Repeal and Replace

In Bobby Jindal's book, Leadership and Crisis, he has an interesting chapter on Medicare and he writes about his time on the National Bipartisan Commission on the Future of Medicare in 1997.  This is a topic with which Jindal was quite familiar having already served as head of the Louisiana Department of Health and Hospitals and had achieved an impressive record of reform there. 

As legislators such as Chuck Schumer lob accusations of hypocrisy at Republicans who accept government health care as part of their federal employee benefit, it is important to remember two things.  John McCormack points out:

The logical fallacy here is that Republicans never said that government employees--which is what U.S. congressmen and senators are--should not receive health care coverage from their employer. What Republicans did was oppose a law that raised taxes and cut Medicare by $2 trillion in order to pay for an entitlement program that greatly increases government control of health care. (They favored and favor a variety of free market reforms.) The fact that many Democrats and a few Republicans do not understand this distinction does not mean all Republicans are hypocrites. 

Further, Jindal points out that the insurance those on Capitol Hill receive is not exactly like Medicare, either.  Jindal explains:

The Federal Employees Health Benefits Program...is not perfect, but it is less bureaucratic and more responsive to its enrollees than Medicare...Instead of paying for services, FEHBP allows recipients to choose from hundreds of health insurance plans, and then it pays for a large portion of the premiums.  Far from being a top-down system [as Medicare is] FEHBP encourages competition among insurers for federal employees.

This is far from what "government insurance" is under Medicare. 

Schumer's cries of hypocrisy are absurd.

On a related point, Peter Ferrara over at American Spectator has done some excellent work in the past in researching and reporting on Obamacare.  His piece this morning is revealing as well.  In explaining how Obamacare plans to phase out private insurance (remember "if you like your insurance plan, you can keep your insurance!" - baloney), Fererra explains exactly how HHS plans to eliminate private insurers over time:

But there is socialist method behind the madness. Obamacare raises health insurance costs by mandating that health insurers provide expensive new benefits. That is why it was so obvious that Obamacare will raise health insurance costs. But now come the federal regulators who plan to dictate to the insurers that they cannot reflect those costs in higher premiums.

And so those companies will have to be "regulated" or go out of business. And no new companies will be there to fill the void so you'll all be channeled into government run health care.  As it turns out, you WON'T be able to keep that policy you currently have.  Read the whole thing.


Many of us may have developed Obamacare "fatigue" as we railed so mightily against it, and many are just plain tired of hearing about it or talking about it.  The old "it's done" attitude.  As Republicans move into Congress today and begin the march toward repeal, we'll be hearing a lot more about Obamacare in the days to come and it's time to pay attention.  Now that we know what's in it, it's time to repeal and replace.




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