Could Health Care Reform Make UnitedHealth Rich?

Now we have an even more interesting tangent in this ObamaCare mess. Maybe the health insurers actually want ObamaCare to happen so that they can rake in the big bucks.

Perhaps more than any other insurer, UnitedHealth is poised to profit from health reform. Its decade-long series of acquisitions has made the company a coast-to-coast Leviathan enmeshed in the lives of 70 million Americans.

United's AmeriChoice unit is the largest government contractor administering state Medicaid programs for the poor and federally sponsored plans for children. AmeriChoice's revenue rose 34% last year, to $6 billion, and it has 2.7 million people enrolled. Those numbers should continue rising under reform since congressional Democrats are proposing an expansion of Medicaid to help achieve universal coverage. More of the working poor would qualify for Medicaid, and AmeriChoice can sell itself to states as the leading service provider.

Talk about hedging your bets if this thing passes. UnitedHealth would be able to make more money since they have a shot at insuring all Americans (health care would be a mandatory product if there is a public plan) plus they will be running the vast majority of any expansion to Medicaid.

Knowing how these guys are gaming the reform might make for an interesting long term core holding on UNH stock. I can see the weaker companies dying to ObamaCare thus leaving only UNH and a few very large nationwide insurers to go up against the government plan. The government can undercut UnitedHealth on price all they want but I think the value-added that UNH can offer (along with a shrunken playing field) might just put them in an excellent competitive position.

In fact it could be a lot like the Post Office vs. UPS and FedEx. FedEx is now trading at a PE of 211 and UPS's PE is 25 (UNH's PE is only 8.99) while the Post Office is running out of money and is closing up its offices.

In this case the Post Office handles the low/no margin letter carrying business (which is being killed by email and texting) while these private companies take the high margin super-quick delivery service (which is growing like a weed due to globalization/internet sellers.)

I can easily foresee a so-called "Post Office dilemma" happening to health care as well. The government plan will take the low margin poor and any of the old people that can barely pay for coverage. While UnitedHealth will take the high margin people who happen to be employed middle to upper middle class and the wealthy.

UNH will provide these high margin people with state of the art care, no wait times, access to face lifts and tummy tucks, maybe experimental procedures, and any physician they want. In other words the public plan will be the Yugo while the UnitedHealth plans will be the tricked out Mercedes.

I can even see some companies sticking with UNH even though the premiums are higher because their employees would burn the place down rather then go onto the crappy Post Office health plan. That could even be an enticement to draw in employees at top firms. "Come work for Microsoft kid, we don't offer that crappy public plan here."

I guess this is a case of being a shrewd capitalist and going long UnitedHealth or sticking to my guns and opposing ObamaCare as a dangerous scheme to add billions to the deficit. Maybe I can justify it by saying that going long UNH is actually a hedge against potentially disastrous Obama policies. In any case UNH is so smart it is scary.

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White House Gives Dems their Marching Orders on Protests

It seems the White House is doing some command-and-control when it comes to heading off the anti-ObamaCare "radicals" at upcoming Town Halls.

White House aides David Axelrod and Jim Messina traveled to the Capitol for their presentation to Democratic senators. Senators saw videos of disruptions at events held by House members, and were told to organize their events more carefully as well as work with labor unions and other friendly groups to generate enthusiasm.

They also were urged to use these events to stress insurance reforms such as a limit on out-of-pocket expenses for those covered by insurance, a ban on coverage cancellation for the seriously ill and protections for small businesses.

They also circulated a list of of answers to basic questions that they might face. I hope the White House has answers to these 5 and their followups:

1. If the Public Plan is so good why aren't all government officials and their families (that includes Congress, the White House staff, the President, and the Supreme Court) required to be the first enrollees? If not why not?

2. Will there be rationing of care in the public option? Will you have to wait 6 months to see a doctor for a cancer treatment? Will face lifts, tummy tucks, and abortion be covered by a public plan?

3. What will happen if companies dump millions of employees onto the public plan to save money and to cut costs during a recession? Can the public plan still stay solvent if that happens?

4. Will there be a nationwide capping of malpractice awards in a public plan?

5. If you don't want to pay for insurance for whatever reason will you be penalized in any way? If so then by what amount and will you be jailed if you refuse to pay?

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Labor Goons to be Unleashed on Town Hall Meetings?

Ugh, the supporters of Obamacare are starting to follow some truly Stalinist tactics more and more every day. This site says to bring a camera to make sure that everything is documented. The sight of a big labor goon stomping down some senior citizen complaining about ObamaCare will be truly tragic and must be documented so that criminal charges can be filed.

Organizing for America, �a project of the Democratic National Committee,� has even sent a flyer by e-mail to its campaign list that the DNC wants people to hold as they outshout anyone else in the room.

But that's not all...
The DNC has also recruited labor goons to police the town halls.
The Huffington Post reported, via LG Links:

The nation's largest federation of labor organizations has promised to directly engage with boisterous conservative protesters at Democratic town halls during the August recess.

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AARP Turns off the Mike to Criticism at a Town Hall in Dallas

Now this should get every senior citizen to wake up and notice that the AARP does not represent them and doesn't even want to listen to them at town hall meetings. I especially like the part where the guy says "Do you work for us or do we work for you?"

Watch the senior citizen �hooligans� and �civic vigilantes� in Dallas question a condescending AARP representative about Obamacare. Dues-paying members are speaking up about the organization�s sellout of its members � and the AARP brass is not happy. Yes, the winds of real hope and change are blowing:

The organization has been left leaning for years but now they seem to be selling out their dues paying members for ObamaCare. It is interesting to see at the end of the video how people were standing up and saying they would be canceling their memberships. That would be the only real way to get the organization to notice or care about what seniors have to say.

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Birthers vs. the Truthers

I finally found a piece of journalism that lumps the Birthers in with the odious Truthers.

One point I'd emphasize is the continuing amnesia of liberals when it comes to their own paranoia and/or their tacit support of it. Here's Robinson:

If there has been a more clinically insane political phenomenon in my lifetime than the "birthers," I've missed it. Is this what our national discourse has come to? Sheer paranoid fantasy?

Really? Did Robinson miss the 9/11 truthers? This was the movement that insisted the U.S. government was in on, or even orchestrated, the 9/11 attacks. Such theories went from the simply nutty to full-on whackjob bonkers. Some, like former DNC Chair and then-presidential candidate Howard Dean simply entertained the "theory" that Bush was "tipped off" by the Saudis but let 9/11 happen anyway. Some, like Rosy O'Donnell argued that the conspiracy was so advanced that the inside job was �the first time in history that fire has ever melted steel.�

Actually you can argue that the thruthers are far more destructive to the public discourse then birthers will ever be. One side wants Obama to release his birth certificate like McCain did and the other thought an American president killed 3000 American citizens with a vastly complicated conspiracy involving thermite, inflicting national trauma, and involving perhaps hundreds of thousands of complicit parties.

One side doesn't trust Obama for being needlessly secretive (what's wrong with your Harvard grades?) and the other side doesn't trust the entire apparatus of government including the White House, Congress, the CIA and the FBI. Both are moonbats but the media only seems to have covered one of them.

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ObamaCare Just Touched the Third Rail: It Pays for Abortions?

Now this thing is going to blow right open because abortion is always a powder-keg issue.

A compromise approved by a House committee last week attempted to balance questions of federal funding, personal choice and the conscience rights of clinicians. It would allow the public plan to cover abortion but without using federal funds, only dollars from beneficiary premiums. Likewise, private plans in the new insurance exchange could opt to cover abortion, but no federal subsidies would be used to pay for the procedure.

"It's a sham," said Douglas Johnson, legislative director for National Right to Life. "It's a bookkeeping scheme. The plan pays for abortion, and the government subsidizes the plan."

This guy is right about it being a bookkeeping scheme. If you think about it this so-called "bookkeeping scheme" is almost worse because those beneficiary premiums are paid by everyone who is part of the public plan. Also some of this money is subsidized by the federal government up to 4 times (8 times?) the poverty level.

So it would be safe to say that if you choose the public plan you are choosing to support abortions with your beneficiary premiums. In other words if you are on the public plan you will be paying for some other persons abortion. It doesn't matter if you are morally opposed to it or not you are still forced to pay.

I think ObamaCare might have just got its plug pulled as the issue devolves into an abortion debate instead of talk of a public plan vs. private plans or the bending the cost curve or other germane issues. I would hate to be defending this issue when the anti-abortion people and Catholics get involved.

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National Pep Talk? You have to Be Joking

It seems that we have to hear more about how the Stimulus hasn't failed and other nonsense.

That tied into his news nugget of the day: the awarding of $2.4 billion in grants toward the production of electric and hybrid cars, part of the stimulus plan. Obama delivered the news in the border region of Indiana and Michigan � the two states benefiting the most.

Too bad these aren't tax incentives for Toyota to build a Prius plant in this 17% unemployment ravaged part of Indiana called Elkhart-Goshen. I mean these plants are dotted throughout the South and those states have nowhere near the unemployment of this part of Indiana. Tax incentives are a very powerful motivator.

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Obama Promises to go it Alone on ObamaCare

It seems that this thing will be rammed through by any means necessary.

"Sometime in September we're going to have to make an assessment" about whether to keep trying to negotiate with Republicans, he told MSNBC.

Obama said he "would prefer Republicans working with us" but that getting his main priorities for a health care overhaul are more important. It represents a marked change from the emphasis Obama placed on bipartisanship when he launched his campaign for a health care overhaul at a White House summit in March.

I think he needs to understand that if this thing fails it will be his fault entirely. I guess he is willing to stake his second term on what the Senate produces or fails to produce. My guess is it will be very watered down and Obama will still claim whatever it is as a milestone.

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Town Halls Become Town Hells

Well it seems that the ObamaCare boosters are starting to sweat when they are taking their concerns to the people.

For Democrats, that�s precisely the problem: Their ability to make their case on health care at public events during the August recess is mostly in the hands of the people who turn out for the events. And if those people want to be disruptive � especially en masse � there�s not much the Democrats can do about it.

�Town halls have become town hells,� said Mark McKinnon, a former adviser to President George W. Bush. �Special interests and opponents have figured out how easy it is to disrupt town halls and get their own message out. The days of the truly free-form town halls may be over.�

The problem also is that embarrassing public officials is great fodder for the news media and YouTube. The idea that "people power" is trumping the "powerful" is always pretty potent. If the Dems are so concerned with what Gibbs calls AstroTurfing Brooks Brothers Brigade then bring in the tax-payer sponsored ACORN goons to shout back. Then the so-called health care debate can really get surreal.

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Prediction of What Will Happen if Public Option Passes

Unless the public option outlaws private health insurers I will be willing to bet that there will be a two tier system in place like this IBD article suggests.

Under ObamaCare, the rich would continue to get the care they want � whether here or abroad � by paying for it out of their own pockets. The rest of us would stand in line and wait for rationed care.

What I envision is that private insurers will consolidate and then turn into Medicare Advantage style value added companies. What I think will happen is that these plans will be priced mostly for the rich and cover anything that ObamaCare does not and will jump the line when it comes to certain care. They will probably reimburse doctors and hospitals at a higher rate then ObamaCare and thus entice them into the plan.

What this will create is a two tier system where the rich will pay for added care while the middle class and poor will be stuck with long wait times and the AmTrack level conditions created by ObamaCare.

These insurance companies are not dumb and they will be able to compete with the public plan but only for the highest premium payers. Taxpayers will instead be stuck paying for everyone elses health insurance including the rich. Such are the laws of unintended consequences.

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Bill Clinton Frees Out Hostages

As Obama dawdles with ObamaCare and Hillary tours Africa we have to send in Slick Willie in there to do the diplomatic heavy lifting.

Following Bill Clinton�s meeting with Kim Jong-Il, news is just coming over the wires that the two US journalists arrested by North Korea, Laura Ling and Euna Lee, are being freed.

Li�l Kim is giving them a �special pardon,� and they�ll be returning to the United States on Clinton�s private plane.

It seems that Bill Clinton has a knack for showing up his wife and Obama. Now he can head over to Iran and get those people released as well.

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Obama Spouts the Single Payer Health Plan in 2003

It seems that all of Obama's talk about "you like your health care you will keep it" and "if you like your doctor you will keep them" is just rhetoric because it seems his own words are contradicting it.

�I happen to be a proponent of a single payer universal health care program. I see no reason why the United States of America, the wealthiest country in the history of the world, spending 14 percent of its Gross National Product on health care cannot provide basic health insurance to everybody. And that�s what Jim is talking about when he says everybody in, nobody out. A single payer health care plan, a universal health care plan. And that�s what I�d like to see. But as all of you know, we may not get there immediately. Because first we have to take back the White House, we have to take back the Senate, and we have to take back the House.�

In other words the "public plan" that competes with private insurance is simply a smoke screen to get to a fully socialized plan. It seems that Obama 2009 and Obama 2003 seem to totally disagree on this issue. I would love to see the real Obama stand up.

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Interesting Take on the Liberal News Media

This should come as no surprise but many journalists are liberal but this is a very interesting article asking why that is so.

Most journalists take a number of psychology, sociology, political science, and humanities courses during their early years in college. Unfortunately, these courses have long served as ideological training programs�ignoring biological sources of self-serving, corrupt, and criminal behavior for a number of reasons, including lack of scientific training; postmodern, antiscience bias; and well-intentioned, facts-be-damned desire to have their students view the world from an egalitarian perspective.

In other words they are indoctrinated as soon as they enter college. So they either become true believers or "get along to get along" in order to pass their classes. That is why I am taken aback by reading some liberal blog comments that say that the press is not liberal at all because they are corporate controlled. The evidence is right there in black and white but they are so indoctrinated into the idea that the corporation is evil that they can't see past that.

The press has been liberal for decades just like the majority of academia in the non-hard sciences or business school. So this article basically proves the point that a liberal journalism curriculum creates more liberal journalists. In other words the idea of the press with no biases should be scrapped and we should just go back to the yellow journalism days of the 20s.

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Government Revenue the Lowest Since 1932

I think these should be some sobering numbers.

The numbers could hardly be more stark: Tax receipts are on pace to drop 18 percent this year, the biggest single-year decline since the Great Depression, while the federal deficit balloons to a record $1.8 trillion.

The problem is that Obama and Pelosi what to dump even more taxes on people even though they aren't getting too many revenues in the first place. The more I look at it the more I think Obama might just put us into a double dip recession.

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ObamaCare Should Give up this Savings Fallacy

I think the ObamaCare supporters should give up this line of defense because it makes no sense.

The White House stands by its claims. Its allies claim that CBO forecasts, for instance, don't reflect potential future cost savings that might be expected from the prevention of illness achieved from wider health care coverage.

I think they need to understand that health insurance and health care are two totally different things. When more people sign up for a service that didn't have it before it consumes more of that service. You are increasing the demand side without decreasing the supply side.

Also I'm not convinced that if everyone had health insurance they will all rush out to the doctor. The only way they could get these savings is by the government forcing mandatory checkups. If this money instead went to free or tax subsidized mini clinics then I can see it making a dent. However, obesity will still be rampant and no amount of health insurance will magically cure that.

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