Free Republic

The Obama administration is trying to persuade millions of uninterested, or perhaps reluctant, Americans to purchase health insurance through the Obamacare exchanges. But the heart of Obamacare is coercion. If Americans fail do what the law's Democratic authors believe is best, the federal government will punish them, through the progressively higher penalties of the individual mandate, until it hurts more not to buy coverage than it does to give up and purchase it. But what if many of those Americans rebel? Even if they know having health insurance is better than not having it, what if they refuse to be...

Many of you have heard about the Little Sisters of the Poor, a group of nuns providing care for the elderly, who  are now taking on the Obama Administration over the Affordable Care Act's (ObamaCare) contraception mandate. Religious exemptions from the ObamaCare contraception mandate are often made for government-approved entities, but the Obama Administration has deemed the nuns, who work exclusively with the elderly, unworthy of an exception. U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor recently granted the Little Sisters of the Poor a temporary injunction, so they do not have to violate their religious beliefs by offering health insurance that...

People forget it now, but the Religious Freedom Restoration Act — the law that companies and nonprofit organizations are using to fight the Obama administration’s requirement that almost all employers cover contraception, sterilization, and drugs that may cause abortion in their insurance plans — was controversial among conservatives in its first years. The old debate over it should remind us of two truths that, while compatible, are in tension with each other: The principle for which conservatives are fighting in today’s cases is important, and it is not absolute.The story starts in the 1980s, when two drug counselors in...

According to National Director Father Frank Pavone, the mandate “promotes the very culture of death that Priests for Life works to combat.” WASHINGTON, D.C., January 2, 2013 (LifeSiteNews.com) – Another religious organization has won victory over the HHS abortion and contraception mandate created under the Affordable Care Act.  On Tuesday, the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the Priests for Life do not have to follow the mandate while the Supreme Court hears an appeal. In a press release, Priests for Life expressed relief that the decision means that they do not have to cancel health insurance coverage for...

A resident and a sister arrange flowers at the Little Sisters of the Poor's Mullen Home in Denver, CO in this undated file photo. Credit: El Pueblo Catolico/James Baca. Washington D.C., Jan 3, 2014 / 05:57 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Despite the claims of the U.S. Justice Department, the demands of the federal contraception mandate threaten the continued works of service performed by the Little Sisters of the Poor, their attorneys say. Eric Rassbach, deputy general counsel with the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, which is representing the religious sisters in court, charged that the government's claim amounts to “doublespeak” and...

Is this some kind of record? On the last day of 2013 four different federal appeals courts issued temporary injunctions against enforcement of the Obamacare contraceptive mandate. The Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals acted on two different cases, Michigan Catholic Conference v. Sebelius and The Catholic Diocese of Nashville et al v. Sebelius, while the DC Circuit Court of Appeals acted in The Catholic Archbishop of Washington et al v Sebelius. Meanwhile, no less than Obama-appointee Sonia Sotomayor issued an injunction in the case of The Little Sisters of the Poor Home for the Aged, Denver, v Sebelius. All in...

**SNIP** During an appearance on CNBC’s “Squawk Box,” Dean argued that the key premise of needing younger Americans signing up to make the program viable “doesn’t really matter that much.” “This is about the individual mandate,” he said. “The individual mandate was not necessary and it’s probably a big political thing, and that is going to hurt the Democrats because people don’t like to be told what to do by the government no matter what party they’re in.” The remarks by Dean are significant because of his position as former DNC chairman, as well as his being a doctor. Dean...

**SNIP** As the New York Post so aptly put it, ”[T]his isn’t about fixing ObamaCare. It’s about relieving the political pain for Democrats.”; and, 3) It gives the administration more time to continue its mojo marketing to the Young Invincibles. As of this writing, the young and healthy are still not signing up in droves for this boondoggle despite new pushes by Adam Levine, Lady Gaga, and a “Buy It ‘Cause It’s Hot” video featuring Barack O’Breezy. Jonathan Karl of ABC News all but mocked the administration and Jay Carney about the Covered California video promotion. He retorted, “I mean...

Last July, after President Obama unilaterally delayed the Obamacare employer mandate for a year, House Republicans asked why the break should apply only to businesses. Why shouldn't individuals be relieved of the burden, too? So the House voted, 251 to 174, to delay the individual mandate. Twenty-two Democrats joined Republicans in voting for delay. A total of 174 Democrats voted to keep the mandate as is. Of course the move went nowhere in the Democratic-controlled Senate. But that was before Obamacare implementation began Oct. 1. It was before the canceled policies, the higher premiums, the higher deductibles, and narrower doctor...

Gov. Martin O'Malley said Monday that 42,589 people had signed up for insurance through the state's health exchange as of Dec. 21—a jump of almost 13,000 people in a week—but the faster clip of sign-ups was temporarily stymied by more troubles with the website.Users on the site were met midday Monday with a "service unavailable" message, and by afternoon a new message said: "We are currently undergoing scheduled maintenance. We apologize for any inconvenience and appreciate your patience."The site came back online by 4 p.m.,and an exchange spokeswoman said there were two separate problems that may have been related to...

A federal judge granted an injunction this weekend that prevents the government from enforcing the ObamaCare mandate requiring religious groups across the country to provide insurance that includes access to the morning-after pill and other contraceptives. The preliminary injunction, issued in an Oklahoma City federal court, is based on a class-action lawsuit filed in October by 187 ministries. The court order Friday came just days before ObamaCare coverage begins January 1, which could have resulted in the ministries facing thousands of dollars a day in tax penalties.

Rejoice, humble peasants, because if Obama’s Big Lie about “keeping your plan if you like your plan” resulted in your plan getting canceled, His Benevolent Majesty, King Clusterfark I, has decreed that you won’t be fined for not having the insurance that you can’t afford because of his idiotic “law,” and couldn’t buy if you wanted to, because of his crappy website. And the announcement was delivered in the most cowardly manner imaginable, on the eve of the Christmas holiday.

The U.S. Supreme Court rejected Monday a lawsuit by Liberty University challenging the constitutionality of the Affordable Care Act's, or "Obamacare's," mandate that employers with more than 50 employees provide health insurance for its employees. In an interview with The Christian Post, Liberty Counsel's Mat Staver, who is representing Liberty University, said he wished the court would have taken the case, but future challenges to the employer mandate are still possible. Liberty's challenge was based upon the argument that Congress does not have the authority to require that employers provide health insurance. The government defended its authority under the Commerce...

**SNIP** But after Obama’s initial success, the backlash set in, and it has been growing with a vengeance since the botched Oct. 1 rollout of the HealthCare.gov website. At this point, Obama’s only hope of mitigating the damage, both practical and political, is to delay the individual mandate until 2015. That’s the only way voters will understand that Obama genuinely wants to make Obamacare right. Otherwise, Republicans will capitalize on the perception that the president is unjustly asking the middle class and working poor to pay for his administration’s mistakes. Obama has two choices: He can nip that probable GOP...

At some critical point, everyone makes choices based on incentives and his own perception of self-interest. Somehow the Obama administration has forgotten that natural law. A therapeutic sense of self-sacrifice is fine in the abstract, but in the concrete such magnanimity causes far more harm to the innocent than does a realistic appraisal of self-interest and a tragic acceptance of the flawed nature of man. The theme of the present administration is that it possesses the wisdom and resources to know better what people should do than they do themselves. From that premise arose most of catastrophes that have befallen...

President Obama: "20 Million people have logged on to the website and that certainly shows that the interest is there for health care ... "

Mike Enzi: "I found they are going to aggregate the numbers so people think they are going to 29 hours employees are finding out that doesn’t get rid of employees for them....…so they can’t get under the 50 employee mark.

President Obama took to the podium today to address the myriad problems associated with the rollout of ObamaCare. As usual, he expressed outrage and sympathy while promising to fix the problems. The main problem is that Obama is lying through his teeth. The only thing he's upset about is that the forced movement of American citizens to government-run health care isn't going smoothly. He again lied about his constant lying to the public over whether one could keep their health insurance or their doctor if they liked them. He said, "The way I put that forward unequivocally ended up not...

Will Obamacare Cancel Corporate Health Care Insurance Policies? Obama delayed the corporate mandate but did not delay the individual mandate. Obama explained that they were not ready to handle the corporate mandate but assured the people they were prepared to handle the individual mandate. We have now learned that Obama lied to us. The government is not ready to handle the individual mandated policies. Obama had also assured the people that they would not lose their existing plans or doctors because of Obamacare. We have now learned that Obama deliberately lied to gain support for Obamacare. People are receiving cancellation...

Meltdown: A health care scholar estimates that if ObamaCare is fully implemented, including the employer mandate, 129 million people will not be able to keep their plans. The train wreck has become a nuclear meltdown. The never-ending and ever-changing story line emanating from the damage control room at the White House has morphed from you can keep your plan, period, to we said you could keep the plan you liked at the rates agreed upon only if we decide it's not substandard. That, we were told, would only apply to some 5% of Americans. They would get a better plan...