We will see. Fact is, though, that it OFTEN works out just the way we think it will. Most of us thought that Trump would be a disgusting, embarrassingly incompetent president...and he has met our expectations exactly.
A question for Democrats and Republicans:
- Thread starter Ross Dolan
- Start date
Yakuda
Verified User
First the poster was talking about something completely different. He suggested Democrats will be winning elections for some time because of Trump. Not likely.
As to dems opinion of trump, no offense but, it's kind of like listening to an arabs give their opinion of a Jew. It could hardly be considered and objective opinion
I stick with my response. WE WILL SEE.
I am not a Democrat...and my opinion of him is at least as negative as any offered by any Democratic politician I've ever heard offer a public opinion about him. As for positive opinions of Trump from Republican politicians, it is kind of like listening to an Iraqi politician giving an opinion about Saddam Hussein when he was in power.
Yakuda
Verified User
And I with mine
It doesn't matter what you are. When an arab tells me how bad a Jew is its not any different than a dem or any anti trumper telling me how bad trump is. The feelings people who oppose trump have toward him are rooted in something far deeper than just political disagreement or dislike. It's utter hatred wrapp d in vitriol. I would say it borders on irrational at best. I've never seen anything like it.
T. A. Gardner
Serial Thread Killer
Obama gave us Obamacare, possibly the worst health insurance plan ever.
Grim Reaper
Chief Exit Officer (CEO)
No. The Affordable Care Act (ACA), commonly called “Obamacare,” is not considered the “worst” health insurance plan by any major health‑policy organization, insurer, or research institution.Here’s what the evidence actually shows.
According to Kaiser Family Foundation and CDC:- Uninsured Americans dropped from ~16% (2010) to ~8% (2016)
- That’s 20+ million people gaining coverage
Before the ACA, insurers could:- deny coverage for pre‑existing conditions
- charge women more than men
- cap lifetime benefits
- drop people when they got sick
See ACA_consumer_protections.
Nonpartisan analyses from:- Commonwealth Fund
- Urban Institute
- CBO
- increased access to preventive care
- reduced medical bankruptcies
- improved affordability for low‑income households
This is where the criticism comes from.Premiums increased for:
- people who earned too much for subsidies
- people in states that didn’t expand Medicaid
- people who previously had very cheap, very limited plans that the ACA banned
See ACA_premium_trends.
Gallup, Pew, and KFF polling show:- Americans are split on the ACA
- But a majority want to improve it, not repeal it
- Only a small minority call it “the worst”
The ACA:- did not cause the Great Depression of health care
- did not collapse the insurance market
- did not rank as “worst ever” by any credible metric
You might be dumb enough to believe that. It accompished a lot, but was changed by medical ,Pharm lobbyists and the Right that is subservient to corporate and wealthy power. It was a start. It was supposed to improve, but Repubs bowed to their ownership and have spent all their energy sabotaging it.
T. A. Gardner
Serial Thread Killer
What percentage of Americans buy health insurance on the Obamacare market? What percentage of Americans on some form of Obamacare are on expanded Medicaid, paid for by taxpayers? What is the annual amount the government is shelling out to subsidize Obamacare? Wasn't Obamacare supposed to be self-supporting by this point?
You can toss out all the vague platitudes you want. Obamacare is a costly disaster and was from day one. The only thing it does other than waste huge piles of taxpayer money is add an unnecessary layer of bureaucracy on an already horribly bureaucratic system.
T. A. Gardner
Serial Thread Killer
More partisan cheer leading from Google AI. Are you really totally incapable of thinking for yourself?No. The Affordable Care Act (ACA), commonly called “Obamacare,” is not considered the “worst” health insurance plan by any major health‑policy organization, insurer, or research institution.
Here’s what the evidence actually shows.
According to Kaiser Family Foundation and CDC:
Worst plans don’t usually expand coverage — they shrink it.
- Uninsured Americans dropped from ~16% (2010) to ~8% (2016)
- That’s 20+ million people gaining coverage
Before the ACA, insurers could:
The ACA eliminated all of these.Even critics of the law rarely argue these protections are “the worst.”
- deny coverage for pre‑existing conditions
- charge women more than men
- cap lifetime benefits
- drop people when they got sick
See ACA_consumer_protections.
Nonpartisan analyses from:
found that the ACA:
- Commonwealth Fund
- Urban Institute
- CBO
Not perfect — but not “worst ever.”
- increased access to preventive care
- reduced medical bankruptcies
- improved affordability for low‑income households
This is where the criticism comes from.
Premiums increased for:
This is a real issue, but it does not make the ACA “the worst plan ever.”
- people who earned too much for subsidies
- people in states that didn’t expand Medicaid
- people who previously had very cheap, very limited plans that the ACA banned
See ACA_premium_trends.
Gallup, Pew, and KFF polling show:
That phrase is political rhetoric, not a data‑based assessment.
- Americans are split on the ACA
- But a majority want to improve it, not repeal it
- Only a small minority call it “the worst”
The ACA:
It did expand coverage, add protections, and raise premiums for some groups — a mixed but far from catastrophic outcome.
- did not cause the Great Depression of health care
- did not collapse the insurance market
- did not rank as “worst ever” by any credible metric
Grim Reaper
Chief Exit Officer (CEO)
You didn’t refute anything. You just complained that the facts were presented clearly. That’s not a rebuttal, it’s a coping mechanism.
Yeah, how horrible to provide healthcare to those who couldn't afford it before.
Your posts are getting more a more stupid. Which is quite an accomplishment, because they can't get more idiotic. and cruel - but you ARE a trumptard - I shouldn't be suprised.
T. A. Gardner
Serial Thread Killer
I'll repeat the questions your AI answer didn't address, because they're ones that count unlike the vague platitudes it spewed.
What percentage of Americans buy health insurance on the Obamacare market? What percentage of Americans on some form of Obamacare are on expanded Medicaid, paid for by taxpayers? What is the annual amount the government is shelling out to subsidize Obamacare? Wasn't Obamacare supposed to be self-supporting by this point?
Grim Reaper
Chief Exit Officer (CEO)
Those numbers are all public, about 3–4% of Americans use the ACA marketplace, about a quarter of Medicaid enrollees are in expansion, subsidies run around $60–70B a year, and no, the ACA was never designed to be self‑supporting. That’s just a misunderstanding of how the law was structured.
T. A. Gardner
Serial Thread Killer
The Falsehoods of Obamacare: A Dozen Broken Promises, Seven Million Canceled Plans, and Hundreds of Billion in Debt
The ACA failed to deliver on at least a dozen key promises, resulting in higher health care costs, increased deficits, and significant disruptions to insurance coverage and care access.
paragoninstitute.org
When enacted, the Affordable Care Act aimed for fiscal neutrality, projecting $788 billion in gross costs from 2010–2019, offset by new revenues and Medicare reforms. Key funding came from taxes on high-income earners, penalties, and efficiency measures.
How Is the Affordable Care Act Funded? Key Insights
The Affordable Care Act's funding relies on general revenues and borrowing. Explore the implications for the U.S. healthcare system.
medicarenationwide.com
Sounds like a decent plan.
Okay.
It is very different. If you actually cannot see the differences, something is wrong. If you mean it, as I suspect you do, in an analogous way, you are wording it wrong.
I consider your comments here to be nonsense. There are good and compelling reasons for much of the criticism directed at him. I can say for myself, personally, that I have never felt the revulsion I feel toward him...toward any other president. And as I have mentioned previously, one-third of ALL the presidents we've ever had have served during my lifetime. He is close to stupid, certainly the least intelligent president in the past century; he is not curious; he has an abominable personality; he is incautious (which is seriously dangerous in a president); his choice of a cabinet would not pass muster with an editor if it were presented in a fiction novel...and the list could go on for pages.
YOU may not see his defects as worthy for the contempt so man people feel towards him, but it is certainly more justified than much of the scorn and contempt people from your side of the aisle feel toward people like Obama, Biden, or Harris.
Well, then I suggest you re-read that last sentence I wrote...and muse on it for a bit.
Grim Reaper
Chief Exit Officer (CEO)
The links you posted aren’t federal data, one is an advocacy article and the other is an insurance marketing site. Neither one contradicts the actual numbers from HHS, CMS, or the CBO. Marketplace enrollment is still about 3–4% of Americans, about a quarter of Medicaid enrollees are in expansion, subsidies run around $60–70B a year, and the ACA was designed to be deficit‑neutral, not self‑supporting. Your sources don’t dispute any of that.The Falsehoods of Obamacare: A Dozen Broken Promises, Seven Million Canceled Plans, and Hundreds of Billion in Debt
The ACA failed to deliver on at least a dozen key promises, resulting in higher health care costs, increased deficits, and significant disruptions to insurance coverage and care access.
When enacted, the Affordable Care Act aimed for fiscal neutrality, projecting $788 billion in gross costs from 2010–2019, offset by new revenues and Medicare reforms. Key funding came from taxes on high-income earners, penalties, and efficiency measures.
How Is the Affordable Care Act Funded? Key Insights
The Affordable Care Act's funding relies on general revenues and borrowing. Explore the implications for the U.S. healthcare system.
No. The worst health insurance plan ever is the one that existed before Obamacare...which is NONE. We pay much more than any other developed country for our healthcare...and are judged to have much, much worse health results.
Do you really think the healthcare plan that Trump has managed to get passed in Congress is better than Obamacare?
T. A. Gardner
Serial Thread Killer
Your demand for more evidence aside, Obamacare is a complete failure. It covers a tiny fraction of Americans that would be better off, at lower costs, getting a policy on an open market rather than one controlled by the government. The Medicaid expansion occurred in primarily blue states and that's their problem for listening to Obama lie to them about the costs.
There were supposed to be no subsidies. Insurers would pay in a portion of their profit from selling polices on the Obamacare market to a fund to subsidize those that lost money. Most insurers pulled out of the program entirely and the fund never got beyond 5% of what was necessary to actually cover costs. The government has made up that money from taxpayers ever since.
The Medicaid portion was to be after 7 years totally a state-run program that would be funded from supposed, imaginary, savings on things like emergency room costs and such. Never happened. That too became endlessly subsidized by the federal government.
Obamacare is a costly disaster.
Grim Reaper
Chief Exit Officer (CEO)
Federal data shows:- Marketplace enrollment ≈ 3–4% of Americans — correct, but that’s only one part of the ACA.
- Medicaid + CHIP cover 76+ million people, over 23% of the U.S. population.
- Medicaid expansion is a core ACA component, not separate.
Before the ACA:- Insurers could deny coverage for pre‑existing conditions.
- Plans often excluded essential benefits.
- Premiums rose unpredictably.
- Guaranteed issue,
- Essential health benefits,
- Out‑of‑pocket caps,
- Premium tax credits and cost‑sharing reductions.
Federal law explicitly created:- Premium tax credits for people 100–400% FPL.
- Cost‑sharing reductions for lower‑income enrollees.
He is referring to the risk corridor program, which:- Was temporary (2014–2016),
- Was not the main funding mechanism of the ACA,
- Was undercut by Congress, which blocked full payments.
Federal rules:- The federal government pays 90% of expansion costs permanently.
- States pay 10%.This is written into law; there was never a 7‑year cutoff.Federal data shows Medicaid expansion provides health and economic benefits, including reduced mortality and improved financial stability.
All U.S. health insurance is subsidized, including:- Employer‑sponsored insurance (via tax exclusion),
- Medicare,
- Medicaid,
- Marketplace plans.
Calling the ACA a “disaster” because it uses subsidies ignores that every major U.S. health program uses subsidies.
Federal data contradicts Gardner’s narrative:- Marketplace enrollment is small but functioning.
- Medicaid expansion is large, effective, and federally funded at 90%.
- Subsidies were always part of the ACA’s design.
- The ACA was designed to be deficit‑neutral, not self‑supporting.
- No federal source describes the ACA as a “costly disaster.”
T. A. Gardner
Serial Thread Killer
This is misleading at best, a lie at worst. "Functioning" doesn't mean it is doing so in some reasonably cost effective way. Obamacare policies are grossly expensive compared to the previous open market. And, no, subsidies that make them "affordable" are still part of the cost. So, policy for policy, Obamacare is an economic disaster on this portion of it.
It wasn't supposed to be 90% federally funded by this point. It isn't particularly effective either, and certainly not cost effective.
None of them were meant to be endless. That is one of the accounting tricks the Democrats used to make it appear revenue neutral.
Deficit-neutral means it has to be self-supporting. If it cannot pay its way on funds generated from the program itself, it is being SUBSIDIZED from other funding sources, mainly taxes.
This is an irrelevant appeal to authority. Federal sources are not the only place to get information on the ACA and its performance.