Rand Paul to introduce amendment to Obamacare, removing exemption for government employees.

He gets into it at 1:26.

Rand specifically calls out supreme court justice John Roberts who decided that Obamacare was "constitutional" for Americans though he himself is exempt...

Why am I not surprised?

He's right government employees should be placed on Obamacare. If it's good enough for the American people then shouldn't it be good enough for those that represent the people?

reply to post by gladtobehere


Rand said, "People want us to stand up and fight Obamacare, and we should."

Exactly, thank you Rand.

Our voices are about all we have at this point, be sure to exercise it!

Obamacare isn't a healthcare nor insurance plan..........

I hope more politicians follow the Rand bandwagon.

The other night on "The Daily Show", Jon Stewart said it costs employers about 10k to provide health care for an employee. If they don't, they face a 2k fine. What do you think the employers are going to do?
Either cut hours or nix them. ugh.

WaterBottle
Obamacare isn't a healthcare nor insurance plan..........

Sadly, most people do not realize this simple fact. Obamacare is simply a government mandate that you purchase medical insurance through a private insurance, or be taxed for that failure. A marketplace is set up for those who do not have coverage through an employer. The idea being to pool large amounts of previously uninsured into a group plan to drive down costs.

In many ways, Obamacare is forces people to engage in private commerce and spend money on services they might otherwise not elect to have. Theoretically, Obamacare should work to reduce the overall affordability of healthcare costs by requiring healthy people to sign up and pay for it, where sick people would receive less costs for their care, subsidized by the healthy. But the fundamental flaw in all of it is that the medical business and insurers are still in it for a profit, and will still deny you for coverage just like they previously have historically done. Thus, Obamacare can only be the first step before we totally have to take profit out of medical care in this country, or at the very least reduce the maximum profit a health provider or insurer can make. Both industries are booming right now, and with innovations allowing layoffs of people these organizations are cash flush.

I work for a hospital and it is the largest employer in our city. Something is wrong, that a hospital is the backbone of a local economy. It also has AAA credit rating and several hundreds of millions in liquid assets sitting unused. When an average night at the hospital, with only a nurse attending to you can run upwards of $10,000 this represents a gouging of unnecessary profits, at least, as applied to that service.

Well now, if Rand keeps being such a rebel to push extremely unpopular positions for the right reasons? I may just have to reassess my earlier thoughts about him being nothing like his Father and just another name among the Political elite.

He has a way to go....but hey, this is the path to take alright. Removing all waivers from any government employee ought to be mandated for Obamacare and standard practice for all laws passed under Congress. There should never be a time where...

'Pain for thee and not for me!'

...becomes an acceptable and tolerated situation between the population and those few who lead us. If they want an exemption from something important? I'll be happy to help give them an exemption from serving in Congress for life come next election.

reply to post by Wrabbit2000


Senator Cruz talked extensively on that during his filibusterer yesterday, how the government should not be exempt from the changes that are going to be introduced.

Cruz and Paul seem to be on the same page. That goes for a number of other congressmen I heard speak.

When you observe how there are things that are good for our pets/livestock, but not for us, and things that we can do that they can't, then you can truly start to grasp how people in those positions that would make laws which they are exempt from... view us.

Once that is truly understood and not rejected as "nobody would *actually* think like that?*... ALL of their decisions and statements begin to make sense.

Mega-celebrities are pets in dog and pony shows. Workers are beasts of burden to do the labor of the ranch.

Well now this is how to fix the problems with Obamacare. Change the bad stuff, add good stuff. About time someone did their dam job instead of just yelling about repeal etc.. Cruise is all talk and no action. If you want stuff changed create amendments and try rather than spewing pro0aganda. So sick of theze A holes doing nothing up there but running their dam mouths.

When Nancy Pelosi hears that she'll go into full panic mode. FUNNY!
Ms. 'pass it to find out what is in it' will end up having to put up with the same
thing that she's subjected everyone else to. GOODIE!!!

FlyersFan
When Nancy Pelosi hears that she'll go into full panic mode. FUNNY!
Ms. 'pass it to find out what is in it' will end up having to put up with the same
thing that she's subjected everyone else to. GOODIE!!!

She already will be getting her insurance through the exchanges...all Congressmen will.

This is a fact, it's part of the bill. There is no "exemption" that was passed, the "exemption" that Republicans talked about is Government contributions to their healthcare...not an exemption.

WaterBottle
Obamacare isn't a healthcare nor insurance plan..........

What is sad is that Rand Paul knows this...but he has to talk to this because his audience consists of a bunch of idiots.

The statement "they should get Obamacare" has no meaning. All "Obamacare" does is say "you need health insurance or pay a fine". I'm sure the SCOTUS judges already have health insurance...so they are already compliant with "Obamacare".


How do people not understand this simple fact?

reply to post by AlienScience


That is why this whole thing is a dog and pony show. The Republicans want to control the legislative and executive branches so they spew this stuff, to get people all riled up. Democrats do this sort of thing too when they are losing support. All of these politicians know what the real law is all about, but complaining about it to an uniformed public makes these politicians look like they are doing something.

Rand Paul's proposed change does little and only seeks to make the government employees not have subsidized healthcare through their employer (the government). Instead they would have to pay it themselves, like all the rest of us. But as the media heads stated, this isn't entirely fair to the lower paid government employees, who would then lose out. But then again, employers in the private sector have been slashing benefits for years, so why not the federal government.

reply to post by gladtobehere


I applaud the efforts of Rand Paul, but it seems the impact would not be felt by any major players in the federal government, as the majority are quite wealthy, they have the means, and can afford to pay for supplemental insurance.

It doesn't matter if they can afford it and wouldn't be meaningfully affected either way. That's just another diversion to try to get people to stop asking questions.

It's the concept of creating any legislation you yourself are exempt from. When will that ever be a precedent and foundation that will be of any help to the people they have volunteered to serve? Not rule... serve.

Though truth is most did volunteer to rule while wearing the robes of servants so they won't be called out on it.

Even politicians trying to make progress in undoing the corruptions have to play the politics game right now, thus they have to take round about ways to get where they want to go and get "the people" to ask meaningful questions.

WE don't have to play that stupid song and dance though... and can go straight to the heart: It is abuse of power to legislate but exempt yourself. Unless you are going to claim the right of a ruler, owner, or master.

ExPostFacto
When an average night at the hospital, with only a nurse attending to you can run upwards of $10,000 this represents a gouging of unnecessary profits, at least, as applied to that service.

What most people do not realize is that health insurance is pretty much a scam. We all are concerned about the "what if" scenario where you get some catastrophic health problem or in a terrible accident and are hit with an enormous bill for it, when in reality as of 2007 in America 85% of all visits to the hospital were less than $5000.00. 13% were no more than $30,000.00, and 1 % were no more than $50,0000.00 which leaves us with a 1% group that were over $50,000.00 and yet we are all paying for the 1%... sort of reminds me of another 1% issue we are having in America.

I was licensed in Florida for life, health, and annuities insurance, and I was frankly disgusted with the health industry. I worked for a company that sold special health insurance at a reasonable rate, but was not Cadillac coverage. I truly believe we should have basic health insurance that is reasonable, and if we want to by catastrophic coverage then that can be bought for a reasonable price of say $100.00/yr. Most people would buy it, and the money would cover those awful situations. I wrote a piece about how most hospitals are gouging people for services like lab work, x-rays, and ekg's. There was a great site put up called Hospitalvictims.com.

The URL link is not working properly, you can see their old site here:

web.archive.org... /hospitalvictims.com... (remove spaces) otherwise the link won't work or look up hospitalvictims.com on wayback machine.

How hospitals screw the uninsured – know how to use the Fair Trade Act to your benefit

You see, the Fair Trade Act is your best friend, and since you can't go shopping for help when you are in need of medical treatment, they have to charge you a fair amount, and that is usually 25% more than Medicaid. I have sample letters you can use to request the proper bills and put the hospital on notice that you are not an idiot. The one rule I found is to NEVER agree to a payment amount until you have gone through the haggling with them.

Obamacare is simply a massive bureaucracy meant to cripple the nation. The people in desperate need of help are not going to get it, and those who have health coverage don't want it. The very poor are already on medicaid or medicare. Obamacare is like FEMA helping you during Hurricane Katrina.

Plus under Obamacare, you will have zero privacy and just imagine, the IRS is in charge of all this information. They wouldn't use a political enemies information to shut them up now would they? Then you have to do as they say or you get no coverage. This is the biggest over reach by government in American history and the people should be in the streets and not cooperating.

UnifiedSerenity
Plus under Obamacare, you will have zero privacy and just imagine, the IRS is in charge of all this information. They wouldn't use a political enemies information to shut them up now would they? Then you have to do as they say or you get no coverage. This is the biggest over reach by government in American history and the people should be in the streets and not cooperating.

Please explain how you will have zero privacy???

I am interested why and how you think this will happen.

reply to post by AlienScience

Same reason random low level contractors (aka kids barely out of college with stars in their eyes) for other agencies/programs are able to access information that you have not consented to share and they have no legitimate reason to access other than the ones they choose to make up and pursue via the backing of people with big guns.

Please give my congratulations to your handler.