Comeuppance: Thousands Quit AARP Over Health Care Reform

From CBS News:

CBS News has learned that up to 60,000 people have cancelled their AARP memberships since July 1, angered over the group’s position on health care.

Elaine Guardiani has been with AARP for 14 years, and said, “I’m extremely disappointed in AARP.”

Retired nurse Dale Anderson has 12 years with AARP and said, “I don’t wanna be connected with AARP.”

Many are switching to the American Seniors Association, a group that calls itself the conservative alternative as CBS News Investigative Correspondent Sharyl Attkisson reports.

Last week alone, they added more than 5,000 new members. Our camera was there Friday when the mail came.

The principle issue driving seniors away from the AARP appears to be the proposed cuts to Medicare and the Medicare Advantage program. The American Seniors Association pulls no punches in its opposition to ObamaCare and the cuts to Medicare and the Medicare Advantage program. The AARP on the hand insists they haven’t endorsed any plan but as the CBS News report notes AARP’s VP for Social Impact, Cheryl Matheis, can’t find anything to quibble with, including the cuts to Medicare and the Medicare Advantage program, saying:

“We haven’t seen provisions in legislation yet, so we’re going to reserve judgment until we see them,” said Matheis.

Heh… You don’t need to see the final bill, as Ms. Matheis suggests, to know it’s a bad deal for seniors.

The ASA is a bit of an unknown, but any reduction in the influence of the AARP is good thing. They’ve effectively become and extension of the federal bureaucracy and are just as out of touch with the people they claim represent as the President and members of Congress.

If there’s one thing that the health care reform debate has made crystal clear, it’s that many seniors believe that the quality of care they’ll receive under ObamaCare will decline. The AARP foolishly thought they could slip that past they’re and now they’re paying a price for their arrogance.

Congressman Eric Massa: I Will Vote Against the Interests of My District

Sen. Tom Coburn is right, American’s have lost faith in their government and I can’t think of a better example of why than the attitude displayed by Congressman Eric Massa of New York.

Rep. Massa met with an intimate group of Netroots activists during their annual Netroots Nation gathering in Pittsburgh this past weekend reiterated his support and promised the he would  “… vote adamantly against the interests of my district if I actually think what I am doing is going to be helpful.” In a broad sense I don’t have a problem with that, politicians aren’t supposedly to be automatons who blindly follow public opinion. George W. Bush, for example, ignored broad public opposition to order implementation of the surge strategy in Iraq. And it appears he was right to do so.

The problem here is that when you take Rep. Massa’s remarks in context with remarks by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid calling opponents of health care reform “un-American” and/or an “Evil mob” you’re left with a very frightening impression… You’re left with the impression that our elected leaders have forgotten that they were elected to represent we the people, you are left with the impression that they have forgotten they are our  representatives  not are rulers.

Thomas Jefferson said “When the people fear their government, there is tyranny; when the government fears the people, there is liberty.” We have come to a point were a broad swath of Americans have lost faith in their government… Remarks like those of Speaker Pelosi, Majority Leader Reid and Rep. Massa’s only serve to reinforce the belief that our elected leaders no longer respect we the people, that they consider us a bunch of ignorant rubes who need to told to shut up and quietly by while their betters rule the nation.

Health Care This and That: Barney Frank Lets the Truth Slip About the Public Option, and Much More…

Lets get started… First up here’s a great video of Congressman Barney Frank letting the truth about the so called “Public Plan” slip:

Yes you heard him right, a public plan will lead to a government takeover of health care… While your at it be sure to check out this video from Naked Emperor News of Pres. Obama in his own words taking about how  his health care plan would eliminate private insurance.

Second, Keith Hennessey provides a  great counterpoint to President Obama’s health care reform email:

Dear Taxpayer,

If you’re like most Americans, you like the health insurance you have today but think the system needs improvement.  You would like things to work better, but are aware of the threats that arise from politicians who promise you something for nothing.

President Obama is correct that the underlying problem with health care is rising costs.  Because of this problem, your paycheck grows more slowly, millions of Americans cannot afford to buy health insurance, and the escalating costs of Medicare and Medicaid will force enormous tax increases onto you and your children.  The President wants to slow the growth of health care spending, and so do I.

Congress has gone in the opposite direction.  Rather than changing incentives to reduce the cost of health insurance, they are trying to shift those costs onto someone else:  you.  The facts are not in dispute.  The bill being developed in the House of Representatives would mean:

• No reduction in the growth of average private health insurance premiums;
• More than $1 trillion of new government spending over the next decade;
• $239 billion more debt in the short run, with ever-increasing additions to the deficit forever; and
• More than $500 billion of tax increases, including higher income tax rates on successful small businesses.

Read the rest…

Third, the National Center for Policy Analysis (NCPA) provides a list of 10 Surprising Facts about American Health Care:

Fact No. 1: Americans have better survival rates than Europeans for common cancers.[1] Breast cancer mortality is 52 percent higher in Germany than in the United States, and 88 percent higher in the United Kingdom.  Prostate cancer mortality is 604 percent higher in the U.K. and 457 percent higher in Norway.  The mortality rate for colorectal cancer among British men and women is about 40 percent higher.

Fact No. 2: Americans have lower cancer mortality rates than Canadians.[2] Breast cancer mortality is 9 percent higher, prostate cancer is 184 percent higher and colon cancer mortality among men is about 10 percent higher than in the United States.

Fact No. 3: Americans have better access to treatment for chronic diseases than patients in other developed countries.[3] Some 56 percent of Americans who could benefit are taking statins, which reduce cholesterol and protect against heart disease.  By comparison, of those patients who could benefit from these drugs, only 36 percent of the Dutch, 29 percent of the Swiss, 26 percent of Germans, 23 percent of Britons and 17 percent of Italians receive them.

Fourth, the Telegraph reports on one of the side effects of government run health care:

Patients forced to live in agony after NHS refuses to pay for painkilling injections

Tens of thousands with chronic back pain will be forced to live in agony after a decision to slash the number of painkilling injections issued on the NHS, doctors have warned.

By Laura Donnelly, Health Correspondent
Published: 7:45AM BST 02 Aug 2009

Tens of thousands with chronic back pain will be forced to live in agony after a decision to slash the number of painkilling injections issued on the NHS, doctors have warned.

The Government’s drug rationing watchdog says “therapeutic” injections of steroids, such as cortisone, which are used to reduce inflammation, should no longer be offered to patients suffering from persistent lower back pain when the cause is not known.
Instead the National Institute of Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) is ordering doctors to offer patients remedies like acupuncture and osteopathy.

Specialists fear tens of thousands of people, mainly the elderly and frail, will be left to suffer excruciating levels of pain or pay as much as £500 each for private treatment.

Finally, Lee Cary, has a terrific series of articles at American Thinker on the questions you should be asking your Congressperson about Obamacare:

Here’s the first installment in a series of questions you might ask your member of the House of Representatives concerning H.R. 3200 – also known as Obamacare.

The two-thousand, five-hundred and forty-one (2,541) sections of the bill can be found here. The emailed version my congressman’s office sent me covers 1,026 pages and is written in the typical legislative labyrinth of gobbledygook, replete with multi-layered, mind-numbing, cross references. There must be a software program called Obfuscate 2Max that cranks this stuff out.

Anyway, below is the first in a series of questions you might ask your congressperson if they’re either undecided about Obamacare, or support it.

Question 1: According the Section 113(b)(1)(C)&(D), “The Commissioner (appointed by the President) in cooperation with the Secretary of Health and Human Services and the Secretary of Labor, shall conduct a study of the large group insured and self-insured employer health markets. Such study shall examine the following:

(C) The financial solvency and capital reserve levels of employers that self-insure by employer size.

(D) The risk of self-insured employers not being able to pay obligations or otherwise becoming financially insolvent.”

SO, self-insuring companies will be subject to government auditing of their books to adjudicate their ability now, and in the future, to self-insure?  Will that information be made available to the Department of the Treasury, including the Internal Revenue Service?

You can read the full seven part series starting with part one here. Part two is here, parts 3, 4, 5, 6 and 7 are  here, here, here, here and here respectively.

Reid and Pelosi: It’s Time to Demonize Insurance Companies…

Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi appear to have a new strategy for pushing health care reform through Congress… They’re going to demonize insurance companies:

A day after formally delaying a vote on a healthcare bill and having to accept a further weakening of a public option to compete with private insurers, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) lashed out at the health insurance industry and urged her members to do the same during the August recess.

“They are the villains in this,” Pelosi said of private insurers. “They have been part of the problem in a major way. They are doing everything in their power to stop a public option from happening. And the public has to know that. They can disguise their arguments any way they want, but the fact is that they don’t want the competition.”

As she prepares to send her members home for the month of August having not voted on a healthcare bill — a deadline the Speaker said she would meet for President Obama — Pelosi said she was urging those members to go on the attack against the private insurance industry to try to rally support for the strongest public option possible when negotiations resume in September.

“The more the public knows about what we’re doing, the more they support it, and especially if you’re talking about a public option, because that’s where the insurance companies are making their attack,” Pelosi said. “Our members have to go out there ready to take on a big special interest that has not made our country healthier, has made costs spiral upward, and for whom that is coming to an end.

“It’s almost immoral what they are doing,” added Pelosi, who stood outside her office long after her press conference ended to continue speaking to reporters, even as aides tried in vain to usher her inside. “Of course they’ve been immoral all along in how they have treated the people that they insure with pre-existing conditions, you know, the litany of it all.”

Not to be out done Harry Reid Had the following to say about insurance companies:

“I don’t think we should be crying great big tears about  the insurance industry,” Reid said at a Capitol Hill press conference when asked whether insurance companies should be allowed to charge higher premiums for people with preexisting conditions.

“There is no business in America that makes more money than the insurance industry–over the last 10 years their profits have been increased by 450 percent,” Reid said. “So I’m not really in very much of a mood to worry about the insurance industry.”

The health insurance industry is so wealthy because it is exempt from anti-trust laws, Reid said: “The insurance industry, my friends, is the only industry other than baseball that is exempt from the anti-trust act, and that’s the reason they have 450 percent profit over the last ten years.”

Whew, talk about winning strategy… Take the least popular politicians in American and have them go off on half baked rants about evil insurance companies. They’re comments are nothing more than a blatant attempt to satisfy Democratic demands for a villain to demagogue in selling health care reform.

For all their talk about “competition, they’re pushing one most anti-competitive measures  in American History… With all due respect to Speaker Pelosi and Majority Leader Reid, Democrats control the White House, have filibuster proof 60 majority in the Senate and 256 seat Majority in the House… You don’t need Republican support to pass a health care reform bill.

The fact that Speaker Pelosi and Majority Reid can’t get a reform bill through Congress has nothing to with insurance companies or Republican opposition. The simple truth is they are unwilling to work with centrists, the “Blue Dog” Democrats,  in their own caucus who are apparently getting an earful from constituents who are vehemently opposed to Obamacare.

Oh, and by the way Harry, Nancy, you might want to read Stephen Carter’s Washington Post Op Ed on why corporate profits are good thing… I’m sure it’ll be lost on you, but read it just the same. You might learn something.

Update (7:35 p.m.): I’m shocked, shocked I tell you… Jonathan Allen at CQ Politics is reporting that while House Speaker Nancy Pelosi may think health insurance companies are “villains” she’s prefect willing to keep their money. Most ethical Congress ever, heh.

Related

• Senate Dems blame media for August health deadline – The Hill
• Police called on retirees at senator’s LA office – San Francisco Chronicle
• Barney Frank: Yes, a public plan will lead to a government takeover of health care – Hot Air

Is the Public Option Dead?

I’m hearing rumblings from various sources that the Democrats so called Public Health Insurance option is dead in the the Senate… The Associated Press is reporting that a bipartisan group of Senators is close to a compromise agreement that would eliminate the employer mandate and the public option, two of the Democrats top priorities from the bill:

After weeks of secretive talks, a bipartisan group in the Senate edged closer Monday to a health care compromise that omits two key Democratic priorities but incorporates provisions to slow the explosive rise in medical costs, officials said.

These officials said participants were on track to exclude a requirement many congressional Democrats seek for businesses to offer coverage to their workers. Nor would there be a provision for a government insurance option, despite President Barack Obama’s support for such a plan.

The three Democrats and three Republicans from the Senate Finance Committee were considering a tax of as much as 35 percent on very high-cost insurance policies, part of an attempt to rein in rapid escalation of costs. Also likely to be included in any deal was creation of a commission charged with slowing the growth of Medicare through recommendations that would take effect automatically unless overturned by Congress.

Assuming for the moment that the rumblings are true and the employer mandate and the public option are really dead it’s no reason to celebrate… The Democrats can still push through some pretty big changes like an individual mandate, highly regulated insurance market, major subsidies, etc. Similar to the Massachusetts model, a plan that’s already already failing. Costs have more than doubled from $630 million in 2007 to an estimated $1.3 billion for 2009. That’s simply not sustainable.

Related

• Obama’s Plan Isn’t the Answer – The Washington Post
• GOP’s teachable moment on the risks of Obamacare – Washington Examiner
• Two in Three Doubt Congress’ Grasp of Healthcare Issues – Gallup
• Just 23% Believe Health Care Costs Will Go Down if Reform Passes Congress – Rasmussen Reports
• CBO calls a TKO on the House health bill – Keith Hennessey
• Remember Hawaii’s Health Care Lessons – Sweetness & Light

This and That: Dodd Trails, Obama Falls, Boxer Struggles, Perry Ready for Showdown

It’s Saturday, the weather is gorgeous and I have a date with a grill and some steaks so rather than spend my afternoon in front of the computer I thought put together a political blotter of sorts.

First up, Chris Dodd trails likely Republican challenger Rob Simmons by 9 points in the latest the latest Quinnipiac poll:

Connecticut Sen. Christopher Dodd trails former U.S. Rep. Rob Simmons, a likely Republican challenger 48 – 39 percent in the 2010 Senate race, but he is inching up in his job approval to a negative 42 – 52 percent approval rating, according to a Quinnipiac University poll released today.

The matchup compares to a 45 – 39 percent Simmons lead in a May 27 poll by the independent Quinnipiac (KWIN-uh-pe-ack) University.

In this latest survey, Simmons leads 87 – 7 percent among Republicans and 56 – 27 percent among independent voters, while Sen. Dodd takes Democrats 74 – 16 percent. The incumbent has gained among Democrats, but lost independent support since May 27.

Dodd’s negative 42 – 52 percent approval compares to 38 – 53 percent May 27 and this was up from a negative 33 – 58 percent April 2.

Second, the latest Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll show Pres. Obama’s poll numbers have slipped again:

The Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll for Saturday shows that 30% of the nation’s voters now Strongly Approve of the way that Barack Obama is performing his role as President. Thirty-nine percent (39%) Strongly Disapprove giving Obama a Presidential Approval Index rating of -9. (see trends).

The number who Strongly Disapprove of the President has increased slightly following the prime time press conference on Wednesday night. That figure—39%–is now at the highest level yet recorded. As a result, the overall Approval Index has fallen to the lowest level yet recorded for this President.

It’ll be interesting to see what happens over the next few days as the full impact of his last prime time press conference starts to show up in the polls.

Third, Polling shows California Senator Barbara Boxer has narrow 4 point lead over likely Republican challenger Carly Fiorina:

Democratic incumbent Barbara Boxer leads former Hewlett-Packard CEO Carly Fiorina in an early look at California’s 2010 race for the U.S. Senate.

The latest Rasmussen Reports telephone survey finds that Boxer attracts 45% of the statewide vote while Fiorina, her best-known possible Republican challenger, earns 41%. Seven percent (7%) say they’d vote for some other candidate, and seven percent (7%) are undecided.

In March, Boxer led Fiorina by nine, 47% to 38%.

Any incumbent who polls below 50% early in a campaign is considered potentially vulnerable. However, a Democrat running in a heavily Democratic state like California is often able to overcome weak poll numbers.

As Rasmussen notes the conventional wisdom says any incumbent who falls below 50% this early is potentially vulnerable but that Democrats running in heavily Democratic state like California should be to overcome weak poll numbers…  I’m not convince the conventional wisdom applies in California these days. California is an economic basket case, the voters there are frustrated by high taxes, high unemployment, hugh deficits… If Sen Boxer is perceived as being part of California’s economic problems she’s vulnerable regardless of how Democratic California leans.

Lastly, Texas Gov. Rick Perry, suggested Thursday that he would consider invoking the States’ 10th Amendment rights to resist the president’s healthcare plan, which he said would be “disastrous” for Texas:

Gov. Rick Perry, raising the specter of a showdown with the Obama administration, suggested Thursday that he would consider invoking states’ rights protections under the 10th Amendment to resist the president’s healthcare plan, which he said would be “disastrous” for Texas.

Interviewed by conservative talk show host Mark Davis of Dallas’ WBAP/820 AM, Perry said his first hope is that Congress will defeat the plan, which both Perry and Davis described as “Obama Care.” But should it pass, Perry predicted that Texas and a “number” of states might resist the federal health mandate.

“I think you’ll hear states and governors standing up and saying ‘no’ to this type of encroachment on the states with their healthcare,” Perry said. “So my hope is that we never have to have that stand-up. But I’m certainly willing and ready for the fight if this administration continues to try to force their very expansive government philosophy down our collective throats.”

I suspect Gov. Perry is right, Texas won’t be the only State to challenge ObamaCare. A number of states have already passed “sovereignty resolutions” asserting their 10th amendment rights.

That’s it for now, have great weekend folks.

Reid: No Health Care Vote Before August Recess

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid effectively pulled the rug out from under Pres. Barack Obama and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi today by announcing that the Senate will wait until the fall to debate and vote on the presidents health care reform proposals:

Senate Democratic leaders on Thursday abandoned plans for a vote on health care before Congress’ August recess, dealing a blow to President Barack Obama’s ambitious timetable to revamp the nation’s $2.4 trillion system of medical care.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., delivered the official pronouncement, saying, “It’s better to have a product based on quality and thoughtfulness rather than try to jam something through.”

His words were a near-echo of Republicans who have criticized what they have called a rush to act on complex legislation that affects every American.

Reid’s announcement isn’t particularly surprising, he doesn’t have the votes in Senate and despite her claims to the contrary I doubt Speaker Pelosi has them in the House either… If they did there’s nothing the Republicans could do to stop them from passing the bills. The Democrats have sufficient majorities in the House and Senate to pass their Health care reform bill without a single Republican vote.

The fact that they can’t get it down says more about the popularity of this bill and leadership abilities of Pres. Obama, Speaker Pelosi and Majority Leader Reid than it does about Republican opposition.

The fight isn’t over though, the just got a lot longer and bumpier but the Democrats aren’t going to give up on this. As Marc Armbinder points out Sen. Reid is more than likely going to spend his summer recess trying to reconcile what the Seante Finance Committee is willing to pay for with what the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee wants.

As an aside, that oft quoted “47 million uninsured Americans” statistic is at best misleading… As CNSNews.com points then number comes from a Census Bureau report published in August 2008. The actual number given in the report is 45.65 million people without health insurance, of them 9.73 million are foreigners, leaving only 35.92 million Americans who were uninsured. Of that 36 million roughly 12 million are eligible for Medicaid and the State Children’s Health Insurance Program–but haven’t signed up.

Once you drill down through all the numbers you’re left with roughly 10-12 million uninsured Americans who would prefer to have insurance but can’t afford it. Politicians and pundits who continually cite that 46, 47 or 48 million uninsured number without providing the full context are doing a great disservice to their constituents or readers.

Bottom line if our elected leaders were really interested in addressing the uninsured they’d focus their efforts on increasing participation in existing programs like Medicaid or SCHIP and providing a safety net for those how want insurance but either don’t qualify for existing programs or who are excluded because pre-existing conditions.

Related

• Pelosi backs off recess healthcare deadline – The Hill
• Obama Accepts Health Won’t Be Done by Recess – Wall Street Journal
• Stocks Surge as Obamacare Implodes – Larry Kudlow
• Breaking: Reid caves on August deadline for ObamaCare – Hot Air
• Fox “Hannity” tonight – “Hawaii’s Universal Health Plan” – Wizbang
• President Obama Failed To Calm The Nation’s Health Care Fears – The Strata-Sphere
• Why Obama might have just killed Obamacare – James Pethokoukis

Obama Administration Putting Off Budget Update

The Associated Press is reporting that the Obama Administration is putting of releasing the annual mid-summer budget update until mid-August:

The White House is being forced to acknowledge the wide gap between its once-upbeat predictions about the economy and today’s bleak landscape.

The administration’s annual midsummer budget update is sure to show higher deficits and unemployment and slower growth than projected in President Barack Obama’s budget in February and update in May, and that could complicate his efforts to get his signature health care and global-warming proposals through Congress.

The release of the update – usually scheduled for mid-July – has been put off until the middle of next month, giving rise to speculation the White House is delaying the bad news at least until Congress leaves town Aug. 7 on its summer recess.

The administration is pressing for votes before then on its $1 trillion health care initiative, which lawmakers are arguing over how to finance.

The question is why? Polling numbers showing the President popularity slippy and rising concern about the deficit explain part of it but the AP’s report hint at the reason. The administration and democratic leaders in the house and senate pushing to the President’s signature policy initiatives  on health care and cap and trade. Simply put the Obama Administration can’t afford to have another report showing how badly they’ve miscalculated the size of the deficit hit the street while they’re pushing a deficit-busting health care program.

James Pethokoukis explains:

While both healthcare and cap-and-trade look to be in various degrees of trouble, some savvy Capitol Hill watchers make this point to me: Democrats look at failure to do something about healthcare as an Extinction Level Event, with a failure on cap-and-trade also incredibly damaging, particularly with the Dem base.  House Speaker Nancy Pelosi told wavering Dems that a cap-and-trade failure was a dagger in the Obama presidency. She pushed them to the wall. Healthcare even more so.  Expect a full-court press in the Senate on both. At the same, either of those issues slipping into 2010 is fatal to their chances. The next five months may make or break the Obama presidency.

He’s exactly right, if Democrats can’t get the President’s health care and cap and trade proposals through the House and Senate this year, both proposals are effectively dead… Call and write you Senators and Congressman and politely but firmly tell them to vote know on both.

Related

• As economy bites, White House delays budget review – Reuters.com
• Cost, Not Universal Coverage, is Top Health Care Concern for Voters - Rasmussen Reports
• Obama hiding the budget numbers until August recess – Hot Air
• Obama is Withholding Key Budget Information Till AFTER Healthcare Vote – Yid with Lid
• HR 3200 Kills the Private Insurance Industry – Wizbang

Joe Biden: ‘We Have to Go Spend Money to Keep From Going Bankrupt’

From CNSNews.com:

Vice President Joe Biden told people attending an AARP town hall meeting that unless the Democrat-supported health care plan becomes law the nation will go bankrupt and that the only way to avoid that fate is for the government to spend more money.

“And folks look, AARP knows and the people with me here today know, the president knows, and I know, that the status quo is simply not acceptable,” Biden said at the event on Thursday in Alexandria, Va. “It’s totally unacceptable. And it’s completely unsustainable. Even if we wanted to keep it the way we have it now. It can’t do it financially.”

“We’re going to go bankrupt as a nation,” Biden said.

“Now, people when I say that look at me and say, ‘What are you talking about, Joe? You’re telling me we have to go spend money to keep from going bankrupt?’” Biden said. “The answer is yes, that’s what I’m telling you.”

With all due respect Mr. Vice President, we’re already bankrupt… Or do you think trillion-dollar deficits as far as the eye can see are a good thing?

Oh, and  by the way Mr. Vice President the Congressional Budget Office has already laid waste to your foolish ‘We Have to Go Spend Money to Keep From Going Bankrupt’ argument.

Related

• Centrist Dem Leader: Has Committee Votes To Block Health Bill – Dow Jones Newswires
• President Obama Continues Questionable “You Can Keep Your Health Care” Promise – ABC News Political Punch
• Bombshell: CBO chief tells Congress ObamaCare will “significantly expand” federal spending – Hot Air

Steny Hoyer: Idiot

From CNSNews.com (emphasis mine):

House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) said that job growth and economic recovery would not be harmed by a Democratic plan to increase income taxes by $540 billion to pay for their health-care reform proposal because the tax hikes would not affect small businesses.

Hoyer also said he could not think of any small business owners who make enough money to qualify for the higher taxes.

Speaking at his weekly press briefing on Tuesday, Hoyer said that the proposed tax was merely a surcharge on wealthy individuals, explaining that the tax increases were graduated.

“This is a surcharge,” Hoyer said, “on people making over $280,000 as an individual, $350,000 [per year] as a couple and it’s graduated, it goes up as you reach $1 million in income.”

Asked by CNSNews.com whether such a tax increase would affect small businesses and job creation during a recession, Hoyer said: “I don’t know many small business men or women who are making, themselves $280,000 [per year], so I’m not sure that very many small businesses are going to be affected by this.”

With all due respect Congressman you’re wrong. I’d suggest you take a look at the Small Business Administration’s Size Standards which defines small business as follows:

A small business is an concern that is organized for profit, with a place of business in the United States, and which operates primarily within the United States or makes a significant contribution to the U.S. economy through payment of taxes or use of American products, materials or labor.  Further, the concern cannot be dominant in its field, on a national basis.  Finally, the concern must meet the numerical small business size standard for its industry.  SBA has established a size standard for most industries in the U.S. economy.  The most common size standards are as follow:

• 500 employees for most manufacturing and mining industries
• 100 employees for all wholesale trade industries
• $6.5 million for most retail and service industries
• $31 million for most general & heavy construction industries
• $13 million for all special trade contractors
• $0.75 million for most agricultural industries

About one-fourth of industries have a size standard that is different from these levels.  They vary from $0.75 million to $32.5 million for size standards based on average annual revenues and from 100 to 1500 employees for size standards based on number of employees.  Several SBA programs have either alternative or unique size standards, such as the Small Business Investment Company Program.

In other words Congressman small businesses aren’t all mom and pop operations. many of them employ hundreds of people and earn significantly more $280.000 in income. The bottom line congressman is that many of these, not so, small businesses file their taxes as subchapter-S corporations or ‘sole proprietors’ and the $540 billion in new taxes you and your colleagues are proposing will ultimately result in slower economic growth and a loss of jobs.

Related

• Health reform would tax the rich, near-rich – Washington Times
• Health Reform Requires Lawsuit Reform – Wall Street Journal
• PROMISES, PROMISES: Indian health care’s victims – Associated Press
• VA admits its failure to give female veterans proper care – McClatchy
• Small Business Faces Big Bite – Wall Street Journal
• 9 reasons Pelosi’s healthcare surtax is disastrous – James Pethokoukis
• Obama will Repeal Medicare – Dick Morris

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