Related: Grapes of Wrath Toward the Boston Globe
Just when I thought I couldn't get more sour:
"Health care law deadline updated" by Ricardo Alonso-Zaldivar | Associated Press, October 10, 2013
WASHINGTON — You’ll have to get health coverage by Valentine’s Day or thereabouts to avoid penalties for being uninsured, the Obama administration confirmed Wednesday.
That is about six weeks earlier than a March 31 deadline often cited previously.
Think of the timing here. Government debt ceiling and all. This isn't about your health from a bill written by insurers and pharmaceuticals; this is a bill to get money from you, folks. That's all. It's a greedy money grab by a money-grubbing government.
The explanation: Health insurance coverage typically starts on the first day of a given month, and it takes up to 15 days to process applications.
Is there anyone out there that still believes any explanation put out by this lying, looting, bankrupt government?
You still have to be covered by March 31 to avoid the new penalties for remaining uninsured. But to successfully accomplish that you have to send in your application by the middle of February. Coverage would then start Mar. 1.
Yeah, they are only thinking of you.
The Jackson Hewitt tax preparation company first pointed out the wrinkle with the health care law’s least popular requirement.
It's the least popular element, and the only one Obama hasn't delayed. And why did it take a TAX PREPARATION COMPANY to alert people for this vaguely-written(?) piece of $hit?
An administration official confirmed it. The official was not authorized to speak publicly and insisted on anonymity.
Because he knows we will string him up!
It’s the latest bit of confusion involving complex requirements of President Obama’s health care law, known as the Affordable Care Act.
I'll clean up some of the confusion right now.
"Separately, Obama came to the rescue of members of Congress and their aides Friday, saying the federal government would continue paying a large share of their health insurance premiums. Ambiguous provisions of the health care law had created serious doubts about whether such contributions would continue."
Congress and the executive have remained unaffected by the shutdown that is going to cost us even more. They are all still getting paid and their services are unaffected. This is such a fuck job on the American people it's outrageous.
Adjustments to the law have ranged from the momentous to the mundane. The biggest one was a one-year delay of a requirement that larger employers offer coverage, announced this summer. More recently, the administration has postponed some Spanish-language capabilities of its enrollment website, as well as full functionality on the site small businesses use to sign up.
They "forgot" the lifting of deductible caps for individuals.
Related: Small businesses on edge due to shutdown
Maybe it was all the coffee drinking, but just to be on the safe side maybe you should cut back like the rest of the world.
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The rollout of online insurance markets this month has been snarled by technical glitches that frustrated many consumers.
I thought I was a PATIENT, but you can $ee what the benevolent corporate pre$$ thinks of me (and you).
House Republicans are still pressing their demand for a delay of ‘‘Obamacare’’ provisions, if not its total repeal, as a condition for lifting the partial government shutdown now in its second week.
Stick to your guns, guys, no matter what the whoreporate press say about the situation. The COUNTRY is WITH YOU! WE $EE what is going on here!
Starting next year, the law requires virtually all Americans to have insurance or face a tax penalty, triggered after a coverage gap of three months.
You $ee? This is NOTHING MORE than a MONEY-GRAB!
The penalty starts as low as $95 for 2014, but escalates in subsequent years.
Related: Man opted out of Obamacare and was informed he owed a $4,000 fine
Hey, what is one more sickening lie in a paper full of them every day?
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The piece of $hit co$t how much?
And look who is lobbying hard for an exemption of their own:
"Shutdown splits foes of medical device tax" by Tracy Jan | Globe Staff, October 10, 2013
WASHINGTON — Members of the Massachusetts congressional delegation have campaigned against the new federal tax on medical devices, agreeing with industry executives that it hurts the Bay State economy by costing device manufacturers hundreds of millions of dollars a year.
Some Republicans also are demanding repeal of the tax — but they are making it a condition of ending the government shutdown.
And therein lies the problem. Despite having the ingredients for a bipartisan deal on a pet cause, Massachusetts lawmakers are not interested. To join ranks with Republicans would mean breaking ranks with President Obama....
The conundrum is one more example of how the sharply drawn battle lines in the shutdown debate are blocking the sort of Washington compromise and deal-making that previously got things done.
I'm going to be shutting down most of my coverage of this soon. The more print they give it, the less I want to read it.
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Senator Susan Collins, a moderate Maine Republican, has proposed legislation to reopen the government, funding it for six months while permanently repealing the 2.3 percent tax, which helps fund Obama’s health law. Collins said she is modeling her bill after a similar House proposal that has received support from 35 members on both sides of the aisle – none of which, so far, come from Massachusetts.
In an interview with the Globe, Collins issued a challenge to Massachusetts Democrats, who represent a state with the second largest concentration of medical device companies. Senators Edward Markey and Elizabeth Warren have vocally opposed the tax in the past. Warren voted in the spring to repeal it under a non-binding Senate resolution.
“That was symbolic. This is real,” Collins said. “It would be interesting to see whether those senators who cast this symbolic vote would be willing to play with real legislation.”
Ooooh, Senate cat fight!
The tax went into effect in January and is estimated to raise $3 billion a year over the next decade to help subsidize insurance under the health law.
And where is the money going to come from (or more importantly, not come from) to replace it?
Proponents of the tax to help pay for the health care law say it makes sense because medical device companies stand to rack up big gains under the insurance expansion; more people will have health coverage that will pay for their products. Also, surges in the use of some medical devices help drive overall health care inflation.
“These companies will be some of the beneficiaries of having more consumers have health insurance,” said Amy Whitcomb Slemmer, executive director of Health Care For All, a Boston-based advocacy group. “It was important and continues to be important that we stand by the law as it has been enacted.”
Except for the big bu$ine$$ exemption and lifting of deductible caps for individuals.
The industry has argued that the tax on devices such as cardiac pacemakers and artificial hips will cause companies to slow hiring, reduce their research and development budgets, and ultimately raise the costs for hospitals and consumers. With 24,000 people employed in the industry, Massachusetts has the second-largest cluster of medical device companies, behind California.
It's always the $ame $hit arguments from bu$ine$$ in this country. I'm for them in principle, but given the wealth inequality in this country that is not what this is about. This is about profit.
In separate statements to the Globe, Warren and Markey said they would support repealing the tax only after the shutdown ends and the debt ceiling is lifted, as long as the lost revenues are replaced.
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As the shutdown wears on and pressure on lawmakers to resolve the crisis builds, industry groups sense this may be their best shot.
Hmmmmmmm! Taking advantage of the situation to $neak something through?
They are doubling down on their lobbying efforts to repeal the tax, running advertisements in publications that cater to the Capitol Hill audience, meeting with lawmakers and their staffs, and sending letters. It is part of a four-year lobbying crusade.
It really is $en$ele$$ to type about this $tuff anymore.
“Grasp the time right now,” Rick Packer, CEO of ZOLL Medical Corp., a medical device firm based in Chelmsford, said in an interview, urging lawmakers to use any vehicle at their disposal to repeal the tax. “There’s bipartisan support for repealing this tax. Find a way to get it done.”
Yeah, turns out parti$an$hip is ONLY FOR THINGS WE the PEOPLE have PAID FOR!
Packer flies down to Washington every six months to press lawmakers to repeal the tax, citing the damage it has already wrought on jobs and innovation.
Thanks for contributing to the greenhouse gas problem.
For the first time in recent years the company is not hiring in Massachusetts and is spending less on research and development.
Packer has focused his lobbying efforts on Warren and Markey, as well as Representative Niki Tsongas, all of whom he said has been sympathetic.
“They’re all in that same political place where they know what the right answer is, they just haven’t figured out the right vehicle,” Packer said. “I’m optimistic that the majority of them will do the right thing when the occasion arises when they can do that politically.”
They will get their repeal. Taxes are only for little people, as someone once said. Tax revenue flows to the wealthy elite.
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Related:
"America’s internal power plays have produced many moments of political theater, but never one like this. A cascade of events Wednesday suggested there was no end in sight to the ideological skirmishes. The military will remain a pillar of America’s establishment no matter what happens. Possible attempts by Obama to separate the military from the worlds of politics and foreign affairs would mark a profound change."
My jewspaper said that about who??
Also see:
Shutdown diminishes US as a global power
A world and planet thanks you.
Charity to pay benefits to families of service members killed
Related: "nonprofits provide new ways for corporations and individuals to influence"
That's what the new$paper is for and who it $erves, and why I no longer want to read so much of it.
