EDITORIAL: Build a new plan, and then repeal Obamacare

Jan. 20--Richard Hudson was reassuring. Nobody is going to lose insurance coverage as Congress repeals the Affordable Care Act and replaces it with ... well, something else.

"My message to folks is we're not pulling the rug out from under anybody," our 8th District congressman said in Fayetteville on Wednesday. "We're going to get it right."

We wish Congress and the president had gotten Obamacare right at the outset. They didn't. It's a too-big, too-complex bureaucratic mess, for one thing. And it was turned into a political pinata by Republican lawmakers who were determined to make it -- and President Obama -- fail. They only partially succeeded in those missions.

But the final result was a health-insurance program marred by confusion, fast-rising premiums and uneven participation by insurance companies.

The Republicans' problem now is coming up with a replacement that doesn't look like Obamacare. Their quest is complicated, because the president swiped the plan from his onetime opponent, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, who successfully installed it in his state. Romney got the idea from the conservative Heritage Foundation. It's nothing short of remarkable that Republicans were then able to vilify the health-insurance system as a socialist plot.

But now, the governance responsibility is all theirs, and the pressure is on. Congressional budget analysts said earlier this week that 18 million Americans will become uninsured if Obamacare is repealed and not immediately replaced -- a political storm most politicians would rather not face.

Hudson is doing the right thing as he ponders a successor to the 7-year-old Affordable Care Act: He's listening. He said on Wednesday that he wants to know what parts of the program are working for people. He's soliciting stories on his website and held a "tele-town hall" last week.

He also said something that gives us pause: He hopes Democrats will work with Republicans on ways to replace the program -- once it's repealed. Waiting until repeal has to be a non-starter. The construction of an alternative has to begin now, before Obamacare is put to death.

For all its failings, the Affordable Care Act has substantially expanded the numbers of Americans with health insurance, and helped millions more by requiring companies to cover pre-existing conditions. We can't back away from that. What we need to do is improve on it. That's the challenge Hudson and his colleagues face. And the ball is very much in their court.

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