Robert Hayes, president of the Medicare Rights Center, states that he had a discussion with Mark McClellan, (Administrator of the federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services) EARLY LAST YEAR:

"I was sitting in McClellan's office and I said, 'Look, even if you get this transition 99 percent right for the people losing Medicaid coverage, you're still going to have 64,000 people without drug coverage come Jan. 1.' And [McClellan] said 'No, we have everything under control.' "

McClellan will leave in about five weeks and would like to work for a think tank where and write about improving health care in the United States.

And Grassley thinks Medicare D could be fixed in five weeks??  

McClellan also stated,"Texas might be a nice place to visit for a little while."
Coincidentally, his mother, Carole Keeton Strayhorn, is the Texas comptroller and is running for governor as an independent.  

Rep. Pete Stark, D-Calif., was surprised that McClellan:  

"spent so long trying to bail water from the Bush administration's sinking ship [as} the drug benefit provides limited savings, unexpected price increases and poor customer service."

"Had he waited much longer, he would have found few employers willing to hire an ex-Bush administration official."

Sums it up best!

UPDATE:Christopher Conover, assistant research professor of public policy with the Duke Center for Health Policy:

"Disappointingly, McClellan's leaving is a signal that the Bush administration is not going to do anything substantive on health care reform." "Health care reform really can't take place without tax reform, and I was hopeful when Henry Paulson was appointed treasury secretary that two parallel efforts could begin," Conover said. "The odds were still long, but McClellan's departure drives the odds to about zero. They'll be treading water on health reform until the end of the administration."

Conover also wrote, "The war on terror has totally diverted the administration's attention from anything domestic."

UPDATE 2:Boston Globe

A Democrat-led House could mire the new leader in ``hearing after hearing," predicted Drew Altman , president of the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation , which tracks health policy issues. The nonprofit group's surveys have found mixed emotions about Part D. ``It probably will be hard to fill the job with an outsider of great standing if the Democrats take control of the House, because it is not going to be a really fun job," Altman said.

McClellan denied that the timing of his resignation was tied to politics. ``I don't believe in that level of cynicism," he said, adding that he has testified at scores of congressional oversight hearings and predicted the next CMS administrator would too, ``no matter who is in control of Congress."

In fact, Senator Charles E. Grassley , Republican of Iowa , will hold a closed-door Senate Finance Committee hearing tomorrow for members to ask McClellan about a glitch that led to Part D beneficiaries being charged too much or too little for premiums and, for 230,000 beneficiaries, wrongly being refunded premiums.

More re: wrong refunds in orange