Inside the Fox News lie machine: Salon contributor Eric Stern fact-checks Sean Hannity on Obamacare
Great article. Stern fact-checked Hannity by personally contacting three couples Hannity claimed had been harmed by Obamacare, and finding out how baseless those claims were.
http://www.salon.com/2013/10/18/inside_the_fox_news_lie_machine_i_fact_checked_sean_hannity_on_obamacare/
First I spoke with Paul Cox of Leicester, N.C. He and his wife Michelle had lamented to Hannity that because of Obamacare, they can’t grow their construction business and they have kept their employees below a certain number of hours, so that they are part-timers.
Obamacare has no effect on businesses with 49 employees or less. But in our brief conversation on the phone, Paul revealed that he has only four employees. Why the cutback on his workforce? “Well,” he said, “I haven’t been forced to do so, it’s just that I’ve chosen to do so. I have to deal with increased costs.” What costs? And how, I asked him, is any of it due to Obamacare? There was a long pause, after which he said he’d call me back. He never did.
-snip-
Next I called Allison Denijs. She’d told Hannity that she pays over $13,000 a year in premiums. Like the other guests, she said she had recently gotten a letter from Blue Cross saying that her policy was being terminated and a new, ACA-compliant policy would take its place. She says this shows that Obama lied when he promised Americans that we could keep our existing policies.
Allison’s husband left his job a few years ago, one with benefits at a big company, to start his own business. Since then they’ve been buying insurance on the open market, and are now paying around $1,100 a month for a policy with a $2,500 deductible per family member, with hefty annual premium hikes. One of their two children is not covered under the policy. She has a preexisting condition that would require purchasing additional coverage for $800 a month, which would bring the family’s grand total to $19,000 a year.
I asked Allison if she’d shopped on the exchange, to see what a plan might cost under the new law. She said she hadn’t done so because she’d heard the website was not working. Would she try it out when it’s up and running? Perhaps, she said. She told me she has long opposed Obamacare, and that the president should have focused on tort reform as a solution to bringing down the price of healthcare.
I tried an experiment and shopped on the exchange for Allison and Kurt. Assuming they don’t smoke and have a household income too high to be eligible for subsidies, I found that they would be able to get a plan for around $7,600, which would include coverage for their uninsured daughter. This would be about a 60 percent reduction from what they would have to pay on the pre-Obamacare market.
-snip-
Finally, I called Robbie and Tina Robison from Franklin, Tenn. Robbie is self-employed as a Christian youth motivational speaker. (You can see his work here.) On Hannity, the couple said that they, too, were recently notified that their Blue Cross policy would be expiring for lack of ACA compliance. They told Hannity that the replacement plans Blue Cross was offering would come with a rate increase of 50 percent or even 75 percent, and that the new offerings would contain all sorts of benefits they don’t need, like maternity care, pediatric care, prenatal care and so forth. Their kids are grown and moved out, so why should they be forced to pay extra for a health plan with superfluous features?
When I spoke to Robbie, he said he and Tina have been paying a little over $800 a month for their plan, about $10,000 a year. And the ACA-compliant policy will cost 50-75 percent more? They said this information was related to them by their insurance agent.
Had they shopped on the exchange yet, I asked? No, Tina said, nor would they. They oppose Obamacare and want nothing to do with it. Fair enough, but they should know that I found a plan for them for, at most, $3,700 a year, a 63 percent less than their current bill. It might cover things that they don’t need, but so does every insurance policy.
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= new reply since forum marked as read
These people hate ACA because, you know, Black President. I don't care how they phrase their opposition, it's pure and simple white racist hatred. And they'll sacrifice their own health -- and their children's health -- before they cave in to logic and compassion.
As for Hannity, he's made millions of dollars lying for hours each day. Pigs roll around in slop and excrement, so Hannity in lies. (Ah, but you can wash a pig.)
[hr][font color="blue"][center]You should never stop having childhood dreams.[/center][/font][hr]
His lips are moving.
I know it's an oldie, but it's SO TRUE I could not resist.
worshipers of and believers in Jesus and Rep. Masha Blackburn (R-TN). It's amazing how much the MSM media run with lies/help fabricate lies. Were the MSM both truthful and did not perpetuate right-wing lies, this non-betting man would bet Republicans would lose at least 25-35% of their seats in state house, state legislatures, and in both houses of Congress. Were this a just world, bet there would be a lot of hanging going on. 
LADY P their British contact/spy.
http://www.tv.com/shows/thunderbirds/
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0057790/
love it!!!
I watch Fox. Whaddya mean I'm spelling it wrong?
FAUX News NO FACTS are good enough for our audience, so we just skip them.
