Here is where we are in the fucked-up political realm right now (with proper use of the word "literally"):
Democrats literally saved the lives of thousands of people, as surely as if they had jumped into the Cumberland River to rescue a drowning Kentuckian. And many of those thousands of people voted against Democrats because saving their lives just wasn't enough to overcome emails.
Now, Republicans are proposing something that will literally kill thousands of people, as surely as if they had tossed that drowning Kentuckian an anchor and then shot him when he came up for air. And there is a good chance that many of those thousands who will be killed or their families and friends will still vote for the Republicans because getting killed is a small price to pay for whatever bullshit illusion of "freedom" the GOP is selling.
That word, "freedom," and another, "access," are what Republicans want you to believe about the American Health Care Act, or, you know, Trumpcare. But those are utterly meaningless terms in this context. If I want, I can tell my employer to fuck off and keep their health insurance because my choices are "limited" to the four plans offered, and then I can go on the open market to pay my hard-earned cash on whatever the hell I want, with my freedom to access every policy out there, except, you know, for the fact that I couldn't afford shit, no matter how allegedly "affordable" Republicans think they can make it.
My health insurance is limited to what my employer offers, like the majority of Americans. Obamacare made it better, with the elimination of pre-existing condition exclusions, no upper limits, and more. Trumpcare will end up making it worse by getting rid of a bunch of things all policies are supposed to cover now. Yes, a punch in the nuts is still better than being shot while drowning, but, you know, it's still a punch in the nuts. Mostly, though, we'll still have the same amount of access and freedom we generally had or didn't have before.
So what's the game here? Is it just that giving the wealthy billions of dollars in tax cuts worth kicking 24 million people off health insurance or pricing them out of it, thus damning them to having either minimal or no coverage and assuring that more people will die? I mean, honestly, the only way this bill makes sense is if Republicans are actively wanting people to die.
I've got a few ideas.
See, Paul Ryan is an exceedingly cruel and stupid man surrounded by exceedingly cruel and stupid people. We can lie and pretend that he's some crazy political genius, but, basically, he's the least creepy option for putting a face on an ideology that is corrupt, hateful, and doomed to failure. And because of how stupid he is, he is going to keep trying to bring that ideology to fruition, consequences be damned, because he's trying to prove something. Something stupid, but something, something free markets, freedom, access, magic, "I'm a hero."
Look at Ryan this way: He is a fluffer on the set of a 1980s gay male porn video who hopes one day to be director, and he's desperately trying to get an erection out of a coked-up star so that shooting can continue. When the producer finally says that it's useless, that dick ain't gonna get hard, shut it down for the day, fuck, we lost a ton of money, who is he gonna blame? Not the star. He's the one you put on the VHS cover that gets sales. No, you blame Paul Ryan, sitting there, red-faced, lips sore, mouth muscles aching, and you fire his ass.
Ryan trusted Trump because Trump pretended to trust Ryan. So Ryan was cornered into putting out a bill, even one so shitty that members of his party are running away from it. Trump's people will pay lip service to the bill until it is assured to fail. Then Trump is gonna destroy Ryan to put in his own lackey. Because what Ryan doesn't realize is that everything the GOP does is about Trump. It is about keeping Trump untouchable. Ryan got played. And then, like crazed religious parents who refuse to get their sick child a doctor because God is supposed to be on call, Trump will let Obamacare slowly die in order to say that he was right all along, consolidating his power. People dying in order to make his point is just dressing on this barbaric salad. He can build his throne out of their bones.
The only thing preventing wholesale upheaval in the country right now is that enough voters have sucked down the Trump chowder that they will still believe this mad president over their own dying minds.
(If I were conspiracy-minded, I'd say this health care bill is like putting into action racist shit-huffer Congressman, and man most likely to have never received a blow job, Steve King's appeal to "Make Western Civilization Great Again," as he put it yesterday. You wanna get rid of a bunch of non-whites in this country so you can "restore our civilization" with white babies? And you can't just round them up and murder them in open pits, no matter what the #whitegenocide dumbass prickholes want? Well, the next best thing is to thin the ranks of the impure by denying them health care and letting disease and untreated injuries and illnesses take them away. It's a fuckin' Steve Bannon wet dream.)
