Brenda Lawrence on Health Care

ObamaCare is sound policy, but deal with consequences

Brenda Lawrence: I support ObamaCare and think it is sound policy. I do believe that there are amendments that could be made to resolve some of the unintended consequences, particularly for small business owners. However, the republicans do not want do discuss improving ObamaCare, they continue to attempt to repeal it.

Marcia Squier (Green Party): I think the Affordable Care Act should be repealed. I would instead extend the age requirement for Medicare to include all ages of people, from cradle to grave. I would include full coverage for all, with income-based deductibles for care and prescriptions. I would also include dental, vision, mental health, and chiropractic care because we all need and deserve to be healthy and no one else should die because of a lack of health insurance.

GOP can't beat ObamaCare, so they pretend it's a "disaster".

Heritage Action Summary: This vote would fully repeal ObamaCare.

Heritage Foundation recommendation to vote YES: (2/3/2015): ObamaCare creates $1.8 trillion in new health care spending and uses cuts to Medicare spending to help pay for some of it. Millions of Americans already have lost, and more likely will lose, their coverage because of ObamaCare. Many Americans have not been able to keep their doctors as insurers try to offset the added costs of ObamaCare by limiting the number of providers in their networks. In spite of the promise, the law increases the cost of health coverage.

Secretary of Labor Robert Reich recommendation to vote NO: (robertreich.org 11/22/2013): Having failed to defeat the Affordable Care Act, Republicans are now hell-bent on destroying the ObamaCare in Americans' minds, using the word "disaster" whenever mentioning the Act, and demand its repeal. Democrats [should] meet the Republican barrage with three larger truths:

1. The wreck of private insurance: Ours has been the only healthcare system in the world designed to avoid sick people. For-profit insurers have spent billions finding and marketing their policies to healthy people--while rejecting people with preexisting conditions, or at high risk.
2. We could not continue with this travesty of a healthcare system: ObamaCare is a modest solution. It still relies on private insurers--merely setting minimum standards and "exchanges" where customers can compare policies.
3. The moral imperative: Even a clunky compromise like the ACA between a national system of health insurance and a for-profit insurance market depends, fundamentally, on a social compact in which those who are healthier and richer are willing to help those who are sicker and poorer. Such a social compact defines a society.

Legislative outcome: Passed House 239-186-8; never came to a vote in the Senate.