Sen. Tom Cotton threw cold water on the White House and HHS Tom Price's talking points about the "three phase" GOP health insurance legislation: "There is no three-phase process. There is no three-step plan."
Sen. Cotton joined radio host Hugh Hewitt this morning and they discussed the Republican plans to repeal and replace Obamacare.
Hewitt asked, "They all say it’s a three-step dance because of the Senate reconciliation rule. So you know those rules. Working within the rules, how can the Senate improve its bill, or how can the House send to the Senate a bill that fits within the guardrails of reconciliation and allows for 51 votes that improves the individual market?"
Way to slant that question, Hugh.
Early this morning, on NBC's The Today Show Tom Price said that the CBO didn't take the entirety the GOP's bill and said they only looked at "one-third of the plan and you can't look at this in isolation."
Sen. Cotton replied, "Hugh, there is no three-phase process. There is no three-step plan. That is just political talk."
Cotton continued, "It’s just politicians engaging in spin. This is why. Step one is a bill that can pass with 51 votes in the Senate. That’s what we’re working on right now. Step two, as yet unwritten regulations by Tom Price, which is going to be subject to court challenge, and therefore, perhaps the whims of the most liberal judge in America."
"But step three, some mythical legislation in the future that is going to garner Democratic support and help us get over 60 votes in the Senate. If we had those Democratic votes, we wouldn’t need three steps," the Arkansas Senator explained.
Not only did Sen. Cotton destroy the new talking points coming from the Trump administration, he also exposed the idea that the Republican health care bill is "mythical."
The Senator could have said "it's a work in progress," or "we are still scoring all the different moving parts," but instead he called it all a myth!
A definition of "Myth": "a traditional or legendary story, usually concerning some being or hero or event, with or without a determinable basis of fact or a natural explanation, especially one that is concerned with deities or demigods and explains some practice, rite, or phenomenon of nature."
Maybe the GOP and Trump believes that the Greek God "Asclepius" will descend upon us, curing the sick and healing the wounded.
Former Speaker of the HOUSE John Boehner has commented on all the "happy talk" coming from Republicans about repealing Obamacare and said that the one certain thing about Republicans and health care is that they will never settle on a plan.
"In the twenty five years I spent in Congress, Republicans never ever, one time agree on what a healthcare proposal should look like. Not once."
