Obamacare Lite

House Republicans have released their long awaited, superior healthcare system to replace the disaster known as Obamacare. Early reported details:

- The individual mandate is gone. This was the primary payment mechanism of Obamacare. The CBO has not scored the Republican bill so details of how patients with expensive pre-existing conditions are paid for is a question mark at this point.
- Medicaid gets cut back
- subsidies that disproportionately benefit poor people are replaced with Tax credits that disproportionately benefit wealthier people.
- More affordable plans that offer less coverage than the current bronze plans will be legally allowed. Enter the coupon books!
- Healthcare savings accounts will allow more tax-free contributions. A tax cut that disproportionately helps wealthier people.
- Political targets of evangelical Christians (Planned Parenthood) have been targeted to remove their funding - despite these clinics frequently being the only affordable access to female healthcare in rural areas.

I have seen no reported details on
- The Medicare prescription-drug donut hole
- Medicare drug price negotiation
- Anything that fundamentally reduces the costs of healthcare services


I wish Republicans good luck getting Joe Manchin's vote to sweep the healthcare rug out from the unemployed coal miners in his state. Oh - and 6 other Democrats too.

Democrats should introduce a bill with the identical rules in effect today, call it TrumpCare and sit back while the idiots howl at Congress for passage of Trumps magnificent new program.

It's a step backwards. They should just work with the Democrats to fix the ACA and focus on real cost reductions. Well at least there are several pages dedicated to how to properly handle eligibility of Lottery Winners for Medicaid.

Wow! They had seven years to come up with a replacement plan and this turd salad is the best they could come up with? They didn’t even have the CBO score it because the numbers are so bad.

Someone, in a bar, was telling me that under the current system a Medicaid recipient who won a million dollars would lose their benefits for one month. The next month, they'd be eligible again as they had no income.

Ahh, . . . it is nice that pjstroh knows what is in the proposed Republican legislation.

The last time the Federal Government imposed a brand-new and exciting health care system, the Congress had to "pass the Bill to see what was in it". But now even pjstroh, . . . just a regular guy, . . . knows what is in the Republican proposal, before anything has been passed.
This is known as a good start.

DonDiego doesn't know for a fact exactly what happens now. He hopes the proposed Bill goes through the normal legislative process by which legislators can understand what it entails, . . . and offer changes, . . . and essentially debate the issue.
Ref: How a Bill Becomes a Law

DonDiego can only hope the Law won't be jammed through like the last time.

Who knows? By the time they're through it might even be an improvement.
Oh, and pjstroh may contact his Representative and Senators to offer any suggestions he has for improvement.

After all this is 'Merica ! ! !

I only know what's been reported, DonDiego. Feel free to correct any of my statements with details to the contrary. Also feel free to object with any of the over-the-top hyperbole you gave us with Obamacare like "big government takeovers of the healthcare system"...and "other people's money" ....or whatever.

I recall Democrats taking a year of deliberations and committee adjustments before they "jammed through" their bill - the one that covered more people, has more consumer protections, and was paid for.

The House GOP plan has removed the individual mandate, Cadilac Tax, and medical device tax which begs the question of "How are the pre-existing conditions paid for?" It does not appear they have a good answer. And that would explain why they don't want the CBO to score their bill

They are going to throw grandma out of the nursing home.

DonDiego doesn't recall employing those exact terms, . . . and he'd still rather see less Government involvement and expenditures, however that turns out.

DonDiego does prefer a society in which folks use their own resources to a large extent to pay for what they get , . . . e.g. chose to participate or not participate in insurance, . . . and the Government serves as a last resort with limited interference in people's affairs.

But some citizens seem to prefer Government doing whatever it possibly can.

"Any government big enough to give you everything you want, is big enough to take away everything you have.”
__President Gerald Ford, 12 August 1974

pj....Love your thoughts on a bill in progress.....also love your comment 'has more consumer protections, and was paid for.' Of all the characterizations you could leap to, this was the most laughable. PJ, what part of the word imploding is it that you don't comprehend? Obamanation care was built on lies, more lies and damned lies. It will soon be a goner and if that tears at liberals heart strings, so be it. To pull language from Obamanation, elections have consequences.....and your side lost. Get over it, or don't.

I absolutely love you and a few others being relegated to the peanut gallery. Chirp early and often my friend, but you simply ain't got the votes.