Congress Must Demand Better On Iran Nuke Deal | Hillary's Email Scandal | Obamacare Consequences - A Trainwreck!

Editorial Cartoon by AF "Tony" Branco
Not Any More!  Hillary's server less emails deleted by
Hillary or her staff has been surrendered to FBI

Today in Washington, D.C. - Aug 13, 2015
Bill Smith, Editor: Congress is not in session but on their August Recess which according to their printed schedule is they are "working in their districts. Wonder want that really means. Working to raise money, secure votes or listening to their constituents. Hopefully, you will have the opportunity to discuss your concerns and issues with them. As for me, so far the only opportunity has been a high price invite to a fund raiser with my Representative and another fund raiser to meet and greet with one of my Senators. Maybe Donald Trump is right in his approach of previously donating to large sums of money to members of Congress and other so that he has access. Unfortunately, the majority of voters don't even come close to what their Congressman/woman earns for less time on the job. Hopefully, some readers have representative and Senators who wish to hear from you even in non-election years. More on a recommended action item below.

Gary Bauer, a contributing author and President of Campaign for Working Families noted today: "Congress Must Demand Better" with regard to Iran Nuke Deal.

"In making their case, President Obama and his allies have repeatedly insisted that Congress should not dare to reject this deal because no better deal is possible and America would "lose credibility" if the deal is voted down. Again, the American people don't agree and, ultimately, the Congress answers to us, not the president.

"But, once again, the administration is distorting the facts. Congress has routinely demanded changes to treaties and international agreements or it has rejected them. Consider this excerpt from a Wall Street Journal column:

"Congress has flatly rejected international agreements signed by the executive branch at least 130 times in U.S. history. Twenty-two treaties were voted down. According to 1987 and 2001 Congressional Research Service reports, the Senate has permanently blocked at least 108 other treaties by refusing to vote on them. Moreover, . . . more than 200 treaties agreed by the executive branch were subsequently modified with Senate-required changes before receiving Senate consent and finally entering into force.""In fact, the Senate rejected several treaties with the Soviet Union until stronger measures to detect and combat Soviet cheating were adopted. "These renegotiations succeeded despite the fact that the Soviet Union, with its nuclear-armed missiles pointed at U.S. cities, had far more leverage than Iran does now," the Journal column notes.

"Previous presidents respected our system of divided government and the prerogatives of the co-equal branch of government to weigh in. Previous Congresses had the courage to defend their authority and demand needed changes to treaties and international agreements.

"Congress can, has and must now demand a better deal!"

ACTION ITEM: Call your members of Congress at 202-224-3121 and tell them to oppose the Iranian Nuclear deal. Tell them that their vote on this issue will determine your vote next November.

Speaker's Office - Hillary's Email Scandal: For months, Speaker Boehner and Chairman Gowdy have had one message for former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton: Surrender your email server to a neutral third party.

And for months, she chose to withhold evidence, prolong the Benghazi Committee's investigation, and offer flat-out false claims. But the Speaker has remained resolute, and together, with the work of Chairman Gowdy and the Select Committee, they've kept the heat on Hillary. And it's working.

Just yesterday, after the inspector general for the intelligence community uncovered multiple Clinton emails that contained information classified as "Top Secret," the former Secretary of State finally saw the writing on the wall, and agreed to surrender the server to the FBI.

Of course, none of this would have come to pass without the steady collection of facts from the Benghazi Committee, and they will continue their investigative work until they get to the bottom about what happened in the events surrounding the 2012 terrorist attack in Libya, where four Americans lost their lives. The families of the fallen, and the entire American public, deserve the truth.

Obamacare "Train Wreck" Consequences
In a report titled, “Kentuckians, Get Ready For Health Insurance Rate Hikes,” WFPL News in Louisville writes, “The Kentucky Department of Insurance recently approved insurers’ requests for rate hikes. And all but one of the 13 insurers selling individual and small-group plans in the state are raising rates.

“The approved increases, which are averages among the plans each insurer offers in Kentucky, are nearly identical to insurance company requests made to the state’s Department of Insurance in June. Most are between 5 and 15 percent.

“The highest increase, by far, comes from the carrier designed to provide the most affordable plans. The Kentucky Health Co-Operative, a nonprofit governed by its members, will see a 25.1 percent rate increase for individual plans this year. Last year, the co-op implemented a 20 percent rate hike.

“The co-op was part of a government push to increase competition among insurers. Funded by a federal loan made available through the Affordable Care Act, its massive back-to-back rate increases suggest things aren’t working as planned. . . . A recent report from the Department of Health and Human Services said the co-op had lost $50.4 million by the end of 2014.”

WFPL notes, “State insurance regulators approved all but two of the increases requested by insurers. Among the highest is CareSource KY, which will raise rates nearly 12 percent for individual plans it offers both on and off Kynect, the state’s insurance marketplace. Golden Rule Insurance Company was granted the 11.5 percent increase it requested for plans it sells outside Kynect. . . .

“Regulators slightly reduced the increase requested by Anthem Health Plans of Kentucky, granting a 12.2 percent hike for its individual plans. And the state is permitting Louisville-based Humana to raise rates for its small-group plans by 7.77 percent.”

Kentucky Insurance Commissioner Sharon Clark explained some of the reasons for the rate hikes to WFPL: “Clark said the fluctuations are in part the result of the Affordable Care Act, which requires insurers to issue policies regardless of a person’s health status or history. . . . [T]he 2016 rates were based on 15 months of data, which gave carriers a better perspective on what usage had been and what they could anticipate going forward. . . . Clark said there was a lot of demand for knee and hip replacements, and prescriptions for diabetes and hypertension within the first few months of open enrollment. That new demand also contributed to an increase in premiums.”

So once again, the reality of Obamacare is showing just how deceptive and unrealistic the claims made by Democrats and the Obama administration about their unpopular health care law were. That it’s happening in Kentucky, which Democrats have been particularly eager to point to as an Obamacare “success” is telling.

Recall that President Obama claimed that “my proposal would bring down the cost of health care for millions - families, businesses, and the federal government.” And that he predicted his plan would “cut the cost of a typical family's premium by up to $2,500 a year.”

During debate in the Senate over Obamacare, one of the law’s principal authors, then-Sen. Max Baucus (D-MT), objected when Leader McConnell argued that the plan would raise costs, “Mr. President, the Republican Leader just a few moments ago says that this bill raises costs. With all due respect to my good friend from Kentucky, that statement is false.” Recall that U.S. Senator Max Baucus was one of the so called geniuses who perpetrated the ObamaCare disaster on Americawoke up and declared, "I see a huge train wreck coming down" the tracks. Where is 'Mad Max"now? He is the current Ambassador to China, the country mocking and hacking the U.S. Government and American businesses.

But of course the experiences of Obamacare have validated what simple common sense dictated from the beginning: when insurance companies are mandated to cover everyone, prohibited from charging different rates based on usage, and are paying for more claims from more people, costs are obviously going to increase. Thus the years of higher premiums and rising costs to governments and employers.

The Aspen Times writes today about Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell being asked by the Aspen Institute’s Walter Isaacson about Obamacare: “‘Let me just make sure you know how I feel about this,’ [McConnell] told Isaacson. ‘I think it was the single-worst piece of legislation that’s been passed in the last half century.’ Rates, co-payments and deductibles have all gone up, he said. Mergers and acquisitions are occurring among insurance companies and hospitals as a result of the government ‘running all of America’s health care.’”

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