After the dog and pony show put up by the President on February 25th he's now content to shove this progressive power grab down the collective throats of the American people, and damn the consequences to his party or the people.

As I predicted in an article here awhile back the televised Health Care summit from Blair House on February 25th was nothing more than Kabuki Theater for the American Public. Barack Obama reduced the entire effort to a democratic photo op by purporting to unveil his own plan three days prior to the event. On March 3rd he encouraged the democrats in the senate to use reconciliation (sometimes called the 'nuclear option') to pass health care on a strictly majority rules vote. His first challenge is to force enough House democrats to commit political suicide and vote for the measure.

No one put this more succinctly than Tom Price, the Republican Congressman from Georgia when he said; "So far the summit has illuminated what Americans have feared: Democrats fundamentally believe that medical decisions should rest in Washington, rather than with patients and doctors… This fundamental difference in philosophy, more than anything, sums up the divide that has stalled the president's legislation. While we seek to empower patients, the president's and Democrat plans hand greater control over to Washington."

Meanwhile the President was quoted as saying; "If we're unable to resolve differences over health care, we will need to move ahead on decisions."

As an interesting aside; Frank Luntz, the author of the book What Americans Really Want…Really was on hand during the February 25th broadcast with one of his patented equally divided audiences wired up to view the proceedings. Care to guess what the most surprising result was to come from this exercise? Few, if any, in the room realized until that broadcast that the republicans actually HAD any proposals regarding health care. So much for the idea of a free press being the watchdog of government, huh? That the progressives, with the help of the mainstream media, had effectively shut an entire party out of the debate, and willingly painted the opposition as "the party of no" speaks volumes. It also speaks volumes to the naiveté of our Ideologue-in-Chief. If he had not held this event, conservative policy would still be submerged, making his current ploy easier to execute. As I've said on many an occasion before, he's not exactly ready for prime time; even after over a year in office. Slow learner I suppose.

The "new" Obama Health Care Plan has so many similarities to the absolutely awful Senate version now languishing on Capital Hill that they might as well have been called twins. The first thing wrong with both the Senate version and the Progressive-in-Chief's version is the cost. Both of these programs are estimated at $1 trillion over ten years. Never mind that the taxes to pay for the programs included in the legislation begin immediately, while the benefits begin four years later. This means that in a direct comparison, that program costs will actually accrue at least at the rate of $160 billion per year. And that's if costs never escalate; and we all know that they always escalate. So, if the program cost has already been "misunderestimated" by 40% per year; that would give us a baseline for calculating other program costs as well. Let's pick just one for illustration.

Truth be known, Obama has basically taken the Senate Bill and made it even worse. For instance, does everyone recall a Senate deal made between Harry Reid and Senator Ben Nelson of Nebraska?  Essentially what Harry promised his good friend Ben was that, in return for his vote on health care, the US government would promise to fund 100% of the cost of all of Nebraska's new Medicaid recipients in perpetuity.  Pretty sweet deal, huh? This ugly piece of Majority Leader bribery was nicknamed The Cornhusker Kickback by some and it provided Senator Nelson with some really ugly press across the country, not to mention his home state as well. So now, proving that Obama can take any crappy program and make it even crappier in his new Health Care plan this promise now applies to all 50 states! How can the US government possibly agree to pay the cost of this program across the country?

Here's a quote directly from the Summary of the President's Plan that can be found in total here .  

"Improve the Fairness of Federal Funding for States. States have been partners with the federal government in creating a health care safety net for low-income and vulnerable populations. They administer and share in the cost of Medicaid and the Children's Health Insurance Program (CHIP) The Senate bill creates a nationwide Medicaid eligibility floor as a foundation for exchanges at $29,000 for a family of four (133% of poverty) – and provides financial support that varies by state to do so.

Relative to the Senate bill, the President's Proposal replaces the variable State support in the Senate bill with a uniform Federal support for all states for newly eligible individuals (emphasis mine) at the rate of 100% from 2014 to 2017, 95% support for 2018 and 2019, and 90% for 2020 and subsequent years."

Among the groups of people served by Medicaid are certain eligible U.S. citizens and resident aliens (once again emphasis mine), including low-income adults and their children, and people with certain disabilities. Federal Medicaid outlays were estimated to be $204 billion in 2008. The federal government, as of right now, is only picking up about 57% of the total cost of the program.  Do the math. The total cost for this program across the country in 2008 was a staggering $357.8 billion! The average Medicare cost per person as estimated for the same year was $14,780 per person covered.  This works out to about 24 million people. Taking a five year running average we add approximately another 1.2 million persons per year to this program. If that cost stays static then over the next ten years the President's proposed program will leave taxpayers on the hook for over $950 billion for the Medicaid part of the program alone.

So, now let's assume the best case scenario for just this portion of the President's plan. After all the mainstream media has been telling us for more that two years that; "YES WE CAN!" If the $950 billion we discovered above is subjected to the 'rounding error' we calculated in paragraph two and all other costs are frozen; then the actual ten year total of this part of the program alone from 2014 to 2023 is a whopping $1.529 trillion; just for the Medicaid portion of the proposal. We haven't even begun to add the supposed 30 million newly covered people into this equation and we're already better than 50% above projected cost. Lord only knows where this number would end up if the estimated 12 million illegal aliens currently estimated to be residing in the United States are folded into this program under the "Federal support for all states for newly eligible individuals…" clause of the posted Presidential Summary.

Like the senate version, he's kept language that allows for the transfer of $1.1 billion per year to "Community Health Organizations" in order to provide "health services" to US citizens. With no mechanism in place to ensure that funds to such centers aren't co-mingled with their general operating budgets. This is nothing more than progressive code for federally funded abortion. Guess which is the number one "community health organization" in the eyes of this administration? Planned Parenthood, that's who. This is a backdoor method to begin the use of federal dollars to fund abortion on demand. This is in keeping with unspoken administration policy that once a woman has made her decision their only duty is to deliver a dead fetus. Why do you think Congressman Stupak was deliberately not invited to attend this Summit?

He's also kept the special tax on "Cadillac Plans" in the bill, but will still exempt unions, federal, and state employees from paying this new tax. So, that means that only non-union workers must pay this extra fee. Whatever happened to "equal" treatment under the law? There's nothing like dangling a little cost saving incentive in front of a prospective new union member to assist in the decision making process, is there? How much easier do you think it would be for a union to get Wal-Mart employees to vote in favor of organizing a union if all they have to do is say; "…and not only will you get federally mandated health care at company expense,. But it'll be tax free to you as well!"  All this, plus the fact that he's still never explained how he can add an additional 30 million people to the health insurance roles and drive costs down at the same time. A statement that defies all logic.

From its inception, this program has never been about the health care delivery system in this country. It has always been about the progressives extending their power to control the population. Just how much say do you believe the Imperial Federal Government will mandate over literally every aspect of your existence in return for a health care entitlement?

It remains to be seen if Speaker Nancy Pelosi can muster the votes in the House to approve this legislation. The last time the House voted on such legislation it squeaked through by a margin of five votes. Due to retirements and other occurrences, that majority has since evaporated.

Be assured that when the arm twisting begins, she will be using any tactic at her disposal, including the threat of withholding DNC party electoral support in 2010 to garner votes. I imagine her spiel will go something like this; "If you think you're re-election bid is in trouble in your district now, just wait and see what happens if I don't get your vote. Can you say primary battle? Can you say no DNC money? You've already jumped off this cliff once; it's time to leap that precipice for the cause once again."

The best hope of the American people is Congressman Stupak and his collation of Pro-Life Democrats. The $11 billion included in the President's Summary for community health services may have been one bridge too far for these representatives. Here's to the sincere hope that these democratic congressmen still have a modicum of legislative backbone.