The GOP: Still The Party Of No

Fresh off of cutting a deal (also to be read, covering their @$$) to keep the government from shutting down Friday, the GOP is back at saying no to any form of consensus on health care reform.

Sen. Orrin Hatch on Tuesday called President Barack Obama’s endorsement of the Wyden-Brown amendment to increase state flexibility “bull.”
“This date-shift gimmick does nothing to change the fundamental problems of Obamacare,” the ranking member on the Senate Finance Committee told the Federation of American Hospitals conference. “I went on TV yesterday after Secretary [Kathleen] Sebelius and she was going on about how much flexibility this was going to give the states and how much better it was going to be for everyone. That’s bull. States still would have to provide Washington-dictated coverage and waivers fail to give relief on the Medicaid spending mandate.”

“Flexibility … I believe the technical legal term is baloney,” the Utah Republican said.

See, the bill in question would allow states to opt out of the mandate on purchasing care for all citizens, IF they come up with their own way to achieve universal care in a few years. Currently, they get to opt out in 2017, if they have their own plan. This bill would allow that to happen in 2017.

In remarks to the National Governors Association, Mr. Obama said he backed legislation that would enable states to request federal permission to withdraw from the law’s mandates in 2014 rather than in 2017 as long as they could prove that they could find other ways to cover as many people as the original law would and at the same cost. The earlier date is when many of the act’s central provisions take effect, including requirements that most individuals obtain health insurance and that employers of a certain size offer coverage to workers or pay a penalty.
“I think that’s a reasonable proposal; I support it,” Mr. Obama told the governors, who were gathered in the State Dining Room of the White House.

“It will give you flexibility more quickly while still guaranteeing the American people reform.”

If you doubt their extremism:

As [Sen. John] Barrasso and other Republicans argued forthrightly earlier this year, the only opt out provisions they really support are ones that fatally undermine the law.
And even [Sen Scott] Brown, who co-authored this plan has told us that he'd still support full repeal, even if Congress adopted this measure.

At a weekly Capitol briefing with reporters Monday, House Majority Leader Eric Cantor said Obama's olive branch really just masks the case for full repeal.

"It is just making our point that not only have we seen a variety of exceptions and waivers issued for the private sector under the act, but now we are seeing how that act is troubling states in a real way as far as their trying to figure out the fiscal situations," he said.

Aside from the stupidity of Cantor's argument on it's face, remember that states like Vermont are just going the "single-payer" route, because they see this as a weaker plan from Washington. The fact is, the GOP is a group of extremists, intent on reverting us to corporate controlled health care. If they get repeal, we're right back where we started.