Tom Price and the repeal of Obamacare

President-elect Trump’s selection of Tom Price for Senate confirmation to the position of Secretary of Health and Human Services overwhelmingly confirms his decision to repeal and replace Obamacare. Repeal of Obamacare is essential if we are to restore sanity, affordability, and utility to the health insurance marketplace so sorely rent by Obamacare mandates; if we are to end the perversion of the Constitution that attends Chief Justice Robert’s dreadful King v. Burwell decision; and if we are to pave the way for a patient-centric, market driven economy in health care.

There is no more profound critic of Obamacare in the United States Congress than Tom Price, Congressman from Georgia’s Sixth Congressional District. A former orthopedic surgeon, Price introduced his Empowering Patients First Act (EPEA) in 2009. That bill would create tax credits to enable Americans to purchase (or not) at their election health insurance. That bill would also create interstate markets in health insurance, encouraging competition to reduce premium prices. In 2014, he introduced another plan that would replace Obamacare with tax credits up to $3,000 per year for those 50 and older (helping people buy their own health insurance) and provide a $1,000 tax cut for tax free investment in Health Savings Accounts.

Price is not a friend of a very energetic government, opposing regulation unless needed to guard against provable harm. He first ran for Congress in 2004, stating that he wanted to get into government to get government off of his back.

As Secretary of Health and Human Services upon confirmation by the Senate, Price will spearhead Trump’s legislative effort to repeal and replace Obamacare. Like Trump, Price is action oriented and driven. He will reform HHS, ensuring that the repeal Obamacare agenda is fully implemented.

Without question, the long elusive goal of repealing Obamacare has been given a huge boost by President-elect Trump’s decision to make Tom Price HHS Secretary. While Democrats in the Senate will likely put up a fight against his nomination, at the end of the day Price will become HHS Secretary. There has not been a person of his conservative principals and dedication to the goals of limited government in that position since the Reagan years. He is a conservative stalwart, well-schooled in the Founding Fathers’ conception of a limited, federal republic and dedicated fundamentally to restoration of as much of that government as he can achieve.

To ensure the success of Secretary Price at HHS, President-elect Trump will need to appoint complementarily conservative, anti-Obamacare, and pro-free market people to the posts of FDA Commissioner; Assistant Secretary for Health (overseeing the Public Health Service); Director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention; and FTC Chairman.

There will need to be a major house cleaning at FDA to eliminate corruption and industry cronyism with the heads of all major departments replaced. Comparable reforms need to be made at each of the other agencies. During the past eight years, FTC has become the captive of leftist ideologues who have contempt for the free market. President-elect Trump will not only need to replace them with pro-free market individuals, but will also need to undo the extensive damage done by FTC through its various regulatory initiatives including, this very month, its latest guidance, which aims at destroying a good part of the homeopathic medical market in the United States.