Obamacare with the Smoke Cleared and Mirrors Cracked
Two years ago, Congress debated and passed the Obamacare bill. It was slapped together with a myriad of side deals and compromises in order to get enough Democratic members of the House and Senate to pass it. No one had read the 2000-page monstrosity, but that didn’t matter. At that time, Speaker Nancy Pelosi uttered words that would prove prophetic: “We have to pass the bill so that you can find out what’s in it.”
Over the past two years, Americans have found out some of the details of the bill and don’t like it. Despite the fact that President Obama said “the plan I’m proposing will cost around $900 billion over 10 years,” it is proving to be far more costly.
Further, with additional smoke and mirrors budget gimmicks, it was declared to actually reduce the deficit by $143 billion over 10 years. That required that the spending be offset with a variety of tax hikes and $500 billion in cuts to Medicare benefits.
The smoke is clearing and the mirrors are all cracked. Upon closer examination of the opaque Obamacare bill, the image isn’t pretty.
Instead of costing $940 billion over 10 years, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) recalculated the cost of Obamacare and found that the cost will almost double to $1.76 trillion over 10 years. That new estimate has gobbled up most of the expected savings Congress was to achieve under the sequestration required by the Budget Control Act when the super committee failed miserably to address the deficit.
Another smoke screen raised by President Obama was his promise that you will be able to keep your doctor under his health-care reform. With the smoke cleared, CBO now says that 4 million will lose their employer-provided health insurance as Obamacare forces businesses to end coverage for their employees. These unfortunate casualties of Obamacare will be forced into the government’s insurance exchanges or forced into Medicaid or CHIP.
However, the government-run insurance exchanges are a murky area too. Both CBO and the president’s own budget people have seen the expected cost of the subsidies to these exchanges balloon enormously this year.
The House Ways and Means Committee has repeatedly questioned the Obama administration as to why this year they have requested significant new funding for the costs for the exchanges. Over the past year, Congress enacted technical changes that CBO said would reduce spending on the subsidies for the exchanges by $9 billion. Yet President Obama now says he will need $111 billion in new funding for the exchanges. No clear justification has been given for this new request.
Millions of Americans would have already lost the coverage they were promised they could keep except for a massive number of waivers to Obamacare granted by HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius under authority which does not exist in the law. More than 1400 waivers have been granted covering millions of Americans. Millions of union members who supported President Obama received a waiver to protect them from Obamacare’s harmful effects.
Surprise, surprise, surprise. American physicians are bailing out. One only needs to look at the changing demographics of doctors in Great Britain and Canada to see where this is going. Medical care will be delegated to nurse practitioners and physicians assistants; two or three years education versus six to ten. Hey, if it works for you, go for it . Well, you know, that we doctors thrive on unnecessary surgeries, unneeded treatments,and excessive testing. The official term embraced by advocates of Obamacare is ‘benign neglect’. Check it out.
Uh, no. Time for you guys to get up to speed. The GOP is cherry picking numbers to distort the true cost of the ACA. Of course their ignorant minions will believe only those pickings that support what they already want to believe. You want to play a numbers game? You won’t win. LOL!
http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2012/03/conservatives-distort-cbo-data-to-claim-obamacare-costs-have-exploded.php?ref=fpa
Anyone who considers “Talking Points Memo” a credible source lack all credibility himself.
Facts are a stubborn thing, I know. Take a look, they provide links. But like I said, not any that would support what you already want to believe. However, if you would like to refute what they have to say give it a whirl, that’s why I put the link up.
Actually, TPM’s data doesn’t really paint Obamacare in a good light. Their argument is that the CBO’s estimate has been shifted two years into the future, so *of course* the number is higher.
The problem is that, even if TPM is right, that just proves the point that was made two years ago: accounting tricks hid the actual costs of the program.
If the program really was cost-neutral, your costs still shouldn’t double.
On a separate note, providing basic health care to everyone will inevitably save billions of dollars. How could it not? As an example, simply providing adequate blood pressure, cholesterol and diabetes control to people who need it can be done for pennies a day. The heart attacks, strokes and other catastrophes that are prevented by providing these services would cost thuosands of dollars each. An ounce of prevention is worth milions of dollars of cure. It’s amazing to me that people don’t see that.
See: http://truecostofhealthcare.org
CW said”On a separate note, providing basic health care to everyone will inevitably save billions of dollars. How could it not”
Take a look at Romney care here in Mass before you spout your liberal progressive crap.
It is not cheeper.
The care is not better.
The wait time is 5 times worse.
The real doctors are leaving the state.
The hospitals are suing the state for NON payment.
Yup that sounds great on a national level.
But the claim ignores the corresponding savings during the additional period of the spending projection, thus distorting the actual cost estimates of the law.
Ah yes, the “corresponding savings.” It’s funny how notoriously poor this administration has been with it’s projections in this regard.
Will you please take the opportunity to expand on the TPM article that you link us to? Tell us all about the revenue to be produced by the taxes, and the spending cuts, and the deficit reduction projections. Give us the full how, when, and where on each of these issues as the article fails to do. Surely, you didn’t simply send us to a site for information about which you have no in-depth knowledge. Just a bunch of sketchy generalizations on an obviously opinionated website. You wouldn’t waste our time with something like that would you?
As I am sure all of the readers of these pages do, I look forward to your careful analysis of the TPM article and the experience of the benefit of the exposure to your expertise in the vital area of healthcare policy. I am so excited about this new source of knowledge that I can hardly wait!
“Just a bunch of sketchy generalizations on an obviously opinionated website.”
Kind of like this article?
Kind of like your boilerplate blackmail tactics of “buy into our worthless program, or it will cost you more in the long run.” What if being “entitled” to any and all care is what will cause people to take worse care of themselves, ending up in those additional long-term costs of which you speak? Ask any dentist who’s worked on a reservation, and heard, “Don’t tell me to stop giving my kids all the soft drinks they want, just fix their teeth like you’re supposed to.”
Expensive worthless pre-school (like Head Start), or more crime. More subsidized housing, or the costs of more homeless. Make the safety net too cushy, and people mistake it for a hammock.
Thank you for your response. However, I asked you to “Tell us all about the revenue to be produced by the taxes, and the spending cuts, and the deficit reduction projections. Give us the full how, when, and where on each of these issues as the article fails to do.”
You obviously couldn’t do it. Sorry to be the one to break this news to you. You’re in over your head!
The article quotes the Congressional Budget Office. The CBO is “The GOP cherry picking numbers”? Delusional much?
The irony is, Cynical Wonder, that your own source reveals the deceit of the Obamacare supporters. Let me quote:
“So where are conservatives getting the idea that the cost of the law doubled? When it passed in 2010, CBO said its 10-year outlays would be about $940 billion. But because the law isn’t set to be fully implemented until 2014, when the coverage expansion takes effect, that initial estimate included several years in which the law cost very little.”
Very true. This begs the question: WHY the misleading initial estimate? In 2009, WHY did you give us a 10 year estimate that included 5 years of expenses and 8 years of income? Who were you trying to trick? Would you think your banker was acting honestly if, in telling you the costs of your loan, he averaged in two years BEFORE YOU BEGAN PAYING to arrive at an average monthly payment? The rational, logical figure is the annual cash flow of the program when fully implemented.
1) What is it?
2) Why was it not divulged by you? Why did we get a false figure averaging in the years prior to implementation?
But if it saves the life of even one child, it will be worth it. /sarc
As opposed to letting that child die as a result of the private health insurance crime syndicate’s death panels? We wouldn’t want the CEO of Anthem Blue Cross to miss taking another hooker on a spa vacation if profits aren’t high enough. A dead child is a small price to pay for a weekend of fun and pampering.
Or a child surviving an abortion but dying of neglect in a hospital utility closet next to some floor cleaner.
I’m still kind of sketchy on this whole not covering you thing.
Now let me see, if I have private insurance and they refuse coverage, I can;
1) sue them in court for specific performance to cover the situation
or, if that doesn’t work
2) mortgage my home and pay for the treatment myself to insure it gets done
however when the government runs the Health Care system and they determine that Coverage for a specific condition is not warrented, I can;
That’s right, no recourse!
And that’s better how?
You have a problem with hookers, fun and pampering? Remember, Charles Manson was a baby once.
“Instead of costing $940 billion over 10 years, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) recalculated the cost of Obamacare and found that the cost will almost double to $1.76 trillion over 10 years. That new estimate has gobbled up most of the expected savings Congress was to achieve under the sequestration required by the Budget Control Act when the super committee failed miserably to address the deficit.”
OK now, who do we complain to? This catastrophic law has been forced upon people who did NOT want it, and now we’re going to get stuck with the bill for paying for it. If anybody is still out there who does not believe that liberal programs eventually lead to bankruptcy, this is the bill to look at. And even the CBO isn’t close to being right. You just know this is going to cost $2 trillion or more when all is said and done. So who do we go to complain to now that we’re stuck with a law we don’t even know is going to work?
November. We have to throw them all out in November. If we don’t, we will end up like Greece before you know it. And sooner rather than later. We will be spending $2 trillion we do NOT have on health care and the only way to get it is to tax the living daylights out of us.
So as Nancy Pelosi famously said, “You have to pass it to see what’s in it.” Surprise! Feel better now?
The title is misleading. The CBO has revealed increased cost expectations and the mirror is definitely cracked. But the smoke is still pretty thick. Costs will keep going up. Take it to the bank.
I won’t be able to take it to the bank…I’ll be broke.
There’s no way I can believe that a program run by the federal government will have higher costs and lower performance than projected. I mean, if that were the case, then Social Security, Medicare, and the Post Office would be going broke, right? Oh, wait…
Less freedon, higher costs, worse healthcare than before… why did we bother?
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Ayn Rand – Liberty vs Socialism
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s1RxKW-P5V8
No bill that big should ever have been passed.
Repeal it.
If there’s any worthy program, propose it by itself.
Seriously, if Congress wishes to create a fund to subsidize insurance for “uninsurable” clients, surely that is 1) doable; and 2) reasonably straightforward; and 3) relatively cheap – on the order of a billion dollars, not venturing onto $2 trillion!
Finally, support your local hospital’s charitable fund. It’s far better than expecting some bureaucrat to decide on anyone’s treatment!
Once we have totally socialized medicine, you’ll never stop paying. Not only will you be paying for a horde of useless government bureaucrats, but health care providers will have a government protected cartel, which will allow them to charge ANYTHING they wish, with no competition allowed, and you’ll be required to pay whatever they want, by law.
And, people will end up getting the same quality of healthcare that folks who signed up for the government program used in the Tuskegee Syphilis “Experiment” got. In that government program people were used like test animals in medical experimentation that Dr. Mengele would have approved of. IOW, they were murdered in cold blood by liberal Democrats, who decided it wasn’t expedient to provide sick people with the medicines they needed.
Anyone that wants government controlled healthcare is an idiot. Anyone dumb enough to trust liberal Democrats to run such a system is so stupid, they really shouldn’t be allowed to run loose without a keeper.
How can this country EVER be solvent – when we pay for all of the medical care for illegal aliens – who are being invited to INVADE our country?
How do you fund infinity?
“New CBO numbers on Obamacare reveal the true cost of the program”
That is a very doubtful statement, since the rules and regulations for Obamacare are still a work in progress. The higher costs could be significantly reduced by withholding care to anyone and everyone that the administration deems not worthy of Obamacare. Or it could greatly increase the premiums on Obamacare for those that the administration deems to have too much money. It could also increase costs further by linking healthcare to green – if you don’t go green your costs will be higher. Or it could link healthcare to global warming…. if you produce more CO2, you will have to pay higher premiums. Or Sebelius could decide that all poor people, blacks, Hispanics and other Democrats will get completely free health care for every possible ailment and Republicans/conservatives, etc., will pay for it. Pelosi was wrong about saying that you will know what is in the bill when it is passed…you will not know what is in it until it is fully written in March 2013, and it will be 6-months to 2 years before we know the measurable impacts…and longer before we know the unintended consequences. The intended consequences will be bad enough.
What I fail to understand is this statement:
“Unfortunately for former Speaker Nancy Pelosi, the more we find out about the Obamacare bill, the less there is to like about this costly and intrusive mess.”
What is unfortunate for Pelosi? Obamacare is unfortunate for Americans, but certainly not for Pelosi.
The POTUS is a liar who is working to destroy this nation.
Gee, who’d a thunk it. It’s nice that the CBO is confirming what we’ve known for a couple of years now.
First action of the next real POTUS (if we should be so blessed): terminate everyone in the CBO and the rest of the bureaucracies and regulatory agencies. Fire ‘em all. Then start gathering evidence for trials that have to do with undermining our government and failing to maintain their oaths to support the Constitution of the United States.
It’s not a soft tyranny any more. It’s rapidly hardening. November 2012 is probably our last opportunity to stop it.
Obamacare is just another symptom of a government that is out of control. Yes repeal Obamcare but it will likely be the first and only time that this has ever happened in the wasteland called Washington. This law is like a cancer and it is growing every minute. It is spending vast sums of money, it is hiring thousands of unionized drones, it is driving out doctors and insurers and debilitating the private sector the true “enemy” and we are supposed to believe that Romney if elected will actually get rid of this insult to our intelligence. The supremes will likely rule that the government has the right to abuse us any time they want with another liberty stealing power grab and again we sit back and let these jack booted liberal thugs take over and debase our country. The $1.7 trillion is a lie too. The true cost of this debacle will be multiples of that as this army of bureaucrats begins to like their power to reign over us and control every aspect of our lives. God help us if we even deserve his help for allowing these bastards into office.
Keep in mind…the Supreme Court Justices – with the exception of Anthony Scalia – have violated their oaths to uphold the Constitution…Kagan because she refused to recuse herself from the ACA case.
They had the audacity to show up to a meeting called by Barry Soetoro before the electoral votes were counted…where he sobbed about not having a birth certificate…and that he wasn’t sure that he was eligible. He had just co-sponsored the McCain Resolution and knew very well that he was ineligible due to his Brit father.
The Supremes folded and swore in an ineligible candidate. They are complicit in defrauding the American people and in failing to uphold the Constitution.
It could be construed as treason. At any rate, they are responsible for putting into office a usurper whose actions are to be rendered null and void, according to the Constitution. His name shall be forever expunged from history.
Speaking of smoke and mirrors…
During the bill’s passage process (aka the jamming through), the justice dept. argued that Obamacare wasn’t a tax. Subsequently, when justice tried to claim in the Florida case (about 26 states joined) that it was legitimate under Congress’ taxing authority, the judge ruled that out as justice itself had said it wasn’t a tax.
Then they moved to the Commerce Clause, one innocent line in the Constitution giving authority to make commerce “regular” between the states.
Now the theory is moving to the “necessary and proper” clause, another innocent line giving Congress authority to carry out its enumerated powers under Article I.
Justice lawyers are reportedly trying to appeal to A. Scalia as a function of a dissenting opinion he wrote in a marijuana case.
Obamacare is a power grab, pure and simple.
These successive “theories” and convoluted verbiage are embarrassing
If this doesn’t scare you!
http://www.youtube.com/watch_popup?v=HcBaSP31Be8&vg=medium
As I’m fond (but not too fond) of repeating…to Hitler and the National Socialist party, government control of citizens’ “healthcare” delivery was absolutely essential.
The brief but longer than usually allowed oral arguments at the SCOTUS start March 26 and a verdict (aka a decision) around the end of June.
If those SCOTUS folks don’t once and for all clarify this mess in all its particulars, if they don’t deliver a fatal death knell to this monstrosity (and all these stupidities like “severability” and so forth go down in flames), kiss what’s left of America goodbye.
“On a separate note, providing basic health care to everyone will inevitably save billions of dollars. How could it not? As an example, simply providing adequate blood pressure, cholesterol and diabetes control to people who need it can be done for pennies a day. The heart attacks, strokes and other catastrophes that are prevented by providing these services would cost thuosands of dollars each. An ounce of prevention is worth milions of dollars of cure. It’s amazing to me that people don’t see that.”
CW has done us a favor by revealing the kind of “thought” behind Obamacare. All the things he says sound just fine. However, what’s missing is any kind of hard data.
“On a separate note, providing basic health care to everyone will inevitably save billions of dollars.” Sounds reasonable – prove it.
“As an example, simply providing adequate blood pressure, cholesterol and diabetes control to people who need it can be done for pennies a day.” With a government agency running things? Prove it. While your at it, prove it would be less than current costs.
“The heart attacks, strokes and other catastrophes that are prevented by providing these services would cost thuosands of dollars each.” Don’t people who live longer use more health care resources?
“An ounce of prevention is worth milions of dollars of cure.” Sounds reasonable – put some numbers there.
This dollop of metaphysical vagueness is the very epitome of liberal “thought” on the issue.
On top of that, he links to a web site that argues for more transparency in health care and deplores the distortion of the markets, and nowhere argues for the government to be more involved.
The Big Lie in the PPAHCA is that 40 milion uninsured can become insured to lower the health care cost curve. A whopper of that magnitude usually stuns the crowd into thinking that they are incoherent and thus the speaker must be telling the truth.
Prevention is a marvelous way to reduce health care costs. All you have to do is to convince everyone to rid themselves of all vices and denial. Good luck with that.
“On a separate note, providing basic health care to everyone will inevitably save billions of dollars. How could it not?”
Easy. If outlays for basic healthcare exceeds the costs of NOT providing that care, then it will NOT save billions of dollars.
That is why you are a liberal. No economic sense. Numbers don’t work just because they *feel* good. They have to actually work. There is no “X<Y, for all values of X and Y".
Example: How much do you pay to support your local fire department? Suppose I were to tell you that for a mere 25x that annual expense, I could provide "preventive fire care", fireproofing your home, inspecting, and maintaining it's fireproof and firesafe condition, so that you won't have a fire and won't need the fire department. It'll save you money, right? How could it not, right?
You see, libs don't think math. You think emotion. "Stop Diabetes!" is thinking with emotion. Math thinking goes: "Is the cost needed to create a 1% decrease in the incidence of Diabetes more or less than 1% of the cost impact of Diabetes?" If that sum of money exceeds 1% of the cost impact of Diabetes, it's a money loser.
That wouldn't be nice, or fair, I know. But that's math.
The greatest insult of Obamacare is that the promise of much needed national debate about medical costs and medical access was a bald faced lie. That debate still needs to happen. Why is it that I can get affordable auto and property insurance from an agency in another state without the government sticking in its big, irritating nose? If I usually spend about $200 a year on medical expenses, why must I pay roughly $4800 yearly for both routine and catastropic care insurance? Why can’t I buy catastrophic care insurance separately? Even better, why can’t I negoitate my bill directly with my doctor? It is easy to see what a poorly thought out disaster Medicare is. Why should we trust Washington to see to everyone else’s medical business also?
Can’t we all just get along?
I know, when pots call kettles black, it’s hard not see red. When Cynical Wonder complains of Republican cherry-picking, it’s hard not to laugh, considering the masterful menagerie of mendacity through which Democrats (who controlled both houses of Congress in 2010) maneuvered during the magical Obamacare mystery tour.
Readers interested in reviewing that malodorous malaise of congressional melodrama are invited to visit Another Slow News Day’s main blog page devoted to Obamacare.
http://anotherslownewsday.wordpress.com/obamacare/
The very first citation on that page embeds three hyperlinks to the historical record which liberals had hoped voters would have long forgotten by now.
Visitors to ASND may also want to browse the many Obamacare sub-topical pages branching out from the Update Topics / Barack Obama / Obamacare menu tree.
News for most of your readers. Do not believe or be taken in by everything you read nowadays. As in this case not everything regarding the cost and containment of costs are noted nor referenced in the article on this site. Go to the full CBO report and read it!Ask for help if you are poor at math. At the conclusion find some worthwhile project to channel your energy into.
Saving the country from the deleterious effects of Progressive/Liberal ideology and preserving the great human experiment in freedom and personal responsibility that was America – is the most worthwhile project anyone could possibly select.
After the crack is smoked and the mirror is cleared… ObamaDontCare gets even uglier as Ms. Sebelius makes her “decisions” for the nation.
Obamacare (Affordable Care Act) was designed from the start to fail. Obama, Pelosi, Reid, and the democrats really want a single payer nationalized health care in the long run, but it was not politically feasible at this time and so they lied about Obamacare. Obama has stated on several occasions his preference for single payer as have other democrats. But how do you go from the existing system to single payer in the current political environment? One way is to break the existing system and then offer single payer as the solution. Here are some steps to breaking the existing system:
1. Bankrupt private insurance companies. For example, by mandating increase coverage without allowing them to increase premiums. The current issue of contraception is one example where Obama is mandating religious institutions buy insurance that includes contraception coverage, but then says that the extra cost will be free of charge where the private insurance companies would absorb the cost.
2. Give employers incentives to drop employer paid health insurance and force more employees into the govement exchanges. One incentive is by making the employer paid insurance cost far more than just paying the fine. Another incentive is to increase the amount of rules and regulations employers face if they pay for private health insurance rather than just paying the fine and letting the government do all the work thru the exchanges.
3. Always blame the private health insurance companies for any and all problems caused by Obamacare.
4. Increase the cost and complexity of the existing system and thus somehow make the single payer system more attractive. We have already seen the increase in the cost of Obamacare and we know that it will increase the bureaucracy.
5. Make it illegal NOT to have health insurance. Fine people who do not have “adequate” insurance.
Ok…what about the 25 million unemployed?
What about the 45 million on Food Stamps?
keep providing oral for obama you piece of total garbage. you are a liar and your pos pres is gone in November. Obamacare will be overturned as we all know you are a liar. go away little girl…………….
Could someone address the issue of Kagan removing herself from the Obamacare hearings?
In contract law both impropriety and the appearance of impropriety i are sufficient to recuse someone from a case (or appeal a decision).
For example, someone is in charge of deciding weather to award a competitive contract to Boeing or Airbus. They award the competitive contract to Boeing. It’s later found out that that their close family owns thousands of shares of Boeing and Airbus appeals the decision based on “the appearance of impropriety”. They don’t have to prove that any impropriety took place. This is a basic legal concept is being steamrolled by Obama and his enablers in what is quite possibly the most significant legal case in our history. They screwed the bond holders at GM in the auto bailout and got away with it. Why isn’t anyone paying attention to this?
The Healthcare Law Is Not About Healthcare: It’s About Making Us Dependent! Allen West 3/27/10 speech
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vej_LqzraNEfeature=player_embedded
Nullification: the states do no have to follow unconstitutional laws http://www.canadafreepress.com/index.php/article/45343
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