Republican lawmakers aired sharp concerns about their party’s quick push to repeal the Affordable Care Act inside a closed-door meeting Thursday, according to a recording of the session obtained by The Washington Post....Are Republicans going to hammer an awful plan together or just tiptoe away from this? Or will they go back to the "repeal and infinitely delay" approach they seemed to be following before that began to scare them? I don't know.
Senators and House members expressed a range of concerns about the task ahead: how to prepare a replacement plan that can be ready to launch at the time of repeal; how to avoid deep damage to the health insurance market; how to keep premiums affordable for middle-class families; even how to avoid the political consequences of defunding Planned Parenthood, the women’s health-care organization, as many Republicans hope to do with the repeal of the ACA.
“We’d better be sure that we’re prepared to live with the market we’ve created” with repeal, said Rep. Tom McClintock (R-Calif.). “That’s going to be called Trumpcare....”
But if they do cough up some plan or other, I hope Democrats avoid the temptation to call it "Trumpcare."
It should always be called "Republicare."
For years, Democrats have failed to make the case that the problems in this country are problems created by the Republican Party -- not by "Washington" or "gridlock," and not by a current Republican Party leader who might happen to be unpopular. Democrats' unwillingness to attack the entire GOP explains why Republicans always make very quick comebacks after periods of unpopularity. (See the Gingrich victory two years after George H.W. Bush's electoral wipeout, the George W. Bush victory two years after Gingrich flameout, and the Tea Party victory two years after Bush's departure in disgrace.)
It's going to happen again if everything terrible that's about to take place in America is blamed exclusively on Donald Trump. Yes, Trump might be a one-term president. Yes, as a result Democrats might regain their electoral mojo. But then the GOP will rebrand itself again, as if Trump never existed, just the way it did in 1994 and 2000 and 2010.
If there's a terrible healthcare plan, it won't be "Trumpcare" anyway. Trump isn't detail-oriented enough to make intelligent recommendations on the makeup of such a plan. He's just going to make broad demands and then sign whatever passes.
Whatever passes will be a Republican plan. It will exist because Republicans -- long before Trump became a candidate -- made it their life's work to dismantle Obamacare, even though they had no better ideas. The terrible healthcare plan we're about to be presented with will be the quintessence of contemporary Republicanism.
So call it by the appropriate name: Republicare.
12 comments:
Well, that's not going to happen unless we bombard Democratic politicians and the media with that name, Republicare and make it a persistent meme.
Greg Walden, both a key player in Republican health care politics and Oregon’s own Donald T Rump, a trust-funder punk who’s never done a day’s work and doesn’t even live in Oregon, makes Republican lawmakers replacement for the Affordable Care Act perfectly clear:
“There is no fix. There is no plan.”
Reach down twit your knees and pull yourself out by the bootstraps.
Ten Bears
Howzabout we call it "Trumpdon'tcare"?
I disagree. Assuming the changes end up being largely cosmetic, keep calling it Obamacare. Or if Ryan and co go ahead with the block-funding radicalism, frame the subsequent chaos as a debate about which states will keep Obamacare. Make Obamacare the generic label for all publicly-funded health care, and Democrats will unconsciously be the party more trusted to get it right.
Naming Obamacare ver.2 'Republicare' will deprive liberals of all the credit they deserve for tackling such a hard issue.
GOPcare might be a better easier name to say. If for some strange reason the Democrats retake the house and senate in 2018 midterms I'd expect Donald to do 180 degree turn and give them everything they wants. What does he care about purity of thought.
"Yes, Trump might be a one-term president. Yes, as a result Democrats might regain their electoral mojo." Hahahahaha! You make the comedy.
Seriously, the Democrats are going to be a minority party as long as they remain Clinton's New Democrats. They are too wedded to their Wall Street owners and hate New Deal policies too much. Voters can tell the difference and won't go for fake Republicans when the real thing is right there.
I fear Roger is correct, today's democrats are naught but republicans lite. I am willing to caveat that: that doesn't quite trickle down to the man or woman on the street. Of course that can be said of both, indeed all, "parties": the party elite are rarely if ever of the party population.
Orwell's 1984 is enjoying a bestselling resurgence these days, but it is Animal Farm, in particular the closing paragraph that stands out in my mind: in the end the animals couldn't tell the difference twixt the pigs and the humans.
There is only one "party".
Ten Bears
Yeah, yeah, yeah, Democrats are just like Republicans. If we had President Clinton and a Dem majority in the Senate, they would have reinstated the gag rule and re-banned federal funding for abortions, and we'd be building a wall on the southern border and pushing a pipeline through Native American land and banning refugees and repealing the Affordable Care Act, and...
Sure we would.
@Kathy thank you. Well said.
Really? Only 17 Senate Democrats opposed granting Mad Dog Mattis an exemption from a law that makes it illegal for a recent non-civilian to serve as Defense Secretary. And the only vote against confirming him was from a self-serving corporate shill who wants to run for president by recalling an uninformed Democratic base with her "progressivism" and courage. Only 11 Senate Democrats voted against confirming General John Kelly as Secretary of Homeland Security. Only 8 Senate Democrats were serious in their opposition to torture enthuseiast Mike Pompeo as head of the CIA. And only 4 Senate Dems voted against confirming Nikki Haley as the Ambassador to the UN.
Yeah, you saw it somewhere else. Fits.
Ten Bears
Yes,and if it had been republicans voting against one of ours there would have been no hold outs.
I don't think the dems are perfect by any means but to say they are the same as republicans....is just not true. How many republicans voted over and over to repeal the ACA? Sure, it wasn't universal health care but it was still better than anything you're going to get from Ryan and his bunch.
You like your national parks well my guess is if the GOP gets it's way there won't be any. You think Dems would sell off the parks?
You want to Drill Baby Drill in the rest of Alaska well if the GOP gets it's way you'll get your wish.
Pence isn't going to be happy until he finds away to make sure that every woman who is in jeopardy from a pregnancy that can kill her, does.
The list is goes on.....
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