Addressing a conservative confab in Washington on Friday, Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) reprised a familiar Republican refrain — made popular by his and Mitt Romney’s presidential ticket in 2012 — to “repeal and replace” Obamacare with a viable alternative that would extend health insurance to millions of poor Americans.
“The way I see it, our job is to preserve our values in the 21st century,” the ranking member on the House Budget Committee said in a video address at Values Voter Summit. “We need to apply our principles to the challenges of today. And that means we need to completely rethink government’s role in our lives.
“We need to completely rethink government’s role in helping the most vulnerable,” Ryan added. “We need to completely rethink government’s role in health care. That means we can never give up on repealing and replacing Obamacare.”
The refrain is largely a blast from the past because the Republican Party, led by a group of conservative senators and House representatives, largely ditched the latter in favor of a quixotic effort to defund Obamacare in exchange for funding the government — with nary a mention about alternative proposals.
Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX), who spearheaded the effort in a 21-hour Senate floor speech, has repeatedly dodged questions about the fate of existing Obamacare benefits — such as the ability to stay on one’s parent’s plan until age 26 — if the law is defunded.
