Free Republic

**SNIP** There are a whole bunch of problems with this most recent scramble to save the Senate majority: 1. Democrats have opposed in lock-step every change or delay that Republicans have offered (e.g. repeal or suspension of the individual mandate, prohibition on insurance company bailouts, relief from the medical-device tax). It’s hard to declare Obamacare “the law of the land,” block serious consideration of changes and then concede it needs changing. 2. Why did they vote for the law in its current state? Maybe they were hoodwinked by the president’s promises that it would be a pro-growth, pro-jobs reform, or...

Slowly but surely President Obama is unwinding, rolling back, and even cancelling his very own Obamacare. A couple of years ago he told Republicans not to mess with his plan. He said he’d veto any changes. But now, in substantial ways, he’s messing with his own plan. By various counts, the president has made 25 to 30 key changes to the Affordable Care Act. They all violate the legislation passed in 2010. Many believe Obama’s executive actions are unlawful or unconstitutional. Whatever the case, at this rate, there may not be much if any Obamacare in the next couple of...

Patients who have had a ‘fair innings’ could be denied life-saving drugs under proposed health reforms. The plans would mean experts taking into account whether there is a ‘wider societal benefit’ to giving a patient crucial medicines. The NHS rationing body, Nice, fears the Department of Health proposals could see younger people deemed a higher priority for drug treatments because they have more years ahead of them – potentially contributing more to the economy – than the elderly. Doctors, MPs and campaigners last night condemned the plans as ‘barking mad’. The move will also fuel fears that the elderly are...

Doctors are leaving private practice to become employees of hospitals, according to this story in the New York Times. The decline in private practice physicians actually began a few years ago when changes to Medicare forced many physicians who practiced individually or in small group offices to make the move to a salaried position in a hospital.But there is no doubt that Obamacare has exacerbated the problem. The onerous recordkeeping is one big reason why private practice physicians are becoming extinct. Private physicians can’t afford the extra employees to meet the demands of Obamacare paperwork.Dr, Paul Hsieh explained in a...

WASHINGTON — One of the latest Obamacare pitches to get young adults to sign up for health insurance starts out with a mother's kitchen note reminding her grown son to enroll. "Mom, you know I can't afford it," the young black man protests, as he sits down at a kitchen table next to a bespectacled woman with a laptop computer linked to the U.S. federal enrollment website, HealthCare.gov. "But for the first time you can," she replies reassuringly. "You go to the HealthCare.gov website, compare quality plans and you could get help paying for it."

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.

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...

The federal overhaul has had a bumpy start, but with insurance payments they can handle, many have stopped gambling on their future Lost amid all the fury, however, have been the success stories.

Editor's note: This review is cross-posted at JohnHanlonReviews.com “I can’t fake it,” then-presidential candidate Mitt Romney said as the political advisers and family members nearby deflated. They knew what that meant. The scene, which occurred during the heated 2008 GOP primary battle between Romney and his rising political adversary, Senator John McCain (R-AZ), occurs early on in the new Netflix documentary, Mitt. The film premieres on Netflix at 11 AM today and offers a rarely-seen look at the former Governor and his family as they trudge through two seemingly-endless presidential campaigns. Director Greg Whiteley was given great access to Romney...

The feedback continues, with a bunch of military veterans and family members asking me how I could defend the callous COLA cuts to military pensions by way of explaining why Congress is trying to undo them. Another reader email: I strenuously object to being asked to sacrifice any more! I risked my life in two deployments to war zones, sacrificed my health (I'm also a disabled veteran), and jeopardized my relationship with my family for my country. I find Congress' latest demand a kick in the gut. We veterans and retirees have sacrificed enough without having to endure the...

In late October, continuing a four-year pattern of making such claims, MIT's Jonathan Gruber, who along with Ezekiel "Zeke the Bleak" Emanuel is considered one of the two "architects" of the Affordable Care Act, aka Obamacare, pointed to a study which claimed that "the Affordable Care Act is working even better than expected, producing more coverage for much less money." But, as Wingfield noted in his Friday column, Gruber sang a totally different tune when quoted in the Washington Post on Thursday. WaPo's Sarah Kliff failed to tag Gruber as an Obamacare architect, making it appear as if he's just...

MSNBC host Melissa Harris-Perry offered an apology to the Romney family on Tuesday after a panel on her show mocked the fact that one of Mitt Romney's grandchildren was black. On Sunday's "Melissa Harris-Perry" show, Harris-Perry led a panel in discussing the "Photos of the Year," which included a Romney family Christmas photo. In the photo, Romney is seen holding his adopted grandchild, Kieran, who is black.

Marc Lamont Hill: “Some would say maybe that it’s an exploitative picture that they’re exploiting the kid by hauling out this black person …” [crosstalk] “They were pointing out the fact that the picture itself was sort of a spectacle and they were sort of making fun of the Republican party. I don’t think they were making fun of the baby. If they were I’d be right on your side. This was a light moment making fun of Mitt Romney” Clear? This was just good old-fashioned, harmless, light, fun-poking based on the self-evidently silly and mockable notion of Mitt Romney...

Lisa Myers has an excellent investigative reporting piece up at NBC News documenting how one small business is dealing with Obamacare. The quotes from the article are just brutal: The 41 employees of Extreme Dodge in Jackson, Mich., are very familiar with trade-ins, but this year they’re learning about trade-offs as they come face to face with the new realities of health care. A few workers say they’re getting a great deal, but most have a severe case of sticker shock. “I feel like I’ve been taken to the cleaners,” said Neal Campbell, a salesman. ... “How is this helping...

The fact that Romneycare is the progenitor of Obamacare and that the state-run health insurance program has led to citizens experiencing the highest per capita cost for health care in the nation, should make even President Obama hesitate to use the program when touting his own legislation. We're probably not going to be hearing anymore about Romneycare as a template for Obamacare.Examiner: On Oct. 30, as President Obama was under fire for the botched rollout of his signature health care law, he visited Boston's Faneuil Hall. It was in that hall in 2006 that then-Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, with a...

Sen. Ron Johnson, a tea party Republican from Wisconsin, knows that the politics of Obamacare are changing. “It’s no longer just a piece of paper that you can repeal and it goes away,” he told the New York Times. “There’s something there. We have to recognize that reality. We have to deal with the people that are currently covered under Obamacare.” Jan. 1 isn't likely to be a glitch-free day for Obamacare. There will be people who try to use their insurance and find they can't, or it's not the plan they meant to buy, or it's not a plan...

“Obviously, we screwed it up.” —President Barack Obama, December 20, 2013, discussing health care reform in response to a question at a year-end press conference. This column needs to be finished quickly so I can drive over to the headquarters of a local health insurance company with a premium check and copies of three proofs of state residency. I tried to use the ObamaCare exchange in my state, I really did. I probably spent about seven hours on the site in four or five sessions over the past few months. Theoretically, I’m the sort of person who might benefit from...

It’s early for a palate cleanser but I’m not sure this doesn’t qualify as legit news. I … did not expect to find myself eager to revisit the Romney 2012 campaign on film, but here we are, my friends. Here we are. It’s true that the trailer is more humanizing than anything Romney’s campaign did for him, but the deck is stacked. The bio video that the GOP produced for the convention was solid but nothing as stage-managed as campaign propaganda will ever have the disarming charm of behind-the-scenes footage of the candidates in unguarded moments. Plus, the trailer’s cheating...

Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus said his opposition research shop is targeting Hillary Clinton ahead of the 2016 election. Priebus said the RNC is trying to focus on the midterm elections, but added there should be a greater emphasis on the potential presidential candidate. “Well, we have — so our research shop, along with America Rising, has been focusing in on Hillary Clinton,” Priebus said on The Hugh Hewitt Show on Thursday. “But I agree with you that there needs to be a more of a focus.” American Rising is a GOP research firm started by Mitt Romney's former...

Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus says the RNC has begun “focusing in” on Hillary Clinton as a candidate for 2016 and will continue to do so. Priebus was asked by radio host Hugh Hewitt on Wednesday whether the RNC would work to attack Clinton as the presumed Democratic nominee for president in 2016, according to a show transcript. “We have. So our research shop, along with America Rising, has been focusing in on Hillary Clinton.