Healthcare

The GOP’s New Health Care Plan is Not New At All

Written by SK Ashby

While I personally don't consider it to be very likely, there is a not-zero chance that Donald Trump's Supreme Court picks will finally manage to invalidate all of Obamacare -- something Republicans have tried and failed to do several times -- and in that chaotic event we're going to have to replace the law.

The Republican Study Group has released their so-called "plan" for replacing the law and it's literally the same tired shit they've been proposing for as long as I can remember.

From CNN:

It would create federally-funded, state-run insurance pools to cover people with high-cost illness. For instance, states could establish high-risk pools, which existed before the Affordable Care Act with mixed levels of success, or institute reinsurance programs to stabilize the health care market.

And it pushes another favorite Republican measure: combining federal funding now used for Obamacare premium subsidies and Medicaid expansion into block grants given to states to help low-income Americans pay for their health care.

High-risk pools! Block grants! What is the definition of insanity?

In any case, we should all hope that Chief Justice John Roberts is feeling generous enough to save Obamacare again because, if he doesn't, this country is fucked. I cannot see our Republican-controlled Senate passing a new bill to protect people with pre-existing conditions given that the lawsuit challenging Obamacare in court right now is based on the idea that insurers shouldn't have to cover pre-existing conditions now that the individual mandate has been repealed.

Of course, Republicans are the ones who repealed the individual mandate and they're also behind the lawsuit to invalidate Obamacare without the individual mandate.

They really want you dead.

Former House Speaker Paul Ryan called for converting Medicaid into block grants in 2011 when he became the chairman of the House Budget Committee and Republicans are still wed to the idea in late 2019.