Photo by George Lauby Adrian Smith

President Obama and top Republicans in Congress meet this week to talk about health care reform, and Rep. Adrian Smith says there is a slight chance of an agreement.

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Smith said Obama must be willing to compromise.

Smith, who is completing his second term in the House of Representatives, was in North Platte Thursday to address a meeting of Nebraska county officials. He stopped at the Bulletin office for a 30-minute discussion, then headed to Thedford to talk with constituents at a mobile office.

Smith said unilateral political party action in Congress prevents level-headed Republicans and Democrats from working together. Leading Democrats, especially Nancy Pelosi, push too hard to pass highly controversial legislation.

As Speaker of the House, Pelosi schedules House bills for floor debate and a vote.

A new Congress had only been in power for five months in 2009 when Pelosi pushed for cap and trade regulations to cut carbon use and overhaul the way the U.S. produces energy. It narrowly passed, 219-212.

So far, the Senate has not taken it up.

Spurred by Pelosi, the House also passed its version of health care reform – including a public insurance option – by just five votes, 220-215.

Smith said his repeated attempts to communicate with Pelosi and her staff brought no response.

Like Pelosi in the House, Sen. Harry Reid plays a strong hand in the Democrat controlled Senate. Health care reform passed the Senate by the narrowest of margins, but a new Republican Senator was recently elected in Massachusetts to replace Ted Kennedy. The Democrat's loss of a single vote put reform on hiatus again.

Meanwhile, health care costs continue to soar. Medical care costs increased 7.4 percent 2009 despite the sluggish economy, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

But if President Obama is really willing to bend on health care, Congress could get it passed, Smith said.

Energy

Smith said the U.S. must open offshore waters and drill for natural gas as well as oil.

Offshore drilling has been demonstrated to be safe and there are substantial supplies of energy in the coastal waters, he said.

Of the many oil drilling rigs in the Gulf of Mexico, none spilled during Hurricane Katrina. They shut down and weathered the storm. And, there is considerable clean-burning natural gas offshore, he said.

Capping fossil fuels under the cap and trade bill would greatly harm much of Nebraska’s economy, which receives relatively low cost electricity from the electrical plant at Sutherland and the coal it burns, he said.

Small encouragement

Smith is encouraged that President Obama is inviting Republicans to talk with him about health-care reform, but he is not convinced Obama will accept the Republican’s ideas for reform.

The House healthcare reform bill establishes 100 new government boards, committees and commissions, creating way too much bureaucracy, Smith said.

Smith favors tort reforms, greater use of health savings accounts and making insurance premiums tax exempt for all individuals, not just the employees of large companies, as is the case now.

The Democrat bill sets up a study of tort reform, but doesn’t set limits.

The majority of states already have limits in place, but more than a dozen do not.

In Nebraska, the tort limit is $1.75 million in total medical malpractice damages per incident. There is also a limit of $500,000 per doctor (or other health care provider).

Those limits, enacted when Nebraska Sen. Ben Nelson was governor, are widely considered to be a model for a nationwide limit, Smith said.

More on Nebraska’s tort limits

• Statute of limitations -- two years. If the injury is not discovered within the two-year period, then the action must be filed within one year from the date that the injury was, or should have been, discovered, whichever is earlier.

In no event may a medical malpractice action be filed more than 10 years after the act giving rise to the injury occurred.

• Caps -- Total damages are limited to $1.75 million. Health care provider’s liability is limited to $500,000. Any excess of total liability of all health care providers is paid from a state Excess Liability Fund.

Notable health care reforms

Generally, both the Senate and House bills:

• Require most Americans to carry insurance and provide federal subsidies to those who otherwise cannot afford it.

• Large companies would have to offer insurance coverage to employees. Both consumers and companies would be slapped with penalties if they defied the government's mandates.

• Such insurance practices as denying coverage on the basis of pre-existing medical conditions would be banned.

• Insurers would no longer be able to charge higher premiums on the basis of gender or medical history.

• The insurance industry would lose its exemption from federal antitrust restrictions on price fixing and market allocation.

• The bills would create a federally regulated marketplace in each state in 2012 where consumers could shop for coverage.

• In the House version, the government would also sell health insurance under the so-called “public option.”