Obamacare Alarm Bells

Obamacare: Whatever Rings Your Bell

 No man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main..I am involved in mankind; and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls  for thee.

John Donne (1572-1631), Devotions upon Emergent Occasions

Unemployment report in a nutshell: The Taco Bell that had 30 40 hour workers now has 40 30 hour workers.

Tweet by David Borge,  political humorist

Daniel Henninger of the Wall Street Journal says: “ Mark July  3, 2013 as the day that Big Government finally imploded.”

That was the day the administration announced the employer mandate was delayed a year because of the “complexity of the requirements.”  That was how the employer mandate delay rang Henninger’s alarm bell.  He said it was the alarming bell sound of Big Government finally hitting the wall.

Just 2 days later, on July 5,  the administration rang the alarm bell again that because of “operation barriers”  citizens seeking Obamacare subsidies would be able to “self-report” their incomes to qualify for the health law’s subsidies.  In other words, trust big government, and we will trust you.   Ring our bell, and we will ring yours. even if yours does not ring true.

While this mutual bell-ringing was taking place,  Republicans were saying that the President could not willy-nilly change the law without consulting Congress and that he couldn’t delay the employer mandate without simultaneously delaying the individual mandate because the two mandates were intertwined.

Where the two political parties stood on the health law,  depended on where they sat, and for whom the bell tolled.

If you were  a Democrat, you might try to ring the public’s bell by saying, “ Sure, Obamacare has not cut costs, or expanded access, or bettered care – yet.   But you just wait and see, until  the bell really starts ringing on October 1, when you sign up for its benefits, which will finally kick in and starts ringing everybody’s bell.  If you are young and healthy, your premiums may double or triple,  but by signing up, look at what you’ve done, you’ve protected yourself against catastrophe and you’ve done a service for your country and your president.”

If you were a Republican,  the employer mandatd delay rang another bell.  They countered, “  Don’t be a ding dong.   Obamacare has finally cracked the Liberty Bell,  by raising costs, depriving you of your choice of doctor and health plan,  threatening your personal freedoms,  making Big Brother your zoo keeper, and increasing the national debt for future generations.  Ding, ding, ding, dong,  dig, dig, dig, deeper, deeper, deeper, into an ever deeper depths of debt and  despair, declareth the doomsayers.  This is a Rube Goldberg bell on the verge of shattering at each new federal  pendulum stroke.”

Tweet:    The delay of the employer mandate has set off a series of alarmist bell-ringing on both sides of the political aisle.