Wednesday, March 09, 2016

Andy Barr and Thomas Massie could do this together to kill ObamaCare once and for all

When ObamaCare was being written, U.S. Senator Chuck Grassley was seen frequently working with Democrats crafting the bill. What resulted was a small provision in the final product which could now be used to neuter the entire federal takeover of healthcare.

Grassley inserted into ObamaCare a religious health sharing exemption to the "Affordable Care Act's" mandates and restrictions against Americans' ability to manage the purchase of healthcare services sensibly. The best thing about the exemption is that it forced the federal government to leave alone three small groups of Christians in existing health sharing groups who collectively set aside a few dollars each month to spent only on medical needs of people in their group. It's real health insurance as it was intended to be, which avoids the term "insurance" merely because preexisting regulations prohibited it. Of course, it's significantly cheaper and more effective than ObamaCare coverage.

The worst thing about Christian health sharing is also where the greatest opportunity lies. That is, if you aren't an active Christian, you don't qualify.

Christian health sharing has seen significant growth among healthcare consumers desperate to escape skyrocketing premiums, narrow and unpredictable provider networks and imploding government-created insurers. But for the huge segment of the American population which does not attend a Christian church regularly, the exemption has no value.

If you would like to gain exemption from ObamaCare but don't regularly attend a Christian church -- or just know someone who fits this description -- please ask Congressmen Thomas Massie and Andy Barr to work together to amend ObamaCare to allow for the creation of non-religious health sharing groups without ObamaCare mandates, designed merely to cover real medical needs of members and not some politician's idea of worthy social engineering.

Obamacrats would be horrified by accurate claims that they supported special treatment for Christians but are now standing in the way of equal health freedom for non-Christians. Such a bill would surely sail through Congress with veto-proof majorities and then everyone would have the ability to avoid ObamaCare.

Call your Congressman!