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ObamaCare was passed by a Democratic Congress and signed by a Democratic president.
Once Republicans gained control of Congress in 2013, having campaigned on a promise to repeal the ACA, they made more than 50 attempts to eliminate the law. They failed.
Trump also promised to repeal it. Thank goodness he also failed. (As usual.)

The numbers tell the story...
Because of ObamaCare, millions of people gained insurance coverage for the first time.
Millions more have increased security when insured, benefitting from prohibitions on discrimination by insurers and protections for people with preexisting conditions.

Has it improved coverage? Indisputably, yes. More than 20 million people have gained coverage as a result of ObamaCare. It has dramatically reduced the uninsured rate.
On the day President Obama signed the ACA, 16% of Americans were uninsured; in March 2020, it was 9%.

ObamaCare also improved health outcomes, at least 19,000 lives were saved. The number of adults reporting improved health increased while the number screening positive for depression decreased.
Diabetes and hypertension control increased, along with increased early-stage cancer diagnoses.

Financial wellbeing of beneficiaries improved; fewer adults struggled to pay medical bills, medical debt and evictions were reduced.
At the same time, there was a significant drop in hospital uncompensated care in Medicaid expansion states. By any metric, it has been wildly successful.

It's one of the reasons folks in Blue States live longer than folks in Red States. (Many Red states have still refused to implement it. Better to be dead than admit you're wrong!)

Thank you President Obama!

Is it any wonder all republicans want to talk about is Hunter Biden?

https://www.networkforphl.org/news-insights/the-af...

I didn't vote for President Obama. Either time.

But even on TMF I had said that this legislation was an imperfect but needed step. My biggest disagreement was the employer mandate - I felt and still do feel - it puts smaller employers at a disadvantage, and discourages hiring - never mind the current labor shortage which is not a forever thing.

My biggest applause for it - was that pre-existing conditions could finally get insurance.

Back then I was an evil 1%'er. Heck I'd never ever inquired nor paid for insurance, I just got a card from my controller each year after she filled out the forms and signed my name to it, lol.

Then things changed - most by my plan and choice, SOME because of personal mistakes and bad luck - and I'm in my 40's and retired for 3 years now. Both me and DW have pre-existing. We have two kids.

If not for ObamaCare - I'd have to go be a WalMart employee or work at a Wegman's grocery store part time just to get so-so insurance. I have no college degree so it's not like I can go back to some profession.

I said back then, I say it now. We on the Right SHOULD HAVE BEEN AT THE TABLE. The "Individual Mandate" that HMOs paid FOX and others to disparage was a CONSERVATIVE idea at first. It would've forced young fit liberals on the coats to buy insurance, and frankly the money would've gone to fatty red states (including people like me lol).

Even now - FLORIDA, TEXAS, many Red areas boast MILLIONS of ACA users. Frankly - I hope we find ways to BOLSTER ACA, so it can make profitable payouts to doctors and hospitals, so ACA plans continue to have access to high rated doctors and hospitals.

I've been putting it off but I plan to write a letter to President Obama, being honest about many philosophical differences, one thanking him for literally helping me take care of my family.

Does that mean I endorse the whole Presidency? Nope. It means I can pick and choose and I'm not in the FOX ghetto, nor the MSNBC ghetto.

It's one of the reasons folks in Blue States live longer than folks in Red States. (Many Red states have still refused to implement it. Better to be dead than admit you're wrong!)

AND YET....American citizens in Red or Blue states who are not eligible for obamacare..

Snip
'According to the Healthcare Affordability Index, respondents are considered 'cost desperate' if they report experiencing three key financial challenges:

Unable to pay for needed medical treatment over the prior three months.
Skipped prescribed medication due to cost over the prior three months.
Unable to afford quality care if it was needed today. Over one-third (35%) of cost desperate adults report that they have cut back on utilities, and half have cut back on food in the past 12 months to pay for necessary healthcare, rates that are 10 times greater than their cost secure counterparts. Another 14% of this group know a friend or family member who has died in the last 12 months after not receiving treatment due to an inability to pay for it'double the rate of 'cost insecure' individuals and seven times greater than 'cost secure' individuals.


https://www.westhealth.org/press-release/112-milli....

According to the Healthcare Affordability Index, respondents are considered 'cost desperate' if they report experiencing three key financial challenges:

Unable to pay for needed medical treatment over the prior three months.
Skipped prescribed medication due to cost over the prior three months.
Unable to afford quality care if it was needed today.

That's no criticism of Obamacare. Where was Trump's health plan that would e unveiled in two weeks?

That's no criticism of Obamacare.

It is a criticism of the left not including ALL Americans to afford decent health care.

Remember, "We have to pass the bill so that you can find out what is in it'?

Passed in the dead of night with NO Republican input that could have improved obamacare to include and helped all Americans, not just a segment who will vote democrat who may think they need to keep democrats in power for/to keep the ACA.

That's no criticism of Obamacare.

It is a criticism of the left not including ALL Americans to afford decent health care.

Passed in the dead of night with NO Republican input that could have improved obamacare to include and helped all Americans, not just a segment who will vote democrat who may think they need to keep democrats in power for/to keep the ACA.

Another piece of fiction put forth as fact. The Republicans were involved, though typically in attempts to gut or destroy Obamacare.


"The day after she was one of three Republican senators to vote against her party's proposal to repeal chunks of the Affordable Care Act, Susan Collins of Maine posted a press release that said: "Democrats made a big mistake when they passed the ACA without a single Republican vote. I don't want to see Republicans make the same mistake."

It was a nice nod in the direction of bipartisanship. But it also perpetuates a deceptive narrative, repeated often by Republicans, that they were completely excluded from the process that resulted in Obamacare. While it is true that no Republican voted for the final bill, it is blatantly untrue that it contains no GOP DNA. In fact, to make such an assertion is like researching your ancestry and going no further back than your mother and father.

Not only were Republican senators deeply involved in the process up until its conclusion, but it's a cinch that the ACA might have become law months earlier if the Democrats, hoping for a bipartisan bill, hadn't spent enormous time and effort wooing GOP senators ' only to find themselves gulled by false promises of cooperation. And unlike Majority Leader Mitch McConnell's semi-secret proceedings that involved only a handful of trusted colleagues, Obamacare, until the very end of the process, was open to public scrutiny.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2017/08/01/...

Not only were Republican senators deeply involved in the process up until its conclusion, but it's a cinch that the ACA might have become law months earlier if the Democrats, hoping for a bipartisan bill, hadn't spent enormous time and effort wooing GOP senators ' only to find themselves gulled by false promises of cooperation.

No it's not.

Democrats weren't negotiating primarily with Republicans during that time. They were mostly trying to get a 60th vote for the bill as drafted. They needed all of Joe Lieberman, Ben Nelson, Mary Landrieu, and Bill Nelson to vote for the bill to overcome a GOP filibuster. Lieberman in particular was probably more "to the right" on the bill than Susan Collins or Olympia Snowe. The efforts to try to get a GOP vote or two wasn't a futile effort at bipartisanship - it was a recognition that the House Democratic proposal was certainly at least five Democratic votes short, and that there was might be a better chance to get a vote from Snowe than Lieberman (and that once they had Snowe, Lieberman would have to follow).

Basically, House Democrats were insisting the bill have a public option. The centrist Democratic Senators wouldn't vote for a bill that had one. Democrats spent the relevant months in question trying to square that circle. They couldn't do it. Obama tried to triangulate to a triggered public option, and Lieberman indicated he might go along with that - but Pelosi's caucus insisted they wouldn't support anything but a full public option. Lieberman recognized that there was no deal on a trigger, he and Snowe then insisted that there couldn't be any public option at all. It took them into the end of the year, but eventually the Democrats caved to Lieberman and dropped the public option. And that's when they got their Senate vote (after giving Ben Nelson his laundry list).

It's a fiction that the Democrats wasted time negotiating with the GOP. During the entire time when they were engaged in those negotiations, they didn't have the Democratic votes they needed. Even after they basically stopped negotiating with the GOP, they still didn't have the Democratic votes.

Yes, I remember that. I was so p-o'd at Pelosi. Any public option was better than no public option.

But the OP seems to be saying O-care should cover more people. I can get behind that. I've long thought it was ridiculous to tie medical care to employment. As I recall, not a single R voted for O-care, even after attempts at bipartisanship. [looking it up, not a single House Rep voted for it, and one Senate Rep abstained]

I recall thinking at the time that Obama was wasting energy trying to negotiate with the Republicans. They steadfastly opposed any and all parts of it. Even though the individual mandate was conceived by the (conservative) Heritage Foundation during the debates on Clinton-care in the 90s. As you explained, the Dems had to pass O-care alone, which means they had to herd cats. Though in later years, Republicans actually saved O-care (e.g. John McCain with his famous "thumbs-down" vote during the Trump years).

I recall thinking at the time that Obama was wasting energy trying to negotiate with the Republicans.

It wasn't a waste of time. Up until Pelosi screwed the pooch on the public option, Snowe and Collins were at least as plausible a 60th vote as Lieberman or Nelson. So it would have been political malpractice not to negotiate with them to see if you could get their vote. And one of their process conditions was that the administration had to talk with any other Republicans that wanted to participate.

Ultimately, that wasn't the path that got them to 60. They had to drop the public option altogether and open up the goodie bag to Ben Nelson (and to a lesser extent Mary Landrieu). But they didn't know that until late into the fall.

It is a criticism of the left not including ALL Americans to afford decent health care.

Remember, "We have to pass the bill so that you can find out what is in it'?

Passed in the dead of night with NO Republican input that could have improved obamacare to include and helped all Americans, not just a segment who will vote democrat who may think they need to keep democrats in power for/to keep the ACA.

No. It passed at high noon with everyone well aware, otherwise how would you know "We have to pass it to find out what's in it?" Proof right there it wasn't the dead of night. 8 republicans voted for it. Republicans wanted to scuttle it, failing that you tried poison pills. So now you pretend. Well, where's that something fantastic from Trump?? Isn't he the Great White Hope? Y'all had your chance. Ya muffed it and then tried insurrection.

Passing ACA was an amazing accomplishment.

I am convinced that the HMOs are as strong as, or even stronger than the lobbies representing guns, Israel, and Senior Citizens.


President Obama used his political capital to get it done.

Behind the scenes, people can criticize all they like but Rahm Emanuel certainly bloodied some noses and burned a few bridges, but he too gets enormous credit.

Sadly in tribal America - Reds and Blues can't come together - - as citizens and just talk. Because it IS us verses them vis a vis the large insurers. They aren't doctors. They aren't nurses. They aren't creating drugs. But they are laughing all the way to the bank and a majority of doctors are simply collection agencies, insurance administrators, and whores to the insurance companies.

SOMEWHERE between great American business and competition - ALONGSIDE government administration and watchdogging - there's gotta be waist keep the great elements of care - but send the HMO folks down the shit chute.

Whether I'm a Trumper, Biden Guy, an AOC'er.......all of us at one time or another will utilize health care.

I seem to recall 50 votes from the then Republican majority to try to scuttle the ACA...

But they are laughing all the way to the bank and a majority of doctors are simply collection agencies, insurance administrators, and whores to the insurance companies.

While I don't follow a lot of your posts, I understood this one. And I agree. I would rather they have made it "Medicare for All", rather than involving insurance companies. All insurance companies do is get between you and your doctor. Though I'm sure Medicare has procedures, too (i.e. insurance fraud, Medicare fraud...two sides of the same coin, and it needs to be dug out).

I didn't remember that some Republicans were potential "yea" votes, but I'll take albaby's word for it. I do remember the obstinance of some congress-creatures who had major insurance companies in their districts. They were Dems, but we in the pocket of insurance companies. IIRC, Nelson was one of them.

I don't recall now, but I have the impression that Obama went with the insurance company scheme to try to bring more Republicans on-board, as opposed to "Medicare for All". I think Clinton-care was going to be more like MfA, and Republicans didn't like it, and some put forth schemes similar to the ACA (with the Heritage Foundation coming up with the individual mandate idea). So Obama thought he might be able to meet the Republicans half way from the get-go. But in the end, they just flat didn't want any form of universal health care. Could have been lobbies, could have been ideology, or could have been "we oppose everything". Probably some combination of all three.

Hopefully the pendulum will swing back away for "red vs blue". Though, right now I don't see any path for doing that. As you say, we should all gather as citizens and talk to each other. But we're not (yet) willing to do that.

I looked it up. It passed the Senate 60-39. One Republican abstained, none voted in favor. It passed the House 220-215. Again, no Reps voted for it.

I'm not sure which "scuttle" you're referring to. The most famous one was when McCain showed up on the floor, issued a thumbs-down, and then left. He was the vote they needed, and they didn't get it. I looked the "Skinny Repeal" up, also. A full 20 Republicans voted against it in the House. The Senate was 51-49. Three Republican Senators voted "no" on the repeal. Once people had health coverage, they were threatening their congress-creatures not to tear it down, and so even Republicans had to bow to the pressure from the voters. We went from 0 supporters in 2010, to 23 in 2017.

I don't recall now, but I have the impression that Obama went with the insurance company scheme to try to bring more Republicans on-board, as opposed to "Medicare for All".

No, it wasn't aimed at bringing Republicans on board. He went with the ACA scheme because he needed 60 votes. There weren't 60 votes in the Senate for MfA. Lieberman, Nelson, and Landrieu all would have voted against it. Sure, all the Republicans as well - but the ACA is based on private insurance because the Democrats never had more than 57 votes for Medicare for All.

As we've discussed before, they probably didn't even have anywhere close to 57. Most people who have private workplace insurance are happy with it. Most private workplace insurance plans provide broader coverage than Medicare. That makes it very expensive to replace everyone's private plans with a government single-payer plan unless you really squeeze the medical providers (which is how most other countries do it, and why states that have considered doing it on their own have failed).

So eliminating people's private plans and replacing it with Medicare was a political non-starter. Nothing to do with Republicans.

While I don't follow a lot of your posts, I understood this one. And I agree. I would rather they have made it "Medicare for All", rather than involving insurance companies.

I always liked this too, and I think we can deliver that in the cities. We need to have more nurse practitioners, PAs, and we can allow veterinarians to treat people too like Australia does. And I'm not against partnering with religious organizations to deliver basic care in areas where there is none. We need to do a better job and I'm open to looking around the world to see if someone has success and how they did it.

I looked it up. It passed the Senate 60-39. One Republican abstained, none voted in favor. It passed the House 220-215. Again, no Reps voted for it.

My bad. Late night tired follies, I misread a source and laughed at it this am. I was going to find the post and point it out, but now I don't have to. :)

I'm not sure which "scuttle" you're referring to. The most famous one was when McCain showed up on the floor, issued a thumbs-down, and then left. He was the vote they needed, and they didn't get it. I looked the "Skinny Repeal" up, also. A full 20 Republicans voted against it in the House. The Senate was 51-49. Three Republican Senators voted "no" on the repeal. Once people had health coverage, they were threatening their congress-creatures not to tear it down, and so even Republicans had to bow to the pressure from the voters. We went from 0 supporters in 2010, to 23 in 2017.

Y'all have more precise memories than mine. I do remember Lieberman, but I was never sure it would pass until it did. Then there was the exchange, and states opting not to expand medicare.

Never heard about veterinarians before. Though, when you think about it, vets are doctors for all kinds of creatures. MDs just specialize in humans. But we're all pretty similar (well...dogs, cats, humans...all mammals, similar circulatory systems, etc).

And I'm not against partnering with religious organizations to deliver basic care in areas where there is none.

I am vehemently against this. The religious health care co-ops (or whatever they call themselves) are almost always scams. They take people's money, and then when care is required, they refuse to pay. Worse than insurance companies, in part because they aren't regulated like insurance companies.

Some religion-based groups do good work. I had a coworker that would go (every few years) to Guatemala, or some such place, to build homes for people. That was very cool. But so many more are just scams. I wouldn't let religion anywhere near my healthcare, and I'm not even female (which would be worse).

They take people's money, and then when care is required, they refuse to pay. Worse than insurance companies, in part because they aren't regulated like insurance companies.

Agreed. I'll be damned if I send one cent to a religious org since most are a bunch of judgemental bigots.


Mother Teresa famously misered funds while at the same time, withheld or provided horrificly substandard services, and drugs that are common place in clinics and hospice services.

<<"I was shocked to see the negligence. Needles were washed in cold water and reused and expired medicines were given to the inmates. There were people who had chance to live if given proper care," says Hemley. He narrates incidents of an untrained volunteer wrongly feeding a paralyzed inmate, who choked to his death; and another where an infected toe of an inmate was cut without anesthesia. "I have decided to go back to Kolkata to start a charity that will be called 'Responsible Charity.' Each donation will be made public and professional medical help will be given," says Hemley

https://www.forbes.com/2010/08/10/forbes-india-mot...

ObamaCare was passed by a Democratic Congress and signed by a Democratic president.
Once Republicans gained control of Congress in 2013, having campaigned on a promise to repeal the ACA, they made more than 50 attempts to eliminate the law. They failed.
Trump also promised to repeal it. Thank goodness he also failed. (As he always does.)

The numbers tell the story...
Because of ObamaCare, millions of people gained insurance coverage for the first time.
Millions more have increased security when insured, benefitting from prohibitions on discrimination by insurers and protections for people with preexisting conditions.

Has it improved coverage? Indisputably, yes. More than 20 million people have gained coverage as a result of ObamaCare. It has dramatically reduced the uninsured rate.
On the day President Obama signed the ACA, 16% of Americans were uninsured; in March 2020, it was 9%.

ObamaCare also improved health outcomes, at least 19,000 lives were saved. The number of adults reporting improved health increased while the number screening positive for depression decreased.
Diabetes and hypertension control increased, along with increased early-stage cancer diagnoses.

Financial wellbeing of beneficiaries improved; fewer adults struggled to pay medical bills, medical debt and evictions were reduced.
At the same time, there was a significant drop in hospital uncompensated care in Medicaid expansion states. By any metric, it has been wildly successful.

It's one of the reasons folks in Blue States live longer than folks in Red States. (Many Red states have still refused to implement it. Better to be dead than admit you're wrong!)

Thank you President Obama and the Democratic Party!

https://www.networkforphl.org/news-insights/the-af...

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