For @American Brummie, @MatthausSammer, and @VFish. Because they obviously need someplace to discuss this topic.
If Trump and GOP bungle this, and make things worse than they are now, then the next time the Dems are fully in power (which might be a mere 4 years from now), they're going to go single-payer.
And as a Libertarian-minded person, this makes me sad. The potential for Obamacare was there, and Republicans decided racism was more important.
Good. That wouldn't be a bad thing IMO. Let the Republicans have their turn with their solution and then if the public doesn't like it, go all-in with doing the thing that every other major developed country have done for some time; ditch health care as a market good.
Problem: the Republicans' plan for the next three years is called the Affordable Care Act. According to their own "policymakers," they intend to keep the law in place.
The Dems got no credit for Obamacare -- even by its direct beneficiaries. They got so little credit, the GOP *might* be able to repeal it without suffering much damage. But there'd be hell to pay if they touched universal programs like Medicare or Social Security. Lesson learned, you'd think.
Obamacare was a half-measure. America has tried a wide variety of half-measures, one after the other, compounding each other, trying to have it both ways; health care as a market good, while also health care as universal. It simply hasn't worked, like trying to fit a square into a round hole.
If that's the idea, then you win. Obamacare remains, and Republicans bark a lot but don't bite. Eventually it simply normalizes into yet another massive program as part of the third rail. Isn't that what you want?
I say the Dems get all the credit for Obamacare. It was their bill and not a single Republican voted for it. And sooner or later we are going to have to do something about Medicare and SS. That said.... Trump is a stupidface.
I'm offended that I would even be lumped in to the same deplorable basket as that orange-headed weasel.
Obamacare is a fix to private health care. Eventually I want a full return to the private markets. I'm a Libertarian.
Right now, private markets are unable to perform the job of providing universal health insurance because the batch of incentives does not make them want to. Enter Obamacare as a fix to the market failure. The ACA, like all good government interventions, has short-term and long-term ways to fix market failure. In the short run, the exchanges, Medicaid expansion, and the public option were designed to correct the errors, provide competition and affordability for consumers, and stabilize prices. The long-run solutions - wellness and prevention, incentives for GPs to go into rural/underserved areas, changing the culture of going to the ER for medical attention - were built into the law to take decades to complete. These will bend the cost curve in a real way, by reducing obesity, diabetes, heart disease, and stroke prevalence in American patients. Those four kill more Americans per year than all others put together, and cause a lifetime of illness, under-productivity, etc. When the government intervention will be successful is when an insurance company, or set of them, can provide insurance without having to worry about these individuals. The pre-existing conditions of today will account for a lower share of the costs than they do today, so laws that force insurers to give them affordable care will be sufficient. To make a long story short, when the government has rectified the market failures through legislation, it can successfully privatize Medicare, Medicaid, and the exchanges. This is how government interventions are supposed to work. A market failure occurs. The government steps in, figures out what went wrong, and fixes it. Then the government leaves. For a small market failure, the withdrawal should be relatively swift (consider the auto bailout). For a large failure - health care - the government needs to stay in for a while and sort things out. For market failures that are permanent - potable water - the government must stay involved forever.
HHS nominee Tom Price belongs to wingnut medical organization. Cause medicine should be political too: Rep. Tom Price (R-GA), an orthopedic surgeon, has been repeatedly touted as a member of the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons (AAPS). AAPS, established in 1943, aims “to fight socialized medicine and to fight the government takeover of medicine” and in its statement of principles urges members to refuse to treat Medicare patients, reasoning government involvement in healthcare is “evil” and “immoral." The group also rejects required vaccination programs in schools. The group's publication, the Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons, also has publicized a variety of dubious or debunked medical theories over the years. One 2005 article in AAPS' journal advocated for rescinding the citizenship of so-called “anchor babies,” or the children of undocumented immigrants, who it claimed were responsible for increased leprosy rates. Other articles pushed the myth of a link between vaccines and autism, suggested a link between abortion and breast cancer, and questioned the relationship between HIV and AIDS. … An article separately posted on the AAPS’s website even speculated that President Obama’s oratory could in fact be a form of hypnosis, suggesting that he won the presidency by hypnotizing impressionable voters like young people and Jews. http://m.dailykos.com/stories/1606348