Ideas, Opinions, Genealogy, and Book Reviews
More on the GOP Big Lie on healthcare. Apparently, several Republicans have recently used a lie about a Washington Post ‘Fact Check’ to support the GOP healthcare big lie.
Continue reading “Details: GOP healthcare big lie”
Yesterday, I read 2 opposing views on the Obamacare/health care controversy. I am more a repair Obamacare person but I think both are well worth reading. So continuing the trend started yesterday on this blog, I will write about things I read in the Sunday paper.
We get 2 Sunday papers, the New York Times and the Philadelphia Inquirer. I discussed an article about retirement plans in the Times yesterday. Today it will be a pair of articles in the Inquirer about Obamacare (Affordable Care Act) .
Continue reading “Should we repair Obamacare or repeal and replace ?”
The recent Supreme Court decision on in favor of Hobby Lobby and Conestoga Wood Specialties seeking an exemption from the contraception mandate of in the Affordable Care Act (ACA) was a step in the wrong direction. I think although the justices applied the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA) to reach a narrow conclusion, it was wrong and that wrongness will cause greater harm than the narrow ruling suggests. Continue reading “Hobby Lobby: Missing the forest for the trees”
There is an inherent conflict between Religious Freedom and ObamaCare. Specifically, the mandate for employers to provide health insurance meeting standards and the employers right to refuse what they feel violates their religious beliefs. Considering an recent event demonstrates this clearly. Continue reading “Inherent conflict between Religious Freedom and ObamaCare”
Did they think it through? About half the states, mostly those with Republican governors and legislatures, rejected the medicaid expansion. They not only rejected a benefit for the low-income folks in their state but it seems they have also hurt many of the hospitals.
Now they might have to bail out these hospitals or watch them close. So the state’s choice is to let them close and hurt the people of the state or bail them out and pay twice. Why do I say pay twice? Continue reading “Rejecting medicaid expansion and thinking it through”
It seems the government is not able to meet its own standards. AmeriCorps, the federal community service program, provides health insurance. But this health insurance does not satisfy the requirements of the Affordable Care Act (aka Obamacare).
An article in the New York Times explains this sad story.
I previously discussed that President Obama and the House have proposed 2 different plans to allow you to keep your existing health plan.
In my opinion, neither is a very good idea. Both plans say they allow holders of existing plans that do not meet ACA requirements to keep there existing plans. One problem is that they allow this cannot actually do this since Continue reading “Obama care and Keep your health plan”
Much has been said about the millions of cancelled health insurance policies. Often the insurance company explains that these plans do not meet the standards of the Affordable Care Act (ACA). There are 2 offered fixes. Continue reading “2 keep your health plan plans”
Since I seem to be pointing out articles I really liked here is another. It is What’s the matter with motherhood? by E.J. Dionne, Jr and starts like this: Continue reading “Abortion, medical care, maternity, and health insurance”
Health care reform (ObamaCare) wasn’t a needless intervention in a well-functioning insurance market. It was designed to address market failure in our health care system
There are problems with the ObamaCare roll-out and the fight over Obama Care gets stranger. Continue reading “The fight over Obama Care gets stranger”
It seems that ever since the Affordable Care Act (aka ACA or Obamacare) was passed and then passed muster in court, nearly all Republicans have wanted it repealed. The latest efforts involve shutting down the government as we enter a new fiscal year and refusing to raise the debt ceiling so the government defaults on its debts.
Both efforts seem foolish and I have discussed them recently.
I live in Pennsylvania and get emails from Senator Toomey. He discussed his desire to compromise on the government shut-down stand-off by adding 3 amendments to the Senate bill. These amendments did not make it into the Senate bill. I do not think the debate on Obamacare should be part of the government shut-down or debt ceiling debates but these are good discussion points on the law.
The first would repeal the medical device tax that is costing Pennsylvania jobs; the second would provide relief from the infringement on religious liberty in Obamacare; the third would delay the individual mandate for one year.
I probably would back the repeal of the medical device tax. It seems to me the best way to do this would be a a separate bill but now seems a bit rushed. I don’t see much benefit to this tax since I would assume the tax would just be passed along as part of the cost of health care. So there is really no benefit since the users of heath care pay the tax and there well could be a job loss associated with this. But on the other hand with more people insured and using health care there may not be a job loss. I’d like to see more discussion on this point.
Regarding the second suggestion (infringement on religious liberty), I think this is inevitable as long as we insist on standards in health insurance. I think the employer mandate is problematic. The religious objection of an employer may or may not seem reasonable to others. One person may object to contraception and another may object to this or that aspect of health care. A public option would be much simpler here but I don’t think that is what the Senator had in mind.
As to the third point (a 1 year delay), there may be a problem. I assume the insurance companies took the widened risk-pool provided by the mandate into account when setting the rates for 2014. If this is not the case and we do not have additional delays such as a 1 year delay every year, it might be worth discussing this.
The ACA is a complex law with many parts. There are things I like and things I don’t. There seem to be things we could fix now and problems that would not be apparent until parts of the law are implemented. And we certainly could use a reasonable discussion of the pros and cons of parts of this law.
Rather than have a series of political stand-offs to attempt to repeal the law, maybe Congress could work to improve the law.
A few days ago, I remarked on the apparent public disapproval Affordable Care Act (aka ACA or Obamacare) although there are many clear benefits some of which seem quite popular.
I like some provisions and dislike others. I like the idea of universal coverage. The ACA doesn’t get us to universal health care but sure gets us closer. There are certainly things I don’t know and perhaps are unknowable until we try.
So my vote is for fixing the parts of the law that don’t work or cause problems. I think a repeal is foolish. And it is certainly foolish to shut down the government to try to force a repeal.
And even more foolish to fail to increase the debt ceiling and have the United States default on its obligations in an attempt to force the will of some Republicans on the entire county.
The House Republicans have shown the ability to manufacture a crisis when there is no need. It is a shame they can’t direct their efforts at solving the problems of the country.
It appears that there is considerable public opposition to the Affordable Care Act (aka Obamacare). House Speaker John Boehner cited this opposition to Obamacare in calling the House bill to to fund federal agencies past Sept. 30 and defund Obamacare.
I think saying a majority of Americans oppose Obamacare is an over simplification and wrote a bit about that.
I find it rather hard to believe that a majority wants to go back to a system where insurers can deny coverage because of pre-existing conditions (or they believe the applicant is likely to make too many claims). Or a system that allows insurers to place caps on benefits so if you develop a serious condition the policy just pays until a certain point and you are stuck with any bills after that point.
How can we conclude that a majority oppose the law when other surveys show many people just don’t know much about the law?
There has been quite a bit in the news lately about public opposition to the Affordable Care Act (aka ObamaCare). It seems that most recent polls indicate most are opposed (see http://www.realclearpolitics.com/).
But are the polls asking the right question? It seems to me you could oppose the law because you think it goes too far. Or you could oppose the law because it doesn’t go far enough.
Or you could generally agree with the aims law and disagree with parts. (And either support the law or not.)
You could want total repeal or perhaps just a modification of what you don’t like. You could want total repeal and replaced with no reform at all. Or you could want it repealed and replaced with a single payer system or another system.
This is really too complicated to just look at one number as a gauge of public opinion.
Another question would be does public opinion really reflect problems in the law or just how effective one side or the other is in presenting the case to the public.