Category Archives: Obamacare

Reaching Across the Aisle? Arizona Senators Illustrate How Republicans are Failing America 0 (0)

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Reaching Across the Aisle? Arizona Senators Illustrate How Republicans are Failing America- “Paul Ryan couldn’t persuade him. Neither could Mike Pence. And in the end, President Donald Trump couldn’t reel in John McCain either.”

by Bill Lockwood

First it was John McCain’s last-minute betrayal on ObamaCare. Now it is Jeff Flake’s unwillingness to invoke the so-called “nuclear option” to remove the same socialistic monstrosity that will bring America into the totalitarian pit. For Flake’s betrayal of conservative values GOPUSA website labels him “flakier” than McCain. Both Arizona Senators epitomize what is wrong with the Republican Party.

Republicans have campaigned on repealing ObamaCare ever since the statist measure became law. John McCain and the Republicans voted for its repeal on a number of occasions. As all GOP legislators have done, they wrung their hands over it, bemoaning the fact that without a Republican president conservatives never will have a chance. That was a safe methodology. Their “repeal bills” never had a chance of passing the president’s desk as long as Marxist Obama sat in the Oval Office. Finally, Americans have what they “thought” they wished for—a Republican in the presidency encouraging the Senate to finish off Big Government in the Health Care Industry.

It was last week’s “skinny repeal” bill than even ObamaCare opponent Rand Paul supported. As Kelly Walsh writes, “The plan looked like it was going to pass until Arizona Senator John McCain dramatically provided the third and final GOP ‘no’ vote to kill the Republicans seven-year quest to repeal Obamacare.”

Politico explained: “Paul Ryan couldn’t persuade him. Neither could Mike Pence. And in the end, President Donald Trump couldn’t reel in John McCain either. The President made a last-ditch effort, calling the Arizona Senator and key holdout on the GOP’s repeal measure, as the bill’s fate hung in the balance.” All to naught.

McCain strode into the Senate after lunch and gave a dramatic “No” vote as stunned gasps echoed through the chamber. Constitution be hanged.

Now the second senator from Arizona, Jeff Flake, in an interview on “Face the Nation,” where he talked about his new book “Conscience of a Conservative,” criticizes the direction of the Republican Party saying it has “lost its way.” “We’ve given in to nativism and protectionism” he explained in a veiled attack on Trump’s “America First” agenda.

Particularly responding to President Trump’s encouragement to use the “nuclear option” which requires only a 51 vote majority instead of the traditional 60, Flake said that changing the rules to invoke the nuclear option would be a “mistake.” “We are at our best in the Senate when we work across the aisle,” he told CBS news.

What of These Things?

Americans are sick of weak-spined, if not treasonous, Republican Senators and Congressmen who continue to pretend that our nation is simply in the midst of a gentlemanly disagreement about the best policies, as if the differences between the left and right are similar to the distinctions between Thomas Jefferson and Alexander Hamilton. These softie Republicans refuse to acknowledge that we have been practically ruined by the ungodly, unconstitutional intrusion of Marxist-style street-thuggery tactics in the halls of government for almost a century and our great nation is fast being re-shaped into a totalitarian nightmare.

These are desperate times in which communist infiltration has been so thorough at all levels of American culture that radicals have almost completely destroyed the Founders’ concept of limited government. America will not be saved from the throes of socialism by the Flake’s and McCain’s who wish to “reach across the aisle.”

Why reach “across the aisle” Jeff Flake? Who can forget the pictures of “closed doors” as Obama’s Democratic Congress secretly met without one single Republican in order to push us into socialized medicine? ObamaCare passed with a 60 vote margin. Not only was this accomplished solely by Democrats—not one single Republican voting in favor of it—but Obama’s Congress later invoked the “nuclear option” in order to cram through more of its lawless agenda. All of this in spite of the fact that polls in the USA consistently showed Americans, by a large measure, disfavored the Obama agenda.

However, there is no need to reach back into even recent history. Witness the manner in which the Democrat base continues to viciously attack our President, even to the point of threatening murder and violence. Congressional Democrats, if not feeding the mindless media frenzy about Russian influence in America, have continued to threaten with nonsensical measures as impeachment. This is a nation out of control, in large part because of liberals who have never learned to put a governor on their own tongues or actions.

The Democrats demonstrated that they intend to be lewd and lawless, from the Fast & Furious controversy to the shutting down parts of the oil industry to robbing American workers to pay for socialized medicine to intruding into every neighborhood to revamp it under the HUD program called Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing (AFFH). Yet, when Republicans are placed in positions in which they can stop this descent into political Sodom and restore sanity for the American citizen Jeff Flake wants to “reach across the aisle.” Unbelievable.

Flake and McCain may be in lock-step with the international agenda (aka, World Government) in which the U.S. Congress is merely a figurehead beneath the control of the United Nations, but to those who cherish American constitutional values and individual liberty their endorsement of and/or allowance of ObamaCare to continue to ruin the lives of hard-working Americans should be their last legislative step.

Republicans are the Problem 0 (0)

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Republicans are the Problem- “They are on the brink of allowing Obama to Trump them all. ”

by Bill Lockwood

As I have stated for a long time, it is not the socialist-Marxists of the Democratic Party who are problematic for Americans—it is the Republicans. The Democrats, with only a two-year window during Obama’s first term, quickly turned one-fifth of our economy on the road to socialized medicine. No fuss among them; no wrangling; no hesitation. We know where they stand. What Americans need is principled opposition to this onslaught. Now that the Republicans have control of not only the Congress but the White House, we are learning they are not the standard-bearers of these constitutional principles. They are on the brink of allowing Obama to Trump them all.

Since the Affordable Health Care Act passed in 2010 government mandates, gigantic premium hikes and loss of quality health care has become the norm. This was not a failure—it was the design. Throw Americans onto government-run socialized medicine, which Obama previously had announced was the entire goal.

Republicans whined, wrung their hands, and postured continually at home and in Washington, D.C. that “there was nothing we can do about it” as long as Democrats controlled both Congress and the White House.

Voters responded by giving the House of Representatives to the Republicans in 2011. Republican Representatives, however, complained to voters that that was not enough. The electorate responded in 2015 by turning over both houses of Congress, the Senate and the House, to the GOP. A huge defeat for the Obama machine.

But what occurred? With budget reins in hand, including the ability to defund each of Obama’s statist unconstitutional programs, Republican majorities in Congress continued to fund ObamaCare.

Rank and file Americans at the grassroots were suspicious—and rightly so. They suspected that the stock answer quipped by Republican lawmakers—“we have sent repeal bills to the White House; but until we have a Republican there to sign the bill, we have no hope”—was a ploy. Their suspicions are today turning into reality.

Secretly, many of the GOP evidently hoped they would never get the White House. Not because they do not know how to govern, but because too many of them fundamentally agree with government-run entitlement programs and Americans would call their bluff.

Republicans know how to govern. What they do not know how to do is govern from a soft-socialist position, which is where their hearts lie, while maintaining a conservative face for their constituents. It is easier to satisfy angry voters by chirping that they have tried to stall our slide into statism than actually to stop unconstitutional programs with which they fundamentally agree—ObamaCare being the case in point.

This is the only evident reason that many GOP lawmakers, including the John McCain’s and Paul Ryan’s, were reticent to support President Trump. They knew that Trump would call their bluff. This is where we are now. At least there was no deceit with the Democrats’ position on Health Care. They openly campaign for a single-payer socialized system. Republicans are mired in subterfuge. Vaunting love for a limited constitutional system, too many of them are on the socialist bandwagon.

United Nations Healthcare v. The Bible 0 (0)

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United Nations Healthcare v. The Bible- “The only Constitutional and biblical solution to America’s health-care problem, therefore, is to repeal ObamaCare.”

by Bill Lockwood

As the Health Care debate wages in Congress and across America, the United Nations, fulfilling its world “governance” destiny, is seeking to influence our laws. Dainius Puras, the UN “Special Rapporteur on the right of everyone to enjoyment of the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health”, warned the Trump Administration in February that “repealing ObamaCare” would violate “international law.” The United States, in going back to a more constitutional government, would become a “human rights violator.”

This is more than merely meddlesome political pressure for Puras declares that it is the duty of the UN to manage America. “It is my responsibility, under the mandates provided me by the Human Rights Council, to seek to clarify all cases brought to my attention.” Puras demanded not only more information from the Trump Administration, but asserted the UN’s supposed responsibility to “prevent” violations by the United States. The Republicans would be committing illegal actions by International Law if ObamaCare is repealed because, according to the UN, healthcare is a “right” for all citizens to enjoy.

Back to Basics

Seeing the mass confusion on this issue led by the socialists of the world at the UN, let’s go back to pick up basic concepts.

First, if there is no God, there are no so-called “rights.” A “right” as normally defined refers to a moral or legal entitlement to something or to a certain behavior. But an “entitlement” by definition means “to give a right” or to “bestow a privilege.” The atheistic UN has no ground upon which to argue that any nation “ought” to do this or “ought not” to do that. Omitting God as the UN has done removes the basis from which to argue that anything should be “given” to some by others. Things just are. “Human rights” are just the personal tastes of those who populate the World Dictator’s Club known as the United Nations.

Second, the inalienable “rights” of mankind, as set forth in our Declaration of Independence, are posited on the ground that they are gifts of God. Important it is for Bible students to recognize that nowhere does God actually speak of “man’s rights” in the sense of “entitlements.” One might argue that rights to life, liberty and property are implied due to the fact that murder and theft are forbidden (Exo. 20:15; Dt. 5:21) and the ability to own private property is assumed. So also is my ability to earn a living wage (1 Cor. 9:9-11).

But it is just as important to recognize the fact that these privileges are actually blessings from God and not entitlements that are owed to me by my Maker.

Third, good health is actually itself not a “right” but a blessing from God. Not every person in the world is born with good health. Many have defects and diseases due to the sin-cursed earth upon which we live. Resentment can easily be created in persons who have disabilities if they assume the notion that they are “entitled” to good health by God. If we consider good health in life a “blessing” from God we are much closer to a biblical frame of mind.

Fourth, maintaining my health is a personal responsibility which I have, not a “right” to which I am entitled. My body actually belongs to God and is considered a temple of the Holy Spirit (1 Cor. 6:9-11). My physical body is a “gift” from God which prevents me from abusing it or destroying it with health-altering drugs or lifestyles. How many myriads of people deliberately abuse their bodies into poor health? Whose is responsible for addictive behaviors or poor choices that people make pertaining to their bodies?

Fifth, health care is a service provided by some people on the behalf of others. Becoming a doctor or nurse is no different than becoming a carpenter, plumber, or even an attorney—except for the amount of training that is necessary. These are all occupations by which people serve others for profit. Health care therefore is the means whereby I can fulfill my God-ordered responsibility to my body and to family members under my care. There is no difference in principle in my hiring a doctor to serve myself or my family than hiring a carpenter to build my house. Health care is not a right owed to me by others.

Government intrusion via ObamaCare and all socialized medicine schemes are actually forcing individuals who are in the professional business of providing health-care to serve some people for little or no compensation—or, for compensation provided by a taxpayer.

There is no difference between this and slavery. For government to overstep its God-ordered bounds of maintaining order to extract money from me in order to provide for others who may or may not have the means to care for themselves is a form of slavery, pure and simple. Government run Health-Care also enslaves health care providers by forcing them to provide for others at either their own expense, or others’ expense.

The only Constitutional and biblical solution to America’s health-care problem, therefore, is to repeal ObamaCare. This may make America, in the eyes of the UN, a “human rights violator,” but according to the world body, it prefers communist dictatorships to freedom.

As Jefferson famously observed, “…a wise and frugal government which shall restrain men from injuring one another, shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned. This is the sum of good government.”

RyanCare Does Not Eliminate Government Playing Doctor 0 (0)

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RyanCare Does Not Eliminate Government Playing Doctor- …wearing the mantle of Franklin Roosevelt who helped turn America upside down and create a socialistic state…”

by Bill Lockwood

The proposed Republican version of ObamaCare, known as the American Health Care Act (ACHA), is just that– a lighter “version” of the Affordable Care Act—but certainly not a repeal as demanded by voters last fall. It is true that some of the provisions of the ACA, such as the individual mandate, have been cut. However, Republicans have retained their own set of Federal mandates. In the words of Senator Mike Lee (R-Utah), “This is not the Obamacare repeal bill we’ve been waiting for. It is a missed opportunity and a step in the wrong direction.” Bottom line: the Republican version of Health Care, the ACHA, fails to recognize that, in the words of Ronald Reagan, “government is the problem.”

First is the AHCA regulation requiring insurers to accept all applicants and charge them the same rates regardless of pre-existing conditions. This is known as “community rating.” According to Michael Tennant (The New American, 3-8-17) “community rating” is the cause of the death spiral that health insurance is now experiencing under the ACA. It encourages the sick to buy coverage immediately while the healthy are encouraged to forgo it until they need it. This is why Obama placed individual mandates in the ACA. But free markets are not created by federal pressure, either a Democrat or Republican-controlled Washington, D.C.

Second, RyanCare also prohibits caps on lifetime coverage. According to the government website hhs.gov the current law (ACA) prohibits health plans from putting annual or lifetime dollar limits on most benefits you receive. Previously, “many plans set a lifetime limit—a dollar limit on what they would spend for your covered benefits during the entire time you were enrolled in that plan” (latimes.com).  According to Fortune magazine, “Like Obamacare, ACHA also prohibits insurers from putting an annual or lifetime dollar limit on how much benefits a patient may receive.”

Let’s translate with illustration.

America is plagued with burgeoning health problems, in part caused by such practices as illegal drug use. Young and old alike are flooding into treatment centers because of one type of addiction or another. Many treatments are subsidized by the American taxpayer. This is an “entitlement” pure and simple. Again, no free market and no incentive for personal responsibility.

Third, RyanCare imposes its own mandate known as the “continuing coverage” mandate. Seth Chandler, writing in Forbes online (3-6-17) explains that section 133 of the AHCA requires insurers to charge purchasers a 30% “penalty” if they “obtain coverage in a given year without having had coverage the preceding year.” Individuals are “incentivized” to purchase health insurance “even in those years when they feel the premiums are high relative to their expected costs.”

In other words, the Republicans under Paul Ryan are keeping “mandates”–albeit in a more subtle fashion. “No one will be forced to do so—it won’t be a tax on doing nothing like the ACA imposed—but, if people know about the penalty, it might be fairly effective and feel somewhat less coercive.” It is government coercion just the same.

Fourth, then there is the “tax credit.” The GOP plan retains ObamaCare “tax credits” for the purchase of insurance. These “credits” may sound like tax “cuts,” but in truth they are not. The Cato Institute’s Michael Cannon noted, “To the extent that the bill’s modified tax credits are tax reduction … they are the functional equivalent of ObamaCare’s individual mandate.”

This is because the “tax credits” are available only to those who purchase health insurance. Those who do not purchase health insurance must pay more to the IRS than those who do. This is a mandate and another entitlement.

For all the trumpet-blasting by the Republicans as they convene to rid America of the socialistic morass in which the health care industry is now engulfed, they cannot bring themselves to return to a Constitutional concept of limited government where more personal responsibility is required of citizens. Instead, they are wearing the mantle of Franklin Roosevelt who helped turn America upside down and create a socialistic state wherein the workers of America continue to be robbed to pay for more entitlements.

Most importantly, federal government involvement in health care is unconstitutional. Though America is used to thinking of the Constitution in terms of what federal judges, including the Supreme Court, may say it means, those who crafted it were very clear. Samuel Adams, though not of the Constitutional Convention, was Governor of Massachusetts and a delegate to the Continental Congress. He noted,

“The utopian schemes of leveling [income redistribution], and a community of goods [central ownership of property], are as visionary and impracticable as those which vest all property in the Crown. [These ideas] are arbitrary, despotic, and, in our government, unconstitutional.”

Benjamin Franklin, the most elderly delegate to the Constitutional Convention, warned us of the collectivist left and its raft of “entitlements.” After living many years in Europe and witnessing redistribution programs first-hand, he had plenty to say about the evils of those systems into which we now have been led. To a friend he wrote, “I have long been of your opinion, that your legal provision for the poor [in England] is a very great evil, operating as it does to the encouragement of idleness.”

Entitlements are the problem. Retaining government mandates and entitlements by RyanCare sustains this unconstitutional system and is why the Republican ACHA is a “step in the wrong direction.” Our politically correct society is churning out young people who have been given subsidized education, food, housing, health care, and even subsidized incarceration. Entitlements incentivize poor choices while punishing responsible choices. RyanCare continues this sad legacy.

 

What’s the Problem, Republicans? 0 (0)

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What’s the Problem, Republicans?- “Turn it around. Repeal ObamaCare now…”

by Bill Lockwood

According to The Washington Post, Republicans have voted a total of 54 times to repeal, revoke, or tweak the ObamaCare (Affordable Care Act) law during President Obama’s tenure in office. Voters continually heard the whining from Republicans that they, at first, did not have enough votes to repeal it completely. Then we gave them both houses of Congress. Whimpering from Republicans took on a new form: “President Obama will just veto our bills.” Now Republicans have both houses of Congress as well as the Oval Office. But, according to multiple media reports, a plan by Speaker Paul Ryan (R-WI) will simply “repair” it. This is deception.

According to Ken Cuccinelli, the president of Senate Conservatives Action, the plan written by the House includes advanceable, refundable tax credits to buy insurance—a costly new entitlement. More empowering of the IRS to write checks to people who pay no taxes is not what the Trump Revolution is about!

Ryan’s plan also includes retaining portions of ObamaCare, including Medicaid expansion. Growth of government. Senator Majority leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY), another leading Neo-Con, is poised to accuse the opposition to RyanCare of “blocking repeal”, when in point of fact they are betraying the American Voter.

This reminds me of what President Reagan used to lament: government programs are the nearest thing to eternal life found on this planet. Especially is this the case when Republicans have not the backbone, will, fortitude, or desire to roll back government expansion that citizens might enjoy God-given liberty.

Former Senator Jim DeMint (R-SC), who now heads the Heritage Foundation, says it just right: “We must and we can repeal ObamaCare now… They should send that same bill to President Trump right now.” I suggest that conservatives take the position of the much criticized Nancy Pelosi (D-CA). She said, “Let’s pass it [ObamaCare] to find out what’s in it.” Turn it around. REPEAL ObamaCare now—then we will worry about what are the effects and what to do about them tomorrow.

Democrats complain that up to 18 million insured will lose their coverage. This argument illustrates that the Democrats are always playing fast-pitch hardball and the Republicans are playing slow-pitch softball. What did Obama “care” that millions would lose their current coverage; pay higher premiums; pay huge deductibles; have inferior plans; be forced to purchase coverages that they did not need; be forced into poorer care?

Costs of coverage under ObamaCare in Arizona have sky-rocketed over 100%. In Oklahoma it is the same as well as numerous other states. Jonathan Gruber, the chief architect of ObamaCare, admitted that they had to LIE to the American people in order to get it passed, which Obama was nimble enough with a compliant media to do. Democrats knew full-well that all of this turmoil would ensue after cramming through mandated medicine. They were simply elated to push us into a more socialized state.

If Republicans cannot get as excited to return to a more limited government by negating the most unpopular expansion of government since the time of FDR—Repeal ObamaCare Now—they will ensure that Donald Trump will be a one-term president.

Tom Deweese: The Solution to Healthcare Reform 0 (0)

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The Solution to Healthcare Reform – “Let the insurance companies create policies to fit the market’s needs.”

by Tom DeWeese

As the Republicans in Congress struggle to present a workable replacement to Obamacare, the solution is staring them in the face. It’s called free enterprise.

The only reason we need massive insurance programs today is because of government meddling in healthcare. It started with Medicare in which government dictated percentages it would pay for services. Insurance companies followed suit. Therefore, forcing doctors and hospitals to raise prices to make more money from those established percentages. To prove that fact, simply go to a hospital as an uninsured patient and observe how much they deduct from your final bill. Insurance would have had to pay the higher price.

Then, with the intrusion of government came the inevitable paperwork. Lots of it. Today, under the Affordable Care Act doctors and hospitals need full time staffs just to fill out the paperwork. That costs money. Eliminate it.

Now there are rules and regulations on who must be treated and what procedures must be used. Of course, like all things government, these rules and regulations haven’t been written by doctors, but by bureaucrats serving various special interests who stand to gain financially. Eliminate them.

Read 
Tom DeWeese’s book, “Erase: A Political Thriller”

What’s the solution? It’s simple. Get government completely out of the healthcare industry where they don’t belong. Don’t try to write whole new policies. Let the insurance companies create policies to fit the market’s needs. Let them advertise for customers. Let them fight it out among themselves in the market place and let the customers choose which company has the policy that fits their needs.

Repeal Obamacare with no government replacement and watch how fast and creatively these insurance companies rush to the solution, just like every industry, including car insurance.

Oh, but wait. You can’t do that, say the liberals with great compassion. We have these poor who can’t afford to pay for insurance. Well, there is a solution and it’s full of compassion. In the America of the past we had a great legacy of charity. Americans are a generous people. We used to have community funds, service clubs and churches dedicated to helping the less fortunate. What happened to them?

Nearly everyone has been replaced by a government program. Instead of people helping voluntarily according to their ability and interest, they have been ruthlessly and unrelentingly taxed to the point of suffocation. As a result, they have stopped giving to charities which subsequently have disappeared.

Yet, there is still a fantastic example of human generosity, concern and caring that exists today, even in the socialist world of control. Organizations like St. Jude Children Center and the Shriners Hospital collect money from private donations and provide services free to families in need. Imagine how such programs would soar and fulfill the needs of every American if we were all simply allowed to make our own choices with our own money.

Congress, just repeal Obamacare and let the free market work for everyone. Now, let’s get on with draining the rest of the swamp!

Read Tom Deweese’s Biography