Friday, December 20, 2013
Another Day,
Another Individual Mandate Delay
Delay is preferable
to error.
Thomas Jefferson
(1743-1826), Letter to George Washington
Yesterday
the Obama administration issued another change, its 21st, in its health care
law. This change gives a “catastrophic
exemption “ to those whose plans have been cancelled for failure to meet
federal standards and who cannot afford a government plan. People will now be
able to keep their “bare bones” plans.
This is in response to public outrage over plan cancellations for 6
million Americans and higher premiums and deductibles for replacement plans.
Some
are calling this latest federal action a “Hail Mary”pass to save ObamaCare and its unpopular individual mandate.
This “catastrophic exemption” raises a
fundamental question; Is ObamaCare an unworkable failure, a rolling
disaster, a cataclysmic
catastrophe, and merely the latest in a
string of strategic mistakes?
These
mistakes include: going whole hog on
reform rather than approaching it incrementally, arrogantly stiff-arming the GOP rather than
asking for their input into the specifics of the law, and changing the law 21 times through “executive
orders” through improvisational delays rather than consulting with Congress.
ObamaCare
may not yet be a catastrophe, but it’s getting there when its various
provisions, heretofore abstract theories
become concrete realities. The
American people do not like what they see, and they are responding by not
signing up for health exchanges and by expressing their disappointment in
countless polls.
The issues in
question are mainly three: one distrust
because of broken government promises,
two, uncertainty about future costs and access to health plans and doctors; and
three, concern about government incompetence in rolling out
healthcare.gov.
Why
not back off, Mr. President, and admit
you made some mistakes in your path to reform?
Why not delay ObamaCare for a year?
Why not consider the obvious options – retaining coverage for
pre-existing illnesses and young adults under their parents’ plans, modifying
the individual mandate to fit the needs of the young and others, expanding Medicaid under the individual state’s
direction, selling plans across state
lines, tax credits for all, health
savings accounts for all, and national
tort reform?
Tweet: ObamaCare
is in trouble, as shown by government changing
it 21 times, e.g. “catastrophic exemptions” for those who can’t afford
it.
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