Greetings from the front line of the 3rd District of Kansas.  As many of you know, 2010 will be a year of intense politics and it is my hope that I will be the one to represent you in the US House for Kansas 3 as a term-limited Congressman who is first and foremost-accountable to you.  I am running to bring common sense back to Washington.  Our founding fathers never intended politics to be a life-long endeavor.  I, like many of you, watched as Hope and Change became a direct assault on the 10th Amendment and the start of Big Government 2009.  We can turn the tide, and I have become the only fiscal/social conservative who has pledged to term-limit himself.  I also will bring common sense to the health care debate with my 20 years of experience in the bio-tech industry.  I stand ready to turn back Cap & Trade which will blow the doors out with increased taxation with little promise of accomplishing anything.  You deserve to keep more of your own money.  Government can only inject money into the economy by taking it from you or borrowing from someone else.  I support the FairTax (HR-25) along with Congressional leaders in Kansas such as Tiarht/Jenkins/Moran.  This is the final push for the 4th quarter.  I can assure you that I am humbled by the support I have received, and I know that I have a tremendous group that will help in my grass-roots push to represent you.  Please consider helping me “shake-up” Congress with your donation of $50, $100, $250 or if you can, the legal maximum of $2400 dollars per individual. I know that times are tough, but I believe that they will get better if we elect leaders that know the issues and want to make sure that the next generation will have at least the same opportunities ours did.
www.JohnRysavyforCongress.com

Thank you & God Bless you!
Yours to count on,

John Rysavy

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Happy Holidays, Merry Christmas and Happy Hanuka  to all in the 3rd District of Kansas.  I am humbled and honored by all the trust and support you all have shown in me.  I can assure you that I realize that I am not a career politician.  I am one of you that was not driven by polls or phone calls to run, but rather a fervent desire to make a difference for YOU.

I have gone from the sidelines to the front-lines for you.

The Kansas- 3 US House seat is one that will be competitive, but at the end of the day, one that will unify Kansas as a Red state.  I will continue to be a champion for you regarding state’s rights, responsible health care reform and the passage of the FairTax at the state & Federal level.  We must stop the Cap & Trade bill and support our 2nd amendment rights.

I believe in Life, Liberty & the pursuit of Happiness!  I will fight for you and serve no more than 12 years in Washington DC & come back to make a difference in the community or state.

God Bless you all!

Your servant,
John Rysavy

Republican Candidate for US House of Representatives-Kansas 3

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“A mandate requiring all individuals to purchase health insurance would be an unprecedented form of federal action. The government has never required people to buy any good or service as a condition of lawful residence in the United States.” Yet, all of the House and Senate health-care bills being debated require Americans to either obtain or purchase expensive health insurance, estimated to cost up to $15,000 per year for a typical family, or pay substantial tax penalties for not doing so.

Read the Entire Article Here

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This Morning Bell is the final installment of a five-part week-long series on how Obamacare will affect you.

Lost in all of last weeks headlines on how the Senate Finance Committee (SFC) finally delivered a health care product that the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) was willing to say would reduce the deficit, was how exactly they achieved it. At a price tag of $829 billion, the SFC ’framework’ will reduce the number of uninsured Americans by 29 million, moving the overall percentage of nonelderly Americans with health insurance from 83% in 2010 to 94% in 2019. But of those 29 million with new insurance coverage, almost half (14 million), will get their coverage through the welfare programs Medicaid and the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP). That is equivalent to adding every resident of Ohio and Nevada to the welfare rolls.

In other words, for half of those Americans who are being promised health reform, they are going to be stunned to find themselves in a welfare office applying for Medicaid. Under the current baselines for Medicaid and the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP), there will be 76 million individuals served by these programs for at least some part of the year in 2019. If the SFC proposal becomes law, the number on Medicaid/SCHIP will top 90 million. So why do Obamacare supporters want to put 90 million Americans on the welfare rolls? It is cheaper than providing them with real quality health care.

Medicaid was originally created to provide access to health care for families on welfare. Medicaid pays providers 20-25 percent less than does the private sector, forcing doctors and hospitals to subsidize Medicaid through lower rates. This deters doctors and hospitals from participating in the program, creating a lack of access that itself is a form of rationing. As Time magazine reported this July: “But there are real questions as to whether the program could handle the strain of that many new clients. Already, it is difficult in some areas to find health-care providers who are willing to accept Medicaid patients.”

Even those who are not pushed into welfare will feel the strain on the health care system. The majority of individuals moved into Medicaid will be young and healthy. Keeping them on welfare rolls will shift even more costs to individuals and families buying private health insurance, as doctors and hospitals recoup their losses from Medicare/SCHIP by charging more to the privately insured. In effect, the congressional policy seems to be to expand dependency by discriminating against individuals based on their income.

And then there is the effect on states. The CBO estimates that the Finance Committee plan will cost states $33 billion over 10 years. But even that may be a low estimate. Governor Phil Bredesen (D-TN) has warned that the costs for his state alone could be as high as $3 billion. Thanks to strings attached to Obama’s failed stimulus, states already are facing an erosion of their authority to manage their Medicaid programs. The true cost to taxpayers in the states will only become apparent as spending for education, child welfare, public health, and investment in transportation systems and infrastructure are crowded out over time.

As Heritage Senior Fellow Dennis Smith reminds us:

In June, President Obama told Senate Democrats, “As we move forward on health care reform, it is not sufficient for us simply to add more people to Medicare or Medicaid.” Unfortunately, that is precisely what Congress is going to do with the Baucus proposal.

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This Morning Bell is the second in a five-part week-long series (readMonday’s on out-of-pocket costs) on how Obamacare will affect you.

“I will not sign a plan that adds one dime to our deficits – either now or in the future. Period.” President Barack Obama promised this to the American people in his health care addressbefore a Joint Session of Congress on September 9th. Problem is, no one believes him.

The Congressional Budget Office has issued reports on the Senate Health Committee bill (HELP), the House Tri-Committee Bill (HR 3200), and the Senate Finance Committee bill (Baucus bill). According to the CBO, the HELP bill would add $600 billion to the deficit in just the first ten years, HR 3200 would add $239 billion to the deficit in just the first ten years, and the Baucus bill claims to reduce the deficit by $81 billion.

But nobody believes that the Baucus bill will accomplish what it claims to do. As theWashington Post reported:

The cost difference stems from the fact that the House measure is honest enough to include the full 10-year cost of the so-called “doc fix” — $245 billion to reverse scheduled cuts in Medicare payments to physicians — although not fiscally responsible enough to pay for it. The Senate just patches the problem for one year and pretends that doctors take a 25 percent cut in reimbursements the following year and then stay at that low level forever. No one believes that will happen, so the money is going to have to be scrounged up later or else add more to the deficit.

The Washington Post is right: claims that the Baucus bill reduces the deficit are a complete fraud since there is simply no way Congress is going to cut doctor pay by 25% in one year. But all of these bills are deeply dishonest about their true costs in a more fundamental way.

Look at these charts on spending levels in the HR 3200 and the Baucus bill over time. Notice how in both bills the increased revenues (a.k.a. tax hikes) take place immediately but the increased spending doesn’t really ramp up until 2013. In other words, in order to game the CBO scoring system (explained by former CBO Director Donald Marron here), Democrats have packed ten years of taxing, but only six years of spending, into the CBO’s ten-year budgeting window.

So what happens to the deficit in those years after the CBO budget window? Rep. Jason Altmire (D-PA), a member of the Democratic Blue Dog Coalition explains: “Every year, you lose ground. It’s likely after 10 years, we fall off a cliff.”

Falling off a cliff. That is the verdict from members of his own party on what Obamacare will actually do to the federal deficit.

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Quoted from http://blog.heritage.org/2009/09/29/morning-bell-what-the-baucus-bill-will-cost-you/:

Morning Bell: What The Baucus Bill Will Cost You

The Foundry - September 29th, 2009

This morning the Senate Finance Committee will resume their markup of Chairman Max Baucus (D-MT) health care bill. Thanks to Sens. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and Jay Rockefeller (D-WV) the focus today will be on whether or not the Democrats on the committee can find enough votes to include a government-run insurance program. Just like Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s (D-CA) preferred public plan, Rockefeller’s plan would set price controls for health reimbursements at 5% above Medicare reimbursement rates. If the public plan was opened to all individuals and families, 103.4 million Americans would end up on the public plan, 88.1 million of whom would first lose their existing private coverage.

It is unclear at this point if centrist Democrats in Congress are really ready to force this many people out of their existing private care and into government-run health care. But even if the public option is not included, there are still plenty of regressive job killing taxes and invasions of privacy in the Baucus plan that makes it terrible public policy:

Taxes Families – Under the plan, everyone will have to have health insurance by 2013. The mandate will apply to all adults and their dependents under age 18. Those who failed to buy insurance would be forced to pay an annual tax between $750 and $3,800 per year. Those who fail to pay the tax could be jailed for up to one year. Worse, 7.7 million households would face a 35% excise tax on their health insurance. 94% of these households would be paying a higher tax rate on their health insurance than they would be paying on their income.

Taxes Businesses – Employers with more than 50 employees that don’t offer health coverage would have to pay a penalty for each employee who qualifies for new federal subsidizes under the bill. To stay in business employers will be forced to cut jobs and cut wages.

Taxes the Sick – The Baucus bill imposes higher taxes on manufacturers and importers of medical devices, health insurance companies, clinical laboratories, manufacturers and importers of drugs. In effect, the Baucus proposal would tax the sick to subsidize insurance for the healthy, and many of the taxes would be imposed on the same people “helped” by the subsidies.

Invades Your Privacy – The Baucus bill enforces both its individual and employer mandates by deputizing the Internal Revenue Service. To enforce these provisions, the bill would therefore require individuals, health insurers, employers, and government health agencies to report detailed health insurance information on all Americans to the IRS, adding significant administrative costs and reducing privacy protections. The IRS would also be required to report personal income data to state exchanges, insurance companies, and employers because premium credits and out-of-pocket limits would depend on income.

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Quoted from http://blog.heritage.org/2009/09/23/panel-of-experts-see-no-economic-stimulus-from-cap-and-trade/

Panel of Experts See No Economic Stimulus from Cap and Trade

» The Foundry – September 23, 2009

The Heritage Foundation recently hosted an event on the economic impacts of cap and trade. Multiple organizations have modeled the effects of cap and trade and found varied results but none of them provided the news you’d want to hear, especially in a recession. Despite repeated attempts to sell cap and trade as a jobs bill, not one scenario of even one presenter (including the three government agencies) projected a net increase in income or employment from cap and trade. The entire debate was over the magnitude of income, consumption and job losses.

Speakers included representatives from the National Black Chamber of Commerce, The Brookings Institution, the Energy Information Administration, the Congressional Budget Office, the Environmental Protection Agency, and The Heritage Foundation. The Congressional Research Service’s recently analyzed seven studies on the projected cost (including the National Association for Manufacturers’ study and the Massachusetts Institute for Technology’s study). None of the studies projected jobs or income growth from cap and trade. While these studies differed, they only differed on the magnitude of negative impacts. There was no disagreement on the sign. That is, cap and trade will lead to fewer jobs and lower income.

The disparity in the cost estimates was largely a result of differing assumptions on the use of offsets as well as the commercialization of carbon capture and sequestration and increases in the amount of nuclear energy. But two things are clear: This is not a jobs bill. This is not an economic stimulus.

Regardless of the cost estimates and regardless of whether global warming is a significant problem, the studies all agree that cap and trade will not stimulate the economy. So maybe the trade off is lost jobs and lost income for a cooler planet?

Climatologist Chip Knappenberger projected that the Waxman-Markey cap-and-trade legislation would moderate temperatures by only five hundredths of a degree in 2050 and no more than two-tenths of a degree Celsius at the end of the century.

More on the costs of cap and trade can be found here. You can watch yesterday’s event, and find the presentations of the presenters, here.

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Quoted from http://www.heritage.org/Press/FactSheet/fs0037.cfm:

September 18, 2009
The Max Tax: Baucus Health Bill Is More of the Same

Nothing New Here Same Objectionable Features: A public plan disguised as a co-op, individual and employer mandates, massive federal regulation over insurance and benefits, and massive Medicaid expansion–the Baucus bill has them all. These are the same features plaguing the other bills in Congress and that Americans have routinely dismissed for months. Seven Fatal Flaws Middle Class Tax Hike: The Baucus bill would impose a new sales tax on drugs and medical devices and a new federal excise tax on insurance plans that exceed $8,000 for an individual and $21,000 for a family. These taxes will ultimately be passed down to the consumer, putting many middle class families on the receiving end of a tax hike. An Individual Mandate: In 2013, almost everyone would be required to purchase health insurance that complies with new federal standards. Those making more than three times the poverty level would face a tax penalty of $950 (maxing out at $3,800 per family) and $750 (maxing out at $1,500 per family) for those below 300 percent poverty. This penalty could apply to individuals with incomes as low as $10,831 a year. No Privacy: In order to enforce the tax penalty provisions, the government would be forced to collect detailed health insurance information on Americans, reducing patient privacy and adding significant administrative costs to employers and insurers. A Pay-or-Play Employer Mandate: Employers with more than 50 employees that don’t offer health coverage would have to pay a penalty for each employee who qualifies for new federal subsidizes under the bill. Inevitably, low-income workers will be hurt the most as employers would simply downsize or cut wages. A Thinly Disguised Public Option: The Baucus bill invites indefinite federal control of a “co-op” by providing an unnecessary $6 billion in federal funding for startup loans and grants and it gives broad latitude to the HHS Secretary to regulate co-ops and promote them. The co-op created in this bill is literally an acronym for a new government-run health plan. Medicaid Expansion: Under the Baucus bill, millions of Americans would end up on Medicaid. The current Medicaid program is unsustainable and poorly serves the needy and indigent now. Taxpayers will pick up the new costs of Medicaid, and states will have little flexibility for real reform. Medicare: The Baucus bill establishes value-based purchasing, requiring compliance with government guidelines on the delivery of medical services. Hospitals and physicians who don’t comply would get lower Medicare payments. This approach could bias or compromise doctors’ decisions and contradict U.S. law on the federal interference in the practice of medicine. Start Over Time to Hit the Reset Button: The President needs to lead by meeting with key leaders of both parties and seek bipartisan reform around two key themes: 1) instead of a one-size-fits-all federal solution, Congress should let the states take the lead on reform, and 2) reform the tax treatment of health insurance to give all taxpayers tax relief for purchasing private insurance and extend assistance (through spending offsets) to low-income families to purchase private insurance instead of expanding government care. For more information, please visit: http://FixHealthCarePolicy.com

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Quoted from Heritage.org

The Foundry

Byron York gets this scoop in the Washington Examiner today:

…if the plan envisioned by President Barack Obama and Congressional Democrats is enacted, the primary federal bureaucracy responsible for implementing and enforcing national health care will be an old and familiar one: the Internal Revenue Service. Under the Democrats’ health care proposals, the already powerful — and already feared — IRS would wield even more power and extend its reach even farther into the lives of ordinary Americans, and the presidentially-appointed head of the new health care bureaucracy would have access to confidential IRS information about millions of individual taxpayers.

In short, health care reform, as currently envisioned by Democratic leaders, would be built on the foundation of an expanded and more intrusive IRS….

…Under the various proposals now on the table, the IRS would become the main agency for determining who has an “acceptable” health insurance plan; for finding and punishing those who don’t have such a plan; for subsidizing individual health insurance costs through the issuance of a tax credits; and for enforcing the rules on those who attempt to opt out, abuse, or game the system. A substantial portion of H.R. 3200, the House health care bill, is devoted to amending the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 in order to give the IRS the authority to perform these new duties. Continue reading…

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