THE MANDATE

                                                      

  

                                                                                                                                                                 To recap, under Obamacare all employers will be required to arrange for “health insurance” for their employees. Coverage MUST include various disease-preventive health services and women’s contraception at no charge. No premium-sharing, no copays, no deductibles – nothing. 

The Department of Health and Human Services, which has ominous rule-making power under Obamacare, exempted Catholic churches (as employers) from this rule because Catholicism teaches that contraception is sinful. However, HHS did not exempt Catholic institutions whose mission (the government says) extends beyond religion, namely, colleges, hospitals, and charities. Those institutions would have to pay (nominally at least) for their women employees’ birth-control products and services.

This led to Ms Fluke's testimony on Capitol Hill where she..well...whined that her University (Georgetown..a Jesuit University which might be exempt from this ridiculous mandate) will not cover her birth control. Watching her testify I couldn't help but wonder....do I say it?.....should I go there?.....ok..I honestly did question what guy on this planet would..ya know...make her need birth control.   Enter Rush Limbaugh who calls her a slut and it's ON!!!!!!  

Of course through all the phony outrage (where was this outrage when Bill Maher called Sarah Palin a "dumb twat"? CLICK HERE if you'd like to hear the response to that attack)  the core issue of the debate has been lost in all the hyperbole of a news media which is, at best. unreliable in delivering the news.

One of the most ridiculous arguments I've heard from the Libtards is the idea that Insurance companies always prefer to cover contraception above maternity costs and/ or the costs of medical complications from pregnancy, miscarriage, or abortion, as contraception is much, much cheaper than the alternatives. The insinuation being that insurance companies allegedly would save money because they wouldn’t have to pay for medical services associated with having children. That makes the false assumption that if the insurer were not providing free contraception, women would have to do without. Target charges less than $15 /month for the pill for those who aren't covered. Seems like an easy solution. If one dared to claim that the cost is still prohibitive, one may properly ask how that could justify forcing others to pay? Also, if we accept that the insurance companies make the calculation re: costs for pregnancies vs paying for contraception, isn't it fair to ask if the individual might make that same calculation?

 It’s amusing to watch advocates of free contraception cite, as evidence for their position, polls showing that women overwhelmingly support no-cost contraception. Since when have people not wanted free stuff? I think I just saw a poll showing that men overwhelmingly are in favor of a free trip to the playboy mansion. Duh. 

Women have managed to obtain birth control up until now (we’re repeatedly told that nearly all women, including Catholics, have used it), and low-income women can resort to Planned Parenthood if necessary, which already gets TAXpayer money (which is not to say it should). Speaking of TAX payer money...as i read in NRO 2 weeks ago "... any man in need of free condoms only needs to download the free “NYC Condom” app to their  iPhone, BlackBerry, or Android smartphones and have its GPS service direct them to the nearest provider of free contraception with devastating accuracy. Never has a society been so precisely and easily led to safe sex. (One might well ask whether someone who can afford a smartphone and its monthly bills is genuinely in need of an app that locates “free” — i.e., paid for by taxpayers — condoms, but then this is 21st-century America, and New York’s mayor is Michael 

Bloomberg, so such small questions are unavoidably consumed by bigger ones. BTW...The NYC Condom program’s not-so-subtle slogan is “Grab a handful and go,” .""..paid for by the taxpayers of NYC. 

Now onto the nature of insurance itself.......

Insurance arose as a way for individuals to pool their risk of some low-probability/high-cost misfortune occuring in their lives. Car insurance, life insurance, home insurance , flood insurance all have similar characteristics. The purchaser of those products basically pay a premium...a losing bet for the most part...in exchange for a good nights sleep.  Health insurance has turned into something else altogether over the decades and IMO Obamacare takes us further down the wrong road. What I heard from Ms Fluke's testimony was somebody who wanted more service than she was willing to pay for. She's not a "slut"...she's an entitled Libtard.  So who pays for it? More on that below. 

It shouldn’t be necessary to point this out, but coming of child-bearing age and choosing to use contraception is not an insurable event. It’s a volitional act...a choice.  It may have positive consequences for the person taking the action and society at large, but it is still a volitional act. It makes no sense to talk about insuring against the eventuality that a particular person will use contraception. Strictly speaking, contraception has nothing to do with insurance. (Neither does Viagra ...the idea that my premiums are higher than they need to be because some men can't get a fucking erection is offensive to me) 

 Unfortunately, we don’t speak strictly about health insurance. One reason we don’t is the tax code.  Compensation for labor in the form of employment-based health insurance does not count as taxable income. (Money spent independently on health insurance does count.) The tax code thus creates perverse incentives to 1) depend on one’s employer for medical insurance, 2) shift income from liquid cash to restricted insurance benefits, and 3) define uninsurable events as insurable. Would someone care to explain how well-baby care can be insurable? So we have taxation to thank for yet another feature of the modern world: the corruption of language. In the medical realm "insurance" no long means insurance. 

Instead it’s a game by which we get other people to pay for stuff. Well, that’s not quite accurate. It’s actually a game in which we pretend that other people pay for stuff. Contraception, mammograms, colonoscopies, and well-baby care are not free. They require labor and resources for which the owners wish – not unreasonably — to be compensated. Someone HAS to pay. If employers are compelled nominally to pay for the coverage, does anyone seriously doubt that employees will actually pay through lower cash wages?  Employers are not charities. So even without a copayment, we all know deep down that we as workers pay for the coverage.  (Which by the way is likely to be more expensive than the services would be in a freed market, since insurance companies will charge overhead and more for their trouble. Also subsidized demand raises prices...if you disagree with that point, you haven't been paying attention to the relationship between Sallie Mae and rising tuition rates) Nevertheless, the truth is so obscured that people can pretend they’re getting something for free.

So the government-generated system treats us like children, and alas most of us seem happy to be treated that way. What a pity. You might be able to imagine how I feel about entitlements.