Health Care BS

The Secretary of Health and Human Services has no authority over the private health insurance industry, which is regulated by the states, but that hasn’t prevented Kathleen Sebelius from sticking her bureaucratic nose in its business.

Last week, she wrote a letter to Anthem Blue Cross of California demanding that it “provide a detailed justification” for a proposed rate increase, and today her agency released a report singling out that insurance carrier for special criticism:

Recently, Anthem Blue Cross of California … announced that its individual market premiums would rise by as much as 39 percent in the coming months … This shocking increase isn’t unique. Across the country, families have seen their premiums skyrocket in recent years …

In addition to arrogating authority not granted to HHS, Sebelius released the report knowing full well that Anthem has already decided to delay its rate increase in the face of political posturing by politicians in Washington and Sacramento.

So, if there isn’t going to be an increase, why the attack? This is an obvious set-up for next week’s “reform” summit in which Sebelius’ boss will claim that Obamacare is needed to stop insurance industry avarice. The tip-off is in the intro to the HHS report:

These massive increases are disturbing examples of the problems that make reforming our health insurance system more important than ever.

The irony here is that we have been assured by the President and his accomplices that Obamacare isn’t about government destruction of the private insurance market. All they want to do, we are told, is introduce a little competition.

But this brazen attack on a private carrier over which she has no statutory authority (about premiums it proposed to charge private individuals and businesses), makes it clear that Sebelius and her boss plan to go rogue on the insurance industry.

These people have no respect for the free market or the constitutional limits of their offices. They can’t be trusted with health care—-or anything else.