caulfield12

QUOTE (StrangeSox @ Jan 17, 2017 -> 08:17 PM) Franken did a good job of exposing her incompetence. https://twitter.com/keithboykin/status/8215...src=twsrc%5Etfw There's a 0% chance she's the nominee if she wasn't a huge Republican donor. Read Elizabeth Warren's full 16 page dressing down of DeVos... https://www.warren.senate.gov/files/documen...eVos_Letter.pdf

QUOTE (JRL @ Jan 17, 2017 -> 08:37 PM) I tend to agree. This is certainly a very real possibility. It's a possibility most people have ignored, by just repeating the refrain that "his value will never be higher", so we must trade Quintana right now. I've spelled out a ton of reasons at length why his value could very realistically increase, and even more likely that it certainly won't decrease, if Sox hold on to him. There is no deadline to trade him or anyone else. The Sox should make the move when they think the return is likely to be at it's optimal point period. One thing none of the "Code-Red, trade Quintana in the next 10 seconds!" camp seems to have thought about is that if it is absolutely undeniable that once the season begins Quintana's value cannot possibly ever get any higher than it is at this very second, because of an imagined glut of impending FA pitchers available at the deadline this year, and is most likely to decrease, how is it possible that his value will increase over the course of the current offseason, from now until the start of the season? Why would it be that Quintana could net a better return in a week than he did a week ago? You can phrase it differently, as there being more available pitchers at the deadline or whatever, but the bottom line is that the sentiment that we have to trade Quintana now, lies in the assumption that as time goes on, the only thing that can change re Quintana, is that potential suitors will have moved on to other options (e.g. pending FAs available at the deadline). It may not be quite the furious swap market that it will be at the deadline, but still, over the course of the offseason the same should hold true, if you believe that. That is, the only thing that can happen re Quintana's value as the offseason moves from today to tomorrow to next week, is that teams could pursue other options and the Sox are left holding Quintana and trading him for even less than they turned down a week ago. I'm not saying Quintana's value certainly has increased over the course of the offseason and/or that it will continue to increase, but if the Sox didn't think was the strongest possibility they obviously would have dealt him a week ago. Obviously, they could end up having made the wrong decision. That's a possibility. But, even if we think they are a bad front office, they wouldn't hold him as long as they have if it were so in your face obvious as everyone likes to make it seem that every day he's held his value can only go down and will not possibly go up. Obviously, there are very real reasons why the Sox have decided that his value was likely to increase even as they have held on to him or they wouldn't have done so. Again, they may end up being wrong, but to paint it as so obvious a decision in disregard of that fact, is a bit ignorant. Not to mention "adding that key impact player" would provide a huge boost (despite it being after Christmas) to a lot of team's season ticket marketing plans... How many seats he would sell, hard to say, but it's not an insignificant consideration for teams thinking about striking now instead of waiting to see what their own internal prospects can produce in the first 2-3 months of the season.

QUOTE (JRL @ Jan 17, 2017 -> 08:08 PM) It doesn't seem to make sense that the Sox are in a particular position to take the risk of trading a hugely valuable asset for less projectable high-upside players that also have a good chance of not panning out altogether. If anything, the fact that the Sox are in full rebuild mode for at least next 2-3 years, and selling off their valuable major assets makes them less well-positioned to take such a risk. A team with a plethora of young players who are eminently projectable would be the one better positioned to take a risk. You know you have the core of a succesful team going forward anyway, and if a high-upside guy pans out, it's all gravy. For the Sox who are trying to rebuil, when they don't really yet have a ton of young players further toward the "sure thing" end of the projectability continuum, you really want to make sure you acquire critical number of players you can count on to form the core of a succesful team down the road when you're ready to contend, and you certainly don't want to trade hugely valuable major league assets for packages with stronger chances of amounting to absolutely nothing, even if they have higher upside. This is likely why the rumors were that the Sox were trying really hard to get major league ready guys/guys who even have some level of major league experience (Bregman, Benintendi, Turner, Swanson, Dahl etc...) in spite of the fact that those guys would be lingering in the majors for 2-3 years with their service time clocks running while the Sox have zero chance of contending. Yes, the ship on getting a guy as far along on the projectability continuum as one of the aforementioned players has long ago sailed, but it's really not an all or nothing strategy. The reasoning still holds, even if the Bregmans and Swansons of the world are not happening that you want to make sure you add pieces that they can have a greater degree of confidence will be able to contribute at a major league level, even if their top-end upside may not be as quite as high as a toolsy A-ball outfielder from Houston. Therein lies the conundrum. You have to get at least TWO 3-4 WAR guys for it to make any sense, or you're better not trading him. The odds aren't great that you can put all your eggs in one basket if it's closer to a one for one trade. For every Seager, there's a 10-20 Joc Pederson's who's very solid but won't give you Q's numbers. If you were to put Turner, Benintendi, Swanson, Moncada, Torres, Gary Sanchez, Bregman, Meadows, Rodgers/Dahl, etc., into a time machine, how many of those guys are going to beat Q's WAR over the next four years in 6-7 years? 1/3rd of them? 25%? Like you said, if you extend it out over 4-5 players instead of going for 2-3 REALLY solid ones, there's no doubt there are two sides to both approaches. The best all-time version of this trade is something between Colon for Cliff Lee/Sizemore/B. Phillips and Greinke (much less control at the time of trade, but an unquestioned ace) for Cain/Escobar. The Hamels to the Rangers trade would be another to look at, moreso than Shelby Miller to the DBacks (because it's now one of the barriers to another "steal" of a trade like Eaton to the DBacks is perceived to be in the industry). At any rate, it feels like the best strategy is to make a mixture of these deals and pray your scouting is spot on. Kopech/Basabe and starting pitching always is going to have a high bust rate, so position players SEEM like safer bets. The problem the White Sox are in right now as it almost feels like they HAVE to get position prospects back for Q, and that's eliminating a number of possible trades, along with this "untouchables" prevailing storyline about the players listed above. There's no doubt the White Sox have been terrible developing hitters, there's also no doubt "offense sells at USCF over defense/pitching" (if both result in .500ish teams) and that this team has BEEN DYING for a young hitting star. For fifteen years, we've only produced Rowand/Crede....and I won't list the flameouts because we all know them forwards and backwards. So maybe taking a step back would be the best thing for all parties at the moment....rather than "forcing" a trade to happen because of arbitrary deadlines like Sox Fest, the start of the WBC, Spring Training report dates, etc.

https://www.pri.org/stories/2017-01-17/chin...e-globalization Kind of amusing that Xi Jinping is more likely to be quoting Abraham Lincoln these days than our own president "Pursuing protectionism is like locking oneself in a dark room. Wind and rain may be kept outside, but so is light and air," Xi said in a speech that took in references to Chinese folklore, Charles Dickens and Abraham Lincoln's Gettysburg Address. It is simply "not possible" to reverse the flow of global capital, technology, goods and people, Xi said in the heart of a continent where Britain is plotting its exit from the European Union and far-right parties are on the rise. He insisted China was committed to "opening up" and stood by globalization's gains for emerging economies — as well as defending the Paris accord on climate change, which is also in Trump's sights. And he said there is "no point in blaming economic globalization for the world's problems," highlighting China's view that catastrophically weak regulation rather than free trade lay behind the West's 2008 financial crisis. His message was met with acclaim from many in a hall packed with government leaders, captains of industry, stars of entertainment and agenda-setting thinkers. Former Swedish prime minister Carl Bildt noted that a century ago, Russian Bolshevik leader Vladimir Lenin was plotting world revolution in Zurich, a couple of hours' train ride from Davos. "And now, 100 years later we have the leader of the largest communist party in the world coming to the leading meeting of global capitalists to preach the virtues of globalization," he told AFP. "Lenin is dead." http://www.cnbc.com/2017/01/17/its-pretty-...a-ceo-says.html "Xi spoke earlier this morning, and he's quoting Abraham Lincoln and the Gettysburg Address about development being 'for the people, by the people'," Moynihan said on "Squawk Box" from the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. "You start to say this is a pretty interesting world where you have the president of China quoting the great American president," he added. In his speech, Xi said: "It is true that economic globalization created new problems, but this is no justification to write off economic globalization altogether." He also warned that populist approaches could lead to war and poverty. Moynihan, who had lunch with Xi, reported the Chinese president is "very much concerned that there will be a retraction from trade, and the ability of trade to help the world grow, and the ability rebalance the imbalances in economies." As one of the five co-chairs of the World Economic Forum, Moynihan said: "That's the fear out there."

http://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/201...are-act-tax-cut The "hidden" reason Republicans are so eager to repeal Obamacare The two big relevant taxes, according to the TPC’s Howard Gleckman, are “a 0.9 percent payroll surtax on earnings and a 3.8 percent tax on net investment income for individuals with incomes exceeding $200,000 ($250,000 for couples).” That payroll tax hike hits a reasonably broad swath of affluent individuals, but in a relatively minor way. The 3.8 percent tax on net investment income (money made from owning or selling stocks and other financial instruments rather than working), by contrast, is a pretty hefty tax, but one that falls overwhelmingly on the small number of people who have hundreds of thousands of dollars a year in investment income. For the bottom 60 percent of the population — that is, households earning less than about $67,000 a year — repeal of the ACA would end up meaning an increase in taxes due to the loss of ACA tax credits. But people in the top 1 percent of the income distribution — those with incomes of over about $430,000 — would see their taxes fall by an average of $25,000 a year. And for the true elite in the top 0.1 percent — people like designated White House senior adviser Jared Kushner, Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin, Education Secretary Betsy DeVos, Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, and many major campaign donors — the tax cut is truly enormous. Households with incomes of more than $1.9 million would get an extra $165,000 a year in take-home pay. That’s obviously more than enough money to make these hyper-elite families come out ahead regardless of what happens to health insurance markets. By contrast, upper-middle-class families would get an extra $110 a year in after-tax income. That’s nice, but it isn’t going to replace a health insurance plan. Phil Klein, a top conservative health policy journalist, has urged Republicans to solve their overpromising problem by “stating a simple truth, which goes something like this: ‘We don't believe that it is the job of the federal government to guarantee that everybody has health insurance.’”

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/trumps-tweet...=3Gw92UR1PtATA1 Trump's tweets, good politics but poor economics Written by Harvard Business School prof No real Republican can counter this argument logically...because it's impossible. There are countless ways to force (maybe push is a better word, or influence) China to comply with fair trade practices without imposing tariffs that wouldn't seriously impact both American consumers and workers so negatively.

http://www.espn.com/mens-college-basketbal...pId/7/teamId/77 Beat Wake and Dayton, as well as at Nebraska and at PSU. Sitting at 42 in RPI. No bad losses, maybe Minnesota at home will look worse later. Lost by only 2 at Butler.

QUOTE (farmteam @ Jan 16, 2017 -> 10:51 PM) Wait what? Those examples don't make sense, and even if they did, wouldn't be in the same universe as what Jenks mentioned. Renewables had astronomical growth under Obama. And Solyndra is just a terrible Republican talking point. Republicans used Solyndra to argue the loan program was terrible...but 98% of the loans administered through that program were repaid. Solyndra was one of the few failures. It'd be like arguing that Reagan did terribly in the '84 election because he lost Minnesota. I was just joking. Republicans ALWAYS bring up Solyndra, school choice/labor unions, e-mails, Benghazi, birth certificates....the same talking points. Now, all things considered, we're not really close to going electric with automobiles in mass production, but that's largely attributable to much cheaper gasoline prices, and partially related to the fracking argument, where the US is now a net exporter of energy. It's not like Obama could force everyone to put up solar panels, anyway...like in the late 70's when Carter was president. And the budgetary resources (and customer demand) for high speed rail and magnetic levitation trains just isn't there. At least not YET.

Astros started out with something of a bang as well this off-season...

Iowa sucks again. ISU's glory days are gone. Meanwhile, Greg McDermott and Creighton have a secret juggernaut in the Midwest. http://www.omaha.com/creighton/blog/greg-m...2581422f46.html And the big question, will Northwestern FINALLY make the NCAA Tourney?

http://www.cnn.com/2017/01/16/politics/whi...aith/index.html White nationalists losing their faith in Trump already

https://www.yahoo.com/news/german-vice-chan...-085837447.html Europe/EU/NATO/BMW vs. Trump, who blinks first? http://curmudgucation.blogspot.com/2017/01...anks-devos.html Liz Warren questioning Devos for Secretary of Education should be high theater.

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/07/us/polit...iness.html?_r=0 Anyone care to defend Jared Kushner still having a key role in the White House after reading this article? http://www.theatlantic.com/international/a...es-trap/406756/ Well, guess it really doesn't matter since there's only a 12/16 (75%) probability of going to war with China. Bigger fish to fry.

How many Q threads have been closed/relocated so far? Is this the 3rd or the 4th? Can't even keep track anymore. Maybe we need to barrage all the Denver sports media with theoretical Rockies/Sox trades, lol...because this current dynamic of the Astros, Pirates and Braves doesn't have that OOOMPH to get negotiations over the top.

There's no reason to think that: 1) Rodon won't improve with better catchers and finally feel at home as the "ace of the staff" with Q's departure. In many ways, it will (at least for the time) feel like his team, as well as Anderson and Moncada. In that role, he becomes even more valuable to other teams, at least the perception that he's growing into that projected "ace" or TOR role. 2) That the White Sox won't be able to run competitive teams out there in 2019-2021, especially the latter two years. So unless you're deathly afraid of a TJS situation with Rodon and also scared to death of his mechanics, or feel he'll never have enough control of his offspeed stuff or cut his walk totals, then there's just no reason to trade him for 50-75% of what he'll be worth in the future. There's always a risk that Rodon and especially Anderson will backslide, but that's true of all young players. We've experienced it firsthand in recent years with Quentin, Beckham and Viciedo, to name just three.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Jan 16, 2017 -> 11:19 AM) lol. Yeah, poor guys fleeing murderous dictators. I wonder why we ever tried to protect them as special versus other people who were just fleeing for better opportunities that the Dems are saying they won't send back. Will they be doing the same to Syrians? You know, so no one gets "special" treatment, and all get treated like every other immigrant? Read about Batista's Cuba in the 1950's. Arguably even worse in terms of civilian deaths. In the end, Trump was going to upend this policy anyway, since he's pretty much doing the opposite of Obama on nearly everything. Would it have been better if Obama extended the eligibility period until the middle of the day next Friday? Isn't it better to pick a date ahead of time and give (the majority of) those who are planning to leave some advance warning? Granted, there will always be some "caught in the middle" of transit, but waiting until noon next Friday is basically as logical as replacing the leader of the DC National Guard in the very middle of Inauguration Day (which is always considered an honor for military personnel to participate in), out of political spite. Yet another unprecedented Trump action. https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/public...ba6b_story.html Does that make any sense?

The Republican members of Congress have to be pretty livid with Trump about now...especially Ryan and Price (well, theoretically the future head of HHS if he survives the nomination process with allegations of "insider trading" hanging over his candidacy). On the other hand, it's giving Rand Paul some "open water" to present his own plan, which definitely has some positive things going for it.

Well, he already took MLK Day off and skipped doing a community service/volunteer project. Does meeting with a member of MLK's family make up for? NAH. The damage has already been inflicted. Now we're up to around 24 representatives refusing to go to the inauguration for various reasons.

http://www.cnn.com/2017/01/16/politics/tom...x.html?adkey=bn Price's nomination looks to be in trouble now with all the smoke around his candidacy...but who knows anymore what is disqualifying, if anything, when you control Congress.

QUOTE (JenksIsMyHero @ Jan 16, 2017 -> 10:59 AM) Bill Clinton was treated the same way by his opponents. As was Bush. As is every President. And frankly, Obama has been given serious passes for major f*** ups too, like the VA scandal (still ongoing!), Fast and Furious, Libya, the continuation of Gitmo and the drone program, etc. etc. Yeah, he had to deal with the birther nosense, and that's fair, but I think that's about the only race/religion specific crap he had to deal with. Don't forget Solyndra and the green energy/clean tech revolution not exactly taking off as planned in the US.

I guess. But Miller, Chapman and Betances are closer to elite. There's really no guarantee that Robertson, Holland or Jones will increase their value...and I have a feeling the White Sox will be outbid on Holland by a contender if he's at least 85-90% healthy. That said, there is no guarantee with Derek Holland as well, but can they get this Holland for roughly the same price?

In case you just woke up, we're getting closer to war with China/Mexico/Germany and continuing to cozy up to Russia. Oh, by the way, that little NATO deal is obsolete (AGAIN). Despite everything we've heard from his Cabinet choices on the matter. Quoted in German by Bild from a conversation held in English, Trump predicted that Britain’s exit from the EU will be a success and portrayed the EU as an instrument of German domination designed with the purpose of beating the U.S. in international trade. For that reason, Trump said, he’s fairly indifferent to whether the EU stays together, according to Bild. WHAT? It's the darned Nazis all over again, secretly planning global economic hegemony!!! The Times quoted Trump as saying he was interested in making “good deals with Russia,” floating the idea of lifting sanctions that were imposed as the U.S. has sought to punish the Kremlin for its annexation of Crimea in 2014 and military support of the Syrian government. “They have sanctions on Russia -- let’s see if we can make some good deals with Russia,’’ Trump said, according to the Times. “For one thing, I think nuclear weapons should be way down and reduced very substantially, that’s part of it.’’ (Great, didn't he just wipe out the entire department and leave it without a chair/director for the first time in modern history?) https://www.yahoo.com/news/m/5f3214a9-0b49-...ny-have-it.html https://www.bloomberg.com/politics/articles...&yptr=yahoo

This is a pretty logical summary of the problem, in one long paragraph. Avatar Thomas 15 hours ago WrongFreedomHawk. Your assertion that the government caused the escalation of college tuition and the fees charged by physicians i simply not true. College tuition has increased, because universities and colleges are treated as a business, there to make money, and the government has systematically reduced its contribution to school aide, grants, and scholarships, resulting in more and more students having to rely on high interest loans to pay their college tuition, which continues to escalate faster than inflation. The single most important factor in the rise of physicians fees, was the eventually acceptance of assignments of benefits and third party payments by doctor's offices back in the 1960's and 1970's. Prior to this period, patient's had insurance, provided by employers, but few if any doctors offices accepted the insurance. The patient would pay the doctor his established officer fee, and the doctor's office might help the patient complete the insurance forms, so that the patient could get reimbursed by the insurance company for the payment to the doctor. However, in the 1960's and 70's there were many medical and professional lecture series dedicated to teaching doctors how to bill insurance companies for their fees, and the advantages of doing so, in expanding the patient pool seeking medical care. Many doctor's offices began accepting insurance assignment of benefits permitting them to bill the insurance company directly for their services provided insured patients, sparing the patient from having to pay for the medical services. This systems created a disconnect between the patient and the fees charged by the providers, allowing doctor's offices to greatly increase their fees, because the patient's were no longer paying. Government had no pony in this race. The patients did not seem to care or concern themselves with the cost of the care they were receiving, that was now solely the responsibility of the insurance companies. The doctors, realizing the discontent, raised their fees dramatically over a number of years, and reaped huge economic rewards, while insurance carriers were expected to pay for any and all services billed regardless of their efficacy or patient outcome. I can recall a time when colleagues of mine, being newly trained in arthroscopic surgery began charging insurance carriers $15,000.00 for what was in effect a 20-25 minute minimally invasive procedure and would schedule 15-20 of these surgeries per day. You do the math. These surgeons were making $200,000.00-$300,000.00 per day. Hospitals loved these high volume surgeons, because they were a cash cow generating huge revenues for the hospitals. Almost like printing money. Medicare, Medicaid, and other government programs have actually had a very negative effect on doctor's fees and income. Medicare pays only a fraction of a doctor's usual and customary fees. Medicaid pays fees at such an artificially low level, that few doctors will accept medicaid patients, and those that do may feel compelled to commit insurance fraud, as a rationalized justification of the mistreatment and underpayment of fees by the government. Third party insurance carriers attempt to use the extremely low fees paid by Medicare to negotiate down doctor's usual and customary fees. Note: I have lived through and had to adapt to the changes in our healthcare delivery system, the multitude of changes of healthcare reimbursement, and I own 4 healthcare companies, and a medical billing company. SO, BASICALLY, you've got the doctors/hospitals, insurance companies and drug companies all fighting for a diminishing piece of the pie. Who's going to be willing to sacrifice any of their profits, and WHY? http://www.cnn.com/2017/01/15/politics/ran...ment/index.html Rand Paul presents his plan. On Sunday, Paul gave a preview of his and argued that in requiring insurers to offer more robust plans, Obamacare drove up prices and pushed people out of the market. 1) "One of the key reforms that we will do is, we're going to legalize the sale of inexpensive insurance," he said. "That means getting rid of the Obamacare mandates on what you can buy. We are going to help people save through health savings accounts, as well as a tax credit." Those less expensive options, which were prevalent on the market before the 2010 reform was signed into law, would offer less robust care but also, as supporters argue, be more neatly tailored to what consumers view to be their specific needs. 2) Under Paul's program, the bargaining power created by the state and federal exchanges would be replaced with a provision that allows individuals and associations like small businesses to create their own markets. "There's no reason why (a business owner) with four employees shouldn't be able to join with hundreds and hundreds of other businesses that are small to become a large entity to get leverage to bring your prices down," Paul told Tapper. He added that those negotiations with insurance companies could also be used to guarantee the availability of policies that "can't cancel you and guarantees the issue of the insurance even if you get sick." 3) Paul's plan did not directly address the future of states that signed on for expanded Medicaid offered as part of Obamacare. Kentucky, which had a Democratic governor when the law went into effect, was among those to accept the funds. The majority of the more than 400,000 Kentuckians insured under the law were brought into the fold by Medicaid expansion. "That's the big question," Paul said of their fate. "And I don't think that's going to be in the replacement aspect." The future of Medicaid expansion would then be decided during the repeal process, which will run through a budget reconciliation vote -- one that requires only a simple majority for passage. "What we have to decide is what can be kept and what can't be kept," Paul said, suggesting that the states should raise taxes if they want to maintain their current expenditure levels. So that's two reasonable enough ideas, although not sure why it took since 1994...of course, you have to deal with the pre-existing conditions (addressed in point 2, although not comprehensively, it's a bit vague, as insurance companies won't voluntarily cover the most expensive pre-existing conditions) AND under 25/26 year olds staying on the insurance plans of their parents as well as who continues to pay for the CHIP plan/Medicaid (states? Federal government? higher taxes on individual families?) Of course, independent auditors/CBO are going to have to look at these Medical/Health Savings Accounts, vouchers and tax credits and score how much money it's actually going to cost compared to the current system...

https://www.yahoo.com/finance/news/valeant-...-153344072.html Syprine is considered the gold standard for treating Wilson’s (Disease), in part because it has relatively few side effects. But from 2011 to 2015, as Valeant hiked the price of Syprine from less than $1000 for 100 capsules to $21,266.80 for the same 100 capsules, according to documents Valeant provided the government, the drug came to have an inordinate impact on the company’s profits—and far more importantly, on the lives of those who suffer from Wilson’s disease. Syprine was featured prominently in the report about price gouging that was released last month by the Senate Special Committee on Aging. Syprine drug price increases. Source: US Senate — Special Committee on Aging All the negative press doesn’t appear to have done much to change Valeant’s tactics. One patient just received her three-month supply of Syprine at a total cost of $72,338.58, or almost $300,000 a year. The Senate Committee on Aging says that current Valeant CEO Joseph Papa told them that the company had not reduced the price of Syprine and didn’t plan to do so. (Valeant argued to me that it effectively has reduced the price of Syprine by creating patient assistance programs under which commercially insured patients will pay no more than $25 per month for their prescription, and those without insurance whose household income is below 500% of the federal poverty level will get free medication. That, of course, still leaves the insurance system, i.e. all of us, paying for Valeant’s profiteering.) In recent years, the Federal Trade Commission has been increasingly aggressive about using antitrust laws to challenge deals between drug companies that may keep a lower-priced drug off the market. In 2013, the Supreme Court ruled, over howls of protest from drug companies, that these deals are subject to antitrust scrutiny. “These business arrangements sometimes serve as a fig leaf to disguise harms to the market and price increases,” says Michael Carrier, an expert on antitrust law at Rutgers Law. But not all such deals are unlawful. The not-so-benign view is that Valeant gave Kadmon 10% of Syprine’s gross profits so that Kadmon wouldn’t undercut Valeant’s pricing by launching its own competing drug. After all, as one lawyer says, “Kadmon isn’t Pfizer,” meaning that a tiny company that was hemorrhaging money and didn’t have a massive sales force doesn’t seem like a choice partner. “If I were still at the FTC, I would investigate,” says a former FTC lawyer. Good luck, Trumpicans!

http://www.cnn.com/2017/01/15/politics/tru...care/index.html Trump promises "INSURANCE FOR ALL" Don't see how this can possibly go wrong. Republicans have long slammed Obamacare, saying its high premiums and deductibles leave enrollees feeling like the don't have insurance. They have vowed to lower the cost, primarily by lifting Obamacare's insurance regulations that require carriers to provide comprehensive benefits. Ryan and Price have unveiled frameworks for replacement plans that rely on tax credits based on enrollees' age, not income. However, health policy experts have said those credits will have to be generous in order to make coverage affordable. And that could run afoul of Republicans' promise to lower federal spending on health care. while also vowing to force drug companies to negotiate directly with the government on prices in Medicare and Medicaid. Trump said he will target pharmaceutical companies over drug prices. “They’re politically protected, but not anymore,” he said of pharmaceutical companies. In general, congressional GOP plans to replace Obamacare have tended to try to constrain costs by reducing government requirements, such as the medical services that must be provided under health plans sold through the law’s marketplaces and through states’ Medicaid programs. House Speaker Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.) and other Republicans have been talking lately about providing “universal access” to health insurance, instead of universal insurance coverage. “The Congress can’t get cold feet because the people will not let that happen,” Trump said during the interview with The Post. Trump said his plan for replacing most aspects of Obama’s health-care law is all but finished. Although he was coy about its details — “lower numbers, much lower deductibles” — he said he is ready to unveil it alongside Ryan and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.). “It’s very much formulated down to the final strokes. We haven’t put it in quite yet but we’re going to be doing it soon.” “We’re going to have insurance for everybody,” Trump said. “There was a philosophy in some circles that if you can’t pay for it, you don’t get it. That’s not going to happen with us.” People covered under the law “can expect to have great health care. It will be in a much simplified form. Much less expensive and much better.” Trump did not say how his program overlaps with the comprehensive plan authored by House Republicans. Earlier this year, Price suggested that a Trump presidency would advance the House GOP’s health-care agenda. When asked in the interview whether he intends to cut benefits for Medicare as part of his plan, Trump said “no,” a position that was reiterated Sunday on ABC by Reince Priebus, Trump’s incoming chief of staff. Moving ahead, Trump said that lowering drug prices is central to reducing health-care costs nationally — and that he will make it a priority as he uses his bully pulpit to shape policy. When asked how exactly he would force drug manufacturers to comply, Trump said that part of his approach would be public pressure “just like on the airplane,” a nod to his tweets about Lockheed Martin’s F-35 fighter jet, which Trump said was too costly. Trump waved away the suggestion that such activity could lead to market volatility on Wall Street. “Stock drops and America goes up,” he said. “I don’t care. I want to do it right or not at all.” He added that drug companies “should produce” more products in the United States. The question of whether the government should start negotiating how much it pays drugmakers for older Americans on Medicare has long been a partisan dispute, ever since the 2003 law that created Medicare drug benefits prohibited such negotiations. Trump’s goal is uncertain, however, with respect to Medicaid, the insurance for low-income Americans run jointly by the federal government and states. Under what is known as a Medicaid “best price” rule, pharmaceutical companies already are required to sell drugs to Medicaid as the lowest price they negotiate with any other buyer. https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/tru...m=.487eeaecbdcd