Where do Virginia's two U.S. Senators, Jim Webb and Mark Warner, stand on health care reform - and specifically a "public option" as part of that reform - and on a clean energy/climate change bill? First, here's where they stand on the public option, according to the Virginian-Pilot (June 25, 2009).
Sen. Jim Webb also likes the idea of a competitive public plan because it may be the only way to cover the more than 47 million Americans without health insurance.In short, right now it looks like Jim Webb is supporting the "public option" as part of health care reform, while Mark Warner is not. I strongly agree with Jim Webb and urge Mark Warner to reconsider.
“There is no reason to believe that private insurers alone will meet the public purpose of ensuring coverage for all American at an affordable price for taxpayers,” Webb and 15 other senators wrote in an April letter urging that a public option be approved.
Warner begs to disagree. Rather than a new federal insurance plan, Warner said last week he wants to explore creating non-profit health care cooperatives that would pool their resources to provide their members with benefits and would compete with for-profit insurance businesses.
As to the clean energy/climate change bill, environmental blog Grist puts both Warner and Webb in the "Undecided/Unknown" category, along with 43 other Senators. Grist has 30 Senators listed as "likely supporters" and 25 as "likely opponents." I strongly urge that everyone let Senators Warner and Webb know that we want them in the "likely supporters" category, ASAP. Thanks.
P.S. On the clean energy/climate change bill, the bottom line for Webb and Warner is that Waxman/Markey was supported by Rick Boucher (D-Coal Producing Region of Virginia) and even our old pals at Dominion Power. That should certainly be "good" enough for Warner and Webb.
