California Conservative

President Obama has taken a beating over the last year. His job approval ratings have dropped because people increasingly don’t trust his promises. Nothing illustrates that better than when President Obama told the nation that Caterpillar would start rehiring laid off workers during his visit to Caterpillar headquarters in Peoria, IL:

President Barack Obama said Wednesday that heavy-equipment maker Caterpillar has informed him it will rehire some of the thousands of workers it has laid off in recent weeks if Congress passes an economic stimulus bill.

“Yesterday, Jim, the head of Caterpillar, said that if Congress passes our plan, this company will be able to rehire some of the folks who were just laid off,” Obama said today in Peoria.

The problem for President Obama is that Caterpillar CEO Jim Owens didn’t say that:

But when asked today if the stimulus could do that, Owens said, “I think, realistically, no. The honest reality is we’re probably going to have more layoffs before we start hiring again.”

That’s why this article is so interesting:

Caterpillar Inc. said the health-care overhaul legislation being considered by the U.S. House would increase the company’s health-care costs by more than $100 million in the first year alone.

In a letter Thursday to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and House Republican Leader John Boehner of Ohio, Caterpillar urged lawmakers to vote against the plan “because of the substantial cost burdens it would place on our shareholders, employees and retirees.”

Caterpillar, the world’s largest construction machinery manufacturer by sales, said it’s particularly opposed to provisions in the bill that would expand Medicare taxes and mandate insurance coverage. The legislation would require nearly all companies to provide health insurance for their employees or face large fines.

The Peoria-based company said these provisions would increase its insurance costs by at least 20 percent, or more than $100 million, just in the first year of the health-care overhaul program.

“We can ill-afford cost increases that place us at a disadvantage versus our global competitors,” said the letter signed by Gregory Folley, vice president and chief human resources officer of Caterpillar. “We are disappointed that efforts at reform have not addressed the cost concerns we’ve raised throughout the year.”

Getting this information published will cause America to rethink its opinion about the Democrats’ health care legislation. It might even get some DC-bound Democrats to rethink their vote, especially wobblies in Illinois.

It isn’t a stretch to think that passing this bill might cause a new round of layoffs at companies like Caterpillar. Rather than just accepting the additional expense of health care, why wouldn’t companies like Caterpillar just lay people off? As this letter says, the Democrats’ health care legislation would put Caterpillar at a competitive disadvantage internationally.

This is why health care will do long-term damage on President Obama and the Democratic Party. President Obama and Pelosi’s Democrats have promised that their legislation will lower health care costs. The minute the people see health care and health insurance costs rising, the American people will be more disgusted with President Obama and Pelosi’s Democrats than they are already.

Megyn Kelly interviewed Juan Williams and Scott Rasmussen about health care and how it would impact the midterm elections. Juan Williams tried minimizing the effect health care would have on the elections, saying that the economy would have a bigger impact on the elections.

After reading this article, I’m thinking that people will start mixing the two things together. I think that because having the Democrats’ health care legislation cause a massive increase in insurance premiums will dramatically affect people’s pocketbooks.

At a time when they’re already struggling, people won’t forget what caused the additional financial hardship. Rest assured that they’ll be reminded morning, noon and nighttime where that additional pain came from in TV and radio ads.

Technorati Tags: Stimulus, Caterpillar, Jim Owens, Gregory Folley, Health Care, Health Insurance, President Obama, Speaker Pelosi, Democrats, John Boehner, Republicans, Scott Rasmussen, Polling, Election 2010

Cross-posted at LetFreedomRingBlog

This entry was posted on Friday, March 19th, 2010 at 1:12 pm and is filed under Author: Gary Gross, Democrats, Economy, Election 2010, Health Care, Obama, Pelosi. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.