Alexandria, Va. • Paul Manafort’s longtime bookkeeper testified against him Thursday, telling a Virginia jury that his seven-figure lifestyle lasted until about 2015 when the cash ran out, the bills piled up and he and his business partner began trying to fudge numbers to secure loans.

The dry but potentially damaging testimony from the bookkeeper, Heather Washkuhn, appeared to undercut Manafort’s defense against bank and tax charges, which is that his business partner is responsible for any financial misdeeds. But Washkuhn testified that Manafort approved “every penny.”

Washkuhn spent hours on the witness stand, describing account balances, bills received and payments. Her testimony is critical to the case being heard by a six-man, six-woman jury in Alexandria, Virginia, as Manafort, who was then-candidate Donald Trump's campaign chairman for a period in 2016, is charged with running a years-long scheme to hide millions of dollars from the Internal Revenue Service, and then, when his income dried up, lying to get bank loans so he could continue living the good life.

Washkuhn characterized Manafort as a "very knowledgeable" client. "He was very detail oriented. He approved every penny of everything we paid," she said.

That point could prove vital to jury deliberations because Manafort’s lawyers have made clear they aim to place blame on the case’s star witness, Manafort’s former right-hand man, Rick Gates, portraying him as a liar and embezzler who is responsible for any financial chicanery found by the FBI.

On the witness stand, Washkuhn said she prepared ledgers for Manafort's finances, which she would eventually hand off to his accountants to file his tax returns. She said she sometimes saw transactions in those accounts from other accounts to which she did not have access.

Critically, Washkuhn testified she did not have any records of foreign accounts controlled by Manafort, and had not been aware of such accounts. Prosecutors have already introduced evidence that Manafort used foreign accounts to pay for millions of dollars of clothes, cars, real estate and home remodeling.

Prosecutors charge that Manafort made $60 million between 2010 and 2014, while working for the Ukraine government, and hid millions in foreign accounts that were not reported to the IRS.

Washkuhn described how Manafort's firm, Davis Manafort Partners, took in millions of dollars a year before its revenue cratered in 2015. The firm reported only $338,542 in income in 2015 and a $1.2 million loss in 2016.

Prosecutors say that’s because Manafort’s biggest client — what one associate called his “golden goose,” Ukrainian president Viktor Yanukovych — fled for Russia in 2014 amid massive protests against his government.

As his business was gasping, Manafort was tapped to run Trump's campaign in mid-2016. He received no pay for the job, even though his firm was losing hundreds of thousands of dollars a month, according to election filings and evidence presented to the jury.

Trying to pay Manafort's bills became a problem, Washkuhn testified, and he needed more than $1.1 million to pay off credit cards and other expenses.

"$120K is urgently needed for your personal bills," Washkuhn wrote to Manafort in one email presented in court. Manafort's company also was struggling to pay its bills. In an email to Gates in April 2016, Washkuhn warned that the firm's health insurance was going to be canceled because the bill hadn't been paid.

Washkuhn's testimony is important not just for the tax charges against him, but the bank fraud counts as well.

Prosecutors charge Manafort engaged in a scheme to doctor documents submitted to banks, wildly overstating his firm's 2015 revenue.

After being shown paperwork submitted to two banks indicating Davis Manafort Partners made $4.5 million that year, Washkuhn testified that was "four million more than what was reported on the documents that we created."

Prosecutors charge Gates altered the document before it was sent to banks, and they showed jurors a series of messages detailing an alleged effort to inflate income.

According to the messages, early in the morning on March 16, 2016, Gates asked Washkuhn to send him a Microsoft Word document version of the previous year's financial records, rather than a scanned pdf. Word documents can be edited; pdfs cannot. Washkuhn replied to Gates that she could not comply with his request.

After a back and forth, Gates then asked her to add $2.6 million in "accrued revenue" for 2015, something he said in a previous email Manafort had requested. She said she could not because the firm operates on a cash basis, recording money when it comes in rather than when it is earned.

Gates then emailed another employee at the bookkeeping firm, Laura Tanner, and, "per email with Heather," told her to add the $2.6 million to the 2015 income.

It's unclear what Tanner did. But prosecutors showed jurors an attachment Gates sent to Banc of California. "It is similar in some respects" to the Davis Manafort Partners financial statement prepared by the bookkeeping firm, Washkuhn testified, but she said the disclaimer was missing, the font was different, and "the numbers are different."

Manafort's lawyer Thomas Zehnle tried to show that Gates played an important part in any financial misdeeds, getting Washkuhn to concede that Gates had authority to direct wire transfers from overseas.

Gates "handled a lot of the business affairs," Washkuhn said.

But later, the line of questioning seemed to backfire on the defense. In response to questioning, Washkuhn said Manafort kept a tight grip on financial decisions for the firm and himself.

"He approved every expenditure on the personal and business side," Washkuhn said.

Before the bookkeeper's testimony, jurors heard more details of Manafort's expensive tastes.

The owner of a landscaping company in the Hamptons testified that he charged Manafort about $450,000 for landscaping over the years, to maintain the grounds of a one-acre property in Bridgehampton. The lawn featured red flowers in the shape of the letter "M."

Manafort also spent $20,339 for a video and karaoke system at that house, but that cost was dwarfed by his bills for television and home entertainment systems for his homes on the East Coast, which totaled more than $2.2 million, according to a witness, Joel Maxwell, who said the work was paid for with wire transfers from foreign accounts.

On Wednesday, witnesses testified that Manafort spent more than $1 million on business suits and luxury clothes over five years.

The testimony about Manafort's high-priced purchases has angered U.S. District Court Judge T.S. Ellis, who said Thursday morning that he would not let prosecutors "gild the lily" by asking witnesses to explain in detail Manafort's spending.

"All the evidence of the fancy suits really is irrelevant and besmirches the defendant," Ellis said. "It engenders some resentment."

Prosecutors had filed a motion in the morning asking to be given more leeway in explaining Manafort's purchases, arguing it was essential to showing the jury evidence that the foreign accounts used to pay for those luxury items were under Manafort's control. They also said they needed to show Manafort's profligacy to explain why he would resort to bank fraud when his business foundered.

While he has been tough on prosecutors at the trial, the judge has been pleasant to the jurors, giving them permission to bring a cake to the jury room Friday for what apparently is one of the juror's birthday.

Prosecutors also said that Gates, the key witness in the case, could testify as early as Friday.

Gates pleaded guilty earlier this year to lying to the FBI and conspiring against the United States, and agreed to cooperate against his former boss and partner in the hopes of getting a lighter sentence.

The Washington Post’s Matt Zapotosky contributed to this report.

The Episcopal Church has decided to revise its 1979 prayer book, so that God is no longer referred to by masculine pronouns.

The prayer book, first published in 1549 and now in its fourth edition, is the symbol of unity for the Anglican Communion. The Anglican Communion is the third largest Christian communion founded in 1867. While there is no clear timeline for the changes, religious leaders at the denomination’s recent triennial conference in Austin, Texas, have agreed to a demand to replace the masculine terms for God such as “He” and “King” and “Father.”

Indeed, early Christian writings and texts, all refer to God in feminine terms.

God of the Hebrew Bible

As a scholar of Christian origins and gender theory, I’ve studied the early references to God.

In Genesis, for example, women and men are created in the “Imago Dei,” image of God, which suggests that God transcends socially constructed notions of gender. Furthermore, Deuteronomy, the fifth book of the Hebrew Bible written in the seventh century B.C., states that God gave birth to Israel.

In the oracles of the eighth-century prophet Isaiah, God is described as a woman in labor and a mother comforting her children.

And the Book of Proverbs maintains that the feminine figure of Holy Wisdom, Sophia, assisted God during the creation of the world.

Indeed, The Church Fathers and Mothers understood Sophia to be the “Logos,” or Word of God. Additionally, Jewish rabbis equated the Torah, the law of God, with Sophia, which means that feminine wisdom was with God from the beginning of time.

Perhaps one of the most remarkable things ever said about God in the Hebrew Bible occurs in Exodus 3 when Moses first encounters the deity and asks for its name. In verse 14, God responds, “I am who I am,” which is simply a mixture of “to be” verbs in Hebrew without any specific reference to gender. If anything, the book of Exodus is clear that God is simply “being,” which echoes later Christian doctrine that God is spirit.

In fact, the personal name of God, Yahweh, which is revealed to Moses in Exodus 3, is a remarkable combination of both female and male grammatical endings. The first part of God’s name in Hebrew, “Yah,” is feminine, and the last part, “weh,” is masculine. In light of Exodus 3, the feminist theologian Mary Daly asks, “Why must ‘God’ be a noun? Why not a verb — the most active and dynamic of all.”

God in the New Testament

In the New Testament, Jesus also presents himself in feminine language. In Matthew’s Gospel, Jesus stands over Jerusalem and weeps, saying, “Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you, how often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, and you were not willing.”

Furthermore, the author of Matthew equates Jesus with the feminine Sophia (wisdom), when he writes, “Yet wisdom is vindicated by her deeds.” In Matthew’s mind, it seems that Jesus is the feminine Wisdom of Proverbs, who was with God from the beginning of creation. I think it is very likely that Matthew is suggesting that there is a spark of the feminine in Jesus’ nature.

Additionally, in his letter to the Galatians, written around A.D. 54 or 55, Paul says that he will continue “in the pain of childbirth until Christ is formed in you.”

Clearly, feminine imagery was acceptable among the first followers of Jesus.

The church fathers

This trend continues with the writings of the church fathers. In his book “Salvation to the Rich Man,” Clement, the bishop of Alexandria who lived around A.D. 150-215, states, “In his ineffable essence he is father; in his compassion to us he became mother. The father by loving becomes feminine.” It’s important to remember that Alexandria was one of the most important Christian cities in the second and third centuries along with Rome and Jerusalem. It was also the hub for Christian intellectual activity.

Additionally, in another book, “Christ the Educator,” he writes, “The Word [Christ] is everything to his little ones, both father and mother.” Augustine, the fourth-century bishop of Hippo in North Africa, uses the image of God as mother to demonstrate that God nurses and cares for the faithful. He writes, “He who has promised us heavenly food has nourished us on milk, having recourse to a mother’s tenderness.”

And, Gregory, the bishop of Nyssa, one of the early Greek church fathers who lived from A.D. 335-395, speaks of God’s unknowable essence — God’s transcendence — in feminine terms. He says, “The divine power, though exalted far above our nature and inaccessible to all approach, like a tender mother who joins in the inarticulate utterances of her babe, gives to our human nature what it is capable of receiving.”

What is God’s gender?

Modern followers of Jesus live in a world where images risk becoming socially, politically or morally inadequate. When this happens, as the feminist theologian Judith Plaskow notes, “Instead of pointing to and evoking the reality of God, [our images] block the possibility of religious experience.” In other words, limiting God to masculine pronouns and imagery limits the countless religious experiences of billions of Christians throughout the world.

It is probably best, then, for modern-day Christians to heed the words and warning of bishop Augustine, who once said, “si comprehendis non est Deus.” If you have understood, then what you have understood is not God.

David Wheeler-Reed is a visiting assistant professor at Albertus Magnus College. The views expressed in this opinion piece do not necessarily reflect those of Religion News Service.

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

Sylvia Chan-Malik never expected to become Muslim, let alone an expert on Islam in America.

A scholar of American and gender studies at Rutgers University, she was raised in California by Chinese immigrants who were culturally Buddhist but not religious. In high school, she was nearly baptized but decided against it. (The pastor said she couldn’t attend a Madonna concert). When she began working on her doctorate at the University of California at Berkeley in 2001, shortly after the Los Angeles riots, she wanted to explore the intersections between Asian- and African-American communities.

Then the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, happened.

She soon began collaborating on anti-racism initiatives with Muslim and Arab activist groups in the Bay Area. “I quickly realized that the same racial dynamics that I was studying between African-Americans and Asian-Americans were all present within Muslim communities,”Chan-Malik said.

She began documenting the ways U.S. Muslims were trying to constitute their identities and grapple with cultural differences to find a political voice. In the course of her research, she found herself drawn to the faith and converted in 2004.

Her new book, “Being Muslim: A Cultural History of Women of Color in American Islam,” walks readers through the largely forgotten history of Muslim women of color in the past century. She begins with black women in the Ahmadiyya and Nation of Islam movements and ends by exploring how women of color today defiantly practice Islam against the backdrop of the Trump presidency and the ongoing war on terror. “In the narrative of American Islam, there’s this complete omission of these black Muslim women who are so critical to its making,” she says.

Chan-Malik spoke to Religion News Service about Islamic feminism, the fixation on the veil and why it’s critical to understand American Muslims through the lenses of race and gender. The interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Your book diverges from the popular narrative of Muslims becoming American to look at people in America being Muslim. How does your personal background shape your research?

In my own experience learning how to practice religion, I’ve always been very intimately aware to do it against whatever people were thinking — in my family, my community, my work, even walking down the street. “Being Muslim” is a thing. You not only have to think about who you are, but you have to constantly be aware of how other people are perceiving you in your current environment, what happened in the news that day, how people are looking at you. That’s what being Muslim is: a constant, active insurgency. You feel it in your body. To choose to be Muslim, even against all these things that might cause you harm or stress, is an insurgent act.

So “being Muslim” is something that connects all Muslim woman, as opposed to “becoming American,” which is an experience something that’s restricted mostly to immigrants over the past several decades. But it’s the experience that’s most often associated with Muslims today.

Can you have this experience of “being Muslim” without being Muslim?

The actor Aziz Ansari wrote in The New York Times about how he left Islam a while ago. But the political climate has made him say, “OK, this is how I identify as a Muslim because of the ways in which other people see me and my parents.” So he recognizes that he shares this experience with other Muslims in this country.

That’s in line with the experience of racialized minorities in this country. If you think about what connects Asian-Americans and African-Americans and Latinx people — there is no real common thread except for how they’re racialized in the same way.

Today you can’t really talk about Muslim women without discussing the hijab or burqa. Has that always been the case?

In the U.S., it only starts coming up at the end of the 1970s. In my own research combing through all The New York Times and other news coverage prior to that, they would just mention in travel coverage that, oh, they were in Morocco and the women dress like this. It wasn’t something stressed in media coverage, and it definitely wasn’t demonized or fetishized how it is now.

This really changed in 1979. It was never seen as a threat until the rise of oil politics became the pre-eminent marker of our relationship with Iran and the region. That was also a moment in which the second-wave feminist movement was looking for an international cause. This issue then connected oil politics with the ways in which white feminists were trying to go global. They could say, “Hey, we can go there and be useful to these poor women around the world and show them how our values are superior.” So the veil became a useful and convenient symbol.

The mention of women also cues up questions like: Is Islam compatible with feminism, and is there such a thing as Islamic feminism? How have Muslim women in the U.S. dealt with these questions?

A strong desire for women’s empowerment and gender agency has been at the core of women’s engagement with Islam for the past century. Even within what we might see as traditional, conservative family frameworks, they were trying to express agency and power in order to uplift their communities. Many Muslim women themselves would not call it feminism; they’d say, “I’m trying to empower my community” or “I’m trying to submit to Allah.” I argue that this constitutes a desire for gendered liberation.

In a lot of Islamic discourse and mosque communities, there’s a visceral rejection of the word “feminism.” It’s seen as a sort of destructive force within our community. But there’s another tradition of feminism called womanism in the U.S. that goes back to Sojourner Truth and Ida B. Wells and enslaved African women fighting for freedom. They produced a different version of feminism that I see as being much more in line with the way Muslim women have found Islam as a source of empowerment.

What’s missing in popular depictions of Muslim women?

Women of color who engage in grass-roots community building, activism and cultural production, especially African-American Muslim women. I’ve seen a lot more films being done by those women themselves, but nobody else is really striving to tell their stories. There’s a whole generation of African-American Muslim women who are now in their 70s, 80s, 90s who have so much to tell. They have entire archives on how they created the first Islamic schools in their communities, they have all these documents and photographs in their homes, and nobody is interested.

I’d love to see young Muslims try to preserve and explore and learn from these stories.

Provo • The past few weeks haven’t been great for BYU’s basketball program, as Cougar coaches have watched a pair of the state’s top recruits commit to play for the rival University of Utah.

Sky View’s Mason Falslev and Pleasant Grove’s Matt Van Komen both pledged to Utes coach Larry Krystkowiak in late July.

However, on Thursday night BYU coach Dave Rose landed a commitment from another 6-foot-3 guard from Timpview, rising senior Nate Hansen.

“So happy to say I’ve committed to play basketball at BYU,” Hansen tweeted Thursday night.

Hansen averaged 15.1 points last season for the Thunderbirds and will go on an LDS Church mission next summer before enrolling at BYU. His teammate on last season’s Timpview squad, 6-3 guard Hunter Erickson, signed with BYU last fall and is currently on a church mission.

Like Erickson, Hansen is an excellent long-range shooter, having made 90 3-pointers last season.

Hansen scored a career-high 30 points against Cottonwood on Jan. 26, according to Maxpreps.com. He has been playing on a traveling club team coached by former BYU star Marty Haws called the Utah Mountain Stars and also had an offer from UC Irvine.

Utah 's football program will stage a Senior Day observance Nov. 24, when the Utes host BYU. The pregame ceremony won't last long.

Next year's event, though? That one will take awhile.

The Utes have only 13 seniors (including one non-scholarship player) in 2018, about half as many as in the previous two classes and tied for the fifth fewest among Power Five programs. In contrast, they’re projected to have a record number of seniors next season — nearly three dozen, counting several walk-ons on this year’s roster — if everybody comes back, rather than entering the NFL draft.

Being limited to 85 scholarship players in the program, coach Kyle Whittingham had fewer openings than allowable 25 signees in the 2014 and '15 recruiting classes, the main sources of this year's senior class. Attrition also explains how the Utes arrived with so few seniors.

“Even though the seniors are not high in number, their quality is outstanding,” Whittingham said this week. “And they're great leaders.”

The 2014 group of 16 signees included 12 freshmen, and some of them ended up transferring, including quarterback Donovan Isom and receiver Raelon Singleton. Others played four straight years and graduated. The '15 recruiting class of 20 players featured several freshmen who redshirted, making them seniors next year, and junior college transfers who already moved on. Most members of the larger 2016 recruiting class played as freshmen and are on track to become seniors next season.

Breaking down the 2018 senior class, the numbers are even more stark, with several nontraditional cases. Only seven seniors are projected starters on offense or defense. Only six will have played four seasons for Utah. And the group would be even smaller if not for offensive lineman Lo Falemaka and kicker Matt Gay receiving NCAA waivers for an extra year of eligibility.

Five players are junior college transfers, including receiver Derrick Vickers, who arrived on campus this week with one season to play (Utah will petition the NCAA for another year’s eligibility, Whittingham said). He’s an extreme case; linebacker Chase Hansen, whose first year in the program was 2012, is at the other end.

Juggling the roster of 85 scholarship athletes in the program is tricky for Utah, partly because of LDS missionaries coming and going. Another variable is whether players redshirt, sitting out a season for the sake of development during their five-year eligibility calendar. That's how the Barton brothers will end up sharing Senior Day in November. Jackson Barton redshirted in 2014 after arriving on campus a year ahead of Cody, a linebacker.

Hansen, Falemaka and punter Mitch Wishnowsky are among the Utes' top candidates to be voted captains this season, as part of a senior class that has bonded. “A lot of guys have gotten really close throughout the time we've been here,” Hansen said.

The contrast in size of the ’18 and ’19 senior classes suggests that Utah is building toward next season, when quarterback Tyler Huntley will be among the key players returning and the school’s Pac-12 schedule is less daunting. Utah replaces Oregon with Oregon State and Stanford with California in the rotation. Yet the Utes will lose several impact players and strong leadership among their seniors, and juniors such as cornerback Julian Blackmon, running back Zack Moss and defensive linemen Bradlee Anae and Leki Fotu may consider departing early for the NFL.

She’d walk out to her car and the tires would be slashed. She’d go to her locker and it would be broken open. She’d be called to the principal’s office and sit there for the entire school day because someone had called in a threat.

“A number of students were targeted. There were teachers who would not engage with us,” said Ivy Fox. “The whole thing was powerful.”

Fox, now 37, spent Friday night at the Utah Pride Center, sharing her experience of the fallout from when students at Salt Lake City’s East High School submitted an application in 1995 to start a new club — a gay-straight alliance — and were banned from meeting on campus.

“It took a lot of bravery,” she said to a room of supporters filling nearly all of the 40 chairs.

The cheerful event celebrated the 20th anniversary of the lawsuit the American Civil Liberties Union of Utah filed against the Salt Lake City School District. The students had formed the group to talk about their experiences, how to tackle anti-LGBT bullying and how to prevent suicides. They wanted to create a safe space to express themselves.

They ended up setting off a five-year fight that involved administrators, state lawmakers, national conservative leaders, a slate of attorneys and two lawsuits.

“It’s funny looking back now,” said Leah Farrell, who, like Fox, was a student plaintiff involved in the cases. “Of course, at that time, I didn’t have the perspective to see what a big landmark it would be.”

The challenge started when, rather than approve the alliance application, the district school board voted to ban all 46 extracurricular clubs, including chess and Frisbee, in February 1996. That way, it couldn’t lose $100 million in federal funding on grounds of discrimination under the Equal Access Act of 1984.

Sen. Orrin Hatch, who sponsored that legislation, fumed that it was being used by gay groups instead of Bible groups, as he had proposed. “The act was never intended to promulgate immoral speech or activity,” he told The New York Times in 1996.

The decision to ban all clubs created a firestorm. State senators rushed to a closed-door meeting to weigh whether they could draft legislation that would ban gay groups from public schools. Some East students filed a petition to start an “Anti-Homosexual League.” Gayle Ruzicka, president of the conservative Utah Eagle Forum activism group, led a faction opposing the gay-straight alliance.

“Homosexuals can’t reproduce, so they recruit,” she said in 1996. “And they are not going to use Utah high school and junior high school campuses to recruit.”

Fox, who graduated high school in 2000, was 16 when the first lawsuit started. She reflected Friday on the case with Farrell, who attended West High in the late ’90s, and then-ACLU Director Carol Gnade. Two more East alumni who came to listen and reminisce were pulled out of the audience and brought into the conversation.

“I realized there was some danger to what I was doing,” said Kelli Peterson. “But when you’re a teenager, you think you’re invincible.”

After years of fighting and $175,000 in court costs, the school board backed down. In October 2000, it reinstated all nonacademic clubs and the ACLU withdrew its challenge. East students started a gay-straight alliance, and soon other Utah schools followed suit. By that time, Fox had graduated.

“We set a legal precedent, and you can’t take that away,” Fox said.

State Rep. Joel Briscoe, D-Salt Lake City, was in the audience Friday, and he spoke about joining the school board in 1998 because he wanted to overturn the decision to block all clubs. He was part of the 6-1 vote that did so two years later.

“I thought that ban was unjust,” he said to cheers.

Farrell, an ACLU lawyer, said the anniversary event was “a chance to look at how far we’ve come.” Today, she helps students who want to form gay-straight alliances at their schools — which few openly question. Gay marriage is legal in the United States. More than 75,000 people attended this year’s Salt Lake City Pride Festival, compared with 5,000 in 1996. And Hatch now urges compassion for the gay community. (“No one should feel less because of their orientation,” he said in June.)

“It’s just been such an incredible amount of progress," Farrell said, "that’s been made around LGBT rights.”

Fox looked at her with a smile and added: “We’ve still got some work to do here. We’ve got so much to do.”

A Syracuse man faces two counts of child abuse after being accused of punching a 15-year-old boy in the jaw at church.

The Davis County Attorney’s office has filed charges — one third-degree felony, one Class A misdemeanor — this week against a 40-year-old man over an incident in a Syracuse church on May 6.

According to the probable cause statement, the man told a Syracuse Police officer the boy made a sexual gesture toward the man’s daughter. The man then called the boy back to where he was sitting, and told the boy not to do that.

After that, the accounts differ.

The boy told the officer that he said he didn’t know what the man was talking about — which is when the man allegedly hit him in the jaw. The boy left the chapel, and the man followed him outside and grabbed him by the neck, the boy told the officer.

The man told the officer he followed the boy outside, and grabbed him by the necktie. He denied to the officer that he punched or strangled the boy.

The indictment does not specify the church where the incident allegedly took place. The man will be served with a summons. No court date has been set.

During his presidential campaign, then-candidate Donald Trump promised to replace Obamacare with "something terrific."

For a long time, that "something terrific" was left unspecified. Now, more than a year and a half into Trump's presidency, we have finally learned his grand plan for reducing Americans' health-care costs.

It is: Don't get sick. Ever.

That, at least, was the message of the administration's new rule expanding the availability of junk insurance plans, finalized Wednesday.

The rule deals with "short-term" health plans. Short-term plans were initially designed to do exactly what they sound like: provide stopgap coverage to tide consumers over until, say, school starts in the fall or that new job begins.

Under the Trump administration's new regulation, however, these plans will soon be allowed to last up to 364 days and to be renewed for up to 36 months. So, not so short after all.

There's a reason Trump wants short-term plans to last such a long time. That way, they'll look like an attractive alternative to insurance for sale on the Obamacare exchanges, with one key difference: Unlike Obamacare plans, short-term insurance doesn't actually have to insure anything.

Seriously. Unless states step in, these not-so-short-term “short-term” plans are not subject to any of the protections required by the Affordable Care Act.

Short-term plans can turn away people with pre-existing conditions, including asthma and acne. They can charge older or sicker people prohibitively expensive premiums.

Or they can enroll such people at what looks like a bargain-basement price and then refuse to pay for any care related to pre-existing illnesses — including illnesses that enrollees didn’t even know they had when they enrolled, such as cancer or heart disease. Some plans have dropped consumers as soon as they got an expensive diagnosis, sticking them with hundreds of thousands of dollars in unexpected medical bills.

Unlike Obamacare plans, short-term plans also are not required to cover any particular benefits, even for the relatively healthy.

A Kaiser Family Foundation review of short-term plans offered around the country found that most did not cover prescription drugs, and none covered maternity care. Preventive and mental-health care are also frequently excluded.

Even care listed as "covered" is often subject to ridiculously low or otherwise absurd payout limits. Think: a policy term maximum of $3,000. Or no coverage for any hospital stay that begins on a weekend.

The tiny print can be endless. And as former head of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services Andy Slavitt points out, consumers will never, ever be as good at reading the fine print as insurance companies will be at writing it.

Because these plans cover so little, cherry-pick their enrollees and pay out so infrequently, premiums tend to be dirt-cheap. The Trump administration estimates that people who purchase short-term plans will pay about half the average unsubsidized premium on the Obamacare exchanges.

How could the availability of cheaper insurance possibly be a bad thing, you ask?

A few reasons.

This parallel system of insurance will siphon off healthier, younger, less expensive people from the exchanges. That will leave behind a pool of sicker, older, more expensive people, which will drive up premiums on the exchanges.

The combination of expanding short-term plans and repealing the individual mandate will increase Obamacare premiums by an average of 18 percent in the 42 states (and the District) that don't already prohibit or limit short-term plans, according to an Urban Institute study.

People with incomes low enough to qualify for Obamacare subsidies will be at least partly shielded from these premium hikes, of course. The federal government will instead be on the hook for their higher costs; as a result, the Trump administration estimates that its new short-term insurance rule will increase federal spending $28 billion over the next decade.

However, middle-class people who don’t qualify for Obamacare subsidies — yet still, you know, need real insurance — will be stuck paying the higher rates themselves.

And what about those lucky, healthy people who might celebrate the greater availability of cheap plans?

They won't be celebrating if their kid breaks a leg, or they try to fill a prescription or (heaven forbid) they face a more serious health scare.

That’s when they’ll discover the insurance that seemed so cheap is cheap only because it’s worthless — and that their “catastrophic coverage” doesn’t even cover catastrophe. If they want to pay their “catastrophic” medical bills, they’d better luck into a job with decent insurance. Or join the hundreds of thousands who are begging strangers online for charity.

Which brings us back to Trump's real plan for American consumers: Stay healthy, or drop dead.

Catherine Rampell is an opinion columnist at The Washington Post. She frequently covers economics, public policy, politics and culture, with a special emphasis on data-driven journalism. Before joining The Post, she wrote about economics and theater for the New York Times. crampell@washpost.com. Follow her on Twitter, @crampell.

Boise, Idaho • About 100 escaped goats have munched on manicured lawns in Idaho’s capital city before being rounded up and hauled away.

Multiple news outlets captured the goats calmly eating grass and shrubs in a Boise neighborhood Friday morning before a trailer arrived amid applause from neighborhood residents.

It's not clear where the goats came from or how they got loose.

Goats are sometimes let loose in the nearby Boise foothills to eat wild plants and reduce wildfire threats.

Logan • Utah State University’s sexual assault prevention office has started a Tinder profile aimed at reaching students on the dating app.

Coordinator Felicia Gallegos tells the Herald Journal a number of people have "swiped right" or "liked" the profile promoting the importance of consensual sex, though they haven't gotten any direct messages yet.

In the future, she expects Utah State to use the app to feature messages about healthy relationships, stalking prevention and domestic violence awareness.

It comes as in the aftermath of several sexual misconduct cases at Utah State, including a former football player accused of assaulting women he met on Tinder. Torrey Green has denied the allegations.

Gallegos says the office’s Tinder profile lets students searching for a date for weekend pause and “remember the importance of consent and respectful relationships.”

Springdale • Zion National Park in Utah has reopened popular rock-climbing routes after peregrine falcons finished their nesting season on the cliffs.

Park rangers say four juvenile falcons were raised successfully, two on Tunnel Wall and two on Angels Landing. Another nest and breeding pair were detected, but biologists did not record any successful offspring.

The park's cliffs are home to a relatively large number of breeding falcons every season, and the park service works to protect sensitive sites. This year, 13 routes were closed in March. Most were reopened on Wednesday.

Zion is a sanctuary for the American peregrine falcon, a predatory bird that neared extinction in the 1970s but was removed from the endangered species list in 1999.

On Saturday, Aug. 4, bring your appetite and your party spirit to the second annual Food Truck and Brewery Battle. This summertime bash for all ages runs from 4 to 10 p.m. at The Gateway, 100 S. Rio Grande St., Salt Lake City. The event will have 18 food trucks serving square pizza, burritos, Southern-style mac ’n’ cheese, deep-fried Utah scones and more. Those who attend can vote for Utah’s Best New Food Truck and see who wins the Editors' Choice award given by The Salt Lake Tribune, one of the event sponsors along with The Food Truck League, U92 and The Gateway. In addition to the food, 10 Utah breweries will be pouring brews for those 21 and older. Identification required. Rounding out the party will be DJs, Barzz artists, karaoke, comedians and The Bboy Federation on two stages. Admission is free, but bring your wallet to buy food and beer. For more details, visit https://www.facebook.com/events/1830171210612620/

Flagstaff, Ariz. • The Federal Trade Commission is accusing an auto group in the U.S. Southwest of using deceptive and unlawful practices to sell vehicles to Navajos.

The complaint against Tate's Auto Group, filed this week in U.S. District Court in Arizona, says the company falsified consumers' monthly income and down payments on financing applications and contracts without them knowing. The complaint also says the company used deceptive advertising.

It's part of a push by the Navajo Nation Human Rights Commission to protect Navajo consumers. The commission has been collecting information from tribal members about business practices in towns that border the reservation, which spans Arizona, New Mexico and Utah. It issued a report in 2014 that showed more complaints were received about Tate's than other auto dealerships.

"The representation from the auto dealer is that 'we're helping your Navajo people,' " Leonard Gorman, executive director of the commission, said Thursday. "The reality is you're cheating our Navajo people."

Tate's Auto Group has dealerships in Show Low, Winslow and Holbrook, Arizona; and in Gallup, New Mexico. Owner Richard Berry said he was stunned by the complaint and rejected a settlement offer from the FTC earlier this year.

The company has safeguards in place to ensure it sells and services customers honestly and to the best of its ability, he said. "We are confident that we will be vindicated and appreciate the continued support of our community, staff and customers," Berry wrote in a statement.

Fraud reviews from third-party financing companies found that Tate's inflated customers' monthly incomes by hundreds or thousands of dollars, according to the complaint. One of those companies stopped doing business with Tate's in January 2016 after suffering financial losses when customers defaulted on loans or their vehicles had to be repossessed, the complaint states.

Tate's also misrepresented offers for vehicles and the terms to buy or lease them, the FTC says.

The commission is seeking relief that includes restitution and refunds to customers.

In another consumer protection case in federal court in New Mexico, a Navajo couple reached a $1 million settlement in a lawsuit against a Gallup, New Mexico, business that offered loans tied to tax returns. William and Sammia DeJolie had alleged that T&R businesses charged secret fees and hid true interest rates. The couple asked a judge this week to determine whether the settlement is fair and certify a group of about 14,950 people who could benefit from it.

Gorman said the dynamics of free enterprise in Western society often don't fit in with Navajo culture. Words are significant and important, taken at face value, he said. And on a reservation where banks are sparse and no car dealerships exist, extra time must be taken to ensure customers who often travel long distances — particularly limited English speakers — understand, he said.

Customers also have a responsibility, Gorman said. The commission has been educating Navajos about credit and financing. Navajos should assess their personal finances before heading to a car lot and be ready to say no and walk away if they don't like or understand the terms, he said.

They also should review agreements with the same diligence as purchasing livestock, something Navajo families have done for generations as part of a traditional lifestyle, Gorman said.

"When grandma purchases a sheep, she takes the time to assess the condition of that sheep," he said. "She'll look at the teeth, she'll massage the chest area of the sheep and grandma will make the decision. Is the sheep too old, too skinny?"

The FTC complaint highlights a need for economic development on the reservation where tribal laws cap interest rates at below those of neighboring states, ensuring fairness for the business and consumer, Gorman said.

Logan • Police who had been keeping stray animals in kennels at the station following a split with a northern Utah humane society say they’ve found a new shelter.

Logan police said in a statement Thursday they've contracted with neighboring Brigham City police to house the animals until they can find a more permanent solution. Any animals they picked up in Logan will be held temporarily in police-station kennels and transferred to the shelter in Brigham City.

The city was left without an animal shelter when a rift with the Cache County Humane Society over impounding and boarding fees grew until the two groups cut ties this week.

The department says they impounded three dogs in the makeshift kennels, and all have been returned to their owners.

Boise, Idaho • A central Idaho man authorities say started a wildfire by shooting exploding targets is facing charges and could ultimately have to pay the cost of fighting the fire that grew to 85 square miles on Friday.

Blaine County prosecutors on Thursday charged 35-year-old Ryan Jensen of Bellevue with a misdemeanor under an Idaho law that involves malicious injuries to property.

Nearly 500 firefighters are fighting the Sharps Fire about 6 miles east of Bellevue. The fire is burning timber, grass and brush.

Officials say Friday will be a tough day with high temperatures and high winds.

The fire is 29 percent contained, officials say, and won't be fully contained until Aug. 12.

It’s not clear if Jensen has an attorney.

Michael Johnson’s big grin never seems to disappear because he is doing what he loves.

The smile sticks out as he drives the No. 54 Audi for JDC-Miller Motorsports in the Continental Tire SportsCar Challenge. So does his other set of wheels — the wheelchair he uses when he's not behind the wheel.

"I do it (racing) to get myself out of the wheelchair. It's a big thing," said Johnson, who is paralyzed from the waist down. "I'm a totally separate person (in the car). I don't have to deal with any of the stresses in life. I can really just focus on what I'm really good at — driving a race car and having fun doing it."

The native of Flint, Michigan, is one of a handful of disabled race car drivers competing worldwide at the top levels. One of his heroes, former open-wheel star Alex Zanardi, lost his lower legs in a crash in Germany nearly two decades ago. Now 51, Zanardi, a two-time CART champion who also drove in Formula One, returned to racing, won in world touring cars and is still driving .

Turns out the 25-year-old Johnson is good enough to win, too. Johnson and co-driver Stephen Simpson combined for their first win on July 21 at Lime Rock, Connecticut. It was their third straight podium of the season and another positive sign for Johnson in his recovery from a devastating crash.

"It's been a fantastic evolution," said Simpson, who's helped coach Johnson for the past seven years. "We've gone on a long road together."

Johnson won 14 national motorcycle championships by age 12 and was on the cusp of landing a deal for a permanent ride with a manufacturer when his budding career skidded to a dramatic halt on a dirt track in Canada in 2005. He was involved in a crash in Sarnia, Ontario, suffering a broken collarbone, broken left ankle, broken left leg, broken ribs and, worst of all, two fractured vertebrae in his back, which caused the paralysis.

The first thing out of his mouth was, "Don't make me quit racing," said his father, Tim, a former motorcycle racer.

Four rods and 15 screws were inserted in Michael's back during an 11-hour operation. Johnson spent a couple of months in the hospital and another month at home in bed.

"It happens in racing, so I'm not going to dwell on it," Johnson said. "That was 13 years ago. I've moved on."

On Christmas Eve 2006, Johnson took a spin in a specially equipped go-kart with hand controls in the parking lot of his father's phosphate coating business, which has allowed the family to help him pursue his dreams.

"It was a good feeling," he said. "That's when everything started."

After getting clearance from his doctors, Johnson won a go-kart title and his career on four wheels began a rapid ascent.

IndyCar team owner Sam Schmidt, who also was paralyzed in a crash, advised Johnson to get involved with Skip Barber Racing. After lawyers approved his entry into the formula car series, Johnson ran a partial schedule in 2010 with modified hand controls. He competed in the entire summer series the next year, winning at Watkins Glen and twice at Elkhart Lake among seven podium finishes.

"It's not a surprise," Tim Johnson said. "There's no doubt in my mind he would have been a professional (motorcycle) champion. He had the passion and, more importantly, he had the work ethic to make it happen."

Michael Johnson spent two seasons in USF2000 and two more in Pro Mazda as he chased an open-wheel ride with an eye on competing some day in the Indianapolis 500, a dream he still has.

Acquisition three years ago of a hand-controlled driving system produced by Guidosimplex of Italy gave Johnson an edge he needed. His steering wheel features two rings, one for the throttle, the other to brake, and paddle shifters allow him to grip the steering wheel to navigate the serious turns on the road courses used by the series.

"What he's able to do is nothing short of amazing when you think he's only operating with a third of the sensory perception that a normal person has when they're sitting in the seat of a race car," team engineer Cole Scrogham said.

The 10-race Continental Tire Challenge series — Johnson and Simpson compete in the street tuner class, where the cars can reach speeds of around 140 mph — is the foundation for grooming amateur drivers to compete and move up to IMSA’s WeatherTech Series. Teams are required to make a driver switch every race, and Johnson and Simpson are able to accomplish it in competitive times thanks to Johnson’s trainer Josh Gibbs, who pulls him from the car and carries him behind the wall on pit road.

There have been setbacks. Johnson has crashed twice in the past three years, most recently in practice for the IMSA season-opener at Daytona in January. He was second on the time sheets when his brake linkage snapped. The crash broke a leg.

Johnson, who underwent stem cell surgery in Portugal in 2009 in hopes of improving his chances of walking again, recovered and returned to race at Mid-Ohio in May after being cleared by series officials. Johnson responded by qualifying on the front row and leading a race for the first time.

"It's amazing to see his resilience," said Mikey Taylor, who drives in the series and has coached and spotted for Johnson in the past. "For sure, Michael still has a ways to go to be a professional like Stephen, but in the car he's equally as good and holds his own. I definitely think he's got a very strong career in sports cars ... in the higher ranks."

Johnson also has a passion for spreading his message.

“It’s a good feeling to know that I’m really one of only a select few that have gone this far,” he said. “I’m trying to help out as many people that are paralyzed in wheelchairs that I possibly can. Whatever challenges you’re having, don’t give up. There’s always something that can be done.”

Leave it up to one of the kids to put it into context.

“This is where teams have to have found their form and are hopefully clicking at this point in the season,” said Justen Glad. “This is it.”

Real Salt Lake’s 21-year-old center back isn’t fooling.

It might seem like there’s plenty of time left in RSL’s 2018 regular season with 12 matches remaining, but roughly 65 percent of the season is in the books, and RSL is clinging to one of the six playoff slots in the air-tight Western Conference race.

Only five points currently separate sixth-place RSL and 10th-place Seattle. So with back-to-back home matches on tap for RSL, starting Saturday evening against the scuffling Chicago Fire at Rio Tinto Stadium, there isn’t really any room for dropped points if the club is to stay above the red line.

After next week’s home match against visiting Montreal, RSL is on the road five of the following seven outings, and the road has been anything but kind (1-8-2) to RSL this year. That means RSL, winless in its last three, must begin padding its point total in the stifling summer heat and ward off the chasers.

“There’s a lot of teams that are around the same points,” midfielder Albert Rusnák said, “so every point, every win matters at this point of the season. We have two home games, so our target is to get six points and nothing less than that.”

Enter the Fire who have lost five straight league matches in which they’ve conceded 15 goals.

If RSL wants to snag its first win since July 7, it’ll certainly need its midfield playmaker, who left last weekend’s 0-0 draw at San Jose with a non-contact neck injury. Rusnák was sporting a neck brace in the days after the returning home, but participated partially in training earlier in the week and said he felt good enough to go Saturday.

“It was too painful to even move, never mind to play,” Rusnák said.

He watched the remainder of the match in the visitor’s locker room lying down.

RSL’s attack, while without a headliner in 2018, has been versatile and productive. Prior to the scoreless draw on the road last weekend, RSL had scored at least two goals in its last four matches. But the center forward position again remains a position in need of shoring up. Rookie Corey Baird has fared well — he and back-up Luis Silva are tied for second most goals on the team with five — but he hasn’t scored in a month.

The MLS transfer window closes on August 10, leaving less than a week for clubs to bolster their respective rosters.

Said RSL coach Mike Petke of the window’s final week: “We’re looking for the best possible situations and we get called constantly about a lot of players. We’re constantly calling around about other players. Trades just don’t happen very easily. One side always wants to get the better.

“If the opportunity comes up to add something that’ll improve the team, then we’re going to certainly [try to] do it, I’m going to want to do it and we’re going to see what we have to do to get it done.”

The match against the Fire could be the last time this RSL roster, as currently constructed, lines up at home. But as Glad noted, it is indeed “getting closer to that time” where you start to scoreboard watch and see the congestion in the standings.

“There’s always pressure to perform,” he said. “That’s the fun.”

This Pat Bagley cartoon appears in The Salt Lake Tribune on Sunday, Aug. 5, 2018. You can check out the past 10 Bagley editorial cartoons below:

• <a href="https://www.sltrib.com/opinion/bagley/2018/08/02/bagley-cartoon-enemy" target=_blank>Enemy of the People</a>
• <a href="https://www.sltrib.com/opinion/bagley/2018/08/01/bagley-cartoon-bringing/">Bringing Copiers to a Gun Fight</a>
• <a href="https://www.sltrib.com/opinion/bagley/2018/07/31/bagley-cartoon-smoke-gets/">Smoke Gets in Your Eyes</a>
• <a href="https://www.sltrib.com/opinion/bagley/2018/07/31/bagley-cartoon-wilderness/">Wilderness Trafficking</a>
• <a href="https://www.sltrib.com/opinion/bagley/2018/07/27/bagley-cartoon-physics/">Physics for Dummies</a>
• <a href="https://www.sltrib.com/opinion/bagley/2018/07/26/bagley-cartoon-toting/">2A Toting Tots</a>
• <a href="https://www.sltrib.com/opinion/bagley/2018/07/25/bagley-cartoon-monumental/">Monumental Bull</a>
• <a href="https://www.sltrib.com/opinion/bagley/2018/07/23/bagley-cartoon-pioneer/">Pioneer Parade is for the Birds</a>
• <a href="https://www.sltrib.com/opinion/bagley/2018/07/21/bagley-cartoon-spy-who/">The Spy Who Did(n’t) Love Me</a>
• <a href="https://www.sltrib.com/opinion/bagley/2018/07/19/bagley-cartoon-inland/">Inland Port Parlay</a>

Want more Bagley? Become a fan on Facebook.

Provo • Butch Pau’u burst onto the BYU football scene in a big way in 2016, breaking tackling records and developing a reputation as the fiercest hitter on the team.

Known for flashing a broad smile after devastating hits and helping opponents to their feet after many of his tackles, Pau’u became a fan favorite as a sophomore before injuries dampened his breakout season.

Still, the middle linebacker from Servite High in Anaheim, Calif., finished with 83 tackles that season, including seven for losses. He had 19 total tackles against UCLA, the most for a BYU defender since Uani Unga had 19 in 2013 against Notre Dame.

His junior season did not go nearly as well.

“I played terribly,” the senior said at BYU Football Media Day. “It was a bad year. I put on too much weight in the offseason. It wasn’t healthy weight, either. I struggled with mobility and everything. Then I had injuries, and struggled even more.”

Although he appeared in 11 games, up from 10 in 2016, Pau’u’s production dropped considerably. He made just 74 tackles, and just three were for losses.

One of the first things BYU assistant head coach Ed Lamb did when he became the new linebackers coach in the offseason was to persuade Pau’u to drop back down to 225 pounds, which was his playing weight in 2016. He had ballooned to 245.

“At his height [6-foot], that’s about as much weight as he can possibly pack on, Lamb said in June. “There are not a lot of NFL linebackers that are his height. But of those at his height, that’s about as big as they can get. He’s power packed. He’s one of the strongest players on the team. He is right where he needs to be. If anything, if his body composition is wrong, we would ask him to lose weight. But right now, he is really solid. His body fat percentage is really low. He’s done a great job this offseason.”

After “testing out” his new weight Thursday as BYU preseason camp got underway, Pau’u liked how he felt.

“Yeah, smiling Butch is back,” he said, flashing the pearly whites that were a mainstay in September of 2016. “Thank goodness. My parents gave me the longest talk a couple weeks ago about how I just wasn’t happy last year. But we are back. It is good to be back.”

Pau’u broke up with his longtime girlfriend, former BYU basketball star Kalani Purcell, in the offseason as well.

“No worries,” he said when Purcell’s good-natured critiques of his play was brought up Thursday. “We are actually not together any more. We are still good friends, though.”

Pau’u had a rather unremarkable freshman season after an LDS Church mission to Honduras, then got his chance as a sophomore in preseason camp when Harvey Langi was moved from middle linebacker to defensive end.

“What an overwhelming sense of joy,” he said at the time. “I was a BYU fan since before I was created.”

The new iteration is a bit lighter, but stronger and faster. That showed Thursday as the senior glided from play to play (no hitting is allowed until the pads go on in a few days) and offered encouragement to a pair of his running mates at linebacker who played different positions last season, Sione Takitaki (defensive end) and Zayne Anderson (safety).

“I am just continuing to work with Zayne and Sione and our guys that can move and keep up with those faster receivers and running backs, and I think we are going to get there,” he said.

Anderson, who has been asked to put on some weight as he makes the transition, said Pau’u has been a tremendous help already.

“Butch has taught me some moves and some reads, and helps me keep my eyes right and stuff,” Anderson said. “With his experience at linebacker, it really helped me out as a newcomer to the position.”

America's health-care debate is entering a new phase. Liberals, inspired by self-described socialists such as Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who recently won the Democratic primary in New York's 14th congressional district, are excited about the possibility of "Medicare for All." Republicans have at the same time largely abandoned efforts to enact major reforms of health care.

This new phase of the debate is full of opportunity for Republicans, and peril for conservatives.

But perhaps it would be better to say that the debate is reverting to an older pattern. For roughly four decades, liberals have highlighted the flaws of the existing health-care system, chiefly high costs and unequal access, and proposed increased governmental involvement as the solution. Conservatives talked up the dangers of bigger government, chiefly even higher costs and the disruption of existing arrangements, and reminded voters of the virtues of the status quo.

Most of the time, health care has been a back-burner issue, and discontent with the system has been a modest source of political strength for liberals. When health care has become a dominant issue, however, public fear of disruption has helped conservatives. From 2009 through 2016, Republicans were able to exploit public unhappiness with the changes that Obamacare first threatened to make and then did make.

There have been two brief exceptions to this pattern. In 1995-96 and 2017-18, Republicans advanced their own sweeping changes to health policy. Led by Newt Gingrich 20 years ago, they tried to reform Medicare and Medicaid. Over the last two years, they tried to replace Obamacare and reform Medicaid.

Both times the public's fear of change was turned against Republican politicians, who did not like the pressure one bit. Most of them are relieved to have dropped their party's Obamacare and Medicaid proposals. They are eager to settle into the familiar role of criticizing liberal health-care proposals.

There’s plenty to criticize. In polls, most people say they like their existing insurance policies — which may be a way for them to signal to politicians that they fear their meddling with those policies. The single-payer plans that are ascending among Democrats would by definition threaten most existing coverage.

These plans pose much bigger political risks than Obamacare did. Obamacare was carefully designed to insulate Democrats from charges that they were turning people's coverage upside down.

In selling the legislation, President Barack Obama spent much of his time reassuring people that they could keep their doctors and their insurance plans if they liked them. The law mostly avoided changes to the employer-provided coverage through which most Americans get health care.

Yet Obamacare still provoked a backlash. That backlash was especially intense when, in the fall of 2013, it resulted in a significant number of plan cancellations. But many voters have also resented the narrower networks and higher premiums and deductibles that Obamacare has foisted on them.

As even more sweeping left-wing proposals move to the center of the debate, Republicans can reclaim the advantage of opposing disruption. But they may also again be saddled with the disadvantage of being associated with an unsatisfactory status quo.

They are in charge of Congress and the White House; they have been talking about reworking the health-care system for years; and they have succeeded in making significant changes, albeit much less ambitious ones than they sought. They have, for example, ended the fines on people without health insurance that were a major part of Obamacare. In addition, the Trump administration is in the process of liberalizing the rules for short-term insurance plans that do not have to comply with the regulations Obamacare imposes on most other plans.

The Republicans therefore have some, and growing, political ownership of the health-care system. The more they argue against left-wing proposals to change the system, the more ownership they will have.

For Republican politicians, defending even a flawed status quo is probably preferable to trying to impose disruptive changes to it. But if they adopt that position, it will mean that the only solutions on offer to popular concerns about health care will be left-wing ones.

It will mean, as well, that occasionally liberals will have enough political power to enact some, and maybe a lot, of their preferred changes to the system. We will move, that is, toward a health-care system with a larger and larger degree of governmental control even as Republicans make political gains by resisting that trend.

The new shape of the debate may be good news for Republican politicians, then, but it's bad news for conservatives who favor limited government and free markets.

Ramesh Ponnuru is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist. He is a senior editor at National Review, visiting fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and contributor to CBS News.