The biggest liar of all has been President Obama, whose was able to place three of his lies in the Washington Post’s “Top Ten Lie List of 2013.” One of his three lies in the top ten included the biggest lie of all, the “Lie of The Year,” when he promised “that if you like your health insurance policy you can keep you health insurance policy.”
The August set of Obama Care disaster posts began at the following link:
The September posts began at:
The October posts began at:
The November posts began at:
The December posts began at:
We promise to devote only five to six days this month to the disaster that is Obama Care. It is not that we will run out of material in that timeframe. There are enough disasters to start a new blog and file daily reports on how bad it is. I am currently sitting on well over two hundred articles, analyses, research papers, and personal experiences of suffering Americans around the country regarding the disaster that is Obama Care.
However, rather than wade through all of them, I will blitz through what I can in five or six days. That should be enough to prove again this month that Obama Care is the worst piece of legislation ever passed, it will have severe financial impacts at the household level and national economy level, and needs to be completely repealed as soon as possible, replaced with a plan that attacks the true root causes of how high health care costs.
Today we will focus only on an excellent article that recently appeared on the Newsmax website. It neatly summarized the ten worst program promises of the Obama Care saga (not all of the broken promises, just the ten most epic broken promises). The article and summary were written by Newsmax’s Cathy Burke and appeared on Sunday, 29 Dec 2013.
The following is Ms. Burke’s set up to the ten epic broken promises:
The Affordable Care Act was passed in 2010, but it was in 2013 that the health care reform law imploded into a nightmare of broken promises. Assertions made by the president and Health Secretary weeks ago, months ago and even years ago have over and over again proved to been misleading at best and completely untrue at worst.
No, you may not be able to keep your doctor or your plan. And, no, the website is not user-friendly.
According to Ms. Burke, and I do not disagree with her, here are the Top-10 Obama Care promises that were broken in 2013:
1. The website is simple and user-friendly
Hardly. Just days after is pathetic rollout, the Obama Care website was out of order for almost a week. During the first couple of months, people who tried to sign on either could not get access, were greeted with a notice that the system was not available, or if they did get on, they faced a very slow, plodding response time or had an experience where data was lost, asked for numerous times, etc.
That first significant crash in early October was not the last: on December 20, just three days before the deadline to sign up for coverage starting January 1, 2014, another outage lasted for several hours. For this despicable level of service the American taxpayer was billed over $600 million by an inept Kathleen Sebelius and her Federal Department of Health and Human Services.
2. "If you like your plan, you can keep your plan."
Obama first made this promise on June 6, 2009 and repeated it in dozens of forms and in dozens of forums over the past few years in a variety of slightly different but no less emphatic ways. This assertion was so wrong that the Washington Post made it its premier “Lie of The Year“ for 2013, which in turn, made the President the liar of the year for 2013.
PolitiFact also declared the vow to be its "lie of the year." Millions of Americans lost access to their preferred and current health care insurance policies directly as a result of Obama Care requirements. Many of those that were able to finally see if they could replace their preferred policies with something from the Obama Care exchanges promptly found out that Obama Care policies were almost always more expense from a monthly premium perspective and had deductible levels that were astronomical. In addition, many of these Obama Care policies had very restrictive doctor and hospital lists so many American lost access to their current, preferred doctors and lost access to some of the best hospitals in the country.
Sadly, many of these changes to doctors and hospitals were forced on many unhealthy Americans who were in the middle of serious medical treatment such as cancer treatments. As if they did not have enough to worry about, Obama Care unnecessarily forced them to switch doctors, hospitals, and possibly medicine access in the midst of what had to be stressful times.
Ms. Burke quotes respected Washington Post columnist Charles Krauthammer who correctly pointed out the underlying rationale for forcing people to buy new, more expensive, and often inferior policies, stating that Obama Care itself was a fraud from the beginning since the law "was designed to throw people off their private plans and into government-run exchanges where they would be made to overpay — forced to purchase government-mandated services they don’t need — as a way to subsidize others."
3. "If you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor."
This Obama 2009 promise was repeated many, many times since 2009 but was eventually also broken as Obama Care rolled out in 2013. Many insured Americans who lost access to their current insurance policy and the doctors associated with that policy found that not only did they need a new Obama Care policy but they very often ended up with a policy that excluded their preferred doctors.
The article offers the example of the 15,000 spouses of UPS employees who forced off of their spouse’s UPS insurance plan and have to seek out new plans on the individual market and via Obama Care exchanges, plans that are very likely not to include their usual doctor.
4. Premiums will fall by as much as $2,500 per family
Another promise directly out of the President’s mouth and another promise that has no chance of coming true, as millions of Americans are finding out so far. According to Forbes and a Manhattan Institute analysis of the government Obama Care numbers, Obama Care will actually jack up health insurance rates for young men by an average of 97 to 99%, and for young women by an average of 55 to 62%. As for states, the worst off is North Carolina, which is expected to see individual-market rates triple for women, and quadruple for men. Nowhere is anyone seeing that promised $2,5000 reduction.
5. Obamacare won't add 'one dime to our deficits'
Obama’s exact words, no one else’s. But again, another broken promise based on the analyses of two respected organizations. The Government Accountability Office's report of Febuary 26, 2013, estimated Obama Care will increase the long-term federal deficit by $6.2 trillion. Even worse, Investor's Business Daily analysis also nullified the Obama promise, reporting the legislation could potentially add $18 trillion in new national debt over time, more than the current sky high $17 trillion that the Federal government has accumulated over CENTURIES due to ALL of its operations.
6. Obama Care will cost around $900 billion over 10 years
Not even close. A Congressional Budget Office’s report from May 2013 puts the real price tag more around the area of $1.8 trillion. This doubling of the estimated cost has happened in just three years since the original $900 billion lie was put forth by the Obama administration. Other reputable sources put the cost at three times the original lie.
7. Families making less than $250,000 won't see 'any form' of tax increase
Not likely. Any tax on businesses increases the costs of doing business, costs that are eventually passed along to consumers and those making less than $250,000 a year. Using a Joint Committee on Taxation 2012 report and Congressional Budget Office information, as well as a Heritage Foundation report, Obama Care’s taxes and penalties will accumulate over $770 billion in new revenue over a 10-year period. Among taxes that'll pound the middle class are the individual mandate tax, the medical device tax, and new penalties and limits on health savings accounts and flexible spending accounts.
8. Obama Care will keep healthcare costs down
Not likely since Obama Care never addressed the underlying root causes of our high health care costs. Even if the website worked well, even if Obama gets the seven million new insurance policies issued, even if identity theft is an overblown threat (it is not), at the end of the day:
- Americans will still be eating too much of the wrong kind of food and will continue to be overweight and obese, leading to a myriad of health problems and costs.
- Americans will still smoke too much resulting in cancer and lung diseases and their associated costs.
- Americans will not exercise enough.
- Americans will suffer increasingly from aging diseases, e.g. dementia, diseases that are not attacked by this Obama care feeble health care reform attempt.
- There will still be a need for tort reform in the health care industry.
- There will still be significant cross state line barriers to insurance company competition.
- Our food supply and food chain will still be unhealthy.
In other words, all of the issues that caused our high health care costs will still be in place and will be unaddressed by Obama Care even if everything goes right with the legislation. It is just that we will all likely be paying more for Obama Care tenets, requirements, and taxes. Obama Care has a zero percent chance of reducing health care costs.
9. There are deadlines and mandates within the legislation
In this country, the law is usually the law. Politicians in office are then supposed to execute those laws. If they cannot exeucue those laws, they lawfully have to go back through the legislative, democratic process to change those laws, Unless it is Obama Care.
Never has this country witnessed such a blatant disrespect for the law as the Obama administration unilaterally has changed well over a dozen deadlines and dates that were written into the legislation, including but not limited to:
- In the most blatant change, the administration decided by itself to fix a problem aimed at people who lost their coverage because it didn't measure up to Obama Care standards by changing policy to help people make a deadline to replace dropped insurance plans. Those with inadequate insurance that got canceled were now allowed to claim a “hardship exemption," giving them the option to buy cheaper, minimal coverage plans normally available only to people under 30.
- Another "fix" came Nov. 14 when the President asked insurers to keep offering those plans for a year even if they don't meet minimum Obama Care requirements.
- For small businesses, Obama unilaterally moved back the deadline requiring companies with 50 or more employees to offer insurance from January, 2014 to January, 2015.
- As for sign-up deadlines, it's been confusing. In October, people had until December 15 to pick a plan if they wanted coverage beginning January 1. Then, in November, it was extended to December 23. The goal posts eventually moved again, this time to Christmas Eve, December 24.
- HHS also pushed back the deadline when the first month's premium would be due, and insurers obliged, extending the payment deadline nine days, to January 10.
10. Sure, the national Obama Care exchange is a mess, but the state exchanges are working great.
Not quite. Obama Ccare’s state-run enrollment operations have had major information system delays and low sign-up levels (last month we reported that only 44 people in Oregon had signed up in that state in the first two months). Several states have replaced top executives and Massachusetts and Vermont were investigating legal action against the company, CGI, that built their Obama Care websites: “CGI has consistently underperformed, which is frustrating and a serious concern,” said Jason Lefferts, a spokesman for the Massachusetts' insurance marketplace, Commonwealth Home Connector. “We are holding the vendor accountable for its underperformance and will continue to apply nonstop pressure to work to fix defects and improve performance.”
There you have it, one person’s excellent analysis of the top ten broken promises of the President and Obama Care. It gets this month’s Obama Care review off to a stable start. As we go forward this week, you will see some of the tragic consequences of this ill designed, idiotic piece of legislation and the havoc it is causing America and its citizens.
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.robertringer.com/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08j0sYUOb5w
