Two things stood out to me about President Biden's speech of 1/19/2022, first that he held himself together for a couple of hours and second, I stayed awake listening to him. Biden was also cautious and used language indicating "it's not your fault, but…" when denying any criticism of his administration, a change in tone that was actually welcome, though simply made him easier to listen to.
But Biden remains tone deaf. Perhaps in an effort to change the worn out Democratic chants that they're all racist or Nazis, a trope that today only persuades the most virulent leftists, Biden tried to initiate a new catchphrase, "What do they stand for?"
The question illustrates the problem: Disagreeing doesn't mean you don't stand for anything, it means you disagree. Resurrecting his clearest ideas about how Obama was thwarted by those who disagreed with him during his presidency and either forgetting or deliberately skipping over the Democrat political vicious attempts to thwart, discount and vilify President Trump with tactics beyond disagreement ranging from impeachment efforts, racism claims, Russia claims when Trump was President, Biden belligerently or genuinely wondered what Republicans stand for making him seem at best tone deaf and at worst mentally incompetent.
Nevertheless, Biden steered his answers towards his talking points and regarding health in the US used the fake narrative that brought us Obamacare in 2010 that apparently he hoped most listeners have long forgotten, touting the success of that law, an assessment that requires a pretty low bar in terms of truth.
But bringing up Obamacare and its newly expanded eligibility guidelines (enacted in order to somehow again try to boost anemic Obamacare plan participation), is a great example of a no-change in strategy for Democrats.
Hey, it was a successful cheat of the American people back in 2010 that to this day enjoys a durability that shows a lack of vision or plan for addressing the real, concrete devastation brought by that Act's partnership with insurance companies in providing the cheap seats of finite costs of preventive care in exchange for the sacrifice of affordable, needed medical services.
Balk if you like, but the increased out of pocket costs for consumers of higher premiums, higher deductibles, higher copays, higher coinsurance are real and verifiable over the law's decade of experience.
So, let's revisit reality. Obamacare was based on the crisis of the "47 million" uninsured, a number that years later was lowered by the government and a number that somehow has never been nearly reached during any of the more than a decade of experience of no more than 10 to 11 million people in any year enrolled in Obamacare plans (distinguished from Medicaid plans).
And of those 10 to 11 million people who "gained" coverage, even that lukewarm number never addressed whether those Obamacare plan enrollees had formerly had insurance that was no longer available because of Obamacare, thus representing a number of people who had switched insurance plans rather than "gained" insurance. Further, each year because Obamacare plans prepay premiums that number is adjusted downward as individuals fail for months to pay their share of premiums.
And so with the COVID numbers. The minute COVID as diagnosis was incentivized with government money and the minute COVID as diagnosis was used for Democrats to justify "emergency" powers that bypassed traditional protections from overreaching government was the minute the "accuracy" of the numbers should have been called into question.
As with Obamacare, with COVID, the government agenda in inflating numbers ignores the government's agenda in keeping those numbers high and hurts people. And so, by using the permanent pandemic label, Democrats are seeking to avoid legitimate process for everything from traditional election ballot rules to the freedom to travel, to the right to decide what we are willing to put into our bodies and instead want to make permanent those TEMPORARY EMERGENCY powers.
Same approach different decade. Since Obamacare, employer health insurance costs have soared in price for employees for plans that also boast higher out of pocket costs in addition to premiums, deductibles, copays, coinsurance while never making a significant dent in the '47 million' uninsured. This is Obamacare and whether we're used to this new "normal" of crappy coverage or not, that's what Obamacare does.
Obamacare also did not cover prescription drugs and here again, a little more discernment when it comes to those unfamiliar with Bernie Sanders' plan or the Medicare negotiating prices plan that could save us a lot of grief when you need expensive medication. These plans again go to low-hanging fruit, lowering prices for some common prescriptions like insulin, while excluding coverage for meaningful cancer drugs that can cost half a million or more a year. Sanders' plan specifically covers this low-hanging fruit, basic preventive, basic care and leaves expensive care for real disease as eligible for "private" insurance contracts for coverage…the government simply ignores the problem.
And lest we forget the individual mandate of Obamacare, that sketchy penalty imposed on individuals who dared not to purchase health insurance that the Supreme Court skirted addressing by categorizing the mandate penalty as a tax, Biden resurrected the democrat strong-arming used with the COVID vaccine mandates. Same strategy, different decade.
Biden touted the millions of Americans vaccinated ignoring that many were threatened with loss of job if they didn't comply with the vaccine mandate and ignoring the tens of millions of individuals who are NOT required to be vaccinated from those not covered by executive order (yep, Congress and their staff, postal workers, and all illegal immigrants). Just like Obamacare, buy health insurance that government dictates or else.
Biden also touted the No Surprises Act of 2022 as a means of preventing balance billing, the amount billed to patients by providers not covered in network by their insurance. Big problem, tiny step in the right direction. It's important that under the act you have to sign away your right to the protection if you are offered treatment by someone out of network. If you don't sign away that right, you can be refused treatment. This is more of the same since emergency services have already been covered by Obamacare since 2010 and as we've already witnessed, previously, the requirement meant you would be stabilized and then moved elsewhere for other services that were non-emergency in nature. This remains the same…If you don't sign away your rights and consent to balance billing, you can be refused treatment and must find someone in your network. The issue is a long-standing one and has seen many different strategies used by both providers and insurers to make sure consumers are left holding the bag.
Back to the same strategy, different decade. So, the democrats are harkening back to the good old days of the Obamacare scam. Obamacare also tried to make it obvious that it was a person's "civic duty" to purchase health insurance to prevent increased costs for all. Of course, the premise has and continues to fail. Tens of millions of people remain uninsured. People still use ERs for everyday medical care. Medical bills still bankrupt millions of Americans. People are still uninsured or underinsured. People are still drowning from the real costs of illness. Yet, as if it was 2010, Joe Biden brought up the good-old-days when people simply "didn't understand" that Obamacare protected individuals from being denied coverage for pre-existing conditions and once they did they were all onboard. Sorry, not true and certainly not true for intelligent people.
Pre-existing condition denials of coverage were an issue as insurers used their calculations to determine that those pre-existing conditions raised insurance company cost risks and therefore justified addressing those increased risk of costs. Most often this took the form of exorbitant premiums based on pre-existing conditions, and sometimes, it resulted in denial. Sounds great, right? What Obamacare did was remove pre-existing conditions as a criterion for increased premiums for everyone EXCEPT two groups, those who use tobacco and increased premiums based on age. This is important when it comes to the surcharges being tossed around for those who opt-out of a COVID vaccine.
Not being vaccinated should technically qualify as a pre-existing condition for which no premium surcharge is permitted under Obamacare since it is neither tobacco nor age related. So what gives? Insurance company/government partnership.
For Obamacare, political goals of claiming such-and-such number of newly insured was balanced with the mandate and penalty protecting insurance company profits. With COVID, the same, the increasingly tenuous validity that vaccines reduce COVID risk for everyone justifying "mandates" to force individuals to have the vaccine and the government's desire to keep the number of COVID cases up while arguing that the vaccines only have led to less serious variants…Biden bragging rights that mandates work, look at the millions vaccinated.
The reality is that Obamacare partnered with insurance lobbyists and companies to protect insurance company profits. Only after the government complied with insurance company profit concerns by MANDATING the purchase of their product would insurers address "covering" those with pre-existing conditions for no increased premiums. Same with the vaccine as insurers start to penalize those who opt out of the vaccine.
But the insurance companies don't stop with penalizing, they inch back towards charging more for pre-existing conditions by chagrining everyone more in terms of out of pocket expenses in the form of higher premiums, higher copays, higher coinsurance, higher deductibles. These higher out of pocket costs most definitely more greatly impact those who need medical care. We can anticipate the same with COVID. First those who aren't vaccinated will be penalized, though obviously a choice, a pre-existing condition much like obesity, drug addiction or pregnancy for that matter which therefore should be protected by Obamacare rules. Then we'll see even higher deductibles, copays, coinsurance and premium amounts as insurers claim they have to "cover" COVID costs. Same strategy, different decade.
So there was never a removal of the pre-existing conditions calculations, Obamacare merely chose to ALLOW premium extortion from tobacco users and those who are older and gave everyone else from drug users to the obese, to the alcoholics, conditions also arguably based on "choice," a free pass on increased premiums based on their unhealthy choices or natural condition. And then Obamacare "spread" that risk, so that employees were screened for health conditions and this overall screening was used to determine insurance costs for each employer plan, so if there were x number of people with high blood pressure, the plan offered by that employer would reflect that population risk. That's what we can expect from companies who dare to follow the Supreme Court and do not mandate vaccines, their annual plans will charge more than other companies where the vaccine mandate is in place. A back-door way to force support for the government and insurance company mandate agenda.
With COVID, don't think for a second the insurance companies aren't exploiting their new opportunities. We've already seen insurance companies charging more to the unvaccinated despite the science of new variants emerging. It's just another barrier to jobs, to benefits, to access and shouldn't surprise anyone. Insurance companies are enriched by covering less and charging more and COVID and their Obamacare era partnership with government is just another chapter in the same story.
Ultimately, yesterday afternoon, Biden's strategy was predictable and was delivered calmly as he droned on plugging in his talking points for every issue addressed. COVID strategy working, his staff are all wonderful, they're doing great. Hopelessly Biden confirmed we can hope for no better as he outlined his plans for next year to campaign for other Democrats, to engage more with the public and to seek more advice from academia and think tanks. Pretty sure no one would have suggested those top three goals for Biden's next steps based on the first year of experience with him.
