CLASS Dismissed

by Kelly Sloan | 11:32 am, October 21, 2011

The announcement a week ago by Administration officials of the demise of the Community Living Assistance Services and Supports (CLASS) Act was welcome news, not only because it was a fiscal nightmare, but because it has the potential to illuminate the inherent fallacy of so many similar liberal schemes. The CLASS Act, one of the [...]

Healthcare Vote Day, U.S. Capitol Lawn

by Eileen | 6:20 pm, March 21, 2010

Whether we are moments away from shredding the Constitution or bitch-slapping the Botox out of Madame Speaker, it was a lovely day for politicking.  And, come what may, it has been heartening to see people getting worked up over politics. Democracy is the belief that the common man knows what he wants and deserves to [...]

PPC On the Scene in DC at the Kill the Bill Protests

by T.L. James | 1:40 pm, March 21, 2010

PPC’s Washington Bureau Chief Eileen Mahony sends these shots (and hopefully more later) from today’s protests at the Capitol against the federal nationalization of the healthcare industry. Three GOP representatives make an appearance on the balcony of the House wing, carrying “KILL THE BILL” placards A small (as in 30-odd people) crowd gathers near the [...]

Bayfield Tea Party “Gang of Six” Headed to Sunday’s “Operation Flood D.C.” Rally

by T.L. James | 7:53 am, March 20, 2010

Several grassroots activists from Colorado are on their way to DC for Sunday’s rally against the health care takeover bill: Calling themselves the “Gang of Six,” a group of Tea Party and 9.12 activists from Bayfield, Colo. is on the road to Washington, DC, where Sunday they’re planning to make one last stand against President [...]

Video: Karl Rove vs. Howard Dean Debate at CU Boulder

by T.L. James | 8:18 am, February 17, 2010

Here’s a few more pictures and a few minutes of video from Monday evening’s debate event with former Bush Administration political advisor Karl Rove and former Vermont governor and former Democrat Party chairman Howard Dean. As Michael noted in his post, we as press were only allowed to shoot photos and videos for the first [...]

Colorado Rejects Obama Health Care Reform at Rally

by wesley | 11:59 pm, January 19, 2010

**Update 3** Ari Armstrong has video interviews from the rally posted on Free Colorado. **Update 2** Welcome Michelle Malkin readers! **Update 1** Complete video of the speakers is now available from El Presidente here on the People’s Press Collective, so if you missed the rally, just scroll down for video. Opting out of federally-mandated ObamaCare: [...]

“House Call on Congress” – Peoples Press Collective coverage of Washington DC rally against government takeover of Healthcare (the “Pelosicare” bill – HB3962) (Part 2)

by The Peripatetic Pundit | 9:39 am, November 13, 2009

Thanks to the generous contributions of Peoples Press Collective readers and especially the R Block Party grassroots organization, Peoples Press Collective was able to send a correspondent to cover the national “House Call on Congress” rally against government takeover of healthcare (the “Pelosicare” bill, HB3962) at the steps of the U.S. Capitol.  Unfortunately, despite the [...]

“House Call on Congress” – Peoples Press Collective coverage of Washington DC rally against government takeover of Healthcare (the “Pelosicare” bill – HB3962) (Part 1)

by The Peripatetic Pundit | 9:12 am, November 13, 2009

Thanks to the generous contributions of Peoples Press Collective readers and especially the R Block Party grassroots organization, Peoples Press Collective was able to send a correspondent to cover the national “House Call on Congress” rally against government takeover of healthcare (the “Pelosicare” bill, HB3962) at the steps of the U.S. Capitol.  Unfortunately, despite the [...]

HealthcareSpy.com Website Launched

by wesley | 7:38 am, November 13, 2009

A new website creating quite a splash gives you the good stories and the horror stories of real people dealing with our health care system.  As the health care reform debate continues in DC, it seems that every progressive congressman and senator has no shortage of tear-jerking stories from constituents whose lives have been ruined [...]

Restore Free Market to Address Pre-existing Conditions

by Ari Armstrong | 12:13 am, September 15, 2009

The following article originally was published September 14 by Grand Junction’s Free Press.

Restore free market to address pre-existing conditions

by Linn and Ari Armstrong

Barack Obama’s most compelling examples of problems in health care involve insurers dropping coverage of people once they develop health problems. A related issue is the trouble some have in getting new insurance after they develop health conditions.

We agree that these problems of pre-existing conditions are serious and provide a compelling reason to reform health insurance.

However, Obama is totally wrong about the solution. The problem of pre-existing conditions is a consequence of decades of political controls of medicine. The solution is to roll back those controls and restore a free market, not introduce more controls and the worse consequences they will inevitably breed.

Obama and many others like to pretend that today’s health insurance operates in a free market. It does not. Federal and state politicians have seriously undermined the competitiveness of insurance through gross violations of the contract rights of insurers and their customers.

Through tax distortions, federal politicians have driven most Americans into expensive, non-portable insurance funded through employers. Lose your job, lose your insurance.

Moreover, employer-paid insurance operates more like pre-paid health care than real insurance, again because of the tax distortion. Such “insurance” tends to cover routine, low-cost care but increasingly falls down when it comes to expensive emergencies.

By contrast, real insurance in a free market would tend to cover unexpected emergencies and leave routine care for direct payment, thereby keeping premiums much lower than what most pay now.

A major consequence of federally promoted, employer-paid insurance is to create problems of pre-existing conditions. If somebody gets sick and can no longer work, the person also loses health insurance and probably can’t find another provider.

Politicians continually subject health insurance to changing controls, different from state to state. This effectively prevents insurance companies from offering long-term contracts, because insurers cannot know what political controls they’ll have to deal with down the road. It also reduces insurance competitiveness, as a policy issued in one state is not valid in another.

Another way that politicians undermine competitive insurance is to outlaw insurance options that politicians and bureaucrats don’t happen to like. In his article “How Freedom to Contract Protects Insurability,” Dr. Paul Hsieh points out that political controls effectively prevent organizations such as church ministries from creating insurance.

“The only thing preventing individuals from creating their own contractually binding risk pools today is the government,” Hsieh writes.

Yet, ignoring all the ways that politicians harm those with pre-existing conditions, Obama pretends that the fundamental problem is insurance profits.

In a free market, profit means that customers happily pay for some good or service. It is only outside of that market context that profit is bad. For example, a Mafia boss might “profit” by killing people, or a politician might “profit” by doing favors for special interests.

The fundamental issue is not profit versus non-profit, but freedom versus force. The problem with insurance companies is not that they seek to make a profit, but that they must operate as de facto agents of political overseers who call the shots.

On a truly free market, in which insurers and their customers were free from today’s political controls, people would tend to buy insurance directly, rather than get stuck with the few non-portable plans their employer chooses for them.

In a free market, insurers would be free to offer more plans to more people, and consumers would be free to shop around, regardless of state boundaries. Politicians would no longer coddle insurers with protectionist controls and tax favoritism.

In a free market, insurers would compete on the basis of quality, security, and transparency of contract. Today, because of political controls, insurance companies face little real competition, and they would face even less under Obama’s policies.

In a free market, insurance companies would be able to offer long-term policies that today are politically impossible.

The proper role of government is to protect individual rights, including the right of businesses and their customers to freely contract. The government’s role in a free market is to prevent fraud and ensure fulfillment of contract. If government were doing its legitimate job, insurance companies could not arbitrarily drop people.

Almost the entire problem of pre-existing conditions was caused by political controls. Given that politicians have mucked things up so badly, the last thing in the world we need is for Obama to expand political controls of medicine.

We should instead fight for real freedom in medicine and health insurance, in which the problems of pre-existing conditions would be rare and easily handled through voluntary charity.

True, restoring a free market in the future will not solve all the problems of those who now have pre-existing conditions, no insurance, and ongoing, expensive medical care. Therefore, we support, as a transitional measure only, a tax-subsidized high-risk pool, such as Cover Colorado currently provides.

When it comes to problems of pre-existing conditions, the disease is political controls. The cure is more liberty.

Linn Armstrong is a local political activist and firearms instructor with the Grand Valley Training Club. His son, Ari, edits FreeColorado.com from the Denver area.

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