Why we defend Obamacare
There is much gnashing of teeth and rending of garments over the horrible GOP repeal of Obamacare.
One newly formed progressive super PAC is planning to cart caskets to Republican lawmakers' districts and hold mock funerals for their constituents. Another activist is encouraging protesters to ship their own ashes — should they die without health care —to GOP lawmakers. And other progressive groups are planning graphic "die-in" protests as they work to derail GOP plans to repeal Obamacare.
People are righteously upset over this setback.
It's so important to defeat the Obamacare repeal that even Bernie Sanders agreed to put off the Medicare-for-all bill in order to unite in defense of Obamacare.
Just listen to how this Democratic President denounced the legislation.
Former President Bill Clinton steamrolled President Obama’s signature healthcare law at a rally, calling it “the craziest thing in the world.”
Hmmm. OK. How did that quote get in there?
Wrong president. Let's listen to President Obama explain why Obamacare needs to be defended.
The point is, now is not the time to move backwards on health care reform. Now is the time to move forward. The problems that may have arisen from the Affordable Care Act is [sic] not because government is too involved in the process. The problem is, is that we have not reached everybody and pulled them in. And think about it. When one of these companies comes out with a new smartphone and it had a few bugs, what do they do? They fix it. They upgrade—unless it catches fire, and they just—then they pull it off the market. But you don’t go back to using a rotary phone. You don’t say, well, we’re repealing smartphones—we’re just going to do the dial-up thing. That’s not what you do.
Yes. Very well put.
We need to defend Obamacare because it only sometimes catches fire.
Wait a sec. What?
We're getting off-track here. The important thing is that Trump is breaking Obamacare!
Health insurers are asking for sharp increases in the cost of their Obamacare plans next year, thanks to instability in the law’s coverage markets that’s been compounded by the Trump administration.
In Maryland, Virginia and Connecticut -- the first states to make filings public -- premiums for Affordable Care Act plans will rise more than 20 percent on average, according to data compiled by ACASignups.net and Bloomberg...
The increases can be blamed in part on uncertainty among insurers about the strength of the law’s requirement that people carry insurance. The Trump administration has raised doubts about whether it will enforce what is considered by some insurers to be an already insufficient penalty.
Yes. Exactly. It's Trump's fault for the premiums going up.
Before Trump everything was fine.
As concerns about the survival of the Affordable Care Act’s markets intensify, the role of nonprofit “co-op” health insurers -- meant to broaden choices under the law -- has gained prominence. Most of the original 23 co-ops have failed, dumping more than 800,000 members back onto the ACA markets over the last two years.
OK, well not "fine", but certainly not a death spiral.
One of the biggest industry critics has been Aetna Inc. Earlier in the day, CEO Mark Bertolini said the markets were “in a death spiral,” predicting that more health insurers will quit in 2018, following Humana Inc.’s decision this week to exit entirely next year.
All right, that's just one insurer's opinion. It isn't shared by anyone else.
The head of the largest insurer in the Mid-Atlantic region warned Thursday that the Affordable Care Act marketplaces were in the early stages of a death spiral, a statement that came as the company announced its request for massive, double-digit premium increases for next year.
Hold on just one minute. At least people will be insured under Obamacare as long as Trump doesn't repeal it.
At least 40,000 people in the Knoxville area may have no health plans to pick from in the Affordable Care Act’s markets after insurer Humana Inc. opted to pull out from all 11 states where it still sell plans in 2018.
You didn't let me finish. I meant to say at least people will be insured under Obamacare as long as Trump doesn't repeal it AND they don't live in Tennessee.
The vast majority of counties in Iowa could have zero insurers on the ObamaCare exchanges next year after another company announced it may not participate in 2018.
Medica said in a statement Wednesday it would pull out of the exchanges if Congress does not move quickly to stabilize the markets.
Or Iowa. I meant Tennessee OR Iowa, obviously.
To summarize, we must unite to defend health insurance legislation that is “the craziest thing in the world”, and that sometimes "catches fire", that its premiums rise more than 20 percent on average every year, that is in a "death spiral", and that is vanishing in large parts of America.
We must use all our resources to defend the this status-quo, and that's why we can't have Medicare-for-all.
It makes perfect sense.
Comments
Yeah, somehow a Republican healthcare bill is considered....
A victory for the 'left'. Fuck this shit.
Modern education is little more than toeing the line for the capitalist pigs.
Guerrilla Liberalism won't liberate the US or the world from the iron fist of capital.
And remember
You can't have Medicare-for-all/Bernie because Trump-is-bad/Trump-is-bad and Putin!/racism, so you need to enthusiastically endorse Obamacare/Hillary.
We'll be watching.
The rule of KISS
In my world we prefer to Keep It Simple Stupid. There is no reason for healthcare to be a profit driven "industry". Healthcare should be a service just like oh let me think ... education, yea how about that!!!
Once the profit motive is removed the vultures will go away and we can properly construct the health, education, and welfare programs we should have had from the very beginning.
And, for those shit-heads that groan about public debt, how about we shove some military ordinance up their asses and detonate same. Solve two problems simultaneously, seems like a good idea to me.
Single Payer Systems...
You make a great point P-Rip.
...or the world's largest single payer system, the US Military aka Pentagon. Socialized National Security.
or...socialized transportation systems, aka the Interstate Highway System.
or...socialized dispute settlement systems...aka, the Judicial System.
...ect, ect, ad infinitum.
ah, if Democrats would just be Democrats they would say these things, but, alas, most Brand Name Dems are Reagan Republicans. Or, to paraphrase Winston Churchill, they are sheep in sheep's clothing. Yes, Chris Murphy, I'm talking about you.
A very sad truth
Caucus99Percent has a rather diverse clientele. That is, I seriously doubt that any two of us agree 100% with each other, yet somehow we all agree on the fundamental principal that we should have a fair and equitable society. I just don't understand why that cannot be the foundation of every discussion "out there", as everywhere else, all sorts of lies and distortions keep getting in the way of producing real solutions.
I just don't get it, maybe I am too naive. That's the only conclusion I can reach, probably because I have never been driven to be that person that wants to "die with the most toys."
The whole "He who dies with the most toys ... wins!" is tied to an unrealistic notion of economics. It is as though everyone has grown up playing Monopoly thinking it represented real economics rather than the simple minded game that it is. It's like I am living in a world of adolescents that refuse to be cognizant of reality.
Even as a preschool kid I knew the difference between a game and reality. What the hell is wrong with the rest of the world?
I'd go a bit further
I suspect most of us agree at least in broad brushtrokes the sorts of things needed to do that and, more importantly, the roadblocks preventing such progress. Even better, discussions here tend more towards "discussion" rather than debate so people actually do modify their opinions.
A lot of wanderers in the U.S. political desert recognize that all the duopoly has to offer is a choice of mirages. Come, let us trudge towards empty expanse of sand #1, littered with the bleached bones of Deaniacs and Hope and Changers.
-- lotlizard
Agreement
This what makes c99 so valuable and also rare.
Well, sort of.
I certainly am not favorable to some of the main themes, but I'm willing to go along because they are important to you and not that important to me.
I certainly don't go along with the America hating and the Putin worship. And not willing to go all with it.
I'm against the current wars, but not the idea of having the strongest military. Sometimes you have to use it. I'm glad we used it just before I was born in the 1940's. Endlessly intervening in countries that don't threaten us for the gain of the 1% is something that I strenuously oppose. BTW, notice how MidEast war was bad when Bush was Pres but not when Obama was Pres? (Not here? On Kos and clones)
On Medicare-for-all I'm in perfect agreement. I thnk it needs to go further to eliminate the need for "supplement" policies. People on Medicare can still go broke because of illness.
I've seen lots of changes. What doesn't change is people. Same old hairless apes.
Putin worship?
Come on man, who here worships Putin? Who's ever said they worship Putin? Just because Putin seems a coherent and logical person does not mean in any way, shape or form that anyone here worships him. Quite frankly, your use of that particular phrase smacks of disingenuousness - BIG TIME. "So, you all here don't think Putin is evil so you MUST worship him and want to live under his rule, eh?" If you're not with us, you're against us, is that the sentiment in that statement?
As for that military, yeah, maybe it was a good thing we used it in the 40's but don't ever just assume that really was a "good" war. Our banks were as involved in it as they were in WWI and that is a big part of the reason we decided to join that one. We also had a pretty good idea of that Japanese attack in Hawaii but somehow didn't manage to stop that and then lo and behold, our vaunted Exceptional American Military finally had to join in the defeat of that evil Hitler. A Hitler many of our banks and industries were only too happy to work with until the shit hit the fan and it was "discovered" that Hitler was a genocidal maniac.
Only a fool lets someone else tell him who his enemy is. Assata Shakur
Just the other day
People around here were saying, "I hate America and I love Putin."
And everyone was agreeing because America Bad, Putin Good.
It seemed so obvious no one had to bother to even explain why.
That's c99p for ya.
OK, I'll bite
I don't hate America, I hate "America" the "Greatest country in the world" that allows its own citizens to starve while fighting wars for profit. I hate a country that calls itself the "protector of democracy" while raping and pillaging other countries for their resources. I hate the "America" that terrorizes the globe and talks about nuclear war as if it is do-able. And I LOATHE the sanctimonious bullshit we use to call ourselves great. So, count me in on that hating Murka crowd because right now, I damned well do hate this country. If that is Putin love, so be it. Since we no longer do logic, reason or nuance in this country of ours, I guess that will have to suffice.
Only a fool lets someone else tell him who his enemy is. Assata Shakur
I may be guilty of "Putin worship"
By that what I mean is that Putin is definitely an authoritarian and like pretty much most world leaders he's not a good person. But on the world stage today in the here and now he's the one acting like an adult in the room -- largely because he doesn't need to hide his motives. He's the one fighting on the side of good (insofar as such a thing exists) in the Mideast. We are the foreign occupiers. I have no rose-colored glasses regarding Putin. I think his PR situation is simpler because of the geopolitical situation.
Insofar as hating America, I don't hate America. I just hate American imperialism which bankrupts the 99% in order to enrich the 1% at the expense of hundreds of thousands of deaths across the globe.
I want America to have a strong military also. I am not a dove. I recognize that there are bad actors in the world and there is a need to defend oneself. I just want to stop being one of those bad actors and I'd like to use our strong military for the purposes of defense rather than enrichment of our plutocrats.
A lot of wanderers in the U.S. political desert recognize that all the duopoly has to offer is a choice of mirages. Come, let us trudge towards empty expanse of sand #1, littered with the bleached bones of Deaniacs and Hope and Changers.
-- lotlizard
Brilliant
Absolutely Brilliant. Thank You.
Just like NAFTA and the Telcom Bill created millions of new jobs in the first years alone.
Who needs Unicorns when we have ObamaCare and NAFTA and TARP and AUMF and Graham-Leach-Bliley and Bankruptcy Bills and maybe TPP and Russia and Joe Lieberman, Chris Dodd, Max Baucus, Ben Nelson, Blanche Lincoln.
Stupid me.
Let's assume the Dems win
They'll have spent their political capital saving a health care system that probably only has a few years to live before it implodes.
In investing jargon this is called "picking up nickles in front of a bulldozer".
It's a bad investment.
But it keeps the serfs busy.
This comment and the essay as a whole
are the point I've tried to make to some in my life up in arms over this repeal. When I point out the many failures and shortcomings of Obamacare, many of which I have expirenced firsthand, they shoot back that something is better than nothing.* Somehow though, I can't make them see that the whole mess is hurling towards nothing on its own as big insurance doesn't even want to do the minuscule things required under this plan. It's not worth saving, as it's so weak, it's about to self destruct anyway. Saving Obamacare is a distraction, like so many others. Fuck saving it. Let them have their win, let's regroup and insist the PTB do this correctly this time.
*Edit: my response that something which is unaffordable and doesn't cover squat anyway is the same as nothing always goes unanswered and the subject is changed.
Idolizing a politician is like believing the stripper really likes you.
A perfect summary of Hitlery's campaign
You must have been one of her strategists. One thing about Medusa is that she didn't need any speech writers because her message was NOTHING except "I'm not Trump".
Plus WWW 3
Trump wants to work with Putin! I don't! Let's NOT all get along.
Who's scared of a little nuclear war? (We've got our bunkers - too bad for you.)
I'm wondering if this was their plan all along
to make health care/insurance this awful because everyone watched as their premiums and deductibles kept rising until republicans could be in a position to take it away.
They take away the subsidies, the pre existingclause and Medicaid from the states that expanded it. After that happens, people who were unhappy with how bad it was suddenly came out in droves to defend it.
Wola, the ACA isn't changed and then congress doesn't try to fix it or work for single payer.
People then still see their premiums and deductibles rising but it's better than whatever the republicans wanted.
It's a win win for the insurance companies and as you stated, it's a great distraction from what they are doing behind our backs.
Thanks gjohnsit....
Saving Obama's legacy is more important than insuring people and saving lives and families. Obama is the most arrogant, self-serving d!ck on the planet. btw, Your richsplaining is a big hit on FB. I
"Religion is what keeps the poor from murdering the rich."--Napoleon
Please explain what is Obama's legacy
Is it "fortunately, there have been No Scandals in my administration"? Or how about "I will pull out of Iraq and Afghanistan"? Or perhaps "We pulled disaster [ACA] out of victory"?
Speaking of Obama's legacy
I still think that Obama is responsible for Hillary losing to Trump. Hillary lose is a direct result of what he did and didn't do during his tenure.
This article explains it better than I can.
If Hillary had won then we'd be seeing the continuation of Bush' 3rd term or Bill's 4th term.
http://www.counterpunch.org/2017/03/24/trump-is-obamas-legacy-will-this-...
Certainly Hillary's loss is one aspect of his legacy
But there are more, many more. He will go down in history not as transformational but as institutionalizing graft, corruption and war-mongering--and few other things.
And now he's cashing in.
$3.2 million for his latest speech, in Italy, I believe.
History will show
that your comment hit the nail on the head.
I would add to that institutionalizing the security state which has in effect destroyed several of the amendments to the Constitution contained in the Bill of Rights, particularly #1, #4, and #5. This may be Obama's greatest legacy, not one he should be proud of.
Do I hear the sound of guillotines being constructed?
“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable." ~ President John F. Kennedy
I think Obama's legacy
is that more people now recognize that it's all rigged by TPTB. The chasm between Obama's words and his actions is so broad, it was obvious to many. This change in the consciousness of the American psyche is an important reason, if not the most important reason, Trump won. The molotov cocktail, indeed.
It was during Obama's administration that TPTB seemed to become so arrogant or stupid or both; they didn't seem to care that their veil was being penetrated. Maybe it's all the inbreeding...
The Republican plan is a nogo and the ACA flat out
is broken and it was broken from Day One.
One point I have repeatedly tried to make is that the ACA did not reduce premiums, it merely split the cost of the premium between the individual and the federal government for those with marketplace policies and subsidies; premiums never went down and they have consistently gone up. Co-pays and deductibles made having a marketplace policy an illusion for many - even if they could afford the now more reasonable premium, it's a good bet that many of not most could not afford the actual payout if they had to USE the insurance if they got sick or had an accident.
Here is a for real example taken from the marketplace page calculators of one state - Rhode Island. A fifty five year old person making 30K a year can opt for the cheapest bronze plan with a premium of $99 a month. But if they had to use the insurance, they are on the hook for a total outlay of $10,725 (!) or over a third of their annual income. Why do our representatives not get that this is why a number of people chose to forgo insuring themselves because all they would be doing is throwing good money (premiums) before bad (deductibles and out-of-pockets)down a rathole. The major good that came out of the ACA was the Medicaid expansion, which still had issues for the over 55 population (property liens).
What the ACA has definitively proven, is that a profit model of health insurance CANNOT succeed while providing equal access to all Americans for their healthcare. IF we demand pre-existing condition protections, which we MUST, if we demand age protections in pricing , which we MUST, if we demand no lifetime caps, which we MUST, then it is impossible for an insurance company to make money, because they will be dispensing more outflow in coverage than intake from premiums until premiums rise so high that a crisis point is reached and poorer, sicker, older citizens are driven out of the plans until they reach the point of income where they might finally qualify for Medicaid IF their state went for the expansion.
The answer is as clear as the nose on one's face. The profit-driven, free market model which we had before the ACA did not work because it was based on exclusion and caps. The ACA did not work because while it addresses exclusions and caps, it did not solve the insolvable issue - affordable, accessible healthcare cannot survive in tandem with a model which attempts to skim profit from the process in order to fund the giant salaries and incomes enjoyed by those at the top of the health and pharma industries. If the ACA were made to work through reforms, those reforms would be made against the will of the health paymasters, who I believe would be willing to take down the entire American healthcare system in order to retain their death grip on it.
The ONLY answer is the one turned to by normal, rational thinking nations that are not held hostage by a population of campaign financing, bribe taking representatives in thrall to the industries paying them off - a single payer system of national healthcare.
I just want to add one last thing that simply drives me up a wall and that is the Republican canard that they want to put Americans in charge of their own healthcare "again". Americans have NEVER been in charge of their own healthcare. The healthcare we are able to get is dictated to us by our employers through the plans and companies they choose, and the states with their individual insurance commissions, and the insurance companies themselves. The people who have ALWAYS been last in line when making healthcare decisions are the ones who receive the drugs and procedures these other entities have already dictated - us.
" “Human kindness has never weakened the stamina or softened the fiber of a free people. A nation does not have to be cruel to be tough.” FDR "
The one silver thread we can snatch
from the ACA failure is that we can now talk to our conservative friends about what a canard it is to idealize "market driven" anything. Charter schools and prisons for profit are more examples why they've got to stop thinking privatization is the answer to everything.
Capitalism is broken. It no longer demonstrates its propagandized "ideals". We need to work toward that point.
Not to mention, but maybe a good point with
"conservatives" of the more genuine variety - we are directly subsidizing the profit margin of private industry and putting that cost onto the American taxpayer. As you so right point out, this is nothing more than skimming profit from government - and how in hell is that "free market" capitalism? And who's on the hook for paying so that an insurance CEO can have a massive salary? Why, the American taxpayer, once again, on the hook for it all. Let them stop and really think on just what that means.
Only a fool lets someone else tell him who his enemy is. Assata Shakur
Eloquent healthcare exposition, Phoebe
Your comment is the best summary of the healthcare debacle I have read--and I have read a lot. The nation is largely "woke" to the necessity for MFA/SP. The vast majority of people want this. The elites, bribe-ridden as they are, do not.
Which is why this must be the tip of the spear to reform government without violent revolution.
MFA/SP: One issue. One cause. NOW
Peaceful revolution tends to be met with violence...
Even small scale resistance is met with overwhelming force as we've seen with the Water Protectors and OWS.
Of course the moral fiber or our elites is conditioned to see a single penny being taken as akin to a murder attempt. (And in the thought of Corporations perhaps makes sense as money is their life-blood, and without it they will rapidly die.)
Not saying it's impossible, and I hope that somebody in power will realize that when people think they are going to die anyway, they don't tend to be quite as polite in their disagreements.
[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ylyqoxh-cXk]
I do not pretend I know what I do not know.
Peaceful Revolution
It may be too late for this to happen. When the stockmarket crashes and the petrodollar shrivels into dust, there will be blood.
Thanks for the nice song. I like this band.
I have yet to see anyone
defend the idea that we must have a for profit middle man for healthcare. It IS indefensible.
Healthcare should be a right along with healthy food, clean water, and safe shelter for ALL people.
Do I hear the sound of guillotines being constructed?
“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable." ~ President John F. Kennedy
To join or not to join, das ist hier die Frage
On the one hand: This is a very important discussion, and everyone should be involved. Everyone will be effected, no exceptions, no matter what the outcome → Everyone will need to deal with the consequences in one way or another.
On the other hand: The probability that any particular person's contribution to any particular discussion will be of any import is vanishingly small.
Hence the Question.
I suppose, from some point of view, there is merit in discussing details and minutia. At some point any implemented healthcare program will be filled with details and minutia, much like our present day legal code(s).
From my point of view, the central concern is that healthcare be a universally available service.↙(Notice that full stop.)
Well said.
So, now they want us all to pretend that nobody saw this coming back in the summer of '09.
Pretend that we didn't tell you that this is was exactly the only purpose to this crime, since it was first drafted by the only people on earth that don't want Americans to have health care.
We've demanded health care since the '80s. The parties have worked together to keep it off the agenda this whole time. Both Parties have understood since WWII that if we ever got health care, there's no going back, ever.
It took them forty years to undo the mistake of free/almost free education, and that was with the tacit support of a large anti-intellectual population. The anti-health group is much smaller.
Well, with Trump saying on TV
Well, with Trump saying on TV how Scottland and Australia who use single payer have great and better health care than America, he has opened the gate for our own single payer and not what the Republicans want4ed to push. And the best yet, is it is now all over the internet, he cannot back-track on saying it.
So long, and thanks for all the fish