On July 21 President Obama delivered yet another canned speech in his string of appearances and speeches promoting his attempt at nationalized health-care. A health-care reform package that is unwanted by the American people and quickly becoming so unpopular – even amongst his fellow Democrats – that the One, himself, must descend from mount Olympus, summon of his dwindling political clout, and stump for it. It is only natural that in the face of the precipitous fall in Obamacare’s popularity that the Man-Child return to the campaign trail – campaigning is his strong suit – after all, it is the only job that Obama has held for more than a year.
The following are selected portions of the Campaigner-in-Chief’s prepared remarks delivered on July 21st, and UR’s response to them. The full transcript can be found here.
Before getting to his health-care promotion spiel Capt. Oblivious heartily patted himself on the back for helping kill off funding for the F-22 Raptor program. In and of itself this is innocuous but the words chosen make it entirely too tempting to not quote and respond.
But I reject the notion that we have to waste billions of taxpayer dollars on outdated and unnecessary defense projects to keep this nation secure. That’s why I’ve taken steps to greatly reduce no- bid defense contracts. That’s why I’ve signed overwhelmingly bipartisan legislation to limit cost overruns on weapons systems before they spiral out of control.
And that’s why I’m grateful that the Senate just voted against an additional $1.75 billion to buy F-22 fighter jets that military experts and members of both parties say we do not need.
Funny how spending $1.75 billion on a defense project that provides thousands of jobs to workers of all different career fields is wasteful… but spending $787 billion on absolutely nothing – other than untracked political payouts – isn’t. Not to mention the fact that the Raptor program provides more economic stimulus than the entire stimulus package, and killing it ends more jobs than the stimulus “creates.” I can not speak intelligently on whether or not the F-22 program itself is wasteful… but what I can say is that I would rather $1.75 billion be spent holding those jobs than $787 billion be spent buying votes.
Now, I’ve also said that health care costs are the biggest drivers of our deficit. Nobody disputes that. So I’m looking forward to meeting with several members of Congress who are working to pass health insurance reform that will bring down long-term costs, expand coverage, and provide more choice.
First, government spending and entitlements are the biggest drivers of our deficit. If by health care Obama means Medicare and Medicaid then he would be correct (stimulus, bank and auto buyouts notwithstanding). Given that both Medicare and Medicaid are government run health care, both are broke, and both are in the president’s own words the biggest drivers of our deficit, then why would a nationalized health plan be any different? Those facts alone shoot Obama’s arguments in the foot when it comes to costs, coverage and choices.
These opponents of reform would rather score political points than offer relief to Americans who’ve seen premiums double and costs grow three times faster than wages. They would maintain a system that works for the insurance and the drug companies, while becoming increasingly unaffordable for families and for businesses.
Opponents would rather have a free market system that actually works, is currently the best in the world, and one that wouldn’t completely bankrupt the U.S. We would also like a system that does not include government rationing of health care. The system that we seek to maintain is the best medical system in the world – even the WHO has that documented. As for working for the insurance and drug companies… What makes that a bad thing? They profit, those profits are turned into investments and research dollars. Those research dollars provide new drugs and therapies that improve the quality and cost of health care. The affordability issue is rather simple. If health care becomes too unaffordable, then people will no longer have it and those providers will go under. If we wish to make health care truly more affordable we can do so by relinquishing the current restrictions, mandated by federal government, that prevent meaningful competition across state lines. Why not improve upon what is already the best… instead of destroying it in favor of what is demonstratively far worse?
We’ve agreed that our health reform bill will promote choice. America — Americans will be able to compare the price and quality of different plans and pick the plan that they want.
Promote what choice? As has been shown and as I have stated numerous times on this site, a public plan destroys choice – because it destroys the economic viability of maintaining a private plan while already paying for the public one. Not to mention that sticky little Section 102 of HR3200 that essentially outlaws private insurance. How’s that for choice?
If you like your current plan, you will be able to keep it. Let me repeat that: If you like your plan, you’ll be able to keep it. And each bill provides for a public option that will keep insurance companies honest, ensuring the competition necessary to make coverage affordable.
Once again I refer to Section 102 of HR3200 that actually outlaws private insurance. When asked about this little section, the Man-Child president disavowed knowledge of this section stating that, “You know, I have to say that I am not familiar with the provision you are talking about.” Allow me to refresh the memory:
(1) LIMITATION ON NEW ENROLLMENT-
(A) IN GENERAL- Except as provided in this paragraph, the individual health insurance issuer offering such coverage does not enroll any individual in such coverage if the first effective date of coverage is on or after the first day of Y1.
What this could mean is that there are no new policies allowed to be issued after enactment. However, some say that it means that no new “old” policies can be issued… but the new policies must meet the requirements of HR3200. However, the language of the bill allows for the outlawing of private plans. Yet even if it means that new policies must meet the new standards it effectively kills the private insurance companies because they will simply not be able to compete effectively against a tax payer paid public plan. That is the exact purpose of the new mandates on private insurers, to drive them out of business – and make no mistake about it, it will. Thereby leaving us with only the public plan… and nationalized health care.
We’ve agreed that our health reform bill will protect American families from financial catastrophe if they get sick. That’s why each of these bills has out-of-pocket limits that will help ensure that families don’t go bankrupt because of illness.
Those “out-of-pocket” limits will be compensated for by the American tax payers. Private insurance companies simply cannot compete with that kind of money output. And the American tax payer – and therefor the American economy – simply cannot handle the kind of tax increases needed to pay for it. In light of those facts, how is it that this bill protects American families? It doesn’t, it hurts them far more than the current system.
Time and again, the American people have suffered because people in Washington played the politics of the moment instead of putting the interests of the American people first.
Isn’t that precisely what Obama is doing right now? Isn’t that precisely what he was doing with TARP II, the bank bailouts, the auto bailouts – and subsequent takeovers – all at the expense of the American people? The fact of the matter is that that is precisely what Obama is doing with health care. He’s playing politics with our health and our money… and the facts show that there is no way on earth that Obamacare is putting the American people’s interests first. Not with the cost and repercussions of the bill.
That’s how we ended up with premiums rising three times faster than wages. That’s how we ended up with businesses choosing between shedding benefits and shutting their doors. That’s how we’ve been burdened with runaway costs and huge gaps in coverage.
No, we got there due to federal and state government mandates, entitlements like Medicare and Medicaid, frivolous lawsuits, a complete lack of tort reform, and by providing millions of illegal immigrants with free health care. Address those things and we won’t have the listed problems anymore.
[Americans] care about whether their families will be crushed by rising premiums, whether the businesses they work for will have to cut jobs, or whether their children are going to be saddled with debt.
I’m glad that Capt. Oblivious brought this up since if enacted, HR3200 will accomplish all of these things. Private insurers will be forced to raise premiums (that most employers currently pay) in order to provide the mandated coverages which will translate into either dropping coverage or job cuts (or both) – since the bill includes heavy fines for businesses that do not provide health care coverage to employees. As for saddling our children with debt…. where does Obama think the money for his nationalized health plan is going to come from? It isn’t as if we have the money for it now… we don’t. It will have to be paid for constantly, and that means more debt for our children. Of course, if saddling our children with debt were an issue for him to begin with, then there would have been no TARP, TARP II, auto bailout, bank bailout, much less the so called “Stimulus package.” All of which have resulted in an untenable amount of debt that our children’s children will be paying the interest on.
But as usual, Obama is more than willing to glance over all of the facts in favor of his personal agenda. Above all else he ignores the simple fact that the majority of Americans do not want his health care plan… which is why its popularity is tanking faster than MSNBC’s ratings. And that alone is the reason for pushing to get it passed before the Fall break. He knows that the more the people learn of Obamacare, the less they want anything to do with it. He has said as much himself. “If we don’t pass this thing this year.. then it won’t get done.”