Big government programs are hard to repeal because they’re addictive. People become dependent on the goodies promised from the public treasury, and voters and politicians are reluctant to cut them off.
Obamacare, however, is a special case. Most of the goodies, in fact almost all of the major destructive aspects of the bill, are postdated until 2013 or later in order to game the CBO numbers. There are two elections between now and then, creating an excellent window of opportunity for the will of the people to prevail and for this monstrosity to be killed before it goes into effect.
There are three avenues for repeal. One is to pass a bill striking the Obamacare provisions from the statute books, which would require either a majority in both houses of Congress and the President’s signature, or a 2/3 majority in both houses to override the President’s veto. The second is to refuse to fund the bill — all taxes and expenditures must be affirmatively passed, so a determined majority of either house of Congress could hold budget and appropriations measure hostage until Obamacare is defunded. The third and most daring is for the state legislatures to request a constitutional convention to propose an amendment forbidding federal interference in health care beyond a certain limit.
I’d prefer to concentrate on the first two, especially the second, as the first won’t happen until 2013, and the third is a very drastic measure. But the key word in the second route to repeal is determined. Now is the time to put some steel in the spines of our elected representatives. Don’t let the issue die and be forgotten until it’s too late to do anything about it. If your Representative and Senators voted No, ask them to take the Basic Repeal Pledge:
I pledge to support the repeal of so-called Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010. If elected to the 112th Congress, I will vote for repeal if it reaches the floor, and I will support any and all procedural measures necessary to bring a repeal measure to a vote.
And the Strong Repeal Pledge
I pledge to support the repeal of so-called Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010. If elected to the 112th Congress, I will oppose any budget or appropriations measure which would fund the provisions of that bill or collect the taxes imposed by that bill.
And if your Senators or Representative voted Yes or refuses to pledge to support repeal, ask their opponents to take the pledges.
{ 25 comments }
I repeat myeslf. This is not the end. This is just the end of the beginning. The real fight starts now. And the fight is not just over Health Care. It is over the full-blown “progressive agenda” of the out of control leadership of the Democrat party.
Politics in this country has just irrevocably changed.
When Republicans do the same thing to you ******* Democrats who applaud this tyranny, I will laugh in your face as you scream how unfair it all is.
You set the rules. Now you’ll have to live with them.
Since Republicans have already done all these things in the past, it’s a rather weird threat. “We’ll do to you again what we’ve done before!”
Yeah, that’s politics.
Anyway, this all reminds me way overmuch of all the left-wing rage over Iraq. Many on the left badly overplayed their hand, mistaking ephemeral discontent for some sort of wild swing by the public over to their way of thinking.
Most Americans are not going to rush with rage to the polls because of this. At least, I doubt it. Republicans will ride this wave of discontent in the November elections, where it will help them get some moderate gains. But “repeal Obamacare” is not what most voters will be walking in there to vote about.
And Obama just gave Democratic voters an actual reason to show up in November. They wouldn’t have had one had this bill not passed.
I really find the Repeal It thing rather hypocritical unless you also add repealing Medicare Part D to the pledge.
One battle at a time.
If the goal is to undo this bill, I would think that repeal isn’t the actual best strategy, although it may be best to sell it that way to midterm election voters. An actual repeal would have to get past both a Senate filibuster and a veto (at least until 2013 if not 2017). Instead, the strategy would be to amend/supercede the bill with modifications that effectively gut its key provisions.
That’s not a goal I support, but that would be the most likely way to succeed if gutting the bill is the priority.
if one battle at a time, why start with Obamacare (esp since its largely a Republican bill, modeled in part after Romney’s plan in MA, which will make for an interesting GOP primary season in 2011)?
I dont think that the Republicans are going to even try to repeal. They were out there demagoguing Obamacare as cutting medicare! While simultaneously declaring it socialism redux! (chew on that for a second.)
at any rate – the next step is medicare for all – Alan Grayson’s 6 page bill which is totally budget neutral (allows anyone who wants to, to pay 100% of the premiums to buy into medicare).
Am looking forward to that next step in 2011, after the midterms.
For now though, its time to get some cap and trade, and amnesty. Next up!
no determined minority is going to substantially alter Obamacare. Its law and will remain that way.
The GOP is going to pick up some seats, but not as many as they’d have picked up had Obamacare failed. The Dems will retain control in House and Senate.
The repealit stuff is healthy though. Ultimately even that crowd will come around. In 2020 the next health reform will have Republicans fear mongering about how the Dmocrats are cutting Obamacare, if this round was any preview.
Politics in this country has just irrevocably changed.
good morning, CC. I trust your 9-year nap was restful?
Aziz, why don’t you take a nine year nap and then try to get a doctor appointment.
I would like to request a front page post here about deficit spending. I’m very interested to hear both sides of the debate on the long term effects of uncontrolled spending politically, socially and economically. It seems to me that given Social Security and Medicare’s unfunded liabilities of $100 trillion dollars, plus the anticipated deficits of this new entitlement, the federal government has promised far, far more than it can reasonably deliver. Celebrate the “victory” if you wish, but it seems possible that the government will have to rescind this promise like so many others.
Could someone with a good knowledge of economics please begin such a thread?
CC, I understand you are feeling testy. You are actually in the exact same place many leftists were in 2000 after Gore conceded. Maybe RepealIt will become a conservative MoveOn in response; if so that would be a productive outlet for your anger. But right now you are doing a great job of parroting nearly verbatim the bile of the Sore Loserman crowd. Thats depressing to see, frankly, because if you’re nothing else, you’re a patriot, so to see you essentially slag off your nation you love is quite a turnaround. I think you need a week off to recalibrate and come back to the table.
Keith S, the health care bill will actually reduce teh deficit, by over a trillion dollars over the next ten years. The whole thing is paid for and then some. Thats the CBO analysis, not Obama’s spin.
http://www.cbo.gov/doc.cfm?index=11355&type=1
Matthew Yglesias summarizes some of teh CBO charts:
http://yglesias.thinkprogress.org/archives/2010/03/cbo-health-reform-will-reduce-the-deficit-cover-tens-of-millions-of-americans.php
Here’s some more information about how the legislation controls costs in detail:
http://www.newsweek.com/id/235246
The whole thing is paid for, if the planned Medicare cuts actually materialize, if you don’t take into consideration the Medicare spending increases being passed in parallel in a seperate bill, if the cost of the bill doesn’t greatly exceed projections the way almost every other major health care bill has, and if you ignore that we already have a huge current and long-term deficit to contend with and should be making major spending cuts without offsetting spending increases.
The “cuts in Medicare” are a phase-out of the overpriced Medicare Advantage program. Thats literally corporate welfare.
This bill does pay for itself – arguing that future bills wont is a tacit admission of that, in fact. Though Im not sure what you mean by Medicare increases (two sentences after bemoaning medicare cuts). What increases specifically do you refer to?
structural deficits are indeed a problem. But removing the parking brake of health care cost from the working class will free up human capital and raise the tide. Small businessses in particular will see a major expense lifted from the bottom line – more profits, more tax revenue.
But the best route to long term fscal health is simple- it has othing to do with health reform which pays for itself. We simply need a VAT.
right now conservatives fear a VAT because they see it as raising too much money. Liberals fear a VAT because they see it as regressive. When both sides see the VAT thru the others’ eyes, it will happen. inevitable. (I favor greatly reducing corporate income taxes in tandem with a VAT, btw)
Aziz,
> We simply need a VAT.
Are you baiting us?
Yours,
Tom
The repealit stuff is healthy though. Ultimately even that crowd will come around. In 2020 the next health reform will have Republicans fear mongering about how the Dmocrats are cutting Obamacare, if this round was any preview.
I think you’re exactly right on this point. Which depresses me to no end. There is no way out of this spiral of ever increasing government, taking away our freedoms (economic and otherwise) one bite at a time.
JohnW, you have very concisely stated exactly why I opposed this bill, and why I would have opposed Social Security and Medicare in their turn. This is one more giant step towards an inevitable economic meltdown that will beggar this entire nation (and pretty much the entire Western world).
I think you’re exactly right on this point. Which depresses me to no end. There is no way out of this spiral of ever increasing government, taking away our freedoms (economic and otherwise) one bite at a time.
That’s exactly why I’m trying to capture the moment here to keep the fight alive. Keep the issue on the top of people’s minds, and get Republicans and moderate Democrats who opposed the bill yesterday on the record now to keep opposing it tomorrow and beyond, and we have a chance to roll this back before it becomes entrenched.
Eric, when calculating the cost of this bill, please be sure to remember that the current bill spends in six years what it took ten years to collect. What happens after that is fairly obvious to anyone who understands third grade math. There are only three options:
1. Taxes go up to pay for the 40% gap in spending vs. revenue.
2. The ballooning US deficit balloons even faster, leading to eventual insolvency.
3. Health Care is rationed to keep the cost down.
My prediction is that all three will happen.
When calculating costs, one must also look at what ordinary Americans are now spending on their private health insurance–those lucky enough to have it, that is–and take into account that whether it’s money given to Blue Cross or money given to the tax man, it’s still money out of your pocket one way or the other. Thus the real question is where we derive maximum benefit, and what approach is overall cheaper.
As for the notion that the entire Western world is going to drown itself in a welfare state: that thinking makes me agree that some people are just too overheated with anger right now. The economies of Europe, Japan, and quite a few other developed nations did not go into the sewer as soon as they implemented strong welfare states. Most advanced states have national health care that’s actually far more encompassing than what Congress just passed here, and those nations have had it for generations. They’ve gone through good times and bad times economically, sometimes found that they had to dial back their welfare states, sometimes found they had to dial back spending, but overall, go ahead and pick one–Australia, Japan, Germany, United Kingdom, Canada, etc.–and overall we still see persistent patterns of growth over the decades and over generations.
Do you guys really think that the countries that produced giants like Nokia, Volvo, Ikea, Toyota, and Volkswagen have deteriorated into fascism and economic ruin because they have national health care?
Come down out of the trees, guys. The Gestapo isn’t at your door. Elections will be held as scheduled. The debate goes on. You’re still in America, really.
Dean,
I’ll take your points and ask you some follow up questions. What do the demographics of small business look like in those countries? Do people in those countries enjoy the same opportunities for upward mobility that Americans have enjoyed? Is it possible that democratic-socialist economies build barriers to such mobility, barriers that then divide the large middle class from the wealthy elites and bureaucrats? I’d like to hear your opinion on these matters.
> Most advanced states have national health care that’s actually far more encompassing than what Congress just passed here, and those nations have had it for generations.
Yes, but they passed theirs when they didn’t have demographic issues that were going to turn Social Security, Medicare and the various public pension funds into Madoff style madness.
These demographic issues have not been solved anywhere, Dean. The unsustainablity of the European and Japanese systems is clear. Yet the politicians in those places are paralysed. They, contrary to your contention, have not dialed back benefits. Something has to change.
Yours,
Tom
Tom, Ive posted on VAT many times. Ill do a post about it again. the basic argument against it from a conservative side is that it would generate too much revenue, which would (if you accepyt conservative dogma, which I do not) lead to more big government power and control. The appeal of seeing it as a regressive tax to conservatives would be that the people who do most of the purchasing would bear the greater burden of the cost (who are also the people most likely to benefit from entitlements that the funding would benefit from). Unlike an income tax, which taxes high earners to pay fpor services for lower earners, the VAT would actually not really redistribute wealth.
unless I am mischaracterizing conservative views, thats my understandig. Please educate me if I am incorrect.
The actual math on all of these entitlement programs is so obvious as to be undeniable.
Social Security was set up based on the idea that the working class would be several times the size of the retirement class, and that retirement would last five to at most ten years.
Medicaid and Medicare were set up at a time when life expectancy was still in the 60s and heroic efforts to keep an aging person alive were still unusual, if not rare.
It is an acknowledged fact on both sides of the aisle that the huge majority of costs in health care and social security are due to the ballooning size and proportion of senior citizens in this country. They live much longer today than they did when these systems were set up and they consume far more medical resources than was expected.
And that demographic is not getting better, it is getting worse. All of these entitlements are seeing hugely escalating costs as the baby boomer workforce moves into retirement. All of these aging baby boomers expect as an entitlement to have new knees, hips, hearts and an ever-expanding supply of drugs to keep them active. And since this demographic is both disproportionately large, and disproportionately vote-likely, you can bet that politicians will fall over themselves to promise them everything they want.
The end result is that the costs of these entitlements cannot be held in check, and there is only so much you can squeeze out of those who still work for a living. Eventually it will fall under its own weight.
If there is anyone for whom this logic is not absolutely clear and obvious, I simply don’t know what to say. They live on a different planet than the one I live on, one that must include rainbow unicorns and fairy dust pharmaceuticals.
You know, I’m openly rooting for the Singularity now. It’s the only thing that will stop this spiral into despair, despotism and universal poverty. I don’t even much care for what comes out of the other side, it pretty much by definition has to be better than the future I see where our current “leadership” is taking us.
Except for two things: A plurality of voters supported the invasion. It was a popular war, even if sentiment turned against it later.
Second, the country has always been center-right. If anyone is making a mistake regarding a chance in public sentiment, it would be the people who voted for this program. There hasn’t been a swing yet, and it’s idiotic to think that they will swing once it is implemented. In fact, confirmation bias (I never wanted this and NOW look how bad it is!) will make it even worse.
The Dems now own the entire healthcare system in the mind of the people. Every waiting list at a doctor is now rationing, and there’s some death panel deciding when they get in for their lab work. Every time insurance premiums go up, it’s the Democrats fault. Every problem that people already have medically was just bought by Nancy Pelosi.
No party has ever come ahead by passing a major, unpopular piece of legislation.
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