Funded by who? Ultimately who is going to pay for this obama care?
paid for by the people and used by the people, granted yes indirectly and I would rather see a single payer system but americans are so brainwashed into thinking single payer is bad that it won't happen. meanwhile countries with single payer systems use the horror stories of what does actually happen in the american system.....
I would rather have a longer wait for an elective surgery then die or end up in severe debt from an american system where my insurance just decides they won't pay....
The 2011 budget deal is done, and it's clear the Republicans' real victory was shifting the terms of the debate to fiscal reform. House Speaker John Boehner got President Barack Obama, one of history's great spenders, to praise the cuts he once resisted, and to present a do-over of his own budget.
The groundwork is now in place for the real fight, over House Budget Chairman Paul Ryan's comprehensive fiscal 2012 blueprint. This is the opportunity to move the spending-reform debate from the b-word (billions) to the t-word (trillions). That is, if the GOP doesn't put symbolism ahead of substance.
That risk exists, as evidenced by the recent brouhaha over ObamaCare funding. Behind the scenes, and increasingly in front of them, the GOP and the grass roots have been working up a lather over the ObamaCare "slush funds." The funds are a worthy target—symbolic of everything offensive about the new health law. They are also arguably a diversion.
The beef with the slush funds is that they are "self-funding." Normally, Congress creates programs, and those programs must then be funded by later appropriations bills. Democrats—who worried the GOP might one day control the federal purse— instead included mandatory money for a half-dozen ObamaCare programs in the law itself, thereby denying future appropriators the ability to defund them.
Adding insult, the programs are wince-worthy. There's $230 million in grants for "teaching health centers," for example, and $75 million a year for "personal responsibility education programs." HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius receives awesome authority to dole out money, including an $18 billion fund for anything she deems preventive health care—say, bike paths or jungle gyms.
All this has (understandably) stuck in Republicans' craws. Minnesota Rep. Michele Bachmann has noted the funds will cost an estimated $105 billion over the next 10 years. She's helped turn the issue into a grass-roots cause celebre.
The funds have, as a result, become a litmus test as to how serious House Republicans supposedly are about dismantling ObamaCare. A cadre of GOP members demanded that demise of the funds be part of any 2011 budget agreement, and when that didn't happen, they rapped the deal. Iowa Rep. Steve King, one of the funds' more vocal critics, lamented that Republicans had "surrendered" the "leverage" of a budget deal without shutting off "funding for this unconstitutional law."
A better military analogy may be this. Mr. Boehner didn't surrender. He withdrew from a side skirmish in order to marshal his forces for the bigger battle.
The truth is that little of the $105 billion will be spent in the current or next budget year anyway. Most of it is slated for the out years. But the GOP goal in this budget fight needed to be to get immediate spending cuts.
GOP insistence on the slush funds would have handed Democrats an easy excuse to refuse a deal. Mr. Obama and liberals have chosen to view these funds as symbolic of ObamaCare and refused to budge. The issue could well have led to a shutdown.
That, in turn, would have derailed Washington from this important moment. Because as grating as the ObamaCare slush funds are, they are piddling by comparison to what sort of health-care reforms are now possible if Republicans play their cards right over the next months.
Compare $105 billion to Mr. Ryan's budget, which goes to the heart of ObamaCare spending and beyond. The Ryan plan would repeal the law's Medicaid expansions. Savings over 10 years: $627 billion. It gets rid of the law's health-care (exchange) subsidies. Savings: $725 billion. His proposal to block-grant Medicaid would alone save federal taxpayers $750 billion. We haven't even gotten to Medicare reform, or medical malpractice reform, or efforts to repeal the ruinous long-term-care insurance program called the Class Act.
With even Mr. Obama acknowledging a crisis, the GOP has an unprecedented opportunity to pull the White House into negotiations. By focusing relentlessly on big-picture reform—rather than this or that fund—the party has a chance to get something real out of the Ryan plan. That is if it doesn't make a last stand on a few (ugly) programs.
There's nothing, by the way, preventing the party from mounting a stand-alone attack on the slush funds. The House Energy Committee has already passed bills to repeal them, and this week the full House voted to axe that $18 billion unaccountable Prevention and Public Health Fund. At least four Democrats were embarrassed enough to vote with Republicans.
The GOP is eager to make good on its promise to roll back ObamaCare, and it should be. It should concentrate not on winning a battle but on winning the war.
Meanwhile small business find it easier to remain under 50 employees to avoid the unknown but suspect monster. The government finds ways to overspend and over-intrude with every new law, just give it time.
Obamacare funds a lot of stuff!This from Strassel: Winning the Real ObamaCare War - WSJ.comMeanwhile small business find it easier to remain under 50 employees to avoid the unknown but suspect monster. The government finds ways to overspend and over-intrude with every new law, just give it time.
you article makes a moot point, I don't doubt that ryan's plan is FAR FAR cheaper for the government, no doubt about that, the problem is that it doesn't provide healthcare, nor a means for people to obtain healthcare, so you aren't exactly comparing apples to apples there.
as for funds, yes funds used to help people be healthier are evil, but the republicans spending insane amounts on abstinence only education is all groovy right?
ObamaCare exists to reduce a problem, it isn't perfect, nor is there a perfect solution, ryanCare exists to become a burden on the middle class and lessen the light load on the rich. apples to oranges.
paid for by the people and used by the people, granted yes indirectly and I would rather see a single payer system but americans are so brainwashed into thinking single payer is bad that it won't happen. meanwhile countries with single payer systems use the horror stories of what does actually happen in the american system.....
I would rather have a longer wait for an elective surgery then die or end up in severe debt from an american system where my insurance just decides they won't pay....
"Paid for by the people and used by the people" equates to me more taxes and expenses for a guy like me. There will be more using it than those paying for it and I don't like that. Also I don't feel very good about the prospect of having the government call the shots regarding my health care. Another thing I don't like about this socialized health care is that supposedly by 2014 the government intends to force everyone in this country to have helath care insurance under the threat of fines and penalities if they don't. Not that having health care insurance is a bad thing, but the government has no right to force this kind of thing on anyone. I guess I beleive too much in individual rights over the collective rights of the whole.
Now back on topic. The EU fincial crisis as well as the fear of global economic slow down also has had alot to do with the recent stock market roller coaster ride. Also, and I'm truely sorry for this, the folks with control of their purse strings and holding on to their money and not spending are doing so due to the lack of confidence of the people running the country. No one particular political party or the left or right singled out here as they are all equally guilty for their part for the extended recession were going through here.
"Paid for by the people and used by the people" equates to me more taxes and expenses for a guy like me. There will be more using it than those paying for it and I don't like that. Also I don't feel very good about the prospect of having the government call the shots regarding my health care. Another thing I don't like about this socialized health care is that supposedly by 2014 the government intends to force everyone in this country to have helath care insurance under the threat of fines and penalities if they don't. Not that having health care insurance is a bad thing, but the government has no right to force this kind of thing on anyone. I guess I beleive too much in individual rights over the collective rights of the whole.
What's the difference between a penalty for not purchasing health insurance and a tax break for purchasing it?
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Now back on topic. The EU fincial crisis as well as the fear of global economic slow down also has had alot to do with the recent stock market roller coaster ride. Also, and I'm truely sorry for this, the folks with control of their purse strings and holding on to their money and not spending are doing so due to the lack of confidence of the people running the country. No one particular political party or the left or right singled out here as they are all equally guilty for their part for the extended recession were going through here.
You're saying that it takes two to argue. This idea is true. However, it only takes one to be wrong. The GOP and Tea Party approval ratings on handling the crisis were well below that of any other group. For representatives of the people, they don't seem to be representing the will of the people very well.
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We work together every damn day. --Jon Stewart
What's the difference between a penalty for not purchasing health insurance and a tax break for purchasing it?
You're saying that it takes two to argue. This idea is true. However, it only takes one to be wrong. The GOP and Tea Party approval ratings on handling the crisis were well below that of any other group. For representatives of the people, they don't seem to be representing the will of the people very well.
I don't feel that the Democrats or the Republicans represent the will of the people very well. Unfortunately I believe that most all politicans of both parties are bought and paid for and not by the people they're supposed to represent. I have refered to both parties as republicrats for the last 20 years as I really see little to no difference between them anymore.
I don't feel that the Democrats or the Republicans represent the will of the people very well. Unfortunately I believe that most all politicans of both parties are bought and paid for and not by the people they're supposed to represent. I have refered to both parties as republicrats for the last 20 years as I really see little to no difference between them anymore.
Right on! The government loves being in charge and every little bureaucrat feels his oats. If you have ever sought to win a discussion with one of these minions you are programed for disappointment. Our local SS office refused to accept my wife's delayed birth certificate and she had to prove it all over again. My only alternative, to hire a lawyer, ever wonder about all those SS lawyer ads on TV? I do not want the government involved with my healthcare. The reason insurance companies are a mess is that they are not allowed to compete, they are regulated by the government. When Christian groups came up with their own solution the regulators went after them calling their approach insurance. More government is just what it seems, more government! And more government is neither cheap nor efficient.
The Office of the Actuary in the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services recently put out its annual projections of national health care spending. It seems the actuaries find that Obamacare dramatically increases the near-term growth rate of health care costs. In 2014, the actuaries find that growth in the net cost of health insurance will increase by nearly 14 percent, compared to 3.5% if PPACA had never passed. The growth rate of private insurance costs will rise to 9.4 percent, from 5.0 percent under prior law: an 88% increase. (source forbes.com)
. If I lose it all, well, I'm still doing better than 99.99% of the idiots who play the lottery.
Lottery (n): A tax on people who are bad at math.
I saw them lined up at the tobacconist yesterday and today at a grocery. I want to scream at them.
If you do try to explain it their rejoinder is "you can't win if you don't play".
they see 220 million $$$ in Powerball and anxiously wait to hear they've won.
Anyone know who gets to pay for all the Gambler's Anonymous 12 step programs?
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I'll believe corporations are persons when Texas executes one.: LBJ's Ghost
and I would rather see a single payer system but americans are so brainwashed into thinking single payer is bad that it won't happen. meanwhile countries with single payer systems use the horror stories of what does actually happen in the american system.....
The Right gutted it because their masters in insurance and Pharma as well as Corporate Medicine USA saw the tap getting turned off. We'll soon be a 2nd rate country with the same unaffordable Healthcare.
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I'll believe corporations are persons when Texas executes one.: LBJ's Ghost
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