The New Obama Is The Old McCain

They told Glenn that if he voted for McCain our health care benefits would be taxed.  And they were right!  The Times explains that the Obama Administration is now backing what they denounced during the campaign as ""the largest middle-class tax increase in history."

Administration Is Open to Taxing Health Benefits
By JACKIE CALMES and ROBERT PEAR

WASHINGTON — The Obama administration is signaling to Congress that the president could support taxing some employee health benefits, as several influential lawmakers and many economists favor, to help pay for overhauling the health care system.

The proposal is politically problematic for President Obama, however, since it is similar to one he denounced in the presidential campaign as “the largest middle-class tax increase in history.” Most Americans with insurance get it from their employers, and taxing workers for the benefit is opposed by union leaders and some businesses.

In television advertisements last fall, Mr. Obama criticized his Republican rival for the presidency, Senator John McCain of Arizona, for proposing to tax all employer-provided health benefits. The benefits have long been tax-free, regardless of how generous they are or how much an employee earns. The advertisements did not point out that Mr. McCain, in exchange, wanted to give all families a tax credit to subsidize the purchase of coverage.

At the time, even some Obama supporters said privately that he might come to regret his position if he won the election; in effect, they said, he was potentially giving up an important option to help finance his ambitious health care agenda to reduce medical costs and to expand coverage to the 46 million uninsured Americans. Now that Mr. Obama has begun the health debate, several advisers say that while he will not propose changing the tax-free status of employee health benefits, neither will he oppose it if Congress does so.

At a recent Congressional hearing, Senator Ron Wyden, an Oregon Democrat whose own health plan would make benefits taxable, asked Peter R. Orszag, the president’s budget director, about the issue. Mr. Orszag replied that it “most firmly should remain on the table.”

Mr. Orszag, an economist who has served as director of the Congressional Budget Office, has written favorably of taxing some employer-provided health benefits and using the revenue savings for other health-related incentives. So has another Obama adviser, Jason Furman, the deputy director of the White House National Economic Council.

They, like other proponents, cite evidence that tax-free benefits encourage what Mr. McCain called “gold-plated” policies, resulting in inefficient and costly demands for health care and pressure on employers to hold down workers’ pay as insurance expenses rise. And, they say, the policy discriminates against those — many of whom are low-income workers — who do not have employer-provided coverage.

More on Obama's Mediscare compaign from David Gratzer at NRO.  The Singularity Sensation opines that these trial balloons are about plausible deniability:

As with the Bu$h administration, there are always the Some and They, the measured pragmatists telling everyone how it really ought to be done.

Unless there's a great political groundswell all your health benefits are about to be taxed. And if there is a popular opposition against it, the One will get on the tube and tell everybody, why, this wasn't his idea, but some nameless faceless person in his Administration, and of course he won't let it happen.

Did "Hope and Change" mean voters were hoping that Obama would change into McCain? 

Comments

[verner]

Hey TM, you need to change the page header to "WE ARE ALL SOCIALISTS NOW"

Even Newsweek said so last month.

[clarice]

Wouldn't it be a helluvs lot easier to just write about whatever campaign promise Obama made that he's keeping?
Let me see...................

[Ranger]

Obama to his voters: "Face it kids, you f*cked up. You trusted me."

[Rick Ballard]

What's with all the superfluous links to the bankrupt tabloid? Is there some value added concept here involving knowing the "background" of the authors of drivel?

Given that the Zero Administration is very open and supportive of taxing air, isn't the real question "Is there anything in the world which they do not intend to tax?"

The interesting aspect to this is how Democrat "Kill Granny" plans for "cost containment" will be linked to the socialist tax grab. Ras has the Dud at +6 this morning, back to a tie with his lows. Maybe this proposed tax increase can get him into negative territory, where he clearly belongs.

[Danube of Thought]

Just a bit of history (this is from memory, and I'm more than willing to be corrected by anyone more knowledgeable).

I believe the entire notion that health insurance was something incident to one's employment arose during the wage-and-price control era of WWII. The ever-wise congress decreed, quite arbitrarily, that if an employer paid an employee's health insurance premiums, those payments would not be counted as wages, and would not be taxable to the employee. Thus was born a wholly artificial--but, as usual, permanent--connection between jobs and health insurance.

It certainly strikes me that, on principle, if someone else pays my insurance premiums, that's income properly imputed to me, and to the extent my income is taxed those premiums should be included in it. Nice to find Obama in something of a trap on the issue.

The problem going forward is that the taxes so collected will not be used to "pay for" public health insurance; like all money, those revenues will be fungible. You can bet your bottom dollar that there will be no connection at all between the amount raised by taxing private health benefits and the amount spent on public ones.

[DebinNC]

FactCheck.org called bs on BO's "scare Granny" ads during the campaign, and, when BO challenged their takedown, FactCheck called bs on that too.

[Rick Ballard]

The "fungible" aspect can be explained by noting Turbo's proposal that $500 billion be raised to fund IMF support of socialist kleptocrats. The G20 smiled and nodded at the doofus on that one as well. Wen chirped in with this:

“We are closely following the issue of increased funding for the IMF, but this is a very complex question. I would like to propose some principles. First of all, the IMF needs to reform its internal governance system. It should guard against risks in financing and investment, implement the principle of balanced rights and obligations, and give more consideration to the interests of developing nations. Second, increased funding for the IMF is not a question for just one country. We support the principle that all member countries of the IMF shoulder responsibilities together according to their quotas. Third, we should expand the fund-raising methods for other international financial organizations. Fourth, any country’s additional contribution to the IMF should be based on that country’s actual situation and done on a voluntary basis.”

I would note that it was the IMF which provided Turbo with the income with which to dodge paying his taxes. The US share would be about $80 billion of the total $500 billion proposed by Turbo - a purely regressive tax increase on the productive American middle class would cover it nicely.

[Old Lurker]

DoT.

Right, right,...and right again.

Hat trick.

[Ranger]

Oh, and this is exactly what we need in the middle of a recesion, to increase the tax burden without increasing income, resulting in yet more lost buying power. And, interestingly enough, the people getting hit with this hardest will be union members, who's unions have been forcing up healthcare coverage in negotiations for the last 50 years. At least McCain was going to offset the increased taxes with a health insurance tax credit, so your tax bill wouldn't actually go up. It doesn't look like Obama's plan uses the tax credit offset.

[DebinNC]

It's no accident that Team BO waited until today, when Geithner's out of the country, to hit the Sunday talk shows in full throttle defense of BO's econ plans.

[MayBee]

The Obama administration is open to anything, because he plans to pontificate from on high and delegate to Pelosi on the down-low.

We all predicted this months ago.
He can keep doing the "on the one hand...on the other hand..." business that gives everyone something to believe, then Congress can be the POOF! that makes it all come together.
Except the parts he doesn't like, then he can criticize the imperfection of it.

[DebinNC]

Exactly, MayBee. Teddy Roosevelt:

The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds..

Obama doesn't do striving. He's like an IOC President who shows up at the arena, says, "Let the games begin," and later on takes credit for any gold medals won.

[clarice]

It's way not cool to look like you're working at anything..Doncha know?

[pagar]

to hit the Sunday talk shows in full throttle defense of BO's econ plans.

BO has econ plans? Who knew? My guess is he just takes the ones he is sent by his handlers and puts his name on them.

[Rick Ballard]

"Oh, and this is exactly what we need in the middle of a recession, to increase the tax burden without increasing income, resulting in yet more lost buying power."

It's even better than that - moving the insurance cost to the "taxable" column hits the employer with his "share" of FICA. A $20 dollar an hour hire with a $10K annual medical insurance benefit which had a total wage and benefit cost of $53,060K before the increase now how has a $53,825K cost and the new hire's take home pay is reduced by $765 at the same time.

What a deal! And that's without accounting for any additional income tax sucked out of the employee's pocket. According to this 1040EZ tax calculator, the additional bite for a joint filer would be $1,500 on that $10K bump. Isn't that swell? A new hire at the median household income level would have $2,250 less to waste on frivolities under this plan.

[DebinNC]

David Gregory today on MTP tries unsuccessfully to get BO's econ advisor to tell how McCain's debate comment.. "the fundamentals of our economy are sound".. was wrong, while BO's Friday "the fundamentals of our economy are sound" comment was right.

[Fresh Air]

Ultimately, this sort of stupidity will lead to massive inflation. Companies will raise prices to offset higher expenses. Employees will demand higher wages to offset higher taxes and higher prices. It's 1975 all over again. Anybody got any of those "Whip Inflation Now" buttons?

[Rick Ballard]

Even the dirty socialist journos at AP are noting the utter incoherence of the babbling buffoons.

Will tomorrow's 0845 Fascist Directive focus a 2 minute hate on AP?

[RichatUF]

I'm still not getting how taxing medical benefits would "insure" the so-called uninsured. Seems more of a way to force middle class families into government S-CHIP "coverage" as businesses drop or reduce coverage. Nevermind the insanity of thinking government action will reduce costs while increasing demand by 46 million.

I used sneer quotes on coverage because Obama's plan will eventually ration coverage for middle class families because they are the ones who can "afford to sacrifice". Should go well with his air tax plans.

[pagar]

A new hire at the median household income level would have $2,250 less to waste on frivolities under this plan.

Didn't Obama say he was going to cut down on waste. My guess is he thinks every penny that doesn't go straight to the government is waste.

[Rick Ballard]

"will eventually ration coverage for middle class families"

Rich,

Eventually, but first they'll get Granny out on her own little bitty ice floe. Then, after making sure there is 140% coverage for those who have elected to contract AIDS, dialysis will be cut off for that cute 10 year old waiting for a kidney transplant. No sense frittering away money on potential worker units who may not be able to carry their "fair share" of the cost of a Brave New World.

[narciso]

You'll never guess what Katerina of Converse, saids is at the root of the newspaper shortage, I picked this one up from NewsBusters, through an Ace affiliate,
doubleplusungood, to insulate the stupidity.

[Old Lurker]

"Anybody got any of those "Whip Inflation Now" buttons?"

Sure. But I'll have to charge you a lot more for them.

[matt]

David Broder is calling Obama to account on his handling of the economy in the WaPo today as well. Seems he feels that the Limbaugh gambit is really biting the White House in the hiney.

the drip, drip, drip is turning into a trickle and then a torrent, I think. All of these Sunday socialists are starting to wake up to the fact these the clowns in power are serious about hitting their pensions and their benefits and their taxes and their incomes.....I can just hear the dinner discussion in Washington.... "but I didn't think he was really serious about (name your topic)"

[matt]

Logic would seem to dictate that, if government wants to ration health care for smokers or the obese, then it should also do so for other antisocial behavior such as unprotected high risk sex, drug abuse, addiction to mindless television, or the current curriculum in public schools.

This is what happens when you don't have a Judeo-Christian philosophy underlying the law of the land.

[PD]

My guess is he thinks every penny that doesn't go straight to the government is waste.

There's no guessing involved with that proposition.

[Daddy]

Thank you DebinNC,

Your links are consistantly excellent, as in the one above of David Gregory almost committing journalism.

[daddy]

You too Narciso, excellent links today!

So according to the WaPo, the entity responsible for the demise of America's Newspapers is not the bias, lies, and misinformation of the Newspapers themselves, but the few individuals capable of publicly pointing out the bias, lies and misinformation of America's Newspaper Industry.

Wonder where this columnist sits on The Fairness Doctrine?

[bad]

Romer reminds me of Janet Reno. Romer looked like an idiot in that clip. She's definitely a good fit with the O admin.

Happy birthday Porch. I learned to rollerblade for my 40th.

[bad]

Rick, your tax calculations are very depressing.

[Old Lurker]

"This is what happens when you don't have a Judeo-Christian philosophy underlying the law of the land."

Coming soon to a theater near you.....

[Old Lurker]

Bad, Romer and Geithner are both really bad at communicating. Very unsettling.

[kim]

Well, actually, McCain was right; consumer confidence, the fundament of our economy was still good last September. Now it is bad, and the fundamentals of our economy are not good. McCain was right, and Obama wrong, saying the same thing.

It's even worse than you thought. What a LIAR!
======================================

[JM Hanes]

Daddy

Parker was one of the folks who got invited to an exclusive Obama sit down social on Air Force One. She's part of that new breed of useful idiots for hire.

[JM Hanes]

Old Lurker:

It can be hard to communicate when you've got nothing plausible to say.

[Charlie (Colorado)]

This is what happens when you don't have a Judeo-Christian philosophy underlying the law of the land.

Don't wave that red cape in my face, man.

[narciso]

I think what he was getting at was a solid ethical foundation, which is really the problem. As society's institutional holds
declined, laws and regulations filled the vacuum of what Jonathan Raich (sic) calls the unwritten law, and that supresses both
private economic and personal relations.
Would people really be consuming illegal drugs and engaging in other unsafe practices
if there were solid moral guidelines sans laws. I'd venture to say probably not.

[Rick Ballard]

You're chumming for Bonobo Sophists, Narciso. As Goldstein has been pointing out again recently, the language is currently too perverted for actual discourse on the subject.

[glasater]

Ritholtz has a chart that's pretting interesting:

President Zero, Meet the Markets-Markets Meet Pres Zero

[cindyk]

I just have to say, that I frequent this site for a sample of great thought. However, truth be told, I am actually a Rick Ballard groupie!

[sbw]

As a business owner, I wonder if taxing healthcare isn't a good idea.

Right now, it's a costly pain in the ass to administer. And because the company pays a large chunk of it, the price signals aren't sent to the employees.

We've kept paying because it's cheaper for us to pay with pretax dollars than for the employee to pay with post-tax dollars. As soon as healthcare is taxed, there is no incentive for us to offer it to employees as a company benefit.

You want to see a tea party? Wait for that one.

[matt]

Bonobo sophist? I like it!

[Rick Ballard]

SBW,

Why would you think that you will have any say in the matter?

[Rick Ballard]

Darleen Click has a good illustration of the cost of government "savings" through the restriction of choices. It's a real killer.

[sbw]

Good point, Rick.

But what they forget is that they can't keep me working. They can't keep my business open.

Isn't that the ultimate protest? To take off to St. Janes?

As an aside, it brings to mind the sabotage that Dutch workers did to the German war machine when they were impressed into service. You can never imprison a mind that does not give up.

[narciso]

I was just trying to be ecumenical, or in the linguistic sense. Catholic. But the point still obtains, when institutions like family and church, fell by the wayside, laws
filled the vaccuum, values collapsed, part of the backlash was the Christian Right and now with greater impetus the Sunni fundamentalist (Wahhabi/Salafi current) M. Simon misses this in his critique of drug prohibition, and sadly many libertarians.

[Rick Ballard]

Narciso,

The actual price of most vicious conduct falls most heavily on those least able to pay - and least able to communicate in a forum such as this. I find champions of vice to be almost as boringly self centered in total as their descriptions of the harmless nature of whatever their vice of the moment might be. They damage me by eliciting the wish that the next 16 year old girl who describes her descent through drugs into prostitution at a Teen Challenge meeting might be very closely related to the "champion of license" displaying their verbal prowess in drawing attention away from the actual price which will be exacted.

Their linguistic gymnastics just aren't interesting any more. That Click piece illustrates the debasement of language pretty clearly:

Let’s be clear here, and this is something all Americans should know about the UK NHS — in a country where the legal age of consent for sex is 16 — British women are currently barred from getting pap smears until they are 25 years old. The NHS “invites” women between the ages of 25 to 65 for smears — age 25-49, once every 3 years, 50-65 once every 5 years. American women are advised to start going for paps annually once they are sexually active, or minimally age 21 if not.

One doesn't normally associate the failure to "invite" with a death sentence, but that's what it is for a percentage of the women under 25 in the UK.

[narciso]

I did not know that, but I suspected that was the course followed by the NHS, the model the One wants to impose on this country. I'm reminded of Myron Magnet's insights into the left's values been seeded in communities that needed a strong value system, because the affluent were able to get out of their bohemian phase, what would become the underclass would not be so lucky.

[Rick Ballard]

He's published a lot of Dalrymple's vignettes of life in hell as well. Progs are very decent at destruction, death and the discounting of actual costs.

[Ann]

However, truth be told, I am actually a Rick Ballard groupie!

cindyk,

We all are but he is really, really shy. Welcome to JOM!

[DebinNC]

[John] Stossel: Bailouts and Bull

I pray this outstanding piece reached a large audience.

[Rick Ballard]

Recent Dalrymple

Just a series of "personal choices".

[mel]

Rick-

Yikes!

[RichatUF]

Great comments Rick and narciso and I'm always reminded of the great Dalrymple column, "The Frivolity of Evil".

Intellectuals propounded the idea that man should be freed from the shackles of social convention and self-contol, and the government, without any demand from below, enacted laws that promoted unrestrained behavior and created a welfare system that protected people from some of its economic consequences. When the barriers to evil are brough down, it flourishes; and bever again will I be tempted to believe in the fundamental goodness of man, or that evil is something exceptional or alien to human nature.

...

This truely is not so much the banality of evil as the frivolity of evil: the elevation of passing pleasure for oneself over the long-term misery of others to whom one owes a duty. What better phrase that the frivolity of evil descibes the conduct of a mother who turns her own 14-year-old out of doors because her latest boyfriend does not want him or her in the house? And what better phrase describes the attitude of those intellectuals who see in this conduct nothing but an extension of human freedom and choice, another thread in life's rich tapesty?

[narciso]

An oldy but goody, on the nature of the
'acceptable conservative'; basically none we would care to associate LUNed below.

So we have Rousseau to thank for this state of affairs with Marx, undermining
institutions on economic grounds, Freud extrapolating his own patient's insecurities
(a self selected sample) to the wider community and calling it the id, what a fine mess they have wrought, and they will continue to promote.

[Rick Ballard]

Don't forget Hegel and don't leave out the Empiricists. They all wrote as if they were paid by the letter and the damage done to the language through the very clever gymnastics which they employed has never been repaired. Which reminds me that it's time for another pass through The Spirit of the Law.

[Ann]

Rick,

Your 9:50 post reminded me of all the women that ranted about "Stay away from my uterus" or "Out of my uterus" carp during the elections. Particularly, Cameron Diaz on Oprah. Her principal thought was that women ought to vote, because: "Women have so much to lose. I mean, we could lose the right to our bodies. We could lo--if you think that rape should be legal, then don't vote. But if you think that you have a right to your body, and you have a right to say what happens to you and fight off that danger of losing that, then you should vote, and those are the..." So apparently she thought that legalization of rape was on the GOP election platform.

Well, I wonder what they will think when America will give them a free abortion but not a Pap smear until way over the drinking age.

Let me thank you for taking on a subject that most men wouldn't touch. I think I will start a fan club with cindyk. :)

[Rick Ballard]

Ann,

I have no idea why more women don't highlight the increased risk of cervical cancer among women who have multiple sex partners as adolescents nor do I have any idea why more women don't absolutely scream about suppression of the Carroll Study. If the Brits are successfully forecasting incidence of breast cancer utilizing rather simple statistical methodology based upon abortions among nulliparous women then the corollary should be a recommendation that women who have had abortions prior to delivering their first child need to pay special attention to obtaining mammograms, at a minimum.

Instead the researcher is attacked as a tool of the "right wing". Just another example of the progressive death machine in action.

I hope Cindyk was able to deal effectively with the potential stress which comes from choosing who became temporary victims of the Oconomy. I know I'd be able to sleep like a baby if I were able to choose on the suggested basis but I also know that others might not.

[TCO]

DebinNC: "David Gregory today on MTP tries unsuccessfully to get BO's econ advisor to tell how McCain's debate comment.. "the fundamentals of our economy are sound".. was wrong, while BO's Friday "the fundamentals of our economy are sound" comment was right."

The problem is that the whole lot of you RINO maggots like Kim are (and have been) more obsessed with blame and "winning" than with what is best for America. You stabbed Palin in the back and stabbed Republicanism in the back with your maverick RINO pro-bailout crap. You all make me sick.

[kim]

Naw, TCO, it's a lie that I'm pro-bailout. Your conception of the politics of last fall is simple in the extreme. Media elite and Obama Alinskyites stabbed Palin, not some lack of purity among the Republicans. C'mon, you're a bright boy. Tighten up and fly aware. Learn rather than repeating the same old tired delusions.
===================================

[TCO]

you are pro bailout, Kim. Deal with it. Michelle Malkin has more stones than half the Eric Canton pussies.