Free Republic

Paul Ryan (I know, sorry for bringing him up) delivered a speech at the Reagan Presidential Library at the end of May in which he sought to reassert himself as a leader of the Republican Party. His shtick was the same spit wash that Mitt Romney, Liz Cheney, and George Bush have tried rubbing on the Republican electorate time and again since Biden's official installation. We're better than this reality TV outsider who hijacked the party. Boo to populism; yay to True Conservatism, Inc.! This is serious, people; we're at a 'crossroads' here.I'll tell ya, he sold me. If we...

A conservative-leaning watchdog group says House Speaker Paul Ryan and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell are the biggest congressional scofflaws of 2018, for their anemic handling of the settlement slush fund that used an unlimited pot of taxpayer money to pay off congressional staff in exchange for signing legal papers barring them from taking public their claims of sexual harassment and other mistreatment by their congressional employers. Congress members briefly claimed to be shocked at the victim-gagging slush fund when the media reported on it, but in reality, members of both parties in the House’s leadership oversaw it for years....

“CONSERVATIVE” OPPOSITION TO ENDING OBAMACARE MAKES ME SICK A Howard Kurtz article on Fox News this morning, Why Some Conservatives Don’t Like the Ruling Against Obamacare,” is mis-titled. There should have been quote marks around the word “conservative.” No self-respecting conservative would ever oppose a ruling striking down Obamacare, as has just happened when a federal judge in Texas ruled the law unconstitutional. Think about it—how is it possible for a law MANDATING that you buy a product be Constitutional? Medicine is a product. The practice of medicine is a commercial service. That’s free enterprise. If you force a doctor...

...sign-ups through HealthCare.gov, the federal Affordable Care Act exchange, are down 11 percent through the first five weeks compared with the same time last year -- and experts say final numbers are on track to be lower overall at the end of enrollment. ... ...Get America Covered, published an analysis predicting total enrollment on the federal exchange would fall by 800,000. There are also fewer people enrolling for the first-time in the marketplaces. ew consumers were down about 18 percent compared with last year, and the number of people visiting Healthcare.gov down almost 21 percent. “You look for explanations, is...

The tax-reform provision repealing the penalty on those who refuse to participate in ObamaCare has freed millions of Americans to escape a system that exploits them. But while Americans can escape ObamaCare, they still can’t buy insurance in the individual market independent of ObamaCare because private insurers are prohibited from selling it. If this prohibition can be removed through the granting of state waivers by the Department of Health and Human Services, or by the passage of a new federal statute, ObamaCare will collapse into a high-risk insurance pool for the seriously ill rather than become a stepping stone to...

Crooked Hillary, Low-Energy Jeb, Very Fake News - we've all seen Trump masterfully take down his opponents by re-branding them with names like these. And yet for some reason, as it relates to one of his major campaign promises, he has not yet used this effective tool against the label of "Obamacare" - which arguably serves the purposes of the left by associating "caring" with not only that horrific law, but with all things "Obama". So I propose that Trump and folks on the right start calling this law some other fitting name. Here are a few of my own...

Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., predicted Wednesday that President Trump would soon move on his own to make health insurance more affordable, after the Senate failed again this week to advance any bill to reform federal healthcare policy. Paul he has been pitching the idea of using the Employee Retirement Income Security Act to let people buy insurance across state lines. That law already allows corporations to buy insurance across state lines for their workers if they are located in several states. Paul's idea is to let individuals form associations and do the same thing, and he said Trump administration officials...

Until now, I haven't been too concerned about the Republican Party's difficulties in passing a health care reform bill because delays have resulted in improvements to the proposed legislation. But enough is enough. No more games. It's time to quit the finger-pointing. Neither congressional leaders nor President Trump have done enough to whip votes and sell the bill. A major overhaul of Obamacare, whether a full repeal, or a repeal and replacement, is imperative for Trump and congressional Republicans. More than any other, Obamacare is the issue that has galvanized grass-roots conservatives since 2010, and the Republicans' failure to...

Totally useless, "Never Trumper:, Republican Senate Leader, Mitch McConnell should call for a Senate vote today to eliminate the "Sixty Vote" rule in the Senate. Simple, folks...Fifty One votes makes for a majority. End of story!!! Let's see if this weak sister of a back stabbing, lie telling, Republican leader has any spine or loyalty to his party, country and the American people. McConnell pass that law ...NOW, or resign this afternoon...you complete failure and Trump traitor to boot!!! You could lead your way out of a cardboard box.

If the Republican attempt to repeal and replace ObamaCare ultimately fails, it will be a lesson in the wages of political bad faith. The current path of the Senate bill has plenty of obstacles, including the sheer inertia of the ObamaCare status quo and the fact that no one has made the public case for the Republican legislation. But the effort also suffers from a mismatch between the longtime public posture of Republicans (ObamaCare must and will be fully repealed) and their private misgivings (do we really have to do this, even partially?). It’s not just that Republicans have said...

Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) is hedging over whether he'll back the Senate's new ObamaCare replacement bill. Johnson initially indicated he could back the measure, but told a local newspaper that he's now not so sure because of comments by Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) suggesting some Medicaid cuts in the bill may not happen. "I am concerned about Leader [Mitch] McConnell's comments to apparently some of my Republican colleagues — 'Don't worry about some of the Medicaid reforms, those are scheduled so far in the future they'll never take effect,'" Johnson told the Green Bay Press-Gazette in remarks that...

Republicans are about to do something very stupid. Using bribery, threats and cajolery, they intend to pass a catastrophically unpopular bill on a party-line vote. GOP: Obamacare is unpopular, so let's pass a new health care bill that's even MORE unpopular. Normal Person: Why would you do that? GOP: No, you don't understand. Obamacare is totally imploding, so if we pass this bill now, all its problems will be blamed on us! Republicans would be better off doing nothing. They can survive the ridicule for running against Obamacare through four election cycles and then not repealing it. They cannot survive...

Sen. Pat Toomey (R-Pa.), who has played a central role in negotiating the Senate healthcare reform bill, says a new version of the legislation is expected to be unveiled Monday. The revised bill gives Senate GOP leaders a second chance to round up 50 votes to repeal and replace major parts of ObamaCare, after their first attempt stalled before the July Fourth recess because of divisions within the Republican conference. “We’ve got a new version that comes out today. We’ll get new scores from CBO. And there’s a shot of getting to 50 [votes]. Mike Pence breaks the tie,” Toomey,...

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell pushes for a limited measure if the GOP's Obamacare repeal fails. McConnell argued that a smaller bill would have to focus on helping private insurance markets. The senator's comments indicate that Republicans may have to negotiate with Democrats over fixes for the health-care system.

(Spoiler Alert: If you find slavery or infanticide disturbing, you may be too squeamish to read further.) A perfect crystallization of the full heart and soul of socialized or "single payer" health care is on display in the story of Charlie Gard, a ten-month-old infant with a life-threatening genetic condition, and his parents, Chris and Connie, whose desperate efforts to save their child have been diverted, and finally thwarted, first by the British government and now by an entity with the perfectly Orwellian name "European Court of Human Rights." The parents of terminally-ill baby Charlie Gard are ‘utterly distraught’ and...

Senate Republican leaders released a healthcare bill Thursday that overhauls Medicaid, scraps most of Obamacare's taxes and alters tax credits available to individuals to purchase health insurance. The Senate discussion draft unveiled Thursday is the chamber's response to the American Health Care Act, which passed the House last month. Like the House bill, the Senate version guts Obamacare's controversial individual and employer mandates.

Snarky Colbert. I guess he forgot about "we have to sign it to see what's in it"

Few provisions within Obamacare have proved less popular than the individual mandate, which requires all Americans to secure insurance or pay a fine. Unfortunately, some Senate Republicans are proposing a replacement that's even worse. As part of their bid to repeal Obamacare, Sens. Bill Cassidy, R-La., and Susan Collins, R-Maine, want to allow states to automatically enroll the uninsured in health plans. At least Obamacare let people choose whether to buy health insurance or not. Sens. Cassidy and Collins are calling for an even heavier dose of government paternalism, one that would increase federal spending, line the pockets of insurers,...

Senate Republican leaders outlined a “very liberal” ObamaCare replacement bill during their weekly lunch with their members on Tuesday, sources said. “The moderates are very happy,” an aide to Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah), one of the Senate’s most conservative members, told The Post. “It was a very liberal bill.” Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) told reporters that the upper chamber is “getting very close to having a proposal to whip and to take to the floor” on health care. His comments came after the leaders met with President Trump at the White House to discuss health care reform. According...

From the 3-minute video: "If the Republican Party does not repeal Obamacare, what the hell is the Republican Party for?"