May we never stop repeating:
President Bannon is incompetent.
But my big beautiful healthcare policy Donny promised me is right around the corner?.. Right?
Please keep pissing more people off. Make it so you have no allies, let alone friends
These guys just love to ratchet up the uncertainty, don’t they? Keeping everybody off balance any be useful for pushing a radical agenda, but it is a lousy way to administer a government.
Lots of hubris and no sense of responsibility.
“I think this is part of what I’ve tried to stress in this hearing,” Tavenner said. “We need predictability and we need predictability for long periods of time in order to price and price effectively.”
Let me explain how this works, Tavenner. There is something you need. Trumpp has control of that something. You will have to give him something to get it back.
It doesn’t matter that predictability is good for insurers, good for consumers, and good for healthcare providers. It doesn’t matter that predictability is good for local, state, and Federal budget planners. It doesn’t matter that predictability is good for the economy. It doesn’t even matter that predictability is good for the GOP in Congress.
Trumpp controls something of value. Those who value it will have to pay for it in some manner.
“We do not have any details on the executive order,”
Feature, not a bug. I mean, don’t you realize that he’s already got 50 surrogates lined up to attack the media for reporting anything other than “This is what we warned you about all along. The health insurance industry is now in a tailspin and you’re losing your coverage because of the ACA”? They’ll be shouting it into every earhole in the country ad nauseum and will react almost violently to anyone who says otherwise.
After, when they enact something that at least pulls the industry out of its nosedive they caused, they’ll be yammering about how they saved the country and saved the health insurance and the medical industries as we know them and “You better be fucking thankful in 2018.”
We know that Trump is like, a smart person and when he issues an Executive Order it is phrased in the best words used by a person who went to an Ivy League school. If AHIP were to elect officers and hire employees who are equally erudite they would not have any questions or uncertainties or need any additional guidance from the administration about its plans for implementing the order.
Bannon wants to f*ck up the insurance market. That’s part of the ACA repeal plan. By making the administration of the law completely arbitrary and capricious, they get to do the usual republican thing of claiming it’s not working. And then when the exchanges and even the employer-funded market become a complete mess even before the official repeal, that makes the shock doctrine so much easier.
The fact that insurance companies might lose a few billion dollars (and have to take that out of the hides of future subscribers) is as much a feature for the trump administration as the fact that millions of people will lose their healthcare and tens of thousands their lives. (It’s hard for me to believe I’m typing that, but I don’t see evidence that it’s mistaken.)
AHIP’s statement after the executive order was signed noted that the group had “been meeting with policymakers to offer our recommendations” and that it “found them to be highly engaged and focused on finding real solutions.”
***Pressed by Warren on whether the unknowns surrounding the executive order*** are creating challenges for insurers, Tavenner was slightly more critical.
"I think this is part of what I've tried to stress in this hearing," Tavenner said. "***We need predictability*** and we need predictability for long periods of time in order to price and price effectively."
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
<img src="/uploads/default/original/3X/1/f/1fbbfa0960df36cfa23e53c57fc7d0b8632fe443.png" width="299" height="168">Ms. Tavenner said. “We need predictability and we need predictability for long periods of time in order to price and price effectively.”
TRANSLATION: “When you pull the rug out from someone, it does create unsteady footing”.
Behind closed doors AHIP and its members are trying to lay out the case that PeePee can’t have
-Lower premiums AND
-Lower deductibles AND
-No exclusion for pre-existing conditions AND
-No mandate to buy coverage from the healthier population AND
-Plans that cross state borders without approval by state Depts of Insurance AND
-Lower drug prices (although it now appears that PeePee has folded to Big Pharma) AND
-Rainbows and unicorns
But President Bannon has managed to intimidate/silence most of the opposition to any of his new strongman policies, including congress and soon the judiciary.
I think that President Trump’s tweet explaining his Not-a-Muslim-Ban Executive Order also explains why insurers were left in the dark regarding the ObamaCare Executive Order.
“If the ban were announced with a one week notice, the “bad” would rush into our country during that week. A lot of bad “dudes” out there!”
The word Ban has to be replaced by ObamaCare.
Preferably, something that will enrich the Trump Organization and its holdings. Otherwise, your needs are irrelevant.
This. It is the entire plan. Break stuff. Create chaos and fear. Promote trump as the savior. So obvious.
Pressed by Warren on whether the unknowns surrounding the executive order are creating challenges for insurers, Tavenner was slightly more critical.
“I think this is part of what I’ve tried to stress in this hearing,” Tavenner said. “We need predictability and we need predictability for long periods of time in order to price and price effectively.”
I said it last week (?), insurance execs just love uncertainty.