Krauthammer: Conservatives Will Have to ‘Swallow’ That OCare Created Entitlement and ‘Fall On Their Swords’

On Monday’s broadcast of the Fox News Channel’s “Special Report,” columnist Charles Krauthammer reacted to the announcement of the GOP’s Obamacare replacement by stating, “the conservatives, the ones who are more radical are going to have to fall on their swords,” and that they’ll have to “swallow” that there’s no way of eliminating the entitlement created by Obamacare, and trying to “eliminate the entitlement…would destroy the presidency.”

Krauthammer said [relevant remarks begin around 3:30] “In the end…the conservatives, the ones who are more radical are going to have to fall on their swords, because there’s no way that they could have — this is the signature event for the new administration. If they were to, in the end, eliminate the entitlement, and put it down, I think it would destroy the presidency. I think there’s nothing that they could do right now. They’re going to try to get a more serious, conservative entitlement, but if they were to ask the administration to give, — in the end, a — to fall on their sword on this, I think it would be disastrous on the part of the conservatives. They are, right now, asking for the destruction of the entitlement. I think after what Obama did, there’s an entitlement that is now accepted. But, in the end, there’s no way that they’re going to consolidate the — they’re going to consolidate a loss of the entitlement.”

He added, “[T]hey’re going to have to concede the fact that Obama created an entitlement and they’re now going to transmute it into something different, but the entitlement will stay. There’s no way to ratchet it back, and the conservatives are going to have to swallow that in the end, because otherwise, it collapses.”

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