Health Care And Immigration

There is a discussion going on at Talk Polywell about what the changes in Turkey mean to Europe. The question of health care came up in the context of immigration. I had a few words to say. (edited)

Well yes. Health insurance is a problem. But health care is not. You walk into a hospital with a complaint and you must be served. Pregnant women especially. The hospital has classes. Expensive? Yes. The deal is we can afford it. And our wait times are shorter. We like that. As in any queuing system - if you over provision sufficiently the service is good. If you are efficient the wait times extend. And if you are perfectly efficient the system ceases to function (eventually).

Here at Talk Polywell we often discuss why the US spends so much of its income on health care. My reasoning is as follows: The way income is spent (allocations) varies as you move up in income. The poor spend all their money on food (and shelter if they can afford it). You do not expect the same allocation in a $30K per capita economy as a $45K per capita economy.

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Now should we be providing every one in the country with health care? It is probably a good idea from a public health standpoint.

But maybe we need to do something about those coming across.

Coyotes charge from $500 to $2,000 to get people across the Mexican border. We could set up way stations. Make them watch a video (choice of Spanish or English) about the US Constitution - (focus on the right to bear arms HEH.) give them a copy of the US Constitution (Spanish or English) and issue them a work visa and SS # (foreign nationals cannot collect). And charge them for the privilege.

Right away you make money on the deal. Spread your ideals. And to some extent you can track the individuals (SS#).

This makes more sense than our current approach (doing nothing) but we can't get there because the positions of all sides has hardened.

You can always count on Americans to do the right thing - after they've tried everything else. - Winston Churchill. Let us hope the try everything period is almost over.

Judicial Activism

A Judge has thrown out Obama care. At least until the Supremes get to it. But there are complaints about the ruling.

"Judge Vinson's decision is radical judicial activism run amok, and it will undoubtedly be reversed on appeal. The decision flies in the face of three other decisions, contradicts decades of legal precedent, and could jeopardize families' health care security," said Ron Pollack, executive director of Families USA. "If this decision were allowed to stand, it would have devastating consequences for America's families."

Restraining the government is judicial activism. Except when the government needs restraining.

And I can see we have had some devastating consequences already. Health care rates have jumped up for some. And the waiver machine is going full blast.

And Families USA? Shills for the government controlled health care. What did you expect?

The Gifts Just Keep On Coming

Let me get this straight . . . .. We're going to be "gifted" with a health care plan we are forced to purchase and fined if we don't, Which purportedly covers at least ten million more people, without adding a single new doctor, but provides for 16,000 new IRS agents; written by a committee whose chairman  says he doesn't understand it; passed by a Congress that didn't read it but exempted themselves from it; and signed by a President who smokes, with funding administered by a treasury chief who  didn't pay his taxes, for which we'll be taxed for four years before anybenefits take effect, by a government which has   already bankrupted Social Security and Medicare, all to be overseen by a surgeon general   who is obese, and financed by a country that's broke!    

'What the hell could possibly go wrong?'

H/T Maxine

Hard Drugs

It is rich, but Raich has come back to haunt those hoping for a legal answer to Obama Care. Just as I predicted in Letter to a Friend.

Reason Magazine has the news.

According to a federal judge in Virginia, ObamaCare’s individual mandate to purchase health insurance is constitutional under the Commerce Clause because, under precedents set by previous cases, “Congress has broad power to regulate purely local matters that have substantial economic effects, even where the regulated individuals claim not to participate in interstate commerce.” The ruling, which was released yesterday, dismissed an argument by Liberty University, a Christian school based in the state, that the law should be invalidated because, among other reasons, it unconstitutionally requires individuals to purchase health insurance.

The section of the decision dealing with the mandate leans heavily on the Supreme Court’s ruling in Gonzales v. Raich, a case in which the Court decided that, under the Commerce Clause, Congress could criminalize growing marijuana at home for personal use because failure to do so would upend a legitimate regulatory activity. Yesterday’s ruling by Judge Norman K. Moon quotes Raich to argue that Congress may regulate “purely intrastate activity that is not itself ‘commercial’...if it concludes that failure to regulate that class of activity would undercut the regulation of the interstate market in that commodity."

With the previous understanding the government was merely leasing the taxpayers. It now owns them. But you have to admit the dopers got what was coming to them. And now the rest of us are going to get it. Good and hard.

The Raich case was about pot. So maybe Marijuana is a hard drug after all. Evidently in aggregate it will be hardest on those who don't use it. A very peculiar drug to be sure.

Cross Posted at Classical Values

I Have Another One

It seems the Senate is about to pass S 510. Maybe. It is about food safety (do you really believe that?) and the regulation of food products that could cause illness from contamination. According to what I consider overblown (for now) rhetoric it will be messing with home gardeners and legacy seed growers and collectors.

“If accepted [S 510] would preclude the public’s right to grow, own, trade, transport, share, feed and eat each and every food that nature makes. It will become the most offensive authority against the cultivation, trade and consumption of food and agricultural products of one’s choice. It will be unconstitutional and contrary to natural law or, if you like, the will of God.” ~Dr. Shiv Chopra, Canada Health whistleblower

Now is that true? I haven't looked. But I doubt it. But suppose it is true. Is it unconstitutional? Of course not. Hemp/cannabis has been banned for a long time on health and safety grounds. Why not everything else? They have decades of precedents on their side.

Well what do you know? The Drug War justification works for ObamaCare and the TSA too. And now the control of plants. There is nothing the Drug War can't do.

Cross Posted at Classical Values

Democrats: Vote for the Republican

I was visiting Althouse (thanks Instapundit) and came across this comment.

Revenant said...

Had our 2011 benefits review at work this week. Thanks to ObamaCare, employee contributions are up 5% to 50%, deductibles and out of pocket are up 100%. Plus the joy of my HSP no longer covering over-the-counter medication (that being what I've spent almost all of it on to date).

Nothing I hadn't expected, but I think the Republican ticket just gained a few new voters from among my coworkers.

10/20/10 6:31 PM

The fools had hoped to have these changes come in after the election. But the idiots didn't read the bill before they voted on it. I believe it is clobbering time.

A Question Is Asked

Over at the New York Times some one asks some questions of the Tea Parties.

I have every confidence that the GOP will take Congress this fall. Do you think the conservative movement, the Tea Party, and the GOP have a mandate to go after the New Deal (i.e. privatize Social Security & Medicare, enact Rep. Paul Ryan's plan, etc.)?

A mandate? No. But we do have precedent when it comes to Social Security. Chile. Where privatization is working well.

Granny will not be tossed to the street. The transition will be gradual.But her grand kids are going to have to make it on their own. And the youngsters will be better for it. Their money will get invested. Risky? To be sure. But if you compare that to 100% theft by Congress it doesn't look so bad.

As to the rest? Anything that is unsustainable will not be sustained. So now is the time to start thinking of how to transition out of the unsustainable.

Free Is Too Expensive For Government

And what was IBM giving for free? A chance to significantly lower health care costs and improve service.

Overdetermined

Nate Silver is discussing Democrat prospects for this coming November (bad and getting worse) and says the results are overdetermined.

...there is reason to be skeptical of two types of analyses: those that claim that Factor X definitely isn’t contributing to the Democrats’ troubles, and those that assert that it definitely is. For instance, I’d urge some caution in reading this article at Real Clear Politics by Jay Cost — which rightly critiques those who have entirely dismissed the role that health care played in the Democrats’ decline, but probably goes too far in trying to argue the contrary. Mr. Cost is right, for instance, that the Democrats’ polling decline was steepest during last summer, when health care began to be debated — but when one delves in a little deeper, the timing of the sharpest periods of decline do not line up very well with specific events in the health care debate.

Does that mean Mr. Cost is wrong? Not at all. Health care dominated the political discourse for about nine months; it seems implausible that it hasn’t played some role. But he hasn’t offered much in the way of proof — nor is there much of it to be had: overdetermined phenomena usually beget underdetermined attempts to explain them.

If the results are overdetermined doesn't that mean that the Democrats have a LOT of changing to do?

.i.e. I'm a voter who hates the Health Care Bill and TARP. I only have one vote for two issues. So to get my vote you have to head in a different direction in TWO places.

I don't think the Democrats are constitutionally suited for the changes they need to make. Either the disease or the cure is likely to kill them.

Cross Posted at Classical Values

A Reduced Standard

Obama Care has an interesting standard for the care of the elderly in minority communities.

Section 2046 (b)(3) grants the secretary of HHS the discretion to waive substantial penalties (i.e., fines of up to $300,000 and debarment from federal programs) for failing to report elder abuse and other crimes committed against residents of long-term care facilities that serve racial and ethnic minorities. Obviously, this could increase the probability that residents of such facilities won’t receive the same level of protection as residents of nursing homes that serve non-minority populations.

I guess that is part of the new post racial America I keep hearing so much about. Or maybe it is just the first step in Andrew Breitbart's plan to bring back slavery.

Government Prices Are Market Prices

The government of the US is engineering a shortage of doctors. Read it and weep:

... the Justice Department has unambiguously stated that refusal to accept government price controls is a form of illegal “price fixing.”

The FTC has hinted at this when it’s said physicians must accept Medicare-based reimbursement schedules from insurance companies. But the DOJ has gone the final step and said, “Government prices are market prices,” in the form of the Idaho Industrial Commission’s fee schedule. The IIC administers the state’s worker compensation system and is composed of three commissioners appointed by the governor. This isn’t a quasi-private or semi-private entity. It’s a purely government operation.

What’s more, the Antitrust Division has linked a refusal to accept government price controls with a refusal to accept a “private” insurance company’s contract offer. This lives little doubt that antitrust regulators consider insurance party contracts the equivalent of government price controls — and physicians and patients have no choice but to accept them.

Despite this, Antitrust Division chief Christine Varney, an Obama political appointee, insists she’s trying to protect “competition”:

The orthopedists who participated in these group boycotts denied medical care to Idaho workers and caused higher prices for orthopedic services. Today’s action seeks to prevent the recurrence of these illegal acts and protects Idaho consumers by promoting competition in the healthcare industry.”

The Idaho attorney general compounds the lie:

The free marketplace works best when there is fair competition. Anticompetitive activity harms the marketplace, businesses and consumers. Enforcement of the antitrust laws restores competition to the marketplace to the benefit of businesses and consumers and the marketplace as a whole.

There are two possible outcomes of this:

Government sets prices too high and more producers enter the market and some consumers leave. Or government sets prices too low and some producers leave the market and some consumers enter the market who would otherwise be priced out.

The net result of government efforts is supply/demand imbalances.

There is a third possible outcome: government gets the prices just right and continually adjusts them according to local and general market conditions. What are the odds of that?

A couple of books on the subject of the knowledge problem and market pricing that you might find of interest:

Keynes and Hayek: The Money Economy

Calculation and Coordination: Essays on Socialism and Transitional Political Economy

Update: thanks to commenter S.M. Oliva at the CSM link at the top I have this bit of added information:

By law, the DOJ must file all comments received with the court together with an official reply. The court is then supposed to take the comments and reply into account when determining whether entry of the proposed order is “in the public interest.”

Comments should be sent to Joshua H. Soven, Chief, Litigation I Section, Antitrust Division, U. S. Department of Justice, 450 Fifth St. N.W., Suite 4100, Washington, D.C. 20530. Soven’s fax number is 202-307-5802.

The 60-day clock doesn’t start until the proposed order is published in the Federal Register, which might take up to two weeks.

Do send them a polite note or two. Just to give them something to think about.

H/T Jccarlton at Talk Polywell

Cross Posted at Classical Values

You Can Already Count The Cost

The recently passed Health Care initiative is already raising medical insurance costs.

Letting young adults stay on their parents' health insurance until they turn 26 will nudge premiums nearly 1 percent higher for employer plans, the government said in an estimate released Monday.

The coverage requirement, effective starting later this year, is one of the most anticipated early benefits of President Barack Obama's new health care law. Many insurers have already started offering extended coverage to families who purchase their coverage directly. And employers say parents have flooded their benefits departments with questions.

Raising costs for people is a benefit? George Orwell would be proud.

And about the promise of the health care bill according to Obama?

After decades of struggle and a year of debate, health reform is now law in America.

What does it mean for you? It means an end to the worst insurance company abuses, new rules that treat everyone fairly, and more choices and affordable health insurance for millions of Americans.

I guess affordable means higher priced. See what I mean about Orwell?

Cross Posted at Classical Values

Hammering Small Business

The Taxprof quotes from CNN:

An all-but-overlooked provision of the health reform law is threatening to swamp U.S. businesses with a flood of new tax paperwork.

Section 9006 of the health care bill -- just a few lines buried in the 2,409-page document -- mandates that beginning in 2012 all companies will have to issue 1099 tax forms not just to contract workers but to any individual or corporation from which they buy more than $600 in goods or services in a tax year.

The stealth change radically alters the nature of 1099s and means businesses will have to issue millions of new tax documents each year.

Right now, the IRS Form 1099 is used to document income for individual workers other than wages and salaries. Freelancers receive them each year from their clients, and businesses issue them to the independent contractors they hire.

But under the new rules, if a freelance designer buys a new iMac from the Apple Store, they'll have to send Apple a 1099. A laundromat that buys soap each week from a local distributor will have to send the supplier a 1099 at the end of the year tallying up their purchases.

The bill makes two key changes to how 1099s are used. First, it expands their scope by using them to track payments not only for services but also for tangible goods. Plus, it requires that 1099s be issued not just to individuals, but also to corporations.

Taken together, the two seemingly small changes will require millions of additional forms to be sent out.

So what happens in reality? Fewer items get expensed so tax collections go up. Not counting business that goes underground.

Sons of bitches. This new Health Care Law needs serious fixing. I propose repeal. The first step in that process is to Repeal Congress.

H/T Instapundit

Cross Posted at Classical Values

Zama Ombies

So I'm noodling across the net and came across a reference to this book:

Obama Zombies: How the Liberal Machine Brainwashed My Generation

So naturally I'm interested in the reviews. Here is one reviewer, E. Berry "zeetwo8", whose family is having buyers remorse.

I can't believe where we are at this present time in America. My whole family voted for Barack...I mean my whole family..we are all white working class people. We usually get together for major family events, of which was my mother's 85th birthday. It was not too long before politics was brought up and I have to say, on save my admitted socialist sister attending NYU journalism program, we are all kinda' shell shocked about what just went down in D.C. with the vote on health care. We all talk about how this system needs fixing, as a couple of us are in the health care industry. But, the way this was passed has left most, not all, but most of us very troubled.

Well a lot of us tried to warn you but you were so caught up in hope and change that your eyes glazed over whenever we tried talking reason.

The reviewer does finish off on a positive note.

This book has really opened my eyes and made me really slow down, take a chill pill and slowly, patiently and OBJECTIVELY watch what politicians say and do so that one can make a more reasoned decision.

Thanks Jason for writing this book for my generation. With this new perspective, we have no excuse for repeating this mistake...

You are not going to get anything even close to OBJECTIVE if you keep getting your news from Amalgamated Pravda Inc. Anyway - there is more good stuff in the review. Go read it.

Cross Posted at Classical Values

The Victory Slide

After passing the historic health care bill (how soon can we make it history?) obama seems to have slipped in it.

President Barack Obama's national standing has slipped to a new low after his victory on the historic health care overhaul, even in the face of growing signs of economic revival, according to the latest Associated Press-GfK poll.

The survey shows the political terrain growing rockier for Obama and congressional Democrats heading into midterm elections, boosting Republican hopes for a return to power this fall.

Pyrrhic Victory.

H/T Instapundit

Not What I Want Them To Hear

Senator Chris Dodd has a problem. With Republicans. They are not telling the American people what Dodd wants them to hear.

Senate Banking Committee Chairman Chris Dodd threatened Wednesday to end negotiations with Republicans on a financial regulatory reform bill if they continue to lead what he called a misinformation campaign based on Wall Street talking points.

“My patience is running out,” Dodd said on the Senate floor. “I’ve extended the hand. I’ve written provisions in this bill to accommodate various interests. But I’m not going to continue doing this if all I’m getting the other side is a suggestion somehow that this is a partisan effort.”

That was certainly forthright. Now if he would only explain the connection with campaign donations the circle would be complete.

So what was this "misinformation" he was in a snit about?

Congressional Republicans, led by Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, began an effort Tuesday to paint the bill as doing little to curb future taxpayer bailouts of large financial firms. The White House responded sharply pushing back on the claims all day Tuesday.

The GOP points to the inclusion in the bill of a $50 billion fund, which is paid for by the firms and would be used to wind down a failing institution. But Republicans say it will act as a safety net for Wall Street to continue to push their businesses to the brink of collapse.

And no mention of Fannie and Freddy you Republican cowards.

Nineteen Days

Cong. Crittek Bart Stupak helped put the health care bill over the top. However, it seems that just 19 days after passing this landmark turkey he has decided to spend more time with his family.

Rep. Bart Stupak insists that tea party activists outraged over his crucial support of health care legislation didn't run him out of office, but his decision to retire gives conservatives a rallying point as they target Democrats in the midterm elections.

The congressman, an anti-abortion Democrat whose high-profile role in the "Obamacare" debate earned him enemies on the left and the right, said Friday that he's leaving because he's tired and has accomplished his No. 1 goal: improving health care.

"The tea party did not run me out," Stupak told The Associated Press in a phone interview. "If you know me and my personality, I would welcome the challenge."

Stupak had been a consistent landslide winner in his sprawling northern Michigan district, and the opening now offers Republicans a ripe opportunity to regain a seat they held for decades until Stupak prevailed in 1992.

His political foes — tea party activists and abortion opponents — both claimed credit for forcing him into retirement, and Michigan GOP Chairman Ron Weiser declared that the nine-term incumbent had become the first casualty of the battle over health care in Congress.

Say what you will but I question the timing.

20,000 vs 100

Harry Reid is having a very bad month. After 20,000 showed up in Seachlight, Nevada for the Throw The Bums (including Harry) Out Tour, Harry was only able to get 100 people to come to his rally. That is no typo. Let me spell it out. One hundred.

SEARCHLIGHT-- U.S. Sen. Harry Reid launched his re-election campaign Monday with a sentimental send-off from his hometown of Searchlight, cheered on by more than 100 close supporters.

OK. So it could have been more than 100. It could have been 102 or 103. No mention of whether pets and reporters were counted.

And thanks to Instapundit I found more bad news for Harry.

A new state poll of Nevadans out Monday from Rasmussen Reports confirms what has become increasingly clear in recent weeks: American voters are angry about numerous things and their prime targets of opportunity in 2010 are incumbents.

According to the new poll, fully 62% of Nevadans think it would be a good thing if most incumbents up for reelection across these United States lost this coming November.

An identical 62% of Nevadans also think it would be a good thing if President Obama's recently signed healthcare legislation was repealed; that figure is slightly higher than the national repeal rate.

Unfortunately for Nevada's five-term, 70-year-old senior Sen. Harry Reid, he is not only an....

... incumbent up for reelection this year, he was one of the top driving forces behind Obama's unpopular healthcare legislation. It appears he's going to need those millions from two Obama fundraisers in-state.

In an interview to be broadcast on Fox News on Monday night, Reid sounded defiant, mocking Republican Sarah Palin's speech at a recent tea party in Reid's hometown: "I was going to give a few remarks on the people who were over here a week ago Saturday, but I couldn't find it written all over my hands."

Palin had vowed to thousands of supporters: "We're sending a message to Washington. It's loud and it's clear, and in these upcoming elections we're saying that the big-government, big-debt, Obama-Pelosi-Reid spending spree is over. You're fired.

It looks to me like Harry will be retiring in Jan. '11. I hope he finds the joys of involuntary retirement as attractive as millions of other Americans do. i.e. painful as hell. But all is not gloom and doom for Harry. He has his government pension to look forward to. Which is something most Americans will be paying for until the day he dies. But I look on the bright side. It is cheaper than having him in Congress.

Buy From Government Motors - Or Else

There is an ongoing discussion at Classical Values about whether the Federal Government can force you to buy a product. Like heath insurance say. Or a car from Government Motors.

I just came across an interesting mp3 from the Volokh Conspiracy on that very question. It is a discussion by the Attorney General of Colorado of the subject. The Government Motors question comes up about 17:50 into the discussion. The Attorney General of Colorado is filing suit against the Federal Government over the law and discusses his reasons - and he has a number of them. The whole audio is about 23 minutes and well worth your time.

And for some background: here is a link to the Tabor question.

Cross Posted at Classical Values

The No Cuts Rule

Thanks to the government no employee will be required to take a pay cut to pay for the new health care they will be getting.

Also of interest is the fact that Section 313 states that an employer hasn’t satisfied the contribution requirement if they simply cut the employee’s salary by the amount of the contribution. This is best illustrated with an example: Let’s suppose Employer A has an Employee X who makes $10.00/hour and Employer A doesn’t offer a ‘public option’ for his employees. By law, the employer is now required to pay an 8% tax on payroll (let’s assume Employer A is in the highest bracket). If the Employer simply reduces Employee X’s wage by 8% to $9.20/hour, the Employer is in violation of the statute and is deemed to not have made a contribution. While on the surface this appears good since it forces the employer to effectively increase total employee compensation, this will be a job-killer. Employer A might very easily choose to reduce the workforce by 8% to keep costs the same.

The government has been very kind to those who can keep their jobs. You will be working 8% harder to maintain your job. To the rest?

Enjoy your new freedom (from work) suckahs. You wanted a government controlled by one party. You got it.