The Republican Tax Bill Demonstrates US No Longer A Democracy

[VarrangianBard]

Also: Coal is dying anyway, because it is an inefficient and ever more expensive source of power relative to gas and oil.
The ACA failed because republicans wanted it to. The government offered the states money to subsidize healthcare for people not covered by medicaid, and many red states rejected the free money. Then republican lawmakers refused to fix the bill once they were in power. They still refuse to work with democrats to revise it. Healthcare bills, like tax bills, are complicated, and need to be updated constantly after release. We're still running ACA v0.1

 

[Timsup2nothin]

You acknowledge the piece was not written by Forbes, but still think it's true because it's published by them? You know opinion pieces are just an archaic form of comment's section, right? The guy who wrote the article works for a right wing think tank, The American Enterprise Institute.

In case you haven't noticed, Jay considers right wing think tanks to be the only valid sources of information. His every post, and thus every discernible thought, is right wing parrot speak.

 

[VarrangianBard]

Never hurts to try

 

[Timsup2nothin]

Never hurts to try

True. I've given up on the jeweler's screwdriver approach and moved on to the sledgehammer myself, but best of luck.

 

[VarrangianBard]

True. I've given up on the jeweler's screwdriver approach and moved on to the sledgehammer myself, but best of luck

Sledgehammers are certainly more cathartic

 

[JollyRoger]

Forbes will usually be right about money issues.

There's no economic justification whatsoever for a tax cut at this time. U.S. GDP is growing, unemployment is close to 4 percent (below what is commonly considered "full employment"), corporate profits are at record levels and stock markets are soaring. It makes no sense to add any federal government-induced stimulus to all this private sector-caused economic activity, let alone a tax cut as big as this one.


This is actually the ideal time for Washington to be doing the opposite. But by damning the economic torpedoes and moving full-speed ahead, House and Senate Republicans and the Trump White House are setting up the U.S. for the modern-day analog of the inflation-producing guns-and-butter economic policy of the Vietnam era. The GOP tax bill will increase the federal deficit by $2 trillion or more over the next decade (the official estimates of $1.5 trillion hide the real
amount with a witches brew of gimmicks and outright lies) that, unless all the rules have changed, is virtually certain to result in inflation and much higher interest rates than would otherwise occur.

The GOP's insanity is compounded by its moving ahead without having any idea of what this policy will actually do to the economy. The debates in the Ways and Means and Senate Finance Committees and on the House floor all took place before the Congressional Budget Office's analysis and, if it really exists, the constantly-promised-but-never-seen report from the Treasury on the economics of this tax bill.

Meanwhile, Congress has ignored other estimates like this one from the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School showing that the tax bill won't do what the GOP is promising.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/stanco...l-economic-sanity-in-washington/#575c776877ef

 

[onejayhawk]

https://www.forbes.com/sites/stanco...l-economic-sanity-in-washington/#575c776877ef

I had not seen that one. Stan Collender is one of the better pessimistic voices on budget matters, so this bears weight.

High debt + rising interest rates = Disaster is a theme of his, so it's not surprising to see it here. I am surprised that he does not address the affect of the rate changes on trade and profitability. He ignores them completely.

The ACA failed because republicans wanted it to. The government offered the states money to subsidize healthcare for people not covered by medicaid, and many red states rejected the free money. Then republican lawmakers refused to fix the bill once they were in power. They still refuse to work with democrats to revise it. Healthcare bills, like tax bills, are complicated, and need to be updated constantly after release. We're still running ACA v0.1

Sledgehammers are certainly more cathartic

ACA failed because it was designed to fail. Had the Democrats still been in power, they would be debating phase II of the plan, also designed to fail. Etc. Use the sledge on the thought process that inspired this particular train wreck.

J

 

[VarrangianBard]

ACA failed because it was designed to fail. Had the Democrats still been in power, they would be debating phase II of the plan, also designed to fail. Etc. Use the sledge on the thought process that inspired this particular train wreck.

So what's their ulterior motive here? What were they trying to accomplish by pushing up healthcare premiums? To get themselves voted out of office? They haven't been there for 7 years.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

So what's their ulterior motive here? What were they trying to accomplish by pushing up healthcare premiums? To get themselves voted out of office? They haven't been there for 7 years.

Haven't you heard? According to the right wing echo chamber they are socialists and their intention is the destruction of America.

 

[Broken_Erika]

Haven't you heard? According to the right wing echo chamber they are socialists and their intention is the destruction of America.

The truth is in Banghazi and the Deleted Emails.

 

[onejayhawk]

So what's their ulterior motive here? What were they trying to accomplish by pushing up healthcare premiums? To get themselves voted out of office? They haven't been there for 7 years.

It's an incremental way of producing single payer when the concept of single payer is unpopular.

In any event, ACA mandated a Cadillac plan with inadequate funding. The writing was on the wall before the enactment.

The truth is in Banghazi and the Deleted Emails.

Wrong thread. That's the Russia collusion answer.

J

 

[VarrangianBard]

So they made the system worse so that people would demand a more radical form of healthcare? Why wouldn't people just want to go back to the original system?

 

[Timsup2nothin]

So they made the system worse so that people would demand a more radical form of healthcare? Why wouldn't people just want to go back to the original system?

Logic need not apply.

 

[hobbsyoyo]

ACA is adequately funded...when Republican governora stop trying to hurt their own constituents just to score the political touchdown that turning down Medicaid money is for the teahadists.

 

[cardgame]

What gives you the idea that single payer is unpopular?

 

[Timsup2nothin]

What gives you the idea that single payer is unpopular?

No one in the right wing echo chamber likes it, and since math doesn't apply there they are a huge majority.

 

[Oerdin]

So what's their ulterior motive here? What were they trying to accomplish by pushing up healthcare premiums? To get themselves voted out of office? They haven't been there for 7 years.

Tgeir followers are so stupid and misinformed they will cheer and then claim the reason their healthcare just got dramatically more expensive is because the ACA wasn't fully repealed. They truly are that delusional and disconnected from reality.

 

[Broken_Erika]

No one in the right wing echo chamber likes it, and since math doesn't apply there they are a huge majority.

Yep, 5,000% of Americans Oppose it. Kinda like Trump won the popular vote by 873 billion-quadrillion-frooglepooplillion votes.

 

[onejayhawk]

ACA is adequately funded...when Republican governora stop trying to hurt their own constituents just to score the political touchdown that turning down Medicaid money is for the teahadists.

Never. Not the day it was signed. Not when the executive order started paying subsidies to insurance companies. Particularly not since those payments were discontinued. We have two years of stories where this company pulls out of that states pool to prove it.

At no point during the Obama administration was the law properly funded, and less so now. If the mandate is removed, it will go from underfunded to insolvent in very short order.

So they made the system worse so that people would demand a more radical form of healthcare? Why wouldn't people just want to go back to the original system?

Basically, yes. They made a system that would pass certain financial checkpoints, without being obviously underwater. It's like a car that can pass emissions test, but won't drive 1000 miles without major work.

Part of the process was to wreck the old system as much as possible, so there could be no return. This is one of the places the mandate came in. Everyone had to participate or face a heavy tax.

J

 

[metalhead]

There was broad consensus in 2008 that the old system was broken. Anybody saying now that the old system was in any way better than the ACA is just lying for their own narrow political ends. "It wasn't adequately funded" just sounds like a totally empty talking point, and I'm sure that's exactly what it is.

More than 20 million more people now have health coverage which covers 100% of their preventive health care costs, and many have obtained it at little or no cost to themselves. Premiums have risen more slowly for all Americans since the ACA went into effect.