Against Partial Repeal

There are a number of conservatives clamoring to begin partially repealing Obamacare. Some are misguided, thinking we need to have a series of partial repeal votes to go on and get rid of the bad everyone can agree to get rid of and also keep the issue alive with the voters.Others are useful idiots. They claim to want to get rid of parts of the bill about which there is bipartisan contempt. In reality, they actually know that each time a part of the bill is repealed or “improved” the harder it becomes to actually get rid of the whole.Both those who naively think we should keep nibbling away and those who think we should improve it as a back door way to keeping some semblance of “reform” are misguided at best and deluded at worst.Full repeal is the only tactic the GOP should take for very legitimate reasons.

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Partial repeal, of course, will get rid of the things everyone hates now that they have all read the bill. Each piece partially repealed from Obamacare without a full repeal makes it less and less likely the GOP will then advocate for full repeal instead of “fixing it.” It bears repeating that there is no way to fix Obamacare.Remember, one of the Republican concerns with fighting against Obamacare at all during this election year is the potential for the Democrats to attack the GOP for repealing popular portions of the law.

McConnell may also want to shield his Senate GOP colleagues from voting to repeal popular portions of the healthcare law, such as the provision allowing young adults to stay on their parents’ health insurance until age 26 or another barring insurance companies from discriminating against people with pre-existing conditions.

Once the bipartisan fixers have gotten rid of all the stuff on which there is bipartisan agreement, every additional point of repeal becomes a full on partisan fight just like a full repeal vote, but with one big difference: a full repeal vote has the American people on the side of the GOP. Each additional partial repeal vote will have the public breaking off back and forth between the GOP and the Democrats, making partial repeal a mine field for the Republicans.If the GOP will not commit to repeated votes on full repeal with the American people so clearly on their side, prepare to be nickeled and dimed into an even more costly form of Obamacare where all the stuff both sides agree they hate (the stuff that typically was designed to keep costs down) goes away and all the stuff the Democrats love stays because squishy Republicans are too scared to vote with the rest of their party for repeal.Republicans have never shown the will to lose for the cause that Democrats have shown. The Democrats were prepared to lose Congress to pass Obamacare. They did both. Republicans will not ever be so brave or so bold. The only way to get the GOP to fight for repeal is to push them to repeal the whole without ever letting the Democrats fix the bad parts. Full repeal is the only time the public will be absolutely with the GOP and the GOP will only proceed with the public’s support. Put bluntly — making the public suffer through the logical outcomes of this disastrous Obama legacy will only build public support for full repeal.That is also why fixing the 1099 provision was a miscalculation. The individual fixes do not improve the legislation, they just bandaid the suck. But fools are easily fooled into thinking otherwise. Republicans should not be foolish when it comes to this issue. Too much is at stake.Full repeal is the only acceptable strategy and repeated votes on full repeal the only acceptable tactic this Congress.

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