In “The Empire Strikes Back,” Yoda made effort sound simple: “Do, or do not. There is no try.”
Remember back to February 2017 through July 2017. The GOP tried, tried, and tried again to fulfill six years of campaign promises to repeal and replace Obamacare. First, Paul Ryan went on the attack. Even with all the momentum of a new president and administration, Ryan and the GOP House failed miserably. Eventually, they passed a wonky economic thesis-sounding bill a Wookiee would know was dead on arrival in the Senate. Then came Rand Paul and his “skinny repeal.” It was more repeal than replace, while also seeming like a diet product Marie Osmond would tout. Not surprisingly, that also failed. Finally, Sens. Susan Collins, R-Maine, and Lamar Alexander, R-Tenn., tried a bipartisan science experiment. Failed again.
Doesn’t this all seem like a long, long time ago in a galaxy … well, you know.
Light speed ahead to the present and Obamacare is still here. Crippled only by blows leveled almost entirely by President Trump alone — most notably, Trump’s push for and eventual inclusion in the tax reform bill of the repeal of Obamacare’s individual mandate.
Yes, that infamous mandate, the “solo” at the heart of the law, compelling healthy young adults to sign up for one-size-fits-all health insurance or face a financial penalty. The mandate is gone but somehow, someway, Obamacare — which should be on a ventilator with a mask and artificial limbs — still casts a large dark shadow on the healthcare system. Now the midterm election season rolls ahead in full “force” with a twist of fate even the most creative of Hollywood screenwriters couldn’t make up.
Democrats are running against Republicans on Obamacare.
So, when did repeal and replace become (R)-too-much?
Give Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, R-N.Y., House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., and the Sith crew credit. They saw the weakness. The GOP, especially several governors in red-tilting Appalachian states that accepted Obamacare’s expansion of Medicaid, would not and will not risk alienating voters over the threatened loss of their new entitlement. And, let’s be clear: The Medicaid expansion made up at least the majority, if not the vast majority, of the 20 million newly covered under Obamacare.
With almost sinister, Sith-like treachery, President Barack Obama and the Democrats knew this when they passed Obamacare in 2010. While claiming the law’s purpose was to improve the availability of healthcare coverage, they knew Obamacare was their apprentice step toward the ultimate goal of a universal government-run system, something even the Empire would envy. As President Ronald Reagan best stated, the bureaucracy is the only eternal life form that exists on Earth, and maybe even the galaxy.
Now Medicaid, the program started in the 1960s to lift up our most impoverished, including the elderly poor and those with significant developmental disabilities, covers 28 million able-bodied adults, costing taxpayers more than $500 billion a year. That’s right, millions of able-bodied adults with health insurance fully subsidized by you, the American taxpayer.
While the GOP seems afraid of touching the Democrats’ blue Medicaid lightsaber, they’re also primed to be blamed for the inevitable implosion of the Obamacare exchanges.
Talk about a Jedi mind trick.
Failing to offer a plan even the majority of their party could get behind, come this fall’s open enrollment it will be congressional Republicans answering questions about exploding premiums from bronze to platinum exchange-offered plans.
Joe Cortelli, co-founder of national health insurance brokerage HIG and a coverage expert, sees nobody to blame but Republicans themselves: “Congress doesn’t understand or want to understand health insurance. If they did, they wouldn’t focus always on coverage compared to the value of the benefits. The benefit of health insurance isn’t being covered but a more powerful force negotiating down your health care costs. The insurance and their carriers that do that best for their customers should be incentivized and will have more business.”
Forget insurance, says Michelle Katz, a nurse and nationally recognized patient advocate: “The GOP just plain didn’t get it. Healthcare consumers on all economic levels I work with want the same thing. Not more insurance. They want medication that doesn’t feel like it costs a mortgage payment. They want transparency on what a visit/treatment will actually cost them on the front end.”
Any good news? It’s only May. November is still five months away.
But if the GOP doesn’t offer voters “A New Hope” for their healthcare soon, they should heed the words Yoda told Luke Skywalker about being afraid of Darth Vader: “You will be. You will be.”
Bryan Rotella (@RotellaLegal) is a contributor to the Washington Examiner’s Beltway Confidential blog. He is founder and CEO of the national law firm GenCo and creator of Legal Moneyball. He also serves as strategic general counsel to several CEOs, boards, and political campaigns.
