Obama's health-care plan uses imaginary savings to finance massive new spending. His claim that it will not increase the deficit is based on the notion that he can squeeze $2 trillion in savings out of the current health-care system to finance his plan's huge costs.
Washington Post columnist Charles Krauthammer, who used to practice medicine, points out in his column that these savings aren't real, and that politicians promise to pay for new programs through imaginary savings all the time:
"Obama said he would largely solve the insoluble cost problem of Obamacare by eliminating 'hundreds of billions of dollars in waste and fraud' from Medicare. . . .That's just an insult to our intelligence. Waste, fraud and abuse as the all-purpose piggy bank for budget savings has been a joke since Jimmy Carter first used it in 1977. Moreover, if half a trillion is waiting to be squeezed painlessly out of Medicare, why wait for health-care reform? If, as Obama repeatedly insists, Medicare overspending is breaking the budget, why hasn't he gotten started on the painless billions in 'waste and fraud' savings?"
Even staunch Democrats admit the President's claims are phony. Tennessee Governor Phil Bredesen (D) is criticizing Obama's health-care plan as "the mother of all unfunded mandates," saying it will force states to massively raise taxes or run big deficits. Earlier, one of Obama’s own economic advisers said his health-care plan would explode the federal budget deficit and lead to "crippling deficits" and "higher taxes."
The Associated Press said Obama's proposals "would drive up the deficit by billions of dollars." The Washington Post, which hasn't endorsed a Republican for president since 1952, noted that “the expanded coverage would add more than $1 trillion to the deficit."
Krauthammer notes that Obama misstated whether ObamaCare would cover illegal immigrants: "Obama said they would not be insured. Well, all four committee-passed bills in Congress allow illegal immigrants to take part in the proposed Health Insurance Exchange. But more important, the problem is that laws are not self-enforcing. If they were, we'd have no illegal immigrants because . . . it's illegal to enter the United States illegally. We have laws against burglary, too. But we also provide for cops and jails on the assumption that most burglars don't voluntarily turn themselves in. When Republicans proposed requiring proof of citizenship, the Democrats twice voted that down in committee. Indeed, after Rep. Joe Wilson's 'You lie!' shout-out, the Senate Finance Committee revisited the language of its bill to prevent illegal immigrants from getting any federal benefits. Why would the Finance Committee fix a nonexistent problem?"
The non-partisan Congressional Research Service said that under some of the bills backed by Obama, illegal aliens would be covered. But Obama ignored the CRS about this, just as he ignored the CRS and legal scholars in falsely claiming that the country of Honduras's courts and legislature acted illegally in removing and replacing that country's power-hungry ex-president and would-be dictator, a claim recently called into question by the CRS and rejected by legal scholars and foreign policy experts like Octavio Sanchez, Miguel Estrada, and Dan Miller, Kim Holmes, and William Ratliff, who have said that Honduras's removal of its ex-president was perfectly legal.
(Obama has now imposed travel sanctions on the small, impoverished country of Honduras, cut off U.S. aid, and said he will likely refuse to recognize the results of regularly-scheduled elections in that country, which has been under civilian democratic rule since 1982, and is currently govered by a democratically-elected Congress and civilian president. Cuban dictator Castro and Venezuela's socialist ruler Chavez have joined the Obama Administration in demanding that Honduras allow the ex-president's return, despite his dictatorial tendencies).
Under ObamaCare, illegal immigrants are exempt from ObamaCare’s fines and penalties, even though there is nothing to stop them from joining up if they want to.
This could lead to the worst of both worlds: young, healthy illegal aliens avoiding buying health insurance, while older, sickly illegal aliens get government-sponsored health insurance, so that the government winds up insuring only the most expensive and costly illegals, at taxpayer expense.
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