The ACA and Small Businesses

[DC Tom]

Dude there is no bias.... It's all in your head

 

The drama's in the politics of it. This is implementation. No drama. So they're not reporting it - it's less about "bias" than it is about the news being entertainment rather than news.

[Magox]

The drama's in the politics of it. This is implementation. No drama. So they're not reporting it - it's less about "bias" than it is about the news being entertainment rather than news.

 

I think I'll go with the idea that just about every reporter and journalist from these networks supported the bill and that they'd rather not report on the failings of the implementation of the ACA knowing that it would look bad upon the president.

[IDBillzFan]

The drama's in the politics of it. This is implementation. No drama. So they're not reporting it - it's less about "bias" than it is about the news being entertainment rather than news.

 

Too bad last Friday's job numbers weren't more entertaining because they certain tell an interesting tale once you peel away how embarrassing they were.

[Doc]

In other news, water is wet.

[B-Man]

Obamacare architect Rockefeller: It's 'beyond comprehension'

 

West Virginia Democratic Sen. Jay Rockefeller, one of the towering architects of Obamacare, on Tuesday openly criticized program managers for not moving quickly enough to build the system, warning that if it gets off to a bumpy start it will just get worse.

Decrying the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act as way too complex, he warned the acting Medicare director that Obamacare is "so complicated and if it isn't done right the first time, it will just simply get worse."

The retiring senator also told Marilyn Tavenner at her Senate Finance Committee confirmation hearing to be administrator of the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services that Obamacare rivals tax reform in its capacity to confuse Americans.

http://washingtonexaminer.com/obamacare-architect-rockefeller-its-beyond-comprehension/article/2526681

[B-Man]

More Affordable Care reform;

 

Smoking Is a ‘Preexisting Condition’ ......D.C. exchange board bans “discrimination” against smokers.

 

The District of Columbia’s Obamacare czars — the board that sets rules for the phony insurance marketplace, or “exchange,” that the law creates — have decided that henceforth insurers shall be forbidden by law to charge smokers higher rates than non-smokers. Smoking, as it turns out, “is a preexisting medical condition,” according to Dr. Mohammad Akhter, the chairman of the D.C. Health Exchange Board. Two liberal states, California and Connecticut, have decided likewise, while Colorado and Alaska have rejected the idea.

 

As expected, the definition of “preexisting condition” is proving infinitely malleable, with behaviors born again as conditions. If smoking is a condition, then drug addiction is a condition, self-mutilation is a condition, a penchant for BASE jumping is a condition, juggling ampules of penicillin-resistant syphilis — practically anything qualifies as a condition under such a plastic understanding.

 

There are many ways to implement a bad idea. For instance, Congress might have passed a law requiring that all U.S. insurance companies no longer charge smokers more for their coverage. The state of Connecticut might have passed a similar law. New York City might have passed that law. But in each case, voters who saw that stupidity for what it is would have somebody to vote against. Obamacare eliminates the option for democratic response. Instead, it creates a body of political appointees immune from being held accountable at the ballot box. And who are those appointees? In the case of D.C., you will find few surprises: The SEIU has a man on the board, along with a lot of time-serving political types, a fellow from the Brookings Institution, a lobbyist, etc. Don’t like their boneheaded decisions? Too bad.

 

 

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[3rdnlng]

http://news.investors.com/ibd-editorials/041113-651603-obama-administration-tries-to-blame-gop-for-obamacare-failures.htm

 

 

 

Health Care: As Democrats grow increasingly worried that ObamaCare will explode on the launch pad just as midterm elections get going, the Obama administration seeks to pin blame on Republicans. Good luck with that.

 

Earlier this week, Health and Human Services head Kathleen Sebelius admitted that she didn't realize how complicated getting ObamaCare off the ground would be.

 

Sebelius complained that "no one fully anticipated" the difficulties involved in implementing ObamaCare, or how confusing it would be with the public.

 

She wasn't talking about the massive and impossible task of imposing central planning on one-sixth of the nation's economy.

 

Instead, she was trying to find a way to blame Republicans for ObamaCare's failures when the inevitable problems start emerging.

 

 

 

 

[B-Man]

http://news.investor...re-failures.htm

 

 

 

 

More from the article above;

 

 

So let's see if we get this.

 

Democrats shoved an unpopular, expensive, ill-conceived and poorly written law down the country's throat....................with no Republican support,

 

and without bothering to see whether states would want to take on the thankless and costly task of helping the feds implement it.

 

 

And now that many of these states are rebelling, it's the Republicans' fault?

[B-Man]

MD's should focus on "cost value" first, not the patient ? ?

 

 

Docs Told They Must Drive Health System Change

 

SAN FRANCISCO -- Doctors are the only people who can drive the change in healthcare delivery that's needed to save the country from a financial crisis, a health policy expert said here.

 

Ezekiel Emanuel, MD, PhD, chair of medical ethics and health policy at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, called physicians the most important group in determining the future of the U.S., because others who have tried to incite health delivery reform have run into a brick wall when doctors weren't on board.

 

"I can sit up here and talk all about it. Other experts can talk about it. Only you can put it into practice," Emanuel said at the opening ceremony here at the annual meeting of the American College of Physicians. "You don't do, it ain't gonna happen. It's that simple."

 

Emanuel drew a gasp from the crowd when he noted the U.S.'s healthcare spending last year -- $2.87 trillion -- makes it equivalent to the fifth largest economy in the world. "We spend more on healthcare in this country than the 66 million French spend on everything in their society," he said.

 

The federal government's share of health spending through programs like Medicare, Medicaid, and Veterans Affairs equates to the 16th largest economy in the world -- bigger than Turkey, the Netherlands, and Switzerland.

 

The only way to reduce that spending is to move away from a fee-for-service model that rewards volume over value and quantity over quality, Emanuel said, noting that the fee-for-service system has driven the spending growth that we have today.

 

"We need to take the responsibility now as a group in pushing for payment change," Emanuel said. "It's the only way we can facilitate the transformation and re-engineering that the system needs and we need to care about."

 

He called on physicians to "get our house in order" and "collectively campaign" for these changes.

 

http://www.medpagetoday.com/Washington-Watch/Reform/38404

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[Doc]

I'll do it when lawyers are removed from the equation and have caps on what they can make.

[B-Man]

Roofers union calls for Obamacare’s repeal.

The United Union of Roofers, Waterproofers and Allied Workers is reportedly the first union to officially call for repeal of the Affordable Care Act, aka Obamacare. The health care law is prompting some serious buyer’s remorse in Big Labor, which worked hard on behalf of the administration to pass it.

 

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[IDBillzFan]

Roofers union calls for Obamacare’s repeal.

The United Union of Roofers, Waterproofers and Allied Workers is reportedly the first union to officially call for repeal of the Affordable Care Act, aka Obamacare. The health care law is prompting some serious buyer’s remorse in Big Labor, which worked hard on behalf of the administration to pass it.

 

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How odd. I thought all unions got waivers. Sebelius needs to go back and see who missed their paperwork.

[Magox]

Roofers union calls for Obamacare’s repeal.

The United Union of Roofers, Waterproofers and Allied Workers is reportedly the first union to officially call for repeal of the Affordable Care Act, aka Obamacare. The health care law is prompting some serious buyer’s remorse in Big Labor, which worked hard on behalf of the administration to pass it.

 

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Without reading the article, it probably has something to do with either the 40% tax on the "Cadillac plans" or the unintended consequence of employers opting to drop some of their employee's coverage and paying the fine. It's cheaper for a company to drop coverage, and give them an increased pay that matches the health premium they pay. The rate of health inflation far surpasses any sort of increased rate they would give them for the loss of the health benefit.

[B-Man]

Obama’s Damaging Admission

 

An item totaling 0.01 percent of the budget proves that Obamacare won’t work.

 

by Michael F. Cannon

 

Buried deep within President Obama’s $3.77 trillion budget is a tiny little proposal to increase Medicaid spending by $360 million. In a budget as large as this one, $360 million is scarcely worth mentioning. It amounts to less than one-hundredth of one percent of total outlays. But this 0.01 percent is worth mentioning, because it proves the president’s health-care law will not work.

 

While many uninsured patients pay their medical bills, the Medicaid program offers “disproportionate share hospital” payments to hospitals that treat lots of patients who don’t.

 

The president’s Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act cuts Medicaid’s DSH payments, beginning with a $360 million cut in 2014. The theory went like this: When the PPACA begins reducing the number of uninsured, hospitals won’t need those subsidies.

 

With this proposal, President Obama has admitted that:

 

1. The PPACA is not likely to reduce uncompensated care in 2014.

2. The PPACA won’t reduce the deficit.

3. Hospitals can stop crying poverty.

4. States don’t need to expand Medicaid to protect hospitals. (Expansion on these points...at the link)

 

The president’s budget shows that the brave state legislators who have been fighting the Medicaid expansion in states like Ohio and Florida were right all along — and it makes expansion supporters, like Governors Rick Scott (R., Fla.) and John Kasich (R., Ohio), look rather silly.

 

This relatively small spending item is a big admission that the president’s health-care law simply won’t work, and it should provide encouragement to state officials who are still resisting the massive increase in deficit spending, government bureaucracy, and health-care costs the PPACA embodies.

 

 

 

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Edited April 17, 2013 by B-Man

[birdog1960]

MD's should focus on "cost value" first, not the patient ? ?

 

 

 

 

http://www.medpageto...ch/Reform/38404

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using common sense and providing cost effective health policy is to the benefit of the patient and to society as a whole. that's what he's saying. and he's absolutely correct: fee for service is the engine that drives these ridiculous costs. unfortunately, he's preaching to the choir: many ACP members are already on board (i'd have liked to be in SF for this conference, it's one of the best medical conferences in the world, imo). this message needs to be taken to the proceduralists. that's a much harder sell.

[Azalin]

 

Earlier this week, Health and Human Services head Kathleen Sebelius admitted that she didn't realize how complicated getting ObamaCare off the ground would be.

 

Sebelius complained that "no one fully anticipated" the difficulties involved in implementing ObamaCare, or how confusing it would be with the public.

.

 

how could Sebelius have possibly anticipated any difficulties at all? I mean, we had to pass Obamacare before anyone could learn what was in the legislation, right?

[RkFast]

This thing is DOA. It will be fully repealed by 2016.

[Magox]

Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus, one of the health reform law's chief authors, says he’s worried about a “huge train wreck coming down” if the Obama administration doesn’t improve its public outreach about the legislation.

 

Baucus, a Montana Democrat who is up for reelection in 2014, sharply criticized the administration’s outreach efforts in a budget hearing on Wednesday. He told Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius that people and businesses “have no idea what to do, what to expect” from the law.

 

"If the administration implements it correctly, millions more Americans will gain access to health care next year," Baucus said. "I am concerned that not every state, including Montana, will have an insurance marketplace established in time."

After the hearing, Baucus explained that the train wreck is “that consumers and businesses will just not have enough information. That it will be too confusing.”

He also expressed frustration that the White House and HHS are not providing details of its outreach efforts.

 

“My main concern is that when I ask them for information about the navigators … that I don’t get anything back,” Baucus told reporters.

Read more: http://www.politico.com/story/2013/04/max-baucus-worried-about-health-law-train-wreck-90215.html#ixzz2QkZWV3DV

 

 

Me thinks that Senator Baucus is trying to distance himself from Mr. O's health insurance law.

[DC Tom]

 

Read more: http://www.politico....l#ixzz2QkZWV3DV

 

 

 

Me thinks that Senator Baucus is trying to distance himself from Mr. O's health insurance law.

 

 

 

 

It's kinda fun watching everyone scramble for a chair now that the music's stopped.

[dayman]

Say what you want but the argument that it is so incredibly confusing is stupid.