jerseyhoya wrote: It smells like victory.

drsmooth wrote:

jerseyhoya wrote: It smells like victory.

washington free beacon? smells more like day-old fish

I would save the Union. I would save it the shortest way under the Constitution. The sooner the national authority can be restored; the nearer the Union will be "the Union as it was." ... I shall do less whenever I shall believe what I am doing hurts the cause, and I shall do more whenever I shall believe doing more will help the cause. I shall try to correct errors when shown to be errors; and I shall adopt new views so fast as they shall appear to be true views.

Their efforts foundered last month, when a House health bill had to be pulled from the floor after it failed to attract enough support. Late Monday night, word emerged that the White House and the group of conservative lawmakers known as the Freedom Caucus had discussed a proposal to revive the bill. But the proposed changes would effectively cast the Affordable Care Act’s pre-existing conditions provision aside.

The terms, described by Representative Mark Meadows, Republican of North Carolina and the head of the Freedom Caucus, are something like this: States would have the option to jettison two major parts of the Affordable Care Act’s insurance regulations. They could decide to opt out of provisions that require insurers to cover a standard, minimum package of benefits, known as the essential health benefits. And they could decide to do away with a rule that requires insurance companies to charge the same price to everyone who is the same age, a provision called community rating.

The proposal is not final, but Mr. Meadows told reporters after the meeting that his members would be interested in such a bill. To pass the House, any bill would need to find favor not just with the Freedom Caucus, but also with more moderate Republicans. It would also need to attract the support of nearly every Republican in the Senate to become law.

Technically, the deal would still prevent insurers from denying coverage to people with a history of illness. But without community rating, health plans would be free to charge those patients as much as they wanted. If both of the Obamacare provisions went away, the hypothetical cancer patient might be able to buy only a plan, without chemotherapy coverage, that costs many times more than a similar plan costs a healthy customer. Only cancer patients with extraordinary financial resources and little interest in the fine print would sign up.

"What my plan is is that I wanna take care of everybody. I'm not gonna leave the lower 20% that can't afford insurance," he told ABC News' David Muir in late January. "We're gonna come up with a new plan that's going to be better health care for more people at a lesser cost."

pacino wrote:Trump and his fellow Republicans may have come to a big agreement on healthcare

Rep. Mark Meadows (R-N.C.), the chairman of the Freedom Caucus, told reporters Monday night that the administration officials offered a “solid idea” that could form the basis of an intraparty compromise.

That idea, he said, would allow states to apply for federal waivers exempting them from some health insurance mandates established under the Affordable Care Act — including “essential health benefits” requiring coverage of mental-health care, substance abuse treatment, maternity care, prescription drugs and more, as well as a provision that bars insurers from charging the sick more than the healthy.

A major sticking point could be allowing insurers to vary their prices according to a person’s health — a Freedom Caucus demand that was rejected last month and helped stall the bill.

The Affordable Care Act instituted a “community rating” requirement for insurers — meaning that they could not segregate healthy subscribers from sick ones and charge the latter higher prices. Instead, insurers can only vary their prices based on age, geographical area and tobacco use, allowing the premiums paid by the healthy to subsidize the sick.**

pacino wrote:that iran deal seems to have worked out since they were 3-6 months from breakout and it's now been 3 years

pacino wrote:KT McFarland has been removed from the NSC and was offered the ambassadorship to Singapore. the #$!&@? more Flynn fallout?

They’ve gotten through medical school. They’ve applied to residency programs, and been offered a job at a US hospital.

But for some of the 3,814 non-US citizens who graduated from foreign schools and who won coveted residencies in the US, it’s unclear whether they’ll be able to start work on time in the summer.

That’s because a program that allows employers to fast-track H-1B visa applications for their employees has been suspended as of Monday. US immigration officials announced the change just a month ago — and Match Day, when new residents learn where they will be placed was March 17 — leaving some hospitals rushing to figure out who needed this kind of visa and to apply before “premium processing” would no longer be an option.

Even international medical students who have come to American medical schools could be affected. They often use an extension on their student visa for their first year of residency before transitioning to an H-1B for their second. And if residents at any stage aren’t able to start work when they are supposed to, that could potentially cause staffing problems in hospitals.

pacino wrote:hospital rush to get accelerated visas for foreign medical residents:

They’ve gotten through medical school. They’ve applied to residency programs, and been offered a job at a US hospital.

But for some of the 3,814 non-US citizens who graduated from foreign schools and who won coveted residencies in the US, it’s unclear whether they’ll be able to start work on time in the summer.

That’s because a program that allows employers to fast-track H-1B visa applications for their employees has been suspended as of Monday. US immigration officials announced the change just a month ago — and Match Day, when new residents learn where they will be placed was March 17 — leaving some hospitals rushing to figure out who needed this kind of visa and to apply before “premium processing” would no longer be an option.

Even international medical students who have come to American medical schools could be affected. They often use an extension on their student visa for their first year of residency before transitioning to an H-1B for their second. And if residents at any stage aren’t able to start work when they are supposed to, that could potentially cause staffing problems in hospitals.