Lies and More Lies

President Obama spoke to the Congress and the country about health care in a speech Wednesday night. The full text of the speech is available here. I have not witnessed previously any previous forty-eight minutes as crammed packed with lies, falsehoods, and prevarications. If this speech were made under oath it would be almost in its entirety perjurious.

Here are just some examples.

Obama begins by talking about health insurance and those that do not have it. He mentions that "these are middle-class Americans." Yet the ranks of the uninsured is not primarily middle class Americans. One third are not Americans at all. One third are not middle class but those poor enough to be eligible for Medicaid and the children's health insurance plan who do not enroll. 

He continues: "Some can’t get insurance on the job. Others are self-employed, and can’t afford it, since buying insurance on your own costs you three times as much as the coverage you get from your employer." What are we to make of this statement. Buying individual insurance does not cost three times as much as the cost of employer provided insurance. The key to the half-truth here is the you as 'costs you three times as much'. This really is a lie. The employer may not directly charge you for the health insurance the employer is paying for, but you are paying for it in lower wages. The insurance itself does not cost three times as much, in fact if you could buy a policy that provided you the coverage you wanted and allowed you to accept the risks you wanted you could pay substantially less than the employer does. 

"Many other Americans who are willing and able to pay are still denied insurance due to previous illnesses or conditions that insurance companies decide are too risky or expensive to cover." Another lie. These denied Americans are simply unwilling to pay the actual cost of the care they wish to purchase. Try buying a $100,000 life insurance policy while waiting for open heart surgery. The premium would be close to $100,000 in order to cover the huge risk that the payout will be required before the ink is dry on the policy. If you have a high risk of incurring large medical bills the cost of insuring that risk will be proportionately high. For it to be less requires that someone else incur the cost either voluntarily or by force. 

In berating the country for not having solved the supposed health care crisis until now, Obama notes: "There are now more than thirty million American citizens who cannot get coverage." This statement is patently untrue. All of these thirty million could get coverage, but the cost might be at a price greater than they are willing to pay. The administration claims 46 million or so people without coverage. If we deduct those who are not Americans (12 million) this leaves 34 million. Of these 9 million are now eligible for Medicaid or other entitlements but have not applied. They can get coverage. With this in mind it is not possible for there to be 30 million who cannot get coverage. Mr. Obama is not being truthful. 

Mr. Obama mentions that: "More and more Americans worry that if you move, lose your job, or change your job, you’ll lose your health insurance too." The issue is not the level of worry. There are lots of Americans who worry that an asteroid will destroy the earth tomorrow, that some polar bear will drown when the ocean levels rise to cover the Rocky Mountains, that the Yankees will not beat the Red Sox. Their inordinate and uninformed worries are their own. No one moving from house to house loses their life insurance. No one losing their job or changing their job loses their auto insurance. Their worry about losing the health insurance arises from the fact that they don't purchase that insurance with their own money and instead are reliant on someone else to pay for it. If they purchased their own health insurance, suitable to their needs, with their own money, they would not be worrying about the circumstances of their employment or choice of residence. 

Mr. Obama describes: "Then there’s the problem of rising costs. We spend one-and-a-half times more per person on health care than any other country, but we aren’t any healthier for it." Here Obama's sophistry is in the use of the word we. Just who is the we. Many Americans spend money on health care. This includes food supplements, laser eye surgery, botox, massage therapy, aroma therapy, gender reassignment and cosmetic surgery. I am perfectly happy for Americans to spend their own money on any of these services if that makes those individuals happy, whether they are healthier for it or not. If they spend their own money on what they desire, it does not cost we anything. In those other advanced democracies much admired by the president, the we there does not have those costs because the we their refuses to pay for it, along with advanced medications, modern technology and if the British newspapers are correct even food or water for those who might die. 

Further along Mr. Obama claims: "And it’s why those of us with health insurance are also paying a hidden and growing tax for those without it – about $1000 per year that pays for somebody else’s emergency room and charitable care. " He also asserts, "There are also those who claim that our reform effort will insure illegal immigrants. This, too, is false – the reforms I’m proposing would not apply to those who are here illegally."If there is a hidden cost of $1,000 per year paying for 'somebody else's emergency room and charitable care' and those 12 million illegal immigrants will not be covered, won't that $1,000 per year hidden tax still exist unless illegal immigrants are to be denied any health care they don't pay for themselves? 

We may also appropriately ask just how will payments for health care for illegal immigrants be denied? Under current law, patients cannot be denied necessary emergency room treatment because they cannot pay. Hospitals may not even ask how the service will be paid for before providing it. the 'reforms I'm proposing' will not apply to those here illegally, hospitals would be required to demand up front payment or deny the care all while trying to sift out the issue of which patient is here legally and which is not. Mr. Obama is not telling the whole truth here either. 

If the only way Mr. Obama has to overcome the well-founded objections of the American people is to offer lies and more lies, than his proposals should receive the reception they deserve. Those who plan to vote for these proposals should be counted by the people as among the liars and enemies of the nation. As for me and my house, we oppose them as we oppose all other enemies of liberty.