Senate approves measure launching Obamacare repeal process Daniel Ortega sworn in for another term as Nicaragua’s president
USA - The US Senate yesterday took a first concrete step toward dismantling Obamacare, voting tob instruct key committees to draft legislation repealing President Barack Obama’s signature health insurance program.
The vote was 51-48. The resolution now goes to the House of Representatives, which is expected to vote on it this week. Scrapping Obamacare is a top priority for the Republican majorities in both chambers and Republican President-elect Donald Trump. Republicans have said that the process of repealing Obamacare could take months, and developing a replacement plan could take longer. But they are under pressure from Trump to act fast; he said on Wednesday that the repeal and replacement should happen “essentially simultaneously.” Some 20 million previously uninsured Americans gained health coverage through the Affordable Care Act, as Obamacare is officially called. Coverage was extended by expanding Medicaid and through online exchanges where consumers can receive income-based subsidies. Republicans have launched repeated legal and legislative efforts to unravel the law, criticizing it as government overreach. They say they want to replace it by giving states, not the federal government, more control. But in recent days some Republicans have expressed concern about the party’s current strategy of voting for a repeal without having a consensus replacement plan ready. House Speaker Paul Ryan said this week he wants to pack as many replacement provisions as possible into the legislation repealing Obamacare. But Senate Finance Committee Chairman Orrin Hatch, also a Republican, said this could be difficult under Senate rules. The resolution approved Thursday instructs committees of the House and Senate to draft repeal legislation by a target date of January 27. Both chambers will then need to approve the resulting legislation before any repeal goes into effect.
Senate Republicans are using special budget procedures that allow them to repeal Obamacare by a simple majority; this way they don’t need Democratic votes. Republicans have a majority of 52 votes in the 100-seat Senate; one Republican, Senator Rand Paul, voted no on yesterday. Democrats mocked the Republican effort, saying Republicans have never united around an alternative to Obamacare. “They want to kill ACA but they have no idea how they are going to bring forth a substitute proposal,” declared Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont.
(Reuters.com) MANAGUA, Nicaragua Daniel Ortega was sworn in for another term as Nicaragua’s president Tuesday while his wife, Rosario Murillo, became the new vice president, giving a married couple the reins of power for the first time in the Central American country’s history. Ortega, a 71-year-old former Sandinista guerrilla fighter, took the oath in Managua with the presidents of Venezuela, Bolivia and Taiwan in attendance. “I want to say to Nicaraguan women, here we are, we are going forward together and we have the future ahead of us winning the spaces that we deserve”, Murillo said. Ortega and Murillo were elected in November with 72.5 percent of the vote, but with a high rate of abstentions. Their party won 71 of the 92 seats in parliament.
Ortega alluded to when he entered power in 2007 with the country’s business community against him. “The businessmen and a segment of the country were scared of our return because of the seizures, the war, the chaos, but we have shown that it’s not like that”, he said. Nicaragua could face economic challenges in Ortega’s third 5-year term amid a steep drop in aid from Venezuela, which has funded many social programs. A law is also being considered in the US that could block Nicaragua’s access to loans from international lending organizations, pushed by American legislators critical of a lack of government transparency. Sociologist Oscar Rene Vargas, a dissident Sandinista, predicted Ortega will struggle with economic difficulties. And he criticized the married couple administration installed by Ortega, who was one of the leaders of the rebel movement that ousted the four-decade Somoza family dictatorship in 1979. “A new dynasty has begun”, Vargas said. Violeta Granera, head of the opposition Broad Front for Democracy, said critics of Ortega will continue to be in the streets demanding that the country return to its institutions and rule of law. “Nothing changes here,” she said. “The abstention in November was a clear message that the population calls for free, transparent, competitive and observed elections.” (Nytimes.com/Foto:VOA News)