Obama Lies, Here’s Some Truth
Obama Says: Obama tried arguing again in his speech on September 9th, 2009, that preventive medicine would save the system money, and therefore would render the system deficit neutral or even cost-effective in the long run.
Should We Believe Obama? At first blush, it sounds good, but studies have shown that preventive care — particularly tests like the ones Obama mentions — actually cost money instead of saving it. That’s because detecting acute diseases like breast cancer in their early stages involves testing everybody … including thosewho would never end up developing the disease. The costs of a large number of tests, even if they’re relatively cheap, will outweigh the costs of caring for the minority of people who would have ended up getting sick without the testing.
But don’t take our word for it … the CBO (Congressional Budget Office)¹ wrote in August, 2009: “The evidence suggests that for most preventive services, expanded utilization leads to higher, not lower, medical spending overall.”
¹ In case you’re wondering, who the CBO is and what are their credentials? The Congressional Budget Office is a federal agency within the legislative branch of the United States government. It is the primary government agency that provides economic data to Congress. The CBO was created, by Congress, as an independent nonpartisan agency by the Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control Act of 1974.
Obama says: “The reforms I’m proposing would not apply to those who are here illegally.”
Should We Believe Obama? Again, sounds good. However, even though HR 3200 does state that illegal immigrants are not eligible for the proposed taxpayer-funded affordable premium credits, there is nothing in the bill to enforce it. An amendment to H.R.3200 (Heller) that would have required the use of the SAFE (Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements) program was defeated by democrats in committee. SAFE is already used by seventy-one (71) other programs of this kind, why defeat that stipulation? Because it would have specifically excluded illegal aliens. That’s because the democrats know that, absent a specific exclusion, illegals will get covered “through the back door.”
How could that happen? 1) Without SAFE enforcement, there is insufficient citizenship verification; an illegal can simply claim to be a citizen, 2) unauthorized aliens who meet the substantial presence² test would be required under H.R. 3200 to have health insurance, and 3) democrats favor some form of amnesty. Any new legislation could redefine an individual’s immigration status into something other than “illegal,” (like “interim,” or other term). The result being that, by definition, they would no longer technically “illegal” and become eligible under a law that was written to facilitate this kind of back door slight-of-hand.
² Substantial presence is defined as having been in the United States for at least 31 days during the current year and at least 183 days during the current year and previous two years. No mention is made of legal status in the legislation for determining substantial presence.
A later update suggests that supporters have finally admitted that the bill contained a loophole and steps are (supposedly) being taken to tighten up the language to prevent the illegals from being included in the bill. Sounds like the loophole is fixed, right?
Not so fast. Yet another update, exposing a “back door” to coverage of illegal immigrants. Sen. Chuck Schumer has announced his intention to introduce new comprehensive immigration reform legislation to the Senate this year. Radio America talk-radio host Rodger Hedgecock called the comprehensive immigration reform the Obama administration's "second act," Hedgecock said illegal immigrants initially would be excluded from the health care plan but would have access to it once comprehensive immigration reform is passed by Congress. Hedgecock charged the administration's immigration plan amounts to providing amnesty to millions of illegal immigrants already in the United States.
And note that Obama used a “new and improved” 30 million figure in his speech, instead of the 47 million previously cited by proponents. Supposedly, the new improved figure excludes those here illegally. But, weren’t those using the 47 million number already saying that illegals weren’t covered? Up until Obama’s speech, the 47 million number was the standard count for those who did not have health insurance – what happened? Did seventeen million suddenly acquire insurance? Anyone paying attention knew, that regardless of statements to the contrary, the 47 million estimate included illegal immigrants. They were lying then, and he is lying now.
Obama says: "We've estimated that most of this plan can be paid for by finding savings within the existing health care system – a system that is currently full of waste and abuse."
Should We Believe Obama? Ok, if his administration has identified areas of waste and abuse that can be reformed, then why not do it NOW? Cleaning up waste and abuse should be part of any administration’s job description. During the campaign, didn’t he promise to clean up government waste and fraud? We don’t need a new healthcare bill to authorize actions that should be a basic responsibility of any administration.
But wait! There’s another even more obvious reason that Obama’s statement is ludicrous. He is the eighth consecutive president to promise to clean up Medicare waste and fraud. How many succeeded? How many even tried? The “clean up waste and inefficiency” promise has been made by every politician running for every public office since dirt was young. Yet, the promised savings never seem to emerge, do they?
The fraud and waste argument is misdirection; a straw man. Obama knows that it won’t happen, it’s just a convenient placeholder for dollars that reduce the apparent cost of the program. The formula is simple. You simply estimate a program’s cost, subtract how much can be attributed to increased taxes and the remainder automatically becomes the amount that will be saved via “cleaning up the system.”
Obama says: “I will not sign a plan that adds one dime to our deficits – either now or in the future. Period."
Should We Believe Obama? If he is true to his word, his statement means that there won’t be a plan. Period.
The most fully fleshed-out plan so far (H.R.3200) was said by the CBO to increase deficits by $228 billion over the 2010-2019 timeframe. Remember that the CBO is Congress’ own independent and nonpartisan agency tasked with providing critical economic data to Congress. In the past, the CBO’s word has been Gospel, why would Obama ignore them now? He can’t admit to the CBO’s projection because that deficit increase would show his earlier statements to be false and doom the bill.
Obama says: In his address to a joint session of Congress on September 9th, 2009, Obama said "One more misunderstanding I want to clear up - under our plan, no federal dollars will be used to fund abortions."
Should We Believe Obama? Douglas Johnson, the legislative director for the National Right to Life Committee doesn’t believe him." The reality is that the Obama-backed House bill would explicitly authorize the federal government insurance plan to pay for elective abortions and would explicitly authorize subsidies for private abortion insurance - and all with federal dollars.”
And PolitiFact cites a confirming story that ran in the Chicago Tribune, the day after Obama's Planned Parenthood speech. Washington bureau reporter Mike Dorning wrote that when Obama was asked about his proposal for expanded access to health insurance, the candidate "said it would cover 'reproductive health services.' Contacted afterward, an Obama spokesman said that included abortions."
Oops.
Obama says: His plan will “improve efficiency and patient care.”
Should We Believe Obama? Frankly, that’s just impossible. Consider this, we currently have some 800,586 physicians treating our roughly 300,000,000 residents, a ratio of 2.67 doctors per 1,000 people³. To keep medical care at the same level (maintaining the same physician/resident ratio), we’ll need 80,100 more doctors to treat those additional 30 million citizens – where will they come from?
And don’t forget the nurses. Our healthcare system simply couldn’t operate without qualified, trained nurses. We currently have 2,417,150 nurses providing care to 300,000,000 residents – a ratio of 8.07 nurses per 1,000 residents³. Adding another 30 million residents would require an additional 242,100 nurses – where will they come from? How long would it take just to train that many additional nurses?
The above estimates are based on our current level of professional medical care providers. But what happens if all of those physicians aren’t available? Investor Business Daily conducted a poll which found that two of every three practicing physicians oppose the medical overhaul plan under consideration in Washington, and hundreds of thousands would consider shutting down their practices or retiring early if it were adopted.
Obama had made a point of touting the AMA’s support for the bill, implying that physicians were in favor of his plan, when in fact only 29% of practicing physicians are members. The majority (71%) are not members and have made their intentions known in the IBD/TIPP poll4. Fully 45% say they would shut down their practice or retire.
Even if those physicians didn’t retire or otherwise shut down their practices, an additional 30,000,000 citizens would simply overwhelm the doctors and nurses currently available. And if we did also lose 45% of our current population of doctors, that would mean that we’d be about 440,363 physicians short in total. But, not to worry, our fearless leader tells us that we will improve medical care. Another ludicrous statement, demonstrably false.
³ 2009 Statistical Abstract, U.S. Census
4 The IBD/TIPP Poll was conducted by mail the first two weeks of September, with 1,376 practicing physicians chosen randomly throughout the country taking part.
Can Obama work some magic on this issue? It’ll take more than slight-of-hand – it’ll take some “immaculate perception” on the part of the public to swallow this travesty.
Expect Obama’s best smoke and mirror tricks to date, in fact I think that we'll see whoever's got their hand up his rear talking without Obama's lips moving.