Obama backing off on health care changes?

[onoway]

According to the NY Times: The Obama administration announced on Tuesday it would delay for a year, until 2015, the Affordable Care Act mandate that employers provide coverage for their workers or pay penalties, responding to business complaints and postponing the effective date beyond next year’s midterm elections.

 

Decisiveness and determination to do the right thing is a wonderful thing in the face of controversy. Ah well, at least he knows what to do about people who tell the public what his administration is up to.

[PassedOut]

According to the NY Times: The Obama administration announced on Tuesday it would delay for a year, until 2015, the Affordable Care Act mandate that employers provide coverage for their workers or pay penalties, responding to business complaints and postponing the effective date beyond next year’s midterm elections.

 

Decisiveness and determination to do the right thing is a wonderful thing in the face of controversy. Ah well, at least he knows what to do about people who tell the public what his administration is up to.

Likely the delay is at least partly intended to encourage folks to use the new healthcare exchanges like the one that has proved so popular in Massachusetts. It will be interesting to see how class warfare aspect of this plays out: The Koch Brothers’ Advertising Campaign

 

The advocacy group backed by the Kochs, Americans for Prosperity, is spending more than $1 million on an advertising campaign to (yet again) discredit President Obama’s health care reform law. It’s already been in effect for three years, but they want to soften it up just as its most important changes (mostly, the insurance mandate) begin to go into effect on Oct. 1. That will benefit Republican lawmakers, gearing up for the 2014 elections, who want to reignite the misguided fury against the law that gave them control of the House in 2010.

 

Naturally, the Kochs can’t give voice to their real concerns: That the law raises taxes on the rich to help pay for health insurance subsidies for the poor. That it expands the role of government in individual lives, as a protection against market forces that most cannot control or understand. That its benefits to society may be so profound that Democrats can use it as a badge of accomplishment for generations, as they have with Social Security and Medicare.

I suppose House republicans will vote for repeal a few more times before the 2014 elections.

[hrothgar]

I suppose House republicans will vote for repeal a few more times before the 2014 elections.

 

Anyone else amused that "Green Eggs and Ham" seems to have gone over Ted Cruz's head?

[Winstonm]

Anyone else amused that "Green Eggs and Ham" seems to have gone over Ted Cruz's head?

 

I am surprised that Ted Cruz can dress himself.

[barmar]

Anyone else amused that "Green Eggs and Ham" seems to have gone over Ted Cruz's head?

Did you see Jon Stewart's take on this last night? They created a Seuss-style poem called The Bore-ax about him.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FOX6KjxKfbg

Jump to 10:20 to just hear the poem.

[kenberg]

Sighed Maizie a lazy bird hatching her egg

I'm tired and I'm bored and I have kinks in my legs

From sitting just sitting here day after day

It's work how I hate it I'd much rather play

 

The above has no bearing on the topic, but neither did Green Eggs and Ham, and I just wanted to prove that, as my youngest approaches her forty-sixth birthday, I can still do this from memory. It's right there with the Gettysburg Address, the Boy Scout oath, and the Apostle's Creed.

 

As to the topic:

I think it would be good if our elected representatives, after reciting the Pledge of Allegiance, would give it some meat by pledging that in their disagreements they will never threaten to totally destroy the credibility of government unless they get their way.

They are all Americans, are they not? Well, maybe Donald Trump is right that the President was actually born on Jupiter, but really what sort Senator or Representative thinks that his job is to destroy the credibility of his institution?

 

 

There are, I am sure, some serious issues with Obamacare. It would be good to see them addressed seriously and without over the top threats and bizarre readings from Dr. Seuss.

[ArtK78]

My personal politics and opinions on major issues are almost always closely aligned with our President. Whenever I get a little annoyed at the manner in which he pursues his political and policy goals, all that I have to do is watch and listen to those on the other side. It always makes me feel much better.

[barmar]

It often seems like the GOP is in a Hatsfield vs. McCoys type of feud: It no longer matters what they're fighting about, they just can't let the other side win. If Obama proposed a bill saying that the sky is blue, they'd find a reason to object (or at least amend it to unfund Obamacare).