The numbers are coming in and the ACA will be a success

[Harmony Blue]

What the Republicans are now doing they do not have the political capital to sustain for the long haul. Once the Republican myopic strategy of shutting down the govermment runs out of steam, the ACA will come in like a tsunami and the Republicans will have no answer. Had they focused on generating an alternative to the ACA all these years instead they might have been able to salvage their party.

The Democratic party needs to stick with the ACA as it is the new crown jewel of the party.

[Blanks]

1. Had they acknowledged that the ACA came from a right-wing think tank...

and worked to tweak it, they'd have been ok.

They really set themselves up for failure this time.

[Harmony Blue]

2. I agree that they painted themselves in a corner

because they could have offered improvements to the ACA using Republican ideology to really drive a wedge with the American public. But once the ACA is in action, and the Republicans don't have an answer....the political outcome of inaction, or wasteful action will be substantial.

[defacto7]

3. K & R

[barbiegeek]

4. I think ACA success is why we have a shutdown

Republicans were going to lose votes when ACA rolled out and worked. So shutting down government didn't matter to them because they were losing votes anyway. It's the final FU to Dems for being right

[jeff47]

5. They can't.

The ACA is about the most right-wing way of providing health insurance that can actually work. After all, it is the product of the Heritage Foundation.

Any other plans (High risk pools and so on) either require direct government funding (SOCIALISM!!) or quickly fail.

So they really weren't left with any remotely workable plan to propose as an alternative.

[Harmony Blue]

6. The ACA isn't the most right wing way of providing health insurance

that would be having no ACA at all being the most right wing (basically found almost no where in the western world). It is indeed a right wing plan in origin, but from an era of moderate Republicans. That is why the current Republican party have an identity crisis.

[jeff47]

7. What you describe is not providing health insurance.

Kinda makes it not fall into the pool of ways to provide health insurance.

[Harmony Blue]

8. That is what the extreme right wing believe

or American Libertarians more precisely. Once the exchanges are set up in all 50 states, the best exchange will be copied by other states. Having so many states come up with their own iteration theoretically means that the chance of an efficient streamlined exchange improves dramatically. This leads the way to single payer on a national level.

[jeff47]

9. Yes, but if the OP is talking about the lack of a plan to provide health insurance

Saying they have a lack of a plan isn't providing that plan.

[CTyankee]

10. Because they DON'T have a plan. There is this plan or single payer. We simply could not

continue on this trajectory into oblivion with our so-called, laughable "health care system."

[jeff47]

11. No, there's plenty of plans besides that.

They're all "further to the left" than the ACA. Hence they were not available to the Republicans as alternatives to the ACA. Which is why the Republicans did not offer it. And now we're back to 5 posts ago.

[CTyankee]

12. I meant given the realities of the big insurance companies, the ACA or a complete overthrow of

the private system were the only options left standing after the dust settled...

[Harmony Blue]

13. Yes single payer is the easiest path

the ACA leads to single payer in a roundabout way. I always argued single payer is the simpler more efficient path. But this accomplishes this goal at a gradual pace rather than be punctuated.

[DireStrike]

15. I keep seeing this claim. How does it work when there's no public option?

Is the "single payer" to be one massive insurance company that outcompetes all the rest? I really don't feel very good about that.

[IronLionZion]

14. Have Republicans done anything useful since Nixon created the EPA?

It seems like that was the last time.