It is becoming clear that there is a strategy to hamstring and hamper the ACA so there will be less public opposition to repeal because the law won’t be seen as delivering any benefits. But the hamstringing and hampering will not be great acts that immediately cripple the Exchanges but instead, small jabs and lances that bleed and break the sinews that hold the law together. The Day 1 executive order that sets the policy of the federal government to pass out hardship exemptions to the individual mandate as a matter of routine is part of this. And then the decision on Thursday to cancel paid for ads is another element of this strategy:
Trump administration abruptly pulls Obamacare ads that had already been paid for – from @pauldemko https://t.co/F1yL0GEVQX
— Jennifer Haberkorn (@jenhab) January 26, 2017
Why does this matter? Right now enrollment is either at or slightly above projected pace. But the distribution of enrollment most likely skews slightly older compared to the initial and final 2016 risk pool. Young or healthy people are usually the last people to sign up for an insurance product as it gives the least value while sick or old people who know that they could get sick are more likely to sign up early.
One chart that explains why its so damaging to halt ACA ads now — young adult sign ups spike at end of enrollment. https://t.co/bolXGSRqtp pic.twitter.com/Dqq3AGNftj
— Sarah Kliff (@sarahkliff) January 27, 2017
Deadlines spur action. Deadlines spur young enrollment.
Now cutting $5 million dollars worth of ads won’t death spiral the ACA. There are enough ads paid for by insurers and enrollment non-profits that are up that people are getting hit with the message. Last night at the gym, I saw three ads in under an hour. This morning, I heard two ads on the radio. The communication is getting out there.
But the volume and trust of that communication will be a little bit lower over the final weekend than it otherwise would have been. The enrollment will be a little bit less than it otherwise would have been. The risk pool will be slightly older than projected. That all means carriers will raise rates slightly more than they otherwise would have. It gives Republican opponents of the ACA two moments of good press releases — the first will be in early February when the total enrolled number is announced and it falls slightly short. The second will be over the summer as carriers are releasing their pricing with big, ugly numbers.
low-tech cyclist
This is a blatant “we hate Americans” statement. It’s a ‘Republican ideology trumps your well-being’ statement. It says Trump would rather have Americans go uninsured than have insurance under the ACA.
Fuck the lot of them.
Baud
I wonder if there will be a Streisand effect with them cutting advertising like this.
zzyzx
Except that repeal will have long passed by summer so they’ll be the ones taking the blame.
satby
Turns out that the people who voted for DC to “get shaken up” aren’t so comfy with the resulting instability.
David Anderson
@zzyzx: That is a big question as there are 14 different thoughts about Repeal in the GOP and they can only afford to lose 3 Senators — repeal is a tough vote when it can actually happen. I am still laying money on Repeal by 4/1 BUT there is a chance it won’t be repeal in practice
Hillary Rettig
@Baud: I was wondering if the ads – or some ads – are online and shareable? David do you know?
Oatler.
I like to read the Party Organ (RIcochet.com) where the patricians sigh with satisfaction “at last, the adults are in charge…” ( as opposed to that dirty hippie FDR).
Patricia Kayden
Wow. Some people are just so evil. What a shame that the focus is on destroying the ACA instead of fixing it so that our fellow citizens can get access to healthcare. Sigh.
ArchTeryx
The pulling advertising is something of a nothingburger. Were this the first or second year of the ACA, that might have struck a major blow, but a lot more people know about healthcare.gov these days, more so with all the talk about repeal.
The executive order is more worrisome, but the IRS is by no means legally bound by it. They enforce tax law, and do NOT all serve at the pleasure of the President. If Congress gets involved and repeals the mandate, that’s a whole ‘nother ball of wax, but guaranteed, that’s not going to happen under the radar. Its most pernicious part is the granting of blanket Medicaid waviers. Now red state Republicans can add extremely obnoxious things like work requirements, deductables, co-insurance, things that Medcaid was never meant to work under since it’s meant to *ensure continuity of care for the poor*. Anything designed to picador the program at the state level will get trotted out, and Medicaid will functionally be inaccessible in a huge part of the country.
Bupalos
I’m posting this on this thread too because IM FIRED UP, READY TO GO!!
I’m one of the kumbaya kaucus people that believes we have to try and engage the Trumpies, and I’ll get flamed for opening my mouth in this direction, but I had a non-negative political interaction with a trumpie. She provided a little opening with something that was kind of anti-trump in the direction of “too bad the democrats MADE US DO THIS by nominating a crook” and I just ran with that a little in the spirit of “yeah now look at all these billionaire wallstreeter fraud guys that are going to do the schools and mortgages and stuff, we shouldn’t let them manipulate us with these games, we should just follow and vote on things that affect us, but man it takes too much time man do they have us screwed!”
She was in total agreement. Baby steps. I now can raise direct issues with her. Before anyone flames her up, this is the lady who lost her son to heroin/fentanyl last year and is trying to raise his little boy, we stand waiting for the school bus.
Find one. Try it. This is what RESIST means to me!
jonas
So they hope to kill the ACA by a thousand cuts, but they still got nothing to replace it with. People notice when their premiums and deductables shoot up. They also notice when they have no health insurance at all. Remember: Trump pledged not just to repeal Obamacare, but replace it with a cheaper alternative that provided better coverage and more choice and could be both a floor wax and dessert topping that lets you loose weight while eating as much as you want.
It’s a beautiful, yoooge, golden gilt corner he’s backed himself into here.
Sab
I just called my Ohio Republican senator about my objection to repealing the ACA which saved my life last summer. They politely took my call but wanted no contact information. I politely mentioned that when I called my other senator they wanted contact information. I said that I was concerned that Portman was apparently not actually interested about the concerns of an actual constituent. Was I being off-putting-ly harsh?
mai naem mobile
@Bupalos: I’ve tried that route. I find they go right back to the GOP. They always manage to fund something they don’t like about the Democrat running – abortion/taxes/gay rights/not ‘Xtian’ enough…
low-tech cyclist
@ArchTeryx:
Oh, its effect is small, no question.
But its effect, if it has any, will be that some people don’t get insured who would otherwise have done so. Trump and the GOP say their ideological stand is more important than whether those people get health coverage.
It may be small, but it’s the Trump/GOP regime in perfect microcosm.
rikyrah
You speak the truth, Mayhew.
bupalos
@mai naem mobile: Oh, it’s not like I think I have her converted. But it’s a softening. It’s a start. And ultimately, what I think we need to do with these folks is delegitimize the existing thought process itself. My goal is just to have her stop treating it like a game she watches on TV/Facebook where she’s worried about what some kid did on some college campus and becomes manipulable. The whole thing to me is just to try and get them to look at the real issues that actually affect them. That’s all that has to happen. And yeah, that’s a huge lift, but I think it’s possible.
sherparick
This will be true of the whole Government, except perhaps DoD. They sabotage it and then say see, “Government does not work.”
I get the feeling Rebekah and Robert Mercer, along Prince, having been guiding much of Trump’s personal and policy choices. One thing that the MSM does not report is how much particular individuals, like the Mercers and Koch brothers, will benefit from tax law changes that Ryan will propose and Trump will sign. The Mercers, as opposed to Koch brothers, really do seem to buy into a lot of racialist ideas since they supported the swing in Breitbart to the Alt Right under Bannon and they appear to be interested in building both a private and Government (VOA) media enterprise to support Trump along those lines.
ArchTeryx
@low-tech cyclist: All true, but it is relatively easily replaced by word of mouth and thats the rest of ours’ job.
rikyrah
At a key moment, Trump admin eyes Obamacare sabotage
01/27/17 09:20 AM
By Steve Benen
Donald Trump spoke at the biennial Republican retreat yesterday and made an unexpected acknowledgement. The new president said he recently spoke to House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) about “just doing nothing” with health care policy “for two years,” ignoring possible reforms to the Affordable Care Act, in the hopes that the system would struggle and hurt Democrats in the 2018 midterms.
Trump said he ultimately decided against that route, but as the New York Times’ Maggie Haberman noted, the remark was nevertheless instructive: according to the president himself, he’s open to playing politics with Americans’ lives.
Keep that in mind when reading this Politico scoop from last night.
The point, obviously, is to try to sabotage the Affordable Care Act. The enrollment deadline isn’t until Tuesday, and because so many consumers wait until the last minute, the last few days are crucial.
The Trump administration, however, has decided to stop letting Americans know about their options – not to save money, since the ads were already bought and paid for, but because the White House doesn’t want people to participate and get covered.
Betty
I called Senator Casey’s office and left a voicemail encouraging his continued support of the ACA and opposition to several nominees. I was unable to get through to either of Senator Toomey’s numbers – DC office rang and then went to a busy signal. Local office just rang busy. is he hiding?
Betty
Excellent discussion of the ACA at The New Republic .
Hope this link is OK.
MomSense
@Hillary Rettig:
@jonfavs Jon Favreau was sharing the adds on twitter.
ThresherK
@Oatler.: Tangent: Studebaker sold their Dictator from c. 1927-1938, stopping juuuuusssst in time before WWII.
Packard sold a Patrician from c. 1950-1956.
I have a hunch these names are coming back.
Mai.naem.mobile
As dumb as it sounds I hope some of these stops on the paid ad buys are sabotaged and the ads run anyway. I wonder how hard it is to resell the time last minute or would they just run unpaid PSAs. I doubt Republicans would even notice the ads running since they’re aimed at young people.
Mai.naem.mobile
As dumb as it sounds I hope some of these stops on the paid ad buys are sabotaged and the ads run anyway. I wonder how hard it is to resell the time last minute or would they just run unpaid PSAs. I doubt Republicans would even notice the ads running since they’re aimed at young people.
Another Scott
I just took a glance at HealthCare.gov and was pleased to see that it looks like little if anything about Donnie’s and his minions statements and plans have affected anything. E.g. still discussion of the need to get covered or pay a penalty, etc. But we know it’s coming…
It’ll be clear that they want to kill it by death of a thousand cuts when they start messing with the backend of the website (e.g. putting the database on an old i386 PC on a 300 baud dialup line…) Once that starts happening, we need to add that to the list of things we call and march and write letters about.
Cheers,
Scott.
Another Scott
@Mai.naem.mobile: I saw a HC.gov ad on Comedy Central last night, sometime around 8:30 PM ET – long after Poliltico said they were all killed. I wouldn’t be surprised if there were more in the queue (but wouldn’t be surprised if there weren’t, either).
Cheers,
Scott.
SFAW
@ThresherK:
How do you even know that stuff? That’s like knowing the plug gap on 1961 Messerschmitt KR200.
(And I’m not talking about being able to Google — it’s the idea that you know those models even existed.)
PST
So the new republican plan may be ruin and replace.
SFAW
@PST:
Spot on, except for the “replace” part.
PST
@Bupalos: I agree with you 100 percent. It’s not that I’m not angry at people who voted for Trump for foolish reasons even though they knew or should have known that he would work against the interest of racial and religious minorities, women, and the poor. I am. And while I do not fully agree that anyone who voted for him is therefore implicitly racist himself or herself, I don’t want to argue with those who believe otherwise. We can agree to disagree. What is important is how to do what you’re trying to do — peel off those of the Trump voters who can be disillusioned and turned around. It doesn’t mean we approve of them or what they did. We just need to say what needs to be said to encourage them to jump ship regardless of how we feel about them. As a side note, for some reason many of the white low-income Trump supporters I talked to before the election blamed Obama for the opiate problems that were destroying their families. For some reason, they thought it was because of Obamacare that doctors were handing harmful prescriptions to their family and friends. I’ve never understood how they got that idea, but it was out there.
SFAW
@PST:
The same way they got the idea that Obama caused the 2008 Recession.
Yoda Dog
@PST: Maybe because he’s one of those “blah” people… I dunno just a thought.
I can only speak for myself, but Im definitively in th fuck-em-all camp. That said, I’m not ever going to rag on you guys for trying to reach out to those people. More power to ya. I just dont have the heart and patience, personally.
Mai.naem.mobile
@bupalos: I hope you succeed. I am beginning to think that politics has become so crazy tribal that you can’t get one to vote for the other. I put a lot of this at Newts door. I think he’s the one who started this hyperpatisanship egged on by Fox and talk radio.
catclub
OT: NPR had some real reporting! When they said this morning what nations were listed for exclusion of muslims, they also mentioned that Egypt, Turkey and Saudi Arabia and United Arab Emirates were not listed – and that although they are allies, they are also where Trump has business deals.
Convenient.
SFAW
@Mai.naem.mobile:
Newt is, in my mind, the architect of a lot of the bullshit that goes on today. His GOPAC mailers, with their list of adjectives (e.g., “sick,” “pathetic”) to be used when describing Dems was taken to heart by his Contract On America fuckwads.
Of course, it started before Newt — e.g., George HW Bush was big on saying “LLLLLLLiberal!” in the same tone as a rational person would describe child molesters or Nazis — but Newt took it to a much higher (well, lower, I guess) level.
Mike in Pasadena
And then, bingo, the ACA is a total failure! Isn’t that amazing?
ThresherK
@SFAW: I don’t know, exactly. My Dad was the right age to have contemporary knowledge; he restored a Model A in the ’90s. I guess a lot of the old-car geek things passed down to me by osmosis.
Plus (before the internet, when I was an impressionable young ‘un) there were a good number of neat coffee-table books on the subject at my town library.
Yoda Dog
@SFAW: Lee Atwater. Rotting in hell as we speak most likely. If I believed in such a thing, of course..
Yoda Dog
@catclub: NPR is a broken clock.
Ohio Mom
@Sab: You are lucky you got through to Portman! I try almost everyday and usually have to leave a message.
I have noticed that neither Portman or Wenstrup ask me for contact information when I make a phone call. I always emphasize which Cincinnati suburb I live in at the start of my conversation. It’s a pretty red area.
Depending on my mood, sometimes I am friendly and warm, other times I am, I admit, a raging lunatic. I can’t know for sure but I go on the assumption that it is the hash mark that they make (for example, for/against the ACA) which matters. If some young intern is astounded that there is a crazed woman on the phone, well maybe it will make an impression that people *are* angry and scared. I can’t believe the Tea Partiers were all Miss Manners when they made their calls.
Now, when I call one of Brown’s offices to profess my undying appreciation, THEY take my name, address, phone numbers and what I had for breakfast. Because he is up for re-election and they (correctly) smell a potential donor.
Ohio Mom
@Sab: P.S. I think you should go to Portman’s website and find where he asks for your “Obamacare” story. I think he is looking for, “I can’t afford the premiums”; let his minions read a story of a life it saved.
Miss Bianca
Favorite new comment from my FB friend who studies the history of medicine: “My hot take on the average Trump voter: They are really, really bad at risk/benefit analyses.”
SWMBO
@Yoda Dog: Rupert Murdoch. He mainstreamed “fair and balanced” and just kept moving it farther and farther to the right until it is mass insanity. He also should be rotting in hell.
@PST: My mother is a case in point. She is registered independent and says she looks at all the issues and candidates impartially. Then she watches Fox News and votes the straight republican ticket. Every fucking time. Her reason for voting against Clinton? “We don’t need any more Clintons in the White House”. My autistic son asked her who she was voting for when she told him, he asked her, “What do you want to vote for that asshole for?! He hates disabled people like me!!” She told him at Christmas that she wrote in John Kasich and then a few days later she said Ben Carson. And she voted the straight republican ticket down ballot too. If there is a hell, I want Rupert Murdoch to clean all 7 levels of hell. With his tongue.
Chet Murthy
@Bupalos: I’m glad you’re trying. Somebody should, I guess. But I’ll stick to hoping she and her allies DIAF. B/c that’s what she wants me and my allies to do.
Chet Murthy
Oh, this is good: http://nomoremister.blogspot.com/2017/01/why-we-shouldnt-call-republican.html