Posted on 03/26/2017 3:01:40 PM PDT by taxcontrol
In 2015, Congress passed Obamacare repeal. Now, a replica bill has sat unaddressed in committee since March 8th and there’s a path to getting it to a floor vote quickly.
The Trump spin mill has been in overdrive since House Speaker Paul Ryan pulled the abysmal first attempt of the new administration and Congress at the promised “repeal and replacement” of Obamacare.
The Trump administration and the media sold the American Health Care Act as the last best hope for repealing Obamacare, which is a complete joke. The idea that Republicans in the House and Senate, who have largely run on Obamacare repeal in the last seven years, would suddenly give up because a bad bill didn’t pass is absurd.
Since the AHCA was presented and recognized for the dud it was, there has been an incredulity that after seven years of doggedly campaigning against Obamacare, Republicans weren’t unified and ready with a bill to repeal it.
So, now what?
That’s what many in the Republican caucus and outside interest groups are asking following Friday’s events.
Many have astutely pointed out that Congress passed a repeal bill in 2015, so why aren’t they simply doing the same now?
Alas, unknown to many, a replica of the 2015 bill was introduced by Rep. Jim Jordan (R – Ohio) on March 8th, just two days after the disastrous AHCA.
Rep. Jordan, a member of the much derided House Freedom Caucus, reiterated the familiar words of many Republican candidates across the country just before introducing H.R. 1436:
“Our goal is real simple: Bring down the cost of insurance for working families and middle-class families across this country. In an effort to do that we think you have to get rid of Obamacare completely. So tomorrow I will introduce a bill that every single Republican voted on just 15 months ago – the bill that actually repeals Obamacare. Our plan has always been repeal in one piece of legislation and replace in the other. That’s right. The bill Rep. Jordan introduced earlier this month is a replica of the 2015 bill that passed in the House and Senate less than two years ago.
The bill has been languishing in committee ever since. However, there is one way it could move to consideration on the floor should an ambitious representative choose to take it on.
After a bill has been in committee for a certain period of time, a discharge petition can be circulated, which is privileged, to bring a bill out of committee and to the floor. But it must have a majority of the House. After the AHCA debacle that may seem unlikely, but consider the fact that this bill already passed in the last Congress. Repeal is the one thing a majority ostensibly agree upon.
There have been and will be endless autopsies over what went wrong with the AHCA, but one could insist that Republicans first post-Trump foray into Obamacare repeal didn’t have to go down the way it did.
Conservatives and the House Freedom Caucus took early blame for the AHCA’s passage or failure, even though moderates and the Tuesday Group became august denouncers of the bill as negotiations progressed. However, the HFC was asking for nothing less than what had passed in 2015.
“Conservatives expect nothing less than congressional Republicans to live up to their promises,” Jason Pye of FreedomWorks told RedState. “They passed this bill in the 114th Congress. Why can’t they do it now? This is the one aspect of this we all agree on, and it’s certainly a better option than the half-baked bill that leadership rolled out that didn’t really repeal ObamaCare.”
“But what about after repeal,” one might ask. “[H.R. 1436] gives us two years to work on a replacement that is grounded in real patient-centered, free market principles,” Pye stated.
What a sensible and prudent, but apparently novel, idea.
Rushing a replacement to Obamacare is asking for failure, as we saw with the AHCA. Pushing the bill through committee before the Congressional Budget Office gave it a score and having GOP leadership married to the bill already was poor planning, to say the least.
A clean repeal is what Republicans have been promising the American people for seven years. A clean repeal bill is sitting in committee, ready to go through the same process it breezed through in 2015 but in which the AHCA failed. As has been said before here, should Republicans fail to adequately reduce the cost of health care and increase access by repealing — and replacing to a degree — Obamacare, they will be seen as the biggest scammers in American politics for a generation.
The 2015 repeal bill is there, let’s pass it.
If the second part of this plan is predictive of action in the Congress then the result will be as bad as would have transpired did the late R&R bill actually pass and become law.
Repeal it. FULL STOP.
Then repeal more federal interventions until the government gets out of Medicine and Insurance altogether and is back in compliance with the Constitution in those matters.
Want to bet $20 that it will never sit on Trump’s desk??
Insco’s pay for NOTHING!! You pay based on projected profits . A high risk pool is the answer which the insured pays for. If the insured can’t pay for it then subsidize the insured but don’t move him to MY POLICY!! I am not sick!! Take the money from the general fund but reduce welfare by insisting on “community service” 5 days a week if you are able bodied. You will see millions go to work and thus will have general revenue to pay the risk pool subsidy. This is so easy.
I consider it a sin to gamble so no, I will not be betting.
The real question is, do you want this bill moved out of committee and to the house floor for a vote. Do you want to see who the real conservatives are? I do. That is why I am going to work to make it happen. Maybe I can’t do much, but I can call, write and motivate others to do the same.
Enough calls to congress can start a landslide.
Republicans voted - it is on the record.
My ex-husband was a lying Rat when He said: “What? Did you think I was serious?”
How can one page fully repeal Obamacare? The monster has many tentacles burrowed deeply into every aspect of our lives. Rip out one and another area collapses.
Obamacare was built to be as repeal proof as possible.
I’d be very interested in reading any bill that purports to be a clean repeal.
You have a point.
But going to the ER shouldn’t be totally free to the bums who just want everyone else to pay for their care.
I just don’t think the rest of us should be forced by our government to buy something we don’t need or want. Why should the government be in charge of our premiums? Apparently Jim Jordan was on TV this a.m. and kept saying that they wanted to decrease premiums..well they shouldn’t be in charge of our premiums at all. They psychology of government control of our health insurance has apparently taken hold and is accepted by our so called representatives.
Here’s the language. As of July 1, 2017, all sections of the Affordable Health Care Act are hereby repealed and the regulations which were in place upon it’s passage are restored.
See, 1 sentence.
That would be wonderful.
If nothing else, get all the Democrats in the House and Senate on record voting against the 2015 Repeal bill, and then cite that at every turm as Obamacare collapses.
Trump and the Democrats know how to fight with political spin that changes public opinion. The gutless GOP elite establishment is Clueless. Pau Ryno is like a condom for a Eunuch — beyond useless.
“Here’s the language. As of July 1, 2017, all sections of the Affordable Health Care Act are hereby repealed and the regulations which were in place upon it’s passage are restored.
See, 1 sentence.”
100% Correct! Simple but so many wish to make it complicated so then you need their help (governments help that is)...
God Bless
“The facts also reveal that most of the GOP caucus is not conservative”
People seem to forget that the GOP bankrolled and rolled over for Obama ever chance they got, which was very often.
Most of us were saying that the GOP would fight Trump like they never did Obama.
They voted knowing it would be vetoed. Gutless.
$100
It wasn’t successful. It existed for the sole purpose of being vetoed so they could pretend they were trying. Once it would no longer be vetoed they weren’t going to put straight repeal on the table. They don’t want the bad press of “taking away” a couple million people’s insurance.
As I stated earlier, I consider it a sin to gamble so no, I will not be betting.
20 dollars
100 dollars
1,000 dollars
The answer is still no. It’s call conviction or others call it principles.
I’ve posted examples of repealed laws in the past. You can find one I am sure if you want.
But a full repeal has the standard header and date of a law, and the law section goes on to say that such and such law with title and reference is hereby repealed. And that law ceases to exist.
Look at the 21st Amendment of the Constitution. And that gives an example. It’s the same as repealing a law.
Note that a full repeal is a law in itself. It is a law to take down a law.
Because it is a law, it requires Senate passage which means it must have a filibuster proof majority.
So a full repeal would have easily passed the House because hardly any republican would want to be on record as opposed to repealing Obamacare.
But a full repeal would have failed in the Senate because the democrats would have filibustered.
Had that happened, it would be clear that the democrats failed in the latest round. But as it is, Ryan gets the deserved blame.
You. have. got. to. be. kidding. me.
Repeal. Repeal and Replace. No, Repeal. NO, Repeal and Replace! nO, Repeal! No, Repeal and Replace !
Make. up. your. freaking. minds, gentlemen!!
“....and any legislator who voted for it is hereby banned for life from any elected office, any pension derived from government service, and receipt of any public assistance.”
Insco’s pay for NOTHING!! You pay based on projected profits . A high risk pool is the answer which the insured pays for. If the insured can’t pay for it then subsidize the insured but don’t move him to MY POLICY!! I am not sick!! Take the money from the general fund but reduce welfare by insisting on “community service” 5 days a week if you are able bodied. You will see millions go to work and thus will have general revenue to pay the risk pool subsidy. This is so easy.
The insco’s actually do make most payments for self/fully funded insureds. you sound like a small business owner. that’s why a private fdic type risk pool paid for by the inscos should be set up. it might help you in your billing. but..................... charity provided services are always paid for buy us the payees. its just a question of how that happens. voluntarily or by force of gun. i say voluntary. how do we now re create that. reeducate the majority of the population? just my thots cheers.
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