And, of course, the Wall Street Journal is more than happy to publish their screed:
Health insurers say they plan to raise premiums for some Americans as a direct result of the health overhaul in coming weeks, complicating Democrats' efforts to trumpet their signature achievement before the midterm elections.
Aetna Inc., some BlueCross BlueShield plans and other smaller carriers have asked for premium increases of between 1% and 9% to pay for extra benefits required under the law, according to filings with state regulators.
These and other insurers say Congress's landmark refashioning of U.S. health coverage, which passed in March after a brutal fight, is causing them to pass on more costs to consumers than Democrats predicted.
Right. Because they certainly wouldn't have been jacking up premiums if insurance reform had never happened. Because the last thing insurance companies do is exploit their captive market to maximize profits. The White House responds:
We knew this would happen, which is why the President called on insurance companies not to use the Affordable Care Act as an excuse to implement unreasonable premium increases. In fact, when one insurance company in the State of Washington was called out for telling its beneficiaries that rate increases were due to the Affordable Care Act, that company agreed to issue a new letter clarifying the reasons for the increase.
The premium increases discussed today – many of which were planned before the Affordable Care Act was even signed into law– demonstrate that reform came at a critical time. In fact, consumers have faced unreasonable double digit premium increases for more than a decade, including employer-sponsored plans where premiums have more than doubled since 2000.
The most recent round of premium increase announcements are at odds with a number of health care cost related projections. The Bureau of Labor Statistics reports that medical inflation is currently projected to be 3.2 percent this year. Similarly, The Kaiser Family Foundationconcluded that family premiums were rising only 3 percent for this year. Finally, we estimate that any potential premium impact from the new consumer protections and increased quality provisions under the Affordable Care Act will be minimal – no more than 1-2 percent -- which will be further offset by other out of pocket savings implemented in the law.
I don't think there's a soul who paid any attention to this process who didn't know this would happen, which is one of the reasons the seat the insurers had at the negotiation table was problematic to so many. That the insurers were operating in good faith was more than many could swallow, and now that suspicion is justified. They were going to raise premiums regardless, because that's what they do. This way they get to raise premiums and get to blame it the law they tried so hard to kill.
So I wonder how Reid is doing on securing that promised public option vote?