RUSH: From the Wall Street Journal, another headline that makes me go, ‘All right!’ Another headline that goes, ‘Yeah! Give me more of it.’ ‘Union Drops Health Coverage for Workers’ Children.’ (laughing) ‘Rush, why are you happy about this?’ Well, because all this stuff is coming true that I predicted and I knew was gonna happen ’cause of this bogus health care bill, and now who’s getting hurt? The unions of all people. It’s designed to help the unions, who have been greased by Obama since he took office. I mean, behind every debacle at a business you’ll find a union, union
‘One of the largest union-administered health-insurance funds in New York is dropping coverage for the children.’ Who gave us all of this? It’s a bunch of libs, who care about what? The children, and us. They’re ‘dropping coverage for the children of more than 30,000 low-wage home attendants, union officials said. The union blamed financial problems it said were caused by the state’s health department and new national health-insurance requirements.’ Well, shazam. Now they tell us. So the poor unions are getting hammered as well. ‘The fund informed its members late last month that their dependents will no longer be covered as of Jan. 1, 2011. Currently about 6,000 children are covered by the benefit fund, some until age 23,’ but no more. ‘In addition, new federal health-care reform legislation requires plans with dependent coverage to expand that coverage up to age 26,’ but, no, they’re all being dropped. ‘Our limited resources are already stretched as far as possible, and meeting this new requirement would be financially impossible.’
So once again, another supposed beneficiary of Obamacare is going to need a waiver from the law in order keep its children covered. Notice the fund informed its members late last month. We didn’t hear about it ’til after the elections. Did you notice that? Now, let’s be clear about who it is that’s getting hammered here. I mean you heard it, right here: low-wage home attendants. First off, do you know what a union home attendant is? Do you? I don’t. What is a union home attendant? These are health care workers? Union health care workers, home attendants, sort of like hospice for the living, okay? Hospice for the nonfatal, all right? They’re low wage and they’re having their coverage dropped for their kids. So there’s 30,000 home attendants, i.e., in-home workers who have children. They’re low wage — which means they don’t get paid much for those of you in Rio Linda who no doubt know what low wage means than anything else — and 30,000 of their kids are being axed. But note who’s not being axed here.
Note, ladies and gentlemen, union workers, low wage union workers and their kids are being hammered, but not the rich SEIU members and not the rich AFL-CIO members and not the rich United Auto Workers members, not their kids. No, no, no, the Richard Trumkas and the Jimmy Hoffa Jrs., and their kids, they’re doing just fine. That Stern guy, SEIU, and whoever his replacement is. But poor old Fred Slobodnik and his kids up the river, too bad out there, Fred. It’s because of Obamacare here. ‘The union said in a statement that the state required the fund to participate in a new program — the Family Health Plus Buy-In Program — beginning in 2008. The union said it expected that by joining the program, many of its members would qualify for state assistance –‘ Ah, here we go. Nobody has to pay for anything themselves. We are all gonna pay for ’em, but now there’s no money, especially with the vast cigarette shortage, he-he-he, in New York.
By the way, that’s another thing. We’re gonna start hamming the Indians; we’re gonna get tax revenue there; we’re doing everything we can to start collecting tax revenue and outlaw cigarettes at the same time. Somebody tell me again, why are we supposed to legalize marijuana? That’s for tax revenue, right? Yeah. Somebody just sent me a note: ‘If you’re having trouble getting your arms around what a home attendant is, just think of a Ukrainian blonde nurse working for Moammar Khadafy.’ Okay, that kind of like crystallizes it for me. So, anyway, that’s the story. Union drops health coverage for workers’ children.