Posted on 07/14/2013 5:00:55 PM PDT by neverdem
Obamacare opponents could seize this moment to effectively repeal the law.
In his desperation to save his health-care law, President Obama has created a political opening for opponents to stop it.
Obamacare creates a new, trillion-dollar entitlement to health-insurance subsidies. As one might hope, Congress created an eligibility-verification system to prevent fraudsters and others who don’t qualify for these subsidies from scamming taxpayers. But even before it was enacted, supporters called this system “administratively horrendously complex as well as quite intrusive” and possibly “just a dream.”
Unsurprisingly, the eligibility-verification system proved too complex to implement by 2014. At that point, the president should have proposed delaying the entitlement spending. Instead, he repealed the verification system, unilaterally and unlawfully, for one year (so far). In so doing, he effectively expanded eligibility for this entitlement, without so much as a cost estimate or a heads-up to Congress. Millions of ineligible Americans can now claim those subsidies without fear of reprisal, because for millions there will be no enforcement of the eligibility rules in 2014 (and maybe beyond). House Republicans have requested a cost estimate of the change from the Congressional Budget Office; no doubt it will be in the billions of dollars.
The president also repealed the employer mandate for 2014, again unilaterally and unlawfully. This will further increase the federal debt by reducing federal revenues. And he may do it again in 2015, and possibly beyond.
In response, House Republicans will hold separate votes next week on bills to delay the employer mandate and the individual mandate until 2015. The purpose is to embarrass House Democrats by forcing them either to support relief for employers but not families or to break ranks with their president on Obamacare. That shouldn’t satisfy those who want to repeal Obamacare, because if that’s all House Republicans do, they will be seriously underplaying their hand.
Here’s what someone looking to repeal Obamacare could do:
One news cycle after these votes, Republicans could clarify for the public that President Obama literally wants to increase the debt ceiling to finance his illegal and fraudulent Obamacare spending, and that this latest bit of illegal spending isn’t even the half of it. They could even announce the House will pass a debt-ceiling increase with safeguards to ensure the federal debt does not rise by one penny to pay for this unauthorized and fraudulent spending. Experts say the Treasury may approach the debt ceiling sometime between August and October.
If House Republicans then passed an Obamacare-repeal bill attached to a debt-ceiling increase and an HHS appropriations bill that each lasted through 2014, the move would dominate the August recess. And it would force vulnerable Senate Democrats to spend the month explaining to the folks back home whether they are willing to risk the U.S. economy and the government’s credit rating to protect fraud, not to mention their own president’s trammeling of Congress’s prerogatives.
Ironically, President Obama has given Republicans the strongest hand they have ever had for a debt-ceiling or Obamacare-repeal fight, and he continues to strengthen it every day. The public, including independents, is on the Republicans’ side against Obamacare. Every new glitch and piece of bad news about the law’s implementation would strengthen the GOP’s hand further.
Such a dramatic show of opposition would reinforce the public perception that Obamacare is dangerous and far from an inevitability. The sooner Republicans announce this strategy, the more time there will be for fissures to develop among Obamacare supporters that opponents can exploit. My guess is that more than one vulnerable Senate Democrat will start talking about, you know, maybe just delaying Obamacare until after the next election. Republicans may “lose” in the sense of having to settle for something like a one-year delay. But even the most ardent Obamacare foes would consider that a win, and they could keep fighting for repeal.
For once, Republicans have the advantage on health care.
— Michael F. Cannon is director of health-policy studies at the Cato Institute and co-editor of Replacing Obamacare (Cato, 2012).
90% of those in Congress don’t really want to repeal it.
Obamacare is going to scam the American people far more than we were being scammed under the pre Obamacare status quo.
Who cares about rats and RINOs?
Obamacare does not really exist, it is an etherial concept, a general government takeover of healthcare. They will just fill in the blanks as they go along
Good strategy for the GOP.
Unfortunately there is no one in a leadership position of the GOP that will take it up.
In fact they (Boehner, Cantor and others) are working on far more important matters such as immigration and how to give the democrats a permanent majority. Of course they don’t see it that way. They see as the millions and millions of corporate hucksters filling their campaign and retirement coffers. In other words, they are sell-outs, bribed away bought off corruptocrats.
He is 100% correct.
This is so funny, the Republican leadership in both the House and the Senate H E L P E D pass this fascism law, and then no doubt the blackmailed CJOTSC to validate it.
There is no way the republicans will repeal this bill just like there is no way they will not pass an immigration bill.
It is about control and the New World Order.
Fascism for everyone, death camps for those who resist.
There is no way the republicans will repeal this bill just like there is no way they will not pass an immigration bill.
Those comments and similar sentiments are delusional. Who are the pubbies in either house that voted for Obamacare?
Immigration and the Hastert Rule - The anatomy of a promise.
By this point, the conservatives in the House were coming unglued. The same day, Representative Steve King told National Review Online he had gathered the necessary 50 signatures to force a “special conference” on immigration. While King said he was not envisioning a challenge to Boehner, forcing a special conference happened to be the same procedure one would use to force an unscheduled leadership election.
The Senate would never convict Obama. See comment# 10 and the link.
HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!
Has the Stupid Party (tm) ever been known to take advantage of any political opening?
The RINOs and GOP-e would rather see Obamacare go forward, as an expansion of the federal government, giving them more power.
Don't bother holding your breath waiting for Dems-Lite to do anything that would shrink the fed gov nor reduce federal power.
F the GOP
The house and the Senate have rules, in both houses it takes TWO votes by the minority to get a bill out of committee.
This we all know happened when TWO republicans in BOTH houses voted to let the bill out of committee.
Two and this is really important, it takes NO one objecting in order for a bill that is being considered to not be read in to the record word for word. The republican leadership in B O T H houses ordered that NO ONE was to object and force the bill to be read in to the record.
So the republocrats could have forced the democrats to read the bill BEFORE it was voted on, so ALL of us unwashed hicks would have known everything in the bill.
This point is really important too, when you hear Rush, Sean and all of the talking bobbleheads say the republicans are going weak kneed, or have no backbone it is total BS. The fact is they are in BED with them and all of them are big government, New World Order socialists.
Do not forget that most republicans also voted FOR forced service for 18 year old’s, 2 years I think it is. this will allow for forced indoctrination in to the fascist agenda.
They really need to kill this monstrosity before it multiplies!!!
This we all know happened when TWO republicans in BOTH houses voted to let the bill out of committee.
If you could link those rules, and even better, tell me who those RINOs were, I'd appreciate it.
Two and this is really important, it takes NO one objecting in order for a bill that is being considered to not be read in to the record word for word. The republican leadership in B O T H houses ordered that NO ONE was to object and force the bill to be read in to the record.
I know the Senate uses unanimous consent. Can you show me that the House uses unanimous consent?
Do not forget that most republicans also voted FOR forced service for 18 year old’s, 2 years I think it is. this will allow for forced indoctrination in to the fascist agenda.
When and where did they vote for conscriptiom? Thanks in advance.
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