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Posts Tagged ‘Obamacare’

Things Are Looking Up For The Right!

by Flyovercountry ( 134 Comments › )
Filed under Conservatism, Economy, Libertarianism, Regulation, Republican Party, Tea Parties, The Political Right, Uncategorized, unemployment at February 27th, 2014 - 1:00 pm

Political Cartoons by Eric Allie

I believe some perspective might be in order, so that the significance of this next item may be fully appreciated in its broader context. Harry Reid it seems went to his fellow minions in the Senate, and as their minion leader, found that little more than half of his sub minion drones were on board with the latest bit of class warfare du jour.

I am referencing of course the proposed federal minimum wage hike to $10.10 per hour, euphemistically referred to as, “giving America a raise.” For purposes of perspective, let’s discuss what these little bits of class warfare truly are, and especially the minimum wage hike. They are the go to plays within the Democrat play book that are pulled out whenever electoral trouble is spotted on the horizon. The minimum wage hike is the Democrat equivalent to the Steelers running their bubble screen each and every time they face a second and long and are down by a touchdown or more. They are the equivalent of Peyton Manning coming to the line of scrimmage and declaring authoritatively, “Comanche,” every single time his offense faces a third and long. The minimum wage hike is the go to play, and before now, it has worked every single time, (in terms of electoral politics anyhow. Economically, it has always resulted in disaster.)

From the Hotair article linked to above:

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid on Tuesday delayed action on legislation raising the minimum wage, the centerpiece of the Democrats’ 2014 agenda.

The Nevada Democrat made the surprising move amid escalating Democratic resistance in the wake of a Congressional Budget Office report released last week estimating that hiking the minimum wage to $10.10 an hour could cost the equivalent of 500,000 jobs by late 2016.

Reid has not yet unified his caucus on the issue, which is a constant in the Democrats’ election-year playbook. Of the 55 senators who caucus with the Democrats, only 32 have signed on as official co-sponsors of Sen. Tom Harkin’s (D-Iowa) bill.
Let’s get this straight. This is Obama’s highest domestic agenda priority item, and the chamber which his party controls can barely get half of their caucus to sign onto it? That’s some genius work at the White House. Who’s their legislative liaison these days?

The issue, of course, is that the CBO actually scored the proposal before Reid could advance the bill. Their estimate of 500,000 jobs lost in just two years would be a boat anchor on any legislation, but especially in an economy where workforce participation looks like this:

The Democrats who still have jobs in Washington, and are not tenured enough in their careers as professional wielders of power are worried. They have internal polls, and those internal polls are telling them to forget about 2016, but worry instead about 2014. They can read the tea leaves and those tea leaves are telling them that America is not in a mood to elect Democrats to the office of county dog catcher. This is the reason why we are seeing a huge increase in the retirements from the demographic of Democrat Congressional Leaders. These fine folks are not interested in being in Congress and not being afforded the opportunity to wield power to the degree that they feel entitled.

What we’ve just witnessed, to continue the pro football analogy, is the first snap from scrimmage during a playoff game sailing over the head of the quarterback, while the whole stadium anticipated and feared the bubble screen. The Democrats tried to label Obamacare bi-partisan, and that will never work. Then they tried to laud it as a giant success, that won’t work either. Next they tried the whole populist play book, and received a bizarrely luke warm reception from a nation fatigued with previous consequences from earlier forays into populism. After that, the calls to fix rather than scrap Obamacare were sounded to various focus groups. The response of course was this:

“You can’t fix this car Spicoli!”

The tried and true minimum wage hike was supposed to be their go to play. The good news is that as of now, they can’t even sell it to their own. Demonizing political opponents is all they have left now. Expect to see that soon. It may work, and it may not, but one thing is clear, reports of the death of the GOP may have been premature, once again.

Cross Posted from Musings of a Mad Conservative.

You Can’t Fix This Car Spicoli!

by Flyovercountry ( 88 Comments › )
Filed under Barack Obama, Democratic Party, Economy, Marxism, Progressives, Uncategorized at February 24th, 2014 - 1:00 pm

I read an article yesterday or the day before about the five stages of political denial, equating it to the five stages of grief. All in all, it was pretty funny, but in all honesty, the author missed one. He missed, “the idiotic attempt to self justify the huge mistake,” That’s the stage where after a politician is forced to admit that their spiffy new law is not working as packaged and sold to an angered electorate, and in fact that their grand scheme is an unmitigated disaster, they dish out the, “let’s not undo this terrible idea that we’ve inflicted upon society, but, “fix it,” instead.

This is the brand new strategy to help the Democrats avoid the well deserved consequences of their wholly-owned-and-nobody-else’s-responsible-for-it-Affordable-Care-Act this November. They are now, after the previous attempts to slough off ownership, going with the meme that just a few tweaks here and there will make this all better. The problem of course is not that the law requires a few tweaks here and there to help smooth out a few errors in its implementation. The problem is with the entire premise of this idea, and the underlying refusal to pay any attention to the laws of economics that govern any society, simply because those laws are viewed as mean and uncaring.

From the Investor’s Business Daily Article linked to above:

Vulnerable Democrats think they’ve found a winning strategy for the November elections: Tell voters they can fix ObamaCare, but Republicans won’t let them. It’s a con. ObamaCare is unfixable.

‘Joe Garcia is working to fix ObamaCare,” says an ad for the Florida House Democrat. “He voted to let you keep your existing health plan and took the White House to task for the disastrous health care website.”

Of course, Garcia fails to mention ObamaCare is the reason millions lost their health plans to begin with. Or that its problems extend well beyond a glitchy website.
But this is the Democrats’ midterm election strategy, as revealed in a memo Politico got its hands on this week: Admit that ObamaCare has flaws, promise to repair them and argue that Republicans will only make things worse. Party leaders point to polls showing more people favor repair than repeal.

Still, why should anyone believe them?

Democrats already promised voters that ObamaCare would fix what was wrong with the nation’s health care system, only to be caught in a web of lies. Now they’re asking voters to trust them again to fix the very problems ObamaCare itself created.
Plus, ObamaCare’s flaws aren’t theoretical any more. Millions have been hurt. They’ve had plans canceled, gotten stuck with huge deductibles, lost access to their doctors or were priced out of the market altogether.

Case in point is a recent news story noting how many ObamaCare enrollees in San Francisco “are struggling to find even one doctor willing to take new patients.”
Another tells the story of a mechanic who can’t find a physician to treat his debilitating back pain after ObamaCare forced him to drop his old plan and buy one through an exchange.

As every marketer knows, dissatisfied customers will tell twice as many people about their experience as will satisfied ones.

But the deeper problem with the Democrats’ campaign promise is it’s built on yet another lie: They can’t fix ObamaCare. Nobody can. Its flaws are fundamental, not incidental. Any “fixes” just create new problems.

ObamaCare’s sky-high premiums, for example, are an inevitable result of the regulations at the core of the law.

When the launch day arrived, and the $635 Million on line shopping cart didn’t work, the late night comedians had a field day, and we all had fun with that. Make no mistake about it though, that was not the real tragedy of this part of the whole sordid affair. The real tragedy was in the small fact that our Government legally, blew $635 Million on something that every expert in the field says should have been up and running perfectly with the price tag of $2 Million to $5 Million. Being at our most generous here, that represents an over payment of something just North of 12,000%, for a product that still is not working up to the necessary specification. It is impossible to bend any cost curve down, as these geniuses promised, while overpaying for everything by a factor of 120. The average family of Four probably spends $120 per week at the grocery store. Imagine telling them that you’re opening a store which will deliver them inferior groceries, guaranteed to satisfy no one’s hunger, and will increase their tab per week to $12,000. Then promise that this grocery store will save their family $2500 bucks at the end of the year, how long do you think it would take for their scornful laughter to end? When you couple that with the fact that these are the very people who have spent their entire lives convincing us that they are smarter than we are and should be put in charge of our lives, I can certainly see why most in our nation do not wish to have them making our medical decisions for us. Try not to cry when you read this next sentence. These people now have the life and death decision making for the entire nation resting on their broad shoulders.

The economics of this law, passed by the way without having actually been read by those voting yes on it, are at best misguided. A slightly less diplomatic way to put it would be flat out evil. Stories are cropping up everywhere of people who were forced against their will off of plans that they liked, only to see that their new Obamacare approved plans would not let them get treated for their preexisting conditions, like Cancer, Leukemia, Lupus, or what have you. Even those who were able to find new plans on the Zerocare exchanges have discovered that premiums are only one half of a very tricky equation. They’ve seen their family deductibles increased to an amount that is exactly the same as having no actual coverage anyhow. Drug shortages are sweeping hospitals everywhere, which makes the failure complete. No Spicoli, you can not fix this car.

The only way America, to undo this monstrosity is to get rid of the people who did it to us in the first place. If there is a D following their name, do not vote for them, chase them from town via torch and pitch fork. Remember this when they try to convince you that they are conservative or fiscally responsible Democrats this year and in 2016, there is no such thing.

Cross Posted from Musings of a Mad Conservative.

Back By Popular Demand! Win A Dream Date With Barack Obama: Part Two

by Flyovercountry ( 179 Comments › )
Filed under Barack Obama, Communism, Marxism, Progressives at February 11th, 2014 - 7:00 am

Political Cartoons by Gary Varvel

During my childhood, one certain way to determine that a current teen heart throb was quickly cementing his path towards becoming a former teen heart throb, was when the local radio station ran the ubiquitous, “win a dream date with x,” promotion. The lucky preteen girls would be encouraged to call in, write in, or just generally debase themselves in some fashion, and they would get to spend 45 minutes of quality time with some aging face hell bent on pimping out what was left of his looks to squeeze the last few pesos out of his fifteen minutes. Within six months of the shameless attempt to trade relevancy for cash, the star was gone from the public eye, only to appear on retrospective where are they now shows, or promoting some K-Tel-hits-of-the-old-days-I-can’t-believe-that-great-price recording collections.

Now, most of us have known for decades at least, that in the game of self dignity, politicians are woefully short. That is to say, they possess absolutely no shame in what they’ll do for money. They’ll leave no rock over turned in searching for some way to embarrass their opponents for committing the very sins that they themselves commit with nary a thought. Most importantly, dignity is an afterthought in the political game, reserved for only the weakest.

That is why it shocked no one, when during the 2012 Election, Team Obama/Biden unveiled their, “win a date with Barack and Joe,” contest. Eight bits was sufficient enough of a donation to get yourself a slim chance at obtaining that golden ticket to dine and party like a rock star with our President and his Veep. (The original asking price for a chance to win that magic moment was $3, but it gradually got marked down to couch cushion territory.)

Apparently, the concept has been brought back, as that fifteen minutes did not have the good sense to expire on this national joke/nightmare like it should have two years ago. So, without further ado, here it is again. Still, there is something different this time around.

The Zero is not running again for office. His campaigning is supposed to be finished, and his focus was promised to have been on actually doing his job this time. He is pimping himself out for a final push on his signature achievement, which was passed into law five freaking years ago. I really don’t know which saddens me more, that we have a President who is pulling this stunt to pimp out a current law which now has five candles on the birthday cake, or that we have a President who feels as though he needs to avail himself of the same fame grabbing techniques as were taught to us by the ever present high school musical, “Bye Bye Birdie.” Either way, I guess that it is we the people who are the losers in this scenario, stuck with Obama, and stuck with what he’s done. Then again, we get the government we deserve, and until we do something about it, this will be our result.

Exit question: What sort of grub will the Bamster lay on the winner? Do you think they’ll eat like Michelle, good tasting food meant for human consumption, or will they graze on protein rich food pellets and low carb celery sticks, without the ranch dressing?

Cross Posted from Musings of a Mad Conservative.

Obama to delay employer mandate for small businesses

by Phantom Ace ( 4 Comments › )
Filed under Barack Obama, Cult of Obama, Democratic Party, Economy, Health Care, Regulation, Special Report at February 10th, 2014 - 4:43 pm

Regardless of how one feels about the Immigration issue, John Boehner was right. Obama can’t be trusted and implements laws as he sees fit. Knowing that Obamacare is an albatross around the Democrats, Obama has now delayed the employer mandate for small businesses.

The federal government Monday announced yet another delay in Obamacare’s rules. It will now exempt companies employing between 50 and 100 full-time workers from complying with the mandate to offer employees affordable health insurance by another year, until 2016.

Companies that have 100 or more full-time workers, defined as employees who work more than 30 hours per week, will have to begin complying with the mandate to offer such coverage in 2015 or face financial penalties of up to $3,000 per worker.

Officials Monday said that the delay in the Obamacare mandate will affect 50 percent of the businesses that were supposed to be complying by 2015. Those officials could not answer how many workers would be affected by the delay.

You best bet, Obama will delay the employer mandate for medium and big businesses before the Midterms.