BREAKING: House Votes To Repeal Obamacare
Just to be clear, as we've written many times before, our problem with Obamacare is the individual mandate, which is blatantly unconstitutional, and the egregious giveaways to Big Pharma & Big Insurance that are built into the law. It's a bad fix.
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WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) -- Fulfilling a campaign pledge, House GOP members passed a bill Wednesday that would repeal President Barack Obama’s landmark health-care law, and sent the measure to an almost-certain death in the Democratic-controlled Senate.
The vote was 245-189 and came just two weeks after Republicans re-took control of the House following the midterm elections.
“We will continue this fight until Obamacare is no longer the law of the land,” said Rep. Michele Bachmann, a Minnesota Republican who is a favorite of the fiscally conservative tea-party movement.
Democrats have pledged to block any efforts to toss the law out or change its fundamental elements.
Shares of hospitals, health insurers and related companies fell on Wednesday as the vote approached.
With Republicans in control of the House, the repeal bill was expected to easily pass on Wednesday. But Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, a Nevada Democrat, has vowed to block the bill in the upper chamber of Congress, and Obama has said he’d veto it.
“This is nothing more than partisan grandstanding at a time when we should be working together to create jobs and strengthen the middle class,” Reid said about the House vote.
For his part, Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell has said his party will make sure there’s an opportunity to vote on repeal in the Senate.
Republicans are expected to attack the health-care law piece by piece if they can’t repeal the measure outright.
One way would be to attempt to cut off funding for agencies that are responsible for putting the bill’s requirements in place. Republicans could, for example, target the Internal Revenue Service, which is charged with enforcing the requirement for most Americans to have insurance.
Opponents are also attacking the law in the courts, and a challenge about its constitutionality is expected to go all the way to the Supreme Court. In December, a U.S. judge in Virginia ruled that the law’s mandate for individuals to carry insurance is unconstitutional.
The White House, meanwhile, has been mounting an all-out PR campaign this week, touting the law’s benefits and highlighting stories from individuals the administration says have been helped by the law.
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We hear the sincerity on regulation, but what about this..?..
In August, Missouri voters voted 'NO' overwhelmingly on Obamacare. And in December, Federal Judge Henry Hudson ruled on the constitutionality of the individual mandate, the cornerstone of Obama's plan. As this graphic shows, the new law creates 68 grant programs, 47 bureaucratic entities, 29 demonstration or pilot programs, 6 regulatory systems, 6 compliance standards and 2 entitlements. What could possibly go wrong with something so-well organized?
Full-size image inside.
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Now watch this...
Video: Paul Ryan vs. Obama
More detail...
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More detail is here...
Jan 19, 2011 at 6:18 PM
Reader Comments (12)
http://thehill.com/homenews/house/138897-house-votes-to-repeal-healthcare-law
Downing Street insisted the former prime minister should drop his demands for secrecy when he testifies at the Iraq Inquiry tomorrow.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1348597/Cameron-puts-pressure-Blair-Iraq-letters.html#ixzz1BXcCYmVM
http://revolutionarypolitics.tv/video/viewVideo.php?video_id=13606
http://femalefaust.blogspot.com/2011/01/project-censoreds-top-25-of-2011.html
http://www.naturalnews.com/031054_blueberries_artificial_colors.html#ixzz1BXdRfDFM
2011: $1344 per month
2012: $2325 per month
2013: $4022 per month
2014: $6958 per month
2015: $12,037 per month
2016: $20,824 per month
I don't have the answers, but it seems to me that maybe we need to think about just why it is our freakin' healthcare costs are so expensive in the first place. When my mom was in the hospital, I noticed (as I was watching her flat-screen TV . . . from my comfortable position in a recliner chair . . . in her private room . . . as she was ordering "room service". . . from a menu with no listed prices) that the hospital was almost as nice as some 5-star hotels I've stayed in. I couldn't shake the feeling as I headed down to the cafeteria, passing only original art on the walls, that maybe the hospital actually was nicer than a 5-star hotel. Once I exited the elevator and began to make my way to the newly renovated cafeteria, I was greeted by the melodic sounds of piano music . . . being played, of course, by a pianist from a grand piano. To enhance the scene further, the piano was surrounded by an indoor mini-arboretum with tropical plants and a water fountain. Gazing upon the pianist framed against the tropical plants, I decided that the hospital was, indeed, nicer that most 5-star hotels.
I shit you not. This is the kind of bullshit that is being passed on to our already administrative-bloated insurance companies to pay for. Health care providers AND Insurance companies both need serious "hair cuts", IMO.
http://dailybail.com/home/the-judge-who-could-kill-obamacare.html
I do like the mandate on the state level as a system, but more like that of Germany or Switzerland where insurance companies are non-profits and have to compete for customers. The bottom line is that our government alone already spends more on health care than any other country except Norway (http://truthynews.com/2010/10/us-health-care-is-still-a-mess/), Republicans have done nothing pro-active to address this, and Obamacare simply doubles down on bad policies. No leadership in Congress.
As of the constitutionality of it, I'm not a lawyer. But given other things the interstate clause is used for, this isn't a stretch by any means.
The reason our healthcare is so expensive is our system - not only are we paying insurance company profits, but having multiple systems puts a HUGE administrative cost onto providers and hospitals. Most local doctors spend more on administrators than they do on medical aids.
I agree with you . . . Obamacare wasn't going to solve any of the problems. What is so infuriating, is that Obamacare was a nice little diversion away from any real solutions. I don't know who is to blame for the run away costs - Insurance companies or providers - I suspect both are responsible.
Following is a transcript of the 1971 conversation between President Richard Nixon and John D. Ehrlichman that led to the HMO act of 1973:
John D. Ehrlichman: “On the … on the health business …”
President Nixon: “Yeah.”
Ehrlichman: “… we have now narrowed down the vice president’s problems on this thing to one issue and that is whether we should include these health maintenance organizations like Edgar Kaiser’s Permanente thing. The vice president just cannot see it. We tried 15 ways from Friday to explain it to him and then help him to understand it. He finally says, ‘Well, I don’t think they’ll work, but if the President thinks it’s a good idea, I’ll support him a hundred percent.’”
President Nixon: “Well, what’s … what’s the judgment?”
Ehrlichman: “Well, everybody else’s judgment very strongly is that we go with it.”
President Nixon: “All right.”
Ehrlichman: “And, uh, uh, he’s the one holdout that we have in the whole office.”
President Nixon: “Say that I … I … I’d tell him I have doubts about it, but I think that it’s, uh, now let me ask you, now you give me your judgment. You know I’m not too keen on any of these damn medical programs.”
Ehrlichman: “This, uh, let me, let me tell you how I am …”
President Nixon: [Unclear.]
Ehrlichman: “This … this is a …”
President Nixon: “I don’t [unclear] …”
Ehrlichman: “… private enterprise one.”
President Nixon: “Well, that appeals to me.”
Ehrlichman: “Edgar Kaiser is running his Permanente deal for profit. And the reason that he can … the reason he can do it … I had Edgar Kaiser come in … talk to me about this and I went into it in some depth. All the incentives are toward less medical care, because …”
President Nixon: [Unclear.]
Ehrlichman: “… the less care they give them, the more money they make.”
President Nixon: “Fine.” [Unclear.]
Ehrlichman: [Unclear] “… and the incentives run the right way.”
President Nixon: “Not bad.”
http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Transcript_of_taped_conversation_between_President_Richard_Nixon_and_John_D._Ehrlichman_(1971)_that_led_to_the_HMO_act_of_1973:
DB, keep up the good work; you rock!