Since the passage of the A.C.A. and the SCOTUS's decision that affirmed its constitutionality, a great many libertarians and conservatives have predicted that the law would fail; that it would make health care coverage more difficult to obtain; that doctors would opt out of it by quitting the medical profession; that people would suffer more than before its passage, etc., etc., etc.
None of those predictions have come to pass. In fact the A.C.A. is pretty much doing what it was supposed to do. It needs adjustments, but the Republican House and Republicans in general have no intention of working with Mr. Obama and the Democrats to fix the problems and to make the A.C.A. more workable for Americans. Instead we've had a petulant Speaker Boehner allow 50+ votes in the House to repeal the A.C.A. and not one single plan to replace it. IOW, grandstanding in the best tradition of our current Grand Old Party of NO!
Now comes reality. Something with which the modern Republican Party, and especially its Crazy Flank, the T-GOPers, do not deal very well:
Libertarian Accidentally Shows How Obamacare Is Succeeding
By Jonathan Chait
"The Commonwealth Fund has a new survey showing that the proportion of adults lacking health insurance has fallen by a quarter, from 20 percent of the population to 15 percent. (Most respondents, including 74 percent of newly insured Republicans, report liking their plan.)
Also, this week, the Congressional Budget Office again revised down its cost estimates for Medicare, which now spends $50 billion a year less than it was projected to before Obamacare passed. Also, the New England Journal of Medicine recently estimated that 20 million Americans gained insurance under the new law. The latter study comes in for criticism by Peter Suderman, Reason’s indefatigable health-care analyst. Like the entire right-wing media, Suderman’s coverage of Obamacare has furnished an endless supply of mockery of the law’s endless failures and imminent collapse.
While some of his points have validity, it’s fair to say that the broader narrative conveyed by his work, which certainly lies on the sophisticated end of the anti-Obamacare industry, has utterly failed to prepare his libertarian readers for the possibility that the hated health-care law will actually work more or less as intended."
More inconvenient truths about the T-GOP's hated A.C.A.:
11 comments:
The good news is it hasn't failed, yet. Better news will be if it actually improves the quality and affordability of health care WITHOUT adding to the nation's unfunded liabilities and increasing the national debt.
We'll have to wait and see if that turns out to be the case.
GOP lawmakers should now work to make the later happen. Will they? Nope, not likely. Boner, er Boehner is in the meantime doing the lawsuit shuffle and cheerleader Palin is screeching impeachment. Let the games continue.... I still have beer and wine.
"The good news is it hasn't failed, yet."
That statement implies that you think it will fail in the future.
I have no idea whether it will or will not. If it provides quality health care at affordable cost so all of America is insured and and does NOT increase our unfunded liabilities, ie the nation debt I will call it a HUGE success. I HOPE it does.
There are, as you've pointed out on many occasions, well financed interests and politicians that want it to fail and work tirelessly to see it does.
Like I said in my first comment, it's time for smart conservatives and republicans to give credit where credit is due and partner to make the ACA sustainable without "breaking the bank", something Medicaid and Medicare contributes to currently.
In theory RN, couldn't that be said about every law congress passes, as opposed to just laws Pres. Obama has signed?
Why is there always a caveat? Did libs do that with Medicare expansion?
Dave, no caveat intended. I speak what I see as truth. Now, if you want to talk about republicans and their record we can do so. I would have much negative to say about certain issues.
The thing about the ACA is that it is like a rocket launch to the moon and we are only about 60 minutes into the launch. Recall NASA saying 'all systems go'?
That's not the way this launch has gone. Things are smoother for the time being ... but half the states have no Medicaid expansion and there has been is no implemented employer mandate. What will happen when those finally happen.
The mission hasn't exploded after take off and I don't think it will, but there is some serious shi*t on the horizon!
Bush's drug program helped millions, but was unfunded. Two wars, unfunded. Being unfunded is not the rating of how good a program is, just the stupidity of politicians.
Democrats should back off thinking the ACA is perfect and won't cause problems. It makes them look as silly as Teabaggers.
Anonymous: "Bush's drug program helped millions, but was unfunded. Two wars, unfunded. Being unfunded is not the rating of how good a program is, just the stupidity of politicians.
Democrats should back off thinking the ACA is perfect and won't cause problems. It makes them look as silly as Teabaggers."
Where do you find your claim that Democrats think the A.C.A. is "perfect?" and "won't cause problems?"
There you go again. Setting up straw man arguments so you can knock them down.
We liberals are very much aware of the problems with the A.C.A.
The question is are YOU or the conservatives aware of the fact that the A.C.A. was based on a conservative think tank's idea? And that the insurance lobby threw millions of dollars at politicians to contest the passage of the law, and now that it has passed and the SCOTUS has decided it is constitutional, there is nothing more the conservatives can do but continue to obstruct and try to repeal the law.
Meanwhile, what is the conservative plan to replace this market-based, not-socialist health care plan?
*crickets*
Kinda makes the GOP look like silly Tea Baggers.
Oh...wait...
"...this conservative vision was passed by Congress in 2010. It’s known as ObamaCare. The ringing irony about this week’s U.S. Supreme Court challenge to the Affordable Care Act is that the law’s core principles were all, originally, conservative. And when they were first promoted, almost no one said they were unconstitutional.
The idea of an individual mandate was popularized by the Heritage Foundation and other conservative think tanks as early as 1989. Today, Heritage cites differences between their idea and the Obama version. Yet the basic principles are the same.
In 1992, Heritage proposed a sweeping reform it called the Heritage Consumer Choice Health Plan. Among the plan’s features:
“Require all households to purchase at least a basic package of insurance, unless they are covered by Medicaid, Medicare, or other government health programs. The private insurance market would be reformed to make a standard basic package available to all at an acceptable price.”
As President Bill Clinton began to push for a government-run system in 1993, Republicans introduced bills that included an individual mandate. At the time, Newt Gingrich hailed them:
“I am for people, individuals — exactly like automobile insurance — individuals having health insurance and being required to have health insurance,” he told “Meet the Press” in 1993. “And I’m prepared to vote for a voucher system which will give individuals, on a sliding scale, a government subsidy, to ensure that everyone as individuals has health insurance.”
SOURCE
On your blog every time you write about it and your messiah president.
Yes. And what a fab Messiah He is!
Now excuse me while I light a candle under this blessed image of our Redeemer and Savior.
Have a divine day!
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