Fed up with the health insurance industry’s opposition to health care reform, Democrats in Congress took action on Wednesday to strip anti-trust protections that insurers have enjoyed since the end of World War II. Bills in both the House and Senate contain language that would drop health insurance companies from inclusion in the McCarran-Ferguson Act of 1945, which exempts insurers (as well as railroads and Major League Baseball) from federal anti-trust authority. While the Senate has only introduced its version, the House Judiciary Committee voted 20-9 to approve H.R. 3596, with three conservative Republicans, Dan Lungren (CA), Louie Gohmert (TX) and Tom Rooney (FL), joining the Democratic majority.