Look. God knows you can’t pick a cellphone plan or a cable plan without paying through the nose. But you have to get smarter, America. Stop getting sick, and when you do get sick, spend less on getting better (never mind that, like with cellphones and cable, there is major price obfuscation at play; never mind that, like cellphones and cable, you are shopping for an inclusive product and can’t duck out of one hospital for a blood test at another). If you weren’t so stupid, the very smart Republicans wouldn’t have to take all this time and effort to fix the mess you made.
That, in a nutshell, is the message put forth by the GOP. You should be squirreling your money away in a health-savings account, doing reverse auctions for your care when you get the flu. Set up a proper bidding process, for Christ’s sake! And if amputation is the cheaper option, you didn’t really need that arm anyway! Sigh. I’m ashamed, frankly, to call you an American. The CBO estimate may say it’s not your fault, but the CBO is just a bastard machine full of bleeding heart liberals coddling your snowflake ass.
Fun fact: the Democratic Party is the real anti-abortion party. The Republicans may be pro-life, but the Democrats are anti-abortion. Their support for contraception and for organizations like Planned Parenthood have prevented thousands of abortions. The Republicans haven’t prevented a one.
Fun fact: insurance is when the healthy pay for the sick.
But somehow, abortion is still Planned Parenthood’s fault. They need defunding. Those heathens, how dare they prevent abortions! Their fault! Shame, shame, shame.
But somehow, the sick are the source of the problem. They’re cutting into profits.
We have to fix healthcare, it’s dragging the economy down. The same economy that keeps posting positive, healthy signs from jobs numbers to construction. That economy is in shambles thanks to your wastefulness on healthcare. So we have to fix healthcare by giving the wealthy thousands of dollars a year for every schlub we kick off the insurance rolls. To the tune of hundreds of billions of dollars and ten million newly uninsured.
Because, it’s your fault, God damn it. What are you trying to do to America! Asshole!
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I don’t see a good way around the above conclusion. It’s all our faults. We thought we had a society, when in fact we’ve got a business venture that we’re all just screwing up so badly on. The Republicans have tried to get it through our heads, but somehow we just can’t seem to avoid getting sick. And they don’t want to reward our selfishness by actually paying for the care we need.
Fuck them. It’s idiotic, and their bill is a pile of shit. Anybody who has bothered to look at the whole picture of healthcare knows it. Anybody who has looked at the economy knows that the rich aren’t suffering and don’t need these tax cuts.
The goals for the American Healthcare Act (Aha!, AKA Trumpcare, AKA Republicare):
1. Technically count as “Repeal and Replace”
2. Not wander too far from the status quo as to fuck everything up
The actual bill? Fails on both counts. On Medicaid they will gut the expansion through a sort of sideways rescission. They withdraw it in 2020, but in the meantime bleed it out by making it harder for individuals to remain covered. On the individual market, the subsidies get contorted so that most people pay more for less. Coverage gaps means 30% more, being old means 5× the cost.
And, on top of all of that, it’s not even a real repeal. It leaves the mandate, just zeroes out the tax. It leaves the regulation of insurance. It leaves in place (though delays) the Cadillac tax.
But, to hear the Republicans tell it, this is all your fault. Pathetic.
In a few years when all the Republicans finally admit the existence of global warming, they’ll blame you for that, too. Sad.