Many of the design principles for the insurance market exchanges in the Affordable Care Act were based on unproven, discredited, and frankly absurd conservative notions about the economagic of free markets.  But too many liberals refused to acknowledge this. During the height of the debate on the ACA, the inherently conservative and flawed nature of [...]

The White House has rather swiftly and strongly come out against the Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR) and Paul Ryan (R-WI) plan to make Medicare worse. From the Huffington Post: “We are concerned that Wyden-Ryan, like Congressman Ryan’s earlier proposal, would undermine, rather than strengthen, Medicare,” said White House Communications Director Dan Pfeiffer. “The Wyden-Ryan scheme [...]

This is a deeply disappointing move by Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR). He has joined with Paul Ryan (R-WI) to push for a bipartisan “reform” of Medicare, but like every recent plan for Medicare the word “reform” just means “make it worse” for regular Americans. While it is almost impossible to fully judge the proposal because [...]

The op-ed “Obamacare to the Rescue” in the LA Times by Spike Dolomite Ward has been making the rounds among Democratic bloggers. Ms. Ward was an uninsured, disappointed Obama supporter until she got cancer.  Luckily, Ward was one of a few thousand Americans able to find, qualify for and afford the Pre-existing Condition Insurance Plan [...]

There are increasing signs that the Super Committee won’t reach a deal. This is great news, because no deal means no cuts to Medicare and Social Security, and presumably less likelihood that we will implement dramatically more destructive austerity in the middle of an economic downturn. Reports coming out indicate that the individuals involved are [...]

The Democrats on the Super Committee, in their efforts to reach an deal with Republicans, have offered a new deficit reduction package and just like their last offer this one also contains cuts to Medicare benefits. From Politico: Supercommittee Democrats quietly floated details late Wednesday of a $2.3 trillion tax-and-cut proposal that includes $400 billion [...]

According to exclusive reporting from Reuters the Democrats on the Super Committee are offering to cut Medicare and Medicaid benefits as part of a roughly $3 trillion grand bargain, which would well exceed the $1.2 trillion minimum goal the committee is tasked with meeting. From Reuters: It calls for between $200 billion and $300 billion [...]

The percentage of young American adults between the ages of 18-25 without health insurance decreased over the past year, while the percentage of adults over 26 without insurance increased, according to Gallup. The main reason young adults are bucking the overall trend is that a provision in the Affordable Care Act allowed individuals under the [...]

An article in Politico about President Obama’s deficit speech, by Carrie Budoff Brown and Ben Smith, starts with the line, “President Barack Obama finally gave his liberal critics exactly what they wanted.” I want to make it clear that in no way was this deficit speech what I wanted. With unemployment over 9 percent and [...]