Then there’s Senate Tea Party Caucus member James Moran of Kansas. It is just now dawning on him what this will do to the rural hospitals and health care system in his state.
Yeah, get some brains, Moran!
nm 
It’s a reference to this photo, which became something of an internet legend.
Ah! Thanks mhendo. 
Good grief, even the insurers have no use for the Cruz amendment to Trumpcare:
And in case anybody here doesn’t like Daily Kos, here is another link:
There are many more sources featuring this story, but since some of them are outfits like Mother Jones, HuffPo, and ThinkProgress, I figured I’d better not link to them–even though it’s the same damn article.
McCain’s Surgery Will Delay Senate Votes on Health Care Bill
Paid for by his coverage as a Congressman. Which is Obamacare.
I guess they will have to delay until McCain’s next billing cycle.
No one likes this shit except Congressional Republicans. They’ve shown that give about as much of a fuck about their constituents as Chris Christie, though.
Depends on what you mean by “constituents.” If you mean “those who elect them,” your answer is correct; however, if you mean “those to whom they are answerable,” they definitely give a shit — and will eat any amount, if so ordered.
Four GOP senators now saying they won’t vote on the MTP: Collins, Paul, Lee, Moran. Their reasoning is really important, too.
Collins thinks it’s too harsh, cuts to Medicaid too large, and Medicaid shouldn’t be in the bill.
Moran thinks it doesn’t do enough to lower costs.
Lee opposes leaving the Obamacare taxes and regulations and thinks it doesn’t do enough to lower costs.
Paul thinks it isn’t a repeal and is a new entitlement program.
I’m kind of expecting Portman, Capito, Murkowski, and Heller to come out now and say they weren’t going to vote for the MTP.
Oh and it didn’t help that McConnell told moderates not to worry about Medicaid because those cuts would never take effect. Which got back to Ron Johnson, who wants the cuts, and wants to know why he’d vote for the bill if the cuts won’t happen.
It looks just possible that the GOP will decide that it’s in their best interest to do a bipartisan bill to improve the ACA.
But I have a hard time believing it. Surely most Republicans will figure that continuing to campaign against the ACA is their best bet, since they can basically blame all of the problems in US healthcare on the people trying their best to fix it. If they pass a bipartisan fix bill, it gets a lot harder to continue to disclaim responsibility (even though the opposite should really be true).
I think they own it, no matter what. They might appropriate the funds for the CSRs, to keep the markets at a nice dull roar that they can complain about without actually destroying.
Well, the leader of their party disagrees:
“Republicans should just REPEAL failing ObamaCare now & work on a new Healthcare Plan that will start from a clean slate. Dems will join in!” - Trump a few minutes ago.
This despite the fact that they already tried this and didn’t have the votes, hence Repeal and Replace, which it turns out they also didn’t have the votes for.
Starting to think that the GOP didn’t have an actual plan all those years they were talking about repealing Obamacare.
Sure they did! They planned to lower taxes for themselves and their patrons.
Now McConnell is saying they can vote on repeal if they can get the MTP on the BCRA. IOW, let’s take it to a vote, and then we can revise this into just a full repeal instead of repeal and replace.
That’s already been scored, way back when, by the CBO. 32 million uninsured. Major price hikes. They can’t get rid of the regs that way, just pull the money.
Well, the repeal would be on a 2-year delay. But pulling that ripcord without knowing what’s in your chute is set up for a Wile E Coyote gag.
The 32 million was from when the CBO scored the 2015 bill, which I think had a 2-year delay. I could be wrong. Sheesh. I’m gonna hafta bust out the things I wrote in January!
They had the votes a year and a half ago, when they knew Obama would veto it. At this point, they’re just cowards.