Memo to Republicans: We have 7.1 million ACA signups, with many more to come. It's over. If you don't deal with it, you're over, because we are so over you.
It was a big day yesterday. We couldn't cover it all. So here are some more items of importance to the country and to Kossacks in particular from yesterday and today both, to be unpacked below.
Big speech by President Obama in the Rose Garden, and letter to America:
The Affordable Care Act is here to stay…Armageddon hasn't happened.
There are signs that some Republicans have gotten that memo.
Fox and Bill Kristol backing off? Koch brothers in disarray? Democrats actually, you know, campaigning? Fish get bicycles? ^_^ The End Times have begun?
Rachel Maddow: Two things Democrats know
Kos fundraising e-mail and diary for brainwrap [Updated]
And of course, later numbers for yesterday and early numbers for today from brainwrap. And then, of course, more numbers. And news. And pointing and laughing at Republicans, because getting the memo just isn't their thing, you know?
First, This News
From ACA Signups
Fourth Update, from Kos
A community fundraiser for Charles Gaba, aka Brainwrap, the ACA signups guru
Third Update
Rhode Island: 11.3K Off-Exchange Enrollments
Second Update
"Off the Record", "On Background" and ACASignups.net
First Update
Michigan: BCBSM: 53K Off-Exchange QHPs, 89K "grandfathered" policies?
180,000 members enrolled with BCBSM and BCN “on-Marketplace,” meaning through Healthcare.gov.
53,000 members enrolled “off-Marketplace,” meaning directly through the companies.
April 2
Off-Exchange Enrollments: New York Times makes an amazing discovery...
Florida: Extension period pushed out until April 30??
Arizona: 80K QHPs by mid-March
Michigan: Oh yeah...Medicaid expansion started here today.
April 1
Missing 3/31 State Data: CA, MA, NV, OR, VT
California: QHPs at 1.21M as of 2am on 3/31
Maryland 3/31 Totals: 60K QHPs, 232K Medicaid
West Virginia 3/31 QHPs: 14.8K (Bonus: Updated Off-Exchange for WV, PA & DE!)
Hawaii 3/31 QHP total: under 8K
Kentucky: Corrected 3/31 Totals: 77K QHPs, 294K Medicaid
Washington State: 3/31 QHPs 146.5K, Medicaid: 403.8K
Connecticut 3/31 Totals: 76.6K QHPs, 121.3K Medicaid
New York: 3/31 QHP Total: 412,101, Medicaid: 453,386
Here's where the State Exchange Numbers are at...
Kentucky: 371K Total, 75.5K QHPs, 295.8K Medicaid
Colorado: 3/31 QHP Total: 118.6K; Medicaid: 158.5K
Washington State: 140K QHPs NOT including Monday
DC: 3/31 QHP Total: 9.8K; Medicaid 17.5K; SHOP 12.9K
And from other Kossacks, starting with Himself.
Kentucky isn't done enrolling people, by kos
So if helping people means hurting Republican electoral chances, so be it. They made their bed.
The costs were high, but today, the joke's on the GOP, by kos
The cost was high, but the rewards promise to be even higher. There's a reason that Republicans fought this tooth and nail. For example, Sen. Minority Leader Mitch McConnell must now run on taking away the insurance of nearly 400,000 Kentuckians, giving those new beneficiaries and their friends, families and co-workers reason to turn out and vote Democratic. That dynamic will play out all over the country, and in increasing numbers as the law continues to expand to pull in the rest of the nation's tens of millions of unemployed. For Republicans, this has been an existential battle. And they lost it.
and other Front-Pagers
Seven million and counting—and a Republican Party in retreat, by Jed Lewison
The Obamacare counting doesn't end at 7 million, by Laura Clawson
Daily Kos Elections Morning Digest: The Kochs sow confusion, then complain about it, by David Nir
Stephen Colbert laments Obamacare's success, by BruinKid
Cheers and Jeers: Wednesday, by Bill in Portland Maine
David Gregory, Jr.: Here we are, fifty years later. It's 2064 and you're 99 now. What was it like back then, being part of that first tumultuous year of the full implementation of Obamacare?
Bill in Portland Maine: Oh, it was a time…
Abbreviated Pundit Round-up: What if ACA gets good (or no) press?, by Greg Dworkin
GOP always feared Obamacare's success, not its failure, by Jon Perr
You can look up the Diaries tagged ACA, health care, or Obamacare yourself. Now, if somebody wants to step up and do a regular Health Care Diary Rescue, as Meteor Blades does for Green diaries and the Election Diary Rescue group does for elections, I will cheerfully join in. I just can't do it in this series.
Events
When we left our saga yesterday afternoon, the Obamacare train had triumphantly not gone over the cliff, but had instead arrived at the station jam-packed with passengers to be greeted by throngs of well-wishers, while the health care equivalent of Westboro Baptist Church booed and hissed outside. I posted brainwrap's announcement that we had reached at least 7.1 million signups (well, 7.08 million) on the Exchanges by midnight on Monday, March 31, the last regular day of Open Enrollment, and that there were more numbers still to come for Monday signups, to be followed at some point by numbers for two weeks of extensions (even longer in a few states). And the President of the United States was just about to make the same announcement to wild cheers and applause in the Rose Garden.
Many times brainwrap has expressed the vain hope that this would all wrap up at the end of Open Enrollment so he could get back to his paying clients and his family. Ha! This won't be over until one of two implausible events happens: either somebody who can get paid for the work picks up where brainwrap would like to leave it off, or it ceases to be a political football. Anybody want to bet on either of those?
The President's Speech, with Joe "Cheshire Cat" Biden
Transcript
President Obama's remarks on the Affordable Care Act
The President's e-mail
Hello everyone,
Last night, the first open enrollment period under the Affordable Care Act came to an end.
And this afternoon, we announced that 7.1 million Americans have now signed up for private insurance plans through the new Health Insurance Marketplaces.
7.1 million.
That doesn't count the more than 3 million young adults who have gained insurance under this law by staying on their families' plans. It doesn't count the millions more who have gotten covered through the expansion of Medicaid and the Children's Health Insurance Program. It doesn't include the more than 100 million folks who now have better care -- who are receiving additional benefits, like mammograms and contraceptive care, at no extra cost.
Now, millions of our fellow Americans have the comfort and peace of mind that comes with knowing they're no longer leaving their health and well-being to chance. For many of them, quality health insurance wasn't an option until this year -- maybe because they couldn't afford it, or because a pre-existing condition kept them locked out of a discriminatory system.
Today, that's changed. And while our long-broken health care system may not be completely fixed, it's without question a lot better. That's something to be proud of -- and there's no good reason to go back.
Regardless of your politics, or your feelings about the Affordable Care Act, millions more Americans with health coverage is something that's good for our economy and our country.
At the end of the day, that is what this law -- and the other reforms we're fighting for, from a 21st-century immigration system to a fairer wage for every American who's willing to work for it -- are all about:
Making sure our country lives up to our highest ideals.
I am thankful to be your President today, and every day. And I am proud that this law will continue to make life better for millions of Americans in the years to come.
Thank you.
President Barack Obama
Rachel Maddow: Two things Democrats Know
At 13:34:
It's starting to become clear that the Democrats have started to identify two big challenges for the Republicans in these elections as well.
That would be schismatic Tea Party politics, and continuing to run against Obamacare.
Tea Parties are hurting the Republicans' electoral chances. The Tea Parties will try to primary all electable Republicans, and will make even those who win their primaries much less electable.
Rachel ran a bunch of clips of Democratic ads from around the country against Republicans wanting to take away your health care. Notice that they do not mention Obamacare.
However, we can see that public opinion, which has always favored the ACA, is turning around even on Obamacare.
I know, I know.
Way back in October 2013, Jimmy Kimmel asked people on the street whether they prefer the Affordable Care Act or Obamacare, and showed people saying that the ACA is good, but they don't want anything to do with Obamacare with the government forcing them to do something.
The End Times are Upon Us, or at Least Upon the Republicans
Is Fox News starting to fall off the #ObamaCare Repeal/Replace Bandwagon?
Another sign that running on repeal may not be a winner as the Kochs pull an Obamacare punch
Kos's fundraising blast for brainwrap (and dKos)
We don't normally do this
Markos Moulitsas, Daily Kos campaigns@dailykos.com via mail.salsalabs.net
to me
Edward, the Obamacare enrollment period ended last night—and the results were simply stunning: signups exceeded expectations.
Perhaps most stunning of all: even the mainstream media is now calling the signup period a success.
That media turnaround started from an unlikely source—a single blogger who meticulously recorded all Obamacare signup information. Then, after gaining the attention of reporters everywhere, that blogger used hard data to utterly dismantle every bogus Republican talking point.
Here at Daily Kos, we were fortunate to have Charles Gaba—who blogs under the name Brainwrap—tracking enrollments in one of the most comprehensive and informational series ever written for Daily Kos.
But here’s the thing: Charles volunteered his time to do this.
Charles’s “ACA Signups” series was an incredible and hugely time-intensive undertaking that, as he explained in a recent diary, put a major strain on his life outside of Daily Kos:
“I'm absolutely swamped right now. … [K]eeping the site up to date has literally taken over my life. My business is suffering; my clients are losing patience; my family is starting to get concerned.” - Brainwrap, March 24
We don’t normally do this at Daily Kos, but Charles’s months-long contribution to the fight against right-wing lies about Obamacare was above and beyond. That’s why we’re asking Daily Kos readers to chip in as a way of thanking him for his work and to help him continue his “ACA Signups” series.
Can you chip in $5 to help Charles continue his stunning and invaluable series on Obamacare enrollments?
We’ll be collecting all the money you contribute through ActBlue, and Daily Kos will cut a check for Charles and mail it to him by the end of the week.
[snip]
Thank you and keep fighting,
Markos Moulitsas
Founder and Publisher, Daily Kos