Guess Who's Losing Their Health Care Plan. . . You

Last week, the Democrats began their big putsch. . . er, push to convince the American people that ObamaCare isn’t a clusterfudge of epic proportions. They're spending $125 million on this campaign, which will be headed by tax cheat Tom "MegaLobbyist" Daschle -- I guess Obama does employ lobbyists after all. . . every chance he gets. Sadly for them, reality blew up in their faces in the form of a leaked memo that highlights something that anyone with a brain already knew, but which will come as a great surprise to Democratic voters: you’re going to lose your employer health care plans. Gee, who could have seen this coming?

The Democrats have a huge problem. See it turns out that for reasons that elude the Democrats, the pesky American public has never taken to ObamaCare. Recent polls show that 63% not only don’t like it, but actively want it repealed. Sixty-three percent is a stunningly large number, and there is nothing in our history that has been as unpopular. Indeed, most people tend to accept legislation once it passes as a settled fact of life and they move on -- which is what the Democrats were counting on happening here as well. But that didn’t happen.

And the reasons for this are obvious. First, ObamaCare is a financial disaster waiting to happen. Indeed, everyone knows that the $940 billion cost estimate was phony. We knew it was based on false estimates, unrealistic expectations, and bad math, and we are being proven right. For example, we’ve already heard (1) that the cost estimate for the second ten years, when all of the benefits finally kick in, is around $1.6 trillion, as compared to the falsified $940 billion sales price for the first ten years, (2) that discretionary spending will be $115 billion higher than expected in the first ten years, (3) that the $500 billion in Medicare cuts used to generate the $940 bill price tag won’t happen, because the Democrats are eliminating them with a “doctor’s fix,” and that the fix will actually cost more than expected -- $276 billion, and (4) that there are no cost containment measures in the bill, meaning all the estimates are far too low.

ObamaCare also is endangering Medicare, which is why seniors are angrier than everybody else. You simply can’t cut $500 billion from Medicare without cutting services -- no matter how much the Democrats repeat that lie. To delay the collapse of Medicare until it can be somebody else's problem, Democrats are struggling to pass the doctor’s fix, which is intended to prevent a 21% cut in the reimbursement rate from kicking in. That cut is scheduled to have taken effect June 1, 2010, but they've illegally delayed it while they try to find the money to pass the fix. Even without that 21% cut, doctors are already losing money on every Medicare patient they see and doctors are dropping Medicare patients at record numbers because of it. Seniors know this.

The Democrats are trying to counter seniors’ fears by flat out lying that there will be no benefit cuts, with Obama making ludicrously false claims that he wants to increase doctor reimbursements, and by touting the $250 checks the government is about to send out to some seniors to plug the “donut hole” in the Medicare prescription benefit, but that’s small comfort. . . you’re going to lose your doctor and no one will treat you, but here’s $250, don’t spend it all in one place gramps.

And now the biggest reason yet to oppose ObamaCare has been exposed. The whole time the Democrats were trying to pass ObamaCare, they kept attacking anyone who said that people would lose their employer-sponsored health plans. Does anyone remember Obama assuring everyone: “if you like your current plan, you can keep it.” They even put out ridiculous CBO estimates that said that only around 5% of people might lose their employer plans.

But now a memo has leaked out from the administration (a joint memo by the Department of Labor, HHS and the IRS) that estimates that within three years, 51% of the working public will lose their current employer plans. Yes, 51% within three years. That’s every other one of you. And, of course, the rest of you can be sure that you’ll follow in the next three years.

Going into damage mode, the administration is now claiming this memo was just preliminary. They are also trying to sell you on the idea that what you get instead will be so much better. Yeah, sure. Of course, you’ll be paying for that on your own, but that’s a minor detail right?

The reality is simple to see for anyone who isn’t a moron. Employers are paying close to $5,000 per single employee and $13,000 per married employee to provide health care every year. They can dump your plan and pay only a fine of a couple hundred dollars instead. What do you think your loving, caring employer will do? Why do you think the Business Roundtable is salivating? The Business Roundtable, for those who don’t know, is a collection of the CEOs of the largest companies who routinely advocate corporate socialism under the guise of “free markets.” They expressed confidence in this memo and endorsed ObamaCare because they want to shift their employee health care costs onto the taxpayer's backs.

Rational people don’t spend money they don’t need to. And if companies can dump their plans and save an average of $9,000 per employee each year, don’t you think they will? They might even offer you a couple thousand to make the pain go down easier. . . but I wouldn’t hold my breath.

The reality is that the Democrats, as usual, lied from the get-go. Only this time, the public never bought the lie. And the few who did, are about to find out that they’ve been had. The morons who expected free coverage on day one have already learned that they’ve been had, with more to come -- just wait for the fines to kick in! Those with uninsurable conditions have learned that they’ve been had. Seniors have learned that they’ve been had. And now working Democrats, few and far between I know but there are some, are about to learn that they’ve been had too.

I wonder how they’ll spin this to be Bush’s fault?