Posted on 03/30/2010 9:11:58 AM PDT by Stoat
President Obama this morning cited The Heritage Foundation’s research in an attempt to sell his health care package as a “middle of the road, centrist approach.” We take great exception to this misuse of our work and abuse of our name. This is but the latest act in a campaign to sell this big-government program as a moderate law that incorporates conservative ideas. Americans should not be fooled.
Let’s be very clear: We oppose this new law because it is a radical new intrusion into the daily lives of all Americans and a massive takeover of one-sixth of the U.S. economy. We view the President’s health care law as inimical to our national interests and offensive to the historic American dedication to the principle of self-government.
Our research has shown that President Obama’s health approach is financially unsustainable and will ultimately lead to health care rationing, a lower quality of care and a greater degree of dependence on government. We deplore those outcomes and are committed to making the intellectual case for this law’s repeal.
What part of that does President Obama not understand?
Specifically, President Obama told NBC’s Today Show host Matt Lauer that a centerpiece of his health care package, “in terms of the exchange, just being able to pool and improve the purchasing power of individuals in the insurance market—that originated from The Heritage Foundation.”
But the President knows full well—or he ought to learn before he speaks—that the exchanges we and most others support are very different from those in his package. True exchanges are simply a market mechanism to enable families to choose their health insurance. President Obama’s exchanges, by contrast, are a vehicle to introduce sweeping regulation and federal standardization on health insurance.
Moreover, we completely disagree that President Obama’s law improves the purchasing power of individuals in the insurance market. On the contrary, it will create a staggeringly complex and costly insurance system that will drive up premiums for Americans.
The President’s health care law is only eight days old, and already it has cost our economy billions of dollars. Late last week, AT&T alone took a $1 billion charge because of the impact of the bill, and the consulting firm Towers Watson told the Wall Street Journal that the total hit this year will reach nearly $14 billion. It is sad, given the present state of our economy, that the President’s party in Congress has reacted not by trying to find ways to spare the jobs that will be lost because of this law. Instead, they are trying to intimidate companies that take such charges with threats that they will be hauled in before the Energy and Commerce Committee.
It is also revealing that President Obama is still struggling to sell the American people on a bill that he and his party rammed through passage by a narrow margin in the face of bipartisan opposition. It is a sign of desperation that he, his handlers and the media echo chamber are reverting to the campaign practice of selling the President and his policies as centrist, middle of the road and aisle-crossing. As the country has found out the hard way in the past 15 months, they are none of those things.
The President has made a habit of using conservative talking points when trying to sell a liberal ideology because he knows that this is a center-right country that rejects his agenda when articulated honestly. His supporters have even tried to pin the blame of the potentially unconstitutional individual mandate on us. This approach brushes over the details of our research and ignores our ability to evolve past further developed research.
Over 16,000 new IRS agents will be hired by the government to enforce the President’s mandate on the American people. The President’s health care plan also raises premiums, taxes, and costs while lowering quality, and expanding Medicaid. These are not conservative ideas.
And let’s be clear, these are not ideas Heritage has ever, or would ever, support.
We made every effort over the past year to share our ideas for better health care reform with the President and members of both parties in Congress, but were not invited behind the closed doors. Now, after the bill is signed, it seems the President wishes we were along for the ride. We were not. We remain fervently opposed to the President’s partisan plan, and urge its immediate repeal. This is not common politics, it’s common sense.
Had President Obama limited his bill to centrist elements, he would have won wide bipartisan support for effective reform both within Congress and among the American people. He would have won it, too, at a fraction of the cost of this intolerable, huge and intrusive legislation. He would not now be facing popular rejection by the American people. And he would not need to misrepresent Heritage policies and positions in an attempt to give his radical health plan the patina of respectability.
Edwin J. Feulner, Ph.D. is the President of The Heritage Foundation, Washington’s leading public policy organization or think tank. On January 18, 1989 President Reagan conferred the Presidential Citizens Medal on him as "a leader of the conservative movement." The citation continues: "By building an organization dedicated to ideas and their consequences, he has helped to shape the policy of our Government. His has been a voice of reason and values in service to his country and the cause of freedom around the world."
Feulner also serves as Treasurer and Trustee of The Mont Pelerin Society; Trustee and former Chairman of the Board of The Intercollegiate Studies Institute; member of the Board of the National Chamber Foundation; member of the Board of Visitors of George Mason University; and Trustee of the Acton Institute and the International Republican Institute. He is past president of various organizations including The Philadelphia Society and the Mont Pelerin Society, and past Director of Sequoia Bank, Regis University and the Council for National Policy.
Dr. Feulner has studied at the University of Edinburgh (Ph.D.-Founding President, American Friends of the University), the London School of Economics (Richard M. Weaver Fellow), the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania (MBA-Recipient, Joseph Wharton Award), Georgetown University, and Regis University (B.S.-Distinguished Alumnus Award). He has received honorary degrees from Pepperdine University, Nichols College,Grove City College, Bellevue College, Gonzaga University, Universidad Francisco Marroquin (Guatemala), Hanyang University (Korea), St. Norbert College, Hillsdale College, and Thomas More College.
Feulner served on the Gingrich-Mitchell Congressional Task Force on U.N. Reform (2004-2005) and the Congressional Commission on International Financial Institutions ("Meltzer Commission," 1999-2000). He was the Vice Chairman of the National Commission on Economic Growth and Tax Reform ("Kemp Commission," 1995-1996), Counselor to Vice Presidential candidate Jack Kemp (1996), Chairman of the U.S. Advisory Commission on Public Diplomacy (1982-91), a Consultant for Domestic Policy to President Reagan, and an advisor to several government departments and agencies. He was a member of the President’s Commission on White House Fellows (1981-83), of the Secretary of State’s UNESCO Review Observation Panel (1985-89), of the Carlucci Commission on Foreign Aid (1983), and served as a United States Representative to the United Nations Second Special Session on Disarmament (with the rank of Ambassador) where he delivered the final United States address to the General Assembly (1982).
Dr. Feulner served as the Executive Director of the Republican Study Committee in the U.S. House of Representatives, the Confidential Assistant to Secretary of Defense Melvin R. Laird, Administrative Assistant to U.S. Congressman Philip M. Crane (R-Illinois), and as a Public Affairs Fellow at the Hoover Institution of Stanford University and the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
He is the author of six books: Getting America Right (2006), Leadership for America (2000), Intellectual Pilgrims (1999), The March of Freedom (1998),Conservatives Stalk The House (1983), and Looking Back (1981). He is the editor of U.S.–Japan Mutual Security: The Next Twenty Years and China: The Turning Point, and a contributor to ten other books and numerous journals, reviews and magazines. He was the Publisher of Policy Review (1977-2001), and articles by him have appeared in the Chicago Tribune, New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Washington Post, Washington Times and other major newspapers. He is a regular contributor to Investor's Business Daily. As a member of Investor's Business Daily's "Brain Trust," he regularly contributes op-eds on issues of special interest to financial markets. His weekly column appears in dozens of newspapers across the country.
On a personal note, he is married to Linda Claire Leventhal. The Feulners have two married children, Edwin J. Feulner III, and Emily Lown. The Feulners live in Old Town, Alexandria, Virginia. Dr. Feulner is listed in standard reference works including the current edition of Who’s Who in America.
Just give it a few years, Mr. Feulner . . . your objection will be forgotten . . . and the anti-Heritage crowd will use Obama’s words to club you over the head.
0bama is a consummate liar; he sets a new standard for lying, even among politicians. I wouldn’t believe him if he told me the sun was hot.
More OBAMA lies and deception. He is the Bamboozler in Chief.
Sorry about that, and thank you both for your help :-)
I guess Ed didn’t get the memo saying this was good for America
And the best part is that all this will cost more money than the current system in place now.
This is one of his SOPs. Caterpillar says it will save them money (oops, no). This idea came from the GOP (oops, no). Heritage originated this concept (oops, no).
I have a feeling he’s been doing this since he was a young child. Most of his life he’s been surrounded by people so busy fawning over him that it’s probably been rare that anyone has told him to cut it out.
“Moslem Heritage Foundation President Berky Hussein Obummer Responds to His Own Lies”
He is likely everything you say, but someone on his staff feeds him this stuff. You know he doesn’t take the time to read the bill or any part of it. He gets briefings and talking points from his staff. He has a Communications Director, his Former Campaign Manager and those Chicago crooks Axelrod, Rahm and Jarrett surrounding him and they will say anything anytime to make their point.
This is exactly the kind of intelligent, controlled reply I’d expect from Heritage. This is why I’m a member, and why I send extra funds when I can.
I so hope he will Demand NBC give him equal time to refute it
and that the POS matt lauer has to sit there and listen
MSM is trying to kill US
Anyone still watch the Today Show?
I'm guessing that it's still popular among some elements of the prison population and in hospital wards where patients are prevented from changing the channel.
Beyond that, there's the self-abuse crowd, the families of the crew and stars of the program, and the DNC.
I think that's about it.......
This would be like Obama claiming that his political ideology originated from Ronald Reagan.
Bottom line is this thing is now law. If it’s not stopped in November it will never be stopped.
Let’s say the insurance companies will go out of business, and they will. After a few years we try to change back to the old system. I don’t see new insurance companies springing up and going back to business as usual over night. These companies took years to build. Now we’re stuck with this and there’s nothing we can do about it.
This must be stopped no later than next January. And that may be too late.
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