Sen. John McCain forces delay of vote on Senate ‘Trumpcare’ bill

So Arizona’s angry old man, Senator John McCain, is an expected “yeah” vote then? McCain’s Surgery Will Delay Senate Votes on Health Care Bill. Even though McCain is Concerned Over Medicaid Cuts In Draft Of Senate Health Care Bill? (Read his Statement).

The CBO won’t have Monday score for Senate healthcare bill, and there will not be a vote this week.

Here’s what we already know: How the Republican health-care bill could raise premiums for 177 million Americans:

A leading business coalition has warned that employers could pick up the tab if millions of people lose their coverage under the Republican plan to repeal the Affordable Care Act.

David Lansky, president and chief executive of the Pacific Business Group on Health, a nonprofit organization whose members include Boeing, Chevron, Hewlett-Packard Enterprise, Intel, Walmart and the Walt Disney Company, told The Washington Post that the Senate proposal to repeal the Affordable Care Act could push the costs of providing health care to uninsured people onto employers and their workers.

“There are a couple of specific reasons continuing to support an effective Medicaid program and an individual market is important, and one of those is its importance to business,” Lansky said.

Approximately 177 million Americans receive insurance through employers. Until now those plans have been largely left out of the debate over the future of the Senate health bill, which would make long-term cuts to Medicaid, the government health program for the poor, and reshape the individual market where people buy their own coverage.

But if the bill is passed and more people are uninsured, or public sector programs facing federal funding cuts decrease their reimbursements, Lansky said hospitals will simply shift those costs onto commercially insured patients — namely employers and employees.

He added that if Medicaid is cut and the individual market doesn’t provide affordable, comprehensive coverage, new workers may delay care until they get a job — which could make workers less productive and also create an initial surge in health-care costs that could increase premiums.

“Any additional cuts to public programs are likely to make additional increases [on costs] to the employer and the employee — at a time that most of us are worried about what we’re spending on health care,” Lansky said.

Last week, Governors From Both Parties Denounce Senate Obamacare Repeal Bill:

The nation’s governors, gathered here for their annual summer meeting, came out strongly on Friday against the new Senate bill to repeal the Affordable Care Act, turning up the pressure on Republican leaders struggling to round up the votes to pass the bill next week.

Opposition came not just from Democratic governors but from Republicans who split along familiar lines — conservatives who said the legislation did not go far enough and moderates who said it was far too harsh on their state’s vulnerable residents.

Gov. Brian Sandoval of Nevada, who at the moment may be the most pivotal figure in the health care debate, said he had “great concerns” with the legislation, and all but declared that he could not support any bill that would scale back Nevada’s Medicaid program. His decision to expand Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act had been “a winner for the people of our state,” he said of the government health insurance program for poor and disabled people.

“I have to be comfortable that those 210,000 lives are going to continue to enjoy the quality of life and health care that they have right now,” he said, referring to the number of Nevadans who gained coverage through the expansion of Medicaid under President Barack Obama’s signature health law.

Conservative governors were not much more supportive. Gov. Scott Walker of Wisconsin suggested that Congress consider a better-funded version of the measure proposed this year by two Republican senators, Susan Collins of Maine and Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, that would offer states more flexibility over how to run their health care programs.

Pursuing that approach, Mr. Walker said, would obviate differences between the states that did and did not expand Medicaid while averting the intractable split between conservative and centrist members of Congress over how to structure a replacement. “None of these plans right now do us justice,” he said.

The response mirrored the struggles of congressional Republicans to forge consensus on legislation that would make good on a seven-year vow to repeal the health law. With two Senate Republicans already opposed, Senate leaders cannot lose any additional votes, and on Friday, some of the most influential Republican governors indicated a willingness to torpedo the bill entirely.

* * *

The governors have been playing an outsize role in shaping the congressional debate, with Republicans from states that expanded Medicaid often supplying the loudest voices. But some of the statehouse advice has plainly started to grate on Republican members of Congress.

“I don’t want to be irreverent, but, you know, people talk about their governors back home, are you kidding me?” said Senator Bob Corker of Tennessee. “I mean, if we can’t even deal with our governors back home, how will we ever deal with Medicare and Social Security?”

Oops! Freudian slip. The first rule of destroying social programs fight club is that you don’t talk about destroying social programs fight club. “First they came for Medicaid … Then they came for Medicare … and then they came for Social Security…

So where does the former ice cream man hired by Koch Industries to manage their southwest subsidiary formerly known as the state of Arizona stand? Laurie Roberts of The Republic writes, Gov. Ducey on Senate health care bill: (cue the crickets):

Well, Ducey isn’t saying much of anything publicly, though he did tell a pair of talk show hosts before the revised bill was released that the bill “needs a lot of work.” Other than that, crickets.

This is despite the fact that according to AHCCCS, the state’s Medicaid program, Arizona would take a $1.7 billion hit by 20226 if the Senate’s health care bill becomes law. Our lawless Tea-Publican legislature is never going to raise taxes to make up for that loss of federal revenue to support AHCCCS.

As state Reps. Heather Carter and Michelle Udall recently warned:

“This legislation threatens to return us back to the bad old days of enrollment freezes, when uninsured patients flood our emergency rooms and the cost for care to them is shifted to the hospitals and taxpayers.”

Keep calling your senators to demand that they kill this bill, By a 2-to-1 margin, Americans prefer Obamacare to Republican replacements, and fix “Obamacare” instead of constantly sabotaging it.

14 thoughts on “Sen. John McCain forces delay of vote on Senate ‘Trumpcare’ bill”

  1. From the alternate universe of Donald Trump:

    Donald J. Trump‏Verified account
    @realDonaldTrump
    Republicans should just REPEAL failing ObamaCare now & work on a new Healthcare Plan that will start from a clean slate. Dems will join in!
    7:17 PM – 17 Jul 2017

    • This great idea from the same buffoon who said that Obamacare would be replaced and everyone would have coverage and premiums would go down blah blah…

      So, speaking directly to the Trump supporters here, what you should really be seeing at this point is that your idol/cult leader doesn’t live in the real world, never has and never will. To him, you are invisible along with everyone else. We are invisible to Donald Trump.

      You see, Donald has no conception of what it would be like to be doubled over in pain in the ER or what it would mean to not have enough money coming in to make rent and buy food and prescription drugs.

      But, to be honest, I think it is actually for the better that Donald continues to reveal his total detachment from reality and the lives of the ordinary people. Maybe more of them will wise up in 2018 and help us get rid of the GOP before the entire government lay in ruins.

      • “To him, you are invisible along with everyone else. We are invisible to Donald Trump.

        Do you honestly think you were visible to Hillary, Liza? To people like them, we are ALL invisible. We are only thought of as part of a “block” of people. Don’t be fooled by the rhetoric.

        “You see, Donald has no conception of what it would be like to be doubled over in pain in the ER or what it would mean to not have enough money coming in to make rent and buy food and prescription drugs.”

        Which of the candidates would have known those things? Hillary? Cruz? Saunders? Be serious. When you describe these shortcomings, Liza, remember that you are also describing Hillary. Hillary and Trump are birds of a feather…they just have a different philosophy that they push. Take that away and you have the same beast.

        “Maybe more of them will wise up in 2018 and help us get rid of the GOP before the entire government lay in ruins.”

        As long as the alternatives are like Saunders and Hillary, I doubt it.

        “If they don’t destroy us all, the Democrats will have to clean it up, again, and preside over another recovery.”

        Liza, you need to pay attention…we are in the midst of an economic recovery that is gaining speed under Trump. By whatever measure you choose, the reports show an ever increasing rate of improvement under Trump. I am fairly certain you already know that and are ignoring it for whatever reason.

        “The last thing I recall is two Obama Administrations presiding over an eight year recovery from the 2001-2008 debacle when the GOP damn near catapulted the entire world into an economic depression.

        Then your recollection is flawed and you have put the cart before the horse. The world was experiencing a recession and we were lucky not to have sunk any further than we did. It wasn’t Obama brilliance that pulled us out, it was a resilliant economy.

        • I can’t help but notice that you try to diminish everything I write by parsing it and inserting gibberish.

          Please stop.

          • I think it’s more like argle-bargle, or even jiggery-pokery, but gibberish works.

          • “I can’t help but notice that you try to diminish everything I write by parsing it and inserting gibberish.

            No, Liza, I don’t diminish anything you write nor is it ever my intention to do so. I simply expand a little on what you said and you realize it was maybe a little one sided and a bit foolish. My whole purpose is to give you a different point of view and, perhaps, a different perspective on some issues. I did the same thing to Tom but discovered he has no ability to see anything outside of his biases. He finally gave up and is not responding to me, but I know he still reads mu responses because he can’t help himself. Anyway, I would hate for you to do it because I like you, but perhaps you should consider doing what Tom does and not respond. After all, what goes on with this blog is not critical, it is just an exchange of opinons…that’s all.

            I can’t promise I won’t respond to you in the same way, but I will give it a try. It will be hard, though, because I so enjoy it.

  2. They are no longer waiting for McCain. They have no chance of passing the Senate bill, so they are going to try and repeal Obamacare, which they have a chance of doing, wrong as that will be. I am afraid that those of you who so vigorously opposed the Senate Health Care Bill may have won the battle, but lost the healthcare war.

    I am hoping the GOP cannot muster up enough votes to cancel Obamacare because, as flawed as I think it is, it is something. If Obamacare is repealed, there nothing.

    • Well, the GOP has the Congress right now so they get to stage the battles. We have no choice but to oppose their attempts to decimate the social safety net. And there are other battles as well, but we didn’t call them.

      The last thing I recall is two Obama Administrations presiding over an eight year recovery from the 2001-2008 debacle when the GOP damn near catapulted the entire world into an economic depression.

      Sadly, it appears we’re going down the same path, GOP reckless, mindless destruction fueled by their incomprehensible greed. If they don’t destroy us all, the Democrats will have to clean it up, again, and preside over another recovery.

  3. I can help you comprehend it!

    It’s a very long story, going back decades, and we’re just now getting to the last few chapters, but here’s what it says on the dust jacket:

    “Half of America voted a black man into the White House, and the other half lost their shit”.

    As far as Trump/Kushner crime families go, the rotting fish-head enabling the worst in the GOP, all I have to say is tick tick tick tick…

  4. I find it absolutely beyond comprehension that the best healthcare money can buy is available to McCain, yet they are waiting for him to return to Washington so he can vote to deprive healthcare for tens of millions of Americans.

    This is Orwellian.

    I freely admit that I have lost any ability I may have once had to comprehend what is happening in this country.

    At this point we just have to focus on how to get rid of and replace their “government”.

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