Health care is focus of Goodlatte's town hall

If Sixth District Congressman Bob Goodlatte needed another reminder of how important health care issues are to his constituents, Saturday afternoon provided it.

Despite a gorgeous late-summer day, a lot of yardwork went undone and football games unwatched as close to 200 people showed up for a “town hall meeting” with their congressman.

The “town hall,” in this case, was the Holy Cross Regional Catholic School gymnasium, where Goodlatte’s audience filled up the bleachers on one side and overflowed into auxiliary chairs.

The nine-term Republican from Roanoke put the rhetorical ball in play in his opening remarks, declaring, “I cannot support the legislation (House Bill 3200) that is currently before the House. This is a major new intrusion by the federal government in a lot of different ways.”

He went on to cite figures from “one of three different studies” that he said showed only a small percentage of American citizens were without health insurance coverage.

“The total number of uninsured is said to be 45.7 million,” Goodlatte said, “but of that, 9.5 million are illegal aliens, 12 million are eligible for Medicare or Medicaid but have never applied, 7.3 percent have incomes above $80,000 a year and 9.1 are temporarily uninsured until they find work. That leaves 7.8 million, or less than three percent.”

The health care vision Goodlatte put forth involved open competition among insurance companies and consumers gathered in large pools that would spread out risk — a plan similar, he said, to the coverage offered to federal employees. That, he added, would increase choices for insurance buyers and help eliminate the onerous practice of denying coverage because of “pre-existing conditions.”

Goodlatte bristled at a proposed 8 percent tax on companies that did not provide health care for their employees and said that while malpractice reform “should not minimize the responsibility faced by those who practice health care irresponsibly,” there should be a cap on “outrageous awards for pain and suffering.”

“We also need to end defensive medicine as much as we can,” he said.

The two-hour meeting was sometimes emotional but never angry, with Goodlatte aide Pete Larkin dashing up into the bleachers with a

microphone as hands were raised. Speakers from the audience were generally critical of the current system, whether they agreed or disagreed with Goodlatte, although Rita Hahn said: “They should help the people who are in trouble and leave the rest of us alone.”

Another speaker pointed out that the United States was the only nation in the industrialized world without some form of national health insurance. Goodlatte drew his loudest applause of the day when he replied: “That’s true. But that doesn’t convince me that that’s where the United States should go.”

For the most part, though, the audience members and Goodlatte seemed to be talking past one another, the former bringing up specific cases and the congressman reiterating general points in response.

Bev Jordan said his wife was paying more than $4,000 a month for prescription medications.

“We can help these people without going to a one-size-fits-all system,” Goodlatte replied.

He blamed House Democrats for trying to “ram through” a bill that lacked broad-cased support.

“I think we should hit the reset button and go back and get a bipartisan bill,” he said. “This is too important to pass by one or two votes.”