Obamacare Reform and Paternalism’s Pratfalls by James Bovard April 1, 2017 One of Donald Trump’s first actions as president was to issue an executive order to reduce the regulatory burden of the Affordable Care Act. Obamacare has been intensely controversial since it was enacted in 2010. The battle over its reform or replacement will very likely continue for most of this year, if not most of Trump’s term in office. ...
The Right to Try to Live by George Leef November 1, 2016 The Right to Try: How the Federal Government Prevents Americans from Getting the Lifesaving Treatments They Need by Darcy Olsen (HarperCollins, 2015); 311 pages. The highly acclaimed 2013 movie Dallas Buyers Club told the story of Ron Woodroof, who tried desperately to get drugs that might help arrest Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome back in the mid 1980s. ...
The Libertarian Angle: Obamacare in Crisis by Future of Freedom Foundation August 31, 2016 FFF president Jacob Hornberger and Richard Ebeling discuss the disaster that is Obamacare. Go to the podcast.
The Failure of the Americans with Disabilities Act by James Bovard October 1, 2015 The Americans with Disabilities Act was enacted 25 years ago. It promised a brave new era of equality and freedom. Instead, it has spawned endless lawsuits and absurd federal decrees while harming some of the people it sought to relieve. The original law was badly drafted and subsequent amendments and administrative decrees have made it far worse. The 1990 ADA ...
Why Are Republicans So Upset about Obamacare? by Laurence M. Vance September 3, 2015 Although Republicans have talked incessantly about repealing Obamacare since the day it became the law of the land, they were for Republican versions of it before they were against it. They are for Republican versions of it right now. And they wholeheartedly support government intervention into the health-care and health-insurance industries that are even worse. In the recent Supreme Court ...
Happy Birthday Medicare and Medicaid? by Laurence M. Vance July 27, 2015 On July 30, 1965 — fifty years ago —Lyndon Johnson signed into law the Social Security Amendments of 1965 that created two new government programs. Added to the Social Security Act of 1935 was Title XVIII, Medicare, and Title XIX, Medicaid. They were the nation’s first public health-insurance programs. Medicare is government-funded health care for Americans 65 years old and ...
Obamacare Racketeering and Intellectual Knavery by James Bovard February 1, 2015 Paternalism is a desperate gamble that lying politicians will honestly care for those who fall under their power. This axiom has been made stark with the controversy arising from a video of Jonathan Gruber, one of the architects of Obamacare, in which he admits that the administration conned the American public and blames dumb voters for the flimflam. Gruber, an ...
The Libertarian Angle: Obamacare, Contraceptives, and Immigrant Children by Future of Freedom Foundation July 7, 2014 FFF president Jacob Hornberger and FFF vice president Sheldon Richman discuss the hot topics of the day. This week: the Hobby Lobby ruling and the influx of immigrant children on the southern border. The Libertarian Angle airs weekly. Go to the podcast.
TGIF: Dump the Contraception Mandate and All the Rest by Sheldon Richman January 3, 2014 “Nowadays to be intelligible is to be found out.” —Oscar Wilde In the wacky world of American politics, if you as an employer have a religious objection to paying for your employees’ contraceptives, you are the one contemptuous of religious freedom. As the New York Times editorial board lectured a judge who thinks otherwise, “the threat to religious liberty comes ...
TGIF: The Affordable Care Act Doesn’t Go That Way by Sheldon Richman November 1, 2013 Web problems can be fixed. The problems inherent in the so-called Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA) are another story. Let’s stipulate that most people who favor the ACA have honorable intentions: they want everyone, including people in ill health, to have access to good and affordable medical care. All decent people should want that. (How many favor ...
The Real Problem with the Obamacare Mandates by Laurence M. Vance October 22, 2013 The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, otherwise known as the PPACA or Obamacare, became law on March 23, 2010. Passed along strict party lines, it has proven to be one of the most polarizing pieces of legislation ever passed. Some of those who initially supported the president’s health-care law are now some of its most vocal critics. Yet ...
Ending Medicare by Laurence M. Vance July 12, 2013 Medicare is government-funded health care for Americans aged 65 and over and/or those who are permanently disabled. Like Social Security, it is funded by payroll tax deductions from both employers and employees, but only partially. Unlike Social Security, which has its roots in Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal, Medicare began in 1966 as part of Lyndon Johnson’s Great Society. Initial enrollment ...