Among the gifts Nancy Pelosi brings to the House of
Representatives is her ability to draw a hearty guffaw from the
most jaded observer of American politics. This talent for comedy
was on display last Wednesday when she
told a group of toadeaters disguised as journalists that she
belongs to the anti-corruption party. The Orwellian absurdity of
the claim, combined with her trademark vapid expression, was enough
to make a cat laugh. I do, however, wish C-SPAN would flash some
sort of warning on the screen when the former Speaker is about to
deliver one of these howlers. That one caught me unawares with a
mouth full of coffee and I had to spend the next ten minutes
cleaning off my keyboard and monitor.
In reality, of course, Pelosi and the rest of the Democrats who
infest Congress and the Obama administration constitute the most
corrupt gang of grifters ever to have descended on Washington and
the hapless American electorate. The only real question is: Who is
the worst? Many would bestow this dubious honor on Pelosi herself.
Others would favor her Senate counterpart, Harry Reid. More than a
few would, of course, nominate Eric Holder. And still others would
push the suit of President Obama for the “most corrupt” award. All
are tough contenders, without a doubt, and each has certainly
earned at least a dishonorable mention. Nonetheless, for my money,
HHS secretary Kathleen Sebelius wins the prize.
While all of the above-named candidates have demonstrated
contempt for generally accepted codes of ethical conduct and the
rule of law, none has done so with the former Kansas Governor’s
consistency and arrogance. Before the advent of Commissar Sebelius,
the typical Secretary of Health and Human Services has maintained
such a low profile and remained so far from scandal that most
voters would be hard put to name any of the 20 people who preceded
her in that office. Sebelius has been a noisome exception. The
stench of corruption has followed Sebelius from her confirmation
hearings, during which she admitted that she had made “errors” on
her tax returns, to her “inadvertent” violation of the Hatch Act
last February.
Nor did revelations of the latter outrage stem the steady stream
of skullduggery that has flowed from her office. Even as her Hatch
Act violation came to light, she launched a program that
illegally postponed Obamacare’s cuts to Medicare Advantage
until after the recent election. And it hardly needs to be said
that her behavior since November 6 contains no hint of moderation.
Since then, Sebelius has put in place a legally dubious pay-to-play
program for selecting which health carriers can ply their wares in
Obamacare’s insurance exchanges, and it has been discovered that a
crucial contract involving the exchanges was awarded to a company
that employs a former Sebelius underling who ran the very agency
that awarded the contract.
The pay-to-play scheme for the Obamacare exchanges is the result
of widespread reluctance among the states to set up the insurance
“marketplaces” through which the uninsured will theoretically
purchase “affordable” care. The New York Times
reports, “The Obama administration said Friday that more than
half the states had rejected its pleas to set up their own health
insurance exchanges.” The Times insinuates that this is
nothing but a mean-spirited GOP refusal to “join a White House
campaign to provide health insurance to all Americans.” But the
real problem is that the push for states to create their own
exchanges is a scam designed to trick them into enabling and
enforcing the worst of Obamacare’s provisions.
As I
wrote last month, if the states refuse to set up exchanges,
they cut off the subsidies and tax credits that are the lifeblood
of Obamacare. Moreover, states that decline to set up these
enabling bureaucracies will also be protecting their business
communities from job-killing federal penalties — even if the
federal government comes in and sets up its own exchanges. Why?
Because the hilariously titled “Affordable Care Act” forbids the
federal government from funneling premium assistance or levying
employer fines through a federally-created exchange. In other
words, a federally-created exchange has no legitimate funding
mechanism and will therefore be unable to carry out its ostensible
function.
This is why Commissar Sebelius has decided, probably illegally,
to
charge insurance carriers “for the privilege of selling health
insurance to millions of Americans” via federal exchanges. Will the
insurance companies be willing to participate? Perhaps. “Fees
charged for use of the federal exchange come on top of a separate
annual fee to be imposed on health insurance companies to help
offset the cost of expanding coverage under the new law.” But the
upside for the insurance companies is that the new Sebelius edict
allows them to pass on her new user fees to the uninsured: “The
proposed fees could add 3.5 percent to premiums for private health
plans.” This is what Sebelius and her boss call “affordable
care.”
If this pay-to-play scheme gives off a pungent odor, it smells
like Chanel No. 5 compared to the deal HHS cut with a company
called Quality Software Services, Inc. (QSSI). QSSI was hired to
build a database that will be used to monitor the activity of the
exchanges. The deal starts to smell upon close examination of the
HHS agency that awarded the contract, the Center for Consumer
Information and Insurance Oversight (CCIIO). CCIIO’s director at
the time was one Steve Larsen. Larsen now works for a subsidiary of
UnitedHealth Group — which owns QSSI. In other words, as Jeffrey
Anderson
puts it, “The person who ran the government entity that awarded
that contract has since accepted a position with a different
subsidiary of that same company.”
If the name “Steve Larsen” and that of his former agency sound
familiar, they should. This is the gentleman who issued the
infamous Obamacare waivers to a variety of Democrat donors in 2010
and 2011. And it was it was also during Larsen’s tenure at CCIIO
that it began establishing “information collection requirements”
(ICRs) for a government database containing the private health care
information of all Americans, including those not enrolled in any
government insurance program. Now, having been instrumental in
designing the Obamacare exchanges and delineating the private
health data they will feed to HHS, Larsen works for one of the best
funded and largest “competitors” for customers who will buy
coverage through those “marketplaces.”
How can Sebelius and her minions get away with such
skullduggery? Because Obamacare grants “the Secretary” enormous
“discretion” in her efforts to implement Obamacare. Sebelius has
clearly interpreted this “discretion” so broadly that she doesn’t
feel constrained by any code of ethical conduct or inconvenient
law. So, she does whatever it takes. And if it “takes” your
liberty, privacy and money, not to worry. Like Nancy Pelosi, she’s
a member of the anti-corruption party.
