A downside of whining about the election and wasting time on trying to rewrite the ongoing experience of Obamacare is that consumers will face the same with Ryancare if Dems don't refocus on the present and if Donald Trump doesn't stay on top of things.
Jake Tapper hosted a CNN Town Hall with Paul Ryan on 1/12/17 (you can watch it on YouTube by searching Paul Ryan Jake Tapper Town Hall 1/12/17). It was a consumer deception that provided Paul Ryan the opportunity to illustrate why I consider him the Obama Republican equivalent, a good performer, and there is blame that lies on the shoulders of a partisan media.
Jake Tapper, a Dem, was hog-tied by his own politics, unable to ask meaningful questions about the proposed Better Way Obamacare replacement because of his inability to consider Obamacare's failures. Instead for the first 22 minutes or so, he gave Paul Ryan a stage on which to perform and perform Ryan did. Ryan's formula, the same as Obama's, "This has affected my family so of course we'll protect this," even to the point of talking about Medicare and promising "If you like your plan you can keep it" (which did get an audience laugh.
This light-weight conversation ignored Obamacare's failures and therefore IGNORED the continued peril Americans will face under Ryancare.
Tapper ignored the obvious protection for consumers of a law applying to the public employees of the federal government instead of the continued de facto exemption under Obamacare that allows public employees like Ryan to avoid Obamacare by arguing, "Well my employer (the federal government) gives me superior benefits so this law doesn't affect me," which so flagrantly ignored the fact that American taxpayer dollars pay for those superior benefits.
Tapper ignored Obamacare's failed single-risk pool that included not only the effort to prevent the original problem of people being DENIED insurance for pre-existing conditions but then made it illegal to charge people more for those conditions which created the dual problem of meeting insurer demands of creating mandatory under the law purchase of the health insurance product AND made Obamacare's singling out of tobacco users and older Americans only for higher premiums a discriminatory provision. Instead Tapper allowed Paul Ryan to push his high-risk pool ideas that would receive government funding to keep costs down without asking WHERE IN THE LAW IS THE PROHIBITION OF DENIAL OF INSURANCE FOR PRE-EXISTING CONDITIONS?
Tapper ignored Obamacare's failed attempt to force young people into the faux single risk pool through the individual mandate and the prohibitions against premium increases based on anything but age and tobacco use and therefore also ignored the BETTER WAY's plans to include CONTINUOUS COVERAGE mandates, a private sector punishment for not purchasing the consumer financial product of health insurance.
Tapper was actually mute even when a woman asked whether college students would be able to OPT-OUT, an option they don't currently have when Ryan twisted the question into how by removing essential benefits provisions of Obamacare people would be able to choose a plan that suited them and was affordable, thus avoiding a key problem THE CONSUMER ABILITY TO OPT-OUT WITHOUT PENALTY, the consumer power to vote with our dollars and our feet, would not be available under Ryan Care's continuous coverage provisions.
Tapper's own Obama fanboy status prevented him from contradicting the idiotic idea promoted by public employees of Medicare going bankrupt--idiotic because the GOVERNMENT decides where money goes and as anyone with a brain can see, when the government wants to fund something, like say their raises, they come up with the money, so why does the PAID-IN by CITIZENS benefit of Medicare always seem not to be worthy of public employee support? (Oh yeah, because they get retirement benefits paid for by us that only INCREASE over time).
Similarly, Tapper was unable to counter the Obamacare is collapsing argument--Also idiotic, because, after all, you, Paul Ryan, the same way you vote to fund every other pet project and your own benefits could allocate government dollars into Obamacare with a simple stroke of the pen. Idiotic and unaddressed by Tapper because he could not face the reality of Obamacare's failings.
Tapper was mute when Ryan pushed HSAs, the healthy-wealthy high deductible plans that have left millions under-insured with the failed promise of "savings" in the event of illness since the "savings," the pre-tax dollars aren't enough for even a single disastrous event for real people who have this form of health insurance and end up being tax avoidance tools for the wealthy. After all, Obamacare has left millions under-insured with its low-hanging fruit coverage of preventive and its enormous increases in copays, coinsurance and deductibles combined with the government continually raising out-of-pocket maximums.
Finally, Tapper simply allowed Paul Ryan to repeat his Planned Parenthood defunding argument that is appalling to anyone who actually doesn't support screwing the poor. Ryan lectured that Planned Parenthood performs the majority of abortions--Yeah, as an entity, but Planned Parenthood doesn't even perform half the abortions in the country, the rest (60 percent) are performed by others for MORE money.
Democrats need to catch up and acknowledge Obamacare's failings to avoid a perpetuation of that law's major problems for consumers because Ryancare is doing the same thing---the individual mandate, (which Republicans call continuous coverage,) underinsurance, (with the healthy-wealthy push for HSAs), the public employee exemption making their laws not apply to them, a wellness health conglomerate that lines provider pockets with diagnostic and screening dollars and leaves people facing bankruptcy in the event of NEEDED medical services and care.
Everyone who voted for Trump should demand that Trump not simply pass control to Ryan on this matter and everyone who voted for Hillary should focus on the real issues instead of arguing how Hillary Clinton should have won and how great Obamacare was. It's a disservice to consumers.
