Worse Health, Higher Costs, Endless Repeal: The ACA Is Working—For Health Insurers and Republicans, But Not So Much For You

I started writing my blog in 2009, largely in response to America electing an anti-American president.  During those first few years I talked a lot about Obamacare.  The thing was a disaster from day one, indeed, in an omen of things to come, Obama’s team spent 4X more building a website that didn’t work than Apple did developing the iPhone.

The worst part about Obamacare?  The fact that it was a solution to a problem that didn’t exist.

In 2013 I wrote the following:  

“Obamacare was passed in 2009 (sic) in reaction to anecdotal examples of Americans who couldn’t get healthcare. According to Gallop, in 2009 there were 50 million Americans who did not have health insurance. That represented approximately 16% of the population. Gallop also reported that of those without health insurance, fully 50% were satisfied with their healthcare. That means that fully 92% of the American population either had health insurance – 80% of whom were satisfied with that insurance – or were satisfied enough with their healthcare not to have insurance.

To give those numbers a bit of perspective, compare them the rest of the developed world. The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development publishes the Better Life Index which ranks developed nations by a wide variety of criteria, one of which is health. According to the 2011 Better Life Index survey, in 2009 88% of Americans were satisfied with their health. Of the 34 countries covered in the data, in only two – New Zealand (89.7%) and Canada (88.1%) did citizens report a higher level of satisfaction with their health. Not the United Kingdom (76%). Not France (72.4%). Not Sweden (79.1%). Now, of course health is not healthcare, but the goal of healthcare is to improve or sustain a person’s health.

So, in 2009, when 92% of Americans had health insurance or were satisfied enough with their healthcare not to have it, and 88% of Americans were satisfied with their health, we got Obamacare, a 2,000 page bill that needed to be passed before it could be read..”

Of course, the only reason we actually have this is because that treacherous snake leading the Supreme Court deemed it a tax and therefore allowed it to go into force.  Since then, healthcare has become more expensive and satisfaction has plummeted. 

Today, Americans recognize Obamacare for the utter disaster that it is. We hear horror stories regularly of people who pay thousands of dollars a month in insurance only to be told they can’t have a procedure or the procedure is going to cost an arm and a leg. Often, if they simply choose not to get Obamacare insurance and pay the fine, they actually pay less for their treatments!   But not only have prices for care exceeded inflation virtually every year since then – something it’s done for decades as utilization rates increased – but satisfaction has plummeted.  In every aspect of healthcare other than nurses, American’s satisfaction has declined by double digits. Health insurance companies’ satisfaction rates are down 11% since 2010, while hospitals, doctors and pharmaceutical companies are down by 14%, 15% and 21% respectively. 

So what we’ve seen since Obamacare was implemented is that healthcare costs have increased dramatically and satisfaction has declined.  But hey, sometimes you have to break some eggs in order to make an omelet, and that’s the price we pay to live longer and healthier… Except, we’re not. 

According to the American Journal of Public Health, American life expectancy, after having increased almost every single year between 1950 and 2010, flatlined after Obamacare and actually began to decline around 2014. Plus, Americans’ life expectancy has fallen even further behind that of our European peers under Obamacare.  And the icing on the cake? Our health, the basic issue upon all of this is supposed to be based… has gotten worse! 

So Obamacare has been a complete disaster on every single front.  At least for the average American. For health insurance companies however, it’s been a boon. Since Obamacare was implemented, their stocks have grown on average 708% while the general market, which has been pumped up by trillion dollar superstars like Amazon, Tesla and Facebook, has increased by only 525%.  And their CEOs do pretty well too… . 

But it’s not just been insurance company stockholders and CEOs who have been benefiting from Obamacare.  There is one group for which it has been a godsend: Republicans. 

Perhaps no one has taken advantage of Obamacare as much as the Republicans. It’s an issue that is red meat to GOP voters and they know it.  They have been campaigning against it from before it was even passed.  Every two years we here the drumbeat of “We’re going to repeal Obamacare”.  But a funny thing happens on the way to the repeal, every time… it never happens.  Of course they did get close once, but with TDS addled John McCain’s help, no cigar. But we’re not in power they say… but Republicans held both houses of Congress from 2015 – 2019, with two of those years with a GOP president. Repeal?  Nope.  Nor have they done it this year, despite President Trump saying he was going to replace it if re-elected and the Republicans controlling both chambers on Capitol Hill. 

Democrats are trying to maintain the travesty with a band aid made of money, and thus far the GOP has stymied them. But we all know that the GOP is full of grifters, so who knows what the future holds. Indeed, one wonders if the Republicans will take this opportunity to look at actually doing something for their constituents, now that they’ve created another perk for lining their own pockets.  Having watched them lie to us for the last 15 years, I’m not holding my breath…

The Cowardly GOP Grifters - Feigning Leadership and Losing America

Last week Tucker Carlson showcased the fact that the GOP is doing its best to lose November’s election.

He showed a clip of the Mitch McConnell admitting that the GOP would likely not take the Senate. McConnell and the rest of leadership don’t want to win. Carlson rightly suggested if the GOP really wanted to win, they’d run on crime and immigration.  While the economy is reportedly voter’s number one issue, in reality it’s what goes on in their neighborhoods and on their streets that matter.  If Americans don’t feel safe walking down their streets or in their homes or if they sit in the drive-thru lines because they’re scared to go into a restaurant or store, nothing else matters… not the economy, abortion, gender rights, or Ukraine. 

But the GOP doesn’t care.  They’re complaining about Biden’s spending, bemoaning government overreach and sanctioning Putin. Those issues aren’t going to return the GOP to power.  But Mitch McConnell, Kevin McCarthy, and Ronna McDaniel don’t care about returning to power.  Their lives don’t change if the GOP doesn’t take back the Congress. They’ll still rule their little fiefdoms, still be invited to Georgetown cocktail parties and be feted by lobbyists, and of course they’ll still be on Sunday morning shows to feign outrage for the latest Democrat policy.

For these grifters the only difference between winning and losing in November is having to actually work for the American people… something they’re loathe to do.

But for the average American, the difference between winning and losing in November is literally life and death, lawlessness or civil society.

The world wouldn’t change overnight on the 8^th, but what could happen is that the people who control the purse strings, who are supposed to actually make the laws could change. Just like in 1994.

And that’s a big deal because the people running America today are the same people who have been running America’s biggest cities into the ground for decades.  And every American, whether they live in the San Francisco, Manhattan or Kalamazoo, MI recognizes that America’s coming apart at the seams.  From not being able to go a day without seeing another video of a pack of thugs beating a cab driver in the street or attacking an employee in a restaurant to watching a seemingly endless parade of homeless people punching random strangers, Americans are weary.  From staring with disbelief as a gang of hoodlums ransack a convenience store with impunity to watching video after video of people cussing at or otherwise attacking the police, Americans are watching the collapse of our society.

And this is the environment where Mitch McConnell whines about the quality of the GOP candidates.  The problem isn’t Dr. Oz or Eric Schmitt or Herschel Walker, it’s that the GOP leadership that is not doing its job. Where is Newt Gingrich when we need him?  The reality is, this election has been tailor made for the GOP, but that’s not the way it’s shaping up because McConnell, McCarthy, McDaniel and their puppeteer, the hack Frank Luntz – who happens to be McCarthy’s roommate or landlord or whatever – have decided they don’t want to actually save America, they’d rather sit back in the comfort of their minority position and pretend to care while enjoying the perks of “leadership”.

America needs warriors willing to brave the slings and arrows of the chattering classes, the leftist media, the Washington establishment and, most of all, the fascist NGO influencers who employ mobs on the streets to intimidate citizens and spineless CEOs and coerce into submission anyone who doesn’t agree with their agendas. 

If the GOP really wanted to win in November, we’d see a new ad every single day showcasing the violence going on in our streets along with pictures of some thug who’s just assaulted a random senior as he’s released without bail by a George Soros funded district attorney.  We’d see videos of illegals storming the border.  At the end of every single ad would be a simple tagline:  “If you want more of this, please vote for my Democrat opponent...  If you want someone who’s going to do something about crime and the quality of American life, vote for me.” (Helpfully I've created the nearby video to give him an idea of what it might look like... )

It’s that simple.  There are myriad problems caused by the Democrats, but those issues can’t be addressed without majorities, and none of them will flip Congress in November. But images of blood in the streets will.  A daily total of national Fentanyl deaths will.  Images of career criminals released on bail after having pummeled some teenager into unconsciousness will, and stories of illegal immigrants overwhelming communities will.  Imagine if Dr. Oz ran daily ads with videos showcasing Philadelphia’s violence rather than his clownish grocery store disaster?  No one in Pennsylvania cares about the price of guacamole, but they care about getting shot or stabbed in their own neighborhoods.

Not that I expect the GOP leadership to create such a Contract with America Deux. They’re cowards and grifters.  Such a campaign would require backbone against the predictable cries of “racism” that would emerge because most of the videos involve young black hoodlums and thugs. They would be branded racists by the race pimps and the professional victimization industry. 

Those attacks would come as surely as night follows day.  But so what?  It just happens to be the case that most of the crimes we see involve black perps freed from the justice system in the name of “equity”.  If there are similar videos of white perps they should be shown too.  The reality is, if you’re a victim of murder or rape it doesn’t matter what the criminal looks like.  Is a dead black child any more or less dead because his attacker was black or white?  No. Crime is off the charts not because the pigment of anyone’s skin, but because of the policies of the Democrat party. 

The GOP needs to understand their constituency is not the criminal class of any race.  Their constituency is the average American of every race.  It’s Americans who want to send their kids to school without them having to step over junkies or human feces.  It’s the average American who wants to go to work without fearing getting shot or robbed before making it home. 

The rule of law and responsibility for one’s actions are foundations of a civilized society. Without them there is no civilized society. That’s what we’re experiencing with Democrats in charge, and it seems like the GOP leadership is OK with that. We, however, are not.  This is the hill to die on, this is hill upon which America will either recover or slide into the abyss of chaos and tyranny…

We cannot depend on the current GOP “leaders” to fight this fight. This is going to have to come from the candidates themselves and some new Gingrich character to nationalize this election and help push the feckless GOP across the finish line. McConnell may not be capable of actually leading the country out of this morass, but at least with a GOP majority in November the collapse into a dystopian nightmare can be slowed until people of character can replace him. But being in the majority is the first step, and that will take candidates with the courage to stand up and fight for the average American, regardless of the invective that would surely be headed their way…