Why a Vote to Repeal Healthcare?

A Kindler, Gentler Push for Repeal?
House Republicans have postponed their vote on repealing the Affordable Care Act until next week, because of the Arizona shooting. And even when that debate resumes, Jennifer Haberkorn and Carrie Budoff Brown report in Politico today, the House Republicans will likely adopt a more measured tone. They won’t change their position on the issue itself. They remain committed to total Repeal. But the Republican insiders that Haberkorn and Brown interviewed seem to think Republicans would talk i...

US Chamber backs "Repeal the Job Killing Health Care Law Act"
Good thing that the U.S. Chamber ally Bill Daley will be in the White House to provide a liaison to the business community, to bring them along on President Obama's agenda for the nation and The Economy. Or not. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce is backing Republican plans to try and Repeal President Obama's Health Care bill. "We see the upcoming House vote as an opportunity for everyone to take a fresh look at Health Care reform," chamber president Thomas J. Donohue said in his annual State of Amer...

Call for bipartisan State of Union seating
WASHINGTON, Jan. 12 (UPI) -- Sen. Mark Udall, D-Colo., said Wednesday the House and Senate should abandon the custom of partisan seating arrangements for the State of the Union address. In a message posted on his Web site, Udall published the text of a letter to his colleagues in which he urged House and Senate leaders to end the longstanding custom of Republicans sitting with Republicans and Democrats sitting with Democrats when the president delivers the annual address. Udall called the seatin...

Detroit News writer so far in the tank for ObamaCare, she's about to be crushed by hydrostatic pressure
I don't know a lot about Marisa Schultz, but based on her writing she is so far into the tank for ObamaCare that the hydrostatic pressure is about to crush her into the size of a pea. She took it upon herself to release the result of a biased, partisan report from a supposedly non-partisan organization that most never heard of to put out the canard that repealing the Unconstitutional ObamaCare law would hurt Michigan. This was apparently so important that she wrote it twice with 2 different hea...

Marian Wright Edelman: Health Reform Under Attack
In 2010, there was finally good news for millions of Uninsured Children and families when the President and Congress took a major step towards ensuring affordable and comprehensive health coverage for millions of Children and families in America. With the passage of The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (the Affordable Care Act), more than 35 million Americans including more than 95 percent of Children will have access to the critical health coverage they need to survive and thrive. A...

Udall wants Republicans and Democrats to sit together
Sen. Mark Udall. (Andy Cross, The Denver Post) WASHINGTON — Sen. Mark Udall is urging Republicans and Democrats to sit together during the State of the Union address Jan. 25 in an attempt to end “an arrangement has become a negative symbol of the divisions in Congress.” Usually, Republicans and Democrats sit on different sides of the chamber when the President delivers his remarks. In a letter to House Speaker John Boehner and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, Udall is urgin...

Dora Calott Wang, M.D.: 5 Health Reform Benefits to Act on Today
While Washington fusses and grandstands about Health Care reform, we as individuals can vote with our actions and dollars. In America's free Market Economy, our collective choices will significantly impact the nation's Health Care system. Here are five actions each of us can take today, thanks to new benefits made available by the landmark Affordable Care Act. 1.Pick up the phone and schedule a free annual exam, and routine preventive tests for your age group (such as Mammograms and colonosco...

The Chamber of Commerce calls for the repeal of Obamacare
By mid-December, HHS had already granted 222 waivers to the law — a revealing acknowledgement that the law is unworkable,” Donohue said. “And, with key provisions under challenge in the courts by states and others, it’s time to go back to the drawing board   I have previously written about the 222 Healthcare Reform waivers granted by the Obama regime here. This is what I had to say about these waivers:  The Healthcare Reform law would have been directly responsi...

Colorado senator calls for Republicans and Democrats to sit together at SOTU
Sen. Mark Udall (D-Colo.) proposed that the Speaker of the House as well as the majority and Minority Leaders of both houses of Congress sit together during President Obama's State of the Union Speech later this month, in a letter dated Wednesday. Udall, the senior senator from Colorado, writes in the letter — addressed to Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio), Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.)...

The Media Consortium: Weekly Pulse: Giffords Shooting Reveals Flaws in U.S. Mental Health Services
By Lindsay Beyerstein, Media Consortium blogger Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-AZ) was shot in the head at a constituent outreach event in a Supermarket parking lot in Tucson on Saturday. In all, the gunman shot 18 people, killing 6, including a Federal Judge and a 9-year-old girl. Jamelle Bouie of TAPPED urges President Obama to take up the issue of Mental Health care in his upcoming Speech on the Mass Shooting. Several people who knew the alleged shooter came forward with stories of bizarre beha...

Will Kohl heed lesson?
Sen. Russ Feingold had spent 18 years in the U.S. Senate. For 10 years before that, he was a State Senator. He was popular with his constituency. He held annual listening sessions in all 72 counties. Further, Feingold was known as a maverick. His support came not only from the left - as might be expected - but also from the middle, primarily because of his maverick reputation, something especially well-received in Wisconsin. Feingold also had all the money he needed to run for re-election. Alo...

GOP: Serious on Spending Cuts?
For those tracking how serious Republicans are about changing Washington’s spending culture, here’s two items worth noticing. First, three spending subcommittee chairmen — Republican Reps. Mike Simpson (Idaho), Frank Wolf (Va.), and Robert Aderholt (Ala.) — told The Hill that they think the ban on Earmarks should be temporary.  Simpson made the case that lawmakers, with their knowledge of their own districts, are better qualified to make certain spending decisions, w...

Orange Julius Doesn't Disappoint
As expected, House Speaker Boehner won't even allow any Gun Control Legislation up for a vote, including Republican Peter King's bill. Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) is rejecting gun-control Legislation offered by the chairman of the Homeland Security Committee in response to the weekend shootings of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.) and 19 others in Arizona. Rep. Pete King (R-N.Y.) announced plans Tuesday to introduce Legislation prohibiting people from carrying guns within 1,000 feet of members...

Workers to House Republicans: Health Care Reform Works
In Florida, Gloria’s daughter like so many Young People today, returned home from college, “with a BA degree and no job.” But her daughter does have Health Care coverage-and Gloria has peace of mind-because the new Health Care reform law allows young adults to remain on their parents’ health care plans until they are 26. “Having that alone makes life better for my family,” Gloria writes. “This [health care reform plan] told me someone in governmen

The amazing recovery of Gabrielle Giffords
By Michael J.W. Stickings We've been focusing a great deal on the shooting and on what was behind it, that is, the larger socio-political context, but, lest we forget, the most amazing part of the story is happening at a Hospital in Tuscon: Rep. Gabrielle Giffords is able to breathe on her own, doctors said Tuesday. Giffords remains on a ventilator to help her recovery, said neurosurgeon G. Michael Lemole Jr. Giffords n...

Don McNay: Health Insurance for Children Under Age 19 in Kentucky
I'm doing research on a longer article about the first battles on implementing Health Care reform in Kentucky. A battle between well entrenched health Insurance Companies and a strong willed Insurance Commissioner. While I am finishing the piece, I wanted to make sure that people in Kentucky, and in other states with similar situations, understand that during January, Kentuckians under age 19 can get individual Health Insurance and the companies cannot deny coverage due to a pre-existing heal...

Will French Fries Become the New Broccoli for Health Reform Opponents?
Will French Fries Become the New Broccoli for Health Reform Opponents? The Supreme Court recently declined to hear a case claiming a federal ban on violent Felons owning Body Armor violates the constitution, over the dissents of Justices Scalia and Thomas. Numerous commentators are now combing that dissent for hints on whether the justices will vote to uphold the landmark Affordable Care Act. Predictions that the three Conservatives who did not join this dissent will also reject the Affordabl...

More required reading on high risk pools
Slate‘s Tim Noah has a nice piece today on high risk pools (technically known as the Pre-existing Conditions Insurance Plan, or PCIP). His subtitle, “Republicans are right: ObamaCare’s high-risk pools were a dumb idea. But it was their dumb idea,” expresses the main point. Aaron Carroll over at the Incidental Economist picks up on this with another nice piece, noting that Austin Frakt had anticipated in his own research so many of the problems PCIP is now encountering. L...

Poolside Fight
Timothy Noah is annoyed by Republicans—when is he not? This time it’s because they are complaining about the high-risk pools in ObamaCare when those pools are their own leading idea for health-care reform. High-risk pools are, in fact, a terrible solution to the health-care crisis. But they happen to be the terrible solution Republicans most favor (along with Tax Breaks) whenever they’re forced to state their preferred alternative to last year’s Patient Protection and Aff...

Donohue Goes All In, But Chamber Is Split On Health Repeal
Donohue Goes All In, But Chamber Is Split On Health Repeal Sam Stein is reporting that Chamber of Commerce President Tom Donohue is now calling for the repeal of the Affordable Care Act, despite previous statements that the organization wouldn’t dedicate any resources to the effort. From today’s Speech: DONOHUE: For example, the new Health Care law creates 159 new agencies, commissions, panels, and other bodies. It grants extraordinary powers to the Department of Health and Human...

Taxpayer advocate proposes spending cuts
The new House Speaker, Rep. John Boehner, has said cutting spending will be a priority for his chamber. And the Watchdog group Taxpayers for Common Sense has some ideas on where he can look. The group this week sent both House and Senate leaders a list of Spending Cuts that would total roughly $148 billion over five years.  House Republicans said recently that a vow to lop $100 billion off the federal Budget this year was based on the idea that President Obama’s Budget would be passed. But ...

Retreat With GOP Will Be Obama-Free
As the House Republican Conference retreat gets underway in Baltimore Thursday, Fox News has learned that one notable speaker will not be there: President Obama. While it may seem strange to find a Democratic president in the middle of a gaggle of Republicans, that's precisely where Mr. Obama found himself last year. Back then, the GOP extended an invitation to the president to address conference members. He accepted. The result was contentious. "I want to stick on the general topic of health ca...

With Brownback as governor, Kansas lawmakers move to limit abortion
Topeka — Emboldened Conservatives in the Kansas Legislature didn’t wait long to push plans to restrict Abortion. They’re also pitching a bill to Repeal a law allowing in-state College Tuition for the Children of Illegal Immigrants. And the session is only in its third day. Republican lawmakers expect this to be a banner year for Legislation on abortion, Immigration, Gun Rights and other top conservative causes. The GOP holds a commanding majority in the Legislature and a close...

For EPA, climate tough in Senate
The Environmental Protection Agency is desperate for some friends in the Senate. Republicans have made unraveling the Obama Administration’s climate rules one of their top priorities this year, and with the GOP-led House expected to easily pass a measure to handcuff EPA’s authority, the rules’ fate may be determined by how hard the agency’s champions in the Senate will fight. Continue Reading Text Size - + reset Politico 44 At least 56 senators — just four short ...

Colleagues Pay Tribute to Rep. Giffords
Yahoo! Buzz Rep. Gabrielle Giffords likes chocolate, especially peanut M&Ms and those little Hershey’s nuggets with almonds and toffee. That might be the most personal detail House members have shared about the Arizona Democrat during the nearly four-hour tribute to Ms. Giffords and the other Victims of the weekend shooting rampage in Tucson, Ariz. And it came from a Republican. Texas Rep. Louie Gohmert , who’s known for his occasionally outlandish partisan barbs, told the chamber...