I’m beginning to think that Obama doesn’t actually have any speech writers or talking-point authors… He’s just recycling the set of talking points he was handed in the first four years of his tenure. During a recent Q&A session at a campaign event in Princeton Indiana, the President trotted out the tried-and-failed talking points of 2012 to defend his signature healthcare law. According to the Free Beacon:
“We are seeing almost a double-digit increase in health-care costs every year,” General Manager Mihir Paranjape said. “Do you think that trend is going to go down, and what can we do to control that trend?”
Obamacare might be toxic for some swing-state Liberals, but I’m sure it warmed the cockles of Obama’s heart to hear someone ask the government for help with a government-created problem. And so began roughly four minutes of our Campaigner-in-Chief stumbling through the English language:
“That’s really interesting, you’re gonna have to talk to Henry,” Obama said, referring to the company’s CEO, Henry Jackson. “The question is whether you guys are shopping effectively enough.”
Oh, really? So, I guess it’s my fault I’m paying twice as much as I used to for half the overall coverage? You don’t think it could have a teensy-tiny bit to do with the more than 11,000 pages of Obamacare regulations that have been put into effect? Because that would probably be my first thought. Of course our snake oil healthcare salesman-in-chief wasn’t quite done:
“Over the course of the last four years, premiums have gone up at the slowest rate in the last 50 years.”
This utterance is almost a carbon copy (that means “exact” copy for anyone who is unfamiliar with the world before iPads) of something Obama said back in 2012. It wasn’t true then, and it isn’t true today. Premiums have not slowed down. In fact, they’re climbing much faster than normal.
According to a survey of health insurers across the nation earlier this year, premiums are climbing faster now than they have in the last several decades. The national average is somewhere between 11 and 12 percent, with some portions of the nation seeing 100 percent year-over-year increases in premium costs. And, unfortunately, this calculation doesn’t even take into account the rising deductibles and declining services.
Where Obama might have gotten a little “confused” (I’m feeling generous right now), is that overall healthcare spending has been growing at a slower rate… But let’s not hold a parade for Obamacare just yet. Spending growth was actually slowing before Obama & Company decided to toy with the industry. The recession also helped drive down overall growth, with more people allocating their increasingly devalued dollars on slightly more imminent needs – such as rent and debt services. But don’t worry… For the last few quarters growth in the industry has been making a comeback as deductibles and out-of-pocket costs increase. (If you don’t think this sounds like good news, you’re pretty much right.)
Another problem that Obama has run into, is that many of these statistics vary greatly from one corner of the nation to another. Even Obama acknowledged that healthcare costs are greatly dependent on geography, because companies are often barred from offering certain services across state lines. (Maybe now would be an appropriate time to point out that putting an end to such practices – and therefore allowing interstate insurance purchases – happened to be one of the Republican ideas that was snubbed by Democrats during the Obamacare creation process. Go figure.)
In what I can only assume was an effort to drive the fact-checkers to a different portion of his remarks, Obama also claimed that Healthcare.gov is now in “pretty good shape”. Which, really, isn’t saying much if he’s speaking relatively. I mean heck, for a website that still doesn’t have any security protocols, I guess it’s doing just fine at sucking up taxpayer’s money.
Then, out of no-where, he managed to top himself:
“The Affordable Care Act, by the way, is also known as ‘Obamacare,’” Obama said. “For a while, everybody was sort of using that as kind of an insult. I’m feeling pretty good about it being called ‘Obamacare.’ I suspect that about 5 years from now, when everybody agrees that it’s working, then they won’t call it ‘Obamacare’ anymore … that’s okay.”
Sorry, Obama… But you’re going to be stuck with this one. When people are emptying their pockets to pay for some federally mandated health insurance in an archaic DMV style system, I imagine your name will still be on their lips.
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