Obama to Issue Own Health Care Reform Plan on Feb. 22

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Category : Federal Labor Law

The administration has announced that Barack Obama will issue his own health care reform plan on Monday, Feb. 22.

However, since Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sibelius said Obama's "one proposal" will feature "some of the best ideas" from the House and Senate plans, this can only mean his proposal will be a blank piece of paper.

There were zero "best ideas" in either the House or Senate measures. In fact, there weren't even any "faintly good" ideas in either plan. Just more government, more government control, and less individual choice or freedom.

However, what this announcement really means is the re-emergence of the so-called socialist public option and a rush to reconciliation after trying to shame the Republican opposition at the Feb. 25 health care summit.

Whether we want it or not, and 60-plus percent of us don't, one way or the other we'll have Obamacare shoved down our throats.

Majority of Americans Believe in Starting Over on Health Reform

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Category : Random Musings

A USA Today/Gallup poll released after the election of Republican Scott Brown in Massachusetts shows that a majority of Americans believes Congress should start over on health care reform and abandon the current House and Senate bills.

(Public sentiment has finally caught up with what I've been saying for the past year–the status quo is better than the Democrats' Taxachusetts-based reform.)

The poll shows 55 percent of Americans favoring a redo and 39 percent favoring a go-ahead on current legislation. Those favoring the start-over are largely Republicans and Independents, as two-thirds of Democrats are fine with the current reform measures.

In addition, 46 percent said that other issues were more important than health care reform while 32 percent still consider it a priority.

Eight Years to Renegotiate Union Contracts? Or More Cronyism?

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Category : Federal Labor Law

The unions cried foul, and the Caver-in-Chief caved in to his cronies once again.

Big Labor hated the Big Government plan to tax their "Cadillac" health care plans in the name of health care reform (which is just a health insurance mandate designed to bankrupt the system so a government takeover is the only option left on the table).

So what do the Obamacrats do? Simple, they exempt the unions from the tax on Cadillac plans until, gee, let's see what's reasonable…until 2018.

The unions argued that these rich health care plans were negotiated in lieu of wage increases and they need time to renegotiate the contracts to swap wages for Cadillacs.

I doubt any union on the face of Planet America has a contract that runs for the next eight years, so this is obviously just another example of political favoritism emanating from the stench in the White House.

With Health Care Costs Down, Time for Govt. to Screw Things Up

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Category : Federal Labor Law

health care spending With Health Care Costs Down, Time for Govt. to Screw Things UpHealth care costs have been ameliorating, annual increase-wise, since 2002, with 2008 showing an increase of just 4.4 percent, the lowest in 50 years.

So how does the government react? It comes up with a plan to raise everyone's premiums by mandating coverage for all people, regardless of age, health or pre-existing conditions. Now, of course, it's ideal that everyone be covered, but what the Democrats cover up don't talk about is that it's more expensive to cover everyone, and someone has to pay.

They can hide some of the cost increases through deficit spending and hidden taxes (on the so-called wealthy or on "Cadillac health plans"), but ultimately the costs all rebound to the users, either in terms of higher insurance premiums (guaranteed under Obamacare), longer waits for treatment and medicines (ditto), or flat-out rationing (ditto redux).

Look for all three if so-called health care reform passes.

Death Panels Live, Pardon the Pun

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Category : Random Musings

A thoughtful article over at the Cato Institute Web site by Alan Reynolds exposes the smear campaign against Sarah Palin and her observation about "death panels."

The smear involved linking her comment to the language for "end-of-life counseling" in the House health care reform package, when in fact Palin was referring to the overall end result of such reform.

Her words: "Government health care will not reduce the cost; it will simply refuse to pay the cost. And who will suffer the most when they ration care? The sick, the elderly, and the disabled, of course."

Palin's comments were more directed toward trusted Obama health care adviser Dr. Ezekiel Emmanuel than they were to the House measure. Emmanuel is a longtime advocate for rationing health care primarily to people aged 15 to 45 and letting the young and the old fend for themselves. (Which is basically Hitlerian, but if you mention that, you get the Palin treatment by the traditional media.)

The moral of all this, besides the obvious manipulation of truth by the media, is that we "useless eaters" (thank you, Adolph, for the term) need to unite and defeat Obamacare, but I fear we may be too late. We already opened the hen house door and let the fox(es) in by thinking the Democrats could produce the world's first universal free lunch.

Now we have to pay for it.

CMS Takes Obama Marching Orders, Censors Pharma

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Category : Federal Labor Law

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), on obvious marching orders from the Obama administration, has halted all mailings and communications by drug companies about upcoming health care reform. At least one company was found to be mailing its enrollees a warning that the $500 billion proposed cut in Medicare benefits would reduce services and access (no doubt entirely true).

“We are concerned that the materials sent to our beneficiaries may violate Medicare rules by appearing to contain Medicare Advantage and prescription drug benefit information, which must be submitted to CMS for review,” said Jonathan Blum, acting director of CMS’ Center for Drug and Health Plan Choices.

“We also are asking that no other plan sponsors are mailing similar materials while we investigate whether a potential violation has occurred. We are concerned that, among other things, the information in the letter is misleading and confusing to beneficiaries, who may believe that it represents official communication about the Medicare Advantage program.”

In other words, you’re not allowed to let the proverbial cat out of the bag (how the heck did it get in there to begin with?).

However, House Republican Leader John Boehner (R.-Ohio) responded to the CMS stance by criticizing actions of the Obama administration to impose what he referred to as a gag order on critics of the $500 billion in Medicare cuts proposed by the congressional Democrats. He released a statement contending, "It is outrageous that the Obama administration is trying to keep seniors in the dark about the consequences of congressional Democrats’ costly government-run health care bills."

You get what you vote for, and in this case that’s censorship and thought control from on high.

Health Care Public Option, Meet Mini-You, the Stealth Device!

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Category : Federal Labor Law

The Senate Finance Committee last week killed the full-blown public option for health care reform, but proponents of governmentalizing (ultimately, socializing) health care found a way to slip in a mini-version with little to no fanfare.

MedPageToday reports that Senator Maria Cantwell (D.-Washington) managed to get an amendment added that  "would set aside $200 billion for block grants to states that want to set up their own public insurance plans."

Afterward, Cantwell cackled that this was a "foothold." The obvious intent is to let states set up mini-public plans that quickly go broke, allowing Democrats to cry "the sky is falling" and take over the entire system on the federal level.

Poof! Full-blown public option in no time flat.

The socialists in our midst won’t give up, will they?

State Health Plan Proves Public Option Costs More, Not Less

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Category : Random Musings

The Senate Finance Committee today wisely rejected the so-called public option as it marks up its health care reform measure. The 15-8 vote included five Democrats saying no.

Wise move. Every state that’s implemented a public health plan is now going broke after first proclaiming it would save costs and then having to throw money into the system at twice what was budgeted.

The latest example comes from North Carolina, where its Public Health Plan for state employees and teachers has seen claims skyrocket threefold since inception to where they now amount to half the state’s entire budget, coming in at a whopping $10.7 billion in 2008.

The state, as is being discussed and touted in D.C. during the health care debate, also pinned its hopes on wellness management–getting people to quit smoking and lose weight–as a means to hold health care costs in check.

That didn’t work either and actually ended up adding many millions more onto the state’s health care tab as providers gamely gamed the wellness system.

The state isn’t giving up, though. Now it’s requiring people on the State Health Plan to sign a form attesting that they don’t smoke and that their BMI (Body Mass Index) is less than 40 (which is being reduced soon to 35) in order to get the better, cheaper, 80/20 health care plan. If you’re a fatso or you smoke, you’re forced onto the 70/30, where you pay 30 percent of all medical bills.

Now comes the Big Brother part. Since people were routinely lying on their forms, employers are now required to check for smoker’s breath and to weigh employees to determine their BMI. If you’re found out, you’ll be forced onto the 70/30 plan and made to forfeit all your deductions under the 80/20 plan.

And most Americans favor health reform, according to Obama and the Democrats. Either they’re lying, we’re naive, or someone is making all this up.

Read "Your employer will weigh you now" for the nitty-gritty details of health reform gone wild.

 

 

Heresy! A Liberal Criticizes Obamacare?

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Category : Random Musings

Can you imagine a self-avowed liberal calling parts of the House of Representatives’ health reform measure (HR 3200) “ghoulish” and “creepy.”

Granted, Deborah White doesn’t go so far (or as accurately, right, Zeke Emanuel?) as to predict the establishment of “death panels” down the road, but she does pinpoint some of the really onerous, unctuous and terrifying parts of Obamacare (which HR 3200 most nearly resembles).

Read “Democrats Must Dump Incentives from Health Care Reform.”

Obamacare: ID Card That Instantly Debits Your Bank Account

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Category : Random Musings

For all of you who are still deluding yourselves that Obamacare is going to create free health care for you, I’ve got (scary) news for you.

As envisioned in HR 3200, the House of Representatives’ foray into health care “reform,” each person in the U.S. (I say person because you don’t have to be a citizen) will be issued a Health ID Card, which will be tied in electronically to his or her bank account for instant payment. No funds=no treatment, “Sorry about that heart attack you’re having, mister, but you have insufficient funds.”

At first, when I read about this on Faultline USA, I was incredulous, so I whipped out my copy of HR 3200 and followed Faultine’s page-by-page summary.

Go to pages 58-59 and you’ll see what I’m talking about. If you follow the Faultline summary and verify it against the introduced House legislation, you’ll be blown away. (Did you know taxpayers will assume union retiree health benefits payments under HR 3200? See page 65.)

It’s a scary read. If this is “change you can believe in,” you must be planning to move to Costa Rica soon.