The Real Story Behind the Phony Canceled Health Insurance Scandal

Exactly right. The difference is that there are now 9,000,000 more covered by insurance. And that's worth it alone.

“Greedy Old Psychopaths”

Here at the Grayson High Command, one of the best parts of our job is listening to what you have to say. Because we are always impressed, and often moved, by the eloquence of ordinary people.

Charlene Dill, a hardworking young woman with three children and three jobs, lost her life because Florida Republicans chose to turn down $60,000,000,000.00 in federal aid that would have paid for her healthcare, and the healthcare of one million other Floridians who comprise the working poor. After Congressman Grayson told her sad story in a Tampa newspaper, our Facebook page was inundated with over 600 comments. We’d like to share some of them with you:

Tom Odom: It's more than sad. It's shameful, reprehensible and immoral. Those legislators responsible for blocking Medicaid expansion should be brought up on manslaughter charges, at the very least.

Linda Weiner Seligson: I still remember the GOP presidential debate when there was a question about the lack of health insurance, and the audience shouted "let 'em die," and then cheered!

Cathryn Sykes: Killing people to make a “point.” Monsters!

Taft Chatham: The GOP Congress is one big Death Panel.

Fernando A. Ojeda: The GOP doesn't really care about people who might or might not be able to afford healthcare . . . . They only seem to care about their billionaire sugar-daddies!

Dave Kisor: If you don't have a million to donate to the gangrenous obsolete party , you simply do not matter.

Lala Jaymes: Please continue to highlight the people in the state that die UNNECESSARILY, because of inhumane cruelty wrapped up in fake conservative politics. Give them a VOICE, so that the voters will have a CHOICE!!!!

Pat Evans: Most Republicans don't care if people die because of lack of health care. In their minds, if you don't have the money to pay for health care, you deserve to die. And then they go to church and praise God for all of HIS goodness, just to them. Strange people and strange religion.

Dick Olsen: Republicans want 47% of Americans to die. They see Poor People as Surplus Humanity. Affordable Health Insurance is the last thing they want for Americans.

Michael Durham: Time and time again, the GOP proves that they view the less affluent among us as eminently expendable cows, to be mercilessly milked for all we're worth. Cattle have to be culled once in a while, you know.

Dave Hayes: survival of the fittest. The GOP views people as animals. No one cries if the squirrel dies because it forgot to gather nuts, or ran in front of the car.

Walter T. Kuebler: They believe in Darwinian values, and they want the poor sick enslaved, incarcerated or dead. Or better still . . . pregnant.

Harvey Anderson: GOP mantra: The poor, ill, disabled, and unemployed are solely responsible for their own and all of America's problems and ills. Solution: eliminate all the poor, disabled, and unemployed; but it must be done quietly and without fanfare or publicity, lest the backlash destroy the Republican Party. Therefore, it must seem natural and inevitable when a poor person dies, preferably in obscurity, just one person at a time over a long period of time. Then the GOP can crow about how right they are.

James M. Wardell: The GOP and their belief in unregulated capitalism always put profits or the bottom line above people. It’s a flawed economic system when profits matter more than the people and the planet. It’s not sustainable, as we are starting to see.

Richard Schroeder: The GOP believes life begins at conception and ends at birth. A 32-year-old woman dying doesn't matter to them as much as a 32-week-fetus.

Gregory Gadow: According to GOP dogma, people die for lack of basic medical care because they *want* to die for lack of basic medical care. If they wanted to live long, healthy lives, they wouldn't have been poor in the first place.

Chris Reulbach: They are betting that the majority of people will die will be those who can't afford individual insurance – a/k/a Democratic Voters.

Jamie Dallas: They know exactly what they're doing: killing off the Democratic voters. What better way is there to prevent us from voting?

Chester Prusaczyk: It's tragic that so many will suffer and die because the conservatives hate the President.

Melissa Maino: What Republicans lack is empathy. If it doesn't ffect them personally, they are incapable of understanding someone could be hurt. I believe that is a major difference between the parties, between the people who choose one party or the other.

Cathy McCarthy: Why isn't this story all over the ? The GOP manages to go national with stories about people who have not benefitted from the ACA -- and they have all turned out to be lies. But the story of a woman who collapses and dies because Florida refused the Medicaid expansion doesn't even make the local news.

Eddie Schmidt: Go search Fox News for this story; nowhere to be found . . . .

Stefanie Krantz: in the wealthiest country in the world. We are not broke, we are greedy. There is a difference. Not providing decent medical care to all residents is a moral outrage, in a country literally overflowing with wealth. Charlene would have been better off sweeping the streets in Greece or Cuba. So much for “family values”! My family values are equality, generosity, concern for the sick, the poor, and the downtrodden. Thanks, Republicans! What the hell is wrong with these people?

Mercedes Arguello Aguirre: So much for the "pro-life" party. Hypocrites, all!

Robert Quisenberry: How long will it take before even Republicans realize that their electives care nothing about America and Americans?

Donna Bergman: The GOP & the Tea Party are proving that they are the most hateful, hate-filled, spiteful, mean bunch that has EVER been in our Congress, in the history of America!!!! It's VERY evident that Satan has these people in a choke hold, and he isn't about to let go! He's certainly USING them to his advantage, that's for sure!

Robert Nordgren: Just remember this, people: More people have died the hands of GOP anti-Obama actions than have died Muslim terrorists worldwide. So ask yourself: Who is the real threat to America? It is the GOP.

Alexis J. Richard: Greedy Old Psychopaths.

Vox populi (the voice of the people): We’re listening. And Charlene Dill, R.I.P. We hope that the world learns something from your suffering, and it was not in vain.
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btw way "real""patriotic" "christian" Americans who hate Obamacare, or more accurately the Obama part of it, my labs, ekg, all that stuff? I'm healthy as a horse, in excellent shape. One more moocher without the common decency to get sick and die quickly. Damn shame, ain't it?

I guess long life IS the best revenge after all.

ObamaCare will impact more Americans with better health, and they will live longer. The conservatives hate that!

BTW, has anyone seen the cliff those conservatives warned about before 8+ million signed up?

you mean the one they're all going over?

Yea, another one of those conservative threats that backfired! LOL

Remember "death panels?" They still don't get it.

NYT Poll Blows Up The GOP's Obamacare Narrative

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AP Photo / Rogelio V. Solis
Dylan Scott – April 23, 2014, 11:24 AM EDT

A poll released Wednesday offers yet another data point showing the politics of Obamacare aren't as set in stone as the conventional wisdom would have you believe. Embracing Obamacare isn't necessarily a political loser, and obstructing it isn't necessarily a winner.

The New York Times/Kaiser Family Foundation poll surveyed four Southern states that will help determine control of the Senate this fall. It earned headlines for finding the Democrats in better shape in the Senate races than most would have expected.

But it also assessed the popularity of four governors who have taken vastly different approaches to Obamacare -- and the findings are a direct contradiction of the narrative that the law is a loser, plain and simple, especially in states like these.

The poll showed Arkansas Gov. Mike Beebe (D) and Kentucky Gov. Steve Beshear (D), who expanded Medicaid under the law, are hugely popular. Their approval ratings are more than 20 points higher than their disapproval ratings; Beebe holds 68 percent approval, and Beshear is at 56 percent.

But Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal (R) and North Carolina Gov. Pat McCrory (R) are at best treading water with their constituents after they declined to expand the program to cover low-income residents. McCrory is middling, with 43 percent approval and 44 percent disapproval, while Jindal is 14 percent underwater at 40 percent approval and 54 percent disapproval.

The poll findings don't necessarily suggest causation: Beebe and Beshear are long-serving governors who are likely popular for a number of reasons. Likewise, Jindal has had a rocky tenure outside of the Affordable Care Act, and McCrory is enduring a scandal related to environmental regulation. It is also just one poll out of many, though it tracks with other findings.

But they do continue to sink the notion that Obamacare support is an abject disaster politically, particularly in states that voted against President Barack Obama in the presidential elections. Beebe and Beshear enjoy an unthinkable popularity for most politicians, while Jindal and McCrory are struggling to win over their constituents.

Participating in the law didn't doom the former; rejecting it didn't lift the latter. Paired with the unexpectedly good Senate results for Democrats, the political narrative that Obamacare will carry Republicans to victory by default appears more and more shaky.
About The Author
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Dylan Scott Follow @dylanlscott

Dylan Scott is a reporter for Talking Points Memo. He previously reported for Governing magazine in Washington, D.C., and the Las Vegas Sun. His work has been recognized with a 2013 American Society of Business Publication Editors award for Best Feature Series and a 2010 Associated Press Society of Ohio award for Best Investigative Reporting. He can be reached at [email protected].

Am I the only one who suspects that, after the election, the already-postponed Employer Mandate will be outright canceled?

They only need the Employer Mandate in order to credibly say that people will be allowed to keep their workplace insurance if they wish.

After the election, they can drop it and flood a lot more people onto the exchanges.

I guess if the Republicans are desperate to show they cancelled some part of the ACA that might happen.

Clarification: I am suspecting that the cancellation will come from the Obama Administration.

Perhaps the cancellation of the Employer Mandate will be accompanied by untrue claims that employer policies are "subpar".

And I suppose you could be hit by an asteroid tomorrow hard enough to knock some sense into you.

I gather you do not share my suspicions.

We shall see what happens.

There are only two possibilities.
1. ObamaCare provides better health care at lower cost to their employees. Don't forget, the employee share of the monthly premiums have been going up for the past decade or more, and the employer realized that they couldn't compete on quality.
2. It gave the company an excuse to drop their health benefit to let their employees apply to ACA - to lower the payroll cost.

I guess we will know in a little over 2 years if you were hit by an asteroid before Obama canceled the employee mandate. Too bad you won't be around when I say "I told you so."

I'm rooting for the asteroid...

I just hope there's enough advance notice so I have time to sell my food stamps, cash my welfare checks and sell some meth so I can party on the way out with the rest of my useless moocher brethren.

Two years?

I'm suspecting that they are only going to keep the Employer Mandate alive as a possibility through the 2014 elections.

Then I suspect it'll be time to start saying that workplace insurance is "subpar".

Your suspect is suspect.