Free Republic

(CNSNews.com) - President Obama told House Democrats on Friday that the health care law they passed without a single Republican vote in 2010 will prove itself -- five or ten years from now. "And I just want to say, thank you for all of you hanging in there tough on an issue that I think 10 years from now, five years from now, we're going to look back and say this was a monumental achievement that could not have happened had it not been for this caucus." House Democrats face midterm elections, not in five or ten years, but in...

The head of the state’s beleaguered health insurance marketplace, which was once a national model, broke down in tears Thursday, as she described how demoralizing it has been for her staff to struggle with a broken website that has left an unknown number of people without coverage.

This was brutal. During a Friday Google+ Q&A session broadcast on YouTube, President Barack Obama was confronted by a Kentucky mother who says she lost her health care plan and her son’s medical specialist due to Obamacare. “I’m probably not the only one whose had really a panicked experience lately trying to figure out if my 10-year-old son can continue with his specialist or not. I know that I can’t keep my plan — which I liked — but as I’m trying to figure out what to do going forward, I’ve spent weeks with days on the phone getting confidently...

Dear Mr. Bertolini, With a deep sense of sadness, I must inform you that I will no longer serve as a physician for Aetna patients under the terms of our contractual agreement, which you most recently unilaterally changed. I have been privileged and honored to care for thousands of patients covered by Aetna policies since the 1990’s. I have devoted my life to providing the very best, state-of-the-art care to these individuals. We have formed a patient-doctor relationship, which I hope many will chose to continue in spite of my severing ties with Aetna. You see, health insurance has evolved...

"...Increasingly, experts in health insurance are becoming concerned that many of these first-time buyers will be in for a shock when they get medical care next year and discover they're on the hook for most of the initial cost.... ...Hospitals are worried that those who rack up uncovered medical bills next year won't be able to pay them, perpetuating one of the problems the new health care system is supposed to solve..... ..."The real big surprise was how much out-of-pocket would be required for our family," said David Winebrenner, 46, a financial adviser in Lebanon, Ky., whose deductible topped $12,000...

House Democrats are blocking their Republican colleagues from using Obamacare in letters mailed on the taxpayer's dime to voters, but who made up the term in the first place? Lots of people are asking this question, getting answers like "Certainly a republican, potentially Glenn Beck" and "I am about 80% sure it was Rush Limbaugh" and "Hillary Clinton's campaign coined Obamacare." Iowa Rep. Steve King claimed President Obama himself made it up. Free Republic posters want to claim credit. Lots of liberals suspect an insidious plot by Fox News. But the answer appears to be: a lobbyist.

If PSC drops its health insurance, the company would face a penalty of $2000 per employee under the Affordable Care Act. But for some companies, that penalty may actually be a big savings, says Tom Sutton, a NewsChannel 5 political analyst and chair of political science at Baldwin Wallace University. That’s because companies pay up to $7,000 for individual coverage and up to $20,000 for family coverage. Compared to the $2,000 penalty? “You’re going to save a lot of money,” Sutton says. And that’s not all. Sutton adds, “The Obama Administration has postponed the employer mandate penalty until 2015.” That...

[Obama supporter] Alan Blinder...purports to tell us..Obamacare is still worth it. "America cannot be a humane society if we leave 15% of our population uninsured...." I agree....But in context, his quoted statement above could not be more silly.... Alan, is Princeton so intellectually corrupt these days that no one there has noticed that the effect of Obamacare so far has been to INCREASE the number of uninsured by millions and millions of Americans?

GEORGE WILL: Someone has to tell the president it's not clever to be seen trying to be clever. In all the prevarications and the equivocations of politics, one tries to be economical in the use of the word lie. That's why Churchill once said an opponent was guilty of terminological inexactitude. Well, it's hard to avoid the feeling that even if the president really didn't know on September 26th what was going to happen on the first of October, now he knows what he actually said then, and he's not telling the truth about what he said then. In the...

Administration officials were concerned that once users were able to view the available policies for purchase on HealthCare.gov, they could be disappointed with the cost and options available. The concerns were expressed in meeting notes from the ObamaCare "war room" obtained by CNN. "In some cases, there will be fewer options than would be desired to promote consumer choice and an ideal shopping experience," the meeting notes read. "Additionally, in some cases there will be relatively high cost plans." The discussion last week among officials at the Center for Consumer Information and Insurance Oversight appeared to reveal a behind-the-scenes concern...

<p>Nearly 26,000 New Mexicans are having health plans terminated at the end of the year because the insurance policies fail to provide expanded benefits and other coverage mandated by a federal health care law, according to insurance industry officials.</p> <p>State Insurance Superintendent John Franchini estimates most of those individual policyholders will pay an average of 35 percent more for new coverage, but will have plans with more health care benefits.</p>

Most of the talk about the Affordable Care Act has focused on website glitches and skyrocketing premiums but there are other issues looming on the horizon for the healthcare overhaul. Hospital coverage. If consumers expect to have (or continue to have) access to the best medical services at the nations top hospitals, they are in for a rude awakening. "Most of the top hospitals will accept insurance from just one or two companies operating under Obamacare." Because the ACA caps premiums, insurers will be have to offer less money to the nations best doctors and hospitals. In return, the hospitals...

Read and weep for our country... 11 people who seemed shocked - shocked to hear about obamacare penalties this week

Thanks to Obama and the Democrats (read Socialists) my cancer insurance is up 340% and the older I get, it will go up each year (was a fixed amount for everyone regardless of age before). My families healthcare premium went up 37%, but that's not the worst of it. Rather than having co-payments, now I have a deductible of $1901 before I see a dime of benefits. Thanks Obama for screwing my family over. We will let your, so called, Democratic Party (IE Socialist) exactly how we feel at the ballot box and every blog we know.

In this clip, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., gets a taste of the same medicine Democrats have been dishing out in the Obamacare debate for years. Why, he is asked by CNN’s Dana Bash, will he not go forward if the House passes a bill restoring NIH funding so that about three dozen kids with cancer can get treatment right away? Reid, looking a bit flummoxed, personally attacks Bash’s intelligence for asking the question...Speaking of the House, Reid asks, “What right do they have to pick and choose what part of government’s going to be funded?” There is actually...

Perhaps Obama was onto something when, as a young author, he zeroed in on the term "audacity" to (subconsciously) telegraph his ambitious designs to fundamentally transform our beloved America. What word could describe better than audacity Obama's refusal to accept responsibility for his dreadful policies; his standing before the American people -- even today -- in the face of the avalanche of evidence proving how terrible Obamacare is and continuing to lie about what it will do; his persistence in mislabeling his unaffordable monstrosity "the Affordable Care Act;" his failure to address the legitimate, undeniable complaints about Obamacare and his...

The Obamacare that consumers will finally be able to sign up for next week is a long way from the health plan President Barack Obama first pitched to the nation. Millions of low-income Americans won’t receive coverage. Many workers at small businesses won’t get a choice of insurance plans right away. Large employers won’t need to provide insurance for another year. Far more states than expected won’t run their own insurance marketplaces. And a growing number of workers won’t get to keep their employer-provided coverage.

Even most Republicans, in their candid moments, admit that the Affordable Care Act won't be defunded. But for former Vice Presidential Nominee and Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, that's not good enough. "We’d like to believe that the GOP establishment would applaud the way [Sens. Ted Cruz and Mike Lee] have rallied the grassroots to their cause," Palin writes, in an op-ed penned for the conservative website Breitbart. "But, no, such praise would require a commensurate level of guts and leadership, and the permanent political class in D.C. is nothing if not gutless and rudderless." "But the permanent political class is...

Paul Ryan, the wonky Wisconsin GOP congressman, was standing next to Michelle Bachmann, the folksy Minnesota Republican. ... As Boehner and the rest of the House leadership entered the room after Friday’s vote, the Republican members of Congress in attendance let out a hurrah of support. “Our message to the United States Senate is real simple: the American people don’t want the government shut down,” Boehner said. “And they don’t want Obamacare.” Added Boehner, as the conference roared in applause: “The House has listened to the American people. Now it’s time for the United States Senate listen to them as...

A riveting day has dawned. House Speaker John Boehner, long criticized for inconsistent conservative passion, is actually allowing members to vote on a budget bill that ties continued government operations to a defunding of Obamacare. This would be the strategy Ted Cruz and his allies have been offering for weeks, earning them harsh criticism from Democrats and timid Republicans alike. The House, run by Republicans, will pass the measure. The Senate, run by Democrats, will not. No matter what those votes might be, a presidential veto pen stands ready to kill the whole idea of a bill that funds...