This page has been archived and commenting is disabled.
The Subtle Slavery of Obamacare
The Subtle Slavery of Obamacare: The Cattle Chute of Coerced Cooperation in the Collective Corruption
By
Cognitive Dissonance
You will always find original articles by Cognitive Dissonance and other authors first on www.TwoIceFloes.com before they are posted here on ZH.
To become a Premium or Basic member click here. If you wish to subscribe to ‘Dispatches’, a periodic newsletter from Cognitive Dissonance and TwoIceFloes Creations, please click here.
“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.
- advertisements -
(Banker) Beef. It's what's for dinner. :-)
With a nice hot Political Potato, dripping with...butter ;-)
and hot apple pie with some WHIPPING CREAM...
Cog
All good points. But respectfully off point in regards to the real issues. Obama Care, as with ALL entitlements fall under the umbrella of the Soial Security Act. Without VOLUNTARY participation in the system, you and I wou;ld be ineligible for any of it. This is the scam in a nutshell:
Great Depression, New Deal Legislation. The Feds create the SS Act. The launguage of the ACT ties it directly to State Police powers. (Unemployment, Old Age Survivor as a nexus to "POOR LAWS". The States then seek federal permission to join the other States in the ACT via the federal Compact Clause. See Article 1, section 10 US Const. What the feds did here was to create a PRIVILEGE. What the courts of Law and Equity would classify as extraordinary protections paid for with money from the public treasury. YOU have No Liberty or Property in Public Money. SS is NOT a Contract as the terms of the grant can be modified or taken away at the will of the legislative body that created the Act.
Back to the PRIVILEGE. The feds DO NOT exercise State Police Powers. They are constitutionally confined to dealing with that which falls within its own jurisdiction. And now understand that Congress can TAX the privileges it creates. Yes Roberts was right. As to the feds, Obama Care is an exercise of the federal TAXING POWER. But why, how can they mandate this? They cant. YOU were CONNED into volunteering and the courts are in the position that YOU were suppose to be fully aware of what you got into. Forget about non disclosure. The courts will not hear of it.
Back to SS. You or your parents had to APPLY as a means to get into the system. The application, in law, operates as a WAIVER of your constitutional protections of CONTRACT and PROPERTY in exchange for those protections within the system. The EXCISE of PRIVILEGE tax witheld from your pay uses the WAGE as a unit of measurement to calculate the indirect Excise. The amount of which CANNOT be controled by the courts as the are barred under separation of powers from interefering with political questions. Translated, they can take 100% of what you earn and leave you with NOTHING save a few future promises to pay....if Congress does not change its mind. The courts function is to maintain procedural due process guaruntees as everyone must be treated equally under the law. The courts will go further.
So how do we stop this madness? Look back to the States and Article 1, section 10. The contract clause. The States are PROHIBITED from interfereing with the obligation of contracts. I work for you. We agree on a price for the job. Payment represents the obligation. Property exchanged for property. Yet the feds can take up to 100% of the obligation. But NOT without inital State Cooperation that was necessary to start the whole "system" in the first place. So the States handed the feds the power to do something they themselves are constitutionally prohibited from doing. Moreover, ALL federal direct taxes on property (your labor) would be subject to the "apportionment clause". Not anymore as the States handed the feds the MEANS to WALK AROUND that clause via indirect excise using the "PROPERTY" as a unit of measurement to calculate the indirect excise.
Can the States do that? Existing USSC case laws says NO. But they did and NO PERSON, NO case or controversy has EVER been placed before the courts regarding this issue. The States are CORRUPT and the founders new it. Thatrs why they inserted the CONTRACT CLAUSE in the first place. Moreover, the States had NO POWER to expand the scope of a federal excise whereby negating the apportionment of direct taxes.
THAT is the issue. There are No others.
30 years and over 60,000 hours of study in the areas of constitutional law we are dealing with. The courts CAN NOT help us until the correct arguments are brought forth. And now, via WAIVERS, .gov has absolute and total control of every aspect of our lives. The SS ACT is the means to ALL excises collected from wages STATE AND FEDERAL.
MWB
Farmington MN
You have the delusion that our courts are about written law and a further fantasy about correct arguments. The courts of the USA merged the British courts of law and the British courts of equity (chancery). The fantasy of the British was that equity had some common meaning. Equity means whatever the court says is equitable or just, as opposed to obeying the common or statute (written)law. The US courts go further and claim there's case law, aka the arbitrary prior decisions of the courts.
Our courts are corrupt, venal and capricious. What should be displayed over every US courthouse entrance is "Abandon all hope of justice, law or equity, ye who enter here. Make prior arrangements through your attorney to influence the judge."
The courts and now the hospitals are pirate ships in dry dock. The consequences of going on board are predictable. You will be plundered.
"Come into my web," said the spider to the fly.
"Equity means whatever the court says is equitable or just, as opposed to obeying the common or statute (written) law. The US courts go further and claim there's case law, aka the arbitrary prior decisions of the courts."
If everybody who reads (and understands) Reapers comment and doesn't upvote it, they have no "right" to vote on anything for the rest of their lives because they are too stupid to vote or conduct their own affairs for themselves.
He is pointing out that one bad ruling by a past court (whose members are long dead) can compound upon itself into the future, to the point where, some stupid bitch will cite the Commerce Clause in the Constitution (in that case, regulating wheat production that the market would have solved by itself almost a century ago) as proof that her actions are legitimate and lawful.
As a matter of fact, you don't even have the right to breath our exhaled air.
This is what is killing us. "The courts are corrupt" Or is it possible that they appear corrupt because the overwhelming vast majority simply do not understand them nor do they understand the concept of CONTEXT when reading case law.
You bring up the infamous "Wheat Case". Another EXCEPTION to the commerce powers. But HOW??? Look to the Agricultural Act of that time. Wheat was the object of federal price support. What does this mean? It means that Farmers as private citizens where receiving compensation for their product from THE PUBLIC TREASURY. A PRIVILEGE created by the legislative branch. NO rights of liberty or property involved. So Congress can tie SUMMARY CONDITIONS to the reciept of public money as long as those CONDITIONS have some nexus, however tenuous, to AN ENUMERATED POWER. Hence, if you accept public money, DONT GROW WHEAT FOR YOUR OWN CONSUMPTION because of its cause and effect relationship of negating your purchase of wheat MOVING IN COMMERCE whereby affecting PRICE subject to SUPPORT from the treasury.
But no!!! It now means that congress can summarily plow our gardens under via mere legislative Act. WTF is wrong with people? Are they really that fucking stupid???
YES, its a fucking mess. Yes the commerce clause has been blown out of proportion. But the courts are NOT corrupt. The dangers we face are based in ignorance. And now this case law is cited continuousely by every hack government lawyer claiming commerce powers as the basis of legitimate federal legislation. BULLSHIT!!!! Case law must be read within CONTEXT and to lift that case law up and out of context results in confusion and chaos.
When it comes time for your final judgement, do you to expect God to pick and chose between various laws, Islamic, Catholic, Moses, law of the jungle, or case law from Judge Bean, to judge you? You appear not to have much experience in US courts to trust that they are not corrupt. You have the fantasy that if the right argument is made, you'll prevail. If you're ill, do you want your doctors to consult case medicine and bleed you as they did Washington. If a thousand judges do a wrong or corrupt thing, it's still a wrong or corrupt thing.
Trust in government and/or trust or hope in law, judges or courts is an opiate through which they control you.
What then is the alternative to peaceful redress within the existing system? The ONLY alternative is another bloody, violent civil war. A war I now know cannot be avoided. But still against all odds I maintain hope that somehow reason will prevail. The courts are not self activating. Someone with money and procedural knowledge must properly present a case or controversy pursuant to a legitimate constitutional question. In the case of Obama Care and the SS ACT, No person has come anywhere close.
And yes I have experience in the court system. Specifically Minnesota State courts. The judicial branch in this State is a train wreck. Yet I have sued several times over the past 10 years and have been succesful in getting the government to back down. Present the correct argument and watch the legal manuvering begin. The government always attempts to redirect. Strawman type rebutals. When the smoke clears and the administrative agencies find that they have been stalemated into a corner they simply sweep the matter under the rug and go about business as usual. But make no mistake. The governor, the AG, several State Commissioners and local prosecuters know who I am. I put up a garage without a building permit and the chief Code enforcement officer in the State (Commissioner Dept of Labor and Industry) called me after I sued the State and its building inspector. Long story short, my legal arguments had them so concerned that he went against the States AG position and ordered the matter droped in its entirety. Did anything change? No. They still enforce the "Code" (business regulations) against homeowners as if the creation of the Code were an ordinary exercise of State Police powers. They are not. Its simple. The State licenses contractors. Contractors are engaged in a licensed and taxable business/occupational privilege affecting the health, saftey, and property rights of those they contract with. The power to license includes the power to regulate. The power to regulate (the privilege) includes the power to create an entire body of building construction performance standards under the license. The CODE does NOT regulate property but regulates the ACT of building construction THE ACTIVITY.
Now THINK CONTEXT. WHAT has the State tied its police powers to in the creation of the law? The PROPERTY RIGHT you and I exercise when we build and improve our own property? Or a taxable business/occupational privilege affecting anothers property?? IN THE EYES OF THE JUDICIARY THE POLICE POWERS TAKE ON AN ENTIRELY DIFFERENT MEANING. But 2 principles cannot be ignored. The LAW must be enforced equally upon all who would fall within its scope. Additionally the LAW MUST be enforced within the purpose and CONTEXT in which it was created. Whe you execise a property right, are you similarly situated as the licenced contracter? UNDER THE LAW AS WRITTEN YOU ARE IN THE EYES OF THE COURTS.
Further. What is the State really doing? Its placing restrictions on one mans property via licensed third pary who lacks PROPERTYY and therefore STANDING to argue that those restrictions are UNREASONABLE under a standard of judicial scrutiny that would apply to a CIVIL LIBERTY.
Faced with the prospect that this issue would find its way to the Supreme court, they simply droped the issue. The State refused to enforce the code whereby removing my standing to bring an action against its enforcement.
And thats how the shitshow works.
There is no law within the present court system. "Someone with money and procedural knowledge must properly present a case or controversy pursuant to a legitimate constitutional question." This is a delusion of somehow there's hope; somewhere there's a brilliant lawyer; somewhere a judge who'll listen; in some federal district circuit court, there'll be honorable judges; if I take it to the Supreme Court with the right argument, they'll fix it.
Please enjoy your fantasies about some Superman-attorney convincing the Supreme Court, or a Circuit Appeals Court, or a local Federal District Judge. Your case would never be heard by the Supreme Court, because the Supreme Court would reject your Petition for a Writ of Certiorari.
wrong writ
Ignorance and delusions can oft be corrected. http://www.supremecourt.gov/ctrules/2013RulesoftheCourt.pdf
False hope of eventual salvation enslaves us to impossible and oppressive situations.
Exactly! People Tend to forget that we have 3 branches of government. It is not up to the judiciary branch to make law, but to interpret and protect unalienable rights. Our Supreme Court is accountable to no one, that is the reason they don't have the power to make law. We were never meant to rely on previous outcome court rulings.
These rulings were to act as a guide, not replace or rewrite law. But here is where we get screwed. 2 words "Compliance" and "Consent". Which unfortunately for us, our populace thinks we are democracy. They think because 51% of the population tows the line they must consent even though they would rather not comply. Because of this mass delusion of a majority rule, to many non-thinkers its habit to comply to unconstitutional laws. Like "Mandatory" insurance.
I have a theory, if enough of us (25%) stopped feeding the beast in the form of fiat tax dollars (Compliance), and opt out (Withdraw our consent) of those things we blindly consented to, the inevitable will happen. THE SHIT SHOW WILL FINALLY START! Forcing the zombie idiots to wake from their slumber.
You are deluded.
Judges are the poliicians with the longest terms, no more, no less.
Interpret & protect the written words, the rule of law, thats all the courts are supposed to do. Not find what is not there with its interpretations and then side (as a branch of government itself) against the people, that is not protection.
That is authoritarianism.
My friend. I do understand what you are saying, having spent many hours researching exactly what you are discussing.
But what you are talking about is the legal manipulation and maneuverings of a corrupt system, a corruption that began long before the last few decades.
A better question might be, "Where does the corruption actually originate"? If you were to say from the top down I would vigorously disagree. I find it originates within ourselves. You cannot con an honest man. You simply cannot.
Ultimately any Con requires consent until it no longer does because all power has been willingly conceded and completely transferred. You speak of that in your comment. My question is....why was it allowed in the first place? The simple answer is that the concession came dressed up as a benefit, something received for less than what is put in. What is unsustainable will not be sustained.
Thank you for your comment. It is good to read such a broad yet concise summary.
We've been tracking. Like minded. From the aloha to the pine tree state.
Memo to all: PAY THE FUCKING FINE
It can't be a fine and I don't pay extortion or taxes to corporations. I have the option to not drive on public roads (thus not requiring "insurance") don't I?
As it stands now, by law, they can't collect the "fine" if THEY don't owe you anything after conficating some of your wages from your labor and them holding it "for you" (sans interest), commonly called income taxes.
If I were laid off tomorrow, I would tell them to eat shit and die. They can't collect jack if you don't have it to collect and the last of my shit would be out of their system (401k).
Fuck em, find me.
That's like.....eight time zones.
Still jet lagged? :-)
I wonder how much of the 1.7B ACA the legislature, judiciary and surving presidents got for keeping their mouths shut about this obvious theft.
I suspect the 'vig' was a quarter to a third......at least.
Great article Cog. The corruption in the sick-care industry goes so much deeper than just the insurance racket. Death by Medicine
Powerful video. The corruption runs silent and runs deep.
Folks, not that the criminals if the DC US or their fascist masters care, but ObamaCare is UNCONSTITUTIONAL.
The Constitution bars non-apportioned direct taxes, TWICE. The only exception being the taxing of "income" in the 16th.
The 9th. and 10th. say that what is explicitly permitted to the governmnet created by the Constitution, the United States governmnet, is all that is allowed it, nothing more. Mandated health insurance is not permitted, or even mentioned, and therefor is Unconstitutional.
Additionally, nothing in the Constitution permits only the governmnet to decide what is or isn't "Constitutional." That would is a ridiculous proposition. You, the American individual, the American people, are the arbitrators of what is Constitutional.
ObamaCare is Unconstitutional, and you need not comply. So don't.
The banksters need to repay us.
Most Americans need to throwout the indoctrination they received in "school," and reevaluate their point of view of the Constitution.
The first and foremost question that each and every American needs to ask and answer for themselves is: "Did the states unite and then create a limited national government, the United States governmnet, over the American country, or did they create an unlimited national governmnet, the United States nation, that replaced the American country? Are you a citizen of the American country, or are you a subject of the United States nation?"
The rule of (Constitutional) law is dead, long live the law. While everyone can point to their own favorite violation, I see the Rubicon crossed completely when the GM senior bondholders were entirely circumvented with nary a peep of protest. Of course, it was done for "We the People". Or at least that is what we are told and wish to believe. To do otherwise would require we grow some balls.
"Rights' must be defended because they are never upheld by those who wish to debase them. "We the People" have long since abandoned that line in the sand and are rapidly retreating. The rout has only just begun.
The Con Game grows primarily because 'our' confidence wanes.
Sir, great articles, and writing. Thank you.
With respect, but the Constitution is more important today than ever, as it, and it alone, can be the unifying force and goal of the American people. Without it, what do we fight for? What do we want? Where are we going? Without the Constitution, our battle with our enemy will devolve into a battle between ourselves. The enemy will win. Will win our persons, our land, our souls, and the American country.
We should be fighting for the Restoration of the "Law of the Land," and the Constitutional republic. Then we can debate, argue, and fight, over our desired direction and future. Otherwise, without a unifying cause, the American people will remain adrift on the violent seas of division to be crushed against the rocks of a unified enemy.
Our future cannot be debated while the enemy of our future remains.
The banksters need to repay us.
"Otherwise, without a unifying cause, the American people will remain adrift on the violent seas of division to be crushed against the rocks of a unified enemy."
Hard to argue against that. But if you live by the sword, you die by the sword. If it takes a unified herd to implement change the herd can also be redirected to serve its oppressors. That is exactly what has gone on for decades now.
I often think about why so many 'rebellions' either fail or, after 'winning', become just another oppressor. The herd is easily co-opted and redirected. It as an age old problem ancient philosophers discussed thousands of years ago.
We are awash in rackets - stated policies as camoflage for the unstated criminal realities.
ObummerCare is but one of the most recent egregious and egregarious iterations.
The corruption is everywhere and permeates everything we interact with. This is the last gasp of Empire and also its most destructive. Eventually Empire consumes its own when it can no longer consume others.
CD, I don't know if you're familiar with the work of Douglas Valentine, but his book The Phoenix Program in Vietnam describes the template. Make sure you hear the very end of the podcast as it has his last paragraph of the book where he predicted its domestic evolution.
The Phoenix has landed: http://www.boilingfrogspost.com/2013/08/09/de-manufacturing-consent-with...
I am not at all familiar with this author. Thank you for the heads up.
sometime(s) i envy stupids that know nothing about what we all know...
happiness is bliss :)
happy fucking holidays :))
Pretty good rant, Cog. At least Something Has Happened to start to deal with the double digit per year health costs in the Private Sector for decades prior to ACA. People could lose everything because of health care billing. We now HAVE to address this and decide what is right and what is not. If that is all ACA ever does then that was enough.
Nice summary CD.
60% of Americans have bad credit. I have believed from the start, that one goal of this, is to put another 39% of us in that box.
"We rigged some folks"
http://www.forbes.com/sites/christinalamontagne/2014/08/26/medical-debts...
And another rule is changed to enable one more kick of the can down the road. Who else here thinks the impossible will soon be not only possible, but highly probable?
Sooner or later, debt will be passed on to next of kin just like wealth presently is.
"Sooner or later, debt will be passed on to next of kin just like wealth presently is."
Has already happened in Japan, and being considered elsewhere.
IXQ multigenerational mortgages
step by step...slowly but surely...eventually they'll have it all...all in the interest of helping the American people of course...
From my point of view 'they' already have it all. We are only now receiving notice of the fact after the fact.
agreed...personally, I'm surprised more people aren't rushing for the lifeboats...
There is no more apt description than 'deer in the headlights' to describe the general population. On a one-on-one basis we find many people are somewhat aware of the coming storm. Most, however, feel powerless to stop it and consider it unimaginable to begin to withdraw.
I find it astounding so many millions of plantation slaves can mingle among each other and yet feel so utterly alone. The secret is no one personally feels 'they' are a slave, just everyone else. Critical thinking skills have not been taught in public schools for several generations and it clearly shows.
The meat grinder continues to process the consumer, so all they can do is follow the person in front of them into its maw.
Good explanation CD...
Population awareness and reactions are like turning a large oil tanker. We have to reach critical mass before most see what's going on.
It is coming soon when you extend the costs out. For many of us here, we opt out and won't pay the tax. Doctors are beginning to look at opting out and setting up local payment systems instead of obamacare. Seems to me that new ways to pay and accessibility will run headlong into ever changing health legistration to deliver herky-zerky healthcare at best.
Holee F$%k! That place you live in is super scary.
I'm certainly glad now that I live in North Korea. Best of luck to you all.
Sum Ting Wong
The Totalitarian Tip Toe. Before you know it you find yourself living smack dab in the middle of a banana republic........or the new North Korea.
'They' (meaning the rest of the world and not fictitious 'terrorists') don't hate us for our freedom, they just hate us. And payback is gonna be a bitch.
What to do?
Is it better to live inside the evil empire or not?