This health care bill is so anti-free market, you know Democrats had to create it. At least we have the Republicans to fight for the free market… or something like that.

The danger for Republicans is that their delay tactics begin to look like political opportunism and they appear to obstruct a bill that contains some popular elements such as restrictions on health insurers.

In the give and take on the Senate floor, where the bill will be debated in December, Republicans hope to drive a wedge among Democrats, potentially peeling off centrists on key issues. Republicans also hope to force attention to their own proposals for changing health care, such as limiting medical-malpractice claims and enhancing the ability of small businesses to buy insurance.

“I think people will be more comfortable with us biting off what we can chew instead of this arrogance, thinking we can fix the whole system all at once,” Mr. Alexander said.

via For GOP, Health Is Only One Battle on Road to ’10 Elections – WSJ.com.

OK, so Republicans aren’t for the free market either, they just aren’t as anti-free market as the Democrats. Limiting medical malpractice should not be something the Federal government does. If anyone should pass tort reform, it should be state legislatures. This would cause competition amongst states for doctors and would ultimately lead to a better solution. States would try out different reforms. They could look at each other’s examples and learn from the mistakes and successes. Instead, Republicans believe in a one size fits all plan.

Also, enhancing the ability of small businesses to buy insurance will not fix the rising health care costs. Having businesses in the health care insurance purchasing business is one reason for the increasing costs. Republicans need to get back to the free market ideas and remove the incentives for businesses to provide insurance. Then consumers would be in charge of their health care. HSAs were the right way to go, and more than likely consumers would move towards HSAs if government would stay out of the business of promoting health insurance.

At least Republicans aren’t looking to take over our health care, but it sure would be nice if someone was fighting for the free market in Washington.

In an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal this morning, Republican reps Jeb Hensarling and Pau Ryan layout why economic expectations are so low.

Why all the pessimism? The source appears to be a growing fear that the federal government is retreating from the free-market economic principles of the last half-century, and in particular the strong growth policies that began under Ronald Reagan. A review of the economic policies instituted by President Barack Obama and the Democratic-controlled Congress lends credibility to this concern.

Exhibit A is the economic stimulus package signed into law by President Barack Obama in February. Even among previous stimulus efforts, the 2009 stimulus stands out for its ineffective targeting and sheer size. With interest, it is $1.1 trillion, double the size of Roosevelt’s New Deal spending as a percentage of GDP.

Exhibit B is tax policy going forward. It is a near certainty that Democratic-controlled Congress will allow most of the tax cuts of 2001-2003 to expire on Dec. 31, 2010.

Exhibit C is the administration’s intervention in the GM and Chrysler reorganizations. Upsetting decades of accepted bankruptcy law, the administration leveraged TARP funds to place unsecured and lower priority creditors like the United Auto Workers union in front of secured and higher priority creditors.

Health care, the administration’s signature issue, is Exhibit D. Disregarding its impact on quality and access, its plan will surely cost well over $1 trillion over the next decade. The House-passed version includes an 8% “pay or play” payroll tax and a half-trillion dollar surtax on incomes over $500,000, much of which will strike small business. Both taxes will tend to depress investment and the creation of new jobs.

If one substitutes the Blue Chip Economic Forecast’s interest-rate forecast for that of the administration, deficits will increase by an additional $1.2 trillion over the administration’s projected deficits. If the next decade’s interest rates climb to match those of the 1980s, then the deficit would increase another $5.3 trillion. If higher interest rates then slow economic growth, the impact on the deficit would be much worse.

via Jeb Hensarling and Paul Ryan: Why No One Expects a Strong Recovery – WSJ.com.

While I agree with all these, I think the reps believes that government is the solution, and the problem is their solution is not being implemented. This is what happens when you believe the government is the solution to our problems. Whoever lies the best and gets control of the government sets the policies. I’d love to see these guys calling for the government to quit tinkering with the economy.

The free market works, and will handle slow downs much better than politics. This recession would have hit us fast and moved on already without the tinkering. Can you imagine a doctor giving you a shot and saying I don’t want to inflict the pain, so let me put the needle in slowly? When you get a shot, you want it fast and quick. You know it’s going to hurt. Just get it over with. The economy is the same way. If we are going to go through some economic pain, take the brunt of it and get it over with. Instead we have these idiots trying to avoid any pain, and all they do is prolong it. The Fed caused the damn pain, and then says their role is minimize the pain and prevent it going forward. Really? Good job jackasses. Maybe we should try to control the weather so we don’t have any natural disasters.

If you want expectations to pick up, go back to the constitution. Quit tinkering. Tinkering only causes people to speculate on what the tinkering will be, and because our current tinkerers are bigger socialists than the previous tinkerers, they don’t feel good about the tinkering. Remove the tinkering ,and you remove the speculation and the negative expectations.

Bob Murphy had a great post,  Free Advice: “The Money That Is Sold Abroad Is You!”, that reiterates my post on selling our kids into slavery. This video is a lot more dramatic though. I’m jealous.

Some info on Republican plan via HotAir.

CBO director Douglas Elmendorf scored the new proposal from House Republicans on health-care reform and gave them plenty of ammunition to use against expansive and expensive Democratic plans for government takeovers. Their plan, which relies on interstate competition, HSAs, and tort reform, would only cost $61 billion in the first ten years of the plan — or slightly less than 6% of what Democrats plan to spend to overhaul the entire system:

This evening, CBO released a preliminary analysis of a substitute amendment to H.R. 3962, the Affordable Health Care for America Act, proposed by Representative John Boehner, the Republican Leader in the House of Representatives. CBO and the staff of the Joint Committee on Taxation (JCT) estimate that the amendment would reduce federal deficits by $68 billion over the 2010-2019 period; it would also slightly reduce federal budget deficits in the following decade, relative to those projected under current law, with a total effect during that decade that is in a broad range between zero and one-quarter percent of gross domestic product.

Unlike the Democratic proposals, the bill would actually reduce premiums:

CBO anticipates that the combination of provisions in the amendment would reduce average private health insurance premiums per enrollee in the United States, relative to what they would be under current law-by 7 percent to 10 percent in the small group market, by 5 percent to 8 percent for individually purchased insurance, and by zero to 3 percent in the large group market. Those are averages, however, and they are subject to a great deal of uncertainty; some individuals and families in each market would see different results.

via Hot Air » Blog Archive » GOP health-care reform cost: $61 billion, cut deficit $68 billion.

In an op-ed in the Washington Times, Senator Susan Collins calls into question the constitutionality of the czars. While I completely agree, I’d ask the senator where she has been all this time?

When it comes to accountability and transparency, who is actually in charge and making the policy decisions? Is it the secretary, whom the Senate confirmed, or is it the czar, whom the president unilaterally appointed? These czars operate outside the established structure of checks and balances.

As ranking member of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, I also am concerned about the management dysfunction that so many czars create. They duplicate or dilute the statutory authority and responsibilities Congress has conferred on Cabinet officers and other senior officials.

Unfortunately, because czars can circumvent the constitutionally mandated process of “advice and consent” and because the president’s advisers have informed me that no White House czars will be allowed to testify before Congress, we cannot ask them for the answers.

Czars bypass the constitutional oversight authority of Congress, tipping the balance of power in favor of the executive branch.

via Reining in the czars – Washington Times.

The czars without a doubt undermine the constitution. If I was President and wanted to become a tyrant, one of the things I would do is put my select people in places and positions where they could seize control at the right time. While I am not saying this is Obama’s intent, although everyday I wonder, once the precedent is set,  it allows future Presidents to do the same thing. If one of those Presidents has the intention of becoming a tyrant, he’ll have precedent on his side.

While I agree with Collins on this issue, I would hope she’d be consistent in her concern for the constitution. The congress violates the constitution with almost every bill they write. Will we see an op-ed about the constitutionality of health care reform, cash for clunkers, bailouts, etc?

Republicans wonder why they are losing support? Carly Fiorina is a perfect example of why. Apparently, the freedom we have on the internet is just too much to bare.

Asked what she thought about regulation of the web, she said it was inevitable that there would be more regulation of it. Why, for instance, is there no protection of women and children on the Internet, when there is plenty in real life. She said this duality — where anything goes on the wild wild west of the Internet — would have to end.

via Web 2.0: Carly Fiorina talks potential Senate run, breast cancer battle, and government tech policy | VentureBeat.

I must have missed all the news stories of women being abused on the internet. Also, Carly talks like our non-internet laws don’t apply on the internet. Laws apply to life in general despite the medium used to break them. If someone commits fraud on the internet, breaks laws that we have to protect children from predators, or runs a website infringing on a woman’s rights, our current laws would be applied and convictions would be handed out.

We do not need the government wasting resources policing millions of pages on the internet. Are we going to have internet police monitoring my Facebook account to see if I said something abusive? Are we going to have twitter filters to target users who use derogatory statements? Even worse, are we going to be like China and filter all traffic coming in and out of the country so we can ensure that no citizen is reading something the government doesn’t want that is published by a foreign nation?

Just like other crimes, if someone commits a crime on the internet, the victim needs to press charges and prosecution will proceed. We do not need more government regulation, or in other words more freedom taken away.

Republican’s better decide whether they stand for freedom or not. If we want our freedoms taken away, we might as well just have vote Democrat.

Tony Blankley has column out today that talks about the insane notion that the government seems to have that it can continue spending with out regard to the debt. The debate on health care is so ridiculous when you think about where we are heading already without adding any new programs ever going forward. Here is a small piece of his column.

Don’t take my word for it. In June, the Congressional Budget Office published “The Long-Term Budget Outlook,” its summary reading in part: “The federal budget is on an unsustainable path — meaning that federal debt will continue to grow much faster than the economy over the long run. … Rising costs for health care and the aging of the U.S. population will cause federal spending to increase rapidly.”

And yet the same Congress and president who want to stop the banks from taking too much risk cannot stop themselves from expanding deficits.

The federal government is giving the “green light” for the country to drive to the poorhouse — and drive there, I would argue, by way of the lunatic asylum.

Before Sen. Max Baucus’ health bill is enacted, $9.3 trillion of newly created deficit already has been added to the national debt. The Baucus bill is considered a triumph of careful budgeting because it may cost only $829 billion

via Debt-driven madness – Pittsburgh Tribune-Review.

Now, I don’t think the American public is as crazy as the government, in particular the Democratic party. That is why the majority of the public does not support a public option. Also, this is partly why you see a mass movement against the government’s ever expanding welfare state. The future of our country looks extremely dire with the predictions of the CBO, and yet politicians keep pressing on for more spending. Could it be that the statists would love to see the downfall of the capitalist United States or at least a partial collapse, so that they can grab even more power from a frighten and impoverished citizenry?

As responsible Americans, we have to forget even the notion of any type of health care bill that leads to government expansion. Not only that, we need to start realizing the party is over, we’ve drank way too much, and the hang over is going to be nasty. It’s time for us to make drastic cuts in the welfare state. We can no longer hand out government dollars for today’s “me, me, me” population to the detriment of future generations.

Today I finally picked up my own copy of The Federalist Papers at Half Priced Books for $3.48. Thank God For The Free Market #TGFTFM as I like to say on Twitter. Anyways, I only made it to the third page before I found my first gem.

Alexander Hamilton wrote, “.. that a dangerous ambition more often lurks behind the specious mask of zeal for the rights of the people than under the forbidding appearance of zeal for the firmness and efficiency of goverment. History will teach us that the former has been found a much more certain road to the introduction of despotism than the latter, and that of those men who have overturned the liberties of republics, the greatest number have begun their career by paying an obsequious court to the people, commencing demagogues and ending tyrants”

What he was saying here is there are people who will benefit from weak or inefficient government, and those people will use their fake concern for the people to hide their bad intentions. While I don’t believe our government is weak. It would have been weak if the Constitution was not ratified. In that circumstance there would have been people who benefited from the chaos. There were those who argued against the Constitution to maintain the weak Articles of Confederation. Many of them claimed to be looking out for the people, but they were really trying to maintain their status and power.

What we can take from this is the warning about inefficient government and the warning about those who are excessively for “the people”.  Surely, in our current day and age we can see how inefficient our government is compared to the government that our founders envisioned. How many times have you heard of unaccounted for billions in HUD, the department of education, or medicare?

Surely, you can recall how those who pushed these inefficient programs screamed their great attentions, “zeal”, from the rooftops. They are looking out for the people, the down trodden, or the most often group of concern, “the children”. How about this one? “We have to bail out Wall Street in order to bail out Main Street.” Really? It’s not because you want to bailout your buddies at your former companies? That’s right. Of course, not. It’s for the people.

The waste is horrible, but the second part of Hamilton’s warning is more disturbing. He warns that listening to the people who proclaim to be the champions of the people are the ones who more often than not are the ones who overturn liberties and become tyrants.

Keep this in mind next time you hear politicians claiming to be looking out for the people with health care, student loans, jobs, or the myriad of other government programs. The next three years are sure to be a case study on the warning above from Alexander Hamilton.

Yesterday, the Senate finance committee passed the Baucus bill, well wasn’t a bill, but a set of ideas. One only need to look at the new $507 billion in new taxes to see why government should leave the reform to the private sector. This bill will not only drive up demand, thus driving up costs, but it will also drive down supply and stunt job creation. Obviously, if supply is driven down, cost also go up, and without job creation people can’t afford health insurance anyways. Ok, so let’s take a look at these new taxes and see how they will affect the market. Below is a list of new taxes from CNSNews.com.

(CNSNews.com) – The health-care bill that the Senate Finance Committee will vote on today will cost a total of $829 billion over 10 years, with $507 billion of that cost being covered by new federal taxes and fees, according to the Congressional Budget Office (CBO).

These new taxes and fees include:

– $201 billion in new taxes on high-premium health care plans.

– $83 billion in new taxes paid by workers who will receive less employer-sponsored coverage or lose that coverage altogether but will be compensated with higher wages or monetary benefits, which are taxable.

– $23 billion in penalty fees paid by employers who do not comply with the federal insurance mandate.

– $4 billion in penalty fees paid by individuals who don’t have health insurance.

– $16 billion in new income and Medicare payroll tax revenue due to changes in Medicare.

– $180 billion in other tax revenues items calculated by the non-partisan Joint Committee on Taxation (JCT).

According to the JCT, this $180 billion in new taxes would include: A new tax on prescription drug makers that would account for $22.2 billion over 10 years; a new tax on medical device manufacturers that would bring in $38.6 billion; and a new annual tax on insurance companies would net the government $60.4 billion.

Also, a provision that raises the threshold at which medical expenses become tax deductible, from 7.5 percent of income to 10 percent of income, would reportedly yield the government $15.2 billion in new revenue from sick and disabled Americans with high out-of-pocket medical costs.

via CNSNews.com – Finance Committee Health Bill Includes $507 Billion in New Taxes and Fees.

Now let’s take each one of these taxes and see the law of unintended (let’s hope they are unintended) consequences in action.

The first tax is $201 billion on high-premium health care plans. These are the Cadillac plans that many union guys get. You know, the blue collar guys that supposedly the Democrats love to help. So, one must ask why would you tax these plans and what is the effect of the tax. One only needs to look at the cigarette tax to see the purpose. You tax cigarettes because you want to make it more expensive to smoke and thus drive down the number of people that smoke. Similarly, taxing these high-premium plans will increase the over all cost of them and dissuade companies that offer them from continuing to do so. This is the first example of the socialist principle that if we can’t all have a candy bar, none of us will have one. Because we can’t all have Cadillac health care plans, none of us will. Who does this help? This surely doesn’t help the average Joe. Hmmm, wonder if this applies to Congress’s Cadillac plan?

The second tax listed is $83 billion paid by workers who will receive less coverage from employers or lose coverage, but in turn will get paid more because the employer doesn’t have the insurance cost. Here we go again, with liberals looking out for the common man. The plan drives up the cost of insurance, which is likely to cause many companies, especially small businesses, to drop or reduce the health insurance plans for their employees. “No problem,” says the Baucus bill, “We’ll just tax you the worker.” These taxes are what they believe will be higher wages. The government is showing its hand here. It knows that all costs of an employee lowers the employees wages. Keep this in mind next time the government wants to tax the corporation more. Ok, back to this tax. So, when your employer drops your insurance, the government is betting you get a raise. You better hope they are right, because you’ll be mandated to buy your own insurance or pay a fine.

The third tax is $23 billion in fines paid by employers who don’t comply with the almighty state. OK, so now the government is back to raising the cost of your job to the employer. If you are the employer, is this going to increase your likely hood of hiring or decrease? Also, if you are an employer, you are going to compare the cost of the penalty compared to your current insurance costs. If the penalty is less, you are going to go with the penalty. The difference between fines and insurance costs is insurance costs grow ridiculous amounts every year, and fines will be a fixed cost. From a business planning stand point, that is a plus for going with the fines. So now, not only do you not have health insurance, but money that could be going to paying your more is being sent to the government with no benefit to you.

The fourth tax is $4 billion paid by YOU! That’s right, buy health insurance or pay the government. Isn’t freedom great? So, let’s wrap our heads around where we are right now. If you have awesome health insurance through your employer, the government is going to make it more expensive by taxing it. When you employer drops that, they are going to pay a penalty. Then you  have to hope you get a raise of which you’ll pay taxes on. If you deem you can’t afford to buy health insurance yourself, guess what, you will now pay a fine as well. There sure is a lot of spending going on here, with the end result being you still don’t have health insurance. If you are younger, you may still be better off paying these fines though and holding off on health insurance, because you can just wait till you are sick to buy into health insurance. What the heck, the government is preventing insurance companies from turning down anyone for any reason. Hey, they are just looking out for the common man. Thank your lucky stars!

How many more taxes do we have to go through. I’m starting to throw up a little in my mouth. OK, push through it! The next tax is $16 billion in new Medicare payroll tax due to changes in Medicare. I’ve tried to determine what the hell this means, but have been unable to find exactly what’s proposed here. It sounds like they would raise the payroll tax. If it’s raised on the portion you pay, you just got a tax increase. If it’s raised on the employer’s side, companies just got another reason not to hire or to pay you less.

The last part is a whopping $180 billion in other taxes. So what are these taxes? This is where you get some of the most ridiculous parts of the bill that will do the exact opposite of the the bill claims to do. So, $22.2 billion will be a new tax on drug makers, $38.6 billion on medical device manufactures, and $60.4 billion on insurance companies. So, let me guess, these companies are just going to swallow the crap the government just got shoved in their mouth. This is why politicians should stick to speeches and leave the market to the private sector. Companies don’t pay costs. Consumers pay costs. All of these taxes, drive up the cost of drugs, medical devices, and insurance. This is completely contradictory to what politicians say their goal is. Then again, maybe we just have their goals wrong. I’m guessing they know this, and in a few years they’ll come back and say, “See, the free market isn’t working. We now have to step in and take more control to bring these costs down.” If these taxes can’t be passed on to the consumer by some other legislation, the companies will not be able to meet their profit goals. If they cannot reach their profit goals, they will not make the products. Without the product, supply diminishes even more and drives up costs. So, you either have costs driven up by government induced cost burdens on the medical companies or you have costs driven up by a shrinkage in supply. Pick your poison!

The last one is just perfect. The government loves us so much that they want to make it more expensive if you have very high medical bills. If you have very high medical bills, chances are you are disabled or have a child that has a disability. Don’t worry the government is so compassionate, that is going to make you spend 10% of your income instead of 7.5% before you can get a tax deduction on it. Aww, they are so caring.

Hopefully, if you made it through this blog without vomiting, you see the that government is not trying to help people. They are setting up taxes and other penalties so later all the government zombies come back begging the government for more help. Of course, the government will gladly help out again until they get a nationalized health care system.