In the fast-moving modern world, especially during the Trump Era, news moves along fast, to the point I expect this column to be out of date by the time it goes up, even if it goes through serious changes in the editing session.
By those standards, the recent news must feel like a blast from the past, back before I grew this rockin’ beard. In brief, Obamacare repeal efforts and Trump escalating his North Korea rhetoric came out of the retro remix machine with a few new neat instruments for me to opine on.
The Trump specific stuff first. Peeling The Orange, after all. So, at his debut speech to the United Nations General Assembly, the desiccated-citrus-fruit-wearing came up and promised Kim “Rocket Man” Jong Un that he’d literally destroy the whole country if North Korea continued on its aggressive path, mixed in with a few new lines on global alliances, because he finally figured out that “America First” usually means “America Alone,” at least the way he’d been applying it up to that point.
The problem for me isn’t threatening nuclear retaliation, because that’s generally what we should do if someone uses the bomb on us or our allies, though total annihilation is a tad excessive. Where the problem rests is that self-consciously projecting military strength like Trump likes to do actually betrays a weakness of character. He doesn’t have any particular skills other than those needed convince the dumbest electoral coalition in American history to hand him the keys to all the tanks, and I expect he knows that deep down.
The other bull that happened is the revival of the healthcare debate, since, due to budget rules, they have until the end of September to pass something like this on the party line, without violating their core tenet of “never, ever negotiate or compromise.” Because they apparently spent the last seven years promising a repeal without ever actually taking in the consequences of that, as evidenced by the fact that they only ever voted to flatly repeal Obamacare when Obama’s veto was a given, they’re now forced to either cleverly disguise what they want to do as what their base wants them to do.
Which here means drastic cuts to Medicaid, cleverly disguised as a shift to block grants to states that are drastically less than what each state frequently requires, and each state can just opt not to spend that grant on helping the poor/sick/elderly get treatment at all. This also comes with a flat elimination of the cost-sharing reductions paid out to insurers participating in the marketplace, as well as the coverage mandate requiring people to get insurance or pay a fine. The pre-existing condition acceptance clause remains, but good luck paying for much more than a dollar store enema and a lollipop if you really do need health insurance to help pay for your prostate cancer treatments and your name isn’t Jimmy Kimmel. Heck, even the block grants are set to expire in 2026, and while that’s the outer limit on how far out the government will pay for anything, I wouldn’t be surprised if those too came under attack later down the line.
For what it’s worth, the ruse didn’t seem to work, and the Congressional Budget Office analysis that would have ordinarily told us this didn’t seem to be necessary, as we can more or less fill in the pieces from past efforts, odds are good the Republican Party will say “screw the consequences” and avoid showing up in 2018’s campaign season with literally no major legislation accomplished. The sole exceptions, at least so far as the Senate are concerned are the Republicans who killed it last time.
Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Susan Collins of Maine claimed the bill would hit their districts hard, and John McCain of Arizona, a man literally dying of brain cancer who cast the dramatic final no vote. He seems to be taking the stance that any major legislation of this magnitude needs to be deliberated and amended in the normal fashion, with bipartisan meetings. In my opinion, with Mitch McConnel and Paul Ryan, that seems to be physically impossible for the party as a whole. Therefore, they’re going to rush it hardcore, so fast that we won’t even get a CBO score to judge the bill by, and if it fails, they’re just going to let Obamacare collapse through sabotage just to get some kind of win out of this, even if it is hollow and token. And through it all, Trump is mostly going to sit at the desk and make equally token endorsement noises, because all he wants is a win too.
Logan Graham is a senior studying media arts with a focus in games and animation at Ohio University. Please note that the views and opinions of the columnists do not reflect those of The Post. How are you feeling about Trump's presidency? Let Logan know by emailing him at lg261813@ohio.edu.
