Love My Country, Loathe My Government

Friday, August 21, 2015

August, 2015, Will The Center Hold - Protecting Second Amendment Rights, Fighting The EPA, and Cracking Down on Welfare Abuse At The State Level

On a periodic basis we do a series themed around the idea of “will the center hold?” The basis of this series is that at no time in recent memory have we seen local and state governments, along with individual citizens, pushing back against the overreaching and unethical, immoral, and often illegal actions of the Washington political class and the government bureaucracies they oversee.

From Obama Care to gun control to school lunches to government spying on citizens to a multitude of other issues and actions, we have a Federal government monster that is out of control, trampling freedom and lives in the process. But many in America are striking back against this out of control monster and those stories are what we have discussed in this series over the years.

To review previous discussion in this series, simply type in “will the center hold” in the search box above. After reading these examples of grassroots rebellion against Federal overreach, ask yourself the following fascinating questions: what happens when the Federal government issues a new law or dictate and the rest of the country simply decides to ignore it? Does the center hold or does the country splinter into who knows what? Interesting times we live in.

1) According to a recent Associated Press article, a group of Idaho citizens lined up outside of the home of a U.S. Navy veteran after hearing that the Federal government would be sending people to confiscate the veteran’s weapons. Included in the 100 or so people in the group lined up around the home were state government politicians and the Bonner County Sheriff.

This situation arose after the veteran received a letter from the Veteran Affairs office notifying him that he cannot possess or buy firearms. After pressed on the situation, a Veterans Affairs spokesperson, Bret Bowers, stated that Veterans Affairs does not have the authority to confiscate weapons, that they are only about providing healthcare to veterans.

Whether or not this veteran should be able to have firearms is a separate issue. The real issue we are discussing in the context of will the center hold is that individual American citizens are now much more willing to band together and react and protest against a Federal government that they feel is intruding into their lives and liberties.

2) Fifteen state attorney generals havefiled lawsuits against the Obama administration’s Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), claiming that the government’s extensive and likely illegal carbon regulations need to be stopped. The fifteen states are West Virginia, Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Michigan, Nebraska, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Wisconsin and Wyoming.

According to reporting by the Blaze, the EPA will "regulate the electricity industry and require states and utility companies to meet goals, providing rewards and penalties." But many states and citizens do not buy into the EPA’s reasoning. West Virginia Attorney General Patrick Morrisey said, "This rule is the most far-reaching energy regulation in the nation's history, and the EPA simply does not have the legal authority to carry it out. With this rule, the EPA is attempting to transform itself from an environmental regulator to a central planning agency for states' energy economies. The Clean Air Act was never intended to be used to create this type of regulatory regime, and it flies in the face of the powers granted to states under the U.S. Constitution."

Of course, this action by Obama’s EPA is an attempt to control how American’s get and use electricity under the guise that global warming and climate change are about to end humanity and ruin the world’s environment. Two big things wrong with this view of reality. First, as we have discussed for years under our “I am a global warming doubter and believer in science” series of posts, there is now much more science available to show that manmade global warming and climate change do not exist or do not exist to any degree that will be dangerous to mankind or the world's environment. Thus, this effort to manage the country’s carbon footprint, that has already shrunk considerably over the past two decades, is an exercise in futility.

And second, the EPA does not have the Constitutional power to issue such overriding and overreaching regulations and impose them on the country. That is why states are fighting back against the center.

3) The Obama administration has done two critical things that has caused welfare and food assistance programs to skyrocket in costs. First, the Obama administration ignored current law and dropped the work requirement from certain welfare programs, allowing deadbeat citizens to leech off of the taxes collected from other working citizens without the inconvenience of looking for and getting themselves a job.

Second, despite being years away from the end of the last recession, there are still more than 45 million Americans drawing food assistance money from the government each month. Which can mean only one of two things: the economy is doing fine, as Obama says, and he just runs a very poor food assistance program that is rife with fraud and inefficiencies. Or, the economy is doing far worse than he says it is and 45 million Americans rightfully need government food assistance each month.

Six and half years into the Presidency is enough time to safely conclude that the Obama administration is not going to fix what is wrong with welfare and government food assistance in this country. Which is why about a dozen states are taking their own actions to fix what Washington has broken. The states that are cracking down and taking action include Maine, Arizona, West Virginia, South Carolina, Texas, New York, Oregon, Minnesota, Montana, Mississippi, Connecticut, Iowa, Kentucky and Hawaii. And some of those states are very liberal, historically controlled by the Democrats.

Some of these states are requiring welfare and food assistance recipients to take and pass a drug test, just like many of the taxpayers who support these types of people, are often required to do. Some states are limiting the time that able bodied welfare and food assistance people can actually get assistance before getting cut off. Other states are requiring that able bodied people search for and find jobs before they can get government assistance.

All becuase the Washingotn political class conitnues to hand out freebies to able bodied people to curry favor with them at voting time but crippling state budgets in the process. Finally, states, both liberal and conservative states, are saying enough is enough and taking the issue into their own hands, ignoring what Washington says they should be doing.

That will do it for today's “will the center hold” discussion. States that are fixing the welfare mess that Washington created, state attorney generals telling the Federal EPA to pound sand, and ordinary citizens protecting the Second Amendment rights of a neighbor from a Federal bureaucracy that wants to take those rights away. More pushbacks and rebellions tomorrow.

Our book, "Love My Country, Loathe My Government - Fifty First Steps To Restoring Our Freedom And Destroying The American Political Class" is now available at:

www.loathemygovernment.com

It is also available online at Amazon and Barnes and Noble. Please pass our message of freedom onward. Let your friends and family know about our websites and blogs, ask your library to carry the book, and respect freedom for both yourselves and others everyday.

Please visit the following sites for freedom:

Term Limits Now: http://www.howmuchworsecoulditget.com
http://www.reason.com
http://www.cato.org
http://www.bankruptingamerica.org
http://www.conventionofstates.com
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08j0sYUOb5w

Thursday, August 20, 2015

August, 2015, Part 2,I Am A Global Warming Doubter and Believer In Science: More Arctic Ice, A Nobel Prize Winner Debunks Obama and More

Every month we have enough material to return to a continuing theme in this blog, namely that “I am a global warming doubter AND a believer in science.”This became of interest because of people like Al Gore who fanatically and verbosely claimed that you had to be an idiot to not believe in manmade global warming. It has been my life belief that anyone that is that loud and that obnoxious is hiding something, that rather than argue facts and reality it is better to beat down and insult anyone who disagrees.

As we have dove into the whole issue of manmade global warming, or its new rebranded title of climate change, we found that Al Gore and people like him were guilty of a number of things:

Ignoring science and realities that did not support their opinions and positions.
Rather than have an adult conversation about climate, these types of advocates like Gore sank to the level of insulting those who dared look at ALL science by calling them a variety of names including racists, homophobes, terrorists, flat earth believers, and other slanderous names.
Continuing to insist that politicians step up their intrusions into our lives with higher taxes, more regulations, and more control on our freedoms and standards of living based on a shaky theory at best.

To see the past posts and the multitude of evidence that we have compiled that showed it is perfectly okay to be a global warming doubter and a believer in science, enter the phrase "global warming doubter” in the search box above or go through the monthly historical post listed on the right side of this page.

Thus, let’s see the latest facts and science that prove you can be a global warming doubter and a believer in science, regardless of what Al Gore proclaims

1) Yesterday we discussed the reality that the Arctic ice cap has been growing in size and volume over the past few years, dispelling any lingering doubts that global warming could reduce the ice cap to only water within five years.

This reality was driven home again when a recent global warming research effort to the Arctic by the Canadian icebreaker CCGS Amundsen was terminated because the ice breaker had to be taken off of the study and sent to get several supply ships unfrozen from Arctic ice. Yes, there was too much ice up by the North Pole for freighters to navigate freely, hardly a sign of a disappearing ice cap that Al Gore predicted just six years ago.

According to Johnny Leclair, assistant commissioner for the Coast Guard, ice conditions in this Arctic area are the worst he's seen in 20 years. This was apparently the first time ever that the Amundsen has had to be diverted away from a science mission to go break up ice. Those in charge of the scientific expedition announced that some of the planned experiments and measurements, four years in the planning, will be delayed or terminated altogether as a result of the delay.

The UK Register reported: “The Arctic ice cap has not, contrary to the predictions of climate alarmists, completely disappeared: in fact it has been growing rapidly, increasing by an entire third just in 2013 and more since.” The BBC has also recently published updated research which has confirmed the Arctic ice's remarkable comeback over the last couple of years.

But the growing ice situation must be really bad since news reports indicate that two more icebreakers are heading toward the upper Hudson Bay to relieve the Amundsen.

2) Al Gore and Barack Obama like to degenerate any discussion of manmade global warming and climate change into a name calling, condescending, insult match between themselves, who fancy themselves as believers in science, and the heathens that dare to disagree with their position. Thus, it is always refreshing when we are able to present real scientists that agree it is perfectly logical to be a global warming doubter and a believer in science vs. politicians that parade around as if they are scientists.

Which is exactly what happened recently when a Nobel Prize laureate recently announced that global warming is non-existent. Dr. Ivar Giaever and more than 70 Nobel Science Laureates had actually endorsed Barack Obama for President back in 2008 but seven years later, he now stands against the Obama on the global warming issue.

According to Giaever: “I would say that basically global warming is a non-problem.” Giaever, who won the Nobel for physics in 1973, told this to an audience at the Lindau Nobel Laureate meeting earlier this month. He actually made fun of Obama’s statement that “no challenge poses a greater threat to future generations than climate change,” calling it a “ridiculous position” and claiming that Obama “gets bad advice” when it comes to global warming. Giaever went to to say: “I say this to Obama: Excuse me, Mr. President, but you’re wrong. Dead wrong.”

Giaever was once a professor at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute’s School of Engineering and School of Science and received the Nobel Prize for physics for his work on quantum tunneling. Giaever said he was “horrified” about the science surrounding global warming when he conducted research on the subject in 2012. Giaever resigned from the American Physical Society in 2011 when the Society stated that “the evidence is incontrovertible … [g]lobal warming is occurring.”

At that time, Giaever opined that “Global warming really has become a new religion. Because you cannot discuss it. It’s not proper. It is like the Catholic Church.” Giaever based his views on his own knowledge and the reality that there’s been no global warming for the last 18 years or so, weather hasn’t gotten more extreme and that global temperature has only slightly risen, based on data being “fiddled” with by scientists, he said: “When you have a theory and the theory does not agree with the experiment, then you have to cut out the theory. You were wrong with the theory.”

So who are you going to believe? A real scientist and Nobel winner like Giaever or Holiday Inn Express scientists like Gore and Obama?

3) We will finish up this month’s update on how it is logical to be a global warming doubter AND a believer in science with a little levity. Check out the following video clip and see how a comedian shows more logic, grasp of reality, and truth than Al Gore and all other global warming advocates combined:

http://www.youngcons.com/didnt-see-this-coming-comedian-goes-on-epic-rant-against-global-warming-and-alarmists-cant-stop-laughing/

I am assuming we will be back to this topic next month with more science, more data, and more realities to prove that Al Gore and Barack Obama are on the wrong side of science when it comes to man made global warming and climate change.

Our book, "Love My Country, Loathe My Government - Fifty First Steps To Restoring Our Freedom And Destroying The American Political Class" is now available at:

Wednesday, August 19, 2015

August, 2015, Part 1, I Am A Global Warming Doubter and A Believer In Science: The Ice Caps Are NOT Melting!

Ignoring science and realities that did not support their opinions and positions.
Rather than have an adult conversation about climate, these types of advocates like Gore sank to the level of insulting those who dared look at ALL science by calling them a variety of names including racists, homophobes, terrorists, flat earth believers, and other slanderous names.
Continuing to insist that politicians step up their intrusions into our lives with higher taxes, more regulations, and more control on our freedoms and standards of living based on a shaky theory at best.
To see the past posts and the multitude of evidence that we have compiled that showed it is perfectly okay to be a global warming doubter and a believer in science, enter the phrase "global warming doubter” in the search box above or go through the monthly historical post listed on the right side of this page.

Thus, let’s see the latest facts and science that prove you can be a global warming doubter and a believer in science, regardless of what Al Gore proclaims

1) According to the website, Real Science:

The Arctic ice cap is now growing at a very quick pace and at the current pace of growth it will be about the same size it was back in the 1980s in about five years, dispelling any remaining global warming doubts and proving just about every historic global warming forecast model to be wrong.
It also makes a mockery of Al Gore’s 2009 prediction that the entire ice cap might melt by the year 2014.
The increase lately has been due to a change in winds which is helping to preserve and grow the ice volume.

Oopsie from a global warming perspective.

2) We have often made the case that even if the U.S. substantially reduced its carbon footprint, something it has already done in the past decade or so and has done at a substantial rate, if the rest of the world does not reduce its growth in carbon usage, whatever the U.S. does will be wiped out and overwhelmed by the growth in carbon output from countries such as China and India.

We have previously discussed the reality that with an economy growing at seven percent of more year over year, China will need more and more cheap energy to feed that economic growth and keep its citizens happy. And the quickest, cheapest, and best way to do that is to continue using high carbon content coal to generate energy. In fact, China is building massive infrastructure projects to mine coal and turn it into electricity in its coal rich western regions and transport that electricity to its growing cities in the east. They are not about to give up on coal anytime soon.

There are more people living in India today that do not have access to electricity than who live in the entire U.S. The best and quickest way to get these 300 million plus people onto an electric grid is via coal.

But some people in this country, e.g. Obama and Gore, want the U.S. to continue to hamstring its energy supplies and usage to make a philosophical point that will destroy jobs and economic growth in this country without having an substantial impact on worldwide carbon usage and the environment. Recently, Republican candidate for President, Carly Fiorina, elegantly made this exact point in an interview:

“The scientists that tell us that climate change is real and caused by man made activity, also tell us that a single nation acting alone can make no difference at all. So, when I see a state like California destroy lives and livelihoods with environmental regulations that will make no difference at all to climate change, when I see the Obama administration take that same regulation and apply it nationally – it will make not difference at all, yet we’re destroying people’s lives and livelihoods – I wonder, why are we doing this? Why are we doing this when it won’t have any impact? So I think the answer to this problem is innovation, not regulation. But I must say, it angers me when liberals says “I’m prepared for you to lose your job in the name of sending a signal to…” whom? China could care less? In fact, China is delighted that we are not spending any time or energy figuring out clean coal, because they’re going to go do it.”

Her insightful interview can be seen at:

http://rightwingnews.com/top-news/carly-fiorina-destroys-katie-couric-on-climate-change/

3) Matt McGrath, writing for the BBC on July 21, 2015, reported that the Arctic ice volume grew by one third after a cool summer in 2013. That is a lot of growth over a wide area. He also went on to report that the growth in the ice cap continued into 2014.

But rather than accept the fact that the growth was so much, climate change advocates are claiming that 2013 and the subsequent growth in the ice cap was a statistical anomaly. They insist the ice cap will continue to shrink in the decades ahead. Rather than accept the reality that according to the article, “Relative to the average of the period between 2010 and 2012, the scientists found that there was a 33% increase in sea ice volume in 2013, while in 2014 there was still a quarter more sea ice than there was between 2010 and 2012,” they still grasp the concept that this is not reality and this growth is some kind of fluke.

Same attitude with their global warming models. It took decades to prove that all of the highly touted global warming forecast models were wrong even though for those decades they kept telling themselves and yelling at global warming doubters, that the realities emerging, i.e. the world was not longer cooling, was a statistical fluke and due to natural variations but that their theories and models would win out. Which they never did.

4) Maybe these doubters of a growing ice cap should have read a recent article by James Taylor writing in Forbes. His article claims that new, updated NASA data from their satellites show that Earth’s polar ice caps have not receded since the satellites began measuring the size of the ice caps in 1979.

In addition, total polar ice volume has remained above the post-1979 average size. One reason for the panic over global warming and its effects on the ice cap is that 1979 marked the end of a 30 year colder than average trend, which made the ice caps larger than average. Once that cooling trend ended in the late 1970s, the ice cap started to shrink which caused global warming advocates to incorrectly correlate mankind’s activities with shrinking ice caps. The total shrinkage was much less than 10% but that was enough to set off the hysteria.

But all that shrinkage began disappearing in 2012 as the ice caps began growing again, making the 2009 Al Gore prediction seem that much more idiotic. According to Mr Taylor, May, 2015 NASA data from its satellites show that the ice cap is now 5% larger than the post 1979 average. More data means less believability of Al Gore types.

That will do it for today’s proof that it is possible to be a global warming doubter and a believer in science. One of the big selling points of first global warming and then the rebranded hysteria, climate change, was that the ice caps were melting as a result of mankind’s energy generation activities.

Which is what happens when you selectively look at historical data that only proves your point without having a basis in reality. Reality: the ice caps are growing, not shrinking as predicted by global warming tenets. Reality: whatever the U.S. does relative to coal and carbon footprint, it will have little effect unless the rest of the world aggressively does the same, a reality that is unlikely to happen as elegantly pointed out by Fiorina.

More updates tomorrow.

Our book, "Love My Country, Loathe My Government - Fifty First Steps To Restoring Our Freedom And Destroying The American Political Class" is now available at:

Tuesday, August 18, 2015

August, 2015, Part 4, The Unfolding Disaster That Is Obama Care: Sandbagging Information, A Scandalous Nomination, and Personal Obama Care Horror Stories

Every month for years now we have had to discuss how bad Obama Care is turning out to be under the continuing theme, “the unfolding disaster that is Obama Care.” This month is no different. As the legislation continues to march through America, driving up health care and health insurance prices as it serves as dead weight on economic growth, it cements it rightful place as the worst piece of legislation Washington has ever produced.

It never had a chance to be successful since it really never addressed the underlying root causes of our ever increasing health costs in the country:

Americans eat too much of the wrong kind of food, resulting in obscenely high obesity rates for the country.
Our food chain is infested with overdoses of high fructose corn syrup, salt, and other unhealthy additives.
Americans smoke too much.
Americans do not exercise enough.
The country is in serious need of health care tort reform.
Barriers to insurance company competition across state lines need to come down.
Obama Care never “followed the money” to find out who is actually profiting from the ever escalating healthcare costs in this country and how to get those factors under control.
Obama Care never got the immense amount of fraud and abuse in current government healthcare programs, Medicare and Medicaid, under control in order to save money to efficiently fund other government health care initiatives.
Obama Care never put serious research money towards curing the major diseases that drive high healthcare costs such as high frequency cancers and dementia type diseases.

You cannot resolve any problem unless you understand and address the underlying root causes. No difference here but with a big exception: Obama Care legislation never addressed these listed root causes and thus, has no chance of ever being successful.

Today is the final day of four that we have taken to look at the latest disasters from Obama Care, including the gathering evidence that Obama Care policy holders are in for a big and ugly financial surprise in their 2016 costs along with some personal stories on how Obama Care is causing havoc with American families.

1) A quick follow up to a discussion from yesterday. At that time we discussed the precarious financial position of most of the Obama Care co-ops that were set up to provide low cost insurance to the uninsured and compete with the big insurance companies in geographic areas that did not have a lot of competition. Some of the co-ops are performing so poorly that the Federal government, via the Centers For Medicare and Medicaid, have placed several of the co-ops into a special risk category called “enhanced oversight.”

Given that the American taxpayer gave the co-ops about $2 billion to get established, much of which will never be paid back, it is our right as citizens to understand which co-ops are performing so poorly. Well, despite Obama's bold claim that he was going to operate the most transparent administration EVER, this same administration is stonewalling attempts to get the names of the co-ops getting special oversight attention because of their incompetence.

Despite a legitimate, non-burdensome request, heck the list of poor performing co-ops is only four names long, government spokesperson Aaron Albright has refused to divulge the names of these poorest performing co-ops as requested by the Daily Caller News Foundation. Instead, he suggested that the Daily Caller News Foundation file a Freedom of Information Act request to get the names.

Given that the Obama administration has a proven track record of trying to derail, block and delay other Freedom Of Information Act requests, it could be years before the American public rightfully finds out which co-ops are performing so poorly. Which raises the natural suspicion: what is really going on behind the scenes in these poorly performing co-ops that the Obama administration wants to keep secret? Whatever the secrets are, you can be sure it is just another unfolding disaster from the worst piece of legislation ever written.

2) The following discussion is not directly related to Obama Care but it gives you a sense of the type of people involved in operating the government’s health care operations. The Daily Caller website recently ran an article discussing the story about Andy Slavitt, Obama’s choice to run Obama Care, Medicare, and Medicaid.

According to the Daily Caller:

Seven years ago, Slavitt was linked to a massive fraud scheme that eventually resulted in the largest settlement paid out by an insurance company.
At that time, Slavitt was the CEO of a company called Ingenix, a healthcare analytics company.
The New York state attorney general and the American Medical Association alleged that Ingenix supplied databases to insurance companies that intentionally and fraudulently calculated payments for out-of-network medical services provided to policyholders.
The eventual settlement of the charges was $350 million.
The attorney general charged that Ingenix and UnitedHealth Group, which owned Ingenix at that time, “rigged” reimbursement rates that forced patients to overpay up to 30 percent for out-of-network doctors and hospitals.
Additionally the attorney general claimed that Ingenix was running a “scheme” that sought “to defraud consumers by manipulating reimbursement rate. This involves fraud in the hundreds of millions of dollars, affecting thousands and thousands of families. Too many people have been hurt. It has to stop.”
At that time, it was estimated that years of data manipulation by Ingenix affected as many as 110 million Americans — about one in three patients — who used doctors, labs or hospitals that were out of their insurance network.
According to Senator Jay Rockefeller, who chaired a couple days of Congressional hearings on the scandal: “Everywhere experts have looked at this data, they have found what statisticians called a ‘downward skew’ in the numbers. For 10 years or even longer, this skewed data was used to stick consumers with billions of dollars that the insurance industry should have been paying.”

Despite all of this investigation by the New York attorney general, despite the massive settlement figure, despite the findings of a Senate investigation, Obama still named this guy to be in charge of Obama Care, Medicare, and Medicaid. Unbelievable insanity.

Many more details on this scandal and issue can be found at:

http://dailycaller.com/2015/08/02/obamas-top-healthcare-nominee-was-once-embroiled-in-medical-fraud-case/#ixzz3hlTjHXMF

3) One topic we never discussed relative to Obama Care in much depth is that now that Obama Care has been through two years or enrollments, what do those enrolled in Obama Care policies think about them? We have often reviewed how Obama Care requirements destroyed the preferred medical and healthcare arrangements of millions of Americans, i.e. the promise that if you like your prefered doctor, your insurance plan or your hospital was a bold face lie. However, what do those Obama Care policyholders think about their policies?

Well, now we know. A recent article in the Washington Times by Tom Howell, Jr. reviewed the survey findings by the Deloitte consulting company of Obama Care customers' degree of satisfaction with their Obama Care policies:

The survey found that only 30% were satisfied with the health care coverage they were getting with their Obama Care policy.
Only one in four surveyed were confident they could get healthcare when they needed it.
Only 16% though they were financially prepared to handle future healthcare costs despite having an Obama Care insurance policy.
In a classic understatement, Paul Lambdin, a director for Deloitte said: “Those are not high numbers.”
Fourteen percent of Obama Care health insurance exchange users said they were “not satisfied.” By comparison, those who have coverage through Medicare, Medicaid or plans through their employers had dissatisfaction rates in the single digits.
Also, only 35% had a high level of confidence that the exchanges are providing good information.

Just another failure of a failed piece of legislation, unmet or unfulfilled customer expectations for the money they are paying.

4) In past discussions of Obama Care we have often included the personal and often tragic stories of American families that had their lives, their wallets, and healthcare disrupted by Obama Care. The source of those stories with the website:

www.ourhealthcarestories.com

But it turns out that this is not the only website collecting the heartbreaking stories from Americans relative to Obama Care. There is another website doing the same service called:

www.myhealthcarestory.com

So today and for this month, we will use this source to share with you some of the personal stories of the unfolding disaster that is Obama Care:

Mick - Mississippi: I was dropped from my wife’s insurance which I had been on for 10 years or more. They just came out and told us that all spouses would be dropped because of Obamacare. I had to get insurance through my company which added about $340 to our cost of insurance. Our premiums went up about 60%.

Laura - Texas: I am a truck driver and this past December I had to quit working due to my own health problems. I was driving for an owner operator so I didn’t have insurance in the first place. The first thing I thought I would do was to try and get on the county healthcare, but that was taking too long and they were wanting information that there was no way that I could provide. So, as much as I hated to, I thought I’d try to get on Obamacare. I needed health insurance bad. I could barely walk and was in a lot of pain. So, I went online and put in my info, and for me, not working with no income, the cheapest plan was almost $400! How is that suppose to help anyone? And the deductible/out-of-pocket was outrageous!

So how is this helping people that need insurance? It doesn’t!

John - California: We are in a small town with only one medical clinic. Wife retired as City Employee. City paid, as part of retirement benefits, our health insurance premium as well as a retirement check. Note: Health insurance premium is greater than retirement paycheck. December 2014, at an all-retirees meeting, City announced that increase in premiums due to Obamacare was more than city could handle and city would send us a check, we add to it, then pay our own health insurance. Insurance saw us as new enrollees, wanted 2 months premiums in advance. We paid 2 months, then city said they worked it out where city would pay towards our premium directly, we just pay the difference. Not enough to say that we are just prepaid, Insurance company said they wanted the difference sent in AGAIN, while they investigate the double payment. Now we get no retirement check, as that check didn’t cover the premium, we must come up with difference, and we are prepaid now 4 months, we cannot get a refund for the overpayment, and when wife went to doctor in Feb, we learned that our doctor no longer takes Blue Shield, because of Obamacare, and they will give no refund for our overpayment, and we have no insurance and we are a family not happy with Mr Obama. Thank you for giving me a platform to vent! In fairness, we are covered by health insurance, just not by any doctors that we know or who are in our geographic area.

Laurie - New Mexico: To begin with, I hardly make any money. I am a freelance writer, and that was my choice, so I don’t blame anyone for how little I make.

However, I also believe in personal responsibility. So, I had my own insurance through Blue Cross/Blue Shield. It was not always easy, but I always kept up my $120 a month payment. I only went to the doctor once a year, for my annual exam. Because it was an annual, it was paid for–I didn’t even have a copay. The insurance also paid for most of my prescription for the generic brand of Zoloft, which I need to handle depression and OCD.

Then I had my insurance taken away–apparently it wasn’t good enough for Obama, even though it suited me fine. Out of curiosity I went on the “exchange.” My premium would go up, but not by much–fine. However, the deductible would go up to $4,000! (Or $6,000, depending on which site I looked on.) The worst part–this insurance would pay for NOTHING until I met that deductible–no drugs, no annual, nothing. In essence I would be paying for all of my doctor’s visits, all of my prescriptions, AND insurance every month–what is the point of that??

Again, I have always hated this whole idea, so I felt slimey even trying this, but I went into the exchange to see how much of a subsidy I would get. It told me to go on Medicaid! So here we are. They have taken someone who is totally independent and tried to turn her into someone who is dependent on the taxpayer.

I do not have any insurance at all now. I hate to whine and complain, but the Zoloft generic is running out, and I can certainly tell the difference in how I handle things every day! The great irony, and what makes me the most mad, is the very idea that the government takes away my insurance, and next year I will be fined because I don’t have insurance!!!

Mike - Texas: I am a 60 year old single white male, non-smoker in excellent health. My employer-United AirLines, Houston, TX.

Prior to January 1st 2014 (and for the previous 10 years), I had a “Build Your Own Plan” policy with “0” Deductable and 100% coverage-no Out Of Pocket.

January 1st, 2014, (to “align” our corporate plans more with the Affordable Health Care options being offered), my premiums doubled and I have a 10% Co-Pay, even though I have NEVER used the plan or had a hospitalization.

Chelsea - Texas: Obamacare helped me in no way. I had to leave my apartment and move back in with my parents after the new health care reform took a toll on my job. I was once able to work 39 hours a week as a part time employee and i was comfortable with what i could afford. However, Obamacare changed the rules and all of the sudden my employer dropped my hours down to only 28 per week. This is a huge difference! Instead of helping me, all that Obamacare did was cut my pay dramatically. I should have known better than to think the government might actually be doing something for the good of the people.

But wait! Arlene from Minnesota had this good news relative to Obama Care: I went from $500.00 per month premium for $5000.00 deductible under Minnesota Comp to $442.00 premium per month for a $2000.00 deductible and no copay after the deductible is filled with MNSure. MNSure took patience to work through. It isn’t perfect but I have to say Thank You President Obama and Governor Dayton.

I am willing to look at other options, but I haven’t seen any.

So Arlene saw her insurance payments and deductible levels go down as a result of Obama Care. That is great news. But Chelsea, Mike, Laurie, John, Laura, and Mick saw high increases in their premiums and deductibles or had their lives complicated and endangered b y Obama Care. So despite Arlene's success story, the overwhelming number of people from both websites cited above have had very bad Obama Care experiences. It is truly an ever unfolding disaster.

That will do it for this month. Failed exchanges, failed co-ops, rising costs for premiums and deductibles, etc., one disaster after another. And you can be sure we will be back this time next month to continue this sad, sad saga.

Our book, "Love My Country, Loathe My Government - Fifty First Steps To Restoring Our Freedom And Destroying The American Political Class" is now available at:

Love My Country, Loathe My Government

Friday, August 21, 2015

August, 2015, Will The Center Hold - Protecting Second Amendment Rights, Fighting The EPA, and Cracking Down on Welfare Abuse At The State Level

Thursday, August 20, 2015

August, 2015, Part 2,I Am A Global Warming Doubter and Believer In Science: More Arctic Ice, A Nobel Prize Winner Debunks Obama and More

Wednesday, August 19, 2015

August, 2015, Part 1, I Am A Global Warming Doubter and A Believer In Science: The Ice Caps Are NOT Melting!

Tuesday, August 18, 2015

August, 2015, Part 4, The Unfolding Disaster That Is Obama Care: Sandbagging Information, A Scandalous Nomination, and Personal Obama Care Horror Stories

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