Nov. 7, 2013, Fairfax, Va.— Americans for Limited Government President Nathan Mehrens today issued the following statement on the announcement that the House of Representatives will vote on Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Fred Upton’s “Keep Your Own Health Plan Act”:
“The House of Representatives plan to vote on legislation by Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Fred Upton that would allow health insurance companies to have the option to continue to offer health care policies for another year is both bad policy and bad politics.
“The proposal is bad policy because it does not reflect the reality of shifting insurance pools due to the imposition of Obamacare and provides a false expectation among customers. Congress waiving a magic wand and declaring that insurers can now offer existing insurance plans for another year that may or may not have the necessary customer base to support it does not solve the underlying problem caused by Obamacare.
“Worse, it allows those very Members of Congress who are responsible for the Obamacare disaster to blame the health insurers for cancellations while offering false hope that Congress has taken a meaningful action.
“In the ‘brave new world’ of the politics of the possible, it is likely that shifting blame while not taking real action to stop the Obamacare train wreck, will be a popular solution.
“Those who vote for this political dodge should be ashamed of themselves for opting for political gamesmanship rather than re-opening the push for the real solution of repealing, defunding or delaying of the entire law.
“Americans for Limited Government urges a no vote on the Upton “Don’t Blame Us” legislation. It doesn’t solve the problem of Obamacare caused health insurance cancellations, while crassly allowing Congress to point their fingers at the private health insurance industry for cancellations caused by the President’s health care law.”
(Editor’s Note: The above communication does not necessarily reflect the editorial position of FITSNews.com. To submit your letter, news release, email blast, media advisory or issues statement for publication, click here).
5 comments
Perfectly said. Do not replace. Repeal or be recalled.
????????????
The ironic part of all this is that the tin foil hat brigade rails against the health care individual mandate and calls it unprecedented government intrusion.
What do they think the mandate that all people have a retirement plan as required by the Social Security Act is?
From Wikipedia (I attribute):
In 2012, Eliot Spitzer credited what he called “spectacular historical reporting by Professor Einer Elhauge,” who is employed by the campaign to re-elect President Obama,[5] for finding 18th century legislation that Spitzer and Elhauge called individual mandates.[6][7] The Militia Acts of 1792, based on the Constitution’s militia clause (in addition to its affirmative authorization to raise an army and a navy), would have required every “free able-bodied white male citizen” between the ages of 18 and 45, with a few occupational exceptions, to “provide himself” a weapon and ammunition.[8] (See Conscription.) The Militia Acts had been reported in 2010 by Joe Conason,[9] but were never federally enforced, so their constitutionality was never litigated.[10]
An Act for the relief of sick and disabled seamen, signed into law by President John Adams in 1798, required employers of seamen to pay to the federal Treasury 20 cents per seaman per month, and authorized the President to use the money to pay for “the temporary relief and maintenance of sick or disabled seamen,” and to build hospitals to accommodate sick and disabled seamen.[11] The Act authorized the employer to deduct the monies from the seamen’s wages. (See Workers’ compensation and Social Security Disability Insurance.) Others have called the 1798 statute a tax like Medicare and said it cannot be called an individual mandate, because it does not require anyone to purchase anything.[12]
We have a history of this, no matter what we call it at the time.
Same thing. Legalized theft.