Lessons From Big Daddy O & His Right-Hand Ho

HERE’S WHAT I TOOK away from the weekend long Pelosi Palooza and Obama health-care orgy:

With one flick of a pen, a politician is able to render finite resources infinite; that in the hands of millions of new affirmatively appointed state hires, private property—approximately $409.2 billion, confiscated from rightful, productive owners— will be funneled into so-called state-of-the-art health care. Basically turned into gold. That bilking “$69 billion more in penalties for individuals and businesses who don’t meet mandates to buy insurance” will generate plenty and prosperity like nothing else, just as The Founders envisaged.

Most of the revenue would come from higher Medicare taxes on about 1 million individuals earning more than $200,000 and about 4 million couples filing jointly who make more than $250,000

What assorted idiots and moochers-in-the making took away from this legislative theft is that it is constitutional to single out a distinct segment of society—the productive—for punishment. The only consideration that counts is, “How many Americans want it?” Gimme, gimme, gimme is the new national anthem.

“The man with the Reverse Midas Touch,” Big Daddy O, and his right hand Ho, have taught the nation so many lesson, not least that attainder laws are now constitutional (Article 1, Sections 9 and 10), and that “our high-minded messiah has the authority to punish an (innocent) group of people—more or less 5 million Americans who’ll shoulder the hulking H.R.4872 Reconciliation Act of 2010—“without the benefit of due process.”

Scrap that; no moocher knows what attainder laws are.

And if you don’t yet know that the Republicans are your fair-weather friends who’ll sign their own mammoth bills when they occupy the same seats in the game of political musical chairs they play exclusively with the Dems—then listen to stupid Michael Steel condemn freedom-loving demonstrators for their righteous ire and promise statists like Geraldo Rivera and Sheppard Smith of FoxNews that a welcoming immigration bill is next.

************
Here’s a good precis of H.R.4872 Reconciliation Act of 2010, courtesy of the WSJ:

The $940 billion health-care overhaul will take nearly a decade to roll out in full. A look at the key parts of the bill and when they go into effect.
2010

Coverage

* Subsidies begin for small businesses to provide coverage to employees.
* Insurance companies barred from denying coverage to children with pre-existing illness.
* Children permitted to stay on their parents’ insurance policies until their 26th birthday.

2011

Coverage

* Set up long-term care program under which people pay premiums into system for at least five years and become eligible for support payments if they need assistance in daily living.

Taxes and fees

* Drug makers face annual fee of $2.5 billion (rises in subsequent years).

2013

Taxes and fees

* New Medicare taxes on individuals earning more than $200,000 a year and couples filing jointly earning more than $250,000 a year.
* Tax on wages rises to 2.35% from 1.45%.
* New 3.8% tax on unearned income such as dividends and interest.
* Excise tax of 2.3% imposed on sale of medical devices.

Cost control

* Medicare pilot program begins to test bundled payments for care, in a bid to pay for quality rather than quantity of services.

2014

Coverage

* Create exchanges where people without employer coverage, as well as small businesses, can shop for health coverage. Insurance companies barred from denying coverage to anyone with pre-existing illness.
* Requirement begins for most people to have health insurance. Subsidies begin for lower and middle-income people. People at 133% of federal poverty level pay maximum of 3% of income for coverage. People at 400% of poverty level pay up to 9.5% of income. (Poverty level currently is about $22,000 for a family of four.)
* Medicaid, the federal-state program for the poor, expands to all Americans with income up to 133% of federal poverty level.
* Subsidies for small businesses to provide coverage increase. Businesses with 10 or fewer employees and average annual wages of less than $25,000 receive tax credit of up to 50% of employer’s contribution. Tax credits phase out for larger businesses.

Taxes and fees

* Employers with more than 50 employees that don’t provide affordable coverage must pay a fine if employees receive tax credits to buy insurance. Fine is up to $3,000 per employee, excluding first 30 employees.
* Insurance industry must pay annual fee of $8 billion (rises in subsequent years).

Cost control

* Independent Medicare board must begin to submit recommendations to curb Medicare spending, if costs are rising faster than inflation.

2016

Taxes and fees

* Penalty for those who don’t carry coverage rises to 2.5% of taxable income or $695, whichever is greater.

2017

Coverage

* Businesses with more than 100 employees can buy coverage on insurance exchanges, if state permits it.

2018

Taxes and fees

* Excise tax of 40% imposed on health plans valued at more than $10,200 for individual coverage and $27,500 for family coverage.

—Sources: House bill; Kaiser Family Foundation

Corrections & Amplifications
The House health legislation imposes a 2.3% excise tax on the sale of medical devices. An earlier version of this article incorrectly said the tax was 2.9%, the figure before a last-minute change to the legislation.