Posted on 03/14/2017 7:44:34 AM PDT by GIdget2004
Sen. Tom Cotton said Tuesday that it's vital for Republicans to get legislation repealing Obamacare right on the first try because he doesn't believe there are going to be three steps to the process, as proponents have outlined.
"There is no three-step plan. That is just political talk," Mr. Cotton, Arkansas Republican, told radio host Hugh Hewitt.
Republicans say there's only so much legislation they can get through the first time around under agreed-to budget rules. Step two would then involve regulatory changes, followed by more legislation.
Mr. Cotton said step two could be subject to court challenges and that step three would involve "some mythical legislation in the future that is going to garner Democratic support and help us get over 60 votes in the Senate."
"If we had those Democratic votes, we wouldn't need three steps," he said. "We would just be doing that right now on this legislation all together."
"That's why it's so important that we get this legislation right. Because there is no step three, and step two is not completely under our control," he said.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtontimes.com ...
Agree, but the eunuchs of the Uniparty are striving to preserve the Federal agencies and the power that Obamacare gives Fedzilla.
OK then let’s rephrase it. There is no serious three step plan to replace Obamacare.
“If we had those Democratic votes, we wouldn’t need three steps,”
Watch how many miss that point - Cotton says republicans don’t have Dem votes for a single step process either.
C’mon you heard all those rallies where Trump said over and over “we will repeal Obamacare and replace it with something much better”.
It’s always been repeal and replace. The guy who said “repeal every word” lost.
Trump’s outline on the WH website is not a serious plan?? Do you think Trump is blowing smoke with that plan?
When Cotton admits this, If we had those Democratic votes, we wouldnt need three steps, it means there is no viable single step plan either.
One step plan. Just repeal it.
The Constitution doesn’t give the feds any authority to be meddling in that area anyway.
Thank you!
Three-Pronged Approach to Repeal and Replace Obamacare
https://www.whitehouse.gov/repeal-and-replace
President Trump Leads a Listening Session on Healthcare
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ts_C_WivWGI
Trump tweets on Health Care Bill - hoe to reconcile.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3534244/posts
A problem with that - Cotton says If we had those Democratic votes, we wouldnt need three steps,
The votes aren’t there for single step either.
If ObamaCare is a “tax” (Roberts/SC) ..then why can’t congress remove the tax?
For reducing healthcare costs? No. The proposals do nothing to address that. It usurps state powers to regulate insurance markets. It has a lot of "sounds good" platitudes that in the end do nothing.
There is nothing the government can do where health care coverage is concerned that won't make things worse. They should stop trying. But Congress insists on following Einstein's definition of insanity, and trying again and again expecting different results.
President Trump can remove all of homobama's EO exemptions with a simple EO.
Let the DC corruptocraps squirm under their own law. It will collapse quickly enough and even the demoncraps will vote to repeal it.
That’s ignorant, check post 23 for the plan published on the White House web site.
“For reducing healthcare costs? No. The proposals do nothing to address that. “
From the WH plan;
-> Allow health insurance to be sold across state lines
-> Streamline processes at the FDA, removing the red tape that slows down approvals of generic competitors to high-price drugs in order to lower the cost of medicine
-> Allow small businesses to band together, through Association Health Plans, and negotiate for lower health insurance costs for their employees
-> Reform the medical malpractice lawsuit system by ending doctors incentives to practice unnecessarily costly medicine
Did you even read it??
Consider my phases. The repeal is phase two instead of phase one. I think we are stronger legislatively for the repeal if President Trump guts that terrible law administratively before spineless congresscritters have to cast their votes.
As for phase three, once Obamacare is dead, we can try. If we fail in that phase, we’re no wore off than before the communist took power, except for the extra $10T in debt we are leaving for our children.
“One step plan. Just repeal it.”
Precisely. All of this agonizing over “How will we replace it?” is just question begging.
Why replace something as badly snake-bitten as the Affordable Care act with a less toxic substitute?
The federal government has no business involving itself in giving free insurance to some, while mandating others, particularly those with just enough income to be disqualified from free stuff but enough to have their tax refunds intercepted, face cash penalties, tax levies and possibly jail time due to involving the IRS.
And the kicker: they are uninsured simply because they cannot afford the premiums that are waived for Nanzi’s “artists and musicians free to create”; IOW, the Democrats clients.
Afraid it may cost us at the polls in 2018? Plainly saying in 2016 that we planned to repeal it didn’t hurt us this past fall.
President Trump’s EOs bar the nice folks at the IRS from terrorizing the American lower middle class and also delete the equally despicable provision, the job-killing “If you hire employees for more than 30 hours a week, we own you ... “.
Both of these things reflect a contempt for working class Americans representative of Obama and the Democrats while also demonstrating Obama’s dream from his father of taxing Americans at 100%, then returning to them according to their needs.
So, we go through the charade of trying to square a circle here—to improve or even augment (shudder) this ACA Frankenstein monster—and the Democrats refuse to vote for it because if they supported it, it would be something that we don’t want.
IOW the problem is intractable. They want Leviathan. We don’t.
So yeah, it would be great if we all had free health insurance here on the Big Rock Candy Mountain.
But back in the real world, fall 2018: “We tried. Vote Republican.”
(And we give the GOP even more seats and Ryno/McConnell reply, “But we don’t have ALL the seats yet.”)
td, curmudgeon 1st class
Repeal means repeal, not amend.
I did, did you?
Allow health insurance to be sold across state lines
Insurance can be sold across state lines. In my own home town of Kansas City, Blue Cross/Blue Shield sells in both northwest Missouri and northeast Kansas.
I assume what is being talked about here is having the ability for a consumer to contact an insurance company not currently doing business in their state and buying a policy from them. If so, then it's meaningless. Leaving aside for a moment the fact that it directly contradicts the stated goal of letting states run their one business and the fact that it's probably unconstitutional on 10th Amendment grounds, it's been tried. Three states currently allow their residents to buy health insurance policies from out of state companies. In none of those states has any of their citizens bought such a policy. There is no incentive to do so. Why should the insurance company sell a policy in a state where they have no network of providers billing their services to the insurance company at a set price? Why should the consumer want to buy a policy where they would have a higher co-pay, higher deductible, and higher out of pocket expenses than if they have gone with an insurance company in state with a network?
Streamline processes at the FDA, removing the red tape that slows down approvals of generic competitors to high-price drugs in order to lower the cost of medicine.
Generic drugs already make up close to 90% of all prescriptions filled, so there is a limit to how much money can be saved. Regardless, the restriction on a generic drug is more a question of time than procedure. There is a set period of time for the original patent before a generic could be offered.
Allow small businesses to band together, through Association Health Plans, and negotiate for lower health insurance costs for their employees.
This might help. But by the same token since repealing Obamacare removes the requirements for business to provide coverage then this may also be irrelevant. Why band together if you don't have to provide it in the first place?
Reform the medical malpractice lawsuit system by ending doctors incentives to practice unnecessarily costly medicine
Around half the states in the country have already passed some form of tort reform that caps malpractice awards. And in none of those states is there any evidence that this has led to lower health care premiums. Lower malpractice insurance premiums, yes. But not health care.
The only thing that will cause health care premiums to drop is to remove the pre-existing condition requirement, allow companies to cap coverage at a set amount, and more healthy people buying policies. This plan addresses or promotes none of that. Repeal, don't replace.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.