Obamacare strikes out

Loading

running-out-clock-on-obamacare1

How bad are things for Obama right now?

Bad. Very bad. Very, very bad.

Remember this?

Obamacare is Settled Law

Remember this?

“The simple fact remains: Obamacare is the law of the land and will remain the law of the land as long as Barack Obama is President of the United States and as long as I’m Senate majority leader.”

Remember this?

Let me just raise this issue about ObamaCare, because I want to come back to that. One of the issues is that for conservatives, this has been such a huge issue, even though the law’s been passed and upheld by the court, they still argue, “No, there’s a basis to really try to make it better, to replace it, to get rid of it.” – David Gregory on Meet The Press

Remember this?

What’s more, once the full law is implemented in 2014, it will be all but impossible to roll back its protections and benefits going forward. The Affordable Care Act will take root and join other pillars of modern civil society as basic parts of American public life.

Remember this from Debbie Dumbasserman Schultz?

“You’re darn right that our candidates are going to run on the advantage that Obamacare will be going into the 2014 election. The choice will be very clear,”

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iGV6fKz16RA[/youtube]

I do.

The ACA laws stipulates in no uncertain terms that it must be in effect after December 31, 2013 and there is nothing in it to allow the White House to rewrite it as wishes.

Thanks, Glenn!

But reality can be a harsh shepherd. The adverse political impact of the law can be measured by the number of delays in the law. It is a positive correlation. The greater the number of delays, the greater potential for political damage to democrats were the law to be enforced as written.

As the WSJ notes, the law is no whatever Obama wants it to be:

‘ObamaCare” is useful shorthand for the Affordable Care Act not least because the law increasingly means whatever President Obama says it does on any given day. His latest lawless rewrite arrived on Monday as the White House decided to delay the law’s employer mandate for another year and in some cases maybe forever.

And if he feels like it, Obamacare could be delayed forever!

Under the new Treasury rule, firms with 50 to 99 full-time workers are free from the mandate until 2016. And firms with 100 or more workers now also only need cover 70% of full-time workers in 2015 and 95% in 2016 and after, not the 100% specified in the law.

The new rule also relaxes the mandate for certain occupations and industries that were at particular risk for disruption, like volunteer firefighters, teachers, adjunct faculty members and seasonal employees. Oh, and the Treasury also notes that, “As these limited transition rules take effect, we will consider whether it is necessary to further extend any of them beyond 2015.” So the law may be suspended indefinitely if the White House feels like it.

Why the delays? Because of the economic harm it would do to the economy.

ObamaCare requires businesses with 50 or more workers to offer health insurance to their workers or pay a penalty, but last summer the Treasury offered a year-long delay until 2015 despite having no statutory authorization. Like the individual mandate, the employer decree is central to ObamaCare’s claim of universal coverage, but employers said the new labor costs—and the onerous reporting and tax-enforcement rules—would damage job creation and the economy.

Big businesses and unions have received exemptions. Who hasn’t?

The small businessman. The backbone of the US economy bears all of the burden.

“Once again, the president is giving a break to corporations while individuals and families are still stuck under the mandates of his health care law. And, once again, the president is rewriting law on a whim,” House Speaker John Boehner said in a statement. “If the administration doesn’t believe employers can manage the burden of the law, how can struggling families be expected to?”

Small business is most likely to vote Republican, so who cares?

These constant “rewrites” are a violation of the Constitution:

The final words in the section of PPACA mandating that employers with more than 50 full-time employees provide their employees with “minimum essential coverage” imposes a specific statutory deadline for doing so. It says: “EFFECTIVE DATE.—The amendments made by this section shall apply to months beginning after December 31, 2013.” Last summer, the administration unilaterally moved this hard statutory deadline back one year to 2015 for all employers with more than 50 full-time employees. Now, without any action by Congress, the administration is moving it back again for some employers—despite the plain language of the law.

But laws are for the little people. Charles Krauthammer quips that this is what’s done in banana republics and it’s all about protecting democrats in the next election.

But generally speaking you get past the next election by changing your policies, by announcing new initiatives, but not by wantonly changing the law lawlessly. This is stuff you do in a banana republic. It’s as if the law is simply a blackboard on which Obama writes any number he wants, any delay he wants, and any provision.

Obama did say “I can do whatever I want.”

The country disagrees. It’s so bad that vulnerable democrats want nothing to do with Obama:

The White House and Senate Democrats are preparing an extensive midterm campaign strategy built around one unavoidable fact: Hardly any candidates in the most competitive states want President Barack Obama anywhere near them.

POLITICO spoke with nearly every incumbent up for reelection and aspiring Democratic Senate candidates across the country, but only a handful gave an unequivocal “yes” when asked whether they wanted Obama to come campaign with them.

One democrat is running as the anti-Obama.

Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-MO) says democrats don’t need Obama.

Ouch.

democrats have ceded the House to the GOP and are desperate to hold onto the Senate.

With Democrats’ grasp on the Senate increasingly tenuous — and the House all but beyond reach — some top party donors and strategists are moving to do something in the midterm election as painful as it is coldblooded: Admit the House can’t be won and go all in to save the Senate.

Their calculation is uncomplicated. With only so much money to go around in an election year that is tilting the GOP’s way, Democrats need to concentrate resources on preserving the chamber they have now. Losing the Senate, they know, could doom whatever hopes Barack Obama has of salvaging the final years of his presidency.

And that calculus includes delaying the destruction of Obamacare until after the next election.

Obama had the lesser lights among us buying into his ability to heal the planet and stop the oceans from rising, but his personality has little interest in how anything really gets done. It is and was all blather. He has remained aloof and does not like the sausage making of politics.

Obama, aloof and insular — and convinced he’s smarter than everyone else — would never get his hands dirty like this. But a change in tactics, in demeanor — something — is needed because whatever it is he’s doing now doesn’t seem to be working.

One thing he is definitely adept at is weaponizing the IRS.

The GOP need expend no more energy on repealing Obamacare. It’s dying. It’s dying a death of a thousand delays. It’s being destroyed by its namesake. Things are so bad that this regime is considering allowing those “bad apple insurance companies” to sell those “junk plans” for another three years.

That is, until after the next Presidential election.

Obama has created a mess he no longer wants any part of. He is trying his best to compartmentalize his disastrous achievement and sequester it until he is out of office. If they do anything, the GOP ought to pass a bill that demands the ACA be enforced as written. Obama’s actions, however, set a precedent- the next President, hopefully a Republican, is clearly free to delay Obamacare forever if he or she wishes.

Obama has made that settled law.

But for now, there is no joy in the democrat Congress. Obama has struck out.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7bj-eL8pN40[/youtube]

0 0 votes
Article Rating
Subscribe
Notify of
5 Comments
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments

Spare me Bootlicker Krauthammer’s opinion on anything! This old Bolshevik is not and has never been Conservative & his little butt kissing trip to the Obummer WH was the tell!

Just a surprising aside for me: The hearings in Congress to find the truth regarding Obama’s use of the IRS for corrupt political targeting is still on. I think it was Thursday when there was a hearing and not surprisingly it was mentioned that even after 9 months, the “official” investigation has yet to hear testimony from those “tea party” group members that were affected by Obama’s terrorism against conservatives using the IRS (like Richard Nixon). So there is still great hope that Obama will be impeached and removed soon… very soon.

IRS Scandal
Benghazi Scandal
Fast and Furious Scandal
etc.

Obama’s arrogance is going to fell him.

Obie keeps moving the goal posts at will and the Repubs aren’t even on the field.

it’s clear as crystal this man is not fitted for an AMERICAN PRESIDENT,IF THEY DON’T SEE IT THEY NEED A SEVERE DEBRIEFING, AS HE DOES,
IT TOOK A LONG TIME FOR THE DEMOCRATS TO COME AND TELL THE TRUTH, IT’S GOING TO 6 YEARS NOW
THAT WILL COST THEM THEIR JOBS ALSO,
THEY HAVE DONE WRONG TO THE PEOPLE, IRS AND ALL,
AND THE REPUBLICANS SHOULD MOVE THEIR BUTT NOW,
ANS SPEED UP SO HE DOESN’T
DO MORE WRONG, AND YOU CAN BET HE WILL NOT GO EASY,

“….[I]f he feels like it, Obamacare could be delayed forever!…”

Just like the old ”doctor fix,” that was supposed to pay for Obama Care.
It is law but not enforced…..ever.
Now here is another year or more going by when Obama/care will not collect between $2,000 and $3,000 per uncovered full-time employee per year.
How can ObamaCare cover its own costs when Obama keeps robbing it like this?

And what about the states ObamaCare gave money to so they could set up their own exchanges?
That money disappears after this year.
Those states will have to pony up millions each just to keep the lights on their ObamaCare exchange web sites……

Hawaii is debating whether to have the state take over its exchange, amid warnings that the “business model will not survive.”
Oregon is contemplating a 20% budget cut next year after suffering a disastrous rollout in October.

To pay for their operations, the state and the federal exchanges charge excise taxes of 2% to 3.5% on plans sold through them.

As enrollment lags, so do revenues. Just three of these 15 nonfederal exchanges claim to have reached their enrollment goals. The rest are far behind.

California and Washington are only about halfway to their enrollment goals, according to ACASignups.net. Maryland, Nevada and Oregon aren’t even 20% there. And Minnesota’s enrollment numbers have yet to reach the state’s worst-case scenario.

In Hawaii, just 4,000 had enrolled by early February, a far cry from the governor’s prediction that 100,000 would do so in the first two years.

Read More At Investor’s Business Daily: http://news.investors.com/ibd-editorials-obama-care/021114-689696-are-state-obamacare-exchanges-headed-for-bankruptcy-webhed-are-obamacare-exchanges-headed-for-bankruptcy-.htm#ixzz2t7KoT5O3