Archives for November 2013

House Speaker John Boehner recently vowed never to go to conference over the Senate immigration reform bill but he still intends to forge an immigration bill that largely achieves the same things, according to Center for Immigration Studies Executive Director Mark Krikorian.

Krikorian also says House Republicans have stiffened their resolve against amnesty as a result of the recent government shutdown battle and the disastrous roll out of Obamacare.

Last week, many opponents of the Senate bill rejoiced when Boehner announced the House would not be part of any negotiations involving the bill.

“The idea that we’re going to take up a 1,300-page bill that no one had ever read, which is what the Senate did, is not going to happen in the House.  And frankly, I’ll make clear that we have no intention of ever going to conference on the Senate bill,” said Boehner.

Krikorian says that is an encouraging sign from Boehner because that statement is very different from his original intentions.

“I’ve talked to people on the inside and this really was the plan that he’s now backed away from, was to pass a border security bill and then go to conference with the Senate.  In other words, (he wanted to) negotiate with the Senate and stick the Senate bill into the House bill and present it to House members as an accomplished fact that they have to vote for,” said Krikorian

While that approach has been thwarted, Boehner admitted at the same press conference that he is still pursuing major immigration legislation in this Congress through the work of the House Judiciary Committee and chairman Bob Goodlatte.

“Chairman Goodlatte is working with our members and across the aisle, developing a set of principles that will help guide us as we deal with this issue,” said Boehner.  “I want us to deal with this issue, but I want to deal with it in a common sense, step-by-step way.”

For Krikorian, this is a much better approach to lawmaking, but one that will likely end up with a product not much different than the Senate produced.

“What the House is planning to do is pass targeted, smaller bills dealing with particular issues, which is just a much more responsible way to make law, instead of a thousand-page Obamacare-style monstrosity,” said Krikorian.  “But what they’re hoping is that they will be able to put all those together and come up with a bill that does the same thing as the Senate bill.  So the danger still exists.”

Krikorian says the Judiciary Committee has passed some provisions out of committee, including the SAFE Act, which he calls “a pretty good enforcement bill” allowing local and state police to work closely with immigration authorities.  But another bill that has cleared committee and others likely coming down the pike give him great concern.

“They’ve also passed a bill to import more foreign farm workers and amnesty some that are already here.  Another bill would give green cards to people who have gone to technical education in the United States,” said Krikorian.

“What they’re working on is a bill to amnesty the ‘dreamers,’ illegal aliens who came here as kids and another bill, this is the talk anyway, which would amnesty all the other illegal aliens.  But instead of giving them a green card which would lead to citizenship, what I’ve heard is they’re talking about just giving them work visas that would make them legal…but wouldn’t lead to citizenship.  It’s still amnesty.  It would legalize everybody.  So there’s still going to be a lot of gun and games over the next year on immigration,” said Krikorian.

One of the reasons Boehner is abandoning any hopes of a conference with the Senate bill is the growing resistance to the bill in the House GOP conference.  Krikorian chalks that up to the fallout of the government shutdown and the bungled Obamacare roll out.  He sees both tactical and policy reasons for the GOP to hold firm against what he considers amnesty.

“I’m not sure so much that those Republican members on the fence actually changed their thinking.  I think what happened is the government shutdown and, even more recently, the complete debacle of Obamacare has hardened views so that people say, ‘Look, we’re not going to cooperate with these guys.  We’re not going to give Obama his signature second term victory,'” said Krikorian.

“The only thing he has left now that would salvage the wreckage of his administration is an amnesty.  Why any Republican, even if they agreed with him, would save President Obama’s political fortunes is beyond me,” he said.

At the same time, Krikorian says no one on the right is going to touch a comprehensive approach to anything after watching what happened with Obamacare.

“It’s an extraordinarily complicated thing.  After the incompetence we’ve seen with the Obamacare roll out, does anybody think, even if you thought it was a good idea, that this administration could successfully implement all that stuff?  No, they’d screw that up too.  Obamacare and the government shutdown , which is obviously related to it, make the whole immigration thing just a whole lot less likely to happen,” said Krikorian.

Obamacare and immigration reform collided in a different way in recent days, as Democratic Colorado Rep. Jared Polis suggested giving legal status to illegal immigrants would get them into our healthcare system and help drive costs down.

“American citizens are essentially being forced to pay for the health care costs of people who are here illegally every day, until we pass comprehensive reform,” said Polis.  “We’re wondering why rates are going up…it’s no surprise.  When somebody doesn’t have insurance, their costs are shifted onto other people that do.”

Krikorian says that doesn’t pass the laugh test.

“It’s kind of hilarious actually.  This is the kind of thing I would expect from (Democratic National Committee Chairwoman) Debbie Wasserman Schultz it’s so dopey,” mused Krikorian, who notes the Senate bill specifically forbids illegal immigrants from enrolling in Obamacare for a decade after the bill passes.

“Because illegal immigrants are low-income, if they’re legalized and can sign up for Obamacare, they would be much more likely to get the taxpayer subsidies that other people are paying.  It would actually cost taxpayers more,” said Krikorian.  “This is just another example of a Democratic congressman who doesn’t know what he’s talking about.”

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Greg Corombos of Radio America and Betsy Woodruff of National Review are pleased to see public approval tanking for President Obama and especially for Obamacare.  They also groan as Obama blames GOP criticism of Obamacare as the reason the health care exchanges don’t work.  And they shake their heads as GOP Rep. Trey Radel is busted for buying cocaine.

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Saying the tax code is a complex web that caters to the connected, that the 16th amendment violates constitutional protections against unreasonable search and seizure  and that the IRS cannot be trusted to deal honestly with the American people, Oklahoma Rep. Jim Bridenstine says it’s time to repeal the amendment legalizing a federal income tax and abolish the IRS.

Bridenstine filed the proposed constitutional amendment on Monday, saying that this year’s scandal exposing IRS harassment of conservative organizations is just the latest proof that the current tax system needs to be scrapped.  Especially galling to Bridenstine is President Obama’s insistence that the problem was limited to a couple of rogue staffers in the Cincinnati office.

“That’s not true.  We now know that by direction these ‘insensitive agents’ were sending the packages to Washington, D.C.  Once these applications got to Washington they were sent upstairs to the office of the chief counsel of the IRS, which is one of two Barack Obama appointees in the IRS,” said Bridenstine.  “The idea that the IRS is being used as a political weapon has got people in my district just outraged.”

The proposed repeal amendment is pretty straightforward.

“We just want to repeal the 16th amendment and eliminate the IRS.  This amendment gives us a two-year window to come up with an alternative form of revenue,” he said.

Bridenstine says the proposed amendment does not dictate any specific replacement for the income tax, although he sees it coming down to a debate between the fair tax, would would essentially be a consumption tax and the flat tax, which assesses a simple percentage tax rate across the board.  The congressman personally prefers the fair tax because no federal tax agency would be required to make sure revenues are collected.

In addition to likening the personal information the IRS gathers from Americans to unreasonable search and seizure forbidden in the Fourth Amendment, Bridenstine sees several other reasons why the income tax needs to go.

First on that list is the bureaucratic maze that requires many people to spend time and money to assure they are in compliance with federal law.  The congressman cited a Mercatus Center report showing that Americans spend one trillion dollars per year in tax costs outside of what they pay into the U.S. Treasury.  The same report shows six billion man hours are spent each year on tax preparation.

“That’s the same as a full-time workforce of 3.4 million people for a whole year, and 3.4 million people is larger than the city of Chicago, larger than the city of Chicago.  It’s larger than the city of Houston and it’s larger than the city of Philadelphia.  This is a huge drain,” he said.

Another frustration for Bridenstine and his allies is how the tax code is structured to benefit the well-connected at the expense of the American people.

“From 2001-2010, there were 4,428 changes to the internal revenue code.  That’s more than one change per day,” said Bridenstine.  “The only people who are getting what they want in the tax code are lobbyists, who spend all their time coming and talking to me as a member of Congress, saying why their client is so important and we’ve got to change the tax code for this purpose.

“The reality is that people that are listening to this broadcast, in many cases they don’t have a lobbyist.  They just have a member of Congress.  And their member of Congress is turning over our tax policy to the lobbyists.  It’s disadvantaging some people and advantaging others,” he said.

Several members of Congress have championed tax reform to simplify the system and eliminate massive special interest loopholes.  Bridenstine isn’t buying that as a sincere effort, noting that as long as politicians need to be re-elected they will be giving special favors through the tax code.

Passing a constitutional amendment requires a two-thirds majority in both the House and Senate and ratification by three-fourths of the states.  While admitting it’s an uphill climb, Bridenstine says political winds can shift quickly, noting that no one expected passage of something like Obamacare just a few years before circumstances handed Democrats the White House and large majorities in the House and Senate.

While on the subject of Obamacare, Bridenstine also explained his vote against the “Keep Your Health Plan Act” on Friday.  The bill passed easily, but Bridenstine was one of four GOP members to oppose it.

“We were going to pass a law that takes the president’s law and it puts it on our shoulders, so that we are promising that if you like your health care you can keep it.  The insurance companies cannot change these actuarial tables on a dime, which means in the coming days people are still going to lose their health care policies,” said Bridenstine.

“The last thing I want is Republicans owning that lie, because we can’t keep that promise any more than the president,” he said.

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Greg Corombos of Radio America and Betsy Woodruff of National Review are optimistic that voters in Albuquerque will approve a ban on abortions after 20 weeks.  They also discuss the public spat over marriage between the Cheney sisters.  And they react to President Obama’s terrible approval numbers among young adults and Hispanics.

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While the Obama administration tries to douse political fires over a faulty federal exchange website, millions of Americans unable to keep health policies they like and others facing massive premium and deductible increases, experts now say the system also discourages marriage.

At issue is eligibility for federal subsidies under the new laws and the wide discrepancy between eligibility for two individuals compared to a married couple.

“The cut-off points under Obamacare would be $91,000 for two single people and $62,000 for a married couple.  So it’s about $30,000 less income where you can get the subsidy,” said Heritage Foundation Senior Fellow David Burton, who says a quirk in federal tax law is responsible for this.

“Subsidies are available to people up to 400 percent of the federal poverty level.  The marriage penalty’s really because of the way the poverty levels are calculated.  If you have a one-person household, the poverty level is about $11,500.  If you have a two-person household, the poverty level is $15,500.  For those who don’t want to do the math, that means that it’s not twice as high,” said Burton.  “So the long and the short of it is that two individuals that get married don’t get as much of a subsidy.”

“It very well may give people pause that are considering marriage,” said Burton.  “There are a lot of things discouraging people from getting married these days .  This will be just one more.  It’ll be a financially significant thing.  It could amount to several thousand dollars a year of lost subsidies.”

So was this intentional in the new health laws or are married couples simply taking a hit over the way the poverty levels are traditionally calculated?

“If you actually read the PPACA as it’s called, the law which I have had the misfortune of having done, it’s very badly written.  It was rushed through.  I think it was probably a mistake but it’s just one more of many mistakes where this law wasn’t well thought out,” said Burton.

In addition to the financial disadvantage for married couples, Burton says all Americans are headed for a nightmare come tax time when they try to determine exactly how much subsidy assistance they should be getting.

“The subsidies are administered by the insurance companies in cooperation with the IRS and show up as a lower premium in the exchanges.  But then, every individual in the country is going to have to do the math on their tax return due in April 2015 and reconcile how much they got from the insurance company with how much they should have gotten,” said Burton, who says Americans will “owe a lot of money” if calculations show their subsidies were too big.

Burton expects Obamacare supporters to resist changing the marriage rules in the law unless political pressure becomes too much to ignore.  He says adopting a whole new approach to health care reform is the best hope on this issue and for the system in general.

“If we get to a point where there’s a more reasoned approach to health care and it’s not all so blatantly political then I would hope that this could get resolved,” said Burton.

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Greg Corombos of Radio America and Jim Geraghty of National Review hope Nancy Pelosi is being honest when she says Democrats will “stand tall” on Obamacare in 2014.  They also react to New York Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand saying “we all knew” some health plans would be cancelled under Obamacare because they supposedly weren’t good enough.  And they shake their heads as Washington, D.C.’s insurance commissioner is fired after criticizing President Obama’s “fix” for those who lost their health coverage.

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The House of Representatives passed legislation Friday that would allow Americans to keep their current health insurance policies for another year, even if they fail to comply with the the mandates of the Affordable Care Act.

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For over six weeks now, healthcare.gov has been one of the many roll-out headaches for the Obama administration.  This week, the Capitol Steps capture the aggravation folks are experiencing while trying to see what sort of plans are on the exchanges.  Our guest is Steps star and co-founder Elaina Newport.

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Greg Corombos of Radio America and Jim Geraghty of National Review are encouraged that the media and most Democrats do not consider President Obama’s insurance ‘fix’ a serious effort to help the newly uninsured.  They also slam Obama for blatantly stating his change to the law is designed to shift blame to the insurance industry.  And they have fun responding to an MSNBC personality suggesting that several Democratic senators are going wobbly on Obamacare because their Senate seats have been gerrymandered.

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President Obama announced Thursday that Americans could keep their health care plans for another year even if it has changed since the enactment of the Affordable Care Act or was purchased since then, after millions were informed their current policies are no longer legal under the new law.

Anywhere from 3-5 million Americans have lost coverage as a result of the mandates within Obamacare, but Obama says he is now giving states and insurance companies the freedom to continue policies that don’t comply with federal law.

However, Galen Institute President Grace-Marie Turner says there are countless problems with Obama reversing course now.  First of all, she says, Obama doesn’t have the right to make this change unilaterally.

“What the president is trying to do is once again rewrite the law through administrative fiat.  He does not have the authority to do what he says he is going to do,” said Turner, noting that some congressional Democrats facing tough re-election fights next year are still looking to cement these changes through legislation.

She also doesn’t expect insurance companies to jump at this shift in policy because they’ve already made decisions about coverage options in 2014 based on the new law.

“They don’t have a choice.  These policies are not legal starting on January 1 of next year because they don’t comply with all of the long list of Obamacare mandates and rules and regulations.  The policies aren’t legal,” she said.

“The president today has just waved a magic wand and said, ‘Oh, we’re going to sprinkle some fairy dust and allow those policies to continue,'” said Turner.  “I think it’s mostly for show because he’s getting so much heat for this collapse of a law that they really can’t fix.  The house of cards is falling apart.”

Completely reworking coverage options in the next weeks would be a herculean task for insurance companies and Turner says part of the reason for today’s announcement is to set up the insurance industry as the fall guy for consumer frustrations going forward.

“They have spent the last three-and-a-half years re-engineering every aspect of the health care system.  Companies have spent hundreds of millions of dollars to comply with this law, to restructure themselves  to offer these new policies and exchanges.  And now, at the last minute, the president is changing the rules again and saying we’re going to go back,” said Turner.

“That’s not how our system works.  You don’t just willy nilly wave a wand and change a law.  It has to go through a process,” she said.

Another reason for the administration’s “desperation” is the calendar.  Obama refused to reiterate his earlier promise that healthcare.gov would be fully operational by the end of November.  If it is not, millions will be in violation of the individual mandate since anyone wanting to be covered come January need to be fully enrolled by December 15.  Turner says that’s not going to happen.

“If people aren’t signed up by the fifteenth of December, their coverage can’t start on January 1 if they’ve lost their policy.  That means even if everything works well that you have to funnel everybody who’s been trying to sign up, all those paper applications, all the people who are waiting for the website to work, into two weeks.  The website does not have the capacity to do that and, by the way, it’s not going to be ready anyway,” said Turner.

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