Posted on 08/31/2009 12:36:44 PM PDT by Signalman
As if Obama’s health care proposals were not flawed enough, CBS News reports a previously unnoticed provision of the bill which makes a shambles of any privacy surrounding your federal tax returns. Under the House bill, the IRS is required to make available to the new government Health Choices Commissioner” established by the legislation and to each state health program all of your personal tax information.
In a blog, CBSNews’ Declan McCullagh reports that “Section 431 (a) of the bill says that the IRS must divulge taxpayer identity information, including the filing status, the modified adjusted grow income, the number of dependents, and ‘other information as is prescribed by’ regulation” to the “new Health Choices Commissioner and state health programs.”
And, McCullagh also reports that, under Section 1801(a) “the Social Security Administration can obtain tax return data on anyone who may be eligible for a ‘low-income prescription drug subsidy’ but has not applied for it.”
So the Health Choices Commissioner and anyone in his office, the fifty state health programs and their staffs, and the vast Social Security Administration will all now have access to your personal tax information.
It might as well be published in the newspapers.
The rationale for providing this confidential tax information to all these people is not only to check on the eligibility of those who are seeking federal subsidy – a possibly appropriate use of it – but, also, to those who have not applied but might be eligible. This later20provision essentially authorizes the Social Security Administration to seek and obtain anyone’s income tax information under the guise of determining if they should have applied for a subsidy.
In his blog, McCullagh quotes Tom Giovanetti of the Institute for Policy Innovation as saying “How many thousands of federal employees will have access to your record? The privacy of your health records will be only as good as the most nosy, most dishonest, and most malcontented federal employee.” And not just your health records, your financial records too!
This legislation requiring an agency-to-agency transfer of confidential tax information runs against the general policy of the Privacy Act which prohibits such a paper flow. Generally, information has to come from the individual involved and cannot simply be passed from one government bureau to another. The IRS takes particular pains to keep tax returns confidential and leaks are rare. But this legislation will end any hope or pretense of privacy.
How ironic, the court held that using abortion as a means of birth control was a privacy issue but healthcare, personal finances, census status, etc. is information you must share with our trustworthy government.
Why are people wasting their time discussing individual provisions in HR3200 when the more important point is that the bill on its face is unconstitutional since it is not expressly written as a power granted to Congress in Article 1 Section 8 of the Constitution?
breech, breach
leech, leach
lose, loose
It’s all the same.
/s
We all know it's unconstitutional but most of us aren't Supreme Court Judges. They have a talent for finding hidden gems in the constitution like the right to infanticide and the right of an illegal alein to free medical care, while totally being confused by the meaning of the right to free speech, religious freedom and the right to bear arms. I guess that's what law schools teach now.
I don’t want the government in my tax returns OR my breeches!
(I think he meant breaches)
I think someone last week said it would also allow them to access your voter registration info as to party affiliation. That info could be pretty important in deciding what kind of care you get.
“CBS News reports a previously unnoticed provision”
Not if you’ve read the friggin’ bill! This is just another little nugget that the ‘Bama was trying to slip past the American people with his rush to get the bill passed. Is anyone beginning to see a pattern of deception here??
You see this is not the Main Stream Media doing research and reporting it, this is a news employee making a comment in a Web Log (Blog)
This is just another nail in the coffin of so-called journalists.
They should have been devouring the bill the day it first came out, and challenging the bills supporters on these issues. But instead the talking heads at the MSM just pass on whatever talking points were faxed to them that day by the DNC.
Many of us here at FreeRepublic knew about this privacy action violation days ago. But the general public is yet to be informed.
Just tell Joe Six-pack that the IRS commissioner will be forwarding his tax information for use by the 'death squads' when a decision needs to be made about his chemo treatment.
Under the House bill, the IRS is required to make available to the new government Health Choices Commissioner established by the legislation and to each state health program all of your personal tax information.What about birth certificates? College transcripts? ...
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