Tag Archives: health insurance

Government, Health, Humor, Politics, Satire

Obama, Pelosi pay $2500 for $500 Dodge van – Plan summer Apology Tour

President Barack Obama and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi followed yesterday’s passage of federal health care reform legislation by purchasing a 1985 Dodge Astrovan for $2500. The van was put up for sale for $500 in the Washington Post classifieds by Ms. Ina Surance of Hartford, Connecticut.

Obama and Pelosi will use the van during a June nationwide Apology Tour — two weeks driving from Washington, DC to California, stopping along the way to apologize to the Democratic base for the health care overhaul, which:

  • lacks a public option
  • mandates Americans to buy health insurance from for-profit companies
  • subsidizes coverage by giving taxpayer dollars to insurance companies
  • fails to repeal antitrust immunity for insurance companies, and
  • does not bar preexisting conditions for group insurance plans, and
  • leaves intact the geographic disparity in Medicare reimbursement rates

This morning Obama and Pelosi went before the Washington press corps to celebrate the van deal. Obama described his negotiating strategy: “When I saw the van was $500, I immediately offered Ms. Surance $600. When she said $500 was all it was worth, I kept bidding it up until finally she agreed to accept five times her asking price,” Obama said.

The Speaker agreed it was a good compromise. “We could have taken the Amtrak public option, coast to coast for $524 in USA Rail Passes. Except Rahm Emanuel agreed with Mitch McConnell beforehand that we wouldn’t do that,” she said.

Government, Health, Kleptocracy

Giveaway To ‘Big Insurance’ Passes House

You can sum up the so-called “health bill” that passed the House last night in one sentence:

Mandatory insurance is NOT universal care!

…no matter what that asswipe Obama or the corporate cronies in the Democratic Party say.

This bill is a f*cking disaster.  It’s an enormous giveaway to Aetna, Cigna, and Wellpoint that will do little to improve the health situation for those 25 – 32 million people who’ll be forced to buy private insurance in public exchanges.  Did you see the part of the bill that details the quality of coverage in these ‘plans of last resort’?  No?  Probably because it’s not there!  Likewise, the ability to exclude based on pre-existing conditions isn’t gone.  It’s just been delayed in order to force more people into the exchanges where insurance companies can offer crap coverage with crippling deductibles at high rates.

About the only good thing in this bill are the industry targets for how much of premiums must be spent on actual care.  But that doesn’t go far toward mitigating the reality of this bill:  The party, that at every stage voiced their support for a ‘public option’, did everything in their power to ensure that no such option ever made it into this bill.

Long story short:  Obama, Pelosi, and Reid screwed us and gave the insurance industry more than it could ever have hoped for from the GOP.

Health, Humor, International, Politics, Satire

Insurance industry hospital ship to Haiti – S.S. Hopeless will serve rich quake victims

More aid from the U.S. arrived in Haiti today as the insurance industry’s hospital ship S.S. Hopeless sailed into Port-Au-Prince harbor, on a mission to bring much needed medical relief to rich survivors of the 7.0 earthquake that struck the country January 12.

The Hopeless had steamed at top speed from the Bahamas, where it waited for six days while Haiti’s paperwork was being processed.

“We are here to bring the world’s best health care system to the Haitian elite,” explained Julie McCoy, the Hopeless’s cruise director.

“Medical care for poor quake victims is being provided by emergency public options funded by the world’s governments and nonprofits, so the industry role is to offer a standard of care and service to Haitians willing to pay the free-market price,” McCoy said.

The Hopeless is a 32,000 ton Connecticut-registered vessel, recognized around the world by the familiar green dollar sign painted on its side. It carries 500 private rooms, a galley staffed by six cordon bleu chefs, 12 operating suites for elective surgery, 20 magnetic resonance imaging scanners, a claims department, a Wal-Mart pharmacy, and an IMAX theater currently showing Avatar.

The Hopeless is suspending many of its normal policies due to the urgent nature of the Haiti situation. Plate tectonics won’t be treated as a preexisting condition, and patients will be able to add domestic servants to their policies at a rate of 30% of full premium instead of 50%.

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S.S. Hopeless

In other news, surging GOP Massachusetts senate candidate Scott Brown brought in help yesterday to put his effort over the top. The former male centerfold’s office announced that Jeff Gannon and Levi Johnston were flown in to help campaign for Brown on the final day of his race against Democrat Martha Coakley. “The male centerfold aficionado voting bloc is going to put us over the top,” said a spokesman.

ERITAS and Wiseline Institute and Center for The Secular Humorism celebrates its 300th post on Ragebot
Government, Health, Humor, International, Media, Politics, Satire, Transportation, Travel

New magazine jolts publishing world – TSA body scans to appear in “Public Screenings”

The White House announced the first stage of a new business diversification plan today, launching the first-ever government owned monthly magazine.

“Public Screenings” will carry images of airline passengers taken by Transportation Security Administration using the new millimeter-wave scanning machines.

Press secretary Robert Gibbs said the TSA originally planned to release the photos in the Federal Register, as a way to preempt the paperwork burden of responding to inevitable Freedom of Information Act requests by Maxim, FHM and Fox News.

However, the Office of Management and Budget reviewed the project and immediately saw how a new magazine, when coupled with the public’s insatiable interest in seeing people naked, could result in a major new revenue source.


Gibbs
Press secretary featured in spread in premiere issue

Gibbs cited how the tens of millions of people who fly every year would quickly create a huge collection of body scans of people from all walks of life — including the rich and famous. “The sales of issues containing Tiger Woods mistresses alone could pay for three years worth of the upcoming military occupation of Yemen,” Gibbs said, adding: “Whoopsie.”

OMB projections see newsstand sales erasing the national debt by June.

However, the private sector publishing world denounced “Public Screenings” as exploitation and an invasion of privacy, and called the idea of a federally-published magazine socialistic.

“Americans don’t want a bureaucrat standing between them and their paparazzi, we already have the best private naked picture delivery system in the world,” said Vernon H.W. Lechér, spokesman for the U.S. chapter of the British Institute of Nude Observation Clubs United for Laws Against Robes (B.I.N.O.C.U.L.A.R.), a free-market less privacy rights organization.

“This is a job killer. If Barack Obama has his way, instead of lurking in bushes with telephoto lenses, thousands of independent photographic entrepreneurs will be living under those bushes,” Lechér said.

Instead, Government should cut regulations on independent photographic entrepreneurs. “Imagine what the Globe or National Enquirer could do with those TSA body scanners — provided all local voyeur laws are canceled by executive order,” said Lechér.

“Honest people with curtains and nothing to hide should have no objections,” he added.

In other news, Fox News commentator Brit Hume said yesterday that he meant no offense to Buddhism when he advised prodigal golfer Tiger Woods to become a Christian. “I was only saying that his kitchen floor would be cleaner and shinier with new improved Christianity, over Buddhism or other kinds of witchcraft,” Hume told Fox’s Bill O’Reilly.

DINOs, Employment, Health, Humor, Politics, Satire, Technology

South Carolina wins 2nd production line – “They threw everything at Santa” -Mrs. Claus

The fierce competition to determine the site of a second North Pole production line has been won by South Carolina.

The announcement was made yesterday by Northex, the North Pole’s Oslo-based holding company that also owns Kris Kringle Worldwide and Rudolph Organic Compost.

“South Carolina has shown us it offers the best business and labor climate for our expanded operations,” said Angelina Claus, Northex CFO and wife of Santa Claus for 371 years. “Also, they threw everything at Santa in terms of tax breaks and other incentives” to build the new toy factory in the Palmetto State, she said.

South Carolina officials, decked out in pointed slippers, velvet breeches, belled hats, and other gay apparel, gathered in the state capitol of Columbia for celebrations that stretched late into the night. “South Carolina puts the SC in ‘Santa Claus’ — and ‘Christmas,’ now that you mention it,” said a jubilant Gov. Mark Sanford.

It was Sanford’s personal, secret negotiation of a trade pact in Argentina earlier this year that sealed the deal. Now having a physical corporate presence in South Carolina gives Claus an opening into the lucrative Argentinian toy market currently, controlled by competitor Father Christmas.

Other incentives committed by the state include tax exemptions on in-state purchase of reindeer fuel and gift wrap, and a waiver of environmental regulations for Santa’s capital projects. In addition to the new assembly plant in Charleston, Santa also has plans for a three-runway sleighport and a new project for his Nat King Coal division, which would be the world’s largest open pit mine.


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Barbie’s Dreamliner
Behind schedule

Santa Claus went looking for a new production site earlier this year after negotiations with the elf union, the Arctic Federation of Labor, broke down over the AFL’s refusal to agree to a no work stoppages deal. Santa had demanded the provision after stoppages caused expensive delays in the Barbie’s Dreamliner program.

State House Speaker Bobby Harrell summed up the state’s victory: “Today, South Carolina kicked the asses of a bunch of greedy little elves.”

In contrast, the decision has touched off a firestorm north of Canada.

“Christmas is ruined,” said Elf spokesman Gruffudd Greenbuckle said, and went on to say that work stoppages were a phony issue.

“Periodically elves have to perform a little dance, while singing merry toybuilding worksongs. It’s in our DNA, and it only takes about a minute at the top of every hour, everyone knows this,” said Greenbuckle.

“Santa used it as an excuse to betray our centuries of loyalty, and is blatantly cutting costs at the expense of the little guy,” said the three foot tall Greenbuckle. “Health insurance reform with a strong public option would do more to lower costs,” he said.


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Lieberman
Stole Democrats’ 60th vote

Greenbuckle and other elf leaders are calling upon federal lawmakers to intercede. “Keep the North Pole at the North Pole, we say ‘let’s stay together’,” Pole City Mayor Holly Mistletoe wrote in an e-mail to Rep. Al Green (D-Texas), chairman of the House Oversight of Holiday Observances Committee (HOHO Committee). A spokesman for Green said his committee would take up the issue after the holiday recess.

However, elf assistance legislation is a non-starter in the Senate, according to Homeland Security Committee chairman Joe Lieberman (Connecticut for Lieberman-CT).

“Christmas, shmistmas. The North Pole is an axis, with elves whose union supports the public option. Protecting America from this axis of elf evil is my top priority,” Lieberman said.

Humor, Media, Satire, Society

Obscure company dumps Tiger Woods

Accenture has severed ties with golfer Tiger Woods, following a deluge of negative publicity surrounding Woods’ conducting extramarital affairs with over a dozen women.

“After several years of the endorsement deal, we’ve decided to end the relationship,” said Accenture spokesman Art Andersen.

However, Accenture’s reason is not because of Woods’ admission of infidelity. In a recent poll, 1,200 persons contacted thought Accenture is a meat tenderizing liquid.

“The average person has no idea what Accenture is or what we do,” said Andersen.

“You’d think for all the money we’ve been paying Woods, that today Accenture would have the same name recognition as Rachel Uchitel. I mean, who do I have to sleep with to get that kind of notoriety?” he wondered.

In other news, Connecticut has severed ties with Senator Joe Lieberman, following a deluge of negative publicity surrounding Lieberman’s extramarital affairs with over a dozen insurance companies.

Environment, Humor, Politics, Satire

iNews Friday, 12/11/2009

A sampling of this week’s output from the iNews 9000 Turbo wi-fi headline translator—

Headline: ‘NOVA’ looks at Japanese midget sub in Pearl Harbor attack
Translation: Palin demands Vern Troyer’s birth certificate

Headline: Missing DNA linked to childhood obesity
Translation: Still no solution to missing Fritos mystery

Headline: Reid Compares Opponents of Health Care Reform to Supporters of Slavery
Translation: And that was a compliment

Headline: Christian group vs. Hastings – court to decide
Translation: Teabaggers demand William The Conqueror’s birth certificate

Headline: Palin to make time for Freedom Club in Minnesota
Translation: Palin makes time to club truth over the head

Headline: Bachmann and Palin each claim a rotunda
Translation: Bachmann and Palin cancel each other out in flash of crazy

Headline: Greenhouse Gases Imperil Health, EPA Announces
Translation: Disco is dead, EPA also announces

Headline: Democrats reach deal on health plan
Translation: Horse Committee reaches deal on camel design

Headline: Study Shows Casual Sex Not Damaging for Mental Health
Translation: Study key in Mark Sanford getting off in the Legislature. So to speak.

 

inews9kThe iNews 9000 Turbo will return in 2010.
Happy Holidays!*

Get all the iNews on Twitter

* There, I said it. What are ya gonna do, report me to Bill O’Reilly?

DINOs, Health, Humor, Politics, Satire

Lieberman celebrates green win

Hello, I’m Joe Lieberman, and I want to tell all of you how close America recently came to losing one of its most precious ecosystems — the health insurance industry.

We all depend on this delicate food web of premiums, co-payments, deductibles, MSAs, and MSA deductibles.

It’s a breathtaking example of the wonder of nature at work. There are predators and prey. Some live; some die; some have their claims denied. The lucky ones live to have their claims denied another day.

It’s a circle of life, death, and preauthorizations.

Interrupt this cycle and there would be a health care feeding frenzy. And my home state of Connecticut has one our most sensitive habitats, where some barely survive on tenuous 30-40% profit margins.

Thus you can understand why, when President Obama first broached the subject of reform, I was distraught. “You’re killing the ecosystem!” I told him.

Luckily a group of concerned Senate conservativationists awoke to the threat of affordable health care. Ben Nelson, Mary Landrieu, and Blanche Lincoln are among those who joined me in defeating a strong public option. It was a momentous green victory — meaning millions of pieces of green paper will continue flowing into our campaign treasuries.

It’s often said that even stepping on a butterfly can cause major alterations in the environment. Or maybe that was time travel. Whatever. We can celebrate that insurance companies won’t be added to the endangered species list any time soon.

We can be grateful our children — and their children — won’t have to go to a zoo to see a medical bankruptcy.

DINOs, Health, Humor, Politics, Satire

Stupak offers compromise – Coverage of premature ejaculation treatment could delay abortions “by as much as 6-7 minutes”

Anti-abortion congressman Bart Stupak today notified fellow Democrats that he is willing to modify his controversial health care reform amendment restricting abortion funding.

The Michigan 1st District representative hopes to improve chances his restrictions will be in the final version of reform after reconciliation with the version that will come out of the Senate, which is about to begin floor debate.

Stupak’s amended amendment would add the guarantee for all Americans of universal coverage for treatment of premature ejaculation.

“Guaranteeing access to P.E. treatment would limit abortions by as much as 6 to 7 minutes, each, but doesn’t further restrict women’s reproductive rights,” he said.

“This represents pro-life Americans extending a hand of compromise to pro-death Americans, the kind of compromise abortion foes are all about,” Stupak said magnanimously.

However, his compromise is drawing the ire of one leader of the pro-life movement.  Operation Rescue founder Randall Terry said delaying ejaculation interferes with conception.  “Putting it off by 6 or 7 minutes, that’s delaying the creation of sacred life and therefore unacceptable,” said Terry.

“Besides, without premature ejaculation I wouldn’t have the anger and self-loathing that drives my anti-abortion crusade,” Terry said.

DINOs, Health, Humor, Politics, Satire

Stupak’s amendment cuts medical costs – Bars coverage for all procedures

Rep. Bart Stupak (D-MI) today asked his Democratic colleagues to stay united on health care reform legislation, and support the current version of the legislation even if they have objections to the abortion-restricting amendment he authored.

The version that passed the House 220-215 on Saturday contained an amendment offered by Stupak prohibiting funds for abortions in a public insurance plan, as well as any private plan purchased in a public exchange. This has angered over 40 liberal members, who say they will not vote for any House-Senate compromise containing Stupak’s language.

Stupak called on disaffected progressives not to be hasty, urging: “Don’t throw the fetus out with the bathwater.” He said his purpose was to ensure federal dollars didn’t support a legal medical procedure he objects to on religious grounds.

That, he explained, is also the key to providing affordable coverage for all Americans. “My amendment slashes health care costs, abortion proponents never mention that fact,” said Stupak.

Stupak said a section of his amendment prohibits federal funds or coverage purchased on a public exchange from paying for any kind of medical procedure. “This is out of respect for the beliefs of some Christian Scientists — I mean, come on, they pay taxes too,” he said.

Refusing to recognize illnesses means they would no longer exist — solidifying America’s position as having the world’s best medical system, and saving taxpayers trillions of dollars, Stupak said.

However, Stupak’s approach is opposed from the right as well as the left. House Minority John Boehner objects to Stupak’s bill, saying Americans need a minimum of level health insurance. “Insurance should at least pay for the poisonous snakes some charismatic Pentecostal sects use in faith-based disease prevention,” Boehner said.