“Valerie Jarrett tweeted out that Obamacare didn’t terminate your health plan, the insurance companies did.

It’s the most unreal thing, because why are the insurance companies changing their plans? It’s because they have to comply with Obamacare! This is worse than disingenuous. It’s worse than just out-and-out lying. This is insulting.” -Rush

Conservative Refocus

Barry Secrest

It was early February of 2010.

The battle for universal healthcare, later to become Obamacare, had previously been teetering as too politically controversial back in late 2009, only to later become hung in the US Senate.  But, then a thing happened in California, which, in comparison to what we’ve seen with the ACA rollout of today, would be considered dismissively benign and at best, rather ironic.

On or about February 9th,  2010,  Anthem Blue Cross released a rating increase notification to its customers indicating  that premiums would be increased, on average, by about 39% across California. The rate hike notification sparked an immediate controversy that raged all the way across the nation via a concerned media, finally making its way into the Oval Office; however, it would turn out to be the caustic nudge that the Democrats ultimately needed.

Days after, in what then would have been considered a rare step, the White House requested a justification for the premium increase directly from the insurer. Obama, even more remarkably, had embarked now embattled HHS Secretary, Kathleen Sebelius to write a sternly worded letter to the company, according to the LA Times, which read in part:

“With so many families already affected by rising costs, I was very disturbed to learn through media accounts that Anthem Blue Cross plans to raise premiums for its California customers by as much as 39%,” Sebelius wrote to company President Leslie Margolin.”

“These extraordinary increases are up to 15 times faster than inflation and threaten to make healthcare unaffordable for hundreds of thousands of Californians, many of whom are already struggling to make ends meet in a difficult economy.”

“Policyholders in the individual market deserve to know if their premium increases would be invested in better medical care or insurance company overhead costs like salaries, profits, and advertising. I am aware that the state of California is investigating this matter, and urge Anthem Blue Cross to cooperate fully. In the meantime, I will be closely monitoring the situation.”

“At a time when healthcare costs are a critical threat to families as well as the nation’s economy, I hope you appreciate the urgent nature of this request. I look forward to your prompt reply.”

Interestingly enough, the cost of that particular rate increase pales notably in comparison with the increases we are even now seeing in both Obamacare rates and what will soon become millions of forced policy cancellations, as mandated by the US Government via the uber-intrusive Obama Regime.

The Anthem rate increase would became a demagogic battle cry for both the WHite House and the Democrats, which would eventually result in the Affordable Care Act becoming law in March of 2010, and nothing may ever be the same. In retrospect, most of us fatefully knew how it would likely go from the start, that is at least on the Conservative side, which is why we fought against it so stringently.

Indeed, if you listen very carefully to the  CBS News clip, the news anchor states, “The President’s healthcare law raises the standards for insurance policies, which many consider to be a good thing.”

However, when you listen to the young lady featured within news story, she will tell you a story far different, in fact, from even the highly critical commentary offered by CBS news.

At one point, the young lady featured in the story, Natalie Willis, indicates, “before, I had a plan that had a $1,500 dollar deductible, I paid $199 dollars a month, the most similar [ Obamacare] plan that I would have available to me, would be $ 278 dollars a month, my deductible would be $ 6,500 hundred dollars  and all of my care after that point would be covered at 70%.”

Now Folks, how could that possibly be considered as Obamacare “raising  the standards for insurance policies,” when in fact it makes the new crop of Obamacare policies far less affordable with far less coverage, than ever before? Doesn’t that in effect lower the standard for insurance policies?

Not only that, if the Obamacare policies offer a higher standard now than ever before, then why have insurance policies, which, in the past, offered abysmally high deductibles and outrageous out of pocket expense ratios, been historically considered of poor quality in industry-wide comparison?

But it’s not just in California.

The Civitas Institute website offers a dour collection of Obamacare horror stories, hailing from the exact opposite side of  America from California in North Carolina. When you begin reading these stories, they will tell you a tale of what could only be considered healthcare terror, stemming from what might  soon be known as the “Nightmare from Pennsylvania Avenue” a/k/a Obamacare:

MOTHER OF TWO CHRONICALLY ILL CHILDREN “BEING DESTROYED BY OBAMACARE”…MEDICAL COPAY FOR VITAL MEDICINE SKYROCKETS BY 306 PERCENT…DEDUCTIBLES AND COPAYS SOAR

LOSING CURRENT PLAN “DUE TO ACA REGULATIONS”….PREMIUMS TO DOUBLE….WITH HIGHER DEDUCTIBLE

YOUNG, HEALTHY FEMALE TO SEE PREMIUMS TRIPLE…

CURRENT INSURANCE DROPPED “DUE TO ACA REGULATIONS”…PREMIUM WOULD INCREASE 81 PERCENT…A RISE OF MORE THAN $450/MO…FORCED TO DROP COVERAGE BECAUSE IT WILL BE UNAFFORDABLE

FULL-TIME WORKER HAVING HOURS CUT TO 25/WK…

LOSING CURRENT COVERAGE…NEW PREMIUMS WOULD BE 50 PERCENT HIGHER…COST $4,200 MORE PER YEAR…WITH HIGHER OUT OF POCKET EXPENSES

Problem is, these are just a sampling of what will soon be hundreds of thousands of stories from Sea to shining Sea, and eventually millions.

Continue Reading

The Obamacare Strain: America’s Deadliest Healthcare Contagion