We begin today’s roundup with Aaron Blake at The Washington Post:
House Republicans passed their bill through a key committee in the wee hours of Thursday morning — less than two and a half days after the bill was introduced and without any scoring from the independent Congressional Budget Office.
Then-House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) added around that same time: "We didn't have any open debate for both sides at all on the health care bill, the way it was jammed through."
So the speed of the legislation is one thing; the actual method of passage is what really irked Republicans. But that's also problematic for Republicans today, because they, too, are planning to use the budget reconciliation process. This allows them, again, to avoid a filibuster — but could also limit what they can accomplish.
The other problem for Republicans in moving this along so quickly is that there is no CBO score. Republicans have for years accused Democrats of budget gimmicks and a lack of transparency in the legislation that they have passed. Republicans ran on the idea of posting bills online for everyone to see and understand.
Paul Krugman:
Given the rhetoric Republicans have used over the past seven years to attack health reform, you might have expected them to do away with the whole structure of the Affordable Care Act — deregulate, de-subsidize and let the magic of the free market do its thing. This would have been devastating for the 20 million Americans who gained coverage thanks to the act, but at least it would have been ideologically consistent.
But Republican leaders weren’t willing to bite that bullet. What they came up with instead was a dog’s breakfast that conservatives are, with some justice, calling Obamacare 2.0. But a better designation would be Obamacare 0.5, because it’s a half-baked plan that accepts the logic and broad outline of the Affordable Care Act while catastrophically weakening key provisions. If enacted, the bill would almost surely lead to a death spiral of soaring premiums and collapsing coverage. Which makes you wonder, what’s the point?
MJ Lee at CNN points out no on wants their name on the bill:
The White House says don't call it "Trumpcare." Critics are labeling it "Ryancare" and "Obamacare lite." Hospitals hate it and insurers are pushing the panic button.
The House GOP bill to repeal Obamacare is quickly becoming a bill that nobody wants to own.
Peter Weber at The Week highlights one particularly disturbing part of the hearing — when Rep. Shimkus (R-IL) claimed men should be able to opt-out of maternity coverage:
This is not the first time House Republicans have asked about men having to buy maternity coverage, The Washington Post notes, and it isn't always men asking. Nancy Metcalf, an insurance expert and Consumer Reports columnist, answered the question in 2013:
Health insurance, like all insurance, works by pooling risks. The healthy subsidize the sick, who could be somebody else this year and you next year. Those risks include any kind of health care a person might need from birth to death — prenatal care through hospice. No individual is likely to need all of it, but we will all need some of it eventually.
So, as a middle-aged childless man you resent having to pay for maternity care or kids' dental care. Shouldn't turnabout be fair play? Shouldn't pregnant women and kids be able to say, "Fine, but in that case why should we have to pay for your Viagra, or prostate cancer tests, or the heart attack and high blood pressure you are many times more likely to suffer from than we are?" Once you start down that road, it's hard to know where to stop. If you slice and dice risks, eventually you don't have a risk pool at all, and the whole idea of insurance falls apart. [Consumer Reports]
And, on a final note, Eugene Robinson points out that the GOP can’t claim to be the party of fiscal responsibility:
It’s time to put an end to the myth that Republicans believe in fiscal responsibility. Saving taxpayer dollars takes a back seat to the ideological imperative of blaming and shaming the poor.
Witness the GOP’s long-awaited plan to replace the Affordable Care Act. House committees are moving forward on the legislation before the Congressional Budget Office has even had a chance to estimate how much the measure will cost. Why the rush? Because if the plan doesn’t snatch away health insurance coverage from millions of people — and both President Trump and House Speaker Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.) swear it won’t — then it’s surely going to cost a ton.