Sunday, December 20, 2009

Obama Health Care Plan Includes $100 Million For Wishard Hospital?

I guess Sen. Evan Bayh agreed to support a massive government take-over of the health care industry in exchange for a $100 million give-away for the new Wishard Hospital boondoggle in Indianapolis. Powerline figured out that mystery funding language in the Senate bill points to the Wishard project:

A good candidate for the mystery $100 million may be Wishard Memorial Hospital in Indianapolis, Indiana. Wishard recently won approval for construction of a new hospital in downtown Indianapolis. If Wishard is not the intended beneficiary, they can make a credible case that they should be eligible for a share of the money.

Under Section 10502 of the Reid Amendment, the beneficiary of the $100 million must be "affiliated with an academic health center at a public research university in the United States that contains a state's sole public academic medical and dental school." Is it affiliated with an academic health center? According to its Web site: "Wishard is proud to be one of the leading providers of healthcare in the city of Indianapolis with physicians of the Indiana University School of Medicine providing a comprehensive range of primary and specialty care services." Are they owned by the University of Indiana? No. Are they affiliated? Looks like they are.
Hat tip to Scott Fluhr at Hoosierpundit.

UPDATE: AP is reporting that the money is intended for a hospital project in Connecticut that Sen. Christopher Dodd supports, although projects in other states, including Indiana's Wishard Hospital could vie for the money. So what's in the health care plan for Indiana for Bayh's vote? It seems there were big pay offs in the bill for just about every other wavering Democratic senator.

11 comments:

dcrutch said...

Senator Bayh is a strange cat. Email after email re his fiscal concerns. Goes agains the party grain while being considered for the Vice-Presidency. One of three Democrats voting against raising the debt ceiling. But, if he'll trade his health care vote for creation of a fiscal cuts commission, similar to the base closures- now that's more like it.
.
Hey, I can dream can't I?

dcrutch said...

That would be "the Chicago way", wouldn't it? Sounds like an excerpt straight out of Mayor Daley Sr's biography.

Sir Hailstone said...

Now we're not sure. Chris Dodd was claiming that $100M was for UConn.

mark garvin said...

Media is reporting that Christopher Dodd is claiming he put in the 100 million for a hospital in Connecticut.

I can only hope that Bayh will be held accountable for this vote.

Downtown Indy said...

OK, so now Bayh joins Sen. Nelson of Nebraska trading millions upon millions of dollars in pork for their vote.

And we're going to do all this without a tax increase. Oh, sure.

Covenant60 said...

What a cheap date.

I would love to see polling of Bayh's numbers for next year's Senate race. He may be caught in the undertow of the coming GOP tsunami, just like his father was.

M Theory said...

China is going to cut off BHO. I don't know where he thinks this money is coming from.

Downtown Indy said...

It seems a virtual certainty that this thing will become law now. It's time to start thinking about the ability to repeal it later.

Can that process start next year or is there a requirement that it stay in effect for some period of time before it can be reconsidered? Certainly it will depend upon one more election passing so that the current crop of loons can be thinned out. Maybe more, if it takes that long for voters to start seeing the mess they've been handed.

Will the healthcare system become so badly mangled, and so vigorously suckling government teat that it could never be pried off?

I for one do not see how Nebraska can be given their sweetheart deal no Medicare and all other states left without. Wouldn't that be some violation of Federal law, discriminating against citizens who are not residents of Nebraska?

And what will this do to the Nebraska economy if unemployed and disabled move there in droves an then start sucking up state handouts?

Doug said...

I seem to recall Bayh getting a big reduction on taxes against medical device manufacturers -- see, e.g., Cook & Biomet.

Gary R. Welsh said...

I think there is a real possibility that the 2010 congressional elections will turn out similar to the 1994 congressional election. If that occurs, there will be some hope of undoing the untold damage that the most irresponsible and reckless Congress in the history of the U.S. has heaped on us over the past year. Unfortunately, it may be too late to save our economy. It looks like the dollar will completely plummet next year, stripping America of its wealth so that we can be handed up to the new world order government at a discounted price.

artfuggins said...

Even if Bayh is in a weakened condition, the GOP of Indiana would nominate some ultra right wing nut that would hand the election to Bayh.