It appears that the Senate repeal of Obamacare being worked on is not a repeal at all, but instead a massive infusion of new taxpayer dollars to prop it up: There is general agreement among the majority of the conference that a large "stabilization" fund is necessary to help individual insurance markets stay afloat, as well as tossing away House language that allowed people with pre-existing conditions to be charged much more money. Republicans are still not settled on how precisely to handle future Medicaid spending, but there is growing consensus that the expansion's wind-down will be pushed past the House's 2020 cut-off. All of those moves are likely to require more funding, and the way to get it is to delay repeal of some of Obamacare's tax increases, a strategy that isn't going to fly with conservatives. In an interview this week, Rand Paul charged that the House bill is bad enough because it keeps "90 percent" of Obamacare, said he...(Read Full Post)