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Sunday, March 21, 2010

Health Care Takeover Passes

Freedom, prosperity, and quality medical care lost a battle today. A big battle. But the war goes on. Meanwhile, two thumbs way down for supposedly conservative House Democrats.

Well, they did it. The US House of Representatives, that is. With three votes to spare, they set a time bomb today that is intended to destroy private health insurance, eventually leaving us uncontested socialized medicine by default. It won't do that immediately; the program itself doesn't kick in at all for four years. What does kick in? Massive Medicare cuts, which are likely to leave in their wake -- very soon -- even more providers who can no longer afford to treat Medicare patients for what the government is willing to pay, and more pharmacies that cannot afford to fill their prescriptions. Substantial new taxes come right away too, because we have to start four years early, paying for six years of this bill with ten years' taxes, just to keep the ten-year deficit caused by this bill under a trillion dollars for marketing purposes. It's another body blow the economy doesn't need just now. The fact that we now have to pay for a lot of backroom bribes that were necessary to pass it just makes it taste that much worse and cost that much more.

One is led to conclude that in the Democratic mind the fiscal calamity that is California isn't spectacular enough for the whole nation. We want to be Greece.

The separate bill of House amendments, last I heard, has yet to come up for a vote. But if they had the votes to pass the Senate bill, they have the votes to pass that. This one will have to go to the Senate, and it may not fare so well there. We'll just have to see. I'm sure President Obama will be perfectly happy to sign the original Senate bill, which is what just passed the House, and doesn't much care whether he ever sees the House amendments in the later bill.

The rallying cry of those who understand economic and other basic American freedoms now becomes, Repeal ObamaCare. Whether or not it will be necessary to repeal President Obama himself first is an open question. I think the chances of creating a veto-proof Republican majority in the 2010 election are remote at best. We may have to wait until 2013 to start reversing this disaster, presumably with a new president, elected in 2012, who doesn't despise what it used to mean to be an American.

Justin Combs comments (2/23/2010):

A few points to consider:

1. The precious 32 million (less than 10% of our population) that were uninsured and are now "covered" will not see any "coverage" until 2019. Yeah, that will help the cancer stricken non-exist they used as the heart-bleed to pass this crap.
2. This bill claims to create jobs. Most of the job creation is within the IRS, as agents trolling around auditing and enforcing the new taxes (strike that) fines. With no mention of the millions of jobs that will be lost due to these new fines. Caterpillar announced Monday that in 2013, when the fines take affect, it will cost them an additional 100 million bucks. That is at least one or two jobs lost.
3. The reconciliation amendments did pass the house and, I think, was signed by Obsama (not a typo). It now has to go to the Senate for a 50+1 vote. The weird thing is, the reconciliation rule applies only to budgetary items, not legislative items. So it will be interesting to see how the abortion thing pans out. It will probably be challenged either way.
4. I agree a repeal-Obamacare majority is not possible. In the Senate 18 seats are up. Even if we win all 18 with conservatives, we will only have 59 seats. The House is as unlikely to swing, as well. But I do think we can send a very powerful message.

David Rodeback comments (3/24/2010):

No doubt a lot of the Caterpillar jobs will have to leave the country, unless demand fails to survive the ongoing attacks on the economy, so the jobs just go away.

In any case, the President signed the initial (Senate) bill yesterday. The bill of amendments doesn't go to the President unless the Senate passes it, too.

Any number of things could happen to create a veto-proof majority to repeal ObamaCare after the 2010 election, including the possible election of real conservative Democrats, some party-switching after the election, etc. I think the math is potentially better after the 2012 election, but who knows? That's a long way down the road . . . and we haven't won 2010 yet.

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