Free Republic

Former House Speaker John Boehner said at an event in Las Vegas last week that he used to “sneak into” the White House to see President Barack Obama to avoid scrutiny from the “right-wing press”.... ...Boehner also lamented the fact that Americans now have too many choices of where to go for news and information. “What’s making everything even worse today is because we have so much news, people get to choose where they get their news,” Boehner said, according to the Post. “It used to be we had three big TV networks, five big newspapers, and five big radio...

PARASITES IN US HEALTH CARE In early May my wife and I returned from a short vacation in Peru. Two weeks later I came down with severe diarrhea that has now continued unabated for six weeks. The cause has been identified as a parasite—Blastasytis Species. This parasite is believed to be present in 23% of the American population and 100% of people in “less developed countries” (Wikipedia). Albendazole is the first line of treatment for this infection. Albendazole tablets are sold throughout the world (outside of the US) for 1 penny to six cents each and are usually available as...

In firm control of the federal government, President Donald Trump and his Republican Party have so far failed to deliver on core campaign promises on health care, taxes and infrastructure. But in New York’s Trump Tower café, the Gentry family blames Congress, not the president. Like many Trump voters across America, the Alabama couple, vacationing last week with their three children, says they are deeply frustrated with the president’s GOP allies, faulting them for derailing Trump’s plans. As the family of five lunched in Trump Tower, Sheila Gentry offered a pointed message to those concerned with the GOP’s ability to...

As of April, there were 74,531,002 people enrolled in Medicaid and the Children’s Health Insurance Program as of April, according to the latest data released by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. That is up 16,705,235 in the 49 states that reported their Medicaid/CHIP enrollment numbers for both the July-to-September period of 2013 (the last quarter before the Obamacare exchanges opened) and this April. The 74,531,002 enrolled in Medicaid/CHIP as of April includes the numbers for all 50 states and the District of Columbia. In the 49 states that reported both before the Obamacare exchanges opened in 2013 and...

I remember the day after the 2016 Election, a friend of mine who happens to be white, remarked on social media that he "finally wasn't embarrassed of America and our President." I sprained my eyes rolling them and they have never fully recovered. Since then I've heard this sentiment echoed by more white folks than I can count, especially in recent months; supposed relief at once again having a leader who instills pride. I don't have the time to ask each of the individually, I'll ask here: So, you were embarrassed for the past 8 years, huh? Really? What exactly...

One of the nation’s biggest health insurers says it will not return to Ohio’s public insurance exchanges next year, a decision that could open more holes in the Affordable Care Act’s increasingly thin system for helping people buy coverage. The move announced Tuesday by Anthem Inc. could leave shoppers in 20 counties without an option for buying individual coverage on the exchange unless another insurer steps in, according to data compiled by The Associated Press and the consulting firm Avalere. The exchanges are the only place where people can use an income-based tax credit to help cover the cost of...

<p>The rift within the Democratic Party was on full display at the California Democratic Party Convention on May 19 in Sacramento, California. Progressives joined members of National Nurses United, protesting the Democratic Party establishment’s refusal to support single payer healthcare system. Rather than follow through with Democratic rhetoric that healthcare is a human right, establishment Democrats have responded to voters by scolding and attacking them.</p>

Critics of Republican U.S. Rep. Dave Brat and the House health care bill he voted for packed a raucous town hall meeting in his Virginia district Tuesday night, booing and shouting down the congressman from start to finish. Brat is the latest in a series of lawmakers across the country who have gotten an earful from constituents at town hall meetings since last week’s passage of the House health care bill that would repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act. […] A former economics professor who defeated then-House Majority Leader Eric Cantor in a historic 2014 upset, Brat briefly discussed...

In an interview Thursday with Alter Family Politics on SiriusXM, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) weighed in on former President Obama's upcoming speech to Wall Street firm Cantor Fitzgerald. Obama is expected to receive at least $400,000 for the speaking engagement. TOMMY ALTER: Senator Warren, what do you think about President Obama accepting $400,000 from Wall Street? SEN. ELIZABETH WARREN: Well, I was troubled by that. One of the things I talk about in the book is the influence of money. I describe it as a snake that slithers through Washington. And that it shows up in so many different ways...

State officials are asking Congress to guarantee billions of dollars in health insurance subsidies under a legal cloud as a result of Republican opposition to “Obamacare.” In a letter Wednesday to congressional leaders, the nonpartisan National Association of Insurance Commissioners said the so-called cost-sharing reductions are essential for keeping insurance markets stable next year. Insurers use the money to reduce deductibles and copayments for people with modest incomes. …

GPs are being paid millions by the NHS to ration referrals for operations, scans and even cancer tests, an investigation reveals today. Family doctors are being offered the financial incentives in a bid to slash the number of patients they send to hospital for a variety of procedures. The incentives mostly cover non-urgent referrals for hip and knee replacements, cataract surgery, hearing tests and abdomen scans. But two health trusts have included urgent cancer scans in their schemes, and another two covered heart tests. Patient groups said the payments were ‘profoundly wrong’, while one MP likened them to ‘bribes’. Doctors’...

The Republican repeal and replace bill was a “disastrous piece of legislation” designed to give tax breaks to the wealthy, and it deserved to die in the House, Sen. Bernie Sanders, a Vermont socialist, told CNN’s “State of the Union” on Sunday. He also admitted that the Democrats’ Obamacare has “serious problems,” including premiums and deductibles that are too high and areas of the country where people don’t have a choice of insurance plans. “Ideally, where we should going is to join the rest of the industrialized the world and guarantee health care to all people as a right. And...

From the birth of the American Health Care Act (AHCA), Kentucky Senator Rand Paul was vehemently against it. In an interview with MSNBC’s Morning Joe, Paul noted the problematic rising premiums that Obamacare engenders in the individual market. He elaborately explained the much needed demand to eradicate Obamacare’s insurance mandates and high prices. The AHCA would have earned popularity among conservatives if Rand Paul was involved with the crafting of the bill. Speaker Ryan remained woefully out of touch with the AHCA’s dismal unfavorability; his determination to persist with the proposal serves as evidence of such. Senator Paul was one...

After withdrawing his health care bill from the House floor in an embarrassing defeat, Speaker Paul Ryan said Friday that “Obamacare is the law of the land” and will remain so “for the foreseeable future.” “I don't know what else to say other than Obamacare is the law of the land,” Ryan told reporters shortly after House Republicans canceled a planned afternoon vote on their alternative to Barack Obama’s 2010 health care reform law. “It's gonna remain the law of the land until it's replaced,” Ryan continued. “We did not have quite the votes to replace this law. And, so,...

As Republicans prepare to vote on their health care bill, which does not fully repeal Obamacare, a number of Republicans say it’s a mistake to put their names to the plan: “Just let Obamacare collapse, then challenge the Democrats to come in and help us fix the mess they created,” Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) told Fox News Friday morning, as lawmakers debated the latest iteration of the bill on the House floor. “President Trump’s going to be judged by the outcome of the legislation, and what I see in the House, I don’t think this legislation is going to move...

Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) on Friday warned GOP opponents of the party’s healthcare plan that the measure’s failure could derail progress on other key aspects of Republicans’ policy agenda. In an interview with conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt, Ryan said that a defeat of House Republicans’ bill repealing and replacing ObamaCare would be “momentum killing,” essentially having a domino effect on planned tax reform efforts, among other party goals. “Think of legislation as one train track with a bunch of trains on the track,” Ryan said. “If you don’t get these trains through the system, it slows everything else down."...

They screwed us and I am ANGRY!!!!! The Republicans gave us 123 pages of changes to a 12,000 page healthcare atrocity forced on us by Obama and the Democrats. Call your Representative and Senator and demand they go back and start from scratch. If they give us this, then the Republicans will own it with the Democrats. KILL OBAMACARE and start from scratch!!!!

Support for Obamacare is at an all-time high, according to two surveys released this week as Republican leaders continue to press the case for repeal amid fierce resistance at many town halls. The latest Health Tracking Poll from the Kaiser Family Foundation found that 48% of Americans view the law favorably, compared to 42% who have an unfavorable view. This is the highest level of favorability measured in more than 60 Kaiser Health Tracking Polls conducted since 2010. The boost comes largely from independents, half of whom view Obamacare favorably compared to 39% who don’t. Nearly three-quarters of Democrats continue...

Who knew that Obamacare provides for a “Regular Corps” and a “Ready-Reserve Corps” of officers and individuals who are appointed by the president? Commissioned officers are subject to active duty at the call of the surgeon general. The new law provides $17.5 million in each of the first four years to recruit and train these reserves. During his campaign, Obama said: “We cannot continue to rely only on our military. … We’ve got to have a civilian security force just as powerful, just as strong, just as well-funded. We cannot continue to rely only on our military in order to...

Leaders for the health insurance industry, state insurance commissioners and brokers warned Wednesday that more health plans almost certainly will defect from Affordable Care Act marketplaces unless Congress and the Trump administration provide some concrete assurances within the next two months. Unless the government promises to continue subsidies and other features of the law for at least another year, some states probably will not have any insurers selling health plans to individuals buying coverage on their own for 2018, the witnesses warned at a Senate hearing. “I think we would lose more insurance companies,” said Marilyn Tavenner, president of America’s...