Representative Morris Brooks Jr. (R.Al.) has a simple solution to ObamaCare:
“Effective as of Dec. 31, 2017, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act is repealed, and the provisions of law amended or repealed by such Act are restored or revived as if such Act had not been enacted.”
The mistake of Speaker Paul Ryan in regard to the fiasco over a replacement to ObamaCare was not repealing it first. If he has any brains, a debatable proposition at this point I am afraid, he will ram this through the House and toss it to the Senate. Grass roots pressure will be hard for the Republicans in the Senate to ignore to put a stake in this misbegotten exercise in government by wishful thinking. What comes next? I would suggest mandatory a la carte insurance policies being offered, no mandated coverage of any conditions and allowance of health insurance policies being offered nationally.
I agree that it is a good idea to push this right over to the Senators. At the same time I say that I do think Paul Ryan has plenty of brains and does learn from life experience. Being antagonistic to other republicans is not a good idea. I think Reagan said something about that- not speaking I’ll if each other. Republicans can not be. So fractious at a time such as this, but need to pull in the same harness. Difficult, I know in that “big tent” the republicans have.
“I think Reagan said something about that- not speaking I’ll if each other.”
Not one of Reagan’s more apt quotes, especially considering all the ill he rightfully said against Jerry Ford when he almost seized the nomination from him back in 1976. In regard to brains, Ryan certainly did not display any in regard to the repeal of ObamaCare, unless he deliberately wanted to sabotage the effort to get rid of it, and I am not Machiavellian enough to suspect that, yet. What I do know is that Ryan has a bad relationship with a good many House conservatives, and he has done bupkis to heal the breach which is why he could not pass his ObamaCare lite bill.
🙂 I know from personal experience that these wonderful maxims are easier to say than to do!
I see the republican fractiousness as one of the democrats best tools.
Perhaps the art of the possible, and half a loaf better than none…
Possibly, we have the worst political class in History. Ryan arguably is a RINO, a fake liberal. Ryan may be the worst speaker for this GOP Congress. Review his accomplishments as speaker while Obama was wrecking America. He was no better than Pelosi. Ryan gave Obama all he ever wanted.
When the left fabricated the fake health care crisis, the polls showed 80%+ Americans were content with their health care and insurance arrangements. ACA simply was a boondoggle to wreck private health insurance/care and eventually replace it with single payer. When you realize that, it all makes sense.
ACA made health care unaffordable. It destroyed the health care system with sky-high Obamacare health insurance premium increases and it will bankrupt states with hugely expanded Medicaid costs. Another ticking time bomb for President Trump – Obama overloaded, and will bust, states’ social programs with tens of millions of illegal immigrants.
The failed RyanCare bill was almost as bad as ACA. Health insurance premiums would continue to skyrocket. It did not repeal most of the costly mandates and insurance regulations driving up premiums and deductibles. It replaced Obamacare’s subsidy scheme with a new costly federal entitlement in the form of a refundable tax credit. It left significant portions of the ruinous and expensive Medicaid expansion intact by delaying the freeze on Medicaid enrollment, maintaining the expansion of the program to the able-bodied, and providing a pathway for non-expansion states to accept enhanced federal dollars.
To repeat your “money” quote:
“Effective as of Dec. 31, 2017, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act is repealed, and the provisions of law amended or repealed by such Act are restored or revived as if such Act had not been enacted.”
The problem, really, is that constructing a sustainable system of financing medical care which incorporates universal coverage and the possibility of efficiencies in service delivery is going to require disposing of first-dollar coverage of medical expenses. It’s doubtful the Capitol Hill GOP is willing to attempt to institute a piece of legislation that does that, the Democratic Party would engage in a lallapalooza of demagogery if they did, the predictable glitches in implementation would provoke severe public discontent, and making transparent costs which were previously opaque would promote more discontent. It’s also doubtful that Ryan has much of a grasp of the issue at hand. The whole episode does reveal he really had no plan to speak of. Robert Stacy McCain has been saying for some time that the Capitol Hill GOP is a donation collecting machine and its members despise their base. Cannot argue against that.
People who don’t contribute to the betterment of the Republic are addicted to suckling from the public treasury. Once that happens, Obamacare can never be repealed. The howl will be too great.
https://reason.com/blog/2017/03/29/turns-out-congressional-republicans-dont
Paul Ryan, AM McConnell, and the Capitol Hill GOP: a study in delusions of adequacy.
People who don’t contribute to the betterment of the Republic are addicted to suckling from the public treasury. Once that happens, Obamacare can never be repealed. The howl will be too great.
The marginal increment of beneficiaries derived from Obamacare does not carry much demographic weight. In any case, you cannot really treat medical care and long-term care they way you’d treat consumer durables. Thomas Sowell has suggeted a fee-for-service cum donation economy might be reconstructed. The trouble is, it’s not really worked that way n long-term care since the late 19th century (if not earlier), medical care is a much larger share of household consumption bundles than it was during the period Sowell has made reference to (ca. 1948), and medical care is more salient in determining outcomes than it was 70 years ago.
“Paul Ryan in regard to the fiasco over a replacement to ObamaCare was not repealing it first. If he has any brains, a debatable proposition at this point…”
While Ryan certainly deserves blame, the buck here stops with President Trump. At best, it demonstrates that Trump’s skills as a negotiator are a piece of fiction. At this point, the more likely result of the collapse of Obamacare will be single payer. I seem to be one of the few people who remember what Trump said during the primary debates. One of those things was about how well single payer worked in Canada and Scotland. Never mind the fact that they are clearly abysmal failures. He also said, on MSNBC of all places, how he could work with Schumer and Pelosi while trashing Ted Cruz.
If things go the way they are going now, Trump’s approval numbers cratering and all, democrats will take back both the House and Senate in 2018 midterms . Then Trump will go to Schumer and Pelosi hat in hand and they will gladly lead him where he probably wanted to go all along.
“While Ryan certainly deserves blame, the buck here stops with President Trump.”
Not at all. From start to finish the ObamaCare replacement was Ryan’s project. Trump supported Ryan down the line and Ryan was unable to deliver the votes. As for 2018, absent nuclear war, the Republicans will add to their majorities in both houses assuming the same rate of economic growth we are currently experiencing.
http://money.cnn.com/2017/03/22/investing/trump-economy-gdp/
As for ObamaCare it is manifestly dying no matter what Congress does or does not do.
http://money.cnn.com/2017/02/15/news/economy/aetna-obamacare-death-spiral/
Trump ran hard on repeal and replace. If he was serious about replacing Obamacare with something market based or anything close, he would not have not gone along with Ryan’s proposal, he would not have threatened to primary conservatives who refused to go along with it. Then he takes to Twitter accusing the Freedom Caucus, Heritage Foundation, and Club for Growth with siding with Obamacare and the dems. This was Trump’s baby. Ryan is just a political prostitute and Trump is no his pimp.
I meant to say Trump is now his pimp.
Here in NZ we have a state healthcare system with state hospitals run by district health boards which are taxpayer funded by govt., and in tandem with that, private insurance and private hospitals, and it all works great. Why can’t the US Govt simply make legal all and any private health insurance companies to offer health insurance, to run in tandem with Obummercare until it collapses?
I guess that system might be too simple – us out here on the fringes of civilisation don’t do complexity very well. 😉
Don, depends on how you define “works great.” From stories and things I’ve heard, a lot of europeans and oceanic people put up with things in their health care that americans will not tolerate.
And given the recent IRS scandal, I have my doubts about any nation adopting single-payer and still hanging onto their freedoms after that.
Ah here we go, I finally found the accounts I had in mind:
http://anastasis.livejournal.com/187203.html
http://anastasis.livejournal.com/194950.html
“Ryan is just a political prostitute and Trump is no his pimp.”
No, Ryan is Speaker of the House and Trump is President of the United States. Trump assumed that Ryan knew what he was doing and had or could get the votes for his plan. I doubt if Trump will make that mistake again. If conservatives in the House put a proposal on the Table and seem to have the votes to pass it, Trump will support it. The problem of course is that the Republicans in Congress do not yet understand that Trump will work with them, but he is not going to intervene in their internecine strife until he is sure that one side has the votes. Conservatives in Congress who expect Trump to do the heavy lifting for them are delusional. Trump is an outsider and he will be happy to sign any GOP bill that gets through Congress, but he has no loyalty to any faction of the GOP nor any great following among any of the factions. It is up to the GOP Congress critters to do their job and pass bills for him to sign.
We should rather not see something passed without its making the working middle-classes whole again. There are people paying far more for less and of whom it may be said, they have health insurance in name only.
Mar 30 What god is mortal? The god of relativism is mortal. The god of relativism dies every time the moral value changes and imposes a finite truth.
Human sacrifice was abolished by God on Mount Moriah when Isaac became the first human sacrifice to be physically prevented and outlawed by God. The Chosen People carry the Law of the Triune God from Father Abraham to Moses to the promised Son of Man.
The Democratic Party named for people, murder as many individual persons as they can and make U. S. citizen pay taxes to enable their treachery against the people. The Democratic Party rejects God, Aristotle, St. Thomas Aquinas, The Unanimous Declaration of Independence. The U. S. Constitution, Scientific DNA, ultrasound images of human development and Dr. Seuss, who said that “A person is a person, no matter how small.”
The Democratic Party rejects that the immortal human soul made in the image of God with free will and unalienable human rights infused at fertilization of the human egg by the human sperm forms the human body to become whoever the human soul is…formed by “their Creator”. The name given us by the Democratic Party is “NAUGHTS”, non-human beings, subhuman taxpayers. If “We, the people” are “NAUGHTS”, then who in heaven’s name are Hillary Clinton, Nancy Pelosi and the Democratic Party, but non-members of “We, the people…”. The Democratic Party has disenfranchised its members from our Citizenship in the United States of America. Mary De Voe
It is up to the GOP Congress critters to do their job and pass bills for him to sign.
(A) You have to get rid of the filibuster and (B) You have to craft a worthwhile plan which creatures such as Susan Collins (R – Me) and Lisa Murkowski (R – Her Daddy) won’t try to scuttle. Fat chance.
Maybe not Art. Reports today are that the Gop in the House are going to have another vote soon on the replacement bill. Even the dimmest Rino in Congress will have to glimpse that their will be hell to pay in the primaries if they go into 2018 having accomplished zilch.
The Ryan bill was so disappointing. It was my understanding that various Republicans, in and out of Congress, had drafted health care plan proposals way before the election. Newt Gingrich was one and he seems to have disappeared after the election. So what happened?
Why did Ryan let the media and Democrats pressure him to unveil the bill before it was ready? The Democrats are not bi-partisan, not your friend. When are Ryan and the Congressional RINOs going to wake up. Did Nancy Pelosi care what Republicans wanted when she was speaker of the House, hell no.
Mar 20 What god is mortal? is to be posted on Abortion and the Catholic Democrat. Bear with me. I will learn this computer.
Yes, Ryan is Speaker of the House and Trump is President. But the former is still a political prostitute (just look at the way he did Boehner’s bidding when during his tenure as Speaker) and the latter is his pimp.
If Trump wasn’t the driving force behind the Ryan bill and doesn’t want to involve himself in inter party squabbles, then why did he react in such a caustic way to conservative push back on it? He threatened those who opposed it with primary challenges and lumped them in with Obama and the dems. If Trump will sign any bill the GOP congress puts before him that means he is not interested in leading. It is the President who drives the agenda bus, especially when his party controls Congress. And that is another thing Trump campaigned on, that he is a strong leader.
Trump will work with conservatives? I guess nothing says “I will work with you.” better than threats to your political future and lumping you in with the worst elements of the of the other party.
And this BS about Trump being an outsider is just that, BS! Donald, you yourself called Trump the ultimate insider portraying himself as the outsider some time ago. You were right then.
Two observations: One, the current political class, elites, and media possibly are the worst in Human History. Two, look at the records of serial, deep economic crises, look at the increases in poverty and misery; look at the sharp decreases in real median family incomes; etc.
If the Federal government set out to reform the Sahara Desert, in five years there would be shortages of sand.
Get the government out of our lives.
Nate – please don’t confuse us with Australia – it’s like calling a Scotsman and Englishman, or a Canadian an American. 😉
Not really – but the NZ system has been improved immensely over the past 20 years and is way better than the Australian one. I lived in Oz 30 years ago, so have and inkling of the differences.
“If Trump wasn’t the driving force behind the Ryan bill and doesn’t want to involve himself in inter party squabbles, then why did he react in such a caustic way to conservative push back on it?”
Because he wants to pass something on ObamaCare and move on. If conservatives in Congress want Trump’s support they need to show they can pass something. Trump is not going to get into a losing fight over ideology that he does not share.
“It is the President who drives the agenda bus, especially when his party controls Congress.”
Not this President. Trump in effect ran as an independent. He simply does not have the type of loyalty among members of Congress that most presidents have as a result of party ties and the President controlling the party apparatus.
The GOP in Congress can do a lot with Trump but they have to understand him first. If they view him as a conventional President they are barking up not the wrong tree, but the wrong Kingdom.
“Trump will work with conservatives?”
Sure, if it gets him where he wants to go as he will work with any group, and that is the essence of deal maker Trump.
“And this BS about Trump being an outsider”
That is precisely what he is when it comes to the two political parties. Trump in effect is the first independent elected to the White House since the development of the party system.
“Nate – please don’t confuse us with Australia – it’s like calling a Scotsman and Englishman, or a Canadian an American. ?
Not really – but the NZ system has been improved immensely over the past 20 years and is way better than the Australian one. I lived in Oz 30 years ago, so have and inkling of the differences.”
We don’t want your socialized medicine here in the US in any form or combination. Period!
We don’t want your socialized medicine here in the US in any form or combination. Period!
That’s nice. Socialized long-term care has been extant since the 19th century. Socialized medicine has been present since 1965. No, I don’t think you’re going to persuade politicians or the general public to eliminate Medicare and Medicaid because you personally do not ‘want’ this thing called ‘socialized medicine’. While we’re at it, private risk-pooling is also a means of socializing costs.