Washington, DC - The Obamacare fan club is out in force, led by their cheerleader-in-chief, President Obama, himself. They are making a last ditch effort to influence the decision of the Supreme Court, which will issue a verdict soon on whether insurance subsidies are permissible to those who signed up on Federal exchanges.
"If the court rules against Federal subsidies, the result could deal a death blow to the controversial healthcare law. Without the subsidies the plan simply cannot work" Dan Weber, president of the Association of Mature American Citizens explained.
Reportedly, only Pennsylvania and Delaware are building strategies to cope with the fallout of a negative court decision. Subsidized residents of the thirty-five other states that opted not to create their own insurance exchanges when Obamacare became a reality in 2013 are likely to lose their coverage, although Congress can pass a law to continue coverage until a suitable plan is available to replace it.
Weber said President Obama's remark that the Supreme Court case is actually an exercise in determining the propriety of a "twisted interpretation" of the law bordered on the "contemptuous." In effect, he said, the president was challenging the court's right to review a critical element of the law as it is written.
"There's no doubt that a negative ruling could cause upheavals for many of those who are currently covered by the Affordable Care Act. But, when Obamacare became the law, millions of people also lost their coverage or had it replaced. It continues to create considerable hardship for the country on many levels. Not the least of these hardships has been soaring premiums, which this year are particularly onerous."
Had lawmakers ignored Nancy Pelosi's advice to pass the measure without reading it first, perhaps someone would have spotted the passage that specifies subsidies for coverage must be provided through state exchanges, Weber said. "It underscores the shoddy way in which the Affordable Care Act was foist upon us. It's time to scrap Obamacare and start over again to create a healthcare law that is fair and equitable and that won't bankrupt the country."
It was MIT economist Jonathan Gruber, who helped draft the law, who stated last year that the words under scrutiny by the Justices were deliberately phrased as they were so as to incentivize states to create their own Obamacare insurance exchanges. The admission came in a speech in which Gruber stated clearly that: "What's important to remember politically about this is if you're a state and you don't set up an exchange, that means your citizens don't get their tax credits-but your citizens still pay the taxes that support this bill."
Weber said that "harping" on the past won't help anyone at this time. He said "if the court votes for the status quo, it will be business as usual. If the Justices vote to disallow subsidies awarded by the Federal exchanges, it gives us a second chance to fix healthcare. Congress will then be able to craft a healthcare law that will let people actually keep their doctors, protect their religious freedom and make healthcare insurance more accessible, instead of a law that creates inequities and inefficiencies."
