Posted on 10/25/2017 9:56:57 AM PDT by Kaslin
Democrats and some Republicans in Congress are pushing for a $10 billion a year payout to insurance companies that sell Obamacare plans. President Trump calls it "bailing out" the insurance industry. Truer words were never spoken.
The politicians backing this sweetheart deal claim it will protect consumers. Don't fall for it. The money will go straight to the bottom lines of insurers -- who enjoy tremendous clout in Washington, D.C., thanks to over $85 million in campaign contributions and over $150 million spent on lobbying every year.
The deal's authors, Sen. Lamar Alexander, R. Tenn., and Sen. Patty Murray, D. Wash., have taken hundreds of thousands in insurance contributions personally and through their PACs. No surprise the deal gives insurers everything they want: an estimated $10 billion a year cash plus $100 million in Obamacare ads. No other industry gets taxpayers to pay for their advertising. Meanwhile, consumers get nothing: no freedom to buy affordable plans without Washington-mandated benefits, no escape from onerous tax penalties for not enrolling.
In 2010, the powerful insurance industry worked hand in glove with Democrats to enact the Affordable Care Act, a scheme compelling everyone to buy their product. The ACA also steered tens of billions of dollars in backdoor payments to insurers through 2016 to insulate them from losing their shirts on Obamacare. It doesn't get any sweeter -- a law making your product mandatory and forcing taxpayers to subsidize your bottom line.
The current $10 billion tug-of-war is more of the same -- the Washington swamp exploiting the public. Insurers are fighting for more taxpayer largesse -- and too many members of Congress are lining up to accommodate. But not President Trump. In the Rose Garden this week, Trump quipped that insurers "contribute massive amounts of money to political people. ... Me, I'm not interested in their money."
The ACA requires insurers selling Obamacare plans to give low-income consumers a break on deductibles and copays. Insurers claim they lose money doing that, and want taxpayers to make up the shortfall. But Congress never voted for those payments, despite providing many others to the industry. No problem, under President Obama. He paid the insurers without getting Congress's consent. But the U.S. Constitution says the president can't spend what Congress doesn't appropriate. The House of Representatives sued and Obama lost. Federal judge Rosemary Collyer ruled that the payments were illegal.
Fast forward to Oct. 12, when Trump announced he would halt the payments. Democrats howled that Trump was sabotaging the health law. Sen. Chris Murphy, D. Conn., accused the president of "health care arson," an inflammatory, untrue statement.
Trump's decision lobs the issue back to Congress, where it belongs. But tragically that's where insurers have more sway than taxpayers.
Denying it's a "bailout," Alexander claims "we have strong language in the Alexander-Murray agreement that consumers get the money, not the insurance companies." Those are weasel words. In truth, low-income consumers are already guaranteed breaks on copays and deductibles under the ACA. This agreement gives them nothing extra. The money is paid directly to insurers, going straight to profits.
California Attorney General Xavier Becerra, one of 19 AGs trying to circumvent Judge Collyer's ruling by suing in the left-leaning Ninth Circuit, claims that without the payments, millions of families "would be left in the cold without coverage." Nonsense. The law guarantees low-income families insurance. What it does not do is guarantee insurers a profit.
As for threats that without the payments, insurers will hike premiums, hurting consumers -- don't buy that. State regulators have the final say on premiums.
Of course, bailing out insurers will keep them participating in Obamacare, propping up the failing system. That's the Democrats' goal, to preserve Obama's legacy. But Republicans are fools to go along. It's pouring taxpayer money down the rat-hole. Why would lawmakers do that unless they're in bed with the insurance industry?
Trump has been all over the board on this. If Congress passes something then Trump will sign it.
“If Congress passes something then Trump will sign it.”
We shall see, Doggie. Interesting times.
That’s just the stuff on top of the table.
The under-the-table stuff is an ocean of money that makes multi-millionaires out of every member of Congress.
Section 1402 of the PPACA:
“An issuer of a qualified health plan making reductions under this subsection shall notify the Secretary of such reductions and the Secretary shall make periodic and timely payments to the issuer equal to the value of the reductions.”
It’s a federal reimbursement of insurer-paid (mainly Democratic) patient co-pay reductions paid to hospitals and doctors, etc.
It only benefits the insurers by keeping the PPACA afloat so they can make profits off of it.
The real problem is that no fixes that we would want are being made in exchange for the federal PPACA bailout.
I need lower cost plan options such as EMTALA hospitalization only with say a $10,000 deductible.
Others need an end to the PPACA fines.
Employers need to expand beyond 49 employees.
Millions of employees need to be able to work over 29 hours a week.
I can see how this plays out.
- Bill sails thru both houses of Congress
- Trump vetoes
- Congress does the bidding of its K Street masters and overrides his veto
- Trump uses the resulting voter anger to dismantle the RINO Party.
I think you’re right. Congress will never starve a cash cow.
+1
They may be trying - doubt they will reach their goal....
Ask President Trump to veto it.
This would be disastrous.
<>The Citizens of the United States have never wanted . . . Obamacare.<>
So true; it is true of EVERY social justice program since Social Security.
Twenty-eight states opposed ZeroCare in court. Scotus brazenly rewrote the law to save it. It wasn’t enough. Obamacare is a light burden on the poor. It wasn’t designed so much for healthcare, but rather to destroy the middleclass. Congressmen and their staffs are exempt.
This isn’t republican government.
What’s new. That is SOP.
So one way or another, they are bound and determined to make the hard-working middle class pay for this massive redistribution of wealth. Some of it into the pockets of deadbeats and welfare cheats, and huge amounts of it into the pockets of insurance execs, politicians, and their cronies.
So far, every replacement plan had billions of bailout attached and he was ready to sign all of them.
Suddenly, it’s a different story. Praise God for the freedom Caucus who wouldn’t let the bailout bills through. They took a personal hammering from the prez, who obviously was pro insurance company bailout just a few weeks ago.
As someone once said "on your way up to the top make sure you have a good accountant, priest, lawyer, a few journalists, judge and politician on your payroll".
You'll never be held guilty for anything if you do it right.
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