Health Insurers Fear Probe By House Dems Is Reprisal for Opposing Part of Obama's Plan - Who's next?

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Health Insurers Fear Probe By House Dems Is Reprisal for Opposing Part of Obama's Plan

Reps. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., and Bart Stupak, D-Mich., sent a letter warning health insurers that the House Energy and Commerce Committee is "examining executive compensation and other business practices of the health industry."

FOXNews.com

Wednesday, August 19, 2009

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In a move some fear is a reprisal for opposing President Obama's health care plan, Democrats sent 52 letters to health insurers requesting financial records for a House committee's investigation.

Reps. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., and Bart Stupak, D-Mich., sent a letter warning health insurers that the House Energy and Commerce Committee is "examining executive compensation and other business practices of the health industry."

Waxman, chairman of the committee, and Stupak, chairman of the Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee did not inform their Republican counterparts of their plans.

Health insurers have until Sept. 4 to provide Congress a detailed list of every employee who made over a $1 million dollars a year between 2003 and 2008. Democrats also want documents about conferences and any events held off company property as well as the types of transportation, lodging, food, entertainment and even gifts exchanged.

Raising the intimidation stakes: the Waxman letter offers insurers no explanation of what is being investigated or why.

Industry insiders fear the beginning of reprisals for anyone daring to dissent from the Obama agenda. One said it feels like a reprisal audit by the IRS.

With raucous health care town halls unfolding nationwide during the August congressional recess and polls showing increased opposition to a government-run insurance program or "public option," neither Waxman nor Stupak nor their staffs would comment on this story. But it's no secret that Democrats blame anti-reform ads on the private health insurance industry and its supporters.

Private health insurers warn that a public option could put them at a competitive disadvantage and even out of business, but they insist they support health care reform in general.

A spokesman for Stupak told The Associated Press Tuesday night that 52 letters had been sent to health insurers with $2 billion or more in annual premiums. He said letters were not dispatched to other industry groups, some of which have been airing television advertising in support of Obama's call for legislation.

But Robert Zirkelbach, spokesman for the American Health Insurance Plans, said Democrats on the panel hoped to "silence the health insurance industry and distract attention away from the fact that the American people are rejecting a government-run plan" as part of Obama's planned overhaul.

Zirkelbach said it would be up to individual companies to decide whether to turn the records over.

Spokesmen for three large insurance companies, Aetna, UnitedHealth Group Inc. and WellPoint Inc., confirmed the firms had received the letters but declined comment.

FOX News' Carl Cameron and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

via foxnews.com

Nothing like a good old witch hunt of political enemies. If you can't beat 'em demand all of their records so you can publicly and politically destroy them. Could other dissenting groups be the next to be called in front of this kangaroo court to be publicly humiliated? Congress has no business or right to publicly attack a private company for their internal use of funds. This smacks of Stalinist-style public show trials of political enemies in an attempt to create an air of crisis. This potentially violates several Constitutional Amendments against unreasonable search and seizure (4th), self-incrimination (5th), and Article 1 Section 9. This is not a case of guilty until proven innocent, just guilty as hell regardless of the evidence.

A perfect example of McCarthyistic behavior. Oh, for you liberals, the first red scare came under the Wilson Administration and was perpetrated by his Attorney General and exceeded anything McCarthy did or could have done.

Posted via web from conservativedynamics's posterous

The Ugly Truth of Obamacare - John Stossel Article in Real Clear Politics

False charges about Obamacare don't help.

Like the end-of-life tempest. Former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin popularized the term "death panels." She said: "The America I know and love is not one in which my parents or my baby with Down syndrome will have to stand in front of Obama's 'death panel' so his bureaucrats can decide, based on a subjective judgment of their 'level of productivity in society,' whether they are worthy of health care".

The charge that the House and Senate health care bills would mandate end-of-life counseling -- hence "death panels" -- caught on. Rush Limbaugh, defending Palin's charge, said, "(D)eath panels ... it's a great way to phrase this end-of-life counseling".

Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley of Iowa piled on: "You have every right to fear. ... We should not have a government program that determines if you're going to pull the plug on grandma".

But no bill in Congress mandates end-of-life counseling, much less "death panels." And there's a deeper problem. When opponents of nationalization make such easily refuted charges, supporters of nationalization gain the upper hand. All criticism is undermined. Neutral observers can easily conclude, "If the death-panel claim is false, why believe anything else the critics say?"

That would be a disaster.

There's is reason to be concerned about end-of-life counseling, but the truth is more complicated. Here's the story.

The House bill does deal with the issue. (The Senate Finance Committee bill did until the provision was removed the other day.) Section 1233 amends the Medicare law to add "advance care planning consultation"
(counseling about living wills and the like) to the list of reimbursable services. The provision defines "consultation,"  but nowhere does it require Medicare beneficiaries to participate or authorize death panels. (Grassley voted for a similar provision in 2003 when his Republican-controlled Congress added drug coverage to Medicare.)

But even if some conservative Republican critics are wrong about Section 1233, there is good reason to worry about Obama's nationalization scheme.

The reason can be found in Econ 101. Medical care doesn't grow on trees. It must be produced by human and physical capital, and those resources are limited. Therefore, if demand for health care services increases -- which is Obama's point in extending health insurance -- prices must go up. But somehow Obama also promises, "I won't sign a bill that doesn't reduce health care inflation".

This is magical thinking. Obama, talented as he is, can't repeal the laws of supply and demand. Costs are real. If they are incurred, someone has to pay them. But as economist Thomas Sowell points out, politicians can control costs -- by refusing to pay for the services.

It's called rationing.

Advocates of nationalization hate that word because it forces them to face an ugly truth. If government pays for more people's health care and wants to control costs, it must limit what we buy.

So much for Obama's promise not to interfere with our freedom of choice.

This brings us back to end-of-life consultation. As the government's health care budget becomes strained, as it must -- and, as Obama admits, already is under Medicare -- the government will have to cut back on what it lets people have.

So it is not a leap to foresee government limiting health care, especially to people nearing the end of life. Medical "ethicists" have long lamented that too much money is spent futilely in the last several months of life. Are we supposed to believe that the social engineers haven't read their writings?

And given the premise that it's government's job to pay for our heath care, concluding that 80-year-olds should get no hip replacements makes sense. The problem is the premise: that taxpayers should pay. Once you accept that, bad things follow.

In the end, perhaps the biggest objection to nationalized health care is the "principal-agent problem." For whom does the doctor work? Ordinarily, the doctor is the agent of the patient. But when government signs the checks and orders doctors to reduce spending, it is not crazy to think that this won't influence their "advance care planning consultation".

Freedom is about self-determination. Obama's health care scheme would undermine both.

via realclearpolitics.com

Leave it to John Stossel to be direct and to the point. Excellent article that both sides need to read.

Posted via web from conservativedynamics's posterous

Grassley: FCC Diversity Chief May Stifle Talk Radio. So this is why the liberals told me not to worry about the Fairness Doctrine. It all makes sense now!

http://www.newsmax.com/insidecover/Fairness_Doctrine_FCC/2009/08/18/249417.html?s=al&promo_code=85A2-1

Who needs the Fairness Doctrine when you can have a Diversity Instead?  It makes it so much easier for the liberal Democrats in Congress and White House to claim innocence and attempt to keep their hands free of it.  This fully explains why the liberals and MSM told America not to worry about passage of the Fairness Doctrine.  It all makes sense now!!

Posted via email from conservativedynamics's posterous

Oliver Stone revealing 'Secret History of America' - Like this guy is any more credible/objective than the MSM and they call Conservatives conspiracy nuts.

http://www.thrfeed.com/2009/08/oliver-stone-presenting-secret-history-of-america-.html   

I am sure this will be objective moviemaking.  This guy has no more credibility or objectivity than the mainstream media.  This will be another one of his hack pieces of revisionist history.

Posted via email from conservativedynamics's posterous

Democratic investigators target health insurers - Nothing like government interference in private business practices!

House Democrats are probing the nation’s largest insurance companies for lavish spending, demanding reams of compensation data and schedules of retreats and conferences.

Letters sent to 52 insurance companies by Democratic leaders demand extensive documents for an examination of ‘extensive compensation and other business practices in the health insurance industry.” The letters set a deadline of Sept. 14 for the documents.

Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.), chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, and Rep. Bart Stupak (D-Mich.), chairman of the Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations, signed the three-page letter dated Monday.

An industry source replied when asked for comment: “This is nothing more than a taxpayer-funded fishing expedition designed to silence health plans."

By Sept. 4, the firms are supposed to supply detailed compensation data for board members and top executives, as well as a “table listing all conferences, retreats, or other events held outside company facilities from January 1, 2007, to the present that were paid for, reimbursed, or subsidized in whole or in part by your company.”

For employees or officers making $500,000 or more, the committee wants information on salary, bonus, options and pension.

And by Sept. 14, the firms are supposed to provide copies of reports from compensation consultants, plus board drafts of compensation plans and information about market share.

via politico.com

I sure hope the insurance industry doesn't have any private jets, because Congress may get jealous due to not getting theirs and confiscate them.

Since when was it the government's and specifically the President's and Congress' business to investigate and demand changes to the business practices of private companies? Oh yeah, when Obama took over GM after he pressured the company to fire its management team. This is nothing more than a giant leap forward to changing this country into a freedom-free tyranny. When a government can do things like this without any worry of repurcussions from the courts or the people, Liberty has been yielded to total government control. The insurance companies, or any other private company or individual for that matter, should have the freedom to use their revenue in any legal manner they choose without the fear of unreasonable interference from government entities. This is no longer the truth. Actually this may be bouncing up awful hard against the 4th, 5th, 8th, and 9th Amendments and Art. 1, Sec. 9 of the Constititution which states: No bill of attainder or ex post facto Law shall be passed.

While the courts to this point has granted Congress wide latitude in their "investigations," I wouldn't be surprise if there was a judicial slap up side the head in the near future for overreaching both the commom sense level of that power as well as any possible Constitutional argument in favor.

Again I ask, with the government acting like this, why should they be allowed to control the healthcare industry?

Posted via web from conservativedynamics's posterous