An Extremely Tiny Bit of Good News From Idaho

The federal government told the state of Idaho on Thursday that its plan to allow insurers to sell shoddy, cheap health plans that don’t meet the requirements of the Affordable Care Act cannot move ahead because it is illegal and dumb.

While the head of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, Seema Verma, did tell the state and its governor, Butch Otter (???), that it “looks forward to continuing to work with Idaho” on its applications to waive certain ACA requirements, she said the ACA “remains the law.” Yes it does!

Let us ignore, for the moment, that Verma “suggested that Idaho could legally implement many of its proposals through short-term health insurance plans, which don’t have to adhere to all of Obamacare’s rules,” and that the Trump administration wants to offer these plans for up to a year, not three months. Let us also ignore that the Affordable Care Act is a bad law that merely patches up a deeply broken system, with premiums and deductibles that remain far too high. Let us, instead, have this thought: