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| Obama chides Republicans as shutdown looms - Washington Post Posted: 28 Sep 2013 08:45 AM PDT With Washington barreling toward a government shutdown, a deadlocked Congress entered the final weekend of the fiscal year with no clear ideas of how to avoid furloughs for more than 800,000 federal workers. Millions more could be left without paychecks. The Senate on Friday approved a stopgap government funding bill and promptly departed, leaving all of the pressure to find a solution on House Republican leaders. President Obama weighed in, sternly lecturing GOP leaders that the easiest path forward would be to approve the Senate's bill, which includes money for the implementation of the Affordable Care Act, the president's prized legislation achievement, which he signed into law in 2010. But a far-right bloc of House and Senate Republicans banded together to leave House Speaker John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) virtually powerless to act. "My message to Congress is this: Do not shut down the government. Do not shut down the economy. Pass a budget on time," Obama said in the White House press briefing room. Boehner's leadership team offered no public comment and remained out of sight most of Friday, hunkering down for another weekend on the brink. For Boehner, this is the latest in a series of unstable moments that have become the hallmark of his three-year run as speaker. With a stroke-of-midnight deadline Monday, Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.) said Democrats would reject any conservative add-ons that Boehner might attach to the funding bill. That would further delay passage, and given the staunch opposition from Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tex.), who has suggested that he will not help move the process along, the slow-moving Senate would require up to a week to approve something even if Reid were amenable to the changes. That sets the stage for a shutdown Tuesday. "We've passed the only bill that can avert a government shutdown Monday night. I said this on the floor, I say it again: This is it, time is gone," Reid said Friday after the midday passage of the funding bill on a party-line vote. Before that final roll call, Cruz's attempt to filibuster the legislation was throttled in a bipartisan 79-to-19 vote, but the first-year senator drew support from nearly half the rank-and-file Republicans in defiance of Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.). Cruz confirmed reports that he has been huddling with House conservatives to help plot their strategy to force Boehner's hand on Obamacare. "I am confident if the House listens to the people, as it did last week, that it will continue to step forward and respond to the suffering that is coming from Obamacare," Cruz told reporters Friday, saying he has had "numerous conversations" with House Republicans. Those Republicans upended a strategy crafted by Boehner and House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) to first advance legislation related to the federal borrowing limit, including more demands to delay Obamacare, then allow government funding to be approved. That plan required the GOP leaders to draw all votes from their side of the aisle — 217 of the 232 Republicans — and instead the Cruz-backed contingent hold more than enough votes to sabotage any moves by Boehner and Cantor. Those House Republicans offered their version late Friday of what they want attached to the funding resolution and sent back to the Senate: an amendment delaying until 2015 implementation of all the health law's taxes, mandates and benefits as well as its provisions aimed at squeezing savings from Medicare. |
| Affordable Care Act: For Illinois residents, a land of options - Chicago Tribune Posted: 28 Sep 2013 09:20 AM PDT Three years ago when President Barack Obama signed the 906-page law that promised to transform health care, Americans were deeply divided about whether it was right for the country. Two days from its implementation, little has changed. Many remain skeptical and confused about the law. Critics are convinced it will curb consumers' choices while plunging the country deeper into debt. But to millions who can't afford health insurance or were denied coverage because of pre-existing conditions, the law represents a new hope — both because of its aim to virtually guarantee access to all Americans and the pledge it would rein in spiraling health care costs. The law, known colloquially by both detractors and supporters as Obamacare, now faces its ultimate test: whether it will work. Barring an unlikely last-minute derailment in Congress, which may force a federal government shutdown as part of a Republican battle to block the law's implementation, more than 40 million Americans who don't have health insurance will have their first shot at signing up for coverage Tuesday. Many of them will be doing so for the first time. "These are our aunts, uncles, grandmas, parents and our neighbors who will now have an opportunity to seek the best health care available, an option they didn't have before," said Lee Francis, president and chief executive of Erie Family Health Center, one of the state's largest networks of community heath clinics. For people who lost their jobs and benefits during the Great Recession, the new coverage offers a chance to regain some security. "It's a blessing," said Debra Douglas, a Far South Side 52-year-old who last year lost her job as a certified nurse's assistant and the health insurance that came with it. Of the more than 1.6 million uninsured Illinoisans, some 342,000 will be newly eligible for Medicaid, the state-federal health insurance program for the poor and disabled. Nearly 1 million others are expected to qualify for new federal tax credits to help offset the cost of buying private insurance on new health insurance exchanges. State officials expect about 337,000 to sign up in the first year. Nationwide, the Congressional Budget Office projects that about 7 million will buy coverage for next year through exchanges, online marketplaces where consumers can compare health insurance plans and determine whether they're eligible for federal assistance. As with many big programs, there have been setbacks. Late last week, it was made clear that some portions of the system wouldn't be ready. Federal officials said Thursday that small-business and Spanish-language health insurance enrollment services would not begin Tuesday as planned. That announcement came on the heels of a one-year delay on a mandate that large employers provide coverage to all full-time workers or pay a penalty. Critics have seized on the stumbles as more proof that the law was ill-conceived, poorly executed and doomed for failure. State and federal officials acknowledge that the enrollment systems are largely untested — at least with mass audiences. An Illinois-based call center to help guide consumers through the sign-up also won't be ready Tuesday, state officials said. "This is a very complex operation that we're putting up. We are coming down to the wire on it," said Cristal Thomas, one of Gov. Pat Quinn's deputy governors. "We are sitting here pretty confident that we are launching on Oct. 1. Even if not everything (will have) full functionality, we will have something up and running for people to access." But the law itself is no panacea for solving America's problem with the uninsured, who drive up costs for others because they often put off going to the doctor until problems are so severe they must be admitted into the hospital. Those costs then get passed along to taxpayers and people with insurance, who pay higher health care premiums. Millions of Americans are expected to remain uninsured, including more than 1 million in Illinois, at least in the first year, according to state and federal estimates. |
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