Joseph C. Phillips
*Speaking on ABC’s “This Week”, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi commented, “I think everybody wants affordable health care for all Americans. They know that this will take courage.
It took courage to pass Social Security. It took courage to pass Medicare. And many of the same forces that were at work decades ago are at work again against this bill.”
There is that word again. What exactly does affordable mean? The left tosses the word about but never bothers to define exactly what they mean by affordable. It could mean anything and everything and no doubt it will.
Affordable is a political term that is unassociated with actual costs, only addresses price and means, “you pay according to the amount of political capital you have.” For instance if you belong to the SEIU you pay less than if you didn’t. But I digress.
I dare say that the only reason it takes courage to pass Obamacare is because a majority of Americans oppose it. According to a recent CNN poll only 25% of Americans want congress to pass this Healthcare bill. It is particularly telling that the new left continues to depict the 75% of Americans that oppose their efforts to nationalize healthcare (which is the end game) as ignoble, uncompassionate, ignorant racists. More annoying is that they portray themselves as visionary, compassionate champions of good.
I suspect that the truth is that Americans do not like the substance of the healthcare bills – all 4000 pages! Nor are they enamored of the back room deals this administration cut in order to secure the votes of their own party. Frankly, the stench of bribes like the latest appellate-judgeship-for-yes vote is more reminiscent of B.S. than it is of hope and change.
It is also likely true that Americans have weighed the fiscal promises of huge government programs like Social Security against their reality and decided they would like to find other avenues towards reforming healthcare- other than putting it in charge of Washington bureaucrats.
Social Security was passed in 1935 as an insurance program to protect a small segment of workers in their retirements. In 1940 just over 222,000 citizens received monthly social security benefits. The program has since grown to become the single largest item in the federal budget, consuming over 22% of total expenditures. The program was originally funded by a 1% tax on the first $3000 of income, with the tax increasing to 3% over the next 12 years. In 1966 the Medicare tax rate was split from the Old Age, Survivor, and Disability (OASDI) rate. Since the inception of OASDI there have been 20 increases in the tax rate, which now stands at 6.2% for both employer and employee on earnings up to $109,000; the Medicare rate is 1.45% with no cap on earnings. Nearly 80 percent of Americans pay more in Social Security taxes than they do in federal income tax. And still social security faces a fiscal crisis. What’s more, what began as an insurance program is now simply a welfare program. The Supreme Court has ruled that citizens do not have a right to social security benefits.
This year social security will run a cash deficit for the first time in more than 25 years. According to the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) those deficits will continue into 2011. The system rebounds slightly until 2016 when the deficits begin to accelerate at a steady and rapid pace. This in direct contradiction of the rosy picture painted by Budget Director Peter Orzag and Congressional Democrats, who assured us that SS was secure for at least 50 years.
And what of Medicare? Medicare trustee Tom Saving and his colleague Andrew Rettenmaier estimate that Medicare will consume 25 percent of federal income tax revenue by 2020, and 50 percent by 2040.
Both programs are in need of a fiscal “fix.” What are the Democrats recommendations? President Obama, after acknowledging that the system is running out of money, suggests taxing a larger share of income. True to progressive form Obama suggests what would be the largest tax increase in U.S. history, at least $1.3 trillion over the first 10 years. Yet according to the Cato Institute, such an increase would increase Social Security’s cash-flow solvency by just seven years.
Former Enron Advisor Paul Krugman is on record as recommending a combination of tax increases and benefit cuts. In some languages denying benefits in order to save money is called rationing. And it is into these steady and trustworthy hands that we are being asked to entrust another 1/6th of our economy.
Americans have listened ad nausea to the promises of this administration and found them to be fantastic. The mantra that a national healthcare plan will cost less money, will not raise taxes and will not result in a rationing of care is not only unsupported by history, but is patronizing as well.
Joseph C. Phillips is the author of “He Talk Like a White Boy” available where ever books are sold.
This column takes issue with the definition of affordable with regard to access to healthcare as provided by government-run entities and uses a variety of numbers to show that expanding access for healthcare to citizens of the US is not doable because it’s not affordable using government-run entities.
The underlying wink and smirk that goes with this discussion about affordibility provided by government run entities is indirectly about healthcare access provided by the private sector. In the private sector, profits for insurance investors and shareholders matter a great deal. Private health insurance is a commodity. The investors and shareholders for this commodity are not interested in providing healthcare access so much as they are interested in being enriched with profits from the commodity.
I sincerely wish that we could have a genuine concerned discussion about providing access to healthcare for all citizens. Obviously, our system of healthcare access is broken.
The question that I ponder is if insurance paves the way to healthcare, should insurance be a commodity dedicated to enriching investors and shareholders who are only interested in profits. The private insurance interest in profits causes people to disallowed healthcare access because the use decreases profits.
The conservative arguments tend to be framed using the socialism and nationalism boogeymen. You know, don’t mess with the free market and be afraid of a government-lead effort to compete with private insurers for healthcare access. It’s not affordable for government and it decreases profits for private insurers.
And the Republicans propose ___________???
Let’s go through this.
According the american people, (polls) 2/3 of the population in 1967 opposed interracial marriage. Conceding to public opinion would mean that Loving v. Virgina would’ve been decided differently.
So I’m not surprised that americans are against something. They had little knowledge of what’s in the bill. Some because the dems haven’t done a good job of explaining it. Others are just ignorant enough to believe only what they hear..i.e., the idea that taxpayers will pay for abortions or the many-timed defuncted myth about death panels.
The last time congress reformed SS was in 1983 under Reagan. The next sort of significant reform was two decades later under Bush when he proposed the individual accounts which would allow them to invest their money in the stock market. After 8 years, is SS any more solvent?
I’ve listened, read, and read and no one seems to have a solution to the problem. Ironically, you haven’t offered one either because you are an idealogue. The party of no continues….
Correct. And speaking of polls, the numbers are LOW because the democrats have watered down THIS healthcare bill to appease the oppressors on the right. The majority of Americans want a PUBLIC OPTION!!!
This column takes issue with the definition of affordable with regard to access to healthcare as provided by government-run entities and uses a variety of numbers to show that expanding access for healthcare to citizens of the US is not doable because it’s not affordable using government-run entities.
The underlying wink and smirk that goes with this discussion about affordibility provided by government run entities is indirectly about healthcare access provided by the private sector. In the private sector, profits for insurance investors and shareholders matter a great deal. Private health insurance is a commodity. The investors and shareholders for this commodity are not interested in providing healthcare access so much as they are interested in being enriched with profits from the commodity.
I sincerely wish that we could have a genuine concerned discussion about providing access to healthcare for all citizens. Obviously, our system of healthcare access is broken.
The question that I ponder is if insurance paves the way to healthcare, should insurance be a commodity dedicated to enriching investors and shareholders who are only interested in profits. The private insurance interest in profits causes people to disallowed healthcare access because the use decreases profits.
The conservative arguments tend to be framed using the socialism and nationalism boogeymen. You know, don’t mess with the free market and be afraid of a government-lead effort to compete with private insurers for healthcare access. It’s not affordable for government and it decreases profits for private insurers.
Early polls showed Americans in favor of HCR, even (gasp!) a public option. The only thing that’s changed from the beginning of this debate to now is poor messaging by the WH (which is what happens when a timid president appoints non-progressives to sell progressive ideas), foolery by the Congress, and media spin. My point is how do you know what polls to believe JPhillips? Are you suggesting Americans have read the 4,000-page bill and have suddenly “come to their senses?” lol Or will you concede that Americans are a finnicky, mostly-uneducated bunch (at one time, most believed Saddam Hussein was responsible for 9/11) who pretty much go where they’re led, either by strong leaders or bold buffoons (GWB comes to mind) or by a bored media. In other words, JPhillips, you rest your anti-HCR argument on polls at your own peril. Tomorrow the polls will say something different. One wonders what you will say then. Hmmm
TGEN, if you read the polls, most americans are for provisions in the plan. However, when you ask them whether they like the overall plan, the answer is no.
I honestly think the White House has made a mockery of the issue by rushing it. The push back from the right should have been expected, but rather than taking the time to really put together a bill that everyone understands, especially given the economy, BO issued deadlines. That was just stupid.
Almost impossible. Most americans have no idea what’s in any single piece of legislation. So putting together something americans would understand just wouldn’t work.
The deadlines were a good idea. The waffling of the Party including the president was not.
So, if we follow your ideology, Congress should just continue to talk about this issue ad nauseum and place absolutely no time limit on actually accomplishing something? EVERYTHING has a deadline, my friend, and proper goal setting for success requires timelines.
JCP, If you are opposed to programs you’ve termed welfare and find them in need of repair (i.e., ss, medicare, etc.) can you at least have the balls to be against all government subsidy programs such as: bank subsidies, farm subsidies, oil subsidies, etc.
Where is your supposed outrage when Congress unnecessarily subsidizes these industries to the tune of several billion dollars per year? But, GOD forbid Congress proposes legislation to help everyday ordinary citizens — you lose your freaking mind.
If the new left doesn’t have a clue about healthcare reform, the GOP certainly hasn’t come up with any brilliant ideas either. In this article, you didn’t offer any new ideas either. It was just another opportunity for you to vent and rail without substance.
Don’t forget about those tax cuts for the wealthiest of Americans…
JCP, the problem with your poll, is neither you nor CNN cared to explain or find out why only 25% of Americans want congress to pass this Healthcare bill. And even that 25% is suspect.
A new Washington Post-ABC News poll shows that overall, 45 percent of Americans favor the broad outlines of the proposals now moving in Congress, while 48 percent are opposed.
Also, 57 percent of all Americans now favor a public insurance option, while 40 percent oppose it.
It would then stand to reason, that there is less support for the plan because of its deficiencies, such as the lack of a public option.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/10/19/AR2009101902451.html
JCP weren’t these the same idiots carrying signs saying Keep Gov’t off my Medi-care? The real issue is this is the black guy making these proposals. Obama’s proposals are not much different than the proposals made by the repubilcan in 96′ They were for them until they were against them. Like John Mc Cain spent most of his political career championing campaign finance reform until he was against it hmmm…..
When consrvatives speak about healthcare insurance, their concern is more about preserving the status quo of having private or free market forces prevail. Healthcare insurance is a commodity that enriches investors/shareholders. Use is disallowed to increase profits.
“What exactly does affordable mean?” Well, Joseph, it means that insurance companies will not jack up your rates annually to where you pay more for medical insurance than you do for your mortgage. It means insurance companies won’t find unlawful ways to end your insurance when you get sick because they don’t want to pay for your medical expenses. It means that people UNLIKE YOURSELF- that would be people that live at or below the poverty line- would be given proper medical care.
Someone should explain to me why they can do this in Canada, France, Costa Rica, and many other nations while we trumpet how we have “the best medical care on the planet” that refuses to take care of its citizens because some people are just greedy.
Joseph, what amount would your insurance company have to charge YOU before your health insurance becomes unaffordable? How much is too much for even the wealthiest Americans? The most successful companies?
And I find it laughable that this 1900 page bill has grown in 2300, 2500, 2700, and now thanks to JCP- 4,000 PAGES! I guess that was never addressed in the GOP talking points memo…
“The Supreme Court has ruled that citizens do not have a right to social security benefits.” If that’s the case, it would be illegal for the government to charge this tax. The portion I put in I have every right to under the law.
If social security was as insolvent as the GOP claims, why was Bush so eager to get his grubby, capitalistic hands on it to privatize the money? Common sense would prevail in the notion that funds put into an account to sit for 30-40 years would earn tons of interest. So, unless funds were grossly mis-managed or embezzled, the social security fund is doing fine.
You know, these articles are swinging farther to the right and becoming excessively partisan, containing increasing amounts of fear-mongering and following ever closer to the GOP talking points. Perhaps he should write a new book, titled “He Talk Like An Idiot.”