A Blueprint for Repealing and Replacing Obamacare with Bipartisan Support
It was hubristic of President Obama to think that after enacting a monumental law, without any bipartisan buy-in, opponents would simply fall in line. As history played out, Republicans had no problem undermining a law they had no part in enacting and felt no attachment to. Senator Max Baucus, chairman of the Finance Committee that drafted the health-care bill, “fret[ted]” about the ACA’s origin. “It is my belief,” he said in December 2013, “that for major legislation to be durable, sustainable, it has to be bipartisan.
.. “The partial repeal bill does not get rid of Obamacare’s tens of thousands of pages of insurance regulations,” Roy explains, as well as “the regulations that are responsible for the law’s drastic premium hikes.”
.. If Republicans choose the reconciliation path, as some members are already considering, we would be stuck with Obamacare’s hollow shell. Gutting the subsidies, without eliminating the regulations that make insurance expensive, would be counterproductive: Premiums would continue to increase
.. In 2014, Senate Majority Leader Reid invoked the so-called “nuclear option” to remove the 60-vote threshold for confirming judges and other executive-branch appointments, with the exception of Supreme Court nominees. I fully expect Majority Leader McConnell to use the same parliamentary procedure to confirm President Trump’s first nominee to the high court — it is simply the next step in the downward spiral of our confirmation process.
.. In 2014, Senate Majority Leader Reid invoked the so-called “nuclear option” to remove the 60-vote threshold for confirming judges and other executive-branch appointments, with the exception of Supreme Court nominees. I fully expect Majority Leader McConnell to use the same parliamentary procedure to confirm President Trump’s first nominee to the high court — it is simply the next step in the downward spiral of our confirmation process.
.. In this game of mutually assured destruction, Republicans may be tempted to move first. And if there was ever a single goal that would unify Republicans to take this extreme step, it would be the elimination of Obamacare.
.. In this game of mutually assured destruction, Republicans may be tempted to move first. And if there was ever a single goal that would unify Republicans to take this extreme step, it would be the elimination of Obamacare.
.. There were rumors that House and Senate staffers would resign if they were forced to pay full fare for their insurance. It is beyond ironic that employees who labored to pass Obamacare threatened to leave government if they had to actually use it.