The Hill- Obama: Healthcare law gave Medicare ‘sounder financial footing’

Shane D’Aprile

President Obama used his weekly radio address Saturday to tout the findings of a Medicare Trustees report that concluded the program will remain solvent through 2029, largely as a result of cost-cutting provisions included in the recently enacted healthcare law.

The president said the report clearly demonstrated that the passage of healthcare reform has put Medicare on “a sounder financial footing.”
“Reform has actually added at least a dozen years to the solvency of Medicare – the single longest extension in history – while helping to preserve Medicare for generations to come,” Obama said.

“We’ve made Medicare more solvent by going after waste, fraud, and abuse – not by changing seniors’ guaranteed benefits,” the president said. “In fact, seniors are starting to see that because of health reform, their benefits are getting better all the time.”

The president also touted a $250 rebate meant to aid senior citizens who fall into the so-called “doughnut hole” in Medicare prescription drug coverage. He noted that by next year seniors who fall into that coverage gap will be eligible for a 50 percent discount on needed medication.

“Already, we have put insurance companies on notice that we have the authority to review and reject unreasonable rate increases for Medicare Advantage plans,” Obama said. “And we’ve made it clear to the insurers that we won’t hesitate to use this authority to protect seniors.”

Still, the Trustees report hailed by Obama was filled with caveats, the biggest of which is that the projected cost savings are dependent on future cuts that even Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius suggested are doubtful.
The report’s conclusion hinges on Congress agreeing to a 30 percent cut in Medicare payments to doctors over the next few years, as well as cuts in funding to hospitals and other providers.

Without those cuts — both of which are politically unpalatable options and ones lawmakers are unlikely to embrace when the time comes — the financial projections are not so rosy.

What Democrats and the president hailed as “cost-saving measures,” Republicans panned as “accounting gimmicks” last week.

“Simple logic says that you can’t spend and save the same dollar,” House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio) said Thursday. “The trustees’ report confirms that Medicare’s future now rests on Washington Democrats’ accounting gimmicks and tricks, a risk America’s seniors are by no means eager to take.”

Meanwhile, the president’s radio address made no mention of the more dour projection the report made on Social Security. It concluded the program’s fiscal outlook has dimmed, in large part due to the high unemployment rate.

With more money being paid out through the program than coming in, both this year and next, the Social Security trust fund is expected to run dry by 2037.

Read the original article TheHill

Rep. Ryan: Dems quietly like my budget plan privatizing Medicare, Medicaid

By Mike Lillis

Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) claimed this week that some Democrats are supportive of his sweeping blueprint to balance the budget — just not publicly.

Appearing on Fox News Thursday, the senior Republican on the House Budget Committee, conceded that ideological differences between the parties have led many Democrats to oppose his balanced budget plan, which would privatize Medicare and Medicaid. “But I’ve also had Democrats who say, ‘If it weren’t so political I would go for this,’” he said.

“When the microphones are turned off, I’ve gotten great response from Democrats,” Ryan said. “The problem is we have this political paralysis.”

Under Ryan’s plan, dubbed the Roadmap for America’s Future, those younger than 55 today would receive vouchers to purchase private insurance coverage in lieu of having Medicare’s single-payer coverage kick in when they hit 65. 

The benefits would be means-tested, meaning the vouchers would be adjusted to reflect the wealth of the beneficiary. Ryan’s bill would also tweak Medicare eligibility, raising the eligibility age incrementally to nearly 70.

“I don’t want to turn the safety net into a hammock,” he told Fox. 

Read the original article TheHill

Obama’s Cynical Recess Appointment of Donald Berwick

Ruth Marcus
WASHINGTON — As a matter of policy, President Obama’s nomination of Donald Berwick to oversee Medicare and Medicaid was inspired: Berwick, co-founder of the Institute for Healthcare Improvement, is the country’s leading evangelist for the proposition that it is possible to deliver higher quality medical care at a lower cost. He’s not only preached that gospel; he’s shown that it can be translated into reality.

As a matter of politics, the president’s choice of Berwick was, well, the polite word would be bold. The less polite word: boneheaded. Administration officials argue that Republicans would have seized on any nominee as an opportunity to re-litigate the health care debate. But Berwick offered opponents a loaded gun with his talk about rationing, his discussion of health reform as a matter of redistributing wealth, and his effusive praise for the British system. If the president wanted to buy a fight like this, he ought to have been better prepared to wage it.

And as a matter of good government, the president’s move to snub the Senate and install Berwick by recess appointment was outrageous. Using — more accurately, abusing — this mechanism to make appointments during a Senate recess is a bipartisan temptation. All presidents succumb, and Obama is facing a more implacably recalcitrant Senate minority. Yet the original purpose of recess appointments was to let government function during the long stretches with Congress away, but that’s water under the constitutional bridge.

A recess appointment should be a last step in cases of egregious delay, not one of the first. That standard was nowhere near met in Berwick’s case. Berwick was nominated to be administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) on April 19, less than three months ago. He had not yet had a hearing. His committee vetting wasn’t complete.

In short, Berwick is no Dawn Johnsen.

Johnsen was Obama’s choice to head the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel — like CMS administrator, one of those government jobs as important as it is obscure. Like Berwick, Johnsen could not have been more qualified. She was chosen even before the inauguration. The Senate Judiciary Committee held hearings in February 2009. It approved her nomination in March.

And then … nothing. Because the Senate failed to act before ending the 2009 session, the president had to nominate her a second time. Finally, 14 months into the process, Johnsen’s nomination was withdrawn. A recess appointment — if Obama wanted to take the political heat — would have been entirely justified in her case.

Not in Berwick’s.

As Montana Democrat Max Baucus, the chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, said after Obama’s precipitous action, the confirmation process “serves as a check on executive power and protects … all Americans by ensuring that crucial questions are asked of the nominee — and answered.” Bypassing the process also harms the nominee, undercutting his legitimacy and truncating the time he has to act. Berwick can only serve until December 2011, a short opportunity to make a big difference.

There are legitimate explanations for Berwick’s more incendiary comments on health care. It’s too bad he didn’t get to offer them. A cynic — (BEG ITAL)who, me?(END ITAL) — might think that the administration simply preferred not to suffer the political downside of a public airing.

A cynic might wonder, with Arkansas Democrat Blanche Lincoln facing a tough re-election fight, whether Berwick could even get through committee on a party-line vote. A cynic might think that the last thing Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid wanted before the election was a floor fight about rationing health care.

A cynic might look at the White House explanation — that it was urgent for CMS, without a confirmed administrator since 2006, to have a leader — and ask: Then why did you dither for 15 months before nominating someone?

In announcing the appointment, the president complained that “many in Congress have decided to delay critical nominations for political purposes.” True, but where’s the evidence of delay in Berwick’s case? You can’t fairly accuse the other side of political gamesmanship when you short-circuit the process and storm off the court before the first set.

“To some degree, he’s damaged goods,” then-Sen. Barack Obama said in 2005 about John Bolton’s recess appointment as United Nations ambassador.

Would the president say the same about Berwick?

Read the original article RealClearPolitics

Top Companies Consider Dropping Employee Health Coverage

In a stunning revelation Wednesday, several top U.S. corporations are seriously considering dropping employee health insurance coverage in light of what they see as the inevitable consequence of ObamaCare–skyrocketing costs.
 
The companies state that after their legal experts poured over the thousands of pages in the new law, it will cost them less to pay the fines for not providing healthcare coverage for employees than continuing to provide employer-paid health insurance benefits.
 
As a side-note to the announcement, the companies maintain that ObamaCare will result in a dramatic increase in expenses for providing employee coverage, with added costs skyrocketing to multi-billions of dollars.
 
According to Business Record:
 
“Additionally, the penalties to businesses for not offering coverage are less expensive than the cost of providing insurance, she said. “But for those that aren’t providing coverage now, this is a huge burden to them. And for employers that have a lot of employees working 30 hours (the threshold to be considered full- ime), you may have a lot of businesses cutting them back to 29 hours.”
 
Business Record maintains that despite this fact most companies will probably try to continue to provide coverage.
 
But a report issued today in Fortune Magazine and reported by CNN indicates that the dire warnings of ObamaCare critics concerning the consequences of approving the costly legislation are in fact well-founded.
 
The report points to internal documents from AT&T, Verizon, John Deere, and several other large corporations which show that executives are, in fact, looking at the option of dropping healthcare coverage for employees due to what they are sure will be unsustainable increases in costs.  These costs will be so prohibitive that it would benefit the corporations to pay the government fines instead.

Read the full story Examiner

Fed says Florida can’t opt out of Obamacare

 Carol Gentry and Jim Saunders
Only hours after the Florida House and Senate voted to “opt out” of the new federal health law, the top U.S. health official said Thursday night that will not be permitted.

Without mentioning any particular state or going into detail, Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius said that state and local officials can vent all they want about a so-called “federal takeover” of health care. But they cannot deny their citizens access to its benefits or requirements, she told the Association of Health Care Journalists.
“They may want to opt out, but they don’t get to opt out all of their citizens who want and need health care,” Sebelius said.

Florida has an estimated 4 million uninsured, most of whom will be covered when the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA) takes full effect in 2014.

At least 30 states have passed state constitutional amendment legislation similar to that approved by the Florida Legislature, according to theNational Conference of State Legislatures. 

Sebelius said the backlash against the ACA has been ginned up by “misinformation,” much of it deliberate. Thus HHS will be setting up an Internet site to answer frequent questions and a toll-free helpline, similar to that operated for Medicare beneficiaries. HHS staff members present at the conference said they hope to have the Internet site up by July 1 and the help desk soon after. 

The opt-out measure passed in the House and Senate on Thursday, a proposed amendment to the Florida Constitution, will go before voters in the November election. The proposal says, in part, that Floridians may not be forced by law to “participate in any health-care system.”

Dividing along almost strict party lines, the House passed the proposal 74-42, and the Senate followed in a 26-11 vote. Republican supporters say the issue is a matter of freedom and preventing encroachment by the federal government.

“The fact that we have to have this debate in the United States of America is troubling and bizarre,” said Rep. Mike Horner, R-Kissimmee.

Democrats said the proposal’s supporters have spent more time trying to prevent expansion of coverage than they have on solving the state’s health-care problems.

“That is the folly of this moment, and this constitutional amendment is misguided in the extreme,” said Sen. Dan Gelber, D-Miami Beach.

The measure is primarily aimed at part of the health-reform law that will eventually require people to buy health insurance or face financial penalties — a concept known as the “individual mandate.” Republicans in Tallahassee and other state capitals have launched numerous efforts to allow people to opt out of the requirement since the Democrat-controlled Congress passed it last month.

At the same time, Republican Attorney General Bill McCollum has launched a separate legal battle challenging the federal law. That lawsuit is pending.

Democrats have repeatedly argued that the legislative attempts to allow Floridians to opt out of the federal law would violate the so-called “supremacy clause” of the U.S. Constitution. That clause generally gives precedence to federal law over state law when conflicts occur.

“We should not step on the United States Constitution, and that’s what you are doing now,” Davie Democrat Martin Kiar said during the House debate today.

But supporters dispute that the supremacy clause bars the state from allowing people to avoid the individual mandate. “The supremacy clause does not say the feds control the states,” Melbourne Republican Ritch Workman said.

Supporters also say that even if the proposal ultimately is found to violate the supremacy clause, it would remain in place to protect Floridians from future state health-care requirements. As an example, it would prevent Florida from approving coverage requirements similar to those in Massachusetts.

More broadly, however, Palm Harbor Republican Peter Nehr said it is the Legislature’s duty to “step up and reassert the rights of Floridians.”

Read the original article Health News Florida

Baffled by Health Plan? So Are Some Lawmakers

Robert Pear

WASHINGTON — It is often said that the new health care law will affect almost every American in some way. And, perhaps fittingly if unintentionally, no one may be more affected than members of Congress themselves.

KING: 100 percent repeal of Obamacare

By Rep. Steve King

President Obama, speaking at a rally in Iowa City on March 25, challenged opponents of Obamacare who have vowed repeal. To repeal advocates, the President said, “Go for it.”

Before the first light of dawn on the morning after this Pelosi Congress sent Obamacare to the President’s desk, I started the process to repeal.My decision to take this fight to and through the next election and probably through the presidential election in 2012 was not a knee jerk response to a legislative defeat.It is a commitment to the Constitution, fiscal responsibility, real health care reform and American Liberty.

President Obama, Speaker Pelosi and Majority Leader Reid – the troika that controls America today – have long had designs to shove America into the abyss of socialism. Their philosophy, political power and cynical effort to expand the dependency class all lined up to make Obamacare the law of the land. The highest price every generation of Americans will pay is not measured in dollars but in lost liberty.

America is a unique nation with unmatched vitality. The rights and liberties which transformed the “Dream” into the reality of American Exceptionalism are written on our hearts. We have a vitality that is unmatched because we have skimmed the cream of the crop off every donor civilization.

Millions have flocked to America because of the promise of liberty. They have joined natural born Americans to form the most vigorous culture on the planet. Every preceding generation has had the freedom to succeed and the freedom to fail.

Obamacare is a reversal of the formula that has produced the world’s unchallenged greatest nation. For these reasons, 100 percent of Obamacare must be repealed.

With the massive costs of Obamacare, we cannot hope to pay our debts in our lifetimes or our children’s. Under Obamacare, costs will go up and quality will go down. Under Obamacare, we must go all the way to the Supreme Court to reestablish the Constitution as a pact limiting the reach of the federal government.

However, all of the aforementioned will not crush our national spirit like the oppressive weight of mandated dependency. Obamacare takes away the American right to manage our own lives.

The rights to “life, liberty and pursuit of happiness” are prioritized rights. No one has the right to kill in the name of liberty just as no one has the right to take your liberty in pursuit of their happiness. Obamacare is a “taking” of our liberty.

We the People understand this intuitively and reject this injustice which will, if not repealed, bring about the American decline. We cannot “hide the decline” or “manage the decline.” We must decline the decline by repealing 100 percent of Obamacare.

Every provision of Obamacare must be repealed – not selective parts of it. Not by preserving a short list of less egregious components. Obamacare must be ripped out completely, lock, stock and barrel – root and branch – no vestige left behind – not a DNA particle of Obamacare retained.

The toxic stew of Obamacare would taint every effort to reform and give the next generation of leftist politicians their talking points for another assault on our liberty. Republicans will either stand unanimously together for 100 percent repeal, as we did against the bill, or our ranks will be split and our effort defeated.

The voracious appetite of the leftists to consume American Liberty has spontaneously created a new class of activists whom I define as the “constitutional conservatives.” They are the 9-12 Project groups, all the Tea Party groups, and the organizations who join in their efforts.

Constitutional conservatives are emerging as the new majority makers and will not support a partial repeal. They stood in the streets, town halls and capitols of our states and nation to “Kill the bill.”

No one demonstrated to “kill the most egregious aspects” or “preserve the least egregious aspects” of Obamacare. This is an all or nothing fight from this point forward. Either we will be unified, energized and resolute for 100 percent repeal or we will be divided and deservedly conquered by Obama, Pelosi and Reid.

This is a life or death struggle for the soul of America. We are the redoubt of Western Civilization. It is our charge to set the standard for the world.

From an upstart nation formed on the profound belief that all men are “endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights” we have, over the past century assumed “among the Powers of the Earth,” the responsibility of sole superpower. We have defeated our enemies and saved Western civilization for the world.

We are not a nation created to mimic mediocrity. Our charge is to take this nation upwards to a new level of liberty and prosperity built upon the pillars of american exceptionalism.

Coverage Now for Sick Children? Check Fine Print

Robert Pear

WASHINGTON — Just days after President Obama signed the new health care law, insurance companies are already arguing that, at least for now, they do not have to provide one of the benefits that the president calls a centerpiece of the law: coverage for certain children with pre-existing conditions.

Mr. Obama, speaking at a health care rally in northern Virginia on March 19, said, “Starting this year, insurance companies will be banned forever from denying coverage to children with pre-existing conditions.”

The authors of the law say they meant to ban all forms of discrimination against children with pre-existing conditions like asthma, diabetes, birth defects, orthopedic problems, leukemia, cystic fibrosis and sickle cell disease. The goal, they say, was to provide those youngsters with access to insurance and to a full range of benefits once they are in a health plan.

To insurance companies, the language of the law is not so clear.

Insurers agree that if they provide insurance for a child, they must cover pre-existing conditions. But, they say, the law does not require them to write insurance for the child and it does not guarantee the “availability of coverage” for all until 2014.

William G. Schiffbauer, a lawyer whose clients include employers and insurance companies, said: “The fine print differs from the larger political message. If a company sells insurance, it will have to cover pre-existing conditions for children covered by the policy. But it does not have to sell to somebody with a pre-existing condition. And the insurer could increase premiums to cover the additional cost.”

Congressional Democrats were furious when they learned that some insurers disagreed with their interpretation of the law.

“The concept that insurance companies would even seek to deny children coverage exemplifies why we fought for this reform,” said Representative Henry A. Waxman, Democrat of California and chairman of the Energy and Commerce Committee.

Senator John D. Rockefeller IV, Democrat of West Virginia and chairman of the Senate commerce committee, said: “The ink has not yet dried on the health care reform bill, and already some deplorable health insurance companies are trying to duck away from covering children with pre-existing conditions. This is outrageous.”

The issue is one of many that federal officials are tackling as they prepare to carry out the law, with a huge stream of new rules, official guidance and brochures to educate the public. Their decisions will have major practical implications.

Insurers say they often limit coverage of pre-existing conditions under policies sold in the individual insurance market. Thus, for example, an insurer might cover a family of four, including a child with a heart defect, but exclude treatment of that condition from the policy.

The new law says that health plans and insurers offering individual or group coverage “may not impose any pre-existing condition exclusion with respect to such plan or coverage” for children under 19, starting in “plan years” that begin on or after Sept. 23, 2010.

But, insurers say, until 2014, the law does not require them to write insurance at all for the child or the family. In the language of insurance, the law does not include a “guaranteed issue” requirement before then.

Consumer advocates worry that instead of refusing to cover treatment for a specific pre-existing condition, an insurer might simply deny coverage for the child or the family.

“If you have a sick kid, the individual insurance market will continue to be a scary place,” said Karen L. Pollitz, a research professor at the Health Policy Institute at Georgetown University.

Experts at the National Association of Insurance Commissioners share that concern.

“I would like to see the kids covered,” said Sandy Praeger, the insurance commissioner of Kansas. “But without guaranteed issue of insurance, I am not sure companies will be required to take children under 19.”

A White House spokesman said the administration planned to issue regulations setting forth its view that “the term ‘pre-existing’ applies to both a child’s access to a plan and his or her benefits once he or she is in a plan.” But lawyers said the rules could be challenged in court if they went beyond the law or were inconsistent with it.

Starting in January 2014, health plans will be required to accept everyone who applies for coverage.

Until then, people with pre-existing conditions could seek coverage in high-risk insurance pools run by states or by the secretary of health and human services. The new law provides $5 billion to help pay claims filed by people in those pools.

Federal officials will need to write rules or guidance to address a number of concerns. The issues to be resolved include defining the “essential health benefits” that must be offered by all insurers; deciding which dependents are entitled to stay on their parents’ insurance; determining who qualifies for a “hardship exemption” from the requirement to have insurance; and deciding who is eligible for a new long-term care insurance program.

As originally conceived, most of the new federal requirements would have taken effect at the same time, in three or four years. The requirements for people to carry insurance, for employers to offer it and for insurers to accept all applicants were tied together.

But as criticism of their proposal grew, Democrats wanted to show that the legislation would produce immediate, tangible benefits. So they accelerated the ban on “pre-existing condition exclusions” for children.

Consumers will soon gain several other protections. By July 1, the health secretary must establish a Web site where people can identify “affordable health insurance coverage options.” The site is supposed to provide information about premiums, co-payments and the share of premium revenue that goes to administrative costs and profits, rather than medical care.

In addition, within six months, health plans must have “an effective appeals process,” so consumers can challenge decisions on coverage and claims.

Read the original article New York Times

FOX:Lawmakers Willing to Gamble on Public Anger Over Health Care

FOXNews.com

You’ll learn to like it.

That’s the message from White House advisers and Democratic lawmakers to Americans opposed to the health insurance overhaul signed into law last week.

And they’re willing to wager that come November, Americans will have done just that.

“As people learn what’s actually in the bill, that six months from now, by election time, this is going to be a plus because the parade of horribles, particularly the worry that the average middle class person has that this is going to affect them negatively, will have vanished and they’ll see that it’ll affect them positively in many ways, ” Sen. Chuck Schumer, D.N.Y., said Sunday on NBC’s “Meet the Press.”

The new health care law goes into effect immediately, but many provisions won’t be enacted any time soon, and while the Senate debate has ended, the public square offers a preview of the midterm campaign battle ahead.

According to a new Washington Post poll out Sunday, one in four people surveyed contacted their representative about health care during the last several months. Twenty-six percent of those surveyed said they are angry about the changes, up from 18 percent in August. On the opposite side, 15 percent said they’re enthusiastic about the new law.

Overall, passage of the bill hasn’t swayed public sentiment about it. Forty-six percent of those polled said they support the new law while 50 percent oppose it. The poll of 1,100 adults taken March 23-26 has a 3 percent margin of error.

But David Axelrod, President Obama’s senior adviser, predicted once people get their benefits, they won’t want to give them up. 

“Millions of small businesses this year will get tax credits for health insurance for their employees. Kids with pre-existing conditions will get coverage for the first time. They won’t be excluded any more,” Axelrod said on CNN. “If people really want to repeal those things, then go and make the case to the American people. After all, that’s what elections are for.”

Opponents say that’s exactly what they are preparing for. Tea partiers on Saturday launched a series of rallies that began in Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid’s hometown of Searchlight, Nev. On Sunday, Republican lawmakers warned that the law may have been debated in the halls of Congress but will be fought at home.

“This fight won’t wind up being just in Washington. It’s going to spread to every statehouse in the nation and we’re going to have referendums on this bill through every state house in the nation,” said Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C.

Graham added that the law’s costs won’t hold up under scrutiny.

“It is a house of cards, it’s a Ponzi scheme of the first order. It’s going to blow up the deficit, it’s going to affect every business, every family in this country, it was done by one party rule and it was a shame we had to go down this road,” said Graham, who appeared with Schumer.

Already large companies have announced the costs they are getting hit with as a result of the new law. Large U.S. companies like AT&T that say they will get hit with billions of dollars in charges with the elimination of a tax deduction for drug benefits. 

But Valerie Jarrett, another of Obama’s senior advisers, said the big companies will actually end up ahead.

“What they’re going to have to write off is nothing compared to the enormous financial benefits to those very same companies by health insurance reform that will bring down their costs substantially,” Jarrett said.

But Rep. Michele Bachmann, R-Minn., said with health care, the federal government has just moved into ownership or control of 51 percent of the U.S. economy.

“Today, the federal government has taken either direct ownership or control of banks, the largest insurance company in the United States, AIG, Freddie and Fannie,” she said. “The federal government now owns, Bob, over 50 percent of all home mortgages. Now the direct student loan industry. Chrysler, GM. And with the health care industry, that’s an additional 18 percent of the private economy, which means government would be making decisions over our lives from cradle to the grave.”

Bachmann added that the health insurance overhaul could cost the economy 5.5 million jobs.

“Just this week, we saw American businesses announce that Obamacare will cost them $14 billion. Here in Minnesota, Medtronic announced because of the new tax increases on medical devices, they could be looking at shedding an additional 1,000 jobs. Or 3-M, it will cost them potentially $90 million in the first quarter. … That is not going to bring us back to economic health going forward but that’s what you expect when you have massive tax increases, massive Medicare cuts, massive premium increases,” she said.

Already, lawmakers are listening to constituents as they spend a couple weeks at home during Congress’ Spring recess. Arizona Sen. John McCain announced a couple town halls meetings for this week. 

Democratic Pennsylvania Rep. Joe Sestak held a two-hour town hall meeting on Sunday. It was supposed to be an opportunity for him to explain provisions of the law to constituents. Instead, he got an earful from voters who said the bill will bankrupt America and shred the limited government intent of the U.S. Constitution.

Read the original article FOXNews

EDITORIAL: Obamacare bait & switch

By THE WASHINGTON TIMES

The health care bill that President Obama signed last week bears little resemblance to the reform package he once touted from the campaign trail.

With the final legislative product in hand, it’s worth evaluating how it compares to the promises Mr. Obama made to voters regarding the plan’s cost, its features and the reform process itself. The difference between then and now couldn’t be more stark.

Candidate Obama repeatedly assured the public that his health care plan would cost between $500 billion and $650 billion. This modest amount was to be covered entirety by discontinuing the George W. Bush tax cuts for those earning more than $250,000 a year.

Today, we know that Obamacare will cost at least double that amount. The basic price tag is $940 billion over 10 years, to which one must add the $208 billion “doc fix.” This adjustment to the reimbursement doctors receive under Medicare was separated out from the main package to hide Obamacare’s true cost.

Obviously, eliminating the Bush tax cuts isn’t what’s going to cover these enormous sums. Obamacare must cut Medicare and raise taxes on high-quality health insurance, medical devices, drugs and insurance companies. These increases will hit anyone who gets sick or buys insurance, regardless of income. So much for the promised “middle-class tax cut.”

Mr. Obama is still trying to hide the extent of the bait-and-switch. During the campaign he said, “If you like your plan and you like your doctor, you won’t have to do a thing…. You keep your plan; you keep your doctor.” While he repeated this claim in a speech in Iowa last week, he also reluctantly admitted when questioned more closely that, yes, people may well lose their plan or their doctor.

Even aspects of reform that candidate Obama sharply criticized in a 2008 primary debate with then-Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton have become law. Mr. Obama claimed he was offended by the idea that every American should be forced to buy a government-approved health policy or face a fine. “When Clinton says mandate, it’s not a mandate on government – it’s a mandate on individuals,” he said. “… In some cases, people are paying fines, which means they can’t afford premiums, which means they don’t have coverage. … Both of us seek to get to universal health care. I have a substantive difference … on how to get there.”

The “differences” between Sen. Clinton’s and Sen. Obama’s health care plans have disappeared. Households without a government-approved health care plan face a fine of $2,085. The promised transparency in the legislative drafting process also has disappeared despite the pledge, “These negotiations will be on C-SPAN.” A one-day presidential infomercial hardly counts.

President Obama’s deals were cut behind closed doors without input from the public or even congressional Republicans – and for good reason. Lawmakers rushed through a plan that bears no resemblance to what voters once were promised.

Read the original article Washington Times