More hypocrisy from Obamacare supporters: Obama gives liberal Massachusetts an illegal Obamacare waiver
Massachusetts, one of the bluest states in the country, has requested an Obamacare waiver. And Obama has granted their request.
This waiver is illegal for two reasons. First, the waiver was not approved by the U.S. Congress. Second, the U.S. Constitution requires that the federal government treat all states the same.
Previous examples of hypocrisy from the supporters of Obamacare include:
Obama gave some organizations an exemption from some of the requirements of Obamacare. Many of these organizations were unions that had supported the passage of Obamacare, but now wanted exemptions from the very same law that they wanted to force everyone else to obey. This reveals an extreme level of hypocrisy among many of the supporters of Obamacare. In addition, these exemptions are illegal, because the Constitution requires the law to treat everyone the same. The Washington Times wrote of this:
“Selective enforcement of the law is the first sign of tyranny. A government empowered to determine arbitrarily who may operate outside the rule of law invariably embraces favoritism as friends, allies and those with the best-funded lobbyists are rewarded. Favoritism inevitably leads to corruption, and corruption invites extortion. Ultimately, the rule of law ceases to exist in any recognizable form, and what is left is tyranny.”
“The now-familiar monthly trickling down of new waivers is, at best, a tacit admission that Obamacare is a failure. So far, seven entire states and 1,372 businesses, unions and other institutions have received waivers from the law. The list includes the administration’s friends and allies and, of course, those who have the best lobbyists.”
“More than 50 percent of the Obamacare waiver beneficiaries are union members, which is striking because union members account for less than 12 percent of the American work force. The same unions that provided more than $120 million to Democrats in the last two elections and, in many cases, openly campaigned in favor of the government takeover of your health care, now celebrate that Obamacare is not their problem.”
In December 2012, Al Franken, Elizabeth Warren, John Kerry, and 15 other Democrats who supported the passage of Obamacare wrote a letter to Harry Reid, asking him to delay the tax on medical devices, claiming that the tax would hurt job creation in their districts.
As the Obamacare law was written, the employer mandate was to begin in January 2014. This is what the law said when it was passed by the House and Senate, and signed by President Obama in 2010. However, in July 2013, Obama delayed the employer mandate part of Obamacare until January 2015. Obama did this without approval from Congress. For Obama to change a law that was passed by Congress, without first getting approval from Congress, is a violation of the Presidential oath that Obama took to uphold and defend the Constitution. What Obama did here is an action of a dictator, not an action of a President whose power is limited by a written constitution. If Obama can get away with this, then it sets a horribly dangerous precedent, and means that the President can arbitrarily make any change to any law that has been passed by Congress, without first getting approval from Congress.
After Obamacare was passed, 1199SEIU United Healthcare Workers East announced that it would drop health insurance for the children of more than 30,000 low-wage home attendants. Mitra Behroozi, executive director of benefit and pension funds for 1199SEIU stated
“… new federal health-care reform legislation requires plans with dependent coverage to expand that coverage up to age 26… meeting this new requirement would be financially impossible.”
Three years after Obama signed Obamacare, the New York Times reported that Obama would miss his own deadline for creating some of the insurance exchanges for small businesses.
U.S. Senator Max Baucus (D-Montana), one of the authors of Obamacare, said of it, “I just see a huge train wreck coming down.”
U.S. Senator Jay Rockefeller (D-West Virginia), another author of the law, said it was “beyond comprehension.”
Obama hired 16,500 new IRS agents to run Obamacare. But Obamacare is so awful that even the IRS agents who run it don’t want to participate in it. In July 2013, the National Treasury Employees Union, which represents the IRS employees who will be running Obamacare, provided a form letter to its members to send to their Congressmen. The letter stated:
“I am very concerned about legislation that has been introduced by Congressman Dave Camp to push federal employees out of the Federal Employees Health Benefits Program and into the insurance exchanges established under the Affordable Care Act.”
When asked about this, IRS chief Daniel Werfel responded by saying:
“I don’t want to speak for the NTEU, but I’ll offer a perspective as a federal employee myself and a federal employee at the IRS. And that is, we have right now as employees of the government, of the IRS, affordable health care coverage. I think the ACA was designed to provide an option or an alternative for individuals that do not. And all else being equal, I think if you’re an individual who is satisfied with your health care coverage, you’re probably in a better position to stick with that coverage than go through the change of moving into a different environment and going through that process. So I think for a federal employee, I think more likely, and I would — can speak for myself, I would prefer to stay with the current policy that I’m pleased with rather than go through a change if I don’t need to go through that change.”
In January 2013, the Wall Street Journal reported:
Some Unions Grow Wary of Health Law They Backed
Labor unions enthusiastically backed the Obama administration’s health-care overhaul when it was up for debate. Now that the law is rolling out, some are turning sour.
Union leaders say many of the law’s requirements will drive up the costs for their health-care plans and make unionized workers less competitive. Among other things, the law eliminates the caps on medical benefits and prescription drugs used as cost-containment measures in many health-care plans. It also allows children to stay on their parents’ plans until they turn 26.
Some 20 million Americans are covered by the health-care plans at issue
Top officers at the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, the AFL-CIO and other large labor groups plan to keep pressing the Obama administration to expand the federal subsidies to these jointly run plans, warning that unionized employers may otherwise drop coverage. A handful of unions say they already have examined whether it makes sense to shift workers off their current plans
“We are going back to the administration to say that this is not acceptable,” said Ken Hall, general secretary-treasurer for the Teamsters, which has 1.6 million members and dependents in health-care plans. Other unions involved in the push include the United Food and Commercial Workers International Union and Unite Here
Sheet Metal Workers Local 85 in Atlanta, which has about 1,900 members. Next year it must lift the $250,000 annual cap on the amount it will pay for medical claims. The law’s requirements will add between 50 cents to $1 an hour to the cost of members’ compensation package
In July 2013, three unions that supported the passage of Obamacare in 2010 (Teamsters, UFCW, and UNITE-HERE) sent a letter to Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi which is very heavily critical of Obamacare. Among other things, the letter states:
“The ACA will shatter not only our hard-earned health benefits, but destroy the foundation of the 40 hour work week that is the backbone of the American middle class.”
“The law creates an incentive for employers to keep employees’ work hours below 30 hours a week. Numerous employers have begun to cut workers’ hours to avoid this obligation, and many of them are doing so openly. The impact is two-fold: fewer hours means less pay while also losing our current health benefits.”
“Our health plans have been built over decades by working men and women. Under the ACA as interpreted by the Administration, our employees will treated differently and not be eligible for subsidies afforded other citizens. As such, many employees will be relegated to second-class status and shut out of the help the law offers to for-profit insurance plans.”
“These restrictions will make non-profit plans like ours unsustainable.”
“We can no longer stand silent in the face of elements of the Affordable Care Act that will destroy the very health and wellbeing of our members along with millions of other hardworking Americans.”
For some really hilarious displays of shock and outrage by supporters of Obamacare at how it’s harming low wage workers, check out these threads at Democratic Underground: one, two, three, four, and five.
Pittsburgh employers who voted for Obama are now refusing to pay for Obamacare. I’ve lived in Pittsburgh for 42 years. Everywhere I go, I always see a huge number of pro-Obama bumper stickers. The overwhelmingly vast majority of people in this city are Democrats. They love Obama. They adore him. They voted for him in both elections.
Obamacare requires all employers with 50 or more full time employees to purchase health insurance for those employees, or pay a substantial fine. Obamacare defines full time employment as 30 or more hours per week. Community College of Allegheny County has switched 200 of its adjunct professors and 200 of its other employees from full time to part time in order to avoid paying for health insurance for those 400 employees. This decision was made by high level administrators and executives. I’m certain that the vast majority of these higher ups voted for Obama in both elections. These high level employees have chosen to use a loophole to avoid paying for the very same insurance that they expect other employers to pay for. They voted for Obama. They supported Obamacare. But now they are exempting their own organization from paying for it. The stench of hypocrisy fills the air.
The Carnegie Museum in Pittsburgh has done the same thing. I’m certain that most of its higher ups voted for Obama. But now these very same higher ups have reduced the hours of 48 of their own employees in order to avoid paying for Obamacare. Again, this shows a tremendous amount of hypocrisy.
