Sunday, March 12, 2017

Trumpcare = Public Resentment

“If you ask someone to give up something, there will be resentment. If that claims my congressional career, so be it. It will be worth it to me to have effected this change.
--Representative Michael C. Burgess, Republican of Texas and chairman of the Energy and Commerce subcommittee on health
Congressman Burgess's comment reveals the current kamikaze attitude among US House Republicans. Trump needs a legislative victory. Trump doesn't know what's in that bill repealing the Affordable Care Act. He certainly hasn't read it. It doesn't come close to fulfilling the promises he made about insuring every American. But none of that matters. "Get it passed!" So Rep. Burgess is ready to go down in flames to give Trump his victory.

Congresswoman Foxx just luvs Trumpcare
The Congressman's comment also reveals the truth of the matter (something none of them have admitted in public and certainly not in front of TV cameras): "We Republicans are taking away health insurance from you idiots who voted for us." Republicans would take away more if they could get away with it ... Medicaid, Medicare, Social Security ... the entire social safety net that they've always despised. Look no further than Congresswoman Virginia Foxx to see the mean face of Republican intentions. Conservative Republicans are actually fighting Paul Ryan's repeal bill on the grounds that it isn't mean enough, does too little to reduce subsidies for the poor.

If Rep. Burgess and Foxx get their wish, and if the US Senate goes along, chaos will ensue and will fulminate well into the 2018 general election season. According to Robert Pear and Thomas Kaplan, "A growing chorus of Republican policy experts and senators are pleading to slow the process down or risk a political blood bath."

But Trump enjoys a good blood bath. He takes his almost every morning between 6 and 7 a.m.

Trumpcare -- we're not supposed to call it that, but too bad -- has been harshly criticized by medical professionals, hospitals (especially rural hospitals), insurers, and various state officials, who said it "could increase the number of uninsured and destabilize insurance markets." The Congressional Budget Office is expected to render its verdict on the legislation this coming week. Republicans should maybe brace for bad news. Not that they give a good goddamn about the truth. They're living in a post-truth, alternative facts universe.

Trump World! You have to get there through the looking glass (but please exit through the gift shop!).

7 comments:

  1. Anonymous1:28 PM

    Would Foxx be willing to give up her Cadillac health insurance plan to take on what she's proposing for the rest of us?

    ReplyDelete
  2. Wolf's Head3:26 PM

    "Would Foxx be willing to give up her Cadillac health insurance plan to take on what she's proposing for the rest of us?" anon

    You do know that the wonderful and enlightened Democrats who passed the Affordable Care Act EXEMPTED THEMSELVES FROM IT WHILE SADDLING YOU WITH IT LIKE A BROKE BACK MULE?

    Guess it was OK for the peasantry but not the political elite.

    The GOP plan is just as bad and both of them need to be scrapped ASAP.

    No plan will work without reducing health care costs, and the best way to do that is competition.

    If health care costs are not reduced, for everyone, it will bankrupt the country.

    (As in NO money for your precious entitlements, or anything else)

    ReplyDelete
  3. Anonymous7:57 PM

    Wolf, can you point us to a country that has that "competition" that you speak of in health insurance or healthcare?

    ReplyDelete
  4. Anonymous5:37 PM

    Wolf's head, I await you at St. Peter's gate. Because in this world, you've been done as a human being for a long time.

    ReplyDelete
  5. bettywhite6:44 PM

    Health care isn't like other "products", no matter how many times insurance CEOs say it. When you get hit by a car and are lying bloody in the street, you don't have time to shop around to find the lowest cost. If there's a drug out there that is going to save your life, you will pay whatever you have to pay to get it. It's absolutely criminal that health insurance companies can have investors who make money off of other people's misfortune! Imagine if fire departments were for-profit and had investors! We would all be outraged. Insurance should be non-profit, and so should hospitals for that matter.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Anonymous10:05 AM

    bettywhite...if investors could not make money off of their investments, why would they invest?

    ReplyDelete
  7. bettywhite8:05 PM

    That's my point exactly, Anon. Health insurance companies and hospitals SHOULDN'T have investors. No one should be able to reap enormous profits from health care.

    ReplyDelete