How will they cut Medicare program?

Posted by MissIndependent (anonymous) on November 6, 2009 at 10:59 a.m. (Suggest removal)

Good questions! If you get an answer to any of them, will you write a follow up?

I haven't seen anything that says illegal immigrants will get coverage. I think the concern is there isn't enough to stop or prevent fraud or abuse of this. In other words, not a robust enough screening process. Unless I am mistaken on this - does anyone know?

Actually, illegal immigrants can get health care here by simply going to the emergency room. Anyone who goes in is treated. If they can't pay the bill, it goes to collections but as the old saying goes you can't get blood from a turnip. It is also hard to garnish wages when there is no legitimate SSN. Many are paid cash under the table so no way to track.

Posted by ErnieGann (anonymous) on November 6, 2009 at 1:46 p.m. (Suggest removal)

This bill should be called the "Job export bill of 2009."

Taxing medical device manufacturers--taxing workers--taxing corporations 8%--all sounds good, until you finally figure out who actually pays the tax--the consumers!

The U.S. has moved up to be the SECOND HIGHEST CORPORATE TAX IN THE WORLD in only 20 years. Only Japan is higher, and look what it has done to THEIR economy. We can take little pride in being the highest taxed corporations in the world.

The liberals that come up with these half-baked schemes continue to be amazed that corporations move production offshore--and that we don't actually BUILD things here anymore.

The bill is scheduled for a vote this weekend. If you haven't registered your opposition, do it now! If this goes through, you will have nobody to blame but yourself if you don't weigh in. Tordoff provided contact information for you--USE IT!

Posted by NoDFL (anonymous) on November 6, 2009 at 3:16 p.m. (Suggest removal)

All of those twentysomethings who voted for Barack Obama last year are about to experience the change they haven't been waiting for: the return of income tax bracket creep. Buried in Nancy Pelosi's health-care bill is a provision that will partially repeal tax indexing for inflation, meaning that as their earnings rise over a lifetime these youngsters can look forward to paying higher rates even if their income gains aren't real.

In order to raise enough money to make their plan look like it won't add to the deficit, House Democrats have deliberately not indexed two main tax features of their plan: the $500,000 threshold for the 5.4-percentage-point income tax surcharge; and the payroll level at which small businesses must pay a new 8% tax penalty for not offering health insurance.

This is a sneaky way for politicians to pry more money out of workers every year without having to legislate tax increases. The negative effects of failing to index compound over time, yielding a revenue windfall for government as the years go on. The House tax surcharge is estimated to raise $460.5 billion over 10 years, but only $30.9 billion in 2011, rising to $68.4 billion in 2019, according to the Joint Tax Committee.

The Pelosi-Obama health tax surcharge will have a similar effect. The tax would begin in 2011 on income above $500,000 for singles and $1 million for joint filers. Assuming a 4% annual inflation rate over the next decade, that $500,000 for an individual tax filer would hit families with the inflation-adjusted equivalent of an income of about $335,000 by 2020. After 20 years without indexing, the surcharge threshold would be roughly $250,000.

And by the way, this surcharge has also been sneakily written to apply to modified adjusted gross income, which means it applies to both capital gains and dividends that are taxed at lower rates. So the capital gains tax rate that is now 15% would increase in 2011 to 25.4% with the surcharge and repeal of the Bush tax rates. The tax rate on dividends would rise to 45% from 15% (5.4% plus the pre-Bush rate of 39.6%).

The return of the inflation tax demonstrates once again the stealth radicalism that animates ObamaCare. In the case of inflation indexing, Democrats would repeal a 30-year bipartisan consensus that it is unfair to tax unreal gains in income, thus hitting millions of middle-class Americans over time with tax rates advertised as only hitting "the rich." Oh, and the House vote on this exercise in dishonest government will come as early as Saturday.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424...

Posted by bornFree (anonymous) on November 6, 2009 at 3:52 p.m. (Suggest removal)

On behalf of President Obama, I would like to thank all of you who voted for him because the "Tax Man" has cometh to all. And all you Democrats thought that the guy with a few more bucks in his pocket(the rich) would be the fall guy.

Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Posted by Culture_Warrior (anonymous) on November 6, 2009 at 9:27 p.m. (Suggest removal)

I recall one of the regular DFL letter writers wrote in after the election of Barack Obama and assured us all of the coming prosperity that we will all enjoy under his leadership. (i.e. like 10.2 percent unemployment?) The election of two conservative governors in Virginia and very liberal New Jersey lead me to believe that the people are not buying that. The proof is in the pudding. What the DFL writer failed to mention is that Obama became vastly wealthy under eight years of Bush no less!

Posted by conserned (anonymous) on November 9, 2009 at 5:16 p.m. (Suggest removal)

Total scare tactics as usual used by the party of NO members. That's all they have to go on. Health care legislation WILL happen now.

Posted by ErnieGann (anonymous) on November 10, 2009 at 12:45 p.m. (Suggest removal)

Should we be CONCERNED that CONSERNED doesn't know how to spell his own screen name? It doesn't do much for credibility, does it?

Once again, you have confused PARTY with IDEOLOGY. Yes, Repubs are in the minority after the last election, but Conservatism is rebounding--as demonstrated that the majority in the country not only consider themselves centrist-conservatives, but they have rejected the "health care" bill.

Now, if only Congresscritters would vote the will of their constituents, instead of the party line.

Posted by trifid (anonymous) on November 19, 2009 at 2:15 a.m. (Suggest removal)

Our concern should be american's health, not winning the National Spelling Bee. After all, Ernie, those future capital managers now working for minimum wage at Mcducks need to stay healthy if capitalism(consumerism) is to flourish.