Excerpts from recent editorials in the United States and abroad:
Mohammed bin Salman and Saudi brutality
Salma al-Shehab, a mother of two young children, was studying for a PhD at the University of Leeds and took time off to go on holiday to Saudi Arabia. Ms Shehab is a Shia Muslim, a persecuted minority in the kingdom, and a women’s rights activist who spoke out on social media for women’s right to drive. His vacation ended in prison.
Saudi authorities arrested Ms. Shehab in January 2021 and later sentenced her to six years in prison for using social media to “disrupt public order and destabilize the security and stability of the state.” On Twitter, she demanded the release of Loujain al-Hathloul, who campaigned for women’s right to drive and was jailed and tortured for it. In her appeal, Ms. Shehab pointed out that she used her real name on social media, had a peaceful background, posted photos of her children, and had relatively few followers (2000), so how could she pose a security risk? She complained of being held in solitary confinement for 285 days. In response, prosecutors argued that she should be charged simultaneously under the kingdom’s anti-terrorism laws and under its cybercrime statute. On August 8, the court handed down an especially draconian sentence: 34 years in prison and then 34 years of travel restriction. According to the Freedom Initiative, a Washington-based nonprofit organization, this is the longest known sentence for a women’s rights activist in Saudi Arabia.
The case offers another glimpse into the brutal underbelly of the Saudi dictatorship under its crown prince and de facto head of state, Mohammed bin Salman, whose hit squad assassinated Post Opinions contributor Jamal Khashoggi nearly four years ago. The crown prince, known as MBS, has been eager to present himself as a modernizer, lavishing Saudi wealth on an international golf tour and promoting the construction of a utopian city in the desert. In February 2021, Ms. Hathloul was released after almost three years in prison, but she still has travel restrictions, one of the Saudi ruler’s many pernicious punishments.
When President Biden visited Saudi Arabia last month and bumped fists with MBS, the White House said he “raised specific cases of concern” about human rights, including “the heinous killing of Jamal Khashoggi.” The president “received commitments regarding institutional reforms and safeguards to guard against any such conduct in the future.” Now the crown prince shows exactly what safeguards were in place: none. The Saudi promises to Mr. Biden were a farce.
At the very least, Mr Biden must now speak out and demand that Ms Shehab be released and allowed to return to her children, ages 4 and 6, in the UK, and resume her studies there. Golf fans and hosts of upcoming Saudi-backed LIV golf events in Boston, Chicago and Miami should speak out against Ms. Shehab’s cruel treatment. In the Saudi kingdom, the crown prince commands fear and silence. But in open societies, their ruthless behavior must be denounced at every opportunity.
The government subsidizes health coverage
The Department of Health and Human Services recently made headlines with a report touting “National Uninsured Rate Hits All-Time Low in Early 2022.” Sounds encouraging, but look under the covers and what you’ll find is a quiet but huge shift from private to government-subsidized coverage.
HHS estimates that there are 5.2 million fewer Americans without insurance than in 2020. However, Medicaid rolls during the pandemic increased by 24 million, a 34% increase, while two million more adults signed up for ObamaCare exchange plans.
Why are so many more people on Medicaid when the US unemployment rate has hit a near record low? A big part of the answer: The Families First Coronavirus Relief Act of March 2020 prohibited states from removing from their Medicaid rolls people who become ineligible for the duration of the public health emergency in exchange for an increase in federal funds.
Were it not for Mr. Biden’s recurring emergency declaration, some 20 million Medicaid enrollees would no longer be eligible, most because their income exceeds the threshold to qualify. Many could now get coverage through their employers, but why pay insurance premiums when Medicaid is “free”?
Thus, taxpayers receive a huge surprise medical bill. Annual Medicaid spending has increased by $198 billion during the pandemic. That’s as much as Medicaid spending grew from 2012 to 2019 during the first seven years of the ObamaCare expansion. As long as the Biden Administration continues with the public health emergency, which will now end on October 13, the taxpayers’ Medicaid bill will continue to grow. And what are the chances that the Administration will not renew the emergency again before the elections?
The other explanation for government takeover of insurance is the expansion of ObamaCare exchange subsidies by Democrats in March 2021. As a result, millions of Americans pay no premiums and households earning more than 400% below the poverty line receive generous subsidies. The Congressional Budget Office initially estimated that the two-year subsidy expansion would cost $22 billion. Actual cost: $50 billion.
More Americans signed up for the exchanges than the CBO predicted, and insurers have taken advantage of the sweetened subsidies by raising premiums. However, CBO oddly forecasts that the Schumer-Manchin bill’s three-year subsidy extension will cost just $33 billion.
How does CBO calculate that three years of grants will cost 34% less than two years? Perhaps he expects health care spending to drop as the pandemic recedes, but insurers are now raising premiums to cover COVID-19 treatments they hope the feds will stop paying for.
Incidentally, CBO ignores the Administration’s proposed regulation to fix ObamaCare’s so-called family glitch, which limited exchange eligibility for many people who were offered family coverage through their employers. The Administration estimates that the change could make an additional five million Americans who currently have access to employer coverage eligible for more generous subsidies in the ObamaCare exchanges.
The Administration appears to want to attract more people to Medicaid and the tightly regulated ObamaCare plans, and thereby make more Americans dependent on the government for health care. The government also subsidizes employer coverage through the health care tax deduction, but this is significantly less expensive for taxpayers.
Annual Medicaid and ObamaCare spending has increased by about $230 billion during the pandemic, which equates to about $44,000 for every newly insured American. Unfortunately, taxpayers cannot challenge this surcharge.
