Obamacare: Mandatory Socialized Medicine

Obamacare
Mandatory Socialized Medicine

Note: You might want to start at the Obama Index Page, especially if you arrived here by using a search engine.

The United States already has a multi-billion-dollar system of socialized medicine, called Medicare and Medicaid. Federal, state and local governments spent a total of $783.8 billion on health care in 2006.* Any deadbeat who doesn't have private insurance (which one ordinarily acquires by purchasing it with part of his or her income) can take advantage of Medicaid.

Other taxpayer-funded "safety nets" include SCHIP and a relatively new prescription drug entitlement. In reality, Obamacare extends beyond medical care. It is a system of unmitigated socialism which promises to improve service and low costs for everyone. Only those who attended public schools could possibly believe that the government can make anything more efficient and more convenient while lowering costs. The government is parasitic. Everything the government undertakes is paid for by taxes and debt.

When this idea was proposed in 1993, it was derisively called "HillaryCare" because president Clinton put his wife in charge of its development. The idea was even more unpopular that she was, so it was tabled until the return of the Democratic Party in 2008.

Obamacare is being developed by leftist politicians who are determined to take over the medical care industry regardless of public opinion. Liberals simply do not care if they're out of step with mainstream America. This is about control, not medicine.

Subsections on this page:

Obamacare is wildly unpopular and is sure to result in voter backlash

Pelosi and Reid forge ahead, ignoring public outcries

Democrats have been obsessed with socialized medicine for decades

Can Obamacare be stopped?

Totalitarianism = Unstoppable one-party rule

Who is to blame for all this? Who are the enablers?

Obamacare will affect families and small businesses

The Obamacare bill is over 2,000 pages long. Who knows what's hidden inside?

Does Obamacare include blanket amnesty for illegal aliens?

Obamacare is Hillarycare in a new wrapper

Other objections to Obamacare

Similar subtopics on other nearby pages:

Liberals are using lies and deception to sell this idea.

Liberals resort to lies and emotional outbursts to silence their opposition.

Examples of dishonesty and prevarication related to Obamacare.

What's the rush?

Secrecy, closed-door meetings, and midnight votes.

Liberals are not telling you that Obamacare will bankrupt the United States.

Obama's Big Health Care Summit.

Obamacare is obviously infeasible.

Obamacare won't work as advertised. The promised benefits will never come to pass.

Doctors won't work under these conditions!

Obamacare solves problems that don't exist and doesn't address problems we already have.

Obamacare will result in the loss of your freedom...

Obamacare is socialism -- or worse!

Obamacare opens the door to tyranny.

The Senate bill includes an unprecedented trap: It can't be repealed!

...or perhaps your life.

Rationing and "End of Life" issues.

Taxpayer-funded abortions.

Obamacare will cost far more than the Democrats are letting on.

Obamacare will be horribly expensive.

Obamacare is an affront to the rule of law.

Obamacare will be mandatory -- and therefore unconstitutional.

Despite what you may have heard, health care is not a right.

Reid, Pelosi and Obama shamelessly buy votes

Obamacare carries an odor of corruption.

Related topics on older pages:

Look at the British experience with socialized medicine.

Other countries' experiences, especially Canada's.

Tea parties, town hall meetings and other organized rejecion of Obama's plans.

Medicare, Medicaid, and Prescription Drug Benefits

SCHIP: (State Children's Health Insurance Program)

HillaryCare -- the earlier, simpler version of Obamacare.

The Invasion of the Food Police

Liberals out out of step with mainstream America

Dems intend to bypass GOP on health compromise. House and Senate Democrats intend to bypass traditional procedures when they negotiate a final compromise on health care legislation, officials said Monday [01/04/2010], a move that will exclude Republican lawmakers and reduce their ability to delay or force politically troubling votes in both houses.

National Health Care With 51 Votes. Late last week President Barack Obama and Democratic congressional leaders agreed to use "budget reconciliation" if necessary to jam a massive health-care bill through Congress. Most Americans probably greeted this news with the glazed eyes and yawns that should rightfully accompany any discussion of "the federal budget process" longer than 30 seconds. But this decision is a deeply troublesome attempt to circumvent the normal and customary workings of American democracy.

Irreconcilable Differences. This week, there was a major development that could give one political party carte blanche to remake the country's health care system. ... A procedural vote ... increased the likelihood of a federal government takeover of health care. Both houses of Congress passed a $3.5 trillion budget resolution. Included in the conference report was reconciliation language that would allow health care legislation to be rammed through the expedited budgetary process with no amendments, no filibusters, and minimal debate.

Reconciliation Is Not Negotiation. The President's plan is drafted in a way that envisions the use of a highly partisan parliamentary tactic, reconciliation, to pass the bill. Reconciliation could allow liberals in Congress to ignore the concerns of Republicans, moderate Democrats and the American people during the legislative process.

Their words come back to haunt them:
Obama, Biden, Clinton, Dodd & More Believe Reconciliation is Unconstitutional. The Obama White House has recently announced that they will go forward with a reconciliation process — sometimes called the "nuclear option" — to try and pass their government run healthcare plan in the Senate. This process circumvents a Republican filibuster and only requires a simple majority vote of 51 rather than 60. What did top Democrats think of this process previously?

As Despotic as They Need to Be. Critics of the Senate's 60-vote cloture threshold have come out in full force since the Democrats lost their 60th Senate seat (and some before). ... The argument made is that a majority vote carries the day. But the very structure of our Constitutional Republic sets limits on majority power. From the amendment process to the state-strengthening 10th Amendment to the Senate itself, the American system has built-in defenses against what Thomas Jefferson called "mob rule, where fifty-one percent of the people may take away the rights of the other forty-nine."

ObamaCare is Tyranny, Not Legislation. What we're seeing in Washington, D.C. is not "politics as usual" with the arm twisting and "horse trading" that is typical in getting a bill passed; instead, it is ideological warfare. What Obama, Reid and Pelosi are doing is not legislating; it is an act of tyranny — overturning all the rules and principles of government in a representative democracy. ... Apparently Obama, Reid and Pelosi aren't worried about losing control of Congress in 2010 or even the presidency in 2012, because their higher goal is to irrevocably institutionalize their ideology.

Who is to blame for Obamacare? Who are the enablers?

Who's to Blame for Obamacare? Two Republicans. The real culprits are two Republicans who ran the show the previous eight years: George W. Bush and his "master political strategist" Karl Rove. If it weren't for these two in the White House, the Democrats wouldn't have sixty senators, including a professional comedian from Minnesota, to close off debate and ram down our throats a bill worse than Hillary Care.

Behind the Curtain: Why AARP Supports ObamaCare. When the AARP began its full-throated support for the President's Health Care Scheme many wondered why this venerable organization would support a plan which would cut hundreds of billions of dollars from Medicare, mostly by putting strict price controls on the very popular Medicare Advantage program.

Thousands Quit AARP Over Health Reform. CBS News has learned that up to 60,000 people have cancelled their AARP memberships since July 1, angered over the group's position on health care. Elaine Guardiani has been with AARP for 14 years, and said, "I'm extremely disappointed in AARP." Retired nurse Dale Anderson has 12 years with AARP and said, "I don't wanna be connected with AARP."

AARP loses members over health care stance. About 60,000 senior citizens have quit AARP since July 1 due to the group's support for a health care overhaul, a spokesman for the organization said Monday [8/18/2009].

GOP Report Charges AARP Getting "Kickbacks" In Dem Health Care Bills. One of the subplots to the health care debate I've been following is the cozy relationship between AARP and the Obama administration, as the group has thrown its full-throated support behind the Democrats' health care push even though their membership comes from the age group most opposed to Democratic health care proposals. Today, House Republicans have issued a report providing evidence that AARP is in a position to recieve tens of millions of dollars in "kickbacks" if Democratic health care legislation becomes law.

Quittin' time. My only regret about not being a "joiner" is that I don't have many opportunities to quit organizations. I am a member of AARP, though, and this is looking like the perfect time to quit.

Insurer Gagged, AARP Rewarded. [Scroll down] To further keep the American people in the dark, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), which administer benefits under Medicare, issued what can only be called a gag order after Humana warned its Medicare Advantage customers in a letter that the president's plan might cause them to lose some benefits.

Don't Trust the AMA. "I was surprised, shocked, and saddened." That's how Donald J. Palmisano, former president of the American Medical Association, described his reaction upon learning that the organization had endorsed the House Democrats' health-care-reform plan. "I am a loyal member of the AMA, a lifetime member, but I believe the AMA made a serious mistake in endorsing this bill." He's not the only one.

What's Up, Docs? The AMA is essentially saying that if doctors get paid more, all else is negotiable. Other industry lobbies such as the insurers and drug makers have made the same calculation, putting their short-term self-interest — usually ensuring that government programs remain generous (enough) — ahead of the long-run threats. It can't last.

AMA Doesn't Speak for Most Doctors. The American Medical Association officially endorsed the Democrats' health reform bill. An eager Barack Obama, of course, used this endorsement to claim that "doctors" support his healthcare takeover. This misleading statement plays on the common misperception that the AMA represents some huge block of American physicians. Not true. In fact, excepting membership given to students and residents in training, the AMA represents only 17-19% of physicians actually in practice.

Who's Funding the Obamacare Campaign? If you believe the White House, there are 30 million Americans who support a government health care takeover. But if you look at the funding behind the Obamacare campaign, it's the same few leftist billionaires, union bosses and partisan community organizers pushing the socialized medicine agenda. Let's connect the dots.

Are We Ready for Soros Care? Most of Barack Obama's stated plans for America are indistinguishable from those of George Soros. As the left forces nationalized health care on us, we may want to consider the George Soros funded Project on Death in America.

Why the AMA Wants to Muzzle Your Doctor. The American Medical Association (AMA) is putting the doctors of America on notice. A major cheerleader for ObamaCare, the organization is now trying to silence doctors who oppose it. It is time the American people understood what the AMA is really all about. ... The AMA was not only a major supporter of ObamaCare but also an accomplice in its passage. Without the support of the AMA it is quite possible that the health-care reform initiative would have failed.

Obamacare will affect families and small businesses

The Ministry of Wellness. As a restaurateur, I've been following the heath care debate especially attentively. I have already determined that the health care bill, if passed, will cause a significant reduction in our net profits — depending on how many employees we can shed. After reading the fifty or so pages of the Senate "Affordable Health Choices Act" devoted to "Employers' Responsibilities," I still have no idea whether my businesses are "small" or "large" — but I am pretty sure that it will cost me $100-$150 a month in bookkeeping, accounting, and payroll service fees just to find out.

The Three-Step Plan to Stop Nationalized Health Care. Congressional Democrats, after all their faux wrangling, open bribery and bully tactics, are poised to reach agreement on a massive makeover of the American health system. This makeover will bankrupt the insurance companies, raise premiums, and eventually lead to the full nationalization of health care. That's what it is intended to do.

Merry Christmas: Obamacare Slaps $15,000 Annual Fee on Middle Class Families. The Congressional Budget Office's analysis of the final Senate health care bill indicates it would slap a mandatory annual fee of about $15,000 on middle-class families that earn an annual income greater than 400 percent of the federal poverty level ($88,200 for a family of four) and are not provided with health insurance by their employer.

Repeal Obamacare: Small-Business Killer. The average small-business owner spends about 12 hours filing his taxes each year. Thanks to one of Obamacare's oft-overlooked provisions, that figure will soon increase exponentially. The new law requires all businesses to submit 1099 tax forms to the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) for each vendor from which they purchase more than $600 in goods in a year. Business owners will now have to keep receipts and file forms for every trip to the coffee shop, the local lunch spot, and the office supply store. After all, those $3 lattes each day add up.

The Obamacare bill is over 2,000 pages long. Who knows what's hidden inside?

Obamacare's Avalanche of Paperwork. Pres. Barack Obama promised Americans "health-care reform." So far, "health-care form" is more like it. Obamacare is devolving into the Paper Industry Salvation Act of 2010. This new law spans 2,562 tree-killing pages. Far worse, it will force Americans to spend countless irritating hours completing, transmitting, and filing endless reams of federal paperwork.

I'm from the Government, and I'm Here for Your BMI. While the Stimulus Bill requires that the government have access to your Electronic Health Record (EHR) by 2014, it only vaguely defines what the government will do with this information. Herein lies the danger. Vaguely defined power in new laws always leads to broad interpretation of power by the government.

Read The Fine Print. [Scroll down] Greg Scandlen, a senior fellow at the Heartland Institute, says due to a little-known legal concept the entire law would unravel if a single part was found to be outside the Constitution. "Apparently there was no 'severability' clause written into this law, which shows how amateurish the process was," he wrote. "Virtually every bill I've ever read includes a provision that if any part of the law is ruled unconstitutional the rest of the law will remain intact. Not this one. That will likely mean that the entire law will be thrown out if a part of it is found to violate the Constitution." No argument from us. The bill writers and lawmakers who voted for it without reading it were unprofessional.

Health Reform Doesn't Have To Be So Hard. The fundamental problem with the 2,074-page Senate health care bill (as with its 2,014-page House counterpart) is that it wildly compounds the complexity by adding hundreds of new provisions, regulations, mandates, committees and other arbitrary bureaucratic inventions. Worse, they're packed into a monstrous package without any regard to each other. The only thing linking these changes — such as the 118 new boards, commissions and programs — is political expediency. Each must be able to garner just enough votes to pass. There isn't even a pretense of a unifying vision or conceptual harmony.

Constitution in decline. It's time to reform our administrative state. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi was right when she said Congress would have to "pass the health care bill so you can find out what's in it." That's because the health care bill, like most major laws passed by Congress over the past hundred years, isn't really a law. Rather, Obamacare is a series of assignments to bureaucrats in the Department of Health and Human Services. It is emblematic of what scholars call the administrative state, where legislative, executive and judicial powers are delegated to unaccountable experts sequestered in a fourth branch of government.

Health care law's massive, hidden tax change. An all-but-overlooked provision of the health reform law is threatening to swamp U.S. businesses with a flood of new tax paperwork. Section 9006 of the health care bill — just a few lines buried in the 2,409-page document — mandates that beginning in 2012 all companies will have to issue 1099 tax forms not just to contract workers but to any individual or corporation from which they buy more than $600 in goods or services in a tax year.

CLASS(less). Those of us who are taking Nancy Pelosi's advice to "find out" what's in the healthcare bill are coming to realize that the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act is badly misnamed. As I leaf through the pages of this law, I can see the dollars flying off nearly every page. One of its many potential fiscal nightmares is contained in Title VIII of the law, the CLASS Act.

Pelosi was right about one thing. Several weeks ago, Speaker Nancy Pelosi said the health care bill had to be passed so "you can know what's in it." Conservatives pounced on the opportunity to hammer her, and the clip soon became a laughingstock. Well, it turns out Pelosi was right — we did have to pass the bill to find out what was in it.

House health bill clocks in at 1,990 pages. It runs more pages than War and Peace, has nearly five times as many words as the Torah, and its tables of contents alone run far longer than this story. The House health care bill unveiled Thursday [10/29/2009] clocks in at 1,990 pages and about 400,000 words. With an estimated 10-year cost of $894 billion, that comes out to about $2.24 million per word.

Masterfleece Theater. The King James version of the Bible runs more than 600 pages and is crammed with celestial regulations. Isaac Newton's "Principia Mathematica" distills many of the rules of physics in a mere 974 pages. Neither of them has anything on Nancy Pelosi's new fiendishly entertaining health care opus, which tops 1,900 pages.

House Republicans Find 111 New 'Bureaucracies' in Health Care Bill. House Republicans claimed Monday [11/02/2009] that the health care reform bill pushed by Speaker Nancy Pelosi would create a whopping 111 new "federal bureaucracies." In its latest attempt to portray the Democrats' reform package as an unwieldy expansion of federal government in the health care sector, the House Republican Conference circulated what it called a list of "new boards, bureaucracies, commissions and programs" created in the House health care bill.

Connect the Dots on ObamaCare. Critics of those who have exposed ObamCare's contradictions and incoherencies are either unwilling to connect the dots or too stubborn (dare I say stupid) to acknowledge what the dots really mean. Connecting the dots in this case doesn't require unusual skills, much less a background in symbolic logic, merely perseverance in reading the text of HR 3200. Let's start with Sec 123, the formation of the Health Benefits Advisory Committee, and Sec 124, the creation of the Health Choices Administration and Health Choices Commissioner.

Health Care Reform Vaporizes Obama Presidency. In the fledgling days of the personal computer industry, software vendors frequently announced products that were not yet ready for release. The term "vaporware" was coined to describe such software. Most of these products never reached the marketplace; some that were sold to the public should not have been.

The Dog That Was Not Allowed To Bark. On November 7th, 2009, Speaker Pelosi marched to the podium and paraded her lap dogs to the microphone to proclaim "Victory" for herself, her Democratic House colleagues, and President Obama. What about every other American? The "Victory" was the passage of the second part of ObamaCare, "The Health Care Bill." That's right, the second part of ObamaCare is the 1,990 page bill that created 118 new boards, commissions, offices and bureaus.

159 Big Spending, Big Government Features of Obamacare: When Obama says that his Obamacare healthcare plan isn't a big government take over of healthcare he really is simply lying outright to the nation. ... Here is [part of] a list of 159 new programs, administrative boards, and bureaucracies that the Democrat Party's healthcare bill creates:
[#50] Health and Human Services Coordinating Committee on Women's Health (Section 3509(a), p. 1098)
[#51] Centers for Disease Control Office of Women's Health (Section 3509(b), p. 1102)
[#52] Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality Office of Women's Health (Section 3509(e), p. 1105)
[#53] Health Resources and Services Administration Office of Women's Health (Section 3509(f), p. 1106)
[#54] Food and Drug Administration Office of Women's Health (Section 3509(g), p. 1109)
[#55] National Prevention, Health Promotion, and Public Health Council (Section 4001, p. 1114)
[#56] Advisory Group on Prevention, Health Promotion, and Integrative and Public Health (Section 4001(f), p. 1117)
[#57] Prevention and Public Health Fund (Section 4002, p. 1121)
[#58] Community Preventive Services Task Force (Section 4003(b), p. 1126)

That Other Government Takeover. Everyone knows Democrats are planning to use the budget reconciliation process to get ObamaCare through the Senate. Less well known is that Democrats are plotting add-ons to that bill to get other liberal priorities enacted — programs that could never attract 60 votes. One of these controversial measures rewrites the Higher Education Act to ban private companies from offering federally guaranteed student loans as of this July.

Searching for Core Beliefs. For those who have not heard, beginning July 1, student loans will no longer be administered by banks. Instead, they will be issued directly by the federal government via the U.S. Department of Education. Tellingly, Obama used the same line of argument when pushing for health care reform. There, too, he argued that government takeover will save money. Such assertions are obviously absurd. To see why, we need only to ask this question: When has any government-run program saved money?

Obama's Costly Student Loan Takeover. Obama and his statist allies in Congress attached this bill to the healthcare legislation. Now, with the stroke of his pen, Mr. Obama has taken the 15 million college students who chose from 2,000 lenders for their loans, and dumped them into the Department of Education, which will process future loans by means of four call centers. This will be about as friendly and personal as standing in line to get a driver's license.

We don't need to pass health care reform to find out what's in it. As you can see, the Senate's Christmas Eve Bill originated in the House satisfying the Constitutional imperative that tax bills originate there and it gets them around the ex post facto provision of the Constitution; you and I will be retroactively responsible for paying the taxes on Obamacare from the January 1 of 2010. (Perhaps, as far back as 1/1/2009.)

Obamacare's subsidy for the sexually depraved. Senate Democrats voted almost unanimously Wednesday night to ensure the right of rapists and child molesters to have guaranteed access to government-subsidized Viagra under the president's health care plan. Only Sen. Evan Bayh of Indiana broke ranks with his Democratic colleagues.

Dems Subsidize Prescription-Strength Sex-Enhancement Medication For Child Rapists. Last night [3/24/2010], Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid voted in favor of allowing the federal government to subsidize Viagra for child molesters. So did fifty-six of Reid's Democratic colleagues, including Sens. Barbara Boxer (Calif.), Arlen Specter (Penn.) Blanche Lincoln (Ark.). and others facing tough re-election challenges this November.

Obamacare Dystopia. [Scroll down] In one of a bazillion little clauses in a 2,000-page bill your legislators didn't bother reading (because, as Representative Conyers explained, he wouldn't understand it even if he did), Congress voted to subject the 28 percent tax benefit to the regular, good, ol', American-as-apple-pie corporate tax rate of 35 percent. For the purposes of comparison, Sweden's corporate tax rate is 26.3 percent, and Ireland's is 12.5 percent. But just because America already has the second-highest corporate tax in the OECD is no reason why we can't keep going until it's double Sweden's and quadruple Ireland's.

Little-Known Health Care Law Provision Is a Budget Buster, Critics Say. While Congress spent the last year debating how to provide health insurance for the uninsured, a little-known provision slipped into the heath care law that could cost some Americans upwards of $2,000 a year.

The Beginning of USA Disarmament. Page 1312 of the now signed-into-law Senate version of ObamaCare provides for funding of Obama's private militia referred to as "Establishing a Ready Reserve Corps" Sec. 5210. This "Corps" is given broad powers to control the US citizenry. [In addition,] All Student College Loans are taken from the private sector and placed in the hands of the ObamaGov. The better to fully indoctrinate young minds into totalitarianism — only. No dissenting opinions will be allowed and this time it's mandated by Obama & Co. Did you know that this is also included in ObamaCare?

Dems likely didn't read the bill before passing and signing it. As the president has yet to admit, the health care reform bill does not prevent insurance companies from excluding children with pre-existing conditions. HotAir's Ed Morrissey points out a release from the Senate Republican Conference that showing a number of other omissions as well. Is it possible that the president hasn't read his own bill?

Alexander: Obama's 'Soviet-Style' Takeover of Student Loans. Sen. Lamar Alexander (R., Tenn.), the U.S. secretary of education from 1991 to 1993, tells National Review Online that President Obama's revamping of the federal student-loan program is "truly brazen" and the "most underreported big-Washington takeover in history." "As Americans find out what it really does, they'll be really unhappy," Alexander predicts. "The first really unhappy people will be the 19 million students who, after July 1, will have no choice but to go to federal call centers to get their student loans.

Robbing Peter to pay Paul's health care. Obamacare is a socialist law designed to take money from some Americans and use it to benefit others. The health care bill signed into law by President Obama is full of hidden time bombs. One costly provision buried in the lengthy reconciliation bill at the last minute has taxpayers covering long-term at-home care for the elderly. Through the so-called Community Living Assistance Services and Support Act (CLASS Act), Americans will find between $150 and $250 taken out of their paychecks each month to cover this program nobody knew about.

We Still Don't Know What's In It. Nancy Pelosi promised, after all, that if we passed [Obamacare], we'd find out what was in it. Well, this is what comes of racing through a largely secretive legislative process. [Bill] McGurn explains "one of the murkiest bits of this legislation"...

What The "Affordable Health Care For America Act" Actually Says: In many ways the bill is a convoluted, uncoordinated list of compromises between thousand of legislators, legislative aides, and lobbyists. Yet the bill has two main thrusts, with one central meaning. The first thrust is a massive increase in government power. The second is the total rejection of the free market. The central meaning of both is the repudiation of individual rights. No longer will Americans have the liberty to preserve their own lives in the way they judge best[. F]rom now on, they will have to conform to government controls on the most intimate details of their lives.

Pelosi passed it, and we just keep finding out what's in it. Jon Ward at The Daily Caller unearths a great story from the voluminous health care reform bill that Congress just passed. ["]Tucked away on page 466 of President Obama's 2,704-page health-care bill is a provision that changes the definition of 'medical assistance,' the term describing what states are required to provide to Medicaid recipients.["] The bottom line is that lawsuits against states will proliferate and probably force them to hike Medicaid reimbursements to levels they cannot afford.

Note to Doctors: Now I'm "Entitled" To Your Services. [Scroll down] But thinking about this situation more broadly, one has to ask "what is fair?" ... Is it "fair" that Barack Obama and Joe Biden and Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid and every elected member of Congress and their respective staff members and members of the United Auto Worker's union are all exempt from the heavy handed mandates of Obamacare, while the mandates are imposed on the millions of the rest of us? Is this the "change" we were "hoping" for?

Five things we learned about Obamacare after it passed. [#1] Despite all of Obama's promises and talking points, Obamacare as passed by Congress does not require insurers to cover children with expensive pre-existing medical conditions. Immediately, the White House got an assurance from the insurers. After demonizing them for months as callous profiteers on others' misery (in fact, the entire industry is barely profitable), Obama now tells Americans that they can trust health insurance companies to do the right thing out of the goodness of their hearts.

Obama's private army? [Scroll down slowly] It's hard to see how such a civilian security force under the direct control of the President might be justified, in view of the Posse Comitatus Act of 1878. This law prohibits the federal government from using federal troops for law enforcement purposes within the United States. ... Language in Obamacare seems to remove this prohibition.

ObamaCare Whets Lawyers' Appetites. It turns out the Democrats tucked away a little gift for one of their biggest constituencies, the trial lawyers, in Section 2304 of the new health care law. It alters the section of the U.S. code that defines what "medical assistance" means for state government health care programs, including Medicaid. That leaves states open to far more liability.

ObamaCare's Key to the Kingdom: The enacting legislation of ObamaCare creates a Disney World for micro-managers and other assorted scolds. But in Title V of the bill, we find the key to the Magic Kingdom, or at least the kingdom's treasury. Under the heading of "Health Care Workforce," this section lays out the infrastructure for a single-payer system, while plowing fertile ground for a perpetual left-wing voting majority.

ObamaCare High School: Reading, Writing, and Suicide Assistance? Some years ago, I was speaking to a Nebraska state senator after testifying on a pending bill. I had explained that I wasn't saying that the bill would be interpreted in a certain way, only that it could be. Then he said something I've never forgotten. "Be assured that if a law can be interpreted in a certain way, it will be — by someone. And it will all be perfectly legal."

Oops, we did that? More health care surprises. The partisans on the left who preach with certainty about the effects of the new health care law — it will reduce the federal deficit; it will allow you to keep your current coverage; it will lower premiums — speak from ignorance. No one really knows what the bill will do, including the members of Congress who voted for it.

Stealth IRS changes mean millions of new tax forms. The massive expansion of requirements for businesses to file 1099 tax forms that was hidden in the 2,409-page health reform bill took many by surprise when it came to light last month. But it's just one piece of a years-long legislative stealth campaign to create ways for the federal government to track down unreported income.

Obamacare at Three Months. On the 100 day anniversary that Obamacare became law, which was Wednesday [7/7/2010], Senators Coburn and Barrasso passed around a memo reminding folks that the law isn't actually good for America: Fact [#1]: Sixteen million Americans are forced into Medicaid — a program that denies care, has higher rates of infant mortality, and yields poorer health outcomes for patients. Fact [#2]: Citizens will be forced to purchase costlier health insurance or pay a tax, but illegal immigrants will continue to get free care and those costs will be shifted onto citizens.

The Bitter Fruit of Obamacare. Get ready for your life to change. The so-called benefits of ObamaCare don't start until 2014, but the tax increases, misallocated resources and federal regulations start now. Speaker Nancy Pelosi famously said the night of ObamCare's passage, "We have to pass the bill so that you can find out what is in it." The emerging picture is frightening.

ObamaCare: A Tangled Knot Around America's Throat. Those who wondered what was in the health care overhaul bill now have a chance to look inside. What they see is a snarl of lines, arrows and geometric shapes that will do nothing to improve medical care.

Obamacare Only Looks Worse Upon Further Review. One of the more illuminating remarks during the health-care debate in Congress came when House Speaker Nancy Pelosi told an audience that Democrats would "pass the bill so you can find out what's in it, away from the fog of controversy." That remark captured the truth that, while many Americans have a vague sense that something bad is happening to their health care, few if any understand exactly what the law does.

Dismantling America: Part II. "We the people" are the central concern of the Constitution, as well as its opening words, since it is a Constitution for a self-governing nation. But "we the people" are treated as an obstacle to circumvent by the current administration in Washington. One way of circumventing the people is to rush legislation through Congress so fast that no one knows what is buried in it. Did you know that the so-called health care reform bill contained a provision creating a tax on people who buy and sell gold coins?

The coming investigation into Obamacare. The hallmark of the administration's political bribery and graft is, of course, the so-called Obamacare legislation — legislation that contains 2,841 pages, includes some 2,200 references to the new role of the Health and Human Services (HHS) czar, and creates 600 new authorities that CANNOT be challenged, 150 new bureaucracies and boards interposing between doctors and patients, and 17 new mandates governing insurance companies. Also slapped onto Obamacare, as you will recall, is the unilateral takeover of the entire private student loan industry.

Obamacare's Bureaucracy Nightmare. Even before a single-payer system could evolve, ObamaCare has the potential to topple from bureaucratic overload. Uncountable unelected and untested bureaucrats will be making life-affecting decisions. At this stage, not even experts who have pored over the 2,000-plus-word law know how many bureaucracies are hidden away in the ObamaCare statute.

Does Obamacare include blanket amnesty for illegal aliens?

Obama Won't Give Federal Insurance Benefits to Illegal Aliens, He'll Make Them Legal First. It is true that both the House and Senate health care bills as they are now drafted would make illegal aliens ineligible for federally funded health care. But President Obama has stated as recently as last month at a press conference in Mexico that he will seek "comprehensive immigration reform" legislation that will put illegal aliens on a "pathway to citizenship."

The "Myth" that Health Care Reform Won't Cover Illegal Aliens, Is Itself a Myth. Nowhere does H.R. 3200 say that illegal aliens are ineligible to enroll in the proposed "public option." To the contrary, Section 202 provides that "all individuals" are eligible for benefits offered through the government exchange unless they are enrolled in another health insurance plan.

Obamacare for Illegal Aliens. Big Nanny Democrats want to ration health care for everyone in America — except those who break our immigration laws. Last week, the House Ways and Means Committee defeated an amendment that would have prevented illegal aliens from using the so-called "public health insurance option." Every Democrat on the panel voted against the measure.

Illegal immigrants already put a strain on America's health care system..

Healthcare Crusaders Out To Plunder System. Since Bill Clinton's 1992 presidential campaign, proponents of socialized medicine have bombarded us with nonstop demagoguery about the 40 million-plus uninsured to create a crisis mentality sufficient to catalyze sweeping "reforms." Their efforts didn't stand much of a chance until the advent of the pseudo-crisis-exploiting administration of President Barack Obama, which never met a "crisis" it couldn't leverage.

Government Medical Care Always Becomes Political Medical Care. Americans did not invent democracy. What America rightly did, for the first time in history, was institutionalize the concept of limited government — based not on majority rule, but on individual rights. Sadly, this foundation is not properly recognized and is rapidly giving way to an ever-expanding government. … Those who say that government should seize control of all of our medical care are ultimately advocating the elimination of all restraint on government.

Truth Is A Casualty Of The Final Push. [Quoting President Obama] "By the time the vote has taken place ... you'll know what's in it because it's going to be posted and everybody's going to be able to evaluate it on the merits." The final bill wouldn't available to the public until Saturday morning [3/20/2010], the day before the vote, congressional sources told us Friday. So in fact, nobody would have time to digest the 2,500-page leviathan.

Obamacare is Hillarycare in a new wrapper

Reading the Bill... The White House has pointedly refused to say whether President Obama will read the 1,000+ page health care bill — HR 3200 — now pending before the House of Representatives. ... The language may seem innocuous, but Sec 1866D actually describes the plan for American health care that was first proposed as HR 3600 in 1993 and known as HillaryCare.

Never Seen The Left So Out-Of-Control Desperate. Try looking at this health care debate from the Democrat perspective. It has been a Democrat dream for decades to control the nation's health care delivery system. They thought they had it made in 1993 after Clinton's defeat of George H.W. Bush. Hillary got to work and created a monstrosity of a plan for government control of our health care, and it died a well-deserved and rather painful death. Within a year the Republicans had control of the House and the Senate.

Obama to America: Bend Over and Cough. [Scroll down] Eighty-five percent of Americans have health insurance, and 89 percent of them are satisfied with it. This poses a problem for "reform." MSNBC's Chris Matthews once wrote that because HillaryCare failed to calm the satisfied, it collapsed. "People," said Matthews, "saw their hard-won benefits and options being siphoned off to fund the health needs of all comers. Instead of securing the health care of the 'working family,' Hillary Clinton was offering 'universal coverage' for those who didn't work, financed by those who did. It was an offer people were eager and quick to refuse."

Did someone mention Hillarycare?

Other objections to Obamacare

The Strange Case of the Obama Meltdown. Who made the following decisions? [1] to propose a 1,000 page bill that no one had read, much less could explain?; [2] to ram down the greatest change in the US economy in fifty years by the August recess?; [3] to talk loosely of the "uninsured" without knowing why they were not insured, how much it would cost to insure them, or whether they currently in fact find some sort of care?; [4] to reference Rahm Emanuel's doctor brother as a source of wisdom? [5] to demonize the health-care industry as greedy?

On being ruled by fanatics: The looming ObamaCare fiasco is a classic example of a public policy plan that has never been weighed against the alternatives. Even liberal economists are saying it. Any consistent reader of the Wall Street Journal knows more about healthcare options than the Obama administration's "experts" do.

Obama's Health Care Mess. Health care is stalled and insidiously undermining the presidency of Obama precisely because the public senses he has not leveled with the American people. Of the uninsured, how many millions are young people who feel no need right now to buy insurance, how many million are illegal aliens, how many millions chose to use their optional income for things other than a low-cost catastrophic health plan, how many millions still find care outside the insurance system? Nor do most Americans feel their system is broken.

ObamaCare as a Moral Clunker. Though a relevant consideration, cost is among the least of ObamaCare's problems. Leading the argument against ObamaCare with cost considerations sells the American people short and betrays a moral insecurity that, if not addressed, will cause some future form of ObamaCare to sneak in — if not now, in the not very distant future.

Obama's Health Expert Gets Political. President Barack Obama's health-care plan is in jeopardy because of serious concerns that costs will spin out of control. As much as anyone, it's White House budget director Peter Orszag's job to save it. Mr. Orszag is the administration's point man for controlling health-care spending. So when the director of the Congressional Budget Office, which Mr. Orszag used to run, testified eight days ago that none of the health plans pending on Capitol Hill would control long-term spending, Mr. Orszag knew that meant trouble.

Politicans, Heal Thyselves! If Democrats in Washington think their health care reform with a public option is a good thing, why have they exempted themselves from it? Why isn't what's good for their constituents good for them?

A Cancer In The Capitol Is Killing Us. Hillary Clinton fractured her elbow on Wednesday and was scheduled for surgery in less than 48 hours. As a primary sponsor and advocate of nationalized, government run healthcare, shouldn't Clinton have had to wait a year before surgery — just as she wants the rest of us to do? Apparently, the conditions of nationalized healthcare shouldn't apply to the royal members of Congress, government employees, or their gay partners. Those programs apply only to the commoners who pay their salaries.

The Marriage Penalty in Health Care. Hidden in Obama's health care bill is a huge marriage penalty. Both the Senate and House bills would set up yet another federal program to provide financial incentives to subsidize marriage avoidance and illegitimate offspring.

Political plunder — again. If President Obama and Congress have their way with the so-called health reform bill, the American people will have had their pocketbooks and liberties plundered once again. The basic purpose of government is to protect individuals and their property and to ensure their liberties. However, Congress and most other legislative bodies spend the bulk of their time doing just the opposite.

These are the good old days, Part Two. A friend and occasional Power Line contributor writes: "If [Obamacare] passes, the Dems will own every doctor complaint out there. Moreover, the complaints will multiply, and not just because care will deteriorate as demand increases and supply decreases."

Obamacare's Biggest Losers: A recent study by the Urban Institute, a prominent liberal think tank, lists "the biggest losers" should congressional health care legislation fail to become law. Interestingly enough, this is oddly similar to an earlier Heritage Foundation assessment of the "biggest losers" — if the liberal bills do become law.

16,500 more IRS agents needed to enforce Obamacare. New tax mandates and penalties included in Obamacare will cause the greatest expansion of the Internal Revenue Service since World War II, according to a release from Rep. Kevin Brady, R-Texas.

Obamacare's Hit Man. Last week the Congressional Budget Office reported that it expects that the Internal Revenue Service and the Department of Health and Human Services will spend up to an additional $200 billion over the next decade on administering Obamacare. That's in addition to the estimated $1 trillion that will be spent in 2014-2019 under the new healthcare law. Much of the money will go to hiring hundreds of thousands of bureaucrats to administer Obamacare over the next decade.

A Bigger, Badder IRS: Brought to You by Obamacare. [Scroll down] And why is this tax reporting stuff even in a health-care bill? To help fund it, that's why. To help Pelosi and Reid and Obama get the faux deficit score they needed, the measure is expected to raise $13.7 billion over ten years — though that's before administrative and discretionary costs, which will add another $115 billion or so to the bill's official price tag. Pass the bill to find out what's in it.

Democrats Have Painted Themselves into a Corner. The president has staked his entire administration on getting his Health Care Reform Bill passed. If it fails, he fails. The United States will then be shown to have a hollow leader, and the whole world — Vladimir Putin, Hu Jintao, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, and every dictator and drug lord from here to Marrakech — will know it. By postponing his trip to Asia, first for three days, then for three months, in order to twist arms and get HCR chiseled in stone, President Obama put his entire presidency on the line. He has no plan "B."

Will America break up? President Obama is splintering America. The passage of Obamacare was a historic victory for liberal governance. Yet, its true cost may be that it triggers the eventual breakup of the country.

Healthcare Sends America Down The Path of Tyranny. The beginning of Spring 2010 marks an historic moment in American history: A nation organized as a republic is being transformed into a tyranny. The healthcare bill that has been bruited over for weeks will be law of the land giving Washington, D.C., control of one-seventh of the national economy. More significantly, this act violates the Constitution in several critical ways.

Repeal, Replace, Rinse, Repeat. It is a sad fact that repeal of ObamaCare will be a long, laborious process that is going to take at least two and perhaps three election cycles to achieve. The Republicans must win the kinds of majorities enjoyed today by the Democrats at the ballot box, while electing a president willing to sign a repeal measure in 2012. That's a tall order.

The Unbreakable Theory That Shall Doom ObamaCare in Short Order. Today's Democrats rail against the evil insurance companies and their profits, and once again pretend to champion the little guy. This time it's medical care, not gasoline, that will be in short supply. The new bill will have a significant impact on seniors, since cuts to Medicare and Medicare Advantage are a large part of the plan's advertised savings, and that means more doctors will be opting out as the cost of everything medical skyrockets.

ObamaCare, Castro, and the Future of our Health Care. As the Obama administration and its supporters cheer the passage of ObamaCare — the disastrous health care bill pushed through both houses of Congress by stealth, sleazy deals and perhaps unconstitutional measures — President Obama has received congratulations on the accomplishment from a most unlikely source who should know what America's health care system is likely to look like in the near future — Fidel Castro.

A Declaration of War. It wasn't just that the House of Representatives had ignored the will of the majority of citizens in voting for the so called "health care overhaul." It was the implications behind the act; that "they know better than we do" and that we have to take our bad tasting medicine because we will like what it does for us in the end. ... Imagine America re-instituting slavery, but this time it is more than 99 percent of the population that is to be enslaved for the pleasure and power of a tiny minority of self-appointed elites.

Deere (And Others) In The Headlights. As major businesses lay out the impact of ObamaCare in dollars and jobs, two things are clear: the costs will be enormous, and the president's vow to focus on "jobs, jobs, jobs" can no longer be believed.

The courts can stop Obamacare. Even if Republicans take over Congress in November, they'll probably lack the numbers required to repeal Obamacare over the veto of its namesake. In the short run, then, the only way to fight this massive expansion of federal government is through the courts. If the Supreme Court dares to rule the legislation unconstitutional, there will be cries from the liberals of judicial activism and political bias. Nothing, however, would be further from the truth.

Democratic Senator: Health Care Law to Address 'Mal-Distribution of Income'. After the Senate passed a "fix-it" bill Thursday [3/25/2010] to make changes to the new health care law, Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., chairman of the influential Finance Committee, said the overhaul was an "income shift" to help the poor.

Democrats Try to Smother the Bad News. As I've noted during the week, the ObamaCare steamroller is already flattening the bottom lines of a number of large employers. Not content to see billions of losses pile up, the Democrats have now begun to berate employers for accurately accounting for the anticipated losses.

ATT, Verizon, Deere, Caterpillar Suffer Bloody Billion Dollar Bill. For those who played by the rules, worked hard, did the right thing — you're screwed, the man has you and your wallet and your kids' wallet by the throat. Welcome to the era of the degenerate — they will be sucking your blood and your children's blood and your children's children's blood for decades to come, or however long America lasts.

Why now? If more than 80 percent of Americans are satisfied with their current health care coverage, and if they don't want to lose that coverage, why pass this bill now? If the top issue on Americans' minds is the economy, and if the economy shows signs of a possible double-dip recession, why pass this bill now? If President Obama said just two months ago that "...jobs must be our number one focus in 2010," why pass this bill now?

House Republicans press Sebelius on 'numerous' missed deadlines under Obama health-care law. Key Republican lawmakers are pressing President Obama's top health-care official for answers on why the administration has missed "numerous" early deadlines in implementing Obamacare. The missed deadlines "are some of the most basic provisions of this law," the June 16 letter says, the administration's "failure to meet these deadlines does not bode well for the [law's] more complicated provisions."

The Coming Obamanomics Disaster. Barack Obama's tax plan is going to further impoverish Americans. ... Reaganomics left more money in taxpayers' hands and American businesses thrived. Obamanomics isn't good for American business, and it isn't good for American taxpayers. So who is it good for?

The SEIU's Friendly Inquisitor. Carole Jean Badertscher was a California nurse who just wanted to go to work and take care of her patients — but the SEIU was determined not to let that happen. The union's contract with Badertscher's employer, the Pomona Valley Hospital Medical Center, had expired, and the union had called a strike in response. Badertscher and other nurses, unwilling to abandon their patients for the sake of a stronger SEIU hand in contract negotiations, resigned from the union and went to work.

The Editor says...
When Obamacare gets rolling, expect to see more unionized nurses and more labor union attitude at your neighborhood hospital.

Paying for hope with your change. In the modern era, all presidents have to some degree used their office to promote themselves and their policies. The Obama administration, however, has taken the practice to new heights. The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) last month unveiled a slick, $700,000 television commercial featuring crusty old actor Andy Griffith announcing that "more good things" are coming to seniors — thanks to Obamacare. Just add the O Force campaign logo, and the advertisement will be ready for use in the 2012 presidential race.

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