The Obama-promoting Disney News Channel, ABC News, has joined the Washington Post Journolisters in a summer-solstice frenzy of bad reporting on RomneyCare, the so-called Massachusetts health care reform from 2006. Some "Goofy" ABC News left winger named Liz Hatfield has released one of the worst pieces of journalism ever written on the failure that is RomneyCare. Apparently he or she is so ignorant of health care issues in Massachusetts and in general that he or she was completely mislead by the lies the Democrats fed her (or like NPR, he or she chose to be a willing participant in the lies).
Hatfield said
"Generally speaking... Some 98 percent of Massachusetts residents are insured, according to the state's Health Insurance Connector Authority (the U.S. Census disagrees but why use a non-partisan source when you can go Democratic), and that percentage increases among...seniors at 99.6 percent."
RomneyCare has nothing to do with seniors. We're all on Medicare except for (apparently) 0.4% of us that must be independently wealthy.
Hatfield says:
"Another 439,000 residents have gained insurance since before the reform was passed."
What the hell does he or she mean, "another?" Does he or she think percentages and numbers are different things? The increased numbers caused the increased percentages, Goofy. What happened was the state gave free insurance to about 300,000 people and almost free insurance to another 100,000. That's what makes the percentage 96% (according to the Census Bureau), up from 94% before RomneyCare.
(Someone good with numbers -- not Goofy -- might have realized that 439,000 was more than the 4% increase everyon agrees to. The difference that no one ever mentions is that tens of thousands of fewer Massachusetts residents get healthcare insurance through their employers. Do you remember the claim "You can keep your doctor and insurance company," anyone?)
Hatfield says:
"In 2006 the rate in Massachusetts was 10.9 percent, while the average across the country was 17.1 percent, according to the Current Population Survey."
Oh, OK, use the Census Bureau for the lower pre-2006 number and the Democratic Party lies for the post-2006 higher number. That's good journalism. What a joke of a reporter.
Hatfield says:
"Overall the Massachusetts reform has gone very well and it's done everything it was designed to do," says Jonathan Gruber.
No, incorrect. Romney said his reform would lower costs. It did not as the Disney Channel article states.
Hatfield says Gruber said:
"We lowered premiums in that market by about 50 percent relative to the national trend."
What the hell does that sentence mean? What's "that" market. Relative to what trend? If this refers to Gruber's usual deceit about the individual market (only 0.5% of Massachusetts' population), which no longer exists in Massachusetts, this quote might be interesting. Perhaps Grubers is no longer making his absurd claim that premiums went down.
Hatfield says:
"The cost of the law to the state has not been very high."
This is just total nonsense and misquotes The Massachusetts Taxpayers Foundation (MTF) report. MTF is an arm of Blue Cross, which paid for the propaganda. Even so, what the MTF report says is
"Over the five full fiscal years since the law was implemented, the incremental, additional cost per year was..."
Each of the underlined words has weasel signifcance of the highest order. The actual cost just for "pure" RomneyCare (the attempt to help the working poor) was $2 billion in 2012 up from $1 billion before the so-called reform. Everyone but Goofy would call that a 100% increase.
Hatfield says Gruber says that this makes it harder to argue that state's can easily adopt plans similar to the one in Massachusetts. The economic impact on a similar plan not aided by the federal government can't be accurately compared to the Bay State.
This is not surprising because Gruber has told Wisconsin and other states that pay his consulting fees that Obamacare is going to cost them millions.
(Oh, as an aside, at least learn how to spell "gist," Goofy.)
-- Dennis Byron
