The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) has gone through many trials and travails over the past several years. A new report from the Government Accountability Office (GAO) exposed another aspect of the department that enables waste and mismanagement.
Passage of the Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act (TCA) in June 2009 gave the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) regulatory control over tobacco products. The purpose of the TCA, as stated in the bill’s report language, was to permit the FDA “to restrict the sale and distribution of tobacco products, including advertising and promotion” and to “take specified actions, including public notification and recall, against unreasonably harmful products.” The law also required the FDA “to establish tobacco product standards to protect the public health” but prohibited the agency from “banning all cigarettes, all smokeless tobacco products, all little cigars, all cigars other than little cigars, all pipe tobacco, or all roll-your-own tobacco products,” or “requiring the reduction of nicotine yields of a tobacco product to zero.” Notably, the law also set forth standards for the sale of “modified-risk tobacco products.”
In 1998, Citizens Against Government Waste released “Are You Getting Your Money’s Worth from Nonprofit Hospitals?” which analyzed the level of charity care nonprofit hospitals were providing to their local communities as a requirement under their tax exemptions. The report found that for-profit and nonprofit hospitals are not much different in terms of the charity they provide to their respective communities. The only difference is that taxpayers are subsidizing the nonprofits.
Healthcare reform is not going well for the Republicans, even though they have called for the repeal of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA), better known as Obamacare, since the legislation was signed into law in 2010. Republicans have had seven years to write, debate, and agree to a plan to repeal Obamacare and replace it with something. They promised to repeal ACA for every election since 2010 and as a result, retook the House of Representatives, the Senate, and the Presidency.
Today, the Senate leadership released their revisions to H.R. 1628, the Better Care Reconciliation Act (BCRA) and there are some important changes. Whether the new language will be enough to garner the votes needed to pass a bill remains to be seen. Importantly, the legislation continues to eliminate many of the onerous taxes and provides relief from the mandates contained in the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA), or Obamacare, and reforms Medicaid. The Council for Citizens Against Government Waste announced its support today for the legislation.
With apologies to Poltergeist, the Congress returns this week from its Independence Day break. All eyes are on the Senate as the country wonders if the Republicans can come together and pass healthcare legislation that will stabilize the individual health insurance market that has been devastated by the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA), or Obamacare.
On June 27, Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) announced there would be no vote on the Senate’s bill, H.R. 1628, the Better Care Reconciliation Act (BCRA), to repeal and replace the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA), or Obamacare, until after the Independence Day recess. Capitol Hill staffers have said the delay is simply a “pothole in the road.” In other words, while efforts have slowed down, the legislative process is moving forward.
When in the course of American history, it becomes necessary to dissolve an odious and oppressive law like the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare), the causes which compel this action should be declared.
Elizabeth MacDonough’s job doesn’t generally bring her into the limelight. While MacDonough has served as the Senate parliamentarian for five years and has worked in the office of the parliamentarian for eighteen, the public knows little of her important role with the upcoming debate on the senate bill to repeal and replace the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA) or Obamacare.
With Congress poised to repeal and replace Obamacare, the time has come to abolish the Independent Payment Advisory Board (IPAB), a little-known but dangerous provision within the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA). Congress needs to repeal IPAB, and if it were not for the arcane rules surrounding the budget reconciliation process being used to repeal Obamacare, it certainly would have been included in either of the repeal-and-replace bills being debated.
