ObamaCare Speech: I’m Radical and Mad as Hell

Dateline: September 9, 2009:
Obama speech (as I watch): From the lips of POTUS . . .

Introduction:
Insurance companies are evil but I do not want to put them out of business. (Huh? After listening to the litany of insurance company evildoing, any sane person would put them out of business.)

Middle section:
I favor a not-for-profit public option that will cost nothing (cough, cough). It will promote competition—but competition across state lines is still illegal. (Socialism and states’ rights, together at last!)

If you eliminate profit and executive salaries, the government plan will be cheaper than private plans. (That is the essential belief of socialism: eliminate profit [a net rate of 4% on average] and you can make the world over. . .)

But, wait, even though private plans are awful, greedy, and the socialist plan is better, we estimate only 5% of Americans will choose the public plan. (Are we morons?)

Are you confused yet?

The Uninsured:
As for the uninsured: We will require “irresponsible” young people and greedy employers who don’t insure workers to get or offer coverage. (What’s next? Debtor’s prison for those young people who don’t buy insurance? Not going to happen. See Massachusetts). However, we will start by exempting the following:

*Small business: 95% of firms (who employ 50% of the population) will be exempt.
*Hardship cases will be exempt.
*Illegal immigrants will not be covered.
*Young people will not sign up (trust me, I used to sell health care).

Well, that amounts to about 90% of the uninsured.

Conclusion:
As the speech goes on, the president gets angry:

“Experts” will determine where the “waste” is located. And you people with good health care plans (remember, from the greedy insurance companies!) will be taxed so you can pay for a plan that “doesn’t cost anything.”

Those who say health care costs will rise are “liars.” The finger is wagging at his opponents.

Let us apply this profit=waste, government=efficiency model to every industry! We have taken over the car industry, we know best how to manage health care because “we are from the government and we are here to help.”

Remember citizens:
Sign up and “do your part” for the Volk. If you don’t, face the consequences.

POSTSCRIPT: Many viewers may have missed a crucial line: The president said his Plan would not go into effect for FOUR years so that “we get it right.” That sent chills down my spine because it means “regime uncertainty”—the term devised by Independent Institute scholar Robert Higgs to describe how economies slump when business is uncertain about the direction of the government. In this case, the government promises to do drastic things to the economy but investors and employers will just have to wait. Is Obama trying to make this a Great Depression?

Jonathan Bean is a Research Fellow at the Independent Institute and editor of the Independent book, Race & Liberty in America: The Essential Reader.
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