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The Subtle Slavery of Obamacare
The Subtle Slavery of Obamacare: The Cattle Chute of Coerced Cooperation in the Collective Corruption
By
Cognitive Dissonance
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“The truth is that the State is a conspiracy designed not only to exploit, but above all to corrupt its citizens.”—Leo Tolstoy
Like millions of other individuals and families in the USA, Mrs. Cog and I have reached a point this year where we must make decisions regarding Health Sick Care Insurance for 2015. Before I begin I would like to point out we are attempting to take back control of our health by eating better, exercising more, mostly by way of regularly working on the homestead, while practicing preventative/proactive care using such things as natural herbs and supplements, organic teas and honey and so on.
Our point of view is simple: other than possibly needing emergency medical assistance for major accidents and injuries or catastrophic illness such as heart attack, stroke etc., we don’t use the health sick care industry nor do we wish too. Our preference would be to have access to a catastrophic emergency care insurance policy with a large deductible (say $15-25,000) to keep the insurance premium manageable. We will handle our day to day health issues as well as preventive care on our own.
We do understand, and generally agree with, the need for catastrophic health injury/illness insurance to meet our responsibility of limiting our, and society’s, liability and expenses. We do not wish to be a burden to others or to ourselves. We have in the past, and continue today, to express our willingness and desire to participate in a common insurance risk pool to mitigate that possibility. Mrs. Cog and I do not wish to receive a free ride, where others pay for our medical expenses, nor do we expect to just show up at the local emergency room and demand treatment without the ability to pay either out of pocket or via insurance for services rendered. That said, let me begin.

This is not the way to exit the sick care racket.
Dammed if we do, dammed if we don’t doesn’t even begin to describe the situation we find ourselves in this December of 2014. Aside from the ‘normal’ annual increases, our present health sick care insurance provider jacked up our premium rates in April and again in August of this year to (they claim) bring our present policy into compliance with the Obamacare ‘mandate’. The total increase over the last eight months was 65% with the majority coming in August. Worse, we just received notice of another 10% increase set for January 1, 2015. So much for the flat out fraudulent and horrifically misleading declared ‘inflation’ rate of 2%.
While I will not discuss specific details, our present coverage is far removed from what the medical system describes as a ‘Cadillac’ plan. The per-person deductible is several thousand dollars each and the total family deductible is well north of six thousand dollars, a figure which doesn’t include co-pays and out-of-network surcharges. The maximum out-of-pocket potential is more than ten thousand dollars a year.
Making matter worse, up here on the mountain there is no doctor network to speak of, further driving up first dollar costs for Mrs. Cog and me. While we take some responsibility for this because it was our decision to move to this rural mountain area in the first place, why all doctors cannot participate in several different national insurance networks is beyond me. It is so much more than just reimbursement rates that determine which doctors are in what network.
The latest correspondence from the health sick care insurance company helpfully informs us we may visit their website before Jan 1, 2015 and select from a variety of ‘affordable’ health sick plans, thus clearly admitting our present day policy is no longer affordable……though it never was for the services desired or received. It is almost as if the system is set up to bolster insurance company profits first, drug and medical services company profits second, doctor and clinic profits third and patient care last. Of course we are told otherwise by all of the above.
The letter ran several pages long and was laid out in a question and answer format obviously intended for those with a sixth grade education or below. Several questions followed along the lines of “Where’s my health care subsidy/premium tax credit” followed by a simple answer; ‘We the (little) People’ were out of luck unless we visited the official ‘Health Insurance Marketplace’. You mean the rabbit hole goes deeper?

What Rabbit Hole?
For nearly two decades I was a licensed life and health insurance agent and sold both individual and group health insurance policies during that time. In addition, from 2001 until 2008 I helped select and structure a midsized employer group health insurance program for my employer as well as the day to day administration of the plan. But even with that large experience base I am far from an expert on the ins and outs of the animal called Obamacare. And I seriously doubt there are more than a few in this entire country who are expert other than the insurance companies who actually wrote the law in the first place.
My blind spot is the nuanced intricacies of the Affordable Care Act (ACA). Even after they passed it I was still not able to read and fully understand it. But mama didn’t raise no fool. Speaking as one of millions of semi(un)informed ‘consumers’ of health sick care insurance in America, when I say the game is rigged and ‘We the People’ are the bait, the prey and the patsy, it is more than just me smelling a skunk in the woodpile. The rabid skunk not only sprayed me, but bit me as well and for the life of me I can’t find medical care at a reasonable cost. Welcome to a brave new world.

Nurse - "Doctor, the patient has died."
Doctor - "It's OK nurse, we extracted the wallet in time."
As many of you know Mrs. Cog and I moved to the mountain in June of 2013 and have followed a path of asset divestiture and debt pay down, done primarily to extinguish debt and to greatly simplify our lives. Anyone who has followed this path understands the way to play the financial ‘game’ is NOT to do as we are doing, but to hold on to the assets in order to keep leveraging up while avoiding the tax man’s ugly wrath.
The net effect of our financial insanity is that the Federal and State tax (wo)men have been richly rewarded for our self proclaimed liberation, though some would definitely call us foolish. We are deliberately working ourselves into the poor house, with gross and net incomes that now land us squarely among the lower middle of the middle class.
The good news is while our income has dropped dramatically, so has our outgo to an even greater extent. The net result is while others in our income class are really struggling to make ends meet, we are not in a dire situation because our housing and transportation costs, other than insurance, utilities, gasoline, upkeep and taxes, are nil compared to many others.
Still, considering our unsubsidized health sick care insurance premiums now represent almost 25% of our gross income, this is no laughing matter. In just four short years, beginning shortly after Obamacare (aka the Orwellian named Affordable Care Act or ACA) was passed under the cover of deliberate ignorance and confusion, health sick care insurance premiums have more than doubled in price and in some cases tripled, quadrupled or more.
Something has gone horribly wrong for the average Joe and Jane Doe and this was not an accident or a product of unintended consequences by any stretch of the imagination. How is it that among all first world countries the USA charges on average 50% more for health sick care services with results/outcomes no better than, and often much worse than, the rest of the first world nations and many second world nations?
While I have watched health sick care insurance premiums rise at triple or quadruple the officially declared inflation rate for more than two decades, what has transpired over the last four years is nothing short of criminal. Even though insurance companies claim the expanded ‘mandate’ of the ACA is directly responsible for the significant premium increases, two things stand out as glaringly obvious even to a blind man.

A modern day treatment plan in practice.
One, the first dollar deductibles and co-pays have risen even faster than the premiums, indicating to me that any greater risks absorbed by the insurance companies from the ACA has been at least partially offset by more money out of the public’s pocket even before the insurance company collects its first greatly increased premium or pays its first dime in benefits.
Two, one look at the huge increase in health insurance company profits since the ACA was ushered in, not to mention their stock price, is a sure sign these companies are not suffering, but rather profiting handsomely simply from the process of preparing for the full implementation of the ACA. They understood quite well a simple ‘bidness’ (a la Tony Soprano) concept. When change is imminent the key to making (more) money is to complain like hell about the threatened legislation while quietly lobbying behind closed doors for the ability to write said legislation. And that is precisely what they did, and continue to do, with the (re)writing of the fine print by the administering government agencies.

Insurance companies brought out the big gun lobby for the ACA
"Watch out for that kick (back)."
Similar to automobiles, housing and higher education, ultimately the price of any expensive product (in this case health sick care insurance) is based upon who is paying (in part or in full) and how easily it can be financed and/or subsidized. When expensive items are easily financed at favorable terms or subsidized/fully paid for by others, there is little incentive to hold prices down because ‘price’ is no longer a critical barrier to entry for the purchaser. As well, if you distort and distribute the price paid among several parties and no one feels responsible to hold the line, another incentive to keep prices manageable is lost or ignored.
The majority of medium/large employer group health sick care insurance premiums are paid by the employer, though as those costs continue to rise the burden is beginning to shift towards the employee through various cost sharing arrangements. While the ACA changed and accelerated that dynamic somewhat, with even more to come over the next few years, for the most part the employer sponsored and heavily subsidized group health sick care insurance policy remains alive and well for now.
What is important to remember here is the lack of a real and significant incentive by the employer, employee and the insurance company to restrain premium increases since no one party bears the brunt of the entire increase. The employer doesn’t wish to upset their employees with sudden and significant premium increases when real wages have been stagnant for years. And after several rounds of layoffs, or at the very least the ever present threat of downsizing/relocation/merger, many employers wish to keep their remaining productive and profitable employees working. It is usually cheaper to keep a (slightly) more expensive employee than to go through the significant expense of replacing him or her, then training a new one who at least initially is less productive.
The employee will likely complain, then grin and bear it because they are concerned about keeping a job in a world increasing populated by part time work with no ‘fringe’ benefits at all. And the insurance companies just want to make hay while the sun shines. As long as someone pays the increased premium, what incentive does the insurance company have to mitigate increases other than to increase company profits? Death by falling drops of water is slower than a rushing tsunami, but the end result is just the same.
The individual or family without access to a (subsidized) group policy, but still able to ‘afford’ to purchase health sick care insurance before the recent changes, will most likely continue to buy the insurance despite the premium increase. They might try to lower the financial impact by going with higher deductibles and co-pays rather than go without insurance so long as they are (self) employed and bringing in an income.
But with the implementation of the ACA and the accompanying penalties…..err……‘taxes’, one is limited in how high they can raise their deductibles in order to save money without triggering the penalty……tax. Meaning if they try to purchase a low cost high deductible catastrophic sick care insurance policy they will still be forced to pay the penalty tax in addition to the insurance premiums. Talk about a cattle chute.

What could possibly go wrong?
What was missing from the general insurance risk pool before the ACA (along with the higher insurance premiums) were the chronically uninsured aka the poor, the unemployed, chronically ill, injured, disabled and so on. Make no mistake about it; this wasn’t a case of the insurance companies not wanting those higher risk individuals and families in the risk pool. There just wasn’t anyone available who would, or could, pay the higher premiums associated with the risk. Essentially an entire class of people, a whole new line of (profitable) business if you will, was missing from the insurance company’s portfolio because no one was willing or able to pay. Until now that is.
With the passage, and now ongoing implementation of the ACA, this ‘oversight’ has been rectified. However, the high premiums charged are essentially meaningless or of little consequence to some of the people in this pool because many of the poorest will pay little or nothing after the government subsidy is applied in advance on a monthly basis. It just doesn’t get any better than this for the insurance company(s). The crony nanny state has now firmly inserted itself into another aspect of daily life in America, bringing an already vulnerable class of poorer Americans that much closer to the nourishing teat of total governmental dependency and control.
But it is not just the poor or lower middle class who were, and are, affected by the ACA. While I just said employer sponsored group policies are still going strong, it appears their time in the sun will be limited. Especially after employer ‘mandates’ kick in next year (2015), more and more employers will throw in the towel and cease to resist the impulse to let go and let government totally control the health sick care insurance arena.
If a study of world history (altered and propagandized as it may be) is any indicator, a despotic tyrannical governmental force will eventually be bound and determined to spread its corruption and control as far and wide as possible. It makes perfect sense for this to be promoted since the more citizen slaves nourished from the government teat, the more the newly corrupted converts will fight to remain at the fiat bloated breast.
Once firmly attached and dependent, the suckled will fight any ‘enemies’ the government claims will threaten their government milk supply. This is not to imply everyone, or even anyone, who takes a government subsidy in order to afford their grossly overpriced and underserved health sick care insurance, is a bloated freeloader who doesn’t wish to earn their keep. Far from it in fact. It is a tightly sprung trap not even Forrest Gump could outrun even with his damn box of chocolates.

Run Forrest Run!
The socioeconomic system in general, and the ACA in particular, was specifically designed to corral nearly everyone into the cattle chute of coerced cooperation in the collective corruption of the nanny police state. But for those who claim this frightening trend is new are in our opinion way off base. This is the direction this country has been moving for decades and it was only when the acceleration reached liftoff velocity on its exponential curve to outright oppressive slavery did people begin to notice they had fallen down and couldn’t get back up.
While I fully agree corruption starts at the top and filters down, in so many ways it has now permeated the general public by presenting nearly impossible situations which, while they may be wearing the façade of several ‘choices’, only one choice presents itself as practical, the one which was originally designed to be the ‘only’ choice from the beginning.
The secret to administering the modern day ‘democratic’ nanny police state is to subsidize the illusion of freedom which when you boil it all down is expressed as freedom of choice. The key is to manage those choices in such a way that no ‘good’ choices (defined as fair and beneficial to “We the People”) are presented and the worst best choice further ensnares the public in the corruption nets like an encircled school of sardines. To do this, the government and its joined-at-the-hip special interests most often employ the carrot and stick approach.

Let the games begin.
With Obamacare the process works like this. Currently mandatory health sick care insurance policies are so expensive even the reasonably well off income wise will swallow hard at the price tag. To mitigate the mandatory pain the public is informed they can always opt out if they don’t like the choices. But if they do so they must visit the penalty tax box each year to ‘pay’ for their freedom to choose none of the above. As planned we are given several bad choices to choose from.
Next we are introduced to the carrot after a firm shaking of the stick. Offer to subsidize all those bad choices on a sliding (and generous) scale so individuals whose income is well above ‘poverty’ level, itself a fictitious number pulled out of thin air which is supposed to represent abject suffering but in reality is so much worse, as bait to entice them into the spring loaded mouse peasant trap. Anyone with an adjusted gross income between 100% and 400% of the ‘poverty’ rate is eligible for a (government printed paid) subsidy on a sliding scale. See, that anal probe doesn’t hurt so bad now does it?
You may ‘choose’ to purchase the exact same policy directly from the insurance company and receive no subsidy at all, either on a monthly basis or when tax preparation time rolls around. Or you can use a Federal or State government sponsored and created internet information gathering portal, spill your guts on line and expose all your financial and personal information to the government (and any competent hacker or NSA operative) to receive a subsidy for the exact same policy. Some ‘choice’, huh?
And all this is presented with the straightest of straight faces, as if not only is this perfectly normal but it has always been this way. Besides, it’s for your own good. While not exactly a Hobson’s choice, it’s too damn close to tell the difference.

Annual insurance company executive conference.
Essentially the insurance companies get to author the law and then raise premiums for four years in anticipation of the law’s enactment. Upon implementation (and after further premium increases) the insurance companies are paid some or all of the high risk ‘pool’ insurance premiums directly by the government on a monthly basis. Best of all, if the subsidy was incorrectly applied or calculated and the taxpayer insured received too much, the IRS is the bill collector, not the insurance company. It just doesn’t get any better than this.
The Affordable Care Act is a prime example of the ‘legal’ process by which an increasingly despotic and fascist government joins hands with other powerful and moneyed entities in opposition to the very people who supposedly ‘support’ the government in order to maintain power over a system that is rapidly collapsing primarily because of the corrupt influences of the government and its cronies. The crony nanny state isn’t here to protect you, but to protect itself and its cronies from you.
It takes very little imagination to recognize similar behavior in the higher education/student loan juggernaut, the military/industrial/political/false flag war machine, the banking/Wall Street/Federal Reserve/IRS parasitic fiat organism, the oil/petrodollar/puppet dictator/empire collective, the nanny state/militarized police/fake terrorism/freedom of speech area/bash and gas the protestors/left-right illusion of freedom game, the Hollywood/NFL/NCAA/MLB/NBA public financing of private assets/bread and circuses distraction, the 1984/FCC/MSM/ISP/DOD/ATT/NSA et al spying on citizens in the name of terrorism/blackmail of anyone useful dirty underwear program and the Corporate Welfare/State Tax Concession/phantom jobs added/Congressional donations, kickbacks and bribery crony capitalism scam to name just a few of the more obvious.

Wait......I think there's more blood left in this turnip.
The one party left out of this you-scratch-my-back-I’ll-fill-your-pocket game is the citizen in whose name all this is justified and done. As The Powers That Be (TPTB) leeches of the slave plantation system bleed ever more life sustaining financial fluids from the population, the natural tendency of said population is either to flee the system or to cutoff and burn the leeches. The leeches, being quite smart and enterprising sociopaths, understand their hosts might actually revolt if something isn’t done and have begun to turn the vise ever tighter to seriously clamp down on dissent and ‘disorder’.
The solution, at least for the leeches, is to dig their suckers in even deeper while injecting ever more anticoagulants and painkillers in the form of more bad choices, narrower cattle chutes and a lot more extra judicial killings by the elite status quo enforcers aka the militarized police. Whom, I might add, are increasingly protected by a corrupt and co-opted judicial system endorsed and enforced by executive order and new Congressional Critter ‘laws’ making it all nice and legal.
All it needs to make it complete is a pretty red bow on top and NSA/FBI operatives conducting sneak and peak investigations (also known as a ‘legal’ breaking and entering) to examine our person and papers while planting drugs, child porn and/or incriminating documents on our computers and in our paper files while harassing any remaining dissidents brave enough to stand up and just say no.

Plenty of room at the inn for dissidents.
The system itself is completely corrupt and thoroughly rigged folks. There is no way out and no possibility of making changes from within because, similar to the methods employed by organized crime, the system will protect itself from those it claims to be protecting while shielding those who most benefit from this arrangement in order to feed itself. What started as the totalitarian tiptoe has now turned into an extremely dangerous crony capitalist state. The nanny police state no longer needs to sneak about since its only remaining purpose from here to perpetuity is to grind our bones to make its bread.
Sadly the more average Jane and Joe becomes aware of the trap, the more dangerous the police state becomes as each citizen/slave is recognized less as a food source to the leaches and more like an enemy combatant come to destroy. Our ignorance is the police state’s bliss and the gearing up for battle by the police state is rapidly extinguishing the public’s ignorance in an all consuming positive feedback loop of shocked awareness. We ain’t in Kansas anymore Toto.
Those of us who now recognize we are sleeping with the enemy, and worse the enemy is rapidly becoming you and me as we are consumed by the engorged system, have some stark and disquieting choices to make, all of them bad with none of them leading to a satisfactory solution. As the nanny police state continues to destroy its host in order to feed itself those choices will not remain static, but instead will move hand in hand with the political wind and the continuing dollar debasement.
Mrs. Cog and I do not have answers to all of our own questions regarding how to protect ourselves, along with those we love and care for, from the encroaching, and suffocating crony nanny state. What we do know is profound in its overwhelming simplicity. When you find yourself in a deep hole with a shovel, the first course of action is to stop digging and begin the process of climbing out.
Or in this case when you find yourself face to face with the crony nanny state, the first course of action is to withdraw to the best of your ability, take stock of the situation and your resources, then begin to forge a path towards more sustainable living and less dependency upon the nanny state. Since everyone’s situation is different, there is no ironclad advice to give you other than just to begin the process. Essentially do everything you can to buffer yourself from the state while bolstering your own position.
Now get to work.
12-23-2014
Cognitive Dissonance
Hard at work calculating next year's premium increase.

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Good article.
I have a slightly different take on it but the basic premise is the same. Those who presume to own you will look for ways to maximize profits at every step - even the last one. They presume that you work on their land, using their resources and property in the form of Federal Reserve Notes to discharge debt. You do not "pay" for anything as it is logically impossible to pay off debt with "evidence of debt" (see 18 USC 333). You are presumed to be a pauper (see Article IV of the Articles of Confederation here: http://uscode.house.gov/browse/frontmatter/organiclaws&edition=prelim). You are presumed to have no rights except those .gov grants you. The "sickcare insurance" scam is just one more way to maximize profits from the ignorant paupers while getting the double benefit of creating yet more mouths on the prey - who will fight until your death to stay attached and profit.
On a positive note, you can learn a lot about real healthcare by paying attention to other cultures and their medical practices. Even in America, there is still a lot of knowledge up in the hills of SW Virgina and East Tennessee/Kentucky. On your own, with a critical mind, you can largely avoid or minimize most chronic diseases with diet and exercise proper for YOU. Figuring out what is proper for you is, in most cases, on you however. No American allopathic doc can help much. On other hand, if I was in a serious accident, I would still prefer to hauled into an American trained trauma team.
All the best for 2015!
What amazes me is how long it has taken people to see what I have known for years: THEY ARE USING THE MEDICAL INDUSTRIAL COMPLEX TO SUCK WHAT WEALTH IS LEFT OUT OF THIS COUNTRY. Why do you suppose they created the reverse mortgage product for? Over 90% of all reverse mortgage proceeds are used to finance some form of illness care. One thing I have noticed; allot of Doctors in my area are forming "alternate arraignments". One idea is you pay a one time fee up front {$3,000} and you have that doctors services for the entire year, unlimited. Kinda steep if you ask me for a GP. My area has one of the largest senior populations in the country, so there is more chronic illness. But, insurance is cut out of the equation, that in itself is a plus. I expect to see more such arraignments devised as this system becomes more untenable.
The picture you paint is pretty ugly but the reality is uglier still. The safety net has been replaced with a fish net and the shark net is being installed. The shark net is designed to keep you (a dangerous animal) away from the civilized people (the elites). The Obamacare subsidies are like dependency creating welfare program (the fish net). Once you get caught in the net (receiving subsidy), it is difficult to escape. The end goal is to make the planet a better place by causing you to die. To continue receiving the subsidy, they will demand that you reduce future expenses by being inoculated against diseases that they create. The vaccines will make Americans sterile and sick. You are being farmed. They are milking you and shearing you and making you pull the cart. When you no longer can produce for them they will give you a disease that will cause you to give all the money that you saved up over a lifetime to get a few more months of life. You are resisting them by not moving into the population center. To promote the health of the population center they will demand that you are disarmed. Then you will be directed towards the slaughter house. Merry Christmas.
Merry Christmas to all the ZH'ers!
Great article Cog!
Most here knew this was going to be an abomination. Once the law take full effect you will see more and more Corporations dumping their plans. Even the unionized companies will be dumping them. The cost of doing business will see to it. This law is a big boom for these entities including local cities and states. They will simply stopp offering healthcare plans they pay for. This was an is headed for a single payer system. Private insurance will eventually be something you or anyone else will pay for to get ahead in line for medical care.
True story is my brother's wife was all for this and actually insert any expetive you like when I tried to discuss this with her. She is now totally against the law after she had to actually pay for a plan. The deductables are outrageous and she must now buy a plan. LOL everytime I think about her. Someone stated it well earlier. They played on people's greed and they fell for it as they thought they would be getting something for nothing. She forgot as I pointed out to her many times nothing is free and the taxpayers would indeed be getting screwed. Ahh the irony.
The unions hate this law because once it actually is fully implemented cadillac healthcare will be considered as income.
Not exactly the best read on xmas morning. LOL.
I already have most of this knowlege however this is probably one of the best articles i've ever read on here.
And don't worry..........Obama is now interested in 'protecting the net' so i'm sure we'll be able to continue spreading the word. Just remember, Obama needs to be voted out and we need to vote in Jeb Bush to take care of the mess he made.
UGH.
And as I predicted a couple months ago......DOW 18K just in time (more like saved for) xmas!!! Surely no one seen that coming!
NO question the entire system and all its tentacles are rigged from the get go and we all live in massive illusions! " Essentially do everything you can to buffer yourself from the state while bolstering your own position". Been doing that for a long while now and a bit ahead of you on that scenario. By the way never did hear from you guys ? I actully have a few secrets that work !
A friend used to date Bill Daleys daghter in Chicago. They went to highschool together and were neighbors. He later became a VP at Moragn Stanley and had an office in the twin towers when they went down. He did not go to work that day because he had a premonition? Hows that for scary ? none the less we were trading options and commodities and he phoned me one day and said hey Steve you still got any trades on at MF Global? I said yes , he said unwind them ASAP and get out cause its going down. And in 2 weeks it did just that. And that was my full bore wake up call of how seriously it is all rigged bullshit. He said Corzine was gonna take them down becasue the big boys did not want any serious competetion for CME in Chi town ! And I guess he would know ? We both had friends that lost millions. I lost 160K becasue I could not unwind it all fast enough due to the dates. and that boys was why I said fuck you! Rob somebody else motherfuckers. Better hope the tables aren't turned one day cause I know exactly what I am doing ? www.downtoearththinking.com
Cog, i liken you to Randall P. McMurphy- the only sane fucker in the asylum other than the Chief.
Yeah we don't always do what society expects of us, but we always do what the God who made us expects of us.
There's damn few who know that everything they know was already provided, at birth, to them.
It's impossible for "trained" individuals to know what "learning" is.
Merry Christmas, my friend... even though I know that that whole story is likely a lie, I still wish you the best!
Just as there is a fine line between genius and insanity, so too between trained and indoctrinated.
Happy holidays to you as well. ;-)
Cog, I don't think you fully comprehended what I'm trying to tell you.
Everything you know was embedded in you. You have just begun to realize this- and you're doing a damn fine job of articulating the travails of your journey.
Some choose to learn, others wish to be trained. Those who choose to learn further the human cause, while those who choose training ensure their own demise.
Ironic. eh?
For you to have come from insurance salesman to who you are today is truly a miracle.
I love ya'll.
“regarding Health Sick Care Insurance…”
It’s actually a little worse. The real aim of Medicare, Medicaid, Obamacare et cetera is to eliminate private workers as quickly as possible after they retire. This will simultaneously prolong the Social Security bribery system – er, retirement system – and prolong the debt problem.
It is to be achieved by medicating and indoctrinating private retirees with prescription drugs (each contains small doses of poisons; that’s why they must be “approved” by the FDA) and by propaganda dished out by media and government, churches and commerce.
Now, let me suggest an alternative.
Over the last 40 years, I have developed a health that has REDUCED – not slowed – my biological age 50 years (it also un-does the damage done by medication and indoctrination).
This health regimen has given me the coordination, health and physical condition of a professional athlete around the age of 20; I’m 70 years of age (for validation, video and webpage – each leads to the other).
If you’ll follow my health regimen, you should achieve the health and physical condition you should have had as a teenager.
You reversed the aging process by spending your days in a batting cage? What about at the driving range?
So I recently had an appendectomy. I have some platinum plan from my employer, but if I didnt have insurance I would have been screwed.
But its because of this.
Total price for the appendectomy + 1 day in the hospital billed by the hospital : almost 30K
Price paid by insurance because of pre-negotiated rates for services = 5K
WTF. Hospitals should be forced to publish prices for services.
If you had been following my health regimen, there is a very high probability you would still have your appendix, and the cash you spent on your operation. And you would have the health and physical condition you should have had as a teenager.
"Obamacare" itself is not the problem. The problem lies with what Obamacare was supposed to fix. But, like all Democrat 'fizes', it simply adds a new layer of complexity and bureaucracy to an already overly-complex system. And 'fizes' nothing in the process.
The problem has been in treating healthcare like just another business...it isn't. There are some things you just don't monetize, regardless of the potential profits to be had. I'm sure there'd be a lot of money in selling human organs, but we haven't crossed THAT line. Yet.
Most folks would immediately see the problem with allowing human organs to be bought and sold like pork bellies, and would rightly say No, we should NOT allow that. But those same folks don't see the problem with a child with severe dental issues DYING because his parents can't afford a dentist, and dental isn't covered, or just barely, with many plans. (Yes, bad teeth can cause heart attacks...did you know that? And dental coverage is not just about cosmetic veneers and braces.)
No one should be denied basic medical care because they can't afford it. No one should get breast implants on the taxpayers dime either, but basic care is NOT a luxury item to be denied to the poor. And dental should be part of your health insurance...teeth are part of your body and effect your health. Dentists need to get with the program here and stop acting like some kind of Medieval guild or something.
The times when we exchanged booze or produce for care sure seemed a lot better than these "exchanges." To me the whole process strikes me as the setting up of yet another "Information Exchange" run by the NSA.
The first of these Obamacare insurance cooperatives failed in Iowa today. Of course they dropped the news on christmas eve, after tens of thousands had signed up for 2015 coverage and paid their premiums. Now these poor bastards will be scrambling around trying to get covered and hoping they don't need their coverage during January.
Interesting to note travelers healthcare coverage for people visiting the USA has cheaper premiums with better coverage than Obamacare.
The fact is Americans can buy travelers healthcare insurance coverage.
Currently it's cheaper to fly to Lima, Peru and pay cash for surgery/healthcare/hospital stays. The physicians are multilingual and likely trained in USA medical schools. This is why the large shipping companies fly their sick/injured ship employees to Lima if they require hospitalization and surgery/treatments. The foreign hospitals in Lima are like 5 star hotels.
Cost in Lima Peru for ambulance from cruise ship to hospital, ER, x-rays, head & neck MRI, overnight hospitalization, consult with 2 ER docs, 1 Neurosurgeon...$168 TOTAL...and you can put it on your Visa card.
Wake up Americans, you are being scammed by your own government. Social Security income based on contributions is also a huge scam. You will probably get triple the monthy income PLUS retain all your cash principle if you put that same Social Security contribution into an ordinary investment fund.
http://www.travelinsure.com/what/vusarate.asp
The herd is only in the first gate of financial ruin. The second gate is ALL the retirement monies in all the financial institutions. All paper backed by what? All that capital [labor saved] is being debased by targeted inflation, but there is enough to grab. ACA is the current modus, just wait. Cog?
Merry Christmass,
Rene
Many miles (of second, third and fourth order debasement, theft and confiscation) to go before I sleep.
Who is providing the care? The doctor or the Government?
It's articles like this that will make me subscribe as a member on two ice floes. For real.
"...its only remaining purpose from here to perpetuity is to grind our bones to make its bread."
Brilliant.
We would love for you to join. Always room at the inn for intelligent and open minded conversation.
The purpose of insurance is to guard against financial disaster. Not financial inconvenience, but financial disaster. CD has written yet another very interesting article, but doesn't provide much practical advice for those of us unable or unwilling to exit the system at the present time. And while comments such as "Fuck the System!" and "Kill all the bankers!" can be quite cathartic, it doesn't change the current economic reality until you actually do something.
So, here are few suggestions for complying with the existing criminality that is the ACA:
1. Start a business, any business (it cost around $400 to incorporate via Legalzoom.com). The ability to write-off liabilities is huge (assuming you don't claim ridiculous amounts and/or crazy items that would trigger an audit by the IRS). By reimbursing yourself for business expenses (which can a whole lot of stuff you use in your daily life), you can keep your declared salary low and qualify for a subsidy to offset some if not all the premium required to maintain medical insurance under the tyrannical ACA. If researching U.S. & state tax codes isn't your cup of tea, then consult a CPA--a good one is worth any fees he will charge.
2. Start a Health Savings Account. This is similar to an IRA, but is used specificially for health care needs. The 2015 Individual Contribution Limit is $3,350 and the 2015 Family Contribution Limit is $6,650. These are pre-taxed dollars, so these amounts are deducted from your declared income just like IRA contributions.
3. Get the highest deductible plan you can find (check out ehealthinsurance.com for rates). Normally, this will be between $10K - $12.5K. Remember, like life insurance, you hope never to have to use these policies--they're for catastrophic illness only.
4. Use the money saved from your HSA and the high-deductible health plan to join a gym, eat better, and improve the overall physical quality of your life. And keep educating yourself by reading a variety of websites such as ZH.
5. Remember, it's not the cards you're dealt, it's how you play them. Never let the bastards get to you. And keep stacking both PM's and ammo.
Best wishes & Merry Christmas!
The result of a world wide global fiat monetary system. Inflation shifts wealth toward the powerful and politically connected, the middle class and the poor get poorer, the ones at the bottom go onto welfare and become dependent and hopeless....the rich get richer and consolidate power at the top even above the bounds of the US government which is also growing. Anyone opposing the system is a danger to it since it must always expand and consolidate more power which increases as the structure becomes more unstable and the list of people who are dangerous eventually expands to include all but those who walk on their knees. Of course an entrie system based on force and theft can only use those same means to propagate itself so the military and police state expands. I'm not sure if it can be fixed, but it would proably have to be done through the monetary system. There has to be rewards for saving and the workers have to be able to keep the wealth. The whole system of theft would have to be practically abolished. I don't think it's possible.
Universal healthcare/medicare woulda been so much worse, eh? Don't wanna get in bed with the rest of those developed western "communist" countries, after all--they got no NO FREE MARKET!!
Of course, as long as the AMA has been controlling the supply of doctors, much as they might like to posture about the grave dangers of "socialized medicine," there has NEVER BEEN A FREE MARKET FOR MEDICAL SERVICES IN THE US during modern times. That's what monopolies do, right . . . and the reason, while being only a small percentage of the population with intelligence in the top 1%, they are a far, far greater proportion of the those with incomes in the top 0.5%. There's no point in beating this horse, however . . . it will only incite AMA trolls to enter with their tales of struggle and woe threatenting to Go Galt and let us all just die. As if everybody doesn't know virtually all of them are making far better livings than they would in a real free market.
Getting to the IRS piece of the equation, though . . . tax day will be a bloodbath for people at the lower income levels, say, $20-30k per year, who dealt with unstable employment--temp job economy, anyone?--or for any other reason misjudged their income for the last year when forced to estimate it in advance to meet the legal mandate to enroll in an insurance plan. Those who guessed to the low side, at least (and how many people would you guess estimated to the high side, given that the government subsidies for the wildly unaffordable insurance they were faced with were higher for those with lower incomes.)
People who guessed low are indeed gonna have government enforcer IRS demanding a large percentage of the difference in their post-tax income as repayment for the "undeserved" subsidy. Picture somebody with an income of $20k (gross) income getting a $2,000 bill from the IRS for making $3,000 more than expected last year.
How the fuck will they ever pay it . . . when their insurance premium for this year, along with copays, deductables and "co-insurance" liability, will all balloon dramatically due to outrageous premium hikes and their slightly greater income last year?
Expect a fucking disaster.
Too bad so few saw it coming.
Health care is unaffordable because there is no competition between the various types of medicine.
It's our state governments that gave Ambulance or Allopathic medicine a government-protected monopoly to diagnose, treat and cure ALL medicine including degenerative diseases that represents 90% of medical care.
The rest of the world is using cheap Chinese, Naturopathic, Homeopathic or Ayurvedic medicine and they aren’t dropping like flies like Americans want to believe.
Monopoly Allopathic Medicine has duped Americans into believing that disease strikes randomly like lightning from germs or genetics and that we have little control over our health.
Louis Pasteur finally admitted on his death bed that germs don’t cause disease but the terrain is the chief cause.
The terrain is the state of cleanliness or toxicity in the body that enables our immune system to reverse or prevent disease unencumbered.
With government-protected Monopoly Medicine it's all about maximizing profits and getting patients on daily "maintenance" drugs. There's no interest in cures or cost containment.
In fact investors who have Big Pharma stock should sell ASAP because when the dollar devalues, corrupt agencies like the FDA that protect the "Standard of Care" favoring Big Pharma and Monopoly Quack Medicine will probably decline also.
Like the corrupt Fed, these are the last days of government-protected monopolies and if they had to compete with cheaper, safer and far more effective natural medicine like Homeopathy, Naturopathy or Chinese Medicine they would likely be starved for patients.
The last time the dangerous Allopaths competed in the marketplace in 1900 they could only attract 14% of patients.
The public was afraid of them and fortunately there was still a free market in medicine so the public chose affordable, safe and vastly more effective natural medicine.
In the 1918 Flu Pandemic, the Allopaths lost 30% of their patients. The Alternative Medical providers lost 1%.
Allopaths were known as the Quicks (later Quacks) for the quicksilver or mercury they poisoned their patients with.
They're still poisoning patients with toxic mercury in vaccines along with aluminum, MSG and formaldehyde embalming fluid.
They're also poisoning and killing patients with chemotherapy for cancer that's a derivative of WW1 mustard gas.
Because we allowed EU Organized Crime through their Jesuit, Zionist and Masonic agents to take over our money and medicine around 1913, we allowed the Quacks of the day, a government-protected monopoly and drove out the true healers.
The sheeple to this day still believe the myth that Ambulance Allopathic Medicine earned it's government-protected monopoly status because it's the only "proven and scientific" medicine.
Nothing could be further from the truth. It's a vicious, cruel lie that 90% of Americans not only believe, but even defend.
Forget about government-protected monopolies containing costs and becoming affordable, our hidden rulers are getting a huge belly laugh on their way to the bank.
Visit naturalnews.com and mercola.com and educate and treat yourself with cheap, safe and effective natural medicine that cleans up your immune system terrain and turns on powerful prevention.
Empower yourself and dispel the myth, power and fraud of Monopoly Quack Medicine.
Allopathic ambulance medicine specializes in stabilizing traumatic accidents and that’s what they should be restricted to doing.
PBS doctor Andrew Weil MD says that Allopathic Medicine has no business treating degenerative diseases just as natural medicine has no business treating accident victims.
We’ve all been duped by our organized-crime hidden rulers into believing false paradigms about medicine and money.
It’s time we woke up and started controlling our economic future and health. We will all find that the body is enormously powerful in keeping us healthy without the poisoning agendas and interventions of corrupt men.
Sam - yes, that outlines the big picture, but while you're mentioning mercury, don't forget the dentists!
Veterinarians treat your precious pet exactly like humans (over-vaccinated and poly-pharmacy) with one exception: animals don't sit there with their teeth being soaked in fluoride gel twice a year, and they don't get their teeth drilled and filled with mercury amalgam.
I blame my dentist for my health issues (gold crown over amalgam) and I blame my allopathic MDs for abdicating responsibility for the mouth to the other 'quacks'. When was the last time you ever heard about an MD investigating what has gone on in the mouth? Call for copies of dental records? Never. "Oral History" means just listening to your gripes.
Your mercury filled teeth sit right under your brain and right over your thyroid, the two organs we are having lots of trouble with.
See the work of Hal Huggins, David Kennedy DDS, and Andrew Hall Cutler PhD, and Boyd Haley PhD
Merry Christmas
You people don't listen, you don't observe,,,THEY OWN YOU!!! They fucking OWN YOU!!! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rsL6mKxtOlQ & there is nothing you can do about it....NOTHING....THERY OWN YOU!!!!!
We can only imagine, as with all other humans, that once they have what they desire, they will quickly grow dissatisfied and find us more trouble than we are worth. Once our labors have filled the grain reserves and funded the technology needed to replace us, I believe we will be gone. Everything we are experiencing is transitory, a step on the path, not an end. The end is our end.
Well, since there is nothing we can do we might as well just crawl into some dark corner and die.
Or..........we can look within and begin our own inner journey of personal growth and self fulfillment.
While on that journey, there still remains the possibility to let any doctor you'd probably ever need stare down the wrong side of a dark guns barrel, since it is in the end there where every justice derives from, anyways. Merry christmas, my friends ...
I won't go to a doctor. I'd rather smoke and be sore and have a short life than participate in this Fascist paradise.
If you go to a Dr. you are the problem.
If you are a doctor you are the problem.
Just like crooked cops, expect to see crooked specialists gunned down in broad daylight too. People with nothin to lose will take as many as they can that have something to lose.
I see a death bed conversion coming on
I would be remiss if I didn't mention this. I will preface by stating that many of my immediate relatives are employees of hospitals and leave it at that. So it stands to follow that we might know a few doctors and there is particular one that you should know about. I have actually done some work on his property because he is not a young guy. We will just leave his name out of it. When Obamacare was passed our M.D. friend did not like it and got rather angry about it so he started accumulating large volumes of paperwork regarding the matter. He started giving the hospital admin some grief about it.
What you need to know is that there are people like me who may be obtuse at times and people like this doctor who really is a kind soul. I will burn in hell before this guy will. Just a very easy going guy who is very intelligent. I have never seen the guy angry but he got angry about Obamacare and proceeded with his documentation of why it is so wrong. Much of it had to do with what he could or could not do as medical practice. That is something that I do fully understand but he said he was being limited in what he could do by this law and he didn't like it. Here is a guy who did doctors without borders who has experience without everything at his disposal but that is not what he was asking for. What he was saying was that if we have it let's use it. Obamacare won't allow for that because some asshole bill writers think they know better.
We can go further down road but I digress. Our doctor friend took his paperwork to the board of directors at the hospital he was employed by and lodged his complaints several times and told them why it won't work. What do you think happened? Yep, they finally fired him a few weeks back. All the guy wanted to do was to help people when they where sick and he got fired for it. He refused to acquiesce to authority.
That is ridiculous....it just is. Does anyone really realize how hard those jobs must be? I hear about it often. I could not do those jobs unless I was forced to by necessity. You need to have a certain demeanor to be able to do those kinds of jobs. I know what I am and I am the kind of guy that will rip the door off the hinges. I admit this. People who give health care are not like me and I find this legislation to be more than offensive. My nature is to fight but their is nature is to heal if they can. I have a lot of respect for their ability to do so. Have you ever been to a nursing home? I rather just shoot myself in the head to be perfectly honest. I am not going to put my children through that ordeal.
So we are thinking of opening up a small family practice facility with the doctor who was fired. My Russian wife has a great knowledge of herbs and other holistic things that can heal and they DO work. You really don't need ciprofloxacin every day.
That is the story so far so I will let you know how it goes.
Peace.
Obamacare is giving physicians directives to WITHHOLD USUAL AND CUSTOMARY MEDICAL CARE on certain patients. Essentially if you are 70 or older, severely disabled or a baby born with serious defects you will be relegated through systems and forms to only receive "Progressive Care Pathway" or "Comfort Care", both of which are essentially no medical care or treatment, no food, no hydration, absolutely no treatments, pharmaceuticals or surgeries..........until you die.
They will (legally, through Obamacare policies/directives) administer Haldol (to keep you unresponsive and bedridden) and Morphine (to arrest your ability to breathe). It can take 2 days to 2 weeks to die lying in a hospital bed receiving nothing. If you're old you could go the the ER for pheumonia and be withheld usual and customary medical care and be dead in days.
Read up on the UK's Liverpool Care Pathway where some UK physicians assert 29% of seniors have been systematically relegated to early death by withholding all medical care. Obamcare treatment/no treatment policies are patterned after LCP. Canada is doing the same thing with their elders, an example is withholding dialysis from seniors, in Canada elders are not even allowed to get on the waiting list for life saving dialysis.
Obamacare is total control of your body and when you are allowed to live or die. You have to leave the USA to receive usual and customary medical care if you want to live under Obamacare policies and procedures.
And the insurance companies will get away with not paying, even if your premiums are up to date.
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/11/24/how-the-health-care-bur...
Good luck to you, and all I can say is DON'T TAKE INSURANCE!
In the small coastal town I live in (Oregon), there are no private practices left. Everybody captitulated and became an employee of the hospital because the hospital could get reimbursed 3 times as much for outpatient work as the private practitioner could. Can't beat em, then join em. Until you get fired for being a heretic, that is.
If I need medical care, I travel 70 miles to a naturopath/acupuncturist who still keeps hand written charts filed in manila folders on the shelves in her office. Cash only, no insurance.
careful on the small family practice idea. find out why small family practice guys leave that. and find out what is involved in trying to untie yourself from a small family practice.....THAT is a very long payment process because you have to keep your practice insurance afterwards for many years because one of your patients may sue you later. years later. ect ect.
If your friend is a member of the American Medical Association he deserves hell in spades.
Tell him so. Rank and file sellouts -- every -- single -- one.
He is not. He is a stupid guy.
http://otdon.blogspot.co.uk/2014/12/the-stupidity-of-voters.html
It's all about the stupidity of voters
You Americans, to save a few bucks, should cut off your own balls. You don't need 'em anymore!
Funny story there. Maybe some day I shall tell it when Mrs Cog is out of the room. :-)
I can barely stand to be among the zombies anymore, their self imposed bubbles of ignorance are seriously bumming me out. I find my desire to communicate with them and listen to their twaddle dwindling, even among family members. It is becoming a self imposed isolation. Judging by CD's retreat to some remote mountain top, I can see that I am not alone.
I find interacting with strangers at times more enjoyable. You can get surprisingly deep for a passing conversation, but not so deep either my ignorance or theirs is obvious. Plus people are often surprised and sometimes delighted to make a new contact who has more to say than just casual conversation.
As Mrs Cog often says people just want to be 'seen' by others and this stranger will do if he sates that need.
Of course I am also interested in people and enjoy hearing their stories.... up to a point. Carry that conversation on a little further and soon I am avoiding pot holes because I am uncertain whether what I might be construed as "offensive". Even the one clear litmus test to determine if they are awake has been banished to to impolite conversation: what exactly happened to building 7?
As a former confirmed people avoider, I know just what you mean. The funny thing is, the same strange rural people who have no concept of the nature of the ponzi or the big lie, maybe even ones who look funny and/or shop at Walmart, they can produce their own food and fix things when they break. These are the people who avoided life on the urban treadmill and all those onerous student loans. Old school common sense and problem solving still exists in pockets everywhere. So who am I to say I'm more awake than them? I'd go as far as to say learning a bit of humility has done more to wake me up than information on any agenda.
Obamascare is unconstitutional. Great article, as usual Cog. Merry, Happy, whatever to you and Mrs. Cog. Hang in there. It can only get worse.