What's the Big Deal About Obamacare?

Updated: March 25, 2013
There are four things wrong with Obamacare:

#1 - The way the law was drafted
#2 - The way the law was passed
#3 - The way the law was upheld by Supreme Court 
#4 - The effect 

#1 - The way the law was drafted and sold to the American people:

• Obama and the Democrats lied about virtually every component of the bill - the cost (to the nation as a whole and to individuals), the coverage, its impact on the deficit, its impact on level of care, its impact on the private insurance industry, and its impact on the most innovative healthcare system in the world. 
• The entire bill was drafted without Republican input and behind closed doors despite Obama’s repeated promise to broadcast the debate on CSPAN.

#2 - The way the law was passed:

• Bribes and kickbacks of senators in return for their vote.
• “We have to pass the bill to see what’s in it” Nancy Pelosi.
• Not a single Congressman read the bill before they voted on it (and I would venture a bet that few have read it since).

"I love these members that get up and say 'READ THE BILL.' What good is reading the bill if it's a thousand pages, and you don't have two days and two lawyers to find out what it means after you've read the bill?" -- Rep. John Conyers (D-MI)

“It will be of little avail to the people, that the laws are made by men of their own choice, if the laws be so voluminous that they cannot be read, or so incoherent that they cannot be understood. . . ” - James Madison, The Federalist #62

• Obama emphatically denied it was a tax. He knew it would never pass if it was represented as a tax.

“How is that not a tax?" George Stephanopoulos 

"A responsibility to get health insurance is not a tax increase," Obama 

• The bill was ultimately passed using a budget reconciliation method rather than a full vote on the House floor.

#3 - The way the law was upheld by Supreme Court:

• Despite repeated promises that this bill was not a tax, one of the administration’s arguments before the Supreme Court was just that, “it IS a tax”, therefore it is constitutional under Congress’ right to levy taxes.
• Instead of sending the bill back to Congress, Chief Justice John Roberts essentially re-wrote the law circumventing Article I, section 7 of the Constitution - "All bills for raising revenue shall originate in the House of Representatives". The Obamacare bill was originated in the Senate! Judicial activism at its worse.

#4 - The effect:

• Over 1,000 Obamacare waivers were granted within several months of the bill's passage, mostly to Democrat constituents (at one point 20% of the waivers were provided to Nancy Pelosi’s district). If this is the greatest piece of legislation in history why are waivers necessary? Why are senatorial bribes necessary?
• It is estimated that 20 million people will lose their current health insurance because it will become too expensive given all of the mandates.
• The private insurance industry will die leaving only the government (single-payer). Think of your doctor’s office as a national DMV.
• It gives the federal government essentially unlimited taxation power and amounts to the largest tax increase in world history.
• Obama promised insurance rates would decline by $2,500 a year. As of the last update of this post, studies show rates are up an average of $2,500 a year.
• Obama promised the bill would lower the deficit and cost no more than $1 trillion. Both claims have been proven false. 
• Ultimately, the quality of healthcare will decline as thousands of doctors retire because they can no longer make a living serving more patients for less money, Medicaid will get dropped by doctor’s offices due to low and delayed reimbursements, rationing of care will occur just like it does in every country that has socialized medicine, bureaucrats will make healthcare decisions for us, death panels will be established for end-of-life decisioning (yes it’s in the bill) and a massive bureaucracy will reign over us (you thought the TSA was big).

Narcissism Personified

See if you can discern for yourself who is a narcissist.

George W. Bush speech after capture of Saddam Hussein:

The success of yesterday's mission is a tribute to our men and women now serving in Iraq. The operation was based on the superb work of intelligence analysts who found the Dictators footprints in a vast country. The operation was carried out with skill and precision by a brave fighting force. Our servicemen and women and our coalition allies have faced many dangers in the hunt for members of the fallen regime, and in their effort to bring hope and freedom to the Iraqi people. Their work continues, and so do the risks. Today, on behalf of the nation, I thank the members of our Armed Forces and I congratulate them.

Barack Hussein Obama speech, Sunday, May 1, 2011:

And so shortly after taking office, I directed Leon Panetta, the director of the CIA, to make the killing or capture of bin Laden the top priority of our war against al Qaeda, even as we continued our broader efforts to disrupt, dismantle, and defeat his network. Then, last August, after years of painstaking work by our intelligence community, I was briefed on a possible lead to bin Laden. It was far from certain, and it took many months to run this thread to ground. I met repeatedly with my national security team as we developed more information about the possibility that we had located bin Laden hiding within a compound deep inside of Pakistan. And finally, last week, I determined that we had enough intelligence to take action, and authorized an operation to get Osama bin Laden and bring him to justice. Today, at my direction, the United States launched a targeted operation against that compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan.

What's Your Solution?

'What's Your Solution?" is a favorite chant of Obama supporters to deflect criticism of his dreadful record.


Below I share an email I sent to a family member in response to their incessant chant.
---------------------------
I find it hypocritical for you to throw the “give me your solutions” line at me when you are the one who has, on several occasions, backed out of these types of conversations with me saying, “I don’t follow this stuff as closely as you”. Yet, you have the gall to say, “don’t give me the political bullshit”? I am both amazed at and disappointed by the lack of intellectual curiosity to pursue this discussion beyond the repetitive call for “where is your solution”? Why didn't you read any of the half dozen "solution"-rich sources I provided you previously? Instead, all I get is a repetitive, sarcastic chant.  

2006

I remember back in 2006 when you told me that you were happy with the mainstream media’s unrelenting crucifixion of George Bush because, as you said, “they are on my side”. I said something like, “well at least I can respect that”. Ever since then that exchange has bothered me. I have come to realize that the reason this country is falling apart is because of people who think like you (Party over Country or “they’re on my side”). There are no sides! 

There is the country as it was founded then there is the country we have today and then there is worse-than-that. Yet, you approved of the media’s continual drumbeat of “Bush Lied People Died”, “Bush is a war monger”, “Bush is a fill-in-the-blank” without the slightest bit of interest into the truthfulness of the charges. At least you are in good company. Consider Dan Rather’s willingness to throw away a forty-year career over falsified documents in order to hurt Bush’s reelection campaign. That is nothing short of psychosis. But, Dan was on your side so I suppose that was ok. 

Message Received Loud and Clear:

The message I received was loud and clear whether you meant it or not. The Democrat Party is more important than the country. I don’t get too upset when I see assholes like Nancy Pelosi, Barney Frank, Chuck Schumer, Harry Reid, Chris Dodd, and Barack Obama doing that but you? That’s where the disappointment resides.

Just for the record, the Democrat Party died when they threw Senator Liebermann under the bus back in 2004. There simply was not enough room under the tent for dissension so the former Vice Presidential candidate was cast aside like a used rag. Not much different in the Republican Party, which died decades ago with the exception of eight years under Reagan. That’s why both parties get lame-ass Presidential candidates like Bob Dole, John McCain, Barack Obama, Al Gore, John Kerry, Michael Dukakis, and Walter Mondale. Now that’s the cream of the crop!

To Summarize What I Hear You Saying:

Dozens of personally authored blog posts with innumerable solutions offered, thousands of Twitter posts, The Heritage Foundation, an Obama-appointed panel (Bowles-Simpson), four presidential candidates’ platforms and a courageous Congressman’s plan to reform entitlement programs (Paul Ryan) are NOT enough SOLUTIONS for you. I guess those types of solutions are not presented on NBC Nightly News or on NPR (both of which we know are politically neutral news sources).

Final Thoughts:

I now realize that I am in the minority. I, and others like me, know that both major political parties are full of shit. They are power hungry and self-serving. They are more interested in lining their own pockets than looking out for their constituents’. People like me actually believe in The Constitution, unlike many of our elected officials and the majority of voters who are apathetic or ignorant. People like you are more concerned with the “D” or “R” initial in front of a politicians name rather than listening to what they have to say (their solutions!).

Parting Shots:

Since I will refrain from future political conversations with you, I want to prognosticate about Barack Obama’s reelection campaign:

1. He will woo the ignorant, the apathetic, the straight-party voters, the  dependent (those who rely on the government for money/food stamps/health care) and the unions.
2. He will say “fair share” 8,000 times between now and November.
3. He will divide Americans into as many segments as possible and pit us against each other – black vs. white, rich vs. poor, young vs. elderly, The 1% vs. The 99%, illegal immigrants vs. citizens, pro-life vs. pro-abortion, atheists vs. the religious, those who are pro-dirty air and water vs. the Democrats, the “drill baby, drill!” crowd vs. the more sophisticated environmental movement, those for limited government (pro-Constitution) vs. big government (nanny state), etc, etc.
4. His campaign will crucify the Republican nominee with personal attacks, lies, falsified documents and attacks on their religion.
5. The complicit news media will ignore Obama’s pitiful record of unsustainable deficits, pending inflation, the  longest period of high unemployment since The Great Depression, high gas prices, the worst economic recovery since The Great Depression, shitty GDP growth, crippling regulations,  the unconstitutional disaster known as Obamacare, his associations with the likes of Saul Alinsky, Jeremiah Wright, Bill Ayers and George Soros, crony capitalism, “skyrocketing electricity prices” and the “fundamental transformation of America”. Instead they will focus on invented controversies like contraception and Sandra Fluke.
6. He will say things like, “it was much worse than we thought” and “we need more time to implement our plan” and “we’ve come to far to change horses in the middle of the race”.
7. He will constantly explain how he actually has very little control over things like gas prices, the economy, government spending, war, etc.
8. He will blame Congress for not working with him (pay no attention to the 50-60 bills sent to the Senate from the House that Harry Reid refused to bring to a vote).
9. When all else fails, Obama and his supporters will blame George W. Bush.

·    Through it all, you will notice that he  never accepts responsibility for anything. Instead of “the buck stops here”, we have “the buck starts here”.

The reason he is forced to go through such machinations is because HE CANNOT RUN ON HIS RECORD!

Rather than recognize the miserable failure the two political parties have been over the last dozen years, you seem to hold blindly to the Democrat machine and throw “what’s your solution” at me over and over again despite the fact that I gave you at least a dozen.

On Twitter, I regularly engage self-proclaimed socialists, atheists, pro-abortion-is-a-religionists, global warming purveyors, and Democrat hook-line-and-sinker voters. They have no problem with the Democrat’s divide-America-while-claiming-to-bring-it-together strategy but they all have one thing in common, they never point to any evidence that anything has improved under Obama. All I get are shallow generalities, superficial platitudes, propaganda and the “what is your solution” chant.  

The Case Against Obama in Pictures

National Debt Clock

Average Annual Deficit Spending as Percent of GDP

U.S. Unemployment Rate

50% of Americans Pay No Federal Income Tax

Constitutionality of Obamacare's Individual Mandate

Budget Deficit by President

Obama's Budget Increases Overall Tax Burdens

Obama's Budget Sends Federal Debt to World War II Levels

The Obama Recovery

In every prior post-war recession, employment has fully recovered within four years. As of December 2011, four years after the recession’s onset, payroll employment remains 4% below the number of workers employed when the recession started in December 2007.

The Obama Recovery 

How Dangerous are Liberals and Progressives?

Consider the following and answer the question yourself:

• The Constitution is a “charter of negative liberties” , it does not tell what the government should do for the people. Barack Obama
  
   NO SHIT MR. PRESIDENT! THE CONSTITUTION WAS WRITTEN TO PROTECT THE PEOPLE FROM THE GOVERNMENT.
  
• “Whenever Congress refuses to act, Joe and I, we’re going to act” Barack Obama

• Rep. Kathy Hochul (D-NY), admits that she and other Obamacare supporters are "not looking at the Constitution" when it comes to the law's individual mandate for healthcare. http://newsbusters.org/blogs/nb-staff/2012/02/28/open-thread-we-dont-look-constitution#ixzz1nhncXR9r. 

• Democrat Governor of North Carolina, Beverly Perdue – "I think we ought to suspend, perhaps, elections for Congress for two years and just tell them we won't hold it against them, whatever decisions they make, to just let them help this country recover. I really hope that someone can agree with me on that," Perdue said. "You want people who don't worry about the next election."
  
  Post Script: Since uttering this nonsense, she has decided not to run for reelection. 

• Obama’s makes "recess appointments" while Congress is NOT IN RECESS. 

• Attorney General Eric Holder refuses to prosecute slam dunk voter intimidation case against Philadelphia Black Panthers because . . . could it have something to do with the color of the offenders' skin? 

• Nancy Pelosi regarding the passage of Obamacare against the will of the people: “We’ll go through the gate. If the gate’s closed, we’ll go over the fence. If the fence is too high, we’ll pole vault in,” she said. “If that doesn’t work, we’ll parachute in. But we’re going to get health care reform passed for the American people.” As you may recall, they did just that bribing Senators with exemptions for their states and using Reconciliation to secure final passage.