Category Archives: health insurance
Affordable Care Act Subsidies
We have to pass the bill so we can find out what’s in it. The bill passed, the DC Circuit Court of Appeals has read it, and found out what’s not in it. The Affordable Care Act says subsidies are available for plans purchased on state run exchanges. That was an inducement for states to set up their own exchanges. Still, 36 states chose not to build exchanges and left the job to the feds. People with plans from Federal exchanges aren’t eligible for subsidies, says the court.
Subsidies All Around
Another court – the Fourth Circuit -says the plain language in the bill wasn’t the intent of Congress. In other words Congress didn’t mean what it said. Not an unreasonable assumption.
For now the IRS will continue to allow subsidies for health care plans bought on federal exchanges.
Religious Freedom
Religious freedom has been taking a beating.
A National Review editorial last week made the point that during the Clinton administration Democrats in Congress felt the Supreme Court had too narrow a view of religious liberty. As a result the Religious Freedom Restoration Act was passed with bipartisan support and signed into law by President Clinton.
Along comes the Affordable Care Act (ACA), …which empowered the Obama administration to issue regulations that burdened a religious liberty..
This leaves Democrats in a political pickle. They passed a law to protect religious freedom, but they do not desire to protect religious freedom when doing so interrupts their risible war-on-women soap opera.
Senator Udall, in his rhetoric, has been particularly dishonest about this, characterizing the Hobby Lobby decision as mandating that women “have to ask their bosses for a permission slip to access common forms of birth control.” In fact, the decision does no such thing: Hobby Lobby has nothing to do with the right to do anything, but rather with the right to not do something.
Elsewhere on the religious freedom front, the Islamic State of Iraq has ordered Christians to either pay jizya (a religious tax), convert to Islam, or die.
The Debate Is So Over
The debate is over for ObamaCare, Climate Change, and Gay Marriage. Especially gay marriage.
Brendan Eich, former CEO of Mozilla, didn’t know that. In 2008 he made a $1000 contribution in support of California’s Proposition 8 to ban gay marriage. The majority of California voters didn’t know the debate was over either. They passed the proposition. To better help everyone understand that the debate is over, Brendan Eich was forced out of his job.
The Debate is Over, Dammit
The wizard standing on top of the guillotine has a hockey stick on his wizard hat. That’s in honor of Michael Mann’s “hockey stick” theory of global warming. Dr. Mann is a professor at Penn State University. The shaft of his “hockey stick” graph represents 1000 years of steady global temperatures and the blade shows a sharp increase in the 20th century. Some skeptics claimed Professor Mann’s model results in a hockey stick shape no matter what data you enter. This enraged the Professor. He went all goon and has been taking two handed slashes at his doubters ever since.
Some skeptical journalist drew an analogy to Mann’s methods and those of another noted Penn State figure, Jerry Sandusky. In order to help the journalists understand the debate is over Dr. Mann sued them.
ObamaCare Victory Lap
The world’s least likely NASCAR driver took a Rose Garden victory lap to celebrate the sudden sign up of 7.1 million souls for ObamaCare. There was no mention of how many of those souls paid a premium, which is required to actually have coverage. Also unheard from were the 6 million or so who lost their coverage, doctor, or both due to changes required by the new health care law.
President Mocks Republicans after his Victory Lap
The most notable unmentionable, however, was ACA Czar Kathleen Sebelius. The president ignored her during his shout-outs to other Democrats among the Rose Garden gathering. President Obama did stop short of further humiliation for Sebelius by not mocking her as he did Republican opponents of the unpopular legislation.
Also missing from the victory lap crowd were red state Democrats up for re-election.
It wasn’t all gauche behavior by the Driver-in-Chief of ObamaCare. The president modestly declined to call attention to his own unilateral changes to the law of the land.
