The GOP House wrote their "health care" bill in one month with no public testimony and the rejection of 100 Democratic amendments, then they had to pull their first bill because they couldn't get enough votes from their own party members, then they passed a second version that was passed by one vote after adding language that the GOP claimed would protect people with pre-existing conditions, so then Trump declared that this was "a great plan," but the CBO said that it would result in higher premiums and 24 million Americans losing their health insurance and it turned out it didn't really protect people with pre-existing conditions and the bill turned out not to be a health-care bill at all but instead a big tax refund for the super rich, so only 17% of Americans approved of it, so then Trump said that it was "a mean bill," so the GOP Senate said that it would write their bill from scratch, so thirteen male Republican Senators wrote a bill in secret in six weeks leveraging large parts of the House bill, but this version couldn't get enough GOP votes because the CBO said that it would raise premiums and cause 32 million Americans to lose their health insurance, so the vote was delayed until John McCain could return to Washington, then Trump threatened GOP Senators at a really nice White House lunch that they had better not leave town until they had passed some kind of bill, so a new version of the bill was presented and a vote was taken on whether to bring the bill forward, so then Murkowski and Collins voted against that, but then John McCain arrived to cast the deciding vote to begin debate, and then McCain announced that he would vote against the actual bill, so a bill "repeal and replace" new bill was distributed to Senators and voted on 90 minutes later, but it failed even though McCain reversed himself and voted FOR it, so then the Interior Secretary threatened Murkowski with the state of Alaska's financial ruin and Trump told the Boy Scouts that DHS Secretary Price would be fired if the GOP bill didn't pass, and then the Senate voted on the same "repeal now and replace later" bill it had passed in 2015, but this time six Republican senators who had voted for the bill in 2015 changed their minds and voted AGAINST it, so that bill also failed, so then McConnell decided to create a fake bill called a "skinny bill" that was only created so that it could be sent back to the House so that the House GOP could conference with the Senate GOP and create a whole new bill that would be the real bill that Trump would sign into law, so then the CBO came out and said that the "skinny bill" would raise premiums and cause 11 million Americans to lose their health insurance, and the top health insurers and the AMA begged the GOP to kill the bill, but then GOP Congressman Mark Meadows told Senator Lindsay Graham that there was a danger that the House would just skip a conference and pass "skinny" into law, so then Senatots Graham, Johnson and McCain held a press conference saying that the "skinny" bill was "a fraud" that would lead to a "disaster" that the GOP would be blamed for, and then they said that they would vote "no" on the "skinny" bill until Paul Ryan gave them an ironclad guarantee that the bill they were trying to pass would never actually get passed, so then Ryan said he would do that, but he said it in a way that didn't seem ironclad, and Ryan also demanded that the actual real bill that Trump would sign would have to be written by the Senate GOP and not the House GOP because he knows that he can't tell the GOP Senate what it wants to actually pass, so then the Senate GOP produced the actual text of the "skinny" bill, which was voted on three hours later, but then McCain voted against the bill and it was defeated, and McConnell said he was disappointed and Schumer said they should work together to fix Obamacare, and then all the senators went home at 2 a.m.
Calling Dr. Death
At this point--and things have been changing literally hour by hour for more than a week--it looks as if the Republican Party and Donald Trump and much of the media will be crowing later today about a remarkable, last-minute, "victory" on health care brought about by Trump's personal lobbying efforts.
This bill is probably the worst piece of legislation ever passed by Congress. It's not a health-care bill. This bill will take health insurance away from more than 20 million Americans who have insurance today in favor of tax cuts for the rich. Thousands of Americans who would have survived under Obamacare will die each year if this bill is passed. Thousands of Americans will again go bankrupt each year because of medical expenses if this bill is passed. The bill includes an exemption for members of Congress so that they can continue to enjoy better health care than the people they represent. The bill guts Medicaid. This bill does NOT protect people with pre-existing conditions. It would separate those people from the general insurance population and will allow insurance companies to deny those them insurance by making it prohibitively expensive. This bill denies affordable health care to lower income women by defunding Planned Parenthood. The Wall Street Journal revealed just this morning that the bill allow employers to not provide their employees with affordable, comprehensive health insurance--a catastrophic step back to the dark ages that ensures that this bill will have the potential to hurt ALL Americans.
How did the Republicans create such a monstrosity?
Despite seven years of opposition and more than 65 votes to repeal it, the Republcans had no health care bill ready when Trump was inaugurated.
No Republican has read this bill. There has been no draft of the bill to read.
This bill has been rushed through the House in less than a week.
There gave been no hearings on this bill. No input was allowed from the American people, Democrats, or health-care professionals.
No Republican knows what will happen if this bill is passed. They are voting on this bill before the Congressional Budget Office publishes an analysis of its impact.
This bill is a Frankensteinian construct designed by less than a dozen Americans: a handfull Republican representatives, Trump, Pence, and Paul Ryan.
The only criteria for the design of this bill was to get 216 Republican votes. The only reason the Republicans want to kill the ACA is because it has Obama's name on it. They know that they are lying when they say that Obamacare is collapsing, and they refuse to even consider fixing its shortcomings.
It's true that there is no chance that the Senate will pass a bill that resembles this one, but we should all be deeply fearful for our nation that such an immoral, corrupt travesty has passed the House. There can be no quarter with the Republicans. They care nothing about the American people or about governing. They are determined to take their crackpot economic theories--which have recently destroyed the economirs of Kansas and Louisiana--and implement them nationwide.
The only possible positive from today's national tragedy is that 216 or more Republicans will be on record as voting for a supremely cruel and un-American piece of legislation. The American people must prove this hellish tribe to be not winners but a group of political suicide bombers who have just detonated their vests today and thereby doomed the GOP to lose their House majority in 2018. If we don't use this treacherous bill against the GOP to transform the makeup of the House, this country may be damaged beyond recovery by 2020.
I would also hope that today's horror show in Congress will cause progressives and leftists who feel passionately that there is literally NO difference between the Democratic Party and the Republican Party to soberly revisit that position, which is clearly and unambiguously refuted by today's vote. As lame, frustrating, and even corrupt as the Democrats can be, there is no way that group would ever submit, much less approve, such a vicious bill. The reality is that a vote for the lesser of two evils, as Dan Savage has pointed out, is LESS EVIL. If after today you still do not accept that sitting out an election because your own chosen candidate was not triumphant can wreak needless devastation and, literally, death on your fellow citizens, you need to own the fact that by doing so you are relinquishing your right to complain about--and fight--its real-world impact. This shameful day needs to be a juncture where we all look deep into our own hearts and respond to the impure complexity of reality by fighting for our fellow Americans and against the horror and profound cruelty of Trumpism and not with each other.
Trump and Ryan at the bat
The outlook wasn’t brilliant for the Health Care Act that day;
Without the Freedom Caucus, the bill could not be saved.
The moderates were terrified by the COB’s grim score,
And the Democrats just sat there—they’d seen this all before.
The old and poor will have insurance, but at half their salary;
The rich will get a tax surprise beneath their Christmas tree.
This is the ultimate health care defined by Ayn Rand—
Make it rich or prepare to join the heavenly angel band.
But Ryan couldn’t hide the fact that premiums would rise,
And if you read the fine print you could not be surprised
That millions upon millions would lose the coverage they had,
Thanks to that damn Obama. Even gone he made them mad.
The pundits got their knives out and called the bill a joke.
Kasich and the governors said their red states would go broke.
But Republicans inhabit an imaginary realm,
And they were sure they would prevail with Trump and Ryan at the helm.
At first the lanky Speaker in a firm voice did intone
That no amendments would there be—the bill was set in stone.
But after Mrs. DeVos helped him with the math
He found he held a losing hand—to 215 there was no path.
Then from the mouths of Reagan’s party there rose a lusty yell
That rumbled through the Capitol like a war cry straight from hell.
McDonnell almost fainted and in delight Pete King did squeal
For Donald, mighty Donald, was stepping up to seal the deal.
He brought them to the Oval Office and twisted every arm;
He blew such smoke his handlers dismantled the alarms.
If they couldn’t bring themselves to like it they got his ironclad guarantee
That all would be made perfect in Phase Two if not Phase Three.
There was ease in Donald’s manner, he had no doubt he would astound
He knew not what was in the bill, but he would bring them ‘round
He would bless each change they asked for, it wasn’t like he cared
And as he caved and caved again, the pilgrims marveled at his hair.
The Freedom Caucus fumed against the socialistic stuff—
Maternity care and Medicaid—they called the Donald’s bluff.
“We will only cast our votes for right-wing thoughts purebred.”
“But what about the Senate?” Ryan asked. “Strike one,” the alt-right said.
As rightwards moved the legislation, the moderates complained.
“My district went for Clinton—why must I bear all the pain?
Who will pay for my robo calls and bury all the dead?”
“Grow a pair,” said Donald. “Strike two,” the moderates said.
The smile is gone from Ryan’s face, for there is no Plan B;
This Wednesday midnight meeting will bring his charges to their knees.
The Donald is beside him as they make their final pitches;
Winning is for men like them and losing is for bitches.
Oh, all across this favored land the many millions can exhale—
The Republican death panels at least for now will not prevail.
Let the word go forth to all of deadly TrumpCare’s rout
For there is no joy in Mar-a-Lago—Trump and Ryan have struck out.
TrumpCare
After seven years of brave, full-throated opposition to the Affordable Care Act, the Republicans have unveiled their vision for health care in America. TrumpCare is a brilliant bill that offers bold solutions to the biggest health-care issues we face as a nation.
First: Too many Americans have health insurance. Mick Mulvaney, Trump’s Office of Management and Budget director, has made it clear that “insurance is not the end goal” of the Republicans’ health-insurance legislation. TrumpCare will ensure that 11 million Americans covered under Medicaid will lose their health insurance within the first two years. Longer term, the prospect of taking health insurance away from Americans is even brighter. TrumpCare’s funding provisions won’t work, so it’s entirely possible that all Americans currently covered by the ACA will lose their insurance when the TrumpCare goes into a predictable death spiral.
Second: The richest Americans, the neediest and most neglected sector of society, will finally get critical relief as their premiums are reduced dramatically.
Third: Elderly Americans on fixed incomes, who are killing this country with their outrageous demands for special treatment, will finally be appropriately punished with higher premiums.
Fourth: Women, that bewildering segment of society that insists beyond all reason that they have access to birth control, maternity care, pediatric dental and vision care, will be brought back to the real world. Insurance companies will no longer be required to cover such incidentals and “nice to haves.”
Fifth: Health-care-company CEOs will no longer have their freedom infringed upon by un-American salary caps. The GOP bill ensures that these brilliant business leaders will finally be allowed, just like other American CEOs, to grant themselves enormous salaries that in no way reflect their performance.
Sixth: Health-care fraud committed by lottery winners. Six pages in the bill are devoted to ensuring that lottery winners are not provided with health insurance. Finally!
Our new President is really stepping up to the plate and asserting his innovative, clear-eyed vision for the health-care crisis. Just yesterday he told Congressional Republicans that he didn’t care which health-care bill they passed as long as they passed SOMETHING.
And the GOP Congressional leadership has achieved what many thought was impossible—the crafting of a TrumpCare bill that has been universally condemned by all stakeholders (conservative Republicans, moderate Republicans, Tea-Party Republicans, all Democrats, health-care companies, the American Hospital Association, AARP, the American Medical Association, health-care experts, the Koch brothers, the real media (Breitbart), and the lamestream media (all news outlets except for Breitbart). You know you have a good bill when everyone is against it. The Republicans really ARE bringing the country together.
All the naysayers who contend that the anti-government Republican Party is no good at governing and that Donald Trump was completely bullshitting the country about his health-care vision have been totally silenced, probably forever, by this week’s jaw-dropping TrumpCare blitzkreig .
Now that the pesky health-care problem has been solved, it’s on to new challenges: reforming the tax code, giving the Russians and the banks whatever they want, taking immigrant children away from their mothers, making America less safe by taking TSA and Coast Guard funds to build a Mexican border wall, getting Trump trademarks for escort services approved in China, blaming everything on Obama, dismantling public education, and launching new wars with North Korea and the scientific community.
