Twila Brase, president of the Citizen’s Council for Health Freedom (CCHF) and one of the most educated of Americans concerning the ins and outs of Barack Obama’s Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, believes the language of the law makes it clear that the overwhelming majority of people do not have to participate in ObamaCare unless they freely wish to do so. Brase writes:
Obamacare has more chinks in its armor than a turtle without a shell. As a result, state governors and legislators can inflict great damage. The following amazing chink was discussed by a Goldwater Institute attorney during a Tennessee-based webinar on Monday (at which I was a panelist). It’s only 10 lines long in the 950-page version of the law:
‘No individual, company, business, nonprofit entity, or health insurance issuer offering group or individual health insurance coverage shall be required to participate in any Federal health insurance program created under this Act (or any amendments made by this Act), or in any Federal health insurance program expanded by this Act (or any such amendment), and there shall be no penalty or fine imposed upon any such issuer for choosing not to participate in such programs.’
I emailed Twila Brase and suggested that this language indicates that ONLY “health insurance issuers” may escape fines or penalties for not participating in Barack Obama’s signature healthcare takeover. Individuals and businesses who choose to not participate will face crushing fines and penalties obviously designed to FORCE their submission to the will of the left. Certainly, we have already heard of these punitive fines and penalties.
Ms. Brase was kind enough to respond, writing that “lawyers disagree” with my reading of this tiny portion of the law.
Is it possible that we are misreading the language and intent of the law? Does the above sentence actually mean to say that all “individuals, businesses, nonprofit entities and health insurance issuers” who offer group and individual health insurance coverage and refuse participation in ObamaCare will not be fined? That is, individuals who offer group or individual health insurance, businesses who offer group or individual health insurance, etc? Clearly, this would dramatically reduce the number of those who could refuse to obey the ObamaCare law and still avoid punishment.
One thing is certain–it’s difficult to imagine that a radical left at long last politically capable of literally controlling the life and death of 300 million American citizens could be guilty of stating that no one has to obey its commands! How could these power-hungry Marxists manufacture a 2700 page law, bribe and intimidate recalcitrant politicians into supporting it, and then commit such an extraordinary oversight?
Nearly 3 dozen lawsuits designed to take down ObamaCare are now working their way through federal courts. Maybe the question of who must really obey the law will eventually be answered. Until then, we can only hope that Twila Brase is absolutely correct and the creators of ObamaCare have made a monumental blunder.
Photo Credit: Fresh Conservative (Creative Commons)
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All we can do is pray this is true.
I believe that I can re-word this a little to make it easier to understand and show that people are still illegally and unconstitutionally required to purchase Obamacare healthcare. First let me copy and paste what is written then make minor changes to make it easier to understand.
‘No individual, company, business, nonprofit entity, or health insurance issuer offering group or individual health insurance coverage shall be required to participate in any Federal health insurance program created under this Act (or any amendments made by this Act), or in any Federal health insurance program expanded by this Act (or any such amendment), and there shall be no penalty or fine imposed upon any such issuer for choosing not to participate in such programs.’
The part that Ms. Brase wrongly interprets is easy to understand once you re-write the first couple of lines.
No individual OFFERING group or individual health insurance coverage shall be required to participate in any Federal health insurance program…
No company OFFERING group or individual health insurance coverage shall be required to participate in any Federal health insurance program…
No business OFFERING group or individual health insurance coverage shall be required to participate in any Federal health insurance program…
No nonprofit entity OFFERING group or individual health insurance coverage shall be required to participate in any Federal health insurance program…
Notice the word OFFERING. If an individual, company, business, or health insurance issuer OFFERS health insurance, then they would not suffer any penalty or fine for choosing not to participate in the program.
Nowhere in the article does it say that the individual or company or business or nonprofit entity or ANYBODY does not have to BUY health insurance. This is particularly important when you apply it simply to an individual. It does not say the individual does not have to BUY health insurance. It says an individual that OFFERS group or individual health insurance will not have a penalty of fine imposed on them for not taking part in the program. To OFFER is not BUYING. It is OFFERING to sell insurance. An individual is still REQUIRED to BUY insurance even if they don’t want to.
I don’t care if they are going to require me to buy it though. I am not going to do it and I will not pay the fine for not doing so either. Everybody else that doesn’t want to bow down to this illegal and unconstitutional law should do the same thing.
twila is either an idiot , or she and many other attorneys are misinterpreting the language of the law ! it clearly states that no one offering any form of health insurance can be forced to participate , it says nothing about the average citizen who will be forced to participate one way or another !
Agreed. Take out unnecessary adjectives and you get a clear statement:
“No individual offering group or individual health insurance coverage…” That’s OFFERING, not buying.
Vlad,
Your right. I guess people want to see what they do and the others can just be mislead.
The area quoted say’s: ‘No individual, company, business, nonprofit entity, or health insurance issuer
Note. The last word is who this applies to.
A law should define where it applies. I have searched the PDF for Obamacare for words like Arizona, Colorado, Texas, Florida, and NOT FOUND THEM. Were they saving ink by not listing the names of the 50 states of the Union ANYWHERE in the legislation? They only would have had to list them all together once, but failed. The federal government makes laws for federal employees, federal land, federal territories, and federal people.
Careful reading of the “10 lines” of the law clearly refers to any individual or any business that is ISSUING health insurance can, if they so choose, opt out of obamacare.
Be that a doctor in private practice giving insurance to his employees or a major business employing thousands…they don’t have to participate if they don’t want to. They maybe strongly encouraged by the Government to do so, but there is no penalty to comply.
However, we all still must get some sort of health insurance or the Government will “give us a spanking”.
ITS JUST A MATTER OF TIME BEFORE CONGRESS TELLS OBAMA TO PISS UP A ROPE AND REMOVE HIM……THIS IS STILL AMERICA AND FOR SOME REASON, I BELIEVE THAT THEY HAVE ALL HAD ENOUGH OF THIS CRACK SMOKING LUNATIC.
could not of said that better thank you
joe – Congress will drag their feet too long to remove him. Can’t offend anyone, ya know. It will be We The People, legal American citizens, the sick & tired military who will remove this stain from OUR WH and jail him and guard that jail. He will be tried & convicted by American citizens, not the U.N.a.k.a. Unethical Nutjobs.
The first two words of the “LAW” states that, “NO INDIVIDUAL” I guess I would be considered an individual?
I will place my bets on Twila Brase. This whole nobamacare stinks, stinks, stinks, and smells very fishy and unconstitutional. And possibly before it’s being forced on us, the dictator-in-chief, shall be impeached and tried for treason, making everything he’s said and done, null & void!
I’m not a lawyer, but it seems pretty clear to me. What it DOESN’T say may be more important. If an exempt entity (as defined in the law) chooses NOT to participate in ObamaCare, will they still be allowed to operte in America? THAT may be the stinger! If they cannot operate as a health insureror a broker, etc. without joining ObamaCare aren’t they being penalized? There are so many questionsstioll unanswered. Nancy Pelosi, we ‘approved’ your reeking bill, and we STILL don’t know what’s in it! Do you?
“Individual” is not the same as “Employer”….when you get insurance through your job, it’s not an individual that is offering it!!
[ No individual, company, business, nonprofit entity, or health insurance issuer offering group or individual health insurance coverage shall be required to participate in any Federal health insurance program created under this Act (or any amendments made by this Act), or in any Federal health insurance program expanded by this Act (or any such amendment), and there shall be no penalty or fine imposed upon any such issuer for choosing not to participate in such programs.’ ]
I think the key to reading this lies in the presence or absence of a coma between “issuer” and “offering”.
WITH a comma, I think it would apply only to those issuing health insurance whether an individual or company or business, etc.
WITHOUT the comma, though, it may be read as applying to “health insurance issuer offering group … coverage” OR “individual” OR “company” etc. without requiring that “individual” or “company” be an issuer.
This means that ANYONE CAN OPT OUT WITHOUT FINE. IF, that is, my reading of the significance of the comma is accurate. To be honest, I may have it completely backwards and it is with the comma that would give us all an out, but without it it only gives issuers (of any sort) an out.
Granted, though, the penalty waiving clause does specify that the fine will not be imposed upon an issuer, so even without the issue of the preceding clause, if we as individuals opt out we will be subject to the fine. However … there are no fines. Now it is supposed to be a tax. Did anybody rewrite the darned thing to reflect this? If not, then any fines mentioned would seem to be nullified …
Are there any actual lawyers out there who would care to comment?
I’m not a lawyer, but I do know grammar, and I believe your interpretation is correct. The phrase “offering group … coverage” modifies “issuer,” not the whole comma delimited list.
Hm. This is the first positive thing I’ve read yet about this piece of garbage. I’m about resigned to paying a fine, because I’m tired of unwillingly supporting those who are too lazy to work & pay their own bills.
“we can only hope that Twila Brase is absolutely correct and the creators of ObamaCare have made a monumental blunder.” No need to hope the creators of obamacare have made a monumental blunder!
obamacare IS a monumental blunder!
Whether it says one thing or the other is meaningless. Obama’s Thugocracy will force you to participate. You may set off for work some day happy in the knowledge that you’ve dodged ObamaCare only to learn later in the day that the Regime’s Private Army has taken your wife and kids into “protective custody” to insure that they are safe from “dissidents”.
Yeah, right. Safe from YOU.
You can launch all the legal challenges you want in court to no avail. DoJ will simply counter-sue and spend hundreds of millions of tax payer dollars defeating those tax-payers who dare to challenge it. It can go all the way to the SCOTUS only to be decided by “Judges” who are politically somewhere to the Left of Stalin.
There are two other ideas floating around that have merit. A Constitutional Convention or the right of States to withhold votes in the Electoral College. Try THOSE ideas on before you run off wildly waving your arms over this.
I am sure that will be changed by BHO’s lawyers
It is already too late. The brain-dead have re-elected him and if he gets his agenda going there will be no more elections. He already wants to do away with congress and the constitution and they will continue to allow him to do it because they do not have the balls to stand up to him for some reason.
‘No individual, company, business, nonprofit entity, or health insurance issuer offering group or individual health insurance coverage shall be required to participate………….
Because they put commas after each “group”, then placed an “or” before Health insurance issuer offering… means exactly what it says, which means Twila is absolutely correct. The above groups listed are completely seperate because of the commas and certainly because of the “or”. If they left that teeny, pesky little “or” out, then it would mean anyone who is an insurer, or anyone (Individual) who offers insurance shall not be required to participate…………
But, they will do whatever they want anyway.
Now my question is this… If I am wrong, how does one go about getting a license to “offer” insurance? Doesn’t mean you have to, but just that you “can”. That would put the whammy on them for sure. I.E by the way this was written, they are saying that non-health insurers can be an individual. Get my drift?
It does say NO individual, NO penalty and NO fines. I looked this up. Check out the LINK yourself. The Thomas link is the OFFICIAL Govt site for laws.
AND AT where laws Congress passes are kept:
http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/F?c111:1:./temp/~c111Tw5KcU:e483664:
The Library of Congress > THOMAS Home > Bills, Resolutions > Search Results
Bill Text
111th Congress (2009-2010)
H.R.3590.EAS
H.R.3590
Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (Engrossed Amendment Senate )
SEC. 1555. FREEDOM NOT TO PARTICIPATE IN FEDERAL HEALTH INSURANCE PROGRAMS.
No individual, company, business, nonprofit entity, or health insurance issuer offering group or individual health insurance coverage shall be required to participate in any Federal health insurance program created under this Act (or any amendments made by this Act), or in any Federal health insurance program expanded by this Act (or any such amendments), and there shall be no penalty or fine imposed upon any such issuer for choosing not to participate in such program
Individuals still do. Those who do not have employees of their own. And that is almost everyone. We serfs are still being whipped daily. Well..not the Muslims, Labor unions and other friends of Obama.
Anyone have any idea what the fine will be for a 62 year old, female, individual?
I am disabled. Cannot get disability. I have no health insurance because my gene pool was polluted.
With the extra taxes, I have to pay, and the insurance I would have to pay for, with a $30k deductible…I would have to pay $36,000 the first year. It will go up from there. What is the use of having health insurance if I have pay the first $30k????
Heck! I cannot even find a job with all my disabilities! How in Heaven’s name am I going to come up with $36,000+? Because I get alimony..for a little while longer…I am between a rock and hard place.
I figure I am going to jail. At least I will not have to pay taxes, no overhead because I will lose everything, and will have 3 hots and a cot! And guess what…FREE HEALTHCARE! Do I want a sex change? Nah? Do I want my bad knee fixed? Heck Yeah!
And I know…the Free Healthcare is not really Free. But it would be for me in prison! They have the cheap labor to build those prisons for all the people who cannot pay….and YOUR taxes to pay the cheap labor…illegal aliens…Isn’t life grand in the USSA? Amerika!! And people like the ones that own the former Blackwater …KBR will be making billions off of YOUR taxes. They already build and run many of the prisons in the USA.
I read somewhere ( on internet) that the insurance can’t be more than 3% of your income so if you make 30,000 / year you pay 900.00 for your ins. for the year and the government picks up the rest. Now I don’t know if you have to pre-pay and get re-imbursed or if you buy the ins through the gov. and that is your payment. If what I read is true the government will be $20 Trillion in debt in next to no time. Just like Obama wants. Still to pay another 900 /year and pay huge deductables that you can’t afford is the same as paying $ 900 for a ‘free’ physical.
Thank you Lindylew.
Where did you get that info so that I can read further?
I figure with extra taxes included, from what you have told me, I will have to come up with an extra either $3200 or $4200 a year. And that still means paying all medical procedures myself, until I reach $30,000 a year. Yeah! I have that kind of money! Right! Better than $36k though. But still if you owe and cannot pay…you STILL go to jail, whether it is $4200 or $36,000!!!
And with taxes going up exponentially….we are ALL going to end up in debtors prison. NONE of us, unless terribly rich, will be able to live as we are now. Our children and grand children are is such DANGER!
OBAMA HAS MY SUPPORT, IF HE DECIDES TO RESIGN….THEN I AM BEHIND HIM ALL THE WAY….
It doesn’t matter how WE read the language of the law or even what it says. All that really matters is how some judge reads it. HE will decide the meaning, whether it is supported by the actual language or not!
If there is one thing politicians have all learned it is to NOT be very clear!