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Tuesday, November 12, 2013

Navigators

The Affordable Care Act, which is producing huge premium and deductible increases when it's not causing people to lose their insurance altogether, is beset with so many other problems that it's hard to keep up with them.

Ed Rogers has a column at the Washington Post in which he gives six reasons why things are just going to get worse for the Democrats responsible for this fiasco.

The six reasons Rogers gives are these:
  • There will be more canceled health insurance plans. Millions of Americans are losing the insurance plans they had and with which they were satisfied.
  • If you like your doctor, you can’t keep your doctor. Millions will soon discover that this promise was simply false.
  • Sticker shock. Premiums for many people are going through the roof and so are their deductibles.
  • Obamacare ads. Republicans can be expected next Fall to air ads over and over showing the President and many Democrat office-holders declaring that people will be able to keep their doctors and their insurance plans.
  • Navigators. See below
  • Security breaches. The online exchanges are going to be a playground for hackers and identity thieves. There's no security and the administration seems blithely indifferent to the fact.
Go to the link for Rogers' explanation of these.

It was all predictable and, in fact, had been predicted by lots of people ever since Obamacare was enacted into law in 2009. There was no way that coverage could be extended to millions of people who couldn't pay for it without raising the costs to everyone else, but those who did the math were dismissed as bitter clinger, tea party racists by those who voted for the bill or otherwise supported it without having read it. The skeptics were nevertheless right and now we find ourselves on the brink of a massive social upheaval as millions of people face medical bills without coverage and are unable to afford whatever coverage is out there.

Meanwhile, James O'Keefe the intrepid undercover videographer who has documented numerous scandals and criminality at ACORN, Planned Parenthood, and elsewhere has turned his documentary skills to the "navigators" who have been hired to help people find their way through the thicket of Obamacare's insurance options and rules.

It turns out that these people are largely untrained and unvetted. Many of them have been hired from the ranks of community activists and radical ideologues. Despite not having been subject to background checks these navigators will have access to much of their client's personal financial information, including, perhaps, social security numbers. The potential for identity theft is enormous, and the dismal ethics of the navigators appearing in O'Keefe's video does little to assure us that our information is in safe hands.

Nor is it comforting to learn that the people manning the exchanges are working hand in glove with the Democratic party to enroll new Democrat party members and voters:
For an elaboration on the video read John Fund's column at NRO. Reading Fund's piece makes one wonder why would anyone go on these exchanges to purchase insurance.