Category Archives: Government
State Exchange Subsidies
The DC Court of Appeals ruled that the Affordable Care Act means what it says. You have to buy insurance from a state exchange to qualify for a subsidy. If the ruling is upheld by the Supreme Court, ObamaCare will be in big trouble.
ObamaCare supporters are insisting that the law, as it’s written, does not express the intent of Congress. It’s just a type-o.
State Exchanges
MIT whiz Jonathan Gruber insists there is no way ObamaCare tax credits were meant to be restricted to state exchanges. And he should know, he helped write the law. Except that videos have surfaced showing Gruber insisting that if governors don’t set up state exchanges they will deny their own citizens ObamaCare tax credits. And not only that, they’ll be forced to subsidize policy holders in other states! Gruber’s response is that was a “speak-o”.
Kevin Obrien in the Plain Dealer is on the case. So is Megan McArdle in Bloomberg, and Jonathan Keim in National review.
President Lone Ranger
“So the only reason I’m doing it on my own is because you won’t do anything,” said the president about Congress.
President Lone Ranger is not happy about being sued by John Boehner. That’s because he wants to be impeached. The prospect of impeachment is a fundraising bonanza for Democrats.
As someone once said, the Republicans may be dumb but they’re not stupid. They impeached the first black president (Bill Clinton) and he remains wildly popular to this day. They’re not about to impeach the second one.
So they’re suing him.
Kerry, Qatar, Hamas, and Turkey
Israel, Egypt, Jordan, and the Saudis want Hamas out and Fatah in in Gaza. So what did John Kerry do? He met with Islamist Turkey and Qatar to come up with a cease fire agreement that keeps Hamas in power and its rockets and tunnels intact. The Israeli cabinet unanimously rejected the deal. Israel has Hamas on the ropes. Hammas is without friends – save for Turkey and Qatar – which is why Krauthammer called Kerry Hamas’s lawyer.
Here’s David Harsanyi in The Federalist:
Perhaps because of tragic loss of life, the United States would rather see a ceasefire than Hamas dealt a mortal blow. And that is almost certainly one of the reasons Hamas uses Palestinians as human shields.
Thomas Sowell , looking way back, says ” ‘Cease-fire” and “negotiations” are magic words to “the international community.” But just what do cease-fires actually accomplish?”
In the short run, they save some lives. But in the long run they cost far more lives, by lowering the cost of aggression…
At one time, launching a military attack on another nation risked not only retaliation but annihilation. When Carthage attacked Rome, that was the end of Carthage.
Looks like mutual assured destruction all around is the key to world peace.
The Washington Post’s David Ignatius calls this Kerry’s big blunder:
Kerry’s error has been to put so much emphasis on achieving a quick halt to the bloodshed that he has solidified the role of Hamas, the intractable, unpopular Islamist group that leads Gaza, along with the two hard-line Islamist nations that are its key supporters, Qatar and Turkey. In the process, he has undercut not simply the Israelis but also the Egyptians and the Fatah movement that runs the Palestinian Authority, all of which want to see an end to Hamas rule in Gaza.
The State Department’s response to Kerry criticism? Well, this is “not the way allies treat each other.”
Fundraising Vacation
The world is going mad and President Obama is going on vacation. The rest of the government is following The Bear’s vacay lead. On Saturday the US Embassy in Libya was vacated. Fred Hiatt in the Washington Post calls it all a deliberate strategy of withdrawal.
Fundraising Vacation
The president will be on a working vacation in Martha’s Vineyard. That is to say he’ll be fundraising. He’ll check in at the Blue Heron Farm. Has Obama checked out of the White House? Krauthammer thinks so. He thinks Obama believes history is traveling on autopilot.
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.
