We Don't Need Relief From Obamacare. We Need Relief From Republicans

[skews13]

The Monday night collapse of Mitch McConnell’s Better Care Reconciliation Act has many causes, but the least discussed, and most important, is this: Obamacare is working, and that’s why the Republican replacement effort is failing.

We have gotten used to discussing the Affordable Care Act mainly in terms of its problems, and those problems are real. There are pockets of the country in which it is working poorly. Deductibles are too high, and premiums are volatile. The Trump administration has worked hard to sabotage the insurance exchanges and drive insurers out of the marketplaces.

But focusing on the problems obscures the overwhelming reality: The Affordable Care is popular, it is working, and on every dimension that voters care about, it outperforms the Republican alternatives. And that makes it damn hard to replace.

Poll after poll shows more people now favor the Affordable Care Act than oppose it.

It has higher approval ratings than Donald Trump, Mitch McConnell, Paul Ryan, or the Republican Party.

It far outperforms the Republican replacement plans: A new Washington Post/ABC News poll found voters prefer Obamacare to the Republican health bill by a 2-to-1 margin — 50 to 24 percent. You rarely see numbers like that in American politics.

These numbers are strange if you listen to Republicans describe the Affordable Care Act. In their telling, it is always “imploding,” “failing,” “dying,” “disastrous.” How can a law in such crisis command such healthy public support? The answer is that the law is, for the most part, not in crisis. There are areas of the country where the exchanges have struggled to attract insurers, and there are markets in which premiums have increased rapidly. These problems are real and, if the party in power were interested in improving the law, solvable.

But even without improvements, the reality is that for most people, in most places, the Affordable Care Act is working. The bulk of its coverage expansion has been through Medicaid, which is immune to the problems of the insurance marketplaces. Surveys find that Medicaid enrollees really like their coverage; they’re just as satisfied as people who get health insurance at work. Indeed, the Medicaid expansion has proven so popular, and so effective, that Senate Republicans from Medicaid-expanding states like Ohio and Nevada have been fighting to preserve it.

Nor are the exchanges in anything close to a state of collapse. More than 10 million people are buying insurance off Obamacare’s exchanges, and surveys show most of them are happy with their plans. While there are some counties at risk of beginning 2018 without participating insurers, the total number is quite small — 38 out of 3,143 counties, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation.

Nor has the Affordable Care Act seen exploding costs either in the program or in the health care system more broadly; the ACA has cost less than the Congressional Budget Office expected, and spending growth in the health system overall has been at historic lows (an achievement for which Obamacare deserves some, though not all, of the credit). Cost control in the health system has been so unexpectedly effective that the government is now projected to spend less on health care with Obamacare than we were projected to spend without Obamacare.

This is the reality that Republicans are flinging their repeal effort against — and it is a reality that their plans mostly worsen. According to the Congressional Budget Office, over the next 10 years, 23 million fewer people would have insurance if the House health bill passed, 22 million fewer people would have insurance if the Senate health bill passed, and 32 million fewer people would have insurance if the 2015 repeal bill — which McConnell now wants to bring to a vote — passed.

Obamacare’s biggest problem is the high cost sharing that frustrates those who buy coverage on the marketplaces. But all of the Republican bills would lead to higher deductibles, higher copays, sparer insurance, and, on an apples-to-apples basis, higher premiums. The reasons for this are simple: The GOP bills cancel the individual mandate, which pushes young and healthy people to buy health insurance, and then take hundreds of billions of dollars Obamacare is currently spending to make insurance more affordable and spend it instead on tax cuts and deficit reduction.

If the Affordable Care Act were truly as bad as Republicans say it is, it would be easier to replace. Hell, if it were as bad as they say it is, straight repeal would be an improvement — but even conservative Republicans don’t dare discuss repeal without some kind of vague, wonderful replacement.

The most concise description of GOP health policy thinking was President Donald Trump’s promise to repeal Obamacare and replace it with “something terrific.” But every time Republicans offer up an actual replacement, it dramatically, embarrassingly underperforms the Affordable Care Act. Republicans have spent years complaining that the Affordable Care Act covers too few people with insurance that costs too much and covers too little. But they have not managed to come up with a replacement that covers even as many people with insurance that costs less.

Could the American health care system be better than it is today? Of course. But it could also be much worse. And so far, much worse is what Republicans have offered. The reality is that Obamacare took many of their best ideas on health care, the GOP remains divided on what its health care policies are even meant to achieve, and the result has been a disastrous process that has created appallingly cruel and unworkable legislation.

But make no mistake: The Republican failure to craft an effective replacement for Obamacare isn’t an accident. It’s a function of the fact that Obamacare is largely working, and Republicans who spent years persuading themselves and their base it’s a catastrophic failure are now slamming into that reality.

Obamacare repeal is flailing because Obamacare is working

 

[Doc1]

The Monday night collapse of Mitch McConnell’s Better Care Reconciliation Act has many causes, but the least discussed, and most important, is this: Obamacare is working, and that’s why the Republican replacement effort is failing.

We have gotten used to discussing the Affordable Care Act mainly in terms of its problems, and those problems are real. There are pockets of the country in which it is working poorly. Deductibles are too high, and premiums are volatile. The Trump administration has worked hard to sabotage the insurance exchanges and drive insurers out of the marketplaces.

But focusing on the problems obscures the overwhelming reality: The Affordable Care is popular, it is working, and on every dimension that voters care about, it outperforms the Republican alternatives. And that makes it damn hard to replace.

Poll after poll shows more people now favor the Affordable Care Act than oppose it.

It has higher approval ratings than Donald Trump, Mitch McConnell, Paul Ryan, or the Republican Party.

It far outperforms the Republican replacement plans: A new Washington Post/ABC News poll found voters prefer Obamacare to the Republican health bill by a 2-to-1 margin — 50 to 24 percent. You rarely see numbers like that in American politics.

These numbers are strange if you listen to Republicans describe the Affordable Care Act. In their telling, it is always “imploding,” “failing,” “dying,” “disastrous.” How can a law in such crisis command such healthy public support? The answer is that the law is, for the most part, not in crisis. There are areas of the country where the exchanges have struggled to attract insurers, and there are markets in which premiums have increased rapidly. These problems are real and, if the party in power were interested in improving the law, solvable.

But even without improvements, the reality is that for most people, in most places, the Affordable Care Act is working. The bulk of its coverage expansion has been through Medicaid, which is immune to the problems of the insurance marketplaces. Surveys find that Medicaid enrollees really like their coverage; they’re just as satisfied as people who get health insurance at work. Indeed, the Medicaid expansion has proven so popular, and so effective, that Senate Republicans from Medicaid-expanding states like Ohio and Nevada have been fighting to preserve it.

Nor are the exchanges in anything close to a state of collapse. More than 10 million people are buying insurance off Obamacare’s exchanges, and surveys show most of them are happy with their plans. While there are some counties at risk of beginning 2018 without participating insurers, the total number is quite small — 38 out of 3,143 counties, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation.

Nor has the Affordable Care Act seen exploding costs either in the program or in the health care system more broadly; the ACA has cost less than the Congressional Budget Office expected, and spending growth in the health system overall has been at historic lows (an achievement for which Obamacare deserves some, though not all, of the credit). Cost control in the health system has been so unexpectedly effective that the government is now projected to spend less on health care with Obamacare than we were projected to spend without Obamacare.

This is the reality that Republicans are flinging their repeal effort against — and it is a reality that their plans mostly worsen. According to the Congressional Budget Office, over the next 10 years, 23 million fewer people would have insurance if the House health bill passed, 22 million fewer people would have insurance if the Senate health bill passed, and 32 million fewer people would have insurance if the 2015 repeal bill — which McConnell now wants to bring to a vote — passed.

Obamacare’s biggest problem is the high cost sharing that frustrates those who buy coverage on the marketplaces. But all of the Republican bills would lead to higher deductibles, higher copays, sparer insurance, and, on an apples-to-apples basis, higher premiums. The reasons for this are simple: The GOP bills cancel the individual mandate, which pushes young and healthy people to buy health insurance, and then take hundreds of billions of dollars Obamacare is currently spending to make insurance more affordable and spend it instead on tax cuts and deficit reduction.

If the Affordable Care Act were truly as bad as Republicans say it is, it would be easier to replace. Hell, if it were as bad as they say it is, straight repeal would be an improvement — but even conservative Republicans don’t dare discuss repeal without some kind of vague, wonderful replacement.

The most concise description of GOP health policy thinking was President Donald Trump’s promise to repeal Obamacare and replace it with “something terrific.” But every time Republicans offer up an actual replacement, it dramatically, embarrassingly underperforms the Affordable Care Act. Republicans have spent years complaining that the Affordable Care Act covers too few people with insurance that costs too much and covers too little. But they have not managed to come up with a replacement that covers even as many people with insurance that costs less.

Could the American health care system be better than it is today? Of course. But it could also be much worse. And so far, much worse is what Republicans have offered. The reality is that Obamacare took many of their best ideas on health care, the GOP remains divided on what its health care policies are even meant to achieve, and the result has been a disastrous process that has created appallingly cruel and unworkable legislation.

But make no mistake: The Republican failure to craft an effective replacement for Obamacare isn’t an accident. It’s a function of the fact that Obamacare is largely working, and Republicans who spent years persuading themselves and their base it’s a catastrophic failure are now slamming into that reality.

Obamacare repeal is flailing because Obamacare is working

"Obamacare is working, and that’s why the Republican replacement effort is failing."

No, it isn't working but then it wasn't designed to. It was designed to crash the system so you could get your Single Payer, that's the ONLY way it's working. Once a dumbass, always a dumbass.

 

[SassyIrishLass]

Seems America does not think demoquacks have any use other than to hate Trump.

Here's one of those "polls" the loons love, suck on it loons. You all would be wise to work on your decimated party and image

52 Percent Of Americans Think Democratic Party Just Stands Against Trump



According to a new poll by The Washington Post and ABC, over half of Americans believe the current Democratic Party doesn’t stand for anything besides resisting President Trump.

The poll asked 1,001 Americans, “Do you think the Democratic Party currently stands for something, or just stands against Trump?”

Only 37 percent of respondents believed that the Democratic Party “stands for something,” while 52 percent of respondents said the party “just stands against Trump.”

POLL: Over Half Of Americans Think The Democratic Party Is Just Anti-Trump

 

[koshergrl]

Ha Obamacare is going to die a really ugly death.

Which was the plan all along. Dems and corrupt rhinos totally pwned by trump. Again.

 

[jillian]

The Monday night collapse of Mitch McConnell’s Better Care Reconciliation Act has many causes, but the least discussed, and most important, is this: Obamacare is working, and that’s why the Republican replacement effort is failing.

We have gotten used to discussing the Affordable Care Act mainly in terms of its problems, and those problems are real. There are pockets of the country in which it is working poorly. Deductibles are too high, and premiums are volatile. The Trump administration has worked hard to sabotage the insurance exchanges and drive insurers out of the marketplaces.

But focusing on the problems obscures the overwhelming reality: The Affordable Care is popular, it is working, and on every dimension that voters care about, it outperforms the Republican alternatives. And that makes it damn hard to replace.

Poll after poll shows more people now favor the Affordable Care Act than oppose it.

It has higher approval ratings than Donald Trump, Mitch McConnell, Paul Ryan, or the Republican Party.

It far outperforms the Republican replacement plans: A new Washington Post/ABC News poll found voters prefer Obamacare to the Republican health bill by a 2-to-1 margin — 50 to 24 percent. You rarely see numbers like that in American politics.

These numbers are strange if you listen to Republicans describe the Affordable Care Act. In their telling, it is always “imploding,” “failing,” “dying,” “disastrous.” How can a law in such crisis command such healthy public support? The answer is that the law is, for the most part, not in crisis. There are areas of the country where the exchanges have struggled to attract insurers, and there are markets in which premiums have increased rapidly. These problems are real and, if the party in power were interested in improving the law, solvable.

But even without improvements, the reality is that for most people, in most places, the Affordable Care Act is working. The bulk of its coverage expansion has been through Medicaid, which is immune to the problems of the insurance marketplaces. Surveys find that Medicaid enrollees really like their coverage; they’re just as satisfied as people who get health insurance at work. Indeed, the Medicaid expansion has proven so popular, and so effective, that Senate Republicans from Medicaid-expanding states like Ohio and Nevada have been fighting to preserve it.

Nor are the exchanges in anything close to a state of collapse. More than 10 million people are buying insurance off Obamacare’s exchanges, and surveys show most of them are happy with their plans. While there are some counties at risk of beginning 2018 without participating insurers, the total number is quite small — 38 out of 3,143 counties, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation.

Nor has the Affordable Care Act seen exploding costs either in the program or in the health care system more broadly; the ACA has cost less than the Congressional Budget Office expected, and spending growth in the health system overall has been at historic lows (an achievement for which Obamacare deserves some, though not all, of the credit). Cost control in the health system has been so unexpectedly effective that the government is now projected to spend less on health care with Obamacare than we were projected to spend without Obamacare.

This is the reality that Republicans are flinging their repeal effort against — and it is a reality that their plans mostly worsen. According to the Congressional Budget Office, over the next 10 years, 23 million fewer people would have insurance if the House health bill passed, 22 million fewer people would have insurance if the Senate health bill passed, and 32 million fewer people would have insurance if the 2015 repeal bill — which McConnell now wants to bring to a vote — passed.

Obamacare’s biggest problem is the high cost sharing that frustrates those who buy coverage on the marketplaces. But all of the Republican bills would lead to higher deductibles, higher copays, sparer insurance, and, on an apples-to-apples basis, higher premiums. The reasons for this are simple: The GOP bills cancel the individual mandate, which pushes young and healthy people to buy health insurance, and then take hundreds of billions of dollars Obamacare is currently spending to make insurance more affordable and spend it instead on tax cuts and deficit reduction.

If the Affordable Care Act were truly as bad as Republicans say it is, it would be easier to replace. Hell, if it were as bad as they say it is, straight repeal would be an improvement — but even conservative Republicans don’t dare discuss repeal without some kind of vague, wonderful replacement.

The most concise description of GOP health policy thinking was President Donald Trump’s promise to repeal Obamacare and replace it with “something terrific.” But every time Republicans offer up an actual replacement, it dramatically, embarrassingly underperforms the Affordable Care Act. Republicans have spent years complaining that the Affordable Care Act covers too few people with insurance that costs too much and covers too little. But they have not managed to come up with a replacement that covers even as many people with insurance that costs less.

Could the American health care system be better than it is today? Of course. But it could also be much worse. And so far, much worse is what Republicans have offered. The reality is that Obamacare took many of their best ideas on health care, the GOP remains divided on what its health care policies are even meant to achieve, and the result has been a disastrous process that has created appallingly cruel and unworkable legislation.

But make no mistake: The Republican failure to craft an effective replacement for Obamacare isn’t an accident. It’s a function of the fact that Obamacare is largely working, and Republicans who spent years persuading themselves and their base it’s a catastrophic failure are now slamming into that reality.

Obamacare repeal is flailing because Obamacare is working

"Obamacare is working, and that’s why the Republican replacement effort is failing."

No, it isn't working but then it wasn't designed to. It was designed to crash the system so you could get your Single Payer, that's the ONLY way it's working. Once a dumbass, always a dumbass.

there are things that need fixing. but the spiteful effort to make sure that president Obama's legacy is destroyed needs to stop.

maybe then the rightwingnuts won't be epic frails.

 

[Doc1]

The Monday night collapse of Mitch McConnell’s Better Care Reconciliation Act has many causes, but the least discussed, and most important, is this: Obamacare is working, and that’s why the Republican replacement effort is failing.

We have gotten used to discussing the Affordable Care Act mainly in terms of its problems, and those problems are real. There are pockets of the country in which it is working poorly. Deductibles are too high, and premiums are volatile. The Trump administration has worked hard to sabotage the insurance exchanges and drive insurers out of the marketplaces.

But focusing on the problems obscures the overwhelming reality: The Affordable Care is popular, it is working, and on every dimension that voters care about, it outperforms the Republican alternatives. And that makes it damn hard to replace.

Poll after poll shows more people now favor the Affordable Care Act than oppose it.

It has higher approval ratings than Donald Trump, Mitch McConnell, Paul Ryan, or the Republican Party.

It far outperforms the Republican replacement plans: A new Washington Post/ABC News poll found voters prefer Obamacare to the Republican health bill by a 2-to-1 margin — 50 to 24 percent. You rarely see numbers like that in American politics.

These numbers are strange if you listen to Republicans describe the Affordable Care Act. In their telling, it is always “imploding,” “failing,” “dying,” “disastrous.” How can a law in such crisis command such healthy public support? The answer is that the law is, for the most part, not in crisis. There are areas of the country where the exchanges have struggled to attract insurers, and there are markets in which premiums have increased rapidly. These problems are real and, if the party in power were interested in improving the law, solvable.

But even without improvements, the reality is that for most people, in most places, the Affordable Care Act is working. The bulk of its coverage expansion has been through Medicaid, which is immune to the problems of the insurance marketplaces. Surveys find that Medicaid enrollees really like their coverage; they’re just as satisfied as people who get health insurance at work. Indeed, the Medicaid expansion has proven so popular, and so effective, that Senate Republicans from Medicaid-expanding states like Ohio and Nevada have been fighting to preserve it.

Nor are the exchanges in anything close to a state of collapse. More than 10 million people are buying insurance off Obamacare’s exchanges, and surveys show most of them are happy with their plans. While there are some counties at risk of beginning 2018 without participating insurers, the total number is quite small — 38 out of 3,143 counties, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation.

Nor has the Affordable Care Act seen exploding costs either in the program or in the health care system more broadly; the ACA has cost less than the Congressional Budget Office expected, and spending growth in the health system overall has been at historic lows (an achievement for which Obamacare deserves some, though not all, of the credit). Cost control in the health system has been so unexpectedly effective that the government is now projected to spend less on health care with Obamacare than we were projected to spend without Obamacare.

This is the reality that Republicans are flinging their repeal effort against — and it is a reality that their plans mostly worsen. According to the Congressional Budget Office, over the next 10 years, 23 million fewer people would have insurance if the House health bill passed, 22 million fewer people would have insurance if the Senate health bill passed, and 32 million fewer people would have insurance if the 2015 repeal bill — which McConnell now wants to bring to a vote — passed.

Obamacare’s biggest problem is the high cost sharing that frustrates those who buy coverage on the marketplaces. But all of the Republican bills would lead to higher deductibles, higher copays, sparer insurance, and, on an apples-to-apples basis, higher premiums. The reasons for this are simple: The GOP bills cancel the individual mandate, which pushes young and healthy people to buy health insurance, and then take hundreds of billions of dollars Obamacare is currently spending to make insurance more affordable and spend it instead on tax cuts and deficit reduction.

If the Affordable Care Act were truly as bad as Republicans say it is, it would be easier to replace. Hell, if it were as bad as they say it is, straight repeal would be an improvement — but even conservative Republicans don’t dare discuss repeal without some kind of vague, wonderful replacement.

The most concise description of GOP health policy thinking was President Donald Trump’s promise to repeal Obamacare and replace it with “something terrific.” But every time Republicans offer up an actual replacement, it dramatically, embarrassingly underperforms the Affordable Care Act. Republicans have spent years complaining that the Affordable Care Act covers too few people with insurance that costs too much and covers too little. But they have not managed to come up with a replacement that covers even as many people with insurance that costs less.

Could the American health care system be better than it is today? Of course. But it could also be much worse. And so far, much worse is what Republicans have offered. The reality is that Obamacare took many of their best ideas on health care, the GOP remains divided on what its health care policies are even meant to achieve, and the result has been a disastrous process that has created appallingly cruel and unworkable legislation.

But make no mistake: The Republican failure to craft an effective replacement for Obamacare isn’t an accident. It’s a function of the fact that Obamacare is largely working, and Republicans who spent years persuading themselves and their base it’s a catastrophic failure are now slamming into that reality.

Obamacare repeal is flailing because Obamacare is working

"Obamacare is working, and that’s why the Republican replacement effort is failing."

No, it isn't working but then it wasn't designed to. It was designed to crash the system so you could get your Single Payer, that's the ONLY way it's working. Once a dumbass, always a dumbass.

there are things that need fixing. but the spiteful effort to make sure that president Obama's legacy is destroyed needs to stop.

maybe then the rightwingnuts won't be epic frails.

"Epic frails"? Alrighty then.

 

[koshergrl]

hahahahaha

"spiteful" that's classic. Cuz except for our unreasoning hatred of obama, obamacare is AWESOME.

Good grief. Wine is not a breakfast food.

 

[jillian]

The Monday night collapse of Mitch McConnell’s Better Care Reconciliation Act has many causes, but the least discussed, and most important, is this: Obamacare is working, and that’s why the Republican replacement effort is failing.

We have gotten used to discussing the Affordable Care Act mainly in terms of its problems, and those problems are real. There are pockets of the country in which it is working poorly. Deductibles are too high, and premiums are volatile. The Trump administration has worked hard to sabotage the insurance exchanges and drive insurers out of the marketplaces.

But focusing on the problems obscures the overwhelming reality: The Affordable Care is popular, it is working, and on every dimension that voters care about, it outperforms the Republican alternatives. And that makes it damn hard to replace.

Poll after poll shows more people now favor the Affordable Care Act than oppose it.

It has higher approval ratings than Donald Trump, Mitch McConnell, Paul Ryan, or the Republican Party.

It far outperforms the Republican replacement plans: A new Washington Post/ABC News poll found voters prefer Obamacare to the Republican health bill by a 2-to-1 margin — 50 to 24 percent. You rarely see numbers like that in American politics.

These numbers are strange if you listen to Republicans describe the Affordable Care Act. In their telling, it is always “imploding,” “failing,” “dying,” “disastrous.” How can a law in such crisis command such healthy public support? The answer is that the law is, for the most part, not in crisis. There are areas of the country where the exchanges have struggled to attract insurers, and there are markets in which premiums have increased rapidly. These problems are real and, if the party in power were interested in improving the law, solvable.

But even without improvements, the reality is that for most people, in most places, the Affordable Care Act is working. The bulk of its coverage expansion has been through Medicaid, which is immune to the problems of the insurance marketplaces. Surveys find that Medicaid enrollees really like their coverage; they’re just as satisfied as people who get health insurance at work. Indeed, the Medicaid expansion has proven so popular, and so effective, that Senate Republicans from Medicaid-expanding states like Ohio and Nevada have been fighting to preserve it.

Nor are the exchanges in anything close to a state of collapse. More than 10 million people are buying insurance off Obamacare’s exchanges, and surveys show most of them are happy with their plans. While there are some counties at risk of beginning 2018 without participating insurers, the total number is quite small — 38 out of 3,143 counties, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation.

Nor has the Affordable Care Act seen exploding costs either in the program or in the health care system more broadly; the ACA has cost less than the Congressional Budget Office expected, and spending growth in the health system overall has been at historic lows (an achievement for which Obamacare deserves some, though not all, of the credit). Cost control in the health system has been so unexpectedly effective that the government is now projected to spend less on health care with Obamacare than we were projected to spend without Obamacare.

This is the reality that Republicans are flinging their repeal effort against — and it is a reality that their plans mostly worsen. According to the Congressional Budget Office, over the next 10 years, 23 million fewer people would have insurance if the House health bill passed, 22 million fewer people would have insurance if the Senate health bill passed, and 32 million fewer people would have insurance if the 2015 repeal bill — which McConnell now wants to bring to a vote — passed.

Obamacare’s biggest problem is the high cost sharing that frustrates those who buy coverage on the marketplaces. But all of the Republican bills would lead to higher deductibles, higher copays, sparer insurance, and, on an apples-to-apples basis, higher premiums. The reasons for this are simple: The GOP bills cancel the individual mandate, which pushes young and healthy people to buy health insurance, and then take hundreds of billions of dollars Obamacare is currently spending to make insurance more affordable and spend it instead on tax cuts and deficit reduction.

If the Affordable Care Act were truly as bad as Republicans say it is, it would be easier to replace. Hell, if it were as bad as they say it is, straight repeal would be an improvement — but even conservative Republicans don’t dare discuss repeal without some kind of vague, wonderful replacement.

The most concise description of GOP health policy thinking was President Donald Trump’s promise to repeal Obamacare and replace it with “something terrific.” But every time Republicans offer up an actual replacement, it dramatically, embarrassingly underperforms the Affordable Care Act. Republicans have spent years complaining that the Affordable Care Act covers too few people with insurance that costs too much and covers too little. But they have not managed to come up with a replacement that covers even as many people with insurance that costs less.

Could the American health care system be better than it is today? Of course. But it could also be much worse. And so far, much worse is what Republicans have offered. The reality is that Obamacare took many of their best ideas on health care, the GOP remains divided on what its health care policies are even meant to achieve, and the result has been a disastrous process that has created appallingly cruel and unworkable legislation.

But make no mistake: The Republican failure to craft an effective replacement for Obamacare isn’t an accident. It’s a function of the fact that Obamacare is largely working, and Republicans who spent years persuading themselves and their base it’s a catastrophic failure are now slamming into that reality.

Obamacare repeal is flailing because Obamacare is working

"Obamacare is working, and that’s why the Republican replacement effort is failing."

No, it isn't working but then it wasn't designed to. It was designed to crash the system so you could get your Single Payer, that's the ONLY way it's working. Once a dumbass, always a dumbass.

there are things that need fixing. but the spiteful effort to make sure that president Obama's legacy is destroyed needs to stop.

maybe then the rightwingnuts won't be epic frails.

"Epic frails"? Alrighty then.

you freaktards have the house, the senate and the presidency... and can't get out of your own way.

yes, epic fails.

puissant.

 

[jillian]

hahahahaha

"spiteful" that's classic. Cuz except for our unreasoning hatred of obama, obamacare is AWESOME.

Good grief. Wine is not a breakfast food.

quiet, loon.... of course, it's spite.

now go crawl back into your bottle.

 

[Bonzi]

Good Lord. I wanted to laugh at the headline and had to scroll thru the Torah to get to it!

 

[Avatar4321]

So you agree that we should limit the power of federal government? Good. Lets limit their power by getting them out of our healthcare first.

 

[Doc1]

The Monday night collapse of Mitch McConnell’s Better Care Reconciliation Act has many causes, but the least discussed, and most important, is this: Obamacare is working, and that’s why the Republican replacement effort is failing.

We have gotten used to discussing the Affordable Care Act mainly in terms of its problems, and those problems are real. There are pockets of the country in which it is working poorly. Deductibles are too high, and premiums are volatile. The Trump administration has worked hard to sabotage the insurance exchanges and drive insurers out of the marketplaces.

But focusing on the problems obscures the overwhelming reality: The Affordable Care is popular, it is working, and on every dimension that voters care about, it outperforms the Republican alternatives. And that makes it damn hard to replace.

Poll after poll shows more people now favor the Affordable Care Act than oppose it.

It has higher approval ratings than Donald Trump, Mitch McConnell, Paul Ryan, or the Republican Party.

It far outperforms the Republican replacement plans: A new Washington Post/ABC News poll found voters prefer Obamacare to the Republican health bill by a 2-to-1 margin — 50 to 24 percent. You rarely see numbers like that in American politics.

These numbers are strange if you listen to Republicans describe the Affordable Care Act. In their telling, it is always “imploding,” “failing,” “dying,” “disastrous.” How can a law in such crisis command such healthy public support? The answer is that the law is, for the most part, not in crisis. There are areas of the country where the exchanges have struggled to attract insurers, and there are markets in which premiums have increased rapidly. These problems are real and, if the party in power were interested in improving the law, solvable.

But even without improvements, the reality is that for most people, in most places, the Affordable Care Act is working. The bulk of its coverage expansion has been through Medicaid, which is immune to the problems of the insurance marketplaces. Surveys find that Medicaid enrollees really like their coverage; they’re just as satisfied as people who get health insurance at work. Indeed, the Medicaid expansion has proven so popular, and so effective, that Senate Republicans from Medicaid-expanding states like Ohio and Nevada have been fighting to preserve it.

Nor are the exchanges in anything close to a state of collapse. More than 10 million people are buying insurance off Obamacare’s exchanges, and surveys show most of them are happy with their plans. While there are some counties at risk of beginning 2018 without participating insurers, the total number is quite small — 38 out of 3,143 counties, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation.

Nor has the Affordable Care Act seen exploding costs either in the program or in the health care system more broadly; the ACA has cost less than the Congressional Budget Office expected, and spending growth in the health system overall has been at historic lows (an achievement for which Obamacare deserves some, though not all, of the credit). Cost control in the health system has been so unexpectedly effective that the government is now projected to spend less on health care with Obamacare than we were projected to spend without Obamacare.

This is the reality that Republicans are flinging their repeal effort against — and it is a reality that their plans mostly worsen. According to the Congressional Budget Office, over the next 10 years, 23 million fewer people would have insurance if the House health bill passed, 22 million fewer people would have insurance if the Senate health bill passed, and 32 million fewer people would have insurance if the 2015 repeal bill — which McConnell now wants to bring to a vote — passed.

Obamacare’s biggest problem is the high cost sharing that frustrates those who buy coverage on the marketplaces. But all of the Republican bills would lead to higher deductibles, higher copays, sparer insurance, and, on an apples-to-apples basis, higher premiums. The reasons for this are simple: The GOP bills cancel the individual mandate, which pushes young and healthy people to buy health insurance, and then take hundreds of billions of dollars Obamacare is currently spending to make insurance more affordable and spend it instead on tax cuts and deficit reduction.

If the Affordable Care Act were truly as bad as Republicans say it is, it would be easier to replace. Hell, if it were as bad as they say it is, straight repeal would be an improvement — but even conservative Republicans don’t dare discuss repeal without some kind of vague, wonderful replacement.

The most concise description of GOP health policy thinking was President Donald Trump’s promise to repeal Obamacare and replace it with “something terrific.” But every time Republicans offer up an actual replacement, it dramatically, embarrassingly underperforms the Affordable Care Act. Republicans have spent years complaining that the Affordable Care Act covers too few people with insurance that costs too much and covers too little. But they have not managed to come up with a replacement that covers even as many people with insurance that costs less.

Could the American health care system be better than it is today? Of course. But it could also be much worse. And so far, much worse is what Republicans have offered. The reality is that Obamacare took many of their best ideas on health care, the GOP remains divided on what its health care policies are even meant to achieve, and the result has been a disastrous process that has created appallingly cruel and unworkable legislation.

But make no mistake: The Republican failure to craft an effective replacement for Obamacare isn’t an accident. It’s a function of the fact that Obamacare is largely working, and Republicans who spent years persuading themselves and their base it’s a catastrophic failure are now slamming into that reality.

Obamacare repeal is flailing because Obamacare is working

"Obamacare is working, and that’s why the Republican replacement effort is failing."

No, it isn't working but then it wasn't designed to. It was designed to crash the system so you could get your Single Payer, that's the ONLY way it's working. Once a dumbass, always a dumbass.

there are things that need fixing. but the spiteful effort to make sure that president Obama's legacy is destroyed needs to stop.

maybe then the rightwingnuts won't be epic frails.

"Epic frails"? Alrighty then.

you freaktards have the house, the senate and the presidency... and can't get out of your own way.

yes, epic fails.

puissant.

Sorry child, I am not a Republican. Both party's are nothing but two sides of the same coin, sorry. Maybe one you'll grow up and find some intelligence. Right now you're "frailing".

 

[koshergrl]

The Monday night collapse of Mitch McConnell’s Better Care Reconciliation Act has many causes, but the least discussed, and most important, is this: Obamacare is working, and that’s why the Republican replacement effort is failing.

We have gotten used to discussing the Affordable Care Act mainly in terms of its problems, and those problems are real. There are pockets of the country in which it is working poorly. Deductibles are too high, and premiums are volatile. The Trump administration has worked hard to sabotage the insurance exchanges and drive insurers out of the marketplaces.

But focusing on the problems obscures the overwhelming reality: The Affordable Care is popular, it is working, and on every dimension that voters care about, it outperforms the Republican alternatives. And that makes it damn hard to replace.

Poll after poll shows more people now favor the Affordable Care Act than oppose it.

It has higher approval ratings than Donald Trump, Mitch McConnell, Paul Ryan, or the Republican Party.

It far outperforms the Republican replacement plans: A new Washington Post/ABC News poll found voters prefer Obamacare to the Republican health bill by a 2-to-1 margin — 50 to 24 percent. You rarely see numbers like that in American politics.

These numbers are strange if you listen to Republicans describe the Affordable Care Act. In their telling, it is always “imploding,” “failing,” “dying,” “disastrous.” How can a law in such crisis command such healthy public support? The answer is that the law is, for the most part, not in crisis. There are areas of the country where the exchanges have struggled to attract insurers, and there are markets in which premiums have increased rapidly. These problems are real and, if the party in power were interested in improving the law, solvable.

But even without improvements, the reality is that for most people, in most places, the Affordable Care Act is working. The bulk of its coverage expansion has been through Medicaid, which is immune to the problems of the insurance marketplaces. Surveys find that Medicaid enrollees really like their coverage; they’re just as satisfied as people who get health insurance at work. Indeed, the Medicaid expansion has proven so popular, and so effective, that Senate Republicans from Medicaid-expanding states like Ohio and Nevada have been fighting to preserve it.

Nor are the exchanges in anything close to a state of collapse. More than 10 million people are buying insurance off Obamacare’s exchanges, and surveys show most of them are happy with their plans. While there are some counties at risk of beginning 2018 without participating insurers, the total number is quite small — 38 out of 3,143 counties, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation.

Nor has the Affordable Care Act seen exploding costs either in the program or in the health care system more broadly; the ACA has cost less than the Congressional Budget Office expected, and spending growth in the health system overall has been at historic lows (an achievement for which Obamacare deserves some, though not all, of the credit). Cost control in the health system has been so unexpectedly effective that the government is now projected to spend less on health care with Obamacare than we were projected to spend without Obamacare.

This is the reality that Republicans are flinging their repeal effort against — and it is a reality that their plans mostly worsen. According to the Congressional Budget Office, over the next 10 years, 23 million fewer people would have insurance if the House health bill passed, 22 million fewer people would have insurance if the Senate health bill passed, and 32 million fewer people would have insurance if the 2015 repeal bill — which McConnell now wants to bring to a vote — passed.

Obamacare’s biggest problem is the high cost sharing that frustrates those who buy coverage on the marketplaces. But all of the Republican bills would lead to higher deductibles, higher copays, sparer insurance, and, on an apples-to-apples basis, higher premiums. The reasons for this are simple: The GOP bills cancel the individual mandate, which pushes young and healthy people to buy health insurance, and then take hundreds of billions of dollars Obamacare is currently spending to make insurance more affordable and spend it instead on tax cuts and deficit reduction.

If the Affordable Care Act were truly as bad as Republicans say it is, it would be easier to replace. Hell, if it were as bad as they say it is, straight repeal would be an improvement — but even conservative Republicans don’t dare discuss repeal without some kind of vague, wonderful replacement.

The most concise description of GOP health policy thinking was President Donald Trump’s promise to repeal Obamacare and replace it with “something terrific.” But every time Republicans offer up an actual replacement, it dramatically, embarrassingly underperforms the Affordable Care Act. Republicans have spent years complaining that the Affordable Care Act covers too few people with insurance that costs too much and covers too little. But they have not managed to come up with a replacement that covers even as many people with insurance that costs less.

Could the American health care system be better than it is today? Of course. But it could also be much worse. And so far, much worse is what Republicans have offered. The reality is that Obamacare took many of their best ideas on health care, the GOP remains divided on what its health care policies are even meant to achieve, and the result has been a disastrous process that has created appallingly cruel and unworkable legislation.

But make no mistake: The Republican failure to craft an effective replacement for Obamacare isn’t an accident. It’s a function of the fact that Obamacare is largely working, and Republicans who spent years persuading themselves and their base it’s a catastrophic failure are now slamming into that reality.

Obamacare repeal is flailing because Obamacare is working

"Obamacare is working, and that’s why the Republican replacement effort is failing."

No, it isn't working but then it wasn't designed to. It was designed to crash the system so you could get your Single Payer, that's the ONLY way it's working. Once a dumbass, always a dumbass.

there are things that need fixing. but the spiteful effort to make sure that president Obama's legacy is destroyed needs to stop.

maybe then the rightwingnuts won't be epic frails.

"Epic frails"? Alrighty then.

you freaktards have the house, the senate and the presidency... and can't get out of your own way.

yes, epic fails.

puissant.

No, we wanted Obamacare gone. Not modified.

Guess what? Trump scores again.

You people are morons. You just don't learn.

 

[Doc1]

jillian

American's are but bit players in a semi-interactive political show, nothing more.

 

[SassyIrishLass]

This is wrong, are you proud demoquacks?

A note left on Sen. Dean Heller’s (R-NV) door on Monday threatened to kill him if he voted in favor of the proposed health care bill, the Nevada Independent reported.
“Vote no on the health care bill or I will lose my health care and die, and you will, too,” the note reportedly read.

Although the identity of the culprit remains unknown, it is understood they illegally gained access to Heller’s office but did not steal anything.

“The Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department received a call from an alarm company representative reporting a burglary alarm at the main entrance of an office building where Senator Dean Heller’s office is located,” a police statement said.

GOP Senator Receives Death Threat to Oppose Obamacare Repeal

 

[Iceweasel]

Obamacare is a hot potato and was designed to be. It's nearly impossible to get rid of a government program once it's up and running. And health care is no small matter. I never agreed with replacing it, government needs to get out of our medical care. Any government program is going to be bloated, inefficient and more costly. How to slowly get out without leaving people stranded who already paid in is not going to be easy.

But like Medicaid, Medicare, Social Security the politicians will probably end up kicking the can down the road...