Okay, so why was Julie Boonstra advocating for lower-cost oral chemotherapy treatment in Washington when she was getting that medication for a set, low monthly price under the insurance plan she liked and did not want to part with? Was she concerned about reaching her annual or lifetime coverage cap?
Boonstra is the ex-wife of Mark Boonstra, the former Washtenaw County GOP chairman whom Gov. Rick Snyder appointed to the Michigan Court of Appeals in 2012. Julie Boonstra said she’s never been a political person beyond advocating for lower-cost oral chemotherapy treatment in Washington. [My boldface.]
— Dexter cancer patient who called health care ‘unaffordable’ will save more than $1K, Marisa Schultz, Detroit News, Mar. 10
Boonstra famously was quoted in that article as saying when told the details of her new Blue Cross plan that it “can’t be true” that that plan is cheaper, by a minimum of $1,200 for the year, than her old plan. “I personally do not believe that,” Boonstra told Ms. Schultz. Schultz continued:
She said she still fears her costs will be unaffordable because she could be hit with large out-of-pocket bills in the early months when she wouldn’t have the money to pay. She also said her out-of-pocket maximum could be higher than advertised because there’s one prescription that was previously covered by her old plan that isn’t and she now buys with a separate prescription discount card.
An interesting comment thread developed here during the last few days in response to my post on Tuesday about the Detroit News article. I titled that post “Julie Boonstra Tells the Detroit News Why Her New Healthcare Plan Doesn’t Work for Her: It Requires Her to Read the Policy or Ask Blue Cross a Few Basic Questions In Order to Learn What the Plan Actually Covers and What Her Expense Cap Is.” One subject of the discussion concerned her statement that there’s one prescription that was previously covered by her old plan that isn’t and she now buys with a separate prescription discount card. I pointed out that she does not say that that prescription is part of her cancer treatments, and that according to a Blue Cross spokesperson Ms. Schultz contacted for the article, it is not; all her cancer drugs are covered.
I also noted that Boonstra has not said that her old plan covered all medications. She just said it covered all of her current medications. And since I happen to know, having shopped there many times, that there is a Rite Aid pharmacy on the far west side of Ann Arbor, just east of Dexter, a village that is a small bedroom community mainly for people who work in Ann Arbor, I posted this from Rite Aid’s website:
Rite Aid, 500 generic-brand prescriptions available: $9 for a 30-day prescription; $16 for a 90-day one.
I also said in that comment something that, surprisingly, no one else (to my knowledge) has mentioned:
She also, by the way, has not said–because she doesn’t know, and either does Blue Cross–what her old plan would have cost in monthly premiums and out-of-pocket expenses and co-pays THIS YEAR, had the plan not been discontinued. But it sure as hell would be interesting to know how her old plan differed in costs and coverage last year from the year before, and how much her premiums and out-of-pocket and co-pay costs went up in, say, the last five years on that plan.
But there’s an even more fundamental question about Boonstra’s comments to Ms. Schultz: Why was Boonstra advocating for lower-cost oral chemotherapy treatment in Washington during a period when she was paying set, low monthly out-of-pocket costs and was happy with her plan?
When I first read the article it seemed strange to me that this anti-federal government Republican was advocating in Washington for federal regulation of the cost of a particular medical prescription. But only after reading through the comments to my post on the article, in which I did not mention that statement of hers, but a commenter to the post did, did it occur to me that there was something more, something fundamental, wrong with this picture.
This clearly is someone who is locked deep inside the Fox News/Rush Limbaugh sphere of reality. She seems to want a single-payer, Medicare-for-all type of healthcare insurance system, and wants the actual benefits of the ACA, including, apparently–no, undoubtedly–the removal of annual and lifetime caps on coverage. And it’s a safe bet that she personally does not believe that the ACA includes these bars, and that that is why her old plan was cancelled. It can’t be true, because Fox News and Rush Limbaugh haven’t mentioned it.
This woman is among those who cannot be reached with facts. But they are in the minority among the electorate. It’s deeply unfortunate that our Democratic president won’t educate the public about the actual specifics of the plan. He doesn’t do specifics in speaking to the public, and doesn’t do facts and explanations at all. And he certainly doesn’t do refutations of misinformation.
We know by now that hell will freeze over before he refutes Boonstra, Emilie Lamb and the others in the AFP ads, and I guess that’s okay, because everyone’s tuned him out anyway. But why has it taken so very, very long for the Dems to begin to take over this slack? Their failure to do do this because Obama is unpopular is a key reason why Obama is so unpopular. Or at least a key reason why Obamacare is unpopular. Which, apparently more than anything else, is what matters this election cycle.
As for Boonstra, reader Alex Bollinger posted this comment this morning to my earlier post:
Yes, we should feel compassion for this woman. And our blame should be mostly on the political consultants who are taking advantage of her loyalty to movement conservatism (I don’t think she’s stupid at all because I’ve seen very intelligent people really, really want to believe something is true so much that they believe their rightthink).
But her comments are intended to rescind the ACA, which has already insured over 12 million people. I’m sure there are people who either have or will get cancer among those 12 million. Just because they don’t have TV ads doesn’t mean that their lives aren’t important as well, and Boonstra has the ability to temper her ideological fervor with, you know, having a basic understanding of her plan before going on national TV to talk about it.
Exactly.
That’s the Woman’s OPINION of her new policy. Her OPINION will not kill ANY of those 12 million people, they are American Citizens and well able to make up their own minds. I am sure most will read their own plans and make the best of it. I am also sure most won’t get a discount coupon from the Detroit Rite Aid.
Can’t Gary Peters find at least ONE SATISFIED ACA CUSTOMER to present on TV?
geez
M.M., “That’s the Woman’s OPINION of her new policy.”
it may be her opinion, Mike, but its presented as a fact in a political policy advertisement. It is a fact, the fact that it is her opinion. That’s enough to confuse the viewers of those ads. The electorate is not that difficult to fool. Limbaugh would not have the audience he does if the average American listener/viewer were well informed and open to facts.
Beverly hits the nail squarely when she points out the abysmal lack of reaction from the Democratic organization. That deficiency can be extended to the general news media, which has hardly noticed this particular story or the significant fabrications that are presented in most hard to the right political publications. And no Mike, there is not an equal amount of deceit and deception taking place between the two parties. Unfortunately the Democratic organization doesn’t appear to know how to spin a good tale. They can’t even take advantage of the truth when it would benefit the party and its candidates.
“This clearly is someone who is locked deep inside the Fox News/Rush Limbaugh sphere of reality. ”
I have talked to one of those people. He has latched on to one of their sound bites; ‘if you like your health insurance you can keep it”. Since that was not true, then he is prepared to believe the worst of ObamaCare. And there is no reasoning with him. First he is on Medicare. (ObamaCare is irrelevant.) Second, he is complaining bitterly that the price of his supplementary policy has gone up by $25 to about $150 a month. But it turns out that this policy has no deductibles or copays. (That is what he says.) I didn’t know that such a thing was even possible! I have been insured since 1969 and I have never had a policy that did not have yearly deductibles, and co-insurance or copays.
Another friend told me that his yearly deductible had gone up to $3000 and he blamed ObamaCare. In his case he has heard so many complaints about ObamaCare that he is prepared to believe the worst. First he is retired and the state is providing his healthcare policy. (ObamaCare is irrelevant.) Second I was able to check the stats on the group of health insurance policies offered and his yearly deductible had to be $700 or less. It turned out that his maximum yearly out of pocket was $3000.
President Obama is losing the propaganda war.
I am an Independent but the Democrats have the high ground on this issue. They had better find a way to respond to the Republicans with soundbites of their own or they are going to lose in this off-year election.
The soundbites should be negative about the system before ObamaCare. Negative trumps negative. (An appreciation for the positive effects of ObamaCare will take a few years to percolate up from the insured.)
I like this sound bite: “The old voluntary heath insurance system allowed for too many people to freeload on the backs of the elderly and the chronically ill.” It is fundamentally true.The Republicans hate the mandated coverage and this would be a good response to any attack on the mandate.
I knew I have seen this “OPINION” thing before.
Sheldon Cooper: This is my home now. Thanks to you, my career is over and I’ll spend the rest of my life here in Texas, trying to teach evolution to creationists.
Mary: You watch your mouth, Shelly. Everyone’s entitled to their opinion.
Sheldon Cooper: Evolution isn’t an opinion, it’s fact.
Mary: And that is your opinion.
Sheldon Cooper: [to the others] I forgive you. Let’s go home.
[leaves]
Mary: Don’t tell me prayer doesn’t work.
Why not just have ads where one person after another praises the ACA for its good coverage and the huge money savings they’re seeing? It’s simple and personal stories are effective.
Hmmm. Mike, what makes you think Peters can’t find at least ONE SATISFIED ACA CUSTOMER to present on TV? That he and others point out that Julie Boonstra’s claim that her new policy costs so much more than her old, cancelled one that her medical costs are now unaffordable is flatly false, and that initially (and for about six weeks after her first ad began running) it looked like she would save a small amount–whatever the total of her “low” monthly out-of-pocket costs were under her old plan, minus $2 for the year total maximum costs under her new plan–and that it now turns out that she’ll save a minimum of $1,200 this year?
Seriously, how does this translate into: Gary Peters can’t find at least ONE SATISFIED ACA CUSTOMER to present on TV. What does one thing HAVE TO DO WITH THE OTHER?
As for the opinion=fair-representation-of-fact nonsense, I’ll just adopt the spot-on comments here of Jack, JimH, and EMichael. And I’ll add that my opinion is that anyone who can’t distinguish between an opinion and an explicit representation of fact needs to, maybe, look up the meaning of the word “opinion” in, say, Webster’s.
I’ll let you figure out whether or not that opinion of mine is fact.
To EMichael: THANKS FOR THAT!
And, thanks, Jack and Jim, for spot-on comments.
JDM, it’s absolutely necessary to also point out that the Boonstra/Lamb-type ads are making bald misrepresentations of fact. Since, after all, the Boonstra/Lamb-type ads are making bald misrepresentations of fact, and, left unrefuted, lots of people will believe them.
Why should the Dems just let these blatant misrepresentations go unrefuted?
Jack: Its a POLITICAL ad. People who believe Limpballs will ALWAYS believe Limpballs because the TRUTH means absolutely nothing to them. They WANT to hear that shit. Should Julie come on TV and swear&be damned that her policy was better than ice cream, Rushblow would call her a liar and the herd would follow. Thems that believe, believe, thems that don’t, don’t.
Much like O-Bots believe Obama can do no wrong, Blowhards believe that Rushblow can tell no lies. Just like swiftboating THAT’S American politics.
The Dems lie too, THAT’S how Viet Nam got started and ACTUALLY KILLED millions.
NO POLICIES HAVE BEEN SHOWN so that WE the public might read for ourselves to “DO THE MATH” and therefore see for once and for all how Julie has fared in this matter.
Beverly Mann: YOU have a right to YOUR opinion but that’s what it is an opinion; Proof is in SHOWING THE PLANS and the difference between them, that’s proof. Opinions are like political ads they change with the political winds. I was asking “Why doesn’t Mr. Peters come up with an ACTUAL CUSTOMER to oppose Julie’s OPINION”. Hell, PAY them to lie if need be should he NOT be able to find a truly satisfied person, The Koch Bros do it.
YA WANNA WIN, DONCHA???
Either SHOW PROOF or get in the game and lie. Don’t go around with some half-assed opinions that ONE QUESTION, like “Where’s the proof?” can stop YOU dead in the swiftboat water.
EMichael: Although I’ve been to and lived and worked in Texas, I have an Uncle there also, I have NEVER met or heard of Sheldon Cooper or, I presume, his spouse, Mary.
And so, I’m forced to ask, “What’s YOUR point”?
“. wants the actual benefits of the ACA, including, apparently–no, undoubtedly–the removal of annual and lifetime caps on coverage. And it’s a safe bet that she personally does not believe that the ACA includes these bars, and that that is why her old plan was cancelled.”
I don’t think this can be right. Lifetime caps were barred for all policies effective in 2010, and annual caps, which could not be less than $2 million since September 2012, would have in any case been unlawful in any amount as of this year. So her policy already could not have had a lifetime cap, and any renewal of her old policy would have had to eliminate an annual cap by law.
I get it, Mike. You don’t know what the definition of “opinion” is. “YOU have a right to YOUR opinion” is not what an opinion is.”YOU have a right to YOUR opinion but that’s what it is an opinion” is a tautology. It says nothing about the definition of opinion. And, no, Mike, you don’t have a right to spew false facts–not as you mean “a right.”
And, no, you don’t have a right to your opinion about the meaning of the word “opinion.” The word has a set, defined meaning.
And btw, I forgot to mention in my last response to you that Rite Aid’s discount plan is not a coupon; it’s an ongoing discount plan established years ago and available to anyone for any of the included medications, to people who have no prescription insurance or whose insurance doesn’t cover the particular prescription.
Urban Legend, if you click the link in my post where I mention Emilie Lamb, you’ll see that the cancelled plan she claimed she liked and angry was cancelled had an annual cap of $25,000. Many of the mini-insurance plans, like the ones offered to minimum-wage fast-food employees for a monthly premium paid by the employee, had low annual caps and most of them had high deductibles. If I recall correctly, the ACA originally had a cutoff on these plans of sometime in 2011, but there was such a fuss about it that the cutoff was extended. I think it was extended until the full law came into effect on Jan. 1, 20014, although I’m not sure.
The waivers were always set to expire for businesses (wanting time to eliminate their mini-plans) and individuals to 2014.
Should say: … and was angry was cancelled ….”
Mike,
geez
just…………geez
Beverly Mann: I don’t believe I said the facts are a right. POLITICAL SPEACH IS A RIGHT fact or lie, and OPINIONS are a right, but FACTS must be proven to be facts.
AN OPINION is simply that which someone believes. FACTS or rights may well have nothing to do with them but then again they might.
I’m almost sure those 12 million won’t be getting their generic drugs from The Detroit Rite-Aid, coupon or not, just an opinion as I have NO PROOF all 12 million don’t live in The Detroit Area.
I completely understand THOSE PLANS may not available for US to peruse so that WE may “do the math”. Still, that would be the way prove Ms. Boonstra’s claims one way or the other.
I’m NOT a true Dem believer nor a Republican or a Bagger. I’m a “Third Party, Folks” person. Trying to run on an O-Bot line will not work on me.
I don’t trust anything from either party, ESPECIALLY during an election year. I see all the anecdotal testimonies as politicking. Such politicking got US into Iraq and Afghanistan which, other than “getting Bin Laden” has done nothing toward “The Greater Good”, IMHO.
I STILL CONTEND that’s just too early to determine if ACA is good for the nation with respect to healthcare or not. How can one know if the plans are working without seeing them or if they have worked or not?
Urban Legend, I also want to point out that it is the ACA that prohibits the annual and lifetime caps, irrespective of whether those prohibitions kicked in before this year or not.
M.M., “I STILL CONTEND that’s just too early to determine if ACA is good for the nation with respect to healthcare or not. How can one know if the plans are working without seeing them or if they have worked or not?”
Mike, if that’s what you’ve been trying to say in those many comments of yours regarding the differences between opinion and fact and your insistence that you must see with your own eyes each plan before knowing the value of that plan, then you’ve wasted a lot of time and space. No problem if you want to waste your own time, but its a pain to find that you’ve wasted our time and the blog’s space chasing your tail. Maybe that was your intention, and if so that would qualify you as a troll of the worst kind. You start by seeming to have a genuine interest, but we come to an end point that concludes with you needing to see something play out before yo can know if its a good or bad idea. Welcome back to reality. If correcting something as serious as health care financing for all, and especially the poor, were dependent on your opinion we’d all be dead and buried before you satisfaction criteria were met. Thanks for nothing.
Beverley Mann —
Thanks. I forgot about those waivers. Pretty annoying when they were adopted, but they kind of had the administration over a barrel. The abhorrent Republican total-resistance plan — refusing to cooperate on fixes — made the politics co-extensive with policy, making it imperative to protect the law against political assault.
I don’t think the waivers ever applied to the lifetime cap, did they?
Amen that it was only the ACA that has guaranteed that insurance be genuine insurance. Unfortunately, it’s been difficult to make that particular case (elimination of caps) politically, because for most people operation of the caps is a remote contingency. The Democrats, however, have done an utterly horrible job of informing Americans of the actual content of the law, if for no other reason than to run interference for loyal supporters in Congress running in 2012 and 2014. A long time ago, they should have started a multi-media campaign (including TV) that said, essentially, if you think you hate this law, you should at least be sure you know what’s actually in it — and what’s in it even for people who are not the unlucky downtrodden and think they are unaffected because they have employer-based insurance, i.e., guarantee you can get insurance even if you lose the job. An informative campaign like that with a trusted spokesperson — not Obama now, unfortunately — could still help for this November.
Jack: THANKS for calling me a troll.
I love this country and the people in it, I was born here. I’ve been poor before too. For YEARS I lived on the street, under overpasses and in railroad yards, and when the police forced me, in homeless missions. I believe I have a reasonable understanding of poverty. I STILL hoard food and keep a tent and sleeping bag close by just in case.
I have also seen how many poor are kept that way so others can make money off of their poverty, and its often brutal. Many are taken for everything because of the “fine print” in government programs. Why just look how the “fine print” in government supervision of the housing sector and mortgage finance put so many to living on the street, for example. Wiped away their pension plans and life savings(Detroit for one), left them hanging in their old age.
So if I look at these programs with a HARD EYE, it because I know better than to accept such things at face value. I want to READ THAT FINE PRINT before I sign on to something.
If YOU don’t , well that’s YOUR business, but I WILL mention it to YOU first if I think it will help avoid trapping YOU and others.
If its a “waste of time” or “tail chasing” I guess that’s on YOU and whether YOU look at those PLANS with a hard eye, read that fine print or not.
“The boy, I say the boy, is as sharp as a bowling ball.”
Foghorn Leghorn
This thread has already gone on too long–or, specifically, the exchanges between Mike and everyone else have. There’s no point to it, because most people do know and understand the things that Mike does not.
But I’ll just make one final response to him in this thread, to point out:
First, Rite Aid is a pharmacy chain that, while it is not in every state, is in many states, and has stores throughout Boonstra’s state of MI;
Second, Rite Aid, like all pharmacy chains and other chains (Walmart, KMart, supermarket chains) that sell prescription drugs, have a set nationwide price for each drug, and their discount drug plans are available to anyone without prescription-drug insurance coverage or whose plan doesn’t cover the particular drug, regardless of which location the prescription is filled at;
Third, the Rite Aid I mentioned that is on the north side of Ann Arbor, very close to Dexter, is on a retail-store stip that includes within a half-mile or so, Kroger’s, KMart, Walgreens and CVS. A friend of mine uses Kroger’s pharmacy’s discount program and says it’s very inexpensive. KMart’s, I believe is, too. Walgreen’s is slightly more expensive than Rite Aid’s, but still very inexpensive. Same also, I believe, with Meijer’s, a large regional grocery store chain with stores throughout Michigan, and same also with Walmart, although there is no Meijer’s or Walmart as close to Dexter as the other stores I mentioned.
Fourth, I do not know why you’re now claiming, Mike, that the insurance policies at issue are provided by the federal government, nor do I know why you’re claiming that the specifics of how these plans will work are as yet unknown. You seem to be conflating three or four rightwing cliches about the ACA and about the federal government, and applying them to phantom facts.
So I’ll just finish this by pointing out: (1) that the insurance plans at issue are plans issued not by the federal government but instead by the private insurance industry; Boonstra’s plan is issued by Blue Cross of Michigan, not by the federal government; (2) the ACA-compliant individual-market plans, including Boonstra’s are every bit as specific and explicit as are employer-based insurance plans and as were the private-sector individual-market plans (like Boonstra’s old plan) that were canceled, and so your claim that it is not yet known how these plans will operate is flatly wrong (and, no, is not an opinion); and (3) the only two federal healthcare insurance plans in this country are Medicare and Medicaid, and the premiums, coverage (including which drugs are covered, and co-pays other out-of-pocket costs are absolutely specified and clear.
You keep shifting your objections and claiming that the new objection was really your objection all along. You also don’t seem to understand that the accurate and oft-repeated statement that it is as yet unclear how well the ACA itself will work overall means that it is unclear what the various individual-market plans currently offered by various private insurance companies cost and cover. That’s absurd.
This is my final comment to you on the ACA, Mike.
I DO NOT believe health insurance policies (other than Medicare/Medicaid) are issued by The Government. I DO believe that federal oversight (ACA) has created a give-away to said insurance corporations. I AM SAYING that one cannot know the benefits/liabilities of said health insurance policies without READING THEM.
Can’t find Boonstra’s Policy or a REASONABLE facsimile then why not say so?
I think YOUR dog tried to bite me.
Boonstra’s policy is identified by name in the Detroit News article. Boonstra told the reporter which policy she had. The reporter then checked the Blue Cross policy itself, and also spoke with a Blue Cross of Michigan spokesperson.
I can’t even imagine why you keep saying that the specific policies offered, and the specific policy Boonstra says she bought, have not been identified. I can’t imagine why you don’t read the articles at issue, and why you keep saying that the specifics of her policy aren’t known. You read my posts, which make it clear that the articles specify the terms of the policy, and that the articles are based on those specifics. My posts themselves specify the specifics. The very point of my posts and of the articles I’m discussing is that the specifics are known–and that the policy will save her money. More than $1,200 this year.
You’re claim that the specifics aren’t known, and that we’re making up the math, is just downright weird.