Two Arkansas Republicans, Tim Griffin of Little Rock and Rick Crawford of Jonesboro, joined 78 of their colleagues in correspondence addressed to House Speaker John Boehner and Majority Leader Eric Cantor, advocating for a showdown this Fall over the “Affordable Care Act” (even though it is anything but affordable-what a misnomer!), requesting the de-funding of Obamacare. In a letter they wrote it provided, “We urge you to affirmatively de-fund the implementation and enforcement of Obamacare in any relevant appropriations bill brought to the House floor. . .including any continuing appropriations bill.”
Of course, the Democrats allege that the attempt to de-fund Obamacare is an attempt to shut down the government. Griffin and/or Crawford indicated that they are not calling for such a shutdown, and that the letter does not ask for a shutdown. Griffin elaborated that , “The letter does not advocate for a government shutdown: You won’t find those words anywhere in the letter, just like you can’t find any of the lower costs or economic benefits President Obama and Nancy Pelosi attribute to Obamacare.” Crawford said, “I believe that rushing ahead with $1.3 trillion in new entitlement spending in the middle of a debt crisis is irresponsible and the letter I signed expresses my desire for House leadership to consider using the appropriations process as a mechanism to move toward stopping this madness.” By way of background, Congress has not enacted appropriations bills needed to keep the government operating beyond the end of the current fiscal year on September 30th; in the past, they turned to a continuing resolution that would temporarily fund the government.
Rep. Mark Meadows, House Republican from North Carolina who organized, drafted and/or strategized the letter, said that de-funding Obamacare by the end of September is imperative, inasmuch as enrollment begins on October 1st in state-based health care exchanges, which is a major component of the health reform law. Rep. Meadows said during an interview with Mike Huckabee, radio host, that “The American people are with us on this particular issue.”
Since the House holds the purse strings, it will be interesting to see how this plays out; one can only hope that the madness of Obamacare ends! God help us!
