Two Quotes That Show the Absurdity of Obamacare
by Amy Payne, Heritage Foundation, March 7, 2014
President Obama wants you to know that he gets it.
You just don’t understand how much better Obamacare is going to make your life; you’re afraid of change. It’s okay, he wants you to know; he understands.
“There are some people who have very bad insurance, but they don’t know it because they don’t understand the fine print,” Obama said yesterday. Politico Pro reports that the President continued:
We said, “You know what, you’re right. You should be able to keep the health insurance you have even if it’s not very good. Even if you could get insurance on HealthCare.gov, you should be able to keep it.” And that’s the part of the law we’ve extended.
Wasn’t that thoughtful? You don’t know what you’re talking about, because you don’t understand what’s good for you. But the Obama Administration will try to make you feel better for another year…oh, and hopefully those of you who still have your old insurance won’t get cancellation notices right before the midterm election.
>>> “Junk” Health Plans and Other Obamacare Myths
But most of the cancellation notices already happened. Last year, at least 4.7 million Americans received one. In fact, getting rid of that old insurance plan was part of Obamacare’s design.
Heritage expert Alyene Senger says Obamacare definitely piles on the mandates—but does that mean its coverage is “better”?
Obamacare cancels many insurance policies that individuals chose based on their wants, needs, or ability to afford, and it replaces those plans with what the government deems “better” insurance. But this leaves little choice for consumers and increases costs.
Speaking of Obamacare’s design—and upgrading everyone’s insurance—what about the uninsured? Weren’t the new exchanges supposed to fix that problem?
Well, we already know it’s not going to accomplish that goal, as the Congressional Budget Office estimates 31 million will still be left uninsured. But now we find out that the progressives behind Obamacare didn’t even bother to track their progress.
Yesterday, an official with the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) was asked: How many uninsured Americans are signing up for Obamacare?
“That’s not a data point that we are really collecting in any sort of systematic way,”CMS’s Gary Cohen said.
That’s right. One of the big selling points for President Obama was that Obamacare would insure the uninsured. And now the Administration doesn’t even know whether the people signing up had insurance to begin with. The Washington Post reports:
the online application, used by most people to enroll, asks whether people want to apply for coverage but does not give them a place to indicate whether they have insurance now or have had it in the past. As a result, HHS analysts have no way of assessing how many of the online enrollees were uninsured in the past.
According to the President, it’s ordinary Americans who don’t understand health insurance. But every revelation about Obamacare screams that this law is completely unworkable. Its creation and implementation have been ham-handed at best and disastrous at worst. Americans deserve better.
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