The Obamacare Secret Pricing Swindle March 2, 2017 Tucker Carlson
Steven Weissman, formerly the head of a hospital in Florida, says that the healthcare industry spends more on lobbying than the oil industry, the defense industry, and the aerospace industry combined. All plans to amend, repeal or replace Obamacare are based on the false idea that there is an insurance problem when the real problem is billing. Healthcare pricing is based on how much can be extracted from an individual or an insurance company, so prices fluctuate widely. People cannot shop for a better price because price comparison is prohibited. In fact, pricing is considered to be a trade secret that is protected by law. -GEG
Illegitimi non Carborundum
During times of universal deceit, telling the truth becomes a revolutionary act.- Orwell
Exclusive: Obama Illegally Robbed Fannie, Freddie to Fund Obamacare Obama diverted money from low-income housing to keep Obamacare alive Jerome R. Corsi | Infowars.com - February 27, 2017
WASHINGTON, D.C. – Will this be the final nail in the coffin for the Affordable Care Act, commonly known as “Obamacare?”
Federal court litigation provides evidence the Obama administration illegally diverted taxpayer funds that had not been appropriated by Congress in an unconstitutional scheme to keep Obamacare from imploding.
In 2016, a U.S. District judge caught the Obama administration’s Health and Human Services Department acting unconstitutionally and therefore put an end to the illegal diversion of taxpayer funds, but the Obama administration didn’t stop there.
Forbidden by Judge Collyer’s decision from diverting money Congress appropriated for other ACA provisions to pay Section 1402 subsidies, the Obama administration faced the prospect that the government could not pay subsidies to permit lower-income persons and families to buy the amount of health insurance Obamacare was written to provide them.
Either this, or insurers would be forced to charge middle and high income-persons and families such outrageous amounts for their insurance coverage (to subsidize the poor under ACA) that only the wealthiest could afford to buy health insurance.
In other words, Obamacare was dead in the water if the Obama administration could not find a way to circumvent the District Court’s decision U.S. House of Representatives v. Burwell to fund Section 1402 despite the fact Congress had refused to do so.
Determined to keep Obamacare alive, the Obama administration decided to find a way around Judge Collyer’s ruling.
The fix involved the Obama administration redefining the terms of the 2008 conservatorship agreements which advanced funds to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac from a 10% dividend on moneys borrowed to the federal government’s confiscation of 100% of the future and imminent profits of these Government Sponsored Entities, or GSEs.
In passing the Housing and Economic Recovery Act of 2008 (HERA), the U.S. Congress had fixed the regulatory issues at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, creating a mechanism for them to be placed into conservatorship at federal government’s discretion AND providing up to $187.5 billion in funds that could be advanced to the GSEs through a purchase of senior preferred stock paying a ten percent dividend.
In deciding to bail them out, the federal government took control of the two giant mortgage GSEs, with Fannie and Freddie effectively put into government “conservatorship.”
As part of the conservatorship, the federal government effectively acquired warrants, convertible at a nominal price, which allowed the federal government to acquire 79% of the GSE’s common stock.
This resulted in causing dilution in the percentage of Fannie and Freddie common stock ownership that was left in the hands of private and institutional investors.
Congress’ intent was that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac would pay back the Treasury as the mortgage giants returned to profitability.
But after the Treasury was paid back, the terms of HERA anticipated Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac would pay appropriate dividends to stockholders, including the federal government, leaving enough funds within Freddie and Fannie to “conserve and preserve” the assets of the two GSEs, anticipating their eventual return to a “safe and solvent” operating condition.
In 2012, the Obama administration unilaterally decided to change the terms of HERA by sweeping all the profits of Fannie and Freddie into the Treasury’s general fund.
The Obama administration took this action, the so-called “Net Worth Sweep,” without any Congressional authority to do so.
The result was that the U.S. Treasury “found” a way to sweep 100% of Fannie and Freddie profits into the Treasury’s “general fund,” leaving the giant mortgage GSEs vulnerable to the need for another government bailout should another disruption occur in the nation’s economy.
Because of this decision, the Obama administration on its own authority simply decided to discontinue paying dividends to private and institutional owners of Fannie and Freddie common and preferred stock.
Government documents leave little doubt profits from Fannie and Freddie confiscated by the U.S. Treasury have been used by the Obama administration to pay Obamacare subsidies and other items not appropriated by Congress, in complete and illegal circumvention of the District Court’s ruling and the Constitution’s determination that only the Congress shall have the power to tax and spend.
What should be outrageous to progressives understanding the Obama administration subterfuge to keep the ACA alive is that by confiscating Fannie/Freddie profits to keep Obamacare alive, Obama ignored core members of the Democratic Party’s core constituency – affordable housing advocates and minority groups – with little explanation.