Congress Kills Part of the Affordable Care Act

[UCmeNdc]

When Congress struck a deal to avert the fiscal cliff, it also dealt a quiet blow to President Obama’s health overhaul: The new law killed a multibillion-dollar program meant to boost health insurance competition by funding nonprofit health plans.

The Consumer Operated and Oriented Plan, or CO-OP, program was aimed at spending as much as $6 billion to help launch nonprofit health insurance carriers. It came into favor with Democrats when it became clear that a government-run plan, known as the public option, could not gain enough political support.

I'm going to disagree with that last paragraph a bit. Yes, this was intended to create an option that was non-profit, with 95 percent of premium dollars going toward actual health care expenses rather than padding the bottom line for profits. But this was not ever sold as or intended to create the impression that it was any sort of replacement or even consolation prize for the public option. . Despite Wendell Potter's belated endorsement of co-ops as a possible sleeper solution to the public option, there were many barriers to success to overcome.


The right wing hates the OPM option and wishes they could kill it. It appears they had to settle for de-funding the loans to CO-OPs instead. Conservatives have long looked for ways to de-fund the ACA, and the CO-OPs were one of the first and primary targets. By conflating the Solyndra loan guarantees with the loan guarantees in the ACA, they managed to create enough negative energy to kill them in exchange for raising taxes, evidently.

http://crooksandliars.com/karoli/congress-quietly-kills-part-affordable-care

[MotherPetrie]

1. Evil FUCKERS!

[libodem]

2. What you said, Mother

[and-justice-for-all]

3. They are fucking bastards..nt

[annabanana]

4. This REALLY burns my ass... This was the best chance for an earlier,

rather than a later incursion of genuine lower cost insurance.

Medical Insurance as it stands, is an instrument of pure evil and greed.

[Delphinus]

6. Ooh,

annabanana, your last sentence is pure gold.

[politicaljunkie41910]

5. $6 billion is not a lot of money when you consider a federal budget of $1.2 trillion.

I don't understand why President Obama would have allowed it to die on the vines if it were such an important part of the ACA.

[zipplewrath]

8. 'Cause he's all about the "win"

Same way ACA got passed WITHOUT a PO in the first place.

[Brigid]

7. For the hundred zillionth time . . .

WE NEED A SINGLE PAYER HEALTH SYSTEM!!!!

[CTyankee]

9. May I join you at that brick wall?

[Brigid]

10. Of course.

It is frustrating, isn't it? I don't know what it will take to get this done.

[CTyankee]

11. The vast American public has to get used to at least the semblance of universal health care and

that is what the health insurance industry fears most. That is why fighting against the weakening of Medicare and Medicaid is so dangerous and we must fight it with all our might.