Article snippet: Posted at 4:00 am on June 28, 2017 by Jay Caruso Congress will head home for the July 4th recess without having passed a single major piece of legislation. Worse, there’s no repeal of Obamacare. There isn’t even a healthcare bill that passed, and the fate of that legislation is still up in the air. Worse, Republicans handled it all so ineptly they’ve already lost the political battle to the Democrats who were ready. The GOP, led by President Donald Trump, floundered. Make no mistake, Donald Trump as the de facto leader of the Republican Party shoulders most of the blame for this fiasco. People can wail all they want about Mitch McConnell and Paul Ryan. To be sure, they share in plenty of the blame, but it was President Trump who campaigned as a Democrat in 2015 and 2016 promising not to touch entitlements including Medicaid. The debate over whether or not the Republicans are “cutting” Medicaid in their healthcare bills is one in which the GOP faces a hostile press that uses the term “cut” even though Medicaid spending increases every year under their plan. Critics say the growth the GOP projects will not be enough to cover necessary expenses in the future and therefore it is a “cut.” Unfortunately, people who forecast what something costs in government have a horrendous track record and the bottom line is, when it comes to public expenditure, the recipients of those dollars always say it is never enough. That is the practical way of looking at the issue. There i... Link to the full article to read more