Congratulations to this week’s Comment Contest winner — MelissaS.

***

I don’t know how things are where you live, but here in the People’s Republic of Massachusetts, we embrace all things “green.” Well…the vocal busybodies do. Regular folks don’t really have time to spend trying to force other people to live as they want them to. We’re generally too busy working so we can pay the high cost of living here.

Unlike said busybodies, who apparently have a lot more disposable income than the rest of us, we very often vote with our wallets when deciding where and what to purchase. That fact of life is, for the busybodies, annoyingly evident when it comes to purchasing electricity. It seems they have their collective panties in a bunch because the unenlightened have not been signing up to buy more expensive “green” power.

Green electricity finds few customers in Mass.
Wind farms bring higher NStar bills

Five years after NStar became the first Massachusetts utility to allow customers to buy electricity supplied by a wind farm, its Green program has failed to catch on. Less than 1 percent of the company’s nearly 900,000 customers have enrolled.

The dismal response resembles lackluster participation in similar renewable energy programs offered by other utilities, worrying state officials as they push toward a goal of generating 20 percent of electricity from renewable energy by 2020.

The NStar program has faltered because of the recession and falling fossil fuel prices, which resulted in a greater surcharge for wind energy. Environmental activists are frustrated and question whether utilities have done enough to publicize the programs.

Ed Loechler, an activist from Brookline, knows first-hand the challenge of trying to persuade people to put their money where their environmental ideals might be.

For several years, the Boston University biology professor has been going door to door in his neighborhood to plug the NStar program. When a door opened one night last week, he urged a young man to sign up. “This is the single, simplest way you could cut a lot of carbon dioxide from your household,’’ Loechler said.

But after he explained that enrolling would add between 15 percent and 30 percent to his neighbor’s electric bill, the 22-year-old thanked him for promoting what sounded like a good idea. “But it’s probably too much,’’ the man said.

It was a response Loechler, who moonlights as coordinator of Climate Action Brookline, has heard over and over again. “I’m sympathetic to people who don’t want to spend money,’’ he said, “but it can be discouraging.’’

Click Here to read the rest of the story.

I sort of feel sorry for Ed Loechler and those like him. I’m sure they are nice people, but they appear so wrapped up in self-righteous assurance that they have the way, the light, and the truth when it comes to energy that they refuse to accept reality.

Energy production is a business. For a business to succeed, it has to offer folks a product or service they want at a price they are willing to pay. All things being equal, if two companies offer an identical product, folks will generally choose the one that is less expensive. That’s why Amazon is fast making bookstores obsolete. It’s why the Nook and the Kindle and other eReaders are fast making print books obsolete.

I would be happy to buy “green” energy if the company offered it at the same price, or less than I pay now. But instead, they want me to spend fifteen to thirty percent more. Our electric bill averages about $100 per month. Loechler would have me pay $115 to $130 so he can imagine he’s saving the Earth from becoming an oven. Sorry, Ed, but it’s not going to happen. That $30 is a healthy chunk of our weekly grocery bill. It will buy us a night out at our favorite Chinese restaurant. It will fill up the gas tank on my wife’s Corolla.

If Loechler really wants to do something that will make a difference, he should start experimenting and find away to bring down the cost of wind and solar and other “green” energies to the point where they are competitive with coal, oil, and gas. When that happens, Ed will find his neighbors a lot more receptive to going “green.”

What’s the energy situation in your area?

Do you have the option of purchasing “green” electricity? If so, what’s the surcharge and do you buy it?

And do you think “green” energy will ever be able to compete with coal, oil, and natural gas?

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Many of us in Massachusetts knew it was only a matter of time…

Cost-controlled health coverage gaining ground

In just three years, a new way of paying for medical care has spread rapidly across Massachusetts, and now more than 1.2 million people are covered by plans that put providers on a budget in an effort to restrain health spending.

This means that about one in five Massachusetts residents are being treated by doctors working under these new cost-conscious arrangements, a Globe survey of insurers found – even before state lawmakers begin debating legislation to address soaring health insurance premiums by, in part, encouraging such plans.

Governor Deval Patrick called on legislators last week, in his State of the Commonwealth address, to eliminate the traditional fee-for-service system that pays health care providers separate fees for every procedure, test, and office visit. House and Senate leaders are working on their own bills intended to control costs.

The state’s four largest health insurers – Blue Cross Blue Shield, Harvard Pilgrim Health Care, Tufts Health Plan, and Fallon Community Health Plan – now have more than 1 million members in employer-sponsored health plans that put doctors at risk of losing money if they exceed the budget for their patients’ care, they said. Providers can earn extra profit if they spend less than budgeted.

Adoption of these “global payment’’ plans is driven by a desire to control soaring health insurance premiums by giving physicians an incentive to be more sparing in their use of expensive procedures, such as sophisticated scans. But it is also motivated by an eagerness to encourage more preventive measures, and that in turn improves care, which often is disorganized as doctors lose track of patients who need follow-up calls, visits, or tests.

“The numbers have grown dramatically,’’ said Marc Spooner, vice president of provider contracting for Tufts, where 70 percent of HMO members are cared for under budgets, compared with 17 percent three years ago. “The plan and providers have collectively recognized we have a responsibility to manage costs.’’

Click Here to read the rest of the story.

It sounds so reasonable, doesn’t it? Doctors get a fixed amount to provide care for each patient. If the care they order costs less, they get a bonus. If it costs more, they’re penalized.

You have to give the politicians credit. It’s a fiendishly clever plan. They know the public will likely rebel against government managed rationing if they order it, so they come up with a plan to make the doctors and hospitals do it. If you don’t get the MRI or CT scan that would have made the difference in your treatment, the baby-kissers can hold up their hands and claim it’s not their doing.

Now, I am not going to suggest that some doctors or treatment facilities are going to deliberately withhold care or order or provide substandard care for their patients to ensure they are not penalized and do get the bonuses, but human nature being what it is, does anyone really think it is never going to happen?

When you need delicate surgery one day, will you be referred to the person you wanted, who graduated first in her class and who charges more for her services or will you be required to have your surgery performed by the doctor at the local hospital who graduated in the bottom third of the class?

When you are in your seventies and need quadruple bypass surgery to buy you another ten or fifteen years of healthy life, will you get it or will your condition be “managed” with drugs until you die in a few years?

Will those unfortunate enough to contract rare illnesses be correctly diagnosed soon enough when their doctor’s incentive is to not immediately order the expensive tests that might have revealed the condition in time to successfully treat it?

Those are a few examples of how “cost-controlled coverage” can affect the patients of physicians who — rightfully so — need to pay attention to the bottom line. A medical practice is a business and if enough money isn’t coming in to pay the staff and the rent and the insurance and provide a good living for the doctor(s) they will have to either get out of the business or find ways to ensure they are not penalized for providing too much and/or too expensive care.

What’s your take on this?

Am I worrying needlessly? Or do you think doctors and hospitals will always sacrifice their earnings to ensure the best care for their patients?

And what is likely to happen as doctors earn less and less?

Will the best and the brightest continue to go into medicine or will they opt for professions where their earnings will reflect their skills and talents rather than what some political hack or insurance-company bean-counter thinks they should get?

Will the quality of medicare go up or down?

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Comments welcome.
Which are your favorites?
Enjoy!

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Let’s say scientists discover that donuts are actually healthy food and that they currently cost $6 per dozen. As the news of their health benefits spreads, more folks are going to want to buy donuts. Following the law of supply and demand, donut shops find themselves with folks wanting more donuts than they can produce each day. So they raise their prices and continue to do so until the demand equals what they can supply. Let’s say the price tops out at $12 per dozen.

Some folks begin to complain that they can’t afford to eat donuts every day any longer. Only the wealthy can afford to do so and that’s not fair! So government steps in and starts providing income-based grants to help lower income folks continue to buy donuts. Demand shoots up again. This time, not only does the price  begin to rise to $15 per dozen, lots of new donut shops open thanks to new donut-production grants given directly to the shops. Sure, the donuts from the new shops may not taste as good, but by cutting corners on ingredients, they can sell them for $13.50 per dozen. Everyone’s getting donuts and so everyone is happy.

But it turns out that in order to pay for all those donut subsidies, government simply printed more money, devaluing the money that was already in circulation. Ingredients start costing more so all the donut shops have to raise prices again. And because everyone is so healthy thanks to all the donuts they’re eating, they get busy more often and have more kids. The population grows creating more demand for donuts and soon the price is $20 per dozen and rising annually.

Well, government is outraged! How dare the donut shops keep raising the price of donuts. So they tell the donut shops that if they keep raising prices, they’ll stop giving them the donut-production grants. At the same time, they triple the amount of donut-production grants they’re going to give. Of course, costs and demand keeps rising so there is no practical way for donut shops to not raise prices unless they use the donut-production grants not to produce more donuts, but to keep producing the same amount.

Eventually, government has to raise the tax rates to cover the ever-increasing donut subsidies. People have less money to spend on donuts and stop buying so many. Eventually, the whole donut subsidy scheme collapses under its own weight creating a recession economic downturn. Many folks lose their jobs, many donut shops go out of business and eventually, the supply of donuts again equals the demand. Or would have if government didn’t double down and continue to print more money to subsidize donuts.

That’s all fantasy, of course, but so is Barack Obama’s latest bright idea.

Obama warns college officials
He threatens their federal aid if tuitions go up

ANN ARBOR, Mich. – President Obama fired a warning at the nation’s colleges and universities yesterday, threatening to strip their federal aid if they “jack up tuition’’ every year and to give the money instead to schools showing restraint and value.

Obama can’t proceed, though, without the OK from Congress, where the reaction of Republican lawmakers ranged from muted to skeptical.

Higher education leaders worried about the details and the threat of government overreach, and one dismissed it as mere election-year “political theater.’’

Average tuition and fees at public colleges rose 8.3 percent this year and, with room and board, now exceed $17,000 a year, according to the College Board.

Obama delivered his proposal with campaign flair, mounting a mainstream appeal to young voters and struggling families. He said higher education has become an imperative for success in America, but the cost has grown unrealistic for too many families, and the debt burden unbearable.

“We are putting colleges on notice,’’ Obama told an arena packed with cheering students at the University of Michigan.

“You can’t assume that you’ll just jack up tuition every single year. If you can’t stop tuition from going up, then the funding you get from taxpayers each year will go down.’’

Obama is targeting only a small part of the financial aid picture – the $3 billion known as campus-based aid that flows through college administrators to students.

He is proposing to increase that amount to $10 billion and change how it is distributed to reward schools that hold down costs and ensure that more poor students complete their education.

The bulk of the more than $140 billion in federal grants and loans goes directly to students and would not be affected.

Rising tuition costs have been attributed to a variety of factors, among them a decline in state dollars and competition for the best facilities and professors. Washington’s leverage to take on the rising cost of college is limited because American higher education is decentralized, with most student aid following the student.

And that’s not counting the legislative gridlock.

“If you were a betting person, you would not bet on it getting done, simply because the political atmosphere in Washington is so poisonous,’’ said Terry Hartle, senior vice president at the American Council on Education, an organization that represents colleges in Washington.

Could it be that The Smartest President Ever^® and his cohorts in congress are not quite bright enough to understand that when you create more demand and deflate the value of the dollar, prices must go up?

Do they really not see that the cost of secondary school tuition has skyrocketed precisely because of all the Federal grants, loan subsidies, and guarantees? It’s a simple equation straight from Economics 101. More money + more demand = higher prices.

Or is this just election-year posturing to attempt to buy votes with your tax dollars. After all, giving other people your hard-earned money is a time-honored liberal/Democratic method of convincing them to vote “the correct way.”

What do you think?

Am I being a surly curmudgeon again?

Or maybe I’m just a “bigotted simple minded individual” as a Facebook reader branded me recently?

After all, ANY criticism of Our Dear Leader MUST be based on the color of his skin. Right? There’s no way it could be due to his anti-American, economy- and jobs-killing beliefs and performance. Right?

Sigh…

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You may have heard that the federal food police have issued new standards for school lunches.

US school lunch program to serve healthier foods under new rules

ST. LOUIS – American schools will serve more of the good stuff – vegetables, fruits and whole grains – and less of the not-so-good – salt, fat and sugar – under new rules issued Wednesday, the first to significantly revamp the nation’s school lunch program in 15 years.

The rules, which will begin taking effect in July, require that any school receiving federal funds for breakfast and lunch make sweeping changes to its food lineup, an overhaul that health advocacy groups are calling a major step in the battle against childhood obesity.

The new rules “will greatly improve the nutrition quality of lunches and breakfasts,” said Margo Wootan, director of nutrition policy for the Washington-based Center for Science in the Public Interest, which also supported an earlier set of rules. “It’s a huge improvement. This is really a step forward from where most schools are today.”

School service directors Wednesday said they support them for the most part, praising the emphasis on fresh produce especially. But many acknowledged that they could present some challenges. For starters, some worry that students might turn up their noses at the new offerings.

“The food police approach doesn’t work,” said Michael Kanak, director of food services for the Parkway School District in Chesterfield, Mo. “You have to bring kids along to make them want to eat healthy.”

Kanak and others said they are concerned that the new requirements also could strain already overstretched budgets.

“It’s really going to get tight,” said Bridget Jordan, director of food services for the Clayton School District in St. Louis. “Fresh fruits and vegetables are expensive.”

The new rules will double the daily servings of fruit and vegetables, restrict milk offerings to fat-free and low-fat varieties, limit calories based on age and increase the amount of whole grains, among other things.

Click Here to read the rest of the story.

The fantasy is that kids will begin gobbling up all the healthy fare that’s placed on their trays and suddenly eschew the stuff they really like to eat and start shedding pounds by the ton.

Here is the reality.

My son manages a restaurant and catering operation which prepares and serves lunches for nine private schools. The schools, or more properly, the parents of the students, require the food be all-natural, organic, etc. and it is. The kids are served a wide variety of entrées along with the usual “healthy” side dishes of various vegetables, etc. While most of the meat-, cheese-, and starch-based entrées are generally consumed, the veggies invariably end up in the trash. This is true of all grades from elementary through high school. Parents pay well for food their kids toss out.

Changing what is served to kids in school is not going to make one iota of difference in terms of reducing obesity. All it will do is leave schools with a bunch of kids who are hungry and thinking about their stomachs when they should be thinking about their studies. Kids will simply load their backpacks with junk food. Then what? Will the food police start prohibiting kids from bringing food to school?

The simple fact is that kids will eat what kids want to eat and if you serve them adult-defined “healthy” fare they do not like, they will toss it and fill up with junk food after school. That was what happened when I was in school two generations ago, it’s what happened when my kids were in school one generation ago, and it’s what happens now.

The real reason so many people, young and old alike, are overweight is that we no longer burn off all the calories we eat. When I was young, me and all the kids I knew spend every free moment outside running around, playing ball and hide-and-seek, and otherwise having fun. Today, kids spend all their time texting, playing video games, and watching TV.

What we have are a bunch of frustrated “experts” who cannot legally force people to do their bidding at home (yet!), where it might make a difference, or in public (though they are seriously pushing for high taxes on food they disapprove of), so they pounce on something where they can force others to do as they, in their wisdom, think best.

What we really need is a whole lot less experts, a whole lot less rules, regulations, and laws, and a whole lot less government in general so folks, young and old, can live their lives as they see fit, even if the food police, the sex police, the clothes police, and the rest of society’s busybodies don’t approve.

What do you think?

Am I off-base here? Do we really need food police?

Do you think what kids eat in school with somehow magically change their eating habits outside of school?

Or is this just the latest example of government sticking its nose where it doesn’t belong?

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It really is a mystery to me.

In 2008, white guilt helped elect the most unprepared, and as the years have shown, one of the most arrogant and ineffectual men ever to have served as President of the United States. And more’s the shame because if we, as a nation, decided it was time for a non-Caucasian to be president, there were so many really good choices available. Of course, most would not have been so adept at using a teleprompter, so maybe that made all the difference.

In any event, here we are, three years later, our economy in shambles, unemployment sapping the strength and spirit of so many, our currency being devalued by Federal printing presses, our national debt over six times greater than the amount of revenue anticipated for 2012…well, I don’t have to list all the nation’s problems for you folks. The point is, thanks to his own hubris and incompetence, we have the most vulnerable president ever and the Republican party seems determined to do whatever is necessary to help re-elect him.

Are politicians, upon election, inoculated with a stupidity virus?

Having seen what the hope and change of liberalism/socialism has wrought, America is crying for someone with true conservative values, someone to lead the nation out of the abyss of debt and back to prosperity by getting government out of the way, yet we find ourselves with Republican front-runners who are devoted to everything but conservatism. Romney is no conservative. He’s a puppet who will say anything to get elected. Gingrich? Put him in a dress and you might mistake him for Nancy Pelosi. Okay, maybe not, but their politics don’t seem to be that far apart when you look at their voting records.

Ron Paul is the only person running for president with even an ounce of character but the press is determined to marginalize him and even many of his supporters, me among them, have long questioned his electability.

Has the Republican party finally purged itself of true conservatives? It seems that way.

Given the current crop of candidates, I really have no idea what, if anything, can be done to prevent the final nail in America’s coffin from being pounded in by the re-election of Barack Hussein Obama and his cabal.

Do you folks have any ideas?

And why is it we don’t hear much about the Tea Movement anymore?

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BHM Senior Editor John Silveira has been visiting his old stomping grounds for the past two weeks. He stayed with us the first few days and has been back here since Monday. Today, he heads to Utah and the Sundance film festival so I’m taking most of the day off to hang out with him and then drive him to the airport.

So, instead of a long diatribe on whatever, I thought I’d offer you all some homesteading and self-reliance news.

First up is a story about a woman who’s been getting raw milk to make her own butter. Please, don’t rat her out to the Feds. She doesn’t need a SWAT team breaking down her door to confiscate her bowl of butter.

21st Century Homesteading: Making Butter

Raising chickens in backyards isn’t anything new, of course. The trend helped inspire the launch of Backyard Poultry magazine six years ago. Here is yet another story about a couple who dream of farming and have begun by raising chickens.

Urban homesteaders raise their own chickens

Mother Earth News has an interesting Q&A article. They asked nine homesteaders questions like What motivated you to choose a self-sufficient, homesteading lifestyle? How did you get started?, What are the biggest misconceptions people have about homesteading and homemaking?, and What is the most valuable lesson or skill you’ve learned?

Guide to Self-Sufficient Living: Advice From Nine Modern Homesteaders

Finally, in California, Patty Chelseth has launched a campaign to get a “Local Food and Community Self-Governance” ordinance passed to stop the food police from prohibiting sales of raw farm products.

Local-food movement gets verbal support from El Dorado County officials

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Are you living the homesteading life?

What do you think of the advice given by the nine homesteaders interviewed by Mother Earth News?

And what two or three pieces of advice would you offer folks who are now dreaming about homesteading one day soon?

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Congratulations to this week’s Comment Contest winner — Tawnya.

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The back page of the local newspaper section that contains local and business news features photos and short items about people in the news. It also features a daily quote. Today, it was this one:

“I think that the board is a lot older and they’re conservative, so some of the content in the music is offensive on some level.” – 50 Cent, on how rap artists rarely win the major awards at the Grammys.

Is he joking? It was a good thing I had not just taken a sip of coffee because I’d have spewed it as I broke into laughter.

When my children were young, they, like so many of their generation, were attracted to “rap.” So, as a dutiful parent, I listened to a few “songs.” The very first thing that came to mind was “It’s not a coincidence that rap rhymes with crap” and I’ve not had reason to change that opinion these past twenty or so years.

I then made clear to both of my children, in no uncertain terms, that while I could not control what they listened to when they were elsewhere, such garbage would never be played in our house and if I found any such CDs laying around, they’d be quickly filed in the trash bin.

To be fair, many of the lyrics to songs old and new are not exactly dripping with profundity. But the one big difference between them and rap is that if you take away the lyrics, you’re generally left with music worth listening to. Take away the lyrics from rap and try to sell what’s left and you’ll go broke.

Because I’ve not since heard much rap other than what generally indecipherable pieces may have assaulted my ears via movie soundtracks, and so was unfamiliar with Curtis James Jackson III’s body of work, I googled “50 cent song lyrics,” clicked on the first return, then on the first title listed. I’ve reproduced it, below.

After you read the lyrics, perhaps you’ll be kind enough to briefly decipher them for me in the comments section.

I would also like to know what you think of rap.

Do you listen to it? Do your kids listen? If so, who are your, and/or their, favorite purveyors?

Am I missing whatever it is in the genre that attracts so many young people? If so, what is it?

And given the widespread misogyny rapper spew forth in their lyrics, why in the world would any girl or woman listen to it or its creator?

Here are the lyrics mentioned above. I did not bother reading any more of his…whatever you want to call it.

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“The Hit”

Uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh

[Chorus]
I change places, to prevent catchin’ the cases
Races, in the faces, hall at you laces
This is a hit, let’s see if homicide trace this

[Verse 1]
The only thing hotter than my flow is the block (inhale and exhale)
That’s why I left this snow biz, and got into show biz
Let’s get this clear, it ain’t on ’til I say it’s on, (pause), it’s on
I’m eatin’, ya’ll niggas fastin’ like it’s Rimadon
Bowlish way in Lebanon, know 50 the bomb
I be at the edge of the bar, sippin’ a Don
I keep the bottle just in case, you never know when it’s on
This worries bump, I can’t go wrong, my team’s too strong
You want war? I take you to war, now that my money long
Why you broke? cat’s buy the by lines and fantasize
The way I’m spittin’, put TV’s in everything I’m sittin’
While I’m hot to death, I’m gonna say this to all you playa haters
Ya’ll should hate the game, not the playas (c’mon)

[Chorus: repeat 2X]
I change places, to prevent catchin’ the cases
Races, in the faces, hall at you laces
This is a hit, let’s see if homicide trace this
(50 Cent, let’s see if homicide trace this)

[Verse 2]
Everyday is bugged, niggas’ll come to a club
To try to show you they a thug, instead of showing some love
Now, what you think you chump me, If I let you bump me
When I’m about to make a mill, faster than you make a G (haha)
I know I lie, it’s a habit, I vow to clean the city like the mayor
And in the crack game, I’m a franchise player
Niggas be thinkin’ I be out to lunch with mines
Then in crunch time, I start hittin’ ‘em hard with punch lines
You cats got to be sick, to think 50 can’t spit
Better check my batting average, I always make hits
My flows leave these rap cats ketro (ketro), all across the metro (metro)
Plus I pack a cannon, up under my marple cannon
They fake, they look like money, but ain’t worth half the cake
Have me runnin’ from Jake, in a GS with bad brakes
They want to knock me take, for Christ sakes

[Chorus]
(50 Cent, let’s see if homicide trace this)
I change places, to prevent catchin’ the cases
Races, in the faces, hall at you laces
This is a hit, let’s see if homicide trace this
(50 Cent, let’s see if homicide trace this)

I change places, to prevent catchin’ the cases
Races, in the faces, hall at you laces
This is a hit, let’s see if homicide trace this
(50 Cent, let’s see if homicide trace this)

[Verse 3]
Yo, son remember them fake playas
Who try to play us at The Shark Club in Vegas
Had them tight linen blazers, and beat up gators
Lookin’ like last year’s playas, (pause)
Yeah, I could tell they dough was low
When we came through the do’
I copped a case of Cristal, and copped one bottle of Mo
From the looking through face, and the bulge in his waist, he holdin’
(Yeah he’s packin’, I can see his rack
The one in the middle, he a big man, I dealt with him son)
Yeah, so I expect look like they ain’t had a run, since ‘ 81
They ain’t here on a hunt for food,
So they could catch you, some cash, and expensive jewels
I’m gonna crash ‘em with this bottle if he move
I ain’t the one son, my shit ain’t come easy
It won’t go easy, believe me

[Chorus: repeat 3X]
I change places, to prevent catchin’ the cases
Races, in the faces, hall at you laces
This is a hit, let’s see if homicide trace this
(50 Cent, let’s see if homicide trace this)

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An Associated Press news report making the rounds today helped bring into focus the underlying scam behind Obamacare.

Obama’s health overhaul lags in many states

WASHINGTON (AP) — Here’s a reality check for President Barack Obama’s health overhaul: Three out of four uninsured Americans live in states that have yet to figure out how to deliver on its promise of affordable medical care.

In this photo taken Wednesday, Jan. 18, 2012, Dan and Vicki McCuistion, of Driftwood, Texas, pose for a photo together in Austin, Texas. The McCuistions have been uninsured throughout their 17 years of marriage. An analysis by The Associated Press shows that states, which were supposed to be partners in carrying out President Barack Obama's health overhaul, the biggest health safety net expansion since Medicare and Medicaid, are moving in fits and starts. “It’s not that we want something for free, but we want something we can afford,” said Vicki, who works two part-time jobs. With the nation’s highest uninsured rate, her state, Texas, has made little progress. (AP Photo/Eric Gay)

This is the year that will make or break the health care law. States were supposed to be partners in carrying out the biggest safety net expansion since Medicare and Medicaid, and the White House claims they’re making steady progress.

But an analysis by The Associated Press shows that states are moving in fits and starts. Combined with new insurance coverage estimates from the nonpartisan Urban Institute, it reveals a patchwork nation.

Such uneven progress could have real consequences.

If it continues, it will mean disparities and delays from state to state in carrying out an immense expansion of health insurance scheduled in the law for 2014. That could happen even if the Supreme Court upholds Obama’s law, called the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.

“There will be something there, but if it doesn’t mesh with the state’s culture and if the state is not really supporting it, that certainly won’t help it succeed,” said Urban Institute senior researcher Matthew Buettgens.

The 13 states that have adopted a plan are home to only 1 in 4 of the uninsured. An additional 17 states are making headway, but it’s not clear all will succeed. The 20 states lagging behind account for the biggest share of the uninsured, 42 percent.

Among the lagging states are four with arguably the most to gain. Texas, Florida, Georgia and Ohio together would add more than 7 million people to the insurance rolls, according to Urban Institute estimates, reducing the annual burden of charity care by $10.7 billion.

Click Here to read the rest of the story.

Take a few seconds and read that last quoted sentence again. By adding 7 million uninsured to the insurance rolls, the four states will save $10.7 billion! Really?

If that is truly the case, the next question must be, who will be paying for that $10.7 billion in care? It surely will not be the newly “insured” 7 million. If they could afford health insurance, they would likely already have it.

The answer is that you and I will pay for their insurance. Even those who can afford to pay something will need the rest subsidized. I know this for a fact because I live in Massachusetts, where Romneycare, on which Obamacare was based, has far-more-than doubled the cost of my health insurance since it was enacted.

Not only do I get to pay for me, I get to kick in part of the cost for all the formerly uninsured, because what they can afford to pay for their insurance can’t possibly cover the cost of providing the benefits.

Now, it is true that I was previously paying part of my taxes to cover free care in the state. But back then, I was only paying for one bureaucracy, that of the state. Now, not only do I have to pay for the state bureaucrats, I have to pay for all the additional employees of all the insurance companies involved plus all the new employees healthcare providers had to hire in order to comply with all the paperwork requirements of the law.

Therein lay the first big lie.

$10.7 billion isn’t going to be saved. The cost, plus more, is only going to be shifted. And costs will increase further as the newly insured, who previously would not have run to the doctor or emergency room for minor ailments, begin doing so now that all they have to pay, if anything, is a cheap co-pay.

Romneycare and Obamacare are not about helping people. That’s the second big lie. They are about funneling more money to insurance companies.

If government really wanted to reduce the cost of health care, it would get the hell out of the way, eliminate all the costly mandates, and allow insurers and consumers to work out what is best for each of them.

I don’t need or want coverage for in vitro fertilization, birth control pills, psychiatric care and hospitalization, and myriad other “benefits” insurers here in The People’s Republic to make me pay for.

The simple truth is that government cannot make our lives better by getting involved in them. They can only ever make things worse by forcing one-size-fits-none compromises on everyone.

If you think heath care is expensive now, just wait until Obamacare really kicks in.

What’s your take on this?

Am I missing something?

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