|
Post by philunderwood on Jan 21, 2012 9:25:25 GMT -5
www.qando.net/?tag=free-contraceptionThe Health Care Czar speaks – “free” contraception for all! Published January 20, 2012 | By Bruce McQuain Yes, Czar Kathleen (Sebelius, Czar Secretary of Health Care HHS and the final arbiter of all things ObamaCare) has declared that your insurer will now, without compensation or charge, do the following: The Obama administration said Friday that health insurance plans must cover contraceptives for women without charge, and it rejected a broad exemption sought by the Roman Catholic Church for insurance provided to employees of Catholic hospitals, colleges and charities. You may take a knee in thanks. Said Czar Kathleen: “This rule will provide women with greater access to contraception by requiring coverage and by prohibiting cost-sharing,” Ms. Sebelius said. Because, you know, the devices and services are delivered by magic fairies and don’t cost anyone anything. No wonder Obama chose Disneyland as the venue for his speech yesterday. The religious question aside, where in the world does this bunch get off deciding I have to pay for someone else’s contraception? Because that’s what is going to happen … the bill, just like taxes to corporations, is going to find its way into my premium in some form or fashion (TANSTAAFL). The order is an administration interpretation of this: The 2010 health care law says insurers must cover “preventive health services” and cannot charge for them. “Preventive health services”. Wow … how broadly can that be interpreted. Well, broadly enough to include contraception as a “preventive health service” I suppose. Which means, I assume, that the sky is the limit. Creative interpretation is only limited by … not much, huh? We have a czar. She has an agenda. She is the final, unaccountable “decider”. What could possibly go wrong with that? ~McQ
|
|
|
Post by Ritty77 on Mar 22, 2012 21:53:35 GMT -5
The Supreme Court Weighs ObamaCareCongress's power to regulate interstate commerce is broad but not limitless.By DAVID B. RIVKIN JR. AND LEE A. CASEY On Monday, the Supreme Court will begin an extraordinary three-day hearing on the constitutionality of ObamaCare. At stake are the Constitution's structural guarantees of individual liberty, which limit governmental power and ensure political accountability by dividing that power between federal and state authorities. Upholding ObamaCare would destroy this dual-sovereignty system, the most distinctive feature of American constitutionalism. ObamaCare mandates that every American, with a few narrow exceptions, have a congressionally defined minimum level of health-insurance coverage. Noncompliance brings a substantial monetary penalty. The ultimate purpose of this "individual mandate" is to force young and healthy middle-class workers to subsidize those who need more coverage. Congress could have achieved this wealth transfer in perfectly constitutional ways. It could simply have imposed new taxes to pay for a national health system. But that would have come with a huge political price tag that neither Congress nor the president was prepared to pay. Instead, Congress adopted the individual mandate, invoking its power to regulate interstate commerce. The uninsured, it reasoned, still use health services (for which some do not pay) and therefore have an impact on commerce, which Congress can regulate. Congress's reliance on the Commerce Clause to support the individual mandate was politically expedient but constitutionally deficient. Congress's power to regulate interstate commerce is broad but not limitless. First among the limits is the very nature of congressional authority, which is based on specifically enumerated powers. As the Supreme Court has consistently acknowledged, the Constitution denies the federal government the type of broad public health and welfare regulatory authority known as a "general police power," which is reserved exclusively to the states. The court has also repeatedly held that preservation of this division between federal and state authority is a matter for supervision by the courts, and its precedents make clear that congressional Commerce Clause regulation must be subject to some judicially enforceable limiting principle. The defining characteristic of a general police power is the states' ability to regulate people simply as people, regardless of an individual's activities or interaction with goods or services that might themselves be subject to regulation. Thus, the Supreme Court has ruled that states, exercising their general police power, can require all resident adults to obtain a smallpox vaccination. Only this type of authority could support ObamaCare's individual mandate, which applies to all Americans as such, regardless of any goods they may buy or own, or any activities in which they might choose to engage. Congress has crossed a fundamental constitutional line. Neither the fact that every individual has some discernible impact on the economy, nor that virtually everyone will at some point in time use health-care services, is a sufficient basis for federal regulation. Both of these arguments, advanced by ObamaCare's defenders, are flawed because they admit no judicially enforceable limiting principle marking the outer bounds of federal authority. On the left and right, legal thinkers too often forget that Congress has no constitutional power simply to regulate the economy. Rather, that power comes from a series of discrete authorities—to regulate interstate and foreign commerce, to tax, spend and borrow, to coin money and fix its value and so forth—that together allow it broad control over the nation's economic affairs. As a result, congressional efforts to address national problems may well be less economically efficient than would a more straightforward exercise of police power. The Constitution subordinates efficiency to guarantee liberty. The Constitution divides governmental power between federal and state governments so that one may check the other. This requires that the electorate be able to tell, especially on Election Day, which government is responsible for which policies and regulations with which we live. As Justice Anthony Kennedy explained in one leading Commerce Clause case, United States v. Lopez (1995): "The theory that two governments accord more liberty than one [emphasis added] requires for its realization two distinct and discernible lines of political accountability: one between the citizens and the Federal Government; the second between the citizens and the States." Congress's use of its commerce power in passing ObamaCare eradicates those "discernible lines of political accountability." Even so, Congress's enumerated powers support a vast and ever growing regulatory state, much of it based upon the Commerce Clause. Neither that Leviathan, nor the Supreme Court's precedents upholding it, is now at issue. Justice Antonin Scalia explained in another of the Supreme Court's recent Commerce Clause cases, Gonzales v. Raich (2005), that the power to regulate interstate commerce, especially in conjunction with the power "to make all laws which shall be necessary and proper [emphasis added] for carrying into execution" its enumerated powers, gives Congress broad authority to reach even local and non-commercial activities when necessary to make legitimate regulatory schemes effective. Raich upheld federal control of purely local cultivation, sale and use of marijuana, and it is often incorrectly cited as support for the individual mandate. Related Video But the Necessary and Proper Clause does not guarantee Congress whatever power it would like to reach its policy goals. That provision supports only otherwise legitimate exercises of Congress's enumerated powers. So under the Commerce Clause, Congress can try to achieve universal coverage through regulating the interstate health-care insurance market, as ObamaCare does, by requiring insurance companies operating in that market to cover pre-existing conditions. Then under the Necessary and Proper clause, Congress could also require employers to collect data on pre-existing conditions from new hires so insurers can better plan. Requiring all Americans to have health insurance may well create a new revenue stream for insurance companies so as to lessen these new burdens on them, but it does nothing to make these new coverage requirements effective regulations of interstate commerce as the Supreme Court uses that term. In particular, the individual mandate does not prevent avoidance or evasion of these new insurance regulations. Nor does it make compliance easier to police, as was the case in Raich. There, the ability to regulate local marijuana production and use was necessary to make its interstate regulation effective because, as Justice Scalia noted, the homegrown variety "is never more than an instant from the interstate market." Unlike the regulations at issue in Raich, the individual mandate applies regardless of anyone's interaction with a commodity, service or other activity, like the interstate sale or transport of marijuana, that Congress can legitimately regulate. Put another way, the Controlled Substances Act is about the regulation of drugs, not people. It affects individuals only to the extent that they interact with the substances it proscribes, and it can be avoided by simply avoiding those substances. Americans cannot escape the individual mandate by any means because it regulates them as people, simply because they are alive and here. That requires police power authority. Permitting Congress to exercise that authority—however important its ultimate goal—is not constitutionally proper and would forever warp the federal-state division of authority. Messrs. Rivkin and Casey are lawyers who served in the Justice Department during the Reagan and George H. W. Bush administrations. They represented the 26 states in their challenge to ObamaCare before the trial and appellate courts. A version of this article appeared Mar. 22, 2012, on page A15 in some U.S. editions of The Wall Street Journal, with the headline: The Supreme Court Weighs ObamaCare. online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702304636404577291883293776326.html?mod=WSJ_Opinion_LEADTop
|
|
|
Post by Ritty77 on Mar 25, 2012 8:04:37 GMT -5
Obamacare’s contract problemBy George F. Will March 25, 2012 On Monday the Supreme Court begins three days of oral arguments concerning possible — actually, probable and various — constitutional infirmities in Obamacare. The justices have received many amicus briefs, one of which merits special attention because of the elegant scholarship and logic with which it addresses an issue that has not been as central to the debate as it should be. Hitherto, most attention has been given to whether Congress, under its constitutional power to regulate interstate commerce, may coerce individuals into engaging in commerce by buying health insurance. Now the Institute for Justice (IJ), a libertarian public interest law firm, has focused on this fact: The individual mandate is incompatible with centuries of contract law. This is so because a compulsory contract is an oxymoron. The brief, the primary authors of which are the IJ’s Elizabeth Price Foley and Steve Simpson, says that Obamacare is the first time Congress has used its power to regulate commerce to produce a law “from which there is no escape.” And “coercing commercial transactions” — compelling individuals to sign contracts with insurance companies — “is antithetical to the foundational principle of mutual assent that permeated the common law of contracts at the time of the founding and continues to do so today.” In 1799, South Carolina’s highest court held: “So cautiously does the law watch over all contracts, that it will not permit any to be binding but such as are made by persons perfectly free, and at full liberty to make or refuse such contracts. . . . Contracts to be binding must not be made under any restraint or fear of their persons, otherwise they are void.” Throughout the life of this nation it has been understood that for a contract to be valid, the parties to it must mutually assent to its terms — without duress. In addition to duress, contracts are voidable for reasons of fraud upon, or the mistake or incapacity of, a party to the contract. This underscores the centrality of the concept of meaningful consent in contract law. To be meaningful, consent must be informed and must not be coerced. Under Obamacare, the government will compel individuals to enter into contractual relations with insurance companies under threat of penalty. Also, the Supreme Court in Commerce Clause cases has repeatedly recognized, and Congress has never before ignored, the difference between the regulation and the coercion of commerce. And in its 10th Amendment cases (“The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states, are reserved to the states respectively, or to the people”), the court has specifically forbidden government to compel contracts. In 1992, the court held unconstitutional a law compelling states to “take title to” radioactive waste. The court said this would be indistinguishable from “a congressionally compelled subsidy from state governments” to those who produced the radioactive waste. Such commandeering of states is, the court held, incompatible with federalism. The IJ argues: The 10th Amendment forbids Congress from exercising its commerce power to compel states to enter into contractual relations by effectively forcing states to “buy” radioactive waste. Hence “the power to regulate commerce does not include the power to compel a party to take title to goods or services against its will.” And if it is beyond Congress’s power to commandeer the states by compelling them to enter into contracts, it must likewise be beyond Congress’s power to commandeer individuals by requiring them to purchase insurance. Again, the 10th Amendment declares that any powers not given to the federal government are reserved to the states or to the people. Furthermore, although the Constitution permits Congress to make laws “necessary and proper” for executing its enumerated powers, such as the power to regulate interstate commerce, it cannot, IJ argues, be proper to exercise that regulatory power in ways that eviscerate “the very essence of legally binding contracts.” Under Obamacare, Congress asserted the improper power to compel commercial contracts. It did so on the spurious ground that this power is necessary to solve a problem Congress created when, by forbidding insurance companies to deny coverage to individuals because of preexisting conditions, it produced the problem of “adverse selection” — people not buying insurance until they need medical care. The IJ correctly says that if the court were to ratify Congress’s disregard for settled contract law, Congress’s “power to compel contractual relations would have no logical stopping point.” Which is why this case is the last exit ramp on the road to unlimited government. www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/obamacares-rewriting-of-contract-law/2012/03/23/gIQAVuFmWS_story.html
|
|
|
Post by Ritty77 on Mar 27, 2012 17:34:47 GMT -5
Mark levin submitted a Amicus brief to SCOTUS re Obamacare. The following excerpt was basically repeated by Justice Kennedy today in a question to the Obama lawyer: The heavy-handed demands of temporary politicians seeking to fundamentally and permanently change the relationship between the citizen and government – in a manner that no past Congress or Executive have undertaken and which the Constitution does not allow – must not be given this Court’s imprimatur. This looks like Kennedy's case to decide. He's sounding very critical of PPACA. Hopes it's not a head fake. Mark Levin's Landmark Legal Foundation brief can be found here if you're interested. Most of the cases that the Obama team bases its alleged precedents on are irrelevant precisely because Obamacare goes too far. There is no precedent.
|
|
|
Post by leisuresuitlarry on Jun 28, 2012 9:39:37 GMT -5
What the hell is wrong with this country? How can the Supreme Court rule in favor of Obamacare? The mandate alone should have been shot down. Has Liberal/Progressive/Socialism infected that much of our nation?
|
|
|
Post by philunderwood on Jun 28, 2012 11:06:41 GMT -5
I guess we’ll have to answer that question this November.
|
|
|
Post by leisuresuitlarry on Jun 29, 2012 6:11:28 GMT -5
After calming down a bit and watching a few news channels - even some bits on CNBC, not all Fox News like the ass holes like to say we watch - I see why it was done. I see a lot of commentators are saying Roberts did it to incense the right and get us riled up to oust the Chosen One and had he sided with the nays it would have looked like they split on party lines similar to 2000 Bush v. Gore and Roberts sees himself as a sort of protector of the court's image. Still though, his wording in the ruling shows that he could have, and likely should have, gone the other way. The thing is unconstitutional, but he said it appears that it could be a tax and not a fee and therefore is okay... could be seen as a tax? Come on. I just hope there are more anti-Obamacare people out there now who will vote this fool out of office in Nov. because of this Supreme Court decision. Oh, a fun Obamacare poll I created at the Williamsport PA Chat board... williamsportpachat.proboards.com/index.cgi?board=obama&action=display&thread=43
|
|
|
Post by Ritty77 on Jun 29, 2012 16:32:21 GMT -5
|
|
|
Post by mikekerstetter on Jun 30, 2012 14:20:35 GMT -5
dailyitem.com/0100_news/x546488843/Q-A-What-does-the-health-care-law-mean-for-youQ&A: What does the health care law mean for you? By Connie Cass Associated Press WASHINGTON — Free vaccines for kids, cheaper drugs for the elderly and many other benefits of President Barack Obama's health care law are already out there. More are coming, like a guaranteed right to buy health insurance even for patients with serious medical troubles. Many businesses and wealthy taxpayers, however, will see their costs go up. And most Americans balk at the idea of the government making people carry insurance or pay a penalty on their federal tax returns. The effects of the nation's health care law, upheld Thursday by the Supreme Court, are gigantic and growing. Some questions and answers about it: Q: What does the ruling mean for me? A: The ruling affects virtually every American. Obama's health care law tells almost everyone they must be insured and makes sure that coverage will be available to them even if they are already ill or need hugely expensive care. It helps the poor and many middle-class people afford the cost. And it requires insurers to provide certain basic benefits, like preventive care without co-pays from the patient. Q: What did the Supreme Court say? A: The court upheld almost all of the law, including the most disputed part: the requirement that virtually all Americans have health insurance or pay a penalty. The court said the penalty is essentially a tax, and that's why the government has the power to impose it. The ruling somewhat limits the plan to expand the Medicaid insurance program for the poor, a joint effort of the federal government and states. It says the government may not withhold a state's entire Medicaid allotment if it doesn't participate in the expansion. Chief Justice John Roberts sided with the court's four liberal justices — Stephen Breyer, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Elena Kagan and Sonia Sotomayor — to form the 5-4 majority. Q: What does the decision mean for the November election? A: It's a big win for Obama, dousing accusations that his signature legislation was an unconstitutional power grab. But Republicans hope the court's ruling will fire up their supporters and inflame popular opposition to the law. Presumptive Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney and GOP congressional candidates promise to repeal the law if voters put them in power. Q: What's the law done so far? A: Some parts, like the elimination of co-payments for preventive care, are already in effect. Young adults can stay on their parents' insurance up to age 26. Insurers can't deny coverage to children with health problems. Limits on how much policies will pay out to each person over a lifetime are eliminated. And millions of older people already are saving hundreds of dollars through improved Medicare prescription benefits. Q: What else is coming? A: Unless Congress changes the law, starting in 2014 almost everyone will be required to be insured or pay a penalty. Subsidies will help people who can't afford coverage. Most employers will face fines if they don't offer coverage for their workers. Newly created insurance markets will make it easier for individuals and small businesses to buy affordable coverage. And Medicaid will be expanded to cover more low-income people. Insurers will be prohibited from denying coverage to people with medical problems or charging those people more. They won't be able to charge women more than men, either. During the transition to 2014, a special program for people with pre-existing health problems helps these people get coverage. The law is expected to bring coverage to about 30 million of the estimated 50 million uninsured people in the U.S. Overall, more than 9 in 10 of the eligible population — citizens and legal residents — will be covered. Q: Why will some people still go without insurance? A: It's estimated that more than 20 million people will still be without coverage, including illegal immigrants, people who don't sign up and choose to face the penalties instead and those who can't afford coverage even with the subsidies. That number could be higher, depending on whether any states decline the Medicaid expansion. Q: Do people like the law? Not much. Some parts of the law have proven popular. But the individual insurance mandate is widely disliked. Each time The Associated Press has asked in polls, more than 8 in 10 Americans have said the government should not have the right to require everyone to buy health insurance. And the public has tilted against the law as a whole over the two years since it was passed. About half opposed it and a third were in favor in an AP-GfK poll shortly before the Supreme Court ruled. Many elderly Americans are worried about the cuts in reimbursements paid to hospitals and insurers by Medicare, which have already started and will grow deeper. Q: Does the insurance mandate affect many people? A: Relatively few, because more than 8 in 10 Americans already have insurance coverage. Employers face their own mandate. Those with 50 or more workers will be fined if they don't provide insurance for their employees, and opponents argue that will cost jobs at a time of high unemployment. Q: Why impose a mandate that's unpopular and won't require any action by most people? A: The mandate is designed to produce extra income from more healthy, paying customers so insurers can to hold down costs for everyone. Without the mandate, insurance companies probably would find it too expensive to comply with requirements to accept customers with pre-existing health problems and not charge them extra. Companies sought to control their costs by cherry-picking the healthy as their customers. Q: Is the penalty for the uninsured a tax? A: It will be collected along with income tax each year by the Internal Revenue Service. But Obama and Democrats have avoided using the dreaded "t-word." Instead, they referred to it as a penalty for failing to act responsibly and focused publicly on other legal justifications. Before the Supreme Court, however, the Obama administration also argued that the law was constitutional under the federal government's power to levy taxes. The court rejected the Obama administration's other two legal arguments for the law but accepted the tax one. Still, most of the 20 million or more without insurance will not be docked. By 2016, about 4 million people will pay the penalty, the Congressional Budget Office has estimated. They would pay $695 for each uninsured adult or 2.5 percent of family income, up to $12,500 a year. The IRS can't prosecute violators or place liens against them, however. Its only enforcement option may be withholding money from refunds. Q: What other new taxes are in the law? A: An assortment, including: Individuals making more than $200,000 a year and couples earning above $250,000 will get new payroll taxes. These people are also hit with a 3.8 percent tax on investment income. Medical-device makers will pay a 2.3 percent excise tax, which probably will get passed along to patients. Taxpayers will have to spend more on unreimbursed medical care before they can claim itemized deductions. Q: What are Republicans saying? "Obamacare was bad law yesterday. It's bad law today," Romney said. Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell said Obama deceived Americans by denying that the penalty on the uninsured amounts to a tax. The ruling marks "a fresh start on the road to repeal," he declared. The Republican-led House already has voted for repeal — and its leaders plan to repeat that vote next month — but repeal is stuck there so long as Obama's in the White House and Democrats lead the Senate. Q: What does Obama say? A: He says the decision upholds the fundamental principle that in the wealthiest nation on earth, no one should be ruined financially by an illness or accident. Obama called it "a victory for people all over this country whose lives will be more secure because of this law." Q: If the law survives in Congress, will the health care issue finally be put to rest? A: No, there's more to do. Although the law is supposed to help curb costs, the nation's spending on health care already is enormous and sure to climb as the baby boom generation ages. Skyrocketing budget deficits will force lawmakers to look for ways to save on the Medicare program for seniors and Medicaid for the low-income and disabled, and that means painful choices ahead.
|
|
|
Post by Ritty77 on Jul 1, 2012 10:24:51 GMT -5
Ronald Reagan from 1961. Still true today.
|
|
|
Post by philunderwood on Jul 2, 2012 7:36:05 GMT -5
A lie makes Obamacare legal By Mark Steyn www.JewishWorldReview.com | Three months ago, I quoted George Jonas on the 30th anniversary of Canada's ghastly "Charter of Rights and Freedoms": "There seems to be an inverse relationship between written instruments of freedom, such as a Charter, and freedom itself," he wrote. "It's as if freedom were too fragile to be put into words: If you write down your rights and freedoms, you lose them." For longer than one might have expected, the U.S. Constitution was a happy exception to that general rule — until, that is, the contortions required to reconcile a republic of limited government with the ambitions of statism rendered U.S. constitutionalism increasingly absurd. As I also wrote three months ago: "The United States is the only western nation in which our rulers invoke the Constitution for the purpose of overriding it — or, at any rate, torturing its language beyond repair." Thus, the Supreme Court's ObamaCare decision. No one could seriously argue that the Framers' vision of the Constitution intended to provide philosophical license for a national government ("federal" hardly seems le mot juste) whose treasury could fine you for declining to make provision for a chest infection that meets the approval of the Commissar of Ailments. Yet on Thursday, Chief Justice John Roberts did just that. And conservatives are supposed to be encouraged that he did so by appeal to the Constitution's taxing authority rather than by a massive expansion of the commerce clause. Indeed, several respected commentators portrayed the chief justice's majority vote as a finely calibrated act of constitutional seemliness. Great. That and $4.95 will get you a decaf macchiato in the Supreme Court snack bar. There's nothing constitutionally seemly about a court decision that says this law is legal only because the people's representatives flat-out lied to the people when they passed it. Throughout the ObamaCare debates, Democrats explicitly denied it was a massive tax hike: "You reject that it's a tax increase?" George Stephanopoulos demanded to know on ABC. "I absolutely reject that notion," replied the president. Yet "that notion" is the only one that would fly at the Supreme Court. The jurists found the individual mandate constitutional by declining to recognize it as a mandate at all. For Roberts' defenders on the right, this is apparently a daring rout of Big Government: Like Nelson contemplating the Danish fleet at the Battle of Copenhagen, the chief justice held the telescope to his blind eye and declared, "I see no ships." If it looks like a duck, quacks like a duck, but a handful of judges rule that it's a rare breed of elk, then all's well. The chief justice, on the other hand, looks, quacks and walks like the Queen in "Alice In Wonderland": "Sentence first — verdict afterwards." The Obama administration sentences you to a $695 fine, and a couple of years later the queens of the Supreme Court explain what it is you're guilty of. A.V. Dicey's famous antipathy to written constitutions and preference for what he called (in a then largely unfamiliar coinage) the "rule of law" has never looked better. Instead, constitutionalists argue that Chief Roberts has won a Nelson-like victory over the ever-expanding Commerce Clause. Big deal — for is his new, approved, enhanced taxing power not equally expandable? And, in attempting to pass off a confiscatory penalty as a legitimate tax, Roberts inflicts damage on the most basic legal principles. Still, quibbling over whose pretzel argument is more ingeniously twisted — the government's or the court's — is to debate, in Samuel Johnson's words, the precedence between a louse and a flea. I have great respect for George Will, but his assertion that the Supreme Court decision is a "huge victory" that will "help revive a venerable tradition" of "viewing congressional actions with a skeptical constitutional squint" and lead to a "sharpening" of "many Americans' constitutional consciousness" is sufficiently delusional — that one trusts mental health is not grounds for priority check-in at the death panel. Back in the real world, it is a melancholy fact that tens of millions of Americans are far more European in their view of government than the nation's self-mythologizing would suggest. Indeed, citizens of many Continental countries now have more — what's the word? — liberty in matters of health care than Americans. That's to say, they have genuinely universal government systems alongside genuinely private-system alternatives. Only in America does "health" "care" "reform" begin with the hiring of 16,500 new IRS agents tasked with determining whether your insurance policy merits a fine. It is the perverse genius of ObamaCare that it will kill off what's left of a truly private health sector without leading to a truly universal system. However, it will be catastrophically unaffordable, hideously bureaucratic and ever more coercive. So what's not to like? To give Chief Justice Roberts' argument more credit than it deserves, governments use taxes as a form of incentive. There is mortgage-tax-relief because the state feels homeownership is generally a good thing. Conversely, not buying health insurance is a bad thing, so such anti-social behavior should be liable to a kind of anti-social tax. But, as presently constituted, the Supreme Court's new "tax" is a steal — $695 is cheaper than most annual health insurance policies. Especially when, under ObamaCare, you're allowed to wait till you get ill to take out health insurance, and you can't be turned down. Which is why the cost of insurance is already rising, and will rise higher still down the road. Which means that in a few years' time paying the penalty will look even more of a bargain, at least until you fall off the roof or acquire an uncooperative polyp. Right now, many Americans are, by any rational measure, over-insured. That will be far less affordable in the future. Some are already downgrading to less lavish policies. Those with bare-bones policies might likewise find it makes more sense to downgrade to the $695 penalty. What Chief Justice Roberts sees as the Alternative Mandate Tax, millions of Americans will see as a de facto Alternative Minimum Health Plan. Who knows? Chances are I'm wrong, and the justices are wrong, and the government's wrong, and the consequences of ObamaCare will be of a nature none of us has foreseen. But we already know Obama's been wrong about pretty much everything — you can keep your own doc, your premiums won't go up, it's not a tax, etc. — and in the Republic of Paperwork, multi-trillion-dollar cost overruns and ever greater bureaucratic sclerosis seems the very least you can bet on. It should also be a given that this decision is a forlorn marker on a great nation's descent into steep decline and decay. Granted the dysfunctionalism of Canadian health care, there's at least the consolation of an equality of crappiness for all except Cabinet ministers and NHL players. Here, it's 2,800 unread pages of opt-outs, favors, cronyism and a $695 fine for those guilty of no crime except wanting to live their lives without putting their bladder under the jurisdiction of Commissar Sebelius. And the Constitution is apparently cool with all that. So be it. It's down to the people now — as it should be. But, meanwhile, a little less deference to judges wouldn't go amiss. The U.S. Supreme Court is starting to look like Britain's National Health Service — you wait two years to get in, and then they tell you there's nothing wrong. And you can't get a second opinion.
|
|
|
Post by philunderwood on Jul 3, 2012 7:35:55 GMT -5
Judicial Betrayal By Thomas Sowell www.JewishWorldReview.com | Betrayal is hard to take, whether in our personal lives or in the political life of the nation. Yet there are people in Washington — too often, Republicans — who start living in the Beltway atmosphere, and start forgetting those hundreds of millions of Americans beyond the Beltway who trusted them to do right by them, to use their wisdom instead of their cleverness. President Bush 41 epitomized these betrayals when he broke his "read my lips, no new taxes" pledge. He paid the price when he quickly went from high approval ratings as president to someone defeated for reelection by a little known governor from Arkansas. Chief Justice John Roberts need fear no such fate because he has lifetime tenure on the Supreme Court. But conscience can be a more implacable and inescapable punisher — and should be. The Chief Justice probably made as good a case as could be made for upholding the constitutionality of ObamaCare by defining one of its key features as a "tax." The legislation didn't call it a tax and Chief Justice Roberts admitted that this might not be the most "natural" reading of the law. But he fell back on the long-standing principle of judicial interpretation that the courts should not declare a law unconstitutional if it can be reasonably read in a way that would make it constitutional, out of "deference" to the legislative branch of government. But this question, like so many questions in life, is a matter of degree. How far do you bend over backwards to avoid the obvious, that ObamaCare was an unprecedented extension of federal power over the lives of 300 million Americans today and of generations yet unborn? These are the people that Chief Justice Roberts betrayed when he declared constitutional something that is nowhere authorized in the Constitution of the United States. John Roberts is no doubt a brainy man, and that seems to carry a lot of weight among the intelligentsia — despite glaring lessons from history, showing very brainy men creating everything from absurdities to catastrophes. Few of the great tragedies of history were created by the village idiot, and many by the village genius. One of the Chief Justice's admirers said that when others are playing checkers, he is playing chess. How much consolation that will be as a footnote to the story of the decline of individual freedom in America, and the wrecking of the best medical care in the world, is another story. There are many speculations as to why Chief Justice Roberts did what he did, some attributing noble and far-sighted reasons, and others attributing petty and short-sighted reasons, including personal vanity. But all of that is ultimately irrelevant. What he did was betray his oath to be faithful to the Constitution of the United States. Who he betrayed were the hundreds of millions of Americans — past, present and future — whole generations in the past who have fought and died for a freedom that he has put in jeopardy, in a moment of intellectual inspiration and moral forgetfulness, 300 million Americans today whose lives are to be regimented by Washington bureaucrats, and generations yet unborn who may never know the individual freedoms that their ancestors took for granted. Some claim that Chief Justice Roberts did what he did to save the Supreme Court as an institution from the wrath — and retaliation — of those in Congress who have been railing against Justices who invalidate the laws they have passed. Many in the media and in academia have joined the shrill chorus of those who claim that the Supreme Court does not show proper "deference" to the legislative branch of government. But what does the Bill of Rights seek to protect the ordinary citizen from? The government! To defer to those who expand government power beyond its constitutional limits is to betray those whose freedom depends on the Bill of Rights. Similar reasoning was used back in the 1970s to justify the Federal Reserve's inflationary policies. Otherwise, it was said, Congress would destroy the Fed's independence, as it can also change the courts' jurisdiction. But is it better for an institution to undermine its own independence, and freedom along with it, while forfeiting the trust of the people in the process?
|
|
|
Post by philunderwood on Jul 4, 2012 8:10:47 GMT -5
www.qando.net/?tag=nutritionSpeaking of your health care, the obese should prepare for another government mandate Published July 3, 2012 | By Bruce McQuain Given that ObamaCare has been upheld, the following shouldn’t take many people by surprise: In a move that could significantly expand insurance coverage of weight-loss treatments, a federal health advisory panel on Monday recommended that all obese adults receive intensive counseling in an effort to rein in a growing health crisis in America. The U.S. Preventive Services Task Force urged doctors to identify patients with a body mass index of 30 or more — currently 1 in 3 Americans — and either provide counseling themselves or refer the patient to a program designed to promote weight loss and improve health prospects. Under the current healthcare law, Medicare and most private insurers would be required to cover the entire cost of weight-loss services that meet or exceed the task force’s standards. And, of course, all that will be “free” and cost absolutely nothing because ObamaCare has magically lowered costs in the insurance and health care world. Read those three sentences carefully. You can see the coming disaster easily through this fairly simple example. Government has a solution to obesity. More government. First BMI is a crock of crap. Anyone who has spent a day looking into it knows that. Yet the government stubbornly holds on to the standard. I’m 6’ and 188 pounds. My BMI is 26 which makes me “overweight”. Sorry, that’s BS. And if you have any muscle mass at all, you can most likely count on being overweight even if you’re in the best shape of your life. But BMI is what we’re going to see used to determine who that one-third are, and the bottom two-thirds? Well they have a role too. They will be paying for that top one-third’s “intensive weight loss services” for which the law mandates insurers pay. What are those standards of treatment? The task force concluded after a review of the medical literature that the most successful programs in improving patients’ health were "intensive, multicomponent behavioral interventions." They involve 12 to 26 counseling sessions a year with a physician or community-based program, the panel said. Successful programs set weight-loss goals, improve knowledge about nutrition, teach patients how to track their eating and set limits, identify barriers to change (such as a scarcity of healthful food choices near home) and strategize on ways to maintain lifestyle changes, the panel found. The programs set goals? Anyone who is past the age of 20 and with an IQ above room temperature knows that programs setting goals are useless. Unless the person for whom the program is setting those goals is willingly and totally committee to change, it won’t work. Ask any ex-smoker or alcoholic. But, cynic that I am, I see opportunities here for all sorts of waste, fraud and abuse. It is found in the phrase “community based programs”. The new growth industry? “Intensive, multicomponent” weight loss companies contracted to the government to provide “behavioral interventions” and facilitate weight loss. Because otherwise, doctors have to do the sessions and we all know that’s going to happen, don’t we? We;’re so overstocked with them and they have so little to do. And don’t you just love the phrase “behavioral intervention?” Sounds … ominous? Finally, the government is still pushing diet regimes that don’t solve the problem. Look at the sample menu here on this 1,600 low calorie menu. Note the carbohydrates and sugars in that menu (sugars aren’t noted, but it has juice and fruit). If you want to lose weight it is those you must cut out. Not salt. Not even fat. The body converts carbs and sugars to glucose. And it burns glucose before it burns fat. If you load up on things that produce glucose and the body doesn’t burn It all, it then stores the rest as fat. So you want a diet that reduces glucose production and has the body burning stored fat. That is how you lose weight. That means removal of grains, bread, potatoes, pasta, etc. You should also avoid starchy vegetables like corn. That menu is loaded with them. Personal experience. Go low carb and you’ll see weight drop off and quickly (like 7 pounds in a week). At some point, you can begin to add a few carbs back in when you go to maintenance mode. There are or may be some initial unpleasant side effects to going low carb, but you get over them fairly quickly. But government continues to push a “balanced” diet loaded with all the things that actually help make us fat. If any weight is lost using their plan it will be excruciatingly slow and if you think someone is going to stick with a diet like that I’ve linked for very long, you don’t know human nature. If you’re going to motivate someone to lose weight, you’d better show them some pretty real and dramatic progress fairly quickly or you’re going to lose their interest in about 2 weeks, a month at the most. Because here is ground truth about diets: A common argument that many experts wield against carbohydrate restriction is that all diets fail, the reason being that people just don’t stay on diets. So why bother? But this argument implicitly assumes that all diets work in the same way—we consume fewer calories than we expend—and thus all fail in the same way. But this isn’t true. If a diet requires that you semi-starve yourself, it will fail, because (1) your body adjusts to the caloric deficit by expending less energy, (2) you get hungry and stay hungry, and (3), a product of both of these, you get depressed, irritable, and chronically tired. Eventually you go back to eating what you always did—or become a binge eater—because you can’t abide semi-starvation and its side effects indefinitely. -Taubes, Gary (2010). Why We Get Fat: And What to Do About It (p. 209). Random House, Inc. By the way, that’s a great book and I recommend it highly. Anyway, I didn’t mean to wander off into a diet discussion, but it only helps reinforce my point. Government, as of now, is touting exactly the wrong stuff to fight obesity. Yet it plans, obviously, on taking the lead, having doctors prescribe the weight loss programs and require unwilling “obese” people to take them. And all of it will ‘cost less’ – never mind the golden opportunities for waste, fraud and abuse. Yes, friends, now that the government owns health care, it has a plan for all you fatties out there. Whether or not you really want to lose weight that’s another choice (freedom) you’ll probably lose. Mandatory obesity screening and a prescribed program of weight loss coming you’re way whether you want it or not. And all at a nominal cost, of course. Because, you know, health care costs have been reduced now that we all have to have insurance or pay a tax. Welcome to your new world. Forward. ~McQ
|
|
|
Post by mikekerstetter on Jul 5, 2012 3:47:17 GMT -5
Sounds like McQ is an Atkins fan. I've done the Atkins diet with a lot of success. A few years ago when I was pushing 280 I tried it and within 6 months was down to 225. I've been on and off it a few times since and I am currently off if it and weigh in at 245 lbs. I'd like to think it's because my weight lifting at the Y is paying off (which it is) and I'm building muscle, but my slightly tighter fitting pants tell me otherwise.
Every year we have to take a 'Health Risk Assessment' for our insurance, and depending on the answers, we may have to participate in some type of online or telephonic program to get a discount on what we pay towards our insurance. When I started a telephonic program during that 6 months they kept trying to get me to stop Atkins. I finally had to tell the lady that she wasn't a Dr., my Dr. approved, and I had success where I didn't have success with a standard diet, and I wasn't about to stop what is working.
One thing I DID learn is that Atkins (like ANY diet) is not an eat as much as you want diet. You can't sit down and eat a two pound steak or a dozen eggs and pound of bacon. It IS really restrictive on what you can eat. No beans, corn, breads (although you can find wraps and some low carb breads which are less than 6 grams of carbs per serving), pastas, rice, potatoes, and a whole lot of other things. I found out quickly that a LOT of stuff has carbs and added sugars. Two of my favorite veggies were cut out... carrots and corn. But for me, except for missing pasta and potatoes (and for those who are wondering, spaghetti squash and mashed cauliflower just didn't cut it for me as substitutes, I don't care what all the other people said), I was happy with the diet.
Now if I could just get my health insurance provider to cover my Y membership........
|
|
|
Post by Ritty77 on Jul 5, 2012 10:20:52 GMT -5
No beans?!
|
|
|
Post by mikekerstetter on Jul 5, 2012 16:47:46 GMT -5
Nope, no beans, they have starch, and therefore carbs. You can have heavy cream, but not milk. Skim milk has the most carbs. Thinking about my weight gain after going off the diet, I think it's because I continued to eat the high calorie, high fat foods I added that I could have, like heavy cream in place of milk or creamer of my coffee, and adding the carbs with it. It's pretty interesting figuring out which foods have carbs.
|
|
|
Post by mikekerstetter on Jul 6, 2012 11:17:55 GMT -5
www.standard-journal.com/articles/2012/07/06/opinion/doc4ff6e5d5053f1209543942.txtThe good and bad of health care reform By Allen C. Minor Published: Friday, July 6, 2012 8:18 AM CDT The lengthy debate about the “Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act” (ACA) did not end in late June when the Supreme Court ruled it constitutional. While Democrats declared a victory for the uninsured and for seizing control of the escalating cost of health insurance, Republicans vowed to repeal it and characterized it as bad legislation that will not accomplish its stated goals. So which side is correct — the right or the left? Is the ACA a landmark piece of legislation that will provide health insurance to millions of uninsured Americans, while also closing loopholes that hurt countless others at a reasonable cost? Or is it another example of big government expanding its reach and also passing along the most expensive tax increase in American history? The main issue the nation’s high court was asked to resolve was whether the federal government has the power to require every American to buy health care insurance. Under the ACA, if you do not have health insurance you must report it on your income tax return and pay a penalty. What is so good about this requirement, you may ask? Think of fire insurance. Those who buy fire insurance hope they never need it. However, the few who do need it are paid out of the funds collected from everyone who buys the insurance. Otherwise, fire insurance companies would go broke if only fire victims purchased it. The same can be said about health insurance: The vast majority of Americans pays into the insurance funds and payment for medical services will be drawn down from these accounts. An argument has been made that it is inappropriate to require young, healthy people to buy health insurance that they do not need. But what if a young, healthy person is bitten by a rattlesnake and incurs a hospital bill of $125,000? The difference with health care is that we all will require it at some point in our lives. We could make an argument that all of us should participate in health insurance. We all pay for it anyway. Medicaid and Medicare for the poor and elderly are funded through taxes, and other costs — such as employer-provided health insurance, charity care and bad debts — are passed along in the price of goods we purchase. Wouldn’t it be better to require everyone to have health insurance so the ACA could reduce the burden of charity care and bad debts on health care systems, while also improving the overall health of Americans through wellness programs and other services? Conversely, a lot of the people who oppose ACA do so over philosophical reasons, arguing that it is nothing more than a large tax increase and an expansion of an already bloated government that seeks to run the everyday lives of its citizens. The Supreme Court said ACA’s penalty is a tax and Congress has the authority to tax. Can the federal government require us to buy something else, such as a Ford or Chevrolet, by creating a penalty tax? Does this ruling give the federal government too much power? What about small employers that cannot currently afford to buy health insurance for their employees? State health insurance exchanges will be developed under the ACA. The exchanges will be subsidized to lower premiums for individuals and employers that cannot otherwise afford insurance. But will the premiums be low enough to resolve the problem? There is a lot of uncertainty about these exchanges and how they will work. The ACA provides access to health care by increasing the income limitations for people to qualify for Medicaid, the health insurance for the poor. An additional 32 million people will be covered by Medicaid through this provision and other provisions of the ACA. Shouldn’t all Americans be eligible for basic health care? The problem is how to pay for the added volume of patients and ensure the health care system can provide proper care. Pilot projects in the ACA pay providers, doctors and hospitals for helping to keep our nation’s citizens healthy rather than paying for sick care. Under our current sick care system, the more services patients are provided, the more money providers are paid. Many of these services — as much as 30 percent — are unnecessary and are harmful, according to several studies. We are receiving too much radiation and unnecessary surgeries, for example. Under the new system, providers will be paid a bundled payment or a “capitation” rate to keep us healthy, thus reducing unnecessary services. It is supposed to reduce health care costs, but it will not be fast enough to pay for the increase in Medicaid patients. Without malpractice reform, unnecessary tests will probably continue, even though providers will lose money by providing these services. A lot of the ACA targets reforms in health insurance. For example, health insurance companies are required to provide preventive care without a deductible or coinsurance. Insurance companies cannot refuse to provide coverage because of a pre-existing condition for children or cancel policies because someone gets sick. Lifetime limits have been eliminated. Our health insurance will continue even if we receive an organ transplant that costs more than $1 million. Insurance companies will base premiums on average cost rather than charging one group more because they work in an industry that uses more health care. So why do Republicans want to repeal the law? Shouldn’t we be able to live in a society where we do not have to worry about losing our savings or homes because of an illness? The problem, again, is the cost. Increased taxes, premiums and reductions in payments to providers will not cover the entire bill to provide health care to almost everyone in the country. Write your elected officials and tell them not to repeal the health care reform law. There is a lot of good stuff in there to build upon. Also, tell them not to continue the existing reform law in its entirety because it costs too much. Tell them to set their party loyalties and ideologies aside and amend the law so no American will have to worry about getting high quality health care. All will have to give a little for a healthier and a more economically stable country. Allen C. Minor, D.B.A., is an assistant professor of business and director of the health care management program, at Misericordia University. Dr. Minor can be reached at aminor@misericordia.edu.
|
|
|
Post by mikekerstetter on Jul 7, 2012 5:01:11 GMT -5
www.standard-journal.com/articles/2012/07/07/opinion/doc4fedaf49997c5970747305.txtHow about less-expensive health care? By Mike Tischio Published: Friday, June 29, 2012 8:37 AM CDT Does every single person in the United States deserve health care insurance? Do they deserve health care? As always I have what seems to be an unending series of questions. I guess the reason why might be I really don’t know if there can be any correct answer to many of the political questions of the day. I do believe we are all entitled to quality health care. For the most part, we get quality health care in this country — those of us who have enough money to pay for it or have great health insurance programs. Due to the economic woes we’ve faced for the last three-plus years, fewer people have affordable health insurance, and that number is only going to shrink over the next year — unless Obamacare is upheld by the Supreme Court. I am writing of course before the decision has been announced and frankly the question of universal health care is a tough one. As a society of free people (see last week’s column), do we subsidize those among us who cannot afford the high cost of medicine themselves? Many states had programs in place before Obamacare to assist the poor when they needed emergent health care. With budgets being slashed and whole cities going bankrupt (Stockton, Calif. for instance) much of that aid has dried up. What we do deserve is less expensive health care. The dynamics are complicated, and the cost of research and development in medicine through the roof, but what’s upsetting about the current state of medicine is the $80 or more it takes to get 10 minutes of your doctor’s time. And then she or he simply gives you a prescription and another hunk of change flies out of your wallet. Whatever the cause for the outrageously high cost of seeing the doctor is, it needs to be addressed aside from and maybe before any discussion of health insurance is examined. In the meantime there are things we can do to help our own condition. It may be too late for those of us with chronic health concerns, not however for the young and healthy — they have choices to make which will absolutely decrease what they pay for health care over a lifetime. Before illness or disease strike we all can do our best to eat right, exercise daily and get enough sleep. What... were you expecting a miracle pill costing only 5 cents a day? Sorry, good health will never be achieved by medicine — prevention is the key and the pill most of us don’t want to swallow. Americans, whether our system of healthcare has been adequate or not, are living longer than ever. Unfortunately we are being kept alive by a dependence on drugs and supplements, surgeries and therapies. Our quality of life is deteriorating even as we live longer to enjoy it! We don’t need more medicine — we need health. The answer is available to every person in the United States. The cost may hurt the very poor, but helping the poor find decent jobs first is the issue. It’s not the one I’m discussing today. Every healthy young person can afford a fitness plan which will prevent health problems and promote a better quality of life. If they can walk, they can be well. It’s really that simple. Walking or running or bicycling for an hour a day is the entire fitness regime you need to be reasonably healthy; not expensive gym memberships or gimmicky fitness plans advertised on late night TV. Combine an hour of using your legs with a diet free of most sugar, low in fat and empty carbohydrates, and the need for expensive medical care will not be as troubling. Sure there are needs for medical aid despite good health such as pregnancy and childbirth. However, if we’re not nickel and dimed into poverty by constant doctor visits for preventable illness, then we’d have more money for the medical necessities. And if our economic system of a free-markets really still exists, the decreasing demand for medical care will bring down the cost of medical care. Okay, so that’s a stretch thanks to a very powerful special interest group — the American Medical Association. It’s up to us, each and every American to live healthy and live free of an expectation to be saved by modern medicine. Whatever the decision made by the Supreme Court and eventually Congress, we can be healthy without medicine. And that is the only answer for expensive medical care: living healthy and independent of medical care. Mike Tischio is a freelance columnist living in Union County. To comment, simply email newsroom@standard-journal.com.
|
|
|
Post by philunderwood on Jul 7, 2012 6:47:39 GMT -5
Ideally, we should be free to choose our level of health insurance. Younger and healthier people would probably opt for a major medical plan to cover other than preventative care and minor illnesses and injuries. If we furnished our own insurance, pre-existing conditions wouldn’t be an issue; it’s only when we change jobs and go with different policies that pre-existing conditions become a problem.
Removing conditions imposed upon insurance companies by state and federal governments would cause companies to compete with one another on a national level and would bring down cost while improving coverage and claims service.
Our present system adds considerable cost by including regulators salaries and increased labor required to comply with regulations. I’ve never seen a study on this, but I’ll wager there are far more people, who have nothing to do with delivering healthcare, adding to the cost of healthcare than there are people actually delivering healthcare.
|
|
|
Post by Ritty77 on Aug 10, 2012 21:23:29 GMT -5
|
|