American Politics Thread: Orange is the new POTUS

[Regorium]

Originally Posted by Frequitude

What are "individual mandates" as it relates to Obamacare? Is it that those folks in that not-too-rich-not-too-poor category are required to purchase health insurance (which is then subsidized through tax credits)?

If so, wouldn't the "skinny repeal" of only those individual mandates totally screw up the entire system? So long as the law that insurers can't exclude pre-existing conditions is in effect, removing individual mandates would just incent people to only buy health insurance once they get sick. Insurance prices would skyrocket, in theory to the price of actual medical costs instead of the lower costs with distributed risk.

Am I missing something?

You are completely correct. Under Obamacare, everyone is REQUIRED to have health insurance.

However, skinny repeal basically means that the name Obamacare remains, and when it fails, they can go hard on blaming Dems.

[kermitology]

As I understand it, the individual mandate maintains enough of a pool of paying members to pay for the entire thing. IF you remove that then you cripple the revenue stream to be able to pay for the program.

[photon]

The Republicans even realized this as they put in their own mandate in one of their bills. Instead of requiring through the IRS, you had a six month waiting period if your insurance lapsed. So you couldn't buy insurance when you found out you have cancer or something.

And Trump already sabotaged the mandate somewhat by giving that EO to tell the IRS not to enforce the mandate.

In Switzerland you go to jail if you don't purchase health insurance.

[oldschoolcalgary]

Originally Posted by direwolf

Pretty scary if this actually passes. Holy s--t.

that's GD sickening... F those clowns...

its a non partisan entity meant to evaluate policy from both the right and the left...

Getting rid of it because they are calling you out on your BS policy and numbers? They are doing their GD job...

seriously, this is where spineless Fs like McCain really piss me off

[Parallex]

Originally Posted by Frequitude

If so, wouldn't the "skinny repeal" of only those individual mandates totally screw up the entire system? So long as the law that insurers can't exclude pre-existing conditions is in effect, removing individual mandates would just incent people to only buy health insurance once they get sick. Insurance prices would skyrocket, in theory to the price of actual medical costs instead of the lower costs with distributed risk.

Am I missing something?

No, you're precisely correct. That's why the estimates on lost healthcare under it are so high. Without the individual mandate creating a large enough pool of healthy insured people premiums would raise significantly beyond a large portion of the populations ability to reasonably pay for it.

Americans would still have better healthcare then pre-ACA due to the medicaid expansion remaining in place but it'd be worse then what they have now (for sick people anyways).

For all their complaining (and 7 years of time to research the issue) Republicans haven't come up with a health bill alternative that doesn't leave the sick worse off.

[direwolf]

Sounds like the Joint Chiefs were completely blindsided by Trump's transgender ban. And not surprisingly, there's no plan in place for how to implement it. Typical Trump just tweeting out bulls--t without anything to back it up. What a f'n clown show.

http://www.cnn.com/2017/07/27/politi...efs/index.html

The Joint Chiefs of Staff, including chairman General Joseph Dunford, were not aware President Donald Trump planned to tweet a ban on transgender service members, three US defense officials told CNN -- the latest indication that top military leaders across all four service branches were blindsided by the President's announcement.

For now, Dunford has informed service members that there will be "no modifications to the current policy until the President's direction has been received by the Secretary of Defense and the Secretary has issued implementation guidelines."

"In the meantime, we will continue to treat all of our personnel with respect," Dunford wrote in a memo to the military that was obtained by CNN. "As importantly, given the current fight and the challenges we face, we will all remain focused on accomplishing our assigned missions."

While Trump's tweet states that he consulted with his generals and military experts ahead of making the announcement, US defense officials have indicated that many of the top brass were caught off guard by the policy change.

One of the heads of the military branches was informed by a staffer of the President's tweets on transgender policy and had no idea it was coming, an official said.
Adding to the confusion is that Trump's decision came without a plan in place to implement it.

[calculoso]

"Adding to the confusion is that Trump's decision came without a plan in place to implement it."

Sounds like the decisions made by most CEOs

[PsYcNeT]

Apologies if fata.

[Frequitude]

Got it. So skinny repeal is really just meant to make Obamacare structurally fail. Then Republicans can say "see I told you so" and Democrats can say "WTF you're the one that broke it". And nothing will change because the respective constituents of both parties will just listen to their own side. Fun. At least this thread will keep on rocking and rolling.

[Parallex]

Originally Posted by Frequitude

Got it. So skinny repeal is really just meant to make Obamacare structurally fail.

Parts of it. Like I said the Medicaid expansion would remain and insurers would be required to offer packages that cover pre-existing conditions... but they would be killing the "Affordable" part of the "Afforable Care Act". There's also the chance that whatever they come up with won't pass muster with the senate parliamentarian and not be eligible to be classified under reconciliation and require the 60 vote minimum.

I halfway wonder if they don't do that so that they can use it as a rallying cry for the 2018 midterms (But that's likely to conspiratorial).

[ernie]

Originally Posted by calculoso

"adding to the confusion is that trump's decision came without a plan in place to implement it."

sounds like the decisions made by most bad ceos

fyp

[ernie]

Originally Posted by Frequitude

Got it. So skinny repeal is really just meant to make Obamacare structurally fail. Then Republicans can say "see I told you so" and Democrats can say "WTF you're the one that broke it". And nothing will change because the respective constituents of both parties will just listen to their own side. Fun. At least this thread will keep on rocking and rolling.

Well there will be one change...premiums will go up at a faster rate than the past 7 years and the fastest rate increases will be on the voting block that traditionally votes GOP. It may be enough to cause a decent loss of support for the GOP.

There is another issue. The GOP never had anything ready to go after 7 years of complaining and instead of coming out the first couple weeks of the presidency with a passing bill they've had months of infighting. This has had the effect of people actually getting informed on what the ACA was and increasing amounts of people do not want it scrapped. A majority either want to leave it as is or use it for the basis of improvement. The GOP repeal and replace has limited support.

[Frequitude]

I know little of Lindsey Graham's history so forgive me if I'm stumbling into another scolding like McCain, but its great to see actual quotes of Republican anger and actions instead of "inside sources". Can't wait to read Trump's reaction.

Sen. Lindsey Graham vows 'holy hell to pay' if Attorney General Jeff Sessions is fired

"I'm 100% behind Jeff Sessions," Sen. Lindsey Graham, a South Carolina Republican, told CNN's Manu Raju Thursday morning on Capitol Hill. "If Jeff Sessions is fired, there will be holy hell to pay."

...

Graham then announced that he plans on introducing legislation next week to ensure that a special counsel cannot be fired if they are investigating the President, unless there is judicial review of the firing.

"I'm going to try to come up with statutory language that would say, in the case of Bob Mueller and future special counsels, that if the attorney general fires that person who's been empaneled to investigate the President or their team, then judges will have to look and see if whether or not the reasons stated meet the statutory definitions," Graham told CNN.

The South Carolina senator noted that this legislation is intended "not just for Trump, but for any future president," adding that "we need a check and balance here."

http://www.cnn.com/2017/07/27/politi...ons/index.html

[ResAlien]

"Rawr there'll be hell to pay I tell you, hell to pay!"

*Votes along party lines 100/100 times*

"...hell I say!"

[ernie]

This is the kind of political crap they waste their time on while gleefully hoping to strip millions of their insurance (from CNN):

There’s only one vote (so far) this afternoon:

It's a GOP amendment proposing “Medicare for All.”
But that doesn't mean much: It's an amendment purely designed to force Democrats on the record as for or against a "single payer" health care plan.
Republicans will oppose it.

Of course every year the support for single payer increases. Over 60% of Americans believe the government is responsible for providing healthcare to all citizens. 33% outright support single payer...which is 5% more than 18 months ago and 12% more than 3 years ago.

Also, the boy scouts have apologized for the political rhetoric in Trump's speech. Let that sink in...the Boy scouts had to apologize for the current president for the things that came out of his mouth. I mean they were stupid to think he could actually behave but it sure says about everything you need to know about the man that he can't control himself in such a forum.

[Parallex]

Originally Posted by Frequitude

I know little of Lindsey Graham's history so forgive me if I'm stumbling into another scolding like McCain, but its great to see actual quotes of Republican anger and actions instead of "inside sources". Can't wait to read Trump's reaction.

That's just some good ol' boyism. Sessions was a Senator so I see that more as just him repping for one of their own.

Sessions is tough spot for Trump...

1: He's well liked by the populist/nationalist/nativist Breitbart types,
2: He's also well connected with establshment types (So Fox News & Congress),
3: Firing him limits his replacement options

I'm fairly certain that Trump wants him gone but he wants to force him to resign rather then fire him. If he "resigns" then conservative media and congressional Republicans grumble rather then fury and he can appoint some lapdog without any skin in the game that Trump doesn't give him.

[Thor]

Have you all noticed how obviously the staff in the white house Trump speeches are told to clap really really loudly, yell out, cheer, and stand for the speech, whatever it might be.

Its all so North Korean, I still can't believe this is happening in the USA.

[Hemi-Cuda]

Originally Posted by Parallex

I'm fairly certain that Trump wants him gone but he wants to force him to resign rather then fire him. If he "resigns" then conservative media and congressional Republicans grumble rather then fury and he can appoint some lapdog without any skin in the game that Trump doesn't give him.

It goes further than that. There are rules governing who Trump can appoint as a replacement AG if he fires Sessions, it's a select list of individuals that he has no control over. However if the AG resigns then Trump is free to assign anyone he wants to the role

[direwolf]

Excellent piece from Vox today on the GOP's Obamacare repeal fiasco.

https://www.vox.com/policy-and-polit...e-repeal-lying

Republicans are making life-or-death policy for millions of Americans with less care, consideration, and planning than most households put into purchasing a dishwasher.

But the deeper problem — the one that will continue to corrode the system long after this debate resolves — is the role that deception has played throughout the process.

This has been a policymaking process built, from the beginning, atop lies. Lies about what the bills do and don’t do. Lies about what is wrong with Obamacare and lies about what the GOP’s legislation would do to fix it. Lies about what Republicans are trying to achieve and lies about which problems they seek to solve.

This isn’t just a moral offense, though it is that. It is a profound challenge to the policymaking process.

Senate Republicans look to be ending their process with a bill that mainly repeals the individual mandate, and thus sends far more markets into collapse. And so the one vaguely real problem they identified and repeatedly promised to solve they are now making much, much, much worse.

This is not normal. It is crazy-making. It’s a debate where words have no meaning, promises have no value, noise carries no signal. A functional policymaking process cannot survive in this environment for long.

Skepticism is healthy in politics. But this era requires more than skepticism. This is a total collapse of the credibility of all the key policymakers in the American government. Our political system is built on the assumption that words have some meaning, that the statements policymakers make have some rough correlation to the actions they will take. But here, in the era of bull#### politics, they don’t. If this becomes the new normal in policymaking, it will be disastrous.

[Titan]

I have been meaning to post this for a while but the Washington Post prepares daily breifing emails that are excellent. The link to sign up for them is here: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/...=.e68be7b79587

I have been getting the Daily 202 for a while and it is consistently excellent.

They have also launched, or at least are promoting, a Health 202 where their health policy reporter will be discussing all things health care and the process to destroy it in the US. I have not read it yet but assume it will be excellent. Based on some of the questions in the thread I think there may be an appetite for it here. They will be discussing the machinations of the various votes and be explaining them. Here is the blurb I received via email about it:

Health care reporter Paige Winfield Cunningham is your guide to understanding the complex votes, legislation and politics surrounding GOP efforts to roll back the Affordable Care Act.
Get Paige's newsletter to make sure you have all the information you need to explain everything you need to know about Washington's health-care debate. Want a sample? Here's a link to today's edition.