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January 19, 2010

ObamaCare's $59 Billion Giveaway to Unions

Posted by The MaryHunter at January 19, 2010 7:19 AM

You've seen the disgust rising deep in the throats of the American public in response to the broken promises of health care reform "transparency." The backroom dealings in Congress alone likely extend well beyond Sen. Mary Landrieu's "Louisiana Purchase" and Sen. Ben Nelson's "Cornhusker Kickback," the latter of which is reportedly being challenged by 15 state prosecutors. But this congressional payoff gig is small-time. How about the giveaway that President Obama, Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid are planning for the unions? The proposed exemption of union employees from the Cadillac healthcare insurance tax amounts to a $59 billion transfer of wealth to unions.

It is unconscionable that $59 billion will be extracted from taxpayers and others to subsidize labor unions. The Obama administration and Congress are now planning on taking $15 billion more from hospitals and $10 billion more from pharmaceutical makers to cover part of this fortune. But there is no reason hospital and drug costs should go up to subsidize unions.

This transfer of wealth to unions has become part of a pattern. Over the last year, the unions have been given a long string of massive wealth transfers. Take the government forcing GM and Chrysler bondholders to forfeit their legal right to be the lead creditors so that auto unions could get large shareholdings in both companies through bankruptcy. Similarly, the stimulus package placed all sorts of restrictions on how the money could be spent, requiring that much of the spending go only to unionized workers.

With only about 12.4% of the American workforce unionized (16.1 million as of 2008), how will this massive, vote-buying wealth redistribution program to a distinct yet vociferous minority of U.S. workers play among the rest of the workforce when the next election rolls around?

The tin ears of Obama and the Demonrat Congressional leaders are only exceeded by their profound hubris. Regardless of what happens in the battle for Teddy Kennedy's the people's Senate seat in Massachusetts, the writing is on the wall: Americans will have none of this.

Brit Hume said on Fox News recently that, perhaps it would be the best thing for the Democrats if Scott Brown actually won the race and, by killing their filibuster-proof Senate majority, could allow the Republicans to shut down the most radical elements of their agenda such as ObamaCare and Cap and Trade. Perhaps some vulnerable Democrat seats might even be saved come November, if the brakes are put on their dangerous statist agenda. With all due respect to Mr. Hume, another train has already left the station, and it's bearing a bold flag with a cruel serpent that reads DON'T TREAD ON ME.

Image hat tip: GraniteGrok