You Can Solve Obamacare’s Biggest Problem

obamacare img 300x224 You Can Solve Obamacares Biggest Problem

Do You Know How To Deal With Long-term Care Under Obamacare?

We face some dire changes in the world of health care. I want to share with you what to do to insulate yourself against the effects of Obamacare. I’m going to explain the Achilles Heel of Obamacare and why preparing for long-term care should be your top health care priority right now. Originally, we were told Obamacare would solve our long-term care problems. Then – in the shadows of the night – Congress passed and Barack Obama signed a complete repeal of the provisions in Obamacare intended to help families with long-term care.

The message from Washington is clear: You are on your own.

They don’t want to help and they have gone back on their pledge to help with long-term care.

In addition, Obamacare slashed funding to Medicare, a program passed with bipartisan support to help the elderly secure medical insurance. That’s bad news for all Medicare participants.

Congress has proposed many changes to the program, the worst of which is lower reimbursements to doctors for their services. This means more everyday care will be administered by nurses and practitioners – not doctors.

Look, Medicare reimbursements are already shamefully low. They barely cover doctor’s costs.

If payments are cut further, doctors could actually lose money when they treat some Medicare patients.

The next logical step is that doctors will refuse to treat Medicare patients at all.

I don’t mean to scare you. I know you’re probably already afraid of losing coverage or struggling to find participating physicians.

But this isn’t even the worst crisis of Obamacare.

Within the next year, practically all of the elements of Obamacare will have taken effect.

Read more here:

Liars And Tyrants And Bureaucrats – And The MEDIA

Obama Teleprompter Liberal Media SC 300x236 Liars and Tyrants and Bureaucrats – And the MEDIA

Who’s in charge here, anyway? The Obama administration is responsible for everything, but knows nothing. America is in ruins, scandal, and no one’s to blame. Evidently, the buck permanently stopped with George W. Bush.

The ever so smug White House Press Secretary, Jay Carney, has had a tough go of it lately creatively answering questions saying he doesn’t know anything and the president had absolutely no knowledge or involvement – in anything. Apparently, ‘at no time was the Obama administration aware of what the Obama administration was doing.’ 

It’s funny, infuriating, and sad all at the same time. The most corrupt government in American history has not, is not, and will not be held accountable for their actions.

I hope I’m wrong; nothing will come from any of this.

With Americans as uninformed and disinterested as we’ve ever seen, consider the mounting information that continues to be brushed under the rug. If President Obama were a Republican, he never would have been reelected in 2012 and he’d be impeached in 2013.

But the media refuses to report the truth – unless they are practically forced to – about anything remotely negative on Obama, and four years of this has not only led to a well- insulated president, but also citizens who are not hearing many facts.

A CNN poll last week revealed 53% of Americans still approve of the job Obama is doing as president! Since it’s nearly impossible to estimate how many of these are die-hard liberals, progressives, Democrats, and college students, we should assume a majority of them have little interest or knowledge of Obama’s actual record. Gallup also has Obama’s approval right around 51%. So – what gives? His approval should be in the 30’s.

It’s been suggested that the media can tilt an election by approximately 8 points. I’d also say they can influence polls and approval ratings by making a devil seem like an angel.

America has reached a tipping point. While people are getting more frustrated, government is becoming more arrogant and evasive. Here are some stories that come to mind.

Who can forget the Obamacare monstrosity that was rushed through Congress and then crammed, forced, and stuffed down the American people’s throats? Nancy Pelosi infamously told us we’d have to pass the bill to find out what was in it, and now it’s old news. The lies have been told, the people have been deceived, and more than $1 trillion in new taxes and more than $2 trillion in new spending later, the Democrats have gotten away with their abuse of power Scott-free.

Even HHS Secretary Sebelius admitted insurance premiums will increase and approximately 24 million Americans will lose their current coverage once Obamacare kicks into gear. Because of this, some employers are already cutting full-time workers hours so they won’t be forced to pay for as many employees’ insurance plans.

Blue Cross Blue Shield, for one, has proposed a 25% rate increase for many of their plans.

Insurance rates have gone up, people have lost health care coverage, employers have been forced to drop certain plans, and countless medical costs have gone up because of the upcoming changes in the law – forced upon the majority of Americans.

A few years ago, Arizona Governor Jan Brewer was begging our own government for help protecting the U.S./Mexico border. Citizens were having property damaged or stolen, deaths were reported, and Mexican gun cartel activity was traced nearly 100 miles into Arizona. What happened? The Obama administration sued the state of Arizona for enforcing their immigration laws.

Next, when it came to the deaths of American and Mexican citizens, the reckless Fast and Furious gun-running operation was forgotten shortly after Obama protected Erik Holder and the (In)Justice Department by exercising his executive privilege – after it was confirmed Holder lied and was held in contempt of Congress.  

One scandal I thought would stick was Benghazi. The evasive runaround, the administration’s laughable talking points, and the complicit media silence kept people uninformed. The scandal didn’t stick, but it does stink. The spin and media puppet show shielded Obama and leading up to the 2012 Presidential Election, the Obama administration received extremely little scrutiny for the Benghazi incident and how it was mishandled back in D.C.

Remember the stimulus debacle? We’re talking about massive spending of taxpayer money on green energy scams; I mean “investments.” Jobs were promised and immediate economic growth was predicted and yet, one after the other, these companies failed miserably.

Solar Trust for America, declared bankruptcy after receiving $2.1 billion in loan guarantees from the Department of Energy.  First Solar blew through $1.46 billion, Solyndra wasted $535 million, Fisker Automotive received $529 million, Evergreen Solar spent $527 million, and the list goes on.

Now, we see the current, growing AP scandal involving information leaks as well as the DOJ seizing records of several Fox News employees while they targeted reporter James Rosen.

It’s also been confirmed the IRS has targeted the Tea Party, Christians, and many conservative groups including Republican business executives that simply donated to the Romney campaign.

Naturally, no one in the Obama administration knows anything.

To end with a ‘you just can’t make this stuff up’ storyline twist, the crony slated to take over Obamacare for the IRS, Lois Lerner, will apparently take the 5th in the ongoing investigation of IRS corruption.

I also faintly recall ongoing investigations regarding voter fraud in the 2008 and 2012 elections.

Geez, I hope the media or Obama justice Department find some answers they’re not seeking.

It’s all “ongoing.” Most of us are not holding our breath.

The IRS’s Job Is To Violate Our Liberties

IRS 233x300 The IRS’s Job Is To Violate Our Liberties

“What do you expect when you target the President?” This is what an Internal Revenue Service (IRS) agent allegedly said to the head of a conservative organization that was being audited after calling for the impeachment of then-President Clinton. Recent revelations that IRS agents gave “special scrutiny” to organizations opposed to the current administration’s policies suggest that many in the IRS still believe harassing the President’s opponents is part of their job.

As troubling as these recent reports are, it would be a grave mistake to think that IRS harassment of opponents of the incumbent President is a modern, or a partisan, phenomenon. As scholar Burton Folsom pointed out in his book New Deal or Raw Deal, IRS agents in the 1930s where essentially “hit squads” against opponents of the New Deal. It is well-known that the administrations of John F. Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson used the IRS to silence their critics. One of the articles of impeachment drawn up against Richard Nixon dealt with his use of the IRS to harass his political enemies. Allegations of IRS abuses were common during the Clinton administration, and just this week some of the current administration’s defenders recalled that antiwar and progressive groups alleged harassment by the IRS during the Bush presidency.

The bipartisan tradition of using the IRS as a tool to harass political opponents suggests that the problem is deeper than just a few “rogue” IRS agents—or even corruption within one, two, three or many administrations. Instead, the problem lays in the extraordinary power the tax system grants the IRS.

The IRS routinely obtains information about how we earn a living, what investments we make, what we spend on ourselves and our families, and even what charitable and religious organizations we support. Starting next year, the IRS will be collecting personally identifiable health insurance information in order to ensure we are complying with Obamacare’s mandates.

The current tax laws even give the IRS power to marginalize any educational, political, or even religious organizations whose goals, beliefs, and values are not favored by the current regime by denying those organizations “tax-free” status. This is the root of the latest scandal involving the IRS.

Considering the type of power the IRS excises over the American people, and the propensity of those who hold power to violate liberty, it is surprising we do not hear about more cases of politically-motivated IRS harassment. As the first US Supreme Court Chief Justice John Marshall said, “The power to tax is the power to destroy” — and who better to destroy than one’s political enemies?

The US flourished for over 120 years without an income tax, and our liberty and prosperity will only benefit from getting rid of the current tax system. The federal government will get along just fine without its immoral claim on the fruits of our labor, particularly if the elimination of federal income taxes are accompanied by serious reduction in all areas of spending, starting with the military spending beloved by so many who claim to be opponents of high taxes and big government.

While it is important for Congress to investigate the most recent scandal and ensure all involved are held accountable, we cannot pretend that the problem is a few bad actors. The very purpose of the IRS is to transfer wealth from one group to another while violating our liberties in the process, thus the only way Congress can protect our freedoms is to repeal the income tax and shutter the doors of the IRS once and for all.

Obama’s Culture Of Corruption

Obama NDAA SC 300x180 Obamas Culture of Corruption

During the 2008 campaign, President Obama declared, “It’s time to fundamentally change the way that we do business in Washington.” And change it, he has done! It’s been transformed into even more of a brash, thuggish, and coercive environment than it ever was before. The current IRS scandal of politically motivated discrimination against conservative non-profit groups perfectly characterizes the disturbing ends-justify-the-means “Chicago-style politics” that Obama and his comrades have brought to Washington.

As admitted by an Internal Revenue Service (IRS) official last week, and confirmed this week by the Inspector General’s (IG) special report on IRS abuses, the IRS, arguably the most onerous and oppressive government agency in the country, was discriminating against conservative, religious, and pro-Israel non-profit groups seeking 503(c) designation. What would normally take 6-12 months for such a ruling was taking up to three years. In addition, the filing requirements of such groups went far beyond the requirements specified for such applications.

To make matters even worse, IRS employees were releasing the confidential filings for such groups to the George Soros-backed liberal propaganda organization ProPublica. They admitted earlier this week, “In response to a request for the applications for 67 different nonprofits last November, the Cincinnati office of the IRS sent ProPublica applications or documentation for 31 groups. Nine of those applications had not yet been approved — meaning they were not supposed to be made public.  “We made six of those public, after redacting their financial information, deeming that they were newsworthy”, according to ProPublica.

There are clearly five improprieties or crimes under one scandalous umbrella here. First, the systemic targeting of groups thought to be critical of the administration; second the demand for information that was irrelevant to the tax status filing; third, obfuscation and outright lying by IRS officials to Congress and the public about those abuses; fourth, sharing those confidential filings with an opposing political group, ProPublica; and fifth, intentional withholding of information until after the election.

And lest we think these abuses were perpetrated by just a couple of rogue employees, all requests for 503(c) status go through the Cincinnati office. The Inspector General’s Report indicated it was the entire division, referred to within the IRS as the “Advocacy Group.” The IG’s report clearly documents that Washington was aware of what the “Advocacy Group” was doing.

So what’s happening to those involved? Not much. Acting IRS Commissioner Steven Miller, has resigned, even though he was already planning on leaving the agency. And Sarah Hall Ingram, who had been serving as commissioner of the Tax-Exempt and Government Entities Division from 2009 to 2012, the “Advocacy Group,” is now serving as director of the IRS’ Affordable Care Act division. That is the unit that’s responsible for enforcing Obamacare. Now isn’t that comforting?

Although this has been going on for at least three years, if we’re to believe White House Spokesman Jay Carney, Obama only found out about it from press reports, though the IG’s report reveals that Treasury Secretary Geithner’s office knew last summer.

The President seems to know nothing about what’s happening in his administration. From the Fast and Furious gunrunning, to the IRS and the AP phone records scandals, the president knows nothing until he hears “from news reports.” Whether he knows personally about these scandalous activities of his administration or not, it seems clear that since he’s surrounded himself with compatible ideologues and sycophants, that the entire atmosphere of Washington has become an extension of his Chicago-style politics of suppressing dissent, colluding against groups opposed to his agenda, intimidating the opposition, and suppressing damaging news.

Charles Krauthammer said this week, “Obama ran as a man who would not only change Washington but change the essence of politics itself in America as a kind of Olympian historic figure. He can’t even run the bureaucracy, that’s what we’re seeing. There’s arrogance here, of course, but there is incompetence of the highest order. He poses as the bystander. ‘I learned about it in the press.’ This is an indictment of people who believe in big government, want to expand it, have it control healthcare and cannot run the minimal essence of the duties of government.”

Harry Truman famously kept a plaque on his desk that said, “The Buck Stops Here.” If Obama had a plaque on his desk along the same lines, it would likely read, “The Buck Never Gets Here.” It could also include an additional qualifier, “And if it does, I don’t know anything about it.”

On March 7, 2010, Obama famously declared, “Ultimately, the buck stops with me.” On Sept. 23, 2012, in a 60 Minutes appearance, he said, “As president, I bear responsibility for everything, to some degree.” Yet still we have Jay Carney denying the president is responsible for anything. Obama has said of the Benghazi scandal that it’s merely “a side show.” If that is the case, this entire administration is a scandal-ridden three-ring circus, and the president is the ringleader.

Even Commissioner Miller understands the idea of accountability. In his testimony on Friday before Congress, he said, “I resigned, because as the acting commissioner, whatever happens in the IRS, whether I was personally involved or not, stops at my desk. So, I should be held accountable for what happened.” It’s too bad the head of the country hasn’t come to that same realization.

Just two weeks ago at the Ohio State University commencement, President Obama said, “Unfortunately, you’ve grown up hearing voices that incessantly warn of government as nothing more than some separate, sinister entity that’s at the root of all our problems; some of these same voices also doing their best to gum up the works. They’ll warn that tyranny is always lurking just around the corner. You should reject these voices. Because what they suggest is that our brave and creative and unique experiment in self-rule is somehow just a sham with which we can’t be trusted.”

How ironic that we’ve seen so much of his administration unmasked by his adulating media so soon after that statement, for the first definition of tyranny is,  “arbitrary or unrestrained exercise of power; despotic abuse of authority.” And that’s precisely what we’re seeing as the Oz curtain is pulled away revealing the tyranny of the Obama administration.

Whether the president is explicitly complicit in all of these scandals or not, his politics and leadership style have created, and are conducive with, the pattern and atmosphere of corruption and abuse now in full display by the administration.

AP award winning columnist Richard Larsen is President of Larsen Financial, a brokerage and financial planning firm in Pocatello, Idaho, and is a graduate of Idaho State University with degrees in Political Science and History and former member of the Idaho State Journal Editorial Board.  He can be reached at rlarsenen@cableone.net.

Photo credit: watchingfrogsboil (Creative Commons)

Why Rush Is Wrong On Obama Scandals

Rush Fox News 300x156 Why Rush is wrong on Obama scandals

Rush Limbaugh is taking a “whistling past the graveyard” approach to Barack Obama’s scandals. He is being very cautious about allowing himself to feel that some damage will be done to Obama when the dust from these scandals clears.

Rush even quotes James Carville’s liberal wishful thinking about this lasting “only 30 days” to help convince himself he’s right.  Nevertheless, Rush is wrong.

While there is no doubt that Obama won’t be impeached, as Rush allows that isn’t important. Saying there won’t be any damage to Obama his Party and their dangerous agenda is simply wrong.

These scandals will do the following:

When Rush is proved “right” and nothing “seems” to change, the fuse of a renewed TEA party revolution will be lit.

People will be reminded America isn’t supposed to be this way.

Democrats will remain on defense through the mid-term election cycle – you’re not winning when you are on defense.

More whistleblowers will come forward because those already out will be insulated from reprisals.  Fast and Furious can be revisited.  “He’s not a citizen” will get new life.  Conservative state legislatures will be embolden to pass more conservative laws and repeal  more liberal ones. Photo id to vote – think Boston bombing.  More sheriffs will sue Obama over gun control.  The IRS will be neutered.

It will force House Republicans to finally do their jobs or face an angry constituency willing to throw them out in many districts.  This will shift the leadership of Congressional GOP from RINOs to more conservative leaders.  It will set new standards for GOP candidates – collaborators need not apply.

This makes it far more likely the GOP will hold the House and regains the Senate.

It weakens Obama’s leverage to ram through his socialist programs.

It weakens Obamacare’s grip on us.

It will further infuriate average Americans being disadvantaged by Obama’s sequestration.

It will end gun control and immigration “reform efforts”.

It will make bringing the needed 5% of conservatives back to vote easier.

When most of Obama’s rank and file DO NOT turn on him the “us versus them” mindset needed for conservatives to stop pandering to Hispanics and Blacks, who will never vote Republican, will grow.

This will encourage “Atlas Shrugged” type passive resistance to government and more willingness to sue and fight the IRS giving rise to appeals of court losses to the IRS.

The coupling of the Gosnell case with the IRS attacks on pro-lifers on behalf of Planned Parenthood will cause these groups to redouble their efforts to stop abortions and enjoy previously unattainable successes in the courts and in public opinion.

These things will make having Obama around worth the trade.

Photo: Standard Compliant