Obamacare Has Republican DNA

With all the latest fuss about the Affordable Care Act, better known as Obamacare, one key fact seems to fly over everyone's heads.  Despite all the Republican attempts to dismantle it, even going so far as to hold the government hostage to do so, many of its core provisions were originally Republican ideas, no matter how much they like to deny it today.  Even some of those who are against it today supported something very similar in the 1990s.  In fact, one can even say that the healthcare law was largely written by the insurance industry for the GOP, since it is virtually a clone of the plan that the industry had originally wanted all along.  Here's a brief history lesson for those who still don't know.

While many of the more progressive Democrats (as far back as Truman and FDR and even Obama himself as recently as 2008) have long wanted some type of universal single-payer system, most Republicans have traditionally balked at the idea, and have proposed their own alternatives that would leave the for-profit private health insurance system intact.  The first alternative came from Nixon, the same guy who gave us the plague known as HMOs.  Nixon's idea was basically equivalent to Obamacare's employer mandate as well as the Medicaid expansion.  (Of course, despite being Republican, Nixon was actually to the left of both Clinton and Obama.)  The next Republican idea was proposed by the Heritage Foundation in 1989, which was the individual mandate that many despise so much, also combined with a Medicaid expansion.  The insurance industry loved it so much (for obvious reasons) that several Republicans from Gingrich to Romney have at attempted to implement some form of it in the 1990s and early 2000s, often including subsidies or tax credits.  When Romney implemented Romneycare in Massachusetts in 2000, by that point most of the plan was largely identical to what eventually became Obamacare.  When Congress finally put it together, the version that passed in 2010 was essentially inspired by Romney who was inspired by Gingrich who was inspired by the Heritage Foundation and who were all inspired to some degree by Nixon.  And that, my friends, is the long and checkered history of the most controversial aspects of Obamacare, which actually turns out to be somewhat of a misnomer.

The TSAP currently supports a truly universal, single-payer system instead of Obamacare or the status quo.  Clearly, Obama never should have trusted the insurance industry in the first place, and should have stuck with his original plan rather than approve the Faustian bargain that would become his namesake law.  In the meantime, however, we believe that Obamacare could become a steppingstone to single-payer if it is given a chance to work, and the Republicans should give up trying to thwart it.  Of course, we still do not support the idea of the individual mandate on principle, and we believe that it should be delayed by a year if not longer, or better yet jettisoned entirely as it is really not necessary.  As we have noted before, the problem of adverse selection is not nearly as large as the mandate proponents believe, and can be greatly ameliorated by simply providing carrots rather than sticks.  In fact there are already such incentives built into the Affordable Care Act, namely the tax credits and subsidies that make health insurance more affordable.   The relatively narrow "open season" for enrollment would also reduce the problem as well.

Additionally, thanks to the law of unintended consequences, the employer mandate should also be further delayed, truncated, or jettisoned since it appears to have led to part-time employees having their hours drastically cut so their employers don't have to offer benefits, and this is a huge deadweight loss.  But everything else in the Act should remain as is until Congress finally gets the intestinal fortitude to implement a single-payer system despite what their corporate masters want.  Anything less would be uncivilized.

Default Averted, For Now

Finally, after 16 days of being shut down, the federal government has officially reopened on October 17.   At the 11th hour, Congress finally passed a bipartisan deal to fund the government through January 15, 2014 and suspend the debt ceiling enough to get us through February 7.   Thus, the risk of default is nil for the next few months, until the next inevitable battle on the horizon of course.   The President stood his ground, and no significant changes were made to Obamacare as Bonehead and most Republicans finally backed down for now.  Our economy, and indeed the world's economy, has been saved from the brink of catastrophe.  So, cue the music, Maestro:

HALLELUJAH!  HALLELUJAH!  HALLELUJAH, HALL.......err, wait a minute.  Seriously?  There is really nothing to be rejoicing about, since true progressives gained absolutely nothing from the deal, the sequester cuts are still in place, and the crazy fanatics who held our government hostage and nearly drove us over the debt cliff get to walk away unpunished, salivating like Pavlov's dog at the next chance to do it all over again.  The antics of the past few weeks have already done significant damage to our economy, and made America look like a dysfunctional laughingstock around the world.  We must not tolerate this kind of outrageous and unacceptable behavior from any of our elected representatives, ever.  Period.  So, one more time, we will say it again to them loud and clear:

"YOU'RE FIRED!!!"

Now pack your bags and get the hell out before we primary each and every one of you.  We the People have spoken.  Don't let the door hit you on the way out.

Dear Congress: You're Fired!

It's official.  The much-feared government shutdown has begun.  All because Congress couldn't get their act together and pass a continuing budget resolution by the October 1 deadline.  They have gone way too far this time.  And we are all paying a heavy price for it. 

The most blame lies with the Republican Party, especially the Koch-funded Tea Party members.  Wanting desperately to repeal, defund, or at least delay Obamacare, among other demands, they insisted on playing chicken with the economy because they didn't get their way.   Led by John Boehner and Ted Cruz, they refused repeatedly to pass a "clean" bill to fund the government for even a few weeks beyond October 1.  Well into September 30, they made one outrageous demand after another as a condition for passing a continuing resolution.  But the Democrats are not entirely innocent either.  They let it get to this point for quite some time now, and even took the weekend off knowing a shutdown was likely imminent.  And when Boehner offered a surprisingly reasonable 11th-hour request to allow the shutdown to be avoided if 1) only the "individual mandate" part of Obamacare would be delayed by a year and 2) Members of Congress would not get any healthcare subsidies, the Democrats (led by Harry Reid) still refused, and Obama still threatened to veto it.  Of course, the Republicans then punted again, and still refused to even allow a House vote on a "clean" bill.  Despicable!  Why both sides couldn't come to a compromise is beside the point.  The real issue is that shutting down the government just because you don't get your way should NEVER be done, period.  And the longer the shutdown lasts, the more damage is done to our economy and society at large.

But it appears that an even bigger fight is on the horizon.  We are just weeks away from defaulting on our national debt if the debt ceiling is not raised in a timely fashion.  Such a default would be unprecedented and would likely lead to another Great Depression.  And if Congress's current unacceptable behavior is any indication, we are in for a VERY rough time ahead in the weeks to come.  They are essentially putting our nation in distress, hence the inversion of the American flag on the TSAP blog.

Thus, the TSAP hereby gives virtually all 535 members of Congress (regardless of party) a vote of "no confidence", and we will take their government shutdown to imply the resignation of such members.   We encourage every reader of this blog to sign the following petitions:

Dear Congress:  We Accept Your Resignation
No Pay for Congress During Shutdown
Minimum Wage for Congress

Let them know that We the People have had ENOUGH of the gridlock, grandstanding, backstabbing, corruption, venality, follies, lies, recklessness, childishness, and otherwise outrageous behavior of Congress.  And we will support a primary challenge to ALL of them, with the only exceptions being Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders.  If we weren't clear, we'll say it again:

YOU'RE FIRED!!!

So what's the opposite of "progress" again?  You guessed it.