Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Republicans in disarray!

Republicans: slavery is when you own me. freedom is when I own you.

Not all heroes wear capes.

Not so fun when the rabbit gets the gun, is it?

It’s always darkest before the other shoe drops.

The “burn-it-down” people are good with that until they become part of the kindling.

… gradually, and then suddenly.

I’d hate to be the candidate who lost to this guy.

He wakes up lying, and he lies all day.

Thanks to your bullshit, we are now under siege.

The unpunished coup was a training exercise.

You come for women, you’re gonna get your ass kicked.

If you voted for Trump, you don’t get to speak about ethics, morals, or rule of law.

Republicans choose power over democracy, every day.

And now I have baud making fun of me. this day can’t get worse.

They punch you in the face and then start crying because their fist hurts.

Peak wingnut was a lie.

I like political parties that aren’t owned by foreign adversaries.

Why is it so hard for them to condemn hate?

So many bastards, so little time.

Tick tock motherfuckers!

Republicans cannot even be trusted with their own money.

Reality always lies in wait for … Democrats.

Compromise? There is no middle ground between a firefighter and an arsonist.

You are here: Home / Anderson On Health Insurance / Healthcare and KS-04

Healthcare and KS-04

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A loss can contain very useful information. Kansas-04 is such a loss.

There are half a dozen tactical decision making fights going on Twitter that I’ll avoid for a moment. What does this mean for healthcare?

Anything that has to get out of the House needs to have all of the House Freedom Caucus on board plus most of the Tuesday Morning group or all of the Tuesday Morning Group and a third of the House Freedom Caucus. The House Freedom Caucus policy demands are clear; revert the American healthcare system to 2009 as quickly as possible. The Tuesday Morning group’s demands are a bit more nebulous as they don’t want to be blamed for anything bad and they want large upper income tax cuts.

The AHCA went down because the House Freedom Caucus defected en masse and the Tuesday Morning Group was fleeing very quickly as it was obvious that the bill was going to inflict a lot of very obvious and blamable pain. Rep. Justin Amash (R-MI) thinks that there would have been at least fifty Republican votes against the bill.

Since then, the bill has become even more incoherent on a policy basis while moving in the direction of the House Freedom Caucus’s demands.

So what does this recent history lesson mean?

The AHCA, if it was to pass the House, needs the entire House Freedom Caucus and no more than twenty four total defections from the least conservative Republicans. The original danger zone for Republicans were the twenty three Republican reps who sit in seats where Hillary Clinton won. This matters. We can assume that Republicans who now sit in seats that Trump barely won are on edge. The margin of passage of the AHCA or anything that looks like it was always hyper narrow. It is even narrower.

And by the way:

Reader Interactions

94Comments

  1. 1.

    Baud

    If you’re thinking to yourself “But I’m unqualified to run for office,” remember: Donald Trump is president of the United States right now

    QFT. If I weren’t in a blue area, I’d seriously think about it.

    Would be cool to have a juicer as an MoC.

  2. 2.

    zach

    Seriously what’s stopping Paul Ryan from proposing an non-offset, 10-year-sunset tax cut (immediate rebate for everyone, marginal rate cuts for all, corporate cuts, repatriation cuts) plus planned parenthood defunding and drug/job-testing and all the other Medicaid tweaks GOP wants to shit on the poor without getting in trouble for it?

    Give Trump a win in his first 100 days and move on; hope this plus war in Syria is popular enough to expand Senate majority in 2018 (not so hard; it worked for Bush) and go for attacking anti-poverty and healthcare spending then if you feel like it.

  3. 3.

    Betty Cracker

    @Baud: I’m trying to talk my husband into running for something. I’d do it myself, but some local Republican knob would dox me, and my entire foul-mouthed Balloon Juice oeuvre would sink my candidacy.

  5. 5.

    rikyrah

    There are 23 GOP Reps from districts that Hillary won. We can get every last one of them. Period. We need to field candidates in every race!!

  7. 7.

    dr. bloor

    @Betty Cracker: Oh, so us taxpayers are going to foot the bill providing security for you in Florida while hubby goes off to DC? I can’t imagine what the tab for protecting all those goddamn chickens will come to.

  14. 14.

    Chyron HR

    PROG WARS: EPISODE VIII

    In which the plucky rebels discover that a “Fifty-State Strategy” doesn’t mean you actually win every district in all fifty states.

  16. 16.

    Russ

    The problem ACHA has is the ACA was a heavy lift for Democrats giving something to Americans. Most have adjusted their attitude towards it and learned over time it’s benefits and like things the way they are.

    Republicans will be taking something away from Americans.

  20. 20.

    Revrick

    @Baud: Generally speaking, the only times we can significantly raise taxes is during times of war when patriotic fervor can overcome the “they’re stealing my money” mentality.

  22. 22.

    Humboldtblue

    Booman has a wet blanket for your “lessons from the loss in Kansas” position.

    I’m no longer really amused by the gamesmanship that allows us to claim moral victory if we lose an election by less than 30 points. In this case, it’s not even remotely true because the problems for Republicans in Kansas are highly specific to that state. Gov. Sam Brownback may be a hard-right Christian politician but his name is a dirty word even among his evangelical base. If the Democrats do well in the special election tonight, it will have a lot more to do with Brownback that anything to do with Trump.

  23. 23.

    Humboldtblue

    And on a far lighter note (that comes with its own dark shadow) a bomb went off near the bus carrying the Dortmund soccer team as they headed to the stadium for a Champions League match against Monaco. The game was postponed until today but that left a few Monaco fans scrambling to find a place to spend the night.

    Dortmund fans stepped up to help

  26. 26.

    Humboldtblue

    @Baud:

    Ahh, missed that. I always love a good dismissing particularly when it’s someone who knows far more than me, those dismissings come with the sweetest sense of keyboard righteousness.

  28. 28.

    Eric S.

    @Baud:

    Baud!/Betty! 2016!: Fuck You, That’s Why!

    Where do I subscribe to your newsletter?

    Also, don’t you mean 2020!?

  32. 32.

    liberal

    @Taylor: To great critical acclaim. Everyone said she used it perfectly.

    Kinda like when one of my twins, at age 4, said “If we can’t find the rain boots, we’re f*cked.” Musta got that from her Mom.

  33. 33.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    @zach:

    Seriously what’s stopping Paul Ryan from proposing an non-offset, 10-year-sunset tax cut (immediate rebate for everyone, marginal rate cuts for all, corporate cuts, repatriation cuts) plus planned parenthood defunding and drug/job-testing and all the other Medicaid tweaks GOP wants to shit on the poor without getting in trouble for it?

    The hard right wants a balance budget and Ryan’s no Billionaire left behind tax cuts wouldn’t do that. That;s why he wanted to kill ACA and Medicare first, so he could get the money to pay for all these tax cuts.

  34. 34.

    Kropadope

    @Baud:

    Baud!/Betty! 2016!: Fuck You, That’s Why!

    Wouldn’t that be stealing Trump’s campaign slogan deeds-not-words?

    @Humboldtblue:

    If the Democrats do well in the special election tonight, it will have a lot more to do with Brownback that anything to do with Trump.

    @Humboldtblue:

    If the Democrats do well in the special election tonight, it will have a lot more to do with Brownback that anything to do with Trump.

    Republicans everywhere are awful is news to whom besides Republican voters under unified Republican government?

  35. 35.

    SFAW

    @Baud:

    We dismissed him in the prior thread.

    Semi-related to that: is there any left-wing blog — of those mentioned in comments, not talking about the blogroll — that does NOT get dumped on here, at some point? Outside of LGM, that is. I’ve seen Kos (Diarists? Front-pagers? Both?), Booman, Josh, Pierce, a few others get that treatment. I guess Digby hasn’t been taken to task, so that’s two.

    Maybe the bad-mouthing is just more noticeable (to me), and I’m overlooking lots of other stuff?

  36. 36.

    zach

    @Enhanced Voting Techniques:

    The hard right wants a balance budget and Ryan’s no Billionaire left behind tax cuts wouldn’t do that. That;s why he wanted to kill ACA and Medicare first, so he could get the money to pay for all these tax cuts.

    LOL no they don’t. The freedom caucus was the first out the gate saying that tax cuts OK in lieu of tax reform… they’re the starve-the-beast true believers. It’s morally bankrupt conservative technocrats like Ryan who call for deficit neutral reform when they absolutely know that the only offsets that’ll get over Club for Growth’s veto power are Medicaid and other anti-poverty cuts (which might even be politically possible if you don’t have them really kick in for a decade or so).

  38. 38.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    @Humboldtblue: Bam! Right there, the pundits saying a 20 pt swing to blue means the Democrats need to adopt Republican policies.

    Anyway, so frappping what? The whole Freaking point of a goddam two party system is the party out of power is an alternative to the party in power. Just maybe the good voters of Kansas are starting to see the problem with one party rule?

  40. 40.

    BlueDWarrior

    @SFAW: We really only go in on those blogs when they start on the ‘heightening the contradictions’ talk you get out of bitter Marxists, or when they like Booman want to dump on everything that isn’t a clear victory.

    At some point you have to start making progress in Red areas and celebrating the progress you do make. It doesn’t make you blind to making further progress, but the relentless negativism/Eeyore-ism, I think, weighs us down much more than it does on the right. If we can take one lesson from right-leaning voters, is that they throw themselves against the proverbial barricades even when they are losing, because the Universe is fickle and the winds can change direction for seemingly no reason.

  48. 48.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    @zach

    :The freedom caucus was the first out the gate saying that tax cuts OK in lieu of tax reform…

    Isn’t that the same thing is Conservatard speak? It’s magic pony thinking anyway – TRUE Conservativea believes they can cut taxes to nothing (at lest for REAL Americans, as in rich, white Republican donors), balance the budget, massively increase defense spending to WWII levels and eliminate ALL socialism (including defense spending) all at the same time.

  49. 49.

    schrodingers_cat

    @Kropadope:I am a lowly blog commenter, BS on the other hand, his every attack on the Dems gets amplified in the media. This may be a good strategy for him to stay in the news but if the goal is to beat the Rs, this is a shitty strategy.

    ETA: FWIW its worth I have no beef with you. We have some genuine differences of opinion and that’s OK but there are some self professed BS supporters who come into the threads just to derail them. Neo Russian and the Gblue come to mind.

  50. 50.

    Humboldtblue

    @schrodingers_cat:

    And I’m not taking any of it seriously, particularly you. Did you just claim that I was a Bernie Sanders supporter? Because that’s as baseless a claim as can be made. You’ve never read anything written by me here or anywhere else that in any form or fashion could be construed as being a supporter of Sanders.

    If you want to believe that the results in Kansas mean something for Democrats feel free, just remember last November.

  51. 51.

    MomSense

    @Kropadope:

    If you voted for Bernie you’re probably low info. If you believed all the Russian propaganda about the DNC and anti Clinton then you’re a fool who was easily manipulated by an Oligarch (the penultimate 1%er).

    ETA Not saying you personally.

    This fucked up situation we are in has a lot to do with Bernie’s fucking ego and grift. It’s also life and death for a lot of us here so I’m not sorry if any Berners are offended.

  53. 53.

    Tissue Thin Pseudonym

    @Humboldtblue: The problem with Booman’s take is that every congressional elements has local elements that play a role in the outcome. That’s not unique to KS-04. It’s also why the outcome of a single special election isn’t meaningful. However, as was pointed out way at the top, we don’t have just a single special election to draw inferences from. So far, we’ve had two, and they both show a Democratic increase of around 20% of the vote. We have two more in the coming weeks. If they show a similar pattern, then there is a trend, and the Brownback specific element in last night’s outcome becomes less meaningful.

    Booman knows all of this; he’s just pretending he doesn’t for some reason.

  55. 55.

    Kropadope

    @MomSense:

    If you voted for Bernie you’re probably low info

    And if you voted for Clinton you’re probably smugly self-satisfied. See how broad brushes work?

  56. 56.

    chopper

    @Humboldtblue:

    if this election was a referendum on brownback, why wasn’t the general? what’s changed in the last few months? sounds like bullshit defeatism to me. 25 point swing, people.

  60. 60.

    Humboldtblue

    @schrodingers_cat:

    Yeah, stupid me reacting negatively to things that elicit negative reactions.

    @Tissue Thin Pseudonym:

    So far, we’ve had two, and they both show a Democratic increase of around 20% of the vote. We have two more in the coming weeks. If they show a similar pattern, then there is a trend, and the Brownback specific element in last night’s outcome becomes less meaningful.

    Booman knows all of this; he’s just pretending he doesn’t for some reason.

    I agree with you, but we just witnessed an election that flipped the tables on all the expert prognostications (I was one to flip past the latest 538 poll update as Silver warned us day after day they didn’t read the way we wanted them to read) and the congressional map has not changed since that election. I get the whiff of “we can take back the house” but after watching Clinton lose to Trump I aint holding my breath.

  61. 61.

    zach

    @Enhanced Voting Techniques:

    Isn’t that the same thing is Conservatard speak? It’s magic pony thinking anyway – TRUE Conservativea believes they can cut taxes to nothing (at lest for REAL Americans, as in rich, white Republican donors), balance the budget, massively increase defense spending to WWII levels and eliminate ALL socialism (including defense spending) all at the same time.

    It’s not that magical. Bush slashed taxes and spent way more money on the military than would’ve been necessary. Most of the tax cuts made permanent because it’s hard to raise taxes on anyone in the USA (also it was an argument made more difficult when unemployment was still pretty high). It hamstrung Obama when it came to being able to grow the government at anything close to the the long-term growth rate of the tax base.

  62. 62.

    Humboldtblue

    @chopper:

    if this election was a referendum on brownback, why wasn’t the general?

    You don’t have to take my word for it.

    “We’re running against the record of the Brownback administration and our opponent not showing up,” said Colin Curtis, Thompson’s campaign manager.

  63. 63.

    MomSense

    @Humboldtblue:

    What happened in the last election is that the voter suppression laws Republicans have been instituting since 2010 robbed us of just enough voters for them to win. We need to focus on voting rights and making sure all of our voters are able to exercise their franchise. Half of the voting machines in Detroit were not functioning on election day. Half a million people vote in Detroit.

    We know that over 300,000 voters couldn’t get the necessary IDs to vote in Wisconsin and that the people who struggle to comply with Voter ID laws are poor, students, minorities. In other words they are D voters.

    Even though PA was not supposed to enforce their ID laws, they were doing so anyway.

    And then their is the Kobach/Crosscheck fiasco that was used by many states to purge people off the voting rolls.

    I do not think the polls were off. I think voter suppression worked especially when combined with a Russian cyber war, a failed press, and fucking Comey.

  65. 65.

    schrodingers_cat

    @MomSense: He always comes here suppress the mildest enthusiasm we may allow ourselves to feel.
    From the Dec 30 thread, that I linked to, above.

    Do you really think all these emails and calls to action are going to stop the Republicans from doing what they wish? Who the fuck is going to stand in their way, Chuck fucking Schumer? You’re going to see Democrat after Democrat legitimize this administration and eventually cave in because that’s what they fucking do and they want to keep their seats and their corporate donors and their $25,000 dollar a plate fundraisers.

    This is what a supposedly non BS supporter had to say in the same comment:

    This is what 30 fucking years of Clintonism has left us, slightly more liberal Republicans wearing the shirts of Democrats and they’re gonna fuck over the base as fast as they fucking can when push comes to shove because they can and they will be rewarded for it.

    You’re all out of your fucking minds

    His agenda is to disparage and dismiss the resistance. I leave the motivation for you to decide.

  66. 66.

    rikyrah

    @Enhanced Voting Techniques:

    The hard right wants a balance budget and Ryan’s no Billionaire left behind tax cuts wouldn’t do that. That;s why he wanted to kill ACA and Medicare first, so he could get the money to pay for all these tax cuts.

    Never forget…Trumpcare was a tax cut bill masquerading as a healthcare bill.

  67. 67.

    Humboldtblue

    @MomSense:

    If Democrats can perform elsewhere like they performed in Kansas they can pick up some 120 seats (and according to Silver a Senate seat in Utah) I just suspect that we are still a long way out from November of 2018. Redistricting isn’t going away.

    @schrodingers_cat:

    Now I’m just gonna point and laugh at you. Criticizing national Democrats who have shown the spine of amoeba in the past 20 years is criticism of Democrats, not support for Sanders or some secret underhanded motivation to “dismiss the resistance”.

    That’s gonna be my new band name “Dismiss the Resistance”.

    Funny, I seem to recall that I have also posted plenty of links to both local and statewide “resistance” (fuck, pretty soon they’re gonna issue berets and Sten guns along with captured German weapons and pilfered Gauloises so that we all look the part) events like the local women’s march and the march to support Planned Parenthood and the series of town halls on health care and a dozen links to the actions the legislature has taken to blunt the worst of the effects from Trump’s decisions. But nope, those were in service to ol’ Senator Not a Democrat.

  68. 68.

    randy khan

    @Humboldtblue:

    There is a difference between polls and actual election results. (And I will point out for the umpteenth time that the national polls actually were quite accurate.) Election results are more significant.

    That said, all the usual reasonable caveats apply – special elections are not regular elections and you generalize at your peril.

  69. 69.

    gvg

    @schrodingers_cat: Not always per my impression. you however are in a real pick a fight with everyone mood lately and that is kind of a turnoff to me. Some of your fights are with people I am mad at too, others seem really uncalled for. The impression you are leaving is really negative and not convincing. Humbolt was pretty cheerful about being pointed at why we weren’t agreeing with Booman before you commented.
    Mind you I am waiting for more evidence and trying not to just believe what reinforces my biases on hope for a democratic swing in red districts. Time will tell.

  70. 70.

    catclub

    @zach:

    what’s stopping Paul Ryan from proposing an non-offset, 10-year-sunset tax cut

    I have no idea either. Those ‘only 10-year’ cuts that Bush got, mostly have been made permanent. And being the one to NOT extend them is hard for any politician.

  71. 71.

    BlueDWarrior

    @schrodingers_cat: I wonder what we are supposed to call people like him; I don’t quite think Eeyore Liberal does it, not enough depression and self-loathing. It’s like a Democrat isn’t being a Democrat if they aren’t trying to be Anti-Republicans and tearing them down for daring to exist (I’m willing to just settle for tearing them down because their policies are idiotic to actively malicious).

  72. 72.

    schrodingers_cat

    @gvg:

    Not always per my impression. you however are in a real pick a fight with everyone mood lately and that is kind of a turnoff to me. Some of your fights are with people I am mad at too, others seem really uncalled for. The impression you are leaving is really negative and not convincing.

    So you agree with HBlue and don’t like my tone. Thanks for letting me know.

  73. 73.

    Kropadope

    @Brave Balloon Juicer Bernie Hater Club

    Punch hippies! Punch hippies! All day, every day punch hippiiiiiiiies!!!!

    ::Hippie punches back::

    YOU’RE TEARING THE DEMOCRATS APAAAAART!!!!!!!!!!!

    ::much wailing and gnashing of teeth::

  75. 75.

    cthulhu

    @chopper:

    if this election was a referendum on brownback, why wasn’t the general? what’s changed in the last few months? sounds like bullshit defeatism to me. 25 point swing, people.

    I think it was maybe Enten that noted that Brownback’s favorables are actually very slightly up a bit from last year so that doesn’t much explain the difference. I think Thompson was wise to focus on local issues regardless – I don’t think it is effective to nationalize Congressional races issue-wise, just support-wise. He might have done worse with more obvious national party support.

    Maybe the main thing is that Trump supporters really don’t care all that much for the GOP. Thus you have this dynamic where he’s likely to hurt the GOP’s brand much in the next two years while potentially having his core supporters also sour on him as well. So what we are seeing so far is the first effect.

  76. 76.

    Humboldtblue

    @randy khan:

    I remain skeptical how much of a message will be sent if Osoff wins as well. There is no doubt a groundswell of opposition to the GOP with Trump at the head and to be honest I hope he remains there because (as has been said a thousand times here) a Pence administration worries me far more. There are 23 vulnerable Republicans and the more the GOP bangs the ACA repeal drum the better it is for candidates in those districts I am just wary of getting the hopes up this early.

  77. 77.

    hovercraft

    @Baud:

    If I weren’t in a blue area, I’d seriously think about it.

    But I though you were already more than thinking about it, I’ve cleared my calendar from November ’18 till November 2020 to work on your campaign.
    For far to long democrats have focused on candidate qualifications and experience while they’ve been running yahoo’s, literally yahoos like Ted Yoho, and Christine O’Donnell, and Joni Bread Bags, and the Chicken for Healthcare lady. We are embarrassed when kooks run on our side, the GOP celebrates them and goes all in and supports them. I’d say at this point at least two thirds of the GOP caucus is unqualified and unfit to serve in congress, and that’s just at the federal level, I’m sure it’s even worse at the state level given the bullshit legislation they keep producing. I mean seriously why would the NC legislature want to double down on the discrimination, why is Alabama voting to arm churches, or Missouri and their bullshit. They get rewarded for stupidity, sadly I can’t bring myself to support it, fantasy is for entertainment, not governing, that’s why I could never get behind Wilmer.

  78. 78.

    Miss Bianca

    Hi, late to the thread, but here is the response I got from CO Senator Cory Gardner on my opposition to ACA repeal:

    Thank you for contacting me regarding healthcare reform. I appreciate you taking the time to write. It is an honor to serve you in the United States Senate and I hope you will continue to write with your thoughts and ideas on moving our country forward.

    On March 24th, 2017, the House of Representatives elected to withdraw the American Healthcare Act, their plan to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act, without voting. This legislation intended to reform healthcare by eliminating taxes and mandates, expanding Health Savings Accounts, and implementing a monthly tax credit. It is vital that any replacement plan offers states the flexibility they need, while also ensuring stability for Colorado’s sickest and most vulnerable patients, concerns I raised in a March 6th, 2017 letter to Senate leadership. As conversations around repealing the failed Affordable Care Act continue, I remain committed to replacing it with common sense reforms that control costs, expand access to care, and protect the doctor-patient relationship, while also ensuring a stable transition and flexibility for Medicaid populations.

    I maintain my commitment to addressing the fundamental problem with healthcare in our nation: cost. In Colorado, and across the nation, families have faced significant premium increases. According to the Colorado Division of Insurance (DOI), the average premium in Colorado increased by 20.4% on the individual market in 2017. This unsustainable policy has motivated multiple insurers to remove its plans from the state health exchange for this plan year. As a direct result, 43 of the 64 counties in Colorado have two, or fewer, insurance carriers to choose from. This decrease in competition has had a dramatic impact on Coloradans’ ability to purchase insurance and access care. Since the implementation of the Affordable Care Act, over half a million Coloradans have lost their health insurance. Many Americans today choose not to visit the doctor or purchase necessary medication because they simply cannot afford to do so. This is unacceptable, particularly for individuals with preexisting conditions. Despite empty assurances that the Affordable Care Act would solve the rising cost of healthcare in this country, the price Coloradans are paying for necessary services has skyrocketed. In order to actually lower the cost of healthcare, I believe we need real free-market solutions, not tax increases.

    Moving forward, I will continue to support policies that will the lower cost of healthcare while increasing the quality of care. Again, thank you for contacting me, and do not hesitate to do so again when an issue is important to you.

    OK, now this strikes me as such a sticky web of shit that I’m literally at a loss as to how to respond. All I know is that I feel compelled to push back. David/Richard, and BJ hive mind – any ideas as to where to start?

  79. 79.

    Humboldtblue

    @Miss Bianca:

    It sounds like he’s bullshitting on the numbers so start there.

    Opponents — which included exchange CEO Kevin Patterson and the state’s Department of Health Care Policy and Financing — said the bill would heap expense on the state. If Connect for Health goes away, Colorado would have to spend about $3.6 million to link the state’s Medicaid system with HealthCare.gov, according to the bill’s fiscal note.

    Meanwhile, Sen. Lucia Guzman, D-Denver, noted that Connect for Health just hit a new record for sign-ups in the most recent open-enrollment period, a trend that could be scrambled if Colorado suddenly changes systems.

  80. 80.

    MomSense

    @Miss Bianca:

    I would just state that you don’t want to replace the ACA but that there are a few things they could do to improve it.

    1. Expand Medicaid
    2. Have Medicaid provider reimbursements equal to Medicare (so providers will treat Medicaid recipients)
    3. Turn the 400%FPL cliff into a more gentle slope so people don’t just lose their subsidies
    4. Restore the Risk Corridors to keep exchanges competitive and to keep smaller insurers and co-ops in the marketplace
    5. Allow CMS to negotiate drug prices with rigorous safety regulations to make sure the pharmaceuticals are safe and effective and actually what they say they are.

    That’s my working list so far.

  82. 82.

    hovercraft

    @Miss Bianca:
    To Senator Gardener,

    First of all can we dispense with meaningless political speak.

    As conversations around repealing the failed Affordable Care Act continue, I remain committed to replacing it with common sense reforms that control costs, expand access to care, and protect the doctor-patient relationship, while also ensuring a stable transition and flexibility for Medicaid populations.

    The Affordable Health Care has not failed. Millions of people all around this country are getting health insurance either for the first time in their adult lives or for the first time in decades. They would assure you that the Affordable Healthcare Act has not failed.

    If as you say you would like to replace the ACA with something that is better, delivers more, and at a cheaper price, I welcome your proposal. The thing is, you’ve been serving in either the House of Representatives or US Senate since 2011. Where is your legislation, you and the rest of the republican party have had 7 years to develop alternative legislation, where is it? You were elected on a platform of repealing and replacing the ACA, and yet you apparently did not have anything to replace it with.

    As I stated above, this is not politics to the millions of people whose lives depend on the insurance coverage and care they’ve received through the ACA. The majority of people who are not on the exchanges, are also huge beneficiaries, the most popular provisions of the ACA, affect all Americans, the elimination of life time caps, the elimination of pre-existing conditions to getting coverage, allowing adult children to remain on their parents insurance until age 26, wellness checks, closing the Medicare Part D donut hole. You and other proponents of “Repeal and Replace” claim that you will keep these popular provisions in place and yet the legislation that was being considered and a new version of which is still in the works, eliminates the mechanisms that pay for them, how do you keep the popular, eliminate the unpopular, when those are the very mechanisms that make the popular possible? Offering something for nothing is popular politically, until people read the fine print and realize that what you are offering is not plausible.

    You say that you are concerned with the rising premiums, I would like to point out to you that health insurance premiums have been steadily on the rise for decades, there was a brief slowdown in the rises, due to many factors including both the overall slowdown during the Great Recession, and passage of the ACA. Since the Republican takeover of Congress in 2011, experts have said there are modifications needed to improve the ACA and deal with its many shortcomings, but during that entire period you and the rest of your party have refused to do anything to improve the law. You have focused exclusively on doing everything in your power to ensure that no tweaks are made. It has been the stated goal of your party to ensure the laws failure.

    Given your track record, you’ll forgive my skepticism as to your sincerity in offering a better alternative, our track record does not inspire any confidence. You have the opportunity to prove the skeptics wrong, produce a viable alternative that covers the same number of people and offers genuinely comparable coverage for less and I will not only support your effort, I will encourage everyone I know to support you as well. If you have no such plan, as I suspect, put aside your partisan talking points and engage with your colleagues to improve the ACA. No major piece of legislation is without flaws, there are always variables, and unforeseen problems, responsible legislators throughout our history have worked together to fix these problems. You have an opportunity to now do the same, show us that you are actually in the Senate to work on improving the lives of your constituents, not just to improve both your own and your party’s electoral chances. Endlessly repeating that the Affordable Care Act has failed is untrue, you can keep trying to make it true, or you can work to make sure that it succeeds for the benefit of your constituents and your Country.

    ETA Sorry it’s a little rambely, multi-tasking ;- ‘)

  83. 83.

    Miss Bianca

    @hovercraft: OMG. You just said everything I could possibly have wanted to say, a thousand times better than I could have! Dare I ask if I can rip off huge chunks of this in my reply? I’ll post what I come up with later, but seriously…a thing of beauty and a joy forever!

  85. 85.

    Bess

    @Miss Bianca:

    Despite empty assurances that the Affordable Care Act would solve the rising cost of healthcare in this country, the price Coloradans are paying for necessary services has skyrocketed. In order to actually lower the cost of healthcare, I believe we need real free-market solutions, not tax increases.

    The ACA contains some features that should help lower the cost of health care such as training more physicians, moving medical records to digital, and providing health screening to catch problems early when they are cheaper to treat. But those are not major fixes for the cost of health care, nor are they the main purpose for the ACA.

    The ACA was created to give 30+ million uninsured Americans access to health care.

    The ACA has done a great job so far and with some well thought out adjustments by members of Congress it can perform even better.

    That said, let’s circle back to your complaint – the ACA has not lowered the cost of health care. That’s kind of like saying putting a new washer in my kitchen faucet didn’t stop the roof from leaking.

    Congress needs to tackle the cost of health care. This is a place where fiscal conservatives should excell. Determine why health care (including pharmaceuticals) is so expensive in America and devise ways to prod the free market to be more efficient and fiscally responsible.

    Bring down the cost of healthcare and the cost of health insurance will drop.

  86. 86.

    chopper

    @Humboldtblue:

    i know, a 25 point swing towards the dems over the course of 100 days in one of the reddest districts in the country is nothing to be happy about. we probably all have cancer, also.

  87. 87.

    hovercraft

    @Miss Bianca:

    Of course you can have it, that’s why I wrote it, and why it’s addressed to your senator. I’ve learned to do politely rude through years of practice.
    See no swearing Mom ;- )

  88. 88.

    Humboldtblue

    @chopper:

    Man, it’s almost like a Republican won the seat in the district that is home to Koch Industries. Tell ya what, champ, if ya knock off the new Republican in that district in November of 2018 I’ll buy you a beer. Deal?

  90. 90.

    chopper

    @Humboldtblue:

    inorite? why do dems even try?

    i’m surprised you drink beer. i would figure it’d just get watery and tasteless, what with you always crying in it.

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