Obamacare Bipartisanship: You Probably Can’t Keep Your Coverage

President Obama had another stressful week.  But not nearly as stressful as millions will experience when they find that they still can't keep their health coverage.  [Credit: Dr. Lillian Glass Body Language Blog]

Pres­i­dent Oba­ma had anoth­er week of stress.  But not near­ly as much stress as mil­lions will expe­ri­ence when they find that they still can’t keep their health cov­er­age. [Cred­it: Dr. Lil­lian Glass Body Lan­guage Blog]

Wash­ing­ton has at last arrived at a bipar­ti­san con­sen­sus on what to do about the mil­lions of peo­ple whose insur­ance poli­cies are being can­celed because of Oba­macare: not near­ly enough. Con­tin­ue read­ing →

Blaming Insurers: Why Valerie Jarrett is Wrong

Valerie Jarrett last night blamed insurers for cancelling policies. But it was the Administration itself that broke the President's promise to let people keep the coverage they like. (Credit: justpiper.com)

Valerie Jar­rett last night blamed insur­ers for can­celling poli­cies. But it was the Admin­is­tra­tion itself that broke the Pres­i­den­t’s promise to let peo­ple keep the cov­er­age they like. (Cred­it: justpiper.com)

Valerie Jar­rett last night sent the fol­low­ing tweet: “FACT: Noth­ing in #Oba­macare forces peo­ple out of their health plans. No change is required unless insur­ance com­pa­nies change exist­ing plans.”

Jarrett’s tweet sig­nals that the White House is now blam­ing insur­ers for can­celling cov­er­age for hun­dreds of thou­sands — and per­haps mil­lions — of Amer­i­cans. This is utter­ly men­da­cious. The text of Oba­macare, as Jar­rett sug­gests, explic­it­ly gives peo­ple the right to keep their exist­ing cov­er­age. But in an inex­plic­a­ble action, the Admin­is­tra­tion in 2010 issued a reg­u­la­tion that stripped peo­ple of that right and made it ille­gal for many insur­ers to renew cov­er­age for next year. Con­tin­ue read­ing →

A Congress United … on Obamacare

 

A famously fractious Congress has at last found common cause: getting out from under the Obamacare provision that would take away their health insurance subsidies. [Credit: sightsonpennsylvania.blogspot.com]
A famous­ly frac­tious Con­gress has at last found com­mon cause: get­ting out from under the Oba­macare pro­vi­sion that would take away their health insur­ance sub­si­dies. [Cred­it: sightsonpennsylvania.blogspot.com]

[NOTE: This post has been updat­ed to reflect recent devel­op­ments.]

Con­gress hasn’t been this unit­ed since the Ger­mans bombed Pearl Harbor.

Its 535 Mem­bers — com­pris­ing dif­fer­ent polit­i­cal par­ties, ide­olo­gies, races, gen­ders and geo­graph­ic inter­ests — and its thou­sands of aides are fix­at­ed on a sin­gle thing.

Immi­gra­tion reform? Unrest in Egypt? The loom­ing debt ceil­ing expi­ra­tion with its prospect of US gov­ern­ment default? Con­tin­ue read­ing →

Health Insurers and Democrats: An Awkward Embrace

W and O share an awkward embrace.  (Credit: Life)

Pres­i­dent Bush and Oprah shared an awk­ward embrace — but not near­ly as awk­ward as the one between health insur­ers and the Admin­is­tra­tion.  (Cred­it: Life)

When it comes to health insur­ance com­pa­nies, the Demo­c­ra­t­ic par­ty is divid­ed between those that don’t like them and those that real­ly don’t like them.

The suc­cess of the new health law, how­ev­er, depends in large part on the will­ing­ness of insur­ers to par­tic­i­pate in its health insur­ance “exchanges.”

How’s that work­ing out? Con­tin­ue read­ing →

$52 a month for health insurance sounds like a great deal. But maybe not.

 

Maybe Kevin Costner should build the new health exchanges.

Maybe Kevin Cost­ner should build the new health exchanges.

Would you pay $52 per month for health insur­ance cov­er­age? 

Palm Beach Coun­ty offi­cials thought peo­ple would.  They were wrong. Con­tin­ue read­ing →