Obamacare: Democrats own it, it's on you! Fix it!!

And the costs are worse, for the bulk of the people who were promised better. The available networks are fewer, & shrinking every quarter.

The cost to maintain the current ACA keeps growing, like the hunger a junkie has for a fix.

Fail.

 

Would have required reading it ahead of time. Remember Pelosi "we can't know what's in it, until we've passed it."



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Exactly.

A shell game.

 

OBAMACARE was not a crappy invention, please,if you will,understand OBAMA'S intentions were to "help" every American citizen to get quality Health Care at an affordable cost, I have OBAMACARE & it works for me as it was intended & I thank our Nevada GOP Governor Sandaval for putting Country over party-- the reason OBAMACARE is faultering is because the GOP Governors did not opt in to medicaid expansion in their states for purely political reasons--NOW,here is what will be very telling in the near future,"IF" the GOP "refuses" to include OBAMACARE in their budget, yes,then it will implode, it that what the GOP wants, "hurt" as many American people as possible to make a political point, what does that tell you?
Now, in my opinion,let's get to work,both parties get together, put political party aside & do what should have been done to begin with---Universal Health Care for ALL----OR,work together to strengthen OBAMACARE by all states opting in, brings Insurance company's back for more choices & brings down costs for everyone---it is a very easy fix without disrupting everyone's life----

 

Completely shows you do not have an understanding of what OBAMACARE is all about---you think it is only for the poor among us--that is completely untrue---The premise of OBAMACARE is "the more people that sign up,the cheaper it is for everybody"yes,we all get subsidies,& that is determined by your level of poverty & you don't have to take the subsidies if you don't want too-
So, to insult someone just because you don't understand something is pretty disingenuous----

 

Sure they have a plan. It's known as trump's If-You-Get-Sick-Die-Quick, plan. They just refused to vote on it the other day because even a lot of republicans understand that their plan stinks like a cat that's been dead for a week.

 

Republicans have been complaining for 7 years about the Affordable Care Act. They ran on the platform of repeal / replace. That was THEIR stated objective for years. If they don't like it, it is down to THEM to change it.

In fact, the failure of the AHCA to pass is down to Trump. He owns the failure. It is his responsibility because he is not a leader, or to put it another way he is an abject failure as a leader.

He showed no leadership at all in terms of crafting the key elements of the bill that he wanted, drumming up support across the aisle and tweaking it and working until it had the support of enough members of congress to pass. He should have had a fundamental role in the crafting of the bill but he didn't. In my opinion, because he didn't really care what was in it as long as he could say that it kept his promise of repeal and replace. He just didn't care enough and was not a leader.

For the people who blame Democrats: who did Trump reach out to on the Democratic side of the aisle to get support? He had a lot of meetings with Republicans but I don't recall seeing a single story about him (or any other Republican leadership) reaching out to Democrats.

This legislative failure is 100% down to Republicans and Trump has to wear the blame for that.

 

It's been failing for 7 years now and Democrats have done nothing to fix it. It's up to you. Get a plan together, get it to the President, get behind and get it fixed and we want to see a plan that still reduces the deficit.

You invented this pile of crap. You broke the healthcare system. You fix it.

 

Failing? nope not even close to reality

 

This just parrots the pathological liar's statements yesterday, after the clown and the Republicans utterly failed in repeal & replace. The Democrats have been bringing plans to enhance, repair etc. elements of the ACA to the House for years, but, guess what, Republicans have been in the majority in the House since January 2011 - as a result Republicans have been spending the last 6 years telling Obama and the Democrats to go pound salt, the Republicans had not a thought of helping Democrats with anything....period. That is what Republican obstructionism is all about - extending squat, nada, zero.........the Republicans are the ones who have allowed anything to "break", not the Democrats.

The Republicans now have the White House, House & Senate and the American people know this. They've had 7 years to plan repeal & replace, they've also tried to repeal the ACA some 60x, while apparently not having any replacement plan at all. Republicans should now do the smart thing, listen to and help the Democrats with their initiatives because clearly the Republicans are incapable of organizing a fart in a bean factory....... The Democrats just might be in a position to help Republicans help themselves - before the American people come after them for doing nothing, as usual....

Do you think the Republicans will let Democrats help them and get things done for the American people? Neither do I........

 

I'd credit that it was an honest attempt to provide health care to many people. But they took the approach "at any cost." They thought they would only get one bite at the apple, so they made horrible compromises to get it through. Compromises even Obama said were bad, but may have figured they could take back later. Problem is, once you put those promises into law it's hard or impossible to them walk back.

So now many people who needed it have essential care options, but wired into that is a demand on others and unreasonable free stuff for still others that are inseparable. I don't see how it can be fixed and I don't think people will let it be reversed. We're stuck with the damn thing.



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Healthcare is complicated as Trump said, and just because you have a good plan that works on paper doesn't mean its all going to be perfect when implemented in a 300 million person nation. So there are going to be problems we don't foresee and it should have been tweaked to plug the cracks. Many of the perceived problems of Obamacare weren't really Obamacare's fault and were from the high cost of healthcare in general, and were only seen when those costs where shifted onto insurance.

Obamacare was meant to be only the first of several bills to fix the American healthcare system and wasn't going to fix the entire system including its high cost. Also a lot of fixes, like a public option, were just not politically feasible at the time as well. Why don't we patch and expand Obamacare instead of replacing it with something worse or just repealing it and taking us backwards.

There is a difference between what they touted their complete fix of healthcare was going to be and touting Obamacare specifically. They promised a solution that would cut costs for every family and fix healthcare. However it was very difficult to get a healthcare bill passed and so they had to made due with only a partial solution that helped make healthcare more affordable for many families and expanded coverage that that was Obamacare.

The Republicans fell into the same trap. Trump was promising something that didn't cut medicare, expanded coverage to everyone, covered more, and was far cheaper but then they had to face the fact that they were offering unrealistic promises and they couldn't get all they wanted passed.

A bipartisan fix to Obamacare is almost impossible because all sides want different things. We have several factions:
1. Get rid of all government involvement in healthcare and repeal medicare (libertarian conservatives).
2. Get rid of all healthcare tax hikes on the rich and medicare expansion and subsidies and get a free market solution (Conservatives).
3. Keep only some of the healthcare tax hikes on Obamacare and medicare expansion and get a more GOP friendly fix (Trumpcare).
4. Repeal and replace Obamacare but keep large parts of it including the medicare expansion and get a more free market GOP friendly alternative (moderate republicans).
5. Keep Obamacare and make tweaks to improve it (moderate democrats).
6. Go much further and expand Obamacare including a public option (mainstream democrats).
7. Go even further and get a European-style single payer system instead (Bernie supporters).

The best bipartisan solutions we can make are small bills that improve Obamacare in ways that most Republicans and some democrats will agree which will have to be more free-market oriented.

 

But the high cost was the problem that needed fixing. During his presidential campaign, Obama kept telling us that the cost of healthcare was the issue. He said it didn't matter what else we did, if we didn't find a way to lower that cost "it would break the back of American businesses."

To his credit, he understood and even tried to address that central problem. But it's a tough one and he couldn't find partners from either side of the aisle that were as brave. So after a year of not being able accomplish anything (his first year was a disaster), he compromised. He went in with Pelosi and Reid's agenda to "get something" in place. The attention turned from solving the real problem, to looking good to the voters. Which gave us Obamacare. Pretty sure he wishes we called it something else.

Personally, I think a central problem that makes health care more expensive in America is the perception that it's a product and just needs to be "given to" the consumer. Wasn't always that way. You used to see a doctor for advice, then took ownership of your medical problems acting on that medical advice. Now instead of a doctor telling you, you should run laps we expect him to install a lap band. Instead of warning us to change our diet, we get a side order of Lipitor with our french fries. And that little blue pill is ridiculous. If the solution we expect to be provided to us isn't right the first time or doesn't make everything the way we like it—we sue the doctor. Malpractice insurance and CYA tests drive costs still further.

That consumer mentality also means we choose doctors and hospitals by which one has the flashiest commercials or best new technologies (even if our needs don't require them). Hospitals are rated like hotels, by how fast the wait staff can get you a drink or fluff your pillow. Creating a competitive loop that adds no real value and drives costs still higher.

Obama was right. It's the base cost of medicine that is out of control—not how the bill gets paid. And it is out of control because we think fixing a person is as simple as changing the oil in a car. Pull it up and let the mechanic do all the work. Costs won't come down until we face the simple truth that our lives are our responsibility and health is more about lifestyle than product choice.



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The biggest complaint about Obama during that time by democrats was they he was disengaged. He wasn't interested. He rarely took part in any aspect of the debate other than telling the public what they wanted to hear which if it were Trump would immediately be called lies and which did turn out to be untrue.

 

He was disengaged from a conversation that had deteriorated into a debate about how much free stuff we should issue. One side saying "all of it" and another saying "none of it." No real solution was going to come out of that debate and (at that point) Obama knew it. But he had given up and was just trying to "get something into place" so he could call it a win.

Obama wasn't ready for that office. He walked in with no idea how far from actually solving problems Washington lives. Trump might be better in that world, because Trump doesn't have even a shred of idealism. Trump seems happy to chalk up paper victories and let the wheel keep turning. I believe the tragedy of Obama was he really wanted to make the world better. And found out pretty quick how alone he was in that goal.


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Who's world? His idealized and unrealistic world. He did not enter office with any understanding of the American people or the American experience other than his own filter.

Trump deals. He walked away from Ryancare because he understands there is a better deal down the road. He lives in this America, not some utopian ideal. He has a much better understanding how things work.

 

Yep and if he presents the American(USA version) single payer plan, and the newly elected congress of 2018-2019 adopts it, he may go down as the greatest president in recent history.

 

Trump announced he expects the current healthcare plan to collapse and he intends to let that happen, so those who see the world differently—if they don't want people to suffer—will have to do things his way.

Trump deals. At the expense of other people. Yes, Obama was an idealist who was out of touch with how ruthless and selfish Washington politics is. He was not prepared for that office. Trump is not an idealist, he's as ruthless and selfish as they get. Trump is willing to let the folks who elected him suffer to get the deal he wants.

Neither of them have been the president I would have liked. Obama though, is a man I can respect. I think he tried to right by the American people and grew into a pretty good leader while in office. I don't think Trump cares to do right.

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exactly and now Trump has decided to keep the ACA, so he owns it now

 

The biggest mistake is that the GOP rushed this bill out without have a clear consistent vision of what it should do and gaining allies that would stand strong.

The longer Obamacare lasts, the longer its roots go and the harder to dig it out. Republicans who are in full control, are now fully responsible to either dig it out and plant something better, or help it to thrive . Being the party of 'NO' only works when you are not expected to solve anything. The rifts in the republican party are too deep to come up with enough votes to do either. They need Dems and that means compromise. The problem is that the Dems party's base will not tolerate compromise with either the Tea partiers in the House, or the Donald Trump and moderate Dems will be challenged in primaries if they don't tow the line and gain the wrath of Pelosi who expects discipline and knows how to produce it. The DNC and its progressive backers will not be writing any checks to traitors to fund their campaigns.

The more Dems stay strong, the more finger pointing between Trump and Ryan and within the GOP caucus will weaken any trust. That will make it even harder for the GOP to win votes on tax reform, tort reform or any other initiatives.

We are going to keep on winning while the GOP flounders.


We can afford to wait.

 

I have to admit that due to life, I haven't been able to really dig into what he GOP had proposed.

What I did grasp, was yeah, essentially it was as fragrant as the ACA.

 

I'm not too sure about the whole one bite at he apple angle.

I'm pretty sure they figured they had the last cycle sown up.

As the reality of the ACA's shortcomings started showing, I reckon they'd just try to push single payer.... With a less than moderate D in the WH, they figured it would be n easier sell.

Surely easier that that ACA turd.

 

Look, while I appreciate the effort here, in trying to sway me, you have to understand, I'm a fiscally conservative Libertarian.

NO governmental anything, especially controlled, or mandated @ the federal level, will ever appeal to me, or win me over to large federal intrusion into my, or my fellow citizen's lives.

 

Taking a strong position to get intransigent folks off their butts is not the same thing as 'letting people suffer'. Now, if democrats refuse to help fix Obamacare, who will be the ones that will let people suffer?

 

one thing that would help is to end the war on drugs and stop requiring people to get permission from a doctor and allow people to self medicate

as long as the government forces poor people to get permission to take the medications they know they need, the gov should pay for it