Study: Insurance costs to soar under Obamacare

Dude, you'd need 60 Senate seats to repeal ObamaCare, just like it took 60 senators to pass it.
All you need to do to get that done, is appeal to black voters......

 

This has the ring of a sophomoric, in-your-face response, as opposed to a serious, analytical response...

 

Just pointing out reality.
How long do you think it will take the GOP to get to 60 seats in the Senate?
That's when you can repeal ObamaCare, say around 2080 maybe.....

 

Did the Democrats have 60 Senate seats in 2010, when ObamaCare managed to squeak through that chamber (with the aid of the so-called "Louisiana Purchase" and "Cornhusker Kickback," among other examples of political shenanigans)?

 

Yeah, they did, well, 58 Democrats and 2 independents caucusing with Democrats.

And it's going to take 60 Republican Senators to repeal it, 67 if the president is a Democrat.
And 5 or 10 ten years from now, ObamaCare is going to have a 66% approval rating, just like RomneyCare does after 6 years.

What you have to realize is that all this blabber about ObamaCare isn't real, no one in the know thinks that ObamaCare is going to be repealed, that's just something they toss out to the sheep. You're being used.....again.

 

Actually, there were 57 Democrats plus two independents who caucused with the Democratic Party (Joe Lieberman of Connecticut and Bernie Sanders of Vermont), making for a total of 59--not 60: http://wiki.answers.com/Q/How_many_republicans_and_democrats_in_the_senate_currently_2010

It is certainly your prerogative to believe that, if you wish.

My own view is that ObamaCare will be disliked intensely once it is fully implemented--by at least a two-to-one majority (and more likely by a three-to-one majority)--but I believe it would be best for us both to just wait and see...

Very few politicians--especially at the national level--are principled; most are animated by a desire to further their respective careers. So I expect them (realistically) to vote in accordance with the majority of their constituents' preferences.

If ObamaCare is as widely despised, within a very short amount of time following its full implementation, as I suspect it will be, most politicians will likely be clamoring for its repeal, in my opinion...

 

Wow, you found a factoid that kind of supports your point, but you are still dead wrong.
Because your factoid was dated after Ted Kennedy died and was replaced by Scott Brown, when the ACA passed there were 48 Democrats and 2 Independents, because it needed 60 votes for cloture, you really don't think the GOP would let that come to a vote without a filibuster do you?

Well, that is the case everywhere in the world where the individual mandate has been implemented.
But feel free to believe that Americans (at least in 49 states) are different...

Well there's always a first time.
But I get to quote Damon Runyan here,
"The race goes not always to the swift, nor the battle to the strong,
but that's the way you bet"

Again, let me point out, even if Americans are different from the Americans in Massachusetts, the Japanese, the Australians, the Dutch and the Swiss, and end up despising the mandate, it only takes 41 senators to preserve the law, and it will be decades, maybe even a century before the GOP returns to power, and by then the GOP will be in favor of the individual mandate, in opposition to Democratic calls for Single PAyer or even better the National Health Service.

 

Presumably, you intended to assert that there were 58 Democrats in the Senate at the time of ObamaCare's passage (in keeping with your earlier assertion).

But Ted Kennedy passed away on 8/25/09--about seven months prior to ObamaCare's eventual passage...

Yes, I do "feel free" to believe that the people of Massachusetts should not be viewed as a template for the people of the other 49 states...

That would be a far more forceful observation if ObamaCare were now--or ever had been--widely embraced by the American public.

But you would appear to have much further to go, in order to be able to trumpet its widespread celebration, than I have to go, in order to note its widespread disdain...

I am aware of no serious political analyst (e.g. Charlie Cook, Stu Rothenberg, Larry Sabato, or anyone else) who really believes this...

Again, this assumes that the general public will largely embrace ObamaCare.

(For the record, I believe that a single-payer system, as it exists in Canada, the UK, and elsewhere--although vastly inferior to what a reformed insurance-based system could be--is also vastly superior to ObamaCare; as a conservative, I would easily choose single-payer over ObamaCare, if those were the only two options available...)

 

Maybe you should learn about the legislative process before you make these assertions.
It took 60 Democratic and Independent Senators to move the process forward that produced ObamaCare.
The bill never reaches the floor without cloture.
After cloture, the threshold is lowered, it only takes 50 Senators (and the VP) to pass the bill.

The Senate version was passed in December 2009, Kennedy had passed away, but had been replaced by Paul Kirk, who was appointed by Governor Deval Patrick. That is when the 60 votes were present.
The House passed a version, but after January of 2010, the Democrats no longer had 60 votes, so rather than reconcile the House and the Senate version, which the GOP would block, the House simply passed the Senate version as it stood.
That was the only choice, other than the status quo, available, due to the GOP refusing to have any part in passing health care legislation.

It was a rare moment when a party has that 60 vote supermajority, it only lasted a few months, it may be decades before it happens again.
But that is what it would take to repeal ObamaCare outright, and the probability of the GOP obtaining a Senate supermajority in the next election cycle, is essentially zero.

 

29 states are likely going to expand Medicaid or use the money for their own state program ,Vermont, and the rest of the states likely will join up just to get all that money for one other reason its now likely never to be repealed that is 29 States with their combined clout in Congress on the program. You cannot repeal that portion without these states consent. Period.

As for repealing the rest of the law and a replacement unless you keep this Medicaid expansion your dead in the water. Now does it need reforms of course but you can do that and not repeal the law I would just do this a simple law keep the Medicaid expansion and 100% Federalize it so its not a state concern then do this:

Any state not providing medical care to 90% of the estimated uninsured in their state this can be in any way they wish, but must be done within four years lose ALL discretionary funding from Congress and state parties are excluded from government contracts at all levels this excluding disaster relief and contracts vital to national security that no be done in another state. Spending authorized by Congress will be held until such time the state is compliant. Current contracted obligations will be held for the terms of those contracts.

There it hands this over to the states they can do anything they wish, I would add in some funding help and they can just opt in or out as they wish but it will cost them harshly for not going along with the program. And the Conservatives should accept this since its 100% Constitutional your just saying you don't do as we ask you get little of our money over other states.

 

As regarding your enormously didactic (and rather tedious) response: It was you who originally referenced Ted Kennedy (in post #32 in this thread). I was merely following suit.

And yes, it is certainly correct that the Harry Reid-led Senate bypassed the usual procedure of reconciliation, and rammed through the House-passed measure on a strict party-line vote.

As to the part about the GOP's (supposedly) "refusing to have any part" in the legislation--well, that is so absurd as to border on the laughable. Republican-sponsored ideas--such as tort reform and the ability of healthcare-insurance carriers to sell their products across state lines--were simply never allowed by this bunch that really wanted no compromises to The Pure Democratic Plan...