U.S. Senator McCain says Republican healthcare bill likely dead

[webfact]

U.S. Senator McCain says Republican healthcare bill likely dead

By Yasmeen Abutaleb

 

U.S. Senator John McCain speaks during a news conference in Kabul, Afghanistan July 4, 2017. REUTERS/Mohammad Ismail

 

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A senior U.S. Republican senator predicted on Sunday that the Republican bill to roll back Obamacare would likely fail, adding to growing signs that the bill is in trouble.

 

"My view is that it's probably going to be dead," Senator John McCain, a senior U.S. Republican, said on the CBS program, "Face the Nation."

 

The Senate bill, which faces unified Democratic opposition, has been further imperiled during a week-long recess where several Republican senators have had to return to their states and face constituents strongly opposed to the bill. Senators return to Washington on Monday.

 

The Senate bill keeps much of Obamacare intact but strips away most of its funding. It repeals most Obamacare taxes, overhauls the law's tax credits and ends its Medicaid expansion. It also goes beyond repealing Obamacare by cutting funding for the Medicaid program beginning in 2025.

 

Critics have derided the bill as a tax break for the wealthy by taking away health insurance for the poor and driving up costs for sick people and older Americans.

 

The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, which assesses the impact of legislation, estimated that 22 million people would lose their health insurance over the next decade under the Senate bill. In a separate report, the CBO also found that the proposal would cut government spending on Medicaid by 35 percent come 2036.

 

White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus said on Sunday on Fox News that U.S. President Donald Trump expected Congress to pass a bill to repeal and replace Obamacare.

 

Republican Senator Ted Cruz on Sunday said failure to pass the bill was "not an option," and said the Senate effort must focus on lowering premiums. He pointed to an amendment he offered that is being scored by the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, which assesses the impact of legislation.

 

Cruz's amendment would allow insurers to offer plans that do not comply with Obamacare's mandate that they charge sick and healthy people the same rates and that they cover a set of essential health benefits, such as maternity care and prescription drugs, as long as they also offer plans that do comply with the regulations.

 

Cruz's amendment has drawn the support of conservative senators and groups, who say the amendment will help lower premiums. But moderate Republicans and outside critics say it will erode protections for people with pre-existing conditions and make their insurance unaffordable.

 

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell aims to hold a vote on the legislation, which needs the support of at least 50 of the Senate's 52 Republicans, before a six-week recess that begins on July 29.

 

Yet even McConnell cast doubt on the bill's prospects for passage last week.

 

Speaking at a luncheon in his home state of Kentucky, McConnell said if Congress fails to follow through on a seven-year pledge to repeal Obamacare, then it must act to shore up private health insurance markets, comments seen as providing a pathway to a bipartisan deal to fix the health system.

 

(Reporting by Yasmeen Abutaleb, Valerie Volcovici and Caren Bohan; Editing by James Dalgleish)

 

-- © Copyright Reuters 2017-07-10

[darksidedog]

Good. It was a very nasty and mean piece of legislation. I will be glad to see the back of it, as will probably the 24 million or so who would lose their health care.

[selftaopath]

But 45 and his Pro Russia defenders said they will do EVERYTHING to weaken/dismantle ACA. If funds are withheld etc. what happens then?

[maewang99]

this means no progress on any kind of restructuring of the Medicare and Medicaid programs.... cuts in entitlements....

a debt level will ensue with or without rising interest rates. 

the exponential effect of multiplying WW2 Boomers as they age... with growing benefits that the GOP (George W. Bush administration) intentionally (of course) rallied to have tacked onto the already unsustainable tsunami of unaccrued promised health services and drug outlays etc etc..... will have an impact all the way to Thailand.

it will impact the US dollah.

 

they can't deal with this politically at all.  it's a Fukashima meltdown in Washington DC... you can actually watch it happen in slow motion. it is out of control.

western Europe and most of Asia has a better handle on their health care systems and financing.... and how they deal with it socially and politically.... the USA is not showing us they can do this.

 

Edited July 10, 2017 by maewang99

[ilostmypassword]

7 minutes ago, maewang99 said:

this means no progress on any kind of restructuring of the Medicare and Medicaid programs.... cuts in entitlements....

a debt level will ensue with or without rising interest rates. 

the exponential effect of multiplying WW2 Boomers as they age... with growing benefits that the GOP (George W. Bush administration) intentionally (of course) rallied to have tacked onto the already unsustainable tsunami of unaccrued promised health services and drug outlays etc etc..... will have an impact all the way to Thailand.

it will impact the US dollah.

 

they can't deal with this politically at all.  it's a Fukashima meltdown in Washington DC... you can actually watch it happen in slow motion. it is out of control.

western Europe has a better handle on their health care systems and financing.... the US has a one payer system... Medicare and Medicaid.  it will be a disaster fiscally and economically.  it already is being felt.  

 

The US does not have a one payer system at all. Medicare is basically for the elderly and Medicaid for those unable to afford medical care. People who are not yet 65 are mostly on some form of private insurance. What's astonishing is how a population that is paying for itself and is on the average healthier, still pays such high rates for medical care. The most expensive in the world. By far. Medicare and Medicaid actually deliver services at a much lower cost than do private insurers.

[ilostmypassword]

The good old days of the distant past:

'Promise Kept': The Senate Finally Votes to Repeal Obamacare

"Republicans on Thursday night achieved something of a milestone in their five-year battle against the Affordable Care Act: They finally passed a bill repealing the law through the United States Senate.

The measure cleared by a narrow, party-line margin of 52-47, and it must still return to the House for a final vote next week. But passage in the Senate means that after dozens of failed tries by Republicans in the House, President Obama will get the opportunity to stamp his veto on a bill eviscerating the law that, in the popular parlance if not in text, bears his name.

https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2015/12/the-senate-finally-votes-to-repeal-obamacare/418644/"

 

I wonder how many of the Republican senators who now are opposed to the Senate bill on the grounds that it's too harsh, voted for the repeal.

 

[blazes]

What I can't understand is how Americans, seeing the rest of the advanced world build (more or less) competent and single-payer health systems during the last five decades, can just sit there and watch their standard of living plummet as a result of increasing charges by the insurance companies and their Congressional parasites.

 

Every  tourist to America knows that he or she must insure themselves up to the hilt just in case they are unfortunate enough to have to visit an American hospital.

Edited July 10, 2017 by blazes

[retarius]

It's about time this old warmonging codger was put out to grass.

[shanesox]

So funny hearing the whining "working class"Trump voters who are now up in arms! Hits hard when something like health is up for a reversal


Sent from my iPhone using Thaivisa Connect

[mike324]

Its funny how Republicans have so much time to repel and protest about Obamacare but can't come up with a replacement, what does that tell  us? their plan is just as bad as Obamacare to begin with or even worse

[Rancid]

Personally I believe the whole healthcare system is a con to enslave us on expensive drugs and surgery, whereas a healthy lifestyle actually prevents most problems for free. That aside though for those, the majority,  that want a pharmaceutical system the only one that works is the one payer system.

 

Interesting seeing McCain pop up with a comment for something other than salivating for a new war somewhere.

[bendejo]

Senator Johnny there, he knows a lot of things we don't.  My guess is he's counting on an administration change in the near future...

 

 

[spidermike007]

Just another, in this continuing chain of legislative failures on the part of this incompetent president, and his churlish administration. He really got shown up by Putin. No wonder. More than likely Putin studied several briefs prior to the meeting. Trump more than likely did not spend more than 4 minutes, looking at briefs his intelligence people spent weeks working on. He is woefully unprepared for this job. And THAT, is a national security issue.

[Thaidream]

Every Industrialised country in the World has universal healthcare except America. This is a national disgrace and it shows me, as an American, that my country is controlled entirely by a wealthy cabal consisting of  Big Insurance and Big Pharma as well as the sycophantic politicians who support it.

 

Thee is only one real solution and that starts with making Healthcare a human right just as it is in Europe with a single payer program. This forces insurance companies to go out of business and Big Pharma to lower prices to acceptable levels. Everyone has government supplied healthcare paid for by the taxes on Medicare which we already are paying if working. If not working and over the age of 65- all healthcare will be at no cost. The mechanism of Medicare is already in place- all the politicians need is the will to do it and stop taking the payoffs they get from the Insurance and Pharmaceutical industry. America is so far behind the rest of the World on this issue due to the absolute corrupted healthcare industry that has grown wealth off the backs of the middle class and the poor.