Marxism: Redefining the Cliff

"I predict future happiness for Americans if they can prevent the government from wasting the            labors of the people under the pretense of taking care of them."

                                                                                              Thomas Jefferson

In what has been hailed as the top feel-good story for the 2012 Holiday season, a young New York City police officer, Lawrence DePrimo, gifted a barefoot homeless man with a pair of socks and boots on a bitter November night.  While walking his beat near Times Square, Officer DePrimo became concerned about the well-being of the apparently destitute man, and offered to buy him a pair of socks.  The homeless man declined, but wished God’s blessings on DePrimo, who subsequently returned with both socks and new footwear.  DePrimo’s actions were undeniably a laudable and selfless act of human kindness and compassion.

The irony of the story, however, is that the “homeless” man, Jeffrey Hillman, isn’t actually homeless at all.  In fact, the 54 year-old army veteran receives a significant amount in monthly federal subsidies for housing, food and healthcare, and has a private apartment in the Bronx in which he chooses not to live.  He receives a combination of Section 8 rent vouchers, Social Security and Veteran’s Benefits, plus food stamps and Medicaid, and has for several years. Within days, the new boots Hillman received from Officer DePrimo were nowhere to be found, and he was once again shoeless.

Jeffrey Hillman is emblematic of the failed welfare state.  For discussion here is not whether he suffers from mental illness, is worthy of receiving federal subsidies, whether he is attempting to defraud the system, or whether or not the government is a good steward of our hard-earned tax dollars. If these programs were run privately, as they were in the pre-entitlement era, they would certainly be much more tightly controlled and their administration would be significantly more efficient.  Churches, private charities and other community support groups have far less tolerance than the federal government for wanton waste of precious funds and lack of measurable results – But these are topics held for future articles and debate.

At a time when the country is in dire financial straits, entitlements are the very programs that must be critically and objectively evaluated. Yet defying common sense, liberals don’t seem to care how entitlement programs are run or what results they actually deliver.  So the question at hand is why? Why are President Obama and leading Democrats hell-bent on protecting entitlements? Despite the approaching “fiscal cliff”, entitlement programs – which are identified by most economists as destined to bankrupt America – have been labeled sacrosanct by democratic lawmakers. Like fiscal kamikazes, liberals have actually focused on crafting ever broader and richer entitlements. Who cares that tax dollars are being squandered, distributed inappropriately and produce questionable, if any, positive impact?   This is America, land of the “fair”, home of the “level playing field”, right?   It is, if you espouse the Marxist philosophy that wealth is a zero-sum game.     

 The Department of Human Welfare in Pennsylvania ran a recent analysis that determined that a single mother with one child is better off with a $29,000/year gross income than to earn a gross income of $69,000. How can it possibly be that an additional $40,000/year – well more than doubling of the lower salary – would not result in additional disposable income, you ask?  The value of entitlements.  By the time this single mother adds the various welfare subsidies to which she is entitled (Medicaid, food stamps, Section 8 subsidized rent, tax credits, etc.), she will have a net income and entitlement benefits package equaling $57,327.  After taxes, the mother earning $69,000, on the other hand, will net only $57,045. In other words, entitlements make it more profitable to remain in a job that keeps one below the poverty line than to ascend to what is arguably a respectable middle-class income.  By virtue of the structure of taxes and entitlement programs, the government penalizes work, and ultimately, success.  It is subsidizing and incentivizing a set of behaviors that will not only result in our walking the plank to financial disaster, but will place the final nail in our placard as a fully socialist economy.

While we are taunted daily by the looming “fiscal cliff”, the debate in Washington centers on how to best raise taxes on the rich.  Despite the opinions of a multitude of economists who agree that is mathematically impossible to hike taxes on the wealthy enough to balance the budget, this remains the sole focus of both the President and House Democrats. In fact, the point has been well made that actually confiscating 100% of the incomes of the country’s millionaires and billionaires would not make an appreciable dent in the national debt. There is also a threshold beyond which continuing to hike taxes will do nothing more than provide a strong disincentive to work, save and invest.  Furthermore, history has proven time and time again that raising tax rates does not translate into increased revenues to the government.  To wit, revenue as a percentage of GDP has remained essentially the same for the past century, regardless of the top marginal tax rate.

Given these facts – which are well documented and based on both historical truths and sound economic principles – it begs the question why Obama and his merry band of profligate spenders continue to push for tax hikes as the solution to the deficit and the debt crisis.  The answer, if we are to employ honest rhetoric, is that their approach is not about “taxing the rich”; it’s about “taxing the successful”.  This is Marxism, pure and simple.  It is a tactic aimed at leveling the playing field, redistributing wealth, and artificially creating equality. 

America has employed a progressive tax formula nearly continuously since Abraham Lincoln first signed it into law in 1862. When teamed however, as it has now become, with a rich and growing set of entitlement programs, we meet the very definition of Marxism:  “From each according to his ability [progressive tax rates], to each according to his need [entitlements].”  To make matters worse, in America, Marx’s dictum has been interpreted to mean “…to each according to his perceived need.”  Rather than learning from Russia’s abject suffering under Marxism, America is sliding further into that same abyss, while the cries of outrage from conservatives are increasingly drowned out by the din of degenerate comrades like the Wall Street occupiers. 

What we have created in this country is tantamount to joining a club without paying the membership fee, and then demanding that those who have paid continue to fork over more and more of their money so that you can not only enjoy the benefits of membership, but be assured that the perks are continually expanded and enhanced – All without paying a dime!

Contrary to what the media would have the American public believe, the tiresome debate about tax hikes vs. spending cuts as the way to avoid economic Armageddon doesn’t highlight the need for “bi-partisan solutions” or the centrality of ideas; it’s about the reality of arithmetic.  

There are currently more than 66 million Americans receiving some form of government support -- food stamps, Medicaid, subsidized housing or a combination.  An additional 21-plus million Americans work for the federal government, and their salaries are paid for with tax dollars. That makes 87 million people who are being directly supported by the taxpayers.  The problem is that there are only 109 million Americans working in the private sector – And of those, only 50% pay any federal income tax at all.  While it is certainly true that some percentage of government employees do pay taxes, a large number fall below the lower income limit and therefore glean their salaries from the tax base without contributing to the tax base themselves.

So in reality, roughly 55 million people are providing the vast majority of tax dollars to support an ever-growing number of people and entitlements, as well as the country’s vast and rich infrastructure (roads, schools, national defense, etc.) for which taxes were originally designed.   It’s arithmetic, stupid, and the numbers simply don’t work. 

If the goal is actually to deal with the debt crisis and not simply to decimate the existing American class structure, then the only credible solution is to drastically cut entitlement spending. Instead, we are looking at a redesign of the tax system by liberals who are using the monies to bankroll their poorly conceived and inefficiently administered programs. The Democrats’ current policies are simply not consistent with a Constitutional Republic. Their focus is on penalizing the successful and rewarding the handout recipient, all under the guise of creating a country that is “fair”.  By comparison, the current administration makes soviet dictators look like common street thugs.  In the end, we will have made the successful poorer, and Jeffrey Hillman will still be shoe-less, living on the street.  Karl Marx would be proud.

Post ObamaCare: The Brave New World

It is an inviolable fact of nature that in every contest, there are winners and there are losers. While Mitt Romney, Super PACs and big coal were thumped in the recent elections, that same rencounter delivered resounding wins, not only for Barack Obama, but also for "green energy", marijuana fans and Big Bird.

As the dust begins to settle, we are already seeing the negative repercussions of the wet-blanket legislation known as ObamaCare.

In order to escape the mandate to provide expensive healthcare insurance for workers, many companies have already decided to drop the benefit entirely and opt to pay the fine of roughly $2,200 per employee.

Others, particularly those in the hotel and restaurant business, are moving to increase part-time employees for whom they bear no benefit responsibilities. The CEOs of both Papa John’s and Applebee’s have launched plans to cut workers hours and institute a hiring freeze to reduce spiking healthcare costs under the new legislation.

In response to ObamaCare’s 2.3% tax on medical devices, multiple large device companies, including Medtronic, Welch Allyn, Boston Scientific and Stryker intend drastic employee layoffs. These companies will also move jobs overseas where they will be less expensive to fill. Furthermore, they plan to pass the increased tax burden on to consumers in the form of higher device pricing. Of note, Stryker owner and CEO, billionaire Jon Stryker, was one of Obama’s top five contributors. But this is real business with real impact, and the company is slated to close multiple facilities and slash 5% of its workforce as a result of ObamaCare. In the words of Barack Obama, "Elections have consequences."

Likewise, Boeing, PepsiCo and Dana Holding Corp. have announced plans for major layoffs in an attempt to stem the financial crush of ObamaCare’s employee mandate.

This "blowback" – to coin an espionage term used to define the unintended consequences of a covert operation that are suffered by the civil population -- is anticipated to have continued and wide-reaching repercussions on American businesses and the economy. Entire companies may dissolve and reconstitute as a series of smaller subsidiaries, each with less than 50 full-time employees, in order to avoid the onerous requirements of employee health insurance.

Unfortunately, what every good parent understands, but clearly Democrats in Congress fail to grasp, is the concept that we should subsidize those things we hope to promote, and tax those things we wish to suppress. Research, medical devices and jobs are prime examples of the former. This is not politics; it’s economics.

While many have focused on the negative consequences or blowback of ObamaCare’s stay-of-execution, the fundamental truth of the "winners and losers" adage remains. Americans are a highly entrepreneurial and resourceful bunch, and many opportunities will ultimately be borne of ObamaCare.

In passing the legislation in 2010, Congress virtually guaranteed total government control of healthcare by rationing care, setting fee schedules, mandating coverage of services and limiting access to treatments that citizens may wish to buy. In addition, they laid the groundwork for the federal government – that tightly run ship -- to serve as the ultimate "competition" for fat, greedy private insurance companies.

After a year or so of denials for hip replacements, annual mammograms, pap smears, dialysis and cataract surgery, many Americans will look to alternative options for care; the treatment and services they obtain may not be legal, but they will be available. In the words of Winston Churchill, "If you destroy a free market, you create a black market."

Americans with financial resources will seek – and industrious practitioners will provide -- under-the-table healthcare services. Cost for this care will be layered on top of the guaranteed higher taxes that are part and parcel with ObamaCare, but American consumers with means will not sit back and accept the lowest common denominator when it comes to healthcare.

There will likely be an explosion of "health spas" and "wellness retreats" that will advertise a vague range of services, with the covert understanding that an active senior can easily obtain that desired knee replacement or government-denied pacemaker. The surfeit of disenfranchised and disgusted healthcare providers will be more than eager to reinvent their practices geared toward this private-pay and highly motivated consumer class.

The medical version of "speakeasies", mobile surgical hospitals, and an underground railway for medical supplies will be created within less than a year. These sorts of entrepreneurial endeavors require minimal up-front capital and insignificant lead-time. More energetic groups of investors will look to create full service, floating hospitals on refurbished cruise ships that can be anchored in international waters off the coast of Miami or elsewhere. These "off-shore" medical centers will offer convenient helicopter service to world-class care, free from the constraints of an over-zealous and increasingly socialistic government. As an additional plus, they will have no risk of running into an offshore oil rig, as these are prohibited by the current administration.

Major U.S. based medical centers such as the Cleveland Clinic have been several years in the process of building huge medical megalopolises in the United Arab Emirates, Singapore and elsewhere in Asia. While originally conceived to tap into the expansive wealth and vast patient populations of these foreign nations, these international hubs for healthcare will thrive with the influx of Americans seeking care out of the control of the U.S. government, where they can still buy the best healthcare services in the world.

Then there’s the opportunity presented by the recognized "sovereign status" of Native American reservations. It is this designation that has allowed various Indian tribes across the country to operate casinos, even in states that prohibit gambling establishments. If their sovereign status justifies casinos that promote gambling, dancing girls and rampant alcohol consumption, certainly one can imagine that a medical facility offering high-quality, elective healthcare procedures would stake a strong argument. State-of-the-art hospitals and clinics with associated luxury hotels and fine restaurants could turn vast swaths of Native American-owned property into a veritable medical Disneyland. In a somewhat ironic twist, Native American tribes may take advantage of the opportunity to gain control of a significant portion of the U.S. economy via healthcare.

Medical tourism will certainly extend across our southern border to clinics and hospitals that will spring up in Mexico, catering to those unwilling to accept denial of treatments on their home turf. As an incidental consequence, this trend could potentially reverse the flow of illicit border crossings, as both Americans and Canadians travel south to obtain healthcare services no longer allowed in the U.S., and Mexico subsequently enjoys a significant uptick in jobs that will keep their residents put.

Companies that are inclined to remain within the confines of the U.S. and have latitude with regard to geography will gravitate to states that for one reason or another have a "bye" for ObamaCare. Some of those states have achieved their coveted waiver status as a result of filing a formal lawsuit against the federal government. Others received special dispensation by executive fiat. Regardless, in an extension of the law of unintended consequences, states that eschew ObamaCare will doubly benefit by an influx of revenues from companies that seek safe haven there.

Before ObamaCare was conceived, there were a number of initiatives to "privatize" other scientific and technology sectors, including the space program. As a result, large numbers of specialists in esoteric fields such as nanotechnology are free from their previous government commitments and anxious to continue their work. Much of this applied science, particularly microchip technology, has potential application in the healthcare arena. It is likely that we will see a wave of new entrepreneurial endeavors aimed at developing and selling these technologies – pre-revenue -- to European or Asian countries where they will be further developed and commercialized.

It is virtually a given that some version of a black market in healthcare will arise as a direct result of ObamaCare. Given that by definition, black markets exist outside the law, the question remains how it all will be regulated, and by whom. The probable answer is by no one. The promise of obtaining services and treatments no longer conventionally available, however, may well be enough for Americans to assume the risk, and forego the right or ability to sue for medical liability.

Ironically, one additional unintended consequence of all of this will be a drastic widening of healthcare disparities between the "haves" and the "have-nots"; precisely the divide Democrats claimed to be narrowing when they conceived the healthcare reform bill.

Economists and business owners alike warned that ObamaCare would cost billions and billions of dollars and implored Congress to carefully consider its potential fall-out on jobs and the economy. Little attention has so far been paid, however, to the potential opportunities, legal and otherwise, that would inevitably emerge if ObamaCare marched forward. Americans are an industrious group – and the blowback from ObamaCare may well be the birth of a brave new world.

Election 2012: As Healthcare Goes, So Goes the Nation

Pivotal. Monumental. Constitutive. So much is at stake in the 2012 presidential elections that many have put its significance on par with the country’s first election, as well as the 1860 contest that spawned the American Civil War.  It is also a study in stark contrasts.

Perhaps nothing elucidates more sharply the axiological difference between the candidates than their approach to healthcare reform.

Without doubt, the Affordable Care Act will have a devastating impact on the economy and the sustainability of the U.S. healthcare industry. As a physician, I also have grave concerns about the very fundamental changes that ObamaCare, if not repealed, will inflict upon the American way of life. Rather than entrusting physicians to make informed clinical decisions and tailor care to individual patients, ObamaCare represents thousands of pages of new regulations that control office visits, operating rooms, consultations and treatment options. It ultimately prohibits the ability for doctors to provide the best possible care.

Few things are as sacrosanct as the relationship between patients and their doctors. We have laws that recognize the confidential nature of the alliance between people and their lawyers, and protect the “attorney-client privilege”.  We safeguard interactions between people and their pastors.  We hold dear the “spousal privilege” that protects the sanctity of conversation within a marriage. And historically, we have held the essence of the relationship between patients and their doctors in the same inviolable regard. 

As a country, we have always recognized that patients and their doctors are in the best position to make decisions about what is right for them and their families.  We have valued the very personal and private bond that occurs within the confines of the exam room.

For the first time in history, the Affordable Care Act threatens the very fiber of the patient-doctor relationship by inserting a host of government mandates and regulations that legislate what doctors can and cannot do. ObamaCare represents an egregious intrusion of the federal government into what was formerly hallowed ground.

Although the Affordable Care Act was passed in 2010 and is just now in the process of full implementation, the seeds of its philosophical transformation were sown from the beginning of the Obama administration.  Medical education itself has changed, as medical students and young physicians have been taught to rely on government issued “guidelines” and standards set by bureaucrats not trained in science. They have been inculcated with the concept that cost-of-care trumps quality, and that the government is better able to make decisions about treatment options than doctors and patients.  As a result, we are training an entire generation of doctors who are little more than reasonably competent “healthcare technicians”.  They have no understanding of how to assess and care for the whole patient, weigh treatment options, and make well-reasoned clinical decisions.

In what can be best described as linguistic subterfuge, ObamaCare’s architects and supporters have co-opted conservative terminology such as “personal responsibility” and “market competition”. They have hijacked these phrases in hopes of surreptitiously passing off their centrally planned and statist concepts. Forcing people to purchase a government-defined product -- and threatening them with a hefty tax penalty for failure to comply –is not “individual responsibility”. It’s extortion.  These requirements serve only to drive costs up and severely limit choice.  The healthcare law, and the new “insurance exchanges” that it mandates, are designed for overwhelming government control and income redistribution rather than for individual choice and free-market competition.  As with every other sector of the economy, liberals simply refuse to believe that the free-market can work in healthcare, and therefore, the government must intercede.

Despite President Obama’s claim that the insurance mandate will guarantee that everyone will now have access to care, “Insurance” is not “assurance” of anything; plummeting reimbursement and ObamaCare’s over-whelming intrusion into the treatment room will cause tens of thousands of highly-trained doctors to leave the practice of medicine, worsening an already critical physician shortage. The multitude of new taxes and entitlements included in the Affordable Care Act will devastate our economy and impoverish future generations.  Mandates and regulation will cripple medical innovation and technological advancement.  In short order, ObamaCare will lower the overall standard of living for Americans.

When the focus of healthcare delivery becomes standardization, and cost-containment, there is no option but for quality to suffer and rationing to ensue. How can physicians possibly render personalized treatment when they are restricted by mandates dictated by appointed bureaucrats like the Independent Payment Advisory Board (IPAB)? How can they provide the best care when they are being pressured by an auditor at an Accountable Care Organization (ACO) to keep costs down? Patients need a doctor who can be an advocate, as well as an expert to provide professional medical expertise. A physician should never be put in a position to choose between doing what is best for a patient and what has been mandated by the government. I took an oath to first and foremost, “do no harm”; ObamaCare will force me, and others in my profession, to violate that crucial first principle of medicine.

In speaking to medical students in 1908, famed poet Rudyard Kipling noted, “There are only two classes of mankind in the world – doctors and patients.” Americans no longer have the luxury of remaining apathetic or uninformed about the potential impact of this election.  It is incumbent upon all of us to vote and to encourage others to do so. If President Obama is re-elected, future historians will reflect on the period from 2008-2016 and conclude that he successfully forced the government take-over of American healthcare, and in so doing, sounded the death knell, both for democracy and for the greatest healthcare system on the planet.

Fighting for Our Lives: The Ten Worst Things About ObamaCare

The gauntlet has been laid down. With less than 50 days until the election, and what many agree will be the most significant political and philosophical decision point of our lifetimes, it’s time to take the gloves off. Not in terms of dirty politics, misleading television commercials or mud-slinging, but with regard to educating the American public about exactly what calamity will befall us if we do not vote President Obama out of the White House and repeal the Affordable Care Act (ACA). The clock has run out; the time is nigh. Failure to repeal this legislation before it is fully implemented will have nothing less than devastating consequences for our country and our lives. Americans need to fully engage in this battle.

In writing the majority opinion of the Supreme Court and upholding the constitutionality of the ACA, Chief Justice John Roberts stated:  

“Members of this Court … possess neither the expertise nor the prerogative to make policy judgments. Those decisions are entrusted to our nation’s elected leaders, who can be thrown out of office if the people disagree with them. It is not our job to protect the people from the consequences of their political choices.”

In so writing, Chief Justice Roberts challenged the American people to speak loudly and decisively with their votes on November 6^th. In the critical remaining days before this election, we need to be armed with the overwhelming and compelling facts about the travesty known as ObamaCare and we need to broadcast these truths from every pulpit:

1) ObamaCare will increase healthcare costs

Although one of the primary stated goals of ObamaCare was to bend the cost curve downward, the average price of a family policy has risen by $2,200 since passage of the law. Costs for families, individuals, doctors and hospitals are expected to rise further as additional components of the law are put in place. In addition to the direct impact on healthcare costs, ObamaCare will levy more than $569 billion in new taxes to offset its massive entitlement spending.  Many of these taxes have nothing to do with healthcare, including new taxes on bio-fuel, investment income, and tanning salons.

2) ObamaCare will increase the deficit

When the bill was passed in March 2010, leading House Democrats proclaimed that it would significantly reduce the deficit. Within less than 6 months of its passage, the CBO essentially doubled the cost estimates from $940 billion to $1.76 trillion and those same House Democrats were forced to admit that the bill was not even “budget neutral.” Current estimates put the cost of ObamaCare at over $2.6 trillion between 2014 and 2023. The reality of this bill’s monumental impact on increasing the deficit has become clear.

3) ObamaCare will limit patients’ healthcare choices

Despite President Obama’s promise that “you will be able to keep your health plan and your doctor” under the new system, that is far from likely; more and more physicians will refuse to accept Medicare and Medicaid patients as a result of inadequate reimbursement from these programs. A large percentage of businesses will drop their current healthcare insurance plans rather than try to meet onerous requirements and rising costs. Furthermore, the law prohibits Americans from paying out of pocket for services that are not covered by healthcare insurance and makes it unlawful for physicians to render those services. This hardly constitutes legislation that promotes choice or provides any element of control to patients and their families!

4) ObamaCare will decrease quality

Think of all the people that you know who fly to Canada, Cuba or the United Kingdom for their healthcare. Can’t think of any? That’s not a coincidence. Government run healthcare systems rely on a capitated budget. What that gets you is rationing of services, long wait times and limited access to the newest drugs and latest technologies. Significant increases in the number of insured, combined with a host of new entitlements promised in ObamaCare, will tax the supply of practitioners beyond capacity. More than 60 percent of physicians say that the increase in patient volume will hurt the level of care they can provide. There will be a leveling of quality amongst physicians because physicians will no longer have to compete for patient business, they will lose their autonomy regarding patient care decisions and their incomes will be capped. The vast majority of physicians will ultimately become government employees and Americans will get exactly the type of compassionate and personalized care that we currently receive at the U.S. Post Office and the Department of Motor Vehicles.

5) ObamaCare will control decisions made by doctors and other healthcare providers

Make no mistake: ObamaCare represents a clear and absolute government takeover of the healthcare system. Federal bureaucrats – not physicians – will determine what healthcare benefits and services are “essential.” Doctors and hospitals will face a tsunami of new regulations and reporting requirements to ensure that they are following the government’s definition of “quality care.” Hundreds of pages of new “guidelines” have already been produced, aimed at “educating” practitioners on ways to “manage finite resources” and “limit overuse of services.” Everything from preventive care and screening services to chronic disease treatment protocols are being rewritten by government appointees and bureaucrats – not based on new scientific studies, but based on actuarial reports that evaluate the cost of services rendered. These new guidelines are nothing less than a thinly veiled manifest for healthcare rationing.

6) ObamaCare will decrease access to care and increase the physician shortage

What good is an insurance card in your wallet if there aren’t any doctors to see you? The United States was already facing a significant shortage of physicians prior to the passage of the ACA; studies have estimated that there will be a deficit of more than 69,000 doctors by 2015. Adding an additional 30 million people to the rolls of the insured will make that shortage worse. More importantly, increased patient volumes and decreased reimbursement is driving physicians out of practice; 43 percent say that they are considering retiring within the next five years as a result of the new law.

7) ObamaCare slashes Medicare

Maintaining his usual distant but cordial relationship with the truth, former President Bill Clinton proclaimed at the Democratic National Convention that the new legislation “does not cut Medicare services.” While technically correct, it is irrefutable that the ACA cuts $716 billion from Medicare, and those cuts will come from drastic reductions in payments to doctors and hospitals. Medicare actuaries predict that 40 percent of physicians will either go bankrupt or stop seeing Medicare patients altogether as a result of these cuts. So while ObamaCare may theoretically extend the life of the Medicare trust fund, the reality is that there will be no Medicare providers to staff it and seniors will be left with a worthless insurance subscription.

8) ObamaCare negatively impacts job creation

Small business is the engine for job growth in America. As a result of the “employer mandate” – that portion of the legislation that requires employers with more than 50 employees to provide government-approved health insurance for their workers or face federal fines – many companies will limit hiring in order to stay below the 50 employee minimum. Furthermore, as many as 60 percent of employers intend to increase the portion of premiums that workers are required to pay. Recent surveys indicate that others – as many as 35-40 percent – will simply stop providing coverage for their workers and opt to pay the fine, forcing employees to purchase their own insurance from state exchanges. The most powerful job creation plan Congress could enact would be to repeal ObamaCare!

9) ObamaCare violates religious freedom

Despite its many promises to the contrary, the Obama administration has refused to respect religious liberty in implementing the Affordable Care Act. The new law guarantees women access to “free” sterilization procedures and contraceptives, including drugs that are intended to induce abortions. At issue is the requirement that faith-based institutions such as Catholic universities and hospitals either violate fundamental tenets of their faith by providing the offending drugs and services in their employee healthcare plans or face the federal fines for failing to meet the employer mandate. Although HHS has promised to issue some type of “accommodation” following the election, it is unlikely that it will truly allow religious organizations and individuals to freely follow the teachings of their faith without government intrusion.

10) ObamaCare violates personal freedom

In a breathtaking assertion of congressional authority, for the first time in history, the federal government will force citizens to use their own money to purchase a product – healthcare insurance. The fact that the Supreme Court ruled that the penalty for not complying is a “tax” does not attenuate this stunning conscription. Not only does it mean that Americans are compelled to purchase a product every month for the rest of their lives, but it reflects an intrusion of the government into our private lives in a way that was heretofore unimaginable.

Americans are just beginning to understand the misadventure that is ObamaCare. It is time that we accept Chief Justice Roberts’ challenge to protect ourselves from the consequences of our political choices. We must educate others on the facts about ObamaCare and the egregious assault it will levy on our personal liberties and healthcare as we know it. We must vote for the candidate who has vowed to repeal this abomination. Fight as if your life depends on it, because it does.