The Garbage Bill That is Graham- Cassidy

Lies, More Lies, Maybe the Most Lies

There is so much wrong with the Senate's last ditch effort to repeal and not replace ACA that it is impossible to discuss every horrible aspect of it in a Forum like this. But here is one of the worst things, from the WaPo.

The drop in funding “gives strong incentives for the states to be more efficient with their program,” said Ed Haislmaier, a senior fellow at the conservative Heritage Foundation. That is, states may be able to maintain the ACA structure and regulations as long as they streamline operations.

Mean spirited people, conservatives in today's world have been using this argument for centuries to punish the unfortunate and make their lives miserable. The argument is that helping low income families really harms them, because it causes them to be dependent on aid and removes their incentives for improving their lives or being more careful with their spending. It ignores the problem that for the vast majority of people who are not doing well it is either not their fault (disabilities, lack of education, etc) or that some how they are happy in their miserable lives and don't want to change.

Modern America, at least the thinking and compassionate part of it moved away from this a long time ago. But the conservatives whose greed and avarice and spite and meanness have never left them, it is a thinking that remains. If Graham Cassidy is put in place it will cement their thinking in American health care policy for decades.  That policy is that low and middle income people should not get sick, that if they do get sick it is their fault, and if they cannot pay they do not get treatment.  And that is an ugly, ugly thing.