OPINION: To the GOP on Obamacare: This spud’s for you

Feb. 22--Health care policy as a political hot potato has become a popular metaphor. Writers at Vox, CNBC, the American Constitution Society and elsewhere have compared Obamacare to a fresh-from-the-oven tuber that's too painful to hold and must be tossed back across the aisle as quickly as possible.

Noting growing concerns about inherent flaws in the complex structure of Obamacare -- formally known as the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act -- libertarian Bloomberg View columnist Megan McArdle argued in a Feb. 15 essay that Congress is no longer "arguing about whether (and how) the exchanges can be saved, but playing hot potato as both parties vie to avoid being stuck with the blame for the ensuing disaster."

Nice try.

Though it carries the name of a former Democratic president, Obamacare isn't a scalding russet alternately burning the palms of lawmakers who don't want to own the program. It's a steaming glop of mashed potatoes piled on the plates of the Republicans.

They ordered it. They now have to eat it. And that's no chive.

Yes, GOP partisans objected strenuously and unanimously to Democratic President Barack Obama's convoluted overhaul of the nation's medical insurance system when it was proposed, wagging their fingerlings at what they described as a government takeover of health care.

After Obama signed the act in 2010, Republicans in the House of Representatives voted dozens of times to repeal all or most of it. This was easy enough to do because such votes were merely impotent expressions of discontent sure to be blocked in the Senate or vetoed by the White House.

But accompanying these remonstrations and obstructions were assurances:

We have better ideas. We know how to expand necessary coverage to the poor, protect against medical bankruptcies and offer low-cost preventive services without making a hash of the existing system of private insurance provided largely through employers. If only we could root out those dastardly Democrats, we'd show you!

The 2016 Republican presidential candidate, Donald Trump, promised to repeal Obamacare on "Day One" of his administration and replace it with "something terrific" that was cheaper and offered the same or better coverage.

It was a big part of Trump's pledge to "Make America au Gratin Again," and although he was maddeningly vague on the details, voters, particularly white, blue-collar voters living on a shoestring, believed him.

They elected Trump and GOP majorities in the House and Senate in November. But with those victories for Republicans came full ownership of national health insurance policy.

Trump did not, of course, move to repeal Obamacare on Day One. Or Day 10. Or Day 30. Bills to repeal, replace or even rehab the health care system have yet to advance in Congress. And I'm certainly not the only common tater to be skeptical that the emergence of a new plan is imminent, as Trump recently promised.

"Good gravy!" I imagine Republicans saying to themselves, their brows crinkled. "Key provisions of this law are far more popular than we knew. Getting rid of just the unpopular parts either fries the whole thing immediately or creams the insurance companies. Our plans for making good on Trump's pledge to provide 'insurance for everybody' turn out to be half-baked, and voters will scallop us if we simply pass a repeal that would end coverage for up to 30 million people, including many tots."

I'll tell you what's uncomfortably hot: the seats in which GOP lawmakers now sit, wondering how they're going to choke down the starchy mound on the table in front of them.

As an aside, I'd recommend the butter of a single-payer, Medicare-for-all system of universal coverage, or the salt of government-sponsored options on the insurance exchanges.

Am I done, at last, with the potato jokes?

Eye yam.

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