| Bark Stupak's office released this letter after being asked whether the representative would support health care reform that included funding for abortion. When asked if Stupak would support any bill that had abortion funding, his spokeswoman Michelle Begnoche said she wouldn't get into hypotheticals, but the excerpted part of the letter kind of speaks for itself. The answer is: 
The representative has other concerns with health care reform, at least as it stood a few days ago. His office said that the Congressional Budget Office estimates show that it wouldn't save money, that regional differences in Medicare reimbursements (Miami health care providers, for instance, get far more in Medicare reimbursements than one in Marquette) need to be addressed, more transparency is needed in the market and that anti-trust provisions protecting health insurance providers need to repealed. The CBO estimates do show that there are no savngs at the federal leve, which means that the federal government would get more expensive. Congressional leaders say they're working to even this out. Late last week, Congressional leaders said that they'd resolved the Medicare reimbursement issue. As of Monday, Stupak's office said it hadn't seen any specific language on this. |
