Rush Limbaugh: Romney Is Not A Conservative

[darrmad]

The reason is simple: Romney is not a conservative. He's not, folks. You can argue with me all day long on that, but he isn't. What he has going for him is that he's not Obumer
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2011/10/12/rush_limbaugh_romney_is_not_a_conservative.html

http://klsouth.wordpress.com/top-posts-essays/the-romney-rino-scorecard/

[RevDWW]

IF he wins it will be because folks voted against Obama.

[AreYouReady?]

I got one of those emails today telling me what all Romney is going to overturn that Obama put into place if he is elected over Obama.

Well...I just do not believe it. Why would Romney overturn Obamacare when he put Romneycare (basically the same thing) into place in MA? I think he will strengthen it.

[deacon blues]

Because he will have the entire GOP expecting him to turn it over, hopefully a Senate and House pressuring him and the sense that if he goes against the will of his party and the American public, there will be heck to pay n the midterms and inthe 2016 election. You may be able to get away with moderate to liberal policies as the governor of Mass, but to be the head of the GOP, you won't survive. It would be political suicide to strengthen Obamacare and he's smart enough to know it.

One things for sure, we have a ZERO percent chance to overturn Obamacare if Obama is reelected. With Romney, we have a chance. I'll take my chances. Those of you who won't vote for Romney because you don't like him will assure Obama's reelection. And I can promise you this, you definitely won't like what the next four years holds if you think these first four were a debacle.

Obamacare isn't going to survive the Supreme Court. But if reelected, Obama will probably try another version. Liberals don't give up til they get what they want.

WAKE UP AMERICA!

[RevDWW]

Because he will have the entire GOP expecting him to turn it over, hopefully a Senate and House pressuring him and the sense that if he goes against the will of his party and the American public, there will be heck to pay n the midterms and inthe 2016 election. You may be able to get away with moderate to liberal policies as the governor of Mass, but to be the head of the GOP, you won't survive. It would be political suicide to strengthen Obamacare and he's smart enough to know it.

One things for sure, we have a ZERO percent chance to overturn Obamacare if Obama is reelected. With Romney, we have a chance. I'll take my chances. Those of you who won't vote for Romney because you don't like him will assure Obama's reelection. And I can promise you this, you definitely won't like what the next four years holds if you think these first four were a debacle.

Obamacare isn't going to survive the Supreme Court. But if reelected, Obama will probably try another version. Liberals don't give up til they get what they want.

WAKE UP AMERICA!
Good Post!

[Pressing-On]

Because he will have the entire GOP expecting him to turn it over, hopefully a Senate and House pressuring him and the sense that if he goes against the will of his party and the American public, there will be heck to pay n the midterms and inthe 2016 election. You may be able to get away with moderate to liberal policies as the governor of Mass, but to be the head of the GOP, you won't survive. It would be political suicide to strengthen Obamacare and he's smart enough to know it.

One things for sure, we have a ZERO percent chance to overturn Obamacare if Obama is reelected. With Romney, we have a chance. I'll take my chances. Those of you who won't vote for Romney because you don't like him will assure Obama's reelection. And I can promise you this, you definitely won't like what the next four years holds if you think these first four were a debacle.

Obamacare isn't going to survive the Supreme Court. But if reelected, Obama will probably try another version. Liberals don't give up til they get what they want.

WAKE UP AMERICA!

It's ironic that we want to oust Obama over Federal "mandated" healthcare, but want to replace him with Romney who advocates state "mandated" healthcare.

Now Massachusetts is capping health care expenditures relative to GDP. I really don't see much difference or anything to be joyful about between these two candidates on the healthcare issue.

[Jermyn Davidson]

It's ironic that we want to oust Obama over Federal "mandated" healthcare, but want to replace him with Romney who advocates state "mandated" healthcare.

Now Massachusetts is capping health care expenditures relative to GDP. I really don't see much difference or anything to be joyful about between these two candidates on the healthcare issue.

There isn't a difference and Limbaugh is right.

[deacon blues]

It's ironic that we want to oust Obama over Federal "mandated" healthcare, but want to replace him with Romney who advocates state "mandated" healthcare.

Now Massachusetts is capping health care expenditures relative to GDP. I really don't see much difference or anything to be joyful about between these two candidates on the healthcare issue.

Big difference is the fact Massachusetts citizens overwhelmingly supported state mandated healthcare. Romney delivered what the people wanted. Obama went against the will of the American people.

[Pressing-On]

Big difference is the fact Massachusetts citizens overwhelmingly supported state mandated healthcare. Romney delivered what the people wanted. Obama went against the will of the American people.

Please don't patronize me with this baseless argument. The Obama administration sought out Romney to get plans on furthering the healthcare mandate agenda for the nation.

National healthcare will have the same story as the state healthcare issue, if we dare to really admit we even looked into it.

Mandatory Health Insurance: Lessons
from Massachusetts

The rapid growth in expenditures is not altogether surprising as Massachusetts only pays 50 cents for every $1 it spends on expanding
its health care initiative. The federal government pays the other
half in matching funds. From 2006 to 2009, Massachusetts’ health
care initiative, which includes supplemental payments to Medicaid
and hospitals for unfunded care, increased from $1.04 billion to
$1.86 billion, an increase of 78 percent, as seen in Table 1. Even if
the federal government continues to pay half of the increase in these
expenses, the growth rate in the state’s spending on its health care
initiative still averaged almost 26 percent from 2006 to 2009. The
state now spends 33 percent more per person on health care than the
national average, while in 1980 it was 23 percent more (Sack 2009).
In total, annual expenditures on the state’s health care initiative are
projected to be $409 million higher in 2010 than in 2006 (after
receiving an additional $409 million in federal reimbursements),
which is an average increase of $102 million per year, as seen in
Table 1. However, federal reimbursements are not guaranteed, and
must be negotiated by the state (Dembner 2008). This puts
Massachusetts in a particularly vulnerable position if there are future
federal budget cuts, since their health care expenses could potentially
rise even more quickly.

In 2009 the state collected $2 billion less tax revenue than in 2008, a drop of 10 percent. With only $500 to $800 million left in its “rainy day fund,” the state is rapidly burning through its reserves (Massachusetts Taxpayers Foundation 2009).

Thus, greater access to health care, a primary goal of the program,
has been achieved, but the large increase in costs has put increased
pressure on an already strapped state government.

The outline of the rest of this article is as follows. First, it seeks to
explain the mechanics of mandatory health insurance as it was enacted
in Massachusetts, and the special difficulties of making health
insurance a mandated purchase:

Perverse Incentives for Employers

Other perverse incentives have also arisen. For a firm that has 11
workers, it might be financially advantageous for the manager to fire
one employee in order to take advantage of the Commonwealth
Care program, and not pay any fair share assessments as well as eliminate
all health insurance responsibilities. Likewise, other small firms
might hesitate to hire more than 10 workers who were getting subsidized
health care, because now they would be obligated to provide it
or suffer the financial consequences. Thus, there are significant
incentives that push small firms toward shrinking rather than growing.

Perverse Incentives for Individuals

Like any government subsidy program that depends upon income
levels, problems arise when the individual begins to earn more
income. The subsidy is withdrawn, resulting in an implicit tax rate
that may exceed the tax rate for the wealthiest income tax bracket.

This implicit tax, although high, is at least smooth and predictable
in this example. However, the implicit tax rates of the
Commonwealth program have sudden jarring transitions, leading to
highly unusual and perverse incentives to earn less, not more, in
order to qualify for government subsidies, as seen in Figure 1.

The perverse incentives built into this system are doubtless causing
many families as well as individuals to think carefully about
accepting pay raises.

Conclusion

Mandatory health care reforms have resulted in fewer uninsured but
have not contained soaring costs in the health care system. Instead,
the reforms have created incentives for costs to rise even faster.

Mandatory health insurance may improve access, but the nut has
not yet been cracked to solve the second and now more pressing
problem of efficiency and cost containment.

But the case of Massachusetts also offers cautionary lessons for
the United States as the Obama administration seeks wide-ranging
health care reforms that move more in the direction of mandatory
health insurance. Keen attention needs to be paid to the distortionary
effect of regulations on individual and firm incentives, balancing
out the costs versus the benefits to society of a subsidized
program. The lesson learned is that it is difficult to create any subsidized program that does not encourage people to earn less—ironically,
the programs get more expensive as the work incentives improve.

http://www.cato.org/pubs/journal/cj29n2/cj29n2-7.pdf