COVID-19 & Healthcare

Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

FAUX News "chickenhawk" Sean Hannity Tells GOP: Defunding Obamacare "Is The Hill To Die On" (great comment from "imbecile": Yeah, but these guys will go down as participants of Clusterfuck's Last Stand.)

But the GOP House leadership is backing off of the threat by Tea Party economic terrorists Ted Cruz, Mike Lee and Rand Paul over on the Senate side to take the country hostage again and to shut down the federal government and default on the national debt (shoot the hostage) unless Democrats surrender to their extortionary demands to defund "ObamaCare." The GOP House leadership understands that this fantasy the conservative media entertainment complex is selling the GOP crazy base will be political suicide for the GOP.

Ed Kilgore writes at the Political Animal Blog today,

Will “The Base” Stand Down On De-Funding Obamacare?

So the big buzz in Washington today is that House Republican leaders
have turned the corner in tamping down sentiment for a suicidal drive to
shut down the federal government unless the administration and Senate
Democrats suicidally agree to “de-fund” (or as some argue,
systematically delay) implementation of the Affordable Care Act.

Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

Karoli at crooksandliars.com takes aim at the "Kochtopus" and Tea Party front group FreedomWorks, and its congressional August recess campaign to defund and/or kill "ObamaCare" by taking the country hostage and forcing a government shutdown and defaut on the national debt ceiling at the end of September. Per usual from this right-wing organization, everything it says is a lie. FreedomWorks' Eight Outright Lies About Obamacare:

This was in my afternoon email today, along with this text:

You can just say NO to ObamaCare.

Just say NO to bureaucrats making your health care decisions. Say NO
to unconstitutional mandates. Say NO to socialized medicine.

Just say NO by burning your ObamaCare card here!

The truth is, ObamaCare needs millions of people like you to sign up.
If you don't, it collapses. The law needs your money to work. If you
refuse to sign up, you are “burning your ObamaCare card.” You are doing
your part to make sure ObamaCare crumbles. Forever.

If you do sign up for ObamaCare, the Progressives win. The program
gets the money it needs. The lobbyists and bureaucrats get the power
they want.

You lose your freedom. You may lose your doctor. And you certainly lose your money.

Just say NO. Burn your ObamaCare card right now.

Time is running out to stop the health care takeover.

How many lies are there in this short bit of text? Well, at least eight that I see right off the top.

Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

27 states defaulted to a federal marketplace health insurance exchange for purchasing health insurance — a major component of the Affordable Care Act — including Arizona.

6 states — Texas, Arizona, Alabama, Missouri, Oklahoma and Wyoming — have notified the federal government that their state insurance departments will not be policing the Affordable Care Act health care law.

In the 6 states that will not enforce the insurance exchange and market reforms, the federal government will have to review insurance forms and respond to consumer complaints about health insurance. Think Progress reports, These Six States Want To Allow Health Insurers To Deny Coverage To Sick People:

Officials in Texas and five other GOP-led states are refusing to oversee even Obamacare’s most basic — and popular — consumer protections and
insurance market reforms. That includes the law’s ban on denying coverage or charging more because of a pre-existing condition and discriminating against women on the basis of gender. The decision could present major hurdles to Americans who buy health insurance through federally-run marketplaces in Texas, Arizona, Alabama,
Missouri, Oklahoma, and Wyoming.

Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

All major legislation with lots of moving parts requires tweaking over time. Legislators are not omnipotent, and there are always unforeseen circumstances that require a fix. This is what Congress is supposed to do — at least until the unprecedented insurrection by Tea-Publican economic terorrists with respect to sabotaging the Affordable Care Act (aka "ObamaCare").

In some cases they inserted a "poison pill" amendment into the act, hoping to sabotage it, and in other cases they refuse to make easy fixes that everyone agrees is a workable solution, hoping to emphasize "the horrors of ObamaCare" in a misguided attempt to sabotage the health care program.

Case in point, is an Obamacare Fix Spares Hill Staffers:

Capitol Hill staffers will avoid the financial blow of a
Republican-planted provision in Obamacare that was poised to
significantly raise their health care costs next year and lead to
disruptions in congressional offices.

Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

The Affordable Care Act (aka "ObamaCare") rollout continues this week.

You can now open your individual "ObamaCare" account – but you'll have
to wait a while before you can actually use it to select a health-insurance plan. 'Obamacare' accounts debut for individuals:

Just eight weeks before the Oct. 1 launch of open enrollment under
President Obama's health-care overhaul law, administration officials
announced Monday that the Affordable Care Act is a step closer to
reality for millions of uninsured Americans.

Health and Human
Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius said consumers can now go online to
HealthCare.gov and create personal accounts by establishing a username
and password.

However, serious shopping will have to wait until
sometime in September, when details on insurance plans and premiums
offered in local areas will become available through the new online
marketplace. [Arizona's health insurance marketplace is not yet online.]

Sebelius quickly moved to doubters on notice. "Let me
be clear," she said. "We are on target and ready to flip the switch on
Oct. 1."