Wow! You are so wrong. Do you read every year how many millions sign up for Obamacare, but then don't pay the premiums for designated companies? I just read yesterday that more that 25% sign on the dotted line, but DON'T pay!
Guess who pays the subsidies?
"And I think it also makes everyone pay for coverage, rather than illegals simply walk into an emergency room when they’re sick."
Yes, that was the theory, but you're wrong again. Because of the yearly increasing high deductibles and high premiums, people are cancelling their health insurance policies. Remember, under Obamacare, you can get deathly sick and THEN buy an insurance policy. That is like you total someone else car and then you buy car insurance to cover those costs. That is not INSURANCE and neither is Obamacare since you can buy insurance with pre-existing health problems. Again, subsidized by hard-working tax payers.
"I don’t know exactly what Trump means by “repair and replace†but am cautiously optimistic about it, anyway."
I agree that I don't know what Trump's ideas are fixing the health care system other buying policies across state lines, which he mentions rarely. He talks in sound-bytes. I keep trying to tell the "Trumpets" he is a Perot. Don't know if you remember him, but he also talked in generalities, "Well, we'll just fix it. What ever the problem, we'll look at the issue and just fix it". That was his story over and over and sound like Trump to me.
THE smartest guy on the stage is Ted Cruz. He is not only the most informed, but has the Conservative bona fides since he has written cases to be presented to the USSC and won them.
Whereas Trump talks about "across state line" insurance purchases, he rails against insurance companies.
You can pick a lot out of one of Trump's statement (below) and use it to support a myriad of positions - so fluid, so flexible, so worthless.
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TRUMP: As far as single payer, it works in Canada. It could have worked in a different age. What I'd like to see is a private system without the artificial lines around every state. I have a big company with thousands of employees. And if I'm negotiating in BY or NJ or CA, I have like one bidder. Nobody can bid. You know why? Because the insurance companies are making a fortune because they have control of the politicians. They're making a fortune. Get rid of the artificial lines and you will have yourself great plans. And then we have to take care of the people that can't take care of themselves. And I will do that through a different system."...