Hill gets Obamacare fix

http://www.politico.com/story/2013/08/capitol-hill-obamacare-crisis-solved-95100.html?hp=t2_3

Lawmakers and staff can breathe easy — their health care tab is not going to soar next year.

The Office of Personnel Management, under heavy pressure from Capitol Hill, will issue a ruling that says the government can continue to make a contribution to the health care premiums of members of Congress and their aides, according to several Hill sources.

The problem was rooted in the original text of the Affordable Care Act. Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) inserted a provision which said members of Congress and their aides must be covered by plans “created” by the law or “offered through an exchange.”

Until now, OPM had not said if the Federal Employee Health Benefits Program could contribute premium payments toward plans on the exchange. If payments stopped, lawmakers and aides would have faced thousands of dollars in additional premium payments each year.

Under the old system, the government contributed nearly 75 percent of premium payments.

this is hypocrisy 101, they fight and bite, vote 40 times to kill when it finally sinks in that they are the party of stupid, they run and get their cut, shouldn't they be refusing to except it like before, why are they subjecting themselves to such an abomination, could it be because they finally read the real papers not the one they passed around as a talk point, and had a aw crap moment?

Obama’s involvement in solving this impasse was unusual, to say the least. But it came after serious griping from both sides of the aisle about the potential of a “brain drain.” The fear, as told by sources in both parties, was that aides would head for more lucrative jobs, spooked by the potential for spiking health premiums

There was a certain sense of urgency, too, since enrollment in the exchanges was set to begin Oct. 1. There were discussions of a legislative fix — attaching language to a must-pass bill to fix the problem. But that would’ve been too difficult in today’s paralyzed Washington.

White House officials acknowledged that a fix was needed. But they knew that once they dealt with it through a regulation, some Republicans would use it against them – even though most of their party was privately obsessing over it.

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), in a statement Thursday night, touted the law’s benefits and Democrats’ efforts to educate consumers.

has he OutBma'd them again how can they embrace for themselves and still deny other American citizens the same, actually they are doing that now but the air's a little clearer now and people will see what ought to be their shame, the lis they'll tell to neutralize is what will put them in the jackpot, bring it.