Better Late Than Never Obamacare Schadenfreude

OK, I'll try to do this quick today, it's been a long day and I still have more to do; however, yesterday was a big day for Obamacare Schadenfreude.

Did you hear that "If you like your plan you can keep your plan" was named the Political Lie of the Year by that right-wing outfit PolitiFact?  Ace has the news:

Leftwing Hack Site PolitiFact Bends to Reality and Declares "If You Like Your Plan, You Can Keep Your Plan" as the Lie of the Year

PolitiFact has flacked for Obamacare for three years. In 2010, I believe, they declared the statement that Obamacare represented a national takeover of health insurance their Lie of the Year.

Lie of the Year, they said. While today we witness, every single day, new edicts issued from the Pontiff of the State about what insurers may not or must do. Not based on law, even. Just based on Obama's political needs in any particular day.

After previously declaring Obama's statement that "if you like your plan, you can keep your plan" to be True (they said "half true," but only because the insurance companies were not required to keep the promise that Obama made; Obama's promise was good, they reasoned, but he had no power to compel insurers to abide by it), they finally now reverse themselves.

In fact, Ace was really on a roll yesterday (I guess the meds were working well): Smartest. Administration. Ever!

The continuing PR push by the Health Insurance Salesman-in-Chief is providing some hilarity today.

First, behold the product of the left's 50-year experiment in improving our public schools:

And He Spake That They Should Be Deemed To Be Covered, And It Was So. And It Was Good.

It seemed to only be on the outermost fringes of the possible... and yet, as the Day of Catastrophe and Crisis approaches, the Administration seems to be thinking more and more about the Unthinkable Solution.

During the Obamacare rollout, stories have spread about millions of Americans losing their current health insurance coverage, preferred doctors and hospitals as plans restrict networks to comply with the law, and losing their prescription drug coverage.

On Thursday afternoon, the Department of Health and Human Services said it was “strongly encouraging” insurers to help the department fix a raft of problems created by the rocky rollout of President Obama’s health care law.

Among the guidance the HHS announced:

— It is requiring insurers to accept payments until Dec. 31 for coverage starting on Jan. 1.

That's absurd and illegal. They need time to actually have the check clear the bank to actually be paid. But Obama has spoken, and it shall be so.
It is also “urging” insurers to give individuals more time beyond that to pay for coverage.

If you want insurance to begin January 1st, you can pay, like, whenever.
In other words, if somebody pays for coverage in the middle of January, HHS is asking insurers to retroactively make that person's coverage effective as of Jan. 1. HHS is also asking insurers to cover individuals who offer a "down payment," even if that payment only covers part of the first month's premiums.

They go further-- after having imposed "skinny network" coverage on America, the HHS is now "strongly encouraging" (again) insurers to pay for doctors outside of the network. That is, pay for non-network doctors.

So that people don't realize (at least at first) that they will not be keeping their doctor at all.

Obamacare is now Calvinball being played at a presidential level, with the whole country as field of play, and with the citizens as snowmen:

Remember the "Life of Julia" the paean to female dependency on government that was cooked up by the Obama campaign to explain Obama's view of the expansive government, which was roundly critiqued, ridiculed and parodied until, one dark night, the White House took the bulk of it off their website?  Obamacare has prompted a new version: The Real Life of Julia's Policy.  A taste:

The whole thing is working so well that Hill Staffers are being warned not to believe the info obtained on the Washington DC Obamacare website:

On the same day the HHS was accused of criminally obstructing a probe into the disastrous ObamaCare rollout, Congressional staffers being forced into the exchange have been warned not to rely on information from the bungled website. A real vote of confidence there.

Capitol Hill staffers who signed up for ObamaCare through the District’s exchange are being told to confirm their enrollments in person.

An email from the Senate Disbursing Office, obtained by The Hill, warns Capitol Hill staffers they shouldn’t trust the information provided to them by the DC Health Link (DCHL) site.

“It is essential that you confirm your coverage in DCHL through the Disbursing Office,” the email reads.

“Please do not assume you are covered unless you have seen the confirmation letter from the Disbursing Office.”

The warning adds another ObamaCare headache for staffers and lawmakers, who raced this week to sign up on the exchanges to meet the Dec. 9 deadline for having coverage in 2014.

Hacker Says ObamaCare Website Security Still Not Fixed

“So, there’s a few of them,” Kenndedy responded when asked if security problems were still present “there’s one that’s been addressed and that was one of the easiest ones to fix.” But, said Kennedy, “the most critical ones that we had testified in front of congress for are still there.”

On whether the security problems could be fixed, Kennedy said, “my recommendation has always been to basically try to take the site down, rework it, recode, and kind of release a version to stand up and be secure, as well as perform well. This was flawed from the get-go for security and performance.”

The Connecticut  Obamacare Exchange, object of praise in a Rose Garden speech was discovered to be giving incorrect advice to everyone who consulted it seeking individual plans.

The website for Access Health CT, the state’s new health exchange, had incorrect information online about deductibles and co-insurance impacting all 19 individual health plans from the three insurance companies that offer those plans through the exchange: Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield in Connecticut, ConnectiCare, and HealthyCT. The 12 small-group plans were unaffected.

But not to worry, Sebelius is paying for a whole new bunch of Obama activists health care navigators that might help the people who wrote the damn thing navigate its intricacies.

HHS Awards Another $58M for Obamacare Navigators

Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Kathleen Sebelius's agency announced grants of $58 million to 1,157 community health centers to allow them to "expand their enrollment assistance efforts as more Americans enroll in affordable health insurance coverage." These grants come on top of $150 million previously given to such health centers to "support outreach and enrollment activities" for Obamacare.

 Man with Critically Ill Son Gives Up on HealthCare.gov After More Than 50 Tries

John Gisler has been trying to buy an Obamacare plan for his sick son since the federal exchange launched on October 1, but after nearly three months, three failed applications, and “maybe 50 or 100” calls to the national hotline, he’s given up. Faced with the prospect of being left without insurance on January 1, Gisler has opted to buy an individual plan from a local insurance broker.

The Washington Post’s Sarah Kliff reports that Gisler and his son are two people who may fall into the “coverage gap,” comprised of up to 15 million people who saw their plans canceled and have been unable to enroll in the exchanges. In the case of Gisler’s son, who has a rare degenerative condition, the plan is ending because Utah’s high-risk pool is being shut down at the end of this year.

Rather than keep trying to enroll amid a series of problems, the family has decided to forgo the $3,000 tax credit they would receive on the exchange, because they worry they wouldn’t be covered in time.

At least that way, they won't wake up Jan. and find themselves uncovered.  Another Obamacare success story!

How Obamacare will kill your daughters smile: Obamacare raised the cost of your kids’ braces

Thanks to a change from the Affordable Care Act that places an annual $2,500 contribution cap on flexible spending accounts, which let workers set aside pre-tax dollars to cover medical expenses, some consumers may be spending more on braces, expensive eyewear and other medical supplies they would typically buy with the accounts. Before the new rule, there was no official cap on how much taxpayers could stash into the account, though many companies typically set their own limits of $5,000. For a person in the 25% tax bracket, the cap cuts the maximum tax break in half to $625 from $1,250.

But what they lack in success stories they hope to make up with an advertizing campaign:

'Sexiest Man Alive' Brought In to 'Boost' Obamacare Enrollment

"The Sexiest Man Alive is being enlisted to spice up Obamacare," Bloomberg reports.

"Pop singer Adam Levine, who won the designation from People magazine last month, is among the celebrities who’ll be promoting enrollment in online health insurance exchanges as part of a social media campaign kicking off tomorrow.

"With enrollment totals behind administration projections after the botched start-up of the federal exchange, 17 state exchanges joined by an advocacy group are drawing on Obama administration allies in entertainment and sports to promote sign-ups, using social media such as Facebook and Twitter."

Apparently the sexiest woman alive was not having trouble paying for a health plan.

Obamacare Advertises on ESPN

"Now, for the first time, you can be covered -- with a quality health plan from the new health insurance marketplace, part of the health care law," says the male announcer.

"It's where brand name companies offer plans you can compare side by side. And it's the place to get lower monthly payments. ... So if you have an accident, get sick, or just need a check-up. Enroll now at the Health Insurance Marketplace at healthcare.gov."

Having insurance to cover a regular check up is like having auto insurance cover oil changes.  Why pay the insurance company a fee for passing that money to the doctor? Forget it, they're rolling...



Larry the Cable Guy has a message for critics angered by his Obamacare jokes.

Why do democrats hate old and sick people?  Despite the fact that the "young invincibles" are being forced into the program to pay for the 'old vincibles' Medicaid is being forced to take a 14% cut.

An estimated 3.5 million poor and ill homebound senior citizens will wake up on New Year's Day to discover Obamacare has slashed funding for their home health care program.

It will happen because the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services quietly issued a regulation Nov. 22 announcing a 14-percent cut over the next four years in funding for the Home Health Care Prospective Payment program.

The rule cuts Medicare payments to home health care providers by 3.5 percent each year beginning in 2014, for a total cut of 14 percent.

The program puts health care in the homes of seniors suffering from acute or chronic afflictions, or who are in need of rehabilitation therapy.

And workers?  Nearly half of CFOs plan to cut jobs over Obamacare

A new survey of 400 chief financial officers in the U.S. finds that nearly half of companies plan to cut back on employment in response to Obamacare.

Despite more optimism about the U.S. economy and their own companies, the quarterly survey, conducted by Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business and CFO Magazine found that “48% of US CFOs say their firms are considering reducing employment in response to the Affordable Care Act.”

Twenty percent of CFOs said that they may hire fewer workers in response to Obamacare. Ten percent said that layoffs were a possibility while 40 percent of CFOs said they might decrease employees’ hours to below the 30-hour-a-week threshold.

I may have post this one before, but, heck, Ace does high dudgeon so well:

Man Who Complained of Cancelled Insurance Policy Was Soon After Audited By the IRS;Health Care Freedom Activist Helps Him Get His Policy Restored, and Now Finds Himself Being Audited As Well

When I first heard the cancer patient who complained of getting his health care policy cancelled was being audited -- for ten year old returns -- I didn't cover it.

It's not because I didn't suspect Obama's minions of harassing their opponents. I did. But I didn't cover it because I figured there was no way to prove it. Audits happen, after all, and I'm sure anyone willing to harass a political opponent is also willing to fake up some paperwork showing the audit was random or based on some acceptable legal reason.

But now I find out that it wasn't just the cancer patient who suddenly had the IRS alert and curious and on the case -- it was also his advocate, an insurance salesman and Obamacare critic who was helping the man get his hold policy back.

This man was also suddenly being asked questions by the IRS -- mostly about his trouble-making client.

It is unavoidable; it is open and shut; it is a serious political scandal. The fact that two men who came forward to criticize Obama are both hit with a snap IRS inspection days after making their complaints public can simply not be attributed to chance.

There is a principle in law: res ipsa loquitor. "The thing speaks for itself." In some cases, you don't have to prove an element of a tort, if it is obvious, based on circumstances, that wrongdoing has in fact occurred.

It is deliberate. It is, in fact, conspiracy.

But what's sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander (or maybe vice versa); Chairman Issa is on the hunt:

Issa to Sebelius on Healthcare.gov Probe: Failing to Turn Over Info is Criminal Obstruction of Justice 

In a letter sent late Wednesday, Chairman of the House Oversight Committee Darrell Issa reminded Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius that obstructing a congressional investigation is a crime.

Issa's Committee has been looking into the details of how Obamacare was implemented, along with the major problems with Healthcare.gov and has requested a number of documents from HHS, none of which he's received. The documents requested pertain to companies hired by HHS to build and operate Healthcare.gov.

How Obamacare Destroys Self-Annointed Elites Illusion of Competency:

The biggest damage from the developing ObamaCare trainwreck is to the carefully crafted illusion that progressives have worked so hard to create for the past several decades: that Big Government self-anointed elites in Washington DC are competent super-managers of sterling character who can be trusted with an ever-increasing amount of power and control over the lives of citizens.

The Washington Post obtained a memo that detailed the White House in-fighting over how ObamaCare should be implemented. The memo goes over the struggle within the administration between what it dubs 'the economics team', who argued for bringing in private sector specialists with experience at start ups and complex problem solving of the magnitude that the ACA called for, and the 'political team' who wanted fast implementation by it's own in-house political staffers who fully believed they were up to the job.

After all, who needs actual experience when you believe all the 'right' things? The noble cause will grant you competency, or something. Progressives seem to actually believe this,and as David Horowitz explains here, this is why every central planning escapade turns into a flaming trainwreck.

Juking the ObamaCare Stats

A charitable reading suggests that ObamaCare's net enrollment stands at about negative four million. That's the estimated four million to five and a half million people who had their individual health plans liquidated as ObamaCare-noncompliant—offset by the 364,682 who have signed up for a plan on a state or federal exchange and the 803,077 who have been found eligible to receive Medicaid.

HHS is boasting of enrollment for November that was four times as high as October, yet 62% of the total was in the state exchanges, some of which are marginally less prone to crashing than the federal version. Then again, 41 states posted sign-ups only in the three or four figures, including eight states that run their own exchanges. Oregon managed to scrape up 44 people. Among the 137,204 federal sign-ups, no state is reaching the critical mass necessary for stable insurance prices.

Why Obamacare Is Off the Rails   Read the whole thing 

The introduction of the Affordable Care Act (ACA), as revealed by the roll-out of HealthCare.gov, is an epic public embarrassment, living up to predictions of a train wreck.

We're watching government at its most harmful and ineffectual. This is not rocket science -- no risky new technology is required; no laws of physics have to be invented or repealed. While the technology itself may present some challenges, problems like this more often than not stem from poor leadership, discipline, and accountability.

Whew!  Who in the hell thought up this thing?