Obamacare is a big failure!
Just kidding.
Now that I have your attention, it’s worth noting that the only people who seem to be claiming Obamacare isn’t working are Republicans.
They hate to be wrong.
They are.
Case in point – Donald Trump.
“Obamacare is not working and has missed all targets,” says Trump, who has as much knowledge about the Affordable Care Act, and he does about the president’s birthplace.
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services estimates that there will be a 25 percent increase in the number of insurers during the second year of Obamacare.
When the new exchanges open in mid-November, in some states, there will be double the number of insurers who’ll participate in exchanges for 2015.
More insurers, means lower prices.
Lower prices, will surely mean greater participation.
Greater participation, will likely mean louder Republican cries that President Obama is a card-carrying socialist who’ll create truckloads full of dead and dying grannies before he leaves office.
Another problem for Obamacare detractors is the fact that it has led to drops in the number of uninsured Americans.
Despite the rocky start for HealthCare.gov, about 7.3 million Americans who initially signed up for the ACA, are still paying premiums.
There have also been some critics who’ve complained that some insurers have actually dropped their participation in Obamacare.
That could be true. But that’s not all of the story. For every insurer that’s dropped out, there have been five more that have joined.
There’s also been a lot of Fox News-floated predictions that the second year of Obamacare will lead to much higher costs than for the first year.
According to PricewaterhouseCoopers Health Research Institute, the “average proposed rate increase is holding steady at 7.5 percent well below the double-digits many feared.”
All of this has led to only muted calls for Obamacare to be “repealed and replaced,” in Congress this year.
Oh, there’ve been more than 50 Republican-led votes to get rid of Obamacare, but hardly anybody pays any attention to them these days.
That’s because even Republicans know there’s no legislative “cure” for Obamacare.
Republicans have some hope that they can take control of the U.S. Senate, so they can join forces with the Republican-controlled House, and gut Obamacare piecemeal. Of course, the Senate would need 60 votes to advance any legislation. That would be highly unlikely, since no matter how many new Senate seats Republicans win in November – a Democratic minority would keep that legislation from reaching the floor for a vote.
None of that would matter anyway, since Obama would have lots of fun vetoing any major changes to his signature legislation.
But that still hasn’t stopped failed ex-vice presidential candidate, and the Republican’s leading congressional policy-wonk-without-a-real-plan, Paul Ryan, from waxing philosophical about a possible end to Obamacare, at some time in the future.
Ryan recently told a reporter that he’d like to “go back to the pre-Obamacare baseline,” whatever that’s supposed to mean.
I can remember when he and Mitt Romney launched an entire campaign designed to keep the world safe from Obamacare, but that didn’t work out so well, did it?
So, when Ryan claims to have a key to solving the (supposed) ills of Obamacare, by implementing, “A smart system that is patient-centered will give everybody the ability to get affordable insurance,” I have to wonder why he and Romney didn’t elaborate on that “smart system” back in 2012.
Here’s the answer. Ryan doesn’t really have a viable system that will satisfy anybody except his fellow Republicans who are hoping that Obamacare will lead to massive debt, and long-lines of unhealthy Americans.
That’s not a plan. It’s the same old, warmed over, tried and untrue, electioneering nonsense, that got him unelected to the second highest office in the land two years ago.
Ryan needs to find new non-policies, to be non-specific about.
As the Republicans’ chief mouthpiece for dismantling Obamacare, he seems to be having trouble sounding coherent.
Meanwhile, 11 days after the November elections (on Nov. 15th), the new enrollment period for Obamacare officially begins.
Paul Ryan should take note.
Edward A. Owens is a three time Emmy Award winner and 20 year veteran of television news. E-mail him at freedoms@bellatlantic.net