By Greg Scandlen
Where to begin this week? How about the overall political environment? It is beginning to look like the wheels are coming off this bus to the point that even Democrat loyalists are getting nervous. Obviously the President of the United States cant do much about plugging the oil leak in the Gulf of Mexico.
The federal government doesnt have the equipment or the technical expertise to do it. But there is a whole lot the federal government could be doing - and is not - about cleaning up the oil that has already leaked.
This is serious enough to call for a mobilization of the Navy and Coast Guard not to mention hiring all the out of work fishermen to get out there and collect the oil before it hits shore.
Instead the Obama Administration is getting in the way of what other people are trying to do.
It ignores Governor Jindals request to build sand reefs to protect Louisianas coastal marshes. It doesnt provide needed oil booms but it talks like gangsters about having its boot on the throat of BP and promises to create a commission.
Then there is a charge by Rep. Joe Sestak that he was offered a bribe to get out of the primary with Arlen Specter. The Administration keeps repeating there is nothing to it.
Oh really? Isnt that what Nixon said about Watergate?
Then there was Arizonas effort to deal with illegal immigrants of whom there are at least half a million in the state including many drug gangsters human traffickers and kidnappers. The Administration tried to make it seem like the Ku Klux Klan had taken over Arizona government but it is failing.
If you havent seen Governor Brewers video response please look here. She makes the Administration look ridiculous and petty.
And the International Monetary Fund (IMF) released a report that the national debt will exceed 100 of GDP by 2015. The report included a devastating
graph of the level of American debt since 1950. It was pretty flat during the Bush years but has soared since Obama took office.
And as we describe below support of the health care monstrosity continues to plummet as more people find out what is in the law.
It remains to be seen if Congressional Republicans can do anything with all this.
So far there is very little evidence that they have learned anything about health care in the past two years so it is hard to be optimistic that they will be effective even if they have big gains in the coming election.
| |
| Latest Discoveries about ObamaCare
Rasmussen reports that the sentiment for repealing ObamaCare is now two-to-one with 64 of likely voters in favor of repeal and 32 opposed. This is the first time since the law was signed on March 23 that the percentage in favor of repeal has exceeded 60 and with every passing week support for the law erodes.
SOURCE: Rasmussen
And small wonder. Every day reveals more awful things about this law. The media writes these up and says they are little noticed provisions. There have been so many of these stories that a professor at the Cornell Law School decided to do a search for the expression little noticed. He came up with over twenty separate articles and growing.
SOURCE: Legal Insurrection Blog
The Mercer company conducted a survey that found one-fourth of large employers believe the new requirements under ObamaCare will add 3 or more to their cost of benefits in 2011 on top of the usual increases. These provisions include the slacker mandate the elimination of lifetime limits the requirement to auto-enroll new hires and the definition of full time workers to include anyone working 30 hours a week.
SOURCE: Mercer
Writing in the New York Times Robert Pear finds that about one-third of employers subject to major requirements of the new health care law may face tax penalties because they offer health insurance that could be considered unaffordable to some employees. He explains If a company offers coverage but requires any full-time employees to pay premiums that amount to more than 9.5 percent of their household income the coverage is deemed unaffordable and the employer may have to pay a penalty. The penalty could be $3000 per worker if the worker gets government assistance.
Now this provision raises a host of issues beyond the simple cost of the new penalty. Youll notice the standard is 9.5 of household income. But that includes income from a spouse from a second job from investments and so on. Employers know how much they pay their workers but they have no idea how much a worker earns on the side. Does this mean you will have to report to your employers all of your income from all sources? Does the standard apply to worker-only coverage or also to family coverage? Does income mean gross AGI or after all deductions are taken? How is a worker supposed to know what his income is for one year until April 15 (or later) of the following year?
Finally who is the idiot that wrote this stuff?
SOURCE: New York Times
Towers Watson has issued a release that predicts Health care reforms so-called Cadillac plan excise tax will affect more than 60 of large employers active health plans by the provisions 2018 effective date. Randall Abbott is quoted as saying Assuming even reasonable annual plan cost increases to project 2018 costs many of todays average plans will easily exceed the cost ceiling primarily directed at todays gold-plated plans.
SOURCE: Towers Watson
But thats okay because small employers will be getting a generous tax credit for providing coverage right? Well no. Virtually no small employers will qualify for the full tax credit and very few will qualify for any tax credit at all.
The Administration likes to say that employers with up to 25 employees and an average wage of under $50000 will be eligible for a tax credit. But like a lot of what comes out of this Administration it is simply not true. In fact the full tax credit is available only to companies with fewer than ten employees making less than $25000 and paying 50 of the workers premium. Then the tax credit will be 35 of the premium paid by the employer. The worker gets no tax help for the part of the premium she pays. And family members of the owner - even brothers-in-law or step-siblings - are not eligible.
As soon as the threshold of ten workers and $25K income is crossed the credit tapers off steeply reduced due to both larger size and higher incomes. A recent Associated Press story illustrated this in the case of Zach Hoffman owner of an office furniture company with 24 employees. He will get no tax credit even though he has fewer than 25 workers and has an average payroll of $35000. The article says Hoffman used an online calculator to figure his companys eligibility. At least four are available including one from the House Energy and Commerce Committee which helped write the legislation. All produced the same result.
The article concludes To get the most out of the new federal credit Hoffman said hed have to cut his work force to 10 employees and slash their wages. That seems like a strange outcome given weve got 10 percent unemployment he said.
SOURCE: IRS Notice 2010-44 Associated Press
|
|
