[VIDEO] Alabamans angry, upset over ObamaCare and Obama’s broken promises

If I were a Democrat who only cared about keeping my power, this would scare me to death:

Via: The Right Scoop

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Report: Feds spent $4.4 BILLION on state Obamacare exchanges

Data compiled and released Friday by the conservative organization Americans for Tax Reform reveals the amount of federal tax dollars funneled to states to implement Obamacare exchanges at $4.4 billion.

According to ATR, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services distributed the funds to states for a variety of “vague” purposes.

ATR pulled out grant purposes such as:

• “[P]reparations to demonstrate operational readiness”
• “Provide assistance to hire staff and consultants”
• “Continue and complete current planning and implementation efforts”
• “Secure staff consultants and expert resources and actively engage stakeholders”
• “Marketplace IT system design and development costs including IT consultants and privacy and security consultants”

States that did not end up setting up there own Obamacare exchanges also received money, according to ATR’s research.

Alabama for example, received $9,772,451 in two grants in 2010 and 2011 one for planning the exchange and the other to “support core staff, contracts, and activities around early implementation of the Alabama Health Insurance Exchange.”

Many of the states that did end up creating their own exchanges received more money than those that did not.

ATR’s tax policy director Ryan Ellis told The Daily Caller that it was not clear from CMS’ records what ended up happening to the money provided to states to set up exchanges that in the end decided not establish their own exchange.

“Presumably, [the funding] was to try to get those states to change their mind at an earlier stage of development,” Ellis wrote in an email.

Via Daily Caller

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ObamaCare Will Raise Average Insurance Claims By 32% For Individual Coverage The Next Four Years

In my search for the truth about how much ObamaCare will increase the cost of health care insurance, I came upon a frightening map of the United States that projected what the percentage hikes would be state by state for people with individual coverage. The projections, prepared by the Society of Actuaries in March 2013 predicted some pretty outrageous total health care increases for people with individual coverage in the likes of California (62%), Alabama (60%), Texas (34%) and Arizona (41%). Only in  New York, Massachusetts and New Jersey would the premiums decline slightly for people with individual coverage, a segment of the market that is expected to increase from 11.9 million people at present to 25.6 million as more Americans sign up for insurance coverage under ObamaCare.

The Society of Actuaries contacted me this morning to explain that the large percent increases are the projected estimate for “underlying claims costs… not the expected premium. So, I was incorrect in pinning the 32% just on the rise in the cost of buying health insurance, but rather it refers to the projected average increase in the insurance claims to be paid by the health insurance companies.

Via: Forbes

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With His Premiums More Than Doubling, This Dad Would “Rather File Bankruptcy” Than Deal with Obamacare

Ben Neptun and his wife Charla are “furious” their family’s health insurance premium will be raised from $419 to $899 per month because of Obamacare.

“We will absolutely go in a hole with this change,” Ben said.

Ben, 36, and Charla, 34, are both home health nurses in Mobile, Alabama. They each make about $23 an hour and have spent the last year learning how to budget and recover from debt acquired in previous marriages. With a blended family of five—a 15-year-old, a 2-year-old, and a 10-month-old—Ben said “there’s no room for several hundred dollars extra per month” in their budget.

The Neptun family buys their insurance directly from Blue Cross Blue Shield and spends about $2,000 a year on health care for the family, not including the monthly premium. So when Ben received a letter from Blue Cross explaining health insurance rates were increasing to comply with the new Obamacare regulations, he was angry. The new regulations in Obamacare force healthy families like his to “spend a boatload for nothing,” he explained.

“We’re healthy, non-obese, non-smokers, and on no medication,” Ben said. “I should not have to pay more.”

Ben said if he is forced to spend $500 more per month on insurance, then that’s $500 less that’s going into his family’s basic needs like groceries, savings, and his children’s college funds. He’d “rather file bankruptcy and do without health insurance” because “the fines are less.”

Via: The Foundry

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The Importance of Quin Hillyer

A principled conservative in 

Alabama.

Butternut squash.

Say what?

In the world of disagreements between like-minded conservative colleagues, this was the code word I would use with Quin Hillyer when we had reached that rare stage of disagreement.

It was meant to acknowledge the disagreement — while making certain that both of us knew that in fact, in the larger world, we were exactly on the same conservative page.

My friend and former colleague Mr. Hillyer is a conservative’s conservative — the kind who takes umbrage if you mistake that fact. This is decidedly not someone who runs from the fray, trying to figure out what mealy-mouthed toss of word salad can please whomever needs pleasing in the moment. Quin, as it were, takes his conservatism straight-up. He runs straight towards the action, principles fixed.

This is, sadly, a rare phenomenon in the Republican Party, as conservatives have repeatedly learned to their chagrin. But take heart: today that principled political courage is on display as Quin runs for the congressional vacancy in Alabama’s 1st district in Mobile.

And by a quirk of fate — the resignation of the incumbent — the special election in the Alabama First takes on a special importance as the place the repeal of not just ObamaCare but the disaster that is the Obama presidency begins.

Via: American Spectator

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Painful Lessons from Hurricane Sandy

Having lived in the Tornado Alley for 30 years, I have learned many valuable lessons. After many raging tornadoes, straight line winds, and hurricanes I understood that churches and other Americans near and far, not the big government, were the first line of defense after a disaster.

Mennonites, Baptists, Mormons, and the National Guard came by truckloads with bulldozers, shovels, and chain saws to extricate their fellow Americans from trees and debris. Utility trucks from places as far away as Utah helped restore our power.

I have never met a Mormon who was not giving and caring to their fellow man. For this reason, I do not understand the sheer hatred against Mitt Romney’s Mormonism. At the same time, liberals bend over backwards to appease and co-exist with “religions” that preach hate and terrorism.

How can New Jersey turn down utility crews from Alabama who came to help restore their power, just because they were not union members? There are still one million people in New Jersey without power yet crews from Alabama were told to stand down. They are either going back home or to New York. Does the Democrat pro-union political machine trump the misery and suffering of Americans?

Via: Canada Free Press

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If Economy Is Recovering Why Is Obama Increasing Welfare Spending?

Rising welfare spending has served as a metric for the weakness of the economy, but a new report suggests that will change in the coming years, as Obamacare increases welfare spending even after the economy bounces back.

“As projected by the Congressional Research Service, spending on welfare will continue to rise over the next decade, even as the economy is expected to recover,” the Senate Budget Committee Republicans announced today.

This year, welfare spending was approximately $1 trillion. By 2016, that number will rise by $321 billion, according to figures released by Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala.

“Altogether, the President’s health law would add a new means-tested federal benefit to 30 million more Americans (many of whom do not currently receive means-tested assistance),” Sessions’ office explained. “In total, fully one-third—approximately 105 million—of all non-elderly Americans will receive their health care through the government once the law takes full effect. That figure will be even higher if the economy continues to experience weak growth.”

Mitt Romney has promised to repeal Obamacare if elected. If President Obama wins a second term, he could veto any repeal of the law unless two-thirds of the House and Senate voted to override his veto.

Via: Washington Examiner

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Awesome: Alabama House Leader Moves To Block UN Poll Watchers From Operating In His State…

Montgomery – In response to news that poll watchers affiliated with the United Nations will be sent across the country to monitor balloting in various states and search for evidence of “voter suppression” during the upcoming November 6 presidential election, Speaker of the House Mike Hubbard said he will support legislation in the next session requiring all poll watchers in Alabama to hold U.S. citizenship.

“The United States is the worldwide beacon of free elections and the Republican form of government, so having an international squad from the United Nations playing referee in our elections is insulting and absurd,” Hubbard said. “We’ve been holding elections in the U.S. for the past 223 years without the United Nations playing a role or enforcing the rules, and we certainly don’t want or need them now.”

At the request of several liberal-leaning groups including the American Civil Liberties Union, the NAACP and the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, a United Nations affiliate, announced it will deploy a team of poll watchers to polling sites across the country in order to monitor and document potential disputes.

The poll watchers will come from Serbia, Belarus, Ukraine, Kazakhstan, Germany and France, and other countries.

Hubbard said he will push the law in order to ensure U.N. observers are blocked from future elections in Alabama by allowing only those who are U.S. citizens to be certified as poll watchers in the state.

“If you can’t participate in an election in the United States, and if you can’t cast a vote in the United States, you really have no business serving as a poll watcher in an election being held in the United States,” Hubbard said. “It’s bad enough that Alabama remains trapped under the provisions of the Voting Rights Act, so we certainly don’t need anyone from the United Nations coming into our state and meddling in our elections, as well.”

Via: Yellow Hammer

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Welfare spending jumps 32% during Obama’s presidency

Federal welfare spending has grown by 32 percent over the past four years, fattened by President Obama’s stimulus spending and swelled by a growing number of Americans whose recession-depleted incomes now qualify them for public assistance, according to numbers released Thursday.

Federal spending on more than 80 low-income assistance programs reached $746 billion in 2011, and state spending on those programs brought the total to $1.03 trillion, according to figures from the Congressional Research Service and the Senate Budget Committee.

That makes welfare the single biggest chunk of federal spending — topping Social Security and basic defense spending.

Sen. Jeff Sessions, the ranking Republican on the Budget Committee who requested the Congressional Research Service report, said the numbers underscore a fundamental shift in welfare, which he said has moved from being a Band-Aid and toward a more permanent crutch.

“No longer should we measure compassion by how much money the government spends but by how many people we help to rise out of poverty,” the Alabama conservative said. “Welfare assistance should be seen as temporary whenever possible, and the goal must be to help more of our fellow citizens attain gainful employment and financial independence.”

Via: Washington Times

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