As if television commercials and "news" stories in various media haven't prepared you, today is the enrollment deadline to sign up for health coverage in 2016 under the Affordable Care Act.
Yes, the same Big Media that helped President Obama and a Democratic-led Congress push across the unwanted health care law in 2010 is now the Department of Health and Human Services' willing accomplice in offering helpful news and feature articles telling feel-good stories about people who acquired insurance or about the need to beat the deadline.
Enterprising Chicago radio reporter Mike Krauser opens his recent report by telling listeners, "If you don't have health insurance, you have just a few days before the January 31 deadline to sign up under the Affordable Care Act."
He then finds a not-so-unbiased source, a federal Health and Human Services director, who says, "None of us want to wake up on February 1 knowing that there was one more person who suffered for lack of health coverage that we could have reached."
Meanwhile, the Space Coast Daily in Brevard County, Fla., says not only is it offering "a series of informational posts" in order "to assist you to better understand the Affordable Care Act and what it means to you and your family," but it also found a sponsor for the "informational posts." The series is sponsored by Health First Individual, which, surely coincidentally, provides health insurance for individuals and families. If you are interested, the post says, you can click on the website post, get a free quote and apply online.
The Obama administration doesn't have to pay a dime for that kind of advertising. But that doesn't mean it isn't shelling out big money - taxpayer money - for slick ads encouraging more Americans to sign up.
In one television commercial, for instance, a husky, bespectacled man wearing a driving cap walks up a set of steps and into what is presumably a library.
"Financial help with healthcare.gov," he said, "makes it possible."
That, indeed, is the bait on much of the 2016 advertising: C'mon, sign up, we'll help you pay for it.
According to the White House, 86 percent of people who obtain insurance through the ACA exchanges receive government assistance to help pay for their premiums. That's assistance the rest of us are paying for.
Yet, 29 million people remain uninsured, and the Obama administration budget office last week slashed its prediction by 40 percent of how many would get their insurance through the Affordable Care Act marketplaces this year.
But, no worries, the White House says. Because those who haven't purchased coverage will be paying higher fines. Indeed, the minimum penalty for someone uninsured a full 12 months and not eligible for one of the law's exemptions has risen from $325 in 2015 to $695 in $2016. But since the fine actually will be the larger of $695 or 2.5 percent of taxable income, the fines are expected to average nearly $1,000 for all uninsured households.
Millennials starting businesses and starting families who want to roll the dice on health care for a few years, that's you the administration plans to collect from.
For those who have purchased coverage on the marketplace exchanges, the median premium increases for 2016 are about 12 percent. Depending on the coverage, deductibles and the out-of-pocket maximums also may have risen.
One year from today, the United States will have a new president. Only one present candidate, Democrat Hillary Clinton, wrapping herself tighter and tighter in the Obama mantle (she even said last week he would make a fine Supreme Court justice), is expected to keep the Affordable Care Act as it is.
"It's working," she said in December.
And, the president said in his weekly radio address, it's "only going to get better."
If false promises, unstoppable premium increases, decreased coverage and fines are anyone's idea of "working" or getting "better," they have their candidate.
If it's Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., he wants to replace the plan with an entirely government-run program. Ironically, millennials, the age group targeted by the current plan and the ones likely to feel the sting of the deficit spending on Sanders' plan, are his biggest cheerleaders.
If it's a Republican, most candidates have vowed to repeal the Affordable Care Act and replace it with some type of market-driven plan.
After today, the Affordable Care Act advertisements and the helpful news stories will go away for the remainder of 2016. But Americans have at least one more year before they'll have the ability to turn the page on this nightmare.
We should be sure they have that opportunity in November.