Move It Right

National Park Service Director Jonathan Jarvis Follows Lawless Obama Administration

2012-01-27T07:16:00.007-05:00

Anyone watching National Park Service Director Jonathan Jarvis' testimony on O'Reilly, along with Megyn Kelly's assessment of his testimony (National Park Service under fire for helping 'Occupy') , witnessed yet another abuse of power.

The abuse is the director's admitted inaction that unevenly enforces the law based on his classification of groups of people or due to their purpose.

It seems to work like this: If you are merely camping he will give you the boot. But if you are a member of a protest group, then he cannot burden your First Amendment free speech rights. Nonsense! The bottom line is that it is against the law to camp in national forests where it has been specifically prohibited.

I am not sure if it was his decision or if he was hold to allow the protesters to camp there from on high. Either way, it is wrong.

This is illegal, of course. Under the 14th Amendment, law enforcement does not have the discretion to overlook violations of the law simply because they agree with the law breakers' cause. But this sort of conduct is endemic of the Obama administration (search on New Black Panthers intimidate voters).

Nancy Pelosi: Worse Than Insider Trading

2011-12-15T06:04:00.005-05:00

Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) is now pushing legislation that would directly benefit her stock portfolio, Heritage.org reports (‘NAT GAS’ Energy Subsidies Would Enrich Pelosi, Lachlan Markay,
December 14, 2011 at 12:09 pm)

With the Orwellian name "New Alternative Transportation to Give Americans Solutions" or NAT-GAS (H.R. 13), it is another taxpayer funded income redistribution effort aimed, as usual, at Democratic Party supporters with deep pockets and failed ideological efforts, IMO.

Figures. Between, congress's legal insider trading, high profile Senate multimillionaires (John Kerry, John Edwards [disgraced Kerry vice-presidential pick], to name a few), Sen. Chris Dodd's sweetheart deals with Countrywide, Rep. Barney Frank's Mortgage meltdown, President Obama's handing off billions of taxpayer dollars to corporate losers, and a history of reprehensible behavior, the so-called party of the blue collar working family boldly proves they are not. I just gave to wonder when the blue collars are going to wake up to this un-American conduct.

President Obama "Step on the gas"

2011-12-03T14:27:00.006-05:00

The president says the US needs to "step on the gas" to revive our economy. His idea: pass his jobs bill, including extending his two percent Social Security (SS) payroll tax cut. The problem is that this president apparently does not know how to drive and neither do his advisers (economic council).

Here are my issues with his gas pedal. While it is nice for working Americans to pay less in taxes (always a good thing), economists agree the payroll tax reduction of 2% has had little affect on job creation.

Better put: Obama has tried to step on the gas pedal, missed it, and landed firmly on the brakes... Again.

We saw the same with the 2009 stimulus bill, his failed foray into governmental venture capitalism (Solyndra & others), and personalization of Corporate bankruptcy law (GM) and his uncanny ability to claim it is all someone else's fault. This may reveal why liberals despise capitalism: they cannot grasp the concept.

Since he obviously does not know how to drive, how could he possibly drive us out of the ditch?

But why should Americans turn down a payroll tax cut extension? You do not want the elderly to become homeless, or worse: move into your home, when they can no longer pay their bills and the government is completely out of money and a closed credit line.

The payroll tax is the source of all of SS's funding. All of it. The 2011 Social Security Trustees Report shows red ink in 2010 ("the first time since 1983"). This plan will put much more red on the ledger. And it wasn't so long ago that Democrats were wailing and gnashing their teeth over a plan to redirect 2% to do what? Voluntarily move two percent of the payroll tax into personal retirement accounts. If it was going to bankrupt SS under Bush, how is it helpful under Obama with eight million fewer workers paying into it?

Driving, creating jobs, balancing a budget, leading: It is all a mystery to our President. Time to show him the door.

Representative Maxine Waters Version of "Civil Discourse"

2011-08-22T20:36:00.004-04:00

Representative Maxine Waters tells the Tea Party to go straight to hell. And she will help them get there.

Did she just threaten bodily Harm to political opponents?

Video...

What kind of American does that?

Opinion: The kind that should not be in government.

Insidious New Gun Control Commercial - Because the Truth Doesn't Work

2011-07-03T07:28:00.015-04:00

I saw an amazing anti-American gun control advertisement on TV. It featured terrorist spokesperson Adam Gadahn, an American-born member of Al Qaeda, urging fellow terrorists to buy fully automatic weapons without background checks at gun shows in America.

Of course that is complete nonsense. The terrorist, targeting English speaking people, does not know what he's talking about, but that's OK with the 550 US city mayors* who produced the advertisement. (less than 6 percent US city mayors).

A disclaimer near the end of the video proves the lie of the spoken words.

"Terror suspects can buy semi-automatic assault rifles from private sellers with no background check"

Truth is the first casualty in the Progressive war on American freedoms and this ad proves it. The lie here is designed to gain support for changing the lefts imagined "gun show Loophole". The ad lays that out.

FYI: It has been unlawful to purchase an automatic weapon in the USA without a BAFT permit since 1934 and the NRA supported background checks have been required at gun shows since 1994

The video

*NYC Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Boston Mayor Thomas M. Menino, co-chairs of the 550-member Mayors Against Illegal Guns coalition gun control production. This should finally prove to any doubters that hizzonor Michael Bloomberg embodies the term RINO.

If you are going to contact your representative in congress, be sure to tell them that you support the Second Amendment to the US Constitution and that sworn (or affirmed) government officials who willfully and intentionally violate their oath of office should be removed from office.

Read more about it at the NRA

Obsession of the Left - Sarah Palin

2011-06-13T18:32:00.009-04:00

The political left in America, who invented the politics of personal destruction, now have a treasure trove of information to dig through concerning Alaska's former Governor, Sarah Palin. Never mind that she holds no political office. Never mind that she is not running for office. They are spending valuable time and energy in an effort to dig up dirt on Mrs. Palin.

They want their followers to help them dig. I post opinions at Huffington Post so I'm on their emailing list. They sent an email, Subject: "Read Sarah Palin's Inbox", asking if I would like to help Advance the persecution.

The email reads in part (entire email below),

"This afternoon, we'll post the documents online and provide a place for you to leave notes on the emails you see." and

"We'll contact you as soon as we have the documents available for you to read. If you want to be among the first to read Sarah Palin's emails and help The Huffington Post write great stories about them, please sign up by following the link below."

While it might be interesting to gain insight into admired political figures; Who has the time to spend on this witch hunt. My guess would be the paid hunters have time and the motive, while their followers will drink it all in.

Sorry, Mr. Soros, I won't be signing up. I don't fear her, or her message, as your people seem to.

I suppose if the left had more time to spend on real issues, they might learn that they have been undermining this country for many decades now, and they certainly do not want to learn that.

The entire Email, rec'd June 10th, 2011 from .

Subject: Read Sarah Palin's Inbox

HuffPost Eyes & Ears to me
Today, the U.S. media will get its first glimpse of more than 24,000 emails sent and received by Sarah Palin during her tenure as governor of Alaska. These emails were originally requested by journalists, citizens and other groups in 2008, when Palin was Sen. John McCain's running mate on the Republican presidential ticket. They are being released now after years of delays.

The Huffington Post expects to start receiving some of these emails this afternoon. We need your help going through this mass of documents to find notable passages and references to pass on to our reporters. This afternoon, we'll post the documents online and provide a place for you to leave notes on the emails you see.

We'll contact you as soon as we have the documents available for you to read. If you want to be among the first to read Sarah Palin's emails and help The Huffington Post write great stories about them, please sign up by following the link below.

GOP Presidential Candidate Huntsman - Not

2011-06-12T08:22:00.011-04:00

I was headed to the grocery store this past Saturday when I heard presidential candidate Governor John Huntsman indicate that he supports banning so-called assault weapons on the Hugh Hewitt radio show. I'm sure this will revelation will have an effect on his NRA + A rating.

Of course, the Governor has sent an email to Mr. Hewitt claiming he misunderstood the question.

What?

If he misunderstood the question, then he has no business being President of The United States. I believe over the past three years we have experienced what happens when a president hasn't understood questions. I.e., massive new debt, prolonged high unemployment, programs that depress the job markets and no indication that he has learned anything since taking office.

That question was followed with a question on the Defense of Marriage Act, signed by President Clinton in 1996. His answer was ambiguous while registering his support for same-sex civil unions.

I don't recall the the exact quote, if a candidate mostly sees the government the way you do, vote for him/her. If not, vote for someone else. My hope is that this guy does not win the GOP nomination. Voting for him could be difficult.

What do you think?

Hugh Hewitt show transcript excerpt (from his blog):

HH: Would you veto an assault weapons ban?
JH: I would not veto an assault weapons ban.

HH: Would you veto repeal of the Defense Of Marriage Act?

JH: I personally am for civil unions. I don’t think we do an adequate job when it comes to equality at that level. I am for traditional marriage. I would have to look carefully at the language.

The Governor's assault weapon correction is posted on Hugh Hewitt's blog.

The Democratic Party's Recession

2011-06-11T20:28:00.006-04:00

Just a thought, but it just occurred to me that liberals, progressives and Democrats always blame business for screwing over the "working stiff", who they claim to protect and care about. But if you think about, the US Congress, state legislatures and local governments always, always make a grab for your earnings in the form of taxes, fees and penalties. And they never ever find any reason to cut into their own pay.

Lately, they have not only blamed capitalism, but are quick to point out that the current recession started under the previous administration. I believe it is important to add two unchangeable facts to the conversation.

1. The US President cannot appropriate a single dime from anyone, any business or anywhere, without the US Congress first passing a law to appropriate those funds. The president can only veto the legislation if he has been advised to oppose it.

2. The country's, and the world's economy was doing just fine until 2007, when the Democrats took control of the US Congress.

The democrats are still in control of the presidency and the US Senate.

June 2011, the recession continues*.

The Republicans in control of the US House of Representatives cannot make any legislation into law without the cooperation of the US Senate and the president.

We can blame zero percent of this recession and its continuation to Republicans, although they are partially complicit in setting up the playing field for an economic meltdown.

Come November 2012 we will have an opportunity reduce the influence of the US Congress' and this president's failure to understand what they are doing by putting Republicans in control.

* The government's definition of an official recession is not the definition any unemployed person who lost their home and/or life's savings would use. Much like the way the politicians calculate inflation, it is designed to minimize blame on those politicians make and enforce (or not) those laws.

How To Repair the USA, Part One

2011-05-26T06:28:00.005-04:00

This a small installment on moving the country towards its original intent, i.e., a government that serves the people and not the other way around.

First though, I received a humorous email with a story that may or may not be true or accurate, but it made sense to me and is chock full of head nodding truths that might apply to the US Congress and the government as a whole.

The truth is spelled out in the monkey experiment, where 5 monkeys are in a tall cage with a ladder and bananas at the top. As each monkey attempts to climb up to reach the bananas he is hosed down. After a while none try as they have learned something. Each monkey is then replaced, one at a time, and the "experienced" monkeys prevent the new member from climbing. After a while, when all monkeys are replaced with monkeys that were never sprayed, they still prevent any from climbing even though they do not know why.

That is what Group think does.

Such is congress. Group think overrules everything. Trickling in a few new new representatives only continues the political mindset. Replace them all at once and the paradigm will change.

Of course, congresspersons do not start that way. The appearance is that once an idealistic and selfless new congressperson has been among the veterans, they learn the rules of the road. These rules include poll watching, reading legacy media opinion pages, grasping any fault and applying it to the opposition, espousing their service while responsibly (their word) spending other people's earning and justifying it all in name of the common good.

We have an opportunity to replace every Representative every two years and every senator over an 18 year period. So the Senate would be a big glitch in any repair model.

Of course, replacing them all is probably over the top and even though they are politicians, they are probably able reason better than monkeys, although we have little proof of this.

The President Blows the OBL Intelliganece "treasure Trove"

2011-05-13T14:08:00.007-04:00

On May 1st, 2011, President Obama held a press briefing1 where he announced the killing of Osama Bin Laden (OBL), the terrorist behind the 9/11/2001 attacks. Shortly thereafter representatives of the Whitehouse held an additional briefing2 adding detail to the operation to take out OBL. CBS New York3 then tells us, and the terrorists, that we have a "treasure trove" of information. These briefing would not take place without the Commander in Chief's express approval.

One of the many things a soldier learns is operational security: doing everything humanly possible to deprive the enemy of any information about your security operations. The idea is to prevent the enemy from knowing what you are doing and what you know about their operations. This only makes sense. If the enemy doesn't know what you are doing, what your strengths and shortcomings are, where you secure your assets, and how you conduct military operations, along with many other considerations, they will have a much harder time fighting your forces. Or in the case of Al Quaeda, avoiding them. On their side, if they do not know what we know about them, they are much more vulnerable and may be defeated with less loss of life and limb on both sides of the conflict.

One major consideration is to prevent the enemy from piecing together a picture of your state of readiness by getting bits of information from here and there, that many times seem unrelated, but just may be the the final puzzle piece that they need to get an advantage over your forces and this can will cost lives.

The very last thing the Commander in Chief should be doing is bragging on national, rather international, TV and giving the terrorists pieces of our intelligence about them: that he has taken out the enemy's leader and that we now have a "treasure trove" of information about Al Qaeda's organization and assets.

Many may not know why that was an extraordinarily bad idea and why the continued releasing of more details of the operation makes the situation worse. So I will try to help.

The first is that the enemy now knows their leader is dead and will have to quickly find another to take his place. Delaying the news leaves the enemy without a leader, without an explanation of his absence and would be far more disruptive to their operation than being notified within a few hours of Osama Bin Laden's death by the President and his staff.

If the announcement had been made a few weeks or months after it happened, our forces would have had time to use the intelligence that was gained from the OBL. If some of their mass murdering plans had been set in motion, we were in a position to stop them. But, now that they know what they are doing they will have to re-plan their attack. Some will say, "but delaying them is a good thing". Maybe, but wouldn't it be better to find and stop them and confiscate any equipment, supplies, and funds they may have? Instead, they will just try again next week or next month when we don't know what they are up to. As it is, they have the knowledge to start protecting themsleves by discarding cell phones, changing locations and names and moving their finances and supplies to avoid losing it.

But don't get me wrong. The president deserves credit for making the decision to take out OBL. But his inexperience, coupled with advisers who seem to be inexperienced, and quite frankly, juvenile, have taken a great advantage in the war on terrorism, the demise of OBL and the gathering of valuable intelligence on our enemies, and squandered it for a few minutes of chest thumping.

Generally speaking, we probably all know that no one man, or woman, can expert on all things. When you apply for a job, you may not know all aspects of the job that you must be knowledgeable on. This includes the job of President of the United States. For the president, these shortcomings can be overcome through the use of expert advisers. His current crop of advisers apparently cannot help him effectively on national and operational security (among other things). He needs a new set of advisers and he needs them fast.

---------------------------------------------------
(1) Remarks by the President on Osama Bin Laden
(2) Press Briefing by Senior Administration Officials on the Killing of Osama bin Laden,
(3) Bin Laden’s Death Yields Flood Of New Al Qaeda Intel

Cutting Oil Subsidies: Another Price Spike

2011-05-03T18:22:00.004-04:00

It is important to be truly represented. You can only do this by voting and by communicating with your representative. This an email I sent my US Congressman, Vern Buchanan.

Re: President Obama's call to Remove Four Billion Dollars in Oil Industry Subsidies

Dear Representative Buchanan.

If the business expense tax incentives are removed from the American oil industry it will have the affect of raising the cost of energy and especially at the gas pump. Businesses always pass on their expenses to the consumer.

A better idea to influence a downward pressure on oil prices would be to update and improve a control on the futures market. Currently speculators risk up 5 to 15 percent in cash holdings up front to play the futures in oil. If that were changed at least 50 percent up front, it would throttle back the volatility of the market make it more stable. If the 50 percent rule were in place, oil would not be over $110.00 per barrel and regular gas at the pump would still be below $3.00 per gallon.

I drive 55 miles round trip to work each day and my vehicle gets around 17 miles per gallon. Since 2009, my cost in gasoline just to drive to work and back has more than doubled and dominates my family budget. I cannot buy a more efficient vehicle: at least this one is paid for.

Something needs to be done sooner rather than later. Reigning in the futures market, along with a push for domestic drilling, and removing the ethanol subsidies (another triple whammy in wasted tax dollars, higher gas prices & lower gas mileage) would help working Floridians and all Americans who need relief from the unreasonable inflationary effects of government's mishandling of America's energy needs.

Thank you for your attention to this matter.

Give the Pesident a Chance: Been There, Done That

2011-04-13T06:01:00.007-04:00

Interested commentators at the Huffington Post seen to believe that opposition to the president is based in racism. One comment reads,

"Republicans....GET OVER IT...A BLACK MAN IS PRESIDENT. GIVE HIM A CHANCE!"

Sorry Lady, but that is simply ridiculous. Nobody I know is concerned about the race of the president. It is only liberals, progressives and Democrat partisans who are fixated on race and use accusations of racism to stifle opposition.

It's not working.

President Obama has been given a chance. But after two full years we see that he lacks leadership with his wait-and-see MO, recklessly spends "hope dollars" on special interests and corporate welfare, disregards centuries of accepted contract law, and is bankrupting the country. Some of the terms used to describe his actions such as "feckless", "inexperienced", and "serial flip-flopper", have surfaced recently. His Orwellian speeches, saying one thing after doing the opposite, emphasis this perception.

Additionally, he doesn't seem to care that Americans, especially those on fixed incomes (Social security & Disability recipients are suffering under his two year COLA freeze), along with his dollar devaluation (due to unprecedented borrowing), the 50% increase in fuel prices at the pump over that last year that forces prices up on everything (especially food), and the loss of millions of family homes that could have been prevented (and would have cut the recession short). Instead he prolongs the jobless situation.

We can only assume that his advisers believe that people who want to "give him a chance" will forget all this if the economy picks up despite his actions by November 2012.

Bailouts Still Hurting American Families

2011-03-25T14:36:00.007-04:00

Browsing the Huffington Post... There is a complaint of racism in the mortgage foreclosures by Janis Bowdler (Deputy Director, WBPP) that is widening the gap between the number of Black & Latino owned homes and Caucasian home ownership in the USA.

While I believe this to be true (the widening gap) I do not believe it is based in racism as greed and self-promotion couldn't care less about race.

Our so-called leaders had an opportunity to help prevent average Americans of all races from losing their homes and it may still possible to stop the further loss of homes and saving accounts. There was and is only one answer to the mortgage securities crisis that caused and is causing families of all races to lose their homes.

A moratorium on foreclosures.

There are many reasons this is a good way to help Americans and improve the economy.

1. People would be able to stay in their homes, so families would not be uprooted, traumatized and homeless without an address to put on a job application.

2. There would not be a flood of homes on the market driving down prices wiping out trillions of dollars in overall value.

3. The financial institutions, who are mostly responsible for the crisis would not be double dipping into middle class America's wallets. (Pay & Pay, then Take it Away).

4. Fairness: The government will use borrowed money to extend unemployment insurance payments for periods up to 99 weeks, but will not prevent the banks from taking the unemployed person's home while they try to get back on their feet. We know the governmen is willing to take the "property" of a corparation and give to someone else. This is precisely what they did in response to the GM bankruptcy.

5. There would have been no need for the bailouts. Today most of the bailout money has been paid back, but no one is saying how the banks became profitable enough to earn hundreds of billions of dollars in profits that allowed them to pay back hundreds of billions of dollars in TARP loans. Thia tells me that TARP was not needed in the first place.

Speaking of TARP, back in the spring of 2008 our leaders said were looking for a way to save the homes of working families and after several minutes grueling brainstorming they came up with a plan to bailout those responsible for the mortgage mess instead. Somewhere along the line, they totally lost the working families that they had claimed they were helping.

Since that time they have been patting themselves on the back having claimed to stop a recession from becoming a depression and seemingly not noticing that millions of Americans lost their homes and their retirement savings.

On top of that, the working family received a real kick in the head from those same bad actors at the financial institutions. Bad actors who did not lose their jobs, homes and savings, are getting those homes to resell again. Any equity and investment that a homeowner had in their home is wiped out completely. Those same bankers are fat and happy and sitting on their bailout money and minimizing their own risk instead of reinvesting it in a major way. This another reason the recovery is so slow. Could it be by design?

If congress and Presidents Bush and Obama really wanted to help working Americans they would have stopped foreclosures and allowed the CEO's and Executive VPs to sink instead. There would have been no depression. Only new faces with a renewed sense of responsibility running those financial institutions, something this country drastically needs. And the recovery would be well on its way to pre-bailout levels.

President Obama Reads Reagan... Why?

2010-12-24T09:17:00.006-05:00

From the known history of the Obama administration, what do you believe would be the purpose of Whitehouse press secretary Robert Gibbs informing Americans that President Obama is reading "President Reagan: The Role of a Lifetime", during his Hawaiian vacation? (source ABC Blog).

I wonder what he plans to learn from it... Optimism? Voodoo economics? Leadership? How to be reelected in 2012?

I believe this is an attempt to soften up the 112th Congress and independent voters with a fake move to the center now that he does not have a GOP proof congress. The shellacking he took in November no doubt has caused him to reassess how he will further his agenda. But I doubt their will much in the way of change in the borrowing, spending and nationalization that he desires.

The pundits have already characterized the President's support for the tax extension compromise as a move to the center, so this marketing scheme isn't really necessary.

Dear Mr. President.

Please do not bother with the Reagan book. You won't understand it and the Republicans in congress have already shown that they cannot stand up to any criticism from anyone. They cave on fundamental issues that conservatives know they should be stopping in its tracks such as DADT, your New START treaty, and the tax rates extension.

Thank you for your support.

Mover

Another Un-American Program From The Obama Administration.

2010-12-10T06:13:00.006-05:00

My co-worker alerts me this story at the Raw Story, Homeland Security ‘messages’ coming to Walmart, hotels, malls

"Shoppers at Walmart will soon have something other than glossy magazines and chewing gum to look at when in the checkout line: A "video message" from the Department of Homeland Security asking them to look out for "suspicious" activity and report it immediately."

Welcome Walmart shoppers. You now have Big Sis* to greet you at the check-out.

Hey, maybe they will implement the technology to see what you are buying and advise you about safety or better deals. You know, for your good.

In 1995 I went on a MIA recovery mission to Vietnam. The communist government broadcast propaganda over their public address system that had speakers on most telephone poles around the city.

What else can this government do?

and it's one, two, three, what are we fighting for......

*nickname "Big Sis" heard on the Rush Limbaugh Show

Dialy Kos: No Trick Left to Chance

2010-10-11T06:47:00.003-04:00

The Daily Kos will do anything to push their agenda forward. In this latest ruse, they want the followers to skew search engine results in their favor.

I received the following instruction from the Daily Kos via their list-server.

--------------

Every time you post a hyperlink anywhere on the Internet--including on message boards and social networking sites--it impacts search engines like Google. Also, one of the most common actions undecided voters take online is to use search engines like Google to find information about candidates. As such, shouldn't we learn how to post hyperlinks in a way that helps lead to our preferred political outcomes?

With a new campaign from Daily Kos, Grassroots Search Engine Optimization, you can do just that. By learning about the most effective ways to post hyperlinks, Grassroots SEO will help hundreds of thousands of undecided voters read damaging news articles on the Republican candidate for Congress in their district.

It sounds tricky, but it’s pretty easy. To make it work, we just need a few hundred grassroots activists like you to sign up and take part.

In 2006, we used this technique to reach over 700,000 voters in key congressional districts during the last two weeks of the midterms. With the rise of Twitter and Facebook, we can do even better in 2010.

To get started, sign up here. Once you sign up, you will be redirected to a Daily Kos diary that explains the next steps.

Keep fighting,
Chris Bowers
Campaign Director, DailyKos

--------------------------

Is this what it means to be a progressive?

Is honesty and honor dead?

Voters Declared "Irrelevant" by Wacky CA Judge.

2010-08-05T12:42:00.093-04:00

After a 13-day hearing California's Constitutional amendment, ballot Proposition 8, defining marriage as being between a man and a woman has been struck down by Chief U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker. In his rambling final decision he throws out this blockbuster;

"That the majority of California voters supported Proposition 8 is irrelevant,.."

There you have it. High ranking members of the American left have now openly and officially stated that your vote does not count.

If this stands it redefines the United States of America from Constitutional Republic, which we used to be, to a new form of government where the average American is now under the expert care of the self-anointed intelligentsia. Already we have become a bureaucracy, where a select few make the important and (now) personal decisions for society. The final authority has become the judges: the new ruling class.

I believe this particular judge has left himself open to impeachment with his lack of understanding of the law, his inability to leave his personal opinion aside and his personal benefit in his decision's outcome. For the last, a truly honorable judge would have rightly recused himself.

Rationality?

The judge defends his position by stating in his decision that the voters were "irrational" and goes on to cite court cases where a rationality requirement had been determined. But cases he cites on jurisdiction and rationality, do not seem to apply. In one case (Minnesota v Clover Leaf Creamery Co),the court found that that there was no equal protection violation by the state legislature, so that does not support his decision, and in the other (Heller), the court ruling is that the legislature must have a rational basis to create or modify law. The Heller case makes no mention of legislation placed on the ballot by the people. It addresses legislation put on the ballot by the legislature. I submit that in this country, the people are the ultimate authority. Something that seems to escape this judge (and many others).

Setting aside another reworking of American government for a moment, this decision has other points that need to be addressed.

The gay and lesbian community claim that Proposition 8 singles them out for unequal treatment under the law. The plaintiff's contention that Prop 8 prevents homosexuals ...

(1) "from marrying the person of his or her choice."

The fact is Prop 8 does not mention homosexuals at all. Additionally, it does not prevent homosexuals from joining in a civil union with another gay person or marrying the person of their choice.

What Proposition 8 does do is prevent the re-defining of the 5000 year old term "marriage" for the purpose of improving the feelings of a minute portion of the population at the expense of the rest of the population's feelings.

Their suit then claims

(2) "The choice of a marriage partner is sheltered by the Fourteenth Amendment"

In case anyone is interested, there is no mention of marriage in the US Constitution. This includes the innumerated powers (Section 8), the Bill of Rights, or any of the other 18 amendments to the US Constitution. This lawsuit appears to be an excuse to have the central government manage marriages between individuals: Something the Founders never intended or envisioned and did not include in the US Constitution, nor has it come up in any ratified constitutional amendment. It is not written into federal law with the exception of the Defense of Marriage Act (President Clinton) and some sexist property issues that were resolved in the 19th century.

The US Constitution does not cover marriage, however there are provisions for the states and the people to decide these matters. One is titled the Tenth Amendment to the US Constitution, which gives this power to the states. It reads:

"The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people." - Tenth Amendment

As written, the letter of the law reserves the power to the states and the people. Not the federal government or federal judges.

Many states have addressed the feelings of gay and lesbian Americans. Using their constitutional power, states have codified civil unions into law which include gay and lesbian unions. So what is next?

Number (3) goes off the charts, saying that the state permits civil unions, but that civil unions are not good enough. They are equal but not equal, according to the plaintiffs.

"a status giving same-sex couples the rights and responsibilities of marriage without providing marriage —— does not afford plaintiffs an adequate substitute for marriage and, by disabling plaintiffs from marrying the person of their choice, invidiously discriminates, without justification, against plaintiffs and others who seek to marry a person of the same sex."

The question here is; If the civil unions offer the same "rights and responsibilities of marriage" why does it not "afford plaintiffs an adequate substitute for marriage"?

Inquiring minds want to know.

Aren't "rights" the crux of their argument? But in this case the rights are the same., so what is the argument? Why aren't civil unions adequate? Well, the judge's decision includes,

"Cott explained that domestic partnerships cannot substitute for marriage because domestic partnerships do not have the same social and historical meaning as marriage and that much of the value of marriage comes from its social meaning." p.19, ln 4.

First: I thought the complaint was that civil unions were not adequate. Now it's domestic partnerships. Is this change of wording to used to redefine the debate or to merely confuse the debate?

This third complaint goes to heart of the problem. It can only be read as, 'According to the activist gay community, equal is not adequate,' so they invidiously discriminate, without justification, and want to redefine marriage for everyone on their own terms. No one else's feelings matter to them. I'm sorry but I do not believe the human race is ready for the open ended redefining of the basic family unit that traditional marriage represents. That the gay and lesbian community needs this kind of government mandated acceptance indicates that there is some other motive involved.

Mr. Cott alludes to the why of it's inadequacy to the gay community. They want the government to force society to award gay and lesbian couples the exact same historical and social meaning that traditional marriage has been over the millennia. I for for one, do not believe it is government's place, nor does government at any level have the ability to proclaim any historical and social standing on any group. And especially the history of marriage where men and women have been marrying each other and producing children. Of course, homosexual couples can never produce children, so the common sense question is "How can it ever be exactly the same?" Common sense would dictate that it cannot, which should make the argument mute.

Gay and lesbian Americans have a need for the government's stamp of approval, their blessing so to speak, of the gay and lesbian lifestyle. I have no insight into this apparent need, but it might be that after millenia of actual and perceived mistreatment by the heterosexual community they have discovered an open ended opportunity to 'even the score'. By redefining marriage at the federal level and making it a stealth "right", they may believe they are winning something.

What I fail to understand is why anyone, or any group, would want their private sex life and their private relationships managed by the bureaucratic central government?

Media Matters; No Truth Go Un-Spun, No Deception Too Small

2010-07-12T05:47:00.010-04:00

I've been on Media Matters (MM) email list for a few years now and I can say that I have never read one that did not twist the truth to conform to their agenda: Propping up Democrats, liberals and progressives, while attempting to marginalize Republicans, conservatives, and lately the Tea Party movement.

This Time MM is attacking Chris Wallace of Fox News Sunday for asking Mr. Axelrod legitimate questions concerning President Obama's underhanded recess appointment of Donald Berwick to head up Medicare and Medicaid. The rant, titled "Wallace revives tired right-wing attacks on "controversial " Berwick quotes" was published July 11th, 2010.

MM says, "

Chris Wallace claimed that President Obama used a recess appointment to install Center for Medicare & Medicaid Services head Donald Berwick to avoid defending Berwick's "controversial statements" regarding health care rationing and Britain's National Health Service."

The fact that they feel the need to attack Chris Wallace reveals the truth of the matter.

To Media matters: If the real reason for this surprise recess appointment was not to avoid questioning by the US Senate, why did the President do it?

MM does not answer that question, and neither does Axelrod, the president or any of his staff. At the Whitehouse Blog, Dan Pfeiffer writes,

"In April, President Obama nominated Dr. Donald Berwick to serve as Administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS)."

So why didn't the Democrat controlled US Senate not consider this nomination? He provides this for an answer...

" Many Republicans in Congress have made it clear in recent weeks that they were going to stall the nomination as long as they could, solely to score political points."

Is that so? Does Mr. Pfeiffer prove his statement? Nope. He's a Democrat working for Democrats to give cover to the Democrats and the president. And, as we've learned, Democrats do not need facts, they only need someone to blame. He describes the US Senate confirmation process as "Washington game-playing" that they don't have time to "waste" on.

Now it is odd that the appointment had to be made in secret as there was an Acting Administrator, Charlene Frizzera, in place since January, 2009. Barack Obama has been the President for over 18 months. If the appointment was as important as is claimed, why did he leave a "temp" in there for 18 months?

Dr. Berwick was never scheduled for a US Senate confirmation hearing. The appearance is the president's staff pulled him out of nowhere and placed in charge of rationing the federal government's largest budget area ($700+ Billion annually).

Recess appointments are generally not a really bad thing and have been used many times by most, if not all prior presidents. But this one exceptionally devious and reveals the overall mindset of this administration, where Mr. Obama creates "czar" positions expressly to avoid an open information exchange in a government that was originally founded on transparency.

Media Matters has build a fine tradition of skewing information to meet their agenda. This is just another example.

NASA to Make Muslims Feel Better

2010-07-07T10:58:00.005-04:00

Last month I wrote about President Obama's plans to remove national pride of our space agency, NASA, in "The US Space Program Loses to the Audacity of Inexperience". Now I am prompted to write more on NASA as he carries the farce further by turning it into a political tool to support his ill conceived foreign policy to ingratiate himself to the the world's Muslim community. He'd already been over there making up stories about this country then apologizing for it, as he bows to their despots.

I heard Byron York speaking about this during the second hour of Bill Bennett's radio show, "Morning in America", yesterday. You can read Mr. York's article at the Washington Examiner and you can hear Mr. Bolden's remarks to AL Jazeera TV here.

It seems Mr. Obama's NASA Director, Charles Bolden, told Aljazeera that the president,

"... wanted me to find a way to reach out to the Muslim world and engage much more with predominantly Muslim nations to help them feel good about their historic contribution to science, math, and engineering."

I would have to ask what, if anything the Muslims have contributed to space. But there is a time line page at Wiki that shows many legitimate contributions to science math and engineering. But I'm thinking they will contribute far less to our space program than would justify allowing them access to space technology data. As we know, Iran is developing nuclear weapons and delivery systems for them, they support terrorist activities (as do many other Muslim dominated countries). I wonder what they could use from our space program to further those ends?

On the humorous side, Bill Bennett's executive producer, Seth Leibsohn, suggests that the US space program was helped by a certain young lady from Babylon named "Jeannie", who was instrumental in furthering (according to some) NASA's Major Anthony Nelson career a few decades ago.

This is further proof that this administration is running on ideologies that only they believe are good for this country. Everyone who has an ounce of common sense and a few factual history lessons understands this to be problem.

President Obama does not want to destroy this country. He wants to reshape in a form that traditional Americans will not recognize. And abusing a few federal agencies, the states, along with massive unemployment, growing a huge national debt and lowering national security, are sacrifices he is more then willing to make. It is for your own good, you know.

Kevin Costner to Save the Gulf of Mexico

2010-06-09T11:40:00.005-04:00

You know, a week or so ago I heard some guys on the radio making jokes about the another way to get the BP oil leak fixed. They made an unstated reference to 1995 eco-nut-job movie "Waterworld" suggesting that they send Kevin Costner. In the post global warming movie, where dry land is a long lost legend, Mr. Costner played a mutant equipped with gills who could dive deep and stay there.

That was funny. But this may not be.

It seems Mr. Costner is an environmentalist who puts his money where is mouth is and has been funding research into oil spill cleanup techniques. And he is offering a technology to help with the Gulf cleanup effort. No kidding. Read about it CBS News web site.

Kudos to Mr. Costner.

BTW: I found the movie "Waterworld" to be entertaining and funny. When I watched it the first time I knew it was written and created by a, or some, nut-jobs. In the movie we are introduced to the bad guys by Mr. Costner's character when he sees some of them coming towards his trimaran on personal water craft and mutters, "smokers".

Well, I thought the "smoker" label was referring to the fact that they were using gas powered vehicles in contrast to his wind powered trimaran. I almost coughed up a box of pop-corn when it was revealed that the bad guys weren't called "smokers" because they used machines that emit the horrible substance known as exhaust, that emits evil CO2 and 'smoke' when operated. Especially in machines that have been around for generations. You had to know that evil big oil was what was meant because this film is an environmentalist's dream come true. Shortly thereafter we learn that no, they aren't smokers because of their machines, but because they SMOKE CIGARETTES!!! All of them all of the time and no matter what they were doing. Cigarettes were used by the chief evil guy and smoker (played by the late Dennis Hopper) as prizes for an evil job well done. I didn't know that smoking was a criteria for evil, but you know.... the president smokes.

And, of course, the mother ship of the evil smokers was none other than the infamous Exxon Valdez. Go figure.

British Petroleum should invite Mr. Costner on board, eh?

President Obama, At It Again.

2010-05-31T15:20:00.009-04:00

The President seems to be unable to stop blaming the Bush administration for everything that has gone wrong in this country, and some things that are not wrong, but do not fit Mr. Obama's ideology. He blames everyone else at every opportunity. This time he is trying to remove blame from himself for the Gulf of Mexico oil spill, even though it all happened on his shift. Truthfully, I do not blame President Obama for the oil spill, but his insistence that it's not his fault only makes me lose respect for him. Blaming others is not the mark of a leader.

During his remarks concerning the oil spill on May 27th, he said,

"When Secretary Salazar took office, he found a Minerals and Management Service that had been plagued by corruption for years –- this was the agency charged with not only providing permits, but also enforcing laws governing oil drilling. And the corruption was underscored by a recent Inspector General’s report that covered activity which occurred prior to 2007 -- a report that can only be described as appalling. And Secretary Salazar immediately took steps to clean up that corruption. But this oil spill has made clear that more reforms are needed."

This tells me that:

1. His Minerals and Management Service (MMS) issued the permits for the Deep Water Horizon drilling project. Meaning they looked over the project plans, equipment, qualifications of the personnel, contingencies and safety precautions and approved them.

2. The guy he put in charge of MMS, Interior Secretary Salazar, knew of supposed corruption and yet had done nothing to rectify the situation. He probably still hasn't changed anything except to fire Ms. Birnbaum.

3. He is trying to remove himself and his administration from fault by blaming the Bush administration.

4. He claims he's been in charge since the beginning.

I just have to wonder if he believes that anyone is swallowing this tripe. But it doesn't stop there, He he nails the premise with this...

"For years, there has been a scandalously close relationship between oil companies and the agency that regulates them. That’s why we’ve decided to separate the people who permit the drilling from those who regulate and ensure the safety of the drilling."

Again, assuring that everyone understands that it not his administration that is at fault here.

I have to wonder what it is about himself that forces him to continuously try and divert attention from his actions to anyone or anything else, including throwing his subordinates out with the trash.

BP Gulf Oil Spill: Priorities

2010-05-26T09:31:00.006-04:00

UPDATE: May 31, 2010

Sadly, I was right.

I hope I'm wrong, but it seems to me that the primary reason British Petroleum (BP) has wasted over a month in attempts to stop the spewing of oil into the Gulf of Mexico is because they are trying to get oil into tankers so they can sell it.

Think about it.

What have all of their plans included:

1. Attaching a pipe to siphon off oil from the leak in the pipe that is way down the road from the wellhead.

2. A secondary well to "ease the pressure" by pumping the crude into tankers. (I wonder if they will use the same blow off preventer (BOP)?

3. The 70 ton hat trick had what? A pipe to siphon off oil from the leak.

Now they have to plans working in "parallel":

1. One where they would pump "heavy mud" into the blow out preventer (BOP) and clog the leak, then make the seal permanent with concrete. Surprisingly, this one would not involve attaching a pipe to grab the oil.

2. The lower marine riser package (LMRP) cap containment option calls pulling the old riser off the BOP and for cutting off the pipe, then and inserting what amounts to another riser onto the BOPand siphon off oil to the Discoverer Enterprise drillship, putting them back in the oil capturing business. (Rigzone.com)

I have to ask these simple questions:

1. Why did BP not try the heavy mud option the day after the Deep Horizon blew up, sank, and they discovered the oil spewing into the Gulf? Did it take them over a month to think of that? I would find that hard to believe as they have used the heavy mud process before.

2. If cutting off the pipe and putting another connection on it is an option, why didn't they try that the day after they discovered the leaking oil?

I predict the heavy mud plan will fail in favor of the LMRP option to siphon off oil.
(note: I hope I am wrong about this one.)

Now don't get me wrong. I am a big supporter of capitalism and oil companies keeping the nation and the world running on the energy they provide. We would not have any of the modern conveniences, medical treatments, or anything else worthwhile without the freedom that capitalism and oil provide. But their comes a time when businesses must put safety and ecology ahead of profits. This is one of those times and BP apparently is not doing the right thing.

States Rights. What?

2010-05-24T06:30:00.003-04:00

Watching news programs, reading newspapers, listening to talk radio and participating in several blog sites, I learned that states have rights. At least that's everyone seems to agree on. Maybe it's another reflection of our public school system and the greater agenda of making everything "right".

Well, I'm not really comfortable with the term "states rights".

Only people are endowed by their creator with certain inalienable "rights": not states, or any level of government.

States have "powers" and the federal government has "enumerated powers" (that means powers limited to those specifically listed in the US Constitution). The government derives their just powers granted to them from the people.

Check your US Constitution, Declaration of Independence, and Federalist Papers, for the facts.

Immigration: What would Teddy Roosevelt Say?

2010-05-08T06:22:00.006-04:00

Lately I've been hearing a lot about how "progressive" President Theodore "Teddy" Roosevelt was. The left seems to believe that he was a rare good Republican who reflects their position on life in the United States. So now I'm going to help relieve them of that nonsense.

The following picture and text was taken from an email that is circulating. I can't swear the picture goes with the speech, but it looks believable. And it has been associated with the speech at many web sites. I checked at Snopes, who label it "True" As an side, there is more to be learned about President Roosevelt and immigration at the Snopes page.

Theodore Roosevelt's ideas on Immigrants and being an AMERICAN in 1907.

'In the first place, we should insist that if the immigrant who comes here in good faith becomes an American and assimilates himself to us, he shall be treated on an exact equality with everyone else, for it is an outrage to discriminate against any such man because of creed, or birthplace, or origin. But this is predicated upon the person's becoming in every facet an American, and nothing but an American...There can be no divided allegiance here. Any man who says he is an American, but something else also, isn't an American at all. We have room for but one flag, the American flag... We have room for but one language here, and that is the English language.. And we have room for but one sole loyalty and that is a loyalty to the American people.'
Theodore Roosevelt 1907

History. It is a wonderful thing.

Paul Volcker: VAT "not as toxic an idea". What?

2010-04-22T16:39:00.012-04:00

Proof again that the geniuses in Washington DC are not.

Paul Volcker, current Whitehouse adviser and former Federal Reserve Chairmen under Presidents Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan says the value-added tax (VAT)...

"was not as toxic an idea." (Reuters)

Not toxic to whom? Politicians and Corporations? Ex-fed chairmen?

It is toxic to me.

I have to say that I believe these people in Washington are totally out of touch with the American people and the American way of life. Never once have they considered that the deficits and debt are a result of their uncontrolled spending or that if they want to reduce deficits and debt, cutting spending might work.

Just say "no" to spending.

At least the US Senate was thinking with 85% clarity, when they voted 85 to 13 opposing a VAT in a nonbinding "sense of the senate" bill. (Read about it here)

There many reasons why a VAT would be a bad thing. The top four are...

1. Inflation
2. The poor are the hardest hit
3. It is super insidious
4. Why do we need another tax?

It is inflationary because it adds to the cost of everything that congress wants to tax. All businesses pass along any cost of doing business to the customer. Always. A 3% VAT would at least 3% to the cost of vehicles, gasoline, housing, food, transportation, clothing and food. If they make it 6% then everything goes up that much. The government already jaacks up the price of everything with a 35% corporate tax. The VAT will be added on top of that corporate tax (the same way they do it in Germany)

The poor would be hit hardest because they have less income to spread around to the different products and services needed. While a loaf of bread doesn't even show up on the radar of a wealthy person, it becomes decision time for poor family. (Do we get the whole wheat @ $4.00, or white at $3.25?) This same scenario goes to everything they need and choices they make to stretch the money out to cover everything they need, and would no doubt would adversely affect children's birthdays and Christmas. (And they describe Republicans as "mean spirited").

I, and many others, believe that a VAT is very very insidious as it is a tax hidden that consumer never sees. The way a VAT works is the government collects a tax each time "value" is added to a product.

Take oil pipe for instance. Oil comes out of the ground through steel pipe 2- 3.5 inches in diameter. To make the final product iron ore goes through many "value adding" processes. At each improvement, the value added tax is slapped to it. After each process that adds value, the VAT is added to the cost. When I worked at US Steel the the major steps went like this.

1. Iron ore is dug up and shipped to US Steel (Lorain Cuyahoga Works) and converted into blocks of steel - Value Added
2. It is sold to the Blooming mill and turned into bar stock and billets - Value Added
3. Billets are sold to the Pipe mills who then sell it to the lapping mill (a department of the Pipe Mill) - Value Added
4. The billets are extruded into 25 to 30 foot lengths of seamless pipe - Value Added
5. The pipe is sold to Number 2 lap, where threads are added to both ends of the pipe. - Value Added
6. The pipe is sold to 3 Seamless, where a coupling is screwed on to one end of the pipe - Value Added
7. The pipe is sold to the shipping department for final sale.

The oil companies who buy the pipe will not know how much VAT is being paid on the pipe, they just buy it at their best price and add the cost into calculating how much to sell the oil for (which has its own value adding process), and it all comes out of your pocket.

You may never know when the VAT rate is increased by congress (I was going to say 'when it goes up or down', but that would be crazy talk), unless you are watching Fox News who will tell you when they change the rate.

Why do we need another tax on top of all the other taxes we pay now? Let's have a look at how much money we are sending to government.

If you are working, own a home & pay utilities, drive to work, and live in America, you hand over about half of your income to all levels of government.

You are paying income tax, payroll tax Medicare & Social Security), sales tax, property tax, state & federal gas taxes, fees for services (I use the term loosely), corporate taxes (that's right, it gets passed along as part of doing business), excise taxes on various services (tanning salons comes to mind), room taxes if you travel, airport taxes, communication taxes on your telephone, cell phone and not-so-smart phone, internet access taxes, connection taxes, use taxes, etc., etc., etc.

And all of that does not include a VAT.... yet.

Contact your representatives and the president and tell them you are supporting someone else if they try and add a VAT to the cost of living in this country.

The US Space Program Loses to the Audacity of Inexperience,

2010-04-16T15:00:00.006-04:00

Yesterday the President of the United States went to the Space Coast to tell NASA workers that even though he was killing the US space program at a cost of an estimated 10,000 jobs, he is not killing the US space program. In fact, if anyone wanted to train for a new line of work, he was provided funds to retrain them. (Remarks by the President on Space Exploration in the 21st Century)

I have to ask; Who told him to say that? He has proved that he knows almost nothing, which goes to the value of a Harvard education, and he is listening to people who do not much about anything or being an authentic American either.

After his obligatory comments for the locally spawned Democratic Party Senators and Congresspersons, and then repeating his own heartfelt history with the space program, he said,

"So let me start by being extremely clear:"

I've come to know that when he says this, whatever comes next is the exact opposite of what he really feels or means, if he has any thoughts or feeling at all on the topic. It's hard to tell sometimes because, while his advisers are fairly clueless (in this case, he is apparently blaming the White House Budget Office), his speech writers do know what Americans want to hear. Especially after he has screwed with any particular group, such as NASA employees.

He continues...

"I am 100 percent committed to the mission of NASA and its future. (Applause.) Because broadening our capabilities in space will continue to serve our society in ways that we can scarcely imagine."

We can tell he is "100 percent committed" because, according to CBS in Miami (KDKA TV) on February 1st, 2010, Mr. Obama intends to cut $100 BILLION from NASA's budget and shut down their return to the moon effort known as Constellation Program, in favor of spending $9 Billion to outsource the work NASA has been doing. This is being described as an "increase" to NASA's budget. Yeah, that won't cost any jobs. In Texas, the Examiner is reporting that Mr. Obama's 2011 budget will cost 6000 jobs in Houston and 30,000 engineer jobs around the country. He sure seems to enjoy destroying jobs.

Losing jobs, really? I'm afraid the answer is 'yes'. Not only do we know this from his forced bankruptcy of GM and setting aside centuries of contract law, someone added this to his speech in Florida.

"Now, it’s true -- there are Floridians who will see their work on the shuttle end as the program winds down. This is based on a decision that was made six years ago, not six months ago, but that doesn’t make it any less painful for families and communities affected as this decision becomes reality."

OK, just a moment. He takes another opportunity to blame President Bush for what, losing jobs? It doesn't matter, just as long as he can blame anyone but himself for anything that could be construed as bad"" that happens, while taking credit for anything good that happens, even if it was initiated before his presidency.

He continues...

"So I’m proposing -- in part because of strong lobbying by Bill and by Suzanne, as well as Charlie -- I’m proposing a $40 million initiative led by a high-level team from the White House, NASA, and other agencies to develop a plan for regional economic growth and job creation."

Riddle me this. If he was not killing jobs, why would he need to add a program to retrain workers who already have jobs?

He is not done yet.

"And I expect this plan to reach my desk by August 15th. (Applause.) It’s an effort that will help prepare this already skilled workforce for new opportunities in the space industry and beyond."

Now we learn that he really does not have a plan. He would merely like to have a plan for the soon to be unemployed. I wonder if congress will put this one ahead of Cap & Trade, crippling the financial sector, or are they concentrating their re-election prospects.

Personally, I believe he is killing the Constellation Program for two reasons.

1. It was a created under the Bush administration and he must remove any hint of anything that Mr. Bush did that Americans can take pride in.

2. The space program has been a binding force that brings Americans together and evokes pride, patriotism and the American competitive spirit. It is a force that glues Americans to a television to join in with cheering on the astronauts while watching in amazement. President Obama and others of his ilk cannot stand the idea of competition as something that anyone would volunteer to engage in as it leads to unequal outcomes. And, unlike his campaign promises, this shows that he is no "uniter".

There are winners and losers in life. He wants government to equalize the playing field, beating down the successful and redistribute wealth to those who do not succeed, and anything that works against this goal is the enemy.

Having never been required to compete for anything himself, he may be unable to understand the rewards that come with it. I do not count his presidential victory or his senate wins as "competitive" events. For the US Senate race his opponent was a last minute emergency nominee that wasn't even a resident of Illinois. And in the presidential race, his gangland staff was able to write pretty speeches conveniently displayed on a teleprompter and devoid of detail for his benefit. He relies on the legacy media to repeat his propaganda and demonizes those to reveal the truth of his actions. He seems to be determined to destroy any competitive efforts in this country.

I have to add that I first heard President Obama described as the first "Post American President" on the Bill Bennett Show, Morning in America, when a guest (whose name I do not recall offered the title for our president. With the information above and other actions (HCR, Stimulus 2009, bankrupting GM, Chrysler, Lehman Bros, etc.) by this president, I now believe that the label is more accurate that we can imagine.

The space program does not deserve to be handicapped this way. I am writing my representatives in DC to insist that they extend the shuttle program, build new space shuttles, reinstate the Constellation Program, and keep the USA in the forefront of space exploration.

I hope our friends on the left, who often complain that President Bush did not spend enough on science and research will join me in contacting their representatives and renew the space program. It's not that hard to do.

Rep. Wasserman-Shulz: No free Speech for the Religious.

2010-04-12T12:51:00.003-04:00

Rep. Wasserman-Shultz (D) was on Fox News Sunday, along with Rep. Ryan (R) during the March 21st show.

I did learn something interesting from the exchange. Apparently, Ms. Fisherman-Shultz doesn't believe everyone has free speech rights in America.

WASSERMAN SCHULTZ:

"I'm sure the nuns would be surprised to learn that they don't have the right to weigh in on health care reform."

Did Chris Wallace ask her that question? No, she volunteered it.

Quite frankly, I'm surprised to know that. I knew many Democrats in public service (using the term loosely) believe that Americans have different rights based on any of their various prejudices. But more and more, this truth is being displayed on news shows, in speeches and are getting codified into law. Last Summer we heard our president say,

"But I don't want the folks who created the mess to do a lot of talking. I want them to get out of the way so we can clean up the mess. I don't mind cleaning up after them, but don't do a lot of talking." (Breitbart TV)

They even censor their mailings from the US House and restrict Republicans from mailing important information that they disagree with (a chart showing the ObamaCare routes that compared to the allowed "HilaryCare chart back in 1993). They even got to the US House Franking Commission (run by Democrats, go figure). (CNS News).

They can't even be honest with the AGW debate. Last December the Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming's Chairman Ed Markey (D-Mass.) refused to allow testimony from a global-warming skeptic. (Democrats Censor Climate Skeptics in Congress, Jillian Bandes)

They are even censoring twitter (Mark Hopkins).

I'm beginning to think that these people believe that they are supposed to tell us what we can say and when we can say it, which our "hate crime" laws testify to, and we should stop bothering them with our antiquated ideas that doesn't get them anywhere.

How Democrats Keep Their Mindset

2010-04-05T12:24:00.000-04:00

I have been concerned about politics in our country for some time now. It started to peak for me in 1993 when the newly elected president rolled out Mr. Brady to be the emotional nudge for a far reaching gun control plan. Logic and common sense made me agree with the gun control opponents after I learned the reasoning behind the desire to infringe on our individual Second Amendment rights.

Since that time I have often wondered how the liberal rank and file, rebranding themselves Progressives after people became aware of what liberals represent, remain supporters of the Democratic Party. I've come to understand that in order to be a liberal, you must have a certain mindset that relies on emotion and remaining in good standing with your clique rather than facts when deciding what issue they like and those policies and politics they will support. I lurk around such noted blogs as the Huffington Post, Moveon.org, pharyngula (an atheist's heaven) and have offered facts as I know them to many of the commentators and blog writers. Of course I receive many negative comments that are normally devoid of facts, if my contributions make it past the censors.

Most recently, I visited the Democratic Underground. Their admins fully support my theory of like-minded people gathering in one place to discuss how right they are and how anyone who disagrees with them just doesn't get it. I was considering posting a comment but needed to register. The registration page had a link to the rules for commenting and while I like to help out, I skipped the whole thing after reading the discussion rules.

Here are the rules and a translation of their meaning.

Discussion Forum Rules.

1. This is a moderated discussion forum with rules. We have a team of volunteer moderators who delete posts and ban disruptors. Members are strongly urged to familiarize themselves with our rules, and make an effort to become a positive member of our community. Those who do not risk having their posts deleted or their posting privileges revoked.

If they do not like you based on your opinion, you will not be allowed to alter their really and will be shunned and banned.

2. Who We Are: Democratic Underground is an online community for Democrats and other progressives. Members are expected to be generally supportive of progressive ideals, and to support Democratic candidates for political office. Democratic Underground is not affiliated with the Democratic Party, and comments posted here are not representative of the Democratic Party or its candidates.

If you do not tow our party line, you are not welcome. Be a good soldier or leave, and leave quickly.

3. Civility: Treat other members with respect. Do not post personal attacks against other members of this discussion forum.

We can call others names, make fun of them, restrict their speech while here, but don't try it with your fellow emotional progressives or you are outta here.

4. Content: Do not post messages that are inflammatory, extreme, divisive, incoherent, or otherwise inappropriate. Do not engage in anti-social, disruptive, or trolling behavior. Do not post broad-brush, bigoted statements. The moderators and administrators work very hard to enforce some minimal standards regarding what content is appropriate. But please remember that this is a large and diverse community that includes a broad range of opinion. People who are easily offended, or who are not accustomed to having their opinions (including deeply held personal convictions) challenged may not feel entirely comfortable here. A thick skin is necessary to participate on this or any other discussion forum.

The area of inflammatory and extreme belongs to us for use against anyone who disagrees with us. If they are using facts to back up their claims, it is even worse. Only we are permitted to use this type of language against those others, but it can never be directed at your fellow disruptive trolling anti-social bigots.

6. Forum Administration: Respect the moderators and administrators, and respect their decisions. You can help make their job easier by clicking the "Alert" link on any post that might need moderator attention. Please understand that moderating errors and inconsistencies are inevitable on a large website like this. If you have a question about DU policies, or if you have a concern about an action a moderator has taken, please contact an admin privately.

Since we are always correct, any allusion to any other position will be treated as being disrespectful of your betters. And believe us, you have betters. Now shut up and tow that line.

The censorship at the Democratic Underground is too prohibitive to be American. It must be more of the post American left, who do not understand the US Constitution, including the Bill of Rights, or how this country was made great through individual freedom and rugged individualism who tried not to be a burden on their neighbors. True Americans are actually ashamed to be required to depend on government to survive (except for national security) and all any real American wants is an equal chance at success in life. Something that many in this government has been working against since at least 1933.

Ignorant Legacy Media

2010-04-02T12:17:00.005-04:00

Every day it becomes more and more obvious that the legacy media cannot be trusted to be truthful in their news and the opinions. The latest misinformation was published last Monday in an LA Times Op-Ed where Joe Queenan complains,

"Rush Limbaugh threatened to leave the United States if the healthcare bill passed. Well, the bill did pass, and he's still here."

I'm sorry to have to inform Mr. Queenan that Mr. Limbaugh never said that. What he and others are doing is hearing what you want to hear, or just plain lying. What he actually said was he would get his health care in Costa Rica.

How would I know the truth? Easy. Unlike our fleet of professional researchers, reporters, editors and pundits, I actually listen to the show occasionally and I heard him say it.

Imagine that. Actually knowing what you are talking about. What a concept.

He goes on to say,

"If you were going to make a threat, you were honor-bound to go through with it. Otherwise, you were merely confusing the issue."

Does that include campaign promises (threats, as I see them)? I have to wonder if he had the same opinion on President Obama's threats. You know, those campaign promises to be post-partisan and transparent among others. If Mr. Obama were honor-bound to go through with his threats, he would have insisted that a health care insurance reform bill included Republicans in the backroom bribery sessions and questioned the Democrats sneaking out of those rooms to avoid Republicans.

But in the newly emerged tradition of Democratic Party politics, he falls under George Stephanopolous' famous line after President Clinton's reelection in 1996. When asked why President Clinton did not keep his campaign promises, George Stephanopolous said,

"has kept all of the promises he intended to keep."

I expect politicians, and the legacy media (such as Mr. Queenan) who prop them up, to continue acting infallible while continuing to fail at every opportunity.

ObamaCare: Would You Buy That?

2010-04-01T14:03:00.000-04:00

For the sake of argument, let's say that instead of buying health care reform, we were buying a new car.

Would you make payments for 6 months on a car that you've never seen, you don't know what options it comes with, and that has never been tested?

Then, after 6 months of payments, you may get to drive it, but only roads predetermined by someone else while continuing to make the payments that go up and up for 10 years. Everyone who doesn't buy a car will be fined. Finally, when everyone has the same car on fewer and fewer roads, you can't really drive it much because the car company wouldn't allow more fuel to be harvested.

That is an accurate picture of the health care bill that has been built for us by the back room bribery of the self-serving know-nothing brokers of ObamaCare.

Originally posted on 3/19/10 4:03 PM

UPDATE: I'm happy to include this news release from Senator George LeMieux's (R-FL) office as further evidence that nothing the president or the Democrats have used as a sales pitch for their health care reform (HCR) is reliable.

The day the president signed this HCR into law may well be remembered as one of the darkest days of this country, where the completion of the central government's usurping of states' power and Americans' freedom is nearly complete. Next up: Immigration, followed by Cap and Trade.

Federal Power Grab

2010-04-01T09:58:00.007-04:00

The U.S. federal government has been sporadically taking power away from the 50 states and rights away from the people. They are doing this under the guise of "helping" Americans. This has been going on since at least 1935 with the introduction of the world's largest Ponzi scheme, Social Security. The facts are clear, every social program they have instituted has become more of a burden on the people more than anything else and is demonstrably unconstitutional. This also means that those who swore or affirmed to support and defend the United States Constitution are not. Either through intent or negligence, the elected class is undermining this country's basic reason for existing... Individual freedom.

I could go on and on about it, but the judge has the last word. In these three YouTube videos, Judge Napolitiano lectures on the natural rights of man, the Patriot Act and how it has unconstitutional elements and why we should not allow our representatives to get away with this. He also informs, in no uncertain words, on the how federal government politicians has been empowering themselves with programs that have never work as marketed.

This partial description is taken from Free The Nation's YouTube video posting - October 2nd, 2009 -

Judge Andrew Napolitano gives a speech from the heart about freedom and from where our rights come. The Judge explains the hard core truth about the Constitution and why we must fight to regain and retain our freedoms. Courtesy of www.CampaignForLiberty.com. Edited by FreeTheNation.com

These videos include a request for political support. You can simply turn off the Annotations to be rid of them.

Part One

Part Two

Part Three

The truth of Judge Napolitano's words are self evident.

Note: I am not affiliated with www.CampaignForLiberty.com or FreeTheNation.com.

ObamaCare Passes: Progressives Have Change.

2010-03-22T12:02:00.004-04:00

The US House of Representatives passed their health care reform legislation later last night. The progressives (i.e. liberals) have more of the change they have been looking for. They believe they are winners and are still using the GOP as a whipping kid.

Trying to share the blame, Nancy Pelosi said that "the vote may be partisan, but the bill is not as it has 300 Republican amendments". Of course she won't say what the GOP amendments are. That would allow Americans to verify her claim. But, since it's not true, and she is not truthful, we can take our cues from that.

With any luck, in November, we will replace many of these post-American politicians with some that will minimize the damage HCR will cause.

Titanic Pettiness, Thy Name is Joe Klein.

2010-03-16T13:14:00.008-04:00

Joe Klein, columnist for the Times magazine, reviews Karl Rove's new book titled Courage and Consequence. The title of Joe's column, "Karl Rove's Memoir: Act of Vengeance", tells us exactly where he is going.

I find it hard to believe that anyone who so loved Barack Obama would be as in-your-face with accusations of pettiness. In fact I would believe that the Democratic faithful, including members of the legacy media, would hold pettiness up as a virtue to be emulated rather than a character flaw. Pettiness has become hallmark and will be the legacy of the Obama administration.

Mr. Klein's complaint seems to be that another evil Republican is pointing out the fallacies and hypocrisies of the left and defending his own record. And if there is anything liberals cannot stand is a conservative defending him or herself, so the article spends time sort of re-correcting the record on a few items that liberals hold dear, such as weapons of mass destruction (WMD) in Iraq, and the Valerie Plame/Joe Wilson brouhaha. Both situations are misused by the left in America to portray Republicans and conservatives as evil, conniving, liars who only care about their own personal fortunes and profits for their "Wall Street fat cat" friends.

Many Democrats and all liberals believe that Iraq was a war of American imperialist aggression and therefore a "war of choice" by the naturally evil Republicans. Mr. Rove points out that not only did President Bush believe Iraq had WMD, so did most of the US Congress, including a majority of Democrats. Rove even names Democrats went before the microphones and declared their belief that Saddam did have WMD.

Of course, Mr. Klein absolves Democrats of any responsibility for the so called war of choice and accuses Mr. Rove of "titanic pettiness" for naming them. Klein takes particular offense when the green apostle, former VP Al Gore, is named as being outspoken in his belief that Iraq had WMD. For Mr. Klein, this is " a step too far", writing, "Gore, in fact, was making a wise argument".

Gore has wisdom. Rove is bitter. Why is that?

As we have learned, if there is anything a liberal columnist abhors it would be the use of facts when writing. He refers to Rove's researchers as "Rove's busy-beaver oppo researchers" as if working to be accurate is something to mock. With press like this, it's no wonder Barack Obama won the 2008 presidential election without revealing any detail about his plans. And what is an "oppo"?

ValerieGate

Legacy media opinion writers and columnists, such as and including Joe Klein, were no doubt highly disappointed that Karl Rove, Vice President Dick Cheney and others, were not charged with revealing Valerie Plame's secret identity or anything else they could dream upl. Never mind that he and they had no part in revealing her to a reporter.

Fact: We know that it was Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage who spoke to Robert Novak about the subject. There is and was no evidence of a Bush Whitehouse conspiracy to marginalize Clinton Ambassador Joe Wilson by "outing" and endangering Valerie Wilson (Plame). People like Mr. Klein simply cannot wrap their little brains around that fact. They refuse to believe there are any redeeming value to anyone who is not a liberal, progressive and/or Democrat.

It his his own pettiness that is on display by trying to rewrite history again. While calling Rove "less successful", Klein ends with,

"the crucial revelation here is that when you make a political consultant your senior policy adviser, spin supplants substance, oppo research rules and winning the news cycle becomes more important than winning the war."

I wonder if he criticized the Obama administration for the same thing?

Stop ObamaCare, Contact Your Senators and Representatives

2010-03-04T10:42:00.004-05:00

Writing to you congresspersons is a relatively easy process. Simply type their name and the word "contact" in your preferred search engine. Google with show a contact link is the search results.

Now that you are there, fill in the indentification information and do not forget to enter your email address if you would like a response from them.

When sending an email be sure you treat it as if you were sending a letter with the proper salutation, such Dear Senator Last name, be respectful if you are serious about getting a favorable result with your message, do not stray into more then one issue (or you risk confusing them), and end it with a respectful closing, such as, "Thank you for your service". Do this even if you did not vote for that person and especially if you do not like them at all. This will demonstrate ability to keep a level head when discussing issues that you care about deeply and especially if the issue presses your hot buttons.

These same rules apply when writing a letter to the editor of a newspaper, or even when responding to blogs. Some of the more open minded and progressive blogs, such as the Huffington Post, censor the comments and will remove anything that goes against their mindset, or the mindset of the author of the blog, using the excuse that you were using ad hominem attacks or other distractions that they willing allow when the object is someone or some organization that they don't like. Save the fun for your own blog.

Back to writing to your congressperson....

Here are examples of two different webmails I sent to my senators this morning.

The first one is to Senator Bill Nelson, a Democrat from Florida. I'm pretty sure he will vote for ObamaCare anyway, believing we will forget that he helped destroy the country by the time he runs for reelection.

Notice how I give my specific reasons why I do not want this legislation passed. And, while I may not have all my grammar and spelling correct, I sent it anyway because the issue is important to me and I believe that it is understandable.

Here goes....

Dear Senator Nelson,

I am very troubled this morning to learn that the US Congress is planning to force the president's version of health care insurance reform through congress while knowing that 73% of Americans are against it.

The problem isn't that we do not know enough about it, as we do know.

The problem is that experts agree this program, if enacted, would destroy all private sector health insurance companies and make all Americans dependent on the federal government for health care insurance.

With the Medicare cuts, it would destroy Medicare as well.

It cuts payments to doctors ensuring that there will be fewer doctors to provide services to the president's estimate 30 million additional patients while reducing the number of qualified researchers who discover all the wonderful innovations that have made America the envy of the entire world.

This one reason alone is why other countries can seemingly afford nationalized health care as we are paying for the research, not them. It is the same as they depend on us for their national defense and they only invest minimally in their own.

It increases the threshold of medical expense deductibility from 7.5% to 10% of the adjusted gross income, penalizing responsible Americas who pay for their own medical care and insurance.

Instead of lowering private sector insurance premiums, it would cause a large increase due to:

- having fewer paid customers (who will be moving to the government's plan),.

- making up the difference of lower government mandated fees to doctors who would otherwise leave the profession due to their inability to earn a living.

- no relief from malpractice insurance ensures no relief from higher costs and higher fees that are passed on to the patients and their insurance company.

- mandatory coverage of pre-existing conditions means that people will not pay for insurance until they need it. This will drive costs even more as the only paying customers will be those who already require expensive treatments.

- this country is already dangerously in debt and this health care reform will make matters worse. The debt is responsible for devaluing the US dollar, down at least 16% in the last year. This also makes insurance more expensive.

Government mandated purchasing of insurance by working Americans will fail the Constitutionality test as this kind of intrusion has never been the within the authority of the federal government.

This bill makes no sense to working Americans and needs to be stopped before it can further ruin this country.

The government is constituted to represent the will of and by the consent of the people. Poll after poll shows that most Americans do not want this bill. Passing it will surely cause voters to reconsider who they allow to be the majority party in congress during the next few election cycles when we know for a fact that will of the governed is being set aside for political gain in Washington.

There are better plans out there that need to be considered by rushing into national bankruptcy merely for the purpose of tallying up a win in the president's corner.

Thank you for your service.

I also wrote to our other senator, George LeMieux, Republican - Florida.

Dear Senator LeMieux,

While I am very sure that you will be voting against this health care reform package, I would like to reiterate my opposition to it. This makes me in agreement with at least 73% of Americans who are against it, knowing that it would be a huge unwieldy mess and that there are many more common sense way to help uninsured Americans to receive proper health care. Most of those ways are listed in the GOP's health care reform web site.

I also want to thank you for your service to this country and the Great State of Florida and I hope that you will consider a run office at the end of this term.

Sincerely yours.

Please note that the letter to the "friendly" senator is much shorter than the one I sent to Senator Nelson. I've written to both before on this issue and while Senator LeMieux's response agrees with mine, while Senator Nelson's only reiterated the party talking points.

When you right a letter, you do not need to include all the reasons your are for or against some issue or policy. Just letting them know your position on the issue is normally enough. Besides, I doubt they (or a staffer, most likely) will not have the time or inclination to read it all. That is the reason I put my request, vote NO, in the subject line of the mail. When the staffer sees the subject, the point is already made.

Finally, I tried to write to my Representative, Vern Buchanan, after writing to my senators, but it seems as if his web page is overloaded and would not display. I'm sure he is on the same side of this issue as I am, so I may try again later or simply trust him to do the right thing. (What a concept).

Punxsutawney Phil: Six More Weeks of Global Warming

2010-02-12T12:10:00.003-05:00

Punxsutawney Phil saw his shadow on February 2nd, 2010. This means we will have 6 more weeks of global warming, er, I mean Winter. That statement may seem odd at first glance, but once you look into it a little, it makes perfect sense.

The religion of Global Warming, re-branded as "Global Climate Change" (you know, a CYA in case the temperatures move in other directions). Well it has. While some scientists are reporting that global temperatures have been on a cooling trend for the last decade or so, the AGW's are claiming it just a small cycle in the big picture. Just like they are saying now the the some areas of this country's 100 year snow storms and record cold spells are evidence of global warming. They ere the real deniers.

I believe in global climate change.

I also believe there is a profit motive behind the current global warming and I ain't buyin' it.

The Mighty Scott Brown: an Army of One

2010-01-27T15:22:00.004-05:00

Good News.

In a special election to fill the US Senate seat held for over four and a half decades by the dearly departed and Honorable Senator Ted Kennedy, a relatively unknown state politician in Massachusetts named Scott Brown, a Republican, is elected in the bluest blue state in the nation. He upsets the unbalance in the US Senate adding the 41st vote for the minority and ending the Democratic Party's filibuster proof, and out of control, 111th Congress. This apparently has put and end to the ill, and secretly, conceived Health Care Reform legislation, saving the country from certain bankruptcy.

Thank you Senator Brown, and thank you Massachusetts.

The Economy is Improving; What Happened and Why

2010-01-24T08:56:00.024-05:00

Let's talk about our current economic condition. I've been looking around and learned a few things I'd like to share.

I believe this recession (2008 through 2009), that some are calling the "Great Recession"* was caused by the federal government.

I was going to say that Wall Street "fat cats" helped as well, but I believe they were doing what everyone wanted them to do, maximize profits, follow the rules that the government imposes on them, and honor their contracts. This benefits everyone.

The reasons for the recession are multifaceted, but the prime mover in this debacle seems to be the FEC's Financial Accounting Standards Board's (FASB) modification their "mark to market" rules in Financial Accounting Standards (FAS) number 157, which forces investment firms to estimate and report the value of their holdings, for taxes, investor information and other purposes, to current market values. This makes sense on the surface, but if there is a market slow down, such as the subprime market hitting the skids, where their holdings cannot be easily liquidated, the value goes down.

In the subprime situation, many loans were adjustable rate loans and started adjusting upwards as the prime lending rate went up in mid 2004 through 2008. (Coincidence? I wonder if Mr. Bernanke had any part in this?)

Here is what I believe happened

A real estate bubble soars upward with easily available credit due in part to a low prime rate and subprime loans, peaking in 2006.

- By 2004 there were trillions of dollars in mortgages and investments in the subprime loan markets, backed by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, two "quasi governmental" organizations that guarantee the loans.

- The Federal Reserve increases the prime lending rate (money the Fed loans to banks and others) from 2.00% in 2001 to a peak of 6.25% in June of 2006.

- Throughout the same period, investment firms obtain and repackage mortgage loans into security derivatives and sell them to investors around the world and making profits all over the place. As long as the money is flowing, such as mortgage holders making their payments; no problem.

- Through 2006, subprime mortgage holders' payments increase with many doubling and tripling. Many who could just barely make their payments now cannot afford them and mortgage holders default and and banks foreclosure.

- In 2007 the housing market becomes saturated with over priced real estate. Many are denying that it is a serious problem.

- Investors who bought properties as investments, such as those who "flip" them, find the market flooded and real estate values are tanking. They start walking away from the debt.

- New terms, "illiquid", "toxic Assets" and "derivatives" become every day words in the general American population.

- In September 2007, the Federal Reserve starts lowering the prime lending rates.

- FASB tightens the asset estimation and reporting requirements of FAS 157. They became effective for businesses with fiscal years beginning after November 15, 2007. Under the stricter requirements, firms that invested in these toxic assets, had to report the loss of billions of dollars is their assets.

- Over 100 companies fold due to the now illiquid assets they were stuck with.

- Markets around the world that invested in these (once) high yield derivatives lose capital causing a panic in our federal government. (if those countries fail, who will loan this government more money?) Representative Barney Frank (D-NY) runs around denying it was his fault.

- The federal government start picking winners and losers in the financial services and investment companies. While loaning funds to some financial institutions, the government decides not to assist Lehman Brothers Holdings, Inc., the competitor to Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson's former employer, Goldman-Sachs (GS). GS, who turned a profit from the subprime meltdown, would later receive $12.9 Billion in bailout funds from the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP).

- In September 2008, Secretary Paulson pushed for bailouts of $700 Billion (TARP) to shore up the now almost defunct financial markets in this country and abroad. He got it done and President Bush signed it.

- American International Group, Inc. (AIG) receives Bailouts totaling $122.8 billion by the end of 2008, with more to follow. Nobody can say where the money went.

- The Obama pre-administration complains about executive bonuses being paid by companies that received taxpayer hope dollars.

- General Motors (GM) is laying off employees; In 2008 GM was down 13,000 salaried employees since 2000 & 40,000 hourly jobs are gone since 2006 (NY Times). They were closing plants and reporting that they will not have enough operating capital to pay their employees and creditors. Along with Ford and Chrysler, they are asking for a bailout. GM received $9.4 Billion in December 2008 (CNN Money), and more bailout money was to come.

- As businesses fail, being unable to secure funds to continue to operate due to a "bad banking environment", millions around the world became unemployed. This causes more foreclosures, lost homes and lost investments, many of these investments were retirement accounts. Many who were planning to retire now must continue to work (if they can find a job).

- In March 2009 President Obama says he does not want to run the automobile industry, but fires GM CEO Rick Wagoner (Politico), tells GM what vehicles to produce, and insists that GM downsize, destroying thousands of jobs. GM totals 40,000 more layoffs for 2009 alone (LA Times).

- In March 2009 President Obama instructs GM on how to run its business or he will cut off the bailout funds (Business Week).

- GM files for chapter 11 protection under the bankruptcy laws after receiving bailout funds several times, being nationalized the President of the United States. The federal government then claimed a sizable percentage of GM stock and gave the remaining stock to the UAW.

The net result of the change to FAS and the failure to properly mange Fannie and Freddie: subprime market crash, stock market crash, housing market crash, worldwide recession, the loss of millions of jobs, millions lose their homes, and the US Deficit is tripled with hope dollars. Our government nationalizes some banking and automobile manufacturers, acting like 1959 Cuba or 1971 Venezuela, and the list goes on.

This is how we find ourselves trying to climb out of a recession in 2010. The mortgages that were "owned" during this period had their values drop as much as 50 percent making them "upside down', meaning investors and home owners owed more than the property was worth. Many investors and owners started walking away from this bad debt. The debt was guaranteed by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, two quasi-governmental entities that now held trillions of dollars in debt from these loans.

The good news

Realizing what they have done (primarily from the discussions of Steve Forbes) but continuing to blame former President Bush, they changed the mark to market rules last April (FAS -157, 2009), easing the rules and stabilizing market prices and the economy is improving.

This is why I am of the opinion that the US Congress caused and allowed this recession through...

- handing off the power to regulate markets to the FEC, who produced poorly thought out market rules instituted with their failure in the Enron debacle in mind.

- decades of intimidating financial institutions to give loans to people who in all likelihood would be able to make the payments for very long.

- turning their backs on the indicators (from as far back as 1998) and prompts from the Bush administration to reign in Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac hopefully before it became too late. Committees refused to hear the advice, senators promised filibusters if any interference with their plans to lend money in an exceptionally risky manner, with charges of racism and other bogus claims to prevent any change to the status quo (which is ironic as now, while in the majority, the Democrats are labeling the Republicans as the "party of no").

Hey, maybe we should give the health care insurance industry to a board or commission created by these guys. What could go wrong?

Notes

*No doubt trying to equate it to the actual Great Depression to bypass President Carter's "great recession"

Kudos to Lanny Davis, Mostly...

2010-01-21T09:23:00.005-05:00

I have to admit that I really do not care for many lawyers, especially those who help move the liberal agenda along with (what I consider) frivolous lawsuits. Lanny Davis, former special counsel to President Clinton, has earned new respect from me. He has written an editorial published at the Wall Street Journal's online edition where he takes America's progressives/leftists to task and blames them for the successful campaign of Senator Scott Brown (R, Massachusetts) . Read it HERE.

He rightly informs progressives that they did not lose due to a poorly run campaign by Democrat Martha Coakley as they claim. Instead they lost because of the message. That is one in a row for Mr. Davis.

Mr. Brown ran his campaign on stopping ObamaCare. That was the message. Mr. Brown knew, as did the voters, that ObamaCare is very similar to the universal health care program former Governor Romney signed into law. The voters did not like it, as the polls proved.

But my praise for Mr. Davis is short lived as he goes on to confuse the issue in the fashion of defense lawyers and especially lawyers supporting Democratic tax and spend programs . He says,

"According to polls, fears about the Democrats' health-care proposal played a prominent role in Mr. Brown's victory yesterday. In the last several months, the minority congressional Republicans have dominated the message on health care—and stamped on the Democratic Party the perception that we stand for big government, higher taxes, and health insecurity when it comes to Medicare."

While voters do fear the Democrats' completely partisan, bribe ridden, country busting, freedom destroying, health care plan, it was not because Republicans, congressional or otherwise, "dominated the message" and branded the Democratic Party as standing for big government, higher taxes, and health insecurity.

The fact is that the Democrats in government and in the news have earned the label of standing for big government, higher taxes, and health insecurity. They did not need Republicans to create this persona. They did it themselves.

And contrary to Mr. Davis' point of view, if the GOP had been dominating the news with their message, why it that only a very few know that the GOP had offered an alternative health care reform (HCR) plan? HERE

Did you even know that there is one? It's been around for almost a year now. And there are others from the GOP. The excuse used when anyone mentions the failure to report his newsworthy item is that the GOP is the minority and plan would go nowhere anyway, so why bother? Even O'Reilly from Fox News Channel makes this excuse.

Folks such as Mr. Davis routinely accuse the GOP of being the "party of no" in some Orwellian psychosis where they project their own MO at their opponents, while being careful to omit that there is an opposing plan, preventing Republicans from offering amendments to HCR

It is a well known fact that the legacy media (broadcast news such as ABC, NBC, CBS, & major newspapers), consist mostly of registered Democrats (85% at last count) and still enjoy the vast majority of viewers and readers. Much more than the few balanced or conservative radio and cable news and news talk shows. That being so, the legacy media always support their people in the Democratic Party and in government as much as they can get away with. This is the reason that many believe that the GOP have no plans, are undercutting HCR, and are only trying to prevent Democrats from doing anything for purely partisan reasons.

But Lanny does not stop here. He continues with a thorough rewrite of history. He injects a small truth, then lets the creative juices flow. He shows anyone who is paying attention that he cannot be trusted to be truthful on any subject.

In revamping President Clinton's re-election win, he states,

"He did so by creating a new ideological hybrid for a still-progressive Democratic Party: balanced-budget fiscal conservatism, cultural moderation, and liberal social programs administered by a "lean and mean government." This New Democrat combination appealed to Ross Perot independents concerned about deficits, and also to traditional Republican suburbanites who were culturally moderate on issues like abortion and gay rights but opposed to high taxes and wasteful, big-government bureaucracy."

President Clinton did no such thing. He was against the GOP's budgets, which brought him kicking and screaming to balance then surplus (for what it's worth). There nothing lean about government when he repeatedly (3 times) refused to sign a welfare reform act (beginning of the term "party of no") until one of his marketing agents warned he'd lose the election.

FYI Mr. Davis. "Liberal social programs" cannot be administered by a "lean and mean government." The two are polar opposites and are totally incompatible.

Mr. Davis,

"Then, in 2008, Barack Obama added something extra: a commitment to a "new politics" that transcended the "red" versus "blue" partisan divide."

I'm sorry, but Mr. Obama may have such an idea in his heart and may be able to articulate his well thought out marketing speeches, but he has yet to implement any such transition, paying only lip service to those high ideals.

"Obama's health-care proposal did not include a public option;"

You may call semantics if you like, but candidate Obama repeatedly professed suport for a single payer health care plan. A rose by any other name is still the public option.

"Bottom line: We liberals need to reclaim the Democratic Party with the New Democrat positions of Bill Clinton and the New Politics/bipartisan aspirations of Barack Obama"

I, as a conservative, can only hope and pray that Democrats are more open about their liberal ideology. As it is now, they hide behind the terms used by moderates when they are not moderate at all. If they follow your plan, Mr. Davis, they will finally come out of the closet and let the voters know who they truly are. Then we could vote for our representatives as opposed to the representatives of the Democratic Party or the Republican Party or the well monied special interests.

If Mr. Davis wants to find the real partisans, simply get a mirror.

David Axelrod: Wrong on Wrong.

2010-01-15T16:29:00.027-05:00

Mr. Axelrod, President Obama's Senior Adviser, has written a article designed to ridicule his opposition and confuse the electorate titled, "What Karl Rove got wrong on the U.S. deficit" at the Washington Post. According to his writing, he and others, including Carl Rove, were invited by the Washington Post for a sort of brainstorming session. Mr. Axelrod seems to only taken way this...

"Of all the claims Rove made, one in particular caught my eye for its sheer audacity and shamelessness -- that congressional Democrats "will run up more debt by October than Bush did in eight years."

He then starts in with a revisionist view of recent history that excludes important information (an effect of tunnel vision) and fills it in with his self-serving version.

I saw this opinion piece referenced on the Huffington Post and could not resist calling Mr. Axelrod on his deliberate misuse of the facts and his attempt at rewriting history. The HPost only allows 250 words to be posted by the rabble (me) when they don't delete them altogether. So, I've revised and continued my rant here.

Here is how it went with more...

Dear Mr. Axelrod.

I want to thank you for revealing the true nature of our current government. Orwell’s characters surely have nothing on you and the rest of the White House's leadership. You have taken a modicum of truth and twisted the facts completely out of reality. The way you write them has little relation to the real story.

Let’s try to set the record straight.

So first, from what I've seen so far not many in the White House today know how the US government lawfully operates or even have a fundamental knowledge of the US Constitution. You will have to understand how our government is supposed to work according to the written and agreed to US Constitution. Recall that the government is in place to serve the people with power on loan from them, not to serve any politician or their advisers, cabinet members or anyone holding public office.

Quickly: Congress appropriates, the executive branch spends what the congress allows them (you) to spend. Both branches, along with the third branch, the US Supreme Court, are supposed to "support and Defend the Constitution of the Unites States." Simple, really. You will see how this is important very shortly.

You continue...

"The day the Bush administration took over from President Bill Clinton in 2001, America enjoyed a $236 billion budget surplus -- with a projected 10-year surplus of $5.6 trillion."

Pop quiz, class: Who did the appropriating? (This means gathering up the funds from various sources to be spent in the service all Americans

Answer: The Republican controlled congress.

Bill Clinton didn't spend a dime that was not appropriated by congress, revealing that they, not just the president, are responsible for the surplus.

But President Clinton also left office with the country in a recession. Your party quickly turned it into an Orwellian campaign slogan claiming President Bush "caused" it. No really. During the campaign of 2000, pundits were echoing Democrat strategist talking points, specifically, they claimed Bush was "talking down the economy" when he mentioned that the economy was slowing down.

This makes me wonder if the Democrats haven't been talking down the war and costing lives. Harry Reid on Iraq 2006, "This war is lost". But I digress.

The Bush Administration inherited a recession (Washington Post), followed with the extremist Muslims finally proving that they were at war with us on 9/11/2001. Something they (Islamic extremists) have known since 11/04/1979.

These two big issues, war and recession, along with the US Congress are the major cause of the deficits, not Bush’s economic policies. In fact Bush's tax policies reversed the recession and produced real GDP growth every year after 2001 until the 2008 when the congressional banking/mortgage/securities/illiquid assets crash and burn began its meltdown.

The funny thing is that President Bush, a truly classy individual, did not blame his predecessor for the recession and other problems. And doesn’t call Obama, and you, on your blame game.

Your "fiscal irresponsibility” remark misses the mark.

It was the regulations, or lack there of, produced by the US Congress that was "laissez-faire", with Rep. Barney Frank claiming that Fannie and Freddie were "fundamentally sound" and said Bush's proposals to fix them were "inane". Then after the fall in 2008 he voted for those changes. I would say that no one was watching AIG or the others, but somehow, I know that's not true. It seems the tax and spenders always have on eye on profit makers so they can tax and spend more. In his budget report in April of 2001, Bush asserted that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were "too large and over-leveraged" (Rove, WSJ) , but was shut down by Democrats in congress. Recall that the US Senate during President Bush's administration was not filibuster proof and Chris Dodd (D-Con) said the Bush recommendations were "ill advised" successfully filibustered any changes. In 2008 Senator Dodd supported the same changes.

Your next whopper,

"deepest economic catastrophe since the Great Depression",

is another fabrication. Unemployment is at 10+%, inflation is 0% (supposedly), and growth is stalled, but slowly coming up in the third quarter of 2009.

The truth is the current Obama/Democrat led congress-owned recession is the worst since the Carter "malaise" of the late 1970's, with double digit unemployment, inflation and mortgage rates. The Great Depression was much worse where FDR kept the unemployment rate at 14-21% throughout most of his 3 administrations (see chart HERE). The financial market "crisis" of 2008 is nowhere near as troublesome as Carter's or FDR's Great Depression.

In more classic subterfuge, you say,

“Economists across the political spectrum agreed that to deal with this crisis and avoid a second Great Depression, the government had to make significant investments to keep our economy going and shore up our financial system.”

And that’s where you lose my confidence in government's ability to handle economic issues. The president should see this as a clear learning moment to stop interfering with the free market system. The government had to do something, but it wasn’t obligating $700 Billion to hand over to the former employers of Secretary Paulson (Goldman-Sachs) among other supporters. The money that this country does not have I now refer to as “Hope Dollars”, as everyone hopes that the program will work, and they hope that America’s lenders won’t cut off the spigot and politicians hope they won't get the blame when it doesn't work. I had also thought that federal level politicians hoped that it would also get paid back. But I now know, after the next grotesque abuse of the US Constitution known as “American Recovery and Reinvestment Act“ where you obligated another $787 Billion that you do not have in pork programs, that no one in the White House or the majority in congress are concerned about it at all.

You,

“Obama administration's rigorous stewardship added transparency and accountability…”

What!

We know, from watching the US Congress that no one in government knows what the word “stewardship” means (back to laissez-faire attitudes). And as for transparency; I'm afraid that there is a disconnect between the dictionary meaning of the term and the Obama White House definition. The president of "change" has changed nothing except running up the national debt and running down confidence in America.

The textbook examples of Orwellian speech continue under your,

“At the same time, we also recognize that we need to address the long legacy of overspending in Washington.That is why, shortly after taking office, Obama instructed his agency heads to go through the budget page by page, line by line, to eliminate what we don't need to help pay for what we do."

What! Again.

Sure, you called for it, but you have no one who is capable of deciphering it even if it were fairly accurate. None of the president’s economists, nor even the president, have any real world experience. None have worked in the private sector in their adult life. Exactly how would anyone in the White House know how to address the economy in a helpful way? (I guess I’m being Orwellian now. You may be able do it in a helpful way, but the only help would go to the Obama administration.)

We know that spending was a problem and the President read his plan to us. Then he followed the speech by obligating another $420 Billion in hope dollars in March. He must have a short memory.

More...

"As a start, the president proposed billions of dollars in cuts, and he'll continue to fight for them and others in the upcoming budget."

Yes, Billions in cuts from Medicare, Medicaid and the defense budget. I seem to recall the demonization of Speaker Newt Gingrich when he spoke of, but tried to implement, a program to reduce the overhead in Medicare, characterizing it as "withering on the vine". Democrats grabbed this single phrase and turned it into 'evil Gingrich wants to end Medicare and Medicaid' when no such thing was recommended. Where are these people now that the President wants to cut over $500 Billion from Medicare in actual cuts.

And...

"Obama had been more successful in getting his proposed cuts through Congress than his predecessor was in any of his eight years in office."

Of course he did. President Obama had a filibuster proof majority in the US Senate and a majority in the US House of Representatives. President Bush did not have this luxury.

Mr. Axelrod says that the president has insisted that the health care reform not add to the deficit, but their is ample evidence that a smoke and mirror subterfuge is going on here. First the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) says it will add a trillion dollars to the deficit, even with Medicare cuts. They cannot have that, so in a show of totalitarian power, the president calls the nonpartisan CBO head into his office and miraculously, the same reform plan will really reduce deficits by $132 billion.

And this...

"But the course correction that was so badly needed after the previous administration has begun in earnest."

You know, it become so common place for this administration to continuously blame anyone they can (other than themselves) including the previous administration, so-called greedy CEO's and "Wall Street Fat Cats", for those things that go wrong that it is expected. And most all of it as a consequence of government's meddling in areas they know nothing about.

One of the first rules of leadership is to take responsibility for one's actions. This president and his followers absolutely will not accept any responsibility for the state of this union.

As I've noted above, it is the US Congress that spends the money. They are mostly responsible for the deficits and the national debt. This president was a member of the congress that voted to spend all that money on wars, Medicaid, Medicare, the executive departments and on bailing out US and foreign banking and investment institutions, from 2007 to his inaugural. He was part of the majority that did not try reign in Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, even though they had the power to do so. Even previous congresses wouldn't take on Fannie and Freddie. All of your blaming Bush and others is nothing more than an attempt at slight of hand, to redirect the voters attention away from the real perpetrators: the US Congress. I have to tell you, it does not work and makes the president look amateurish.

But it is not all bad. I believe the president should have his own agenda and at times it may be at odds with the congress. This is how President Reagan ended up with deficits. He had an agenda and the US Congress had their agenda. The word of the decade was "compromise". Reagan took responsibility for the deficits on his watch, as did Presidents George H.W. Bush, William J. Clinton and George W. Bush. None of them blaming their predecessor for the problems that were theirs to solve. They had leadership abilities and did compromise with each other. This president and this congress will not.

Obama is trying make a major shift from our market based economy to a government owned and operated economy and he along with the Democrat controlled congress are spending borrowed money at a breath taking rate.

The bottom line is Karl Rove is correct. The congressional Democrats "will run up more debt by October than Bush did in eight years." Heck, they already have.

NPR: Learn To Speak Tea Bag

2010-01-07T06:05:00.011-05:00

Mark Fiore of MarkFiore.com creates juvenile, uninformed, flash cartoons. Some his most popular include "Gun Crazy", and Gringo Guns, has a created another flash cartoon, titled "Learn To Speak Tea Bag", that reveals the sense of humor and intelligence level of Progressives everywhere. Its title implies that it is going to teach Progressives to understand what Tea Party protesters, fondly referred to as "Tea Baggers", are saying.

One of the first lines in the 'toon, shows a poor schlub trying to handle the big words like "health insurance reform", "negotiate drug prices", "expense caps" and "public option". Our poor schlub tries to discuss the public option and degrades quickly into his apparent last resort, "socialist". He tries other complicated topics and falls into "socialist" again. The poor sapp, eh? Funny, eh?

Maybe not.

The cartoon relies on the Democrat strategy of attempting to marginalize and devalue a sector of the electorate that does not agree with their ideas. And, since they have no solid evidence or history to back their expensive hair-brained schemes, they must rely on lies, redirecting attention and emotion to get any support at all.

NPR decided it would be a good idea to give Mr. Fiore a soapbox on their website. But Mr. Fiore's opinion piece struck my funny bone. Why funny? Read it. He is blowing his own horn in the third person. It's as if he's referring to some other person as a "guru". Too funny.

Small note: I wonder if the president was referring to the Tea Party protesters (T PP) when he said people were getting upset a "pee peeing on everything".

Janet From Another Planet Redeux

2009-12-28T18:44:00.010-05:00

I watched Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Janet Napolitano say that the

"The system has worked really very, very smoothly over the course of the past several days" (Read it HERE)

yesterday (Sunday) on “This Week” on ABC. She repeated her assurances on other Sunday news shows as well. Apparently she attributed the 'working' part to the passengers that subdued the "alleged" terrorist AFTER he set off his explosive device. The only part that worked in the favor of those passengers was the part where the device did not function as designed.

Today (Monday) is a new day with a new quote from Napolitano on NBC's Today Show.

"Our system did not work in this instance. No one is happy or satisfied with that. An extensive review is under way.” (see it below)

Apparently it's first things first with Janet: Getting correct quote into the airways before any other information is available. Of course, in accordance with current political philosophy, she can always "clarify" her remarks later. The Secretary seems more interested in political fallout than she is about actual security of the country and its people, or the truth. Much like the previous Janet, she is someone who has no demonstrated ability to accomplish the mission at hand.

Speaking of Janet reminds me of the last high ranking Democratic appointee who seemed to believe that international terrorism is a law enforcement problem. She was President Clinton's Attorney General, Janet Reno. Among Janet's many accomplishments were authorizing a SWAT-like raid on a family home in Miami to kidnap a 6 year old child from his family, ordering the burning of the Branch Davidian compound in Waco Texas, causing traffic problems around Florida in a red pickup truck, and addressing international terrorism against this country as a police problem as opposed to a military problem.

In order to support her political and operational position on terrorism, she sent her second in command Deputy Attorney General Jamie Gorelick, over to federal law enforcement and intelligence agencies, primarily the FBI, NSA, CIA and military intelligence, to inform them that communicating between intelligence agents and criminal investigators would hamper her law enforcement operations. The document signed by Ms. Gorelick, known as the "wall", instructed them stop all that communicating with each other concerning foreign investigations. Ms. Gorelick has gone to earn the title of "Mistress of Disaster".

This Janet (Napolitano, pictured left of Janet Reno) is following along in the pre-9/11 Clinton/Reno law enforcement mindset that not only made this country more vulnerable to terrorist attacks, some will argue that it invites and encourages them. This administration, like previous administrations, refuses to acknowledge that we are at war with Muslim extremists and have been since 1979 when our embassy in Tehran was invaded and occupied Iranian for 444 days.

It is my belief and the belief of many others, that Iran declared war on the western nations on that day and have been sending their shadow army of international terrorists to destroy their enemies since that time. From the Marine Barracks in Beirut to today's struggle in Afghanistan and around the world, terrorists and insurgents have been and are being supported with ammunition, funding and supplies that are used to kill our troops and civilians. That is why this is a war and not a "man caused disaster" (more Obama DHS tripe... geez).

It has been very clear to me from 1992 forward that the Democratic Party elites who have no clue about the effects and unintended(?) consequences of anything thing they do. Their mean spiritedness and hatred came boiling out when they lost control of the US House of Representatives in 1995 and it has not slowed down in all that time.

I have to admit that when I see the failure of virtually every liberal/progressive idea that has become the law of the land or an administrative policy, I just have to cringe and tell myself that it will only last 4 years. With any luck, a shorter time for this majority in the US Congress and the DHS secretary.

Are Republicans, Greens, Constitution, and other political parties so awful that you are willing to destroy this country's freedoms and safety to vote for the liberal Democrats? I ask because ultimately, it's the people's choice on the direction of this country and our own safety.

Get Health Reform Right: Anti Reform or Anti THIS Reform.

2009-12-11T12:28:00.009-05:00

Over at business insider.com they describe "Get Health Reform Right" (GHRR) as "an anti-reform group" in their article lambasting GHRR's method for gathering information. But that type of Orwellian speech has become common place in this government.

Wouldn't it be more accurate to describe them as "an anti-this reform group". I think so.

As for GHRR's methods, internet game money for taking a poll, it doesn't seem unreasonable to me when considering all the lobbyists and big money that is going into passing the damn thing (Obamacare). The thing that 70% of polled Americans are against. GHRR method doesn't cost anyone.

I am for reform, but specifically not this reform, and I fail to understand how anyone who has looked at any of it could support it in any way.

Here is what the current health care reform in the US congress does not do:

1. No tort reform (thank you lawyer lobby)

2. No income tax deductions for medical insurance (just the opposite)

3. No expanded area coverage to increase competition.

4. Does not lower insurance premiums.

5. Does not cover over 30 million uninsured. (the advertised target of reform*)

What it does do:

1. It cuts reimbursements to Medicare contracted doctors.

2. It adds a new income tax as a penalty for not acting the way the central government wants you to act.

3. This "reform" raises the before-you-can-claim-it deduction from 7.5% to 10%. Currently you can only claim medical expenses that are over 7.5% of your AGI (adjusted gross income).

5. Increases premiums for those who pay for their own insurance.

6. Influences employers to drop coverage.

7. Makes millions more Americans dependent on government instead of themselves.

Keeps the poor poor.

8. Stifles medical innovation.

9. Reduces the number of medical personnel per patient.

10 Slashes Medicare and Medicaid (except Medicaid in Louisiana and Nebraska).

11. Lowers the value of the US dollar thus making those products that Americans need, such as food, housing, clothing and transportation, more expensive and less affordable to lower and middle income Americans.

This healthcare reform is about bankrupting the middle class for generations to come in order to make them more dependent on the political class. The political class that promises to keep the "freebies"** coming.

*Much like TARP that was advertised as help for Americans to keep their homes and their retirement accounts, but did none of that. It only helped politicians and the CEOs that support them, the so-called "stimulus package" that did nothing for anyone except politicians and the Unions that support them, and Auto industry bailouts hat did nothing for anyone except politicians and the Unions that support them, the current US House and Senate Health care reform bills will do nothing for anyone other than politicians and the CEOs, unions, Big Pharma, and Big Insurance that support them (with lots of dollars). All the while it's going to cost you a fortune.

** More Orwell: There is nothing free about these "freebies". They will cost you your freedom, your earnings and your ability to make choices to guide your own life and those of your children.

GOP Health Care Alternative

2009-12-02T12:14:00.002-05:00

I would say "finally, a GOP plan". Except there have been GOP plans submitted along with all the Democratic Party health care reform plans and for many months now. The fact that many Americans do not know of these plans calls for investigations if you ask me (something ain't right in the legacy media). Even Fox News Channel doesn't report on the GOP's plan, and they are supposed to be slanted conservative.

It's their alternative to the the new, expanded and improved HR 3200, renamed to HR 3962. The big news here is that is saves $68 billion over 10 years rather spending an additional $3 Trillion as Democrat plan does. And it is a mere 219 pages, as opposed to the 2079 pages in the Pelosi bill.

It has become news since Nancy Pelosi has allowed the GOP plan to be brought to the floor and be voted on. Of course, she does not allow any amendments or debate, but still. This the first and only of around ten Republican plans that she has allowed. She reveals the new Democratic Party version of "bipartisan". You know, the bipartisanship and equality they demanded of the "mean spirited" and "corrupt" GOP in the US Congress when Democrats were swept out in 1995?

The GOP bill is titled, "Common Sense Health Care Reform and Affordability Act". Their summary can be read HERE.

The main points are: interstate competition zones, individual access to group rates (by forming groups), expansion of health savings accounts (HSA's), children can remain on parent's policy until age 25, tort reform, insurance companies must accept preexisting conditions and cannot drop customers who become expensively ill.

Of course, there are already some of these consumer protections in place where preexisting conditions are concerned. Employer based insurance programs allow preexisting after a waiting period (usually 6-12 months). This has been the law for many years (did you know that? I'll bet not). What needs to happen to improve the options for the insured is to make this law available to anyone who buys insurance, instead of just being available through employers.

What it lacks are removal of the 7.5% income tax penalty Americans are charged for getting sick (the Democrat bill raises it to 10%) and no income tax incentives for purchasing insurance.

The Democratic public option is compared to Medicare in application, but Medicare is bankrupt and has been broke for decades. Over 40% of Medicare's funding comes from the general revenue (Part B subsidized at 75%). The copays, payroll taxes and monthly premiums fall short. The government cannot pay for the Democrat plan nor should we want them to.

The GOP health care reform plan looks much better than the Democrat plan due to its lower cost and no individual penalties (Dems want to tap you for 2.5% of your taxable income). Their plan relies more on expanding markets rather than government subsidized, meaning taxpayer subsidized, health care that is the public option.

If you want health care insurance reform, I suggest getting behind the Republicans on this one.

The Government Health Care Makes to the Floor

2009-11-23T13:19:00.005-05:00

Last Saturday in a 60 (D) to 39 (R) vote, the US Senate in a rush to get a nationalized health care billed passed has moved their version of health care reform on to the floor of the US Senate for "debate", as they define it. These days debate mostly entails excluding opposing opinion. And certainly allowing no GOP amendments.

It was illuminating to see how blatant the Democrats are with their bribes and hypocracy, though. U.S. Senator Mary L. Landrieu (D-LA) received only $300 Million for her state (being called the Louisiana Purchase) for her vote. she'll vote for anything and is not afraid to brag about it. Another senator, one who railed against the public option, Senator Blanche Lincoln (D-AR), has been rolled it on as well. She made a wonderful speech in opposition to the public option and insisted she would not vote for a bill that included it, but voted to allow the bill with a public option still in it to go forward.

I honestly do not know how these people can look at themselves in the mirror each morning.

Fraudulent Green Revisited

2009-11-22T19:56:00.027-05:00

In my previous post (Fraudulent Green, August 2009) I made the case that CO2 is not the end of times monster that the leaders, worshipers and profiteers of the green agenda would have us believe. Now there is more information to encourage doubt about man made, or anthropogenic, climate change. Newly released ERBE satellite data analysis, exposed IPCC/CRU communications, Al Gore displaying his expansive knowledge of the Earth, and Copenhagen extravagances, add to the myth of man made global warming.

On August 26th of this year a report published by MIT climate scientist Richard Lindzen reveals CO2's the realistic effect on climate change. 15 years of satellite data indicates that more heat was radiated back out into space as is radiated into Earth's atmosphere. If that is true, how could the “greenhouse gas”, CO2, be warming the place up? Especially when it’s been cooling off for the last 11 years (Check it out).

Recently exposed emails between some of the high up muckety-mucks at the CRU, at the University of East Anglia, Norwich, England, and greenies from Pennsylvania State University show a concerted effort to maintain a man made climate change as a problem and massage the story line to maintain their global disaster scenario. They have been described as "gatekeepers" on global warming information. In the Washington Times editorial, "Hiding evidence of global cooling", they expose Professor Phil Jones, the head of the Climate Research Unit and professor Michael E. Mann at Pennsylvania State University for willfully altering information and are accused of destroying original raw data to prevent any peer review of their "science".

Update: It seems Prof. Jones has stepped down while an investigation goes forward.

Also, in researching for any peer reviewed studies on climate change, I came across this gem.

BEYOND THE IVORY TOWER: The Scientific Consensus on Climate Change, by Naomi Oreskes (Science, 3 December 2004). It is an article in Science Magazine posted online and it starts out discussing peer reviewed, or refereed, climate studies. She says,

"The scientific consensus is clearly expressed in the reports of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)."

And,

"In recent years, all major scientific bodies in the United States whose members' expertise bears directly on the matter have issued similar statements."

And,

" Others agree. The American Meteorological Society, the American Geophysical Union, and the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) "

This called "Argument from authority" or "appeal to authority" and is a logical fallacy that relies on the perceived knowledge of those commenting on a subject that it must be true.

(an aside: This reminds me of watching the President's economic advisers on Meet the Press. They are the authority on economics as demonstrated by their degrees and awards, and yet not a single one of them has had any practical experience in real world economics. They are academics. Just watch the economic policies that come out of this bunch and its effects on the economy for a general idea of how these things may work.)

On first blush, one might think the thousands of scientists who are in agreement had conducted scientific reviews before they came to their conclusion. Ms. Oreskes refers to 928 peer reviewed climate change studies as proof of the science's validity. But she does not mention whether any had access to any raw data. Data that the exposed IPCC/CRU communications indicate may have been destroyed. The author cites the IPCC as the source of the data. And of course we know that the IPCC gets data from Climate Research Unit (CRU).

I problem I see is the claim (from the recently published CRU communications) that they have resisted releasing years of "raw data" and reports are circulating that the good people at CRU have destroyed that data.

So I ask;

How can a scientific conclusion be peer reviewed if the peers doing the reviewing do not have access to the raw data?

In a sane world, just these would be the end of the story for the entire green movement. But, somehow, I doubt that will happen. Many are invested in green as it has become a trendy new-age guiltist religion. We only need listen to its oracle, Al Gore, and his disdainful looks down his nose if someone should be so blasphemous as to challenge his holy word. And as I've mentioned, it's a green cash cow.

Update: They opened the Copenhagen Climate summit with a nice video...

They aren't trying to scare people are they??

I suppose the must use scare tactics to gain support from the great masses of non-scientists who they need to implement their agenda. After all you and I should not be riding around in SUVs, pick up trucks or limousines. And far too many people are flying around in private jets when commercial air is much more cost efficient. The delegates employed "1,200 limos, 140 private planes" (UK Telegraph). And don't forget the "caviar wedges".

Update: Noted suedo-scientist and Nobel Laureate, former VP Al Gore Jr. reveals why he does not accept offers to debate climate change with challengers on the Tonight Show with Conan O'Brian. While discussing geothermal energy, Mr. Gore states that,

"People think about geothermal energy - when they think about it at all - in terms of the hot water bubbling up in some places, but two kilometers or so down in most places there are these incredibly hot rocks, 'cause the interior of the earth is extremely hot, several million degrees, and the crust of the earth is hot..."

OK, Big Al. I understand that you believe that human beings are causing this planet's temperature to rise, but is it really matching the temperature of our Sun? Maybe Al should do a little more research on his pet moneymaker before he ruins it for all the green weenies.

The green agenda defined: A cabal of self-serving self-styled intellectual elitists successfully acquiring fame, power and wealth, at the expense of all others and most especially, from the USA. Their methods include fear mongering, misinformation, exaggerations, falsified reports, the exclusion of relevant data concerning Earth's environmental systems and the steadfast refusal to debate anyone on their so called science. Climate change has had many an entrepreneur take up cause in the name of politically correct profit. It is now a $120 Billion per year industry according to an article on CNN.

Short rant:

These are the people who tell you that capitalism makes your world unfair and preach about stopping "Wall Street greed", while using fear to gain support for their own capitalistic schemes (such as the Chicago Climate Exchange). I fail to understand why educated adult Americans continue to support these people.

End of Rant.

More information for skeptics like me.
Climate Change, NIPCC
Waxman-Markey Global Warming Bill, by Karen Campbell, Ph.D. and David Kreutzer, Ph.D. Web Memo #2504
Climategate: An Opportunity to Stop and Think, by Joseph Bast
EPA Finds That Greenhouse Gases Threaten Public, By Coral Davenport, Mon Dec 7, 2:14 pm ET
The Climategate Fiasco by Steven Novella, Dec 07 2009

Imagration: Sanctuary Cities Are Illegal

2009-11-22T13:37:00.001-05:00

Many cities in the United States of America are in direct violation of their own oaths of office when they declare their city to be so-called "sanctuary cities". They have adopted ordinances that prevent their police and other city employees from inquiring about a person's immigration status.

According to Wikipedia, there 31 sanctuary cities in the USA. Some of these cities

"are Washington, D.C.; New York City; Los Angeles; Chicago; San Francisco; Santa Ana; San Diego; Salt Lake City; Phoenix; Dallas; Houston; Austin; Detroit; Jersey City; Minneapolis; Miami; Denver; Baltimore; Seattle; Portland, Oregon; New Haven, Connecticut; and Portland, Maine."

So, how can this be a violation the law?

ANS: The mayors of all cities in this country and all states sign on to the US Constitution and in their oath of office, they proclaim it.

Oaths of office read ( in part):

"I, ______, do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States"

Using California's Oath of office it goes on to say,

"Public officer and employee" includes every officer and employee of the State, including the University of California, every county, city, city and county, district, and authority, including any department, division, bureau, board, commission, agency, or instrumentality of any of the foregoing."

Each and every police officer, officer of the court, and most especially these mayors, have sworn, or affirmed, to uphold the law of the United States. Under the United States law, entering the country without documentation and without permission is illegal. It is ilegal all of the time and everywhere within our borders and in our embassies in other countries.

So, how is it that they can declare their cites "sanctuary cities" in violation of their oath and claim any real or moral authority? No one calls them on it.

I have to wonder sometimes what would have happened if I violated the oaths I took when I enlisted in the US Army. No, I don't wonder, I know exactly what would happen. Fort Leavenworth would happen.

These violations of the law continue today with virtually no one taking these elected public officials to task for violating their oath of office. Political correctness rules these days and has much more weight than honor, self respect and morality. How can any public official insist that anyone believe them when they are perfectly happy to violate their word and the law.

Mayor Newsom of San Francisco has recently acquired some common sense, for which he is paying, moved away from his previous position of supporting sanctuaries due to the murderous acts of Edwin Ramos, who is an illegal alien from EL Salvador and member of Mara Salvatrucha (MS-13, a street gang). His city council still insists on keeping the policy and voted to keep it.

Hypocrisy of the Left

2009-10-26T09:16:00.002-04:00

We have been hearing the tired old tale from the left about grass roots political movements they claim are really organized the power players and pundits of the political right. So these political machinations must be a horrible thing to engage in.

Surprise! The Left, organized and led by White House insiders are now using their power for "Organizing for America". They are cruising around the country looking for and publishing stories from a few unfortunate souls they find in an effort to sell health care reform.

Isn't this a bit hypocritical? The whining and inventing of story lines claiming that the Tea Party movement and other anti-ObamaCare rallies are the product of a duped populace by high powered GOP'ers, while they flagrantly and proudly participate in that very same behavior?

And while they are at it, they (again) will not add any factual interpretation of the HR 3200, the Baucus bill or any any other iterations of there legislation's consequences. They can only use the politics of personal destruction (which the left invented) to abuse and brow beat opponents of their causes.

President Obama Signs on to UN Censorship

2009-10-22T12:20:00.006-04:00

USA Today's Jonathan Turley notes on his blog that we, the USA, through the current administration, have agreed to something he calls "blasphemy laws", saying

"While attracting surprisingly little attention, the Obama administration supported the effort of largely Muslim nations in the U.N. Human Rights Council* to recognize exceptions to free speech for any "negative racial and religious stereotyping." The exception was made as part of a resolution supporting free speech that passed this month, but it is the exception, not the rule that worries civil libertarians. "

It is a story worth reading, along with the references to other articles, blogs, and opinion pieces and the actions that have been taken under this sort of fear (of Muslims) UN regulation.

This sort of censorship is a very bad thing. And not because it mostly supports Islamic fundamentalism (another bad thing). But because it is yet another step in demonizing, or even criminalizing, personal beliefs.

In a sort of backwards way, Mr. Turley reveals part of the administrations true intent by including among his examples, an incident where...

"In Canada, the Alberta human rights commission punished the Rev. Stephen Boission and the Concerned Christian Coalition for anti-gay speech, not only awarding damages but also censuring future speech that the commission deems inappropriate."

Since homosexuality is not a religion, how is it "blasphemous" for a Canadian minister to write a letter to the editor conveying his religious beliefs by highlighting the church's position on the homosexual agenda. (National Review Online) (Read the decision here)

The last time I looked, homosexuality was not a religion.

Mr. Turley summarizes with...

"However, the fear is that, when speech becomes sacrilegious, only the religious will have true free speech."

That may not be accurate when you consider that in the case (above) as the religious belief is being punished.

So, it isn't so much about censoring so called blasphemous speech against religion. It is about censoring speech that any particular group or individual determines is unacceptable. Commonly known as the exact opposite of free speech.

The sad part is that the Obama administration supports such un-American censorship. It lets you know that the "Real change you can believe in" has little to do with the American way of life.

Moveon.org Wants the Public Option

2009-10-21T16:44:00.013-04:00

Moveon.org wants a public health care option. They have enlisted actress Heather Graham to sell the public option (PO) to Americans. It depicts Ms. Graham as a sprinter and the private sector insurance (Big Health Care) as a bunch of fat n' happy lallygagers, filling up on donuts at our expense. The race starts and Ms. Graham pulls ahead but Big Health Care (BHC) catches up after a while. I interpret this to mean that with the the public option, BHC will adjust down to the new premium rates imposed by big government (BG).

While the PO may be preparing for a race, it will be a race to the death of private sector health insurance and a sprint to national bankruptcy.

As Dennis Miller said many years ago (paraphrasing here), "there comes a time when these countries, such as China, say 'wait a minute, what about that other $100 billion you owe us. We gotta have something, my friend."

Of course that will not happen. What will happen is BHC will die a quick death, as Moveon, Democrats in government and the legacy media want to happen in favor of a European style single payer system.

In the video they also want us to know that 70% of Americans also want to be PO'd. Of course that is misleading in a big way.

An October 23rd, 2009, Rasmussan poll shows,

"Forty-nine percent (49%) of voters nationwide say that passing no health care reform bill this year would be better than passing the plan currently working its way through Congress." (which includes being PO'd)

But lying is a trait that liberals admire. (See Clinton, William, US President)

Rasmussan also points out,

"One reason that Democrats have been careful to distinguish between their reform plan and a single-payer system is that just 32% favor single-payer health care while 57% are opposed."

Honesty can't win it for them.

Once again, Moveon.org is barking up the socialist tree and using lies and distractions to move their agenda on. Another reason to oppose being PO'd and another reason to disregard this commercial.

The video...

Why Stimulus Did Not Work: Economic Advisers

2009-09-22T17:00:00.001-04:00

First, I must say a few words about the current recession as the president's programs are directly related.

This recession was caused by the US Congress. There no doubt about that fact. It was a multistage, multi-year bipartisan effort. They refused to alter any of the Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac legislation that was propping up an unrealistic boom in real estate sales and was the underlying cause of overpriced properties. Also, it was the US Congress that overreacted during a previous economic scandal: Enron. This resulted in the mark to market rule that arbitrarily forced financial institutions report their asset loses without regard to the effect. Along with congress, the FTC, SEC, and DoJ, failed to provide proper oversight of the mortgage securities exchange market. Of course, since this president was a member of congress, he did not inherit anything. He helped create it.

As an aside, I do not let President Bush off the hook for his part in this. While his administration attempted several times to influence congress to change the mortgage rules, they did not stress the problem enough nor did they take their concerns to the American people in any memorable way. President Obama wants his version of health care to become law, so he has made speeches to the American people more than 30 times. (This should be a lesson to politicians everywhere)

What made the president go along with this form of "economic stimulus" after promising to cut "pork" and earmarks and cut the deficit?

The answer has two parts:

1. The President has no personal knowledge of the capitalist system.

2. His advisers told him it would work, and his advisers have no practical knowledge or experience in the capitalist system.

When you look at the president's White House biography, you learn that he has no experience working for or managing any private sector enterprise. None. He has never created jobs nor held one in the private sector. You learn that he has always worked in "jobs" that rely on the generosity of others. He "worked his way through collage" on someone else's dime, did community work for some churches, was handed the job of President of the Harvard Law Review, went to Chicago to work as a community organizer registering voters, taught in Chicago school system, then state senator followed by US senator for a short period. That led to being President of the United States of America. Oh, I forgot, but does being hired as a lawyer for ACORN count as a private sector job?

No private sector work and no paying his own way. It is only natural that he would embrace a public policy that grabs money from those who earn it and ensure his own future by handed it off to his supporters. You know, "spreading the wealth".

So, knowing nothing about capitalism, how does arrive at his decisions to nationalize health care, authorize an economic stimulus package and tout his vague plans to help create jobs in America? How does he run a one year deficit 4 times his predecessor's worst fiscal year? And then, say he's not finished yet, he wants to add another $1 -2 trillion dollars to the deficit. Trillions he and the country do not have. He either doesn't know what he's doing or is trying to deepen the economic crisis to make Americans dependent on him. After all, it worked for FDR with 3 terms.

President Obama and the legacy media always refer to the Stimulus package as if the president sat down and wrote it. We know that is not correct as his "recovery and reinvestment" plan was put together by the US Congress. His involvement was limited to assuring them he would sign it. I'm of the opinion that to this day, he does not know what is in it.

The Obama stimulus package has proven to be exactly what its opponents warned of; An 8000 part pork package that is the envy of leftists in governments everywhere. It is a conglomeration of old and new lobbyist's "gimmes" pulled out of the drawer and patched together by unwitting Democrat staffers and lobbyists as payback for political support. In this respect, it is very similar to the Wall Street and autoworker bailouts. Additionally, no one has been able to identify any significant help that it has or will provide in any quantifiable way.

For a few months, the White House and their sycophants have been saying that the stimulus "brought the economy back from the precipice".

The fact is it has not.

We can know this as nothing has changed. Well, there is the exception of the White House/sycophant talking points; that has changed, but the economy has not. The White House predicted a maximum unemployment rate of 8% when selling Stimulus and it is now, a short 6 months later, approaching 10% (9.7%).

While they claimed it would save jobs, it has actually prolonged the pain as millions of Americans continue to lose their jobs, closely followed by losing their homes and their American dream. Not to mention the continued decimation of millions of retirement accounts. All of which was unnecessary.

The White House's surrogates and the president were touting last week's employment numbers; bragging that the 150 union employees that went back to work is a positive sign of recovery and that we are losing jobs at a slower rate. In the case of union employees, common sense might tell us that the Obama administration just spent $4 billion on their "Cash for Clunkers" (CfC) program which artificially spiked vehicle sales for about 2 weeks. As it is now, the car sales markets are even more depressed than they were before CfC.

Other clues into his lack of knowledge include the president's remarks in Elkhart, Indiana, on February 9th, 2009, when he said,

"We have inherited an economic crisis as deep and as dire as any since the Great Depression."

The fact is in February our recession was the worst economic crisis since the Carter administration 1979. If it were as bad as the Great Depression, unemployment would be at 12%-19%, not 8%.

O.K, who was it that said to 'look to those who he surrounds himself with if you want to know about them?' Oh that's right, the president said it in one of his campaign speeches.

His economic advisers must have advised him that all the pork would be a good thing. The problem that his advisers are real-world-clueless as well.

The president's economic advisers would be the Council of Economic Advisers and the National Economic Council (along with his political advisers). These are folks who also have little or no actual experience in the private sector.

They study, analyze, teach and advise. But actually doing it? It never happened.

The evidence is clear. Simply look to the White House web site the president's economic advisers:

National Economic Council (from the White House)

"The National Economic Council (NEC) was established in 1993 to advise the President on U.S. and global economic policy. It resides within the Office of Policy Development and is part of the Executive Office of the President. By Executive Order, the NEC has four principal functions: to coordinate policy-making for domestic and international economic issues, to coordinate economic policy advice for the President, to ensure that policy decisions and programs are consistent with the President's economic goals, and to monitor implementation of the President's economic policy agenda."

"Lawrence H. Summers is the Director of the National Economic Council and was appointed by President Barack H. Obama on November 24, 2008."

White House biography about Lawrence H. Summers

"Until January, he was the Charles W. Eliot University Professor at Harvard University. He served as the 27th president of Harvard University from July 2001 until June 2006. From 1999 to 2001, he served as the 71st United States Secretary of the Treasury following his earlier service as Deputy and Under Secretary of the Treasury and as Chief Economist of the World Bank. Summers has taught economics at Harvard and MIT. His research contributions were recognized when he received the John Bates Clark Medal, given every two years to the outstanding American economist under the age of 40, and when he was the first social scientist to receive the National Science Foundation’s Alan T. Waterman Award for outstanding scientific achievement. He is a member of the National Academy of Science and has written extensively on economic analysis and policy publishing over 150 articles in professional economic journals. Lawrence Summers received his B.S. from MIT and his Ph.D. in economics from Harvard. He and his wife Elisa New, a professor of English at Harvard, have six children."

Council of Economic Advisers (from the White House)

"The Council of Economic Advisers (CEA) is a group of three respected economists who advise the President of the United States on economic policy.[1] It is a part of the Executive Office of the President of the United States, and provides much of the economic policy of the White House. The council prepares the annual Economic Report of the President."

President Obama's CEA:

The current Chair of the CEA is Christina Romer, the two other current members of the CEA are Austan Goolsbee and Cecilia Rouse. The two nominees were confirmed on March 10, 2009

White House biography for Christina Romer

"Romer was the Class of 1957-Garff B. Wilson Professor of Economics at the University of California Berkeley. Before teaching at Berkeley, she taught economics and public affairs at Princeton University from 1985-1988.
Until her nomination, she was co-director of the Program in Monetary Economics at the National Bureau of Economic Research and served as Vice President of the American Economic Association, where she was also a member of the executive committee."more...

White House biography for Austan Goolsbee

"Goolsbee was the Robert P. Gwinn Professor of Economics at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business. He was an economic adviser to Barack Obama’s 2004 Senate race before becoming a senior economic adviser to Senator Obama’s 2008 Presidential campaign." more...

White House biography for Cecilia Rouse

"Rouse is currently on leave from Princeton University, where she is the Theodore A. Wells '29 Professor of Economics and Public Affairs. She has been a senior editor of The Future of Children and the Journal of Labor Economics" more...

Zero real world experience

It appears that there is approximately zero real world experience at working with and understanding the American version of capitalism and forces effecting free markets in this administration. And because of that fact, the rest of us who are not well connected, such as Wall Street executives, powerful lobbyists, or any object of this administration's favor, will be picking up the tab.

Anyone who has even a passing notion of the economic history of this country (and some others) would know that excessive spending will do nothing to help the economy grow, and most likely holds it down. They would also know that the way government can stimulate the economy is to lower the cost of doing business. Lowering taxes worked for Presidents JFK, Ronald Reagan, Bill Clinton and George W. Bush.

But, no, the economic advisers, the US Congress and the President himself, have no plans to lower taxes or fees on any American. Instead, he imposes a 35% tariff on imported tires from China, raises excise taxes, and threatens to raise taxes (2.5%) on middle/lower income Americans, and even more on those who actually produce the jobs (while lowering their charitable deductions. This is nearly exactly what President Hoover did to "help" American workers in 1930. He added tariffs on imports and increased taxes on anyone with an income during The Great Depression.

Hmmm. Maybe it wasn't intended to improve the economy?

With any luck the president will fail to enact any more of his that-sounds-good policies.

Move it Right

Constitutional Birthday, 17 September 1787

2009-09-17T00:01:00.004-04:00

Say "Happy Birthday!" to the US Constitution. It is 222 years old today.

On 17 September 1787 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, the Constitution of the United States of America was born (completed & signed), having been written primarily by James Madison and debated in secret by the invited members of the several states. But it wasn't until the 9th state, New Hampshire, ratified it on 4 March 1788, that it became the supreme law of the land.

On that day the US government started operating under the new rules and began the work of ensuring laws enacted under the Articles of Confederation were in compliance with the new constitution.

But some weren't satisfied with the lack of specificity in some areas, so it was agreed that it would be amended to specify the people's rights and the government's limits. This brought about the first 10 amendments, known as the "Bill of Rights".

The US Constitution's premise is that the government has limited power on loan from the people and that the people of the United States are endowed by there creator with certain inalienable rights. The primary purpose of the central, or federal, government is to protect the people's rights by way of securing the nation from its enemies, both foreign and domestic, providing a system of laws and courts, and promoting the general welfare. It is a shame that it has moved way beyond.

Today, in 2009, we have a serious constitutional crisis. And this is a real crisis, not one made up by politicians, although it was created by politicians. This crisis is signaling the end of constitutional law in this country in favor of the politics of 'what-have-you-done-for-me-lately'?

When I say "-me-", I mean those who take, but lament when asked to be responsible. For example, just look at Wall Street. The movers and shakers made many very bad choices and when the bottom fell out of their schemes, they went crying to President Bush's Treasury Secretary, the former CEO of Goldman-Sachs, for relief. The Bush administration allowed Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. to fail, then along with the US Congress bent over backwards proclaiming the financial meltdown was imminent, we were in a crisis and this country would fail, jobs would be lost, and millions of Americans would lose their homes. They said we needed to put a stop to it, with money. Money we don't have. Money we won't have. Hope Dollars.

Did this huge transfer of hope dollars on loan from China make a difference? Did it prevent anyone from losing their home? The short answer is: No, it didn't do anything to help the situation. It did, however, transfer a huge amount of money to executives of the financial institutions who support the politicians in Washington.

Is this fair? Is this the founders idea of America? Is this the contract the people made with the government? Again, the answer is an indisputable "no".

It is not fair and it is not the government's job to pick winners and losers. The US Constitution is about equal protection under the law and we are not seeing fairness from our elected officials.

After the "Wall Street Bailout" they decided that the economy was going to fail anyway and they did exactly zero to help defaulting mortgage holders, they chose to help out out GM and Chrysler instead. We then learn that they gave a third share in the auto companies to the very union that is the primary cause of the US automaker's problems.

So who did they help? I would say they helped themselves and their supporters at the expense of everyone else.

This pattern is repeating itself with the Stimulus Bill, Cap & Trade, and health care reform. None of which qualifies as legitimate constitutional programs. This kind of legislation becomes law due to the fact that politicians are not concerned with topics they do not understand. They display a complete lack of understanding of everything except what their hired marketers tell them.

Some citizens pay less (many pay nothing) and demand more from government, while others receive less and pay more of their earning to government so they can "spread the wealth". This gives rise to the 'Vote for me to keep your benefits flowing' politics and self aggrandizement that we see at the national level (and Charlie Crist). When you throw in many well funded lobbyists into the mix, hard working Americans are on the bottom of the list of "interest groups" that politicians are interested in being responsible to.

The pattern no doubt started immediately after ratification but has become epidemic in a political system set up and managed by politicians that has become an incumbency protection game of twister, with each party trying more and more ways to lock up the vote. They employ gerrymandering districts, voter registration, opinion polls, and campaign donations from anyone or anything that will give.

We should use this constitutional anniversary to start a new American rights movement to bring this country back where it belongs: a free market society where you receive what you earn and the government is looking out for your welfare as opposed to their own bank accounts.

Lately, the Tea Parties and other grass roots protesters have kicked the ball into play. But under the playing field has been landscaped by politicians and it will be very, very hard to change.

Happy Birthday, US Constitution.

Move it right.

Public Option Oregon Style: We'll Gladly Help You Die

2009-09-10T06:57:00.000-04:00

The term "Death Panels" has been used by conservative talk radio and other conservatives, and most famously by former Alaska Governor and vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin. Many leftists are giving the Governor credit for coining the term, but it was actually Betsy McCaughey (former Lieutenant Governor of the State of New York) who coined the term. I wonder how far off the mark they are when I see stories like this one from Oregon.

"Health plan covers assisted suicide but not new cancer treatment"

The article shows that government run health care does make life and death decisions. In this article we learn that Oregon has a "death Panel" and they are using it.

"Her doctor offered hope in the new chemotherapy drug Tarceva*, but the Oregon Health Plan sent her a letter telling her the cancer treatment was not approved.

Instead, the letter said, the plan would pay for comfort care, including "physician aid in dying," better known as assisted suicide."

The story goes on to state that a evil big pharmaceutical is helping her with the medication. Makes wonder who has any empathy, big pharma or elected government officials.

The term "Death Panels" used in association with ObamaCare has even gotten the President's attention and he and his minions are insulting opponents and saying,

"We are closer to achieving that reform than we have ever been and that's why we're seeing some of the divisive and deceptive attacks. You've heard some of them. Ludicrous ideas. Let me give you just one example, this notion that somehow we are setting up death panels that would decide whether elderly people would live or die. That is just an extraordinary lie. This is based on a provision in the House legislation that would allow Medicare to reimburse you if you wanted counseling on how to set up a living will or other end-of-life decisions. Entirely voluntary. It gives you an option that people who can afford fancy lawyers can already exercise." - Mr. Obama

HR 3200, Section 1233, has provisions requiring government certified health care personnel visit the elderly every five years and counsel them on how to prepare in the event they are unable to communicate their end of life issues. Death panels? Maybe, maybe not. But since no one in the US Congress, the press or the president himself, can say that it is not going to be the ultimate purpose of these counselors.

It is especially questionable in light of this administration's re-posting of the end of life and disability advice for veterans pamphlet, "Your Life Your Choices". An atrocious document reportedly created by that famous supporter of the military, President Clinton. It was removed from the VA web site by the Bush administration. Now it's back. This pamphlet is a self study guide to allow you to determine how much of a burden you are to your family and the taxpayers and what you can do about it. Who needs death panels, eh?

Look, President Obama says that he will reduce the cost of health care. But he demands that any plan congress comes up with includes a 'no rescission' and 'no denials due to preexisting conditions'. These will balloon the cost of healthcare insurance.

So where is his savings coming from? He says reducing fraud, waste and abuse, but that is small change compared to entire Medicare/Medicaid system. We don't know if he means cutting all fees and services, but we do know he intends to cut some. Already in the works: An Obama administration plan to cut Medicare payments to heart and cancer doctors by $1.4 billion next year.

What effect do you think that will have? Will more cardiologists and oncologists be poring out of med school? That along with his recent insults to all doctors everywhere. More likely it will mean fewer doctors to service the (revised number) 30 million new patients.

Can you say "rationing"?

I believe it's important to look at government sponsored programs with a very critical eye. Those who have been paying attention know that most "do good" legislation has its unintended consequences and end up hurting more than it helps. Just look at welfare that makes dad unnecessary. That has led to a 70% out of wedlock birth rate in the inner cities.

I believe the President does not know anything about free markets, capitalism, competition, or health care, as he has no experience in any of those areas. He must rely on what he is told by his advisers, who also have no experience in these areas.

President Obama's health care reform ideas, if passed are going to lead to more unintended consequences that he is unable to see. It will mean higher taxes, higher health care costs, and if it's managed by government, it will bankrupt the country. Then again, most of the cost of health care comes later in life and dead people cost nothing. Hmm... Death panels???

*Tarceva, an FDA approved drug, is used for cancer treatment.

More on Health Care Reform: Competition

2009-09-06T20:05:00.008-04:00

It seems that Team Obama's understanding of what competition is needs some real world examples. Interestingly, Senator Waxman seems to know that there are at least 52 insurance companies that provide health care insurance. We know this because Mr. Waxman send them a letter, dated August 17th, 2009, demanding payroll information from all of them.

So do we need a another insurance company to provide "competition"?

The short answer is we don't need it at all.

Common sense says that 52 companies competing against each other makes for plenty of competition. In their defense, no one has ever accused the US congress of having common sense. Besides, anyone who believes that a government program would be competitive is either ignorant of how government works or they are trying to trick everyone. Since I can't believe Obama's people are ignorant, our problem reveals itself.

FYI: None of those 52 private sector insurance companies can print their own money to cover the unintended consequences of their self-serving policies. The US government can.

See my original post, Healthcare Reform: Competition, dated 8/12/09, for more on competition.

Dear Ms. Pelosi: Helping with the Public Option

2009-09-03T19:02:00.005-04:00

The Speaker asked for help, so I offered a suggestion HERE.

And here is my suggestion. What are the odds that it will be read, let alone considered?

Dear Speaker Pelosi,

You asked for suggestions for a better plan than the Public Option. I believe I have it figured out. We can have a public option without affecting federal deficits, making it truly budget neutral. The answer is quite simple actually.

Just craft it so that the premiums, co-pays, etc., are paid for by insured. To accomplish this, you would have to hire experienced actuaries to work out cost v. risk & payouts, just as private sector insurance companies do. This would cover the costs and make the public option truly competitive. And, according to the President, competitiveness is the watch word for a public option.

Naturally, the public option health care insurance budget would have to be free of taxpayer dollars or it would no longer be competitive. Subsidizing it with tax dollars would be unfair business practices as the private sector cannot print money or force it from the general public, and we wouldn't want that. Maybe just some seed money to get it started, but other than that: Off limits.

So, I hope you like my idea and will consider it for inclusion with health care reform.

Sincerely Yours,

Feel free to copy and send this yourself.

Dear Governor Crist: An Open Letter

2009-09-01T11:19:00.005-04:00

Dear Governor Crist,

I was very disappointed to see the tricks you are playing to grab Senator Martinez's U.S. Senate seat for yourself. I can only believe that self-promotion is and always has been the motivating factor for your campaign and election to Governor of our great state and for appointing an unknown to the the vacated seat. Even though I know very little about George LeMieux, I'm sure he is just a "placeholder" for you as the Wall Street Journal wrote yesterday.

FYI: The US Congress has created an economic crisis in the great state of Florida and elsewhere. This state needs a governor who is dedicated to helping his/her state, as opposed to someone who is in it for their own self-aggrandizement. Your conniving move shows that your attention is focused elsewhere and not on the betterment of Florida. If you had cared about Florida as much as you care about yourself, you would have taken the high rode and appointed a well known Republican who might have a chance at keeping the senate seat. Then you would follow up by running against Senator Bill Nelson in 2012.

Although I am a registered Republican and voted for you for governor, I'm afraid you have received the your last vote from me. I would go so far as to say that if Senator Reid, Nevada's Mr. Doom & Gloom (who is going to lose in Nevada in 2010), were to establish Florida residency and campaign for Senator Martinez's senate seat, I would vote for him over you for the sole purpose of moving you out of public office.

With any luck, you will lose your Senate bid and in doing so, lose your governorship as well.

Tell us Governor, will you be appointing someone to as a placeholder for the governor's mansion while you're running a senate campaign?

Respectfully yours,

A Florida Voter.

The problem with the Health Care Debate: GOP Getting it Wrong... Again

2009-08-29T06:23:00.005-04:00

There is a real problem for Republicans who are against "Health Care Reform".

The problem?

They are saying "health care reform" when discussing the Obama/Pelosi health care reform bill (HR 3200). This sends the message that the GOP, conservatives, grass roots protesters, and conservative talk radio are against reforming health care in America. I believe this to be false and that the legacy media and Democrats who support ObamaCare are benefiting from this confusion.

The term they should be using for ObamaCare is closer to "government health care", or "nationalized medicine", "competition killer", or "expanded government nanny state" when describing HR 3200.

Why? Simply because the characterization of Republicans and average Americans being against "reform" is ludicrous. Everyone wants health care to be less expensive and more available to the poor. The problem with HR 3200 and the debate about it is that includes nothing that would reduce the cost of health care. Instead, it has pages and pages of requirements that will only make it more expensive.

Somehow, I believe the Democratic politicians want it that way.

Fraudulent Green

2009-08-18T07:31:00.001-04:00

In the beginning, it was hydrocarbons causing smog, and we paid extra to omit the process of adding lead to gasoline. Then we learned that there are many, many, substances in the air and water that is going to kill us, such as CFCs and acid rain. But don't panic because we paid even more, so that was being fixed. Then, our food was killing us: more cash. But it has all morphed into the number one problem of the 21st Century.

Global climate change caused by man's Killer Carbon Dioxide footprint.

Now, don't misconstrue what I'm saying here. I believe the climate is changing, but I do not believe the cause is man-made CO2. And especially not American made CO2. I believe it is a combination of factors, such as solar activity and the normal cycling that the planet goes through.

According to the smartest people in the room Carbon dioxide, CO2, is public enemy number one. It has caused the average global temperature to go up most of a degree Fahrenheit in the last half century and it is caused, mostly, by the American way of life. To defeat this evil, it's going to be expensive, so open your wallet you self-absorbed American. Never mind that the average temperature has leveled off for the last decade.

The pushers of the green agenda would have us believe that we (Americans) consume too much of the world's resources and in doing so, produce the most unnecessary CO2. (I know that's not true, but the green salespersons are not fact-checked by their followers) They paint an America lusting for unnecessarily large individual vehicles, large air conditioned homes and generally, our very wasteful ways. Then saying we insist on fancy imported delicacies, such as bananas from Brazil, pineapples from Hawaii and oranges are transported all over the USA from Florida to California and the other way around. Let's not forget importing Italian marble and granite, diamonds from South Africa and steel from Japan. Then there is oil. Big oil, from all over the world. All of that requires CO2 producing oil, and lots of it, to move it around and even to produce the fuel itself. It's horrible, I tell ya.

Well, all that prosperity has to end. We must cut back and stop being so, so... American. We must go GREEN. President Obama says so and he is the president. Just ask him.

I have some real problems with whole man-made-climate-change, or green, agenda and the extent of the intrusion of green in our lives has become enormous and promises to undermine our way of life. And I'm not talking about the perception that Americans are living lavishly at the world's expense. That's just nonsense. I'm talking about having our individual freedoms chipped away until we look like Brazil. There is big money and big payoffs in the green agenda. But not for average Americans. We are the source of the big money for the big payoffs to the Al Gores of this world.

Just look at those who are cashing in on the green religion. Many environmentalists and entertainers, and now entrepreneurs, government (Cap & Trade) and big business, have latched on to so-called "global climate change", formerly "global warming". It has become big business and big restrictive government.

There is not a half hour segment in broadcast television that does not have commercials for companies pushing their green compliance and products or telling us what is right and what is wrong. Moreover, our children are indoctrinated into green in preschool. Heck, the green agenda types even have their own network, ENN. At the same time, the automobile industry is continually lambasted for pollution and failing to produce more energy efficient/alternative fuel vehicles (we know they can, they are keeping it secret due to big oil's demands, right?). It's all part of the indoctrination.

Honestly folks, green is an overly expensive technology that does very little in actuality to reduce public enemy number one, carbon dioxide gas (CO2) in the atmosphere, but benefits a very few.

Here is how the fight is shaping up.

While some claim the climate change debate is over, such as former Vice President Albert A. Gore Jr.:

“The scientific community has gone through this chapter and verse. We have long since passed the time when we should pretend this is a ‘on the one hand, on the other hand’ issue,” he said. “It’s not a matter of theory or conjecture, for goodness sake,”

It is very hard to find anyone who is pushing the green agenda that is willing to, or has ever, debated anyone with opposing views. This makes his claim very suspect to me.

Also, since it's become a political and monetary issue, many support the idea of man-made climate change simply because they are positioned to make huge sums of money from the US government (read: tax paying Americans). Congresspersons, this president (and the last president), are more than happy to appear as though they care about green issues by talking it up and pouring trillions of dollars into these programs.

Here is what it is going to cost you.

Then comes Cap and Trade, that has passed by the US House of Representatives on June 26, 2009, after the Herculean effort of reading the 1200 pages with 300 pages of changes in a mere 16 hours. According to the CBO previous estimates, it's going to cost over $846 Billion in new taxes. The Heritage Foundation breaks it down to state and district losses and to personal incomes totaling GDP loss by 2035 would be $9.4 trillion.

The "American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, or "Stimulus", includes $43 billion in tax credits, grants and loan guarantees for energy projects." That is billions of dollars in green research, green corporate welfare and green tax incentives. Never mind that it is money we do not have. Spending hope dollars translates to devaluation of the US dollar and higher prices for everyone.

And there is some stupid going on.

The US House of Representatives, led by Rep. Nancy Pelosi, is one government agency that is proving how stupid the entire green movement has become. She has promised to make the Capital Building "carbon neutral" by the end of the 110th Congress that ended in December 2008, but so far has been unsuccessful (gee, I wonder why?). To make up for this failure, our tax dollars are being used to buy "carbon offsets" to "offset" the carbon dioxide produced by the National Monument of Geniuses. The Washington Post informs us that...

"Daniel Beard, the House's chief administrative officer, will cut a taxpayer-funded check today for $89,000 to buy credits that will offset the impact of 30,000 tons of carbon belched into the atmosphere by the U.S. Capitol's antiquated, coal-burning power plant every year."

This money is to be paid to the Chicago Climate Exchange, a clearing house for your carbon credit needs.

Carbon credits has to be one of the most beautiful scams ever created. First your are convinced by "experts", who are backed by all the smart people, that the world as we know it is going to end soon (When? Real soon.) if we don't pony up and pay extra for the energy we need, pay even more for new energy sources, and cut back on our use of CO2 producing vehicles we're all gonna die. Or, you can just buy yourself and everyone else's safety by offsetting the carbon that is produced when you do anything, such as driving your car, flying on an airplane, or breathing. You give them your money and you absolved of your evil carbon producing ways. You don't even have to think about anymore as they will ensure that your money is going to save the planet by planting trees that convert CO2 into oxygen or investing in some inefficient "green" technology (solar, wind, ethanol) and that will save us... eventually.

Our friend and savior, Al Gore, buys carbon credits as well. Apparently he produces lots of CO2 as he rides around in giant SUV motorcades/caravans, powers his mansion, and jets all over the world, producing many many times more carbon dioxide than your average American.

Who does the king of global warming pay for his carbon offsets? Himself.

Al Gore is part owner of the Chicago Climate Exchange. And don't expect that most people will know this because the legacy media is ignoring it.

Smile Al.

Then I find THIS page on the web. The climate map for South America where they are confusing erosion with rising sea levels. In number 45, they say that in...

"Recife, Brazil -- Sea-level rise. Shoreline receded more than 6 feet (1.8 m) per year from 1915 to 1950 and more than 8 feet (2.4 m) per year from 1985 to 1995. The dramatic land loss was due to a combination of sea-level rise and loss of sediment supply following dam construction, harbor dredging, and other coastal engineering projects."

Come on people. This is the type of overstatement and confused "facts" that drive the green agenda. While I can see losing six feet of shoreline each year due to their stated reasons (dam construction, harbor dredging, and other coastal engineering projects), the claimed measurable rise in the sea levels at this point has been 20 centimeters (cm) from 1890 through 2000.

Telling stories.

These two charts tell a story. The first one graphs estimates in sea level rise over a recent 120 year period (20 cm). Number two shows estimates over the last 24,000 years with the sea level rising about 140 meters through 5000 years ago, then leveling off. If you were just rely on these charts, common sense would dictate that the rise in sea levels is actually slowing down to a snail's pace.

As for the plague of human caused CO2 (or is it just a plague of humans that disturbs the greenies?) in the atmosphere and it's affect on climate change, there are many who are breaking away from the herd and acknowledging that CO2 actually may have little, if any, influence on climate change, especially the minimal percentage that human activity produces. (Personally, I believe climate has more to do with planetary cycles, wobble, Earthquakes, volcanoes, and solar activity.)

So let's talk a little carbon dioxide .

If you look at the Wikipedia page on carbon dioxide in the Earth's atmosphere, you can learn that:

"As of November 2007, the CO2 concentration in Earth's atmosphere was about 0.0384% by volume, or 384 parts per million by volume (ppmv). This is 100 ppmv (35%) above the 1832 ice core levels of 284 ppmv"

(I will not be able to prove this, but last year wiki said that CO2 was about 0.0285% of the atmosphere, up from about 0.0250% over the last 100 years.)

They go on to say that:

"Despite its relatively small concentration overall in the atmosphere, CO2 is an important component of Earth's atmosphere because it absorbs and emits infrared radiation at wavelengths of 4.26 µm (asymmetric stretching vibrational mode) and 14.99 µm (bending vibrational mode), thereby playing a role in the greenhouse effect".

"Relatively small" is an understatement.

This is one of the logical reasons I do not believe that man made CO2 is causing global warming. At 0.0385% it is a very small amount and is about 1/10th of the amount of the water vapor in the air.

The not-so-funny thing is, they never mention water vapor as a contributor or mediator of temperature.

CO2 weighs more than air, so the vast majority of it stays close to ground level where plants can use it to live (you know, growing green plant life that exhales oxygen). Only a small percentage of that small percentage reaches any real altitude in the troposphere, so how much affect can it have? Understand also that CO2 dissolves in water, so whenever it rains, the air gets somewhat scrubbed of CO2 and other pollutants. When it is blown over bodies of water, some is dissolved in the water. If the temperature of the planet were to become consistently hotter, there would be more water vapor in the atmosphere and that would have a cooling affect on the planet. SO it kind of balances out.

The number one location for measuring CO2 in the atmosphere is in Hawaii where they have continuously active volcanoes that do what? Spew large amounts of CO2. That makes me a little apprehensive about the accuracy of the sampling.

If you're looking for a something that affects the climate, check out solar activity. It has far more influence than a little CO2. Moreover, water (liquid and vapor) have the most Earthbound influence on climate at any particular time (Maybe we should study how not reduce water levels, ay?).

We gotta have it

Atmospheric CO2 is necessary for our life to exit. Plants breath in CO2 to live and exhale O2 (oxygen) so the we and other animals can live. It's a balance that has been going on for millions, if not billions of years. Nature spews more CO2 and other pollutants than human activity ever will. When the eruption of Mount Pinatubo in the Philippines blasted off, it threw more "greenhouse gases" into the atmosphere than all of the cars in the history of driving.

Then we have Dr. Richard Lindzen, back in 2006 saying there are doubts and that it may be a career stopper to speak out in opposition to global warming.

A new book by Ian Plimer, "Heaven and Earth: Global Warming, the Missing Science" ,

"an evidence-based attack on conformity and orthodoxy"

The vast majority of people who swear that climate change is being caused by the activities of man are those lay people who support their chosen causes and those who are personally profiting from it. They can't and don't know the science. They depend on scientists and "experts" in the news to tell them what is going on. Scientists themselves live and prosper by way of tax dollars and grants support the green agenda. Their livelihood depends on money given to them so that they may conduct research. If the research isn't supported by the money brokers (politicians and wealthy philanthropists) then scientists go to work in patent offices. Politicians believe they will profit by showing they care what happens to "the people", thus ensuring their reelection.

The climate is changing. The climate is always changing and man's activities may have an influence, however small. The biggest problem that I have with the green agenda is that it will cause average and poor Americans to reach even deeper into their pockets to finance an agenda that will only have minimal returns while providing an rich lifestyle to the purveyors of the global warming fear. Our ability to live independently will be reduced, while dependency on government grows. Government is already telling us what we must drive, or ride, what fuel we use, what we should and should not eat and buy our votes with massive Ponsey schemes. There are to be trillions of tax dollars spent or borrowed to work at preventing the oceans from rising 2 feet over the next 50 years.

You have to ask yourself, who will be hurt by a two foot higher sea level? The first thing that comes to my mind are the wealthy people and industry who own waterfront property. It will have no effect on anyone else. Is mortgaging your children's future worth it?

And let's not forget the polar bears. What about their shrinking habitat? Well, the problem with that is that it is another fake crisis. The pictures you are shown of the momma bear and cub seemingly searching for a place to live? That is stock footage of a normal Spring thaw. Something Polar bears have been living with for untold eons. Again, it's a fraud.

Personally, I am looking forward to global warming. I was raised in Northern Ohio and lived in Michigan, Utah, and Germany. I even spent a few weeks of winter in and around Anchorage, Alaska. I know what it's like to be cold. That is why I moved to Florida. Oh, and I bought property that is 26 feet above sea level.

Bring on the global warming and dump the fraudulent green. Mr. Gore and others have made enough off of this scam.

Facts Are Stubborn Things, You Snitch: Update

2009-08-14T06:04:00.002-04:00

I received the infamous unsolicited White House email from Senior White House Adviser David Axelrod.

You I did the patriotic thing: I reported it to flag@whitehouse.gov.

Here is what I wrote:

Dear flag,

I wanted you to know that I have been receiving fishy emails from the the person below. I believe he may be illegally using email addresses gathered by the government to send spam filled with misinformation concerning health care reform. Thank you for you attention to this matter.

Regards,

I never thought I could have fun using White House's shenanigans.

Healthcare Reform: Tax Relief

2009-08-13T15:01:00.010-04:00

A show of hands. How many people believe the 111th Congress would offer tax cuts as part of a health care reform plan?

Oops, I don't see any hands.

OK, that is because you are right. This congress would never conceive of giving taxpayers a break. It's just not in their genes.

But our government has been using tax law to influence the behavior of Americans as far back as 1862. For example, they give tax breaks for buying a home, having children, charitable giving (for now) and for medical expenses over 7.5% of your adjusted gross income (if you file the long form with Schedule A). It has been this way for many decades.

Why do they not allow you to deduct all of your medical expenses? They allow business to deduct all of the Benefits they offer, which include medical insurance expenses, and they do not even need to use a long form. (IRS Form 1120, line 24). I'm sure this situation has a lot to do with the amount of money lobbyists have to offer.

I believe they should continue using tax law to influence Americans (in the way I would, of course) and enact a dollar for dollar tax credit for medical expenses. That would be all medical expenses including doctor, hospital, laboratory fees, prescription drugs, insurance premiums, deductibles and co-pays. This would influence more people to buy their own insurance, maybe start a health care savings account, and pay for their own health care. With a few other reforms, such as tort, Medicare, Medicaid reform and expanding competitive regions, the cost will be reduced, further encouraging personal ownership of health care insurance. Personal ownership would also make portability much easier to realize.

Ya know, I would like to have a tax deductible health care savings account, but government regulation won't allow it due to the health care insurance program I am in. It makes no sense.

Lowering income taxes: Good. Adding new taxes: Bad.

If they wanted to make health care more accessible and save you and I some of our earnings, our representatives could cut taxes on healthcare expenses. As it is, H.R. 3200, includes plans to make everyone, rich and poor, subject to an additional a new tax penalty (Title IV-- Amendments to Internal Revenue Code). It is in the form of a 2.5% fine on individuals without "acceptable" health care coverage. So, congress and the president want to mandate that you spend your money on their committee's version of "acceptable" health care insurance or you will see your taxes go up.

Giving a tax credit, as opposed to the current new tax penalty, would help many more Americans to purchase their own healthcare insurance and remove dependency on bloated government programs. When people pay for goods and services out their own earnings, they are careful to ensure they are getting the most cost effective

I believe government's meddling in the health care arena helps force, I mean "influence", people to move into government sponsored programs, such as Medicare. Medicare looks like a good deal because the true costs are hidden from consumers. Medicare Part B participants only pay about 25% of the actual cost. The other 75% is paid out of the general fund. If we were to ween people off of Medicare that would add 42 - 47 million paying into a private health care insurance plan. Gee another way to lower private sector insurance costs.

Adding people to the government rolls via the "public option", or government option, will only make matters worse.

Healthcare Reform: Competition

2009-08-12T14:55:00.003-04:00

In his town hall meeting Tuesday in Portsmouth, NH, the president said,

"I mean, if you think about it, UPS and FedEx are doing just fine, right? No, they are. It's the post office that's always having problems."

How this remark helps his cause is unknown to me. If anything, he is acknowledging that a government run "business" in competition with private sector businesses, including the health care industry, will fail to be competitive.

'Nuf said.... almost.

Competition is the engine of self sufficiency and wealth in America. It is what created the most advanced living conditions in the history of man. Competition is responsible for the rapid advance of every aspect of American life. This includes the state of modern health care. Some Americans who do not believe that they are "competitive" will always end up in unions, on assembly lines or on welfare, and being dependent on those who are competitive enough to win them any income and benefits they may have. Competition lowers prices and costs as evidenced by the impetus to institute anti-monopoly laws in this country.

The same holds true for healthcare insurance. Competition, fair competition, will lower the cost of healthcare insurance and the cost of healthcare in general. There are some anti-competitive policies in place in this country right now that are causing the costs to skyrocket. Government healthcare programs and state restrictions on out of state insurers.

I found it interesting that some push the "public option" for healthcare insurance, claiming it will be "competitive". If you believe private sector insurers can compete with the federal government, then, answer these questions...

Do private sector companies print their own money?
Do private sector companies use their power to forcibly extract money from others?
Do private sector companies make their own laws and regulations?

Of course not, which makes the argument for a public option irrational. Heck, the government doesn't even have to pay for advertising.

The question to ask is, "Do government programs, such as Medicare and Medicaid cause healthcare costs to go up?"

The answer to that is a firm "yes".

There are at least two reasons for this.

- One is that when the government pays the medical bills, those millions are removed from the customer base of insurance companies. According to Health Harbor, "Medicare covers between 42 million and 45 million Americans, making it the largest single payer of healthcare in the nation." That is 42-45 million people who are not buying private sector healthcare coverage, which causes insurance providers to raise fees on others to stay in business.

We all know that the insurance company model is to "spread the wealth" (to steal a phrase), or risk, among their policy holders. More policy holders means the risk is spread thinner and the cost to each would be lower.

- Another is that people using Medicare and Medicaid cannot see how much it is costing everyone. Sure, they see their own charges. But to most, those figures are meaningless. Why? Because the payment isn't coming out of their checkbook. They have no need to be concerned and if they were concerned, they have no way to tell if Medicare or Medicaid are being over or under charged. There is nothing for them to compare it with.

Many believe that Medicare Part B is paid for with payroll taxes, monthly premiums, copays and deductibles.

Not true. In fact about 75% of the payouts to Part B claims comes from general revenue, with payroll taxes, etc., covering the remainder (2007 numbers).

- Medicare and Medicaid limit prices. Logic would say that limiting prices would limit costs and make it less expensive. But Doctors, hospitals and big pharma cannot put an equal limit on their costs. They must earn enough to allow them to pay their bills and stay operational. Remember, no matter who pays for for goods and services, someone must get paid to make that product or provide that service. The government price fixing forces them to look elsewhere to make up the difference between what they need to pay their staffs, office space, utilities, medical equipment, etc. They end up charging more to those patients who use private sector insurance and those who pay cash. For proof, just look at any bill that is paid by Medicare/Medicaid. It will show how much their fee is for the service and how much Medicare/Medicaid allowed.

The bottom line is there is no way possible that a government public option would be competitive with private sector insurance providers and that the federal government's meddling in what should be private sector businesses is what has caused healthcare and healthcare insurance to skyrocket for almost four decades since Medicare and Medicaid stated.

Real competition is the road to lower healthcare and healthcare insurance costs.

Healthcare Reform:: Preexisting Conditions.

2009-08-11T13:31:00.007-04:00

Denial of preexisting conditions is one of the talking points the administration and congress are using to try and sell their "public option" insurance plan. The president is using it as I type in his town hall meeting today.

Insurance companies do not refuse the vast majority of applicants because of preexisting health conditions. They require a waiting period before coverage of the preexisting condition starts, usually 12-18 months, and charge more for coverage.

We know this because of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA) is "a federal law that:

* Limits the ability of a new employer plan to exclude coverage for preexisting conditions;
* Provides additional opportunities to enroll in a group health plan if you lose other coverage or experience certain life events;
* Prohibits discrimination against employees and their dependent family members based on any health factors they may have, including prior medical conditions, previous claims experience, and genetic information; and
* Guarantees that certain individuals will have access to, and can renew, individual health insurance policies."

What can ObamaCare, or DemoCare, do to fix this?

They could expand HIPAA to include individuals who want to purchase healthcare insurance but who were not a member of a group plan. Of course this change would run up the cost of the insurance, but congress doesn't mind. They won't be in that insurance system. And besides, running up costs may just be their plan.

While providing health care is the humanitarian way, providing health care and insurance is not a right, as in a constitutionally protected right, such as free political speech or lodging soldiers in your home. If it were, it would be guaranteed by the US Constitution and given to Americans "free". Of course it cannot be free as the health care providers need to earn a living just like you and I, so they must be paid.

HR 3200's preexisting condition clause ensures the cost of insurance will increase. Ultimately someone must pay for it.

Facts are Stubborn Things: Update

2009-08-07T12:09:00.005-04:00

In my last post concerning the White House's attempts to revise the Obama historical quotes, Facts are Stubborn Things, I showed the Obama single payer video, the White House response and the other tactic they want to employ:

Snitching on your fellow Americans.

Well, I had some thoughts on this during my drive home from work yesterday. So, believing that I am rather patriotic, I went ahead and reported myself to the White House for daring to disagree with their health care policies and the government owned solution to the health care shortcomings.

Here is What I wrote.

To: flag@whitehouse.gov
Subject: Fishy Web Sites

Dear Ms. DeParle,

I would like to report these two web sites. The author seems to be adamantly opposed to the President's healthcare reforms and is spreading his version of the truth.

Move It Right
Dear Mr. President Letters

I hope this helps and thank you for your support.

PS: I would like to thank Michelle Malkin ("Who's Behind The Internet Snitch Brigade?") for providing the name of the official in charge of this thing.

Facts Are Stubborn Things, You Snitch

2009-08-06T08:12:00.009-04:00

The White House gets that right, it's too bad the facts go against what they want you to know. So now, they are demonizing average Americans and calling for American "snitches" to tell them when someone disagrees with them. I just keep thinking that it's a sad time for this country as they are carry on with their Orwellian business model.

This time, they are trying to revise history by responding to a You Tube video that shows the president, in his own words, supporting a government take over of the health insurance industry. (Just as they've taken over banks and automobile manufacturers.)

The White House says,

"In this video, Linda Douglass, the communications director for the White House’s Health Reform Office, addresses one example that makes it look like the President intends to "eliminate" private coverage, when the reality couldn’t be further from the truth."

In a lame attempt to counter the opposition video, she points out that the president claims that his reform plan will allow Americans to keep their insurance plan and doctor, if they want to.

In a White house Blog she writes,

"For the record, the President has consistently said that if you like your insurance plan, your doctor, or both, you will be able to keep them. He has even proposed eight consumer protections relating specifically to the health insurance industry."

The opposition video

So what is going on?

The people who are satisfied with their insurance (80% of private sector policy holders) do not want to have their insurance become so expensive that they will be forced to sign on the Obama plan. The White House and their surrogates are desperately trying to convince Americans that no such thing will happen.

But the people know that the Obama plan leads directly to government run single payer program that will dramatically increase the cost of health care in America and government bureaucrats would be deciding what doctors, labs, specialists, procedures and hospitals the public plan will allow, and to whom they will allow it. This government has a history of choosing the winners, such as Goldman-Sachs, and deciding who will lose, such as Lehman Bros.

In their efforts to keep the public from turning against their plan (too late), they have requested that if you hear anyone talking down their reform plans you should report them to the White House. This is sort of like the legions of informants some 80 years go in Europe.

From the White House.

"There is a lot of disinformation about health insurance reform out there, spanning from control of personal finances to end of life care. These rumors often travel just below the surface via chain emails or through casual conversation. Since we can’t keep track of all of them here at the White House, we’re asking for your help. If you get an email or see something on the web about health insurance reform that seems fishy, send it to flag@whitehouse.gov."

Who wants to be a loyal lap dog to the government's disinformation machine?

The blatant Orwellian business model that the administration is employing should be a warning to everyone.

Tax, Tax Tax

2009-08-05T05:18:00.001-04:00

President Obama wants "Almost $1 TRILLION in New Taxes Over Next 10 years, Starting in 2011." (White House Correspondent Jake Tapper, February 26, 2009 12:00 PM)

The president wants more from you by allowing the Bush tax cuts to expire, remove itemized deductions from your income tax form, and to raise capital gains (no doubt to further erode the US private sector). ($636 BILLION over 10 yrs)

He wants to slam the business sector with Superfund taxes, tax carried-interest as income, repealing FIFO, reporting on rental properties, an excise tax on Gulf of Mexico oil & gas, repealing of the allowance for drilling costs and manufacturing costs for oil and gas, eliminate the advanced Earned Income Tax Credit, and others. ($353 BILLION over 10 yrs).

That's $989 BILLION more that the president wants to take out of your pocket and put in his pocket and the pockets of his supporters.

Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick's Budget Recommendation - House 1 Fiscal Year 2010

"These blueprints also dedicate new revenues from modestly increased statewide meals and hotel and motel room occupancy taxes to mitigate cuts in Local Aid; eliminate sales tax exemptions for sweetened beverages, candy and alcoholic beverages to protect our children and support public health programs; expand the Bottle Bill to promote and fund recycling programs and water and sewer rate relief; and update and consolidate motor vehicle registry fees to streamline service and strengthen our transportation system."

But wait, there's more...

Taxes may rise to pay health care according to TS Timothy Geithner and National Economic Council Director Lawrence Summers this past Sunday. They are saying the President has not "ruled out" tax increases. So, keep your eyes pealed for this one.

The President does not count the State Children's Health Insurance Program (S-CHIP) tobacco tax increase from $32B to $71$ over 5 years, as a tax increase on people making under $250K per year (Politico - Josh Gerstein). Barry fails to note that 54% of smokers are poor (28%) or "near poor" (26%), with 18% "not poor" (Heritage Foundation). Well, unless the poor in America make over $250K per year, then I'd say Barry has some 'splainin' to do.

Let's not forget Cap and Trade (labeled Cap & Tax by conservative talk radio). There we find an additional $1.6 TRILLION according to the Heritage Foundation, by Loris and Lieberman.

I'm sure there are more that I've left out, such as locally increased fees for utilities, license plates, park access and for other services. All design to prove to average Americans that they cannot stay afloat without government holding them up.

The paradigm: Spend, Spend Spend, then Tax, Tax, Tax.

Left Wing Loons Still At It

2009-07-30T13:40:00.007-04:00

Left Wing Loons Still at It.

Joan Walsh in her piece titled "Right-wing racism on the rise" over at Salon.com, is trying her best to destroy some folks whose views are different from her's. You know, for a group of people who claim to care about the other guy and claim the high ground by being liberal minded, they sure can pile on those who don't think in lockstep with their own ideas. Ms. Walsh gives perfect examples.

She starts with her version of trying to get along with others,

"First, credit where it's due: A few lonely Republican leaders are belatedly trying to clean up the party's mess of crazy, from the racially tinged character attacks on Sonia Sotomayor to the unhinged rhetoric of the Birthers to the overall vicious and fact-free spew of Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck."

She indulges her fantasy world by claiming she's giving a little credit to the other side, then immediately attempts a give childlike pounding to her perceived enemies. I would certainly like to know what "racially tinged character attack on Ms. Sotomayor" has occurred. The only discussion of racially biased quotes I have heard are Ms. Sotomayor's own remarks, e.g.,

"I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn't lived that life." - Sonia Sotomayor

Please say again, who is the racist?

For evidence that Rush Limbaugh is a racist, gives us this quote,

"Here you have a black president trying to destroy a white policeman,"

Note: (This remark was made in response to the president's remark characterizing the police as acting "stupidly" in the disorderly conduct arrest of his friend Prof. Gates in Cambridge earlier in the week.)

I see nothing racist about his remark. Mr. Limbaugh's opinion may be incorrect, but "racists"? Uh, no.

While we can't know what the president was thinking, we can make our own judgments on his remarks ("acted stupidly"). It was a statement he had planned to make and it is very racial. Ms. Walsh is using the same tactic the Obama crowd used to get him elected: Throw in race card to shut them up.

The left, Democrats and Democrat supporters tried to intimidate anyone who spoke against candidate Obama's vague policies by claiming some inference to his race. Of course, that never happened, nut the facts have never stopped them from trying to leverage the situation.

My proof? Continue to read her words, where she offers exactly zero to back up her attempts to shut the opposition down.

Joanie gives Mr. Graham a thumbs up (sort of).

"Sen. Lindsey Graham tried to kick off a new GOP flirtation with decency when he announced his vote to confirm Sotomayor last week. "

I fail to understand how Mr. Graham's surrender can be moralized. Confirming or not confirming the judge has zero to do with her race, as it is considered Caucasian anyway.

In the following example, her primary targets are Limbaugh (again) & Glenn Beck.

"These two racists are projecting their own racial feelings onto Obama. Increasingly, the ranks of the racially blinkered (and I include MSNBC's Pat Buchanan here) are playing victim, insisting Obama's modest moves -- appointing a Latina justice, using the Gates case to speak out against racial profiling -- are reversing the racial order wholesale, and putting white men on the bottom of the pile." (emphasis mine)

Ms. Walsh, much like many other leftist writers, seems to have the power to read minds, and she is a psychoanalyst to boot. She knows their feelings and in her professional opinion, recognizes that they are projecting.

Well don't that beat all. The folks who have been projecting their own guilt, failings and weaknesses onto others, recognize the syndrome and accuse the opposition of doing that which they do. (it seems she must have read some of posts at the Huff)

By the way: I am not a psychoanalyst either, but I play one on the web.

Continuing... She has no proof of that any Republican or conservative in a position of power in the United States has ever claimed that the Obama appointments are racist in nature. I happen to believe that his appointments reflect a willingness to appease his base, but racist? Uh, no. Did he appoint people who if not for their political connections would be fined thousands of dollars or in prison? Yes, he did. That would be my complaint about Mr. Obama's "transparent" White House.

She rambles on,

"One look at Congress, the Supreme Court, Fortune 500 CEOs -- or conversely, at prison cells across America -- tells you how delusional the Beck-Limbaugh-Buchanan view is, but that doesn't make it irrelevant. It's likely to get worse, as persistent economic hardship plus a spike in right-wing racist rhetoric increases the appeal of scapegoat strategies." (emphasis mine)

Quite frankly, I do not see anything in her remark that proves anything racial. I can't even see her examples as explaining anything. I guess it's more than adequate for some that she merely used those words to describe people that her people dislike anyway. Yes, it looks irrational to us. But they just cannot help it. If you were a slow learner and you only half read it, you might think it says something important. If you do, then it's back to school for you. And she doesn't identify any "scapegoat strategies."

The only scapegoating I've seen is the whole of the Democratic Party, their surrogates and especially the president himself repeatedly claiming they "inherited this mess", this "crisis". The truth be known the president, the elected Democrats in congress and hope for their kind of change and childlike intellects, are at the bottom of the current financial crisis. And it is their inability to understand basic human nature (or simply disregard it) that motivates them to attack anyone that comes in opposition to their grandiose, but terminally flawed, plans for America.

More.

"It's time for more decent Republicans to take a stand against the vicious anti-Obama racism of the party fringe and their broadcast fuhrers. On Monday Ohio Sen. George Voinovich blasted the dominance of his party's Southern fringe, and its outdated Southern Strategy with its emphasis on racial division. Like Voinovich, I think GOP racism and race-baiting will consign the party to a long time in the political minority. But it could claim a lot of other victims along the way." (emphasis mine)

Again, she demonizes Republicans by implying that they need to be less vicious, racist, fringy, and to stop race baiting. As previously mentioned, it is she that is doing the race baiting.

If any Republican follows her advice, he/she should resign immediately. Her entire article is based on her hyper-partisan hate for any anyone questioning of her idol's policies. Furthermore, it is designed to make Republicans look inward for fault where no fault exists. It's a shame that many will take her words to heart.

Broadcast fuhrers. Too funny.

Healthcare Reform: Ban rescissions

2009-07-29T16:18:00.009-04:00

While at a left wing blog site, I was reminded of the premise that private sector insurance companies employ a profit protecting methodology called "rescission". A link to an article saying as much was his proof.

I just have to ask Democratic Party supporters; Why is there no law banning rescissions?

Consider this: The Democratic Party have set themselves up as the protector of the little guy in America, the "blue collar" party whose members "feel your pain" and are only in government to look after your best interests have allowed this practice to go on while they were and are in a position to stop it. The US Congress, House and Senate, have been under Democratic Party control for almost all of the last 6 decades. Additionally, they had Democratic presidents for 20 of those years.

Is this how they show their selfless service? Could they have done something about it?

I'm going to say yes, this is how they show their service and that they could have banned this practice. But they didn't.

Next question: Why not?

My first guess would be lobbyists. Our politicians live and breath for lobbyists. Lobbyists have access to real money that their representatives need to maintain their elected offices. You know, so they can help you.

If that sounds cynical, how about this: The US Congress passed a law in 2008 to try to prevent insurance companies (AIG), banks and other Wall Street investors from filing for bankruptcy, while telling you that they were going to save the mortgage industry so you could continue to own your home. They passed out hundreds of billions of federal tax dollars to these companies with no strings attached. Did it stop any foreclosures? (no.)

I wonder how much of that they expected to get back in the form of campaign contributions or maybe special treatment on home or business financing at some time in the future?

Going back a few years to 2001, I wonder if there was some relation between the fact that we taxpayer gave tens of billions of dollars to the airline industry and the fact that Senator Tom Daschle's wife was a high paid lobbyist for the airline industry?
Note: Senator Tom Daschle 22nd United States Senate Majority Leader June 6, 2001 – January 3, 2003

So again, why haven't our representatives banned the egregious practice of rescission?

Oh, I don't know. Why don't you ask their lobbyists?

Government Mandated Health Care Passes the Senate Health Committee

2009-07-15T11:07:00.005-04:00

It's not too late to call or write your senators to register your opposition to this country killer.

Reuters is reporting that the Senate Health Committee passed their version of the the Obama health care plan in a party-line 13-10 vote. The albatross is to be combined with the Senate Finance Committee's input, which they have not written yet. Then it will be passed through 4 more senate committees before it comes to the florr.

The bill ostensibly will insure the 46 million people in America that do not have health care insurance. Of course, opponents say that it will insure only about one quarter of that 46M at a cost of $1.5 Trillion.

Additionally, it will add:
- A government-run health care program (will destroy competition and nationalize health care)

- Require most Americans to obtain health insurance (who are they leaving out? Whose insurance plan? ANS: The government's plan)

- Mandate most employers to provide it to their workers. (to reduce job opportunities for middle America, after piling on income and other tax increases on them)

- The legislation also would seek to reduce costs in the $2.5 trillion U.S. health care industry. (by lowering doctors' and hospital fees, thus reducing the number of doctors and hospitals and other emergency services and by cutting Medicare and Medicaid)

Translated this all means the government is going to further tell individual Americans what is best for us and make you pay extra to for arousing their attention.

President Obama has promised to reduce Medicare and Medicaid spending by over $500 Billion to make it whither on the vine.

I this what you want?

Sign the petition at www.freeourhealthcarenow.com

Free Our Health Care Now Online Petition

2009-07-13T14:33:00.002-04:00

Sign This Petition

You'll be a better person for it. This issue is not about partisan politics, it's about who is going to make your medical decisions for you and for your family.

The current proposed government solution to health care in America will drive up the cost, while congress dismantles Medicare and Medicaid. It will spend over a TRILLION dollars that the government does not have, and will only cover a small percentage of those it is supposed to include.

So, add your name to the 300, 000 who have already agreed that we need to take back health care from the government and put it back into the hands of those can best make decisions for themselves. This includes you.

Sign This Petition.

Orwell Would be Aghast or How the President is Faking You Out.

2009-07-09T08:28:00.011-04:00

President Obama embodies the spirit and soul of author George Orwell's vision of the future. When speaking he introduces a little truth, never fills in with details, sprinkles in some double-speak, misinformation, using his winning form of propaganda and seems to be mired in doublethink. The legacy media's news programing uses a burgeoning form of newspeak by slavishly catering to his agenda, not asking the hard questions or reporting the details of his proposals and plans.

Put the fear in them

President Obama has based his presidency in crisis management to gain public support for his government's helping all Americans. He makes speeches ensuring a fearful electorate that he is looking out for our welfare and then uses the various monetary crises to obligate trillions of dollars that we do not have. (Why he would want to bankrupt the United States is beyond me, but it seems to be the goal. If not, then he is getting horrible advice from his advisers and will continue to borrow, print and spend this country into a hole that could become beyond correcting.)

Doublethink

The president says that current government spending trends "cannot be sustained". OK, so he has one right. But he said that the day after signing a $420 Billion budget for half of the fiscal year. It seemed he came to his senses as if he believed we had obligated too much already. That was a few short weeks after he signed $787 Billion "stimulus Package". Throughout this time, he has been saying that he would not allow any so-called "earmarks" (read as "pork barrel projects). All of this massive spending was on the heels of TARP, $700 billion that he supported and voted on in the US Senate.

Of course, this president has done nothing wrong because he inherited all of this mess.

Does it get any more Orwellian than this?

Why, yes it does. In nearly all of his speeches he will say one thing while urging congress to do the opposite.

Consider that he claimed that there is no room in his administration for lobbyists, then he hired at least twelve lobbyists to work in the White House and chose former Senator Tom Daschle to join his cabinet.

Candidate Obama emphatically and repeatedly claimed that he would put an end to earmarks. (An earmark is a type of "pork barrel" project) Then, at his very first opportunity to sign a a spending bill, he sells and signs a bill (the Stimulus Package) that is exclusively earmarks. Thousands and thousands of earmarks.

And, he still wants to spend another $1.4 Trillion for a government takeover of health care insurance in the United States. He wants it now, before congress breaks in August.

He then said if you want to keep your current insurance plan, you can have the same coverage you have now. But he can produce no documents or study to show where private or employer paid health care insurance will be unaffected by his "competitive Public" plan. But we are all aware of what happened when Hawaii decided to provide insurance to cover everyone.

He claims that the stimulus package has saved or created over 150,000 jobs, but cannot point to any of them. All the while, unemployment continues to raise well beyond his predictions. We lost another 467,000 in June alone.

While campaigning, he and his minions lambasted Senator McCain for suggesting that employer paid health care insurance might be taxed as income (along with a tax deduction for paying for it). Now, the president wants to tax the same benefit with no suggestion of an offsetting tax deduction.

He said no one making under $250,000.00 annually would have their taxes raised. That 95% of Americans would receive a tax cut. What was the first thing newly inaugurated President Obama did? Raised taxes on cigarettes by 67 cents per pack. The vast majority of cigarette smokers are poor to middle class in America (that's under way under $250K per year). Then comes the Cap & Trade bill that introduces over $800 billion in new taxes on everyone that exhales.

In the automobile industry bailouts, he said that he did not want to run the car companies and followed that by firing General Motors' CEO, then telling GM that they weren't building cars that way he liked and if they didn't change their evil ways, he was going to pull the bailout funding from them.

Newspeak

Showing his ever increasing control over the media, the president declared that we are no longer fighting a "global War on Terror". It has been replaced with the more correct term "Overseas Contingency Operation"

During his campaign the media and Obama supporters would ostracize anyone mentioning his middle name, Hussein. Furthermore, only African Americans and his other supporters could talk about race. Unless, of course, they were gloating over the possibility of America's first black president.

Through out this presidency, the media have only told one side side of the story. Barack H. Obama's side, and they are just getting started.

Orwellian or not?

Huffing on Palin

2009-07-04T14:20:00.015-04:00

The Huffington Post, always a paragon of virtuous reporting, is dumping on Governor Sarah Palin like a gang twelve year olds slamming the new kid on the block.

As everyone in the known universe knows, yesterday Gov. Palin announced her intent to resign the Governorship of Alaska at the end of July. This has brought on an avalanche of debate on the whys and what fors of this decision. Never mind what she said, just make up what you'd like and post it at the Huff. Once written, it must be true, right? (uh, no) Bloggers at the Huffington Post are a particularly nasty as group and individually. Here is a list of Palin bashing stories where the headline makes their positions crystal clear.

Starting with Palin's Lamest Excuse, then Palin Resigns to Accept Post as Lunatic Laureate, along with: Sarah Palin -- What a Schmuck, and my favorite, Woman to Woman: Advice to Gov. Sarah Palin on Running for the Presidency in 2012. Nice people, ay?

In Palin's Lamest Excuse, John R. Bohrer says she is trying to play the part of "martyr" and "was going after all the GOP soft spots. His claim is based on her statement that she wants to save Alaska's budget from millions of dollars in ethics investigations. How ethics is a GOP soft spot is beyond me.

In recent history, I'd have to give the DNC the title in the ethics arena. Can you say "tax cheating Secretary of the US Treasury"? Can you say lobbyists "won't work in my White House" ? Can you say "no tax increase on Americans making under $250K"? ("the bill would slap the equivalent of a $4,609 tax on a family of four by 2035".)

OK, talk to me about ethics Mr. Bohrer.

Then there is Palin Resigns to Accept Post as Lunatic Laureate, where Evan Handler imparts his wisdom. His argument is that the Governor was "having fun all the while insisting they're doing it for someone else's benefit".

He goes on to say, "It's easy to criticize, I know. But today I feel qualified. Because this is the identical excuse I gave to every girlfriend I broke up with in my twenties and thirties."

OK, I see. Due to your confessed lying and, well, everyone is just like you. Because, you know, you are not a lunatic, are you?

I don't know if she ran for governor for "fun" or not, but I cannot read minds. Apparently Mr. Handler can.

Hey, Mr. Handler. Has the CIA approached you use your special powers?

Ah, Ms. Krautter with, Sarah Palin -- What a Schmuck, who says, "If I were a citizen of Alaska, and especially if I had voted for her, I'd be pissed off."

You would? I always find it a little surprising when liberals advise conservatives to be wary of "this flighty fowl from above the 48th parallel". Yes, yes, we will be wary of what: Sarah Palin? Or should we be wary of liberals who want to help conservatives? I pick door number two.

In Woman to Woman: Advice to Gov. Sarah Palin on Running for the Presidency in 2012, Sophia A. Nelson describes herself as a "lifelong moderate-centrist Republican woman" and she has some advice for Governor Palin. Ms. Nelson knows about these things because she is "someone who has followed politics for the past 20 years or so." She "can tell you it (Gov. Palin's reason for resigning) is a "bogus" statement which is simply code for "I'm running for president."

After portraying the governor as a liar, Ms. Nelson wants to help her run for president. (go figure) She, being the friendly sort of 'moderate centrist Republican, just wants "offer the soon-to-be former governor and presumed GOP nominee hopeful in 2012 some unsolicited, but hopefully useful political counsel:"

That's right, I'm questioning her motives. And why not? Isn't she a self proclaimed lifelong moderate-centrist Republican, who just happens to support the wildly left leaning Huffington Post? Just reading a few of these hit pieces reveals that you'd be hard pressed to find anyone Huffing around who sincerely cares about Sarah Palin, her family or her future in national politics.

Anyway, some of her friendly advice.

1. "Surround yourself with political advisors who have real life experience"

Uh maybe not. Current politicians and their advisors are nothing more than marketing agents who will spin any truth to promote themselves. Gov. Palin represents a welcome change to the norm in national politics.

My sincere advice to the Governor would be to stay away form these empire builders at all costs. They are exactly why Republicans lost in 2006 and 2008. Avergae moderate-centrist Republicans wabt people who represent us. Most of our current batch of public servants are serving the publics earnings to themselves.

2. "Reach out to the bigger GOP tent"

I'm afraid we all will have to battle the legacy media and leftists, such as those who linger around the Huffington Post, to broaden party appeal. The reason is that according to those sources all Republicans are right wing religious extremists who want to grab your benefits and make it an offering to their rich friends.

Be confident in the fact that most Americans live their lives as conservatives, are "moderate" in all political issues and want a real person to lead them, not some empty suit of a cardboard commercial.

3. "Build coalitions." Well, one in a row. She says, Palin cannot get the nomination "as the 'old boys' do it."

No kidding. Governor Plain became Mayor, governor, and nominated for McCain's VP by going outside the good old boys system.

4. "Take time to learn and educate yourself about world affairs -- go get a degree from the Kennedy School of Government"

Do you mean the way VP Joe "McGaff" Biden has? Or maybe President Obama? Well, that's not going to work unless the legacy media is fawning over you or your running mate. Mr. Biden may have many years of experience on foreign relations committees, but from what I've seen, he didn't learn very much. Moreover, the President had even less foreign affairs experience than Governor Palin. In fact, Mr. Obama had no experience at anything other than Teleprompter 101 and Advanced Teleprompter. Even the President's earned degree constitutional law seems to be a long lost memory to him.

5. "Be a woman of conviction."

This helpful hint reveals a very large gap in Ms. Nelson's understanding of the Sarah Palin the rest of America has met. I'm shocked and amazed that anyone would even suggest that to her. She is the one giving other politicians lessons on advancing themselves by sticking to her principles. Her principles are what brought her to the national scene. I would go so far as to say that if more Republicans stuck to their conservative principles, they would not be the minority party today.

Finally, as for the actual reason why Governor Palin announced her resignation, only she knows for sure. But what her actions have revealed is the rabid fear of the perception of honest and selfless public servants that the left in America harbor. So much so that they cannot help but try to drag down anyone who they perceive as having these traits. Governor Palin is just the most recent target in a long line of personal assassinations delusional leftists.

Healthcare Reform: The Public Option w/A View From the Huff

2009-07-02T08:57:00.010-04:00

Bob Cesca, A Huffington Post Blogger, opines that the opposition to the Obama healthcare insurance reform is from the "crazy wing nuts" who are lying and exaggerating the situation. He had no real defense for the public option plan. Just your typical leftist insults on subjects he does not understand.

Insults:

"Political race-baiter (and, somehow, CNN contributor) Alex Castellanos"

"random "Republican analyst" on MSNBC: But this DMV crap on a stick is only one of many crazy attacks against the president's healthcare reform agenda and the public option."

"Predictably, as healthcare reform grows larger in the window, the claims from the far-right are becoming increasingly bizarre and ridiculous, topping, in some cases, the psychotic claims of, say, the Obama birthers."

He includes Sean Hannity, Representative Michelle Bachmann and Glenn Beck in his citing of "crazy wing nuts".

Then there is his absurd claims, while never once backing up anything he writes. (I've just read "True Patriot" by Eric Liu & Nick Hanauer. It has about the same in the lack of any evidence. So, this seems to be the way of the left.)

He states,

"First, no one in the government would mandate this switch."

(to the public option in lieu of their private sector plans)

What he simply doesn't know is the fact that there is no need to mandate it. The public option would put private sector providers out of business. Just as it almost did in Hawaii (an emergency session repealed the "public option" within 7 months of its creation to undo the damage)

"In non-wingnut reality, of course, the public option would function similarly to Medicare, which is hardly a spooky or unfamiliar program, and I challenge anyone to produce a single human being who would willingly give up his or her Medicare coverage."

Of course, this challenge is ridiculous as, except for the the very wealthy, no senior could afford the cost of private sector insurance. And there are reasons for that.

1. There aren't enough customers to spread the risk due to the government's unfair business tactics, which drives up the costs for everyone.

2. Seventy five percent (75%) of all Medicare part B payouts come from the federal government's general revenue. A small percentage comes from the participant's monthly payments (currently $96.40), their co-pays and payroll (FICA) taxes.

As for being reliable, the Trustees Summary Report for 2009 also says Medicare is unsustainable. Besides, President Obama is calling for reducing Medicare and Medicaid spending by $509 Billion annually. So, where is the money coming from?

He continues with,

"Hannity deliberately inflated the number to 20 million and overlooked how and why people would leave their private plans. But I don't think he expected Tom Arnold to be the one to call him on his lies."

Well, all I have to say is, 'Hannity is a piker in the exaggeration department.

President Obama and all of his foot soldiers in the legacy media are claiming that they will cover 47,000,000 uninsured Americans. This is a huge exaggeration of the facts. According to the US Census Bureau the total of 45.65 million uninsured in 2007 included 9.73 million foreigners, bringing the total down to 35.92 million. Of those there were about 9 million who made over $75K per year and chose not to buy insurance, bringing the total down to 27 million Americans who were uninsured in 2007. Moreover, those numbers of uninsured was down in each category.

47 million vs. 27 million

Tell me again, Mr. Cesca, who is exaggerating?

Then, flailing about at Rep. Bachmann, he misconstrues this way...

"As I was researching the topic of crazy wingnut healthcare arguments, I thought perhaps Michele Bachmann would have an insane healthcare quote on the record for me to exploit and debunk. I was wrong. It turns out that Bachmann's most recent healthcare reform attack accidentally underscored the leading argument in favor of the public option."

And what caused that unfortunate circumstance for him? Rep. Bachmann had said,

"Approximately 114 million Americans are expected to leave private health insurance. Why? Their employers will drop the insurance because the taxpayer-subsidized plan will be 30 to 40 percent cheaper."

To which he responds...

"Up to 40 percent cheaper? That's amazing. I've heard estimates of around 30 percent, but 40 percent is even better. Make sure to tell your Republican friends that The Michele Bachmann Unit says that the public option will be 40 percent less expensive than private health insurance."

On the very thin surface, it may look like an endorsement of the public option. When you know a little more, you realize that, once again, this will usurp the private sector's customer base and move huge numbers of Americans to the only plan available, the public option.

And will it cost less overall? Will it be better for individuals needing health care?

According to the CBO, probably not.

But, this is typical of your self-centered leftist blogger. He is way too busy raking the muck looking for insults rather than spending some time trying to dig out the truth. The president has also spent too much time on, well, I don't know what, because he simply has no idea of what is in this healthcare reform that he wants, he just wants it. And this example is typical of his supporters. They also have no clue of the consequences of too much government intruding into private sector free market economies (this explains, in part, how they can support Mr. Obama's policies.

ObamaCare or DemoCare is going to break the bank, if it isn't already beyond repair.

Send in the Clowns; Never mind They’re Here

2009-07-01T12:58:00.004-04:00

Well don’t that beat all? Al Franken, former comedian and hate spewing liberal ex-talk radio failure, has been awarded a US Senate seat by the Minnesota State Supreme Court after eight months of recounts and court challenges between Mr. Franken and incumbent Senator Norm Coleman.

Originally, Mr. Franken lost the election by about 350 votes or so, and then demanded a recount. They recounted and recounted until he had the lead by 300 or so votes.

Close enough: Take ‘em to court.

In court we learned that Mr. Franken’s cronies had many absentee votes rejected due to what they call improperly filled out forms. This would include voted from service persons serving in combat zones and registered voters who file absentee because they cannot get to the polls on Election Day.

Democrats take full advantage of this very important feature of election law. They know that they can take congressional seats by whining & crying, complaining & filing lawsuits, and making sure everyone knows how badly they are treated. Treated badly mostly by those people who insist that voters are legal voters and that all the legal votes get counted. Commonly referred to as either Republicans or conservatives.

Minnesota is the state that gave us Governor Jesse Ventura in 1998, so it's no surprise that this vote, between a moderate Republican and a whacked out self-serving ex-comedian would be so close. I believe I'll check around and see how many novelty toy factories are in Minnesota as well.

After getting past the lunacy of that whole circus, you find that now, the economy crushing liberal left now have a super majority in the US Senate. This may mean that there is very little to prevent Democrats in congress and the White House from bankrupting the entire country, government, private industry, and individual Americans in record time.

By the way: The state bird of Minnesota is the Common Loon. Go figure

Cap & Trade Passes: Americans lose.

2009-06-27T06:38:00.008-04:00

In their (now everyday) underhanded way, the Democrats in the US Congress passed this economy killer. Eight Republicans (update) turned their backs on America, while 44 Democrats revealed some common sense. R ead it here and see if your representative has any common sense or not.

Underhanded because the renamed and revised 1300 page bill (Here) , with amendments (H.R. 513) was brought to the floor for debate early in the morning (3 AM) and voted on it at 7:17 Pm the same day. I wonder how many of our representatives were on hand for that? I wonder if anyone other than Rep. John Boehner (R-OH) and his staff read any of it? House Resolution 587 limited debate, changed the name to HR 2998 and designates the bill as "read". Read by whom? Clerks & Staff? I hope you read it.

In an email to constituents, Rep. Vern Buchanan writes:

"The 1,200-page bill was being rewritten hours before the scheduled vote to attract support. Washington is broken, and nowhere is this more evident than in the fact that complicated, far-reaching legislation is being brought to the floor that no member could possibly have read ahead of time."

It is amazing that anyone could have read the thing while it made it's way through 13 committees in 3 days. (OpenCongress.org). The review period for each committee of 3 hours each was ordered by the Speaker.

Here are some of the mechanisms included to bankrupt the middle, now that they've bankrupted the US financial, mortgage and automobile industries.

Health care is next.

CBO and the Joint Committee on Taxation (JCT) estimate that over the 2010-2019 period
enacting this legislation would:

Increase federal revenues by about $846 billion; and
Increase direct spending by about $821 billion.

The US Congress and the current president are planning to raise your taxes by and additional $846 billion

$846 billion in new taxes!

The Heritage Foundation...

"An analysis of the Waxman-Markey bill (as reported out of the House Committee on Energy and Commerce) by The Heritage Foundation found that unemployment will increase by nearly 2 million in 2012, the first year of the program, and reach nearly 2.5 million in 2035, the last year of the analysis. Total GDP loss by 2035 would be $9.4 trillion. The national debt would balloon as the economy slowed, saddling a family of four with $114,915 of additional national debt. Families would also suffer, as the bill would slap the equivalent of a $4,609 tax on a family of four by 2035."

The Heritage Foundations' Web Memo 2504, How the Waxman–Markey Climate Change Bill Would Affect the States, by Congressional District breaks the costs down. Speaker Nancy Pelosi pushed this for in her district: The personal income loss for 2012 is $560.24 Million and averages $327.30 each year through 2035. In Author Henry Waxman's district it is –$550.66 and –$318.93. Edward Markey's district: –$560.24 and –$324.47. In my district (13 FL, Rep. Vern Buchanan) it will be –$504.97 in 2012 and –$292.46 each year through 2035. This means that in my district alone it will cost a total of $7,231,550,000.00 lost to the government through 2035.

The AP describes the bill as

"an effort to curb global warming"

Uh, OK.

Cap & Trade: Letter to US Congressman

2009-06-26T08:39:00.004-04:00

The US House of Representatives are debating the Waxman-Markey Cap and Trade bill, officially the "American Clean Energy and Security Act", HR 5454. From OpenCongress.org. This is a huge tax on American families. Even some Democrats acknowledge this fact.

My understanding is that US House Speaker, Nancy Pelosi, is pushing hard on this one.

At the Heritage Foundation they are saying this law is bad for consumers and business.

"Presented as a comprehensive energy bill, the American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009 (ACES)[2] offers nothing more than subsidies and mandates for unsuccessful, unproven energy sources coupled with taxes on reliable energy sources that falsely claim to stimulate the economy by investing in clean technology and creating green jobs. This government-centric approach will destroy jobs and drive up energy prices for years to come."

So I urge anyone reading this to contact their representative in Washington DC and repectfully request that they vote down this job killing legislation.

Here is what I said...

Dear Representative Buchanan,

This note is to ask you vote against the American Clean Energy and Security Act today.

Of the many agenda items the new president and Democratically controlled congress are trying implement, this one has to be near top of the list of Things That Will Kill the US Economy. Some of the others being Public Health Care, the lack of oversight on Freddie Mac & Fannie Mae, and two more trillion dollars of deficit spending.

While I support common sense ideas to reduce air pollution, placing an enormous burden on our economy is simply wrong headed and out of sync with the needs of the country and the world. The Democrats in congress have already decimated the financial, construction, and auto industries. They must be stopped.

What this country needs is to revive our economy ad that can only happen if government stops implementing expensive programs that slow everything down and cause unchecked inflation. Then start implementing common sense tax cuts in the form of realistic health care deductions, reducing or eliminating capital gains taxes and reducing or eliminating corporate taxes for starters.

Once again, I thank you for your support.

Public Health Care: A Letter To My Representative

2009-06-25T14:51:00.004-04:00

A letter to my representative, sent June 25th, 2009.

Dear Representative Buchanan,

I have been watching the current health care debate and I have to say that the Kennedy plan is the wrong plan for our country and its future as the land of the free in a world where freedom is the exception.

While the president assured everyone that the public plan will be competitive and lower costs, we only have to look to the great state of Hawaii to know the outcome. Their program lasted 7 months before they decided to repeal it due to a massive shift in private sector insured to the state plan. They nearly bankrupted the private sector insurers and ran into the red in the state budget almost immediately.

I realize that the federal government can simply print more money when it runs out, but that solution is extraordinarily inflationary and will come back to haunt us when the real costs start settling in. Besides, the president and congress have already spent us into a hole that will take decades climb out of. We simply do not have the funding for a massive health care takeover by the federal government.

The president's claim of competitiveness is false. When employers see that the government will provide insurance, they will drop their employee coverage, just as happened in Hawaii. Private sector insurance companies cannot print their own money to make up for lost customers, so they will have to price themselves out of business. Additionally, how can he claim to be competitive when the Kennedy bill calls for taxing health care benefits, but excuses union members from paying it? In addition it is violation of equal protection under the 14th Amendment and will coerce middle and lower income families to join a union to be able to have insurance.

I have a better idea. Though I'm sure some or all of this has been passed around before, I need to know that it is known to my representative.

First, change the income tax law to allow at a direct 10% or more deduction for all medical expenditures. Currently only the amount over 7% of one's gross income can be deducted on a 1040, and only when itemizing. Make it part of the 1040EZ form. It has been this way for many decades and tells a sad story about American politics. I believe this helps force people into government sponsored programs, such as Medicare.

Two: An additional dollar for dollar deduction for insurance premiums paid out of one's income. This will encourage many to purchase their own coverage instead of relying on Rep. Barney Frank for our insurance needs.

Three: Allow insurance companies to compete for customers across states. Interstate competition will lower costs by expanding the customer base. There are around 1300 health care insurance companies around this country. Let's get them all competing with each other.

Four: Phase out Medicaid and Medicare. The president has already said he will cut Medicare and Medicaid by $509 billion and no one squawked about it. This opens the door to move away from the government solution to a regulated private solution. It is a well-known fact that government insurance programs leads to much fraud and waste (around $60 Billion last year). Additionally, the people who watch their own hard earned money very closely are not so careful with free money from (what seems like) someone else. However, we all know, or should know, that that money to cover the doctor and hospital visits come out of our own pockets when the government is picking up the tab.

Five: Tort reform. The Democrat pundits are claiming it is a non-issue as the lawsuit judgments are relatively small when compared to the total cost of health care. But what is not said is that the malpractice insurance industry has not lowered their premiums. Doctors and hospitals still pay outrageous rates for malpractice insurance and this is passed along to the patients.

Modern society has Americans on-the-go all of the time to earn a living, raise children, maintain homes and personal budgets. I can see how there may not be much concern over having too many labs at the doctor's office when the bill is something they do not have to think about.

The answer to health care reform is for Americans to get involved in our own health care, reduce insurance costs through fair competition and tort reform. Please remember that there can be no competition between the government, with virtually unlimited assets, and private sector insurance companies, who depend on a large customer base.

I understand that changing health care from government issue to personal responsibility is a big job that may ultimately be impossible. Nevertheless, it is important to prevent this country from failing due to a lack of responsibility on the part of its citizens and a need for ever more and more power by some members of the federal government.

Thank you for your support.

Some Bloggers. Sheesh

2009-06-24T16:35:00.004-04:00

Some bloggers censor their blogs. I would like to believe that the main attraction to to blogging is the free exchange of ideas.

However, while looking for a quote on public health care insurance, I came across "GOP Lies About American Health Care", Our Rants & Raves - Politics, by Michael Boh. It appears that Mr. Boh is only interested in opinions that match his own. I posted a rebuttal to his rant at about 9 PM Tuesday night and it yet to appear. I normally wouldn't be spending time ranting about someone else's blog, but this guy is just way too in the can for the Democrat policies and President Obama, while spewing hate for opposing politicians, and, apparently, opposing opinions.

Of course I have no problem with managing one's own blog, but censoring for opposing opinions is un-American. Especially when he says, "All opinions are welcome!"

I kind of liked Mikey's rules and thought I might plagiarize them for this blog. He'll never see it, so it would probably not be a problem. Here are his, very reasonable rules. Some of which he has violated.

Rules
1. Write your own. (Did that)
2. Respect to be respected. (Did that)
3. Debate the topic at hand. (Did that)
4. Cite only reputable facts. (a matter of opinion)
5. No distractions, distortions. (a matter of opinion)
6. No "F" bombs, sexual language. (Did not do that)
7. No harassing, abusing bloggers. (Did not do that)

All opinions are welcome! Michael (Not so much)

You can read Mikey's rant and decide if I violated any of his rules.

My post to Rants and Raves:

This is incredible.

The singular cause of skyrocketing health care costs is the federal government.

Medicare and Medicaid set prices, control access and reduce the paying customer base for private insurance. The US Congress setup these programs while being influenced by lobbyists from the pharmaceutical, hospital, and doctors' organizations.

More government, especially a "public Program", will only make it worse. Look to the lesson of the great state of Hawaii. They instituted public health care insurance to compete with private insurance and fill in the the insurance gap. Hawaiians dropped their I-have-to-pay-for-it-out-of-my-pocket insurance for the better deal of the state program.

Some competition, aye?

Since the state cannot print their own hope dollars, they closed it after 7 months.

The lie is not the with the Republicans on this. The lie is that Obama's program will be competition.

The lie is that it will reduce costs. Only competition will do that. And competition is what Obama is trying to destroy.

Moveitright.blogspot.com

Mr. Boh's response: by Michael Boh said...

Mover/GR - I had to reject your recent comments for the following reason(s): they include misleading and/or disreputable facts (Rule #4) as well as distrations/distortions (Rule #5).

Unlike most "conservative" blogs, I will post comments that disagree with my own. However, I will not do it if I feel they are designed to mislead or disrupt the issue being discussed. Have a good day. June 24, 2009 7:55 AM

Cash for Clunkers Passes

2009-06-20T06:26:00.006-04:00

I dislike being a pessimist all of the time, but...

Cash for Clunkers, officially known as Consumer Assistance Recycle and Save Act of 2009, pretends to offer consumers vouchers worth up to $4500.00 to trade in their presumed "gas guzzler" for more fuel efficient vehicles. You can find out how much your vehicle can qualify for at Fuel Economy.gov

So this will turn out to be another in the long line of Democrats in government, and Republicans going along for the ride, using voter dollars to buy votes from them. This one will likely be a zero some gain for car buyers and a boon to the UAW, who Democrats in government unquestioningly support. (Just look at the auto industry's government imposed failures that led to government supervised bankruptcies for proof. The result is the UAW receives a 17% ownership in General Motors. Now that is collective bargaining!)

What I predict will happen is this: Automobile manufacturers and Dealers, who are offering $1000 -$10,000 off of MSRP for new vehicles, will now be offering $500 to $5500 off MSRP. it will be a zero sum gain for consumers, and will be another government handout to autoworkers.

So we, as consumers, have to decide what we are going to do with this new free benefit. Use it or not?

I'm going to say "take it", and here is why. This government is going to ensure that gasoline prices become prohibitively expensive. They don't want to drill for domestic oil and natural gas and they want to squander billions on "alternative energy" and "green" research. They have spent us into a real hole already and are planning many more new spending programs, the most aggressive being "Public health care insurance".

So get a vehicle that will last and gets better gas mileage. Use your own money (Cash for Clunkers) to help pay for it. If your a good negotiator, it may be helpful. If you can, you should take as much advantage of this program as possible.

Go in to trade in your "high pollutin' gas guzzler". Just remember: It's a trick.

Say No to Public Health Care Insurance

2009-06-17T12:33:00.006-04:00

The president's plan for universal health care is another bad idea in a long line of bad ideas on this subject. If he, or anyone is congress, would like to actually help folks obtain health care insurance he would push for tort reform, interstate competitiveness, medical savings accounts, and dollar for dollar tax credits to incentivise working Americans to purchase health care insurance for themselves.

Some folks already have medical savings accounts, but it should be made available to everyone.
Interstate competitiveness may be another hard nut to crack because it would in large part remove the several states' power to regulate medical insurance.

I realize this would be a long shot in today's political environment as our illustrious representatives do not understand the term "tax cut". If you explain it to them (and there is no camera or microphone near by) they may let you know that you're talking crazy talk. Tax cuts indeed! Tax cuts to elected Democrats is like garlic to vampires.

The other issue, tort reform, isn't going to happen anytime soon either. Can you imagine two rooms full of lawyers who get to make law and give themselves pay raises suddenly deciding to cut or remove the the largest jackpot lawyers have ever found? Yeah, me either.

All of these issues would have to take on life as a real grass roots issue. Much like the Tea Parties around the country, or the grass roots effort that killed the lame version of so-called "immigration reform".

But, I cannot just pick on the president all of the time as on some points, he gets it right. In fact this is his forte. He will say that which is so true that it defies contradiction. Wonderful. But then he will go on to say something that is completely contradictory or simply wrong. He outlines, as much as he has been able to, his government health care plan in a letter to congress.

In his letter to congress concerning health care insurance he says,

"Soaring health care costs make our current course unsustainable. It is unsustainable for our families, whose spiraling premiums and out-of-pocket expenses are pushing them into bankruptcy and forcing them to go without the checkups and prescriptions they need. It is unsustainable for businesses, forcing more and more of them to choose between keeping their doors open or covering their workers. And the ever-increasing cost of Medicare and Medicaid are among the main drivers of enormous budget deficits that are threatening our economic future."

I agree 100%. Like a hammer he's hit the nail on the head.

But then he ruins it with this...

"I strongly believe that Americans should have the choice of a public health insurance option operating alongside private plans. This will give them a better range of choices, make the health care market more competitive, and keep insurance companies honest."

Public health care insurance is going to lower costs for everyone?

To borrow a phrase: "Here's yer sign."

But I wonder if Mr. Obama, or anyone in government, know why Health care and health care insurance has become so expensive? I believe they either do know why, and are not saying, or they really do not know why, in which case, they should be replaced with people who have a clue.

Health care in America has become prohibitively expensive because of our government. Through Medicare and Medicaid, government set prices on services and prescriptions, allow waste and fraud to run rampant, has become an unfair competitor to private insurance, and a lawyer led get-rich-quick scheme called "malpractice".

Sorry folks, but attributing cost savings to government would not only be unlikely, it would be impossible. I'm afraid our president's advisers have not learned the lessons of public health care insurance from the great state of Hawaii, the government plan to fill the gap for the uninsured in Hawaii. It lasted an entire seven (7) months before being dismantled. The reason? The people who already had insurance dropped their expensive private insurance in favor of the free insurance and almost bankrupted the state while destroying the private insurance companies. People are not stupid. If the government is going to use someone else's money to buy them insurance, it would only be in their best interests to get in on the deal. Of course, private insurance companies cannot force dollars out of the pockets of their customers, so they were left hanging. It won't work.

A quick glance at Medicare and Medicaid's history is a huge clue. In 1980 Medicare accounted for .7% of the country's health care spending. It has now grown to 19.7% of total health care spending. To ensure participation in this government program, Americans are forced into Medicare at age 65 or earlier if they receive Social Security Disability payments. All of this has reduced the number of people buying private insurance and a smaller customer base means higher prices. (just look at your utility bill. Save a lot and they raise the price.) Read more about Medicare here, here and here.

On Medicaid, the numbers are scary as well. (from Reuters, Report says Medicaid spending "unsustainable")

"In 1970, the report said, combined federal and state expenditures for Medicaid represented 0.4 percent of the economy, but this percentage grew to 0.9 percent in 1980, 1.2 percent in 1990, 2.0 percent in 2000 and 2.3 percent in 2007."

Another inflationary problem with universal health care insurance is the same problem that continues to run up the cost of Medicare and Medicaid: Cost control.

When I have to pay for something out of my pocket, I go for the best price I can get. If someone else is paying for it, then the price is not so much of a concern.

Malpractice Insurance. Doctors are charged huge premiums for malpractice insurance, which they must pass along to patients and their insurance companies. In order to hold back these costs, some governors have frozen insurance premiums in their states. Also, back in 2002 in the article, "High Insurance Premiums Jeopardize Rural OBs" (Rural Health News, Vol. 9, No. 1), they report...

"Citing data from a survey by Medical Liability Monitor, ACOG said that nationally, the median insurance premium for OB/GYNs increased 167 percent from 1982 to 1998. In 2000, it rose seven percent. In 2001, it went up another 12.5 percent. For 2002, the expected increase is 15 percent.

According to American Medical News, eight states saw two or more liability insurers raise rates by at least 30 percent in 2001. In more than 12 states, one or more insurers raised rates by 25 percent or more."

How can this not affect doctor, prescription and hospital fees?

Sheila Guilloton, of the Examiner, writes that...

"Malpractice insurance for OB/GYNs is reported to have one of the highest premium for medical malpractice, with some areas reporting premiums of $100,000 per year for OB/GYN coverage. Premiums in major metropolitan areas can be as much as $250,000 per year."

You can read more on The Tort Threat at the the Insurance Information Institute (I.I.I.)

On the Bill Bennett radio show, Morning In America, Senator Bill Frist said that when a doctor asked if a patient had insurance and the answer is "no", the doctor will prescribe generic, less expensive drugs. If the answer "yes", then the doctor can prescribe the more costly name brand drugs. Since a patient on Medicare or Medicaid is "insured", the fees and prescriptions will add to the taxpayers' burden.

If the federal government enacts public health care insurance, the same pattern will follow. People are not stupid. If they can get free (to them) health care insurance, they will abandon private insurers in favor of saving hundreds or even thousands of dollars each month. Wouldn't you?

So, there you have it. Medicare and Medicaid, along with malpractice insurance rates, are the prime reason that health care costs so much. The way to reduce these costs is not to add more government, as the president, his advisers and the US Congress believe. The answer is less government. Much less government.

Tax breaks will enable the working to afford their own insurance and that will act to keep medical expenses and insurance premiums lower. Tort reform will reduce the number of excuses insurance companies have to increase premiums while lowering doctor and hospital costs.

It needs to be mentioned that government is now intruding into areas of individual freedom that Americans are not accustomed to, such as deciding what to eat and how much exercise we need (or not), what kind of cars we need and what kind of energy usage is better for us. As government moves to further influence our lives, they will use the excuse of 'saving taxpayer dollars to reduce health care expenditures' by a reward and punishment system to be more healthy, just as I did when raising my children.

We are not children and do not need the impersonal government dictating lifestyles of Americans. Americans did just fine when there were no big government babysitting programs and we will do just fine again when they go away.