Election Day 2016 Megathread

[Nodack]

I'm not an expert on Obamacare but, thinking about what is Obamacare I think of a few things. Obamacare added health insurance to 20 million people. A lot of them were just added to Medicare I believe. Kids can stay on their parents insurance until they are 26. Those with preexisting illnesses can't be turned away. No caps on how much insurance companies will cover. Ambulance rides are covered.

Trump said he will repeal and replace on the campaign trail. Now he says for starters that he would keep the part where kids stay on their parents plans until 26 and would keep the part where those with preexisting illnesses wouldn't be able to be denied coverage. He hasn't said whether he would kick 20 million people off of their insurance yet. It is sounding more and more like instead of repeal and replace it will be amend slightly.


https://www.romper.com/p/what-parts-of- ... -key-22650
While Trump's bombastic confidence might be reassuring for those who fear the fallout of repealing Obamacare, it appears that this method of picking and choosing which parts of Obamacare to maintain simply isn't realistic. As The Washington Post columnist Steven Pearlstein pointed out in his column this weekend, Obamacare is a holistic system; Taking away one part affects all the other parts. In the case of pre-existing conditions, Pearlstein argues that insurance companies can afford to insure sick people at lower rates only if there is an individual mandate that compels healthy people to buy health insurance.

In turn, the individual mandate is only feasible if there are subsidies for poorer individuals. Pearlstein wrote,

... At the end of the day, once you decide that everyone, regardless of age or medical condition, should be able to buy health insurance at an affordable price, you have essentially bought into the idea that young and healthy people have an obligation to subsidize the older and sicker people in some fashion. And once you do that, it’s sort of inevitable you end up where every health-reform plan has ended up since the days of Richard Nixon. You end up with some variation on Obamacare.

In the earlier days of Trump's campaign, the then-candidate seemed to show a desire — an interest, even — in insuring all Americans. Back in September 2015, when Trump was still campaigning against various other Republican contenders, he said during a 60 Minutes interview that "Everybody's got to be covered... I am going to take care of everybody. I don't care if it costs me votes or not. Everybody's going to be taken care of much better than they're taken care of now."

There have been indications that Trump's actual understanding of how Obamacare functions is subpar. During a campaign event in October, Trump said, “All of my employees are having a tremendous problem with Obamacare.” This was a confusing statement because Trump's employees are offered company insurance and therefore don't need — and indeed wouldn't be allowed to procure — an insurance plan through the Affordable Care Act. Also in October, Trump told Fox News, "Well, I don't use much Obamacare."

It seems plausible that once somebody tells Trump about how Obamacare works, he'll have more concrete ideas concerning what, exactly, would replace it. As health reporter Sarah Kliff recently wrote in Vox, "Republicans have a strong Obamacare repeal plan. They don't have a strong Obamacare replace plan."

[Mori Chu]

The stupid thing is, he wants to "repeal and replace" ObamaCare, but he is also saying that he'll keep almost all of its core principles. So really all along Republicans don't dislike ObamaCare, they dislike that the other team created it. They'll repeal it and replace it with TrumpCare, which will be 98% the same, and then crow about what a great thing they've done.

ObamaCare isn't perfect. Obama and Democrats know this, and they've known this for years. They have wanted to modify and improve it. But obstructionist Republicans in Congress refuse to let them pass any bills to amend ObamaCare because they want to kill it so badly. Now that they are in charge, they'll likely pass almost exactly the same alterations to it that the Dems would have, only now it's okay and good to do so because they will take credit for it. Stupid.

[Nodack]

Let them call it TrumpCare if it makes them feel better. I care more about the results than bragging rights. Maybe thats's how Dems should approach all dealings with them. Appeal to their ego.

[Cap]

By far the most unpopular aspect of Obamacare is the mandate.

Its constitutionality was challenged in court. CJ John Roberts saved it by observing that it's functionally equivalent to an income tax and corresponding credit for those who buy health insurance. Conservatives were angered by the ruling. Functional equivalence be damned, they said, words matter. A lot of people are choosing to pay the penalty, even though it doesn't make economic sense for them, because they refuse as a matter of principle to comply with the mandate.

The GOP can "repeal and replace" by changing the language of the law to reflect the Roberts interpretation. Instead of a penalty for those who don't buy health insurance, a credit for those who do. You leave the essential functionality of the law intact but claim you have eliminated the mandate.

[Nodack]

Once agan it's all about egos.

[Superbone]

Once agan it's all about egos.

That's what Trump is all about. He's got the biggest ego in the land.

[Nodack]

Big egos are easily manipulated. Clinton easily pulled his strings during the debate.

On another subject.

China Tells Trump That Climate Change Is No Hoax It Invented
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/ ... t-invented
The tycoon tweeted in 2012 that the concept of global warming “was created by and for the Chinese in order to make U.S. manufacturing non-competitive.” China’s envoy rejected that view.

U.S. Presidents Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush supported the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change in initiating global warming talks even before China knew that negotiations to cut pollution were starting, Liu told reporters at United Nations talks on Wednesday in Marrakech, Morocco.

“If you look at the history of climate change negotiations, actually it was initiated by the IPCC with the support of the Republicans during the Reagan and senior Bush administration during the late 1980s,” Liu told reporters during an hour-long briefing.

While Reagan died in 2004, George Schulz, who served as his secretary of state, has become one of the most prominent Republicans voicing concern about climate change and urging action.
“The potential results are catastrophic,” said Schulz, 95, in an interview with Bloomberg in 2014. “So let’s take out an insurance policy.”

Outgoing U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, who helped secure the Paris Agreement last year, said the majority of U.S. citizens back action on climate change and tried to assuage concern.
“No one has a right to make decisions for billions of people based solely on ideology,” he said. “Climate change shouldn’t be a partisan issue. It isn’t a partisan issue for our military. It isn’t a partisan issue for our intelligence community.”

[In2ition]

Once agan it's all about egos.

That's what Trump is all about. He's got the biggest ego in the land.

Come on, he said he's the most humble person you'd ever meet.

[Nodack]

And nobody respects woman as much as him.

He does know a lot more about ISIS than all of our Generals do.

[Indy]

He is a billionaire...

[Cap]

The guy who was born on third base and thought he hit a triple just stole home.

[Mori Chu]

Steve Kerr appears on The Axe Files podcast and goes off on Trump and 2016 election. Interesting stuff; Kerr knows what he is talking about, having lived overseas, traveled a ton, and having had a family involved in international politics.

http://www.cnn.com/2016/11/23/politics/ ... index.html

[In2ition]

Hmm, reading it, I don't think he is all that in touch with what the election was about, but that's not surprising as he's a millionaire NBA basketball coach.

[Mori Chu]

I agree that he's lived a charmed life and has never been poor or hungry or anything like that. What I would say is, Kerr has a multicultural understanding. He's around black people all the time, and around people of different levels of income and education. He does a lot of community outreach and charity work with the NBA. And his family has been overseas a ton, so he's been exposed to other countries and cultures and politics. Kerr's comments are about hate and violence and the discriminatory rhetoric that was so prevalent during this election cycle from Trump.

[In2ition]

You think people voted because of hate and violence?

[Nodack]

The Trump side voted out of anger. Trump convinced them that the world is coming to an end because of the evil Media, Government, Democrats, Mexicans, Blacks and Muslims that all hated America. He convinced them that the economy was destroyed and the military was gutted by Obama. The evil rapist drug dealing Mexicans were all of the sudden here and crossing the border by the millions that have never been here before because they were being invited by Obama so they could destroy America. The Blacks were all in the ghetto shooting each other and cops while sponging off of society. All Muslims were all plotting to kill Americans and they were all bad. He convinced them that he was going to drain the swamp of regular politicians because they were all on the take. In fact everybody was on the take including his own party and only he could fix everything. He convinced them that Hillary Clinton was evil and plotting the demise of America if elected.

They are mad at all the evil Trump described and they want their pound of flesh.

[In2ition]

Are you sure you listed everything?

[SDC]

According to a CNN exit poll, 1 in 3 Hispanic men and 1 in 4 Hispanic women voted for Trump in the 2016 Election

http://edition.cnn.com/election/results/exit-polls

[SDC]

Voters think Obama was a good president for somebody other than themselves

[Nodack]

No, I could go on and on for days.