Looks like fulfilling this empty campaign promise will be a bit tricky. Some Republicans are running away from the issue they had no trouble running on.
Via TPM:
Sen. Bob Corker (R-TN) joined the small but growing chorus of Republicans declaring their discomfort with the current GOP plan of repealing Obamacare in the weeks to come without a replacement. Three other senators have publicly said they would like to repeal Obamacare with some sort of replacement ready, putting the margin Republicans will need to pass a repeal-only bill in the upper chamber in danger.
That makes 4 GOP senators backing away from their signature issue. Governing is hard, guys – especially when your plans will result in people losing their health insurance and preexisting conditions are no longer covered. Hope all that over-the-top rhetoric was worth where you find yourself now.
While the ACA had problems – problems that could have been addressed if Republicans didn’t always say NO – it’s better than the GOP plan. Oops! I forgot. There is no GOP plan.
Corker is becoming mildly interesting. I understand he also said that he believes the Russians did hack the election.
I’m not sure what’s going on with Corker and the others. It looks like a crack in the foundation, but I’m not sure. The question is why he, and others, are doing this? Is it a political play? Is it an admission that repealing the ACA is extremely difficult and the GOP will have to… *gulp* … govern?
Ryan has been stating he wants a FREE MARKET system–however prices are not determined by the Freemarket they are colluded by insurance companies. NOT determined by market value…ALSO they seem to want to gut all things most voters like like Medicare, and Social Security–How is that gonna go over????
Welcome, cc!
You’re right. Free Markets don’t work with health care. I’ve had this discussion with Republicans in the past and when I’ve asked about how a Free Market health care system would work. Every last one of them said consumers would need to shop around for services. Yeah… no. I just went through this with my father. I had to make split decisions on very complicated medical procedures. According to the Republicans I had spoken with, I should have asked for the price (I didn’t, of course) and then called around to compare costs. That’s what Free Market Health care entails.
Free Market health insurance is merely a race to the bottom. It’s the return of junk insurance – which most people find out is junk when they try and use it. It means being able to sell insurance across state lines without meeting a basic “coverage” requirement.
One of the best things about the ACA was that it defined what insurance had to cover in order to be called insurance. I’ve written before – We get this in other areas of out life. We wouldn’t accept ground beef being labeled filet mignon. But that’s what Free Market Health insurance would be like. We’d go back to labeling anything as health insurance and pointing how affordable it is. Welcome back, medical bill bankruptcies!
I’m not sure they’ll actually go after Medicare and Social Security. The outcry would be deafening. If they do, the only way they’ll do it is by screwing over young people. You know, everyone over 30 (40?) will keep the benefits while everyone younger will get coupons. I can’t even wrap my head around how that would work given how these programs are funded. And the ages I listed in the sentence above would probably have to be higher (50? 55?), but the higher they go the bigger the outcry. Of course, if they can get away with it, they’ll do it.
I’m keeping my eye on Medicaid. I definitely think that’s on the chopping block. Big time. It helps poor people – always one of the GOP’s favorite targets.
They also want to be able to de-regulate insurance — let you buy insurance across state lines. Which sounds great, except that means that there is no no one to help you if the terms of your insurance are not being met, or even to manage the effects of a firm going bankrupt. It is an effort to let alot of people make alot of money without providing much in terms of real health care for that money.
One of the things that is going on is that Americans are telling their congresspeople that they have to have something to replace Obamacare with before they repeal it. And they are pretty clearly less concerned about Obamacare than they are about out of pocket costs. Surprise.
One of the things that slays me is that Dems have not been calling this out for what it is — the GOP looking to roll back the taxes on the rich people who pay for part of this. You can see the Chamber’s ads advocating the repeal so they can avoid the increase of the HIT tax for at least a month now. This weekend is supposed to be the start of major Dem messaging on this and I haven’t really heard it yet.
And I saw this in a different forum: H.R.307 – To ensure that Members of Congress and Congressional staff receive health care from the Department of Veterans Affairs instead of under the Federal Health Benefits Program or health care exchanges.
https://www.congress.gov/bill/115th-congress/house-bill/307/all-info?r=1
Congress is trying to save themselves while throwing the rest of us under the bus. I wonder when they realized that if they repealed the ACA without any thing to replace it with, they’d be out of insurance, too.
PS: Hi, guys!
So typical. Republicans are quite brazen.
PS: Hi, Paula! Welcome!