Obama's Big Medicare Lie

Sunday, in the midst of his "Everybody but Fox" Press tour President Obama talked about Medicare:

Obama: "Look, I understand that change is hard. If what you're saying is that people who are currently signed up for Medicare advantage are going to have Medicare and the same level of benefits, but they may not be having their insurer get a 14 percent premium, that's absolutely true and will the insurers squawk? You bet."

Stephanopoulos: "They may drop the coverage."

Obama: "No, these folks are going to be able to get Medicare that is just as good, provides the same benefits, but we're not subsidizing them for $18 billion a year."

To quote Congressman Wilson...YOU LIE !

Both logic and the Congressional Budget Office reveal that the President is not being forthcoming about the Medicare cuts that will result from his health care plan:

ObamaCare's Calculated Deception
Peter Ferrara and Bob McEwen 09.23.09, 12:08 PM ET


In his health overhaul speech last Wednesday, President Obama accused his critics of spreading "misinformation" and "bogus claims," of "demagoguery and distortion," and of using "scare tactics" instead of honest debate. Ironically, all of that can be found in his own speech.


President Obama said that his health overhaul plan includes no Medicare cuts, telling seniors: "[D]on't pay attention to those scary stories about how your benefits will be cut." He continued, "The only thing this plan would eliminate is the ... unwarranted subsidies in Medicare that go to insurance companies--subsidies that do everything to pad their profits but don't improve the care of seniors."


What Obama is talking about here is $177 billion in cuts for Medicare Advantage--the private insurance options that almost one-fourth of seniors have chosen for their coverage under Medicare. Republicans enacted this choice for seniors, and close to 10 million retirees have chosen one of these private insurance options because they get better benefits from it than from standard Medicare.


At a minimum, Obama's cuts will force these plans to cut back on their benefits for seniors. Or the Medicare Advantage plans may just go out of business altogether, dumping all the seniors who have made that choice because they think they are getting a better deal from those plans. Does Obama's quote above regarding this component of his health plan honestly explain to you what is involved? Or does it seem calculated to deceive you?


Obama's health overhaul plan also includes cuts in "hundreds of billions of dollars in waste and fraud" in Medicare. What Obama is talking about here is over $300 billion in additional Medicare cuts, for a total of $500 billion, for payments to doctors and hospitals. In response, doctors and hospitals will cut back on the services and care they provide to seniors. This is the beginning of the health care rationing in Obama's plan. Calling these just cuts in "waste and fraud" is again a calculated deception.


Obama promises seniors in his speech "not a dollar of the Medicare trust fund will be used to pay for this plan." But what Obama doesn't tell us is that only Medicare payroll taxes are devoted to the Medicare trust fund. In addition, Medicare is heavily financed by general revenues, and Medicare cuts could provide general revenue savings that do not involve taking money out of the Medicare trust fund. Such general revenue savings wouldn't be put into the trust fund in the first place. Again, does Obama's discussion of this sound like calculated deception?


President Obama expects credit for these Medicare cuts when promising "I will not sign a plan that adds ... one dime to the deficit, now or in the future" and "The plan will not add to our deficit." But even with these Medicare cuts, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) has officially scored the plan as adding hundreds of billions to the deficit.


Obama also said during the campaign that those earning less than $250,000 per year would not pay one more dime in taxes in any form. But under Obama's health plan, individuals not covered will be forced to pay a special tax.


President Obama also said Wednesday night, "[U]nder our plan, no federal dollars will be used to fund abortions." But Obama knows that the health plan workers will be mandated to buy will include coverage for abortions. However, the premiums the employee or employer will pay for that coverage will not be considered "federal funds."


President Obama also promised in his speech that his plan "will slow the growth of health care costs for our families, our businesses and our government." But all the politically correct benefits, like abortion, that workers and businesses will be required to buy, will raise the cost of health insurance for those workers and businesses. So will the guaranteed issue, community rating and other insurance regulations in the Obama plan, as resulted in Massachusetts.


Obama's new 8% payroll tax for employers who do not provide health coverage will add further costs for those businesses. The plan's increased Medicaid benefits will increase costs for state governments.


CBO estimates that the Obama plan will increase federal costs by almost $1 trillion. This is why taxes will be increased under the plan, not reduced. But Harvard economics professor Martin Feldstein writes, "the actual costs will be much higher" because "the CBO's method of estimating the cost of such a program doesn't recognize the incentives it creates for households and firms to change their behavior." Independent private estimates project increased federal costs of $3.5 trillion to $4.1 trillion under the Obama plan.


The sad truth is you can't believe a word President Obama says about his health care plan.

 At least this tells us how important Obamacare is to the POTUS.  It is so key to him that he will lie to the American people to get it passed--well either that or it is so easy for him to lie that he can't distinguish between his fantasy and reality.