |
Marketing | |
---|---|
Google AdSense | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
Google DoubleClick | Google provides ad serving technology and runs an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
Index Exchange | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
Sovrn | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
Facebook Ads | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
Amazon Unified Ad Marketplace | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
AppNexus | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
Openx | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
Rubicon Project | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
TripleLift | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
Say Media | We partner with Say Media to deliver ad campaigns on our sites. (Privacy Policy) |
Remarketing Pixels | We may use remarketing pixels from advertising networks such as Google AdWords, Bing Ads, and Facebook in order to advertise the HubPages Service to people that have visited our sites. |
Conversion Tracking Pixels | We may use conversion tracking pixels from advertising networks such as Google AdWords, Bing Ads, and Facebook in order to identify when an advertisement has successfully resulted in the desired action, such as signing up for the HubPages Service or publishing an article on the HubPages Service. |
Statistics | |
---|---|
Author Google Analytics | This is used to provide traffic data and reports to the authors of articles on the HubPages Service. (Privacy Policy) |
Comscore | ComScore is a media measurement and analytics company providing marketing data and analytics to enterprises, media and advertising agencies, and publishers. Non-consent will result in ComScore only processing obfuscated personal data. (Privacy Policy) |
Amazon Tracking Pixel | Some articles display amazon products as part of the Amazon Affiliate program, this pixel provides traffic statistics for those products (Privacy Policy) |
Clicksco | This is a data management platform studying reader behavior (Privacy Policy) |