Tag Archives: Obamacare

Commentary

An evaluation of public-option health care plans in five US states

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Amazing article from IBD. (H/T ECM)

Excerpt:

But perhaps the worst — and closest — example of why a federal takeover of health care won’t work comes from Maine.

[…]Maine’s universal coverage plan is most similar to the plans circulating on Capitol Hill. It was proposed in May 2003 by Democrat Gov. John Baldacci and passed a scant four weeks later. Much like the $787 billion federal “stimulus” plan that passed Congress in February of this year, nobody read the Dirigo plan either.

While greasing the pipeline for quick passage of Dirigo Health, the governor assured that all of Maine’s 128,000 uninsured would be covered by 2009, the bureaucracy would be streamlined and health costs lowered, and the plan would fund itself based on system savings with no tax increases — a similar claim to what President Obama has said about a new federal plan.

Six years after it was passed, it has insured only 3% — roughly 3,400 — of the 128,000 promised.

By 2007, the system was so broke that it closed to new enrollees. It still has not reopened and has also cut and capped benefits. The “streamlined” bureaucracy has cost the state’s taxpayers $17 million in administrative costs to cover 9,600 people, leading one to wonder if there are more bureaucrats in the system than enrollees.

Systemwide insurance costs have increased 74% since Dirigo was passed, and the governor and legislature have tried — unsuccessfully — to raise taxes to fund the system.

The short article analyzes the numbers FIVE current public-option health care plans in Hawaii, Oregon, Massachusetts, Tennessee and Maine.

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News

How Democrats vote on illegal immigration, abortion, marriage and corporations

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Here’s a little round-up of stories (mostly from ECM) that will help you to understand what it is that Democrats really stand for. The best way to know what they stand for is NOT to listen to speeches or media bias. The best way to know what they stand for is to look at how they vote.

Democrats want Americans to pay for health care for illegal immigrants

Story here from The Hill.

Excerpt:

Senate Finance Committee Democrats rejected a proposed a requirement that immigrants prove their identity with photo identification when signing up for federal healthcare programs.

Finance Committee ranking member Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) said that current law and the healthcare bill under consideration are too lax and leave the door open to illegal immigrants defrauding the government using false or stolen identities to obtain benefits.

Grassley’s amendment was beaten back 10-13 on a party-line vote.

Democrats want to destroy traditional marriage

Story here from The Hill.

Excerpt:

A House Democrat will introduce a bill on Tuesday to repeal the infamous Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), but he will not have the support of one of the law’s biggest critics.

The latest effort to revise federal marriage guidelines comes from Rep. Jerry Nadler (D-N.Y.), the chairman of the House’s subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights & Civil Liberties, which oversees DOMA. His proposal, which he will unveil at a press conference next week, will include a provision to allow same-sex couples in one state to marry elsewhere, return home and still receive federal benefits.

Nadler has already secured the support of two congressmen — Reps. Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.) and Jared Polis (D-Colo.), who will co-sponsor his effort.

Democrats want to fund abortion in their health care bill

Story from Life Site News.

Excerpt:

Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) proposed to amend the “America’s Health Future Act of 2009” under consideration by the Finance Committee led by Chairman Max Baucus (D-Mont.). His amendments would have codified current conscience protections for health-care providers with moral objections to abortion and also made permanent the Hyde Amendment, which prohibits federal funds from the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) from paying for abortions.

Hatch instead proposed that women could purchase additional coverage for abortions through “riders” that would not be subsidized by the government.

However, the amendments were rejected by the Committee by votes of 13 – 10. In both amendments, Sen. Kent Conrad (D-N.D.) joined committee Republicans in support of the measures, while pro-abortion Sen. Olympia Snowe (R-Maine) joined Baucus’ committee Democrats to vote against the bill.

Democrats support taxpayer subsidies for big corporations that help them get elected

Story from Green Hell Blog.

Excerpt:

Sen. Barbara Boxer’s climate bill set to be released today contains a provision that will compensate General Electric quite nicely for its lobbying and media efforts promoting climate legislation.

[…]So the Boxer bill would compel airlines and the military, when purchasing new aircraft and new aircraft engines, to purchase more expensive “green” engines made by GE, according to standards set by the current and GE-lobbied Obama administration.

Keep in mind that GE CEO Jeff Immelt is member of President Obama’s Economic Recovery Advisory Council.

This is what people who voted for Obama voted for, knowingly or unknowingly. They are still responsible for these policies.

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Commentary

MUST-READ: Why Obama’s health care plan is just wealth redistribution

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Story from the Wall Street Journal.

Excerpt:

President Obama proposes to require insurers to sell policies to everyone no matter what their health status. By itself this requirement, called “guaranteed issue,” would just mean that insurers would charge predictably sick people the extremely high insurance premiums that reflect their future expected costs. But if Congress adds another requirement, called “community rating,” insurers’ ability to charge higher premiums for higher risks will be sharply limited.

Like the homeowner who waits until his house is on fire to buy insurance, younger, poorer, healthier workers will rationally choose to avoid paying high premiums now to subsidize insurance for someone else. After all, they can always get a policy if they get sick.

To avoid this outcome, most congressional Democrats and some Republicans would combine guaranteed issue and community rating with the requirement that all workers buy health insurance—that is, an “individual mandate.” This solves the incentive problem, and guarantees that both the healthy poor 25-year-old and the sick higher-income 55-year-old have heath insurance.

But the combination of a guaranteed issue, community rating and an individual mandate means that younger, healthier, lower-income earners would be forced to subsidize older, sicker, higher-income earners. And because these subsidies are buried within health-insurance premiums, the massive income redistribution is hidden from public view and not debated.

If Congress goes down this road, health insurance premiums will increase dramatically for the overwhelming majority of people.

This is the best explanation of what is really at stake if Obama’s socialized medicine plan passes. Please read it.

What no one realizes is that when one group is funding the lifestyle choices of another group, they stop producing wealth. Maybe they just retire, or maybe they move to another country. But the result is the same: economic growth is stifled and unemployment goes through the roof. These are the unintended consequences of the policies of well-meaning but naive socialists.

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