We begin today’s roundup with Margaret Hartmann’s analysis at New York Magazine on today’s vote on the GOP’s tax cuts for the wealthy/health insurance plan, and specifically, the return of Senator John McCain to the floor for the crucial vote:
On Tuesday the Senate will vote on the American Health Care Act, which is the first step in their last-ditch effort to do … something to Obamacare this week. In a matter of days Senate Republicans may pass a bill that affects one fifth of the economy and millions of Americans’ lives, and incredibly, they have no idea what it might look like. [...] McCain’s hasty return signals that the Republican leadership thinks they’re close to the 50 votes needed. He may wind up being the senator who revived Zombie Trumpcare one last time. [...]
If this were a movie, Tuesday would be the moment when McCains reclaims his reputation as a legendary “maverick.” After a passionate speech on the Senate floor about what his own tragic illness taught him about the importance of reliable health care, he would look McConnell straight in the eye and vote “no” on the motion to proceed.
Those who don’t want to see millions lose their health coverage for purely political purposes can dream, but recent events suggest that’s not the movie we’re living in.
Michael Hiltzik at The Los Angeles Times explains why McConnell’s last minute Medicaid sweetener is all show:
The sweetener is a $200-billion fund for the 31 states that expanded Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act, to be paid out starting in 2022. Since the GOP bill would eliminate the Medicaid expansion, the ostensible idea is to help them cushion health insurance costs for those states and their Medicaid enrollees forced to transition to the ACA’s individual insurance exchanges. [...] Few objective analysts think the $200 billion fund would provide much of a cushion, since the measure published by the Senate GOP — known as the Better Care Reconciliation Act — would cut more than $700 billion out of federal Medicaid funding over 10 years. But the new study, released Monday by the Urban Institute, finds that the $200 billion would cover those transition costs for barely two years.
Jessica Schorr Saxe, a Charlotte physician calls it for what it is — a tax cut bill:
What do you call a bill that provides hundreds of billions of dollars in tax cuts to the wealthy – by taking health care away from other Americans?
It should be called a tax cut bill for the rich, disguised as the “Better Care Reconciliation Act” (BCRA), which has nothing to do with providing care. [...]
The BCRA has been compared to Robin Hood-in-reverse, stealing from the poor to give to the rich. It reminds me of another hood, Little Red Riding, who expected to find Grandma in bed, but instead discovered a wolf wearing Grandma’s bonnet.
Contact your senators to vote against the motion to proceed. If the bill reaches the floor, tell them to vote against it. Any Obamacare replacement bill should help more people, not fewer. No more hoodwinking the American people.
Over at The New York Times, Vikas Bajaj and Stuart Thompson explainhow voting in favor of the bill may cost these Republican Senators their next election;
If they pass the bill, some Republicans might put themselves in a difficult situation because many of them won their last election by fewer votes than the number of people who would lose health coverage in their state under the proposed legislation. [...]
Still, many voters might be worried about the prospect of losing coverage, or entering an insurance market that no longer has the protections of the Affordable Care Act, as they cast their votes next year and in 2020.
Turning to the chaos in the White House, Peter Baker explains that Turmp is testing “a nation’s capacity for outrage”:
After six months in office, Mr. Trump has crossed so many lines, discarded so many conventions, said and done so many things that other presidents would not have, that he has radically shifted the understanding of what is standard in the White House. He has moved the bar for outrage. He has a taste for provocation and relishes challenging Washington taboos. If the propriety police tut tut, he shows no sign of concern.
At The Washington Post, Dana Milbank takes on Jared Kushner’s convenient excuses:
The seen-but-not-heard Kushner met with the Senate Intelligence Committee on Monday (at a session closed to the public, naturally). He explained his repeated lapses — he had to amend one disclosure form three times — by saying, essentially, that he was new to politics and so terribly busy that he couldn’t keep up with everything. And he used the hoariest excuse of all: He blamed his assistant. [...]
A “miscommunication” led his assistant to file his form prematurely.
He said he omitted not only meetings with Russians, but “over one hundred contacts from more than twenty countries.”
And this is supposed to help him?
That’s the trouble with Kushner’s defense in the Russia imbroglio. He’s essentially arguing that he isn’t corrupt — he’s just in over his head. He didn’t really know what he was doing, and he was too busy. Coming from the man charged with handling everything from Middle East peace to opioids, this isn’t reassuring.
And on a final note, here’s Eugene Robinson’s reaction to the new Democratic messaging:
“A Better Deal” is not the worst slogan I’ve ever heard, but it’s far from the best. The Democratic Party has overwhelming support from the “creatives” on Madison Avenue and the marketing geniuses in Hollywood. Why are Republicans so much better at coming up with pithy phrases that pack a punch? [...] Of course, the slogan is less important than the policies behind it.