Sunday Reading

Carlos Barria / Reuters

As always, please follow the link to the full reads.

Adam Gaffney is a critical care physician. He knows the Republican TrumpCare bill is more about tax cuts for the wealthy than anything else:

Let us imagine that you would like to redistribute hundreds of billions of dollars from working class people to the rich, and wouldn’t hesitate to risk the lives of tens of thousands of people to do so. Well, as luck would have it, there is a bill— the “American Health Care Act” (AHCA)—that does precisely that. [snip] 

Together with savings from having less adequate, skimpier insurance subsidies, these reductions will allow hundreds of billions of dollars to be channeled to the wealthy and corporations in the form of tax cuts. 

By enriching the rich in this manner, the AHCA would leave an estimated 24 million more uninsured by 2028. Similar calculations have already been done, but it’s worth briefly revisiting the blood-arithmetic on this.  

Colleagues of mine recently reported estimates, in the American Journal of Public Health, of how many newly insured people there would have to be to prevent one death per year. These estimates, which, being estimates, aren’t perfect, were based on five studies. The numbers ranged from 300 to 1,239 people.  

If we were to pick a round number on the conservative end of that range – say 1,000 – we would estimate that stripping insurance from 24 million people would produce an estimated 24,000 additional deaths annually. That is 40% more than the sum total of all murders, estimated by the FBI at 14,429 for 2014 (using somewhat different numbers, Vox’s Julia Belluz makes this point and comes to the same figure).

Now, in all fairness to House Republicans, as a critical care physician, I too get blood on my hands when I go to work. The only difference is I can wash mine off. [snip] 

This execrable, homicidal bill must obviously be stopped. But that’s not all we must do. The most enduring defense against the rightwing saboteurs is not continued championship of a flawed status quo, but instead the promise of a better tomorrow: healthcare for all, through a single-payer universal system. That alone will put an end to these deadly assaults on healthcare. 

A Republican's idea of great legislation combines tax cuts for the wealthy, afflicting the afflicted, and systematically dismantling the Obama legacy. This POS bill hits the trifecta.

Warren Buffet is an extremely wealthy man. He also knows the Republican TrumpCare bill was written just for people like him:

May 6 Berkshire Hathaway Inc Chairman Warren Buffett on Saturday fumed that healthcare costs are eating away at the U.S. economy like "tapeworm" and said the Republican approach to overhaul Obamacare is a tax cut for the rich. 

The U.S. House of Representatives on Thursday narrowly approved a bill to repeal and replace Obamacare, a victory for Republican President Donald Trump who has called the 2010 law a "disaster." 

Speaking at Berkshire's annual shareholders' meeting in Omaha, Buffett said his federal income taxes last year would have gone down 17 percent had the new law been in effect. 

"So it is a huge tax cut for guys like me," he said. "And when there's a tax cut, either the deficit goes up or they get the taxes from somebody else." 

E.J. Dionne agrees that this abomination will define Republicans, to their everlasting detriment:

We should never forget May 4, 2017. 

It should forever be marked as the day when the House of Representatives descended to a new level of cruelty, irresponsibility and social meanness. 

The lower chamber has always claimed to be “the people’s house.” No more. It should now come to be known by other names: the house of selfishness, the house of suffering, the house of the wealthy, the house of expediency, the house of untreated illness. Perhaps also: the house of Trump. [snip] 

“This is who we are,” Ryan told his colleagues this week. “This will define us.” 

Yes, it will. [snip] 

And then there is President Trump, who has absolutely no idea what’s in this bill and couldn’t care less. He hailed a measure that dumps people off the insurance rolls by saying that “we will have great, great health care for everyone in our nation.” And then he praised the Australian health-care system, which covers everyone and is the antithesis of the bill he had just praised. 

For the benefit of this empty man, House Republicans, you just sold your social consciences [ed.: puhleeze, they never had social consciences].

The Congressional Budget Office is expected to come out with its official scoring of this atrocity in the coming week. It will lay out the cold facts of this atrocity's impacts, which will have only become worse since the scoring of TrumpCare 1.0.  For now (and into the future), expect much more of what Sen. Chris Murphy observes about Republicans:

In 20 years in public service, I have never seen the level of bald faced, intentional lying that is happening right now. https://t.co/rdp0R83wb0

— Chris Murphy (@ChrisMurphyCT) May 4, 2017

(Photo:  Let this image of Republicans celebrating bringing misery to average Americans in order to deliver tax cuts for the wealthy be imprinted on your brain.)

"A Closer Look" At Lying Hypocrites

Seth Meyers takes "A Closer Look" at the Republican health care tax cut for the wealthy bill (starting at around 2:53), nailing Sneaker of the House Paul "Lyin'" Ryan (R- Galt's Gulch) in the process:

Morning After Reading

Here's some selected reading on yesterday's abomination.

Charles Pierce on Republicans celebrating taking away health care from millions of their fellow citizens:

They had a party in Washington on Thursday to celebrate the fact 24 million people would be made free by losing the healthcare that has made their lives easier since 2009. This was a thing to celebrate. 

They had a party in Washington to celebrate that people with diabetes, or a genetic disposition to Parkinson's, or a congenital heart defect, would be made free because their insurance rates would be subject to the kind ministrations of Republican governors like Sam Brownback, or Republican state legislatures like the one presently sitting in the newly insane state of North Carolina. This was a thing to celebrate. [snip] 

They had a party in Washington to celebrate the fact that taking healthcare from poor people was enough to give the top two percent of Americans a trillion-dollar tax cut. This was a thing to celebrate. 

They had a party in Washington to celebrate the fact that sexual assault can now be considered a preexisting condition. This was a thing to celebrate. 

Goddamn them all. Goddamn the political movement that spawned them and goddamn the political party in which that movement found a home, and goddamn the infrastructure in which their pus-bag of an ideology was allowed to fester until it splattered the plague all over the government. Goddamn anyone who believes that blind, genetic luck is a demonstration of divine design. Goddamn anyone who believes in a god who hands out disease as punishment. Goddamn anyone who stays behind the walls and dances while the plague comes back again.

We could stop right there, but something this abominable deserves piling on.

The Washington Post editorial board on Republican nihilism:

WHAT A BETRAYAL: Republicans promise to maintain access to health insurance for people with preexisting medical conditions, and then on Thursday press a bill through the House that would eliminate those guarantees. 

What a joke: Rep. Fred Upton (R-Mich.) objects to the loss of protection, and then pretends that a paltry $8 billion over five years will fix the problem. 

And what hypocrisy: House Speaker Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.) claims to be restoring fair process to his chamber, and then orchestrates a vote on this hugely consequential bill before the Congressional Budget Office can tell lawmakers what it would cost or how many people would lose access to health care as it took effect. [snip] 

This process began with Republicans seeking to solve a problem that exists only in their imagination: the supposed catastrophic failure of Obamacare. Their solution has involved half-baked legislative language and magical thinking at every step. It is beyond sad that this is what passes for a “win” for President Trump and the Republican majority in Congress.

Catherine Rampell on the Myth of the Moderate Republican:

For years, reports of a mythical figure have lingered in Washington and reverberated through congressional districts around the country. Its legend is spread by talking heads, donors, even many of us in the news media. 

This is the Myth of the Moderate Republican. [snip] 

We’re told of these centrist leading lights of the Grand Old Party, people who listen to experts and weigh evidence, who are serious and sane and even sometimes inclined toward making PowerPoint presentations. They emphasize substance over sloganeering, country over party. 

They are reasonable, rational, sensible. Or so we like to tell ourselves.But at the point that they vote to remake 18 percent of the economy without hearings, without expert testimony, without a public text of a bill even a day before their vote, without waiting for an estimate of either the budgetary or human cost of their handiwork — well, at that point, they lose any claim to “seriousness” or “moderation.”  

If there’s one thing to take away from Thursday’s health-care vote, it’s this: Next time you think these Moderate Republicans are going to save the United States from doing something catastrophically stupid, constructed from the whims of ideologue colleagues, disabuse yourself of the notion. 

Immediately and forever.

This is the best reason not to vote for any Republican, whether or not they voted for this present abomination. Their only compass is one that tells them what's the expedient thing to do, regardless of how it effects others. Those Republican Representatives that voted "no" this time voted that way in an attempt to save their skins, in order that they may continue to plague this country in the future.

John Nichols says no quarter should be given to Republicans:

... What House Republicans voted for on Thursday will not be the final word on this issue. But the votes those Republicans cast for this particular bill ought never be forgotten. House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi warned Republican backers that “they have this vote tattooed on them. This is a scar that they will carry….” Her admonition should serve as a call to arms. [snip] 

They should be held to account for their willingness to tear apart a health-care system in order to reward campaign donors and political allies at the expense of ailing Americans. These wicked politicians will face opposition in 2018. Their opponents should pull no punches. What Ryan and his minions have voted for is not just wrong. It is immoral. 

That is the message that must go forward from this awful day. No quarter should be given in delivering it.

Like nothing else we can recall in recent years, this has exposed the Republican Party for what it is: a collection of amoral sociopaths, liars, hypocrites and nihilists who are unfit to wield power in this country.

BONUS:  For a look at how many would lose coverage in the districts of the partying Republicans, click here. (h/t TPM)

A Shameful Day

By a narrow 217 to 213 margin, Rethuglicans in the House passed their disgraceful bill to replace the Affordable Care Act. Twenty Rethuglicans voted against passage, fearing voters' retribution in the 2018 Congressional elections. As a sign of their mendacity, the Rethugs pushed the bill through without scoring by the Congressional Budget Office, which will report next week on its failure to cover millions of the most vulnerable Americans, while leaving coverage for pre-existing conditions up to states and with a puny high-risk pool. All this, so that they could give their wealthy benefactors a huge tax cut.  Rep. Jim McGovern (D-MA) had some choice words for the other side:

“To claim or to imply that the Republican plan covers people with preexisting conditions, it is a lie. It is a lie. And let’s be honest about it. This does not cover people with preexisting conditions. And to come on the floor and say it does, to try to fool people, well, you may get away with it in the short term, you may get a headline but I tell you people will figure out soon enough when they are denied health care coverage......You should be ashamed. To have a health care bill that cuts Medicaid by $880 billion so you can give a tax cut to the wealthiest people in this country, you should be ashamed.”

The only flaw in Rep. McGovern's statement is his assumption that his Rethug colleagues have a sense of shame, when they don't. Indeed, they're going to the White (Supremacist) House to party with fellow sociopath Donald "Rump" Trump to celebrate their "victory" in stripping health care away from as many as 24 million Americans. Drink up.

BONUS: These 24 Rethuglicans who voted to repeal the ACA represent districts that either voted for Secretary Clinton, or where Rump's vote was below 50%. They need to be defeated in 2018.

BONUS II:  Here's a pic of the shits celebrating at the White House with dimbulb plutocrat Donald "Rump" Trump and smug Sneaker of the House Paul "Lyin'" Ryan clapping happily at the thought of kicking tens of millions of Americans off of health insurance, gutting Medicaid, and giving the rich a trillion dollar tax cut.

Fuck them. Make them pay.



BONUS III: Think Progress lists Rump's six broken promises in the TrumpCare bill.