Have you ever seen such a botched and corrupt process? Rather than focus reform on what needs fixing–access to insurance for the hard to cover–President Obama and his Congressional court jesters tried to remake the entire health care system. But the bill was based on expediency more than principle. As a result, we have suffered through the spectacle of serial backroom deals. And here’s the latest: Union members will apparently be excused from paying the tax on Cadillac policies that all other such policy holders will pay. From the story:
“Unions tentatively struck a deal Tuesday to exempt collectively bargained healthcare plans from a tax on high-cost plans expected to be used to help raise revenue for the healthcare overhaul,” CongressDaily reports. “AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka, Service Employees International Union President Andy Stern and United Auto Workers President Ron Gettelfinger met with House Speaker [Nancy] Pelosi Tuesday, a day after labor leaders met at the White House to express their opposition to the excise tax. … Exempting collectively bargained plans would appease unions that often offer expensive health plans in lieu of higher wages. The deal could also help Obama avoid breaking his promise not to tax those earning less than $200,000″ (Edney, 1/13).
What a travesty. So, if a Teamster and an unrepresented worker have the same high end policy, the Teamster won’t be taxed but the other fellow–poor sap–will. Obamacare is more malodorous than a poorly run tannery.
Think about what an unmitigated mess Obamacare has become: Some states are now being treated differently than other states, on paying the extra costs to come in Medicaid for example. Distinctions in impact are based on non rational criteria. The bill is more than 2000 pages long and it is literally being crafted to help the friends of the power brokers in locked rooms, with curtains drawn.
Obama promised us integrity. He has delivered favoritism and cronyism. He said that he would be a bridge over troubled waters. He has actually been the exact opposite–by favoring some constituencies and punishing others, he has more bitterly divided us than any time in my lifetime, threatening real cultural schism.
Mr. Obama: Tear Down This Wall!
January 13th, 2010 | 3:49 pm
[...] More analysis over at Secondhand Smoke. Comments (0) [...]
January 13th, 2010 | 5:14 pm
That is disgusting. Pardon me while I vomit. I am so glad that I did not vote for Obama. I seriously considered it. But, I did not, thank God.
January 13th, 2010 | 5:52 pm
Dead flies cause the ointment of the apothecary to send forth a stinking savor…
Ecclesiastes 10:1
January 14th, 2010 | 2:39 pm
Wow, I had no idea Obama was so powerful. To be president for only about 365 days, NOT actually pass a final health bill and leave people “more bitterly divided” than anyone else in several generations. And over health care reform totalling 2 years of our typical defense budget – some of which goes to Blackwater mercenaries.
I’ve seen a more botched and corrupt process. I seem to recall a 7 year occupation of Iraq that was wrought with policy and fiscal failures. I remember savings and loan. I remember Hillary care attempts. I recall Carter reform efforts.
Well, since data and evidence indicates it is not logical for Obama to be the cause to have “divided” us (questionable if we are divided to begin with – the Civil War – now that is division), the question is, “What, if anything, is dividing us?”
Hmmm, it seems to me that we are evolving into different factions. On one hand are the logical rationalists. These people tend to be well-educated, and are analytical, logical, and make empirically based decisions and conclusions based on data and evidence. On the other hand are the emotional mythologists. These people tend to react to situations with their emotions, base their decisions on their choice of religious mythological faith, ignore data and evidence derived from science and research, operate under fear of change, reject most forms of intellectual pursuit, espouse me-first patriotism (flying a flag is more important than actual sacrifice), and embrace rhetoric. In part this is a response to a rapidly changing, technology drivern world that must compete in an overcrowded global economy with shrinking opportunity.
I think that is more likely what is “dividing us” than some person who hasn’t actually passed a reform bill yet. Zeus forbid we have to sacrifice a little bit of taxable income or take more personal responsibility for our disgusting, expanding waistlines to better ourselves and our fellow countrymen. May Jupiter bring an end to the liberal reign of terror and restore the middle ages (even though Obama was clearly, and unquestionably elected).
January 14th, 2010 | 3:15 pm
We studied MLK’s Letter From a Birmingham Jail in high school and his definition of a just law. Laws that apply to some and not to others, laws that apply to the people and not the lawmakers are two of his requirments for an unjust law. I think he’d be rolling in his grave right now over this.
January 14th, 2010 | 4:03 pm
David:
So, you’re a member of HistoryWriter’s “anyone who disagrees with me is stupid and/or some kind of religious wacko” school? You do realize this makes you look reactionary and closed-minded, right?
And, what does this have to do with the exemption of favored constituencies from paying taxes on generous benefits? We’re heading towards a bill based on cronyism and influence-peddling rather than shared sacrifice at the moment, wouldn’t you say?
January 14th, 2010 | 8:20 pm
My husband was Teamster when he worked for UPS shortly after we were married.
The insurance was great but…
The teamsters protected workers who came to work drunk/high/asleep.
Supervisors trying to get the packages out to the customers were faced with threatening union meetings because they were “taking union jobs!” Nevermind the fact that they wouldn’t have to do manual work if the Teamster employees weren’t drunk/high/asleep.
Not only that, there was absolutely no incintive to do well. Everyone got the same raise regardless of if he was superman or a slug. Thus, most employees choose to be slugs.
Unions in general protect the worst workers and bully companies. It doesn’t suprise me in the least that they cut a special deal with Obama. They don’t play by the rules, they make them.
January 14th, 2010 | 9:48 pm
David, please go ahead and embarrass yourself; your shallow caricatures only illuminate your own ignorance. I have two degrees and am working on a third. Let me recommend to you Straus’s Introduction to Post-Tonal Theory and see if you don’t get through it without a massive headache.
January 15th, 2010 | 1:38 am
David,
No matter how well educated one is, when they (or you) begin to see themselves as part of “the elite” and everybody who disagrees with them as part of the great uneducated/unwashed masses – then you have become a fool.
Arrogance ALWAYS blinds.
January 16th, 2010 | 3:48 pm
David-as CG pointed out, many of us are educated. I have an honors degree in Cultural Studies and am working on my masters in musicology. And, of course, I’m sure someone with a big, strong brain like you can understand that degrees do not intelligence (or common sense) make.
January 21st, 2010 | 1:02 pm
Safepres says:
“I have an honors degree in Cultural Studies and am working on my masters in musicology. And, of course, I’m sure someone with a big, strong brain like you can understand that degrees do not intelligence (or common sense) make.”
Let’s take a closer look at that. Do you mean “someone with a big strong brain, LIKE YOURS”, or “someone LIKE YOU, with a big, strong brain”?
Ambiguity, you see. So, you might have added that degrees don’t necessarily improve the precision of one’s sentence structure either.
That said, I’m discouraged to see complimentary terms like “elite,” “conservative” and “liberal” evolving from complimentary adjectives/adverbs into pejorative nouns, especially when they’re used as one-dimensional characterizations of the people with whom we disagree. Screwing around with language for political purposes is a technique straight out of Propaganda 1.1
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