Affordable Care Act - Update - 10/13/13

The cure for the evils of democracy is more democracy!

H. L. Mencken, Notes on Democracy, 1926

The Affordable Care Act, a/k/a ObamaCare, is an assault on the fundamental structure of this nation and an affront to the basic tenets of the United States Constitution.

The Supreme Court has, in the estimation of The Madison Conservative, decided the constitutionality of this legislation incorrectly.

There are those on the liberal left who shriek that it is the law of the land and thus must be enacted. All well and good, but given that the President has somehow unilaterally decided by some form of personal fiat to delay certain parts of the law, it is thus not the law that was passed, and should be addressed with that understanding.

The administration has chosen to lie to the American electorate about the reality of the Affordable Care Act, and the Madison Conservative wishes to demonstrate anecdotally just how unconstitutional the law is, how bold faced a lie the President has told, and why it is a threat to this nation.

The following compilation of news articles are presented here in a compressed and edited form – to do otherwise would require as much print as the act itself.

To wit:

The Kentucky Obamacare marketplace has no “expectation of privacy,” warning its prospective customers that their information can be monitored and shared with government bureaucrats.

When clicking “let’s get started” on the state-run health insurance marketplace “kynect,” the user is quickly prompted to a

“WARNING NOTICE.”

“This is a government computer system and is the property of the Commonwealth of Kentucky,” it states. “It is for authorized use only regardless of time of day, location or method of access. “

“Users (authorized or unauthorized) have no explicit or implicit expectation of privacy,” the disclaimer reads. “Any or all uses of this system and all files on the system may be intercepted, monitored, recorded, copied, audited, inspected, and disclosed to authorized state government and law enforcement personnel, as well as authorized officials of other agencies, both domestic and foreign.”

Such information includes Social Security numbers. When calling kynect to enroll in the marketplace a person is told to have their Social Security card, immigration status, pay stubs, alimony payments, student loan information, and current health insurance information at the ready.

The kynect disclaimer says users information can be shared at the will of state government agencies.

“By using this system,” the warning states, “the user consents to such at the discretion of the Commonwealth of Kentucky.”

“Unauthorized or improper use of this system may result in administrative disciplinary action and/or civil and criminal penalties,” it says. “The unauthorized disclosure of Data containing privacy or health data may result in criminal penalties under Federal authority.”

A spokesperson for kynect called the disclaimer “problematic,” and said it was a mistake.

“The disclaimer is a federal requirement intended to let all who come on the website know this is a governmental entity and sensitive information is contained within,” said Gwenda Bond, assistant communications director for the Kentucky Cabinet for Health and Family Services, told the Washington Free Beacon.

“While the language sounds severe, it actually is a warning to those who might try to inappropriately use the website or any personal information contained within,” she said. “We appreciate you bringing this to our attention, and we are working to modify the language so the message is more clear.”

Bond said kynect will update its website to read: “This website is the property of the Kentucky Health Benefit Exchange. This is to notify you that you are only authorized to use this site, or any information accessed through this site, for its intended purpose of assisting individuals, employers or employees in the selection or purchase of health plans or other benefits.”

“Unauthorized access or disclosure of personal and confidential information may be punishable by fines under state and federal law. Unauthorized access to this website or access in excess of your authorization may also be criminally punishable. The Commonwealth of Kentucky and the Kentucky Health Benefit Exchange follow applicable federal and state guidelines to protect information from misuse or unauthorized access.”

Problems with the health insurance exchanges since their launch on Tuesday have been widespread, with reports of long wait times, glitches, and security concerns, with the disclosure of over 2,000 Social Security numbers in Minnesota.

And now a strory about how real people are being affected by the monstrosity that is ObamaCare.

Cindy Vinson and Tom Waschura are big believers in the Affordable Care Act. They vote independent and are proud to say they helped elect and re-elect President Barack Obama.

Yet, like many other Bay Area residents who pay for their own medical insurance, they were floored last week when they opened their bills: Their policies were being replaced with pricier plans that conform to all the requirements of the new health care law.

Vinson, of San Jose, will pay $1,800 more a year for an individual policy, while Waschura, of Portola Valley, will cough up almost $10,000 more for insurance for his family of four.

And does this sound familiar?

Maryland's Health Connection, the state's Obamacare marketplace, has been plagued by delays in the first days of open enrollment.  If users are able to endure long page-loading delays, they are presented with the website's privacy policy, a ubiquitous fine-print feature on websites that often go unread. Nevertheless, users are asked to check off a box that they agree to the terms.

The policy contains many standard statements about information automatically collected regarding Internet browsers and IP addresses, temporary "cookies" used by the site, and website accessibility.  However, at least two conditions may give some users pause before proceeding.

The first is regarding personal information submitted with an application for those users who follow through on the sign up process all the way to the end.  The policy states that all information to help in applying for coverage and even for making a payment will be kept strictly confidential and only be used to carry out the function of the marketplace.  There is, however, an exception: "[W]e may share information provided in your application with the appropriate authorities for law enforcement and audit activities."  Here is the entire paragraph from the policy the includes the exception:

Should you decide to apply for health coverage through Maryland Health Connection, the information you supply in your application will be used to determine whether you are eligible for health and dental coverage offered through Maryland Health Connection and for insurance affordability programs. It also may be used to assist you in making a payment for the insurance plan you select, and for related automated reminders or other activities permitted by law.  We will preserve the privacy of personal records and protect confidential or privileged information in full accordance with federal and State law. We will not sell your information to others.  Any information that you provide to us in your application will be used only to carry out the functions of Maryland Health Connection.

The only exception to this policy is that we may share information provided in your application with the appropriate authorities for law enforcement and audit activities.

The site does not specify if "appropriate authorities" refers only to state authorities or if it could include the federal government, as well.  Neither is there any detail on what type of law enforcement and/or audit activities would justify the release of the personal information, or who exactly is authorized to make such a determination.  An email to the Maryland Health Connection's media contact seeking clarification has not yet been answered.

The second privacy term that may prompt caution by users relates to email communications.  The policy reads:

If you send us an e-mail, we use the information you send us to respond to your inquiry. E-mail correspondence may become a public record. As a public record, your correspondence could be disclosed to other parties upon their request in accordance with Maryland’s Public Information Act.

Since emails to the marketplace could conceivably involve private matters regarding finances, health history, and other sensitive issues, the fact that such information could be made part of the "public record" could prevent users from being as free with their information than they might otherwise be.  However, as noted, any requests for such emails would still be subject to Maryland's Public Information Act which contains certain exceptions to the disclosure rules.

And thus a tyranny is born.

March 17th, 2013 - A Cursory Recap of the Week That Was.

The cure for the evils of democracy is more democracy!

H. L. Mencken, Notes on Democracy, 1926

A cursory recap of the folly and nonsense being perpetrated upon the American electorate this past by the political class and their sycophantic media hacks demonstrate a depth of ignorance shocking in its scope.

To wit:

 President Obama this week stated in an ABC News interview that this nation does not have a looming debt crisis – his quote:

“We don’t have an immediate crisis in terms of debt. In fact, for the next ten years, it’s gonna be in a sustainable place”

At 16 trillion dollars – ($16,000,000,000,000) and growing, it could be said that the President is being disingenuous at best, ignorant at worst.

The current debate on gun control is expanding to include what are euphemistically called ‘background checks’. These checks will not affect law abiding citizens, but the hue and cry is to have these checks include mental health history. This information will be provided as a result of the Affordable Care Act – (ObamaCare). The question must be addressed: Do Americans want their personal medical history provided to a bureaucracy with no controls regulating that information? (The Madison Conservative will address the background check issue in a later post.)

At a time when there is an obvious lack of leadership, at a time when the American people are not being given a true perspective on the importance of what America truly means, the Madison Conservative believes a quick refresher course is in order.

To that end, please read the following address from President Lincoln. It is timeless and timely for Americans to remember what this nation means, and how a true leader speaks to the people in only 278 words.

Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.

Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.

But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate -- we can not consecrate -- we can not hallow -- this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us -- that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion -- that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain -- that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom -- and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.

Dr. Benjamin Carson - 2-10-2013

It is not often that the Madison Conservative will defer its platform to another voice, but given the amazing clarity presented in the below linked speech, it has been decided to present this clip to as many American citizens as possible.

The speaker has been criticized for making his remarks at the National Prayer Breakfast, as if it were in some manner an act of disrespect to the event in general, and to President Obama in particular.

The President does on occasion appear to be uncomfortable with the absolute power of the arguments presented within the speech.

The Madison Conservative believes that the speaker was absolutely correct in his decision to present his speech when and how he did. He was in no way disrespectful to either the event or the President.

It is possible that the hue and cry over the attempted perceived portrayal of disrespect has more to do with the clarity of vision and intelligence of discourse that was presented and the inherent diversion from the accepted presentation of reality by the political class and their media sycophants.

It is requested that you take the thirty or so minutes to listen to this speech; it is as accurate a distillation of what we are told is too difficult to handle into what is actually very much possible.

The orator is Dr. Benjamin Carson, pediatric neurosurgeon at Johns Hopkins Hospital. He is no lightweight, by any measure.

The Madison Conservative will return next week to discuss the Presidents’ State of the Union speech this coming Tuesday.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vyyHegP255g

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The Madison Conservative Platform - Part 3

The continuation of the Madison Conservative platform now turns it attention to those for whom the platform is being constructed. Previous blog posts have discussed the need for campaign finance reform and the debate on term limits. It is now time to thrash out who will be able to utilize these particular reforms.

There has been much bluster and blather centering on what is cynically referred to by the full political spectrum as ‘voters’ rights’. In the wake of President Obama’s choice to circumvent the Constitution and Congress by unilaterally deciding to legislate by executive fiat, the need to clarify voting eligibility is more critical than ever, given the need to flex democratic self-rule muscle in the voting booth before such freedoms are expunged by a singular political will.

{It is critical to note that is was during the 2010 election cycle that a democratic governor (Beverly Perdue, D-NC) suggested bypassing elections so that the congress could act and vote without fear of electoral consequence.}

The question thus becomes clear – who may vote and how, and what, if any, identification should be considered viable for entering the voting booth.

The important distinction is that this particular plank of the platform will only encompass federal elections; the rights for individual states to regulate their own electoral processes must be respected under the tenth amendment.

First, the constitution stipulates that only those citizens who have attained the age of eighteen may vote.

The intriguing question then becomes what constitutes a ‘citizen’. Felons may not vote; their convictions make them ineligible The Constitution is absent a description on this point, and the Articles of Confederation speak only of ‘free citizens’, excepting ‘vagabonds, paupers and felons’.

It thus then falls to the electorate as a whole by way of our elected officials to make the determination in a country of over 300 million inhabitants who may be classified a citizen eligible to vote, and who does not hold that specific status.

We may look to elective office requirements as a guide, but it must be remembered that the Constitution provides that only natural born citizens may hold the office of President, yet naturalized citizens may still vote.

It is with an eye to that particular ambiguity that the Madison Conservative proposes specific legislation to address this murky issue. It may be attained solely through legislation; a constitutional amendment is not a thoughtful option for this issue.

The law would proceed with language somewhat as follows:

Any individual who has attained the age of eighteen and has not been convicted of a felony is hereby eligible to vote in any and all federal elections. Furthermore, any individual who would be qualified to attain United States citizenship may be considered eligible to vote in any and all federal elections.

That would address the specifics of who is eligible to vote.

The next concern is how to maintain the integrity of Election Day itself. The political parties have in essence conspired to help muddy the basic electoral process by promoting various and sundry electoral schemes. Early elections, mail –in elections, same day registrations and their ilk have done nothing but to distill the inherent responsibility of every citizen to have their voice heard. By diminishing the solemnity of the vote, it has lost much of its significance and allowed mischievous political theater. Many need only to recall the imbecility and outright stupidity of American election officials attempting to discern the intent of any given voter by the interpretations of ‘chads’.

The American example of democratic self-rule should never be subjected to such folly ever again. The Madison Conservative thus believes that there should be an encompassing national methodology for casting federal election votes, even it be nothing more than putting an “X” in a box.

The most sensitive point in this particular debate centers on the legality of requiring photo identification in order to vote.

The voices against such a requirement point out correctly that the right to vote is a constitutional right and the only specifically delineated constitutional right that would require such a manner of photo identification in order to authenticate the identity of the voter; in other words it would be the only right that mandates identification. The claim is made that on that point alone requiring a photo ID is somehow an infringement and an unnecessary burden on the voter.

The specious nature of that argument is clear to those on the opposing side. There is little activity that today does not require a valid photo ID, be it to board an aircraft, cash a check or gain admittance to an arena hosting a speech by the President. The omnipotent nature of ID’s makes the burden argument fallacious on its face. The maxim held that it would be better for one hundred guilty men go free than for one innocent man be wrongly imprisoned.

This is the hard fact of voting in the twenty-first century. The ability for political mischief when a simple photo ID can solve much of the potential problems is a requirement in an era when voting has been made more accessible, albeit more so in a manner that almost mandates a security back up.

In other words, it would be better to inconvenience one hundred voters to produce an ID than for one voter to have his vote negated by any manner or cause.

It is that simple.

Contraception - 2-19-2012 - part one

There occurs from time to time a convergence of particular realities that demonstrate the hypocrisy and intellectual dishonesty of intransient political dogma; the appearance of light when all that is evident is nothing more than the heat generated by the blather of idiocy.

The recent nonsense of the contraception debate performs the exact function as stated above.

The Madison Conservative will discuss the inherent flaws in the actual positions taken by both political extremes in a later post; the more immediate concern is to provide a particular insight into the twisted logic of those vying for political power at the expense of American democracy.

Consider the following.

In  what was heralded by certain media flacks as a concession to specific religious organizations  objections over the mandate that the aforementioned  groups must ignore issues of conscious, not to mention fundamental tenets of their theology, the President of the United States announced that those groups would not need to fund the costs of providing contraception. He stated unambiguously that the costs associated with that particular service would be fully borne by the insurance companies.

This is remarkable both in the scope of arrogance and the breadth of executive fiat. This simple decision should concern freedom loving people across this nation.

To understand the danger of such executive mandate, the issue needs to be broken down into its several components. This blog will attempt to do that, addressing the aforementioned parts in no particular order of significance, as all the relevant issues bear equal importance and significance.

The constitutionality of the presidents’ signature domestic legislation, derided by some as “ObamaCare”, lauded by others as the “health care Insurance Reform Act” is at the core of the concerns. If the Supreme Court finds that indeed the individual mandate is constitutional, this president and future presidents of varying political lineage will be able to announce that private business, companies that are not part of government but provide a service to the public, will now do the bidding of the government, under the heading of whatever the topic, that it falls under the banner of ‘healthcare’. There is little in daily life that could not be attributable to ones health, from the manner of their transportation, to their individual diet, to the materials used in home décor. The ability of the government to regulate and control aspects of a citizens ‘ life, for what is euphemistically noted as being ‘for their own good’ strikes at the heart of American independence and individuality, the American sense of self. 

The United States Constitution is a restriction on the rights and powers of the government, designed specifically to allow for the individual to decide how they would opt to live their life. A nation that is tethered to the political vision of a president is not democracy, but rather tyranny. The ability for a president to unilaterally decide how private business will conduct itself, “for the common good” is nothing short of a third world dictatorship, bumped up to super power status.

The belief that removing the financial burden from an issue of conscious is simultaneously arrogant and stupid, no easy feat, and speaks volumes to those who see an issue in that simplistic a light.

There are many private, religious entities that self-insure; how do they provide coverage for issues that they fundamentally disagree with. The argument that such entities take federal monies and so must follow governmental edict is ignorant. The logic would then follow that if there were a federal guideline for gay marriage, churches would be forced to provide clergy to perform the ceremony. Any objections would be dismissed with the clarification that the church would be financially compensated for the service. Where then would the line exist between freedom of religion and the power of the state to ignore that right based solely on the premise of the ‘public good’ and the perceived power of the dollar.

It might behoove certain parties in this public debate of imbecility to brush up on their King James editions.

This entire spectacle is claimed to be centered on the ‘right’ of contraception, and that either one is fully supportive of contraception as a health right, or one is a Neanderthal low brow who would prefer women have no access to any level of healthcare.

As noted above, the Madison Conservative will address the specific salient point in a later blog; for now the theater of the political absurd is the issue.

The absence of intelligent dialogue should be troubling to the electorate at large. The speed and ease with which particular issues are granted the status of a convoluted constitutional ‘right’ is breathtaking.

The American mindset knows instinctively that there is no ‘right’ without an accompanying responsibility. The right to vote is secured only through the responsibility of civic action at the ballot box.

The right to freedom of speech is only garnered through the responsibility to defend that right for those whose speech is anathema to all you hold close and dear. The right for a redress of your grievances to the government comes with the responsibility to do so in a peaceful assembly.

The ‘right’ of contraception does not carry with it any announced corresponding responsibility, and so cannot be considered a ‘right’.

There is a place for such medical applications, and those will be discussed within the framework of a blog focused on the debate on health care.

In the interim, however, the body politic should take two aspirin, lie down, and wait for the blood to return to its brain.