They totally missed their chance to fling lotsa freedom towards this lady and her dementia-ridden mother:
Because that wouldn’t be Freedom, with a capital “F.” Forcing people to have health care available to them?? No, no, that’s un-American!
People need to have the choice not to have any coverage, free to never go to the doctor, never have physical examinations or preventive procedures. They need to be free to make the choice to watch their kids and their parents get sick and die from things that might have been cured or prevented. THAT’S true freedom.
Making routine medical care easy and affordable–that’s Commie, pinko, Socialist BULLSHIT! And we 'Murricans don’t take kindly to gummint interference in our right to die or let others for in their own way.
Anyway, the Good People can afford insurance, and they’re the only ones that matter.
Can we call her skdotter for short? 
My understanding is that either of those options would have been subject to filibuster in the Senate, because they wouldn’t be solely financial measures.
The bill that was under consideration in the House until today was very carefully drafted to be restricted to financial measures that would qualify for the reconciliation process, and which would not be subject to filibuster.
With tequila, substitute lime sherbet for the ice cream.
With whiskey, mint chocolate chip.
Because you’d be shutting down the health insurance business, is the short answer. Lord knows how many billions of stock value would go ‘poof’ overnight, and that’s not the sort of thing people tend to take lying down.
We got this far because Obamacare kept them in the game, with a reasonable possibility of being at least as profitable after Obamacare took effect than they were before. The tradeoff was that while they’d make less money off their existing policies (due to essential health benefits, community rating, etc.), they’d be able to sell millions of new policies through the Exchanges.
So that got insurance industry buy-in for Obamacare, rather than having the industry and its stockholders as furious opponents.
So how do you get to single-payer from here? Now that I know we’ve got a health policy wonk in our midst, I’d be interested in jsgoddess’ take on this, because I’m sure she knows this territory way better than an interested amateur like me. Because health policy really IS complicated.
But I think you’d have to get there slowly, and the best route for that would be to allow near-seniors (e.g. 55+) to buy into Medicare, and then, over a couple of decades, gradually lower the age at which you could buy into Medicare. The insurance companies might not fight the 55+ buy-in, because they’d be losing the part of their customer base that they’d be most likely to lose money on. Then each time you lowered it after that, the same would still be true, just at a different point on the curve. Then maybe by the time they’re just insuring people under 45 or so, you’ve shrunk the industry enough that the government could just buy it up and take over entirely.
Maybe the 55+ buy-in could be a big part of TrumpCare.
You know, this moment is just so wonderful. I’m still basking in it.
From the election to the inauguration, we knew disaster was looming, and we were living under its shadow. And for the past nine weeks, many of us have woken up each morning, wondering what Trump and the GOP were going to do to try to screw us over today.
But yesterday, we stopped them. And at least for the moment, they’re stunned and directionless. All their plans for what to do next - the continuing resolution, the budget, tax ‘reform’ - all assumed that Obamacare repeal (and fake replace) would be in place already.
This weekend, the worst we’ll see from them is some angry but impotent tweets. Instead, at least here in the mid-Atlantic, it’ll be a rather nice spring day, with suddenly nothing hanging over our heads. A moment of just plain normal. What a blessing.
Sweet: basketball fans last night were treated to these ads congratulating Republicans for repealing Obamacare and telling viewers to thank their Congresspersons. “Thank Congress(wo)man _____ for replacing the Affordable Care Act with better health care.”
Oopsie. 
But those moves took place in the 6 out of the 9 dimensions we don’t experience in the real world.
Ha! Yes, it’s complicated. But the real problem with my pontificating about how we get there from here is that it’s not that we can’t do it for policy reasons. Policy reasons support it. We can’t do it for political reasons.
So, I can say that Medicare is a pretty good program, and I would support its expansion to the general populace with the huge caveat that the program would need to be expanded not only in eligibility but in scope. And the cost-sharing in the program are not acceptable for UHC.
Medicare is still fairly expensive for beneficiaries who are not dually eligible for Medicaid. The monthly premium is $134 if you are of average income and newly joining the program (or otherwise not exempted from increases by the hold harmless provision, which is not really part of this conversation). The deductible is a very reasonable $183. But here’s the kick in the pantaloons: The coinsurance is 20% and, for Original Medicare, there is no cap.
In addition, Medicare does not cover some vital services: Oral and dental health, in general, eyes and ears, and the room-sized elephant that’s taking up all of the space, long-term care.
Politico Magazine has a pretty good review of how the Repubs couldn’t get it done: Inside the GOP’s Health Care Debacle - POLITICO Magazine
Thanks for the lesson! I knew some of that (esp. long-term care), but most of what you said about what Medicare doesn’t cover was news to me. (I’ll be finding out a lot more about that in ~2 years, though. :))
Politico’s actually been doing some decent reporting lately. I may have to stop referring to them as Tiger Beat on the Potomac.
Dave Weigel at the WaPo has a pretty good piece crediting the grassroots, rather than the Democratic Party, for yesterday’s outcome. Two thoughts: (1) on the grassroots end, I think he overcredits grassroots organizations, and overlooks the extent to which this was just a lot of people all stepping up, organized or no, and calling Congress, showing up at town halls, and all the rest. And (2) keeping the Dem caucus unified was still essential to what happened yesterday. If they’d been able to peel off even a few Dems, it would have made the job of keeping the less conservative Republicans on board in the face of popular pressure. I’m going to be calling up my Congresscritters (all Dems) on Monday to say thanks.
Well, let’s be clear, there was nothing in this bill that any Democrat could support. There was never a chance of getting any Democratic votes.
Which has to make you wonder why any Republicans would support it, for reasons other than “Obamacare is evil because Obama” or “we hate it when government helps people who need help.”
One of my favorite bits of the story:
Suck it, Bannon!.. you poster child for drunken mediocrity.
I’m always glad to talk about Medicare!
Hmm. I think you are underestimating the way grassroots orgs created the atmosphere for both (1) and (2).
And it’s a great idea to call and say thanks. Tweet them, too, for those on Twitter. Hill staffers regularly point out how many MoC pay attention to Twitter. It’s a lot.
So Trumpcare turns out to be based on snake oil.
The insurance companies could sell Medigap insurance to all. (Not a money machine, of course.)
This would have to be fixed eventually, but not at first. These costs are high, but not astronomical like chemo, organ transplant, hip replacement, long hospital stays. I’ve never had insurance that covered eyes or ears. I’ve spent thousands, but not hundreds of thousands.
Oh, we’re all clear on that. It’s The Donald who seems not to get it.
If the Republicans stick it to him again, with the result that headlines start to feature the words FAILURE and LOSER too much, I believe that is the only thing that will send him looking for the exit. He’s not a fighter. He’s a “blame someone else and get out” kind of guy.
There are no bankruptcy provisions because of a deficit of political capital, which will be Trump’s undoing - he’s only used to operating at a loss.