Senators Rand Paul (R-KY), Mike Lee (R-UT), Ted Cruz (R-TX), Mark Meadows (R-NC) and Tom Cotton (R-AR) and the House Freedom Caucus oppose replacing ObamaCare with another version involving too much government control and a new version of subsidies called tax credits, while Senators Lamar Alexander (R-TN) and Jeff Flake (R-AZ) have warned Republicans against moving too quickly and overreaching.
The main reason Rand Paul and his like-minded patriots should be and could be opposing the Paul Ryan promoted ‘Replacement’ program of ‘The Establishment’ is that it is all about keeping the government’s controlling tentacles in place like a ‘Control the People Doctrine.’
States Rand Paul in his recent The New American article, “I think the reason why the House leadership bill is Obamacare Lite is because it retains subsidies. Obamacare had subsidies for people to buy insurance. In the Paul Ryan bill, they keep the subsidies — they just call them refundable tax credits. Some people are predicting that it’s actually going to be more expensive than the subsidies we have under Obamacare. This isn’t you getting your own money back, this is you getting somebody else’s money. So, a family that makes $30,000 a year could actually get $14,000 that they didn’t pay. Let’s say they paid zero in income tax, they could get $14,000 back. One, we don’t have the money — it’s a new entitlement program and two, if you get $14,000 back do you think the insurance company is ever going to sell insurance for less than $14,000? That becomes the floor. So, it actually pushes insurance rates up — it doesn’t allow insurance rates to fall. So, that doesn’t allow insurance rates to fall and it sets up a new entitlement.
“The second thing that Paul Ryan’s Obamacare Lite bill does is they keep the Obamacare taxes — all of them — for a year. And then after a year, they keep the Cadillac Tax forever. That’s the tax on if you have really good insurance, Obamacare taxes that. So will Paul Ryan’s plan.
“The third thing they do that is Obamacare-like is they keep the individual mandate. It seems like every Republican says they were against the individual mandate. That’s if you didn’t buy insurance you had to pay a penalty to the government, a tax. Obamacare Lite, Paul Ryan’s plan, just changes it so you have to pay a penalty to the insurance companies. I consider that to still be a mandate that isn’t consistent with those of us who want less government involvement. So they keep the subsidies, they keep the taxes, and then they keep the mandate.
“Then the fourth thing they do is they actually subsidize the insurance companies. Right now, insurance companies are losing money and Obamacare has this rescue thing called ‘risk corridors’ to bail out the insurance companies. Paul Ryan has got the same thing, he just calls it reinsurance and it’s $100 million worth. I predict that might not even be enough. So I don’t like any of it. Now, I do think we agree as Republicans on repeal. But I don’t think we agree on the replacement. That’s why I say we should separate them, vote on repeal and then vote the same day on a separate bill that’s called replace.”
Kentucky Rep. Thomas Massie of the 40 member House Freedom Caucus described the GOP plan introduced by Ryan called the American Health Care Act as a ‘stinking pile of garbage.’ “I think the [American Healthcare Act] was written by the same people that wrote Obamacare,” Massie told the Washington Examiner. “That’s why it looks so similar. It was the insurance lobby.” The Freedom Caucus is committed to “open, accountable and limited government, the Constitution and the rule of law, and policies that promote the liberty, safety and prosperity of all Americans.” Go to the above New American link to see Rand Paul’s plan.
I admired how Paul Ryan came up and have especially admired his work ethic, his sleeping in his office, exercise regime, driving home to Wisconsin on three day weekends while dedicating himself to serious work. But somewhere along the way, maybe by osmosis in the swamp he has become very obviously influenced by handlers of the Establishment or/and LOBBYI$T. He appears to have lost touch with his oath to our Constitution and how our system could work well if only we followed it instead of these influencers.
‘The Establishment’ aka The Council on Foreign Relations (CFR), ‘the Mothership,’ as Hillary Clinton glowingly referred to them, expressed appreciation for their opening of their new offices in D.C. so she wouldn’t have to travel to New York for her marching orders. The CFR is dedicated to controlling all matters political in our government. See: ‘Who the Establishment Really Is‘ to understand just how fervently serious they are about clandestinely taking down America ‘in their own words.’ See also: Hillary Clinton admits Council on Foreign Relations controls Washington
Remember, the States created the Federal Government with clearly specified enumerated powers which it has for decades increasingly overreached. If accountability ruled like it should, such as businesses must be run accountably or they go out of business, the USA would have been gone a long time ago. Wouldn’t it be nice if businesses, could make their own rules, forgive their own errors with no recourse, and especially nice if they could print their own money and borrow into infinity. The Federal Government can’t even run a simple agency that delivers the mail without an annual $18 billion subsidy.
America is about Freedom not guarantees, subsidies or freebies of any kind and it certainly shouldn’t be subsidizing or giving tax credits for healthcare. Nothing is free. Someone always has to pay. Taxpayers get the bill for everything the government does and gives away. ObamaCare was obviously designed to fail so that eventually a song and dance explanation about how it is irreparably flawed would surface, along with the announcement that the simplest ‘fix’ is for the government to just provide everything like the sorry Canadian healthcare system. Single pay if you will and higher taxes. If Paul Ryan’s plan becomes law and is known as ‘RyanCare’ or ‘ObamaCare Lite’ or maybe even ‘DonaldCare’ President Trump and the Grand Old Party will shoulder all the blame and own the wrath of Americans for a poorly run system when the system evolves as it no doubt will ‘by design’ just like the establishment has intended all along. Saul Alinsky will dance in hell because this really is all about controlling the people.
If the government can’t be gotten out of healthcare immediately we should be hearing about a timetable to effectively wean it out accountably in a reasonable time frame. Too big a rush can be disastrous taking the time to do it right only hurts the democrats that will continue seeing the results of ObamaCare embarrassingly dissolving before their eyes.
There is much, much more which is wrong with ‘replacing’ ObamaCare. See the last four articles in Gem State Patriot that deal with the topic: 1. ‘Get Government out of Healthcare and ‘Put the People Back in Charge,’ 2. ‘GOP replaces ObamaCare with SwampCare,’ 3. ‘Healthcare Starts with the Individual, not in the Legislature,’ and 4. ‘Repeal, Don’t Replace ObamaCare.’
As Joe Wolverton, II, JD, said in this above article about Rand Paul, “True conservatives have just one thing on their wish list: for the federal beast to be forced (by the states and the people) back inside its constitutional cage and to leave healthcare — and thousands of other federally funded programs — to the legitimate control of the marketplace.”
“Bad as it is financially for the federal government to be saddled with the runaway costs of ‘entitlement’ programs, it is far worse for the society as a whole to be saddled with millions of people with the ‘entitlement’ mentality and all the social problems that go with it.” – Thomas Sowell, ‘Barbarians Inside the Gates’
