Atlas Shrugs

My Healthcare Renewal Bill

I just got my healthcare renewal form. My rates are up over 30% across the board, and that's with a $5,700 deductible. Impeach the liar. He really makes me sick -- oops, I can't afford to get sick.

I want a waiver -- oops, I don't know any crooked Democrats (is there any other kind?) who can fix it for me.

Who is the recipient of these goodies from this crooked administration? Unions, of course, and FOO.

This, over at The Examiner:

The Obama administration has given waivers for the new Healthcare program to 111 corporations and entities so far, but few know where the application is to apply for it.  On the Health and Human Services (HHS) website, it takes clicking through six pages of information and misdirection to find the waiver application, and also to see a list of approved businesses who have opted out.

Approved Applications for Waiver of the Annual Limits Requirements of the PHS Act Section 2711 as of November 1, 2010.  (Click on the link to go to the page with waiver applications and approved lists)

Unfortunately, to receive a waiver it appears you must have political capital with the administration to be accepted.  For most small businesses, you will be incurring the new taxes, fees, and programs that will add thousands to your bottom line, and in more than a few cases, might cause a small business to close their doors.

In March, AT&T reported from an internal study that the new Healthcare program will cost their company over $1 Billion in new and additional costs.  We do not know at this time if they have applied for a waiver from HHS, but they are not on the approved list as of November 1st.

Looking at the list, you will notice that unions are one of the largest entities given a waiver, and speaks to the political gifts given by the Administration to them.  The Obama Presidency has proven their partnership with unions since 2008 to the detriment of small business.

 

Thomas Sowell: Alice in Health Care

Thomas Sowell, the great American thinker, last of a breed ................. weighs in and slams the failed socialists and communist usurpers in DC. Alice in Health Care:

One of the biggest reasons for higher medical costs is that somebody else is paying those costs, whether an insurance company or the government. What is the politicians' answer? To have more costs paid by insurance companies and the government.

Back when the "single payer" was the patient, people were more selective in what they spent their own money on. You went to a doctor when you had a broken leg but not necessarily every time you had the sniffles or a skin rash. But, when someone else is paying, that is when medical care gets over-used -- and bureaucratic rationing is then imposed, to replace self-rationing.

Money is just one of the costs of people seeking more medical care than they would if they were paying for it with their own money. Both waiting lines and waiting lists grow longer when people with sniffles and minor skin rashes take up the time of doctors, while people with cancer are waiting.

In country after country, the original estimates of government medical care costs almost always turn out to be gross under-estimates of what it ultimately turns out to cost.

Even when the estimates are done honestly, they are based on how much medical care people use when they are paying for it themselves. But having someone else pay for medical care virtually guarantees that a lot more of it will be used.

Nothing would lower costs more than having each patient pay those costs. And nothing is less likely to happen.

One of the big costs that have actually forced some hospitals to close is the federal mandate that hospitals treat everyone who comes to an emergency room, whether they pay or not. But those who talk about "bringing down the cost of medical care" are not about to repeal that mandate. Often they want to add more mandates.

The most fundamental issue is not whether treating everyone who comes to an emergency room is a good policy or a bad policy in itself. If it is a good policy, then the federal government should pay for what it wants done, not force other institutions to pay for it. Then let the voters decide at the next election whether that is what they want their tax money spent for.

Confusion between costs and prices add to the Alice in Wonderland sense of unreality.

What is called lowering the costs is simply refusing to pay all the costs, by having the government set lower prices, whether for doctors' fees, hospital reimbursements or other charges. Surely no one believes that there will be no repercussions from refusing to pay for what we want. Some doctors are already refusing to accept Medicare or Medicaid patients because the government's reimbursement levels are so low.

Similarly, if it costs a billion dollars to create one new pharmaceutical drug, then either we are going to pay the billion dollars or we are not going to keep on getting new pharmaceutical drugs produced. There is no free lunch.

Schemer Schumer Proposing Legislation to Steal the Vote: Universal Voter

Schumer is shaping up to be one of the most dangerous Democrats in the Senate, and considering the competition, that is a huge accomplishment.

He is the lowest. Anyone who would pretend to be frum, pretend to be religious to con the orthodox Jews in his Brooklyn district that he was "one of them," is evil. A friend of mine was a lawyer in his Brooklyn office at the time. She was a true blue Democrat then, but the things she saw made her skin crawl.

Frum Schumer lobbied against the nomination of one of Israel's great friends, Ambassador John Bolton. Snake. Low life snake, I tell ya.

Schumer has compared freedom of speech with porn. Perhaps because he is so obscene. Look at what he said:

“The very same people who don’t want the Fairness Doctrine want the FCC [Federal Communications Commission] to limit pornography on the air. I am for that… But you can’t say government hands off in one area to a commercial enterprise but you are allowed to intervene in another. That’s not consistent.” …

The recent revelations in the gossipy book Game Change, show us Schumer was Barzini all along. it was he who threw Hillary under the bus and made Obama the candidate. It was Schumer who delivered this nation into the hands of the enemy.

He's a pig and that ain't kosher.

John Fund of the Wall Street Journal and expert on voter fraud is warning that Sen. Charles Schumer, D.-N.Y., and Rep. John Conyers, D-Mich., plan to propose universal voter-registration legislation – possibly within weeks.

Democrats are scheming to manipulate the electoral process this election year by implementing a federal mandate to involuntarily register millions of people to vote – making the system ripe for unprecedented fraud and abuse. "Democrats were very rattled by the Nov. 3 election results," Wall Street Journal reporter and political commentator John Fund told a crowd in November 2009, at a David Horowitz Freedom Center forum. "What do liberals do when they lose elections? They change the rules."

"Schumer is definitely introducing a bill," Fund told WND. "It's not public yet, but he's definitely going to do so."

A congressional staffer confirmed Schumer's involvement.

"What we know from statements from advocacy groups that support universal voter registration is that they have been working with Sen. Schumer's office since approximately last spring to create a bill," the staffer told WND. "We don't know exactly when he will introduce it, but it has been predicted to be introduced in the near future for several months now. Schumer definitely has been, and seems to be, the point person on this."

Dems positioning to rig November elections including illegals voting?

Can falsified registrations become votes? If the feds push universal voter registration by overriding state elections procedures, you bet, says John Fund of the WSJ.

"What does universal voter registration mean? It means all state laws will be overridden by a federal mandate. At that point you will have destroyed the integrity of the registration process. This is their stealth bill . . . it is even more sneaky than the healthcare bill."

Topics = Illegal Immigration, universal voter registration, ACORN, fraud, Democrats, John Fund, rig elections, illegal alien voters

January 4, 2010
Allan Erickson
Clarity Digital Group LLC d/b/a Examiner.com

If you think ACORN voter registration and fraud threaten the integrity of the American electoral process, just wait until Chuck Schumer and Barney Frank get their way. 

For many years, John Fund has been warning about Democrat efforts to redesign the electoral process. These 'reforms' are sold as ways of improving the process. Fund insists they are designed to manage favorable outcomes for Democrats, going so far as to say last November that the Democrats are working to subvert and corrupt the voter registration process.

Here is Fund's word-for-word presentation on this topic last November at the David Horowitz forum:

"Democrats were very rattled by the November 3rd (2009) election results. What do liberals do when they lose elections? They change the rules. In January, Chuck Schumer and Barney Frank will propose universal voter registration. What is UVR? It means all of the state laws will be overridden by a federal mandate.

"The feds will tell the states: 'Take everyone on every list of welfare recipients, take everyone on every list of unemployed you have, take everyone on every list of property owners, all driver's license holders, and register them to vote, regardless of whether they want to be. Oh, and by the way there will be felon re-enfranchisement too.

"At that point you have destroyed the integrity of the registration process.

"Now, they will sell this very cleverly. They will say, 'Well, OK, ACORN did have some problems with voter registration . . . we should not have these third-party rogue groups out there, so let's put ACORN out of business. Let's register everybody!'

"Now, the problem is of course is there are a lot of duplicates. And there are a lot of people on those rolls who are illegal aliens.

"There are a lot of people on those rolls . . . it's not a clean list.

"They (the Dems) don't care.

"So this is the issue you haven't hear about. There is a reason you haven't heard about it. They don't want you to hear about it.

"The path between the day this bill is introduced and the day it hits the House floor will probably be less than two weeks.

"Get ready for it. You can stop it. Don't get me wrong, but this is their stealth bill that is even more sneaky than the healthcare bill.