IRS looking for exemption from Unaffordable Care Act

David Catron:

Among the most offensive features of the ironically titled “Affordable Care Act” is its designation of the Internal Revenue Service as the main enforcer of the law’s many mandates, taxes, penalties, and reporting requirements. It exponentially increases the power of a group of bureaucrats notorious for repeatedly abusing their authority. Now, highlighting the growing gulf between the government and the governed that has become the hallmark of the Obama era, these IRS enforcers are asking their congressional representatives to spare them the indignity of enrolling in Obamacare’s insurance exchanges.

The National Treasury Employees Union (NTEU), whose members include most IRS employees, has launched a letter-writing campaign whose goal is to prevent Congress from passing legislation that would require all federal employees to enroll in the exchanges. And the NTEU is not only encouraging its members to write to their representatives expressing deep concern that they might be treated like mere private sector serfs, it is relieving them of the intellectual pressure of composing their own missives to Congress. Its website provides a fill-in-the-blank template with which to express their angst.

The form letter, provided in an NTEU action alert urging members to contact their representatives, begins as follows: “I am a federal employee and one of your constituents. I am very concerned about legislation that has been introduced by Congressman Dave Camp to push federal employees out of the Federal Employees Health Benefits Program (FEHBP) and into the insurance exchanges established under the Affordable Care Act (ACA).” The NTEU site also gives IRS employees the choice of hectoring their congressmen and Senators via email, the default option, or by the more traditional printed letter.

The worrisome “legislation that has been introduced by Congressman Dave Camp,” the Republican Chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, is HR 1780. This bill was introduced last April when it was reported that congressional leaders were “engaged in high-level, confidential talks about exempting lawmakers and Capitol Hill aides from the insurance exchanges.” These talks were allegedly prompted by fears that “requiring lawmakers and staffers to join the exchanges … could lead to a ‘brain drain’ on Capitol Hill.” As hilarious as this may seem to most of us, Chairman Camp was not amused.

Thus, he introduced the legislation that has the NTEU so worried. HR 1780 would “restrict the health plans that the federal government may make available to the President, Vice-President, or federal employees to a health plan either created under [Obamacare] or offered through a health care exchange established under [Obamacare].” And, unless you’re a Beltway bureaucrat, it’s hard to argue with the bill’s logic as Camp explained it, “If the ObamaCare exchanges are good enough for the hardworking Americans… then they should be good enough for the president, vice president, Congress, and federal employees.”
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There is much more.

The obvious answer to their concerns would be to repeal the entire act.  Why didn't they think of that?  Well, it could be because they see lots of additional jobs which would create more dues paying members of their union.  Camp may want to amend his bill to prohibits people from joining this union.