AARP cheered for Obamacare but is now granted waivers by White House

Wednesday, June 01, 2011 by: J. D. Heyes
Tags: AARP, Obamacare, health news

(NaturalNews) Once one of Obamacare's biggest supporters, now the American Association of Retired Persons (AARP) is trying to get out of its grip.

The AARP was one of the administration's best and most vocal allies in the run-up to the passage of President Barack Obama's signature, but unpopular, healthcare "reform" legislation. Though backing for the law cost the AARP in terms of membership, those finances will be made up many times over -- something to the tune of $1 billion -- "as seniors replace their MA plans with Medicare supplemental insurance -- or Medigap -- policies endorsed by the association," The Hill newspaper reported.

There is more. Not only does the organization stand to benefit financially from its support -- which, by the way, is under investigation by the House Ways and Means Committee -- but now the AARP wants to be exempted from the law's requirements and has requested, and received, a waiver from the administration.

It seems the group's support for the legislation wasn't such a good idea for its own employees.

"In an e-mail sent to AARP employees, the organization indicated that healthcare premiums will increase by 8 percent, to 13 percent, as a result of rapidly rising medical costs," said a report in the New American. "It also told its employees that it will be changing co-payments and deductibles to avoid a 40-percent tax on high-cost health plans that would take effect in 2018."

Never mind that Obamacare is an abject failure in terms of its stated purposes: to ensure Americans had adequate access to quality healthcare and to lower the cost of providing that care. The entire plan is prefaced on a failed system of healthcare delivery in the first place, in that there are no incentives for Americans to improve their lifestyles and little in the way of for promoting the kind of preventative medicine needed to truly "reform" healthcare in general and reduce costs without accounting gimmicks, deal-making and chicanery.

In fact, if Obamacare accomplishes anything, it will only perpetuate the current system by keeping it on expensive life support that most of us -- and not necessarily those who helped get it passed -- will have to share.

As Townhall.com puts it, "AARP aided and abetted Democrats' efforts to inflict a disastrous bill on an unwilling public. They now stand to profit from the resulting law -- while simultaneously receiving convenient exemptions from provisions that may hurt their bottom line."