President Donald J. Trump. (Photo: AP)
The lamestream media told you:
“GOP Concedes Defeat on Health Care Bill”! –USA Today
“Major Defeat” –NY Times
“Trump Tastes Failure” –Reuters
“acute embarrassment” –CNN
“Dems Win on Obamacare!” –Nobody.
The Uninvited Ombudsman notes however that:
The world has now moved on, could Trump have planned it this way? Such prescience, such short public memory, could the president have done this deliberately? You remember how they attacked the president like a bunch of rabid animals.
Or was it really his Secret Plan A: Introduce a flawed complex bill on short notice, without adequate time for review, insist on rapid action, stir up frenzied opposition from your own team, on top of sound and fury from the usual suspects, watch the bill sink, just walk away, problem solved. Yes, solved.
The stickiest, ugliest partisan agenda item in Congress has evaporated. Obamacare remains standing, unscathed. Democrats win, their signature achievement untouched! Now, masterfully, when Obama’s hallmark collapses because it’s everything the Dems won’t admit and experts can’t escape, who gets blamed? Even the alt-left media can’t pin this on the current administration. It’s holy OBAMAcare, Batman.
The Facts
Health insurance isn’t health care. Neither one is in the Constitution. Go look, they’re not. The U.S. Supreme Court can declare the Affordable Care Act constitutional all it wants, even contradict itself in doing so (by calling a tax not a tax, then reversing itself, and then ignoring the hypocritical double standard, NFIB v. Sebelius, 2012) but that doesn’t make it truly legitimate. The Court acts inconsistently a lot.
Congress has no legitimate delegated authority to run the practice of medicine, we all know that (along with the fact they’re eminently unqualified). The same for insurance. When Obama usurped power to abscond with nearly a fifth of the U.S. economy, and attempted to have federal agents run what doctors do, we realized we were on a road to perdition. From two billion dollars for a simple computer database (promised at $93 million) to a bill we had to pass to find out what’s in it, the Democrat’s ACA was bad before it began. Now, under Trump’s watch, we’ll get to see just how bad. That’s a win.
You can thank whatever you pray to that some Republicans lost in their misguided attempt to takeover medicine. If what they’ve been saying is true—Obamacare is an abject disaster about to collapse—let go for Pete’s sake! Why save it? Think about the conniptions left-wing media is going to have then, with no one to blame but… Bush?
States are down to single insurers because health-care firms are hemorrhaging to death. Some counties have hit zero. Insurers can’t afford to stay put with the “savings” they’re not getting. The public is outraged by massive premiums increases… but at least their services have tanked. So many people didn’t get to enjoy the lie of “keep your own doctor,” how do you think they’ll vote after the media-praised Democrat plan implodes?
If Republicans understood this, they would have hastened its demise, not struggled to take it over. From its ashes a fabulous fresh Phoenix can effloresce. Watch the withered remains of a self-immolated illegal confiscation of our medical practice force quick clean repeals of its festering guts. Emergency triage can facilitate change, with natural free-market selection driving activity. People will demand it, not fight it.
You should be able to buy insurance policies, period. Like products, because they are. Like you do for your car, or home, with options. If any laws are needed, they are repeals—of restrictions on your freedom to shop. That sort of protectionism has no place in this nation—it’s not a health-care thing.
Alan Korwin, visit his website GunLaws.com.
Here’s a scenario. When the first few states finally bottom out, and people have zero coverage or options, a big-dog insurer or two will tell their agents, damn the torpedoes, sell policies. They’ll tell their government overlords, have your lawyers talk to our lawyers, see you in court, for the next decade. While they rake in billions providing excellent customer service.
Nothing real prevents insurers from offering juicy terms like pre-existing-condition coverage (for a price), stay on your parents’ plan (as long as you like, to any age, rates and conditions apply), low monthly rates (with high deductibles, your option). Poor people have poor-people options, not the working stiff’s teat.
Insurers all want your business, and will fight to get it, offering you everything from free large-screen TVs to the specific conditions that suit you. You might even do what my healthy friend Erica does (not her real name, she’s afraid to use it in this sorta free country). Pay doctors cash money for service. She gets excellent prices, top-of-the-line practice and the docs like her. A lot. No monthly fees at all.
When Obamacare goes away because it must, Republicans—and you—will finally realize the enormous win America just endured. Which state will be first? Tennessee is virtually there now apparently. Pinal County, Arizona, has hit zero providers. Next is the domino effect. Alt-left media like The New York Times, the TV networks, CNN and the rest will be embarrassed beyond recognition for lambasting the president for his “defeat.” They were defeated, but they’re such ideologues they don’t know it. Yet. The big question is if Trump is so sharp he planned it this way.
Opinions are like a**holes everyones got one.its so easy to sit there from the comfort of your home (that a men with guns make possible) and act like you have all the right answers and everyone who doesnt agree with you is stupid and wrong. Trump truly cares about America and he is not afraid of what people like you or the wacko lefties and their fake news media say or think about him. He is going to try his best to make this country the great country it was. The more you progressive psychopaths try to change America the worse off it gets. Its not that complicated capitalism works its plain and simple. There are always going to be poor people there is nothing we can do about that. The left thinks if we just keep taking more and more money from people who actualy work for a living and produce with their lives and give it to the people who dont put the effort in for whatever reason there wont be poor people anymore. Thats ridiculous if you cant make something of yourself in this great country of ours you have a problem. You can do anything and b anything you want in America with hard work and dedication. Socialism is not the answer and that is what the snowflake leftists are after. Everyone is truly blessed to be in this country the founding fathers knew what they were doing when they designed this country and its government. Bigger government is not the asnwer more government regulations is not the answer.
Mr. Korwin nails the fix towards then end of his article. He is absolutely right when he says we should be able to purchase health insurance just like we insure our cars or homes or other valuables. Repeal in it’s entirety is the best course of action. Upon repealing any law, it does not result in lawlessness, but, instead a reversion back to what was in place prior to the law governing a change. So, of course it would throw insurance companies into chaos, as they’ve participated in the preparation of the ACA (to protect profitability, of course!) and have known full well that the big fish would gobble the smaller ones along the way. It has also empowered them to walk away from a non-profitable situations, like Tennessee, with clean hands.
Healthcare is a behemoth, like Agribusiness, and cannot be easily fixed into something more manageable and fair . . . or can it?
Once you’ve identified a long laundry list of what’s wrong with the healthcare industry, the pharmaceutical industry and the public sentiment of belief that it is some type of inalienable right, only then can you begin to fix it. But, what is a “fix”?
First, and foremost, rationalize the fact that we live in a nation with three distinct social classes. And we are privileged to do so. The majority of nations in our world are two class systems, managed by oligarchy, totalitarianism, socialism, dictatorships, monarchy, communism, or FASCISM (Mirriam-Webster has great definitions of each, btw). And we, thank God, are NOT a democracy, but a REPUBLIC.
Next, accept the fact that within the 3 class Republic we call the USA, we also encourage a free market commerce system. When acceptance is gained, it is easy to transition from a view of healthcare penalization is not a tax, but, is a tax, yadda yadda, and pass a series of laws to treat healthcare just like other INSURANCE policies we can purchase on the free market.
Now, when you’re ready to mandate everyone has health insurance, like auto insurance, then the mandate is a low tier entry level “liability only” type policy. And for those who can afford to add “comprehensive”, then add it to your individual policy. Want a rider to protect against flood/hail damage? Then add it, ala carte!
BUT, it is STILL a privilege, and not a right. So, your basic plan has got to be paid for by someone, somehow, and therefore you reward businesses for providing plans to their employees, full or part-time; allow for charitable donations towards the common insurance “pools”; raise tax penalties to the uninsured to a punishing level like $10K rather than $2.5K on their returns, and any other method(s) to encourage healthcare industry competition as well as setting reasonable and fair pricing for Medicare/Medicaid with a firm cost of care the Government will pay, along with pharmaceutical pricing caps as well.
The Federal Government currently has something called the “Prevailing Wage”. If you, as a contractor, want to do business with them, you MUST pay your employees the prevailing wage the government pays their own employees to do the work. Otherwise, you don’t get a contract with the “G”. Use that same standard for government payouts for health and well being through Medicare/Medicaid/VA programs. Make the health providers and pharmaceuticals argue their needs for higher caps, and those cap arguments can carry over to the private insurance industry. The Health Industry as the protagonist, and the Insurance Industry as the antagonist. Keep them fighting with each other, and we, the end user, benefit from the results.
We must also be cognizant that there are only a few core industries in our country that are “Too Big to Fail”. Insurance companies are not on the list. Banks are not on the list. Investment Brokerages are not on the list. If they didn’t get huge taxpayer bailouts, and failed, other companies would have either absorbed their business, or new companies would sprout up to accommodate. Auto industry? Yeah, unfortunately, they are critical to our infrastructure, and SOME help is warranted. They are some of the last of our heavy manufacturing base, and are critical to maintaining our independence. Healthcare, Health Insurance companies and Pharmaceutical companies are NOT too big to fail. And I’ll bet any of you dollars to doughnuts, rattling their industries with a good and hearty shake will let delicious fruit fall to the ground for all of us to eat, and eat well!
…..President Trump should let OBozo Care just Crash and Burn, …….Let the DumbcRats take the rap for the failure,………and start on a clean slate!!!,……It is a win, win, win for him and the rest of US!!!,…
Winston, there’s just no replacement for down-home old-fashioned stupidity … what an appropriate name for a guy who fervently backs an Orwellian “1984-style” health-care solution, that’s already reached dead-man-walking status faster than any federal program in history …
“Hello! … anyone in there? … ” 🙂
Korwin is spot-on in his opinion. Had the Republicans pushed through some kind of patchwork fix, in the eyes of the media and the country at large, they would have then owned the disaster — lock, stock, and barrel! The Dems were hoping and praying for this to happen, knowing that some kind of half-ass patchwork wouldn’t have worked, but would have been a magic bullet, taking the whole disaster off of their plate, and moving it to the lollipop-sucker-stupid GOP. Thankfully no fix emerged, and although the Dems (and media) will now try to pin the problem on the Republicans, it’ll be a tough sell — even the (ignorant) “general public” will find it hard to swallow that one.
Korwin is right … let the damn thing collapse entirely, in preference to a poor “fix”. The reality for Obamacare is that there IS NO good fix for this disaster of a federal program. And after it has been made manifest and undeniable to public and media, that the Obama Disaster has fully collapsed, then come in with the free-market solution that should have been implemented “way back when” — with providers able to cross state lines, make competitive offers per their own design and blueprint, and let competition bring the prices down to an efficient standard. And by definition in a true free-market capitalistic solution, this will be based on the lowest marginal cost of the most efficient provider in a given geography, plus a reasonable and comparatively modest return on capital invested. Hooray, exactly what we need! Sign us up … and let the Dems bleed for the next decade as a result of their debacle.
Thanks, Mr. Korwin, for an excellent article.
The name says it all, my family has no healthcare except catastrophe insurance! Not too many years ago people did not buy health insurance! They dealt with colds, cuts, and bruises at home and called in a doctor when problems couldn’t be resolved by chicken soup and rest. I take care if my family’s needs and if we need a doctor, we call around for the best cash price, usually $65 a visit in my area. For the amount we need a doc, this is way more than manageable!
If Congress needs to do anything it should be to cap out medical cost, medication, and hospital expenses! I know, I was a nurse aid in the only hospital for three counties in my area! They charge $65 for one aspirin, $ 50 for the plastic $1 pitcher of water, $$500 a night for a room smaller than a room at the local Holiday Inn for $79 a night! At some point some greedy bastard said, I’ve got an idea to make billions off the sick and dying and so now the care that used to be able to be paid for in cash, now has to be financed via insurance, a monthly payment , complete with penalties, and not accepted everywhere status like your AMX card! If patients could only see the price sheets and markups on their healthcare, there would be a revolution!
Health is not a commodity and Trump can’t think a couple hours ahead of himself, let alone plan something over a period of months. Keep telling yourself all this. What you don’t know will HELP you this time.
You’re health is your responsibility, not the governments. It was that way for 233 years and then Urkel and his cadre showed up to tell you otherwise.
Unfortunately, you are wrong. Wall Street via the US government turned health into a business and gave it to the insurance companies to design and be able to make one of the largest wealth transfers in history to them from the public via the government. The US in 2017 is nothing more than a huge corporate fascist kleptocracy whose motivations are greed and have nothing to do with patriotism nor the living standards of the country. Looking at the names of the top 25 corporate suppliers to the government ( who obviously run policy in Beltway ) shows that they have nothing to do with the Public but everything to do with the Pentagon. Wake up.
What the author doesn’t seem to understand is that the media determines who gets blamed when zerocare fails. It
certainly won’t be the demoncrats.
That’s right, they’ve never let truth or logic stop them before. They already tried to pin the failures on Republicans because they dared to oppose it. On a sane planet, completely shutting out one group from any input on your plan would mean that you have 100% ownership of its successes or failures. In Democrat-Land, that just means that their voters are stupid enough to believe them when their media shills turn around and say the reason it failed was because of those nasty people that voted against it.
Where to start. I tend to agree with 90% of what the author has written. Unfortunately the Republican led congress are still trying to fix this monstrosity instead of sending it to the Biz bag where it belongs.
Trump never ran on “repeal and replace”. He ran on repeal. Which is what needs to happen. Then we have commentators like “Dave” above who appears to have never met a socialist he doesn’t like and dislikes our constitution. He uses the old canard of “3/5ths of a person” to justify adding in another federal program without amending that document.
Dave, here’s the rest of the story. The constitution is the document and body of thought that has created and upheld the greatest nation the world has ever seen. If you disagree with the document it’s amendable. But at the moment control of our “health care” is NOT a function of our federal government.
Now if the states want to fiddle with it, like Romney did in Massachusetts that’s perfectly acceptable since whatever is not actually listed as a constitutional federal responsibility is delegated to the states or the people, you can look that up. As for anyone who disagrees with you being a Fascist I’m not sure you really know the meaning of the word. All of the real Fascists are on the left. Those are the ones who want to impose their will on you whether you agree or not. Those are the ones who want to shut you up if you espouse a different opinion. All of us on the right are pretty much live and let live folks.
Well that’s my take for whatever it’s worth and I certainly hope the Republicans let Obamacare die a natural death as it continues to circle the drain. At that point I’m on the authors page of some regulation of the insurance company so coverage is available to all who want it, but no dictating what that coverage should be for any given purchaser. That’s the decision to be made by the buyer, not some bureaucrat and their actual health care is a decision to be made their doctor, not the federal government.
The author has clearly been witnessing Trump display much more forethought and strategy than I have. The infinitely more likely truth here is that he had no clue about how to “fix” the ACA, but promising to do it as he campaigned around the country sounded great, and earned him votes. The fact that he was so hands-off on the actual bill, and left it up to Ryan/Congress to put together an alternative bill, supports that viewpoint.
When I heard President Trump say, “We have idiots running this country.” I was the first in line at the early voting process to vote for him. After that watching socialist media squirm as state after state went for Trump was very entertaining.
Pfffftttt! Your opinion about a Free Market is BullS@#t. Your attitude is elistist let the poor people suffer and die baloney suggesting that if it isn’t spelled out in the constitution then it is neither acceptable nor legal. That ‘s more “conservative” bulls@#t without foundation. There is a reason why there have been ammendments to the constitution or do you subscribe to the notion that “African Americans are only 3/5ths of a person. What is needed is Single Payer Universal Health Care which some call Medicare for All. The United States is the ONLY Industrialized Nation on earth that doesn’t have universal single payer health care which should be an embarrassment to all American citizens. You on the other hand suggest that the insurance industry should become even more powerful by removing regulation. Unfettered Free Markets only foster monopolistic totalitarisnism whichcis in fact FASCUSM. No Thanks and if you think Trump or the GOP planned the loss of the “alternative” you are a fool. Stick to eriting about Firearms. By the way I too agree that the ACA has been bad law from the very beginning. I do find it interesting that you blame the Democrats for tsking Mitt Romney’s Massachusetts Health Care program changing the name and then passing it in Congress with lots of GOP votes along with the Dumbassocrats. In Congress there is very little difference between Dems and the GOP. A majority of both parties are Fascists along eith Trump and all of his lunatic cabal.
Thank you for bringing the truth to this subject. The rich get richer and the middle class pays for it and the poor eats fish heads.
Really??? I’m tired of everyone throwing around the “Fascists” term for everyone they have disdain.
Similar to you are a or that was racist.
It’s now just a diluted adjective.
Spell Check !
Your assertions about single payer will most certainly be accompanied by an example of a country that has one, is successful and doesn’t have large portions of its citizenry traveling abroad as medical tourists.
I’ll standby to be schooled…
Hey Dave. Not one Republican voted for Obamacare – not one. Medicare/Medicaid is on track to go bankrupt and neo-commie pinkos like you want to expand it to everyone? Snowflake SJW’s like you are the real problem in this country. Go back to the rock from whence you crawled out from under.
Why don’t you climb down off your high horse and enable spell checking in your browser, bonehead! At the least have you ever heard of proof reading?
While I agree that Trump and the Republicans may not have the total loss described by the mainstream media it’s hard to go as far as the author does and declare a masterful victory. Republicans have run for 7 years on the promise of ‘repeal and replace’ and Trump made it a centerpiece of his campaign. To make it the number one legislative priority and then fall into a party squabble after assuring Americans that Obamacare was far too complex and that there were ‘simple commonsense solutions’ to our nation’s health care dilemma is a political disaster. Trump WAS right when he declared that the most logical thing he and the Republicans could do is to let Obamacare strangle itself–‘when your opponent is hanging himself provide more rope’. Trump is a winner because he doesn’t necessarily adhere to ideology and needs to convince Republicans that they can no longer be ‘The Party of No’…
Could have been his plan all along! Put up,or shut up? Where’s the plan ! They had 8 years to come up with something that all the Rublicans coild have agreed on! So, their hands are tied . Now what ? More people without health care!
@Dan, this article proves ignorance runs in the gun culture. I own 30+ firearms, but I have never believe in the Right wing mantra, ” God guns Country” crap. Time to put the people first and take back America from the wealthy and the Corporations. Repeal and replace the Orange Blob, he is not saving my firearms, that is what the second Amendment does. If not, Obama would of won the firearms battle.
Well said John. You’d never know it by reading the comments here but all gun owners aren’t slack-jawed, inbred rednecks that actually believe that the military fights to preserve their free-dumb and that “god” likes ‘Murica best.
Or maybe Trump just called congress’ bluff. The House and Senate have claimed to have a plan for repeal and replace for at least a few years now, yet when called on to present this plan there was nothing.