Posted on 11/17/2013 7:22:56 AM PST by Kaslin
Mr. Humpty Dumpty provided the lesson.
Not a novel lesson, I grant you. All the great sages gave similar warnings: “Don’t bite off more than you can chew”; “Look before you leap”; “Don’t put all your eggs in one basket.” So, I repeat, not novel. Call it oval, in honor of Mr. Dumpty — or, more properly, ovoid, because three-dimensional. And because it was President Barack Obama who had the pride, it was he who went before the fall, pushing his ovoid — Obamacare — off the wall.
And now he can’t avoid the fallout.
Which is a broken medical insurance market. Indeed, a shattered legacy, for which grand effort by all his horses, all his men — every last functionary and flunky and fizzled fanatic — will be of no use.
This is one mess that won’t be cleaned up to the satisfaction of its original proponents.
But, you object, Obama didn’t push his ovoid off the wall. What happened was Congress passed the monstrosity without reading it, and Obama signed it without comprehending it, all against much protest . . . that’s an awful lot like a shove.
There were reasons Americans resisted, the largest being that pregnant Tea Party query, “why start a new ‘entitlement’ program when all the other major welfare programs are on the brink of bankruptcy?”
Democrats had grown too confident of their historical mission to put more and more of American society under government control. Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid — these were Democratic badges of honor. The fact that these were all poised to land splat on the pages of history, like a trio of ovoid eggs, did not faze them, for these partisans have (as I explained last week) the hubris to think they can fix anything broken — but their faith in government means any fix can only be seen as a fix if it involves more government. Hence Obamacare, which was supposed to make medicine so much less expensive that it would solve the Medicare and Medicaid problem snap, just like that.
It didn’t work that way.
There’s nothing about a government program that produces automatic cost savings. And these true believers didn't realize the basic Obamacare rationale — put all potential patients under one plan, and then equalize costs from that universal risk group, redistributing the results of the genetic lottery (now much in the news) based on a social engineer’s utopian actuarials — could not hope to work. Monopolies raise costs. Fake markets implode. Besides, insurance is a business based on information, particular information, and everything in the socialistic arsenal of the Democrats’ grab-bag approach to reform screams suppression of relevant information. It is, as I suggested before, a war on information.
They were misinformed. Disinformed. By their own audacious hopes and dreams. Yes, they could screw things up royally. Which brings us back to the king’s horses and men.
In the very first, original nursery rhyme, it read:
Four-score Men and Four-score more,
Could not make Humpty Dumpty where he was before.
And, just so, it’s not going to be easy to bring order to the mess that Democrats have created.
All those cancelled insurance policies? They worked in their time, in part, because enough people applied and passed the qualifications for each. People didn’t get them randomly. And once nixed, by government regulation — by Obaminable regulations — the offering companies had moved on, investing heavily in the new regime.
Which now lies shattered.
Where to go?
The initial suggestion by the administration, that the extra costs of new “above sub-par” policies be subsidized by the taxpayer, was audacity itself, a sort of extra loop of subsidy that didn’t solve a thing. But it did show the utter vacuity of Obamacare’s proponents, how addicted to government they are. It’s worth reminding ourselves that the last century’s most cynical political wisdom, “to make an omelette, you’ve got to break a few eggs,” was said by a communist, and from such folks we learned that a lot of eggs can be broken and all we have to show for it is death, destruction, and tyranny.
Now that they frantically grab for the remote controls, trying to hit rewind and watch Humpty de-dumped and replaced to pre-Obamacare heights, we’re left to watch the scurrying. The likelihood of success seems slim.
Life doesn’t have rewind buttons. From the shattered eggshell and splattered yolk we need a new start.
Don’t put back together the previous, out-of-control system. And don’t launch yet another ovoid.
Avoid that at all costs.
Just remember: The crack-up is in the past. Piecing it back together is not an option. We need another model for a less frangible alternative. And the best one doesn’t require over-design. Freedom and responsibility mean that the best future for medicine is one not cooked up by the king’s henchmen and insider wonks. Provide the even playing field: Free trade and free contract, a rule of law for responsibility and accountability, and (yes) freed markets.
Anything else is just a bad egg that’ll go splat. [references]
Could not happen to a more deserving SOB.
The only thing that government EVER did that worked.... is called AREA 51.
“The crack-up is in the past.”
Egg-zactly! ; )
If you have ever smelled a rotton egg when it dropped, it smells pretty horrible.
You know, whenever the Congress codifies 2300 pages, it is not subject to interpretation by the executive. They did so to make it impossible for a president with more mental horsepower than a guppy to change it on his own figuring they would hold one house to stop any modification to the O care act which they railroaded through. So, IMO, the Congressional intent is well established here: there was to be little or no implementation changes or reworks by the Executive.
All these “changes” to action dates is not subject to the descretion of his excellency. In fact, the changes he has unilaterally put forth would at a minimum have to be announced through the federal register with the waiting period for comment and review by Congress. So, this entire law now has become a whim of his excellency and needs be removed from the statutes, perhaps right after he is removed from power.
There’s another ovoid in play here. It is the product of a special goose, the productive members of our society.
But the goose has been plucked and probed and punished, and golly, no more golden eggs are produced.
Short version.
obama laid an egg.
What people have a hard time understanding Obama is a narcissist. He doesn’t care what his party or the country thinks at all. He knows he has got 38 months in the White House no matter what.Then a great retirement. Him and his teleprompter will make a fortune on the speaking circuit. He’ll have plenty of True Believers to feed his inflated ego. Bomber Bill will help with another book or two, He’ll move to a beach front mansion in Hawaii with plenty of mirrors and pictures of himself in it. Life is good for him in his world.
Certainly, if the GOP had successfully delayed Obamacare for a year, it would have signaled the end of Obamacare and the beginning of the rewrite.....but, that still would have been a better political option than what Obama did instead...which was to call the GOP Tyrants, arsonists, and racists and let the ACA run havoc on the nation.
It is my belief that not since President Wilson have we had a more racist President in office. It is certain he seees the political right as the standard bearer of classism, bigotry, and sexism. He will no more have anything to do with the political right than you or I would to do with the KKK. That's how warped his brain is and that's how little respect he has for half of this country.
He doesn't just see the political right as ‘wrong’, he sees us as evil. It's not only insulting and hurtful, it's a crappy approach to leadership....which is why we end up with garbage like ACA.
President Obama throws red-meat to his true-believers, but that's basically all he's done for the last five years. He's a man of little accomplishment and even less intellect all while possessing the most rueful hatred and disrespect of the political right....and he will remain so for the rest of his term.
I did not much care for President Clinton, but on some level I understood him to be on the side of America. Conversely, Obama reminds me of a lonely alligator floating ominously in a nearby watering hole.....He seems detached from this time period and common sense says that it's best to keep your distance.
A turd is always a turd no matter how it is dressed up, sanitized and ground up. Milorganite (milwaukee wis sanitary waste that is sold as a fertilizer - it is still a turd)
Why are you in shock? It’s either his way or the highway. He proved it again by threatening to veto Congress man Upton’s Keep your plan act.
impeachment is coming!!!!!!!!!
he be going 2 jail.
The way I see it, he stepped in his own sh*t. A gentleman doesn't leave sh*t for others to clean up. A smart man takes a sh*t where it can't be seen. A careful man doesn't back into where he dropped his sh*t. And an honest man doesn't blame others for the sh*t he stepped in. Obama is none of these, not a gentleman, not smart, careful nor honest. Obama is simply all sh*t.
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