Obama saves me $150 a month on health insurance

Health-care savings are floating down on Euclid Avenue in Hackensack.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
Editor

Thank you, Mr. President, for saving me money on health insurance for my wife and son, and F.U., Governor Christie, for making the enrollment process as difficult as possible.

This morning, I signed up for two Affordable Care Act health insurance policies that will save me about $150 a month, compared to what I paid this year to North Jersey Media Group, publisher of The Record, where I worked for 29 years.

NJMG cancelled the Aetna policies, effective Dec. 31, telling me and other retirees to seek coverage under Barack Obama's federal initiative.

GOP sabotage

But Christie and conservatives governors in 35 other states refused to set up their own state Web sites -- hoping to derail health-care reform.

That forced me and millions of other shoppers to apply and buy coverage on healthcare.gov, the federal site that broke down from unusually high demand in October and November.

Two no-deductible AmeriHealth Insurance Company of New Jersey "platinum" policies will cost me $850.63 a month, compared to $1,004.27 I paid monthly to NJMG -- more than my pension.

That means I will save $1,800 in  2014 under the Affordable Care Act. Go Obama.

This month, I made several calls and got cut off a few times before I spoke on separate occasions to Chris, Sharon, Karen and Elizabeth at a federal health-care call center in Boise, Idaho.

I filled out an application three times, once online and twice over the phone. It was a hassle, but in a few months, all I'll remember is the $150-a-month savings.

Today's paper

The story about the federal health-care Web site on the front page of The Record today is relentlessly negative, with not a single success story, just like all of the previous stories (A-1).

Christie's role in gumming up the works hasn't been mentioned in The Record for many, many months, as the Woodland Park daily continues to groom the GOP bully for a presidential run in 2016.

Look at the idiotic headline on the Page 1 story about Teterboro Airport:

Jetting in for Super Bowl?

Make reservations now

How many owners of private jets who plan to fly to New Jersey read the print edition?

Of course, it would be asking too much of the editors to report that story from the viewpoint of thousands of residents of Hackensack, Teaneck and other towns near the Port Authority owned airport who are being driven crazy by jet noise -- sure to increase for the six days of Super Bowl festivities (A-1).

Here's the correct headline for the Teterboro story:

Think jets are noisy now?

Order your earplugs soon

Allegedly crooked court officials, a clueless woman in an SUV who almost got squashed by a train, arrests, an indictment and court news -- all are grist for the local-news mill run by desperate Deputy Assignment Editor Dan Sforza (L-1 to L-6).

Second looks

On Wednesday's Local front, Hackensack City Manager Stephen Lo Iacono (pronounced LOW-yack-a-no) defended the job he has done for the past eight years.

Lo Iacono spoke to reporter Hannan Adely a day after the City Council asked him to step down.

On Wednesday's front page, Staff Writer Melissa Hayes continued to fawn over Christie with her breathless, flag-waving story on his choice of Ellis Island for his second inaugural on Jan. 21.

Hayes reports Ellis Island is the "place where more than 12 million immigrants entered the country in search of the American dream."

That's rich, considering Christie presides over a New Jersey nightmare of high unemployment, low job creation, packed roads, high tolls, overburdened mass transit and crumbling infrastructure.

Hayes gives a bad name to women journalists, and has earned the reputation of acting like the Bride of Frankenstein-Christie.