Posted on 02/14/2013 4:41:43 AM PST by Kaslin
This is a time when the population of America should be throwing rose petals at the feet of the Great Leader, Miracle Worker, Economist, Ph.D and Professor of Constitutional history, Dr. Barack H. Obama, MD.
All of our problems should be solved now.
Two years ago we were told and sold that Obamacare, the keystone legislative effort of Obama’s first two years, would solve our problems when it comes to out-of-control government spending.
It’s a deficit reducer, Washington Post wonk Ezra Klein told us about the government takeout of healthcare under the banner of “reform.”
Just pass Obamacare and we’ll find out how good it is, said Nancy Pelosi, which proved in the end to be a kind of a epitaph for her Speakership of the House.
Imagine how upsetting it might be now, two years later, to discover that the White House thinks that government spending isn’t out control, but that, “to be clear,” as the president himself might say, we have a HUGE problem with healthcare spending. Of all things.
Um, Obamacare? Anyone? Helllloooo?
“I think every economist worth this -- whose insights into this area are worth the paper on which his or her Ph.D. is printed,” said White House Press Jester Jay Carney recently “would tell you that the principal driver when it comes to spending of our deficits and debt is health care spending. And that's just a fact.”
Oh, it’s facts they want?
OK, well here are a few more facts:
If we just keep pace with spending as it stands now, and don’t add any extra measures, the CBO predicts that interest rates will double in the next four years to over 5 percent for the ten-year Treasury Notes. That means that interest on our national debt will approach $1 trillion annually, making interest on the national debt the fastest growing portion of the federal budget.
Now that’s just a fact.
By 2017 interest could be the third largest line item in the federal government.
And Obamacare, far from solving the spending crunch, will accelerate it.
“Spending for major health care programs will be nearly 5 percent of GDP in 2013,” says the Congressional Budget Office [CBO] “and such spending is projected to grow rapidly when provisions of the Affordable Care Act are fully implemented by mid-decade, reaching 6.2 percent of GDP in 2023.”
That means that that 12 percent of our GDP will be dedicated to federal government payments servicing debt and healthcare by 2023 assuming the sunshine and roses predictions of the CBO on GDP growth after 2013.
There is reason to doubt those assumptions.
Already Obamacare, which was scored by the CBO as a deficit-reducing program, has seen private insurance rates skyrocket. The Kaiser Family Health Foundation has found private healthcare insurance premiums have risen over 24 percent in 2012.
Even employer-sponsored plans aren’t immune from inflation. It turns out that when the federal government tells insurance companies that they must cover certain conditions, insurance companies need money to cover costs. In turn, that means they must raise rates.
Only career government types wouldn’t think of that- or better yet ignore it.
“As we wrote in October,” says D’Angelo Gore, of FactCheck.org, “the new law has caused about a 1 percent to 3 percent increase in health insurance premiums for employer-sponsored family plans because of requirements for increased benefits. Last year’s premium increases cast even more doubt on another promise the president has made — that the health care law would ‘lower premiums by up to $2,500 for a typical family per year.’”
Just a few short years after passage of the most ambitious social welfare program ever, Congress, the public, economists and even supporters were dissatisfied.
There were questions about benefits; there were question about affordability; there were question of whether the plan was going to benefit anyone but the federal government.
That program of course was Social Security, which was billed as an insurance scheme as well.
“Since then its purchasers, the nation's taxpayers, have had occasion to read their policy carefully,” wrote Time Magazine in February of 1939, “and, if they have detected no outright jokers, their reaction has been such that practically every politician in the U. S. from Franklin Roosevelt down has put revision of Social Security at the top of his must list.”
Standby now for similar problems with Obamacare, because the law that was supposed to help control healthcare costs won’t do it and even the mainstream media, the White House and maybe –gasp- Ezra Klein are alive to this fact.
“But will they slow down Medicare spending enough to make a dent in the tidal wave of spending as baby boomers retire?” ask Josh Gerstein and Darren Samuelsohn of Politico in their fact check on the State of the Union. “Too soon to know — and the doubters aren’t all in the far right wing of the Republican party.”
But the doubters, like me, are there too. We've just been there longer.
Ransom has become one of my favorite conservative reads lately. Jim’s titles alone break down the issues in such a clear and straightforward way. We have to make blunt and simple arguments. He seems to be doing a great job of it.
It was about DEATH PANELS for Christians and Jews,
but NOT Islam nor Congress nor Obama and their staff.
ObamaCARE was designed to kill Americans other
than Moslems and Congress and Obama and their staff.
Totalitarianism. You are FORCED...
It was about power, control, and money.
Not saving money, but who controls how it is spent. Instead of the consumer deciding, government decides.
Yep. It is totalitarianism, masked with “It is for the good of the poor/immigrants/children...”
In reality, is is doing what liberals do best, saying “YOU don’t know how best to spend the money you have. WE know best...”
We weree fed a blatant pack of obvious lies.
The REAL question, for me, is why didn’t ANYBODY NOTICE??
Could it just be that nobody on our side made lying an ISSUE IN A CAMPAIGN? One Congressman called Barry out in public—and guess WHICH SIDE jumped all over him for “incivility”?
RINORomney called him “misguided”, but still a “nice guy”—jeeeeze Louise, if that’s your arguement NO WONDER YOU LOST.
At the VERY LEAST, you have to have the guts (balls?) to call a spade a spade. (He’s not black, he’s Arab BTW—so i can say that and not be wayyysist.)
“The REAL question, for me, is why didn’t ANYBODY NOTICE??”
Everyone noticed. Then they asked, “what is more important to me, rising healthcare costs that someone else will pay for or having a white President, who won’t give me a free Obama phone?”
“Just pass Obamacare and we’ll find out how good it is, said Nancy Pelosi...”
THIS kind of statement about ANY legislation (no matter WHO makes it) is proof positive that NOTHING in the said legislation is good for America.
“Every thing secret degenerates, even the administration of justice; nothing is safe that does not show how it can bear discussion and publicity.” Lord Acton
Nit-wit Nancy’s statement HAD to be the deal breaker in ANY logical and responsible discourse!
What was Obama”Care” about...PURE GOVERNMENT CONTROL OF OUR LIVES!
If I have to belong to an insurance company and give them money from the sweat of my labors -whether I have a job or not - then how is that any different than being a serf in a feudal society? Instead of castles its glass towers, but as of obamacare, every U.S. citizen is now the property of some insurance lord.
Yes, and about the power to control every aspect of our lives, right down to creating a dependency on the government for our very health. We will have to surrender everything in exchange for the chance at health care. Those who can no longer pay anything into the government, and who are only “takers”, will be the first to be cut loose and left to suffer and die. Citizens will only be useful if they can create revenue for the government, and the welfare state always voting for Dems will no longer be an issue, because EVERYONE will have to play by the government rules or be left to die of disease or injury.
I’d be willing to bet 90% of the people who voted for him knew absolutely nothing about obamacare other than they think they’ll get free health insurance. And preventive care will cut down on emergency room visits.
I know people from socialist countries who hate their own system but voted for this one. That proves their ignorance of the law. I also know healthcare workers who voted for it. And that REALLY proves their ignorance.
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