As President Obama repeatedly tells America that his plan for healthcare reform will not lead to the elimination of private health insurance, statements he made in 2007 and 2003 tell a different story altogether.
In shocking video uncovered by our good friends at Naked Emperor News, Obama, speaking at SEIU’s New Leadership Health Care Forum on March 24, 2007, said, "My commitment is to make sure that we have universal healthcare for all Americans by the end of my first term as President."
Later in the discussion, he elaborated (video embedded below the fold):
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I would hope that we could set up a system that allows those who can go through their employer to access a federal system or a state pool of some sort. But I don’t think we’re going to be able to eliminate employer coverage immediately. There’s going to be potentially some transition process.
In 2003, Obama stated at an AFL-CIO Civil, Human and Women’s Rights Conference:
I happen to be a proponent of a single payer universal healthcare plan…That’s what I’d like to see.
Hey Kevin did you get up and listen to the news today…they put the public option back in …and they said Obama was estatic about it…..you and you know nothiningness is pointless
November 13th, 2009 at 11:25 pm
The public plan as an "option" is a misleading trick to get this bill passed. Remember when HMOs came along, and we were all told they would be "one option" for people? Remember how it was just a few scant years before all the other plans vanished? I sure do. Overnight, everybody who was young, didn’t have many health problems and wanted to save money bailed out to HMOs, leaving the other plans carrying nothing but people who cost a lot to insure. Those rates skyrocketed as a result, naturally, and quickly behind that, those plans vanished from my options.
This "public option" will toss a big tax burden onto everybody. We will all pay into it whether we use it or not. How long do you think it will be before millions upon millions of people, who hardly ever see a doctor anyway, decide, "Well, if I have to pay my taxes into it, I may as well use it and stop carrying my own insurance".
When THOSE people pull out, the only people left in private insurance plans will be the very wealthy and people with critical illnesses who can’t live with the slow, shoddy care of a public system.
Following that, private insurance plans will dry up like mad, forcing the remaining private insurance customers to move to the public system or just pay out of pocket.
Yes, indeedy. This IS a strategy to kill off all privately-controlled healthcare. It bloody well is.