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In which John offers a summary of the health care reform bill that just passed the US senate, discussing the insurance exchange market, pre-existing condition clauses, medicare taxes, and other fine points of the still-under-debate bill. Heres a good explanation of how the insurance exchanges will look like: bit.ly Thanks to Alan Lastufka ( youtube.com ) for the Ben Nelson asshat photo. About abortion: The senate plan works like this: Policies covering abortion would be available in the exchange market (at least in some states), but those plans would have to collect two separate premiums–one covering everything other than abortion, and one for abortion coverage. The subsidy (available to all families making less than about $88000 a year depending on number of kids) would only apply to the non-abortion policy. If this seems like a hilariously stupid distinction, thats because it is. Ultimately, it of course doesnt matter which policy the subsidy goes toward. But then again, every federal program "supports" abortion in some way. For instance, without federally funded highways, it would be impossible for most women to get abortions. All government spending indirectly goes to support all activity in America, but its ridiculous to say that, for instance, food stamps encourage meth use, even though sometimes people trade meth for food they bought with food stamps. Its equally disingenuous to say that this bill will allow federal funding of abortions, unless youre willing <b>…<b>