For the first time in US history, the GOP is intentionally uninsuring millions of Americans

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In 2013, Ted Cruz saw the future.

Pretty much on his own, he took the government hostage, holding up a funding bill in the House, attempting to force President Obama, who had just become the first president since Eisenhower to be elected with 51% of the vote twice, to abandon the Affordable Care Act, the signature legislative accomplishment of Obama’s first term.

Cruz claimed he was worried about Americans losing their doctors and healthcare. But that’s because he couldn’t say what he was really worried about: Americans gaining health insurance that Republicans would never be able to take away without a massive backlash.

Basically, he was afraid of that huge drop in America’s uninsured population from 2013 to 2014:

When Republicans led by Paul Ryan in Trump’s first term tried to repeal the ACA and gut Medicaid, they were essentially trying to do what Ted Cruz failed to do and reverse most, if not nearly all, of the progress made in covering Americans made under Obama. They were unable to uninsure 23 million Americans, by the grace of the universe, because we were about to face the worst pandemic of the century.

Then, because of fixes made to the program, the number of uninsured Americans hit record lows this decade.

But this time, as Bobby Kennedy Jr. does his best to drive us into another pandemic, without any vaccines to prevent the deaths and misery he lusts after, Republicans have succeeded in passing AND not passing legislation that will uninsure millions.

Not as many millions as Paul Ryan aimed for, but far too many.

What I need you to know is that this has never happened before in American history.

Sure, George W. Bush “accidentally” uninsured nine or so million with the bungling that led us into the Great Recession. But the closest Republicans have come to making cuts that took insurance from mass numbers of Americans was Ronald Reagan’s Medicaid cuts, which led to 600,000 Americans losing their coverage, resulting, of course, in “no administrative savings.”

From what we know of Georgia’s ridiculous experience with the job-loss requirements this bill implements, millions will be kept from health coverage and thus care, but any “savings” will likely be swallowed up by excessive administrative overhead designed solely to keep people uninsured.

How will Americans react to this pillaging of our safety net that accompanies the giveaways to the richest that dwarf Trump’s handouts to billionaires his first time around?

Honestly, I have no idea. I’ve imagined backlash coming for most of the decade, after the Supreme Court gutted the Voting Rights Act and then Roe. But the truth is, most backlashes are manufactured, requiring massive resources and usually relying on propaganda to sustain them.

But Ted Cruz knew this could be different. Americans don’t like to be robbed by a Reverse Robin Hood who takes their kids’ health insurance and hands it off to some robber baron to buy another house for his sixth nanny.

Donald Trump sensed this when he offered a fix packed with poison that would keep the first round of millions from losing their coverage. But Speaker Mike personally nixed that. So here we go.

And for one of the few times in my life, let me say: I hope Ted Cruz is right.

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