Medicare for All! Why not?

As a card-carrying curmudgeon, nothing gives me more pleasure than reading an op-ed written by a Progressive and then tearing it to pieces. The Charlotte Observer is a prime source of absurdity, stupidity and outright propaganda for everything government. They put the I in libtard, and we can’t thank them enough for it.


When I read some of these articles. I can’t help but think these people are grasping onto a few strands of reality. Maybe that’s because in a liberal’s utopian worldview, they’re incapable of introspection. Failure is not part of their vocabulary. Why else would they double-down on centralized healthcare when the Affordable Care Act has been anything but. So hey, it’s Medicare for all! Why not!

Here is an excerpt from an op-ed written by a Mr. Bohmfalk advocating for just that:


Medicare is an extremely successful and popular government program, a very good thing for 15 percent of our citizens. As private, for-profit health insurance continues to squeeze enrollees into narrower provider networks and unaffordable cost-sharing, many Americans under 65 are desperate for relief. Most business leaders do not realize that around one-third of every healthcare dollar goes to administration, rather than healthcare. We pay around twice per person what every other country pays for healthcare, the largest share of GDP. Despite being the biggest market, we pay the world’s highest prescription drug prices. Our health outcomes, including life expectancy, rank near the bottom.


Now why is there a narrower field? Could it possibly be that Obamacare forced other insurers and providers out of business thereby squeezing enrollees into narrower networks that are unaffordable? Oh yeah, Americans need relief, alright. They need relief from an obtrusive and authoritarian federal government.


Now let’s address administrative cost. Did Obamacare reduce this bugaboo? NO! They exasperated it. Do a search on the internet and you’ll see pages of articles lamenting this government created monstrosity. But once again, this assertion of lower administrative cost is deceptive. Here is an excerpt from an article pre-Obamacare:


A more accurate measure of overhead would therefore be the administrative costs per patient, rather than per dollar of medical expenses. And by that measure, even with all the administrative advantages Medicare has over private coverage, the program's administrative costs are actually significantly higher than those of private insurers. In 2005, for example, Robert Book has shown that private insurers spent $453 per beneficiary on administrative costs, compared to $509 for Medicare. (Indeed, Robert has written the definitive paper on this subject, from which the above figure is taken.)


Remember these points the next time someone tries to tell you that Medicare is “more efficient” than private insurance.

Yes, remember this, because Mr. Bohmfalk is going to double-down. 

And as for paying twice per person in other countries, all I have to say is what do you expect? Do you expect third-world prices in a first-world country? Of course, we’re going to pay more than the rest of the world, simply because our standard of living is higher. This is basic economics.


However, if liberals insist on everything “free,” we could be like Venezuela, where healthcare is nonexistent thanks to socialism. See what free gets you?

Still , healthcare would be cheaper in the United States had we an actual free market system where the patient/consumer actually participated in a cost/benefit analysis rather than being dependent on a third-party payer system. Competition reduces cost whereas monopolies reduce access and inflate the prices of goods and services. Make no mistake about it, Obamacare monopolized our healthcare system.


Mr. Bohmfalk continues:


Except in the Medicare population. Once people have access to healthcare, their health dramatically improves. Medicare has a secret for the rest of the country: We can expand Medicare to cover everyone, improve it to cover prescription drugs and eliminate deductibles and co-payments, and save money in the process. The secret lies in Medicare’s 2-3 percent administrative overhead, a fraction of private insurance companies’. Politicians commonly campaign on eliminating waste, but their promises rarely materialize. With Improved Medicare for All, we can convert hundreds of billions in administrative waste to actual, life-saving healthcare.


Improving Medicare can be a fairly straightforward process, as described in the House bill HR 676. The taxes to fund it would be less than current healthcare spending for 95 percent of households — a clear win-win for the vast majority of us. Employers would no longer be burdened with providing health insurance and could better compete globally. Everyone truly could choose and keep their doctors, if not their current expensive and restrictive insurance plans.


Mind you, Mr. Bohmfalk stated earlier that 15% of the population is currently on Medicare. According to the trustees of Medicare, this program is scheduled for insolvency in the year 2026 - three years earlier than forecasted. And liberals want to expand it? Their vision of utopia is in reality, a dystopia.  Oh yeah, don't forget, if you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor.  LOL!!!


Source:


https://www.charlotteobserver.com/opinion/op-ed/article215566870.html


https://www.forbes.com/sites/theapothecary/2017/02/01/the-aca-increased-rather-than-decreased-administrative-costs-of-health-insurance/#29bc4ef09e77


https://www.investors.com/politics/policy-analysis/spending-and-overhead-costs-explode-under-obamacare/


https://www.forbes.com/sites/theapothecary/2011/06/30/the-myth-of-medicares-low-administrative-costs/#3b9e7901140d


http://www.latimes.com/nation/nationnow/la-na-pol-medicare-finances-20180605-story.html

Liberals Finally Debunking Healthcare Myths

I know I can safely say there are times when conservatives are stupefied at how dense and illogical liberals can be and it seems to be happening on a daily basis.  These people have no moorings in common sense even when it comes down to something as basic as gender.  If you’re confused about your sex just check your pants.  Are you packing or not?  Case closed.


The same applies to healthcare. Barack Obama peddled a falsehood that the uninsured clogged up the ER and that Medicaid expansion would alleviate this costly last resort.  The Oregon study refuted this assertion a number of years ago.  The Washington Post finally came around to those conclusions.  Here is an excerpt:  



“It would be nice if giving people insurance did get them so healthy and so much access to other care that they didn’t need to go to the emergency department, but that does not seem to be the case,” said Katherine Baicker, dean of the University of Chicago’s Harris School of Public Policy. “It seems clear to me that expanding insurance, in and of itself, does not contain spending. It increases spending, by giving people who had very limited access to care the ability to get their health-care needs met.”


Having insurance doesn’t lower the cost of healthcare either.  We’ve been saying that for years as well.  And what about preventive care?  Does that save money?  Apparently, not:


“It turns out, when you do the math, it’s just very tough to save money when you’re doing things to improve quality. It’s very hard to save a dollar when you spend a dollar,” said J. Michael McWilliams, a professor of health-care policy at Harvard Medical School. “Why has this become such a widespread notion — that we can sort of coordinate our way out of the cost problem? One reason is that it’s a much easier conversation to have: We can all subscribe to this notion of prevention saves money and care coordination saves money — and we don’t have to talk about regulating prices, or breaking up monopolies.”


The so-called Affordable Care Act isn’t so affordable.  This law actually created monopolies which exasperated healthcare cost.  But conservatives knew that.  We tried to warn them.  It’s unfortunate that we have to live through the dystopian world liberals have created for us.  It’s about damn time these mental patients checked their pants before they drag the rest of us through their looking glass.

Source:

Washington Post

The Rule of Law Will Kill Obamacare

Democrats are in a panic.  They’re concerned President Trump might actually adhere to the Constitution of the United States by making Congress do their job as dictated in Article One, Section Nine, Clause Seven:

No Money shall be drawn from the Treasury, but in Consequence of Appropriations made by Law; and a regular Statement and Account of the Receipts and Expenditures of all public Money shall be published from time to time.

That’s right.  This so-called Affordable Care Act has to go through the budget process.  Money has to be allocated by our elected representatives.  Finally, we have a president who believes in the rule of law, unlike his predecessor.  Barack Obama bypassed Congress and drew monies directly from the treasury.  This man acted like a third-world dictator and the American people let him get with it.

The American people might as well forget about Real and Replace. We'll have to let the budget process kill Obamacare, because Congress is incapable of passing one of those as well.  Luckily for the country, this monstrosity will wither on the vine as this charade plays out.   

However, Democrats don’t believe in the U.S. Constitution, budgets or the rule of law.  Progressive attorneys general are threatening to sue the Trump administration if they don’t act like a third-world junta.  They want the American taxpayers to bailout their party’s sponsored cartel: the insurance companies.  Here is an excerpt from CNBC:

New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman called President Donald Trump's termination of the so-called cost-sharing reduction reimbursements "cruel," "breathtakingly reckless" and "unlawful."

"This is an effort to blow up the system," said Schneiderman. He accused Trump of lashing out in frustration over the inability of Republican allies in Congress to pass a bill that would repeal and replace Obamacare.

"We're not going to let him do it."

"We will be in court to defend these subsidies and fight this decision with everything we've got," Schneiderman said as he announced the lawsuit.

The system is already blown-up you damn libtard!  Nobody can afford this crap.  Democrats have been thrown out of office throughout the country because of Obamacare.  Why do you think Donald Trump is president?

I have news for Attorney General Schneiderman, we don’t need repeal and replace as long as we have the U.S. Constitution and the rule of law.

Source:

https://www.cnbc.com/2017/10/13/states-to-sue-to-block-trump-cutoff-of-obamacare-money.html

http://freebeacon.com/issues/white-house-says-cant-lawfully-pay-obamacare-subsidies/

Medicare is Responsible for High Health Care Cost

I cannot believe some of the op-eds that are published in the Charlotte Observer.  Do they have a fact checker?  Shouldn’t the editorial board question the assertions of some of these writers?

The latest absurdity that was published in the Disturber was written by J. Edward Bell from the Charleston School of Law.  His solution for affordable healthcare is to dump catastrophic illnesses onto Medicare.  Here is an excerpt:

This idea can be the ultimate fix that makes health care affordable for most Americans.

Almost half of health care premiums are for catastrophic illnesses – the most expensive illnesses people experience. Two systems have developed to deal with these illnesses – the Medicare system for people 65 and older, and the system for everybody else.

People under 65 often are charged more than actual health costs because medical providers often take advantage of enhanced billing to recoup some of the costs they incur for treating people without insurance. These “cost-shifts” are variable costs that are hard to control, which leads insurers to charge a lot for premiums of people under 65.

But if you are covered by Medicare, the program pays actual costs to a medical provider. Because Medicare only pays actual costs, the overall cost of treatment for the Medicare patient is much less than for the patient under 65.

The difference in costs is amazing, according to research by the Charleston School of Law. Consider a patient under 65 who has an average catastrophic medical bill of $1.6 million. The cost for a Medicare patient with the same illness: about $320,000, or 80 percent less. That’s a savings of more than $1 million.

First of all, you can’t buy catastrophic insurance unless you are granted an exemption from the federal government, and once that is obtained you are limited to the exchanges and god forbid you don’t qualify for a subsidy.

Second, Medicare is the main driver for all healthcare cost.  They set the standard.  The Washington Post let the cat out of the bag back  in December 2013.  Here is an excerpt:

Economists believe that the Medicare prices are even more important than that massive scale suggests, because in the absence of a traditional market for medical services, the Medicare prices form the foundation for private insurers, as well.

That is partly because Medicare is such a huge player in the market, accounting for more than a fifth of the money spent on personal health care. But there is a second, possibly more important impetus: Because of the complexity of modern medicine, setting prices is an arduous, time-consuming task. Insurers save money by letting Medicare do the work.

To measure the impact of Medicare prices, Gottlieb and Jeffrey Clemens at the University of California at San Diego analyzed millions of claims to see how changes in Medicare prices were followed by changes in the prices that private insurers paid. The results were stark.

 “Our results indicate that the private sector will copy Medicare’s pricing errors,” Gottlieb said. “On the flip side, they would gain when Medicare payments better reflect the value of what is being delivered.”

 While that paper largely studied physician fees and outpatient services, other research published in May found that Medicare pricing for hospitals is similarly influential. The paper, by health care researcher Chapin White and published in Health Affairs, found that a 10 percent reduction in Medicare pricing yielded a 3 or 8 percent reduction in private prices, depending on the statistical method used

I published a blogpost back in 2012 about how Medicare and the third party payer system had distorted the healthcare market.  Since the consumer/patient is factored out of the cost/benefit analysis, market pricing no longer exist.  No one knows the cost of a procedure or for that fact an aspirin.  Hence, we have hyperinflation in an industry whose pricing is determined by a government entity.  And everyone wonders why no one can afford healthcare.

Source:

http://costonscomplaint.blogspot.com/2012/09/is-medicare-distorting-health-care.html

http://www.charlotteobserver.com/opinion/op-ed/article170495982.html

https://www.healthinsurance.org/faqs/what-is-the-acas-catastrophic-plan-and-who-is-eligible/

https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/medicare-pricing-drives-high-health-care-costs/2013/12/31/24befa46-7248-11e3-8b3f-b1666705ca3b_story.html?utm_term=.33e504fbc6f3

New York Hospital Drops Obamacare

Here is another Obamacare success story as reported by One America News Network:

New York’s largest hospital system withdraws from selling Obamacare plans, a development that marks another chapter in the collapse of the Affordable Care Act.

Northwell Health says it will shut down its insurer branch Care Connect after it sustaining losses of $156 million in 2016.

The insurer points to a lack of profitability and uncertain prospects amid looming health care reform as reasons for cutting the program.

Care Connect had 118,000 customers in small business plans, and another 30,000 in individual Obamacare plans.

This latest move exposes Obamacare’s excessive reliance on taxpayer money in the form of government subsidies

And Democrats want a single-payer system?  No, thank you.

Source:

http://www.oann.com/largest-hospital-system-in-n-y-drops-obamacare-plans-citing-major-losses/

Affordable Health Care Through Cash and Competition

Americans were told the Affordable Care Act was the panacea for all of our healthcare needs.  This government sponsored utopia would bring down cost by forcing everyone to buy insurance, or at least enroll onto its lesser cousin, Medicaid.  This flawed ideology is based on the concept that insurance equates to healthcare.  Well how’s that working out?   

Obamacare’s mandates and regulations actually contributed to the cost of healthcare.  True reform will not come from a bureaucrat’s pen.  True affordable healthcare will come from competition and the patient playing an active role in a cost/benefit analysis.  Insurance was meant to cover catastrophes, not pap smears and prostate exams.

A man from Montana found out just how affordable a knee replacement can be when he bypassed his government mandated insurance company.  Here is an excerpt from Time:

When Art Villa found out, after one too many boating accidents, that he needed a total knee replacement, he began asking around to see how much it would cost. The hospital near his home in Helena, Mont., would charge $40,000 for the procedure, he says. But that didn't include the anesthesiologist's fee, physical therapy or a stay at a rehabilitation center afterward. A 2015 Blue Cross Blue Shield study found that one hospital in Dallas billed $16,772 for a knee replacement while another in the same area charged $61,585.

It was in the midst of this confounding research that Villa, who's 68, heard about the Surgery Center of Oklahoma, whose business model is different from that of most hospitals. There, the all-inclusive price for every operation is listed on the website. A rotator-cuff repair for the shoulder costs $8,260. A surgical procedure for carpal tunnel syndrome is $2,750. Setting and casting a basic broken leg: $1,925

What did this knee replacement cost Mr. Villa?

To Villa, the model seemed refreshingly subversive. The Surgery Center would charge $19,000 for his whole-knee replacement, a discount of nearly 50% on what Villa expected to be charged at his local hospital. And that price would include everything from airfare to the organization's only facility, in Oklahoma City, to medications and physical therapy. If unforeseen complications arose during or after the procedure, the Surgery Center would cover those costs. Villa wouldn't see another bill.

Can you imagine what the cost would be if there was competition?  This is true healthcare reform.  This is how to achieve affordable healthcare.

Source:

http://time.com/4649914/why-the-doctor-takes-only-cash/

Central Planners Depend Upon Force to Ensure Failure

How many licks does it take for a liberal to call a failed government program a failure?  The answer is never!  These central planners are incapable of introspection.  They see things as they want to see it and the hell with everyone else.  This so-called Affordable Care Act is a centerpiece of Progressive willfulness.

States are witnessing a mass exodus of insurance companies that will no longer participate in this Obamacare fiasco.  North Carolina is no different.  As of now only Blue Cross and Blue Shield service all 100 counties.  Cigna is an option in five counties in the Raleigh area.  That’s it!  This year we received a 32% rate increase with an additional 24.3% scheduled for next year.  Genius!  All hail the master planners!

You would think that progressives would take stock in this massive failure and rethink this top-down, un-American policy.  But that would take a giant leap of faith that these people know what it means to be an American.  We have to remind ourselves that these people are central planners.   There are no limitations to their machinations and we have no say.

The News and Observer’s editorial board sees success where there is failure.  They believe the ACA just needs some tweaking and a little force by big brother:

BCBS also has the problem of the other companies’ withdrawal to deal with. The customers of those companies, some 260,000 of them, will now have to come to Blue Cross, and a good many of those customers may have significant and costly medical issues to deal with. That’s no small challenge for BCBS or any other insurance company.

This is one aspect of the ACA — which required most people to get insurance or pay a penalty — that is an ongoing problem. Without younger, healthier customers enrolled, customers who don’t need to make claims, insurance companies are crunched by increasing claims from older, sicker customers. Not enough of those younger people are signing up.

And unfortunately, given the partisan divide in Congress, it’s virtually impossible to “tweak” the ACA — to prevent companies from pulling out of a market, to strengthen the requirements for everyone to have health insurance, to bolster subsidies — because Republicans in Congress just want to kill the program outright.

Have you noticed federal government programs are dependent upon force?  Does that sound American to you?  It doesn’t to me.

Source:

http://www.newsobserver.com/opinion/editorials/article109036697.html#storylink=cpy

N.C. Progressives Propagandize Medicaid Expansion

How many times have we been told by liberals that the news section of a paper is for facts, and opinions are reserved for the editorial page?  We all know this is hogwash and the Charlotte Observer wallows in it every chance they get.  Last Sunday’s edition was no exception.

What is really despicable is the way these people propagandize health care.  Progressives would have us believe health insurance is the same as care and in doing so they have driven the cost of premiums and deductibles through the roof.  The Affordable Care Act is not affordable.  They have managed to turn North Carolina’s middle-class – those who make $30,600 to $96,812 a year – into beggars by forcing them to accept federal government subsidies, or onto the Medicaid rolls.

Medicaid was designed to help the poor and disabled.  Now this overburdened program is becoming a vehicle for a single-payer system.  The Charlotte Observer would have us believe Medicaid is the cure for all our healthcare needs and our failure to expand this program is directly responsible for numerous deaths in North Carolina:

Saxe often saw children on Medicaid who were brought in by mothers who worked and were not eligible for Medicaid themselves. “They were my patients too, but they would say, ‘Oh, I can’t see you. I don’t have the money.’ ”

As a result, “you have a population of women of child-bearing age, some of whom didn’t come in and get contraception, and that puts them at risk for having another baby at a short interval.”

Saxe recalled one patient in her 40s who had been discharged from the hospital after having several strokes but had failed to keep follow up appointments because she didn’t have insurance or the cash to pay. “She could have died waiting to see me,” Saxe said.

Indeed, an estimated 455 to 1,145 unnecessary deaths a year can be attributed to North Carolina’s failure to expand Medicaid, according to a 2014 study published in the journalHealth Affairs. The study also estimated that 14,776 North Carolina residents would face catastrophic medical bills because of the state’s decision.

First of all, women can get contraceptives at a number of free clinics at no cost.  Second, why is a poor mother unable to qualify for Medicaid and her children can?  Could it possibly be that she’s an illegal alien? Hmmm?  Third, non-profit hospitals provide indigent care.  Besides, you can still have insurance and not afford a doctor because of a $9000 deductible thanks to Obamacare.

I find it laughable the study in Health Affairs used the Oregon Health Insurance Experiment which was highly critical of Medicaid.  OHIE concluded the following:

“This randomized, controlled study showed that Medicaid coverage generated no significant improvements in measured health outcomes in the first two years, but it did increase use of health services, raise rates of diabetes detection and management, lower rates of depression, and reduce financial strain.”

 We shouldn’t be surprised progressives, who were critical of this study, are now spinning it to their advantage.  These people will bastardize anything. Here is what Avik Roy wrote in his broadside, How Medicaid Fails the Poor:

Immediately, progressive bloggers went into overdrive to explain these results away.  “The sample size was too small,” they said, even though new medicines for diabetes, high cholesterol, and high blood pressure routinely show significantly improved health outcomes in much smaller trials.  “Two years isn’t long enough to show a significant benefit,” they insisted, even though new drugs that failed to show any benefit in two years would be summarily rejected by the FDA and abandoned by sponsors.

The Medicaid cohort reported that they felt better about their health and their financial security as a result of enrolling in the program and were less depressed.  We can presume that the 40 percent of Medicaid “winners” who didn’t bother to fill out the application felt differently; they, however, were not surveyed.

The Charlotte Observer didn’t mention the caveats Health Affairs enumerated at the bottom of their hypothesis.  One being an article published by the New England Journal of Medicine entitled, Mortality and Access to Care among Adults after State Medicaid Expansions.  Here is the takeaway:

METHODS

Study Design

We used a differences-in-differences quasi-experimental design that incorporated data before and after Medicaid expansions in both the expansion states and the control states. 

Quasi-experimental design?  What in the hell is that?  Is that an oxymoron like the Affordable Care Act?  Maybe we should ask Dr. Benjamin D. Sommers about his association with The Commonwealth Fund.  That suspect organization had a hand in this whole Obamacare fiasco.  Here is an excerpt from Michelle Malkin’s article:

 The tipster is right to question the Commonwealth Fund’s ability to provide objective information about Obamacare to journalists. The head of the fund, Karen Davis, is a Jimmy Carter leftover and self-identified “progressive” economist who has long peddled single payer. Her 2009 annual report proclaims:

The Commonwealth Fund marshaled its resources this year to produce timely and rigorous work that helped lay the groundwork for the historic Affordable Care Act, signed by President Obama in March 2010.

Perhaps one of the journalists participating in these indoctrination sessions can enlighten the public on the people, funding, and ideology driving the Commonwealth Fund’s media “education” campaign

   

I wonder if this so-called journalist at the Charlotte Observer attended one of these sessions.  Her use of suspect studies and reports is indicative of indoctrination.

Source:

http://www.charlotteobserver.com/news/politics-government/article108286427.html#storylink=cpy

http://healthaffairs.org/blog/2014/01/30/opting-out-of-medicaid-expansion-the-health-and-financial-impacts/

http://costonscomplaint.blogspot.com/2013/05/oregon-medicaid-expansion-has-no.html

http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMsa1202099#t=articleDiscussion

http://www.commonwealthfund.org/about-us/experts/sommers-benjamin

http://michellemalkin.com/2010/06/29/left-wing-groups-grant-will-educate-msm-on-obamacare-law/

http://myfox8.com/2015/04/03/how-much-do-you-need-to-make-in-north-carolina-to-be-middle-class/

Democrats Pushing Medicaid Expansion Despite Higher Costs

How can anyone declare a federal government agency is unbiased in the Age of Obama?  Anyone with common sense knows these bureaucracies are peopled with progressives whose sole purpose in life is to expand the federal government and protect those who adhere to their totalitarian ideology.  Can anyone say Hillary Clinton?  If it weren’t for Obama’s Justice Department she would be sitting behind bars by now.  Unbiased my ass.

So, I'm rather amused by an Associated Press article on an unbiased report from “nonpartisan experts” at the Center of Medicare and Medicaid Services. 

The nonpartisan experts at the CMS Office of the Actuary wrote in their report that they were expecting costs to decrease in 2015. They had reasoned that uninsured people who were putting off care would sign up for Medicaid in 2014, the first year of expansion. The experts expected that pent-up demand would ease in 2015, and per-person costs would drop. But the opposite happened: Costs went up.

An Obama administration spokesman says estimating the cost of a new health program is not an exact science.

"It is natural for estimates to change as new data become available, but the bottom line is that a growing body of evidence shows that Medicaid expansion improves the health of states' citizens, while reducing the burden of uncompensated care," CMS spokesman Aaron Albright said in a statement.

Albright said that the overall cost of the Affordable Care Act's coverage expansion is still lower than estimated when the law passed in 2010. However, other variables besides per-person costs enter into that overall figure. They include the total number of people enrolled, which has been lower because many states have not expanded Medicaid.

Really?  Probably because these scoundrels tried to dump those cost off onto the States.  Sure, these D.C. creatures would help fray the cost for the first three years, but after that who knows.  Democrats are still trying to con States into enrolling in this monstrosity.

In a recent report to Congress, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services said the cost of expansion was $6,366 per person for 2015, about 49 percent higher than previously estimated.

"We were told all along that the expansion population would be less costly," said health economist Brian Blase with the Mercatus Center at George Mason University in Virginia. "They are turning out to be far more expensive." Blase previously served as a GOP congressional aide.

The new estimates could be a warning light for Democrat Hillary Clinton, who has promised that if elected president she would work to expand Medicaid in the remaining 19 states that have not done so. Higher costs would make it harder for a President Clinton to sell Obama's full-financing plan to Congress.

If the costs are higher than expected, then why would anyone want to expand it?  Maybe there is something wrong with the law.  Has anyone thought about that?  Are these people really this stupid?

Source:

http://www.wafb.com/story/32743604/medicaid-estimate-renews-cost-concerns-over-obamacare

https://www.cms.gov/index.html

Obamacare: Heal Thy Self

The cornerstone achievement of the Obama administration was supposed to be the Affordable Health Care Act.  Expectations were high, premiums were to fall and the healing was to begin for all.  You know, pretty much like the messianic promises that were made on stage in front of all those fake columns.  What a shyster.

Reality has set and it’s no surprise to anyone with half a brain that Obamacare is a failure.  IBD reported the following:

Aetna's announcement follows UnitedHealth Group's (UNH) decision to leave most ObamaCare markets, Humana's (HUM) decision to drop out of some, Blue Cross Blue Shield's announcement that it was quitting the individual market in Minnesota, and the failure of most of the 23 government-created insurance co-ops. And it follows news that insurance companies are putting in for double-digit rate hikes that in some cases top 60%, and news that the Congressional Budget Office has sharply downgraded its long-term enrollment forecast for the exchanges.

Who could have envisioned such problems? Not ObamaCare backers. They were endlessly promising that the law would create vibrant, highly competitive markets that would lower the cost of insurance.

Critics, however, were spot on. They said that, despite the individual mandate, ObamaCare wouldn't attract enough young and healthy people to keep premiums down.

  

How many lives have been destroyed because of the Democratic Party’s foolish schemes?

Source:

http://www.investors.com/politics/editorials/obamacare-is-failing-exactly-the-way-critics-said-it-would/

Medicaid's Trojan Horse for the Working Class

“Free” doesn’t exactly mean free as billed by progressives.  Someone has to pay for all this “free stuff.”  We conservatives instinctively know this because we work for a living and are cursed with common sense.  Progressives usually can’t figure this out until it’s too late.  Some never do. 

The Affordable Health Care Act has rendered health insurance too expensive for the working class.  Most will be forced onto Medicaid or pay a fine.  Obamacare is the ultimate Trojan horse; instead of being filled with soldiers, this innocent looking gift is filled with government bureaucrats just waiting to plunder a citizen’s estate.

But with the expansion under ObamaCare, more and more people will qualify for Medicaid without realizing that the coverage is really not free, but instead a hidden secured loan whose terms aren't explicit. As Carol Ostrom, the Seattle Times health reporter, explained:

The way Prins saw it, that meant health insurance via Medicaid is hardly “free” for Washington residents 55 or older. It’s a loan, one whose payback requirements aren't well advertised. And it penalizes people who, despite having a low income, have managed to keep a home or some savings they hope to pass to heirs, Prins said.

Sofia and Gary lived together, she as an artist and he as a tango instructor, and when they saw that they would see their assets evaporate under estate recovery rules if they signed up for Medicaid, they decided to get married. That way, their combined incomes qualified them for ObamaCare coverage on the state exchange, helped along with some federal subsidies. Said Sofia:

We’re happy to be getting married. Unfortunately not everyone has such an elegant solution to the problem.

No, they don’t. Barry Blake lived with his mother who owned her own home and was covered under Medicaid. When she died, the state of Kentucky “took the house ... to be sold and pay those expenses” according to a suit Blake filed to recover it in 2009. The state also took the washer and dryer, their lawn mower, gardening tools, kitchen appliances and other personal items. Blake hadn't read the fine print. The lawsuit was dismissed.

 

There is nothing like the siren song of “free.”

Source:

 http://www.thenewamerican.com/usnews/health-care/item/17216-another-obamacare-surprise-estate-recovery

Obama Admin. Plunders Medicaid and Medicare

The Democratic Party is the federal mafia.  Barack Obama has installed progressive capos at the head of federal bureaucracies and is plundering the U.S. treasury.  The latest shakedown happened at the Department of Human and Health Services and Centers for Medicaid and Medicare.  Secretary Sylvia Burwell diverted billions of taxpayer monies from programs designed to help the poor and elderly to insurance companies that conspired with the Obama administration to force citizens to buy their product.

At issue for lawmakers on the House Energy and Commerce Committee is whether the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services violated the Affordable Care Act by diverting $3.5 billion intended for the U.S. Treasury to insurance companies.

“[Earlier this month], the administration announced that they would be using billions of taxpayer dollars to make payments to insurance companies under the Obamacare reinsurance program,” Rep. Joe Pitts, R-Penn., said Wednesday during a hearing with Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Sylvia Mathews Burwell.

“The announcement that the administration made represents an illegal wealth transfer from hardworking taxpayers to insurers,” he continued, “and this law is very clear—$5 billion of reinsurance fees must be returned to the taxpayers.

Experts have pointed out that with the absence of payments to the U.S. Treasury in 2014 and 2015, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services owes the U.S. Treasury $3.5 billion in payments from the transitional reinsurance program—$2 billion for 2014, and $1.5 billion for 2015.

Laws?  Progressives don’t need stinking laws.

Source:

http://dailysignal.com/2016/02/24/lawmakers-obama-administration-illegally-diverted-billions-intended-for-u-s-treasury-to-insurers/

N.C. Insurance Commissioner Worried Carriers Will Leave State

Obamacare is taking its toll on the Old North State.  N.C Insurance Commissioner Wayne Goodwin, a democrat, lamented how destabilizing the so-called Affordable Healthcare Act has been on the market.  Customers have experienced increasing cost, fewer options and high losses for insurers.  This scheme is unsustainable.  Here is an excerpt from the News and Observer:

“Insurers cannot continue to have annual losses in the hundreds of millions and be expected to continue ‘business as usual,” Goodwin wrote to Burwell. “I am highly concerned insurers may withdraw from the individual market in North Carolina altogether.”

In a subsequent phone interview, Goodwin acknowledged that the ACA has reduced the rolls of the uninsured by providing subsidized health care for nearly a half-million people here. But he said problems with the law and its implementation threaten to eclipse those benefits.

“If North Carolina continues along this path and we have no carriers, what do we do?” Goodwin said, recounting his November conversation with the DHHS Secretary. “Secretary Burwell was dismayed that a state like North Carolina would be posing this question.

I’m sure we’re not the only state that has raised this concern.  And what are we to do?  The only answer these geniuses could come up with is increase subsidies and expand Medicaid enrollments.  Mind you, the federal debt will reach $20 trillion at the end of Obama’s term.  Commissioner Goodwin also wants to implement a state exchange when all others have been complete failures.

These social engineers are ruining our healthcare system.    

Source:

 http://www.newsobserver.com/news/business/article58154628.html#storylink=cpy