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EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
* Following the 2014 mid-term elections, what will the next 2 years of Republican leadership do to change the structures still being put into place to meet the goals of the Affordable Care Act (ACA)?
* Nurses need to be visible by creating partnerships with their new state and federal representatives and by demonstrating collaboration through identified shared values.
* Nurses must hold all congressional leaders accountable for continuing to improve access to quality and affordable health care, while containing costs and strengthening incentives to provide a client-centered approach to care delivery.
* As health care reform legislation is a highly charged political battleground, nurses must support legislative changes in the ACA that will strengthen our health care system, not weaken it.
Every two years the American politics industry fills the airwaves with the most virulent, scurrilous, wall-to-wall character assassination of nearly every political practitioner in the country - and then declares itself puzzled that America has lost trust in its politicians.
~ Charles Krauthammer
WHILE 2014 MID-TERM ELECTIONS resulted in historically low voter turnout in many states (national average about 36%), those who did take the time to exercise their right and responsibility to vote chose to support Republican Party candidates to control the Senate and to add more Republican power to the House of Representatives (McDonald, 2014). At the state level, Republicans wins dominated as well. Many Republicans won in part by pledging to repeal ObamaCare. With more skin in the game now and the need to show voters they have a positive agenda (if they want to stay in office), what will the Republicans do to the Affordable Care Act (commonly known as ObamaDEBORAH Care)? Despite negative public opinion regarding the ACA, a return to the status quo wouldn't be tolerated by most Americans. Although "repeal and replace" was a facile political message for Republicans in this campaign, the reality is less appealing. The repeal without a replacement approach would leave the most dysfunctional aspects of our health care system in place, including its unsustainable financial costs. However, repealing the ACA without a credible proposal for what should take its place would most assuredly create a new political storm and undermine repeal efforts (Capretta & Moffit, 2012).
So how...