David Freddoso and Mark Hemingway: Do Bluedogs believe Obamacare fairy tales?

Members of the House could vote as early as this weekend on House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's 1,900-plus page proposal to create a government-run health care system in America.

While virtually all House Republicans will vote against the Pelosi plan, a key question is whether the 40 or so conservative Blue Dog Democrats will cave to pressure from House leaders to support the Pelosi plan.

If they do, they will have to start believing the following eight Obamacare fairy tales:

Tale #1: You can keep your coverage

Earlier this year, President Obama said "I intend to keep this promise: If you like your doctor, you'll be able to keep your doctor; if you like your health care plan, you'll be able to keep your health care plan." Not surprisingly, the administration walked back this statement, telling the Associated Press, "White House officials suggest the president's rhetoric shouldn't be taken literally."

This is partly because the bill will bury your doctor in tens of thousands of pages of new regulations. And although the federal government might not literally force people to change insurance, they may well force your insurance plan to disappear or change beyond recognition.

The bill will also create a new set of cost incentives such that your employer might benefit by getting rid of your company insurance plan altogether. The Lewin Group, an independent econometrics firm, estimated that under the original House bill, some 88 million Americans could thus lose their employer health insurance.

Tale #2: Health care will not be rationed under the government plan

The Obama administration has boldly declared "health care will not be rationed." If you make the perfectly logical assumption that the government cannot supply an unlimited amount of health care to everyone on demand, this is clearly false. Nor can private providers provide an unlimited supply of health care -- they, too, ration. However, when private providers ration, consumers have options. They can pay more to get the care they need, or in some cases they can resort to legal action to get the coverage they are owed. When you're denied treatment under a public plan, good luck suing the government.

Tale #3: The "public option" will be able to provide insurance at cheaper rates than the private sector

The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) says that a public health insurance plan could save money compared to private insurance through lower administrative costs. However, a major reason why public health plans have lower administrative costs compared to private insurance is the government's inattention to fraud. Medicare loses an estimated $60 billion a year in fraud, seven times as much as the combined profits of the 14 health insurance companies on the Fortune 500.

CBO warns that a public option is less likely to manage efficiently how much treatment each person gets and will attract more unhealthy patients, driving up costs. Costs will likely vary wildly depending on the state, but they could make the public plan's premiums "somewhat higher than the average premiums for the private plans in the exchanges."

Tale #4: The "public option" will keep private insurers honest by forcing their rates down

Even if the public option plan ends up charging higher premium prices to patients, it might still pay significantly less to health providers than private insurers pay them. And when government underpays, doctors and hospitals charge more to private insurers to make up the difference, which in turn drives up health insurance premiums for ordinary Americans.

This phenomenon is pervasive within the Medicare and Medicaid programs, which underpay doctors and hospitals for most services. Their underpayment results in an average $1,800 per year overcharge for every American household with private health insurance, according to the Milliman consulting firm.

The new House bill removes from the old one a provision setting public option payment rates at Medicare plus 5 percent -- which would have dramatically increased this cost-shifting. Still, the public plan's payment rates are left up in the air by the new House bill, to be negotiated by the Secretary of Health and Human Services.

Tale #5: Medicare benefits won't be reduced

At a teleconference sponsored by AARP in July, President Obama assured seniors they would not see a reduction in Medicare benefits. "What we do want is to eliminate some of the waste that is being paid for out of the Medicare trust fund," he said. As an example of waste, he cited $177 billion in subsidies given to insurance companies who participate in Medicare Advantage -- a program to get private insurance through Medicare.

Medicare Advantage is more expensive than Medicare, but that's because it provides more benefits and better access to doctors than regular Medicare. The number of seniors enrolled in a Medicare Advantage program has nearly doubled from 5 million to 10 million in the last six years and accounts for 22 percent of all Medicare patients, Thirty-five percent of all Medicare patients in California, 37 percent in New York and 42 percent in Oregon. Both the House and Senate bills contain deep cuts to Medicare Advantage.

Tale #6: Illegal immigrants won't be covered

The Senate health care reform bill was beefed up following Rep.Joe Wilson's, R-SC, "you lie!" outburst during the president's address to a joint session of Congress on health care. Since then, the White House has made it known that it does not want illegal immigrants covered or subsidized by health reform legislation.

Despite this, it remains an open question whether the House health reform bill will allow illegal immigrants to buy insurance from government-established health insurance exchanges.

Tale #7: Health care reform won't increase the deficit

Democrats have engaged in some shady counting to claim that health care reform is deficit neutral. The Congressional Budget Office only tallies a bill's cost over an immediate ten year horizon. The Senate bill begins collecting taxes immediately but the major spending provisions don't kick in until 2014. That makes the $800 billion bill appear deficit neutral through 2019, but in fact it will cost as much as $1.8 trillion in its first ten years of operation, according to some estimates.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi insists that the House Health Care bill will cost a mere $894 million over the next ten years, but a recent reports put the House bill's cost at $1.2 trillion and rising. Nobody knows what the final price tag will be, but it's more than likely the House bill will add to the deficit.

Tale #8: Health care reform won't fund abortions.

Democrats have repeatedly insisted that their health care reform proposals won't fund abortion and is consistent with the Hyde amendment -- a 1976 law that bars almost ll federal funding of abortion. However, the House bill gives subsidies to people to buy private insurance plans that do cover abortion. The bill would therefore, in effect, fund abortions. Pro-life Democrat Rep. Bart Stupak of Michigan claimed last week that 40 House Democrats will vote against the House health care reform bill if it is not altered to exclude abortion funding.