CLASS-less Obamacare becomes more of a budget drain
File this under “Now they tell us.” From the Washington Post:
The Obama administration cut a major planned benefit from the 2010 health-care law on Friday, announcing that a program to offer Americans insurance for long-term care was simply unworkable. …
Because the insurance program had been projected to reduce the federal deficit by $86 billion over the next 10 years, terminating it complicates the nation’s budget picture. It is now estimated that the health-care law will cut the deficit by $124 billion from 2012 to 2021, according to the Congressional Budget Office.
Actually, plenty of Obamacare opponents said from the beginning that the Community Living Assistance Services Act, better known as CLASS, was a two-fold sham. First, because it would be unworkable, as the Obama administration now concedes. And second, because it was included only as a numbers-rigging exercise to make Obamacare marketable as a net reduction in federal deficits.
In fact, doubts about the program’s viability — not some sudden epiphany about fiscal responsibility within the administration — are the reason CLASS is being dismissed. The Wall Street Journal explains:
The only reason the Health and Human Services Department pre-emptively called off this scheme is that former New Hampshire Senator Judd Gregg succeeded in inserting a proviso that required the Class program’s reality to match Democratic promises as a matter of law. If HHS couldn’t provide “an actuarial analysis of the 75-year costs of the program that ensures solvency throughout such 75-year period,” it couldn’t be legally implemented.
HHS couldn’t do that, and now anywhere from half to two-thirds of the supposed deficit savings (depending on which 10-year window you choose) is gone. The rest will follow soon enough.
Abandoning CLASS also highlights one of the other main criticisms of the law: that it was thrown together hastily so that President Obama and congressional Democrats could salvage something from nearly a year of bumbling, fumbling and stumbling toward health reform. And as we were all taught as children, haste makes waste.
It’s the latest example of why Nancy Pelosi’s “pass it to find out what’s in it” statement will go down in infamy. And it’s yet another reason for members of Congress with any sense to work toward repealing the entire law and replacing it. The WSJ suggests an excellent way of doing that: Make the Gregg amendment apply to the entire law.
Do that, and the law should be dead in the water before the Supreme Court even gets a crack at it next year.
– By Kyle Wingfield
Tell us what you think about the site
Customer Care »
Vacation stops, manage subscriptions and more
AJC Services
Sections
Other Editions
Visitor Agreement | Privacy Statement
© 2013 The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
100 comments Add your comment
It's a stretch
October 17th, 2011
8:29 am
CLASS-less Obama could always come up with some sort of “classy” death panel promotion.
carlosgvv
October 17th, 2011
8:29 am
All of the industrialized Western countries manage to give their people universal healthcare. We are the exception. There are no viable excuses for this. Corporate greed, pure and simple, is the culprit.
Cosby
October 17th, 2011
9:24 am
another example of how the Obama administration is flim flamming the public. his jobs act will follow suit. when will the dumb masses ever wake uop and realize this man, as Neil Boortz puts it, is more dangerous than 9-11. Sham upon sham
Lynnie Gal
October 17th, 2011
9:28 am
So, conservatives would dump old people out on the street after bankrupting them for medical bills rather than help them to provide for retirement homes. And gut Medicare. And force people to give their Social Security to Wall Street. Their war on the old, the sick, the helpless, the poor and the middle class goes on. And on. And on. Ad nauseam.
MarkV
October 17th, 2011
9:39 am
The Republicans have no plan to make health care, including long-term care, more affordable for most Americans, and they react with glee when an attempt to provide a voluntary program for a long-term care turns out to be unworkable. It tells us a lot about them.
Obozonomics
October 17th, 2011
9:43 am
Lynnie Gal,
The way we do now, right? Do you really believe that, if you do you don’t live in the real world..
Get Real
October 17th, 2011
9:44 am
Get a grip liberals, the numbers do not foot; they never did…
Obozonomics
October 17th, 2011
9:46 am
I don’t understand why liberals even live in America, you seem to hate it, but remember you are free to immigrate to Cuba any time you want. I hear that Michael Moore says it is great there. Just think you can live in the leftist values you all cherish right?
USMC
October 17th, 2011
9:48 am
“All of the industrialized Western countries manage to give their people universal healthcare. We are the exception. There are no viable excuses for this. Corporate greed, pure and simple, is the culprit.”
–Carlos
Go buy your own Healthcare coverage, Carlos. We are not going to foot the bill for your sorry arse!
BULLSEYE
October 17th, 2011
9:55 am
Just more rightwing bootlicking from Kyle and a hearty three cheers from the rest of the schmucks.
JF McNamara
October 17th, 2011
9:57 am
Yeah, The Republicans “won”. In the mean time, I just enrolled for my annual health benefits. Guess what? The premium went up and the coverage went down.
I don’t care about ObamaCare except that it seemed to be a step in the right direction to solving my problem. Who is honestly trying to help to solve my problem of rising health care costs?
A Conservative Voice
October 17th, 2011
10:11 am
@carlosgvv
October 17th, 2011
8:29 am
All of the industrialized Western countries manage to give their people universal healthcare. We are the exception. There are no viable excuses for this. Corporate greed, pure and simple, is the culprit.
To carlosgvv – Are you commenting from Wall Street in New York where the rest of the idiots are?
MiltonMan
October 17th, 2011
10:13 am
Libs on this board – about as bright as a burnt out light bulb.
Their illogical belief system = make healthcare “free” to everyone; the US needs universal healthcare just like the other western countries, etc., etc.
Libs – brainwashed since youth that everything is free – free cable, free education, free internet, free school lunch, free government checks, etc., etc.
Western countries like Greece, Spain, Portugal, Italy, etc., etc. have “free” healthcare & look at their crappy econimies.
ragnar danneskjold
October 17th, 2011
10:27 am
The WSJ – may have been the same article – highlighted another obvious truth: the Obama administration implemented programs extending and broadening coverage, while ignoring changes that would control costs. The American public was more concerned with controlling costs than with broadening coverage. More bass-ackwards democrat policy-imposition, but what did anyone expect.
Of course, the bonus with ObamaCare is the ripple effect on the economy – by adding a “per employee” expense, of unknowable magnitude, the overlords have given every employer a strong incentive to dispose of as many current employees as possible, and to use every mechanism possible to avoid adding employees. As the Iranians say, thank goodness the US is run by democrats.
Bill Hilly
October 17th, 2011
10:29 am
Western countries like Norway, Denmark, France, Germany, Brazil, and Chile etc., etc. have “free” healthcare & look at their robust econimies.
Lil' Barry Bailout (Unexpectedly Revised Downward)
October 17th, 2011
10:34 am
carlosgvv: All of the industrialized Western countries manage to give their people universal healthcare.
————————–
False. They don’t “give” them anything. Their citizens have agreed to be taxed in order to “pay” for universal health care.
Lil' Barry Bailout (Unexpectedly Revised Downward)
October 17th, 2011
10:36 am
BULLSEYE: Just more rightwing bootlicking
————————-
It wasn’t bootlicking that forced your Idiot Messiah to admit that this part of his Obozocare program was a sham, a failure, and an early precursor of the failure of the rest of his economy-wrecking healthcare power grab.
Obozo: Fail.
Centrist
October 17th, 2011
10:37 am
These smoke and mirrors fell down, and that is AFTER we have had over 1,000 Obamacare waivers for favorite corporations and unions (who just coincidentally give campaign contributions).
We have a lying, corrupt government and a mostly compliant media since leftist politics suits them more than highlighting policy problems.
Don't Tread
October 17th, 2011
10:52 am
Maybe if we could attach the Gregg amendment to EVERYTHING, all this money-wasting will stop…
MarkV
October 17th, 2011
11:01 am
Nobody who is sane, not even the most leftist liberals, believe that “free healthcare” means that nobody pays for it. When you get a “free sample” in the store, or a “free gift” through mail, they also are not “free” in that sense. “Free universal healthcare” is just shorthand for healthcare costs shared by all. Those with private health care insurance also take advantage of cost sharing, but by a smaller group, and including paying for the administration of the insurance and profit of the company.
Lil' Barry Bailout (Unexpectedly Revised Downward)
October 17th, 2011
11:03 am
If “free universal healthcare” is such a great idea, why didn’t a filibuster-proof Democrat senate and Democrat house pass it?
Dusty
October 17th, 2011
11:08 am
Way to go, Kyle, You got it. The “blumbling, fumbling, stumbling” of the Obama administration can’t figure the cost of penny candy. They couldn’t figure the cost of healthcare but “sold” it to us anyway. NOW they back off.
As liberals declare the beauty of national health programs in other countries, they do not remember the tax rise that goes with it. Denmark, for example, where citizens are taxed over 50% of their income. Much the same in all countries with national healthcare.
Also, you liberals might have noticed that the UK health system just declared that it would not pay for the latest cancer treatment drug because the drug was too EXPENSIVE.
Yeah, treatment for everyone so called “free” because they “don’t have to pay for it”. Ignorance is not bliss. It is sad.
Lil' Barry Bailout (Unexpectedly Revised Downward)
October 17th, 2011
11:10 am
Bill Hilly: Western countries like Norway, Denmark, France, Germany, Brazil, and Chile etc., etc. have “free” healthcare & look at their robust econimies.
———————
Greece, Spain, Portugal, and Ireland do too, so what’s your point?
And oh, by the way, Brazil and Norway have robust economies because their government isn’t moronically in opposition to oil and gas drilling. That’s where most of their income comes from.
The U.S. didn’t become the most important, wealthiest, and strongest nation in the world in just 150 years by doing what everybody else was doing. Deal with it.
Dusty
October 17th, 2011
11:12 am
Don’t tread @ 10:52
Your comment is a fine idea. I hope someone is listening. Stop the waste!
Hillbilly D
October 17th, 2011
11:16 am
In my opinion, there was a window there where something could have been done to improve the health care system. Obama chose to let Pelosi and Reid do the heavy lifting. He preferred to remain above the fray and never convinced people why it was the way to go. He has only himself to blame; he didn’t lead. It’ll probably be 20-30 more years before another opportunity roles around to look at fixing things.
Jimmy62
October 17th, 2011
11:18 am
Lynnie Gal: Funny…. From a factual perspective, Obama wants to gut Medicare, has even said so a number of times. ObamaCare is designed to gut Medicare. Go read the facts, you might learn something. I doubt it since you will discount anything not straight from a hard core liberal, but who knows? Maybe you’ll open your mind for once.
Bart Abel
October 17th, 2011
11:19 am
RE: “New Hampshire Senator Judd Gregg succeeded in inserting a proviso that required the Class program’s reality to match Democratic promises as a matter of law.”
—————————————————————————————–
They’re calling it “the Gregg amendment.” What chutzpah!
I continue be amazed with how confidently some can take credit for things they had little or nothing to do with. With due respect to Republican Senator Judd Gregg, he ultimately had no say in the final legislation that he had no intention of voting for and did not vote for. If Democrats didn’t want the provision in the legislation, it wouldn’t have been there. Inserting it, or not removing it, didn’t gain or lose them one Republican vote–including Gregg’s.
Let’s not forget the problem that CLASS was trying to solve…how to provide access to cost-effective long-term care for seniors. The problem still exists.
Jimmy62
October 17th, 2011
11:21 am
MarkV: The right has had plenty of ideas, they just get ignored in the rush to give everyone free stuff paid for by other people. I won’t list those ideas here, because those ideas are already listed in innumerable places. You’d have to actually demonstrate an interest in anything a right winger has to say, though, and typically lefties dismiss everything the right says without even thinking about the content.
Yep
October 17th, 2011
11:26 am
Even ObamaCare will not fix one of the major problems with our current system. It only addresses actual taxpayers and confiscating their money to pay for universal care. The problem is that there are too many occupants of this country that are not even on the tax rolls that take advantage of our current and future health care system. We will never shake that yoke unless we have other immirgration and entitlement reform that pushes these “taker” into the light and forces them to pay their fair share.
Lil' Barry Bailout (Unexpectedly Revised Downward)
October 17th, 2011
11:31 am
“The problem still exists”
—————————
Wow, you obviously care deeply about this issue. Don’t let the lack of a government run program stop you from contributing. Here is a non-profit long term care facility that you can donate do directly:
http://www.christiancarehome.com/donations.html
Didn’t think so.
Bob
October 17th, 2011
11:34 am
MARKV – I would rather be in the smaller pool with the responsible adults then in the large pond of leaches. Conservs are not out to Kill Granny, We take Granny in and take care of her. It is the Libs that want to Dump Granny in an institute and make others pay for her.
Tiberius - Your lightning rod of hate!
October 17th, 2011
11:40 am
“All of the industrialized Western countries manage to give their people universal healthcare. We are the exception. There are no viable excuses for this.”
Yes there is. We live in a Constitutional republic where freedom and self-reliance is more important than living off the government.
Paulo 977
October 17th, 2011
11:41 am
carlosgvv
October 17th, 2011
8:29 am
All of the industrialized Western countries manage to give their people universal healthcare. We are the exception
—-for all our talk about SOCIAL JUSTICE!!!
JKL2
October 17th, 2011
11:42 am
What do they mean by “solvent”? It’s free insurance. What part of “free” do they not understand?
Tiberius - Your lightning rod of hate!
October 17th, 2011
11:43 am
“The Republicans have no plan to make health care, including long-term care, more affordable for most Americans”
Missed the 7 different GOP-sponsored bills stuck in Democrat-controlled committees back during the health care debates, did ya ?
Dusty
October 17th, 2011
11:45 am
HillBilly D,
I think I might disagree with you on whether Obama was leading on this healthcare program. I think he guessed that is was probably impossible to work effectively. That it was far more costly than estimated.
But…he pushed it forward anyway without any study because he knew it pleased a great many Americans in the belief that it was “free”. He knew that it would get votes and that is his continued aim.
Pelosi and Reid are just dedicated followers of the Democratic lead. They too push anything that might please voters.
Somewhere long ago our leaders forgot to do what is best for the country. Now it is what is best for the “party”. But I believe Americans are still looking for a man or woman who leads for the country. I don’t think that is asking too much. I think it maintains freedom.
Lil' Barry Bailout (Unexpectedly Revised Downward)
October 17th, 2011
11:46 am
“Social justice” is for folks who can’t cut it.
Crenshaw8
October 17th, 2011
11:50 am
Latino voters have a complicated relationship with the health care reform law approved in March 2010. On the one hand, they support the majority of its provisions and oppose its repeal. But just like other voters, they are against the clause that will force them to purchase coverage, the so-called mandate.
These are some of the results of an impreMedia/Latino Decisions (IM-LD) poll in collaboration with the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) Center for Health Policy at the University of New Mexico. This is the fifth in a series of six national polls exploring the opinions of the Latino group that has best integrated into American society: registered voters. This particular poll focused on the issues of insurance coverage and the health care reform law.
The results reveal that 50 percent of Latino voters support the Affordable Health Care Act and only 29 percent support its repeal. These numbers are similar to those of the general population.
However, 59 percent of these voters are not well disposed toward one of the law’s regulations, which makes it mandatory for them to purchase insurance if they do not have coverage. They are against it.
Obamacare cannot exist without the mandate. Choose freedom from government or government mandating where, when, and how you will receive medical attention.
I choose freedom from government.
resno2
October 17th, 2011
12:02 pm
MarkV
“The Republicans have no plan to make health care, including long-term care, more affordable for most Americans, and they react with glee when an attempt to provide a voluntary program for a long-term care turns out to be unworkable. It tells us a lot about them.”
Who does really it tell alot about when 50% of the supposed healthcare savings was wrapped up into a scheme that they had to have know at the time was not financially sustainable?
Lil' Barry Bailout (Unexpectedly Revised Downward)
October 17th, 2011
12:06 pm
“Republicans react with glee when an attempt to provide a voluntary program for a long-term care turns out to be unworkable. It tells us a lot about them.”
——————————
Incorrect. Republicans react with glee when reality slaps morons in the face. This doesn’t tell us anything about Democrats though, because we already knew they were morons.
Dusty
October 17th, 2011
12:12 pm
The USA offers many programs for healthcare. If you do not know about them, download the USA DIRECTORY OF HEALTHCARE OFTIONS.
Our country is not letting people die on the streets without healthcare. In fact, people from other countries are coming here to get the best. I think we can solve our problems here without copying others. We have the freedom that inspires solutions and we can do it again. But I think it will require a new leader with a vision beyond his own self interests.
Jefferson
October 17th, 2011
12:21 pm
The GOP has nothing to offer to solve the health cost problem. NOTHING.
Finn McCool
October 17th, 2011
12:43 pm
Western countries like Greece, Spain, Portugal, Italy, etc., etc. have “free” healthcare & look at their crappy econimies.
Yeah, and Germany, and Norway, and Denmark, and Belgium, and France – look at their economies….oh, wait….
Finn McCool
October 17th, 2011
12:43 pm
How is Canada’s economy doing? They have state health care.
GT
October 17th, 2011
12:45 pm
Wasted resources on the rich while the rest of the 99% die on the vine. I will like to see the 1% operate without the rest of us. I can assure you the 99% could operate without the 1% and if the money was redistributed to the real working class there would be plenty to cover health insurance.
Rafe Hollister
October 17th, 2011
12:51 pm
Well, 2012 is going to put an end to the whole sorry mess, aka, Obamacare. Rasmussen’s latest poll, Cain 43%-Oblamer 41%. Kinda ends the elites cry of only Romney stacks up well against the worst President in American history.
All of you whinners worried that Granny can’t find a place in the nursing home are full of it. My Dad was in two large nursing home, he was one of two private pay patients in one and the only private pay patient in the other. Both places came to us and asked why are you paying, everyone else is on Medicaid, why are you not. Our answer was we do not qualify, too many assets, and we are not going to do like many here and cheat by having family members grab the assets. He saved the money to pay for this expense, why then give it all away, and wait for the IRS to pounce and demand that the money be recouped. No one goes without nursing home care in America, too many nursing homes know how to get you qualified for Medicaid.
Bob
October 17th, 2011
12:51 pm
Finn, Canada is doing quite well. They did exactly the opposite of what Obama and dems did when our economy tanked, they slowed spending and did not implement losing programs like the failed stimulus or cash for clunkers. Your point is “mute” !
Rafe Hollister
October 17th, 2011
12:58 pm
GT, you are so short sighted. The evil rich are the ones that provide money and opportunity so that ideas get implemented.
If Steve Jobs depended to the poor and middle class for financing he would still be tinkering in his garage. He did not have the money to develop and distribute his PC until he floated an IPO on Wall street. Can you imagine him trying to explain this great idea and pick up some funding at an Occupy Wall Street rally.
Justin
October 17th, 2011
1:01 pm
Jefferson
October 17th, 2011
12:21 pm
The GOP has nothing to offer to solve the health cost problem. NOTHING
I totally agree with you! And it amazes me how they invoke God in everything, yet could care less if the elderly and poor are disadvantaged. That says a lot about the republican party.
Rafe Hollister
October 17th, 2011
1:01 pm
Bob, you are so right. Germany did the same austerity program. Oblamer went over and met with the leaders of Europe and tried to sell his “plug the hole” with stimulus spending idea. Angela Merkel told him he was full of you know what that Germany was going to reduce spending and get a handle on their debt. One of them is bailing out Greece, the other begging for tax increases.
saywhat?
October 17th, 2011
1:04 pm
Bob, the word is “moot”. If you don’t understand anything as simple as English, how could you possibly expect people to believe you know anything about the Canadian economy? For one thing, the Canadians avoided tanking their economy because they did exactly the opposite of what W and the Republicans did when they were in power.
Obozonomics
October 17th, 2011
1:05 pm
Jefferson, let me correct your ignorant statement; “The DNC, and Harry Reid, have blocked any Bills that the GOP brought up for a vote.”
Obozonomics
October 17th, 2011
1:06 pm
saywhat, you are free to move to Canada anytime you wish..Just STOP trying to make us a socialist country…
saywhat?
October 17th, 2011
1:07 pm
Rafe, was that German austerity program where they passed a bunch of legislation at their heavily unionized workforce, or got rid of their universal healthcare? I didn’t think so.
saywhat?
October 17th, 2011
1:09 pm
Funny at 1:06. Uses words he doesn’t know the definition of. Perhaps you and Bob can take remedial English together.
Dirty Dawg
October 17th, 2011
1:21 pm
Look Kyle, anything that’s lacking in the Healthcare Act, the one you and your cohorts insist on calling Obamacare, is due to Republican intransigence and dedication to the goal of making sure this President doesn’t do anything that helps people or the country….you POS.
Lil' Barry Bailout (Unexpectedly Revised Downward)
October 17th, 2011
1:28 pm
Perhaps Dirty Dawg can explain why a filibuster-proof Senate had to cave in any way to “Republican intransigence”. Democrats could have made Obozocare be whatever they wanted it to be.
Being liberal means never having to say I am responsible for my actions
October 17th, 2011
1:28 pm
Canada is moving towards more market-based choices in healthcare because people there are tired of waiting nine months to have a bunion removed. In other words, their health system sucks the teabag you stuck in your boyfriends’ mouth last night. Why is individual freedom and choice such a hard concept for you numbskulls to understand? It’s called competition and it has made us the envy of the FREE world. Why do you think foreigners want to come to the Cleveland Clinic for care? Duh……
hatorade drinkers
October 17th, 2011
1:37 pm
more cut and paste? nothing original from yourself as usual. at this rate you will be laid off by end of the year.
Big Barry (Revised Upward)
October 17th, 2011
1:45 pm
Kyle – you and your minions appear to be auditioning for parts in “dumberist, stupider and kompleetly ritarded – the sequel that came after the prequel but beefor the beginning”. As usual. You and them are so seriously nuts that I’m increasingly worried about be fate of humanity since humans, after evolving for millennia, appear to be regressing at an alarming rate. To the point where the very word ‘conservative’ has lost all meaning and should be replaced with ‘regressive’
Rafe Hollister
October 17th, 2011
1:56 pm
Big Barry, so you liked New Coke better than Classic Coke?
dixiedemons
October 17th, 2011
2:03 pm
“And it’s yet another reason for members of Congress with any sense to work toward repealing the entire law and replacing it.”
Our Lobbyist system of government will not allow career congressman to use common sense if they want $$$ for re-election. So they continue to dig and spin our nation into irrelevancy in the world order.
Big Barry (Revised Upward)
October 17th, 2011
2:04 pm
Raffish – given your regressive leanings, please consider changing your moniker to ‘rape holistically’. I’m off to enjoy an ice cold Pepsi on this glorious fall day. Ta.
Lil' Barry Bailout (Unexpectedly Revised Downward)
October 17th, 2011
2:13 pm
DEMOCRAT CALLS FOR A LIST OF THE RICH TO PRESSURE THEM TO ‘GIVE BACK’
Dr. Zbigniew Brzezinski, a former National Security Advisor to President Carter and a frequent guest on his daughter Mika’s MSNBC program, made a series of strange statements during his segment on “Morning Joe” earlier today.
Talking with the MSNBC crew about the concentration of wealth in America as motivation for “Occupy Wall Street,” Dr. Brzezinski seems to believe that publishing the names of people who make a lot of money would be helpful in redistributing wealth:
Brzezinski wants anyone making a lot of money to be pointed out, but a short time later he says he does not want Wall Street “demonized.” Then, he returns to his demonizing of people who legally earn a lot of money and spend it in ways that apparently he would not.
“We have to have disclosure.”
“We have to have transparency.”
“We have to have control.”
——————————————-
Democrats: Fascists.
Steve
October 17th, 2011
2:18 pm
I read the comments in here and I think – is this the script for a sequel to “Deliverance?”
Ignorance is what is going to kill this nation.
Our health care system is corrupt, full of middlemen, expensive, and broke. If you’re wealthy, you LOVE this system. But hey, we let the 1% run the rest of us. Look how well the 1% have brainwashed you cretins to like a system that only helps the 1%? Freaking amazing.
Lil' Barry Bailout (Unexpectedly Revised Downward)
October 17th, 2011
2:22 pm
If you’re letting the 1% run you, you’re a weak little man.
Halftrack
October 17th, 2011
2:32 pm
The WSJ suggests an excellent way of doing that: Make the Gregg amendment apply to the entire law.
Let’s urge our Congress to do that and put pressure on our Journalist so that “Bills” can be properly vetted before they are voted upon. Hindsight is making all of us look Dumb and Dumber.
#occupy my desk...
October 17th, 2011
2:41 pm
Can we stop with the “we are 99%” BS because even that logic is totally flawed. Turns out the top 1% control about 42% of wealth…but that doesn’t make a nearly dramatic enough sign… I think it’s funny that Obama has earned more campaign money than all repubs combined, with much of that coming from Wall Street and top corporations, and yet he somehow has the support of the OWS people.
Anyone else see the irony there?
Monroe Burbank
October 17th, 2011
2:56 pm
Who owns the Wall Street Journal? Oh, yeah, that’s right. The same folks who own Fox News.
Let’s just chunk the whole plan so us Georgia taxpayers can go back to paying about $500,000,000.00 per year to pay the health care bills for those who can’t afford to pay them. (Sorry if all the zeros confuse some of you.)
We require everyone who gets behind the wheel of a car to have auto insurance. We can’t require everyone who walks into a hospital for treatment to have health insurance?
Conservatives, at least those here in Georgia, have mastered the art of cutting off one’s nose to spite one’s face.
Lil' Barry Bailout (Unexpectedly Revised Downward)
October 17th, 2011
3:00 pm
We can’t require everyone who walks into a hospital for treatment to have health insurance?
—————–
Actually, that would be fine with me!
Dusty
October 17th, 2011
3:02 pm
Well, I knew that sooner or later someone would blame Bush for not having free healthcare for the youngest citizen to the oldest grandma.
Sure ’nuff, here comes “waywhat?” to sing the same ol’ Dem song. Goes like this: “Nobody loves me. Everybody hates me. I’m gonna eat some worms and Bush did it!”
Will they ever realize who is the president now breaking the bank and leading the country to bankruptcy while claiming it is for the poor and helpless?
If Obama stays in office much longer we will all be poor and helpless. He won’t be poor because he is one of the rich he so discriminates against. Needless to say or whatever happens, he will continue to be rich. Haven’t heard of him giving his riches away. Just other people’s money.
Cliff
October 17th, 2011
3:12 pm
This commentary doesn’t make any sense. How is the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act a drain on the budget, when it CUTS the budget by $124 billion? It’s not a budget drain at all. Repealing the Act would be a budget drain. Good luck finding $124 billion in cuts in the budget or new revenue, if you want to repeal the Act. By the way, you repeal the Act here are some of the things you lose, at the benefit of insurance companies:
Life time limits return – hello bankruptcy if you need a liver transplant
Insurance companies will once again be able to exclude coverage for pre-existing conditions – Your wife had breast cancer? Sorry, not covered.
Insurance companies can drop you when you get really sick, so they don’t have to pay anything. Your child developed leukemia? Suck it, find another insurer, oh but wait, you have a pre-existing condition.
But yes, by all means repeal the Act that you don’t understand, because some moron on Fox News or talk radio has labeled it “Obamacare”, therefore it must be bad.
Lil' Barry Bailout (Unexpectedly Revised Downward)
October 17th, 2011
3:21 pm
Looks like ol’ Cliff will swallow just about anything.
Cliff, your Idiot Messiah is “repealing” his signature achievement all by himself, with thousands of waivers and now dropping a major part of it that was so clearly a disaster that he had to deep-six it.
Obozo: Fail.
Dusty
October 17th, 2011
3:23 pm
Lil Barry,
I don’t believe hospitals can set up insurance salesmen at the front door. But hospitals do not turn sick people away for any reason. They are not left lying in the streets as some seem to imply.
Good healthcare is expensive. Socialized medicine is mediocre. Seems like that is what we have to decide. Good healthcare or mediocre? Obama insists that we want mediocre. He is wrong as usual. Buying “cheap” has never given long wear.
Lil' Barry Bailout (Unexpectedly Revised Downward)
October 17th, 2011
3:24 pm
Monroe Burbank: We require everyone who gets behind the wheel of a car to have auto insurance. We can’t require everyone who walks into a hospital for treatment to have health insurance?
—————
Who pays for your auto insurance?
saywhat?
October 17th, 2011
3:27 pm
“It’s the latest example of why Nancy Pelosi’s “pass it to find out what’s in it” statement will go down in infamy.”
Way to slip a baldfaced lie into your column Wingfield. The ONLY reason Pelosi’s statement will go down in infamy is because liars like yourself will take it out of context and imply that it meant something completely different. The portion of the quote you conveniently forget to mention is “… outside the fog of controversy”, meaning, of course, that too many lies were being told regarding the bill for people to get trustworthy information about what was in the bill. Pelosi made the assumption that once the bill passed, low life scum bags would lose interest in lying about the bill with tall tales of death panels and socialism. You do a great job proving her wrong. I hope you are proud of yourself.
Socialism's grrrrrrrreat
October 17th, 2011
3:37 pm
saywhat? – lies, half truths and obfuscations are Wingfield’s stock in trade. He is incapable of anything different.
Cliff
October 17th, 2011
3:38 pm
Lil Barry:
You should consider using logic and coherence to make a point, rather than name calling and blasphemy. It’s much more effective. Furthermore, I have more fear and respect for the almighty, then to throw around “Messiah” as freely as you do.
Socialism's grrrrrrrreat
October 17th, 2011
3:42 pm
Dusty – western Europe has better outcomes (ie, quality of care) at a lower cost (ie, you spend less money to get it). Stop buying the lie being sold to you by the medical industrial complex that the quality of healthcare in America is better. Statistically speaks, ‘mericans are fatter, unhealthier and stupider than their western European counterparts. But you go on believing the joke that is ‘Merican exceptionalism and supply side economics.
Kyle Wingfield
October 17th, 2011
3:42 pm
saywhat: Spin it however you want. Pelosi’s statement is wholly consistent with her efforts to pass the bill by any parliamentary tricks necessary, to end the debate.
And whatever you think of the “lying about the bill” before its passage, all of the unpleasant discoveries since then have, unfortunately, been based on reality.
Socialism's grrrrrrrreat
October 17th, 2011
3:43 pm
Lil brainfreeze – irony probably is that your annual household income doesn’t exceed $30k
Kyle Wingfield
October 17th, 2011
3:49 pm
Cliff: How is it a drain on the budget? Because experience so far suggests the rest of the “savings” will prove just as illusory as the CLASS “savings” did.
Socialism's grrrrrrrreat
October 17th, 2011
3:50 pm
‘tricks’ Kyle? What’s tricky about a majority in the house and a supermajority in the senate? Can you spell ‘doofus’? ‘unpleasant discoveries since then’? Its meaningful provisions haven’t come into effect yet. Maybe it won’t work; more likely that it will, however. But you morons won’t give it or anything else a chance. Moron that you are. And liar.
Lil' Barry Bailout (Unexpectedly Revised Downward)
October 17th, 2011
3:52 pm
Sorry to disappoint, Socialism’s, but it does. I know all you libs like to think that “karma’s a bitch” and that the meek shall inherit the earth, but you only believe those things to justify your own lack of success.
Lil' Barry Bailout (Unexpectedly Revised Downward)
October 17th, 2011
3:53 pm
If Obozocare worked, he wouldn’t be waiving it for thousands of companies and labor unions. If it worked, they’d all be rushing to embrace it.
Obozocare: Fail.
Socialism's grrrrrrrreat
October 17th, 2011
4:01 pm
Lil brainfart – gates; jobs; Buffett. Yep, failures each and every one of them. Liberals, too. It’s clear you know nothing about the affordable care act other than what’s fed to you by fox news, which makes your positions understandable but no less reprehensible. You really are a pig.
Socialism's grrrrrrrreat
October 17th, 2011
4:37 pm
What, lil brainfart, no retort? Cat got your tongue? Or you are stymied by ‘inconvenient’ facts? I think the latter.
Rafe Hollister
October 17th, 2011
5:37 pm
Kyle, I thought you were going to ban these name callers, i.e. people like Socialism’s great. He certainly is adding nothing intellectual to this blog.
MarkV
October 17th, 2011
6:02 pm
Bob @11:34 am: “I would rather be in the smaller pool with the responsible adults then in the large pond of leaches.”
As if you could choose with a private health insurance company.
MarkV
October 17th, 2011
6:03 pm
resno2 @12:02 pm:
“Who does really it tell alot about when 50% of the supposed healthcare savings was wrapped up into a scheme that they had to have know at the time was not financially sustainable?”
First, you should check your math. Second, hindsight is always 20-20.
hryder
October 17th, 2011
6:28 pm
Far too many folks want others to pay their financial desires. Funds which they possess they expect fo use all of for discretionary spending. This is BS(male bovine excrement), MS(more of BS) and PhD(piled higher and deeper). You want health insurance, a house, a car, food, clothing, etc., then you pay for it. The USA is broke! When 40% of welfare recipients own a home, a big screen TV, air conditioning, and a minimum of one automobile something is tremendously wrong. #*^@<#&* politicians just keep on buying votes to remain in POWER!
Bella
October 17th, 2011
6:42 pm
CLASS wasn’t feasible because it was a voluntary program. Saying that the entire act should be repealed because of that is pretty weak. If CLASS were mandated, like general health insurance under health reform, it would be feasible. Not that I want CLASS to be mandated . . . But don’t pretend the feasibility issues of CLASS can be applied to general healthcare reform.
saywhat?
October 17th, 2011
6:51 pm
Spin it any way *I* want? *I*want? Slow down, Wingfield, before you get any more dizzy.Pelosi’s statement had ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to do with how the bill was passed. Your statement however, IS consistent with the misinformation she was decrying.
Man up, if you can, and admit you misused Pelosi’s quote, and in a dishonest manner.
As for any “unpleasant discoveries”, this is the only one of any real consequence that I have heard of. Despite this set back, the benefits of the bill still far outway any negatives in my view.
saywhat?
October 17th, 2011
7:27 pm
I am confident that one day Wingfield had this thought run through his head: “Someday when I have my own blog, I hope my post count will be inflated by a single moronic poster, repeating endless variations of the same idiocies over and over again every day. Then I will truly be happy”.
L Dodd
October 18th, 2011
12:23 am
Obamacare is, in my opinion, the WRONG way for a compassionate society to provide medical care to those that cannot afford it.
It would make more sense to provide care (what and how much for per problem and/or per person up for debate but definitly within set financial limits) via block grants to states and have the states provide the needed care on a sliding fee scale via their existing city/county health departments and any willing charity providers. Within the bounds of reason (up for debate), require all medical professional entities and all doctors to participate in providing care–directly and/or via license and/or other fees (and/or w/option for them to pay $ (amount up for debate) to be exempt from directly providing care) to stay in business w/i the state. Amounts always up for debate and subject to change, of course, as each new batch of polititions gets elected.
Is President Obama’s National Health Care Reform Law Slowly Unraveling? – Fox News | News In Politics
October 18th, 2011
9:40 am
[...] the right thing to doSan Francisco ChronicleWhite House waffling on long-term care plan?BusinessWeekAtlanta Journal Constitution (blog) -Washington Post -Boston Globeall 402 news [...]
Gm
October 19th, 2011
5:15 pm
Hail to President Obama for doing something for the 30 million that has no heath covergage: for those who are against hope you or no one in your family has cancer or some other dreaded pre condition illness, and can not get coverage and you have lost your job.
Blame Obama care because Obama really cares, use this as a excuse for not hiring Americans and sending our jobs overseas, rep party are a bunch of selfish sickos, God has a way of dealing with people who prey on helpless people, oh and by the way the ones that are against Obama care are the ones that run to church and cry they are chritians”””’
RonB
October 19th, 2011
5:56 pm
Kyle, I don’t see where you ever gave President Obama or Health or Human Services any credit for getting the High Risk Insurance Program (PCIP.gov) up and running at break-neck speed and shockingly under budget. To date, roughly only 2% of the 5 billion dollars budgeted to provide subsidies for the program (to 2014) has been spent.
All that fear mongering that the money was going to run out within a year has been proven to be totally unfounded. Setting the prices of the PCIP insurance premiums at the FMV of individual policies sold in each state that opted out, FYI those were mostly red states notorious for having little to no consumer protections, and rip-off pricing, naturally caused lower enrollments in states like Georgia. If our Insurance Commission had only fought to run our own state’s PCIP program like Pennsylvania did, we could have lowered the insurance premium rates for the high risk pool, thus upped the enrollment of those otherwise uninsurable. We could have hired Georgians to work Georgian claims.
While you, and Senator McCain were nearly, if not out right calling President Obama a liar when he and the CBO projected the government could run the new high risk pool until 1/1/2014 on 5 billion dollars lives were needlessly being lost all across this country; nearly every year, nearly 40,000 people lose their lives because they were denied access to health care insurance. For those who think all you have to do is go to a hospital to get care, understand this: You can’t get chemotherapy in an emergency room.
Let’s get real. It is time for the Republicans to put their “repeal and replace” health care plan on the table. Are you really going to put the PCIP enrollees, some 30,000+ previously uninsurable folks out on the streets to die, with no other options, just so you can win politically?
Kyle Wingfield
October 19th, 2011
6:11 pm
RonB: You’re right, the pools haven’t proven to be underfunded yet — because, on the contrary, they’ve been undersubscribed by about 92 percent (that is, 8 percent of the people expected to enroll have done so). Did we really need to pass such an enormous and unwieldy piece of legislation to help 30,000 people?
Oh, and as long as we’re “getting real” — HR 3400, to name but one bill, was introduced in the last Congress and has been re-introduced in this one. Just because you haven’t been looking at the table doesn’t mean nothing’s on it.
RonB
October 19th, 2011
11:17 pm
Thanks for the update on HR3400, I thought it was dead. It was not very popular amongst Republicans back in 2009, when first introduced (see other blogs on Google). There was some irony noted that a representation from Georgia, a state that has never implemented a high risk pool, was now coming forth with a federal tax credit plan for states that implemented high risk pools (when most all other states had done so, long, long, long ago). Those proposed Price tax credits are minuscule compared to the cost of insurance even though the PCIP plan. My wife and I currently pay about $15K a year for two PCIP policies, just for the insurance. If you add the deductibles of $2500 and $1000, it is closer to 20K before we see a dime of coverage. A $4000 refundable tax credit would be welcomed, but it will hardly increase the undersubscribed problem you mentioned. But, you really don’t care, how many uninsured die, do you? I don’t sense you do from your comment above.