Dear Virginia, Terry McAuliffe can't be Santa Claus

Left-wing pundits are all atwitter at the idea the Governor-elect of Virginia can swoop in and make another ObamaCare state by unilaterally forcing them into the Medicaid Expansion. He can't, and that might have an impact on Kentucky.

Expanding Medicaid in Virginia can't legally happen without full legislative approval, which is extremely unlikely to happen with a solid Republican majority in the House and an evenly divided Senate. But Terry McAuliffe could follow the lead of Kentucky Gov. Steve Beshear and attempt to implement it illegally, daring anyone to challenge him.

The immediate legal issue for McAuliffe if he tries this would expose a second big ObamaCare lie. While everyone knows you can't keep insurance you like, few realize the promise that federal benevolence will absorb 100% of Medicaid costs for the first three years of ObamaCare depends on a rather imprecise definition of "100%."

In other words, McAuliffe would need -- as Beshear has already quietly admitted to -- gobs of money right away, without legislative approval, to pay increased state Medicaid administration costs necessitated by the massive expansion of Medicaid under ObamaCare.

Ken Cuccinelli famously filed a lawsuit against ObamaCare on the day it was passed. He should get going on this one, too. Kentucky's legal challenge is soon to be heard by the state's Supreme Court.  

Tell Beshear to reverse Humana $65,430 truth tax

Governor Steve Beshear should apologize to Humana customers and return to them the $65,430 fine extracted in September when the company advised policyholders on delaying negative impacts of the federal health law. Beshear's chief insurance thug Sharon Clark said at the time Humana was misleading people by telling them ObamaCare rates would be much higher in 2014.

"Beshear could get away with calling the truth a lie in September in this instance, but he can't now," said David Adams, plaintiff in two lawsuits fighting illegal implementation of ObamaCare in Kentucky. "The money for that fine hurts Humana customers and should be returned to this Kentucky company right away. Beshear's criminal activity must stop."

Is Kentucky ready for Damon Thayer?

Talking head speculation about ObamaCare cheerleader Kentucky Gov. Steve Beshear being appointed to replace Kathleen Sebelius as Secretary of Health and Human Services brings up the possibility of an unprecedented shake up in Frankfort.

If Beshear goes to Washington D.C., per Section 84 of the Kentucky Constitution, Lieutenant Governor Jerry Abramson would finish up his term and then go away. He has said he will not run for Governor in 2015.

And under Section 85, Senate President Robert Stivers would ascend to the office of Lieutenant Governor for the remainder of Abramson's term, likely ending his political career.

The leadership vacuum this creates in the executive branch is far less interesting than what would happen then in the Kentucky state Senate. If Senate Majority Floor Leader Damon Thayer was then elected by his fellow Senators to the office of Senate President, he would have the opportunity to transform the state refusing to enact a budget that doesn't fix some of Kentucky's biggest problems like real pension reform, wildly excessive accumulation of debt and by putting to rest any potential lingering doubts about illegal attempts to fund ObamaCare.

Step away from Medicaid mirage, Gov. Beshear

While President Obama begins to get grief because the media is catching on to some of his fact-challenged health reform claims, Gov. Beshear grits his teeth hoping they won't notice his.

Specifically, Beshear has claimed repeatedly the state will incur no costs for Medicaid expansion for ObamaCare's first three years. Meanwhile, national media types are figuring out Medicaid will crush state budgets in the 26 states dumb enough to opt in to the Medicaid expansion.

Even that analysis is inaccurately rosy because it ignores the immediate new Medicaid costs to states under ObamaCare. Privately insured people with low incomes are forced into Medicaid immediately under ObamaCare and states don't get an enhanced federal match for costs of treating those people. States must absorb 100% of new Medicaid administration costs immediately under ObamaCare. In Kentucky, those costs will be over $40 million in calendar year 2014 and get higher after that.

KRS 205.520(3) requires that the Medicaid expansion be implemented only after legal administrative review as defined by KRS 13A. Because there is no legal mechanism for getting out of the Medicaid expansion once we go in, any review process we start now can't be legitimate. State law requires that a public hearing must be held on the expansion of Medicaid and KRS 13A.270(11) specifically requires that such a hearing must "guarantee each person who wishes to offer comment a fair and reasonable opportunity to do so." But there is nothing "fair and reasonable" about a process that can only have one outcome. To allow such a thing is to ignore Section 2 of the Kentucky Constitution and its unambiguous prohibition of absolute and arbitrary government. Had Gov. Beshear initiated this process on May 9 when he had his "Medicaid expansion" press conference, this process could have been initiated and completed legitimately and lawfully. Now, it can't. Gov. Beshear has a lot invested now in his bizarre claims of victory with ObamaCare, but Kentuckians have far more at stake in seeing that his ill-gotten powers be removed from him before he can do any more harm.

When the truth is "complicated"

An unnamed former Obama Administration official today summed up big government criminality perfectly in a front-page Wall Street Journal article with the following quote: "You try to talk about health care in broad, intelligible points that cut through, and you inevitably lose some accuracy when you do that."

The American people do not bestow power upon elected officials so they tell lies to get their policy wishes to "cut through."

The broad, intelligible point we all need to take home from the ObamaCare debacle loses absolutely no accuracy in the cutting through: there is no role for the federal government in healthcare in America. None whatsoever.

Any questions?

State thugs merely "providing new versions"

The Courier Journal screams 32,000 lucky Kentuckians have enrolled in ObamaCare in its first month, but you really should read the story, which tells a different story.

A great line: "Officials said 'enrolled' does not necessarily mean purchased."

We also learn from the story that "more than 85 percent of enrollments have qualified for expanded Medicaid." And since ObamaCare makes it illegal for anyone who qualifies for Medicaid to buy health insurance on an exchange, that means still fewer than 5000 Kentuckians have even enrolled.

And then there is this:

Tea Party activist David Adams, who has sued in an attempt to stop Kentucky’s health exchange, said the sign-ups were nothing to celebrate, given that more than 600,000 uninsured Kentuckians are eligible for coverage.

“If this was a no-brainer salvation for the state, you’d be seeing more people purchasing coverage,” he said.

He also said that nearly 300,000 residents are seeing individual plans discontinued because of Obamacare’s insurance requirements, and in some cases offered only more expensive options.

Kentucky Department of Insurance officials said those people aren’t being dropped, but rather offered new versions of their plans. They can also choose to shop for a new plan on the exchange.

I actually love this. Those 300,000 Kentuckians getting cancellation notices from their insurance companies mandated by ObamaCare should be very relieved to know that they haven't been "dropped," but merely given a "new version" of coverage with features they don't want and premiums far in excess of their former plans.

The applicability for this kind of government word game is practically endless. Your taxes aren't going up, you are being offered new versions of poverty. Your rights aren't being infringed, you are being offered new versions of force.

Remember, we get the kind of government we tolerate.

Beshear tries to move ObamaCare goalpost

While President Obama was pilloried this week by national media just figuring out he had lied to them about people being thrown off their insurance plans and forced into much more expensive ObamaCare, it nearly escaped notice that hundreds of thousands of Kentuckians face the same catastrophe.

CNN singled out Kentucky as one of the worst states for this man-made disaster, but ObamaCare cheerleaders in Kentucky's media were too busy waiting for marching orders from Gov. Steve Beshear. Today, they got them: change the definition of success.

We know Kentuckians have been very hesitant to embrace ObamaCare by actually purchasing it or even accepting the "free" Medicaid expansion. Beshear knows we know too, but he still hopes we are stupid and not paying attention.

"The hundreds of thousands of web site visitors proves that Kentuckians are not only interested in affordable healthcare, they can't wait to get it," Beshear said today. "I've been traveling the state along with members of my Cabinet to encourage citizens and businesses to find out about affordable healthcare coverage. Through the Affordable Care Act, we will make healthcare available to every single citizen of this Commonwealth."

Someone should introduce the Governor to the concept of a "conversion rate." Attracting visitors to the ObamaCare web site but converting only a very few into becoming customers -- even for a free product -- would create concern in the mind of anyone in the private sector. Beshear wants you to see it as proof of success, but there is no legitimate way to do so.

And before anyone else touts growing numbers of customers for Kentucky ObamaCare, lets realize that the first 300,000 or so that they wind up with wouldn't have been shopping for new coverage at all if the federal healthcare takeover law hadn't first kicked them to the curb. At its current rate, it would be years before Kentucky ObamaCare simply gets us back up to the number of insured Kentuckians we had before ObamaCare,  much less covers "every single citizen."

Go back to trying to silence concerned citizens, Governor.

Beshear trick-or-treats as "Brainless Horseman"

Two weeks ago, we uncovered details of Gov. Steve Beshear's illegal and unconstitutional plans to blow at least $21.5 million of state money on ObamaCare in the first six months of 2014.  Beshear's own attorney entered details of this plan into the court record, though he apparently didn't even realize he did it.

Having evidence of this illegal activity fall into my lap was somewhat unexpected. Hitting a stone wall of resistance when asking budget staffers for Beshear's legal justification was not.

But it was a very funny surprise this morning to get a strongly-worded email from Beshear's attorney telling me to stop snooping around or else.

In his letter, attorney Patrick Hughes for the Governor informed me that he had previously "outlined the appropriate protocols for information requests in pending litigation." This weightless piece of legalese means the Governor doesn't want me asking questions. He goes on to say "the above-referenced litigation is currently pending in the Kentucky Court of Appeals, and as such, the discovery period has ended."

What Beshear's goon fails to realize is my latest question doesn't involve this case at all, but the next one -- should it be necessary. Kentucky's Medicaid expansion under ObamaCare is already illegal. If the state Supreme Court doesn't resolve that issue this year, then next year they will have to deal with the illegal expenditure of state funds, a legally distinct issue. We have Beshear on his heels, but he is clinging to the hope we somehow won't notice and won't stay engaged in the fight. Please support the effort by clicking here and donating what you can.

Kentucky ObamaCare's Theater of the Absurd

To call Kentucky's media coverage of ObamaCare horribly embarrassing is an insult to what any parent felt watching Miley Cyrus "perform" at the Video Music Awards. Gov. Beshear has ignored the law, lied in court, helped blow up our health insurance market and then took off on a national barnstorming tour declaring victory over the wreckage with no meaningful media scrutiny whatsoever.

But all that was before Murray State University's NPR station got involved today with a story headlined: "More West Kentuckians than expected sign up for Kynect."

The story in no way backs up the crazy false headline, but it does pile on some additional crazy. And falsity.

Apparently something called West Kentucky Allied Services has received 300 applications through the state's ObamaCare web site. Seriously, that's the big news in this story. That doesn't even mean 300 people have actually signed up for anything. Or ever will.

The story then quotes program manager Jackie Eubanks gushing "Our governor embraced the program from the very beginning" and concluding "folks at the state seemed to be pretty well organized."

The story concludes with Eubanks stating that people who don't get federal subsidies for their ObamaCare health coverage "pay prices equivalent to those found on the open market."

Asking this reporter or the program manager what that even means would be equivalent to watching drunk college kids on The Tonight's Show's "JayWalking" segment.

You can read the story here.

Jack Conway and his penny loafers

Just sent a request for an attorney general's opinion to AG Jack Conway, who wants to be governor after ObamaCare hero Gov. Steve Beshear retires in 2015. What follows is the text of the request:

Jack Conway,

On page 25 under paragraph (c) of Regulation 907 KAR 20:100 filed for consideration September 30, 2013 by Governor Beshear, tens of millions of dollars in immediate, new unappropriated Medicaid administration costs are described in detail. I have requested of the Governor to know where will that money come from in the current budget and by what statute is its expenditure justified, but have received no answer. In your opinion, is such an unappropriated expense -- created as this is without following proper administrative review procedures as required by KRS 13A -- a lawful function of a governor's executive powers?

Thank you for your consideration and swift response to this important issue as it clearly needs immediate resolution.

David Adams

I can't doubt Conway at this very moment is hiding in a men's bathroom stall in the State Capitol with his feet up on the toilet seat hoping no one can find him to ask an ObamaCare question. Nevertheless, answering questions like this is what he is paid to do. Waiting...

A Kentucky ObamaCare question

Gov. Beshear has said many times Kentucky will incur no costs for the ObamaCare Medicaid expansion until 2017 and state media has unquestioningly repeated the claim many times as well.

We know that is false.

I just sent the following email to Vicki Goins, Policy and Budget Analyst for the Health and Family Services Cabinet in Gov. Beshear's Office of State Budget Director:

Vicki,

 

On page 25 under paragraph (c) of Regulation 907 KAR 20:100 filed for consideration September 30, 2013 by Governor Beshear, tens of millions of dollars in immediate, new unappropriated Medicaid administration costs are described in detail. Where will that money come from in the current budget and by what statute is its expenditure justified?

 

Thanks,

 

David Adams

859-537-5372 

Kentucky ObamaCare crash and burn

Kentucky's media folks are setting the bar on the ground and rolling Beshear's ObamaCare operation over it in order to manufacture a victory.

The numbers they reported today are horrible: 26,174 "enrolled" in three weeks and 21,342 of those are in Medicaid. First, much of this is fraud. But even if we take it all at face value, this means only 4832 Kentuckians got health insurance in three weeks from a program that has been hyped, subsidized, editorialized, memorialized and tearfully praised across the nation and by President Obama himself. That's barely 200 people a day for what is supposed to be a no-brainer and practically free. And some 1000 a day into Medicaid with no cost.

They literally can't sell this stuff and can barely even give it away.

And the puny distribution is really beside the point. If the Kentucky Supreme Court does not follow the law and throw this whole mess out, the 2014 General Assembly must BOTH ratify Beshear's bogus executive order redux - in and of itself illegal - and fund the exchange's operations and those of the Medicaid expansion in the 2014 budget bill. There is no way either of these things will happen.

Best case scenario, Beshear will be back in court next year defending his violations of state law with his opportunity to sell the unseen no longer an option.

Whitewashing Kentucky's ObamaCare disaster

New York Times reporter Abby Goodnough has done more in-depth research on Kentucky's ObamaCare mess than any other ten "reporters." Still, she hasn't reported anything of substance even though she has contributed to several stories mentioning the unfolding federal health takeover.

As of tonight, she has more than enough to blow the lid off the whole thing.

What say you, Abby Goodnough?

Beshear sues House Speaker Stumbo and Senate President Stivers over Kentucky ObamaCare

Kentucky Gov. Steve Beshear has turned on fellow Democrat and state House Speaker Greg Stumbo and Senate President Robert Stivers in a court filing questioning their standing in a suit challenging Beshear's attempt to unilaterally effect the ObamaCare Medicaid expansion here.

"This cross-appeal is also being taken against the Office of the Senate President, Robert Stivers and Office of Speaker of the House, Gregory Stumbo who are both the other Cross-Appellees," said Beshear through his attorney in a brief filed in Franklin Circuit Court (Case number 13-CI-000605 10/11/13).

"Beshear depends very heavily on the media continuing to not pay attention or give any thought to the ramifications of his illegal shenanigans," said plaintiff David Adams. "I'm glad to see these idiots turning on each other and they could all benefit from a few kicks from the proverbial mule."

For further information about this internecine war, contact Beshear's attorney Patrick Hughes at 859-341-1881 and Stumbo/Stivers' attorney Laura Hendrix at 502-564-8100. I'm sure they'd be glad to explain it all to you.

Frankfort's reproductive dysfunction

Gov. Steve Beshear is demanding a forty percent increase in Kentucky's Medicaid Administration budget in the current fiscal year without legislative approval but also now without the objection of even one Republican official in state government.

 

"If only one Frankfort Republican had the testicular fortitude to stand up to Gov. Beshear and ObamaCare, we could stop it in five minutes," said David Adams, lead plaintiff in two lawsuits to stop Beshear from illegally implementing the federal healthcare takeover in the Bluegrass State. "I'm even more disgusted by Republican inaction than I am by Democratic action. Frankfort's surrender caucus is astonishingly unprepared for this constitutional crisis."

Christmas in October in Kentucky

Governor Steve Beshear says he needs $21 million for Christmas and he thinks you are Santa Claus.

In a document filed quietly with the Regulations Compiler in the basement of the Capitol Annex late last month and not yet posted to the internet, Beshear stated that ObamaCare will cost the state $21.5 million in the first six months of calendar year 2014 just for administrative expenses related to the Medicaid expansion.

There is no appropriation in the current state budget for this little surprise, which every pro-ObamaCare Democrat has been insisting for years would cost Kentucky nothing.

"If the corrupt bunch of crackers running this state gave a damn about the rule of law, this would be front page news," said David Adams, the Kentuckian suing the Governor in state court to stop his illegal implementation of the ObamaCare Medicaid expansion.

Louisville Courier Journal still owes us one

On September 30, when the Louisville Courier Journal's Joe Gerth wrote a column inaccurately describing my legal effort to stop Gov. Steve Beshear from illegally implementing, I asked the paper's editors for space to respond. They agreed to my request to print a 600 word response.

On Tuesday October 8, I emailed to the Courier a 593-word essay. I was asked to change one word in the second sentence to clarify that I am indeed personally involved in the legal effort underway currently. I did so and was then informed that my column would appear in the paper on Friday October 11. And it did.

Well, most of it. I read it quickly in the paper's online edition on Thursday night and remember thinking briefly that it didn't flow quite like I thought it did when I wrote it. But I didn't take time to think about it. Later, when I purchased a hard-copy version of the paper, I was surprised to notice a huge graphic at the top of the page, which usually indicates a shortage of content for the space.

Then, I read my column again and realized parts were missing from what I wrote. Pretty important parts.

You can click here and read what the Courier printed and then click here and read what I sent them. The version that made it into the paper is 558 words long.

The first thing removed was a complete sentence contemplating a new lawsuit against Beshear if he continues his illegal activity for a second year. That sentence read: "That suit would be distinct from the first in undisputedly involving expenditure of unappropriated funds." This is an important piece of information because a huge part of Beshear's legal argument is that in 2014, Kentucky's "exchange" is spending dollars given to it by the federal government. At the end of the year, those funds are gone and, unless Senate Republicans suddenly lose their minds and become Obama supporters, they won't be replaced by legally appropriated dollars.

The next altered segment was the following sentence, with everything past the comma removed: "The 2015 Kentucky gubernatorial race would then be substantially about ObamaCare, another prospect Democrats might relish now in their health reform utopian denial, but which reality just might bring home colored differently by then." This is significant because Democrats really need to start considering the millstone ObamaCare will be around their necks when it not only doesn't fix Kentucky's access to healthcare challenges, but actually makes them worse. Gov. Beshear's heady victory tour and caustic rhetoric for ObamaCare opponents may be lots of fun to watch now, but the aftereffects really won't benefit anyone, particularly if we don't resolve this festering problem of an executive who really seems to believe the law doesn't apply to him.

Merely replacing Beshear with a Republican who inherits the same illegitimate power we could and should take away now is a disaster in the making for Kentuckians of all political stripes. Making that point was the purpose for writing the column I wrote in the Courier. Attempting to lessen the impact of my essay, as the Courier did, serves only a lawlessness we should all agree to oppose.

Beshear's bad ObamaCare timing

Kentucky Governor Steve Beshear really doesn't want to hear you complain about ObamaCare anymore.

In two state court challenges to Beshear's illegal ObamaCare implementation earlier this year, he asked for citizen complaints to be rejected because, he said, we don't have the right to complain against his official actions regardless of their illegality. Of course, his anti-American argument was rejected twice.

Apparently, Gov. Beshear wants another bite at the apple.

Late Friday, Beshear filed a last-minute appeal to ask the Kentucky Court of Appeals to muzzle us by ruling citizens don't have legal standing to sue the governor when he violates state law. Beshear's legal team, which is paid for by taxpayer dollars, is simply trying to distract attention from his attempt to throw us into ObamaCare without legislative approval and delay further the legal butt-kicking he and his absurd arguments so richly deserve.

And he is trying to do this now that the ObamaCare health insurance premiums are available for all to see how ridiculously unaffordable they are, despite his wild, unfounded promises that hundreds of thousands of us would benefit. So if you are keeping score, that's illegal official actions blowing up Kentucky's health insurance market at great expense to taxpayers, lying to cover it up and now multiple attempts in the media and in court to tell Kentuckians to sit down and shut up.

Just keep talking, Governor.

Why Boehner and McConnell keep trying to cave on ObamaCare

 

As paltry ObamaCare registration numbers continue to roll in from across the nation, a mostly ignored aspect of the federal health mandate deserves a closer look: who gets all the tax penalty money.

 

"Pundits took for granted projections touting many millions gaining access to 'affordable' coverage were remotely accurate, but instead even the most highly subsidized ObamaCare plans remain out of reach for low-income people who will instead be subject to tax penalties," said David Adams, tea party activist. "It's an enormous regressive tax creating a slush fund from these powerless and voiceless people the Beltway establishment politicians have no use for, and that applies equally to Democrats and Republicans."

Kentucky ObamaCare turnabout

 

 

Kentucky Democrats may soon turn against ObamaCare in the interests of self-preservation.

 

If Kentucky's state-run health insurance exchange survives a legal challenge headed now to the Commonwealth's Supreme Court, it will then face a stiff immediate challenge in January.

 

Under KRS 12.028, the 2014 General Assembly must ratify Governor Steve Beshear's Executive Order 2013-0418, which belatedly "created" the Kentucky Health Benefit Exchange to run ObamaCare here. The Republican majority in our state Senate is not at all likely to give the health reform scheme their stamp of approval. We know that because Senators faced the same opportunity in 2013 with Gov. Beshear's Executive Order 2012-0587, which first attempted to create the Exchange. The House and Senate both refused to ratify that request. Beshear's insistence on continuing with ObamaCare implementation without proper approval sparked the lawsuit to stop him. His subsequent move to reissue the expired earlier executive order showed contempt for the legislature (the people's representatives) and also violated state law KRS 12.028(5).

 

If the Kentucky Supreme Court does not clean up this constitutional mess and legislative opponents of ObamaCare do not effectively reassert their improperly silenced voices, Democrats may soon wish they had. By subverting the legislative process in reorganizing state government without the legislature's imprimatur, Beshear set precedent for the next governor to do the same. And our next governor just might be a Republican.

 

Imagine the uproar on the left if in early 2020 a second-term conservative Republican governor filed executive orders making Kentucky a right to work state, repealing prevailing wage laws and seriously addressing pensions. If he then dared opponents to file lawsuits confident that his appointees to the state Supreme Court would back him up, today's Democratic leaders would have no one but themselves to blame.

If the legislature does not provide a new ObamaCare tax in the 2014 budget for the Exchange to continue in existence in 2015, it won't be able to operate. Most members of the legislature in both parties will have no incentive to bail out Obama in an election year. Frankfort Democrats seem to not yet have considered this.

 

Frankfort Republicans appear not to have thought much about it, either. At a recent luncheon in Lexington, Senate Majority Floor Leader Damon Thayer pondered an imminent state budget stalemate over ObamaCare funding by suggesting erroneously that under such we would risk "letting Steve Beshear run the government," referencing a Kentucky Supreme Court decision which actually states "the mere existence of a law does not mean that it must be implemented if doing so requires the expenditure of unappropriated funds."

 

Once this legal misunderstanding is worked out among Republicans, it's clear ObamaCare will be struck down by the General Assembly for the second year in a row. If Beshear refuses yet again in 2014 to shut down ObamaCare as the people's representatives demand, such action would generate conditions favorable for another lawsuit. That suit would be distinct from the first in undisputedly involving expenditure of unappropriated funds. Beshear's only pathway forward at that point would be to issue yet another executive order, setting the stage for another legal fight in another year -- his last in office. The 2015 Kentucky gubernatorial race would then be substantially about ObamaCare, another prospect Democrats might relish now in their health reform utopian denial, but which reality just might bring home colored differently by then. So for now, Kentucky Democrats should decide if they want to misuse authority to hold power they can't keep or reject the abuses of one of their own in order to prevent creation of a nasty turnabout forged by their own hands.