Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) wrote in a 2009 op-ed in the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel about the Affordable Care Act: "Before members even had time to read the 1,000-page bill, it already has cleared two major House committees." "Those members of Congress who voted for this bill already in their committees did so without knowing what the legislation costs."
The Affordable Care Act took months to enact, and in that time there was extensive committee consideration, outreach to the major healthcare organizations and opportunity for public input. The GOP's American Health Care Act was rushed through in seventeen days from introduction to the first scheduled vote. Three House committees jammed the bill through in one marathon session each and the GOP even waived the one-day rule between the House Rules Committee's release of the bill and the first scheduled vote. After the first two scheduled votes were scrubbed due to insufficient votes for passage, amendments were being done on the fly and the last amendment, that brought over enough votes for a two-vote margin, was negotiated among two GOP lawmakers and President Trump -- Trump had become a legislator in that process.
Ryan also criticized the Democrats for voting on the bill before the Congressional Budget Office had time to score it; however, he was rushing to get a vote on AHCA before the CBO had time to score it, because he knew the score was going to be very bad. Ironically, the addition of $8 billion to the bill was the thing that brought over just enough votes to squeeze it through the House with a two-vote margin, was supposed to help fund the high-risk pool for those who would otherwise lose insurance coverage, but was only four percent of what was needed to fill a shortfall, and didn't even mention "high-risk pool" in the amended language.
In regard to high-risk pools, Speaker Paul was either badly informed or flat-out lying when he informed the nation and the world that high-risk pools have performed well in the past. High-risk pools have significantly raised premium costs for the insured, are expensive to administer, and have been characterized by high deductibles, low annual and lifetime caps. A $74,000 annual cap found in one instance, would not come close to covering a $300,000 drug a patient must take.
Ryan, a devotee of Ayn Rand, who hated collective action and made a hero of the rugged individual who made his way in life without the help of any collective entity, is so rhetorically linked to freedom, that he has said it is a good thing that people have the freedom not to have to buy insurance. What if FDR had included in his Four Freedoms, the freedom not to have to buy insurance?
GOP hypocrisy is not limited to Speaker Ryan, by far, as GOP lawmakers in the Senate have gone along with Majority Leader Mitch McConnell's open declaration that his intent was to make Barack Obama a one-term president, and not to even give Supreme Court nominee, Merritt Garland, a hearing. President Trump's Supreme Court nominee, Neil Gorsuch, was not only rushed through the confirmation process but McConnell used the "nuclear option" --requiring only 51 votes -- to get Senate approval.
The GOP even abused the committee process to try to rush through Trump's Cabinet appointees with the least possible public examination of their qualifications. The attempt was to schedule as many of the committee hearings as possible to begin on the same day, so as to limit media coverage. It was only the absence of required paperwork that caused some hearings to be delayed. Senator Grassley scheduled his hearing for Education Secretary designee, Betsy DeVos, to begin at 5 in the afternoon and limited committee members to one round of questioning.
Even now, thirteen GOP senators, all men, are meeting behind closed doors to try to hammer out a substitute for the highly unpopular ACA replacement bill sent over from the House. No Democrats are welcome and the public is in the dark.
Turning now to the assault on a Guardian newspaper reporter by the GOP candidate for the U.S. House from the state-wide district in Montana --Montana has only one House representative. On the night before the election, the candidate, Greg Gianforte, assaulted the reporter. Although there was no video of the assault, the audio clearly indicated that Gianforte was doing the assaulting. At the end, he ordered the reporter out of the room.
The Gianforte campaign put out a statement placing the blame on the assault on the reporter, because he had been too aggressive in trying to get Gianforte's views on the AHCA. It also identified the reporter as a "liberal," knowing that many GOP rank-and-file members have a highly negative impression of liberals. Fortunately for the cause of some measure of truth prevailing, a Fox News reporter present said that Gianforte put his two arms around the reporter's neck, pulled him down to the floor and began punching him.
Reaction to the assault by GOP members and lawmakers was rather mild for the most part: one voter for Gianforte said he had heard of the assault but didn't know how serious it was; a second said the assault made no impression on him; one U.S. House member had no criticism to make of Gianforte; and Speaker Ryan only asked for Gianforte to apologize. Senator Ben Sasse (R-Nebraska) registered perhaps the strongest criticism of the assault.
Rush Limbaugh, once considered to be the GOP kingmaker, called the assault "manly" and "studly."
Not only could Gianforte be sentenced to six months in jail, filing a false report to law enforcement is considered to be a crime in some legal jurisdictions.
ADDENDUMS:
*President Trump was thrilled with his audience with the Pope. When confronted by power, Trump becomes very deferential.
*Today, Trump announced U.S. withdrawal from the Paris Agreement on climate change. This goes against the advice of the Secretary of State and, apparently, against an appeal from the Pope. Details are in the offing and Trump could change his mind. Gary Cohn, a chief economic adviser to Trump, had recently said that Trump's views on climate change were "evolving." Apparently they evolved to his long-held position.
*Trump told Philippine President Delerte that the U.S. had two nuclear-armed submarines near North Korea. Information about the location of U.S. subs is considered to be highly classified.
*Trump also praised the Philippine President for his conduct of the drug war. Thousands of people have been killed in the drug war, with Delerte being personally involved in some of the killings.
*Both Jeff Sessions and Jared Kushner failed to disclose contacts with Russian officials on their security forms. The defense being offered for Sessions is that as a senator he had so many contacts that he couldn't mention them all.
*President Trump said at the G7 summit that he would not call terrorists "monsters;" instead, he would henceforth call them "losers." Given that Trump has called so many people "losers", it might be hard to distinguish which are ordinary "losers" and which are terrorists.
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