Union pork hidden in OblamerCare

“How do you funnel billions of dollars to your union pals at a time when the government is running record deficits? Easy, you just tuck the money into OblamerCare.
According to a new Government Accountability Office report, the federal government has so far handed out $2.7 billion out of a $5 billion program squirreled away in ObamaCare.
The Early Retiree Reinsurance Program is advertized as a way to "stabilize the availability of employer-sponsored coverage for early retirees," according to a Health and Human Services memo.
This program looks more like a slush fund for Friends of Democrats. Almost as soon as the program was announced, thousands of well-connected unions and government agencies rushed in to apply for the free money. As a result, the agency running the program had to stop accepting applications in May or risk running out of funds.
And just look at who made the cut.
According to figures obtained by IBD, 10 of the top 12 recipients are either unions or public employee groups. In fact, the biggest single recipient was the UAW Retiree Medical Benefits Trust, which alone grabbed more than 8% of all the funds handed out so far. Other union beneficiaries include the United Food and Commercial Workers, the United Mine Workers and the Teamsters.
Meanwhile, almost half of the money doled out has gone to state and local governments, the GAO found.
Other big beneficiaries are giant companies such as AT&T and Verizon that, combined, have received more than a quarter-billion dollars under the program.
The problem is that these groups are the least likely to drop their retiree health benefits, calling the lie to the Obama administration's whole "stabilizing" excuse.
In fact, over the past 10 years, the share of state and local governments offering retiree benefits increased — climbing to 83% from 80% in 2001, according to an annual Kaiser Family Foundation health benefits survey.
That's at a time when private companies have been dropping retiree health plans to cut costs, with the share of large firms offering such benefits falling to 26% this year from 37% in 2001, the Kaiser survey shows.
So this ObamaCare money is really being used mainly to pay off unions and governments that would have provided these benefits anyway.”

nochain wrote:“How do you funnel billions of dollars to your union pals at a time when the government is running record deficits? Easy, you just tuck the money into OblamerCare.
According to a new Government Accountability Office report, the federal government has so far handed out $2.7 billion out of a $5 billion program squirreled away in ObamaCare.
The Early Retiree Reinsurance Program is advertized as a way to "stabilize the availability of employer-sponsored coverage for early retirees," according to a Health and Human Services memo.
This program looks more like a slush fund for Friends of Democrats. Almost as soon as the program was announced, thousands of well-connected unions and government agencies rushed in to apply for the free money. As a result, the agency running the program had to stop accepting applications in May or risk running out of funds.
And just look at who made the cut.
According to figures obtained by IBD, 10 of the top 12 recipients are either unions or public employee groups. In fact, the biggest single recipient was the UAW Retiree Medical Benefits Trust, which alone grabbed more than 8% of all the funds handed out so far. Other union beneficiaries include the United Food and Commercial Workers, the United Mine Workers and the Teamsters.
Meanwhile, almost half of the money doled out has gone to state and local governments, the GAO found.
Other big beneficiaries are giant companies such as AT&T and Verizon that, combined, have received more than a quarter-billion dollars under the program.
The problem is that these groups are the least likely to drop their retiree health benefits, calling the lie to the Obama administration's whole "stabilizing" excuse.
In fact, over the past 10 years, the share of state and local governments offering retiree benefits increased — climbing to 83% from 80% in 2001, according to an annual Kaiser Family Foundation health benefits survey.
That's at a time when private companies have been dropping retiree health plans to cut costs, with the share of large firms offering such benefits falling to 26% this year from 37% in 2001, the Kaiser survey shows.
So this ObamaCare money is really being used mainly to pay off unions and governments that would have provided these benefits anyway.”

Let me get this correct....the COWH used pork to protect the unions?....Need the funding to pay off Jimmy Hoffa Jr's self proclaimed WAR against anyone that disagrees with the union fat cats...

Since GM owe's us 50 + Billion Dollars, what can I expect when buying a GM product? What is my discount since I own the company? Ever hear of "Fleet Rate?"