Discussion: Are Republicans Just Using Obamacare Repeal As Cover For Gutting Medicaid?

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Trump, Ryan, and Price as among the most dishonest politicians alive today.

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RETURN control of Medicaid to the states? #1, before Medicaid, what did the states do (besides a lot less)? #2, States already have a lot of control and responsibility for funding, and some definitely fund it better than others.

But hey, it’s the old “state’s rights” dog whistle, connection to the facts is not relevant.

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Bitch McConnell is definitely in the top three.

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I hope that cup Lyin’ Ryan is carrying has the coffee for his enema.

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Trumpcare is NOT an “overrhaul” of Medicaid, Tierney. You referred twice to Trumpcare as being an “overhaul” and once quoted their “modernizing” meme. These are benign terms coined by Republicans to conceal the fact that Trumpcare is designed to cripple and eventually kill both Medicaid and Medicare. Please do not help the GOP by using their “overhaul” and “modernizing” memes.“Cripple and kill” is what the GOP wants to do to both Medicaid and Medicare, and Trumpcare is how they want to reach that goal.

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“Modernize”, “access”, “patient-centered”

We’re drowning in Republican weasel-words.

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More of a cover for the cluster-fuck that defines the Trump ‘administration’

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If WhatsApp had just 55 employees when it was bought out for $19 billion, or Facebook has a market cap of nearly $400 billion and just 15,000 employees, the notion of workers is becoming an afterthought. You don’t need that many people any more to develop and husband your capital. So why would you bother to invest in keeping your non-employees alive. As the price of meat goes down in our corporate state, it becomes increasingly apparent that there’s nothing in it for politicians for acknowledging this fact. Even Gallup’s latest reading shows that about two-thirds of Americans are not engaged by their current jobs. Medicare is premised on the notion that every life is valuable, and that the burden of paying for that care should not be oppressive on the elderly or those with disabilities. Imagine if we turned that around and premised our society that every corporation is valuable and the burden of operation should not be oppressive no matter how little juice the company has or how much damage the company causes the environment or members of the public.

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O, another shiny object…picked from the ‘treasure chest’ of shiny doodads.

NOT SURPRISED. Republicans can only do their thing, behind closed doors, in back ally deals…it’s just the way they are. Like their gerrymandered electoral college. Bottom feeders.

TREASURE TROTHE OF FOOL’S GOLD

I listened as carefully as I could and fact-checked as best I could the CNN interview between Blitzer, Bash, and Price last night. Price was clearly–to me–knowingly lying. As best I can figure, these are his biggest lies, in no particular order of importance. 1. The new health bill improves individual care by creating subgroups and cutting back of gross funds. 2. The states are better determiners of what Medicaid recipients need than a far-away federal government; 3.The new system will not create financial hardships (whatever that means). 4. The OVERWHELMING MAJORITY of Americans are opposed to clinics that provide abortion services. 5. Planned Parenthood can easily be replaced by this other kind of no-abortion clinic. 6. Federal funds are used for abortion because money is fungible.
I have no doubt that Price is consciously lying in order to gut a program that funds hospitals, clinics, and nursing homes as well as millions of individuals. We can’t be subtle with people like him, because people like him are slippery, sleazy, self-serving, and totally dishonest.

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"House Ways and Means Chair Kevin Brady (R-TX), when asked by reporters about the internal disagreements over the bill, argued, “For Republicans, not many of us have had a chance to cut taxes by nearly a trillion dollars, cut spending by more than that, reduce the deficit by over $300 billion and finally start to return control of Medicaid to states where they can design it for their communities, not Washington: that is a pretty good day’s work.”’
This right here is what’s wrong with Republicans. Brady sounds gleeful about cutting money here and there, and most importantly shifting small amounts of it to the states for their control. This control of money is not about tightening our belts, cutting out luxuries or even the odd treat, it’s about actual humans and their bodies.

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Tom Price (and Rand Paul) both belong to a fringe medical association called the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons. Here’s a post from that group, promoting that group’s long-standing goal of getting rid of Medicaid and praising Price.

But they don’t just oppose Medicaid. They have also opposed Medicare since 1965. Price’s ultimate goal is to gut that as well, and the tax repeal provisions in the AHCA would make that real.

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Yep…and as I wrote a few days ago when this magical ethereal 3-prong pixie dust was raised by teh Trumpsters.

  1. First prong…get rid of Medicaid.
  2. Second prong…get rid of Medicare
  3. Third prong…get rid of Social Security (and privatize the hell out of it by turning it over to Wall Street just as GWB wanted to do not so very long ago.)
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would someone holler “BINGO!!!”?

This is Republican overreeach of historic proportions, and that is saying a lot considering Iraq and all that WMD BS.

They rode into power on the tail of Trump’s least-informed, most bitter, disgruntled voters, and now they’ll make them their first and worst victims, acting not on any real populist sentiment, but on decades-old trickle-down Republican failures they seem to want to perpetually reprise, despite that record of reliable failure.

2018 midterms will reflect that betrayal.

They know that already…so they’re raking in every last centavo before their House of Trump Cards collapses.

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she just misspelled “keelhaul”

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Benjamin Wittes described Rump’s travel ban as “malevolence tempered by incompetence.”

Their incompetence doesn’t exactly temper their malevolence in this case. Republicans’ petty, vindictive, spiteful hatred of people who depend on Medicaid, isn’t very well covered or hidden at all. These are the people who sued to get out of expanding Medicaid in the first place. These are the people who refused to set up exchanges in half the country. These are the people who think healthy men should have the choice to skate by uninsured until they start coughing blood. These are the people who think healthy women should have the choice to skate by uninsured until their menses are 2 weeks late. These are the people who think corporations should have a choice to skate by without offering health benefits, and just call the temp agency for a new worker whenever somebody gets sick or pregnant.

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I just want to say, completely off topic, it has been a true joy watching Tierney become such a major force here at TPM. One of the best reporters that has worked here, ever.

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We need better verbs.

How about zombify?

The Republicans plan to zombify Medicare.

Obliterate, terminate, smash, destroy, all good. Scotch better.

GOP efforts to scotch care for the elderly and disabled.

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They aren’t trying to cover anything. They are simply tacking on all the things that they have wanted to do for a long time to an item that they thought would be popular.

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