“The Court predicts that making tax credits unavailable in States that do not set up their own Exchanges would cause disastrous economic consequences there. If that is so,” writes Justice Scalia, “wouldn’t one expect States to react by setting up their own Exchanges?”
That is, using Scalia’s hyperbole, a “bit of interpretive jiggery-pokery” meaning, “The more authority given to states, the more legislatures like Wyoming’s will find ways to assure Obamacare doesn’t work. Look at the mischief we caused allowing states to choose whether to expand Medicaid. That was some kind of witches’ brew.”
The President
says the Affordable Care Act is here to stay. The witches say, “Double, double
toil and trouble; repeal and replace, fire burn, and cauldron bubble.”
They gathered
round the cauldron. Eyes are red, throats are dry, long fingernails extend from
bony fingers. Fire and smoke fume from nostrils. Partisans focus on their
Obamacare talking points.
“Double, double
toil and trouble; train wreck, socialism, repeal and replace, fire burn, and cauldron
bubble.”
Fifty times they voted
to repeal it, a presidential election was a referendum on the law, its
opponents lost, dozens of candidates spent millions promising to “repeal and
replace” Obamacare and not one offered a plan to do so, two failed trips to the
Supreme Court, an entire television network dedicated to misleading the public
about the law, and yet it remains.
“Eye of newt, and
toe of frog, wool of bat, and tongue of dog, adder's fork, and blind-worm's
sting, lizard's leg, and owlet's wing; for a charm of powerful trouble, like a
hell-broth boil and bubble.”
The timid witch
in the corner says, “Why work so hard to harm vulnerable people? Is this Kool-Aid
any different than Wyoming legislators guzzled when they denied healthcare to
17,000 low income working people?”
The witches
screech, “In the poison'd entrails throw. Toad, that under cold stone, days and
nights has thirty-one; Swelter'd venom sleeping got, Boil thou first in ' the
charmed pot!”
The timid one
inquires, “You stir the brew you hope will kill the law but it will also kill
people. The country would be better off you brewed your own plan to help fix
the country’s broken healthcare system?”
Pretending not to
hear a word, they kept stirring as they chanted, “Fillet of a fenny snake, in
the cauldron boil and bake. Repeal, repeal, repeal.”
The other says, “If
this brew is successful the budget deficit will increase by tens-of-billions of
dollars. Millions of people will lose their insurance. Some of them and their
children may even die.”
The gathered
witches snarled wryly and sang. “Thrice the brinded cat hath mew'd.”
But, says the
timid one, “People who couldn’t afford health insurance are now insured. The
uninsured rate has declined by nearly 10 million under Obamacare. Isn’t that a
good thing? We used to think so, didn’t we?”
The witches
ignore the siren and continue stirring the brew, mixing ingredients. “Scale of
dragon; tooth of wolf; witches' mummy; maw and gulf of the ravin'd salt-sea
shark.”
“Bu-bu-but…for
the first time in history, healthcare costs have declined.”
The other witches
cared not and continued brewing a concoction to kill the law. “This will be the
one,” they say. “Thrice and once, the hedge-pig whin'd. Harpier cries, 'tis
time! 'tis time!”
Growing less
timid, the voice cries, “If the Congress drinks your awful brew, people with
pre-existing conditions can’t be insured, sick people’s policies will be
canceled, young people won’t be covered under their parents’ policies,
insurance companies will not be restrained in how much they spend on lawyers to
fight claims and advertising to misrepresent their policies.”
The plotting
witches chant. The cauldron boils. The timid witch asks, “Just what will you
replace Obamacare with?” They bellowed, “Gall of goat, and slips of yew
sliver'd in the moon's eclipse; Nose of Turk, and Tartar's lips; repeal,
repeal, repeal.”
With thanks to William
Shakespeare.
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