The Modern Republican Party, in Two Stories

[Content Note: Class warfare; racism.]

One: This story, by Greg Sargent, about how Republican governors' decision to opt out of Obamacare's Medicaid expansion is causing millions of people to fall "into a 'Medicaid gap,' making too much to qualify for traditional Medicaid, yet too little to qualify for subsidies on the exchanges." Sargent quotes a Kaiser study that explains:

These adults will not gain access to a new affordable coverage option and likely remain uninsured. Given their high uninsured rates and low incomes, people of color will be disproportionately impacted by this coverage gap, particularly poor uninsured Black adults residing in the southern region of the country where most states are not moving forward with the expansion. These continued coverage gaps and their varied impacts across groups will result in millions of poor adults remaining uninsured and likely lead to widening racial and ethnic as well as geographic disparities in coverage and access to care.

Two: This story, by Chris Cillizza, about an ad being run "in New Hampshire that will be replicated endlessly by Republican candidates and groups in the 2014 midterm election." The ad, care of a conservative advocacy group called Ending Spending, targets Obamacare and "hits all of the high notes. It uses footage of [Democratic Senator Jeanne Shaheen] using the 'if you like your insurance you can keep it' line while noting on screen that President Obama was given the 'lie of the year' by PolitiFact for saying the same thing. A narrator points out that 20,000 New Hampshire residents have had their insurance canceled and that the Affordable Care Act offers only a single provider on the state's individual market."

So, Republicans create major gaps in access that render the Affordable Care Act less effective for voters than it could be, and then go after access in states where it's been implemented because they're angry that it's not accessible enough.

All they've got is trying to undermine the ACA from every possible angle, and still they have no meaningful alternative solutions to ending the health access crisis in the country.