Obama Administration Grants Obamacare Waiver to AARP

Washington DC, May 22, 2011. President Barack Hussein Obama, D-Kenya, has gave the AARP a National Healthcare waiver on Thursday.

Obamacare is taking heat from critics, who accuse the administration of “crony capitalism,” especially since about 20 percent of the latest slew of waivers from parts of the healthcare overhaul went to House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi’s San Francisco district.

“This is getting ridiculous, special waivers for labor unions, Nancy Pelosi’s constituents, and now AARP. How about the rest of America?,” Let Freedom Ring’s President Colin Hanna said. “The President and his radical bureaucrats need a reminder that we are a country of EQUAL protection under the law!”

AARP was a very loud and very vocal proponent for Obamacare, and now they have asked for and received a waiver! They have now joined SEIU, plus many other Unions who worked hard to pass the bill... in avoiding the government mandate or to live under it's consequences!

Also, a great many corporations who donated money to Congresswoman Nancy Pelosi, D-CA, another strong advocate for socialized medicine, have also asked for and received waivers from Obamacare.

If you connect the dots here, it sure stinks of cronyism and political bribery at it's worst. They are effectively telling us that Obamacare is ideal for everyone... except those people who worked hardest to pass it.

Jim Martin, chairman of 60 Plus, (the conservative alternative to the AARP), likens the AARP’s latest Obama administration gift to a “payoff” and that this “doesn’t surprise” him “one iota.”

“It’s payoff time to the AARP (some call it bribery) for selling out seniors and endorsing Obamacare, an awful proposal which makes no sense to seniors who know it’s bad medicine for them,” Martin said in a statement.

“But it makes sense to the AARP, dollars and cents, that is, to its bottom line. The AARP made over a half billion in profits last year, selling ‘low cost’ insurance and other goodies to seniors. But that’s nothing.”

Martin went on to explain how Obamacare, which the AARP actively advocated for, damages the AARP’s biggest competitor, Medicare Advantage. He adds that the AARP is likely to make millions, if not billions, more dollars in the coming years because it can sell many more Medigap plans without competition.

“Now the cash register will ring even louder as these money-hungry merchants fleece the elderly,” Martin said.

“AARP was the single most powerful organization supporting ObamaCare, yet now they want out of the relationship, so that they can make millions selling Medi-gap insurance to the very seniors they betrayed. If there is a more clear example of corruption and hypocrisy, I’ve yet to see it in my over seven decades on the planet. That’s why we call them the Association Against Retired Persons.”

Let Freedom Ring filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request with the Department of Health and Human services in an attempt to pry information relating to the AARP’s involvement in the latest Obamacare move.

They will probably get no explanation whatsoever from the Obama administration.

HHS won’t return requests for comment on virtually anything Obamacare waiver-related and it hasn’t answered official FOIA requests on the matter for months.

For example, last November, Americans for Limited Government (ALG) asked for waiver approved, waiver denied and waiver still pending approval, in addition to any and all information about those requests. No answer has come into ALG at all yet.