Repeal, replace

Two things are obvious about the Republican efforts to kill the Affordable Care Act and replace it with their own version.

President Trump and the Republican Congress are stumped as they didn’t realize how difficult it would be to re-design healthcare legislation, and they are not interested in serving those who cannot afford insurance — the constituency for which the ACA was originally intended.

While the new version of Obamacare, now Trumpcare, shortchanges the poor, it gives tax breaks to the rich. Republicans’ philosophy is not new, and we shouldn’t have expected anything else from a Congress that they control. Dissension only comes in when the proposed Trumpcare doesn’t go far enough in cutting out benefits for the poor.

So far, the political ploy against President Obama’s legacy and landmark healthcare legislation has backfired on both.

This story was originally published March 11, 2017 at 11:00 AM with the headline "Repeal, replace."