Dana Milbank: Obamacare isnt failing. Its being destroyed by Republicans

[babylonsister]

http://www.sltrib.com/opinion/5061121-155/dana-milbank-the-gop-masterminds-behind


Dana Milbank: Obamacare isn’t failing. It’s being destroyed by Republicans
By Dana Milbank The Washington Post
First Published Mar 15 2017 09:45AM • Last Updated Mar 15 2017 04:17 pm


Washington • House Speaker Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.) says Obamacare is in a "death spiral," and he should know: He's the one who cut the power to Obamacare's engines and pointed its nose downward.

snip//

Confronted with the task of selling this cruel plan to the public, the administration and its allies are doing what they've done before: attempting to deny reality. They're seeking to discredit the CBO, perhaps hoping people won't recall that Republicans picked the man who runs it: Keith Hall, a conservative former George W. Bush administration economist .

Worse, they're perpetuating the canard that Obamacare was collapsing on its own, leaving them no choice but to repeal it. Walden argued that "if we don't intercede now, fewer will have access to insurance — period." Ryan said the "law is collapsing" and asked: "Are we going to stay with Obamacare and ride out the status quo?" And Trump floated a fallback plan: pass nothing, let Obamacare fail and blame Democrats for it.

But they aren't "letting" Obamacare fail; they're causing it. As I wrote six months ago, Obamacare extended coverage to more than 20 million, and it works well for most. Slightly more than 2 million people, mostly in rural areas, don't have competitive plans to choose from and are seeing huge premium increases. Congress could have fixed that by giving insurers incentives to participate in those markets. Instead, Republican lawmakers refused to help insurers and then crowed when insurers complained.

Despite Ryan's claim of a "death spiral," the CBO said in its report Monday that the exchanges would remain "stable in most areas" if the current law were left intact, because subsidies and the individual mandate would sustain demand.

The problem is that the administration has been working aggressively to suppress demand, by suggesting the mandate to buy insurance won't be enforced and by ending government attempts to enroll people. A Brookings Institution analysis said a decline in enrollment for 2017 likely wasn't caused by premium increases. Joshua Peck, former chief marketing officer for HealthCare.gov, estimated in a post on Medium that Trump deterred 480,000 people from signing up.

Obamacare isn't failing; it's being destroyed. And those committing the sabotage ought to own whatever happens next, whether they pass a replacement or not.

[janterry]

1. exactly!

this is the message that needs to get out!

[cilla4progress]

2. It's almost like

they planned it. SMH.

I'm almost most offended by how stupid they think we all are!

[Wounded Bear]

3. It's the Republican gameplan...

they've been perfecting it for decades.

Harp on and on about how government sucks, then get elected and act to make sure it does. Yes, lovely self-fulfilling prophesy that they are doing their best to make come true.

I never understood how anybody could vote for anybody whose stated purpose is to dismantle the very government they are being elected to run.

[BarbaRosa]

4. Destruction, it's what repugs call progress.

[Docreed2003]

5. Exactly....

They've been fighting to undermine the core of the Affordable Care Act since they gained the House in 2010. They have tweeked and undermined the law so they're warnings about "death spiral" would become self fulfilling prophecy.