The latest Obamacare repeal bill, the Graham-Cassidy bill, has failed as Senator Susan Collins has decided to oppose the bill. The Hill. With Collins confirming that she is opposed to the bill, she joins Senators Rand Paul and John McCain in opposing the bill bringing it under the 50 votes it needed to pass. Collins did not like the prediction by the Congressional Budget Office that some would lose insurance under the bill. It is unclear if the vote will still happen as doing so would get the senators on the record. The Graham-Cassidy bill was the last chance to avoid the September 30th deadline that prevented Democrats from filibustering the bill.
My Comment:
I don't have strong opinions on the Graham-Cassidy bill. Unlike the other iterations of the Obamacare repeal, I never read the bill. I don't really have strong feelings about it either way since, like most Americans, I get my health care through work. I also had very little hope of this bill passing. There was always going to be a few people in the Senate that weren't going to vote for it.
The important thing is that the GOP failed yet again to pass an Obamacare repeal bill. Considering that both Donald Trump and congress were elected on a mandate to do something about Obamacare, this is a huge embarrassment for the party yet again. They were elected to pass something and they have failed completely. It's a huge betrayal to the base of the party.
This is a major reason why the GOP's approval ratings are so low and why most people support President Trump and not the party itself. They just can't get things done even when elected specifically to get things done. It's just a complete failure.
There are three Senators that came out in opposition to this bill and I think they all did it for different reasons. First, their was Susan Collins who, along with her ally Lisa Murkowski, were opposed to the repeals because they are from the far left wing of the GOP party. They are practically Democrats anyways...
The other group was the libertarian side of the GOP. Rand Paul came out as officially against the bill
because it increased spending, and he was supported by former presidential candidate Ted Cruz. Though I like Paul, sometimes he does stupid stuff like this on principal alone. Sure, principal is a good thing to have but sometimes you have to do what is best for the party and that would have been passing this bill.
As for John McCain, I have given up on trying to figure out what he is doing. As far as I can tell he is dying and before he goes he wants to do as much damage to Donald Trump as possible. Recent media reports suggest that he is still angry about the incident during the primaries where Trump said he wasn't a war hero. That pissed off John McCain to no end and I think he is torpedoing these bills for no other reason.
There had been some rumblings that perhaps a few Democratic senators would cross the aisle for this bill. It was specifically designed to appeal to vulnerable red state Democrats but it appears unlikely that any of them are going to vote for it now. Despite how divided and dysfunctional the Democrats are, they are still very united on health care. They won't cross over here, even if the bill would help their states. They want to twist the knife into the GOP so I am not surprised that they aren't going to help pass this bill.
I think this dysfunction is going to cost the GOP in the 2018 elections. After all, the party has failed to live up to their mandate. It doesn't really help Democrats all that much because the people that want an Obamacare repeal aren't going to vote for the party that came up with the bill, but it might reduce turnout. Why would people want to vote for a party that fails so consistently?
On the other hand, I have the feeling that many GOP senators might be taken out in the primaries. The anger at the party isn't going to go away and I am guessing that quite a few senators are now vulnerable... And if we do take out several vulnerable Senators and flip some of the Democrats, we might finally have enough to actually get some things done.
Finally, I have to say that Donald Trump is about the only thing going for the GOP right now, as much as the party leadership hates it. Though Trump hasn't been able to pressure Congress into getting anything done, he is at least fighting the Democrats through the culture war. Things like the NFL boycott are at least keeping the GOP base fired up and distracted that the party isn't getting anything done...
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