Politics, Business, Culture

Fine Print: IRS to Collect Your Health Care Premiums. You heard right: IRS will garnish your wages; taxman will knock on your door.  This really is Socialism. Does the IRS also intend to take a collection fee on the premiums the PRIVATE health insurance companies are charging?

“Never has the federal government said any American had to buy anything. Now, [you] have to buy insurance. If you don’t buy insurance, pay the IRS more money,” said Sen. Charles Grassley (R-IA) during the Senate’s floor debate in November.

Grassley is correct in that the mandate would be enforced at tax time. If you can’t prove you’re covered, you’ll pay a penalty.

via Anyone Remember What’s In The Health Care Bill? : NPR.

Tweet This Post

Obamacare Will Pay Health Insurers $336 Billion. So Why Is the President Calling Them Evil Profiteers?

“Health Insurers will keep on doing this for as long as they can get away with it. This is no secret,” the president said. “They’;re telling their investors this – ‘We are in the money. We are going to keep on making big profits even though a lot of folks are going to be put under hardship,’” the President told supporters at a stop in Pennsylvania today.

HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, meanwhile, wrote to insurance company executives demanding that they justify premium hikes.

Neither mentioned that the Senate health reform bill, which is the basis for Democrats’ last best chance at comprehensive reform, would give the insurance companies millions of new customers required by law to buy health insurance. It would also require insurers to cover everyone, regardless of age, gender or pre-existing condition.To help pay for the new insurance requirements the government would give to people money to buy insurance – $336 billion over the next ten years. That money, ultimately, would have to go to… drum roll… insurance companies.

via A Complicated Enemy: Obama Seeks to Vilify Health Insurers, Give Them $336 Billion Check – The Note.

Tweet This Post

Olle Johansson, a scientist at Karolinska Institute in Sweden, submitted testimony saying that “very serious biological changes” that include cancer risks have been noticed for years from exposure to low-frequency magnetic fields like those emitted from cell phones.

via The Associated Press: Maine panel weighs cell phone cancer warning.

Tweet This Post

We have to stop the borrowing…

…Arizona’s Jon Kyl, the Senates second-ranking Republican, supported Mr. Bunning’s right to raise the cost issue. “Every time we pass one of these bills, we are adding to the deficit, and we are not creating jobs,” Mr. Kyl said. “And it’s a legitimate point for Republicans to make.”

…Mr. Bunning says he favors the unemployment-benefits extension but wants it to be paid for. The current bill would add to the deficit. “If we can’t find $10 billion to pay for something we all support, we will never pay for anything on the floor of this U.S. Senate,” Mr. Bunning said.

via One Senator Holds Up Bill, in New Level of Gridlock – WSJ.com.

Tweet This Post

“Some news media organizations now present showmen masquerading as political thinkers who package hatred and divisiveness as entertainment. And as in times past, that has proved to be a potent drug in the veins of the body politic.” – Al Gore

via Op-Ed Contributor – We Can’t Wish Away Climate Change – NYTimes.com.

Tweet This Post

Dominique Strauss-Kahn, the head of the International Monetary Fund, suggested Friday the organization might one day be called on to provide countries with a global reserve currency that would serve as an alternative to the U.S. dollar.

“That day has not yet come, but I think it is intellectually healthy to explore these kinds of ideas now,” he said in a speech on the future mandate of the 186-nation Washington-based lending organization.

via Head of IMF Proposes New Reserve Currency – ABC News.

Tweet This Post

Democrat Charles Rangel says he will not step down as chairman of the powerful House Ways and Means Committee even though the ethics committee found that he violated House rules by accepting corporate-sponsored trips to the Caribbean.

Rangel said Friday that the ethics report “exonerates” him because it says there is no evidence that he knew the trips were sponsored by corporations. The report said his staff knew who paid for the trips.

Rangel of New York said he truly doesn’t understand why the committee admonished him.

via Rangel says report ‘exonerates’ him, will stay on.

Tweet This Post

The ethics committee’s decision on Rangel’s trips resolves just a small part of the ethical controversy in which he’s caught up. The ethics committee is still investigating a variety of issues related to Rangel’s personal finances, including his use of a rent-stabilized apartment, his fundraising on behalf of a research institute bearing his name, and his failure to declare hundreds of thousands of dollars on income and assets on annual financial-disclosure reports.

via Charlie Rangel ruling puts Nancy Pelosi in a jam – John Bresnahan – POLITICO.com.

Tweet This Post

The sales decline in January marked the third straight monthly drop following decreases of 3.9 percent in December and 9.5 percent in November.  January’s weakness was evident in all regions except the Midwest, where sales posted a 2.1 percent increase. Sales were down 35 percent in the Northeast, 12 percent in the West and almost 10 percent in the South.

The drop in sales pushed the median sales price down to $203.500. That was down 5.6 percent from December's median sales price of $215,600, and off 2.4 percent from year-ago prices. New home sales for all of 2009 had fallen by almost 23 percent to 374,000, the worst year on record.

via New home sales hit record low in January – Yahoo! Finance.

Tweet This Post

Healthcare advocacy groups are looking to the White House proposal and next Thursday’s summit to shore up public support, and Democratic votes, in the push to get comprehensive legislation to Obama this year.

“As soon as the president and (congressional Democratic) leadership are totally together on substance and a strategy, I think the votes will be there,” said Ron Pollack, who heads the Families USA healthcare advocacy group.

The administration, congressional Democrats and advocacy groups have been turning up the rhetorical heat on health insurers that have in recent weeks announced huge premium increases against the backdrop of sizable profits and growing numbers of uninsured people.

“The premium increases are a powerful reminder that the healthcare problems are not going away,” said David Kendall, a senior health policy advisor at centrist think tank Third Way.

via Obama to spell out new healthcare plan – Yahoo! News.

Tweet This Post