Wednesday, July 24, 2013

ObamaCare: fraud, identity theft AND bad health care

Democratic State Insurance Commissioner David Jones has issued a warning:  consumers could fall prey to fraud, identity theft, or other crimes at the hands of the people hired to help them enroll in ObamaCare.  “We can have a real disaster on our hands” he said in an interview this month.

Jones, whose Department regulates more than 300,000 insurance agents and brokers in the State is concerned that Covered California, ObamaCare in California, does not have the proper procedures in-place to ensure that people hired as counselors are adequately screened and monitored nor have they established procedures for handling complaints or working with police about those complaints.

Covered California will certify 21,000 "enrollment counselors" from 3,600 Community organizations.  These “counselors” will guide enrollees to the proper plan for them and complete the enrollment process.  They, and their community organization, will receive a commission for each enrollment.

What could possibly go wrong?

Covered California‘s rules do not specify offenses that disqualify applicants from a counseling position.  “We don’t want applicants from communities where the exchange really needs to reach out being sent away because they made a mistake in the past or bounced a rent check or have a minor drug offense”, said a spokesman for the California Pan-Ethnic network, one of Covered California’s Community organizations. 

Jones (remember, he’s a Democrat) continued by saying, “Once they are in that position of trust, it’s possible they will obtain information that will allow them to build the trust they have with the individual they are working with and potentially sell them all manner of bogus products, steal their identity, gain access to certain assets they might have.  The list is virtually endless.”

What could possibly go wrong?

The Los Angeles Unified School District is taking another approach, one directly from the East German Stasi (secret police) playbook.  The district will use students to sell ObamaCare to their parents and report to district officials those parents who do not co-operate.

As for the implementation side of the equation, the Federal government is implementing the largest government database ever assembled.  Called “The Hub”, it will combine data from the IRS, Social Security System, Health and Human Services, and other Federal databases with State location and MediCaid (MediCal in California) information.  So, Community organizers/counselors will have access to our Social Security numbers, tax data, residential location, business information and health data.
What could possibly go wrong?

 In a strange twist of fraud, the Obama Administration has not been able to get “The Hub” working.  Being unable to check employer records for pay, health insurance coverage, co-pays, etc., they have postponed the “employers mandate” for one year (until after the election; they may be technically stupid, but are not politically stupid).  The individual mandate, the requirement that everyone must buy health insurance or pay a fine, will go forward even though an individual’s employment, pay, and health insurance records cannot be verified.  Individuals will be asked to “self-assert” that they should get a government subsidy (Mr. Jones, do you certify that you deserve a $12,000 government subsidy, or do you want to forgo it this year?). 

What could possibly go wrong?

MediCare provides health insurance to 48 million Americans (40 million seniors, 8 million disabled). Implemented in 1965, Congress projected its costs would eventually grow to cost taxpayers $12 billion per year.  In 2010, expenditures were $528 Billion.  Fraud (“improper payments” in Federal government jargon) that year, was $47.9 billion.

Medicare is prone to fraud because it is based on the honor system for providers and patients.
ObamaCare is based on monstrous complexity, incompetence, and a willingness, almost gleefulness, to tolerate fraud.  Targeting 300 million Americans, what could possibly go wrong?


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