Donald Trump and maga Republicans cannot govern! Americans need leadership but Republicans play partisan politics with our lives

There are no winners in a government shutdown, but Democrats are right to fight | Philadelphia Inquirer Editorial

Increasingly outrageous actions from Trump and his administration, including the absolute disregard for Congress’ power of the purse, have left Democratic leaders with little recourse.

Once this federal government shutdown ends — whenever that may be — it is inevitable someone will declare victory. 

Nevertheless, as things stand, there will be no real winners.

It won’t be the federal workers — including more than 100,000 in Philadelphia — who either get to sit at home or labor indefinitely without a paycheck. Nor will it be the wider economy, as the last shutdown cost Americans $3 billion. Let alone the dwindling trust that our leaders can get anything done.

Even so, what other choice did Democrats have?

In March, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D., N.Y.) came under fire from many in his own party after he was seen as caving to Donald Trump when he corralled enough senators to vote to keep the government open. Back then, Schumer believed the opposite: that a shutdown would only empower and embolden the president’s ugly smash-mouth style of governance.

Months of increasingly outrageous actions from Trump and his vengeful administration, including the absolute disregard for Congress’ power of the purse, have left Democratic leaders with little recourse but to make their stand.

“How could we negotiate a bipartisan agreement and then have the president unilaterally through impoundment, or the Republican Party through rescissions, and the president unilaterally through pocket rescissions, undo it all without any input,” Schumer said after he and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D., N.Y.) met with Trump and GOP congressional leaders Monday.

Representing the state of bipartisan discourse, irresponsible Donald Trump responded by posting a racist deepfake video to social media depicting Jeffries wearing a sombrero and a mustache while Schumer vulgarly disparaged Democrats and immigrants.

As the shutdown took hold on Wednesday, Republicans demanded Senate Democrats “abandon their radical demands and fund the government.” 

Those radical demands❓ That affordable healthcare access for millions of Americans be protected.

Trump’s cruel signature legislation, the 🤢 One Big Beautiful Bill Act, not only extended his first term’s tax cuts, but also added additional reductions — with the biggest benefits going to the wealthiest few. To offset the loss of revenue, Republicans in Congress instituted funding cuts to Medicaid and changes to the Affordable Care Act❗😥

Democrats want to reverse the Medicaid cuts and extend federal tax credits that reduce the cost of health insurance purchased through ACA (Affordable Care Act) marketplaces, which are set to expire by the end of the year. Taken together, Republican proposals are projected to leave 16 million people without health insurance by 2034.

In saner times, the GOP would see the Democrats’ demands as a win-win scenario. The party could be seen as compromising on the most unpopular aspect of legislation, so toxic that they are actively trying to rebrand it. Not to mention that communities that voted for Trump are likely to be deeply hurt by the cuts, including by the closures of hospitals in rural areas, which depend on Medicaid.

But these are not those times. Already, many Republican legislators are misrepresenting Democratic efforts, casting them as shutting down the government over giving free healthcare to people who are in the country illegally.💥🤥

This is as patently false as it is shameless.

Yet, while Democrats are right to hold the line on healthcare, they are unlikely to prevail in the shutdown, because there is no one on the other side willing to negotiate in good faith. Trump has already promised to use the shutdown to further gut the federal workforce. That the president’s plan may be legally questionable fails to deter an administration intent on flouting the law.

The best chance for those who will lose their healthcare is for Democrats to regain control of Congress. In the meantime, Democrats must remind voters that this clash is about policy differences, that they are willing to compromise, and that while what’s happening is not good, the alternative is worse.

This shutdown fight is worth having. But thanks to the selfish and partisan Republicans, America has already lost.

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg said, "“My most fervent wish is that I will not be replaced until a new president is installed."

Catholic Democrats echo opinion:

I am hoping that Judge Amy Coney Barrett had a difficult time with the ethics of accepting the Supreme Court nomination by Donald Trump, to fill the seat left vacant by the death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. The dying wish of Justice Ginsburg was for her seat to be filled after the inauguration, in 2021, of a new president.  Although Judge Barrett is qualified to sit on the United States Supreme Court, I believe she was misguided in accepting the nomination because of the precedent that was arbitrarily set by Senator Mitch McConnell when he rudely ignored the nomination of Judge Merrick Garland, after President Obama nominated him to replace Justice Scalia, when he died unexpectedly. Therefore, I agree with this opinion published by Catholic Democrats.  In my opinion, Justice Ginsburg's last dying wish should be honored, respected and kept.

Catholic Democrats Condemns Dishonorable Timing of SCOTUS Nomination & Encourages Judge Amy Coney Barrett to Withdraw

A Scalia Protégé, she will further divide Our Fractured Nation and

Her nomination will risk eliminating the Affordable Care Act health care coverage for millions of people. 

September 27, 2020 (Boston, MA) - Below is a statement from Steven Krueger, president of Catholic Democrats, regarding the White House's nomination of Judge Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court of the United States:

Catholic Democrats condemns the dishonorable timing of the nomination to the Supreme Court of the United States made by the current administration yesterday. We also strongly oppose the nominee, Judge Amy Coney Barrett, and encourage her to withdraw her nomination.

About 60 percent of the American public opposes the appointment of a Supreme Court Justice only weeks before the presidential election - and for good reason. Although the appointment is within the letter of the law, it is not within the spirit of our democracy.

This is underscored by the rampant hypocrisy of US Senate Republicans, who have lost their way and are poised to dishonor their oath of office again. The vivid memories of when they denied President Obama's moderate SCOTUS nominee, Judge Merrick Garland, so much as a nomination hearing still deeply trouble fair-minded Americans. At that time, the current occupant of the White House also weighed in with his agreement from the campaign trail.

As Catholics, our faith is based on our belief that God is Love and Truth. While the current occupant of the White House has declared that he doesn't ask God for forgiveness and has gone as far as to speak on behalf of God, the 20,000 plus lies of his presidency have been a remorseless assault, day-after-day, on civic decency and indeed "truth, justice and the American way."

As bullies and tyrants do, the 45th president is now seeking to impose his political will on the nation, without regard to the will of the American people. No one who truly loves our country, and who recognizes the human dignity of all people and their right to participate in democracy, would take such an ignoble action, particularly while also blowing a dog whistle to the nominee that he wants a 9th justice on the Supreme Court to settle any election cases in his favor.

How is it that Republicans want to destroy the protection for health care coverage provided by the Affordable Care Act?

At Saturday's nomination ceremony, Judge Barrett, a protégé of Justice Antonin Scalia, said that he had an "incalculable influence on her life" and that "his judicial philosophy is [hers]." We appreciate her candor but it puts anxiety in the pit of our stomach for the high risk her nomination poses to the common good of all Americans, particularly those in need of healthcare, working class families and those in financial need, and people of color.

Justice Scalia's judicial philosophy led him to vote against the Affordable Care Act (ACA) in 2012 and to say that the Voting Rights Act was "a racial entitlement."

The implications of Judge Barrett as Scalia 2.0 are ominous for our country on a range of issues that go beyond healthcare and voting rights including, reasonable gun safety legislation, the environment, immigration, and the death penalty to name just a few. And this foreboding is only exacerbated by the fractures in our nation.

If nominated, her judicial philosophy will be on display as soon as November 10th when a weak case challenging the ACA comes before the Supreme Court. In 2012, Judge Barrett criticized conservative Chief Justice John Roberts for not overturning the ACA saying, "Chief Justice Roberts pushed the Affordable Care Act beyond its plausible meaning to save the statute."

Beyond the extreme harmful impact that her judicial philosophy will impose on the American people, her acceptance of this nomination in and of itself disqualifies her to sit on the bench. By accepting this shameful nomination, the judge is in effect complicit with the 45th president in this parody of democracy and this will forever taint her appointment. We may never know if the 45th president asked about her opinions on mail-in voting, but there is no question of his expectations with respect to the outcome of the cases that will likely come before the Supreme Court, which may well determine who is our next president.

Judge Barrett is writing herself into a dark history of our country. If she truly "loves the United States," as she said she did yesterday, then she will withdraw her nomination.

Steve Krueger is available for interviews. If you are interested in speaking with him on this subject or matters related to the 2020 election, please contact him at media@catholicdemocrats.org or by phone at (617) 817-8617.

About Catholic Democrats

Catholic Democrats, a national advocacy organization with supporters in all 50 states and over 20,000 Twitter followers, represents a Catholic voice within the Democratic Party and a Democratic voice in the Catholic Church. The Church's mission is to advance the rich Catholic Social Justice Tradition in the public square and within the Democratic Party, to help form a more just, and peaceful society and to advance an understanding of an "integral ecology."

Health care debate - must go to 2018 voters

All across America, ordinary people took to the streets and attended political "town hall" meetings to protest the series of Republican plans targeted to take away health insurance coverage from millions of people. Although the repeal efforts failed, the fact is, they almost passed!

Those same people who gave invaluable time and energy to defeat the Republicans' "repeal and replace" debacle, must take up the momentum to defeat the candidates who will continue these efforts to deny Americans the human dignity of have health coverage. If those Republicans who supported the repeals continue, they'll go after the ACA again, and they won't stop there

Here is an echo from the Atlanta Journal Constitution- an opinion by reporter Tamar Hallerman, from Georgia!

Shock, anger, relief in Georgia after health care effort tanks

by Tamar Hallerman
Christy Nelson survived thyroid cancer but has been fighting insomnia for months, terrified of the GOP effort to dismantle the Affordable Care Act. She and her husband, who has Crohn’s disease, depend on protections for pre-existing conditions to afford health coverage, and following the collapse of the repeal effort their relief is only slowly starting to bloom. “We are a family scared to death,” she said. “This has been a terrible fear.”

Georgia patients, medical workers, hospital officials and taxpayers on all sides of the issue have lived with anxiety for months as Washington Republicans’ tried to repeal the federal health care law known as Obamacare (Affordable Care Act). 

They awoke in wonder Friday, after an early morning dramatic vote with Senator John McCain voting with Senator Susan Collins and Senator Lisa Murkowski — those who didn’t stay up to watch the dramatic moment on TV — to the news that it was over. At least for now.

Senators did not let the dust settle on the health bill before they skedaddled out of town for the weekend.

Many House Republicans were shell-shocked and livid that a central campaign pledge could be left flapping in the wind by a divided Senate.

Which is precisely the reason why the people who successfully influenced the Senators to block the ACA repeal must be even more diligent! We must demand efforts to improve the law, expand coverage and remove all who voted in support of this horrible repeal out of Washington. 

Let the unemployed Republicans find jobs where they need to buy their own insurance, rather than have the taxpayers fund their coverage.

Congressman Tom Price needs coaching to be an ethical public policy director

"Congressman Price repeatedly told senators that his stock purchases were initiated by his broker and that he was unaware of them." (OMG- that's the biggest "pants on fire" lie any physician-Congressman ever told. Believe me folks, physicians know where their money is invested, trust me.)

REPUBLICAN CONGRESSMAN AND orthopedic surgeon Tom Price, Trump’s nominee for secretary of Health and Human Services, spent as much time his character as he did defending his vision of healthcare for all Americans.

Congressman Tom Price is an investor in health care reaps profits from medical device companies and pharmaceuticals 

The Los Angeles Times reports on the hypocrisy of the physician nominee, who will promote profits for the medical community before he delivers on care for the frail and elderly, in my opinion. By Noam N. Levey

Rep. Tom Price (R-Ga.) told the Senate Health Committee that he would protect vulnerable Americans if he is confirmed as President-elect Donald Trump’s Health and Human Services secretary. (But, he was blinking visibly when confronted by Senator Elizabeth Warren about how he would deliver Trump's promise not to cut Medicare, Medicaid or Social Security.)

But the six-term congressman did not detail how he would fulfill that pledge, including how he would replace the Affordable Care Act and how he would preserve coverage for the more than 100 million Americans who rely on Medicare, Medicaid and the healthcare law, commonly called Obamacare. Price has worked for years to roll back all three.

During a testy four-hour hearing on Capitol Hill — which also featured several heated exchanges about Price’s ethics — Price also repeatedly dodged questions from Democrats seeking assurance that he would preserve basic protections required by law.

Among other things, Obamacare bans lifetime limits on coverage, requires that health plans offer basic benefits such as substance abuse treatment and mandates that plans allow parents to keep their children on their insurance until they are 26.

“My constituents are coming up to me with tears in their eyes wondering what the future holds for their healthcare,” Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.), the senior Democrat on the Health Committee, told Price.

Price, whom Trump has said is helping develop the new administration’s proposed Obamacare replacement, repeatedly assured lawmakers that Americans would be able to get the health insurance they want.

“It's absolutely imperative that individuals that have health coverage be able to keep health coverage and move hopefully to greater choices and opportunities for them,” Price told the committee.

At one point, he even said he hopes the Obamacare replacement will cover more people than the current law.

Obamacare has helped more than 20 million previously uninsured Americans gain coverage in the last three years. Repealing it would immediately result in 18 million people losing coverage, according to a new analysis from the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office.

Price has been among the law’s most ardent critics and has pushed budget plans that would cut trillions of dollars from Medicare and Medicaid.

Like Trump, Price offered no indication how it will be possible to cover more people, preserve consumer protections and make health insurance cheaper all at the same time.

He appeared to support Trump’s repeated assurance that major changes for Medicare are not under consideration.

In the past, Price has been a strong proponent of increasing the Medicare eligibility age from 65 to 67 and shifting more costs to patients by converting Medicare into a voucher system that would give beneficiaries a limited amount of money to shop for private health plans.

However, Price refused to say Wednesday whether he would back efforts to expand the government's authority to negotiate lower prices from drug makers, despite Trump’s recent calls to do so. Price made only a general commitment to help make drugs prices more “reasonable.”  (Makes no sense, because Canadians benefit from negotiated drug prices while Americans must pay retail. Dear Republicans, when Canadians get a discount on the same drugs Americans pay retail prices for- duh? We're subsidizing lower Canadian pharmaceutical prices.)

Trump once made the cost of pharmaceuticals a central part of his campaign healthcare pitch. And at his first news conference last week, the president-elect said drug makers were “getting away with murder.” (Again, Trump lied- pants on fire!)

“We’re the largest buyer of drugs in the world, and yet we don’t bid properly,” Trump said. “And we’re going to start bidding and we’re going to save billions of dollars over a period of time.”

Republicans have long opposed allowing Medicare to use its market power to negotiate lower prices for seniors.

And the pharmaceutical industry, which also opposes price negotiation, has protected its interests by lavishing political contributions on members of Congress. Price himself has received tens of thousands of dollars from drug makers and has also invested heavily in industry stocks, records show.

Those ties featured prominently in Wednesday’s hearing, as Democrats pounded Price for repeatedly trading stocks in healthcare companies that were affected by his work in Congress.

As the hearing grew increasingly tense, several lawmakers reiterated calls for an independent investigation of Price for pushing legislation that increased the value of several stocks shortly after he bought them.

These Republicans hate Obamacare, but aren't ready to give it up just yet »

“This whole administration is starting to look like a bit of a get-rich-quick scheme," Sen. Christopher S. Murphy (D-Conn.) told Price, linking the congressman’s stock trading to Trump's refusal to divest his business holdings.

Last year, Price bought up to $15,000 worth of stock in medical device maker Zimmer Biomet just a week before introducing legislation that would have delayed a new regulation that threatened the company’s bottom line, according to CNN.

Also last year, Price invested as much as $90,000 in six drug makers shortly before leading a legislative effort to derail an Obama administration proposal to control Medicare spending on cancer drugs, Time magazine reported.

All six companies make cancer drugs that could have been affected by the regulation. And they all benefited when Price’s effort was successful.

Price repeatedly told senators that his stock purchases were initiated by his broker and that he was unaware of them.

This whole administration is starting to look like a bit of a get-rich-quick scheme," Sen. Christopher S. Murphy (D-Conn.) told Price, linking the congressman’s stock trading to Trump's refusal to divest his business holdings.

Last year, Price bought up to $15,000 worth of stock in medical device maker Zimmer Biomet just a week before introducing legislation that would have delayed a new regulation that threatened the company’s bottom line, according to CNN.

Also last year, Price invested as much as $90,000 in six drug makers shortly before leading a legislative effort to derail an Obama administration proposal to control Medicare spending on cancer drugs, Time magazine reported.

All six companies make cancer drugs that could have been affected by the regulation. And they all benefited when Price’s effort was successful.

Price repeatedly told senators that his stock purchases were initiated by his broker and that he was unaware of them.

“I am offended by the insinuation,” he told Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) after she outlined his extensive work to derail a proposed regulation, even after he had been notified that his broker had bought stock in one of the healthcare companies that stood to benefit.

Several Democratic senators incredulously asked why Price had not directed his broker to avoid investing in companies that would be affected by his work. Price said he complied with congressional ethics rules.

In one of the oddest exchanges of the day, Price refused to acknowledge that human activity is responsible for climate change, despite widespread scientific consensus that this is the case.

“The climate is obviously changing,” Price told Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I). “The question from a scientific standpoint is what effect does human behavior and human activity have on that, and what we can do to mitigate that,” Price said. “And I believe that's a question that needs to be studied and evaluated.”

A growing number of public health and physician groups are raising concerns about climate change’s impact on people’s health.

And at almost the same time as Price’s hearing, Trump’s pick to head the Environmental Protection Agency acknowledged to another Senate committee that human activity is, in fact, changing the climate.

(I'm distressed, disappointed and dismayed about Congressman Tom Price as Health and Human Services nominee. He's a physician before he's a public servant, a surgeon before he's a health policy director and he's obviously more interested in his investments than providing ethical leadership for the frail, elderly and needy American citizens.)

Perhaps Tom Price can advertise: "Ethics life coach needed."

Donald Trump must explain how he will replace Obamacare

An open letter to Donald Trump: 

Here’s why a Trump presidency is a danger to my life

by Kendall Brown

Dear Mr. Trump,

You don’t know me. We’ve never met in person or talked to one another. But you have continuously threatened my life since you began your presidential campaign.

You see, I’m one of millions of Americans with a disability. I was born with severe Crohn’s Disease. The disease is genetic and inherited, and it means I cannot absorb nutrients normally through my intestines and am often left in debilitating pain—unable to eat, or walk, or do most of the things people often take for granted in life. The disease has cost me thousands of dollars, entire semesters of my college career, and nearly two feet of my intestine that had to be removed in an emergency surgery.

And it has nearly killed me, twice. It would have killed me, if it weren’t for one thing — Obamacare.
The first time Obamacare saved my life, I was 25.

Thanks to Crohn’s Disease, I had to have two feet of my intestine removed in an emergency surgery. A few months earlier, I didn’t have health insurance, and likely wouldn’t have been able to get the life-saving surgery. But the first phase of Obamacare had just kicked in, allowing me to go back on my mom’s insurance until I turned 26.

The second time Obamacare saved my life, I was 28.

After I aged off of my mom’s insurance, insurance companies were able to legally deny me health coverage, because having been born with a disease meant I had a pre-existing condition. By that time, I was undergoing a form of chemo treatments, and on my 27th birthday, I was informed at the hospital that my insurance had declined my treatment. Unless I had the $15,000 the treatment would cost, I had to go home without it. I went home untreated that day. Until the second phase of Obamacare kicked in, preventing insurance companies from denying coverage based on pre-existing conditions, they were able to deny me coverage, or just refuse to pay for anything related to my disease.
Obamacare changed all of that.And that’s where you come in, Mr. Trump. You’ve spent the last year telling Americans that Obamacare is nothing but bad news, that you would “repeal it and replace it with something terrific.”
On what, exactly, your “something terrific” would look like, you’ve been uniquely and uncharacteristically silent.

Mr. Trump, access to quality and affordable health care coverage for millions of Americans is not something we can afford for 45th President of the United States to be vague on. Worse, the things you’ve told the American people about health care have been incorrect, outrageous, and at times, outright lies.
And you don’t seem to care that you’re wrong.

I’m not sure why that is. Maybe it’s that you and I are very different. Our lives have been very different.

When your father was giving you your first “small” million dollar loan, my mother was trying to figure out how to pay for my medicine and hide it from me when the stress made her cry. While I was working two full-time jobs while also attending college classes—just to afford my treatment—you were getting an illegal three million dollar loan in poker chips from your dad.

And while I’m a 29-year-old facing the possibility of a medical bankruptcy due to insurmountable medical debt from before the ACA — along what that will mean for my future, my ability to buy a house some day and afford to have children — you’ve managed to walk away from driving businesses into bankruptcy time and time again as the only one not hurt by your actions.

So I know our lives have turned us into very different people, Mr. Trump. That was never more apparent than when I watched you mock reporter Serge Kovaleski for the physical disability he was born with. On that day, you showed all of us in the disability community—along with the rest of the world—just how cruel and ugly you can be.

Mr. Trump, you’ve probably guessed by now that I’m a proud progressive. But much of my family are proud conservatives. And this November, not a single one of us will be voting for you. Because we know that the act of caring, of taking care of our fellow Americans, is a principle that transcends party lines — and it’s a quality you have not built into your campaign. Your statements about health care — and your campaign as a whole — have been built on empty promises.

Empty promises won’t provide disabled Americans like me with health care. Empty promises won’t save my life the next time I need it. And empty promises won’t get you elected come November.

Kendall Brown