Has U.S. Democracy Been Trumped?

[y66]

From The Original Lie About Obamacare by David Leonhardt:

 

You hear it from Republicans, pundits and even some Democrats. It’s often said in a tone of regret: I wish Obama had done health reform in a bipartisan way, rather than jamming through a partisan bill.

 

The lament seems to have the ring of truth, given that not a single Republican in Congress voted for Obamacare. Yet it is false —demonstrably so.

 

That it’s nonetheless stuck helps explain how the Republicans have landed in such a mess on health care. The Congressional Budget Office released a jaw-dropping report Monday estimating that the Republican health plan would take insurance from 24 million people, many of them Republican voters, and raise medical costs for others. The bill effectively rescinds benefits for the elderly, poor, sick and middle class, and funnels the money to the rich, via tax cuts.

 

The AARP doesn’t like the bill, nor do groups representing doctors, nurses, hospitals, the disabled and people with cancer, diabetes and multiple sclerosis. Other than that, Mrs. Lincoln, it’s a great bill.

 

If Republicans still pass it, they will take political ownership of the flawed American health care system — after making it much more flawed. Tom Cotton, the Republican senator from Arkansas, has said the bill is so bad that it would “put the House majority at risk next year.” On the other hand, if Republicans fail to pass their own bill, they’ll look weak and incompetent, which is also not a good look to voters.

 

How did the party’s leaders put themselves in this position? The short answer is that they began believing their own hype and set out to solve a problem that doesn’t exist.

 

Obamacare obviously has flaws. Most important, some of its insurance markets — created to sell coverage to the uninsured — aren’t functioning well enough. Alas, Paul Ryan, Mitch McConnell and Donald Trump are not trying to fix that problem. They’re trying to fix a fictional one: saving America from a partisan, socialistic big-government takeover of health care.

 

To understand why that description is wrong, it helps to recall some history. Democratic attempts to cover the uninsured stretch back almost a century. But opposition to universal government-provided insurance was always too strong. Even Lyndon Johnson, with big congressional majorities, could pass programs only for the elderly and the poor — over intense opposition that equated Medicare with the death of capitalism.

 

So Democrats slowly moved their proposals to the right, relying more on private insurance rather than government programs. As they shifted, though, Republicans shifted even farther right. Bill Clinton’s plan was quite moderate but still couldn’t pass.

 

When Barack Obama ran for president, he faced a choice. He could continue moving the party to the center or tack back to the left. The second option would have focused on government programs, like expanding Medicare to start at age 55. But Obama and his team thought a plan that mixed government and markets — farther to the right of Clinton’s — could cover millions of people and had a realistic chance of passing.

 

They embarked on a bipartisan approach. They borrowed from Mitt Romney’s plan in Massachusetts, gave a big role to a bipartisan Senate working group, incorporated conservative ideas and won initial support from some Republicans. The bill also won over groups that had long blocked reform, like the American Medical Association.

 

But congressional Republicans ultimately decided that opposing any bill, regardless of its substance, was in their political interest. The consultant Frank Luntz wrote an influential memo in 2009 advising Republicans to talk positively about “reform” while also opposing actual solutions. McConnell, the Senate leader, persuaded his colleagues that they could make Obama look bad by denying him bipartisan cover.

 

At that point, Obama faced a second choice – between forging ahead with a substantively bipartisan bill and forgetting about covering the uninsured. The kumbaya plan for which pundits now wax nostalgic was not an option.

 

The reason is simple enough: Obamacare is the bipartisan version of health reform. It accomplishes a liberal end through conservative means and is much closer to the plan conservatives favored a few decades ago than the one liberals did. “It was the ultimate troll,” as Michael Anne Kyle of Harvard Business School put it, “for Obama to pass Republican health reform.”

 

Today’s Republican Party has moved so far to the right that it no longer supports any plan that covers the uninsured. Of course, Republican leaders are not willing to say as much, because they know how unpopular that position is. Having run out of political ground, Ryan, McConnell and Trump have had to invent the notion of a socialistic Obamacare that they will repeal and replace with … something great! This morning they were also left to pretend that the Budget Office report was something less than a disaster.

 

Their approach to Obamacare has worked quite nicely for them, until now. Lying can be an effective political tactic. Believing your own alternative facts, however, is usually not so smart.

[ldrews]

Your turn for a senior moment? May I remind you:-

 

In other words, you wanted change regardless of whether it is better or worse. Can anyone really claim that the change that came with Trump during the election campaign was based on respect? Or indeed that it had any agreed upon goals. That electing Trump was irresponsible and potentially damaging is probably something many here would agree with you on though. I am glad to see that you have come to accept this.

 

So, by opposing the Republicans current attempt at change you are asserting that the current situation is acceptable? That rather than try the Republican change we should do nothing? If not, what is your proposed solution?

 

I personally think that the current ACA program is deteriorating rapidly and if nothing is done millions of people will be signed up but with no effective health care at all. Stories are already surfacing of people who cannot use their health care because they cannot afford the deductible, effectively leaving them with no health care at all. But they do have access, right?

[blackshoe]

Adam Schiff is indeed a wise man and an effective Congressman for his district in LA which is one of the most diverse districts in the country. Probably to the left of you and slightly more libertarian on the political compass which is not an indication of wisdom or rationality.

It's not an indication of lack of those things either.

[Zelandakh]

So, by opposing the Republicans current attempt at change you are asserting that the current situation is acceptable? That rather than try the Republican change we should do nothing? If not, what is your proposed solution?

 

I personally think that the current ACA program is deteriorating rapidly and if nothing is done millions of people will be signed up but with no effective health care at all. Stories are already surfacing of people who cannot use their health care because they cannot afford the deductible, effectively leaving them with no health care at all. But they do have access, right?

I am opposing nothing. As a non-American it has zero effect on me if the government over there thinks that killing off its poorer citizens is a good idea. On the other hand, I feel a certain sadness that such a rich country chooses to act that way. I have already mentioned several possible models that might be of interest. A single-payer model like the UK's NHS; a universal multi-payer system such as in Germany; or a government-funded universal Medicare system such as in Australia. The problem is not coming up with a universal healthcare system that works better than any currently on the table, the difficulty is in getting it past the healthcare lobby when they are willing to pay billions of dollars to avoid the USA moving over to a system that would curtail their profits.

 

As far as the ACA goes, I have seen no evidence outside of your posts that it is deteriorating in the way you suggest. All of the audits of it have reported that it is stable despite the attempts of Republicans to undermine it. Indeed, the last report seems to suggest that deductibles under the Republican proposal will be considerably higher than under the ACA. Would you not consider implementing a scheme that is more expensive, less effective and had lower coverage to be just as irresponsible and potentially damaging as electing Trump was?

[Winstonm]

I just watched a Republican Congressman from Florida argue that the right to "access" healthcare is all that should be guaranteed because the government should not interfere with free markets and free choice, then he went on to say that the government should do something about the way insurance companies and pharmaceutical companies gouge the public. WHAT?

 

Let them eat cake - and oh, by the way, they don't seem to want their piece so I'll have that one, too.

[Winstonm]

From Vox:

 

Beyond its eye-popping findings on higher premiums and large-scale coverage loss, the Congressional Budget Office’s official score of the American Health Care Act also quietly demolishes the central publicly stated rationale for repealing the Affordable Care Act. The key passage is a somewhat jargon-full sentence on the second page of the report that says, “In CBO and JCT’s assessment, however, the nongroup market would probably be stable in most areas under either current law or the legislation.”

 

Stable in most areas is hardly an "implosion". In fact, it sounds like an argument that current law is repairable.

[ldrews]

I am opposing nothing. As a non-American it has zero effect on me if the government over there thinks that killing off its poorer citizens is a good idea. On the other hand, I feel a certain sadness that such a rich country chooses to act that way. I have already mentioned several possible models that might be of interest. A single-payer model like the UK's NHS; a universal multi-payer system such as in Germany; or a government-funded universal Medicare system such as in Australia. The problem is not coming up with a universal healthcare system that works better than any currently on the table, the difficulty is in getting it past the healthcare lobby when they are willing to pay billions of dollars to avoid the USA moving over to a system that would curtail their profits.

 

As far as the ACA goes, I have seen no evidence outside of your posts that it is deteriorating in the way you suggest. All of the audits of it have reported that it is stable despite the attempts of Republicans to undermine it. Indeed, the last report seems to suggest that deductibles under the Republican proposal will be considerably higher than under the ACA. Would you not consider implementing a scheme that is more expensive, less effective and had lower coverage to be just as irresponsible and potentially damaging as electing Trump was?

 

Here is another viewpoint : http://isreview.org/issue/94/affordable-care-act

 

The Affordable Care Act hasn’t ended the crisis in the American health care system. All the hoopla and happy talk about the benefits of Obamacare can’t change the fact that what millions of people are now coerced into buying is unaffordable underinsurance. Having insurance doesn’t guarantee access to health care services, as anyone who has fought on the phone for hours with an insurance company knows well. The fighting with insurance companies will not end. Nor will medical bankruptcy.

 

To be sure, under Obamacare more Americans will have health insurance, but they’ll pay more money for it and receive fewer health care services. And that is exactly the way the health insurance corporations like it.

 

The ACA is a massive swindle that mostly benefits the insurers who are set to receive about $1 trillion in subsidy money from the American taxpayer. This massive transfer of money entrenches and enriches the insurance corporations. It is a sick example of how crony capitalism rewards the corporations that are the cause of the health care crisis. And how can a major, “historic” reform to the health care system that still leaves thirty million uninsured even be called a “major” reform? As if it weren’t possible to cover everyone!

[ldrews]

This is one of the reasons I continue to support Trump: https://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2017/03/13/presidential-executive-order-comprehensive-plan-reorganizing-executive

[Zelandakh]

Here is another viewpoint : http://isreview.org/issue/94/affordable-care-act

The article says what was already known, that a single payer system would be better (based on the values of "International Socialists") and that conservatives continue to find ways of trying to undermine the ACA. Does your providing this link mean that you are also calling for a single-payer system?

[Zelandakh]

This is one of the reasons I continue to support Trump: https://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2017/03/13/presidential-executive-order-comprehensive-plan-reorganizing-executive

This sounds like the corporate equivalent of closing down the police force. Perhaps you would like to see an executive order for this too "to improve the efficiency of Americans going about their daily business". After all, we only really need police to arrest the "browns" so they can be re-assigned to the border patrol.

[kenberg]

Health Care. It's complex. Our president recently came to this conclusion.

 

Trump does not have a plan. He does not have a concept, except that it will be terrific, cover everyone, and cost less. Technocrats can develop a plan from a workable concept. "Terrific" is not a concept.

 

Ryan has a concept and a plan. CBO says it will cover dramatically fewer people and it will reduce the deficit. . This at least allows for reasonable discussion. It acknowledges hard choices. Some people are in serious need of assistance, who will provide it? Or will we just say no? Let them, in Scrooge's words (approximate, I didn't look it up) die and decrease the surplus population. Harsh, but realism dictates limits on what we can do for others.

 

Where is Trump in all of this? He wants everyone covered. Where is the plan? There is no plan. There won't be any plan.

 

As I write this, The Music Man comes to mind. For those too young to have seen it, Professor Harold Hill is going to solve Rover City's problems by organizing and leading a boy's band. It will be terrific. The problem being that he can't read a note of music. Of course Miriam the librarian rescues him the city and everyone. It's a play. But not here, I think.

 

Nobody except Trump cares how many people were at his inauguration. But health care is important. He has no plan. And no concept. Once that is seen, the muddle is a natural consequence.

 

"Boys, to play the Minuet in G you must think the Minuet in G". Maybe, but it's not enough.

[Trinidad]

As I write this, The Music Man comes to mind.

Kushner is selling 76 trombones to China.

 

Rik

[ldrews]

This sounds like the corporate equivalent of closing down the police force. Perhaps you would like to see an executive order for this too "to improve the efficiency of Americans going about their daily business". After all, we only really need police to arrest the "browns" so they can be re-assigned to the border patrol.

 

I am in the camp that less government is better. More efficient government is better. I want the individual citizen to more free, not less. You seem to advocate the opposite.

[kenberg]

Having my morning coffee, I read an op-ed by Alice Rivlin . A name I hadn't heard for a while. I see, that she is 86 so she has a history. One thing form the Wikipedia article

"Originally, Rivlin wanted to attend graduate school in public administration but was rejected on the grounds that she was a woman of marriageable age. Rivlin went on to earn a Ph.D. in economics from Radcliffe College of Harvard University in 1958."

 

I was a young adult in 1958 so I lived through that time, but it still is stunning to see this in print.

 

Living in the D.C. area, my first thought when I saw her name was of the role she played in rescuing the District from its financial collapse. See this Her appointment was more than a little bit controversial. Partly this was because she was an outsider brought in by Congress, partly that she was given very substantial powers, partly because she was white and D.C. proudly declared itself to be Chocolate City. Never mind, she succeeded. Very much so, as I recall.

 

I am no expert on budgets, not even our own. But her history of success surely makes what she has to say worth reading, so I thought I would put this up.

[Winstonm]

I am in the camp that less government is better. More efficient government is better. I want the individual citizen to more free, not less. You seem to advocate the opposite.

 

Does smaller government include a smaller standing army and less defense spending? If you want more freedom, do you support making it easier rather than more difficult to allow people to vote?

[barmar]

To be sure, under Obamacare more Americans will have health insurance, but they’ll pay more money for it and receive fewer health care services.

Yes, they'll pay more money, because before Obamacare they were paying nothing, since they couldn't afford insurance at all.

 

But receive fewer health care services? The uninsured weren't getting any health care at all, except by going to the emergency room.

[jogs]

Health Care. It's complex. Our president recently came to this conclusion.

 

Trump does not have a plan. He does not have a concept, except that it will be terrific, cover everyone, and cost less. Technocrats can develop a plan from a workable concept. "Terrific" is not a concept.

 

 

There is no plan from Trump or any of the 535 members of congress. The sickly poor have no money for health insurance or healthcare.

About 75% of Americans have insurance from their employer or are on medicare. Leave those people alone. They are mostly pleased with their health plans.

That leaves 25% of Americans uncovered. Find a non-insurance based model. The insurance companies are parasites raising the cost of healthcare. Why isn't this obvious? Create a healthcare model for people with no money. Don't think anyone will solve this anytime soon.

[awm]

Reducing government waste and more "freedom" are certainly good things. But every president has tried to do this -- Al Gore as VP eliminated lots of programs during the Clinton presidency if I recall.

 

However, I think Trump defines both "waste" and "freedom" differently than I would. For example, I don't see my freedom being infringed by the fact that my drinking water is not flammable, or that we give poor children healthy food in school instead of junk food, or that the manager of my 401k fund has to invest my money to my benefit instead of his. I don't see the government programs which maintain these standards as "waste" whereas Trump apparently does.

 

Yes I suppose that my "freedom" to poison your water, feed your children garbage, and steal your money has been "taken away" -- but I don't think of these things as "freedom" in much the same way that I don't think of the laws preventing me from shooting other people as a restriction. Basically, my "freedom" stops where it begins to infringe on other people's rights to life, liberty, and property.

[jogs]

Flint, Mich. water crisis can be blamed on Obama's EPA.

 

Also a toxic spill in Colorado.

[ldrews]

Does smaller government include a smaller standing army and less defense spending? If you want more freedom, do you support making it easier rather than more difficult to allow people to vote?

 

Absolutely a smaller standing army and less defense spending! Particularly spending for overseas bases and troops.

 

What has voting got to do with freedom? I believe in North Korea, for example, that voting participation is close to 100%.

[ldrews]

Reducing government waste and more "freedom" are certainly good things. But every president has tried to do this -- Al Gore as VP eliminated lots of programs during the Clinton presidency if I recall.

 

However, I think Trump defines both "waste" and "freedom" differently than I would. For example, I don't see my freedom being infringed by the fact that my drinking water is not flammable, or that we give poor children healthy food in school instead of junk food, or that the manager of my 401k fund has to invest my money to my benefit instead of his. I don't see the government programs which maintain these standards as "waste" whereas Trump apparently does.

 

Yes I suppose that my "freedom" to poison your water, feed your children garbage, and steal your money has been "taken away" -- but I don't think of these things as "freedom" in much the same way that I don't think of the laws preventing me from shooting other people as a restriction. Basically, my "freedom" stops where it begins to infringe on other people's rights to life, liberty, and property.

 

First of all, it not your drinking water, it is the public's drinking water. Which to me is part of the problem. If it were indeed your drinking water you could sue the hell out of whoever is polluting it. Each person suffering damage to their drinking water could do the same. The entity polluting the drinking water would soon be out of business.

 

Second, why is the school providing your children's food? Isn't that your responsibility as a parent? Aren't you responsible for monitoring your child's environment for dangers? Have you totally abdicated your responsibilities?

 

Third, any time you give your money to someone else to manage you have the responsibility to monitor their performance. It is your money. Have you also abdicated your responsibilities in this area?

 

Anytime we pass a law or regulation limiting public behavior we lessen our freedom. Some of it is required in order to live together peacefully, but, in my opinion, we have taken it much too far to point of creating a "nanny" state.

 

And I agree that my freedom stops where it begins to infringe on your right to life, liberty, and property. We just have a disagreement on what is included in those categories.

[Winstonm]

Absolutely a smaller standing army and less defense spending! Particularly spending for overseas bases and troops.

 

What has voting got to do with freedom? I believe in North Korea, for example, that voting participation is close to 100%.

 

If minorities and lower incomes cannot participate, that makes us more free?

[ldrews]

If minorities and lower incomes cannot participate, that makes us more free?

 

Freedom is usually political freedom, freedom from interference by government. Or socially, freedom from hunger, threat, etc.

 

You are talking about enfranchisement, a totally different subject. In any case, minorities and lower incomes can always participate, but perhaps not as easily or on the same level as others. But then some people run faster than others, are more intelligent than others, or better looking than others. Should we be trying equalize all outcomes?

[Winstonm]

Freedom is usually political freedom, freedom from interference by government. Or socially, freedom from hunger, threat, etc.

 

You are talking about enfranchisement, a totally different subject. In any case, minorities and lower incomes can always participate, but perhaps not as easily or on the same level as others. But then some people run faster than others, are more intelligent than others, or better looking than others. Should we be trying equalize all outcomes?

 

The law of the jungle is fine if you want to live like an animal. If not...

 

I find the libertarian viewpoint closely aligned to other magical thinking beliefs - to me it smacks of a romanticism with wild west movies and Ayn Rand novels, exciting when 15 but ridiculous and unrealistic at 45.

 

“If men were angels, no government would be necessary.” James Madison Federalist No. 51.

[cherdano]

Freedom is usually political freedom, freedom from interference by government. Or socially, freedom from hunger, threat, etc.

 

You are talking about enfranchisement, a totally different subject. In any case, minorities and lower incomes can always participate, but perhaps not as easily or on the same level as others. But then some people run faster than others, are more intelligent than others, or better looking than others. Should we be trying equalize all outcomes?

Hahahaha. ldrews just came out in favour of making it harder for minorities to vote.

 

Why are all Trump supporters in this forum so eager to reveal their deplorable side? Onex would think they don't enjoy proving Hillary right.