Obama's Growing Tax Burden: Now Let's Add Health Care!!

Ah, good ol' Barack was on TV the other night addressing his dear tax payers. I had the TV on, but I just couldn't focus ... I'm groggy from all the gloom and doom and the parroting of socialist slogans I hear from his minions. Our Big Government is destined to become even bigger.

I am angry at all this "stimulus" bunch of nonsense going on. Our politicians are going too far, overburdening those of us who have to foot the bill for all their over zealousness in "rescuing" the economy, bailing out immoral banks, investment firms, and the "innocent victims" who got themselves backed into a corner with their mortgages. (Well, I know there are some genuine "victims." I'm sarcastically referring to the ones that were just plain greedy and stupid and are now crying foul."

Now, Obama is harping on our nation's health care system. How much more do he and his cronies expect us taxpayers bend over and keep taking it from them? Terence Jeffrey of CNSNews made the observation that during Obama's speech, the President used the words "investment" or "invest" 18 times. Here are some of Jeffrey's remarks:

At different points in the press conference, Obama used forms of the words “invest” or “investment” to describe government spending on education, “renewable sources of energy,” health care reform, “health information technologies,” “American’s capacity for ingenuity and innovation,” science, technology and infrastructure. He referred to some of these items repeatedly as targets of the sort of government “investment” he wants to make.

In the beginning of his op piece, Jeffrey makes an excellent point of emphasizing the true meaning of "investment":

Merriam-Webster’s Online Dictionary the first meaning listed for the word “investment” is “the outlay of money usually for income or profit,” and the meaning of the word “invest” is “to commit (money) in order to earn a financial return.”

The idea is that investing money is something private individuals and businesses do on the calculation that they will get back more money than they put into a particular enterprise.

So, "health care" has now joined the list of things we Americans need to add to The Big Tax Bill. We're already starting to hear the same blah-blah-blah we heard back during the previous election when all the Michael Moore's and Liberals were on the bandwagon, trying to convince us to go "European" with universal health care.

The other day, I found a great posting over at Maggie's Farm. Check this out ... (emphasis added) ...

Top Ten Reasons For ObamaCare Are Based On False Information

George Bernard Shaw warned “Beware of false knowledge; it is more dangerous than ignorance.” The major overhaul of American health care pursued by President Obama and his supporters is based on many false premises and is excessive and likely to do more harm than good. Tuning up and improvements already always dynamically occurs. Instead, ObamaCare is aimed at dramatically changing one-sixth of the US economy in ways that are untested or tested and found wanting, primarily involving huge increases in government direction of health care.

The details of ObamaCare are largely being left to Congress, the same body that stuffs the federal budget with earmarks, waste, and other programs that are not requested. ObamaCare is premised on claims for drastic changes in health care and major increases in government programs being necessary. Those claims are largely specious.

Below the fold, the top ten specious premises for ObamaCare are discussed:

1. Comparing US Health Care To Other Developed Countries
2. US Health Care Spending Is More Than We Can Afford
3. Reform Overhaul Will Yield Major Savings
4. Increased Evidence-Based Medicine And Health Information Technology Will Significantly Improve Care and Reduce Costs
5. Present Administrative Costs And Insurer Profits Are Too High
6. US Consumer Dissatisfaction Requires Drastic Health Care Changes
7. Health Care Costs Are So High They Are A Major Cause Of Personal Bankruptcy
8. The Number Of Uninsured Is So Large That Drastic Health Care Changes Are Necessary
9. More Preventive Care Will Better Serve Consumers And Save Costs
10. Health Care Consumers Are Being Served By Drastic Health Care Changes

(More could be added, such as that government restraints on prescription drug prices will not impede incentives for innovations, but they are so transparently false that the list below dwells on other ObamaCare premises more misleading.)

Maggie then continues with a point-by-point dressing down of those 10 fallacies that are so blindly recited and repeated by "the experts." Here are some excerpts, although the article goes into much greater detail:

1. Comparing US Health Care To Other Developed Countries: Those pushing for government-run health care are fond of comparing the US unfavorably to other developed countries with heavier government-run or directed systems. Actually, the US is more successful on comparative costs, efficiency of resource use, and outcome.
...

2. US Health Care Spending Is More Than We Can Afford: As it has become more evidenced that the US does not compare unfavorably, the push for heavier government involvement has shifted toward saying we can’t afford the current and future costs. The affordability claim is exaggerated. We can afford more than previously, have chosen to, and benefited.

3. Reform Overhaul Will Yield Major Savings: Price Waterhouse analyzed the primary cost drivers in health care. Leading the pack are new technologies, public demand for broader coverage and access, and defensive medicine. ObamaCare is not proposing restraints on lawsuits, tort lawyers being a major constituency. Health care consumers’ demands for fast access to the latest and best is not contradicted.

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4. Increased Evidence-Based Medicine And Health Information Technology Will Significantly Improve Care and Reduce Costs: ObamaCare proposes major increases in the use of evidence-based medicine. There is a strong case for increased analyses of the effectiveness of alternative treatments to have more evidence-based (also called performance-based or comparative-effectiveness) medicine. The above Price Waterhouse report cites a study that estimates as much as 30% of health care spending is excessive due to overuse, misuse and waste. It cites another study that defensive medicine increases health care spending by 10%. However, if major benefits are to emerge, they will be very expensive to find, seriously troubling and possibly dangerous to administer, and a long time coming. We should move very carefully and not faddishly rush pell-mell into this sphere.

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5. Present Administrative Costs And Insurer Profits Are Too High: The above Price Waterhouse analysis finds 86% of premiums being paid out for claims and an additional 5% for consumer services like prevention, wellness, care coordination, education, and information systems. Government compliance and reporting requirements cost another 6%. That leaves 3% for profits and reserves needed to generate added investments.

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7. Health Care Costs Are So High They Are A Major Cause Of Personal Bankruptcy: President Obama publicly claimed last week that “The cost of health care now causes a bankruptcy in America every thirty seconds." ABC News Director of Polling examined that claim and found it “simply unsupportable.” Examination of the basis for Obama’s claim and of other studies found the numbers vastly overstated.

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8. The Number Of Uninsured Is So Large That Drastic Health Care Changes Are Necessary: That about 16% in the US are uninsured is repeated as cause for universal coverage schemes to cover them that at the same time grossly changes the health care system and costs affecting the other 84%. Even if the other 84% were not negatively affected, the uninsured count is actually an overblown statistic.

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9. More Preventive Care Will Better Serve Consumers And Save Costs: The February 2008 New England Journal of Medicine contains a review of 599 peer-reviewed articles between 2000-2005. The conclusion: “Studies have concluded that preventing illness can in some cases save money [and health] but in other cases can add to health care costs….[and] also sidesteps the question of whether such measures are generally more promising and efficient than the treatment of existing conditions.”

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10. Health Care Consumers Are Being Served By Drastic Health Care Changes: News reports of Obama administration health care parleys say that consumers are at the table. In fact, there are various interest groups each protecting the interests and costs of their members, usually at odds with each other. The interest groups’ before and behind curtain maneuvering is intense and complex, and much of what they’re telling the public misleading of intent or outcomes. Not nefarious in a free country, but each is angling to profit and enlarge from a bigger pie of spending. The only reliable measure of consumer preference is in general polling which, as shown above (point 6), has consumers not dissatisfied with their present arrangements.

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I highly recommend reading the article and doing some research on your own.

Get the facts. Just don't blindly drink the Kool Aid. I'm afraid we taxpayers are going to be pulling even more money out of our as ... er, wallets!