Free Republic

The price is still wrong for too many health insurance customers. Nearly half of all people with individual health insurance plans this year said it's "very" or "somewhat" difficult for them to afford their monthly premiums. The vast majority of Obamacare exchange customers receive a discount on their monthly premiums as a result of subsidies they are issued. Despite that, among individuals with both subsidized and nonsubsidized coverage, "You've got a substantial share saying it's not a great value for the money," said Liz Hamel, director of Kaiser's Public Opinion and Survey Research team. About four in 10 people surveyed...

U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz's presidential campaign will announce the endorsements of four members of the Texas congressional delegation. Republican U.S. Reps. Michael Burgess of Lewisville, John Culberson of Houston, Louie Gohmert of Tyler and John Ratcliffe of Heath are all backing the state's junior senator on Thursday, according to a Cruz campaign news release obtained by The Texas Tribune. Gohmert had a specifically pointed statement in the batch of endorsements. "With a Ted Cruz Presidency, America will finally be respected around the world again as other nations will see a courageous and intellectual leader, NEVER wavering on principle, who stands...

http://www.newyorker.com/news/daily-comment/obamas-game-of-chicken-with-the-supreme-court?intcid=mod-latest

A federal appeals court has rejected the University of Notre Dame's request to temporarily be exempt from a provision in the Affordable Care Act that requires the Catholic school's insurance providers to cover the costs of contraceptives for students and staff. The 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled 2-1 on Tuesday that an exemption provided by President Barack Obama's administration allows Notre Dame to avoid directly paying for contraceptives, and therefore doesn't force the school to violate its religious beliefs. Notre Dame contends that the law forces it to violate Catholic doctrine, which bars most forms of birth control,...

Over the past few years there has been no greater Obamacare cheerleader than Sarah Kliff of General Electric Vox. Therefore it was quite a revelation today to discover she had a change of heart and has found her formerly beloved program to be deeply flawed. Is it too harsh to claim she now thinks Obamacare stinks? Well the Vox headline on her article used the term "crummier" as in Health insurance plans are getting crummier, and these charts prove it.  So just how much crummier have the Obamacare insurance plans gotten, Sarah? Let the former Obamacare cheerleader tell us why the...

After LifeNews.com blogger Ryan Bomberger published his article at LifeNews, the NAACP threatened to sue LifeNews.com and Bomberger over the column that took the civil rights organization to task over its abortion position. The NAACP is upset about a column Bomberger wrote at LifeNews titled, “NAACP: National Association for the Abortion of Colored People” and a legal battle between it and Bomberger ensued. Last year, a judge issued a ruling in the NAACP lawsuit against Bomberger. The judge indicated that Bomberger had no First Amendment right to lampoon the NAACP by calling it the “National Association for the Abortion of...

Health Care: We keep hearing about how millions will lose insurance if the Supreme Court strikes down ObamaCare's federal exchange subsidies. But there's another side to this story that never gets discussed until now.

Many were called. Few chose to respond. The federal Obamacare insurance marketplace HealthCare.gov signed up 147,000 people in 36 states during a special tax season enrollment period, officials revealed Tuesday. HealthCare.gov issued the final tally via Twitter rather than a press release or news call that Obama administration officials have previously used to announce other numbers and results. In all, it appears fewer than 250,000 people signed up nationally. In Hawaii, no people—as in zero—signed up during the special tax season enrollment.

Medicaid enrollment under Obamacare is skyrocketing past expectations, giving some GOP governors who oppose the program’s expansion under the health law an “I told you so” moment. More than 12 million people have signed up for Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act since January 2014, and in some states that embraced that piece of the law, enrollment is hundreds of thousands beyond initial projections. Seven states have seen particularly big surges, with their overruns totaling nearly 1.4 million. The federal government is picking up 100 percent of the expansion costs through 2016, and then will gradually cut back to 90...

At a recent White House science fair celebrating inventors, a Girl Scout who helped design a Lego-powered page-turning device asked President Obama what he had ever thought up or prototyped. Stumbling for an answer, he replied: “I came up with things like, you know, health care.” Ah, yes. “Health care.” Remember when the president’s signature Obamacare health insurance exchanges were going to be the greatest thing since sliced bread, the remote control, jogger strollers, Siri, the Keurig coffee maker, driverless cars and Legos all rolled into one? The miraculous, efficient, cost-saving, innovative 21st-century government-run “marketplaces” were supposed to put the...

There's more than a touch of absurdity in the way an industry fee in President Barack Obama's health care law is being passed along to state taxpayers. As Alice in Wonderland might say, a curious tax just got curiouser. The burden to states could mount to $13 billion in less than a decade. The Health Insurance Providers Fee was aimed at insurance companies. The thinking went: Because insurers would gain a windfall of customers, they ought to help pay for the expansion of coverage. Insurers say they have raised prices for individuals and small businesses to cover the new tax....

One of the more bizarre spectacles of U.S. government in the modern age is the sight of political leaders complaining that a public program is actually working. In many states that expanded Medicaid and even some that rejected expansion under the Affordable Care Act, enrollment has significantly exceeded projections. To some political leaders, for some reason, this is supposed to be a bad thing. Some Republican governors are in effect calling it "an 'I told you so' moment". In Michigan, for instance, first-year enrollment was projected at 323,000, but enrollment topped out at 605,000. Illinois expected 199,000, and has ended...

Chicago has become the promised land for undocumented migrants with kidney problems, people who in other states receive no medical care due to their immigration status although here they can get free dialysis and kidney transplants. The Illinois legislature last October passed a law that provides funds for kidney transplants for undocumented migrants, the first such legislation in the United States. Religious and community organizations such as Latinos por la Salud and the Mision de Vida, Fe y Esperanza have received requests for help from people arriving from the neighboring states of Wisconsin and Minnesota, while others have traveled much...

FULL TITLE: ‘Pro-Abortion Guy’ Begs Interviewer Not to Air His Responses — After Hearing Them, You May Understand Why Rebel Media’s Marissa Semkiw hit the streets during Ottawa’s “March for Life” this week and encountered a seemingly unyielding abortion supporter who argued it’s always the “woman’s choice” — even when it comes to “post-natal abortion.” The man, identified only as Alex, later reportedly sent an email to Semkiw asking that none of his responses be used in any videos or broadcasts. Rebel Media declined his request. During the interview, Semkiw explained that some pro-life advocates would like to see abortion...

In part three of our exclusive interview with Professor Walter E. Williams (Economics Department, George Mason University), we get his explanation why we may never see the “40-hour work week” again and also how ObamaCare is welfare, NOT health “insurance”.

The Supreme Court is probably about to hand congressional Republicans a once-in-a-lifetime chance to eradicate the Obamacare contagion from the body politic, but the GOP has been typically timorous concerning whether to take advantage of this opportunity. A refreshing exception to this poltroonery has been Tom Price, Chairman of the House Budget Committee. Price, who practiced medicine in Atlanta for twenty years before coming to Congress, has not only introduced an eminently viable replacement for the imploding health care “reform” law, but has also said he won’t support proposed legislation that would temporarily extend Obamacare subsidies that SCOTUS deems illegal....

City Comptroller Scott Stringer laid out the grim facts last week on how the most progressive law in decades means disaster for New York City. The bottom line of Stringer’s report: Thanks to the Affordable Care Act, aka ObamaCare, Uncle Sam will cut more than $800 million in payments to the city’s Health and Hospitals Corp, by Fiscal Year 2019. The president’s signature law slashes federal payments that long helped out hospitals serving lots of patients who lack insurance. The idea was that the law would boost coverage so dramatically the aid would be unnecessary. Except that illegal immigrants don’t...

Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Fla.) said Saturday that former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush (R) would make a poor president for American women should he ever enter the White House. “He was a terrible governor for Florida women,” Wasserman Schultz tweeted. “Would be a disaster for women across the country.” Wasserman Schultz, who is also the Democratic National Committee (DNC) chairwoman, was responding to an article she encountered online. [Snip] “And at the end of the day, while Jeb’s right-wing rhetoric might make him stand out from his family, in 2016’s ultra-conservative GOP field, Jeb’s positons will just make him blend...

As Alice in Wonderland might say, a curious tax just got curiouser. The burden to states could mount to $13 billion in less than a decade. ... It works like this: State governments pay insurers for the tax. The insurers then pay the tax to the federal government. The federal government then reimburses part of the cost to the states. It may sound absurd, but it's not amusing to state governments, which wind up losing 54 cents for every dollar of the insurance tax. State taxpayers end up the biggest losers, without any added benefit to their state's low-income Medicaid...

A leaked draft of a trade agreement under negotiation among 12 Pacific rim countries, including the US and Japan, contains language that could delay the entrance of generic competition for much-needed medicines and keep pharmaceutical prices high, according to the Foundation for Aids Research (amfAR), an international non-profit headquartered in New York. The organisation is lending its voice to those expressing similar concerns, like humanitarian organisation Doctors Without Borders. Although details of the proposed Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) have been kept confidential, leaked texts of the treaty have offered some clues, such as its embrace of intellectual property protections that go...