JOHN MCCAIN KILLED GOP HEALTH CARE BILL & SMILED (IN CONCERT WITH DEMS?)

JOHN MCCAIN KILLED GOP HEALTH CARE BILL AND SMILED:

IS MCCAIN IN CONCERT WITH DEMS' STRATEGY OR IS HE TRULY CONCERNED ABOUT GETTING GOP HEALTH CARE BILL RIGHT??

NO DISRESPECT, I'M JUST ASKING.


Sources: Washington Post, Youtube


*****The night John McCain killed the GOP’s health-care fight


It was the most dramatic night in the United States Senate in recent history. Just ask the senators who witnessed it.

A seven-year quest to undo the Affordable Care Act collapsed — at least for now — as Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) kept his colleagues and the press corps in suspense over a little more than two hours late Thursday into early Friday.

Not since September 2008, when the House of Representatives rejected the Troubled Asset Relief Program — causing the Dow Jones industrial average to plunge nearly 800 points in a single afternoon — had such an unexpected vote caused such a striking twist.

The bold move by the nation’s most famous senator stunned his colleagues and possibly put the Senate on the verge of protracted bipartisan talks that McCain is unlikely to witness as he begins treatment for an aggressive form of brain cancer.

“I’ve stated time and time again that one of the major failures of Obamacare was that it was rammed through Congress by Democrats on a strict party-line basis without a single Republican vote,” he said in a statement explaining his vote. “We should not make the mistakes of the past.”

Rumors swirled late Thursday that the Arizona Republican, who had captured the nation’s sympathy this week after delaying his cancer treatment in order to return to Washington, might vote against the GOP’s “skinny repeal” plan — a watered-down version of earlier Republican proposals to repeal the 2010 health-care law.

McCain warned at a hastily arranged news conference Thursday afternoon that he was leaning against supporting the legislation unless House Speaker Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.) assured GOP senators that the House would not move to quickly approve the bill in its current form. McCain and Sens. Lindsey O. Graham (R-S.C.) and Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) wanted Ryan to launch broad House-Senate negotiations for a wider rollback of the law. Two hours later, Ryan issued a statement signaling he would launch negotiations, and Graham and Johnson announced their support.

But not McCain.

Reporters spotted him around 11 p.m.

“Have you decided how you’ll vote?” they asked.

“Yes,” McCain replied.

“How?”

“Wait for the show,” he said.

McCain headed for the stage — the Senate floor — around midnight, emerging from his office in the Russell Senate Office Building for the subway ride to the U.S. Capitol.

When he arrived, he held a brief conversation with Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer ( D-N.Y.), an exchange that left the New Yorker smiling.

“I knew it when he walked on the floor,” Schumer later recounted, explaining that McCain had already called to share his plans.

But few, if any, of his Republican colleagues realized what was about to transpire.

Two votes were called just after midnight. The first was on a Democratic proposal to refer the “skinny repeal” bill back to a committee. The second vote was to pass “skinny repeal,” which would have repealed the Affordable Care Act’s individual mandate and rolled back a tax on medical devices.

“Let’s vote against skinny repeal,” Schumer told his colleagues before the votes as he once again derided the rushed nature of the health-care debate.

McCain stood on the Republican side of the room nodding in agreement.

With Sens. Susan Collins (R-Maine) and Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) already planning to vote against the plan, Republicans could not afford to lose McCain. Vice President Pence was already at the Capitol prepared to break a tie. Instead, he launched a last-ditch effort to win McCain’s support.

As the first vote began, McCain took his seat next to Graham, his closest friend in the Senate. The South Carolinian mostly nodded as McCain gesticulated, and signaled — through his body language — that he was likely to vote no. When Murkowski walked over to join the conversation, McCain winked and gave her a thumbs down — signaling his intentions.

Collins joined the group as another clutch of Republican senators formed in the well of the Senate Chamber. Sen. Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.), who operates in McCain’s long shadow, stood next to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), Sen. John Cornyn (R-Tex.), who counts GOP votes, and Pence. Eventually, Flake was dispatched to talk to McCain.

He obliged, walked over to McCain and asked Graham to move over one seat. But McCain did not acknowledge Flake, focusing instead on Murkowski and Collins.

That left Flake, one of the most polite members of the Senate, leaning into the conversation uncomfortably with a pained look on his face, as if he had to tell his father that he had run over the family dog with his car.

Seeing that Flake was not making progress, Pence walked over at 12:44 a.m. McCain smiled, pointed at Collins and Murkowski, said something about “marching orders,” and stood up.

“Mr. Vice President,” he said, greeting Pence. For the next 21 minutes, the vice president cajoled McCain, Collins and Murkowski. Twice during the conversation, a Pence aide came to whisper in the vice president’s ear — other reporters learned it was the White House calling. Pence finally left to take a call, but later returned to speak with McCain.

By then, other senators around the room realized what was happening.

“You could see the body language in the entire chamber change in two hours,” Sen. David Perdue (R-Ga.) recalled. “One side was kind of ebullient, moving around and talking and the other side was subdued, and all of a sudden it began to change. There was an instinctive reaction that maybe this thing wasn’t going to pass. Nobody knew for sure.”

“It was pretty somber,” added Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.).

At 1:10 a.m., McCain crossed the Senate Chamber to talk to Schumer, Klobuchar and other Democrats, including Sens. Richard J. Durbin (Ill.), Dianne Feinstein (Calif.) and Elizabeth Warren (Mass.). As he approached, McCain told them he worried that reporters watching from the gallery above could read his lips. When he realized that the press was indeed watching, he looked up at the ceiling and shouted, “No!” as senators and reporters laughed. Then, Democrats beamed when McCain shared his news. Feinstein gave him a hug.

Walking back to the Republican side of the room, McCain was stopped by Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) who also offered a hug.

“I love John McCain. He’s one of the great heroes of this country,” Hatch explained later. “Whether we agree or not, I still love the guy.”

The vote on “skinny repeal” began at 1:24 a.m., but McCain was out in the lobby once again conferring with Pence. In his absence, Collins and Murkowski cast their “no” votes along with the 48 members of the Democratic caucus.

McCain returned at 1:29 a.m. without Pence, approached the Senate clerk and gave a thumbs down — the third “no” vote.

Several people gasped. Others applauded. Reporters dashed out to report the news.

McCain returned to his seat, walking past Cornyn and Sens. John Thune (R-S.D.) and Bill Cassidy (R-La.), who stood grim-faced and despondent. Cassidy rubbed his face several times with his hands. Thune’s face contorted. The color in Cornyn’s face seemed to drain.

“Certainly Senator McCain knows how to improve the drama,” Cassidy recalled later.

The vote concluded, and the results were announced — the bill was voted down, 51 to 49. Just days before, McCain had fired a warning shot with a lengthy floor speech that criticized the rushed, secretive process that led to “skinny repeal.” Early Friday morning, McCain, Collins and Murkowski delivered the fatal blow.

McConnell, humiliated by the results, stood to address his colleagues. The color of his face now matched the pink in his necktie.

“This is clearly a disappointing moment,” he said.

JOHN MCCAIN'S REPEAL SENATE FLOOR SPEECH IS HYPOCRITICAL (CONGRESS IS NOT A ROBOT)

JOHN MCCAIN'S REPEAL SENATE FLOOR SPEECH IS HYPOCRITICAL:

MCCAIN ANGRILY CHASTISED HIS COLLEAGUES BUT FREQUENTLY CAUSES UNNECESSARY DISCORD VERSUS ENCOURAGING UNITY.

BUT SHOULD CONGRESS OPERATE LIKE A HUGE ROBOT?

NO.

EACH US SENATOR SHOULD PASSIONATELY FIGHT TO PROTECT AND REPRESENT THE LOYAL CONSTITUENTS WHO ELECTED THEM.


Sources: Fox News, TPM, USA Today, Washington Post, Youtube



**** Full text of John McCain's Senate floor speech: 'Let’s return to regular order'


Sen. John McCain, who returned to Washington on Tuesday after disclosing his brain cancer diagnosis last week, spoke on the Senate floor after casting a critical vote to proceed to debate on the Senate's Obamacare repeal legislation. Here are his remarks as prepared for delivery:

“Mr. President:

“I’ve stood in this place many times and addressed as president many presiding officers. I have been so addressed when I have sat in that chair, as close as I will ever be to a presidency.

“It is an honorific we’re almost indifferent to, isn’t it. In truth, presiding over the Senate can be a nuisance, a bit of a ceremonial bore, and it is usually relegated to the more junior members of the majority.

“But as I stand here today – looking a little worse for wear I’m sure – I have a refreshed appreciation for the protocols and customs of this body, and for the other ninety-nine privileged souls who have been elected to this Senate.

“I have been a member of the United States Senate for thirty years. I had another long, if not as long, career before I arrived here, another profession that was profoundly rewarding, and in which I had experiences and friendships that I revere. But make no mistake, my service here is the most important job I have had in my life. And I am so grateful to the people of Arizona for the privilege – for the honor – of serving here and the opportunities it gives me to play a small role in the history of the country I love.

“I’ve known and admired men and women in the Senate who played much more than a small role in our history, true statesmen, giants of American politics. They came from both parties, and from various backgrounds. Their ambitions were frequently in conflict. They held different views on the issues of the day. And they often had very serious disagreements about how best to serve the national interest.

“But they knew that however sharp and heartfelt their disputes, however keen their ambitions, they had an obligation to work collaboratively to ensure the Senate discharged its constitutional responsibilities effectively. Our responsibilities are important, vitally important, to the continued success of our Republic. And our arcane rules and customs are deliberately intended to require broad cooperation to function well at all. The most revered members of this institution accepted the necessity of compromise in order to make incremental progress on solving America’s problems and to defend her from her adversaries.

“That principled mindset, and the service of our predecessors who possessed it, come to mind when I hear the Senate referred to as the world’s greatest deliberative body. I’m not sure we can claim that distinction with a straight face today.

“I’m sure it wasn’t always deserved in previous eras either. But I’m sure there have been times when it was, and I was privileged to witness some of those occasions.

“Our deliberations today – not just our debates, but the exercise of all our responsibilities – authorizing government policies, appropriating the funds to implement them, exercising our advice and consent role – are often lively and interesting. They can be sincere and principled. But they are more partisan, more tribal more of the time than any other time I remember. Our deliberations can still be important and useful, but I think we’d all agree they haven’t been overburdened by greatness lately. And right now they aren’t producing much for the American people.

“Both sides have let this happen. Let’s leave the history of who shot first to the historians. I suspect they’ll find we all conspired in our decline – either by deliberate actions or neglect. We’ve all played some role in it. Certainly I have. Sometimes, I’ve let my passion rule my reason. Sometimes, I made it harder to find common ground because of something harsh I said to a colleague. Sometimes, I wanted to win more for the sake of winning than to achieve a contested policy.

“Incremental progress, compromises that each side criticize but also accept, just plain muddling through to chip away at problems and keep our enemies from doing their worst isn’t glamorous or exciting. It doesn’t feel like a political triumph. But it’s usually the most we can expect from our system of government, operating in a country as diverse and quarrelsome and free as ours.

“Considering the injustice and cruelties inflicted by autocratic governments, and how corruptible human nature can be, the problem solving our system does make possible, the fitful progress it produces, and the liberty and justice it preserves, is a magnificent achievement.

“Our system doesn’t depend on our nobility. It accounts for our imperfections, and gives an order to our individual strivings that has helped make ours the most powerful and prosperous society on earth. It is our responsibility to preserve that, even when it requires us to do something less satisfying than ‘winning.’ Even when we must give a little to get a little. Even when our efforts manage just three yards and a cloud of dust, while critics on both sides denounce us for timidity, for our failure to ‘triumph.’

“I hope we can again rely on humility, on our need to cooperate, on our dependence on each other to learn how to trust each other again and by so doing better serve the people who elected us. Stop listening to the bombastic loudmouths on the radio and television and the Internet. To hell with them. They don’t want anything done for the public good. Our incapacity is their livelihood.

“Let’s trust each other. Let’s return to regular order. We’ve been spinning our wheels on too many important issues because we keep trying to find a way to win without help from across the aisle. That’s an approach that’s been employed by both sides, mandating legislation from the top down, without any support from the other side, with all the parliamentary maneuvers that requires.

“We’re getting nothing done. All we’ve really done this year is confirm Neil Gorsuch to the Supreme Court. Our healthcare insurance system is a mess. We all know it, those who support Obamacare and those who oppose it. Something has to be done. We Republicans have looked for a way to end it and replace it with something else without paying a terrible political price. We haven’t found it yet, and I’m not sure we will. All we’ve managed to do is make more popular a policy that wasn’t very popular when we started trying to get rid of it.

“I voted for the motion to proceed to allow debate to continue and amendments to be offered. I will not vote for the bill as it is today. It’s a shell of a bill right now. We all know that. I have changes urged by my state’s governor that will have to be included to earn my support for final passage of any bill. I know many of you will have to see the bill changed substantially for you to support it.

“We’ve tried to do this by coming up with a proposal behind closed doors in consultation with the administration, then springing it on skeptical members, trying to convince them it’s better than nothing, asking us to swallow our doubts and force it past a unified opposition. I don’t think that is going to work in the end. And it probably shouldn’t.

“The Obama administration and congressional Democrats shouldn’t have forced through Congress without any opposition support a social and economic change as massive as Obamacare. And we shouldn’t do the same with ours.

“Why don’t we try the old way of legislating in the Senate, the way our rules and customs encourage us to act. If this process ends in failure, which seem likely, then let’s return to regular order.

“Let the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee under Chairman Alexander and Ranking Member Murray hold hearings, try to report a bill out of committee with contributions from both sides. Then bring it to the floor for amendment and debate, and see if we can pass something that will be imperfect, full of compromises, and not very pleasing to implacable partisans on either side, but that might provide workable solutions to problems Americans are struggling with today.

“What have we to lose by trying to work together to find those solutions? We’re not getting much done apart. I don’t think any of us feels very proud of our incapacity. Merely preventing your political opponents from doing what they want isn’t the most inspiring work. There’s greater satisfaction in respecting our differences, but not letting them prevent agreements that don’t require abandonment of core principles, agreements made in good faith that help improve lives and protect the American people.

“The Senate is capable of that. We know that. We’ve seen it before. I’ve seen it happen many times. And the times when I was involved even in a modest way with working out a bipartisan response to a national problem or threat are the proudest moments of my career, and by far the most satisfying.

“This place is important. The work we do is important. Our strange rules and seemingly eccentric practices that slow our proceedings and insist on our cooperation are important. Our founders envisioned the Senate as the more deliberative, careful body that operates at a greater distance than the other body from the public passions of the hour.

“We are an important check on the powers of the Executive. Our consent is necessary for the President to appoint jurists and powerful government officials and in many respects to conduct foreign policy. Whether or not we are of the same party, we are not the President’s subordinates. We are his equal!

“As his responsibilities are onerous, many and powerful, so are ours. And we play a vital role in shaping and directing the judiciary, the military, and the cabinet, in planning and supporting foreign and domestic policies. Our success in meeting all these awesome constitutional obligations depends on cooperation among ourselves.

“The success of the Senate is important to the continued success of America. This country – this big, boisterous, brawling, intemperate, restless, striving, daring, beautiful, bountiful, brave, good and magnificent country – needs us to help it thrive. That responsibility is more important than any of our personal interests or political affiliations.

“We are the servants of a great nation, ‘a nation conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.’ More people have lived free and prosperous lives here than in any other nation. We have acquired unprecedented wealth and power because of our governing principles, and because our government defended those principles.

“America has made a greater contribution than any other nation to an international order that has liberated more people from tyranny and poverty than ever before in history. We have been the greatest example, the greatest supporter and the greatest defender of that order. We aren’t afraid. “We don’t covet other people’s land and wealth. We don’t hide behind walls. We breach them. We are a blessing to humanity.

“What greater cause could we hope to serve than helping keep America the strong, aspiring, inspirational beacon of liberty and defender of the dignity of all human beings and their right to freedom and equal justice? That is the cause that binds us and is so much more powerful and worthy than the small differences that divide us.

“What a great honor and extraordinary opportunity it is to serve in this body.

“It’s a privilege to serve with all of you. I mean it. Many of you have reached out in the last few days with your concern and your prayers, and it means a lot to me. It really does. I’ve had so many people say such nice things about me recently that I think some of you must have me confused with someone else. I appreciate it though, every word, even if much of it isn’t deserved.

“I’ll be here for a few days, I hope managing the floor debate on the defense authorization bill, which, I’m proud to say is again a product of bipartisan cooperation and trust among the members of the Senate Armed Services Committee.

“After that, I’m going home for a while to treat my illness. I have every intention of returning here and giving many of you cause to regret all the nice things you said about me. And, I hope, to impress on you again that it is an honor to serve the American people in your company.

“Thank you, fellow senators.

“Mr. President, I yield the floor.”

JOHN MCCAIN'S RECOVERY & RETURN TO US SENATE REQUIRES LONG SHOT MIRACLE (ARIZONA SPECIAL ELECTION?)

JOHN MCCAIN'S RECOVERY & RETURN TO US SENATE REQUIRES LONG SHOT MIRACLE:

MCCAIN IS NOW BEING COMPARED TO THE LATE US SENATOR TED KENNEDY WHO DIED OF BRAIN CANCER IN 2009.

WILL A SPECIAL ELECTION BE HELD IN ARIZONA TO REPLACE MCCAIN?

WHEN??


Sources: ABC News, Fox News, NY Times, State of the Nation, Youtube


***** Despite cancer diagnosis, McCain says, 'I'll be back soon'


Battling brain cancer, John McCain on Thursday vowed to return to the Senate, leveling fresh criticism at the Trump administration and aiming a good-natured dig at Republican and Democratic colleagues shaken by news of his diagnosis.

"I greatly appreciate the outpouring of support — unfortunately for my sparring partners in Congress, I'll be back soon, so stand-by!" McCain said in a tweet. Showing no signs of stepping back from political and national security battles, he issued a statement slamming the Trump administration over its Syria policy.

The 80-year-old McCain, the GOP's presidential nominee in 2008 and a six-term Arizona lawmaker, was diagnosed with glioblastoma, an aggressive type of brain cancer, according to doctors at the Mayo Clinic in Phoenix, who had removed a blood clot above his left eye last Friday.

They also managed to remove all of the tumor that was visible on brain scans.

The senator and his family are considering further treatment, including chemotherapy and radiation, as he recuperates at his home in Arizona. President Donald Trump called the senator on Thursday, said a White House official who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss private talks.

In a blistering statement through his office, McCain criticized the administration over reports that it was ending a program to assist Syrian opposition forces fighting the government of Bashar Assad.

"If these reports are true, the administration is playing right into the hands of Vladimir Putin," said McCain, chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee. "Making any concession to Russia, absent a broader strategy for Syria, is irresponsible and short-sighted."

Battling brain cancer, John McCain on Thursday vowed to return to the Senate, leveling fresh criticism at the Trump administration and aiming a good-natured dig at Republican and Democratic colleagues shaken by news of his diagnosis.

"I greatly appreciate the outpouring of support — unfortunately for my sparring partners in Congress, I'll be back soon, so stand-by!" McCain said in a tweet. Showing no signs of stepping back from political and national security battles, he issued a statement slamming the Trump administration over its Syria policy.

The 80-year-old McCain, the GOP's presidential nominee in 2008 and a six-term Arizona lawmaker, was diagnosed with glioblastoma, an aggressive type of brain cancer, according to doctors at the Mayo Clinic in Phoenix, who had removed a blood clot above his left eye last Friday. They also managed to remove all of the tumor that was visible on brain scans.

The senator and his family are considering further treatment, including chemotherapy and radiation, as he recuperates at his home in Arizona. President Donald Trump called the senator on Thursday, said a White House official who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss private talks.

In a blistering statement through his office, McCain criticized the administration over reports that it was ending a program to assist Syrian opposition forces fighting the government of Bashar Assad.

"If these reports are true, the administration is playing right into the hands of Vladimir Putin," said McCain, chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee. "Making any concession to Russia, absent a broader strategy for Syria, is irresponsible and short-sighted."

More significantly, McCain's absence complicated Republican leader Mitch McConnell's plans for a Senate vote on a GOP health care bill to erase much of Barack Obama's law. A vote is possible as early as Tuesday, but Republican defections plus McCain's likely absence could sink any chance even to get started.

McCain's closest friend in the Senate, Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, said that they had spoken by telephone Wednesday night and that the diagnosis had been a shock to McCain. But Graham said "woe is me" is not in McCain's DNA. "One thing John has never been afraid of is death," said Graham, who said he expects McCain to be back at the Capitol.

Prior to a Thursday news conference on immigration legislation, Graham said McCain called him three times.

"He is yelling at me to buck up, I'm so going to buck up," Graham said.

It was unclear how long McCain might be out. Earlier this year, Sen. Johnny Isakson, R-Ga., missed several weeks after undergoing back surgery. Former Sen. Mark Kirk, R-Ill., was out for nearly a year after suffering a stroke in 2012.

Meantime, prayers and words of encouragement flowed in Thursday from presidents and Senate colleagues past and present.

"I called Senator John McCain this morning to wish him well and encourage him in his fight.

Instead, he encouraged me," said former President George W. Bush, who prevailed over McCain for the GOP presidential nomination in 2000. "I was impressed by his spirit and determination."

Former Sen. Bob Dole of Kansas said: "Having known John for many decades, I am certain that he is as tough as they come — if anyone can defeat this, it's him. John is a true American hero."

According to the American Brain Tumor Association, more than 12,000 people a year are diagnosed with glioblastoma, the same type of tumor that struck McCain's Democratic colleague in legislative battles, the late Ted Kennedy of Massachusetts.

The American Cancer Society puts the five-year survival rate for patients over 55 at about 4 percent.

McCain, a former combat pilot, has a lifetime of near-death experiences — surviving a July 1967 fire and explosion on the USS Forrestal that killed 134 sailors, flying into power lines in Spain, being shot down in October 1967 and falling into Truc Bach Lake in Hanoi, and going through 5 1/2 years in a North Vietnamese prison.

"The Hanoi Hilton couldn't break John McCain's spirit many years ago, so Barbara and I know — with confidence — he and his family will meet this latest battle in his singular life of service with courage and determination," said former President George H.W. Bush.

Commenting on both McCain and the response, Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., said, "The outpouring of bipartisan respect and love for John McCain as he faces this cancer battle reminds us that after all the meanness there is a human side to politicians. Count this Democrat in John McCain's corner."

In the past, McCain had been treated for melanoma, but this primary tumor is unrelated. Doctors said McCain is recovering from his surgery "amazingly well" and his underlying health is excellent.

HEALTH CARE BILL CUTS MANAGES MEDICAID SPENDING BUT DOESN'T KILL IT

HEALTH CARE BILL REDUCES MEDICAID SPENDING BUT DOESN'T KILL IT:

QUALITY CARE NOT WASTE AND ABUSE.

PROVIDES MORE HEALTHCARE JOBS & TRAINING.

GOP LEADERS MUST WORK TOGETHER FOR THE PEOPLE WHO ELECTED THEM.


Sources: Fox Business, Washington Times, Youtube


**** GOP Senator on Health Care Bill: Medicaid Spending Will Increase


Sen. John Thune, (R-SD), one of the senators who worked behind closed doors on the GOP health care bill, said that Medicaid spending will increase under the new bill.

"It will increase every year at the rate of inflation," Thune stated. He added that the bill aims to build upon the success of innovation already happening with respect to Medicaid.

Sen. John Thune, (R-SD), one of the senators who worked behind closed doors on the GOP health care bill, said that Medicaid spending will increase under the new bill.

"It will increase every year at the rate of inflation," Thune stated. He added that the bill aims to build upon the success of innovation already happening with respect to Medicaid.

House Speaker Paul Ryan also downplayed concerns, saying the bill must be written before it is presented.

"This shifts power, distributes power back to the states," Thune said.

The GOP bill will allow for more choices and competition, the South Dakota congressman promised.

"Too often these programs are driven out of Washington, D.C. in a one size fits all approach," Thune concluded.

Later on in the show, Sen. Ben Cardin (D-MD) pushed back on Thune's claims, saying the Medicaid cuts are deeper than in the House version.

He said the bill "shifts the burden" for covering Medicaid to states, rather than providing more money for the program.

PRES TRUMP SIGNS EXEC ORDER TO UNRAVEL OBAMACARE'S WEB OF DECEIT

PRES TRUMP SIGNS FIRST EXEC ORDER TO UNRAVEL OBAMACARE'S WEB OF DECEIT:

TRUMP DOESN'T NEED TO DELIVER LONG LYING SPEECHES TO TAKE ACTION.

GOD BLESS AMERICA & U.S. MILITARY.


Sources: Fox News, Reuters, YouTube


**** Trump, in Oval Office, signs first executive order on Obamacare

President Donald Trump signed his first executive order on Friday in the Oval Office shortly after his inaugural parade ended, directing agencies to ease the regulatory burdens associated with Obamacare as the U.S. Congress determines how to repeal and replace the health care law.

Trump also signed the commissions for his Defense Secretary James Mattis and his Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly, who were confirmed by the Senate on Friday.

White House spokesman Sean Spicer also told reporters that Trump's Chief of Staff Reince Preibus is sending a memo to agencies directing an immediate regulatory freeze.

DOMESTIC VIOLENCE vs THE 2016 ELECTION (WOMEN VOTERS)

DOMESTIC VIOLENCE vs THE 2016 ELECTION (WOMEN VOTERS):

VA HOSPITALS DON'T SCREEN VETS FOR MENTAL HEALTH OR SIGNS OF BEATING THEIR WIVES. (AGGRESSION)

THE MEDIA HAS FORGOTTEN RAY RICE PUNCHING OUT HIS THEN FIANCEE' JANAY PALMER.

IT'S TIME TO CLOSE VA HOSPITALS &  PRIVATIZE VET HEALTH CARE.

Helping Women in Abusive Marriages and Relationships become self-sufficient should be a key 2016 platform issue.

Women married to U.S. SOLDIERS and ATHLETES are frequent victims of DOMESTIC VIOLENCE.

There are thousands of Male U.S. Military Vets living in American society with severe MENTAL HEALTH issues.

Due to Survival skills they learned while on Active Duty, its not uncommon for Military VETS (Men) to appear Sane in public while Abusing their Wives and Children behind closed doors.

VA Hospitals do NOT screen these Military Heroes, instead they just prescribe them PILLS for the purpose of SELF-MEDICATING their Mental Health issues.

Considering the number of mega VA Hospitals Scandals under Pres OBAMA'S administration, I say it is time shut down all VA Hospitals and PRIVATIZE Health Care for Veterans.

It is also time for all VETS to receive MANDATORY Mental Health screening each time they request pills for illness, each time they are DIVORCED and each time an immediate member of their family dies via SUICIDE.

~ Husbands Who Bring The War Home

With thousands of troops now preparing to return, a new crisis may open on the domestic front. Military wife Stacy Bannerman on the husbands she’s seen transformed into domestic abusers.

"If you don't hear from me in the next 24 hours, call the police," she whispered, then hung up. My phone read 2:12 am; it was the third call in as many minutes.

I tried calling back—no answer. I went back to sleep, angry at Kristi for calling in the middle of the night and scaring me with a single sentence.

The next morning I fired off an email: "I cannot, for the love of God, imagine what you were thinking when you called last night.

Please tell me." Kristi and I had become battle buddies at home while our husbands were serving in Iraq in 2004-05.

We had cried each time a military family member called with word of a soldier's death or suicide; we grieved at funerals and gravesites, marches and memorials.

We wept with and for each another when she or I learned that our husband had been mobilized for another deployment, and again when they finally came home.

Her husband had served three combat tours since 2002.

The last one was the shortest yet, a mere 10 months, and Kristi wrote in an email that "he actually came back pretty normal this time!" That was nearly four months ago. When my phone rang in the afternoon early last fall, I saw that it was her, and picked up.

"Mark tried to strangle me last night," she blurted out. "I called you from the bathroom. I locked myself in with the pets. I didn't want him to hurt my puppy. I'm sorry I called. I was just so scared, and I didn't have anyone else to call. I couldn't call the cops."

I had gotten other midnight calls from other military wives, cowering in closets and under dining room tables, dialing for a lifeline to someone outside of their domestic war zone.

But this was my friend: strong and smart, she had worked at a women's shelter nearly a decade ago. She knew all the warning signs.

And Kristi's husband adored her.

He had no history of domestic violence, no pattern of abuse. He had made no attempts to isolate her from friends, family, or finances. Mark's most recent post-deployment mental health assessment hadn't indicated any issues.

There hadn't been a single red flag before Mark wrapped his hands around Kristi's throat and squeezed, which is what makes veterans' household violence unique.

Abuse by combat veterans tends to have its own distinctive pattern that is unlike the recurring power-and-control cycle of abuse described in most domestic violence literature.

The journal Disabled American Veterans stated that veteran interpersonal violence often involves "only one or two extremely violent and frightening abusive episodes that quickly precipitate treatment seeking."

"Mark tried to strangle me last night," my friend blurted out.

The majority of studies of treatment-seeking veterans with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) or combat-related mental health issues report that at least 50 percent of those veterans commit wife-battering and family violence.

Male veterans with PTSD are two to three times more likely than veterans without PTSD to engage in intimate partner violence, according to the VA, which also found that the majority of veterans with combat stress commit at least one act of spousal abuse in their first year post-deployment.

"How are you now?" I asked Kristi. "Where is he?"

"I'm okay, but my throat hurts a little. He's gone. I made him leave this morning. I told him I didn't want to hear from him until he had talked to a counselor or gotten into some kind of treatment.

I said that I didn't feel safe with him, and I couldn't…I wasn't…" she sobbed, hiccupping out words, "I wasn't sure if I ever would again… Goddamn it. Goddamn this war."

Kristi and I talked a lot over the next days and weeks—mostly she talked, and I listened. She was seeing a civilian counselor, but spent most of her time at home, shell-shocked and alone.

She said her counselor just kept telling her to leave her husband, giving her lectures on the typical cycle of domestic abuse, so she tried to find someone who understood the military and veterans.

She called the military chaplain on post, but he never called back. She called the VA, and asked if they had support programs for wives of combat veterans.

They didn't. She called Military One Source, a free counseling assistance program provided by the Department of Defense.

But the lady there just started to cry, and told her that she got "these calls all the time. I can't help you. Unless you authorize a report, I can't authorize assistance."

Kristi reached out to another military spouse that lived off post and was married to an Iraq war veteran.

She told her what happened, and her friend said that she and her husband had gotten into so many fights, hitting and screaming and throwing things at each other, that she ended up going to the domestic violence shelter.

Staff at the shelter told her that they didn't have programs for wives of veterans, and that her husband made too much money for her to stay there, anyway.

Meanwhile, Mark was staying with friends, or sleeping in his office. 

After several days of silence, they began talking, but she hasn't seen him since that night, and at times, she's wondered if she even wants to. "I miss him, I do," she said. "We've already been apart way too much, but I am so angry, and hurt."

Today, Kristi says that Mark's trying to get help, but it's not easy.

He called a domestic violence hotline, and the person he talked to discouraged him from going to the men's group because he doesn't fit the abuser profile. "It's not like he can make a lot of calls about this when he works for 10 hours every day,"

Kristi says. "His insurance won't pay for him go to a private therapist at night. They said he can only see someone at the base medical center, and he's not doing that. He can't really sneak off for three hours in the middle of the day and drive down to the VA, either."

Most family victims of veteran violence don't file reports with the police or their husband's command.

The military is stepping up domestic violence programs and education at military instillations, but the pressure on spouses within the active duty and retired military culture and much of the civilian population to remain silent is especially intense during a time a war.

Speaking out about veteran violence at home seems to be perceived as more of a betrayal than the violence itself.

Even so, since 2003, there has been a 75 percent increase in reports of domestic violence in and around Ft. Hood, where the number of soldiers diagnosed with PTSD rose from 310 in 2004 to 2,445 in 2009.

Equally telling is the 2010 Military Family Lifestyle Survey, the second annual poll conducted by Blue Star Families (BSF) of military families with a loved one currently in the service.

This year's survey included a ream of questions about returning-veteran violence. I don't think there was a single question on that topic last year.

When I last spoke to Kristi, she said that she had quit praying that she and Mark "would get their old lives back. That's gone." Now, she just prays that the last deployment was, in fact, the last, and that someday, the war will end for them, too.

About 63,000 soldiers will return from combat tours between July and December. 

According to military statistics, nearly half of active-duty National Guard members, 38 percent of Army soldiers, and 31 percent of Marines report mental health problems upon return from Middle East deployments.

If just 20 percent of them have post-combat stress, then it can reasonably be projected that roughly half of those veterans will commit at least one act of severe domestic abuse or interpersonal violence in the coming year.

That's approximately 6,300 veterans' wives and kids who are at risk.

President Obama declared that major combat operations in Iraq are over.

They may just be starting for thousands of America's military family members.

Sources: CNN, Daily Beast NY Times, TMZ, Youtube

Vaccinations & Autism Becomes 2016 GOP Platform Debate Issue

‪#‎Vaccinations‬

GOP LEADERS USING VACCINATIONS AS 2016 PLATFORM ISSUE TO REPLACE OBAMACARE:

ENCOURAGING PARENTS NOT TO VACCINATE THEIR CHILDREN IS POLITICALLY IRRESPONSIBLE & EQUATES TO CHILD ABUSE.

Since GOP leaders have been Unsuccessful in their efforts to REPEAL OBAMACARE, now they've come up with a New 2016 Political Scheme to attract Voters.

What is that New Political Gimmick??

VACCINATIONS!

Although the practice of the Federal Gov't regulating VACCINATIONS has been in effect for Decades, suddenly it appears to be a problem because the United States now has a BLACK President.

Sound familiar?

So it was perfectly acceptable for MITT ROMNEY (a WHITE Man) to enforce "ROMNEYCARE" in the commonwealth of Massachusetts, thus requiring all Massachusetts residents to have Health Insurance but...............

When a BLACK Man requires the SAME level of RESPONSIBILITY for each resident & citizen of the United States, suddenly it's an encroachment on Civil Liberties and suddenly it's a CRIME!

Get out of here!

Give me a break!

YES the OBAMACARE roll out was Dreadful & Terrible we all know this to be True.

YES there is some credible Medical Research which documents that there may be some evidence linking AUTISM to VACCINATIONS.

However to encourage Parents NOT to VACCINATE their Young Children from Contagious, Potentially Deadly COMMUNICABLE DISEASES is Politically IRRESPONSIBLE and equates to CHILD ABUSE.

Thus I repeat.

GOP LEADERS USING VACCINATIONS AS 2016 PLATFORM ISSUE TO REPLACE OBAMACARE.

Such Political Schemes reek of the GOP being Desperate to regain control of the White House in 2016.

Even at the expense of the Health of Young Children!

What a Shame!

Sources: ABC News; CNN; Fox News Sunday; MSNBC; NPR; Politico; WebMd, Youtube

FINLEY BOYLE Suffered Cardiac Arrest After Routine Medical Procedure Just Like JAHI MCMATH (FINLEY Died!)

#FinleyBoyle


MEDICAL MALPRACTICE & HARVESTING ORGANS:

Both FINLEY BOYLE 3, & JAHI MCMATH 13, went into Cardiac Arrest which resulted in BRAIN DAMAGE after recently undergoing Routine Medical Procedures.

FINLEY Died!




ARTICLE: "Hawaii Girl, 3, Dies After Dental Procedure"


Finley Boyle, a 3-year-old Hawaii girl who suffered massive brain damage after undergoing a dental procedure last month, died Friday night, a hospice said Saturday.

The girl died with her family by her side, said Kenneth L. Zeri, president and chief professional officer of Hospice Hawaii.

"There are few greater privileges in life than to accompany someone on their end-of-life journey, providing comfort and support not only to that person but also to their loved ones," the statement said. "As with all of our patients, we were truly blessed to be able to be there for The Boyle Family and for Finley at the end of her journey."

Finley's parents are suing a Kailua, Hawaii, dentist, alleging negligence and dangerous conduct.

The lawsuit, filed against Lilly Geyer and her practice, Island Dentistry for Children, alleges improper medications with incorrect dosages were administered to the girl on December 3, according to court documents filed this week.

"As a direct and proximate result of the medications administered to (Finley) by defendants, (Finley) suffered cardiac arrest during her dental procedure," the lawsuit says.

It alleges that, as a further result of improper medications, Finley "suffered severe and permanent brain damage."

Neither Geyer nor her attorney, John Nishimoto, responded to CNN's requests for comment.

The Island Dentistry website states it has been permanently closed and directs patients to an e-mail address.

The lawsuit, filed Monday in Hawaii's First Circuit Court, alleges that Geyer had no plan in place to respond to medical emergencies, such as the one Finley suffered.

It seeks unspecified damages.

Finley's mother, Ashley Boyle, said she first took her daughter to the dentist in November, when she was told her daughter needed six fillings and four root canals, she said.

They returned in December to undergo the root canals, Boyle said.

The parents allege that Finley was sedated and left unmonitored for 26 minutes.

Finley was moved from a hospital to the hospice in late December.

Finley's pediatric neurologist, Dr. Gregory Yen, said MRIs showed the girl suffered severe brain damage and that she was in a "persistent vegetative state."


Sources: ABC, CNN, Youtube

Obama Admin vs Minimum Wage Laws: Urges Overtime Pay For Home Health Workers

Wage Protection for Home Care Workers

The Obama administration proposed regulations on Thursday to give the nation’s nearly two million home care workers minimum wage and overtime protections. Those workers have long been exempted from coverage.

Labor unions and advocates for low-wage workers have pushed for the changes, contending that the 37-year-old exemption improperly swept these workers, who care for many elderly and disabled Americans, into the same “companion” category as baby sitters. The administration’s move calls for home care aides to be protected under the Fair Labor Standards Act, the nation’s main wage and hour law.

“They work hard and play by the rules,” President Obama said about a group of workers who often feed patients, tend wounds or help with physical therapy. “Today’s action will ensure that these men and women get paid fairly for a service that a growing number of older Americans couldn’t live without.”

These workers, according to industry figures, generally earn $8.50 to $12 an hour, compared with the federal minimum wage of $7.25 an hour. The White House said 92 percent of these workers were women, nearly 30 percent were African-American and 12 percent Hispanic. Nearly 40 percent rely on public benefits like Medicaid and food stamps.

While industry experts say an overwhelming majority are paid at least the minimum wage, many do not receive a time-and-a-half premium when they work more than 40 hours a week. Twenty-two states do not include home health care workers under their wage and hour laws.

“The job they do is a real job and they deserve the same basic rights as any other workers,” said Steven Edelstein, national policy director of PHI PolicyWorks, a nonprofit group that seeks to improve conditions for home care workers. “This industry has one of the nation’s fastest-growing work forces, and the challenge is to make these better jobs if we’re trying to attract good people to come and provide the services.”

According to the federal government, six million of the 40 million Americans older than 65 now need some form of daily assistance to live outside a nursing home. That number, government officials say, is expected to double to 12 million by 2030. Republican lawmakers and business groups criticized the proposed rules, which might be modified after a 60-day public comment period. Industry officials said the proposals would push up costs and might cause home care agencies to reduce the hours of aides who work more than 40 hours a week and instead hire more aides.

“The president’s goal is commendable, but the likely result of this new rule is reduced hours for home care workers and higher costs for taxpayers,” said John Kline, a Minnesota Republican who is chairman of the House Education and the Work Force Committee, and Tim Walberg, a Minnesota Republican who heads the panel’s subcommittee on work force protections. “Moreover, our nation’s elderly may pay the greatest price in the form of more costly services and fewer opportunities to obtain the care they need in the comfort of their own homes.”

William A. Dombi, vice president for law at the National Association of Home Care and Hospice, said workers might not receive much overtime pay as a result of these changes. “These new rules might come out with everybody behind,” he said. “Workers might not get the hours they want and agencies might have higher administrative and recruiting costs.”

Labor Secretary Hilda Solis said any increased costs would be modest. She said it was hard to project exactly what employers would do, whether they would have many employees continue to work overtime or would hire additional workers to minimize overtime. She estimated that Medicare or Medicaid, which cover 75 percent of the nation’s home care costs, would pay $31.1 million to $169.5 million more each year toward home care aides, which she said would represent 0.06 percent to 0.29 percent of federal and state outlays for home care.

Secretary Solis said the proposal would ”level the playing field for staffing agencies, who will no longer be pressured to underpay their competitors on wages to gain an edge.”

Noting that nearly 90 percent of the nation’s home care aides work for agencies, Labor Department officials said such aides would receive the new wage and hour protections. The department said some companions employed by individuals for activities like helping them take walks or engage in hobbies would still be exempt from minimum wage and overtime coverage.

In 1974, the Labor Department exempted “companionship” workers from coverage under the Fair Labor Standards Act, a move that focused on baby sitters at a time when the home care industry was in its infancy.

In 2007, the Supreme Court issued a decision involving a New York home care aide, Evelyn Coke, who often worked 70 hours a week, ruling that she was not entitled to overtime pay under existing regulations.

The court said it was up to Congress or the Labor Department to change the rules.


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Sources: CNN, NY Times, White House.gov, Youtube, Google Maps

Obama Prepares For The Worst If Health Care Law Struck Down: Olympia Snowe & The Uninsured

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Thanks to retiring GOP Senator Olympia Snowe, Pres. Obama's Entire Universal Health Care Law may be struck down because of that Individual Mandate.

In exchange for her Vote Olympia Snowe quietly suggested that Pres. Obama replace a Single Payer or Public Option with an Individual Mandate.

In other words she smiled in his face, while stabbing him in the Back!

Senator Snowe later claimed she did NOT support an Individual Mandate, yet She Voted in Favor of an Individual Mandate.

Pres. Obama’s mistake in this scenario?

He Trusted Olympia Snowe an Experienced, Seasoned Legislator who he thought really Cared More about helping people than about Politics.

He was Wrong!

Olympia Snowe cared more about Politics and about helping her party (GOP) Win.

This is So Sad.

What about the Millions of Uninsured People?

Do GOP Leaders care about those people?

If Pres. Obama's Health Care law is Struck down he should Shout it from the 4 Corners of America about the Good things his Law Offered.

The GOP has NO Replacement at ALL!

Thus Millions of Children & Adults with Pre-Existing Conditions will Suffer.

If I were Pres. Obama I would NOT let the American People forget this harsh reality.

While its true Pres. Obama's Affordable Health Care Law was NOT Perfect, it was most certainly necessary.

An Adverse Ruling by the SCOTUS will most certainly cause Political Implications for the GOP and help to Sink Mitt Romney's Ship come November.

I again ask GOP Leaders, what do you have to Replace the Affordable Health Care Act?

Especially for Millions of Children & Adults with Pre-Existing Medical Conditions??

WHAT??

Senator Snowe if the Affordable Health Care Act is Struck down by the High Court, I hope you can Sleep peacefully at night knowing Millions of Children & Adults with Pre-Existing Medical Conditions will NOT be eligible for Health Insurance.

If Your Political Party (GOP) Wins this battle, was it worth it??

So Sad.

Dear God Help Us!

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Putting On a Brave Face, but Preparing for Heartbreak on Health Care

Late on Tuesday, March 27, halfway around the world, President Obama began one of the most suspenseful waits in recent presidential history.

After a blur of nuclear security meetings in South Korea, Mr. Obama settled into the Air Force One conference room to read a summary aides had written of that day’s arguments before the Supreme Court back in Washington. The justices had asked deeply skeptical questions about his health care law.

Mr. Obama’s most profound policy achievement was at much higher risk of defeat than his aides had expected, vulnerable to being erased by the margin of a single justice’s vote.

Since then, Mr. Obama and the White House have put on brave faces, insisting that the law and the mandate at its center will be upheld when the court rules this month. In private conversations, they predict that the bulk of the law will survive even if the mandate requiring Americans to buy health insurance does not.

But even if the White House is a fortress of message discipline, it cannot disguise the potential heartbreak for Mr. Obama, who managed to achieve a decades-old Democratic dream despite long odds and at steep cost.

If he loses both his law and re-election, many will conclude “that he bet on his major reform, and the Supreme Court defeated it, and he lost his hold on the presidency,” Robert Dallek, the presidential historian, said in an interview.

On the day the ruling comes out, one Obama adviser joked, “I might have to clean out my sock drawer.”

In grappling with what the court may do, Mr. Obama and his advisers now appear to be far past the denial stage (when they dismissed constitutional challenges) but nowhere near acceptance (they still believe the law will be upheld.) Instead, they have quietly entered a surprising new state that might be called Learning to Live Without Universal Coverage.

Former advisers are emphasizing the many aspects of the bill that are not connected to the mandate, like the subsidies to buy insurance. Some aides even argue privately that losing the mandate could be a political boon, because it would rob Republicans of their core complaint against the law.

But that position has a not-small problem: it directly contradicts the argument the administration so strenuously made to the court, which is that the law cannot work without the mandate.

It is also uncomfortable for a deeper reason, one that goes to the core of who Mr. Obama wanted to be as president. Earlier in his term, he refused every chance to settle for the more limited health care overhaul that the Supreme Court may now effectively deliver, making epic sacrifices to win something far broader.

Before he became president, critics said that Mr. Obama’s greatest achievement was his own rise, that he played it safe — sometimes voting “present” in the Illinois State Senate — rather than taking risks for what he really believed. “What’s he ever done?” Representative Bobby L. Rush, Democrat of Illinois, asked repeatedly in 2000 when he crushed his upstart Congressional challenger, and opponents later echoed the question.

Early in the presidential race, Mr. Obama summoned the historian Doris Kearns Goodwin for a conversation about Abraham Lincoln. He was only an upstart candidate, but he was already talking about leaving a legacy, about accomplishing vast things.

In the White House, many of his top advisers, including Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. and his first chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel, counseled Mr. Obama against a sweeping health care overhaul. By summer 2009, with the country still stunned by economic crisis and Republicans falsely raising the specter of death panels, some aides practically begged the president to scale back, take interim steps and move on to other issues.

Mr. Obama did not relent. He had an economic rationale for stabilizing a dysfunctional health system, but he also “saw what Teddy called the moral issue,” Victoria Reggie Kennedy, Senator Edward M. Kennedy’s widow, said in an interview, referring to her husband. For those who wondered what Mr. Obama really believed in, universal health coverage seemed to be the answer.

As the brutal fight continued, the president sacrificed more and more in its name: an overhaul of energy and environmental laws, greater focus on economic issues, some of his own popularity and that of House Democrats, who eventually lost their hard-won majority. “Michelle and I are perfectly comfortable if we’re only here one term if we feel like we really accomplished something,” he told aides.

That declaration sounds different today. Mitt Romney, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, uses “Obamacare” as an epithet and applause line, promising outright repeal if he wins. A few years ago, the health care law seemed a reason for Mr. Obama to risk losing re-election, former aides said. Now, it is a reason he feels he must win re-election.

As he awaits the decision, Mr. Obama has no more knowledge of or influence on it than any of the other lawyers handicapping the odds in Washington bars and boardrooms.

The former law professor turned president is scathing about the argument that the mandate violates the Constitution, saying it has no merit whatsoever. Sometimes, to the nervousness of advisers, he says as much in public; a few days after oral arguments, he laid down a gauntlet for the Supreme Court, all but saying that striking down the law would be politically motivated judicial activism. (He later softened his statement.)

“To have a voice as profound as the Supreme Court say it’s unconstitutional,” said Jonathan Gruber, an economist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology who was an adviser on the law, would be “bad news all around.”

But there are clues that Mr. Obama is privately grappling with both the potential loss of universal health care and how much of it he might be able to restore. At a recent fund-raiser in Manhattan, he rattled off a second-term agenda, and along with tax reform and immigration, he mentioned coming back to health care, to work around a negative ruling. His tone was matter-of-fact, one attendee said.

If the court strikes down the mandate and Mr. Obama wins in November, he could face one last version of his perpetual choice on health care: would he settle, learning to live with a sharply edited law? (Given that Republicans see the bill as a signature piece of big-government overreach, he might have no choice.) Or would he expend yet more precious capital on health care?

Ezekiel Emanuel, Rahm’s brother and a former health adviser to the president, predicted the second path. “Too much of the president’s legacy — and the good of the country — is tied up with this,” he said.

The final result on health care, then, will help determine whether Mr. Obama is the game-changing president he aspired to be.

“This is his singular policy achievement,” said Barry Friedman, a law professor at New York University who wrote a brief supporting the law. “So there’s a palpable pain in having this go down.”

Though the White House continues to maintain official silence on contingency plans, Mr. Obama hinted at his thinking a few weeks ago. “In my first term, we passed health care reform,” he began a joke at the White House Correspondents Dinner in April. “In my second term, I guess I’ll pass it again.”



Olympia Snowe Urges Constituents To Thank Court For Ruling Against The Individual Mandate She Voted For

Politico’s Pulse reports that Maine Sen. Olympia Snowe (R) “is inviting people to send a ‘thank you’ note to the 11th Circuit Court of appeals for deeming the individual mandate unconstitutional.

“I applaud you and your efforts for standing up for the constitution and for defending my individual liberties,’ reads the note on her reelection website, conveniently omitting the fact the Snowe was the only Republican to vote in favor of the mandate when she supported moving the health reform legislation out of the Senate Finance Committee:

In fact, she did not publicly oppose the individual requirement to purchase coverage — which the 11th Circuit found unconstitutional — until October of 2009. Earlier that year, she had indicated that she could support an individual requirement if coverage became more affordable. “I understand the rationality behind the individual mandate,” Snowe said during the committee’s mark-up hearings. “Certainly we shouldn’t pay for those who don’t have health insurance.”

But this isn’t the first time Snowe has attempted to cloud her role in moving forward the health care legislation. In March, Snowe issued a press release announcing that she is co-sponsoring an amendment “to repeal the employer mandate imposed by the new health reform law.” The “mandate” she was referring to, however, is actually a “free rider” compromise provision that she helped broker in her effort to draft a bipartisan health care law.


Sources: MSNBC, NY Times, Think Progress, Youtube