Bad Medicine: The Obama Administration Shells Out Serious Money To Force Americans To Swallow Obamacare

The Andy Griffith ads are just the tip of the iceberg. Judicial Watch tells us more:

• According to a section of the [Department of Health and Human Service] Acquisition Plan entitled, “Independent Government Cost Estimate,” the Health and Human Services Assistant Secretary for Public Affairs (ASPA) states: “ASPA is unable to provide a definitive government cost estimate. Campaigns vary is [sic] size and scope. Some campaigns involve radio, some TV, and some print. Other campaigns may involve all of those avenues plus on ground events, website, bus tours, etc.” However, “ASPA is letting this contract in order [to] produce three to four campaigns per year through the life-cycle of the contract. We are requesting a contract with a $200,000,000 maximum.”
• According to a subsequent March 14, 2011, contract included among the documents, HHS hired The Ogilvy Group “to provide services to design, develop, and execute a multiplatform educational media campaign to promote the new website Healthcare.gov, including the new Spanish language version of the website.” The total amount of the contract awarded was: $3,998,928.
• The Ogilvy contract “task order” describes the purpose of the Healthcare.gov website: “To accompany such a monumental piece of legislation [The Affordable Health Care Act, a.k.a. Obamacare], the law charged the Department of Health and Human Services with the creation of a website to aide [sic] Americans about the health insurance coverage options available to them.” (U.S. Senator Charles Grassley has deemed the HHS online program “state-sponsored propaganda.”)
• The Ogilvy contract also describes the “audiences” that will receive “targeted messaging” during the campaign: “Hispanic Americans, African Americans, Young People, Women/Mothers,” all considered key target demographics for the Obama reelection campaign.
• According to the Ogilvy contract, HHS sought to receive “media training” in the following areas, among others: “controlling your message,” “handling hostile interviews,” “artful repetition,” “identifying loaded questions” and “being persuasive.”

Judicial Watch tartly (and rightly) concludes that:

…the Obama administration is paying hired guns a lot of your money to manipulate you into “accepting” the Obama way and “changing” your behavior.

It’s not enough that the federal government is trying with all its might to foist on the people a program that was never popular to begin with and has only gotten less popular as time has passed. Now they insist on trying to convince us with “targeted messaging” and cutesy ads featuring aged television institutions that what they deem good for us won’t truly leave us all with a bitter taste. Haven’t they spent enough of our money already lately without having to dole out literally hundreds of millions more to sell us on Obamacare? If it’s so great, shouldn’t it sell itself?

The truth is that there’s an orange Triaminic solution to our health care problems out there somewhere — one that will truly be effective in solving the issues and will be pleasant for everyone involved. There are plenty of brilliant American minds and enough American innovation to produce a truly workable solution to our needs. But we have to refuse the bitter medicine the Obama administration is trying to force down our throats. Then we need to tell them to put up the spoon and throw away the bottle forever.

See? It wasn’t just a clever yet painfully obvious metaphor.

—

Chris Queen hails from Covington, GA. Check out his blog, Random Thoughts From The Revolution, and follow him on Twitter.

Continue reading page: 1 2