Parents insuring their kids till they are 26? A bad message to send.

Last week, the first aspects of Obamacare went into effect. Most of America, including myself, is dreading the day, a couple years from now, when the bulk of the bill actually goes into affect (assuming it passes the Constitutionality test it faces in the Supreme Court), but the "patients bill of rights", as it is called, aspect of the legislation, which is what went into effect last Thursday, is the only part of the legislation I actually liked-except for children being allowed to stay on their parents health insurance until the age of 26...

I am a Gen X'er, and, as I was taught, one of the early steps that I had to take in becoming an adult, was in getting a job which provided me with my own health insurance. It was at this point that "mommy and daddy" no longer had to "take care of me" and that I could not only provide money for myself, but was self sufficient enough that I could also provide for my own health when needed. What concerns me is the message we are sending to our future generations by saying they don't have to worry about health insurance until well into adulthood.
Becoming an adult is all about personal responsibility and achieving independence, and a big part of that is being able to provide for your own health. Human nature tends towards laziness (unless nurtured otherwise at an early age); by giving the option to not need health insurance until 26 years of age, we are nurturing that part of humanity that is detrimental to a healthy, vibrant and successful society; and, in a small way, we are telling children that adulthood can wait. This in turn could breed a much broader lack of responsibility regarding personal choices like drug use, sex, and money management.
It may also cause social conflict within children once they reach the age of 18-when law considers them an adult: we have seen for decades the conflict that 18-20 year olds have when they consider they are old enough to vote and die for our country in combat, but not old enough to enjoy a beer and burger with their friends and family. What are they to think about their place in life when all need to be independent at the "legal" age of being an adult is removed? Are we to expect them to be ready for the responsibility of raising a family, owning and taking care of a home, and managing a household and career, when all the little steps at being prepared for such things are removed or pushed later and later into adulthood?...

We can hope that this legislation, 20 years from now, will not lead to such social and personal strife and inevitable economic stresses; then again, we were told in the mid 20th century that Welfare wouldn't produce an entire segment of society dependent on government hand outs for their existence.

Health Insurance: Privilege or Right?

Another of the arguments by proponents[1] for a Federally subsidized health care “option” is that health insurance is a right. This position forces me to question what exactly what is a “privilege” and what is a “right”.

Without pulling out Miriam Websters, a right is a universally accepted morality which all citizens of a particular society are in agreement of being entitled too.

A privilege is anything that can be afforded which is not a necessity and which is considered beyond the income of those who make the median income of those within a given country.

I don’t think anyone would argue that providing health care is a moral virtue on the order of a right, which any society should practice and provide. And it just so happens that in America we do, in fact, provide health care-free of charge if necessary-to any who need it. But the idea that insurance, of any kind, is a right, I have to question.

This time quoting Websters, the definition which applies is “a protective or compensatory measure”.

Traditionally, insurances-whether they be for a car, a life, a home or a body- have been considered luxuries. When “health” insurance was popularized by the unionization of American workers in the early 20^th century it was seen as another great accomplishment of American society reflective of America’s overall wealth relative to the rest of the world, in that jobs were so plentiful, and paid so well, that workers and employers could “afford” health insurance. And even though most, if not all, American workers had health insurance throughout most of the 20^th century. The fact that Americans, as individuals, could afford the luxury of health insurance for most of the 20^th century became lost out of a laissez faire attitude towards our collective health being insured because it was “guaranteed” via full time employment.

And so now we have a political movement afoot to provide a governmentally subsidized health care plan, through which all Americans will have health insurance, and one of the arguments used by supporters of this idea is that health insurance is a right.

If all American’s were to agree that health insurance is a right, then there would need to be a universal concurrence of opinion as to what that right should entail: how much coverage do we all deserve and what quality of basic services are we entitled too. But more so, if we were to all agree that health insurance is a right, and no longer a privilege, then we would be compelled to also agree on what level of “health” we should all strive for.

Knowing that those who are obese and whom smoke cigarettes and who drink too much alcohol have more health expenses-particularly when they get older-would have to be addressed as a nation. The costs of these behaviors being so high as it relates to our health, there would be a need to regulate them to some degree, if for no other reason than to control costs.

A further concern is that in America our rights are guaranteed by law within our Constitution. Therefore, if we were to deem it necessary for health insurance to be considered a right, to guarantee that right an amendment to our Constitution would be required for its maintenance.

Under these criteria, how could we as a nation ever expect to classify health insurance as a right?

The fact of the matter is, health insurance has never been, and never should be, a right. Health insurance has always been a privilege-a privilege traditionally reserved for the wealthy who could afford to “insure” things against loss or damage, for those who could afford to take risks with things-including their health. Our health has never been guaranteed-not from day one and certainly not when measured against the lifestyle decisions most make through out the course of their lives. Based on these realities it is a wonder how so many people can believe that they have a right to health insurance.

---

[1] I have been told that I should stop referring to those who support the current health care reform option as “lefties” or liberals for a multitude of reasons. Needless to say, based on journalistic integrity alone (I am a professional writer after all) I should not be so biased or derogatory towards proponents of a federally subsidized health care plan.

On death panels and "exchanges"

It was with much self restraint that I had to take a break from putting in words my thoughts on H.R. 3200-the bill on health care currently in Congress commonly known as Obama-care.

My lack of words on the subject, however, didn’t keep me from paying attention to what specifics of the bill were being discussed in the media and at various town hall meetings nationwide. Particularly, I took note of Mr. Obama’s appearance on the Michael Smerconish radio show this past Thursday. Obama’s appearance was in an effort to “woo right wing” thinkers to his health care plan. Unfortunately, despite his party affiliation, Smerconish is an Obama supporter and therefore failed to press our President about specifics of the bill and screened callers-in so that most of the hard questions were filtered out before they could be posed.

Regardless, there were 2 aspects about Obama-care which dominated the press this last week: the idea of “death panels” being a part of the bill, and that H.R. 3200 will make the Health Insurance marketplace more competitive through the creation of its “exchange”.

Personally, I find it funny that so many people think that there are “death panels” in this bill. No where in the bill does it define such a thing as a “death panel”. The supposition is drawn from language in the bill which provides for “end of life counseling”. Much of the language for this so called counseling is vague, and can be easily misunderstood to mean that the Fed wants to “guide you into the after life”. Although I wouldn’t put it past the Liberals and Democrats to have the intentions of having actual death panels so has to dictate how and when we can die, I don’t think that, today at least, they are brazen enough to try so-perhaps in the future, but not today at least.

The “Exchange Commission” created by H.R. 3200 is another matter entirely.

I listened all week long as Obama tried to tell people that this aspect of the bill will not effect whether or not we will be able to keep our current doctors, insurance providers, etc and that it will provide “competition in the marketplace”. Mr. Obama sounded really good saying all this and, for about 2 seconds he even had me believing what he had to say was true, until I remembered what that portion of the bill says.

Sections 141-144 of the bill deal with the creation of this so called Exchange and the duties of its Commissioner, but it is within section 142 to which Mr. Obama’s belief that this bill will provide “competition in the marketplace” becomes an out right lie.

Section 142: Duties Authorities of the Commissioner; Part (b) titled Promoting Accountability, subpart (2) Compliance Explanation and Audits (a) says that “in general the commissioner shall, in coordination with States, conduct audits of qualified health benefits plan compliance with Federal requirements. Such audits may include random compliance audits and targeted audits in response to complaints or other suspected non-compliance.”

This can all be taken a couple of ways, but the inclusion of the words “qualified health benefits plan compliance with Federal reguirements”, at the very least, implies that some health insurance plans may not qualify. If this is so, then how does said exchange provide for more competition in the marketplace if it is going to exclude some of that competition?

Needless to say, Mr. Obama’s definition of “providing for a more competitive marketplace” as it relates to our health insurance options falls on shaky ground, which leads me to ask-why? Why, if it is Mr. Obama’s desire to make the health insurance marketplace more competitive, would he support a commission which would effect regulations (i.e. impose restrictions) into said exchange? Logically this makes no sense owing to the fact that any such bodies which impose regulations on their membership become exclusive, thereby leading to easy collusion, or actually limiting the competition-which I believe is exactly what Mr. Obama is after.

As we all know, Mr. Obama is vastly quoted as saying that he would not support any health care reform if it didn’t eventually lead to a single payer system-which is exactly what this exchange is designed to do.

The imminent death of Obamacare leaves some questions to be answered

Apparently the message has gotten through loud and clear to the Obama administration that we, the average people of America, don’t want the Federal Government butting it’s Pinocchio like nose into our health care via a federally subsidized health insurance “option”. In case you missed it, it was first announced yesterday by Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, and then reported as breaking news on all the cable news stations, that the “public option” of H.R. 3200 (commonly called Obamacare) was “not essential to health care reform”. This announcement (and his words that “the public option is just a sliver of the proposed health care reform”) was cheered by those of us who vociferously spoke against H.R. 3200, means that Mr. Obama finally gets it that most American’s want no part of federally subsidized health care. And is saying this, H.R. 3200 is all but dead and maybe Mr. Obama will give up on trying to force his version of health care upon us-for now anyways.

But this backing off of what was obviously bad legislation leads me to ask why?

Why propose this bill at all if the so called public option wasn’t “necessary to the importance of passing health care reform”?

If it wasn’t necessary to passing health care reform then why was it so prominently displayed in H.R. 3200 that it comprised most of the bill’s 1000 plus pages?

And if it was so irrelevant why were the various aspects of this “public option” the ones put forth to Americans as the evidence of what the Obama administration viewed as “reform” of the health care industry?...

We most likely will never get any answers to these questions because A) no matter how much Obama claims he wants “transparency” during his presidency we know better than to expect 100% of it and B) because those journalists who cover the White House and the Obama administration for the large news organizations are too big of pussies to ask the hard questions and really confront our Congressional leaders when they try to pass such blatantly subversive legislation on the American people.

I digress...Obamacare isn’t completely dead yet, but it sure looks to be headed that way quickly. My hope is that many of us learned a lesson out of this which I have known for most of my life: that it is up to us, the public, to keep watch over what our elected officials are doing because if we hadn’t of done so in this case, and then spoke out by the 100’s of thousands against it, just think what could have been?

Rock Star Obama shows up at Town Hall meeting in New Hampshire

It amazes me how much politicians can lie.

I just wasted an hour of my day watching the Obama Town Hall meeting in New Hampshire and what I saw and heard was the "Rock Star" in Mr. Obama come out and spew nothing but a bunch of lies. I watched as the Rock Star said that everything people speaking out against H.R. 3200 are saying a bunch of “lies and myths”. Does Mr. Obama take us to be ignorant, illiterate fools? Does he actually think this is a “conservative vs. liberal” issue? Is Mr. Obama unable to see that many-if not most-of these people, showing up at these Town Hall meetings are independents who do not like the direction in which our country is going or the ridiculous amount of intrusion this bill provides for into our daily lives?

I don't know if Mr. Obama believes in these things, but the Rock Star I saw on TV this afternoon apparently does.

The lies that Mr. Obama spread about made me sick. One of the bigger ones was his saying that he didn’t believe that anyone but ourselves “should be able to choose their own health care options”, but that is not what his bill says. In his words, he calls the government plan another health care “option”, but that is not what it is. H.R. 3200 rewrites-from top to bottom-what sort of coverage we are allowed to have and if you don't believe me then read it for yourself.

Mr. Obama says that it is his intention to provide a healthcare “option” to people that we citizens can afford, but to still have the freedom to choose which option we want. He says that all his bill does is to provide a low cost option-but that is not how H.R. 3200 is written.

H.R. 3200-what we commonly call Obamacare-establishes a health insurance exchange through which the Federal Government determines what health insurance plans meet their criteria for membership. The plan blatantly leaves out what will happen to those insurances which do not “qualify” for the exchange but goes on to say that those businesses which continue to carry non-qualifying plans will be taxed an additional two to six percent depending upon gross payrolls.

Mr. Obama further said that Medicare recipients and seniors have nothing to fear from Obamacare, but that is not what the bill says. The bill makes it very plain that coverage for seniors is going to be limited and that for H.R. 25 to work Medicare, at least in part, will have to be absorbed into the new government “option”.

As if all of these lies weren’t enough, Mr. Obama continues to claim that his plan will not increase our federal budget or deficit, to which I ask how? How is it possible that the Federal Government is going to provide a “government option” to healthcare which, apparently, will be provided (i.e. paid for) by the Fed without it increasing our deficit?

Even worse was the tone Mr. Obama seemed to take throughout his Town Hall address towards those who have vociferously spoken out against “his” plan. He talked about these people as if they either had no clue what they were talking about or had no business speaking. To make matters worse, Mr. Obama spoke of these people with an attitude that bespoke of an “us vs. them” mentality-i.e. Liberals vs. Conservatives.

Mr. Obama, don't you not get it? Do you not get that those who believe in the Constitution; that those who believe in the principles of which our great nation were founded; that those who believe in small government; that those who believe in taking responsibility for themselves do not want this plan? Do you not see that these people far out number those who do want or like your health insurance “option”? Further, Mr. Obama, do you not see that all of these people are not just conservatives or republicans, but are independents and individuals such as myself?

I digress…

One thing I believe that we can all agree on, however, is that we do need health insurance reform in our country, but that doesn’t mean that we need a “government provided option”-which is obviously what the Liberals and the democratic party take it to mean, and, unfortunately with our “rock star” president what we could end up with isn’t reform, but more government intrusion into our daily lives than we want.

Arlen Specters Town Hall meeting in Lebanon, PA

It would be nice if I knew what was going to be worth watching and what wasn’t as it relates to what is on TV regarding political issues, this is why I rarely watch channels like Fox News, HLN or CNN early in the morning because, to be frank, not only are they boring, but they lack any real substance to their reporting at those times (true, they lack any real substance 99.9% of the time, but its particularly noticeable to me early in the day). So it was to my great surprise when I stumbled upon a town hall meeting on CNN (and Fox News) for Arlen Specter in Pennsylvania.

Let me just say that I learned a lot.

I learned that our elected officials are NOT as smart or INFORMED as many of those who elected them to office.

I learned that, at least in the case of Mr. Specter, there should be an age limit as to how old are elected officials should be.

I learned that there is quite a lot of anger in our nation right now as to how the Obama administration is running things in our country and that that anger seems to cross all political ideologies, socio-economic and age groups.

I also learned Mr. Specter is a first rate politician-answering questions without really answering them and deflecting things which he didn’t understand without letting anyone know that he didn’t understand them-which is why, I’m sure, that Mr. Specter has been in Congress for as long as he has.

During this particular Town Hall meeting, Specter allowed only 30 people to ask questions of him. Of those 30 the best wasn’t a question per se, but more of a statement. This gentleman asked Mr. Specter if it were possible to make it public who writes these bills because, in the case of the current health care proposal before the house, they do not seem to be very American. This same gentleman also asked Mr. Specter to propose that, if American citizens really wanted Federally subsidized health care, that it be put on the ballot in 2010. Needless to say, Mr. Specter was unable to properly respond to this man, he did however say that he would take the idea of putting health care on the ballot referendum for people to vote on en mass in 2010. Personally, I’m not keeping my fingers crossed.

What surprised me more than anything else, while watching this meeting, was how uninformed Mr. Specter was. It was obvious from the first question that Mr. Specter had absolutely no idea what the language is which makes up what we call Obamacare. It was amazing to me that, as question after question was fired at Mr. Specter regarding this legislation, he had no real response to them-at least not one based on fact or policy. As a result he was left with no other recourse but to agree with these people-that they were right and that he wasn’t going to support any bill which apparently said the things which this bill does.

In sum, watching the Town Hall meeting in Lebanon, PA this morning was quite the realization for me as to how poorly informed our Congressional leaders are.

There is a larger Town Hall meeting scheduled for later today in Maine, this one involves Mr. Obama himself, and he is expected to address many of the same issues which were brought up at Mr. Specter’s meeting-particularly those on the health care bill. If I can, and if it is televised, I will be watching and will have my say later…

Words of caution as the healthcare debate ramps up

Unless you have been living under a rock the last week or so then you have seen and heard many of the same things I have regarding the debate over what is commonly referred to as Obamacare-the current government subsidized healthcare proposal currently before our Congress…

I must say that I am disappointed by the people who are blatantly attacking their elected officials for trying to force this bill on us. Emotions are running very high all over the nation over this bill, but yelling and screaming and losing our heads over it will do nothing but make those of us who stand against this bill out to be villainous. However, the most ridiculous aspect to all of these debates is the things being said from supporters of Obamacare.

Supporters are claiming that Obamacare will not restrict what sort of benefits we can have under this plan; that this plan does not limit the benefits of “special needs” patients; that this bill will not destroy our health care system as we know it.

They are also sticking to their claims that this bill is intended to level the playing field on health care so that all have it and that it is affordable to all, and that it will, in the long term, make the industry better for all of us.

To those who make these claims I have a question for you: have you read this bill? Do you have any clue as to what this bill says? You obviously haven’t and since that appears to be blatantly true then I strongly recommend that you do. At the very least look down a couple of posts on my blog to my post of a few days ago in which I actually attempted to debunk 10 accusations made against Obamacare only to find that, yes, they were TRUE!! Every last one of them, in at least a small way, could be true. In fact, most of them were 100% true and those who are claiming otherwise are full of shit up to their eye balls (that’s right I swore, get over it):

They’ve never read where the bill says that it will establish an “exchange” through which all-that’s right all­-health care plans must conform too or be punished in some way.

They have obviously never read where the bill says that coverage is limited to $10,000 a year per family and $5000 per individual a year (to start).

They have obviously not read on page 50 of the bill where it says that, under this bill, providers cannot discriminate in providing coverage for any reason.

They have obviously not seen where providers of Obamacare will not be able to reinvest in their own businesses-this includes hospitals.

These few things are just the tip of the ice berg of this bill.

Even more ridiculous is Mr. Obama himself coming out saying that the accusations made against this bill-specifically that it will leave out health care for “special needs” citizens and ration it for everyone else-were false.

Is he deluded or what? Obviously Obama hasn’t read this bill either-otherwise I’d have a hard time believing that he could so ignorantly say such things…

Experts, on both sides of this issue are now coming out and stating quite plainly that implementing this bill will effective destroy the health care industry in our country. One such expert claimed that Obama care could result in nearly 85 million people becoming uninsured due to soaring costs or their own plan not “qualifying” under the exchange established by Obamacare.

For those who are trying their hardest to get it through the thick skulls of those Congressional members of the Democratic party who are determined to push this bill through, I ask you to please use more patience and be calm when addressing them.

If you cannot carry a copy of the bill with you, then have your facts straight; know them point for point and make our elected leaders address them directly-either debunking them or trying to excuse them away.

What we need right now are cooler heads to prevail.

All this screaming and yelling and making idiots of ourselves will get us no where in the long run.

Analyzing "Obama-care"

In my previous post I picked 10 accusations made against what has come to be known as Obama-care and compared them to the exact verbiage within the bill that they are drawn from. After doing so, I have also had a chance to better look over this bill and analyze it for myself.

In a word, I am scared-particularly after hearing on a national news program today that Mr. Obama intends to push this bill through with or without the support of the Republican party.

What scares me is that, on close analysis there is both covert and overt intent on the part of our current congressional and presidential leaders to control us and our lives from birth to death. Not only does this bill have the feel of personal control over our daily lives, but it also explicitly looks to direct involve the Federal Government into both our Health Care system by telling us how much and what kinds of care we can have under this bill, and by attempting to reset the standard of health care both by what small and medium sized businesses will offer to their employees and the level of services and care provided under the plans which will be available outside of “Government Healthcare”.

Worse still is that the Fed looks to punish those businesses who do not take on the Government plan by taxing them between 2-6% of their gross payroll’s and further punishing those healthcare providers who do not adjust their plans to comply with the standard set by the Government or which do not join a so called “Health Insurance Exchange”, the purpose of which is, at best, hard to understand.

Regardless of how you feel about our Federal Government becoming even further involved in our Healthcare systems, one of 2 things are going to happen to businesses if this bill makes it through Congress and becomes law: Firstly, if businesses choose to keep their own health insurance, thereby taking on up to an additional 6% tax on their gross payrolls, their prices are going to have to increase to cover that new expense.

For businesses who choose to take the Government option, they can be assured of losing their best employees due to what will be, without question, a far inferior health care plan for themselves and their family. This could also result in many people simply avoiding being employed by companies whose healthcare is that of the federally provided variety because it won’t be too long before it’s known that “Obama-care” is barely care at all.

As far as the bill itself goes, it has many terrible aspects to it.

Healthcare under this bill is limited to only $10,000 per year per family or $5000 per year for one person. Considering that a fracture to just about any limb of the body could max this coverage out in just one visit to the hospital, it’s more than obvious that this plan is horribly inefficient. Compounding the issue of coverage is that under this plan, those doctors and hospitals which are deemed as “eligible” providers are not allowed to invest in or expand upon the places which they work; doctor’s wages are also set to some degree under this plan. These 2 things combined will force young, would-be doctors, into other fields due to the financial incentives being stripped of the profession-e.g. who is going to want to spend 10 years of additional schooling and not be able to be properly reward themselves once they are finished, all the while acquiring $10’s of thousands in debt. This scenario will eliminate the best and brightest among us from ever pursuing a career as a doctor, thereby dumbing down the profession and, in the long wrong, making our health care the worse for it.

Even the auspices under which this bill came into being were false: that our health care system is failing, too expensive, and that nearly 40 million Americans cannot afford health care. As always, the truth wills out in these situations and once the numbers were broken down, the reality of it is that only 10-12 million Americans cannot “afford” health care, and of those who do have health care, a recent study found that 80% of them were happy with the quality of the care they receive.

As for the cost of our health care, there is little question that there is a problem there, but that is more due to the fact that it is law that hospitals provide care to anyone who walks into an emergency room-which they have health insurance or the money to pay or not-and the chronic suer-suee problem we have in this country forcing idiotic lawsuits on people whose insurers end up paying the costs for and then passing that expense down to their policy holders. It’s needless to say that there are better ways to confront the cost of health care in our country than to have the Fed get more involved in “the game”, so to speak.

Then of course there is the cost-which is pointless to bring up because everyone knows that, as a nation, we simply cannot afford the mass providing of Federally subsidized health care.

In sum, “Obama-care” is a horrible idea. Fortunately, most people are aware of the horrors which await us if this bill some how passes and American’s all over the country are speaking out against. The problem right now is that our so call President seems hell bent on passing this bill. Just today it was reported that he will get this bill passed with or without the approval of Republicans. Not only does this speak to a man drunk with power, but also to one on the verge of dictatorial leanings, and if this turns out to be the case with Mr. Obama, then this health care bill is only the beginning of our problems.

The facts about 10 accusations of "Obama-care"

All of us have gotten at least one email lately about how bad the current federally funded health care plan before Congress is right now, commonly known as “Obama-care”. Most mass media outlets gloss over the negatives in this bill-which appear to be many-and the only legitimate attempt at pointing out even a few of the negatives came in the form of a Yahoo news piece about 2 weeks ago which listed 5 “changes” that we will be forced to accept if Obama-care passes.

As my friends and family all know, I in no way support this health care bill-not so much for what is contained within it, but more because the Fed has no business even attempting such a thing (I mean, come on, look at the mess Medicare is). However, a problem I am having with all of these emails is that they are full of opinion and very light on facts. They all make some very wild claims about what could happen if Obama-care passes without giving us the exact verbiage within the bill which leads them to draw these rather extreme conclusions.

Well, being the inquisitive person that I am, and always wanting to know the facts before I make any formal opinion on anything, I took it upon myself to find out exactly what the proposed healthcare bill says regarding 10 of the more extreme suppositions being drawn from Obama-care.

So here goes, 10 of the crazier suppositions in these emails we are all getting, measured up against the language within in the bill they are drawn from so that you can decide for yourself exactly what “Obama-care” will do to our economy and our healthcare system.

1. The Fed will have to ration our Healthcare.

Common sense and our Federal Governments past as to how business savvy (cough, cough) they are should tell us that this is an inevitability, so it’s not unfair to assume that this is going to happen at some point. Regardless, the exact verbiage relating to this can be found on page 29 of the bill. It says that there is an annual limitation defined as: Part A “The cost-sharing incurred under the essential benefits package with respect to an individual (or family) for a year does not exceed the applicable level specified in subparagraph; B) The applicable level specified in this subparagraph for Y1 is $5,000 for an individual and $10,000 for a family. Such levels shall be increased (rounded to the nearest $100) for each subsequent year by the annual percentage increase in the Consumer Price Index (United States city average) applicable to such year.

The plan goes on to further define this, and only makes it sound worse. Regardless, I don’t know about you, but it sounds to me as if the max any family can spend on healthcare a year is $10k and for a single person it’s $5k. This sounds worse than rationing to me, but you can decide for yourself.

2. You will have no choice in what benefits the Fed will choose for you.

Beginning on page 42, section 142, the bill establishes a commissioner whose duties include “Qualified Plan Standards”. No where does the bill say that you have no choice in what benefits you can have, but it does blatantly imply that the Fed will choose what benefits you are entitled too.

Based on everything else found in this bill, however, the supposition is easy to draw that they you wont have any say in the choice of what health care options you will have.

3. A “Healthcare Exchange is being created to bring all health care plans under government control.

The establishment of this so called “exchange” starts on page 72 of the bill. Although nowhere within its early verbiage does it say anything about bringing all other health care plans under its control, if you read on you can see how, in the future, this may be the intent behind creating this so called “exchange”.

4. Healthcare will be provided to all non U.S. residents, whether here legally or not.

This is just downright wrong and is what lead me to actually do the research myself. At the bottom of page 50 of the bill is a section titled “Prohibiting discrimination in health care”. The first part of this section says “Except as otherwise explicitly permitted by this Act and by subsequent regulations consistent with this Act, all health care and related services (including insurance coverage and public health activities) covered by this Act shall be provided without regard to personal characteristics extraneous to the provision of high quality health care or related services.”

You can take this for how you want, but it does sound as if you are a provider of governmental health care you cannot prevent someone from getting health “care” for any reason what so ever.

5. Doctors will be told by the Fed what they can make.

This is actually true. If you read the bill, it specifies on page 127, sub section B “preferred physicians” will receive payment at a “rate established under section 223 (without regard to cost sharing)” as being paid in full for their services. Sub Section C goes on to say that “non-preferred” physicians “agree not to impose charges (in relation to the payment rate described in section 223 for such physicians) that exceed the ratio permitted under section 1848 (g)(2)(c) of the Social Security Act.

I didn’t take a look at the referenced section of the SSA but I did take a look at section 223 of the bill. This section pretty much says that the Secretary in charge of overseeing implementation and collection of the fees and rates has the power to set these rates based on the rates, but that they must be based on the established rates already found in Medicare parts A and B.

6. Employees of the Fed Healthcare Administration will have unlimited access to all Americans financial and personal records.

This is, without question, one of the scarier accusations of all the emails we are getting about this bill. Here is what the healthcare bill says about this on page 195: “IN GENERAL.—The Secretary, upon written request from the Health Choices Commissioner or the head of a State-based health insurance exchange approved for operation under section 208 of the America’s Affordable Health Choices Act of 2009, shall disclose to officers and employees of the Health Choices Administration or such State-based health insurance exchange, as the case may be, return information of any taxpayer whose income is relevant in determining any affordability credit described in subtitle C of title II of the America’s Affordable Health Choices Act of 2009. Such return information shall be limited to (i) taxpayer identity information with respect to such taxpayer, (ii) the filing status of such taxpayer, (iii) the modified adjusted gross income of such taxpayer (as defined in section 59B(e)(5)), (iv) the number of dependents of the taxpayer, (v) such other information as is prescribed by the Secretary by regulation as might indicate whether the taxpayer is eligible for such affordability credits (and the amount thereof), and (vi) the taxable year with respect to which the preceding information relates or, if applicable, the fact that such information is not available.

Fortunately this doesn’t say that anyone who works for the Healthcare Administration can look into our personal finances whenever they want and for any reason they want too, but it does say that they can if they are given the authority too by their superiors and under specific guidelines. Those guidelines, however, aren’t really that specific as you can see and could be easily exploited.

7. Doctors and hospitals are prohibited from investing and/or expanding the facilities in which they work.

This is freakish but completely true. For brevity at this point I won’t go into the specific verbiage the bill goes into, but over pages 316-320 it specifically says that from the day this bill is implemented both Doctors and hospitals can no longer reinvest or continue to invest in their own institutions. You can only assume that this is because the intention of this bill is to make it so that every healthcare facility in the country becomes the sole and explicit property of the Federal Government.

8. There is a restriction as too how many “special needs” people can be on the plan.

Page 354 starts with section 1154, called “Extension of Authority of Special Needs”. The first sub heading of this section is called “Plans to restrict enrollment”.

Enough said.

9. The Fed will plan out “end of life” for all senior citizens.

This is another scary thing which was passed around in the emails and beginning on page 425 with section 1233 of the bill, is titled “Advance care planning consultation. Again, for brevity I will leave it to you to read this section, but it leaves you without a question as to the intent of this part of the bill.

10. The bill effectively ends both Medicare and Medicaid.

No where in the over 1000 pages of this bill will you find anything about the elimination of either of these programs. However, the bill makes it very clear in several places 2 things about both of them: firstly that different aspects of the bill are going to be based, at least in part, on aspects of either or both Medicare and Medicaid. Secondly, the bill does very little to differentiate between this program and Medicare and Medicaid. In the case of Medicaid, the bill explicitly says they plan to force everyone on to Medicaid who is eligible-whether they want Medicaid or not. The bill also says the same for seniors.