Obamacare's $600 Million Disaster
Barack Obama recently compared Obamacare to Apple's iPhone, and suggested the glitches in Obamacare would eventually be worked out. Well, here's something Obama didn't tell you: Apple spent roughly $150 million developing the iPhone. Obamacare's website, produced under a no-bid contract, has cost at least twice as much and maybe four times as much -- $600 million -- of your tax money.
Meanwhile it continues to be a colossal failure. Government memos obtained by the Associated Press indicate that the Obama Administration expected nearly half a million people would sign up for Obamacare through the exchanges by the end of the month. Good luck.
Only one person has successfully signed up in Delaware. Granted, Delaware is a small state. But officials in Michigan can't confirm if anyone there has signed up at all!
It gets worse. The Wall Street Journal reports today that those lucky enough to get through the system from start to finish may not be getting signed up for anything. Much of the data health insurance companies are receiving from the Obamacare website is apparently unreliable.
According to the Journal, "Emerging errors include duplicate enrollments, spouses reported as children, missing data fields and suspect eligibility determinations." In one case, an individual in Ohio was mistakenly signed up for three plans!
Not surprisingly, the report adds, "Health-department officials have pressured insurers to refrain from commenting publicly about the problems, according to executives at four health plans."
The fight to stop Obamacare has not been lost, and it is not over. The problems with Obamacare go well beyond "glitches." In an editorial today, former Senator Jim DeMint, who now leads the Heritage Foundation, explains why "delaying implementation by withholding funds from a law that is proven to be unfair, unworkable and unaffordable is a reasonable and necessary fight." Click here to read more.
Health Reform Breaks Bad
There is a tremendous article in the latest edition of The Weekly Standard by Christopher Conover reminding readers exactly how we ended up with Obamacare. Socialized medicine has been the crown jewel of the left for generations. But it had never been able to achieve that goal until Obama was elected.
Conover notes that polling over many decades has shown that Americans generally sympathized with the concept of "universal health care coverage." But the polling also showed that Americans did not support higher taxes to pay for it and they generally liked the coverage that they had.
So how did Obama succeed in selling the country on a massive tax increase that would cause many Americans to give up their current coverage? According to Conover, through a series of deceptions like, "no new taxes on the middle class," "annual premium savings of $2,500," "no increase in the deficit" and "you can keep your plan if you like it." You can read Conover's article here.
The Left Goes On The Attack
With the government reopened and the threat of a default behind us, Barack Obama promised yesterday to negotiate with congressional conservatives over a host of issues confronting the country. But while the media blamed "Tea Party conservatives" for the breakdown of Washington, it bears repeating that it was Obama and Harry Reid who repeatedly refused to negotiate throughout the shutdown.
Needless to say, I'm skeptical that future "negotiations" will yield very much.
When it comes to the budget, Big Labor is warning that it won't accept any changes to entitlement spending. AARP is running ads targeting Democrat Senator Mark Warner in Virginia, urging him to reject compromises on Social Security and Medicare.
On immigration reform, Fox News reports that illegal immigrants and amnesty advocates are vowing to "take a more radical approach" in order to force their quasi-amnesty legislation through Congress. The Fox story notes that a protest last week in Tucson forced a federal court to cancel scheduled deportation hearings. Border Patrol agents were recently assaulted by crowds of illegal immigrants just for doing their jobs.
This is the political atmosphere the left is creating. It is making demands, ratcheting up the rhetoric, taking to the streets and all the while demanding that conservatives compromise their values. As I said at the Values Voter Summit last week, the time is rapidly approaching when Middle America will stand up and make its voice heard: "This far, and no further!"
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