Were the ACA passed under President Romney it would be lauded as a ‘free market answer to the perils of socialism’. Praises would be sung from every quarter.
Video had a great shot of Iron-Woman Carly at the end too!
And if you go back far enough you’ll discover that this was largely the plan that Nixon proposed in 1972. http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=3757
The fact is, Obama compromised and presented the conversative plan in order ot move the ball forward. Never in a million years did he believe that they woudln’t adopt their own plan just to spite him.
The reason they have no alternative plan is because the plan we have IS the conservative solution. And that should be hammered home every single day.
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They shrink the bubble until the unwanted presence is outside the walls.
It is very amusing to see that the strategy has shrunk the bubble to the point that people like Paul Ryan are on the outside.
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They truly hate America when they oppose their own plan to try to make some sort of demented political point. Obama should have just gone for a full Swedish system and just told the RWNJs to fuck off, it wasn’t going to make them any more hysterical.
Which would never have made it out of Congress and we would still be wishing we had any substantive healthcare reform at all.
I would also add that while the ACA in its current form has a lot of things that can and should be improved upon, don’t lose sight of the fact that the framework can actually accommodate a mechanism to get us to a fully formed universal coverage/public option simply by altering Medicare to allow early buy-in and offer it through the exchanges.
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Ditto, brother in my case.
I’d like to see Medicare increase coverage by a year every year to those eligible 65, 64, 63… 55 until age 55 is hit.
Then with kids on parents plans until 26 and people eligible for Medicare at 55, that means the HC Crooks have only 30 years to capture folks. Then once that occurs mandate all employerd period, even with one employee offer employer subsidized plans. If they don’t the employee would automatically be eligible for Medicare.
The best part of Obamacare are all the provisions it provides for research and improvements/changes in the future.
Obamacare is very much a living law which will improve on its conservative origins.
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Part of me knows you are right but we cannot get to universal coverage soon enough.
Just let people under 65 “buy-in” early regardless of age. Those buying in early would have a lower premium than other plans, and it would bring healthier, less expensive younger people into the program and paying into it (with the early buy-in premium) above and beyond what they are already paying into it with payroll deductions.
It would shore-up Medicare solvency, give younger people more affordable coverage before 65, and coverage that would be portable across all 50 states, and (if Congress would ever get out of the pocket of the insurance lobby and lift the restrictions on drug purchases, etc.) would make it the 800 lbs. gorilla that could price-set not only drugs, but procedural services and actually drive down the real costs of healthcare services and medications.
Of course big phrama, and the insurance companies, as well as clinics and doctors would scream bloody murder because they would no longer have the leverage to price-gouge the fuck out of patients and “consumers”, which I can live with.
Of course that is why it would likely not happen without meaningful campaign finance reforms because the money and lobbyist would politically assassinate elected Congress critters who actually pushed this through.
But back to the original point… the framework is there within the ACA.
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Looking at it again, “Holler” seems like such an appropriate name for Heritage Action’s communications director.