There is no GOP healthcare plan

Even if you have nothing to write, write and say so. ~ Cicero

We've known this all along. but sometimes it's important to remind ourselves.


Occasionally in the heat of campaign stops a candidate blurts out the already apparent, against his better judgement.  The Republicans have promised to "repeal and replace" the Affordable Care Act as soon as taking office. It turns out the repeal part will be a lot easier than the replace part.  What will the GOP do instead of Obamacare?

Rep Lee Terry (R-NE)

Republican Congressman Lee Terry (R-NE), a 10-year member of the House, was recently interviewed on the campaign trail. From ThinkProgress:

KEYES: If it does ultimately all get struck down, what do we do for 57 million people who have pre-existing conditions?

TERRY: We’re going to work on that. We’re going to do it by looking at first, how do we lower health care costs, how do we make the system more efficient and less costly.

KEYES: Are there any ideas on how to do that?

TERRY: There’s going to be lots of ideas. We just have to accept all of them.

KEYES: Do we have any yet?

TERRY: We’re going to hold hearings, we’re going to invite experts. This is not going to be a closed process at all. It’s going to be completely open where we take as many ideas for reform as we can get and then we’ll see what it takes to deal with those that need more attention if they have significant pre-existing. So we’re going to deal with all of those issues.

KEYES: The mantra for a while has been “repeal and replace.” Is there an idea of what the replace would be yet?

TERRY: No. We want to take it in a very deliberate, open approach and take everybody’s ideas.

[Emphasis from ThinkProgress].


Ah, yes, very deliberate, indeed! Ten years in the House!! Is this a serious answer to a serious problem? The same answer that the Republicans have muttered for all those years that they were in power? How many more decades will Mr Terry need for deliberation? 


My Comment.   Here's the deal: If the Republicans feel that the federal government has no place in health care reform, fine, then why not just say it?  That would be a truthful response and maybe lead to further debate about the overreach of government, etc. Why pretend that the Republicans have anything better than the Affordable Care Act to address this yawning economic problem? 

Answer: because they want to have it both ways. They can whine about having to deal with the current law, complain about its weaknesses, but offer nothing to replace or improve it.

This is similar to their views on Medicare. The Republicans whined and complained for a generation about how evil Medicare was but once their constituents retired they were immediately okay with it.  In fact, they even increased the benefits through Medicare Part D at a cost of a trillion dollars over 10 years!!

I understand why Republican representatives would support existing Medicare even if they disagreed with the concept: after all their constituents paid into it for all their working lives, and even assuming they had paid too much for the benefit, they certainly deserve to get it once retired. What I don't understand is why these same small-government Republicans would then increase the (supposedly) insolvent benefit program with no way to pay for it. It's cognitively dissonant and they've rescinded their bitchin rights.

Now they are doing similar obfuscation with the Affordable Care Act, and 20 years from now a Republican President and Republican Congress will be spending a trillion dollars of borrowed money to expand the ACA for some short-term political gain. 

Anyway, here's the video of the Esteemed Deliberator:

As Cicero, the great Roman Senator implied, even if you have no plan, and no intention of a plan, please tell us.