“So, if repeal is not a viable short-term option, reveal must be. Dissecting Obamcare’s defective anatomy while offering alternatives is the way to get our health care system back on track. That’s why the two committees we chair will continue our aggressive oversight, exposing Obamacare’s failures – and discussing ways to provide more affordable health care to all Americans. What have our efforts ‘revealed’ so far?”
“Following recent revelations that agents in multiple IRS offices, including tax officials in Washington, targeted conservative groups for extra scrutiny, a number of former and current Republican legislators are already counseling caution about the agency’s role in administering the law. Concerns about the agency’s oversight of the health law are well-founded—and not only because of general concerns about the agency’s judgment.”
“In the wake of running disclosures of the agency’s nefarious snooping and political targeting, its new role as chief health insurance enforcer should give us heartburn. Under Obamacare, the principal responsibility for verifying eligibility for the healthcare program, and monitoring whether you carry qualifying health coverage (and are exempt from the law’s penalties) will fall principally to the IRS.”
“Democratic senators, at a caucus meeting with White House officials, expressed concerns on Thursday about how the Obama administration was carrying out the health care law they adopted three years ago. Democrats in both houses of Congress said some members of their party were getting nervous that they could pay a political price if the rollout of the law was messy or if premiums went up significantly.”
“A recent decision by HHS illustrates the arbitrary nature by which some implementation decisions are being made at CMS while highlighting the problem of a top-down approach in Obamacare. After months of small businesses anxiety in Massachusetts surrounding the impact of fewer rating factors due to an ACA mandated one-size-fits all policy, the Federal government recently pulled a piecemeal delayed implementation of the regulations out of thin air.”
“Obamacare is designed to destroy the insurance market. Markets do not function without prices, and Obamacare ensures that prices will not be allowed to emerge. There is a medical price associated with smoking, but the District of Columbia has decided to suppress that price by law. Pretending that smoking has no relationship with health-care costs does not make it so — it is only a way to push costs around in a way that is agreeable to the likes of Barack Obama, converting a system that prices risk into a system of entitlements.”
“One of the many objections to President Obama’s health care reform law echoed philosophical beliefs rather than explicitly appealing to empirical evidence; the refrain is that Obamacare is a government takeover of our health care system, and as such, infringes on our freedom. While the reality isn’t quite that gloomy, the law does significantly increase government involvement in health insurance – through subsidies, Medicaid expansion, and new regulations for health care providers and insurers.”
“Want to apply for Obamacare this fall? Start the paperwork now. The Obama Administration quietly released a draft copy of its ‘single streamlined application’ for Obamacare. This is the form that the government will use to certify eligibility for the program’s subsidies. The on-line version of that form requires 60 printed pages to spell out all the queries. (A condensed paper version of the same application fills 21 pages).”
“State officials say they need 20,000 people for the job of signing up millions of Californians for health insurance in the coming months, but a battle is brewing over whether these workers should undergo background checks and fingerprinting. At issue is the level of screening these ‘assisters’ should receive before they handle confidential information about the people they are enrolling this year in the state’s new health insurance exchange, called Covered California.”
“For instance, the Obama team unilaterally decided to phase-in the guaranteed issue requirements of child-only policies, even though the law required this provision to be fully implemented by the fall of 2010. The administration delayed and then limited the W-2 reporting provisions for employers. These are just two examples.”