Doesn't work that way, Einstein.
The Affordable Care Act had to have a nationwide risk pool in order to have a ghost of a chance at keeping policy costs down.
It had to have the mandate, otherwise it's just a deeply flawed and already broken piece of free market stimulus legislation written mostly by the insurance lobby, now broken even further.
Now that it's been dealt a mortal wound, the case will now be made for single payer even stronger than before.
Obama should have fought harder for the public option, but he was weak and so was the Democratic Party.
Not next time, though.
Healthcare reform isn't going away. Too many disastrous stories will keep it in the public eye, and Congress will be forced to fix the damage done.
You Republicans overplayed your hand, and although it might be a curse now, it may very well turn out to be a blessing later.
Americans are now looking into how sick people get care in the rest of the world, and they've had time to parse the difference between all the phony scare tactics and the reality, and they're starting to realize that they're being treated pretty badly and overcharged.
The truth WILL come out about single payer and once it finally does, we will have it in the United States.
In fact, we may very well wind up getting it WITH bipartisan support from marginalized Republicans who want to be able to say that they DID do SOMETHING decent in their careers on Capitol Hill.
We're not talking about impeachment, we're talking about fixing something for the good of the country, for the American people.
Once we take both houses in November, your little games won't work anymore.
See you then.