President attacks Obamacare again鈥� again?
Robert Mueller has finally spoken.
President Trump can breathe easy.
He is not going to jail; he probably won’t face impeachment; he can gloat all he likes — “cause there really was no collusion!”
It should be clear sailing toward the 2020 election.
Whom am I trying to kid?
Trump being Trump, and the Trump administration being the Trump administration, it was only a matter of hours after the American public was alerted to Trump’s near (but not full) exoneration, that things got predictably dicey.
While Democrats were busily ducking from a withering onslaught of haymakers thrown by Republicans thanks to Mueller’s report, Trump dashed their glee.
He decided he’d pledge to eliminate all of Obamacare.
There’s hardly anything that lifts the spirits of defeated Democrats, like word that Trump is resurrecting his crusade against Obamacare.
Democrats ran on a platform of defending healthcare reform in 2018.
And that helped retake the U.S. House.
They’d sure like to run on it again.
Last year, Trump vowed to protect people with pre-existing conditions from losing their healthcare coverage.
Now he’s vowing to launch a new campaign to rip Obamacare from its foundation – an estimated 53 million people who have pre-existing conditions might lose their coverage.
It’s a risky situation that, no doubt, wiped the smiles from the faces of lots of Republicans in Congress when they heard about Trump’s plan.
One million Pennsylvanians, alone, and 12.7 million nationwide benefits from Medicaid expansion thanks to Obamacare.
There have been lower Medicare costs; kids who get to stay on their parents’ plans until they turn 26; free annual check-ups; free mammograms; free flu shots; free birth control and lower drug prices for millions of Americans in the years since Obamacare became law nine years ago.
What had been an unpopular program when it was signed into law, is quite popular today.
That puts Trump, and his fellow Republicans, in a bind if he proceeds to try to eliminate Obamacare.
According to the non-profit Kaiser Family Foundation, because Obamacare has been so embedded into the fabric of America, “nearly everyone in at least some way,” would be affected if it would be repealed without being replaced.
It all bubbled to the surface after a U.S. Court of Appeals agreed with a lower court ruling that since Obamacare’s individual mandate was struck down – the rest of the law is void.
Trump leaped on that decision. He’s re-launched his attack on Obamacare.
We all know this is really another tired, old attack on Obama.
No matter what he’s talking about, he seems to do it with Obama in mind.
Just about every time he steps in front of a camera, he compares himself favorably to his predecessor.
He could do us all a favor, and try to rename Obamacare, Trumpcare, and spare us the drama.
Then he can claim he saved America from the destruction caused by Obama — and his stupid Obamacare.
When Obama was president, he was far more popular, and, I might add, dignified than Trump.
He was never so eager to claim other people’s successes were really his own.
Trump, though, is riding an economic boom that was already happening when he took office.
Does he deserve credit? Yes.
Does he deserve as much credit as he gives himself? An emphatic NO!
So, when he has an opportunity to gut what’s been repeatedly called “Obama’s signature accomplishment,” he’s all in.
It doesn’t matter to him if millions of Americans may suffer.
He’s still trying to get retribution for that one night in April of 2011 when he was the butt of Obama’s jokes at that White House Correspondents’ Dinner.
He sat motionless, glowering, while Obama made fun of him. Nothing, though, as ruthless, and baseless as Trump’s birtherism.
Trump had been made a fool of in public.
Obama was just having fun. After all, he had more important things on his mind.
Less than 24 hours later, he spoke to the nation with the words, “…the United States has conducted an operation that has killed Osama Bin Laden…
Edward A. Owens is a multi-Emmy Award winner, former reporter, and anchor for Entertainment Tonight and 20-year TV news veteran. E-mail him at freedoms@bellatlantic.net.