An always relevant song by David Frishberg (see an earlier post about him HERE). The song came to mind when I heard a brief discussion on the radio the other day about President Obama's comment on the Affordable Care Act - that anyone happy with their current health insurance policy would be able to keep it under the new legislation. Some people have found that this pledge doesn't hold water. Some are labelling it an outright lie.
The Prez has added a caveat, or tweak, more recently to that earlier promise. Speaking to supporters this week in Washington: "Now, if you had one of these plans before the Affordable Care Act came into law and you really liked that plan, what we said was you can keep it if it hasn't changed since the law passed," he said.
Was it a lie originally? Husband and I chatted on the question and couldn't fully agree.
My view is that, if Obama had felt confident enough to make such a statement originally, then there should have been some clause in the Affordable Care Act backing up his pledge and absolutely preventing insurance companies from reneging on, or cancelling, policies if policy holders wished to keep them. Apparently this was not the case. So, either the President was not familiar enough with the complexities of the Act, or it really was a lie to placate opposition. As with everything Obama - we can never be absolutely sure. Either way it was a "misleading statement", deliberate or not, to be added to the roll of "misleading statements" we've heard, since 2007, from Barack Obama.
With regard to the snafus at the Obamacare website - good advice to one and all:
