Sometimes I wonder if Charles Krauthammer has a screw
loose...
First order of business for the returning Congress: The
No Bailout for Insurance Companies Act of 2014. Make it one line long:
“Sections 1341 and 1342 of the Affordable Care Act are hereby repealed.”
End of bill. End of bailout. End of story.
Why do we need it?
On December 18, the chairman of the Council of Economic
Advisers was asked what was the administration’s Plan B if, because of adverse
selection (enrolling too few young and healthies), the insurance companies face
financial difficulty.
Jason Furman wouldn’t bite. “There’s a Plan A,” he
replied. Enroll the young.
But of course there’s a Plan B. It’s a government
bailout.
Administration officials can’t say it for political
reasons. And they don’t have to say it because it’s already in the Affordable
Care Act, buried deep.
First, Section 1341, the “reinsurance” fund collected
from insurers and self-insuring employers at a nifty $63 a head. (Who do you
think the cost is passed on to?) This yields about $20 billion over three years
to cover losses.
Then there is Section 1342, the “risk corridor” provision
that mandates a major taxpayer payout covering up to 80% of insurance-company
losses.
Never heard of these? That’s the beauty of passing a bill
of such monstrous length. You can insert a chicken-soup recipe and no one will
notice.
Nancy Pelosi was right: We’d have to pass the damn thing
to know what’s in it. Well, now we have and now we know.
The whole scheme was risky enough to begin with — getting
enough enrollees and making sure 40% are young and healthy.
ObamaCare is already far behind its own enrollment
estimates. But things have gotten worse. The administration has been changing
the rules repeatedly — with every scrimmage-line audible raising costs and diminishing
revenue.
(*NOD*)
* NOT TO MENTION TRAMPLING THE CONSTITUTION!
First, it postponed the employer mandate.
* LOST REVENUE!
Then, it exempted from the individual mandate people
whose policies were canceled (by ObamaCare).
* MORE LOST REVENUE!
And for those who did join the exchanges, Health and
Human Services secretary Kathleen Sebelius is “strongly encouraging” insurers
to — during the “transition” — cover doctors and drugs not included in their
clients’ plans.
(*SNORT*)
* WHICH I'M GUESSING IF THEY DO THEY'LL BE ALLOWED TO
"WRITE OFF" THEIR "GENEROSITY" AS "CHARITABLE
DONATIONS" OR SOME SUCH — LEAVING TAXPAYERS ON THE HOOK TO MAKE UP THE
LOST REVENUE...
The insurers were stunned. Told to give free coverage.
Deprived of their best customers. Forced to offer stripped-down “catastrophic”
plans to over-30 clients (contrary to the law).
* THE LAW IS WHAT OBAMA SAYS IT IS. YOU KNOW THIS IS
TRUE!
These dictates, complained their spokesman, could
“destabilize” the insurance market.
* YA THINK...?!?!
Translation: How are we going to survive this? Shrinking
revenues and rising costs could bring on the “death spiral” — an unbalanced
patient pool forcing huge premium increases (to restore revenue) that would
further unbalance the patient pool as the young and healthy drop out. End
result? Insolvency — before which the insurance companies will pull out of ObamaCare.
Solution? A huge government bailout. (It’s Obamacare’s
escape hatch. And — surprise, surprise — it’s already baked into the law.)
* ACTUALLY... IT'S THE GOAL. OBAMACARE WAS NEVER CREATED
TO "SAVE" THE AMERICAN SYSTEM OF HEALTHCARE. NOPE. OBAMACARE WAS
MEANT TO PUSH OUR SYSTEM OFF THE CLIFF SO THAT THERE'D BE "NO CHOICE"
BUT TO GO TO SINGLE-PAYER... SOCIALIZED MEDICINE.
Which is why the GOP needs to act.
* THEY WON'T.
ObamaCare is a Rube Goldberg machine with hundreds of
moving parts. Without viable insurance companies doing the work, it falls
apart. No bailout, no ObamaCare.
* OH, CHARLIE... SO NAIVE... SO UNWILLING TO HARKEN BACK
TO HIS OWN EARLIER ACKNOWLEDGEMENT THAT UNDER OBAMA THE RULE OF LAW MEANS
NOTHING. OBAMA WILL JUST CONTINUE WHAT HE'S BEEN DOING. THE DEMS WILL CONTINUE
TO SUPPORT HIM. THE RINOs WILL REFUSE TO FIGHT FOR VICTORY.
(*SHRUG*)
Such a bill would be overwhelmingly popular because
Americans hate fat-cat bailouts of any kind. Why should their tax dollars be
spent not only saving giant insurers but also rescuing this unworkable,
unbalanced, unstable, unpopular money pit of a health-care scheme?
* CHARLIE... HAVE YOU EVER HEARD OF FIAT... FORMERLY
CHRYSLER...? THAT WAS YESTERDAY! THE AMERICAN PEOPLE WILL TOLERATE ANYTHING!
THEY RE-ELECTED OBAMA, DIDN'T THEY? HRC IS THE FRONT-RUNNER FOR NEXT PRESIDENT
OF THE UNITED STATES. AN ACTUAL LEFTIST IS MAYOR OF NEW YORK!
The GOP House should pass it and send it to Harry Reid’s
Democratic Senate. Democrats know it could be fatal for ObamaCare. The only
alternative would be single-payer.
* EXACTLY!!!
And try selling that to the country after the
spectacularly incompetent launch of — and subsequent widespread disaffection
with — mere semi-nationalization.
* I SOMETIMES FEAR KRAUTHAMMER HAS A SCREW LOOSE. OBAMA
WON'T TRY TO "SELL" IT. HE'LL DECLARE IT! HE'LL DECLARE IT AND THE
DEMOCRATIC SENATE WILL SUPPORT HIM AND IN THE END THE RINO HOUSE WILL ROLL OVER
AND PLAY DEAD.
Do you really think vulnerable Democrats up for
re-election will vote for a bailout?
* NO. BUT THEY'LL VOTE FOR "SAVING" AMERICAN
HEALTHCARE VIA EMERGENCY ENACTMENT OF SINGLE-PAYER! (OR DO YOU EXPECT A MILITARY
COUP, CHARLIE? BECAUSE, FRANKLY, EVEN IF THE HOUSE HAD THE BALLS... IN THE NEW
AMERIKA THE SUPPORT OF ONE HOUSE OF CONGRESS IS ALL OBAMA NEEDS. NO
IMPEACHMENT... NO REMOVAL FROM OFFICE... NO STOPPING HIM.
And who better to slay ObamaCare than a Democratic Senate
— liberalism repudiating its most important creation of the last 50 years.
Want to be even bolder?
Attach the anti-bailout bill to the debt ceiling. That
and nothing else. Dare the president to stand up and say, “I’m willing to let
the country default in order to preserve a massive bailout for insurance
companies.”
* AGAIN... WE'RE NOT DEALING WITH A PRESIDENT. WE'RE
DEALING WITH A DICTATOR. ALL OBAMA HAS TO BET ON IS THAT ABSENT ACTUAL
IMPEACHMENT, CONVICTION, AND REMOVAL FROM OFFICE THE FEDERAL GOLIATH WILL
CONTINUE TO OBEY HIS COMMANDS... EXECUTIVE ORDERS... EXECUTIVE PROCLAMATIONS...
WHATEVER HE CALLS THEM. AND THE MEDIA WILL LARGELY SUPPORT HIM.
In the past, Republicans made unrealistic and unpopular
debt-ceiling demands — and lost badly.
* WRONG AGAIN, CHARLIE. THEY LOST BECAUSE THEY STOOD FOR
NOTHING.
They learned their lesson. Last year, Republicans
presented one simple unassailable debt-ceiling demand — that the Senate pass
its first budget in four years.
* AND HOW'D THAT "BUDGET" WORK OUT?
(*SNORT*)
* FOLKS... I FEAR KRAUTHAMMER IS DELUSIONAL.
Who could argue with that? The Senate capitulated within
two days.
* CAPITULATED? GOVERNMENT CONTINUES TO GROW! SPENDING
CONTINUES TO GROW! DEBT CONTINUES TO GROW! (WHAT ARE YOU BABBLING ABOUT...?!?!)
Who can argue with no bailout? Let the Senate Democrats
decide — support the bailout and lose the Senate. Or oppose the bailout and
bury ObamaCare.
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