Posted on 03/12/2017 12:33:39 PM PDT by Jim Robinson
Sunday on ABC’s “This Week,” while discussing the Republican plan to repeal and replace Obamacare, Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR) said he was “afraid if they vote for the bill, they’ll put the House majority at risk next year.”
Cotton said, “As it’s written today, this bill cannot pass the Senate. I believe it would have adverse consequences for millions of Americans and wouldn’t deliver on our promises to reduce the cost of health insurance to Americans. I would say to my friends in the house of representatives, with whom I serve, do not walk the plank and vote for a bill that cannot pass the Senate and then have to face the consequences of that vote. George, you were in the White House in 1993. You remember when House Democrats voted for a BTU energy tax. Not only did that not become law, it didn’t get a vote in the Senate. And those Democrats lost their next election because they voted on that tax. They call it getting BTU’d. I don’t think this bill can pass the Senate. And therefore, I think the house should take a pause and try to get as close as we can to a good result before they send to it the Senate.”
(Excerpt) Read more at breitbart.com ...
Here’s more of the backstory with my summation:
In passing the Housing and Economic Recovery Act of 2008 (HERA), the U.S. Congress had fixed the regulatory issues at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, creating a mechanism for them to be placed into conservatorship at federal government’s discretion AND providing up to $187.5 billion in funds that could be advanced to the GSEs through a purchase of senior preferred stock paying a ten percent dividend.
In deciding to bail them out, the federal government took control of the two giant mortgage GSEs, with Fannie and Freddie effectively put into government “conservatorship.”
As part of the conservatorship, the federal government effectively acquired warrants, convertible at a nominal price, which allowed the federal government to acquire 79% of the GSE’s common stock.
This resulted in causing dilution in the percentage of Fannie and Freddie common stock ownership that was left in the hands of private and institutional investors.
Congress’ intent was that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac would pay back the Treasury as the mortgage giants returned to profitability.
But after the Treasury was paid back, the terms of HERA anticipated Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac would pay appropriate dividends to stockholders, including the federal government, leaving enough funds within Freddie and Fannie to “conserve and preserve” the assets of the two GSEs, anticipating their eventual return to a “safe and solvent” operating condition.
In 2012, the Obama administration unilaterally decided to change the terms of HERA by sweeping all the profits of Fannie and Freddie into the Treasury’s general fund.
The Obama administration took this action, the so-called “Net Worth Sweep,” without any Congressional authority to do so.
The result was that the U.S. Treasury “found” a way to sweep 100% of Fannie and Freddie profits into the Treasury’s “general fund,” leaving the giant mortgage GSEs vulnerable to the need for another government bailout should another disruption occur in the nation’s economy.
In a nutshell, Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac were bailed out in the financial collapse. That they are corrupt organizations is another story. For now, as mortgage insurance giants they received a massive bailout of more than $100 BILLION.
BUT THEY PAID IT BACK, HOW?
They paid it all back by selling preferred shares to mutual funds and then they became sound and were making a profit.
SIMPLIFIED POINTS:
FANNIE AND FREDDIE BAILED OUT BY TAXPAYERS UP TO ~$188 BILLION
MUTUAL FUNDS BUY PREFERRED SHARES OF FANNIE AND FREDDIE WHO IN TURN USE BUY-IN OF SHARES TO PAY BACK BAILOUT FUNDS
OBAMACARE SHORT ON FUNDS FOR SUBSIDIES
OBAMA ROBS FANNIE AND FREDDIE OF ~130 BILLION TO PROP UP OBAMACARE SUBSIDIES
MUTUAL FUNDS LOSE INVESTMENT AND INTEREST ON FANNIE AND FREDDIE
SHORT SUMMARY:
OBAMA ADMINISTRATION ROBS MUTUAL FUNDS TO PAY FOR OBAMACARE
Several laws were violated in the above. Sessions can bring a criminal prosecution that is fitting.
The takeaway is that Obamacare was doomed to fail and cannot succeed without stealing from others. In this case, Obama decided to steal because he could not get Congress to approve of the shortfall in Obamacare subsidies. So Obama decided to simply steal to prop up Obamacare for votes by stealing from entities that had investors plowing down their money. This is theft on a massive scale and there are several lawsuits with many facts in the public domain uncovered by discovery. Sessions needs to devote some financial crime attorneys on this asap.
The President and the AG can both make press statements declaring that Obamacare was only sustainable by stealing from private investors and for this reason alone it must be ended by repeal, not reconciliation, but full repeal, taking it aff the books so that it is no longer a law. President takes the moral and legal high ground.
That was already pointed out above. It’s the same as blowing up the Senate rules. The problem with blowing up the Senate rules is the democrats will have the green light to do the same when they control Congress in the future.
Cruz is reckless here.
The Administration must play hardball meaning prison. See #61 for a hardball outline.
And note, many are using the term ‘repeal’ when in effect they are referring to a wrecking, a demolition, a gutting, a busting through a reconciliation process. The term repeal refers to passing a law to take down a law. Repeal gets rid of the law. Reconciliation gets rid of the funding but leaves the law in place.
If Ryan gets his first part of the bill passed and President Trump does not veto it, it spells total disaster. Because the second and third bill will not pass Senate. Then we still have Obamacare only worst. This must be one bill to kill Obamacare totally with all the executive orders removed by using the nuke 51 votes.
The single payer plan = universal healthcare did not pass because of the 60 vote limit!
It’s the same here with trying to repeal Obamacare.
Reconciliation is a budget process, not a law repealing process.
Do not confuse ‘reconciliation’ and ‘repeal’.
I’ll say it again:
Through reconciliation, the Obamacare law can be busted, demolished, wrecked but its blueprints are still on the books in Congress signed into law.
That means Americans can go many many years unhindered by Obamacare but in the meantime, THE DEMOCRATS WILL BE SNIPING AT EVERY HEALTHCARE FAILURE REAL OR IMAGINED.
That means in 5 years or 10 years,l whatever, the democrats can resuscitate Obamacare through reconciliation because a repeal was never achieved.
AMERICANS NEED OBAMACARE REPEALED! NOT ‘RECONCILED’ INTO SHORT-TERM DISFUNCTION.
I don’t think we are getting the whole story. Let’s give President Trump the opportunity to play HIS hand himself. I believe our President can be trusted to do the right thing.
Just look how quickly ISIS is being destroyed .. for example.
Now - Phase 1 will end Obamacare. The Senate rules for reconcilation with a Budget require what is being done to enable ending Obamacare with just 51 votes. Any other technique would allow filibusters and require 60 votes. No Democrat will vote for repeal.
Sit tight and let the system work. Investigate yourself and you will understand.
Nah, man. There is no difference between having some text still on the books and creating it to put it on the books.
If the Dems in the future get 60 votes, they’ll just repaste the text. There’s no difference between gutting it and repealing it. It both cases it can be reactivated.
You do what you have the seats to do. Choosing to do nothing because you can’t get all you want is not going to buy you any immunity from being blamed for doing nothing.
Nothing is nothing. Something is something. We have the seats to do something.
Well said. Its why I sat out the congressional portion of last year’s election. Bi-Partisanship means the two gangs, the Crips and Bloods, agreed to a division of spoils.
Very interesting, but I missed the criminal case.
Was this litigated by the injured mutual finds?
Once a bill is passed and signed into law, it becomes a law. It can only become a non-law by repealing it.
Ryan is not repealing it, he’s wanting to make it ineffective by reconciliation measures which are temporary until the democrats take over in the future. And they will because the republicans are stupid. They really are stupid. A few of them are quite brilliant but as a body, they are stupid meaning they never learn enough to turn the nation back to its founding principles. So it’s a given that the criminal part of Congress will take power again at a future date.
The key difference between repeal (President wants) and reconciliation (Ryan offers) is that WHEN the democrats control Congress in the future, and they will, a repeal of Obamacare will force them to once again look at the hurdle of 60 votes in the Senate unless Stupid Cruz gives them a precedent for blowing up the Senate rules to get what they want.
A full repeal is needed, not a weak offering by the Oscar Mayer Weinermobile driver. Yeah, Ryan’s only ever private sector job was a driver for the Oscar Mayer Weinermobile. He is in effect, the Pee Wee Herman of politics, weak, stupid, and unwilling to play hardball for the American republic.
That’s not stupidity, that’s complicity.
Repeal with no replace requires 60 votes. It would get 20.
Ryan’s plan guts Obamacare and offers additional measures later if 60 votes exist. It does all that can be done with the tiny majority in the Senate.
This is not rocket science. It’s math.
The choice is do what is possible, or do nothing. No one will reward doing nothing.
Yes, a good part of it is complicity. But even the complicit weasels will move back out of the way of a hardball game between the Attorney General and the Senate Democrats.
The democrats are right now laughing and smirking watch the republicans shoot each other. They know the republicans will jump up and down, set the ACA on fire, gut this, defend that, take a mandate here, etc. But as long as the law is left in place, they will just sit back and wait.
What they really fear, what would wipe the smirks off their faces is a repeal of the ACA. That would be a more permanent setback for them.
The bottom line is that Congress does not hold the cards, they don’t have the winning hand. President Trump has the winning hand. He needs to play it.
Rules can be changed. And the. Changed back. It’s been done before
It’s also been done for just a specific vote and changed back
The sixty vote rule is completely I remember when it was 2/3. Then it was changed to 60 for some things. Arbitrary
The rule doesn’t even need to be changed. A reasonable reading of it would allow them to do what they want on the issue. But they ought to have replaced the Democrat parliamentarian with one of their own, anyway. And even if the parliamentarian ruled against it, they could simply have Pence sit in and overrule. Dems da rules.
The GOPe is lying to us and to Trump, and so far Trump still seems deluded—thinking that the GOPe are his friends. I think he’ll figure it out, but I hope he does so soon.
Please explain which Dims you want in prison.
I am sincerely trying to follow your logic as to how this contributes to getting free-market healthcare passed.
Mark Levin, Ted Cruz, and Larry Kudlow have been among those pushing, in combination, all those points.
But I should drop him a line—I’ve already tweeted him!
Sure seems to me that the rinos want to lose the house so Trumps agenda gets scuttled.
They are already picking the losers in the house.We have seen this act before.
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