I believe medical insurance reform is essential. I also
believe the Obama/Dem effort at reform was a debacle of lies to Americans.
Obamacare/ACA must be completely scraped to rebuild an actual affordable
medical insurance plan. Justin Smith has the critique.
JRH 10/2/17
**************
Republicans Break Faith With America
A System Going South
By Justin O. Smith
Sent 10/1/2017 1:23 AM
Americans need insurance plans that translate into real
affordable health care and solutions for the mess created by Obamacare, which
cannot be found in more Republican nonsense and Obamacare Lite bills, like Graham-Cassidy.
More spending and continued regulation only moves America one-step closer to a
nationalized single-payer health care system, and if Republicans truly believe
Obamacare has harmed America, as often asserted, they have a duty to revitalize
the free market segment of health care insurance, through a full repeal of the
Affordable Care Act.
No matter how many welfare dollars Congress pours into these
fabricated markets or any amount of price fixing they set, the exchanges are
unsustainable, and Graham-Cassidy offered a permanent drain on this already
strained system and the U.S. treasury. It also added a $700 billion dollar deficit
next year to America's $20 trillion dollar debt, without repealing a single
Obamacare insurance regulation.
The only real solutions exist in a clean slate and a full
repeal of Obamacare, ripping it up by the roots. At least a full repeal would
save over a trillion dollars in spending over the next decade, instead of
trying to save pennies on the dollar and leaving a poor health care system
largely intact, through a bad bill like Graham-Cassidy.
Fortunately, Graham-Cassidy failed to be presented for a
vote in the Senate, during the last week in September. It failed, after Susan
Collins (R-ME), John McCain (R-AZ) and Rand Paul (R-KY) made it clear they
would vote "no", keeping it from the 51-vote threshold in a
reconciliation vote.
Only Senator Rand Paul held the moral high
ground in his decision. On September 20th, Senator Paul told Real
Clear Politics: "That [Graham-Cassidy] is not what I promised voters.
I promised repeal [of Obamacare]. ... Block granting Obamacare doesn't make it
go away."
Described as "a lousy process", the New York
Times (September 26th, 2017) quoted Senator Lisa Murkowski of Alaska stating: "The U.S. Senate
cannot get the text of a bill on Sunday night, then proceed to a vote just days
later, with only one hearing -- and especially not on an issue that is
intensely personal to all of us."
Senator John McCain complained
Republicans should have worked with Democrats, to restructure America's $3
trillion per year health care system, which is simply asinine, in light of the
fact, Obamacare is an entirely Democrat partisan piece of legislation, and it
widely restructured a vital part of the national economy. These same Democrats
destroyed dozens of governing norms through their lies, and they manipulated
the Congressional Budget Score, in order to coerce every American's
participation.
Perhaps, once the problems associated with Obamacare
compound themselves or Obamacare actually collapses, the Democrats will make an
honest effort to compromise on substantive changes, rather than seek more
spending and regulatory controls on consumer choice. However, to date, these
Commie Travelers have had millions of ideas on how to expand the welfare state
and not a single one to save Americans from it.
Many Americans should already have the option of
circumventing Obamacare through the Employment Retirement Income Security Act
of 1974 (ERISA). This act enables people to buy inexpensive
insurance across state lines, by joining an insurance group or
co-op through one's workplace; and, it proves the U.S. really doesn't need such
an expansive program as Obamacare, which makes people pay for many services
they don't want or need, like abortion.
Americans want freedom of choice on their health insurance
plans and plans with less comprehensive coverage than Obamacare allows, which
would reduce the cost of premiums. They want the expansion of health savings
accounts and an end to mandate taxes and penalties. And if possible, most of us
would truly appreciate Medicaid reform.
Currently, the Alexander-Murray stabilization package
offers subsidies to insurance companies to reimburse them for reducing out-of-pocket
expenses for low income people and more freedom for sates to
restructure their insurance markets. While the Democrats see the subsidy
payments as essential, most Republicans, especially in the Freedom Caucus, see the subsidies as bailouts for insurance
companies that would prop up Obamacare. Sensible leaders will not
readily burn more of the taxpayers' money in a system going south.
President Trump has the full authority to place a
sunset deadline on the Obama administration's unconstitutional
subsidy payments, which it created to keep Obamacare from imploding, and he
should do so immediately. Let the Democrats howl "sabotage". There is
not any political, policy or moral reason for the GOP to continue the payoffs.
The recent request for a twenty-three percent rate hike by Blue
Cross Blue Shield of North Carolina [Blog Editor: BCBS asked for
an updated a reduction to 14.1% 8/2/17]
further illuminates the corruption within the current system. The company
acknowledges that it would have asked for only an 8.8 percent increase, if
President Trump had agreed to fund the federal subsidies through 2018, and so,
the U.S. taxpayer gets raked over the coals and robbed blind by Obamacare once
more.
Premium prices have doubled and quadrupled, and doctors are
harder to find. Barack Obama promised Obamacare
would boost the economy, but across America, small and large businesses report
Obamacare impedes their ability to expand and hire.
One must wonder how much of the Republican Party's
reluctance to fully repeal Obamacare lies with lobbyist efforts and donations
to Republicans. Records show that between 2011
and 2016, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell received a total of $424,650
from Kindred Healthcare, Humana and Blackstone. Sen. Orrin Hatch received
$133,500 from Blue Cross Blue Shield and Cancer Treatment Centers of America,
while Sen. Lamar Alexander took $61,100 from Blue Cross Blue Shield and
Community Health Systems in Franklin, Tennessee. And the list goes on.
After seven years of promises, where are the voices in the
Senate offering passionate arguments for repeal? Where is the unified effort
from the Republicans to speak for millions of Americans, who currently suffer
under Obamacare's spiking premiums and decreasing choices? It has all seemingly
vanished, since repeal became a possible reality.
America's well-being is more important than any political
party's legacy and any insurance company's bottom line, and so, Republicans
must not allow this abominable and failed Obamacare "law" to be
prolonged and continue to hurt the American people in despicable fashion. The
next Democratic administration will surely expand its reach and push towards a
single-payer system, if it is not soon repealed, as suggested by Senator Bernie
Sanders (D-VT).
The Republicans and America really do not have any reason to
save a failed Obamacare, and they certainly cannot afford to let it become more
entrenched, while it cuts a liberty destroying path through our society. Until
Republicans gather the backbone to counter the ACA or fully repeal it, the
Republicans have broken faith with the American people.
By Justin O. Smith
__________________
Edited by John R. Houk
All text enclosed by brackets and All source links are by the
Editor.
© Justin O. Smith
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