Healthcare Reform

The unconstitutional Obamacare law must be repealed and the federal government needs to get out of the healthcare business. Below are my recommendations to fix the healthcare system and my reasons for the repeal.

Recommendations:
The reason the American healthcare system is in such a mess, is because of government intervention and the third-party payer system. If we reduce government involvement and bring back capitalistic, free market principles, conditions will improve.

1. Allow people to buy health insurance across state lines like we do for life, homeowners and car insurance. Competition breeds better service and better pricing. If you think the free market can't fix the problem, you are obviously unfamiliar with the markets for Lasik eye surgery, elective cosmetic surgery, privately run urgent care facilities and services such as portable MRI machines all of which must compete in the free market for customers and all of which have seen dramatic price reductions over the last decade. 
2. Remove government-imposed mandates on heath insurance companies. Let people buy a la carte policies or major medical policies rather than forcing the insurance company to cover every ailment under the sun.
3. Implement portability rules. When you are young, you buy a health insurance policy that sticks with you your entire life regardless of your health. As long as you pay your premiums, the insurance company cannot kick you off the policy because of your health. The system we have now is ridiculous where you lose your insurance when you lose or change jobs. The insurance should stay with the person NOT the employer. When I get a new job, I don't lose my auto insurance! Why should I lose my health insurance?
4. Pass tort reform to reduce malpractice insurance costs. 
5. Promote and encourage the use of HSA's (healthcare savings accounts) - tax-free savings that can be passed down to the next generation. The other benefit is the patient is actually paying for the service rather than a third party. No more $15 co-pays! We should pay $75-$100 to visit the doctor. That will force the consumer to price shop and think twice about running to the doctor every time their stomach hurts. When your car needs new brakes or your house needs a repair, do you make a co-pay? How much does the average American family spend on their cell phone bill each month? $200? Their TV and internet service? $150? Entertainment and eating out? $100? Starbucks? $20? And we bitch and moan over having to pay our doctor $100 to take care of our bodies? How insane is that? 
6. Allow citizens with pre-existing conditions to join large pools and spread the cost. Most states already have these pools set up. People with pre-existing conditions should expect to pay more for their health care than a healthy person because they use more of it. 
7. Offer tax benefits to individuals rather than employers for health insurance premiums paid. 

Repeal:

1. The law is unconstitutional. There is no enumerated power for the federal government to be involved in the citizens' healthcare. Nor can the federal government force citizens to buy a product or service.
2. The manner in which the bill was drafted - with no input from Republicans - despite repeated promises by the President that negotiations would be broadcast on TV.
3. The manner in which the bill was passed - bribing Senators, using budget reconciliation to get it passed in the House, not a single congressman whom voted for the bill actually read or understood it! As the bombastic Nancy Pelosi said, "We will have to pass the bill to see what is in it".
4. The consequences of the law - rationing of care, fewer doctors, longer wait times, death panels, bureaucrats making medical decisions. Look at any country with socialized medicine and study their level of care, wait times, rationing, etc.
5. Do you really want your doctor's office to run like a post office or your local DMV? Can you name one government-run endeavor that is run efficiently with the customers' best interest served? Are you willing to turn your families healthcare decisions over to a bureaucrat?

The Freedom Scale

American political conversations need to evolve from constant bickering about the Democrats and the Republicans, rich vs. poor, and red states vs. blue states. Neither party makes the best interest of the American people a priority. Their primary focus is incumbency protection and control over the public coffers.

Glenn Beck recently presented his "Freedom Scale" (depicted below). It illustrates the current political environment in a way that, if most Americans embraced and understood, could lead to a revolution to take back the federal government from the entrenched career politicians who continue to move us toward total government control.

On the extremes of the scale are No Government or anarchy and Big Government or total control by the government. The Occupy Wall Street movement and extreme libertarians advocate for anarchy. Communist and fascistic regimes and dictators operate under the total control end of the spectrum.

One of the reasons the Articles of Confederation was replaced with the Constitution was that it leaned too far to the left side of the spectrum. The central government had virtually no power under the Articles. The Constitution granted it a few "enumerated" powers.

Looking at the modern political landscape, the education system, Hollywood, the mainstream media and labor unions all lean toward and advocate for Big Government. The Democratic Party is only slightly to their left and aggressively moving us total control (higher taxes, Obamacare, thousands upon thousands of job-killing regulations and record levels of dependency on government via unemployment benefits, disability payments, food stamps and free cell phones).

The Republican Party currently resides to the left of the Democrats on this scale but they also advocate for bigger and bigger government with more and more control over the individual (Patriot Act, Prescription Drug benefit, perpetual war).

The so called "moderates" tend to live somewhere in between the GOP and the DNC but, in my mind, make up a small minority of the electorate. If you can't figure out whether the current political environment is good or bad, you probably should not vote!

The sweet spot is right in the middle where the Tea Party and the majority of libertarians reside. They want minimum federal government involvement (only those powers enumerated in the Constitution) with the States picking up most of the slack. They want maximum freedom with just enough security (provided by the government) to hold the community together. They want capitalism to be the driving force behind everything from the local farmers market to the banking system to the education system. Competition and accountability beats government regulations every time! Finally, they believe federal regulations should be minimized.

Preview of the State of the Union Address

Since I did a good enough job to get reelected, I figure I will continue with all of my policies.

#1 - Make more and more people dependent on the federal government - for their food, housing, income and even their cell phones!

#2 - Since you don't seem to care if the economy ever recovers and you still think it's Bush's fault, I will continue to ignore the 14.4% real unemployment rate, the 12 million out-of-work Americans and the record low labor force participation rate. Oh . . . pay no attention to the negative GDP growth rate.


#3 - Since you don't care about that I am bankrupting the country by adding $6 trillion to the national debt in less than four years and have three straight $1 trillion budget deficits, I will continue "investing" money that we don't have. We already borrow $0.40 of every dollar we spend. My goal is to get that to $0.50 by 2014.

#4 - Since you seem to approve of my foreign policy, I will continue doing whatever the hell I want (or not)  in Syria, Egypt, Libya, Iran, North Korea, Iraq and Afghanistan.

#5 - Since you don't seem to mind paying $3.50 for a gallon of gas despite the fact that it was $1.80 when I took office, I will continue to do nothing to reduce prices.

#6 - Since I can continually lie to you with no consequences, I've decided to come clean: I am going to raise taxes on everyone. I am going to continue shoving Obamacare down your throats (NO you can't keep your doctor, NO premiums will not go down, YES it will increase the deficit, and YES there are death panels). And that Ambassador dude that died in Libya . . . it wasn't because of the video! My bad.

#7 - Since you show no interest in the immigration issue, I'm changing the definition of "illegal" to "legal" when it comes to illegal immigrants.

#8 - Rich people are bad.They don't pay their fair share . . . unless they donate to the Democratic Party and say things like, "my secretary pays a higher tax rate than me" then they get bailouts and can participate in the Obama Crony Capitalism Gravy Train.

#9 - Since you don't seem to mind the continued devaluation of the Dollar, The Federal Reserve will continue printing money.

#10 - My top priorities are important issues like gay marriage, gun control, climate change and making the NFL a safer sport.

I used to worry that you guys would wake up and realize what I am doing to this country. Now I don't give a shit. Oh yeah, I almost forgot, the state of our union is . . . getting weaker every day!