#Obamacare: more broken promises to haunt Democrats

**Posted by Phineas

"Cross my fingers!" — “Cross my fingers!”

It’s not just the “If you like your plan, you can keep your plan” lie or the forthcoming “access shock” that Democrats have to worry about as we approach the 2014 midterm elections. At the Washington Examiner, Byron York describes three more promises the president and his party made about Obamacare that could easily come back to bite them. Here’s one:

1) Obamacare will save your family $2,500 a year.

During the 2008 campaign, and as president, Obama promised his health plan would “cut the average family’s premium by about $2,500 per year.” But Obama and fellow Democrats knew that many premiums would actually go up. Obamacare provides taxpayer-paid subsidies to millions of Americans with which to pay the higher prices, but those without subsidies will have to deal with the problem themselves.

In any event, the savings aren’t happening, and the administration has abandoned the $2,500 claim. Obama avoided repeating it when Mitt Romney threw it at him during the 2012 presidential debates. And at a recent Senate Finance Committee hearing, Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius pointedly did not use the figure, even when Republican lawmakers pressed her about it.

“I didn’t say they’re going down,” Sebelius said of health care premiums. “I said the rates are lower than was predicted. And for millions of people in the market, they will actually, for the first time ever, have some financial help paying for their health insurance.”

So the promise of $2,500 savings has become a reality of rising premiums, with subsidies for some. It’s a broken promise that could prove politically toxic for the administration.

I imagine there are quite a few people who would like to remind Secretary Sebelius of her boss’ exact words.

The other two are –and try not to laugh– Obamacare as a job-creating bill (1) and a guarantee that it won’t harm those who are already insured (2).

I’m willing to bet there’s a growing number of incumbent Democrats who are considering retirement much more seriously these days.

Footnotes:
(1) I bet these people (and these) would beg to disagree, Nancy. Loudly and in your face.
(2) You mean, people such as Edie Sundby, a stage-4 cancer patient?

(Crossposted at Public Secrets)

omapian says:

November 22, 2013 at 5:40 pm

The Affordable Health Care Act started with good intentions, added unrealistic promises, and produced poor results. Bureaucrats declared a crisis and Congress packed legislation with earmarks to pass the law without addressing its content. Advocates touted the law’s intentions, distorted its provisions, and dismissed critics as racists, terrorists, or fools. The Supreme Court rejected the authority to force individuals to buy insurance or pay a fine but rescued the law by deeming the fine was a tax.
Some criticisms proved correct. Millions of insurance policies were declared substandard and terminated. New policies offered additional coverage at greater cost. Government exchanges could exclude hospitals and doctors. People lost their current plan, may lose their doctor and premiums went up, not down.
The President is determined to fundamentally transform a system that worked. He will neither allow modification, nor follow, his own legislation. He denies knowing the provisions of the AHCA yet waives those provisions for select businesses and unions. He encourages insurance companies to offer illegal policies. He grants subsidies and exemptions. He decides when, where, and how to enforce the law, delaying negative consequences until after Election Day.
Powerful interests and established incumbents realize government health insurance is a cash cow and to the victor goes the spoils of earmarks in future appropriations. They know onerous regulations, legislative loopholes, arbitrary waivers and selective enforcement facilitate Honest Graft. Lobbyists will reward the incumbents who advance their special interests.
The Founding Fathers replaced arrogant rulers with a Constitutional government and cautioned it would be difficult to keep. Subsequent generations fought to defend the rule of law from the whims of men. ‘We the people’ have not just the right but the responsibility to reject autocrats at the voting booth.
Defending our freedom is never easy.

Drew the Infidel says:

November 22, 2013 at 9:53 pm

I challenge anyone to name ONE thing this clown of a president has done right. One. Green energy? Stimulus? Cash for clunkers? Just more additions to Obhammud’s long unbroken string of failures. When the bin Laden raid occurred he was not even in the Situation Room but elsewhere in the building playing Spades with a staffer and had no direct involvement.

“Vain are the thousand creeds
That move men’s hearts: unutterably vain;
Worthless as withered weeds,
Or idlest froth amid the boundless main.–Emily Bronte