Last September, Bloomberg reported that 60% of employers now offer health benefits, down from 69% before Obamacare was passed. Congressman Peter Roskam (R-IL) asked Secretary Sebelius about this issue:
“How about when the president said you can keep your health care coverage if you like it? And yet, the reality is, according to Bloomberg at least, 9 percent fewer businesses are offering medical coverage than in 2010. There the rhetoric didn’t meet the reality, did it?”
“Somehow, we have to figure out how to boost the price of gasoline to the levels in Europe.”
President Obama and Secretary Chu are certainly on their way towards that goal, as gas prices are now double what they were when the President was inaugurated. In a speech last week, President Obama claimed to support an “all-of-the-above strategy that develops every available source of American energy.” The President went on to say that strategy included oil and gas.
Last week, we learned that House Republicans would rework their transportation bill due to continued opposition (including ours). Originally, they had postponed the vote until after last week’s President’s Day recess. Now we learn that the vote most likely won’t happen (subs. req’d) this week either.
Some details of the reworked transportation bill have been speculated, including the retention of Speaker Boehner’s key proposal to link energy production to the bill as a way to pay for elevated levels of spending. The reduction of regulations and permit expediting are all rumored to be kept in the new bill.
The length of the new bill is yet to be announced, but by all accounts it will be a shorter extension than the 5-year plan previously under consideration.
“He should just write a check and shut up. Really, and just contribute. The fact of the matter is that I’m tired of hearing about it. If he wants to give the government more money, he’s got the ability to write a check — go ahead and write it.”
Maybe President Obama is not as clueless as he usually appears. Despite his policies, he does seem to understand how business and the economy works. The danger in his leadership comes from his desire to try and change the country into his utopian vision; to try and change what actually works to fit to what he wishes would work.
The President and his big-government allies wish that cars ran on sunshine and electricity (which is overwhelmingly generated by coal, go figure) right now instead of gasoline. They wish that raising taxes on job creators would bring in more money to the government. But when you listen to them speak and when you look at their policies, you learn that they actually do know what actually works in the economy, they just choose to do the opposite in order to try and force the country to work the way they want it to. This is evidenced in the President’s energy and tax reform proposals.