In the latest GOP Debate Ted Cruz was asked a great question about Healthcare and Obamacare.

“Today there are millions of people who gained health insurance from Obamacare and they now rely on it. So the question, Sen. Cruz, if you repeal Obamacare, as you say you will: Will you be fine if millions of those people don’t have health insurance, and what is your specific plan for covering the uninsured?“

And here’s Cruz’s response.  While, he completely dodged the question of what will happen to the millions of poor people that need help getting insurance, his answer is never-the-less informative:

“If I am elected president, we will repeal every word of Obamacare. Now, once that is done, everyone agrees we need health care reform. It should follow the principles of expanding competition, empowering patients, and keeping government from getting between us and our doctors. Three specific reforms that reflect those principles: Number 1, we should allow people to purchase health insurance across state lines. That’ll create a true 50-state national marketplace while will drive down the cost of low-cost catastropic health insurance. Number 2, we should expand health savings accounts so people can save in a tax-advantaged way for more routine health care needs. And Number 3, we should work to delink health insurance from employment, so if you lose your job, your health insurance goes with you, and it is personal, portable, and affordable, and I tell you, Bret I think that’s a much more attractive vision for health care than the Washington-driven, top-down Obamacare that is causing so many millions to hurt.”

Here is the Video:

Let me restate his three suggestions for healthcare:

1. Allow people to purchase health insurance across state lines. That’ll create a true 50-state national marketplace while will drive down the cost of low-cost catastropic health insurance.
2. Expand health savings accounts so people can save in a tax-advantaged way for more routine health care needs.
3. Work to delink health insurance from employment, so if you lose your job, your health insurance goes with you, and it is personal, portable, and affordable,

Let me start my review by clearly stating I agree with all three of these points.  I think Healthcare Insurance should be national.  In fact, I think it should be national and single payer.  (I’ll talk a lot more about this in future posts.)  I think there should be health saving accounts that people get tax benefits for.  And I think we should delink health insurance from employment.

So, I agree with Ted on all three of these things.  However, I disagree with Ted and Other conservatives when they say that is all that needs to happen.

Obamacare does two things: 1) removes preexisting conditions as a reason to deny insurance, and 2) Subsidizes insurance for the poor.

Cruz did not answer the question about what happens to those people that rely on those two things to get insurance.

The reason he did not answer it is that Cruz, like many conservatives only think healthcare should go to those that can afford it.  Conservatives call people that cannot afford healthcare “Losers.”  And they have said often they don’t want to help these uninsured losers.

It is not in the best intent of the community to put healthcare into the hands of the free market oligarchies, who see it in their best interest to deny care to those they may deem too expensive to cover, because it would harm profits. Cruz seems to be in favor of this happening, since he didn’t even touch upon it in his response.

The only people Conservatives plan helps are the wealthy and business owners who will no longer be required to offer coverage to their employees. His plan is in no way whatsoever beneficial community.

When I go to a restaurant I want to know that employees have health insurance so they don’t come to work sick and get me sick.

Conservative healthcare plans would bring America back to an era of people dying because they can’t afford coverage.