Quote:For His Next Act, the Tweeting Toddler Will Fix Healthcare
Just after naptime.
GETTY DOM EMMERT
BY CHARLES P. PIERCE
JAN 5, 2017
Well, good morning, merry sunshine. How are you this fine day?
As our friends at The New York Daily News tell us, the president-elect rose early Thursday morning and proceeded to get his toddler on regarding Wednesday's congressional debate on the future of the Affordable Care Act, a debate in which the members of his putative political party demonstrated all the political and intellectual acumen of a coal scuttle. This did not make him happy, and he knew who to blame.
In yet another series of typo-filled tweets Thursday, Trump blasted the Affordable Care Act and the Democrats' promise to salvage the healthcare plan, which the Republican businessman has vowed to repeal.
He also bullied soon-to-be Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer with name-calling taunts. "The Democrats, lead by head clown Chuck Schumer, know how bad ObamaCare is and what a mess they are in," he tweeted early Thursday, likely meaning to write "led" instead of "lead."
(Fair play to the NYDN for its barely concealed snark.)
A second tweet continued: "Instead of working to fix it, they do the typical political thing and BLAME. The fact is ObamaCare was a lie from the beginning." "'Keep you doctor, keep your plan!'" Trump tweeted, mocking Democrats who insisted Obamacare's implementation would not change private insurance. The president-elect probably meant to type "your doctor."
What was plain from Wednesday's congressional exercise of the Ideal Gas Law is that the Republicans not only don't have a coherent plan to replace the Affordable Care Act, but also that they don't have a coherent strategy to dodge the political fallout that is bound to occur when the rubes out in the country discover how badly they've been hosed.
Take, for example, the folks who participated in these Kaiser Foundation focus groups. They are Trump voters who explained to the Times what they want as regards their healthcare.
They are still more people with whom I empathize, but do not sympathize. They're going to get sheared, good and proper, and they asked for it.
But asked about policies found in several Republican plans to replace the Affordable Care Act — including a tax credit to help defray the cost of premiums, a tax-preferred savings account and a large deductible typical of catastrophic coverage — several of these Trump voters recoiled, calling such proposals "not insurance at all."
One of those plans has been proposed by Representative Tom Price, Mr. Trump's nominee to be secretary of Health and Human Services. These voters said they did not understand health savings accounts and displayed skepticism about the concept.
When told Mr. Trump might embrace a plan that included these elements, and particularly very high deductibles, they expressed disbelief.
They were also worried about what they called "chaos" if there was a gap between repealing and replacing Obamacare. But most did not think that, as one participant put it, "a smart businessman like Trump would let that happen."
Some were uninsured before the Affordable Care Act and said they did not want to be uninsured again. Generally, the Trump voters on Medicaid were much more satisfied with their coverage.
Then they're going to love Speaker Paul Ryan's plans for that program.
There was one thing many said they liked about the pre-Affordable Care Act insurance market: their ability to buy lower-cost plans that fit their needs, even if it meant that less healthy people had to pay more.
They were unmoved by the principle of risk-sharing, and trusted that Mr. Trump would find a way to protect people with pre-existing medical conditions without a mandate, which most viewed as "un-American."
In other words, they don't understand how insurance works, but they trust their Tweet buddy to pull a unicorn out of his hat.
...time for Republicans & Democrats to get together and come up with a healthcare plan that really works - much less expensive & FAR BETTER!
The key to effective political communication is the judicious use of the CAPS LOCK key.
1
