It is a rare moment indeed when faith denominations of all stripes unite together in common cause, and it is rarer still when that cause is a political one, with a sole piece of legislation as its principal target. But when that law eviscerates the very foundation of religious liberty in America as protected under the First Amendment, it should not be surprising that Catholics and Jews, charismatic evangelical Christians, and mainline Lutherans alike find common cause in defense of their liberties.

Such is the case with the firestorm of opposition to Obamacare and the Obama Administration’s attack on religious liberty. Under a new Obamacare mandate issued by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), the White House is mandating that many religious employers, with the exception of churches, provide health care coverage for contraception — including abortion-inducing drugs — thereby trampling upon their constitutionally guaranteed free exercise of religion. And it is this mandate that has caused a vehement response in churches and synagogues across the country.

Yesterday, the head of the Catholic League, Bill Donohue, warned that the nation’s 70 million Catholics are ready to go to war with the Administration’s dictates, saying “Never before, unprecedented in American history, for the federal government to line up against the Roman Catholic Church. This is going to be fought out with lawsuits, with court decisions, and, dare I say it, maybe even in the streets.”

Donohue’s remarks follow those of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops and at least 153 Catholic bishops across the country who have weighed in with opposition to the mandate. “We Catholics will be compelled to either violate our consciences, or to drop health coverage for our employees and suffer the penalties for doing so,” wrote Bishop Alexander Sample of Marquette, Michigan. Those penalties include fines imposed by the federal government that could cost larger organizations millions of dollars per year.

The Catholic Church is not alone in its opposition to Obamacare’s onslaught against religious freedom. David Addington, The Heritage Foundation’s vice president of Domestic and Economic Policy, details the growing ranks of the faithful who say the Obama Administration has crossed a very dangerous line. The National Association of Evangelicals commented that “The HHS rules trample on our most cherished freedoms and set a dangerous precedent” and the Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America stated, “In declining to expand the religious exemption within the healthcare reform law, the Obama Administration has disappointingly failed to respect the needs of religious organizations such as hospitals, social welfare organizations and more.” The Agudath Israel of America stated its opposition, as did the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod and the Assembly of Canonical Orthodox Bishops of North and Central America.

The Obama Administration is beginning to feel the pressure. On Sunday, HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius authored an op-ed in USA Today defending the Obama Administration’s actions, claiming that a very narrow exemption to the mandate is evidence that the White House is “working to strike the right balance between respecting religious beliefs and increasing women’s access to critical preventive health services.” That exemption, though, does not apply to institutions like religious schools and hospitals. Sebelius might claim the Administration is offering grace to people of faith, but in fact it is not. In an editorial that ran the same day as Sebelius,’ USA Today agreed with those standing on the side of religious liberty, writing that “in drawing up the rules that will govern health care reform” the Obama Administration “galloped over” the line and violated the “simple proposition that the government should steer away from meddling in church affairs.”

The Obama Administration’s actions, though entirely counter to the freedom of religion, should not be surprising given the nature of the President’s health care law. Obamacare has given the federal government broad power over one-sixth of the American economy and thereby purports to grant Washington the power to force religious institutions to take actions contrary to their faith. Addington writes that this kind of concentration of power “has proved to be a drastic and dangerous experiment.” America’s religious leaders and the faithful have awoken to this wolf at their door and are lashing out in defense of their freedoms. Congress, too, should act now by repealing Obamacare and restoring the religious liberty that is so central to our way of life.

How Many Adults Believe in God?

The vast majority of American adults hold a definite belief in God. Yet, despite this persistence of belief in America and the important place of religious practice in civil society, an increasingly narrow view of religion is threatening to force faith out of the public square.

Sadly, too many are letting the anti faith people dictate what we can, and cannot do.  The 1st Amendment has been distorted and twisted to a point where the Founders would not recognize the actions connecting with the words.

Consider the recent mandate by the Department of Health and Human Services that will require almost all insurance providers to cover contraceptives, sterilization procedures, and education and counseling regarding such services—without cost to the insured. The rule includes mandatory coverage of ethically controversial drugs like ella, which can act as an abortifacient.

If a person is forced to go against their faith, to sin against the Word of God, forced to violate their deeply held principles, isn’t that a violation of the 1st Amendment?

Employers with moral and religious objections to providing such insurance coverage will find little recourse in the mandate’s narrow religious exemption. While the mandate’s potential threat to employers’ religious freedom is already causing a stir in court rooms and in the nation’s capital, the struggle to protect conscience rights on morally divisive issues is sure to continue well into the future.

I suppose this administration, and it’s cronies in Congress that pushed through a bill the vast majority of Americans did not want, is choosing to condemn believers to an eternity separated from God.   The alternative would be not to provide insurance for their employees, and face the fines.  Or, just close their doors and put more people out of work.

I made it to the hospital, on time. I already had everything filled out, and taken care of before hand. Or so I thought. I provided the info. Is it my fault the person on the other side of the desk didn’t bother to include the proper info that I provided? UGH. Well, he was a nice guy and all, but making me feel like I had screwed up at 6am is not a real good idea. Finally, they figured out someone failed to scan in the proper info from my insurance card. After many apologies, we got it all straightened out. Things started to proceed smoothly. Well, as smoothly as waiting around for hours can be. They finally got me stripped and in that ever so lovely hospital peignoir.

Naturally, there was some more waiting involved. A few folks came in, stabbed me with a variety of sharp pointy implements, a few which actually stayed where they were suppose to, after the use of many rolls of tape. But not once did I see the guy with the dimples who was suppose to do all the slicing and dicing. Odd. One guy was a cardiologist who wasn’t aware there was actually a permission slip from my heart doc saying I could get the slicing and dicing. Doesn’t anyone ever actually LOOK at all this information doctors and patients provide? Naw….I guess not.  Too much work? sigh….

Someone finally decided I had waited long enough, and came to get me to take me to……well, there’s some initials they called it, but suffice it to say, it was the room in a long line of rooms ya wait in.  They were quite nice in that room.  On either side of me, I could hear elderly people talking, and it was quite sad.  The nurse would say something, and the man would ask “Why am I here?”  The same thing kept happening on the other side with the elderly lady.  The nurses patiently explain each time they had broke a hip, and had to have surgery.  Neither remembered breaking anything, and neither seemed to remember the conversation about why they were there within 5 minutes.  It just made me want to cry.  I could tell they were both quite scared, but their spirits seemed to be up, so I’m sure they both pulled through just fine.  At least I pray so. 

After a while, the anesthesiologist came in and explained two options.  The regular kind, and then what he wanted to do…which is like an epidural they give ya when ya have a baby.  I don’t remember that epidural being all that effective, but what the heck, I’m game.  So, they had me lean over this table, major draft going on from behind, and that’s the last thing I remember.  No idea what he did, but I’ve got a major blank until I vaguely remember my pastor peaking around the door, taking a look at all the people in that tiny room, none of whom I remember seeing and saying he’d be back. And that was day 2. I lost 2 whole days. Dang! Well, not in the 48 hour sense, but a whole lot longer than 24.   Don’t remember him ever coming back.  Hmmmm….  Did I look that scary?

I do remember Kama, Kevin, Ashley and Emma bringing me a bag full of goodies, which came in real handy in the middle of the night. Nothing up there seems edible. Oh, I’m sure it was fine, but my tastes have copped attitude. Go figger! I even made an attempt at the word find thingy. But ya know what? It’s hard to find any words when the letters are all run together into one long black blur. Kama is now my hero! How did she know I was going to be in desperate need of a Twix at three in the morning?

I also vaguely remember the one person at church, Yvonne, who is shorter than me popping by. I think there was chocolate involved there too. Unfortunately, I didn’t actually SEE it until yesterday morning. Otherwise, it might never have made it home.

Days 1, 2, and 3, are basically a blur. However, I do have a strong memory of the Marquis de Sade’s torture device, also known physical therapy, which….lucky me….I got to bring home with me, along with a nice list of masochistic exercises. And yes, I HAVE been doing them. sigh….

They finally got around to changing the dressing on my knee. Ooooo….how lovely.

Yep. That’s actually a knee. Doesn’t much look like one, does it. Blech. But they tell me it’s doing nicely. How can they tell?

Day 4 was the whopper. Evidently, no one knew what was going on, including me because no one ever bother to tell me…..or the docs, or the nurses. Seems like someone decided I was ready to go home. Well, I’d like to dispute that, cuz honestly, one more night over there might have done me quite a bit of good. But it was not to be. One doctor, who wasn’t MY doctor, said it was all honky dorey and to get the ball rolling. The real problem started when he failed to inform anyone else of his decision. Oh, he told the P/T people who were suppose to get me set up with said torture device, but no one else. The nurse was quite surprised when I informed her that I got a phone call, and what it was about.

The big question….why did the woman call me on my cell phone, instead of talking to the hospital personnel first? No clue. And it all went down hill from there. Back and forth, back and forth until 9 o’clock last night. We FINALLY made it home around 11. Naturally, we had to hunt down a pharmacy that was open. Did you know just because Walgreen’s says it’s open 24 hours, doesn’t mean it is.

Home! Sounds great doesn’t it? Yeah….well, when you have four over zealous felines who are very happy to see you….not so great. I think they’ve all gained 10 pounds in the last few days. OOOOOMPH! sigh….

You’d think the surgery, physical therapy would have been the worst of it, right? Nope. The worst is the dadburn rashes! Every where there was adhesive, I have bruises and a rash.

Yeah….kind of hard to tell, but trust me…..I’m totally rashed! Thinking maybe I should take out some stock in Cortesone 10. I think I’m allergic to hospitals! I itch! A LOT! Probably the meds? Arms, legs, neck, etc. UGH! A nice scrub, a REAL shower, would probably do wonders, but alas….it’s not to be….YET! Once I’m able to wrap that sucker up, tape it real good, so no water can get it, you can believe I’ll be doing the mambo under a hot spray of water!

About the blogging. Well…I’ll still be off a few more days. The few minutes I can snatch of sleep, I will. Believe me! But, not to worry, I’ll be back! I’m kind of hard to get rid of, don’cha know.

Have I ever mentioned that I HATE hospitals? 

But it’s nice to get some purdies from Chris while there. 

Top Ten Things Obama Never Told You About Obamacare

1. Did you know that . . . since Jan. 1 of this year (2011), you cannot use your flex-account at work (FSA) or health savings account (HSA) to purchase over-the-counter medicines?

2. Did you know that . . . since July 1 of last year (2010), Americans have been paying a 10 percent excise tax on all indoor tanning services?

3. Did you know that . . . starting in 2018, if your health insurance is “too good” or considered a “Cadillac” plan, then you will incur a new 40 percent tax on your health plan?

4. Did you know that . . . Obamacare has 21 new or higher taxes in it, totaling over $500 billion in increased taxes going to the government over 10 years?

5. Did you know that . . . beginning in 2014, individuals and families that do not purchase “qualifying”  – as defined by federal bureaucrats — health insurance will be forced to pay a yearly tax penalty?

6. Did you know that . . . 7 tax hikes in Obamacare directly break President Obama’s “firm pledge” not to raise any form of taxes on individuals making less than $200,000 per year and families making less than $250,000 per year?

7. Did you know that . . . the capital gains tax rate under Obamacare will rise to 23.8 percent starting in 2012? That is a 59 percent increase from its current rate.

8. Did you know that . . . in 2013, those Americans facing the highest medical bills and the least ability to pay for them will find their ability to deduct medical expenses is further limited (medical expenses must be reduced by 10 percent of income under Obamacare, rather than current law’s 7.5 percent)

9. Did you know that . . . beginning in 2014, businesses with over 50 employees will be forced to offer health coverage for everyone, or pay a hefty tax for each employee?

10. Did you know that . . . in 2013, Obamacare caps the amount individuals and families can put in their flexible savings accounts at $2500? Currently there is no cap and these accounts are used for a myriad of health expenses including paying upwards of $14,000 in tuition to special needs schools for some parents?

Now, most women know what I mean, and most husband SHOULD know what that is, but for those of you who don’t….  Concealer is that little magic tube of makeup type stuff that conceals minor flaws….like dark circles and bags under your eyes when you don’t get enough sleep.  Ok, so it doesn’t exactly conceal completely, but it’s a good start.

That got me to thinking.  How many times in our lives to we use some sort of ‘concealer’.  There are things we just don’t want people to know about us.  I’m basically an open book, but there are many things about me that people don’t know.  Frankly, cuz it’s none of their flippin’ business.

There are a few folks who have basically got the big picture, the Mr for one.  Why would I try to conceal anything from the man I’m suppose to trust with my life?  Doesn’t make sense.  So, he knows some of the worst about me.   My pastor and a few select friends know a lot, but not everything.  And honestly, there are things I just don’t remember, for a variety of reasons. 

So, when I started thinking about this, it occurred to me, our so called political leaders use a lot of ‘concealer’.  And I mean a LOT!  They cover the ugly parts they don’t want you to see, but they are still there, and eventually, come to the surface.  Many will keep slapping on more and more concealer, in other words, lie….repeatedly, and expect us all to see and hear, only what they want us to see and hear.  We are too stupid to see through the facade, don’t ya know.  Haven’t they pretty much told us that, time and time again?

Take for example the comments Steve Cohen made on the House floor.

“They don’t like the truth so they summarily dismiss it,” he said. “They say it’s a government takeover of healthcare. A big lie just like [Nazi propaganda minister Joseph] Goebbels. You say it enough and you repeat the lie, repeat the lie, repeat the lie until eventually people believe it. Like blood libel, that’s the same kind of thing.

“The Germans said enough about the Jews and people believed it, and you have the Holocaust,” he added. “You tell a lie over and over again.”

Here we have a Jewish man, comparing his fellow Americans with Goebbels.  Nice.  Real flippin’ nice.  The problem is, it’s not the GOP that are spewing the lies, and expecting WE, The People to buy into them.  That would be YOUR side of the aisle, Stevie!  You see, WE have actually READ the bill.  Have you?  Thank you, once again, for embarrassing the state of Tennessee. 

Of course, he did try to do some back peddling.  I’m afraid you can’t get the toothpaste back in the tube.

Then we have one of the ‘queens of concealer’, Shelia Jackson Lee.  Definitely one of my favorites.  /snark Here we have the type of person who will use other people, even through a big fat lie, to attempt to slap down one of the more intelligent people who has interviewed her.  One of the HUGE problems is that, it’s all crap!  When someone shows up at a hospital, with a trauma, or seriously ill, they are NOT ever turned away.  DESPITE their ability to pay.

Just a side note:  There are people who use emergency rooms as their family clinic.  Illegals come to mind.  They are not turned away, even though they don’t pay, and as a consequence, many hospitals have had to close their doors, denying those who could, or would, pay, adequate health care.

Bureaucracies do not save lives.  Never have, never will.  This bill is nothing more than one huge bureaucracy, with the ability to control your life.  Lies.  And they keep repeating them.  Sadly, many have not attempted to see through the ‘concealer’ to what is really underneath.

If, on the off chance, that Cohen or Lee has actually READ the entire bill, that too speaks volumes about their ability to think rationally, as a freedom loving American.  I don’t believe either of them to be such a person.  Which is why, imho, they push so hard to deny the rest of us the freedoms granted to us by the Almighty, Himself.

There is not enough concealer in the world to cover all the “flaws” that came out of the Democrat controlled Congress.  We see through it!

A federal judge in Virginia has declared the Obama administration’s health care reform law unconstitutional.

U.S. District Judge Henry Hudson is the first judge to rule against the law, which has been upheld by two others in Virginia and Michigan.

Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli filed the lawsuit challenging the law’s requirement that citizens buy health insurance or pay a penalty starting in 2014.

He argues the federal government doesn’t have the constitutional authority to impose the requirement.

The federal government has been doing a LOT of things they do not have the constitutional authority to do, but that hasn’t stopped them. Perhaps, now, we can get things back on track, and abolish ALL the unconstitutional crap they have been foisting on us in the last few……decades?  I know this war isn’t over, but it’s a damn good victory.

After President Barack Obama installed Dr. Donald Berwick as head administrator of Medicare and Medicaid by recess appointment, Press Secretary Robert Gibbs was asked at the daily press briefing if “it would have been politically troublesome in an election year to have all these comments aired out about rationing, redistribution that Dr. Berwick had talked about in the past.”

Gibbs was ready for this question, though, and shot back: “Did he say things like, ‘rationing happens today; the question is who will do it’? Did he say that?” The bait laid, the reporter responded: “That was one comment.” The trap sprung, Gibbs pounced: “Actually that was Paul Ryan. That was Paul Ryan. He’s a Republican in Congress.” The White House press corps roared with laughter.

Gibbs may have won that round, but today Berwick is scheduled to testify before the Senate Finance Committee, and conservatives will have their first chance to question the bureaucrat in charge of implementing Obamacare’s many changes to the Medicare system. Hopefully Berwick’s past statements will not dominate the hearings but instead serve as a jumping-off point to shine light on the vast new powers Obamacare granted the federal government.

For starters, in June 2009, Berwick told Biotechnology Healthcare: “The decision is not whether or not we will ration care—the decision is whether we will ration with our eyes open. And right now, we are doing it blindly.” For comparison sake, here is the full version of the Gibbs-truncated Ryan quote from a 2009 interview with The Washington Post: “Rationing happens today! The question is who will do it? The government? Or you, your doctor and your family?”

Notice the fundamental difference between these two quotes? Ryan is asking “who” should ration care: individuals or the government. But Berwick just assumes the government has to ration care and is only concerned with how best to do it. And why does Berwick just assume that government should be rationing care? Well, here is what he said in July 2008 celebrating the 60th year of Britain’s National Health Service: “I cannot believe that the individual health care consumer can enforce through choice the proper configurations of a system as massive and complex as health care. That is for leaders to do.”

And empowering “leaders” to “enforce the proper configurations” of our health care system is exactly what Obamacare does. In a statement to the Senate Republic Policy Committee this September, Heritage Foundation senior fellow Robert Moffit wrote:

Under [Obamacare], there are 123 sections of the law dealing with various aspects of the Medicare program, ranging from changes in fee for service payment for hospitals, skilled nursing homes and home health care agencies, to major reductions in payment for Medicare Advantage plans. … As noted, under the original Medicare law, federal officials were explicitly forbidden to interfere with the practice of medicine. With the new law, it is not at all clear how physicians will be able to retain their traditional autonomy in the delivery of care, particularly under new compliance and reporting requirements related to the provision of quality of care, as determined by federal officials, and the existing restrictions on private contracting and balanced billing.

Moffit then goes on to detail how Obamacare’s Independent Payment Advisory Board, the Physician Quality Reporting Initiative, and the law’s directive to move away from fee-for-service medicine all empower Washington bureaucrats at the expense of doctors and patients. Over 60 years ago, Nobel laureate Friedrich Hayek wrote in his essay The Use of Knowledge in Society: “This is not a dispute about whether planning is to be done or not. It is a dispute as to whether planning is to be done centrally, by one authority for the whole economic system, or is to be divided among many individuals.”

Obamacare is the largest power grab by central planners in Washington away from the many individuals in America in a generation. Health care does not have to be delivered this way. Moffit outlined such a vision in September:

There is a better way: Bottom up. Under this approach, the key element of health care reform would be to restore the traditional doctor–patient relationship and re-arrange the way in which health care is financed. … If doctors control the delivery of health care, the patients should control the financing. So, the key ingredient in creating a value-based health care system would be to transfer direct control of the flow of health care dollars to individuals. This would create a patient-centered, consumer driven system. It would be the kind of system, based on real choice and robust competition, that would deliver what is of value, not as value is defined by either government officials or third-party administrators in the private sector, but as desired by the patient in consultation with his physician. … Ideally, individuals and families should control every red cent spent on health care, as they do in virtually every other sector of the economy, where consumers make an exchange of dollars for goods and services of value to them.

We can have a bottom-up, not top-down, health care system where individuals have much greater personal choice because they would control their health care dollar. But that system can never come about under Obamacare. If the American people want to be the ones making their own health care decisions, not unelected “leaders” like Berwick, then priority number one is the full repeal of Obamacare.

Have a HSA (Health Savings Account)?  Yep, you’re getting screwed, royally.  Thought you were making a wise decision in socking away money for your own health care?  Pfft!  Paleeeeeze!  Doing the right thing is getting you shafted.

Obamacare Sticker Shock: Taxing Over 15,000 Medicines

Nancy Pelosi warned us we’d have to pass Obamacare to find out what’s in it. And what we’re finding we don’t like at all.

Higher insurance premiums are hitting families hard. Medicare Advantage has been decimated. Millions will be forced into government-run Medicaid where long lines and rationing await.

If we like our insurance — too bad.

Beginning January 1, 2011, more than 15,000 over-the-counter (OTC) health care items will require a prescription (and that means a doctor’s visit) for tax-free reimbursement.

I guess you won’t be allowed to have that burrito you love so much, even though it gives you heartburn, eh?  Probably won’t be able to have an extra slice of cheese on your burger either cuz it might make ya constipated.  And heaven forbid if your baby gets diaper rash!

Oh yeah….this was a REAL good idea, wasn’t it!

When it comes to articulating the state of our nation, unfortunately, it’s not a tough task. Pick up any newspaper and you’ll see headlines about rising unemployment, skyrocketing healthcare premiums, and gloomy growth outlooks. The narrative is beyond troubling, but not challenging for anyone to grasp: big government is killing the country. Well, except if you’re running Washington. Or running from it.

There have been cracks showing for quite a while, and instead of doing something to stop the cracks, and reverse the damage, the stress of those cracks has now become a full blown break! Duct tape isn’t going to fix this! We’re gonna have to get a whole new one!

This election cycle Democrats aren’t talking about their legislative wins. Not one Democrat has taken out a paid ad touting Obamacare. Unwilling to acknowledge reality, Vice President Biden says they’re agenda is just too complicated to clarify to the public.

“Democrats aren’t running on the administration’s accomplishments like health-care and financial-regulatory overhaul and the stimulus because “it’s just too hard to explain,” Biden said.

That’s right, boys and girls.  Don’t forget, we are just plain ignorant.  Too stupid to understand the process.  Although WE read the bills, unlike those in Congress who just don’t have the time, nor the inclination to educate themselves.  This is Biden speak for “We don’t understand it, and no one has explained it to us, so we can’t explain it!”  Reckon he didn’t get the memo that the American people are no longer buying their snake oil.

But the White House and Democrats spent over a year explaining their health care plan. Obama alone gave over 40 speeches on the subject. As for the stimulus, wasn’t that Biden’s baby? The lone piece of policy that he was tasked with selling during the highly inappropriately named “Recovery Summer?”

Well, what he did was run around the country, at the taxpayers expense, trying to convince his drooling acolytes his lies were actually truth. “Your insurance premiums won’t go up.” “If you like your insurance, you can keep it.” Little things like that. And if Biden doesn’t understand the crapulus failed, he hasn’t been paying attention. He reminds me more and more of a ventriloquist’s dummy.

Don’t ya wonder who has their hand up his back at any given time?

The truth is that this White House has spent plenty of time pleading their case. But the facts don’t lie. More Americans oppose than favor Obamacare. And more people than not believe that the stimulus has failed. If the policies are flawed and largely unpopular, no amount of clarification can help.

Thanks to some hard working folks, many conservative bloggers and pundits, we DO understand, and we don’t like it! We said so. Fairly explicitly too! The problem is not that we don’t get it. The problem is, THEY don’t! I’ve actually read these bills. Can the White House say the same?

Ah yes. If only they had talked about spending another trillion dollars on the now non-existent shovel ready projects and talked about Obamacare for three years instead of two, they left wouldn’t be facing this backlash.

Oh, there were “shovel ready projects” alright. The media have been holding the shovels, and Obama has been dishing out his B.S.!

The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, a.k.a. Obamacare, is to the law of unintended consequences what Newton’s apple was to the law of gravity: the illustration that bonks us on the head with its obviousness. Practically every week since its passage has added a new dimension of mirth to Nancy Pelosi’s punchline for the ages, that we had to pass the bill to find out what is in it. Out of the mouths of babes and clueless politicians . . .

And her chuckling proves, once again, the jokes’ on us. Well, quite a few, but not all of us. There were many out here in cyberland who warned, shouted it from the rooftops, but were we listened to? Of course not. We’re just the unwashed masses. The “Homer Simpsons“.

The Democrats will rail in reliably demagogic fashion about the evil insurance fat cats boosting their profits, but consider this: Those losses would be passed on to health-care consumers in the form of higher premiums and reduced benefits, meaning that the mandate to cover those with pre-existing conditions will function as a tax on other insurance consumers, and those who were responsible enough to buy insurance before they got sick will be punished to bail out those who were not similarly responsible.

I bought health insurance long before I ever had any health issues. It’s just common sense. You know the old adage, “An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.” Well, that’s quite true. You may never need it, but it’s a REAL good idea to have it, just in case. I’ve already seen my premiums go up, as have most folks. I don’t have one of those ‘pay for everything’ type policies. I have a catastrophic policy. Which means, in case you don’t know, I actually PAY for my doctor’s visits. In full. Did you know that most doctors will charge LESS for a visit if they don’t have to file an insurance claim? Sometimes, it’s up to 50% less. If you’re old enough to remember, EVERYONE use to pay for their own doctor’s visits, and shots, and blood tests, etc. It was a WHOLE lot cheaper. Yes, the cost of everything has gone up over the years, but can you imagine if we didn’t have to pay for everyone else’s doctor visits too? How much would the cost come down? We also had something called Hospitalization. For anything that required a hospital stay, the insurance company paid 80%, you paid 20%. Along came HMOs. Another one of those Democrat ‘bright ideas’. Costs went up dramatically!

Democrats of late have spent a lot of time engaged in televised scoffing at the idea that regulatory uncertainty is a major cause of our current economic malaise. They would do well to consult the insurers whose businesses they are attempting to micromanage. WellPoint had this to say about its decision to discontinue child-only policies: “Unfortunately, there remains a great deal of uncertainty as to how the rules will be implemented and what the impacts might be on participating insurers.”

Once again, the socialists in Congress prove they have NO clue what they are doing. Or, perhaps, they know exactly what the consequence will be on the public, including the companies that take all the risks, and their intent is to destroy the economy, thinking they will step in as the “white knight” and save the day. Create chaos, step in and claim it’s the other guy’s fault, and propose solutions to ‘fix” the problem, steal money from hard working families, and say “You have to give it more time!” sigh….

Dozens of new taxes, regulatory beasties, and unlovely business outcomes have cropped up since the bill was passed. Meanwhile, the Democrats have declared war on financial reality, blasting insurance actuaries for the crime of consulting the actuarial tables when it comes to pre-existing conditions. And who can forget Rep. Henry Waxman’s fit of rage inspired by the fact that corporate accountants were following the rules of corporate accounting, inflicting massive writedowns on scores of struggling American companies forced to adjust their balance sheets to reflect the new costs and liabilities Obamacare inflicted on them?

The Democrats created a dependent society. They are obviously so incompetent it makes ones head spin. When those who can actually add and subtract numbers call them out, what is their reaction? Sputtering blame. I wonder….have any of those who pushed this massive tax/health bill down America’s throat ever balanced a check book? I’ll put it in real simple terms: You have X amount of dollars coming in on a monthly basis. You have X amount of bills. You subtract the bills from the income, and hopefully, you’ll have some left over for food. If you can’t afford steak and lobster with the left over funds (AFTER socking away some for a ‘rainy day’), you buy beans. You don’t go to the grocery store and fill your basket with a lot of high end items, write a check, and expect the next guy two places back in line to pay for the overdraft fees.

You wouldn’t think this was so complicated, would you.

“[W]e have to pass the [Healthcare] bill so you can find out what’s in it.”
—House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, March 9, 2010

BACKGROUND

Section 9006 of ObamaCare expands information reporting requirements to the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) for business transactions in excess of $600 in goods or services. Starting in 2012, ObamaCare mandates that all businesses file an IRS Form-1099 for any vendor with which they have more than $600 in yearly transactions. With an unemployment rate above nine percent for 16 consecutive months, this monstrous accounting and paperwork burden will not provide any incentive to create jobs. To the contrary, the “1099 Provision” will create additional costs for business owners, particularly owners of small businesses, reducing productivity and further stifling economic growth.

CONDEMNATION FROM ALL SIDES

Businesses—Crushed by It: In an extensive June 2010 memo submitted to President Obama’s Office of Management and Budget, the Business Roundtable and the Business Council, industry organizations representing the nation’s largest private sector employers, outlined the job-killing policies of the administration. Referring specifically to the 1099 provision of ObamaCare, the memo noted, “the cost to modify systems to collect the data and send the additional 1099s will not be insignificant.” Indeed, a recent National Federation of Independent Business (NFIB) Small Business Survey determined that tax paperwork, costing $74 an hour, is the most expensive burden placed on small businesses by the federal government. The NFIB’s tax counsel, Bill Rys, has also highlighted the “direct negative impact on small business” of the 1099 mandate.

A recent letter from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce to members of Congress, signed by more than 2,400 member businesses from all industries and regions, stated that the 1099 provision means “40 million entities, including governments, nonprofits, and businesses of all sizes across the nation will be subjected to onerous data collection and IRS information filing burdens.” The letter continued: “these entities will have to institute new complex record-keeping, data collection and reporting requirements that track every purchase by vendor and payment method.” This mandate will “dramatically increase accounting costs, expose businesses to costly and unjustified audits by the IRS, and subject more small businesses to the challenges of electronic filing.”

Accountants—Against It: The American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA) advocated against Section 9006 in a July 2010 letter to Senators. Based on excessive implementation costs and the “limited utility” gained by the government from the “generation and receipt of millions of forms,” the AICPA said the 1099 requirement should be repealed as the “extraordinary burden in this instance far outweighs the potential benefit.”

The IRS—Wary of It: In July, the Internal Revenue Service’s National Taxpayer Advocate highlighted several problems with the 1099 mandate:

• “[T]he new reporting burden, particularly as it falls on small businesses, may turn out to be disproportionate as compared with any resulting improvement in tax compliance.”
• “[S]mall businesses that lack the capacity to track customer purchases may lose customers, leaving the economy with more large national vendors and less local competition.”

House Republican Conference – Mike Pence, Chairman

Tennesseans oppose the national health care reform law enacted by Congress at the urging of President Barack Obama almost 2-to-1, according to a recent poll.

Fifty-seven percent of the 625 registered voters surveyed said they oppose the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, while only 30 percent said they support it. The remaining 13 percent were undecided.

There was notable contrast between Republicans and Democrats.

Of respondents who consider themselves Republican, 92 percent were opposed and only 3 percent supported the law. But 73 percent of Democrats backed the plan while only 10 percent were opposed.

Voters who said they were politically independent opposed the plan, 59 percent to 25 percent.

I keep wondering why there is such a major difference in the way Democrats and Republicans think. I honestly find it disturbing that there are so many who want some faceless entity taking care of their every need.  Where did our spirit of independence go?  People want to lower the medical costs, the first thing they need to do is get the government out of their business.

When Linda O’Boyle was diagnosed with bowel cancer, her doctors told her she could boost her chances of survival by adding the drug cetuximab to her regimen. But the rationing body for Britain’s National Health Service, the National Institute of Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE), had previously ruled that the drug was not cost-effective and therefore would not be paid for by the government. So O’Boyle liquidated her savings and paid for the drug herself. But this is not allowed under NHS rules. When government bureaucrats found out that O’Boyle had purchased the drug with her own money, she was denied NHS treatment and died within months.

Defenders of Britain’s health care rationing system may try to claim that this tragic death is an outlier in an otherwise acceptable government run health care system. They are wrong. It is the point of the system. As socialized medicine and infanticide advocate Peter Singer has argued in The New York Times, the NICE bureaucrats must ration care or else free government health care would bankrupt the British economy. “NICE had set a general limit of £30,000, or about $49,000, on the cost of extending life for a year,” Singer writes. Following this logic, Singer supported NICE’s decision not to allow British citizens the kidney cancer fighting drug Sutent. As a result of this, and many other rationing decisions Britain, has one of the lowest cancer survival rates in the Western world. While 60.3% of men and 61.7% of women in Sweden survive a cancer diagnosis, in Britain the figure ranges between 40.2% to 48.1% for men and 48% to 54.1% for women. And NICE’s rationing has not just hit cancer patients. Doctors have warned that patients with terminal illnesses are being made to die prematurely under the NHS rationing scheme. And according to the Patients Association, one million NHS patients have been the victims of appalling care in hospitals across Britain.

Most Americans would find this harrowing. But not President Barack Obama. Yesterday he bypassed the Senate confirmation process and used a recess appointment to install Dr. Donald Berwick to be the administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS is the agency that runs the Medicare and Medicaid programs). Dr. Berwick said of Britain’s health care system: “Cynics beware, I am romantic about the National Health Service; I love it.” And his love for Britain’s health care system is not in spite of its rationing, but because of it. In 2009 Dr. Berwick told Biotechnology Healthcare: “NICE is extremely effective and a conscientious and valuable knowledge-building system. … The decision is not whether or not we will ration care – the decision is whether we will ration with our eyes open.”

The fact that the White House chose to empower Dr. Berwick by recess appointment is particularly audacious. The recess appointment power was intended to be used for occasions when the Senate is out for months at a time. The Senate is currently out of session for just 11 days. Worse, the Senate majority has never even scheduled a hearing so that Dr. Berwick’s rationing views could be given an “open” forum. In fact, Dr. Berwick has not even returned Senators’ written questionnaires. The White House defends the move by claiming “there’s no time to waste with Washington game-playing.” But then why did the Obama administration wait until April 2010, a full 15 months after President Obama was sworn into office, to nominate Dr. Berwick? Is it because they did not want Dr. Berwick’s well known and public support for rationing health care to affect the debate over Obamacare?

In a 2005 interview with Health Affairs, Dr. Berwick said: “(G)overnment is an extraordinarily important player in the American health care scene, and it has inescapable duties with respect to improvement of care, or we’re not going to get improved care. Government remains a major purchaser. … So as CMS goes and as Medicaid goes, so goes the system.” And that was before Obamacare gave far reaching new powers to government bureaucrats.

In June of 2009, President Obama told the American Medical Association that “identifying what works is not about dictating what kind of care should be provided.” Moreover, the president has assured the public time and again that the government will not get between patients and their doctors.  His nomination of Don Berwick for Director of CMS, however, tells a different story.