Posted on 11/08/2014 8:14:37 PM PST by Steelfish
Here to Stay: Why the New Republican Congress Can't Gut Obamacare BY MAGGIE FOX
Republicans may have promised to repeal or at least do a big makeover of Obamacare now that they control both the House and the Senate, but most experts believe it’s lip service only.
The 2010 Affordable Care Act is in full force across the country, with internet-based health insurance exchanges up and running, expanded Medicaid in 28 states and strict new requirements for health insurers. Here are five reasons the GOP-led Congress won’t be able to change much.
The veto.
This is the big one: President Barack Obama still has veto power. Republicans may have a majority in the Senate, but they don’t have the 60 seats needed to override a Democratic-led filibuster or a presidential veto. And Obama’s not going to allow his signature piece of legislation to be gutted.
They like it.
Republicans actually like a lot about Obamacare. It’s great business for health insurance companies, which in turn give plenty of money to Republicans. Republicans have also always agreed that more Americans need to be covered by health insurance. They just haven’t always agreed on how to get there.
“The five major national health insurers have all seen their stock price at least double — one has almost tripled — since the ACA was enacted, and they’ve all been raising their earnings estimates,” says Jay Angoff, who helped construct health reform at the Health and Human Services department before returning to private law firm Mehri & Skalet. "Republicans are not going to try to repeal a law that has been such a boon to insurers: They are still a Republican constituency group."
(Excerpt) Read more at nbcnews.com ...
BUMP
” Yup, I think you’ve nailed it. Kill the mandates, which aren’t popular to begin with, and the ACA begins to starve. It also ought to be fairly easy to nibble away at the program by targeting other funding mechanisms, like the medical device tax. The votes to repeal this legislative abomination outright might not be there, but it is very possible to begin to “starve the beast.””
Bingo
Of course Fascism will increase stock prices.
Fascist economics is corporatist crony capitalism. Gvt in control and calling the shots, but the means of production and delivery remaining in private hands. And gvt gets to pick the corporate winners and losers.
The question in that scenerio is whether the GOP caves to pressure to expand the subsidies.
They better damn well have an alternative that they can put forward, that Conservatives can rally around and can use to fend off that pressure. Sitting back and doing nothing may be a preferable option, but it’s a political loser.
When the government gets involved in banking and Wall Street through mandates and bailouts it is de facto Fascism. As Hayek said in “The Road To Serfdom,” Communism and Fascism are the same thing when we cut through the crap — my interpretation, and I would add to that Keynesian economics and “Third Way” Socialism that characterizes modern liberalism.
I said it first.
:)
OK : )
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.