Here is the moment when Senator John McCain voted “No” on the repeal of the Affordable Care Act. Mitch McConnell, standing by with crossed arms, watching every senator vote, walked away defeated moments later. He knew he didn’t have the votes.
It has been incomprehensible to me how a government, by the people, for the people, would want to take action that takes insurance coverage away from a significant percentage of its people.
There are 243 million people in the U.S. over age 16, so let’s call them the adult population. Taking health care coverage away from 26 million people would affect 10% of the population.
Picture yourself being one of those 26 million. You may have had a pre-existing condition like diabetes, and now, by the stroke of a pen by your president, that coverage is gone and gone forever. You have diabetes, and you can’t get insurance that you can afford anymore.
Why? Because evil Obama made it so that wealthier Americans pay more taxes to fund shortfalls. Because insurance and pharma executives make millions of dollars a year and their companies are wildly profitable because their non-competitive practices are sanctioned by our laws and regulations. And because a significant percentage of our government is bought off by those individuals and organizations and they have a president who can’t think beyond soundbites on Fox News and will sign anything as long as it serves his aggrandizement.
This entire initiative to kill the Affordable Care Act is motivated not by making things right for the American people, but by political ambitions. The president has said that the Affordable Care Act is a disaster for the American people, and – by golly – many of the dumbed-down American people believe him.
Congress Republicans wanted to score a point, with the president, and with their paymasters. Now we have a White House that not only appears to have been put in place by the aid of an adversarial power, but it also actively sabotages one of the laws of the land – the Affordable Care Act. Rather than upholding the laws, the government is sabotaging the laws.
Trump says he wants to make America great again. By throwing 10% of the adult population off their healthcare? What kind of problem-solving is that? It’s oligarchy. It’s making himself and those in his orbit in debt rich. I do not understand how he can have 37% of the population is his support. A significant percentage of his own supporters would lose their healthcare coverage. Really? That’s a lot of people supporting Trump with no healthcare. Somebody help me understand that.
McCain understood that, and he listened to his constituents. Unlike dozens of his colleagues in the Senate, who also must know deep down how wrong all this is, he showed backbone and he did what is right for the American people. Too bad there isn’t going to be another opportunity to vote for McCain for president.
For more reading on McCain:
See my open letter, also sent to him in hardcopy: Here.
My book review on Faith of my Fathers. I highly recommend this book to anyone wanting to understand the man John McCain and the experiences of a prisoner of war. If you only read one chapter, read the one about “John McCain’s Towel.”
Here is an article about McCain and torture.
Sorry. It was a good vote, but only the very, very least we could expect after his picking and non-vetting of Sarah Palin for his VP, the “John the Baptist” for Trump. McCain showed extremely bad judgement and he knows it!
And no, it is not too bad to not have a chance to vote for this politician — for any office — a too little and too late turned would-be Statesmen. He could have saved this “skinny” bill from even going to a vote and didn’t. It took an eminent death-threat to himself to make him see how important health insurance is for millions and millions who don’t have his Senate kind.
A pox on all Congressional Republicans who only know how to win (by voter suppression and gerrymandering and dark money and lying ads against their opponents and rejigging Congress vote rules) but cannot and will never govern responsibly.
That’s the Barbara I know! Hey, check my letter to McCain for the Palin reference. Totally agree. That was the day he lost my vote in 2007.
And, that McCain — last minute — vote would have counted for nothing, if two women Republicans had not stepped up and voted NO on both votes. There will be reprisals for their states, you can be sure.
I think that the Republicans will sink deep going forward – but then – I thought during the Obama years and the internal wars that they were dead. How wrong I was!
It is depressing to think democracy, congressional laws, the Constitution seem all at risk. I feel the weight of this POS and his cabal has settled over the whole world like a stinky cloud of doom.
But the rain has finally (!) stopped here in Ottawa, so cheer up, Barbara!
Dark ages are upon us, but we’ll get through those and come out better and stronger. We always do. This was a lesson! Now we don’t have to argue anymore who was our worst ever president, choosing between James Buchanan, Andrew Johnson or Franklin Pierce. We now have the boor Donald Trump.
Saw this posted on Reddit…
“I’m not sure if it’s really being appreciated just how comprehensively the Republicans were just fucked over.
See, the Republicans have been trying to pass these godawful healthcare bills through a process called budget reconciliation, which, among other things, protects the bill from being filibustered in the Senate and only requires a simple majority of 50 votes (rather than 60, which the Republicans don’t have).
The thing is, the Senate can only consider one budget reconciliation bill per topic per year. Of course, if the bill dies in committee and never comes to an official vote, it doesn’t count- which is why they’ve been able to keep hammering away at the issue.
This bill, though, was allowed to come to the Senate floor, because the Republicans thought they’d secured the votes. Collins, Murkowski and the Democrats would vote no, everyone else would vote yes, and Pence would break the tie. And then McCain completely fucked them. And it was almost certainly a calculated move; he voted to allow the bill to come to the floor. Had McCain allowed it to die in committee, McConnell could have come back with yet another repeal bill; but he let it come to a vote, and now they can’t consider another budget reconciliation bill for the rest of the fiscal year. The Senate needs 60 votes to pass any kind of healthcare reform now.
So now they’re caught between a rock and a hard place. Either they concede defeat on the issue and try again later (causing a big, unpopular stink that could damage elections if they try it before the midterms, or risking losing the slim majority they already have if they wait) or they actually sit down with the democrats like adults and write a halfway decent healthcare bill.
This is amazing.”
Good link! Nice information.