Nanny State Gone Wild: Defining dependency up
My column today builds on this post about the slacker mandate in Demcare — and examines how the chief architects of the government health care are openly achieving single-payer-by-proxy. Listen to the final self-congratulatory paeans to “health care as a right” this morning and you’ll understand exactly what I’m talking about and exactly what they are achieving.
Nanny State Gone Wild: Defining dependency up
by Michelle Malkin
Creators Syndicate
Copyright 2009
The greatest gifts you can give your children can’t be boxed and bowed. Consider the timeless gift of self-sufficiency – a stubborn thirst to leave the nest, make it own your own, and live as a free-willed adult. It’s a concept that Big Nanny Democrats are sabotaging at every legislative turn.
Several times during the sneaky weekend debate on the government health care takeover bill this past Sunday, Democrats hailed a provision requiring insurance plans that cover dependents to provide benefits to children up to age 26. Democrat Sens. Ben Cardin and Tom Harkin both specifically championed the unfunded mandate in their floor statements.
This manifestation of the Nanny State is especially galling given the massive levels of generational theft that the Democrat majority has presided over the last year. If they truly cared about the physical and financial well-being of young Americans, they’d stop piling on expensive regulations that simply put affordable health insurance out of their reach. I propose a new symbol for the Democrats. Out: Donkey. In: A giant adult pacifier.
I can tell you what most fiscally responsible parents are thinking when they hear the feds “taking care” of everyone else’s adult “children” for them by confiscating their tax dollars and forcing private companies to comply: You’ve got to be kidding me. Yes, Virginia, there are still some of us left who believe our children shouldn’t depend on a government-manufactured umbilical cord as they approach their third decade on earth.
Nonetheless, there are now an estimated 20 states that have already passed legislation requiring insurers to cover adult children. The slacker mandates cover “kids” ranging in age from 24 to 31. And it’s these very government health care mandates that are driving up the cost of insurance. Health policy researcher Nathan Benefield of the Commonwealth Institute reported that in New Jersey, Nanny State peddlers claimed the adult kiddie protection law would help 100,000 uninsured young adults. “Yet in two years, only 6% of that estimate has been realized. The primary reason—health insurance is still too expensive.”
Wisconsin has experienced similar results. “Whenever you insure somebody whom you didn’t insure before there’s some additional risk,” insurance expert James Mueller told the Milwaukee Sentinel-Journal. Mueller points to the premium increases that have followed over coverage mandates on employer-sponsored plans. “The problem with all these good ideas is there’s funding necessary,” Mueller said. In Wisconsin, adult children are not only covered, but also the children of those “children” if they live in single-parent homes.
As he rammed this mandate and the mountain of other government regulations buried in Demcare, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid promised on Sunday: “We are reshaping the nation. That’s what we want to do.” Indeed, this defining dependency up phenomenon is part of the larger push for single-payer-by-proxy. The other universal health care Trojan Horse signed into law this year – the expansion of SCHIP (the State Children’s Health Insurance Program) – welcomed more non-“children” into the government insurance fold.
Both political parties have advocated federal waivers to use SCHIP funds for adults, including parents of Medicaid/SCHIP children, caretaker relatives, legal guardians, and childless adults. According to the General Accounting Office, SCHIP-funded expenditures on adults nationwide “totaled about $674 million in 2006.” J.P. Wieske of the Council for Affordable Health Insurance notes that the bennies incentivize parents to drop their private coverage in order to take advantage of free or discounted health insurance for their children. “It has become a program for the middle class at the expense of the poor.”
This is the engine that will power the Demcare architects’ most naked, radical ambitions: “Health care as an inalienable right,” as Sen. Harkin put it. How? By breeding a massive permanent culture of dependency and bottomless debt in the name of the “children” from birth through quarterlife — and beyond.
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Trackbacks
- Health Care BS
- Must Know Headlines 12.24.2009 — ExposeTheMedia.com
- X-mas Special: Tea Party MAVEN in the FOX Den! « Temple of Mut
- The City Square
- ~ Simple Health Care Test for the Average Joe: What Do You Plan To Do, When… « Critical Political Thinking
- ~ Simple Test for the Average Joe, Part 2: What Do You Plan To Do, When… « Critical Political Thinking
- Michelle Malkin » The slacker mandate revisited
- ~ Simple Health Care Question: At What Point Does the Reality of What Congress is Really Doing Hit Home to You? « Critical Political Thinking
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On the floor before the vote, Majority Leader Harry Reid said, “We’re going to hear an earful, but it’s going to be an earful of wonderment and happiness that people waited for for a long time.”
Yes, he really is that delusional. And when the people rise up against him and this crap bill, he will be stunned, stunned I tell you! It is not possible! Everybody wanted this bill! Everybody!! /////
(I sure hope Obama doesn’t slip on an ornament shard after happy smashes them and fall on the debris in just the wrong way so that so that he severs his freakin’ carotid artery. Those glass shards can be mightly slippery on a parquet floor. )
Speaking of the RNC, HERE is their big plan to stop the bill. There site is just sad. No plan to do anything with the exception to get you to donate. That is the biggest thing I am left wth when I visit. NOT a plan to take back the WH and Congress. Nope – none at all.
Fittingly, they want to redirect you to the Republican Action Network – RAN as in from the fight.
I wasn’t worried, Ig!
On December 24th, 2009 at 5:05 pm,
That would truly be a tragedy!! And equally tragic would be if Biden and Pelosi also met the same fate. I pray that never happens! /////
This being Christmas Eve I wonder if Obama has his long-time pastor and mentor in to lead a prayer not to bless America but to G–damn America.
Well, Obama is in Hawaii and has stated that he has “no plans to attend Christmas services.” Why would he?? Christmas is a Christian celebration, not a mooslum one.
Next up…Nancy and harry behind closed doors in this unnatural Act
Taking a day off from politics and enjoying Xmas. Planning to spend the day with my 3 grown daughters and grandkids. Reid/Pelosi/Obama are placed on hold until tomorrow. Today, I plan on enjoying this wonderful Christian holiday and give thanks for what we all have.
Would that by any chance be Kenya?
Yep, it ain’t Hawaii, no hospital or anyplace else in Hawaii claims to be his birthplace. They don’t want to get caught in the big lie when the truth is finally exposed…no thanks to the media, conservative or otherwise.
Guess they don’t want to be “Lou Dobbed”
for even mentioning Obama’s off-limits mysterious past.
Harry Reid promised on Sunday: “We are reshaping the nation. That’s what we want to do.” Pretty heavy quote – where was this said? Is it part of public record? Could be useful.