Free Republic

With a little tax planning -- or even divorce -- wealthy Americans can easily bilk Obamacare out of tens of thousands of dollars in taxpayer subsidies to cover their insurance costs, according to a “how-to” written by a well-known financial advisor. David John Marotta, of Marotta Wealth Management in Charlottesville, Va., said just a few lifestyle changes would enable a family that owns a business providing income of $140,000 to legally win enough subsidies to cover all but $600 of a $10,825 Obamacare silver plan policy. “In trying to make Obamacare a middle-class entitlement, the legislation encourages even wealthy people...

WASHINGTON, May 19 (Reuters) - President Barack Obama chastised his Republican opponents on Monday for focusing criticism on the events surrounding the deaths of four Americans in Benghazi, Libya, and on his signature healthcare law."The debate we're having now is about what, Benghazi? Obamacare? And it becomes this endless loop. It's not serious. It's not speaking to the real concerns that people have," Obama said.He was speaking to more than 60 people at a fundraising dinner for Democratic candidates for the House of Representatives.The event took place at a physician's home in the Washington suburb of Potomac, Maryland, as Obama...

WASHINGTON-- This week, U.S. Senators John Cornyn (R-TX) and Ted Cruz (R-TX) and U.S. Congressman Pete Sessions (TX-32) and his colleagues filed an amicus brief and joined a court challenge to the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, specifically challenging the legality of that law. The PPACA, which effectively originated as legislation in the Senate, raises revenue through the individual mandate, which violates the Constitutional clause that requires any bill which raises revenue to originate in the House of Representatives. “The President has changed the law six ways to Sunday in order to satisfy political donors, provide breaks to Big...

More workers hired to process Obamacare applications are revealing how they've been filling their days sleeping, playing board games, reading, or fighting with each other on many days when there was little or no work. "I walk out every day feeling as if I have contributed nothing," a worker from the London, Ky., Serco facility told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch on Thursday. A former worker at a processing center in Wentzville, Mo., processing facility, Lavonne Takatz, said she and other workers played games or slept because there was nothing for them to do. She and other workers said company and...

The government may be paying incorrect subsidies to more than 1 million Americans for their health plans in the new federal insurance marketplace and has been unable so far to fix the errors, according to internal documents and three people familiar with the situation. The problem means that potentially hundreds of thousands of people are receiving bigger subsidies than they deserve. They are part of a large group of Americans who listed incomes on their insurance applications that differ significantly — either too low or too high — from those on file with the Internal Revenue Service, documents show. So...

Did you catch the story about those conservative Republican male chauvinist pig politicians in Florida who think that it was a waste of time to pass a bill which would make it a crime for a guy to secretly administer an abortion-inducing drug to a spouse or partner he impregnated? How utterly outrageous ... Wait a minute ... It was Democratic National Committee Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz who said that? C'mon, that's not possible. What? There's audio of her saying that on a Florida public radio station? Get outta here. If that were true, the press would be printing and...

Consumers who purchased new health plans from Blue Shield of California have sued the insurer, claiming they were misled into thinking the insurance would cover their desired doctors and hospitals. In their complaint filed in California state court on Wednesday, San Francisco residents John Harrington and Alex Talon accused Blue Shield of misrepresenting that their plans, sold on California´s health exchange, would cover the full provider network advertised on the company´s website. They sued on behalf of a class of people who had purchased so-called "preferred provider organization" plans from the insurer only to realize that the doctor and hospital

A belated response to the uproar after Rand Paul told an NYT reporter that the GOP’s voter-ID push was “offending people.” After reading this, I think the Guardian has his position right: “Rand Paul believes in voter ID laws. He just doesn’t think Republicans should talk about them so much.”Good enough? [T]his statement comes from Paul’s former chief of staff and current PAC director.“Senator Paul was having a larger discussion about criminal justice reform and restoration of voting rights, two issues he has been speaking about around the country and pushing for in state and federal legislation. “In the...

“This is the law. And every two years — let me tell you something. Every two years I come to the Congress, just like my good friend, Mr. Labrador, we put up our hands to swear to uphold the Constitution and the laws of this country. It is the law.” That’s what Democrat Rep. Elijah Cummings told Anderson Cooper last October. What was he talking about you may wonder. Was it the disastrous Fast and Furious scandal and the cover-up that followed? No, Rep. Cummings dismissed questions over the DOJ Attorney General Eric Hold’s role in the affair as “an...

The health care law has opened up an unusual opportunity for some mothers-to-be to save on medical bills for childbirth. Lower-income women who signed up for a private policy in the new insurance exchanges will have access to additional coverage from their state’s Medicaid program if they get pregnant. Some women could save hundreds of dollars on their share of hospital and doctor bills. Medicaid already pays for nearly half of U.S. births, but this would create a way for the safety-net program to supplement private insurance for many expectant mothers. Officials and advocates say the enhanced coverage will be...

The Republican Party has a big financial advantage heading into the 2014 election, thanks in large part to the growing presence of conservative outside groups. But just looking at raw dollars spent by these groups misses a key point: A huge chunk of that money is being used to tear down fellow Republicans. According to a great new study from the Center for Public Integrity's Dave Levinthal, conservative super PACs and other outside groups this year have spent nearly three times as much money directly attacking fellow Republicans ($9.7 million) as directly attacking Democrats ($3.7 million).

Insurance Execs: Premiums Are Not Lowering Under ObamacareA group of top health insurance executives on Capitol Hill Wednesday stayed stock-still when asked whether they expected families they insure to experience a lowering of their premiums under Obamacare. Rep. Morgan Griffith (R., Va.) extended the question, and awkward silence ensued:

RomneyCare’s pioneering health insurance exchange is headed for the scrap heap. Bay State officials are taking steps this week to junk central parts of their dysfunctional health insurance exchange—the model for President Barack Obama’s health care law—and merge with the federal enrollment site HealthCare.gov. The decision is part of an expensive plan that would occur alongside a parallel, last-ditch attempt to still build a working state system. The state on Monday announced the hiring of hCentive, a Virginia-based contractor that helped construct the Kentucky and Colorado exchanges. The company would rush to build a viable state exchange in time for...

“Thnx Mr. President!” That’s what former MSNBC anchor Dylan Ratigan had to say to President Obama in a tweet earlier today. He was saying it sarcastically. You know, like when you say “thanks a lot!” to someone who bumps into you in the hallway, causing you to spill your coffee all over your clothes. But Mr. Ratigan experienced something far worse than a coffee spill. His health insurance premiums are skyrocketing thanks to the hilariously named Affordable Care Act. What happened? Well, for starters, Ratigan had catastrophic health insurance coverage. That means that he sees himself as pretty healthy and...

Joni Ernst, a Republican Senate candidate in Iowa, was made in the Sarah Palin mold — her first TV ad focused on her experience castrating hogs. Perhaps high off the buzz and Palin endorsement that that ad generated, Ernst just released another TV spot that is beyond parody. The 30-second spot, titled "Shot," features Ernst at the shooting range, "unloading" on Obamacare. The narrator's lines sound like a Palin speech run through the shredder. As Ernst rides into the frame on a Harley, we hear, "Conservative Joni Ernst: Mom, Farm Girl, and a Lieutenant Colonel who carries more than just...

The latest USA Today/Pew survey shows Obamacare polling as poorly as it ever has: Views of ACA Little Changed. As other recent national polls have shown, including the April health care tracking survey by the Kaiser Family Foundation, the recent surge in signups for the new health care exchanges has had little impact on public opinion about the Affordable Care Act. In fact, the share disapproving of the law (55%) is as high as it ever has been in the four-year history of the law. Just 41% approve of the 2010 health care law.

Leaders of both parties in Tennessee are condemning a blog post by a state senator likening the federal health care law to the deportation of Jews to concentration camps in the 1940s. Republican Sen. Stacey Campfield of Knoxville said on his blog that Democrats boasting of about the number of people who have signed for coverage as required by the federal health care law is like “Germans bragging about the number of mandatory sign-ups for ‘train rides’ for Jews in the 40s.” …

On May 8th, oral arguments will take place in the D.C. Circuit Court Of Appeals concerning the unconstitutional manner in which the Affordable Care Act was assembled and placed before congress for passage. According to the Origination Clause in Article 1 of the Constitution, “All Bills for raising Revenue shall originate in the House of Representatives; but the Senate may propose or concur with Amendments as on other Bills.” In 2009, the House passed a bill concerning proposed tax credits for members of the military who were first time home buyers. The Senate took that Bill, removed ALL of the...

I thought Mika was going to cry as she presented the bad news in this new poll that basically shows that people are fed up with Democrats:

Little was sacred when President Barack Obama tossed out playful but pointed jokes Saturday night—not even his own health care plan. “We rolled out healthcare.gov. That could have gone better,” Obama said in remarks at the annual White House Correspondents’ Association dinner. “In 2008 my slogan was ‘Yes we can.’ In 2013 my slogan was ‘Control-alt-delete.’” On the plus side, the president said, “they did turn the launch of healthcare.gov into one of the year’s biggest movies.” On a screen flashed the poster for “Frozen.” …