The Republicans sabotaged Obamacare…
…by telling the truth about it, instead of lying like the Democrats.
Those dirty Republicans.
The New Neo
A blog about political change, among other things
…by telling the truth about it, instead of lying like the Democrats.
Those dirty Republicans.
The suddenly discovered, supposed massive health “Emergency” used to justify Obamacare and to ram this massive bill through by questionable Parliamentary tactics, after little consideration, and in the dead of night with not one single Republican voting for it, was “ginned up.” While there were and are admitted problems with our private health care system here in the U.S., our private health care system provides some of the best health care in the world, there was no such “Emergency,” and the problems that were there could have been solved with carefully targeted legislation. But, such limited, carefully targeted legislation would not enable the Left and Democrats to “fundamentally transform” the United States, nor do the same to each individual’s relationship to the State the way Obamacare would.
The plight and number of those supposedly “uncovered” by health insurance —“uncovered” people without insurance already assured by Federal law of free access to and free treatment by any and every Emergency Room in the country–was exaggerated. Exaggerated, too was the number that Obamacare would bring into the Obamacare “system,” for it is reported that Obamacare is still not going to cover many tens of millions of people.
We were told–over and over again by Obama, by his spokesmen, allies and minions, by many individual Democrats, by the MSM, and by various other NGOs and Leftists with a dog in the hunt that “if we liked our health insurance we could keep it, and “if we liked our doctor we could keep him” as well; all lies readily exposed by the dislocations and millions of health care policy cancellations in just these first few weeks, with much worse and tens more millions of cancellations to come.
We were told that many impossible things would happen; that no one could be denied insurance, no one could be “dropped” by his insurance company, coverage for preexisting conditions would be universal, and there would be no limits on the amount paid for coverage for individuals. We were also told that Obamacare would also pay to cover many more things, and another thirty million people would now be eligible for coverage.
Yet, we were also told, that each and every one of these obviously very costly changes would somehow magically “bend the cost curve down,” and that a typical family’s health insurance premium would decrease on average by $2,500 dollars per year for all that better coverage. Now, we find out that individuals or that family are, instead, likely to be paying several thousand dollars more per year for coverage that, in many cases, they do not need i.e. whether they like it or not, whether they realize it or not, the “haves” are going to be forced to involuntarily pay higher premiums to pay for the health care coverage of the “have nots”.
Then, there is Harvard’s Dr. Ezekiel Emmanuel, who designed the Obamacare panel which is to determine what level and kind of drugs, medical procedures, and care individuals will get. Yet, despite his very well-known advocacy for his “whole life system”–which gives highest priority for health care to the “productive and taxpaying” young, and less priority to the newborn and old (the young not even worthy of consideration until something like six months of age, and the old sometimes derided in the intellectual circles in which Dr. Emanuel travels as just unproductive “eaters”), and which calibrates an individual’s access to health care, a system that determines the type and scope of coverage, and the amount allowed to be paid (rationed) yearly for that individual’s health care based on that person’s age, stage of life, productivity, and “social utility,” we were told over and over again that there would absolutely be no “death panels.” Yet, that is exactly what has been set up, how they will function, and what they are.
And we are only, as yet, at the very beginning stage of the implementation of Obamacare, and the radical, sweeping, and fundamental changes it will make in every aspect of our lives, in the power relationship between each person and the government, and in the United States.
Now, increasing numbers of us are coming to realize with horror that Obamacare’s almost universally derided critics were right, and that everything that we were told about the “Affordable Care Act” i.e.”Obamacare” by President Obama and the Democrats–echoed by the MSM and assorted other Leftist minions and partisans–from start to finish, top to bottom, back to front–was a series of coldly and carefully crafted, calculated lies.
We recognize that, rather than being a grand, very well thought out, absolutely necessary, comprehensive scheme to address a massive health Emergency, Obamacare was merely the subterfuge under which the Left and Democrats would try to carry out, by stealth, their long sought after goal of “fundamentally transforming” the United States. This by–after already having seized a good chunk of the auto industry, the banking industry, and attaining a government monopoly over the mortgage industry, and over student loans, thereby destroying a good bit of the capitalist economy–the government would now seize control over a further sixth of our economy which, in this case, would enable it to force the United States a long way down the road to becoming a Socialist state by destroying our private health care system, and by “redistributing” massive amounts of wealth (i.e. in the form of massively increased premiums for health care insurance) from the upper and middle classes to “subsidize” the lower class, thereby “redistributing” massive amounts of decision making power and control from individuals to the government as well.
All this on the road to a state run “single payer system” in which the government is the “payer” who calls the tune. Obamacare really a scheme to limit and circumscribe the power of the individual to make his own economic, spending, life style, and health care decisions, by giving the government a decisive role in deciding issues of health care and, by extension, almost everything else for each and every person in the U.S.
Altogether a nasty, malevolent, deeply subversive, quite comprehensive collection of deliberate lies, and so comprehensive, subversive, and consequential a set of lies needs to be severely punished in the economy, in the courts, in Congress, in the public square, and at the ballot box.
OT but neo could you possibly revisit the Obama,fool or knave question again in light of recent developments?
There would seem to be an increasingly heavy thumb on the fool side of the scale.
Or perhaps Obama is just a Republican mole intent on forever discrediting the progressive agenda??
kaba:
I have revisited it several times recently, although not in depth.
But for quite some time my answer has been: both. And his greatest strength—the area in which he has been least a fool—is campaigning. His problem right now is that his knavishness has been more exposed to the public because of his foolishness, and because of his cleverness at campaigning.
His promises were too clever by a half. They did the trick—they helped get him elected in a very close race. But the delayed reaction when the reality of Obamacare hit has damaged him now. Will it do him—and Obamacare—in, politically speaking? Not sure. But it certainly has gotten more traction than any other of his knavish enterprises.
What are you going to believe? Chairman O or your lying eyes!
Yes, people who are telling the truth about the Obamacare predicate (how could anyone not know by now anyway?) are sabotaging “the law”. A concept, “the law”, for which Democrats have suddenly and remarkably developed an ostentatious reverence; one which was heretofore much less than obvious .
What was that Scalia said about when stare decisis become important to the left?
“The law” …
Neo, you no doubt remember the Fuller – Hart debates from your philosophy of law undergrad classes? I think I’ll dust off my old copy of “The Morality of Law”, and just for a gas see how many rules for valid lawmaking, those “internal morality of the law” rules Obamacare’s passage and implementation overtly or implicitly violated.
“You have to pass it so you can find out what is in it”
http://www.repository.law.indiana.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=3571&context=ilj
Now, even that sell-out Bart Stupak is complaining. Not that he’s displeased with the mandate itself …
Remember, Roman, truth is lies, lies are truth, and we have always been at war with Eastasia.
“……the old sometimes derided in the intellectual circles in which Dr. Emanuel travels as just unproductive “eaters”),”
I happen to be one of the eaters. I saved and invested during my productive years. I now pay for all the things I consume, except healthcare. However, with a deductible of $7500 and 20% co-pays, I could handle my medical bills as well. In addition, what I have saved and invested in helps the economy. I also do volunteer work and try to do my share for charity. I may just be an eater to intellects like Dr. Emmanuel, but there will be a small hole left when I depart this mortal coil. Most of the old codgers I am acquainted with are pretty much like me. Not dependent on anyone except for Medicare, and doing some things to make life better in their communities. Do I produce wealth anymore? Nope, but I am preserving wealth – something that’s almost as good. Certainly better than the rat holes the progressives are using to destroy wealth. When Dr. Emmanuel gets to a more advanced age, I would like to ask him if he considers himself to be nothing more than an eater, a drag on society, a disposable clump of parasitic cells. The so-called eaters among the elderly are those with Alzheimer’s and dementia, conditions that they did not choose and cannot help. Ethics requires that we take care of them even though it’s expensive. Will IPABs enact rules for doing away with that care as expensive and wasted on unproductive eaters? If Obamacare can’t be repealed, it could come to pass.
” instead of lying like the Democrats”
That is what I suspect few liberals have yet to realize.
The lies were not just Obama’s alone, nor even Pelosi’s. The left and some liberals KNEW they were lies and colluded in the lies. The Clinton’s knew they were lies, Obama plagiarized his, “if you like your plan, you can keep your plan, period” from an earlier H. Clinton statement. Several democrat congressmen have admitted they knew. Liberal journalists knew.
The lies extend far beyond Obama. That is why Millbank and his ilk dare not speak the truth.
Jimmy, just search on “Liverpool Care Pathway” for a preview of what the malevolent Ezekiel Emmanuel has in mind for the old folks.
He, of course, will be protected as part of the oligarchy as long as he lives.
One more thing: when the fertilizer hits the fan about how Lousy the “coverage” is on the more affordable Obamacare plans, there will be more heads exploding from coast to coast.
Complaining about the insurance companies paying only 80%? Wait until Obamacare reimburses you [maybe, after all, they’re the Government] just 60% or 70%!
Complaining about hospital costs under your “junk” insurance? Wait until you have the extra-special Obamacare 50% “cost-sharing” for hospitalization!
I hope the Repubs can restrain themselves from jumping in to help the leftwingers salvage this mess. They could assume an attitude of humility, and say, “We wouldn’t presume to invade Your Program — this is Your bailiwick.” And stand back and let it crash and burn; then move swiftly to help those of us caught in the wreckage with swift repeal and some market-oriented ideas.
Great writing as usual, Neo. Also, in-depth comments like those of Wolla Dalbo and JJ are one of the reasons I really like coming here. It’s like the adult table in here. 🙂
DNW, 3:00 pm — “A concept, “the law”, for which Democrats have suddenly and remarkably developed an ostentatious reverence; one which was heretofore much less than obvious.”
“The law” never mattered when “the law” was *immigration* *law*, and we’re being flooded with illegal aliens [how’s that for speaking truth to euphemizers? — or maybe let’s try “undocumented Democrats”; hat tip to Ann Coulter].
Settled law, shmettled law, who gives a cr#p about “the law”?
That reverence is more than ostentatious. It’s — how do we say? — conveeeeeeenient.
Beverly: “Jimmy, just search on “Liverpool Care Pathway” for a preview of what the malevolent Ezekiel Emmanuel has in mind for the old folks.”
Yep! And the progressives yowled about calling the IPABs “Death Panels.”
When or if I have the death sentence diagnosis, I want to know if any major medical intervention will provide a few more years (3-5+) of reasonable quality of life. (Sentient, ambulatory, and relatively pain free.) If there is an 80% probability that it won’t, I’m ready to settle for palliative care for my remaining days. But I’d like that choice.
Those who are denied care by the IPAB death panel should join the revolution as martyrs…and I mean that in the same sense as our Muslim “friends” mean it.
(great, now I’m on the NSA watchlist!)
If you defeat Democrats in an election, then if you like your country you can keep your country…