Listen All Y'All It's Sabotage

The Trump regime isn't even bothering to hide the fact that the goal now is what former Obama administration Medicare/Medicaid chief Andy Slavitt calls "synthetic repeal". 

Much of the enforcement of ACA regulations are at the will of the executive branch, and Trump is doing everything he can to use those regulations to collapse the individual plan markets and force repeal of the law.  Of course, doing so will wreck the country's insurance markets, plunge insurers into chaos, and jack up premiums on pretty much everyone.

But that's the point. Trump's biggest sabotage efforts so far will come next week with a new executive order that will almost certainly devastate health care coverage for millions.

President Donald Trump will sign an executive order next week to start lifting some insurance rules set by his predecessor’s Affordable Care Act in the aftermath of the failed Republican bid to repeal the law, a senior administration official said Saturday. 

The order is aimed at expanding insurance options for Americans who buy coverage on their own or work for a small employer, and would include broad instructions for agencies to explore ways to loosen regulations and potentially lower premiums, as well as looking at three specific areas of health insurance. It has been anticipated by industry officials and political observers in the days since the GOP repeal effort crashed.

Republicans have long contended that the insurance rules set by the 2010 health law, popularly dubbed Obamacare, have driven up premiums in the individual and small group markets, for healthier Americans especially. Democrats and supporters of the law typically counter that the rules have protected consumers from unwittingly buying shoddy products and helped subsidize the costs of sicker Americans. 

Mr. Trump will order three agencies, the departments of Health and Human Services, Labor and Treasury, to take steps to make it easier for people to band together and buy insurance through “association health plans,” the official said. 

Such plans would in some ways be like large employer’s health plans, subject to some restrictions set by the Affordable Care Act, including a ban on lifetime limits. But they would be free of other regulations, including the requirement that insurance plans cover a set package of benefits. These plans are popular with conservatives; some insurers fear that associations would peel off healthier and younger individuals and leave traditional insurance plans to cover sicker and older customers. 

The president also will order the agencies to start winding back an Obama-era rule curbing coverage known as “short-term medical insurance,” a low-cost but limited-protection option, and allow people to once again buy those plans for up to a year, the official said. 

The Obama administration banned the sale of those plans that offered coverage for more than 90 days, arguing they were inadequate for people’s needs. Some industry officials have pressed the administration to restore them, saying that when marketed honestly they can fit the needs of particular consumers currently priced out of buying the more generous coverage available as a result of the 2010 health-care overhaul. 

In addition, the executive order would order agencies to expand health reimbursement accounts, employer-funded arrangements that employees can use to pay out-of-pocket medical costs and premiums. Obama-era guidance from 2013 had prevented pretax employer dollars in the arrangements from being used to buy health insurance on the individual market. 

The three moves would represent the most substantive step the White House has taken to date in paring back Affordable Care Act rules using administrative powers. They don’t go as far as many critics of the law would like but are likely to be followed by other steps, administration officials said.

The three steps combined would be a nightmare: they would recreate high-risk pools with little coverage and no guaranteed benefits other than catastrophic coverage and allow employers to move employee plans to that model,meaning millions of people would be dodging both the individual mandate and the penalty fee for not having insurance.

It would cause insurance rates for everyone else to skyrocket as a result, collapsing the markets for both individual plans and for employer-based plans too, meaning instead of real insurance, employers could offer health savings accounts for junk plans with no real coverage, and have to pay up front for the privilege (and lose the money at the end of the year if they didn't use it for health care).

In other words, it's a direct recipe for blowing up Obamacare and everyone knows it.

Democrats have characterized the effort as potentially sabotaging the consumer protections they set in the ACA, and they have won support from some insurance industry officials. The National Association of Insurance Commissioners has said it has concerns. 

Some industry officials say that siphoning off healthier individuals from the existing insurance markets with the promise of skimpier benefits but lower premiums could further undermine those markets, increasing premiums ever more for the sicker, costlier enrollees that remain. 

“Its aim is clearly to do with the pen what Congress wouldn’t—eliminate pre-existing condition protections, essential benefit protections and lifetime caps and turn the ACA into a sparsely available high-risk pool,” said Andy Slavitt, who was the Obama administration’s top official at the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.

Only garbage coverage plans would be available through the ACA, and everyone would suffer.

But again, that's the point.

Zuck Trucks Amok But He Mucked Up

Back in August I came to this conclusion about Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg's nascent political aspirations:

So here's the exit question folks: which is more frightening? 

One one hand there's the notion that Zuck wants to run the country like he's running Facebook, as the ultimate Silicon Valley dudebro who thinks tech can solve everything. On the other hand there's the notion that he's lost control of his social network behemoth and not even he knows how to fix the fake news spewing volcano that he's helped to unleash under the body politic. 

Neither scenario exactly fills me with confidence.

Several weeks later as the evidence piles up that the Russians gleefully used $100,000 in Facebook ads as a pro-Trump propaganda tool and that Zuckerberg has lost control of the platform he built to the algorithms that rule it, now we find out that Zuckerberg was warned 15 months ago that his big blue toy was a target and that the Facebook founder ignored the warnings.

In the days immediately after the 2016 election, Facebook C.E.O. Mark Zuckerberg seemed offended by suggestions that the social network he created might have had any influence on the outcome, beyond serving as a marketplace for the exchange of ideas. “Personally, I think the idea that fake news on Facebook, it’s a very small amount of the content, influenced the election in any way is a pretty crazy idea,” he said, on stage at the Techonomy conference in Half Moon Bay, California. While some were quick to blame Facebook for amplifying misinformation about Hillary Clinton, Zuckerberg suggested that critics were betraying a “profound lack of empathy” by not taking voters who supported Donald Trump seriously. 

Zuckerberg wasn’t wrong to be skeptical of Democrats assigning blame rather than engaging in self-reflection. But in dismissing the possibility that social media might be anything other than a force for good, Zuckerberg was also slow to recognize Facebook’s own vulnerabilities in an age of information warfare. About a week after the Techonomy conference, however, Zuckerberg received a “wake-up call” from President Barack Obama, The Washington Postreports. During a meeting of world leaders in Lima, Peru, nine days after the election, Obama tried to personally appeal to Zuckerberg, warning that unless Facebook did something, its fake-news problem would only be exacerbated in the next presidential election:

For months leading up to the vote, Obama and his top aides quietly agonized over how to respond to Russia’s brazen intervention on behalf of the Donald Trump campaign without making matters worse. Weeks after Trump’s surprise victory, some of Obama’s aides looked back with regret and wished they had done more.

Zuckerberg acknowledged the problem posed by fake news. But he told Obama that those messages weren’t widespread on Facebook and that there was no easy remedy, according to people briefed on the exchange, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to share details of a private conversation. 

The account of Zuckerberg’s post-election reckoning also reveals new details about what Facebook executives knew, and when they knew it. The Post reports that Facebook notified the F.B.I. as early as June 2016 when a hacking group working in connection to the GRU, the Russian military intelligence unit, started making fake Facebook profiles to disseminate stolen e-mails and manipulate public opinion—days before Guccifer 2.0, a hacking persona now thought to be a front for Russian intelligence, took credit for hacking the Democratic National Committee. But after looking into the accounts, which were linked to the GRU’s hacking group called APT28 or Fancy Bear, which set up a Facebook profile for Guccifer 2.0 and a Facebook page called DCLeaks, the company came to believe they weren’t linked to a foreign government but were instead financially motivated.

Facebook thought it was about money, not politics.  Then they took the money anyway. Which just goes to show you that the part of technology most vulnerable to manipulation remains the humans who think they control it.

No wonder then that Steve Bannon sought to put a mole among Facebook's staff.

Steve Bannon plotted to plant a mole inside Facebook, according to emails sent days before the Breitbart boss took over Donald Trump’s campaign and obtained by BuzzFeed News.

The email exchange with a conservative Washington operative reveals the importance that the giant tech platform — now reeling from its role in the 2016 election — held for one of the campaign’s central figures. And it also shows the lengths to which the brawling new American right is willing to go to keep tabs on and gain leverage over the Silicon Valley giants they used to help elect Trump — but whose executives they also see as part of the globalist enemy. 

The idea to infiltrate Facebook came to Bannon from Chris Gacek, a former congressional staffer who is now an official at the Family Research Council, which lobbies against abortion and many LGBT rights. 

“There is one for a DC-based ‘Public Policy Manager’ at Facebook’s What’s APP [sic] division,” Gacek, the Senior Fellow for Regulatory Affairs at the group, wrote on August 1, 2016. “LinkedIn sent me a notice about some job openings.” 

“This seems perfect for Breitbart to flood the zone with candidates of all stripe who will report back to you / Milo with INTEL about the job application process over at FB," he continued.

Whether or not anything came of it, we don't know.  But the Trump regime certainly knew how important Facebook was to their plans. And in the end, Doctor Zuckenstein here doesn't want to believe that his creation is a dangerous monster that can be used for nefarious purposes.

We're all in trouble as long as this goes on.

A Huge Serving Of Baked Alaska

How bad is the Graham-Cassidy Trumpcare bill in the Senate?  It's so awful, Republicans are trying to buy off GOP Sen. Lisa Murkowski's vote by letting Alaska keep Obamacare.

Let that sink in for a bit.

According to the aide, here is a summary of what the new draft of the bill entails:
"This draft includes 3 separate provisions benefitting Alaska.

Alaska (along with Hawaii) will continue to receive Obamacare’s premium tax credits while they are repealed for all other states. It appears this exemption will not affect Alaska receiving its state allotment under the new block grant in addition to the premium tax credits.

Delays implementation of the Medicaid per capita caps for Alaska and Hawaii for years in which the policy would reduce their funding below what they would have received in 2020 plus CPI-M [Consumer Price Index for Medical Care].

Provides for an increased federal Medicaid matching rate (FMAP) for both Alaska and Hawaii."

The changes aren't final, and it remains to be seen whether they'll be enough to win Murkowski's vote.

Who knows if she'll vote for it, but Republicans are willing to let Alaska (and Hawaii) keep Obamacare and avoid massive Medicaid cuts just to get one vote.

So why isn't that good enough for everyone else in America, you ask?

Good question.

The Return Of The Revenge Of The Son Of Trumpcare, Con't

The Graham-Cassidy GOP Trumpcare But Worse legislation being rushed through the Senate right now that will effectively end not only the ACA but Medicaid as well, is, as Scott Lemieux points out, old-school perfidious "states' rights" garbage.

Essentially, Republicans are claiming that many people lack access to affordable healthcare because federal politicians haven’t been creative enough, and allowing the states to experiment will solve the problem. 

But this is abject nonsense. The politics of healthcare reform in America are difficult because powerful actors have a vested interest in an inefficient and inequitable status quo. But the policy question is not difficult. Under a market system, many people cannot afford access to basic medical care, and all but the most affluent cannot afford expensive treatment for a serious illness. To get needy people access to healthcare requires some combination of public expenditure and cross-subsidization of the sick by the healthy. (During his brief “Kimmel” phase, Cassidy understood this.) 

Though the ACA did not go far enough, it used tighter regulation and more generous subsidies to provide access to tens of millions of people. Cassidy-Graham would destroy this progress. States are no more likely to find a way to provide effective coverage to more people with less money and fewer rules than they are to discover a formula to convert urine into fine Cabernet Sauvignon. It can’t be done. 

Supporters of universal healthcare in California and other states that have used the ACA to cover as many people as possible might be tempted to find a silver lining here. Couldn’t states use the increased flexibility to create a single-payer system? Almost certainly not, because the block grants aren’t generous enough. As Sarah Kliff of Vox observes, states such as California and New York would have to spend a lot more money just to retain the coverage levels of the ACA. The “flexibility” offered by Cassidy-Graham is a ruse — it would make it easy for states to cover fewer people but exceptionally difficult for states to cover more people.

And Republicans are selling this as "giving power to the states" just like reactionaries did with, you know, slavery. Jim Crow, and interracial marriage.  It's weird then that so many Republican governors are against the legislation because they understand they're going to get screwed by it.

Understand that Graham-Cassidy is there for two reasons: to destroy President Obama's signature achievement by erasing him from the history books, and to brutally punish those who voted for him so that we never dare raise our voices, our hands, or our votes against the GOP ever again, and remember, the GOP doesn't get paid until they do it.

There's a significant chance that both will be successful results of this bill becoming law.

Another Milepost On The Road To Oblivion

Of course Democrat Rep. Adam Schiff is correct when he said today that Trump only cares about Trump.

Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA), the top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, on Sunday said President Donald Trump is neither conservative nor liberal, but simply “pro-Trump.”

On ABC’s “This Week,” Schiff called Trump’s discussions with Democrats “purely transactional.”

“This is a president, look, who has no ideology. He’s not conservative, he’s not liberal; the only consistent theme seems to be, he’s pro-Trump,” he said. “He’s for his own personal interests.”

Schiff also questioned Trump’s reluctance to enforce policies implemented by former President Barack Obama’s administration.

“I don’t know why it is so hard for this administration, whether it’s on climate or on Iran or on our strategy of defeating ISIS, to acknowledge that the prior administration did some things right,” he said.

And so far his term has been 100% about enriching Donald Trump's bank account while treating everyone else like suckers who are beneath him, because he's the guy in the Oval Office and you're not, period.

That's it.  That's the pathology of Trump.

Pardon The Catastrophe, Con't

It looks like Donald Trump has long wanted the case against his Birther ally Joe Arpaio dropped, to the point of asking AG Sessions to close the case altogether and Trump then deciding on the next best thing: a full presidential pardon.

As Joseph Arpaio’s federal case headed toward trial this past spring, President Trump wanted to act to help the former Arizona county sheriff who had become a campaign-trail companion and a partner in their crusade against illegal immigration.

The president asked Attorney General Jeff Sessions whether it would be possible for the government to drop the criminal case against Arpaio, but was advised that would be inappropriate, according to three people with knowledge of the conversation.

After talking with Sessions, Trump decided to let the case go to trial, and if Arpaio was convicted, he could grant clemency.

So the president waited, all the while planning to issue a pardon if Arpaio was found in contempt of court for defying a federal judge’s order to stop detaining people merely because he suspected them of being undocumented immigrants. Trump was, in the words of one associate, “gung-ho about it.”

“We knew the president wanted to do this for some time now and had worked to prepare for whenever the moment may come,” said one White House official who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the action.

Responding to questions about Trump’s conversation with Sessions, White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said, “It’s only natural the president would have a discussion with administration lawyers about legal matters. This case would be no different.”

The Justice Department declined to comment.

Trump’s Friday-evening decision to issue his first pardon for Arpaio was the culmination of a five-year political friendship with roots in the “birther” movement to undermine President Barack Obama. In an extraordinary exercise of presidential power, Trump bypassed the traditional review process to ensure that Arpaio, who was convicted of contempt of court, would face no time in prison.

Trump’s pardon, issued without consulting the Justice Department, raised a storm of protest over the weekend, including from some fellow Republicans, and threatens to become a stain on the president’s legacy. His effort to see if the case could be dropped showed a troubling disregard for the traditional wall between the White House and the Justice Department, and taken together with similar actions could undermine respect for the rule of law, experts said. 

Distasteful cronyism at best case, a patently illegal abuse of presidential power at worst, and while both Arizona GOP Senators McCain and Flake are "concerned" over Trump's actions, again nobody will lift a finger to stop him.

But this is the America we live in now, where Trump and Trump alone now determines what federal rule of law means.

Be frightened.

Last Call For The National Revenge Association

Since President Scaryblack Shabazz "Where the white women at?" Ali McBlackmalcolm X is no longer in the White House and firearm and ammo sales are down sharply in 2017 without a Democrat around to "come to take your guns", it seems that the National Rifle Association has to continue to drum up its own targets of fear in order to sell, sell, sell those shootin' irons.  As a result, right-wing loudmouth Dana Loesch and the NRA have declared war on the NY Times.

Another inflammatory video from the National Rife Association went viral Friday afternoon. 

In a short video, NRA spokesperson and conservative firebrand Dana Loesch threatened a "laser-focus" on the New York Times, dubbing the paper "pretentious" and "tone-deaf" without specifying what issues the NRA has with the Times' reporting.

"We've had it with your narratives, your propaganda, your fake news," Loesch said. "We've had it with your constant protection of your Democrat overlords, your refusal to acknowledge any truth that upsets the fragile construct that you believe is real life." 

"Consider this the shot across your proverbial bow," she added. "We've going to fisk the New York Times and find out just what deep, rich means to this old, gray hag."

"Laser-focus" and "shot across the proverbial bow" from a firearm advocacy group is a pretty unmistakable threat, is it not?

Alas, Trump can't sell guns quite like the inchoate racist rage against a black president did.  I don't think fear of a newspaper will do it either, but it's much more likely to get a reporter shot one of these days.

Of course, maybe that's the point.

Kellyanne Con-Job Gives Up The ACA Game

Right-wing news outlets are "useful" these days because Trump regime folks keep talking to them and giving away their plans.  Nobody's more guilty of this than regime TV mouthpiece Kellyanne Conway, who regularly makes the rounds on FOX to fly the colors (orange, mostly).  These guys aren't clever enough to lie, there's no need to read the tea leaves, Trump makes threats and tries to follow up on them whenever he can.

So where is Trump going after this week's Obamacare crash and burn?  Kellyanne knows and straight up told Chris Wallace of FOX News Sunday.

WALLACE: OK, let’s not waste any more time. Let’s talk -- Kellyanne, let's talk about ObamaCare.

The president put out a new tweet today. I want to put it on the screen. He wrote: Don’t give up Republican senators, the world is watching, repeal and replace, and go to 51 votes, nuclear option, get cross state lines and more.

Is that the president’s plan, stay on repeal and replace, change the Senate rules and legislative filibuster so that you can pass a fuller repeal and replace, including selling insurance across state lines?

CONWAY: The president will not accept those who said it's, quote, time to move on. He wants to help the millions of Americans who have suffered with no coverage. They were lied to by the last president. They couldn't keep the doctor. They couldn't keep their plan.

We’ve met with the ObamaCare victims at the White House several times now. They’re real people, they’re suffering.

And when he talks about the 51 votes, the president is basically making the case that so many of the components of real healthcare reform, Chris, requires 60 votes -- the drug pricing, the selling of insurance across state lines, the associated health plans that allow those who don't get their health insurance to the employers like you and I do, or to government benefits, who have been left out because the premiums are too high.

Premiums have doubled. We see in some states that there are no insurers --

(CROSSTALK)

WALLACE: Let's talk about that. Kellyanne --

CONWAY: So, he will. He will stick with it.

WALLACE: OK, failing it, and fail -- and then we should point out that both Republicans and Democrats say that there’s no chance they’re going to change the Senate rules.

Here’s what the president says his plan is.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: I said from the beginning, let ObamaCare implode and then do it. I turned out to be right. Let ObamaCare implode.

(APPLAUSE)

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WALLACE: Failing repeal and replace, is that really what the president intends to do? Does he intend to cut off what are called cost-sharing reductions which lower the out-of-pocket expenses for people, lower income people? And what about -- you talk about real people, what about the millions of people while ObamaCare is imploding that are going to lose healthcare coverage?

CONWAY: So, Chris, I saw the comment from Mr. Schumer, Senator Schumer, about this. What is their plan to help? The CSR payments are being made and we've already got an opinion by one court because you have members of Congress who sued to say that under ObamaCare, this money was never authorized through the Congress. And so, they would like an opportunity to do that, which is, of course, the normal course of business.

Can I just ask Senator Schumer --

(CROSSTALK)

WALLACE: Is the present going to cut off the CSR payments, the out-of-pocket payments? He can do it starting next month, this week.

CONWAY: Yes, he can. He can -- he's going to make that decision this week, and that’s the decision that only he can make.

I mean, that's as loud of an alarm bell as it gets, guys.  Trump has said on Twitter that he plans to cut off these CSR payments (He calls them "bailouts" when they're not, they fund the subsidies for Obamacare premium payments.)  If he does that, Obamacare basically collapses.  It will mean that health insurers will leave the program and that millions will be unable to afford health insurance, period.

So yes, Trump has been screaming about sabotaging Obamacare for weeks now, and guess what? He thinks he can do it.  I bet he's certainly going to try this week.

It's far from over, as I said earlier this morning.

It's Not Dead Yet

Oh, did you think the Senate GOP was just going to walk away from destroying Obama's legacy after trying more than 70 times over the last 7 years to do so? Of course they have another arcane, byzantine Trumpcare proposal and this time it's Lindsey Graham's straight-out assault on Medicaid, effectively ending the federal program and turning into block grants for states, along with massive cuts to those grants from existing funding levels.

In theory, the Senate could bring back up their party line budget “reconciliation” effort to gut Obamacare as soon as next week. Graham’s bill has not been scored by the Congressional Budget Office and did not receive a test vote this week. It currently has a small group of supporters and will likely need major work to pass the Senate, like language defunding Planned Parenthood which would likely alienate a pair of moderate senators.

Sens. Bill Cassidy of Louisiana and Dean Heller of Nevada joined Graham at the White House on Friday, and each has joined Graham’s bill as the new alternative plan for Republicans. The bill’s supporters are telling administration officials and congressional aides that the bill will score far better than previous efforts, which CBO analyses project would cause millions more uninsured people and short-term spikes in premiums.

“I had a great meeting with the President and know he remains fully committed to repealing and replacing Obamacare. President Trump was optimistic about the Graham-Cassidy-Heller proposal. I will continue to work with President Trump and his team to move the idea forward.,” Graham said late Friday.

The South Carolina senator has been talking to Meadows about the bill as a possible way forward that both chambers could accept. Several GOP governors have signaled interest to Graham for the bill as a way to keep funding levels steady and give states more control. Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price is also monitoring those conversations, a Republican aide said.

Meadows has shopped the Graham proposal around to other conservatives to get their take on the bill. He said Thursday that Graham’s bill would need to ease the ability of governors’ to get waivers to ignore some of Obamacare’s regulations.

“We’re going to regroup and stay focused,” Meadows said Friday. “I’m still optimistic that we will have another motion to proceed, and ultimately put something on the president’s desk.”

Sure, it's a great deal for red states that refused Medicaid expansion and already make it impossible to sign up for the program like Texas and Alabama.  For the rest of states, it'll represent hundreds of billions in cuts, oh and states wouldn't have to actually spend any money on Medicaid *at all* if it's like previous GOP proposals, they just have to have a program like Medicaid.  It's not their fault if 99.9% of people don't qualify for it, right?

Meanwhile states like California, New York, and Illinois would see massive, draconian budget cuts, while red states would almost certainly take the money and give tax cuts to the rich.  Lost in the mess would be millions losing their health coverage and while Obamacare rules would stay in place, there wouldn't be any Medicaid to back up coverage for those who couldn't afford individual plans.

Yes, this plan too would devastate the individual insurance market and kicks tens of millions off healthcare plans.  But as the Senate GOP keeps saying, as long as they can pass something, anything, they can get it to conference with the House GOP and force a final bill without the Democrats being able to stop them.

The GOP's biggest enemy now is the clock.  September 30th would mean a government shutdown and no budget, and then they couldn't use budget reconciliation rules and a 50 vote plus Mike Pence threshold to pass repeal unless Mitch eliminates the filibuster, something he knows damn well would give the chamber to the Dems by 2020.

We'll see.

Last Call For McCain Saves Trumpcare

With 48 Senate Republicans voting yes to proceed on debate on a Trumpcare bill that literally none of them have even seen, GOP Senators Ron Johnson of Wisconsin and John McCain of Arizona stood holding the fate of the country in the balance.  Johnson of course voted yes, making it 49.

Guess what path "Maverick" McCain chose.

Senate Republicans voted Tuesday voted to open debate on repealing Obamacare, dramatically reviving an effort that many GOP lawmakers left for dead just a few days ago. 

The vote is a huge political win and turnaround for Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and Republicans who've promised for seven years to repeal Obamacare if voters gave them control of Congress and the White House.

Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), recently diagnosed with brain cancer, entered the chamber to a standing ovation and cast the 50th Republican vote. GOP Sens. Susan Collins of Maine and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska broke ranks to oppose the measure, forcing Vice President Mike Pence to break a 50-50 tie. 

All Democrats opposed the measure. Underscoring the significance of the vote, many senators sat at their desks for the vote. 

The vote is no guarantee that the fractured Republican caucuses can coalesce around a single health care plan. Now that debate has officially started, Republicans in the Senate lack 50 votes on a policy. Moderates oppose repealing Obamacare without a replacement, and conservatives don’t like the idea of significantly replacing it. 

The leading idea now is to repeal only a small portion of the health law just to get a bill to a conference with the Senate.

Of course that "small portion" will be restored in conference to be 95%-100% of the awful House bill, and then these same GOP "heroes" will vote for Trump again, and that will be it for millions of Americans and they lose their insurance and millions more will find care unaffordable in any way, with millions more going bankrupt.

But it doesn't matter to the GOP, as long as they get to erase the nation's only black president from existence.

Never forget that McCain was the deciding vote to proceed in the Senate with whatever the GOP passes and puts on Trump's desk.

Last Call For Running The Numbers

To recap, this is what President Obama did for white people since the middle of his first term:

White America turned the country over to the GOP anyway.  When Reagan had to deal with a first term recession and was re-elected and brought white unemployment down from over 9% to 4% in his second term, the country gladly elected another Republican to follow him because he was a hero.

Obama did the same thing in a much worse recession but was reviled for it by the very people he helped the most.

But please tell me again it was "economic anxiety".

Last Call For We'll Never Have Paris

As expected, Kang the Conqueror continues America's path down the road of the international pariah as the US will now start the process to drop out of the Paris Climate Agreement.

President Trump announced Thursday that he will withdraw the United States from participation in the Paris climate accord, weakening global efforts to combat climate change and siding with conservatives who argued that the landmark 2015 agreement was harming the economy. 

But he will stick to the withdrawal process laid out in the Paris agreement, which President Barack Obama joined and most of the world has already ratified. That could take nearly four years to complete, meaning a final decision would be up to the American voters in the next presidential election. 

Still, Mr. Trump’s decision is a remarkable rebuke to fellow heads-of-state, climate activists, corporate executives and members of the president’s own staff, all of whom failed this week to change Mr. Trump’s mind with an intense, last-minute lobbying blitz. 

It makes good on a campaign promise to “cancel” an agreement he repeatedly mocked and derided at rallies, saying it would kill American jobs. As president, he has moved rapidly to reverse Obama-era policies designed to allow the United States to meet its pollution-reduction targets as set under the agreement.

“In order to fulfill my solemn duty to protect America and its citizens, the United States will withdraw from the Paris climate accord but begin negotiations to re-enter either the Paris accord or an entirely new transaction on terms that are fair to the United States,” the president said. “We are getting out. But we will start to negotiate, and we will see if we can make a deal that’s fair. And if we can, that’s great.”

The rest of the world has immediately vowed that the Paris Agreement will not be renegotiated,  Of course as I've said before, this is about exterminating Barack Obama and his legacy from the history books, and reversing as many of his accomplishments as possible.

Much like gun control, an overwhelming majority (in this case 71% of  Americans) want us to remain in the Paris Agreement, but the Trump regime and his cultists have said no, and so voters will ignore it and continue to vote for Republicans who believe climate change is a massive hoax and who will do everything they can to wreck the planet.

It's possible that the process for the US exit from the framework won't be 100% official until after the next presidential election, meaning that the Democratic candidate in 2020 may be able to keep us in, but I would assume at this point that no international partner will trust the US after this point, so there's really no point in us engaging.

We are a isolated rogue state.

The world will rightfully treat us as such.  I doubt the damage from Trump will be fixed in my lifetime, if ever.

Russian To Judgment, Con't

A lot to cover in developments in the ongoing Trump/Russia collusion investigation in the last day or so, so let's get to it: First up, remember the two Russian diplomatic compounds in the US that then President Obama kicked the Russians out of in December? Those compounds are now going right back to Vlad and his buddies to continue operating. 

The Trump administration is moving toward handing back to Russia two diplomatic compounds, near New York City and on Maryland’s Eastern Shore, that its officials were ejected from in late December as punishment for Moscow’s interference in the 2016 presidential election.

President Barack Obama said Dec. 29 that the compounds were being “used by Russian personnel for intelligence-related purposes” and gave Russia 24 hours to vacate them. Separately, Obama expelled from the United States what he said were 35 Russian “intelligence operatives.”

Early last month, the Trump administration told the Russians that it would consider turning the properties back over to them if Moscow would lift its freeze, imposed in 2014 in retaliation for U.S. sanctions related to Ukraine, on construction of a new U.S. consulate on a certain parcel of land in St. Petersburg.

Two days later, the U.S. position changed. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson told Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak at a meeting in Washington that the United States had dropped any linkage between the compounds and the consulate, according to several people with knowledge of the exchanges.

Last week the Russian Embassy's Twitter account retweeted a Sputnik article calling for the US to return those two compounds or face consequences.  Looks like manly man Trump caved in order to give his real boss a nice present.

And speaking of Russian bosses, Attorney General Jeff Session has once again been caught perjuring himself with evidence of yet another clandestine meeting between him and Russian Ambassador Sergei Kislyak that Sessions failed to disclose to Congress.

Congressional investigators are examining whether Attorney General Jeff Sessions had an additional private meeting with Russia's ambassador during the presidential campaign, according to Republican and Democratic Hill sources and intelligence officials briefed on the investigation. 

Investigators on the Hill are requesting additional information, including schedules from Sessions, a source with knowledge tells CNN. They are focusing on whether such a meeting took place April 27, 2016, at the Mayflower Hotel in Washington, DC, where then-candidate Donald Trump was delivering his first major foreign policy address. Prior to the speech, then-Sen. Sessions and Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak attended a small VIP reception with organizers, diplomats and others. 

In addition to congressional investigators, the FBI is seeking to determine the extent of interactions the Trump campaign team may have had with Russia's ambassador during the event as part of its broader counterintelligence investigation of Russian interference in the election.

Once again Sessions lied to Congress under oath, but he's still allowed to be Attorney General. Fun times. 

On the congressional side of the investigation, the House is finally issuing subpoenas to those involved in the Russia investigation...but also to former Obama administration officials over "unmasking" these names as Republicans still blame the previous administration for all this.

A political feud erupted on Wednesday over the U.S. House Intelligence Committee's probe of suspected Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential election, with charges that the panel's Republican chairman subpoenaed the CIA, FBI and National Security Agency without telling Democratic members.

Committee aides complained that the chairman, Representative Devin Nunes, who publicly recused himself from leading the Russia probe in April following a secret visit he paid to White House officials, failed to consult Democrats on the subpoenas.

The subpoenas asked the agencies to provide details of any requests made by two top Obama administration aides and the former CIA director to "unmask" names of Trump campaign advisers inadvertently picked up in top-secret foreign communications intercepts, congressional sources said.

The former officials named in the subpoenas were Obama national security adviser Susan Rice, former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Samantha Power and former CIA Director John Brennan.

"Subpoenas related to the 'unmasking' issue would have been sent by Chairman Nunes acting separately from the committee's Russia investigation. This action would have been taken without the minority's (Democrats') agreement," said a senior committee aide, speaking on condition of anonymity.

Another congressional source, who also requested anonymity, said Democrats were "informed and consulted" before the subpoenas were issued.

Former Trump National Security Adviser Mike Flynn and Trump's personal lawyer, Michael Cohen were issued subpoenas, but so have former Obama National Security Adviser Susan Rice, Obama's CIA Director John Brennan, and Obama's UN Ambassador Samantha Power.

In other words, the House GOP wants to dump as much of this on "Obama leakers" as they can to distract from Trump's possible crimes.

But in the Senate, the hammer may drop as early as this time next week as fired FBI Director James Comey is expected to testify publicly.

Fired FBI director James Comey plans to testify publicly in the Senate as early as next week to confirm bombshell accusations that President Donald Trump pressured him to end his investigation into a top Trump aide's ties to Russia, a source close to the issue said Wednesday. 

Final details are still being worked out and no official date for his testimony has been set. Comey is expected to appear before the Senate Intelligence Committee, which is investigating possible connections between the Trump campaign and Russia during last year's presidential election. 

Comey has spoken privately with Special Counsel Robert Mueller III to work out the parameters for his testimony to ensure there are no legal entanglements as a result of his public account, a source said. Comey will likely sit down with Mueller, a longtime colleague at the Justice Department, for a formal interview only after his public testimony. 

When he testifies, Comey is unlikely to be willing to discuss in any detail the FBI's investigation into the charges of possible collusion between Russia and the Trump campaign -- the centerpiece of the probe, this source said. But he appears eager to discuss his tense interactions with Trump before his firing, which have now spurred allegations that the president may have tried to obstruct the investigation.

This of course explains the House move to put Rice, Brennan and Power under oath.  I would expect it to happen the same day or the day after Comey testifies.

Stay tuned.

Climate Of Disgust

All indications are Trump wanted to wait until after the G7 summit last week and return to the US to announce America was dropping out of the Paris Climate Accords so he could get credit with the rubes who voted for him.

President Trump has privately told multiple people, including EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt, that he plans to leave the Paris agreement on climate change, according to three sources with direct knowledge.

Publicly, Trump's position is that he has not made up his mind and when we asked the White House about these private comments, Director of Strategic Communications Hope Hicks said, "I think his tweet was clear. He will make a decision this week."

Why this matters: Pulling out of Paris is the biggest thing Trump could to do unravel Obama's climate policies. It also sends a stark and combative signal to the rest of the world that working with other nations on climate change isn't a priority to the Trump administration. And pulling out threatens to unravel the ambition of the entire deal, given how integral former President Obama was in making it come together in the first place.

Caveat: Although Trump made it clear during the campaign and in multiple conversations before his overseas trip that he favored withdrawal, he has been known to abruptly change his mind — and often floats notions to gauge the reaction of friends and aides. On the trip, he spent many hours with Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner, powerful advisers who back the deal.

It would forever make Trump a hero to the Rolling Coal set.  No matter what happens to him as far as impeachment or the Russia collusion investigation, the notion that he utterly dismantled the first black president's legacy so thoroughly and completely will always earn him a permanent place as a god among white supremacist America.

The goal was always to erase Barack Obama from history and to erase any political power his supporters have, to put us in our place as America is "made great again", to unravel in months what it took him years to create.  Millions of Americans are happy to vote for the white man who does that.

Going After Her Lunch

The Trump Regime continues its erasure of the Obamas in every way, this time completely dismantling former First Lady Michelle Obama's championed programs for kids, including global education for girls.

The Trump administration is discontinuing a signature girls education initiative championed by former first lady Michelle Obama, according to officials. 

The "Let Girls Learn" program, which she and President Barack Obama started in 2015 to facilitate educational opportunities for adolescent girls in developing countries, will cease operation immediately, according to an internal document obtained by CNN. 

While aspects of the initiative's programming will continue, employees have been told to stop using the "Let Girls Learn" name and were told that, as a program unto itself, "Let Girls Learn" was ending. 

"Moving forward, we will not continue to use the 'Let Girls Learn' brand or maintain a stand-alone program," read an email sent to Peace Corps employees this week by the agency's acting director Sheila Crowley. 

" 'Let Girls Learn' provided a platform to showcase Peace Corps' strength in community development, shining a bright light on the work of our Volunteers all over the world," Crowley wrote. "We are so proud of what 'Let Girls Learn' accomplished and we have all of you to thank for this success." 

Gotta get "Moochelle's" name off the letterhead I guess.  But the real hatred against her has always been over her efforts to make school lunches healthier, a national initiative that fostered unending, volcanic, inchoate and incandescent rage among conservatives.  Those standards are now in the dumpster as newly confirmed Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue's first move.

Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue took steps Monday to roll back healthy school lunch standards promoted by former first lady Michelle Obama in one of his first regulatory acts.

In an interim final rule, aimed at giving schools more flexibility, Perdue and his department are postponing further sodium reductions for at least three years and allowing schools to serve non-whole grain rich products occasionally as well as 1 percent flavored milk.

The rule allows states to exempt schools in the 2017-2018 school year from having to replace all their grains with whole-grain rich products if they are having a hard time meeting the standard.

USDA said it will take “all necessary regulatory actions to implement a long-term solution.”

“This announcement is the result of years of feedback from students, schools, and food service experts about the challenges they are facing in meeting the final regulations for school meals,” Perdue said in a statement.

“If kids aren't eating the food, and it’s ending up in the trash, they aren't getting any nutrition – thus undermining the intent of the program.”

The real issue was of course healthier meals are something that A) poor black and brown kids who can't pay for school lunches don't deserve apparently, and B) something that Big Ag was furious about having to help provide when they could be selling snacks and soda to kids in vending machines in every school in the country instead.

For this, Michelle Obama was treated as an object of pure racist hatred, for the unforgivable crime of wanting kids to eat healthier and for girls to learn more.  Thank goodness we're making school lunches great again, or some garbage like that, cause that Obama bitch needs to be put in her place, right boys?

God some days I hate this country.  I really do.

Last Call For Economic Anxiety

Remember folks that the economy was terrible, horrible, and miserable until January 20, 2017.

Now it's great again!

I guess economic anxiety only happens under Democratic presidents.  Especially black ones.

Not Just Kentucky, But Ohio Too

I know we've read a lot of stories about Obamacare here in Kentucky, where 440,000 stand to lose health coverage under the GOP bill.  But the story in Ohio is even worse, where a million people could end up with no coverage  John Kasich went with Medicaid expansion through an overwhelmingly GOP state legislature (and Lord knows they did everything they could to try to stop it) but now the reality of Obamacare repeal in this newly-minted Midwest Trump state is hitting home.

James Waltimire, a police officer on unpaid medical leave, has been going to the hospital in this small city twice a week for physical therapy after leg surgery, all of it paid for by Medicaid.

Mr. Waltimire, 54, was able to sign up for the government health insurance program last year because Ohio expanded it to cover more than 700,000 low-income adults under the Affordable Care Act. He voted for President Trump — in part because of Mr. Trump’s support for law enforcement — but is now worried about the Republican plan to effectively end the Medicaid expansion through legislation to repeal the health care law.

“Originally the president said he wasn’t going to do nothing to Medicaid,” Mr. Waltimire said the other day after a rehab session. “Now they say he wants to take $880 billion out of Medicaid. That’s going to affect a lot of people who can’t afford to get insurance.”

As Republicans in Washington grapple with how to meet their promise of undoing the greatest expansion of health care coverage since the Great Society, they are struggling with what may be an irreconcilable problem: bridging the vast gulf between the expectations of blue-collar voters like Mr. Waltimire who propelled Mr. Trump to the presidency, and longstanding party orthodoxy that it is not the federal government’s role to provide benefits to a wide swath of society.

If they push forward the House-drafted health bill, which could come to a vote as early as this coming week, Republicans may honor their vow to repeal what they derided as Obamacare, but also risk doing disproportionate harm to the older, working-class white voters who are increasingly vital to their electoral coalition.

Many of those voters live in small Midwestern cities like Defiance and neighboring Bryan, home of a candy company that makes Dum Dum lollipops but has moved many of its jobs to Mexico. Though unemployment is low in the region, where farmland stretches for miles between towns, the slow erosion of manufacturing has taken a toll, and “what’s left in our communities are lower-paying jobs,” said Dr. Neeraj Kanwal, the president of Defiance Regional Hospital.

The region has voted Republican in presidential contests for decades, but its support for Mr. Trump — he took 64 percent of the vote in Defiance County and an even larger share in most of the surrounding counties — was more resounding than for any candidate since Ronald Reagan. Yet many people here tend to have conflicting values that make repeal of the health law appealing on its face but ultimately hard to swallow.

“People in this community are very conservative. They struggle with the federal budget deficit, and they like the idea of personal responsibility,” said Phil Ennen, the president and chief executive of Community Hospitals and Wellness Centers, which has a 75-bed hospital in Bryan. “But at the same time, we have a lot of friends and family and neighbors who just don’t have a lot going for them. There is a population out there that needs Medicaid. That’s the dilemma.”

And yet most of the people who voted for Trump, if not every single one of them, bought the promise that Trump would never take Medicaid away from them, personally. 

But here we are.

Oh I don't feel sorry for them.  They gladly voted to take health care coverage away from those people who "didn't deserve it", anyone black or brown.  They knew what Trump was selling.  They just figured he wouldn't screw them over this early.

But again, here we are.  

Only now are people like Jim Waltmire asking questions. Only now are they showing up at town halls.  Only now are they worried about losing what Obama gave them.  Only now.  And the rest? They think Trump will fix it all for them.

When that doesn't happen, then what?

Last Call For Flint, Stones

Republicans in Congress refused to help Flint's water crisis for years until after the 2016 election, when the GOP suddenly decided that passing an emergency grant in December for $120 million that President Obama signed into law was a good idea.  Now we know why they took so long: more than three months later, the Trump regime is taking 100% of the credit for saving Flint when "Obama did nothing" to help.

The fix is part of the Trump administration’s goal of updating the country’s water infrastructure, EPA administrator Scott Pruitt said Friday in a press statement.

“The people of Flint and all Americans deserve a more responsive federal government,” he said. “EPA will especially focus on helping Michigan improve Flint’s water infrastructure as part of our larger goal of improving America’s water infrastructure.”

Michigan Democrats and Republicans praised the EPA’s decision to infuse money into the dilapidated city’s broken water supply.

“We are excited and very grateful to receive these much-needed funds,” said Flint Mayor Karen Weaver. “The City of Flint being awarded a grant of this magnitude in such a critical time of need will be a huge benefit.”

Michigan officials and Flint residents have been struggling to get the small, mostly black town’s water system up and running after lead contaminated its water supply.

Officials switched the small Eastern Michigan city’s water supply from Lake Huron in 2015 to the Flint River in a bid to save money. But the state applied the wrong regulations and standards for drinking water, which ultimately resulted in corroded pipes.

Various reports conducted in the past two years indicate the EPA has been slow to respond to the growing scandal.

One report published in March, 2016, claimed the EPA only acts to enforce clean drinking water regulations when public outrage reaches a fever pitch, implying negligence on the part of agency officials.

Another report conducted in February, 2016, by the Congressional Research Service (CRS), details how the EPA fails to force state regulators to comply with federal drinking water laws.

Nearly 2,000 citizens became fed up with the dawdling, so they sued the federal agency for failing to address the long-running water crisis.

The lawsuit claims the EPA failed to take the proper steps to ensure that state and local authorities were addressing the crisis. The defendants are seeking a civil action lawsuit for $722 million in damages.

You catch all that?  How the Obama EPA "failed" Flint when Republicans refused to lift a finger in Congress to help until Trump won and they could take credit?   That's the Trump regime for you: a problem the GOP created over years of neglect, suddenly fixed when they have the window to blame it on Obama.

Only then do the people of Flint get help with their lead-poisoned water, because they can score political points.

Nice, huh?

The Republicans Are Playing With Thermite

Yesterday Donald Trump went wild on Twitter, accusing President Obama of tapping his phones at Trump Tower and demanding that somebody do something about it, I guess forgetting that as the guy supposedly in charge that he can happily interfere with the ongoing FBI investigation into his Russian collusion and declassify whatever he wants to.

President Donald Trump made a stunning claim Saturday, alleging without offering evidence that his predecessor, Barack Obama, wiretapped his phones at Trump Tower ahead of the 2016 election. 

"Terrible! Just found out that Obama had my 'wires tapped' in Trump Tower just before the victory. Nothing found. This is McCarthyism!" Trump tweeted early Saturday morning in one part of a six-tweet tirade that began just after 6:30 a.m. 

The President went on to compare the alleged tapping of his phones to Watergate and called Obama "bad (or sick)." 

"How low has President Obama gone to tap my phones during the very sacred election process. This is Nixon/Watergate. Bad (or sick) guy," Trump tweeted. 

But two former senior US officials quickly dismissed Trump's accusations out of hand.
"Just nonsense," said one former senior US intelligence official. 

Another former senior US official with direct knowledge of investigations by the Justice Department under the Obama administration said Trump's phones were never tapped. 

"This did not happen. It is false. Wrong," the former official told CNN.

A spokesman for Obama, Kevin Lewis, called "any suggestion" that Obama or any White House official ordered surveillance against Trump "simply false." 

Republicans are of course happy to enable Trump's fantasy, vowing to investigate this "latest Obama scandal."

A Republican member of the Senate Intelligence Committee says he believes President Donald Trump's unsubstantiated allegations that his predecessor ordered wiretaps of Trump Tower will become part of the committee's investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election.

Arkansas Sen. Tom Cotton says, "We're going to follow the facts wherever they lead us. And I'm sure that this matter will be a part of that inquiry."

Trump has provided no evidence of his tweeted accusation that former President Barack Obama wiretapped Trump Tower during the 2016 presidential campaign.

And Cotton said he has not seen any evidence of official wiretapping.

Cotton tells "Fox News Sunday," ''That doesn't mean that none of these things happened. It simply means I haven't seen that yet."

Note Cotton is carefully hedging his bets here.  The obvious reality is that Trump, long considered a national security risk thanks to his dealings with the Russians, was and still is being investigated under FISA statutes by the FBI.  The Breitbart/Bannon wing of the Trump regime is desperately trying to flip this on its head as this being a gross abuse of power by Obama, and indeed the calls to immediately jail the former President are already all over white supremacist Twitter, led by Roger Stone and Mike Cernovich.

Things could get ugly, fast here.  Again, no president in US history has ever been removed against his will.  Nixon resigned when it became clear he had lost the trust of both parties and the American people.  Trump will do no such thing.  If Republicans in Congress decide that it's Obama that needs to be investigated here and not Trump, the results could be both bloody and disastrous.

Sadly, there's every reason to believe that in the name of political expediency, the GOP will play Trump's games.

What's really stopping Trump from rounding up Democrats at this point?

Meanwhile In Congress, Con't

With all the serious allegations surrounding the Trump regime right now, it's important to note that House Republicans have their own agenda, and at the top of the list is burying Obamacare and throwing tens of millions of people off various Medicaid expansion programs. The GOP hardliners led by NC Rep. Mark Meadows in the House Freedom Caucus aren't waiting around for this to magically happen (surprise, they don't trust Paul Ryan) so Meadows and his Tea Party crew say they want it gone completely by this time next month.

The situation: Republicans have two different opportunities to pass major legislation without Democrats through a process called budget reconciliation. The plan has been to use the first reconciliation bill on Obamacare repeal and replace and the second on tax reform. But while leadership has been exploring how much of a replacement it can fit into the repeal bill, Meadows — along with a growing number of conservatives — are saying they want repeal and replacement done in separate bills voted on at the same time. He then wants to use the second reconciliation to replace Obamacare, along with tax reform. 

Here's what he wants: 

1. Within the next 30 days, a vote on full repeal of Obamacare. This includes the individual mandate, the employer mandate and the law's insurance regulations. While these laws weren't included in a 2015 repeal bill because of reconciliation rules, Meadows thinks there are ways around that.
2. Immediately vote on a replacement plan, also within the next 30 days. The replacement must include a way of dealing with pre-existing conditions. Assume it doesn't pass the Senate filibuster.
3. Potentially vote on a tax reform package under normal procedure, without the border adjustment tax. Meadows thinks this would have a chance of passing with some Democratic support in the Senate.
4. Include Obamacare replacement in the second reconciliation bill "that is, quote, being used for tax reform, but it doesn't have to be just used for tax reform."

House conservatives are generally united in their Obamacare strategy. 

Ahh, but when you talk about tax reform and separate, multiple votes, that starts making Republicans nervous, and Nancy Pelosi, Chuck Schumer and the Dems may yet have an opening to strike.

Ok, but: Putting an Obamacare replacement and tax cuts in the second reconciliation bill — without a border adjustment tax — will cost a ton of money. It's unclear where that money will come from, but it could very well require the bill to need 60 votes in the Senate if it's not paid for. Democrats are very unlikely to help pass anything Republicans put forward after an Obamacare repeal, especially if they also don't like the tax components. Republicans know this and could be very unwilling to jeopardize tax reform in this way.

In other words, by tying expensive tax cuts for the wealthy to Obamacare repeal in order to get the double whammy, the GOP may have bitten off more than they can chew and left the door open for the Democrats to scrap the entire plan.  Impatient GOP House conservatives are getting a lot of static from constituents about not having this done already, and the pressure on them is about to get turned up to 11.

For the past three weeks, Democratic protesters have swarmed Republican town hall events across the country, booing, shouting down and trying to embarrass GOP lawmakers seeking to gut ObamaCare. 

In the coming weeks, grassroots conservatives will be fighting back. 

FreedomWorks, the Tea Party-aligned outside group, beginning next month will be organizing rallies and urging its nearly 6 million activists to turn out at town hall events to ensure members of Congress are also getting an earful from ObamaCare detractors.

“There will be more grassroots hand-to-hand combat than we’ve seen in Washington for a long time,” FreedomWorks President and CEO Adam Brandon said Monday during an interview in his office near the Capitol. 

“The conservative [lawmakers], they need to see us out there pushing. And if they see that, they’ll be bold,” he continued. “If they don’t see grassroots there on the ground, they’ll start slipping.”

In other words, the odds that House GOP blockheads are going to move too far, too fast on Obamacare is increasing exponentially, and that the whole thing my come apart at the seams. It certainly wouldn't be the first time Obama-era legislation would be saved by GOP incompetence, and it would certainly not be the last.