Health Reform: If ObamaCare is such a great idea, why are so many governors — including several Democrats — refusing to play along? What do they know that the administration isn't telling the rest of us?
So far, not one part of ObamaCare has worked as planned. Almost immediately, the administration had to distribute huge numbers of waivers to companies because its initial rules would have forced them to drop their low-cost plans.
ObamaCare's high-risk pools promised to cover hundreds of thousands, but ended up attracting almost no one. The small-business tax break has been a complete bust. Insurance premiums are already spiking.
And now states are in open revolt against two key elements of the law.
Under ObamaCare, states were supposed to agree to set up so-called insurance exchanges — which would act as a clearinghouse for government-approved health plans and distribute the insurance subsidies included in the law.
But just 18 states have agreed to build them. The rest — which include eight run by Democratic governors — are leaving it to the federal government to do the dirty work of setting up these massively complicated exchanges. That's a remarkable vote of no confidence on a central element of ObamaCare, and one that's caught the White House completely by surprise.
Which means the Obama administration now has to figure out how to run exchanges in 32 states — a task it is hardly prepared to take on, if it's capable of ever handling it at all.
Why should states play along? Setting up an exchange only means that states will have to spend the money to run them — which will cost tens of millions of dollars they don't have — and then suffer the blame when things inevitably go horribly wrong.
Meanwhile, nine states have said they won't expand Medicaid — and more may join them — which undermines the other leg of the ObamaCare stool that was supposed to provide coverage for another 32 million.
This is despite the fact that under ObamaCare, the federal government promises to pick up the entire tab for all these new enrollees for several years.
But even with the federal subsidy, states would still have to cover the extra administrative costs. Plus, the ObamaCare subsidy drops to 90% after a few years, adding still more costs to a health program that is already busting state budgets. Texas, for example, would face a five-year bill of $6 billion if it went along with the ObamaCare expansion.
With Obama safely in office for another four years, there's no chance of killing ObamaCare outright. But since nothing in the law has worked as promised so far, states are wise to stay as far away from it as they possibly can.