Obama's Health Care Cash Cow
July 28, 2016 at 4:25 p.m.
By Gary [email protected]
I understand that politicians throw money at constituents in hopes of gaining votes.
For example, President Obama is running around talking to college students, hawking a program which will make their student loans more affordable. The idea is that they will then vote for him and help him get re-elected.
Republicans like the plan, too.
So yeah, politicians are wont to toss around money and policy to garner votes. All politicians. I get that.
But last week a Government Accounting Office report recommended that the Department of Health and Human Services cancel a project hatched by the Obama administration because it is basically a cash cow for Obama’s re-election.
OK, “cash cow” is my phrase, not the GAO’s, but that’s pretty much what it is.
Here’s why.
Lots of painful provisions of the Affordable Health Care for America Act – President Obama’s signature bit of legislation more commonly known as Obamacare – don’t take effect until after the next election.
Which is very convenient for the president because he certainly doesn’t want voters feeling any pain right before his attempt at re-election
Especially if that pain can be directly linked to legislation the president so prominently and publicly hailed as his greatest accomplishment.
Unfortunately for Obama, Obamacare does just that, because one provision is set to take effect right before the election.
Obamacare guts the popular Medicare Advantage program.
Medicare Advantage plans are health plans seniors could choose as part of Medicare. Medicare Advantage plans are offered by private companies approved by Medicare.
Millions of senior citizens have been relying on Medicare Advantage. It made health care a lot more affordable for them. It eliminated a lot of coverage gaps by taking them out of the government plan.
Medicare Advantage plans provide all hospital and medical insurance and many times offers extra coverage, such as vision, hearing, dental, prescription drug and health and wellness programs.
Senior citizens love Medicare Advantage.
But Obamacare, with its billions of dollars in Medicare “savings,” effectively ends Medicare Advantage by deep cuts in reimbursement rates for the program beginning in 2013.
Millions of senior citizens would be kicked out of Medicare Advantage and sent kicking and screaming back into plain old Medicare.
In order for all these seniors to get enrolled in their Medicare coverage program in time for next year’s roll out of the Obamacare plan, they’d have to sign up – you guessed it – right before the November election.
In fact, according to the legislation, open enrollment begins Oct. 15.
That’s just three weeks before we all go to the polls.
Now, what could be worse for President Obama than fiddling with millions of senior citizens’ – read that, reliable voters’ – health care. The president’s health care plan would be effectly forcing these voters to abandon a plan they really like and pick between confusing new government-run plans.
There would be millions of senior citizen voters in swing states like Florida and Ohio furious with President Obama right before the election.
Of course, this potential electoral catastrophe wasn’t lost on the Obama administration.
Oh no.
Enter the plan to postpone the gutting of Medicare Advantage past the election.
Seems the administration plans to spend $8 billion in Health and Human Services money to keep the Medicare Advantage program intact until after the election.
Problem is, you simply fund a program set to expire under current legislation without Congressional approval.
No worries.
The money comes from a part of the HHS fund that is allowed for use in “experimental” or “demonstration” projects.
So the administration claims this $8 billion to protect the president’s re-election prospects is being used to study the effect the money would have on the insurance market.
Current law allows the HHS secretary to spend money without Congressional approval if the program is an “experiment” that would increase the “efficiency and economy of health services.”
Yeah, it’s an experiment all right. An experiment on how to keep from angering millions of voters right before an election.
As I said at the outset of this column, the GAO has recommended HHS not spend the money. The 39-page GAO report skewered the proposal and simply isn’t buying the “experimental” nonsense.
“The Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services should cancel the Medicare Advantage Quality Bonus Payment Demonstration and allow the Medicare Advantage quality bonus payment system established by the 2010 Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act to take effect,” the GAO concluded.
Senator Orrin Hatch of Utah is the senior Republican on the Finance Committee, and Representative Dave Camp is chairman of the Ways and Means Committee. They released a statement saying they believed the administration could be “using taxpayer dollars for political purposes, to mask the impact on beneficiaries of cuts in the Medicare Advantage program.”
Benjamin E. Sasse is a former U.S. assistant secretary of health, and president of Midland University. Charles Hurt is a political writer.
In a New York Post article, they characterized the issue this way.
If he’s not stopped, Obama will spend $8 billion in taxpayer funds for a scheme to mask the debilitating effects on seniors of his signature piece of legislation just long enough to get himself re-elected.
Further, they note:
Congress should immediately launch an investigation into this unprecedented misuse of taxpayer money and violation of the public trust, which certainly presses the boundaries of legality and very well may breach them.
Nice, eh?[[In-content Ad]]
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I understand that politicians throw money at constituents in hopes of gaining votes.
For example, President Obama is running around talking to college students, hawking a program which will make their student loans more affordable. The idea is that they will then vote for him and help him get re-elected.
Republicans like the plan, too.
So yeah, politicians are wont to toss around money and policy to garner votes. All politicians. I get that.
But last week a Government Accounting Office report recommended that the Department of Health and Human Services cancel a project hatched by the Obama administration because it is basically a cash cow for Obama’s re-election.
OK, “cash cow” is my phrase, not the GAO’s, but that’s pretty much what it is.
Here’s why.
Lots of painful provisions of the Affordable Health Care for America Act – President Obama’s signature bit of legislation more commonly known as Obamacare – don’t take effect until after the next election.
Which is very convenient for the president because he certainly doesn’t want voters feeling any pain right before his attempt at re-election
Especially if that pain can be directly linked to legislation the president so prominently and publicly hailed as his greatest accomplishment.
Unfortunately for Obama, Obamacare does just that, because one provision is set to take effect right before the election.
Obamacare guts the popular Medicare Advantage program.
Medicare Advantage plans are health plans seniors could choose as part of Medicare. Medicare Advantage plans are offered by private companies approved by Medicare.
Millions of senior citizens have been relying on Medicare Advantage. It made health care a lot more affordable for them. It eliminated a lot of coverage gaps by taking them out of the government plan.
Medicare Advantage plans provide all hospital and medical insurance and many times offers extra coverage, such as vision, hearing, dental, prescription drug and health and wellness programs.
Senior citizens love Medicare Advantage.
But Obamacare, with its billions of dollars in Medicare “savings,” effectively ends Medicare Advantage by deep cuts in reimbursement rates for the program beginning in 2013.
Millions of senior citizens would be kicked out of Medicare Advantage and sent kicking and screaming back into plain old Medicare.
In order for all these seniors to get enrolled in their Medicare coverage program in time for next year’s roll out of the Obamacare plan, they’d have to sign up – you guessed it – right before the November election.
In fact, according to the legislation, open enrollment begins Oct. 15.
That’s just three weeks before we all go to the polls.
Now, what could be worse for President Obama than fiddling with millions of senior citizens’ – read that, reliable voters’ – health care. The president’s health care plan would be effectly forcing these voters to abandon a plan they really like and pick between confusing new government-run plans.
There would be millions of senior citizen voters in swing states like Florida and Ohio furious with President Obama right before the election.
Of course, this potential electoral catastrophe wasn’t lost on the Obama administration.
Oh no.
Enter the plan to postpone the gutting of Medicare Advantage past the election.
Seems the administration plans to spend $8 billion in Health and Human Services money to keep the Medicare Advantage program intact until after the election.
Problem is, you simply fund a program set to expire under current legislation without Congressional approval.
No worries.
The money comes from a part of the HHS fund that is allowed for use in “experimental” or “demonstration” projects.
So the administration claims this $8 billion to protect the president’s re-election prospects is being used to study the effect the money would have on the insurance market.
Current law allows the HHS secretary to spend money without Congressional approval if the program is an “experiment” that would increase the “efficiency and economy of health services.”
Yeah, it’s an experiment all right. An experiment on how to keep from angering millions of voters right before an election.
As I said at the outset of this column, the GAO has recommended HHS not spend the money. The 39-page GAO report skewered the proposal and simply isn’t buying the “experimental” nonsense.
“The Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services should cancel the Medicare Advantage Quality Bonus Payment Demonstration and allow the Medicare Advantage quality bonus payment system established by the 2010 Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act to take effect,” the GAO concluded.
Senator Orrin Hatch of Utah is the senior Republican on the Finance Committee, and Representative Dave Camp is chairman of the Ways and Means Committee. They released a statement saying they believed the administration could be “using taxpayer dollars for political purposes, to mask the impact on beneficiaries of cuts in the Medicare Advantage program.”
Benjamin E. Sasse is a former U.S. assistant secretary of health, and president of Midland University. Charles Hurt is a political writer.
In a New York Post article, they characterized the issue this way.
If he’s not stopped, Obama will spend $8 billion in taxpayer funds for a scheme to mask the debilitating effects on seniors of his signature piece of legislation just long enough to get himself re-elected.
Further, they note:
Congress should immediately launch an investigation into this unprecedented misuse of taxpayer money and violation of the public trust, which certainly presses the boundaries of legality and very well may breach them.
Nice, eh?[[In-content Ad]]
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