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August 20, 2009

House Dems go after insurers for opposing Obamacare

Rick Moran
Welcome to government of the thugs, by the thugs, and for the thugs.

In retribution for daring to oppose Obamacare, health insurance companies are being targeted by Democrats for excessive compensation to employees and lavish spending on conferences and getaways.

The Chief Inquisitor? Henry Waxman, of course. Here's the story from Fox News:
Reps. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., and Bart Stupak, D-Mich., sent a letter warning health insurers that the House Energy and Commerce Committee is "examining executive compensation and other business practices of the health industry."

Waxman, chairman of the committee, and Stupak, chairman of the Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee did not inform their Republican counterparts of their plans.

Health insurers have until Sept. 4 to provide Congress a detailed list of every employee who made over a $1 million dollars a year between 2003 and 2008. Democrats also want documents about conferences and any events held off company property as well as the types of transportation, lodging, food, entertainment and even gifts exchanged.

Raising the intimidation stakes: the Waxman letter offers insurers no explanation of what is being investigated or why.

Industry insiders fear the beginning of reprisals for anyone daring to dissent from the Obama agenda. One said it feels like a reprisal audit by the IRS.

With raucous health care town halls unfolding nationwide during the August congressional recess and polls showing increased opposition to a government-run insurance program or "public option," neither Waxman nor Stupak nor their staffs would comment on this story. But it's no secret that Democrats blame anti-reform ads on the private health insurance industry and its supporters.

Health insurance companies have received no federal bail out money so the question of what gives Waxman the right to be investigating how much private companies pay their employees, or how much they spend on business conferences to Hawaii or Vegas falls under the heading of none of the government's damned business.

If shareholders want to fire executives for making too much that is their right. If these same shareholders want to fire managers for going on golf excursions at company expense under the guise of a business conference, they are well within their rights to do so.

If Waxman wants to make this the business of Congress, perhaps we should start looking at Congressional junkets, gifts, campaign monies being used to pay wives and relatives exorbitant salaries, and a host of other practices that should be illegal but are not.

But that just wouldn't do. Instead, we have Democrats wanting to intimidate people to keep them from opposing their agenda.

Why not just send some legbreakers over to the executive offices of these companies and have them work the managers over a little? It would certainly save us the kind of hypocritical bellyaching we are likely to get about businessmen making too much money from Waxman and the other Democratic thugs who are running the show on Capitol Hill.

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