Posted on 01/08/2016 1:40:37 PM PST by SeekAndFind
Missed opportunity — or a tacit admission of political vulnerability? When Paul Ryan sent the ObamaCare repeal bill to Barack Obama, he held a public “enrollment” event to celebrate the accomplishment. Rather than return the favor, Roll Call reports that Obama opted to veto the bill with minimal publicity:
With little public fanfare, President Barack Obama on Friday vetoed a Republican-crafted measure designed to repeal his signature health care overhaul. But Republican leaders are signaling their repeal push is far from over.
In a statement, Obama said the health care overhaul "is working," slamming the bill because it would "reverse the significant progress we have made in improving health care in America."
"The Affordable Care Act includes a set of fairer rules and stronger consumer protections that have made health care coverage more affordable, more attainable, and more patient centered," Obama added.
The measure's quiet death stood in sharp contrast to the very loud and public debate that has characterized the president's health care push from conception to adoption to implementation. It also would have defunded Planned Parenthood, which was the subject of its own partisan uproar last year.
Yes, it does stand in contrast, does it not? Obama keeps insisting that his signature legislative accomplishment is popular and has expanded access to health care. However, those stuck paying high premiums — even with tax subsidies — find that they are still paying retail for their health care, in some cases the first $5000 or more each year, thanks to skyrocketing deductibles. Let’s not overlook the fact that the New York Times sees this as enough of a trend to cover this week:
Administration officials said last month that about 2.5 million new customers had bought insurance through HealthCare.gov, the federal exchange serving 38 states, since open enrollment began on Nov. 1. The number of new enrollees is 29 percent higher than last year at this time, suggesting that the threat of a larger penalty may be motivating more people to get covered.
But plenty of healthy holdouts remain, and their resistance helps explain why insurers are worried about the financial viability of the exchanges over time. They say they sorely need more healthy customers to balance out the costs of covering the sicker, older people who have flocked to exchange plans.
People, like Mr. Murphy, who earn too much to qualify for federal subsidies that defray the cost of coverage may be most likely to opt out. A recent analysis by the Kaiser Family Foundation found that more than seven million people who are eligible for exchange coverage would pay less in penalties than for the least expensive insurance available to them. More than half would not qualify for subsidies, the analysis found.
If you spend $75 a month after subsidies for health insurance, as the White House claims for the average individual-market user, and end up with a Bronze Plan with an average deductible over $5000, then you have to spend $5900 in a year before getting anything covered other than wellness checks — which would have probably cost no more than $300-$400 retail anyway. For younger and healthier Americans, ObamaCare isn’t just a bad deal — it’s a huge redistribution of wealth from younger and less wealthy Americans to older and more wealthy Americans, whose premiums stay lower with more of the former in the risk pool.
No wonder Obama wants to keep his veto locking those people into exploitation as much on the down-low as possible. Too bad that Republicans took this long into forcing Obama to veto the repeal. Imagine how well this could have been used to reassure GOP voters that leadership wanted to keep the pressure on Obama all along.
Finally!
We should send legislation to him even if we know he will veto.
Doing so places the burden on obozo to justify his action AND shows the republicans are “doing something”: and it is obozo that is standing in the way of the will of the people.
Sh**Care
True, but we shouldn't have to send him legislation AFTER we fund the budget for what we want axed anyway. That's a cop-out.
Its working if you want to destroy healthcare and jobs.
Corrupt Congress did not have enough votes to override a presidential veto of this repeal Obamacare bill now any more than they did before lawmakers promised to repeal unconstitutional Obamacare for 2015 elections.
So this latest PC stunt was purely a dog-and-pony show intended to fool (again) low-information patriots to reelect RINOs imo.
Of course.
Finally after 15 years of trying to get GOP leadership to listen, they take a baby step forward.
My suspicion is Ryan is trying to save his job.
Yeah, they are really feeling the heat (the GOP-e) .. seeing how Trump and Cruz are getting all the attention.
And .. let us NOT FORGET that Ryan has promised that later this month(?) .. the House plans to try to get an override of the veto.
If enough people call or write or scream and yell at their Congress people, maybe .. just maybe we can really override the veto.
WOW! I’d really like to see that ..!!!!!
So your solution is to never pass legislation that we know he will veto and we don’t have the votes to over-ride?
It is time we passed stuff and got him on record and that way the argument is shut-down that the republican-controlled congress isn’t doing anything, that the repubs are the party of no.
Yes. . .yes. . .we all know the repubs are pretty much worthless but at least this time they are doing something and the finger-pointing can now be directed at obozo and the dems, that they are the “party of no.”
If you like losing your doctor, watching premiums soar, hearing about state exchanges going bankrupt and seeing a large increase in your personal taxes, it's working like a charm. The definition of an Obama success story. What a POS!
Such bravery.
Both the corrupt Congress and lawless Obama are taking advantage of the fact that Obama will be out of office in about a year regardless what he does.
So it remains, imo, that the repeal Obamacare bill was intended to make incumbent lawmakers look good in the eyes of low-information patriots, primarily so that such patriots will once again be fooled into reelecting incumbent RINO members of the corrupt Washington cartel.
Yeah, I understand, but I ask again: so your solution is to never pass legislation that we know he will veto and we don’t have the votes to over-ride?”
If not now, when?
And the bought and paid for RINOs will just as quietly, drop the issue.
RE: And the bought and paid for RINOs will just as quietly, drop the issue.
What do you suggest a legislator who is not bought and paid for do?
If the feds were complying with their constitutionally limited powers and associated limited power to appropriate taxes, most of those few powers listed in the Constitutions Section 8 of Article I, then the corrupt Washington cartel would probably not be making the effort to put on vote-winning dog-and-pony shows.
After all, where domestic policy is concerned, how many political parties does it take to run the US Mail Service (1.8.7), one of the very few powers that the states have actually constitutionally delegated to the feds where domestic policy is concerned? (I say that it takes no political parties to run the US Mail Service.)
Note that most of the powers that the Washington cartel is exercising are 10th Amendment-protected state powers which the corrupt feds have stolen, along with associted state revenues, from the states.
For Ryan, I have the old phrase of “Too little, too late!”
Might as well grow your beard back, Paul. Your Kabuki-Warrior Skill Set will no longer be requested or required in the near future.
Ryan was on Bret Baker. He’s pathetic.
If this is “improved health care” I hate to see what the alternative is.
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