the two leading Republicans in Congress are apparently O.K. with that cover-up, because the Trump ascendancy is giving them the chance to do what they always wanted, namely, take health insurance away from millions of Americans while slashing taxes on the wealthy.
.. For generations, Republicans have impugned their opponents’ patriotism.
.. circumstantial evidence that a hostile foreign power may have colluded with a U.S. presidential campaign, and may retain undue influence at the highest levels of our government. And all those self-proclaimed patriots have gone silent, or worse.
.. revival of the term “America First,” the name of a movement opposed to U.S. intervention in World War II. What isn’t often mentioned is that many of the most prominent America-firsters weren’t just isolationists, they were actively sympathetic to foreign dictators; there’s a more or less straight line from Charles Lindbergh proudly wearing the medal he received from Hermann Göring to Trump’s cordial relations with Rodrigo Duterte
Divided Senate Republicans Turn to Health Care With a Rough Road Ahead
The top Republican in the Senate, Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, has a reputation as a shrewd tactician and a wily strategist — far more than his younger counterpart in the House, Speaker Paul D. Ryan.
So the Senate majority leader’s decision to create a 13-man working group on health care, including staunch conservatives and ardent foes of the Affordable Care Act — but no women — has been widely seen on Capitol Hill as a move to placate the right
.. The prospect of higher premiums for older Americans living in rural areas will also loom larger in a legislative chamber where Republicans from sparsely populated states hold outsize power.
.. The Senate Republican working group on health care includes the party’s top leaders, as well as three committee chairmen and two of the most conservative senators, Ted Cruz of Texas and Mike Lee of Utah.
Mr. McConnell’s decision to include himself and his top three lieutenants — but not Ms. Collins, Ms. Murkowski or more junior women Republicans like Deb Fischer of Nebraska and Shelley Moore Capito of West Virginia — speaks volumes about his direction and has raised eyebrows.
.. By excluding Ms. Collins and Mr. Cassidy, perhaps viewed as potential troublemakers for the bill, Senate leaders may have inadvertently created a dangerous alliance. The two senators now have no obligation to fall in line behind the working group’s final product and will almost surely continue to work on their own ideas. Together, they and their allies could hold near-veto power.
.. Beyond neglecting Republican women, Senate Republican leaders overlooked Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina, the only black member of their conference. Before his congressional career, Mr. Scott sold insurance and was owned one of the most successful Allstate insurance branches in South Carolina.
.. Mr. McConnell also left out of the group the only two Republican senators clearly in the Democrats’ cross hairs for 2018 — Dean Heller of Nevada and Jeff Flake of Arizona. With re-election campaigns looming, they will have their own political calculus to make. Both states have expanded Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act, providing coverage to hundreds of thousands of people.
.. Hospital executives, among the most outspoken critics of the House bill, are in town for the annual meeting of the American Hospital Association and will lobby the Senate this week. Thomas P. Nickels, an executive vice president of the association, predicted that the Senate would produce an “utterly different version” of the legislation.
.. The House bill would roll back the expansion of Medicaid, which has provided coverage to about 11 million people. The Congressional Budget Office said the bill’s Medicaid changes would save more than $800 billion over 10 years.
.. Mr. Thune, not wanting to create a new middle-class entitlement, would like to provide more financial assistance to lower-income people and less to higher-income people.
The Senate Takes Up Health Care Reform
The Senate will take up health care reform after a revised version of the American Health Care Act (AHCA) passed through the House last Thursday.
Senator Roy Blunt (R-MO), a member of Senate leadership, said that the Senate will wait for a new CBO score before preceding to a vote.
.. Mick Mulvaney, head of the Office of Management and Budget, said, “The bill that passed out of the House is most likely not going to be the bill that is put in front of the president.”
Members of the working group include Sens.
- Mitch McConnell,
- Bob Portman (R-OH),
- John Corynyn (R-TX),
- John Thune (R-SD),
- Mike Enzi (R-WY),
- Orrin Hatch (R-UT),
- Lamar Alexander (R-TN),
- Tom Cotton (R-AR),
- Cory Gardner (R-CO),
- Ted Cruz (R-TX),
- John Barrasso (R-WY), and
- Pat Toomey (R-PA).
.. The Senate working group does not feature two of the bill’s biggest critics, Senators Susan Collins (R-ME) and Bill Cassidy (R-LA).
.. The two senators joined a separate group of Republicans studying potential health care solutions including Sens.
- Shelley Moore Capito (R-WV),
- Johnny Isakson (R-GA), and
- Mike Rounds (R-SD)
- Susan Collins (R-ME)
- Bill Cassidy (R-LA)
.. Senators Cassidy and Collins released a separate Obamacare repeal bill, The Patient Freedom Act.
States have three options under the Cassidy-Collins plan:
- Retain the Affordable Care Act, allowing individuals and small businesses able to purchase insurance on state exchanges and low-income residents can receive federal subsidies to cover the cost of the program. States that expanded Medicaid can continue to provide increased Medicaid coverage.
- States can receive most of the federal funding, including Medicaid expansion and subsidies to create tax-free Health Savings Accounts for low-income citizens. Low-income residents can use the HSAs to purchase insurance and pay for health care.
- Allow states to create an alternative solution without federal assistance. States would retain the power to design and regulate insurance markets without federal intervention.
.. Senators Rand Paul (R-KY), Mike Lee (R-UT), and Ted Cruz (R-TX) were the strongest opponents of the American Health Care Act. Senator Paul crafted his own conservative plan for repealing Obamacare and worked with the Freedom Caucus to push for an even more conservative Obamacare repeal bill. The Freedom Caucus endorsed Sen. Paul’s plan.
Republicans Party Like It’s 1984
The really important thing, however, is not just to realize that Republicans are breaking their promises, but to realize that they are doing so with intent. This isn’t one of those cases where people try to do what they said they would, but fall short in the execution. This is an act of deliberate betrayal: Everything about Trumpcare is specifically designed to do exactly the opposite of what Trump, Paul Ryan and other Republicans said it would.
.. people with incomes over $1 million would save an average of more than $50,000 a year.
And there is a powerful faction within the G.O.P. for whom cutting taxes on the rich is more or less the only thing that matters.
And on a more subjective note, don’t you get the impression that Donald Trump gets some positive pleasure out of taking people who make the mistake of trusting him for a ride?
As for why they think they can get away with it: Well, isn’t recent history on their side? The general shape of what the G.O.P. would do to health care, for the white working class in particular, has long been obvious, yet many people who were sure to lose, bigly, voted Trump anyway.
Why shouldn’t Republicans believe they can convince those same voters that the terrible things that will happen if Trumpcare becomes law are somehow liberals’ fault?
And for that matter, how confident are you that mainstream media will resist the temptation of both-sides-ism, the urge to produce “balanced” reporting that blurs the awful reality of what Trumpcare will do if enacted?