General Discussion
Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsAnd yet another Fight with Congress to put on the schedule
Okay... so a bunch of Republican Governors have refused to set up a state health insurance exchange meaning that, under the law, the Federal government now needs to set up those state exchanges.
But there is no funding in the law to provide the cost of the Federal Government (HHS in specific) setting up the exchanges.
The House will, of course, not approve any funding. It's not billionslooks like a couple of hundred million dollarsso HHS might be able to cannibalize the budget of something else. But if HHS does that I expect the House will try to have a constitutional showdown. (Congress does have immense power to use the budget to dictate Executive branch actions, so they would have at least a rhetorical argument. On the other hand, HHS is probably required by Congress to set up the exchanges, despite having no money to do so. This sort of conflict has come up a lot, but not often on such a big issue. It's interesting.)
The punchline, in my opinion, will be that the average American will he quite hostile to sabotaging the best implementation of Obamacare. Even if you don't like Obamacare there is little reasonsince it's going to happen anywayto want it to work poorly. If you were in court for years trying to block a highway and you lost and the highway was being built would you then try to ensure it was built poorly?
A political zealot might, but most people would not.
This whole article about the RW exchange boycott is very interesting. I'm just looking at one little aspect of the big picture:
http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2012/02/gop-governors-face-quandary-in-key-obamacare-battle.php
rgbecker
(4,834 posts)Here in Massachusetts its up and running and has been for a couple of years. Simply shift it over to the states which don't want to do it...same insurance plans and companies and let Massachusetts benefit with lower rates for its citizens. LOL!
cthulu2016
(10,960 posts)I remember some "across state lines" controversy during the ACA debates, but not the particulars.
rgbecker
(4,834 posts)The Republicans thought allowing insurance companies to write policies in any state without state oversight would be a great way to get insurance premiums down. It was really a ploy to get cheap, high deductible, minimal coverage policies into states that had minimum coverage tables (Must cover pregnancies etc.) and skim off the low risk customers. The ACA is fighting such a deal by mandating minimum standardized coverage for all states. As to states pooling together to achieve better rates you might find this article interesting....I only skimmed it, but I think it addresses the issue.
http://www.urban.org/uploadedpdf/412325-Multi-state-Health-Insurance-Exchanges.pdf
msongs
(67,441 posts)Egalitarian Thug
(12,448 posts)You know what goes here.