Posted on 09/29/2013 6:22:29 AM PDT by Kaslin
While the media has been fixated on Republican infighting over how to deal with Obamacare, it has completely ignored the panic-induced irrational rhetoric coming from Democrats on the same subject.
No, they aren’t openly forming circular firing squads like Republicans do – progressives put their agenda above ego and public disagreement. But they are worried because, while Obamacare was built to fail, it wasn’t expected to fail so early. That failure puts at risk the progressive dream of single-payer health care in the United States.
We are moving past the “cost estimate” stage of Obamacare into reality of what Obamacare will mean to Americans’ pockets. As the state exchanges get ready to go live on Tuesday, the Department of Health and Human Services released the cost of insurance premiums for individuals in some states, and the numbers aren’t good.
Sure, progressive “journalists,” such as New York Magazine’s Jonathan Chait, took a thesaurus to White House press releases and published rewritten end zone dances, featuring lines like, “I grant that glitches and setbacks have occurred, mostly but not entirely because of fanatical Republican sabotage effort.”
While Chait was claiming premium “savings” and declaring, “I have yet to see a single conservative grapple with the positive developments,” serious analysts such as the Manhattan Institute’s Avik Roy brought some honesty to the table. He writes, “HHS compared what the Congressional Budget Office projected rates might look like—in 2016—to its own findings. Neither of those numbers tells you the stat that really matters: how much rates will go up next year, under Obamacare, relative to this year, prior to the law taking effect.”
In fact, Roy found that comparing apples to apples and not apples to Subarus, “Obamacare will increase underlying insurance rates for younger men by an average of 97 to 99 percent, and for younger women by an average of 55 to 62 percent.”
When the comparison is an honest one it is not much of a “positive development.”
This fact has progressives worried. Obamacare was designed to fail, but it was designed to fail eventually, not quickly. Progressives, with the help of the media, would blame a failure a few years from now on the “free market.” But failure from the start will force the blame fall where is squarely belongs – on government control.
How, you may ask, could an exchange set up, governed and subsidized by a government bureaucracy be called a “free market”? It’s already happened.
When Walgreens announced it planned to drop the insurance it has been providing employees because of Obamacare, none other than the Washington Post hailed it as a great development for them. Those 160,000 employees would not be able to keep the plan they had if they liked it, as the president repeatedly promised. Instead, they would be “joining a growing list of large employers seeking to control costs by having employees shop for coverage in a private marketplace.” (emphasis added)
Of course, there’s nothing “private” about it. But that lie is out there, with the credibility of none other than the Washington Post behind it. Which was the point. People who don’t pay attention will now be exposed to it, and it will spread.
Developments of this sort are now commonplace. The list of companies dropping coverage or cutting hours to avoid Obamacare’s costs now number more than 300 and is growing every day.
With this growing pressure and increasing public realization of the failures of Obamacare, its proponents are getting desperate. The plan is in motion. The law is in place. No matter how much spin they put on it, this lemon seems ready to collapse at the starting line. This is leading to some unhinged behavior.
This week Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., called opponents of Obamacare “anarchists” for working within the normal functions of government to defund it. The president’s senior advisor, Dan Pfeiffer, said the White House is “not for negotiating with people with a bomb strapped to their chest.” Ironically, he said this Thursday, the day before the president announced he’d spoken to the president of Iran, and while he is in the midst of negotiating with Syria over chemical weapons. No to talking with Republicans, yes to Iran and Syria.
Were the President a beer spokesman he might say, 'I don’t always associate with terrorists, but when I do, I prefer they be real terrorists and have been responsible for murdering Americans.' It’s appropriate, I suppose, because he is the “worst president in the world.”
The president himself is engaging in an ever-growing rhetorical meltdown. In his continued effort to sell Obamacare to the public, he’s been giving speeches about its virtues. Part of his rhetorical repertoire is the claim that “there's no serious evidence that the law … is holding back economic growth." The absurdity of this lie can be explained only by desperation or, as he has claimed in the cases of Fast & Furious and the IRS targeting of his political opponents, the president simply hasn’t read or seen any media stories about all the layoffs and cuts in hours.
As more of the train derails the rhetoric will become more desperate.
That’s why a one-year delay, the strategy being discussed now by Republicans, shouldn’t be pursued. A delay gives Obamacare time, and time is life. That’s why the president has delayed as many of the most egregious parts of the law. The further away from launch it collapses the more likely their plan to blame the private market is to work. Republicans should be doing what they can to speed up the inevitable collapse and suing to force the administration to have Obamacare implemented as it is written, as they wrote and passed it. After all, as they’ve been constantly reminding everyone, “It’s the law,” not “mostly the law.”
What Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, did this week was invaluable in that it forced the problems the government created to the top of the consciousness of the American public (though the media is trying to undo that damage). But the collective attention span of the American people is short. In a year or two it will be forgotten. The best chance to destroy Obamacare is to get out of its way and let nature take its course.
They've ALWAYS been unhinged.
Made M. Savage famous ... Liberalism is a mental disorder.
Let it burn, the quicker the collapse the more likely we will have a military dictatorship than a Communist hellhole. Buy stock in rope manufacturers, march on DC with nooses.
Problem is that Liberals are getting support on ObamaCare from the Liberal RINO PhonyCon Free Trader Commie Karl Rove faction of the GOP....the supporters of ObamaCare in the GOP
Sure, he's a self-absorbed power-hungry Marxist. But the above statement is really about perception, and that includes the perceptions of the low info voter. Today's Rasmussen Presidential Poll has O with 51% job approval, his highest in quite a while.
I agree about the delay. It’s inevitable so let it fall on their heads before 2014.
True - but if you haven't had a job longer than a few months in the last 20 years - live in Detroit and vote straight democrat - you'll be better off...
There’s not going to be a revolt on our side... we’re the people who believe in the rule of law - NOT of thugs. Our goal is to bring back a lawful fair society...
I could not agree more. Boehner is now doing the Democrats' bidding for them. Some of them had already floated this idea several months back, and now they have the Republicans doing it for them.
This thing needs to fail now - not after the 2014 elections. At this point, go for more spending cut instead somewhere else, but let this one be exposed for what it is. Remind voters how Democrats promised it to be revenue neutral, and then ask why Democrats need funding at all. But let it fail now, sooner rather than later. Let it fail.
Wanna really see Progressives flip their lids?
Play up the notion that there’s really no “organized” GOP opposition to ObamaCare. That the Dems have been so successful at destroying the GOP and relegating it to a state/regional Party (something a lot of them have been gleeful about, but without understanding that such still results in a majority-GOP House of Reps) that there’s really NO ONE IN CHARGE and Senators/Congressmen who happen to call themselves “Republicans” are really free-agents that need to be negotiated with on an individual level. And since they have no fear of losing their seats (state/regional party, remember?) they can’t really be negotiated with. Let alone held to any sort of party discipline.
I’ve triggered several “Oh SH*T” moments by Liberals/Progressives on FB with that one over the last couple days. “Congratulations! You won! Now you get to feel what it was like to be President Bush after taking out Saddam Hussein! Hope you’ve secured your investments properly!”
We will not get the rule of law back without a revolt on our side.Look how bad things have gotten because we don’t fight like the left does.
And thanks to Cruz and Lee, those that are for it, those that have been protecting it, and those that are against it are out in the open for all the people to see.
My first choice is repeal. My second is defunding. My third is delay. I think it’s the way of least harm at this point.
There is what you want and what you can get. The Senate effectively killed the defund option. The House has already decided that it isn’t going to defend that patch of ground, so why belabor it? The question is whether delay is acceptable as opposed to full implementation?
I understand the sentiments expressed to just let the act go into law and let the ‘rats own it. Understood, but it overlooks the real harm that will come to Americans if it does go into effect. I agree that in war there are times when the “best” choice amongst bad choices is to call in artillery on your own position. This is not one of those times. There are other options on the table.
What ultimately convinced me to come in favor of delay is a detail that has been talked about a bit but not so much: the situation with the computer software. It’s just not ready. And that has the potential to cause a complete meltdown. Yes, it would be gratifying to watch the ‘rat’s beloved mcconnelcare crash and burn in a sadistic sort of way, but don’t forget that real Americans would be harmed as a result. If our best argument for conservatism is that we’ll harm Americans less, but we’re still OK with harming them, then I think we’ve already lost.
Second, delay allows us time to make our arguments and continue the steady drip, drip, drip of negative information coming out about mcconnelcare. One thing that we have now that we didn’t have even a month ago is the costs of coverage under the exchanges. We have the real data. Not conjecture: this is what mcconnelcare is going to cost YOU. That will allow for websites like www.seehowbadACAis.com Don’t underestimate the value of sticker shock. Also, if worse does come to worst a year from now, we will have had time to educate people on the ramifications of noncompliance.
Also, there is some PR value to be had in having stood back from the initial position of defund. Our side has given some. The other side is refusing to even negotiate. While we shouldn’t expect anything but propaganda from the MSM, the truth has a way of getting out.
I don’t trust Speaker Boehner to stand firm on anything. But simply because he hasn’t the last 50 times doesn’t necessarily mean that he won’t shock us and do it this time. And I did notice the information coming to light that the gop conference is pretty happy with this. That includes some fairly good conservatives that are not in a mood to agree with much of anything. I understand it isn’t much, but you fight with the Army you have, not the one you wish you had.
Finally, I think that digging in on delay will cause some defections on the other side. Joe Manchin being the first, but I think there will be others. The other side is evil, but they aren’t completely stupid. They know this isn’t ready for prime time and I’d bet they’re not all that keen on being left holding the bag if it collapses in a heap. Dingy Hairy can talk the talk, but I doubt that he’ll be able to keep all of his members in line if the House digs in it’s heels on a one year delay.
“I have yet to see a single conservative grapple with the positive developments,”
There are NO positive developments! Unfortunately many doctors have already retired as they will not work under the thumb of the Government. The Government has already issued mandatory regulations that have cut services and raised insurance premiums. Which, of course, will be blamed on the insurance companies. And one more thing, when any of them proclaim ‘it’s the law of the land’ when is SOMEONE going to shout ‘SO IS ARRESTING LAWBREAKERS, SUCH AS ILLEGAL IMMIGRANTS, BUT YOU DON’T CARE ABOUT THAT’. The real problem here is the most corrupt Admin we have ever witnessed only enforces the laws they want to enforce. It will take decades to undo all the destruction they have wrought, if we are even given the chance to try.
Totally off the subject, but the first time I saw this guy on TV, before he even spoke, mentally I saw a picture of "I am a d**k" tattooed across his forehead. He and Tamara Holder have to be the two biggest douches in the political sphere.
Up until now, they been fed nothing but roses. Once they try using those roses, they will quickly find out that those roses are really dead ragweed.
Liberals are the violent ones - look at Chicago.
And the problem for all of them is that people are not being fooled. And it's not just the conservatives that are having their eyes opened.
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