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Showing posts with label Health Care Reform. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Health Care Reform. Show all posts
Tuesday, October 2, 2012
Obama II: The Wish List
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Monday, September 10, 2012
Romney Flip-flops To Position He Always Held!
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Monday, August 27, 2012
The Republican Platform: Fringey Stupid
● Priority Number One: The Economy! Well, no. Of the 18 “ideas” listed, not one of them involves improving the economy. Why? Because the retarded chimps who put this platform together don’t care about the economy. What do they care about? Read on.
● Priority Number One: Repealing Obamacare! Well, no. That’s number six on the list, after such high priority issues like “making the internet family friendly.” Yes, you read that right. These dipsh*ts think it is more important to let people know that the Republican Party wants to censor the internet than it is to repeal Obamacare.
● The Homosexual Menace: So what is the first priority listed? This year’s most important priority, apparently, will be stopping gays from marrying. Why? Because “studies” show that children from married couples stay off drugs, get married and don’t commit crimes. Ergo, gays shouldn’t be allowed to marry. Don’t worry if that makes no sense, just accept the idea that Jesus hates gays. By the way, this same group of the self-righteous is opposed to civil unions too because gays are yucky.
● Fix Welfare. . . Somehow: Next our slow friends have decided that welfare doesn’t work, especially because Obama wants to discourage people on welfare from working. So they want someone, somewhere to fix the current system somehow to encourage people to work. . . which it already does.
● Internet “Freedom”: Apparently, the platform will include some highly technical sounding, yet utter nebulous plan to support internet freedom. Reading the definition will make your head spin, but the lawyer in me had to laugh at all the caveats and interest group sops already obvious in the definition. It sounds like the Republican “internet freedom” platform will be about protecting ISPs (who support Republicans) over net companies (who support Democrats). Any freedom resulting from this will be purely coincidental.
And just in case some freedom should accidentally result, the platform makes sure you can't misuse your freedom because it includes a nifty little section on censoring the internet to make it “family friendly.” See, the internet is EVIL. Apparently, “millions of Americans suffer from . . . pathological gambling” and “the Internet must be made safe for children.” So it’s time to shut down gambling sites, ban sex offenders from the internet, and force ISPs to save the children. . . all “while respecting First Amendment rights.” No, I’m not making this sh*t up.
● Americans with Disabilities: Forget the economy, it’s more important that we make sure Americans with disabilities are included in all aspects of our national life. Well, not all aspects. In fact, all we really care about is two things: (1) we need to force insurers and doctors to treat people with disabilities (I’m told doctors in particular like to tease the disabled with fake cures), and (2) when will somebody finally stop the government from taking children away from people with disabilities? Seriously! This national crisis just dominates the news and it's time someone had the courage to address this! Be brave Platform monkeys, be brave.
Oh, we should also support some nebulous sounding employment programs which we didn’t have the time to examine, but their titles sound nice.
● Repealing Obamacare/Abortion: Finally, we come to repealing Obamacare. Why repeal it? Well, because it’s not right. Also, “Through Obamacare, the current Administration has promoted the notion of abortion as healthcare. We, however, affirm the dignity of women by protecting the sanctity of human life. Numerous studies have shown that abortion endangers the health and well-being of women, and we stand firmly against it.” Yep, they talk about repealing Obamacare because it promotes abortion.
● Fixing Our Healthcare/Abortion: So how do we fix the nation’s healthcare? Simple: “health is an individual responsibility” and people need to take better care of themselves. That means you fatboy! “Chronic diseases [are] related to lifestyle [and] drive healthcare costs.” So we need to “promote healthy lifestyles.” No doubt, these will be based on being abortion-free and internet porn free. And lest you think I’m joking, two paragraphs into this one, they call upon states to stop “subsidies for abortion.” I guess abortion makes you fat.
Then they give the usual sop to insurance companies (big Republican contributors), which is the worst thing we could do other than what Obama did, and they want science to save us by making record keeping cheaper. Maybe we should ban 16 oz. drinks?
● More Abortion: Then we do two more “healthcare” related points – “supporting” research and protecting individual conscience in healthcare. The first involves banning stem cell treatments and stopping abortion, and the second involves stopping abortion. Are you starting to see a pattern here?
● Reforming the EPA: Oops, sorry, the EPA is cool. . . everybody likes the EPA. We need to reform the FDA. Why? Because drug companies are Republican contributors and they are having a hard time with the current EPA.
● Oops, forgot, more Healthcare: Yes, we’ve mentioned healthcare several times, but we forgot to mention that we want to reduce costs through tort reform. That should fix everything, even though Andrew pointed out that tort reform will only cut a couple billion dollars in a multi-trillion dollar system. Yep. . . problem solved! (Especially once we stop fat people from getting abortions.)
● Education: We’re opposed to “the crippling bigotry of low expectations.” Hell, who isn't?! So how do we fix that? We want reform! But we don’t believe in one-size-fits all, so we can’t really tell you what we want, but it must involve traditional values.
● “Fixing” College Costs: College costs suck. They are “unsustainable.” We should get private companies to issue student loans (fyi: they already do) and we should tell people more about what they are paying (fyi: they already know). Also, maybe not everyone should go to college? Problem solved!
● Prison Reform: Yes, this issue which just dominates the nation’s headlines day after day after day finishes this amazing platform. Basically, we support what we’ve been doing because liberals oppose it and that makes it reform. Yay reform!
● Other Points: Also, while we're at it, let's keep them dirty Mexicans out and let's think about the gold standard because the 500% inflation in the price of gold in the past decade sure makes gold seem awfully stable!
There you have it. A declaration of idiocy. This is the kind of document I would have written if I wanted to lampoon the Republican Party as being dominated by cultists. Gays, abortion, abortion, abortion, some stuff nobody cares about, abortion, stupidity and the status quo described as reform. Not only has this gang of fornicating monkeys completely missed the issues of the day, they’ve proven that (1) they remain obsessed with gays and abortion, (2) they are obsessed with controlling everyone’s private lives, and (3) they know NOTHING. At least they didn’t include Islamophobia or suggest that women get pregnant and stop taking jobs that belong to men. I guess that's something.
It’s time to purge the party of its moronic fringe and force the party hierarchy to at least join the 20th Century, if not the 21st. Fortunately, Romney doesn’t believe any of this crap and is more likely to wipe his butt with this document than he is to read it.
As an aside, if you want to know what the platform should have looked like, how about this:
1. Replace Obamacare with free market healthcare.
2. 10% across the board cut in federal spending and federal wages.
3. Flat tax.
4. Strict anti-lobbying/graft laws.
5. Repeal of all regulations not necessary for public safety.
6. Comprehensive immigration reform.
7. School choice using vouchers.
8. Internet Anti-Censorship Law plus Privacy Rights.
9. Banning government funding for abortion, imposing reasonable restrictions and otherwise leaving this decision to the individual.
Tuesday, July 31, 2012
Obamacare To Make Doctor Shortage Worse
● Grrr. . . Seriously, W.T.F.?: How can HHS put an ad on my television pimping Obama’s “signature” achievement, i.e. the one he won’t mention on a bet? Well, disturbingly, this is legal. Federal agencies are not allowed to engage in partisan politics. This goes back to the 1930s when the Republicans tried to suck the politics out of the federal bureaucracy. Up to that point, the agencies were considered spoils of the process and the parties used them to hand out jobs and favors and to extract favors in return. Laws like the Hatch Act put an end to that.
So how can HHS run an ad that is essentially a pro-Obama campaign ad? Believe it or not, federal agencies are allowed to advertise the kinds of benefits they offer the public. That’s right. They are actually allowed to put out ads telling people to come get “free” stuff, i.e. things paid for by the taxpayers. This falls under the category of performing their mission because their mission requires advising the public about the benefits available to them.
What HHS technically was doing was telling the public about the new benefits being offered so that those of us who qualify could sign up for them. It just so happens that in so doing, they were basically campaigning for Obama by telling everyone about the great new law offering all the free healthcare you can sponge. Grrr.
As an aside, this isn’t the only instance of this during this election cycle. The Department of Agriculture has actually teamed with the government of Mexico to advertise American food stamps to any eligible Mexicans. Grrrrrr.
● Is There A Doctor In The House?: Anyway, HHS left out one key point in their expositions on the “virtues" of Obamacare: there aren’t enough doctors. The Association of American Medical Colleges estimates that without Obamacare, the nation will be short 62,900 doctors by 2015 and 100,000 by 2025. With Obamacare, the number will exceed 125,000 by 2025. That’s an interesting admission. Why would a law that was meant to make everything perfect make the doctor shortage worse? There’s even a part of Obamacare which was supposed to address this! So how can this be? Well, the law only authorizes 3,000 new doctors, not the 125,000+ needed. Moreover, the law itself is driving doctors from the profession.
Further, I think these numbers are vastly understated. According to official estimates, 30 million people are about to get health coverage in 2014. If the system already has a shortage of doctors, how much worse will it get when that happens? The government recommends 60-80 primary care physicians and 85-105 specialists for every 100,000 people. This means, 30 million “new” people will need an additional 21,000 primary physicians and 28,500 specialists by next year. It apparently takes ten years to train a doctor. So unless someone expected Obamacare in 2004 and started cranking up the med schools, we’re going to be 49,500 additional doctors short starting next year because of Obamacare. And all of this is before another 25 million people join the ranks of Medicare, meaning they will need a lot more care than they presently receive, and they will need it on the taxpayer’s dime.
The result of this doctor shortage will be felt in two ways. Some people won’t be able to find care. A good example of this can be seen in Medicaid. In 2008, less than half of primary care physicians were willing to take new Medicaid patients. Why? Because they lose money on each. Obamacare expands Medicaid. In fact, one-third of the 30 million people who will be “covered” will be covered through an expansion of Medicaid. Few of those people will be able to find doctors.
The other way this will be felt will be as “an invisible problem.” This means that patients will still be able to see their doctors and get care, but the process will become slow and difficult because of overcrowding. Some people will need to drive long distances. Many will languish on waiting lists for care. And a lot of people will end up using the emergency rooms as a substitute. In effect, Obamacare will make the very problems it was supposed to cure worse. Imagine that.
Monday, July 9, 2012
Killing ObamaCare From the Inside
There are four or five ideas being battered around right now on how to kill ObamaCare without a full repeal. I think a couple of these are excellent temporary measures, but a couple others would be disastrous. Here are my thoughts.
● Method One: Starve It. Most federal laws require funding to function. Without funding, they cannot hand out cash, award contracts or even assign government workers to perform tasks. In some instances, this won’t matter because the law is enforced by private individuals who can bring suit to make it happen or, in the case of criminal law, it can be used by DOJ without specific funding. But ObamacCare isn’t that kind of law.
ObamaCare requires the creation of federal exchanges, requires enforcement officials, workers to process paperwork, inspectors, etc. It requires the payment of money to insurance companies and states, funding for the creation of demonstration projects, etc. It even requires money for IRS agents to be able to pursue the penalties. Without money, none of that can happen.
Usually, when laws like ObamaCare get passed, the Congress appropriates (assigns) money in advance to make the law happen. Those appropriations then become line items in the federal budget and take on a life of their own because they become part of each subsequent budget unless they are specifically voted down.
But in this case, the Democrats got careless (or more accurately tried to hide the price) and didn’t appropriate any money. To make up for this, Obama has been funding the law from an HHS slush fund meant to pay for the Federal government’s general health care expenses. Romney can stop this on day one and effectively kill the implementation of the bill. And unless the Congress decides to force funding on Romney, the bill will be dead until Romney is out of the White House.
This could kill about 90% of the bill for up to 8 years.
● Method Two: Ignore It. An offshoot of the first method would be that Romney could simply tell his agencies not to enforce the law. Thus, the IRS would not collect the tax, HHS and Medicare would do nothing to implement the law, etc. Obama has done this with laws he doesn’t like, like many related to immigration.
The problem with this approach is that once money is obligated by Congress for a specific purpose, the President must do that. Until Nixon, Presidents often impounded such money rather than spend it, but a weakened Nixon administration gave up this power. So while Romney could ignore the law for a little, the courts would eventually force him to act. Although, that could take a couple years.
This could kill about 90% of the bill for up to two/three years.
● Method Three: A World Without Rules. To implement a law, the Executive Branch issues rules which tell everyone how the government will enforce the laws. In most cases, these rules are written by the agencies on behalf of the White House -- though a few are handled independently. A new President has the power to re-write any regulations which prior Presidents have issued. Thus, in theory, Romney can wipe out or re-write all the rules related to ObamaCare to neuter it.
But there’s a catch with this method: wiping out rules isn’t as easy as it sounds. For one thing, once rules are promulgated, the agency must go through the whole rulemaking process to change them. That means the rules must be issued in proposed form, the public must be allowed to comment, the rules must be issued in final form, and then dozens of lawsuits will be filed before the rules go into effect. Until that point, Obama’s rules would still apply. This wouldn’t apply to any rules Obama hasn’t finalized yet, but it would apply to all the rules he has finalized. Thus, most of his rules could stay in effect for two to three years.
The other problem is the legal review. As unbelievable as it sounds after Obama’s term, the Executive is required to enforce the laws as reasonably written. So it would be nearly impossible for Romney to just change the rule to “just kidding.” He could cleverly sabotage much of it, but not all of it. Also, the next administration could simply redo his rules.
This could eventually wipe out most of the law, but it would take time and it would only last until the next administration changed the rules.
● Method Four: Misimplementation. Because the law was written with the idea that Democratic administrations would handle all the dirty details away from the sight of the voters, the law gives HHS a lot of discretion in terms of how to implement the law. Romney could exploit this by certifying that people, businesses and states are in compliance when they aren’t really. This could defang the law.
Personally, however, I don’t like this option at all. This wouldn’t wipe out any of the law and it runs the risk of turning into cronyism. It also wouldn’t stop liberal states from taking advantage of the law to demand massive federal subsidies.
That leads me to another method of misimplementation. When the Democrats drafted ObamaCare, they made an interesting mistake. The way the law is written, it doesn’t allow the Federal government to give subsidies for buying insurance except through state insurance exchanges. Thus, if states refuse to set those up, the federal government can set up alternate exchanges but it can’t provide subsidies.
Some conservatives are saying this would be a good move. I completely disagree. This does nothing to kill the bill. It also allows the establishment of federal control, which can become rather oppressive, especially if the Democrats manage to sneak funding into a bill somehow. In effect, this would be like letting a robber hold a gun to your head just because you think it’s not currently loaded. Moreover, this would allow liberal states to implement the law and get subsidies from taxpayers all across the country, while people living in conservative states would not get the subsidies. In effect, conservatives states would be subsidizing big rich liberal states, and the bill would appear much cheaper. This is a bad solution.
Thoughts?
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Monday, July 2, 2012
Some Final Thoughts On Obamacare
● The Supreme Court Fails: Legally speaking, the ObamaCare decision is horrible. Some conservatives have latched onto the fact Roberts made a lot of great points about how the Commerce Clause and the Necessary and Proper Clause don’t extend nearly as far as the statist would have you believe. Sure, that’s nice. BUT then he turns right around and opens an unlimited window for Congress to use its tax powers to do anything! There may eventually be limits on this power, but as it stands right now, this is one of the five or six biggest power grabs in Constitutional history.
It is also troubling that this decision is based on verbal semantics: punishing someone for non-compliance is not the same thing as forcing someone to comply. Really?! That’s nonsense! That’s a distinction without a difference -- a verbal game -- and it’s disturbing that the Supreme Court would accept this double-speak as reasoning. This will lead to a whole new world of control once Congress realizes it can just “tax” you into compliance without ever triggering the limits on its power to “punish.” That’s troubling.
● The Conservative Opportunity: Politically, however, this is a very different story. Politically, I think this decision is a Godsend for two reasons.
First, this decision will destroy the Democrats, and not just Obama. Human nature tells us that people forgive and forget misbehavior if it stops before the negative consequences kick in. So long as people assumed the Supreme Court would rein in ObamaCare, the public was very likely to forgive the Democrats and consider this a non-issues. Now that assumption is gone, and this decision revives the possibility of negative consequences. That will wake up the public and end its forgiving mood. Indeed, I would suspect this will endanger another 3-5 Democratic Senators in flyover country and could ultimately give us another 2-3 seats. And while I don’t think that will give us enough seats in the Senate to overcome a filibuster, it will be the difference between a majority (52-53 seats) and a solid majority (54-57 seats), which should be all we need under the new scorched-earth Senate.
Secondly, I think this ruling saved us from a disaster. If the Supreme Court had struck down the mandate, but left the rest, I have no doubt the Republicans would have declared victory and just moved on. That would have left a plethora of horrible things ensconced in law, including trillions in taxes, dirty deals with drug companies, anti-competitive requirements on hospitals and doctors, new entitlements, the unfunded expansion of Medicare, the creation of these insurance exchanges, etc. In effect, the least damaging part of the law would have been struck down and the other 99% of the harm would have remained. Now the Republicans will need to address the bill itself, and the pressure will be to repeal and replace the whole thing. That means they will actually need to fix much of this. That is the real reason this decision may ultimately prove to be a saving moment for the Republic, because it means the Republicans can’t ignore the real problems.
● Repealing Stupidity: Repealing ObamaCare should be simple. Passing it by reconciliation means that by definition it can be repealed by reconciliation. And reconciliation only needs 51 votes. Naturally, the Democrats (and some weak Republicans) are whining that somehow the bill can’t be repealed by reconciliation, but that’s nonsense.
● Building A New Crisis: There is an economic crisis built into ObamaCare and it will be interesting to see what happens. The law expands Medicaid to the point that it will shatter state budgets. But states don’t need to sign up for this. Indeed, the Supreme Court ruled that the states can refuse to expand Medicaid as the bill requires, and the Federal government cannot withdraw Medicaid funding if the state so chooses -- it can only withhold the additional funds intended to cover that expansion.
But just because states don’t need to sign up, doesn’t mean they are smart enough to refuse. A few Republican governors have said they won’t sign up, but most see this more as an opportunity to negotiate a lot of freedom from the requirements of Medicaid. It will be interesting to see what they obtain. The problem, however, lies with the Democratic states. . . as always. These idiots are rushing to sign up as a show of support. This will result in a dramatic increase of their Medicaid costs, which will bust their budgets. At first, the federal government funds this expansion, but within a couple years, that subsidy vanishes. That’s when states like California and New York will find themselves in budget hell (as if they weren’t already). Without federal money, I don’t see this as sustainable, but how will they cut off so many people once they sign them up? Watch out if you live in a liberal state which accepts this expansion!
● Death to the Middle Class: Conservative economist and Senior Economics Writer for the Wall Street Journal, Stephen Moore, just made an interesting statement. He claims that 75% of the cost of ObamaCare will fall on the middle class -- people making less than $125,000 per year. That’s not at all surprising because that’s who always pays for these programs. Still, this is unwelcome news for a middle class which has been hit with falling incomes, falling asset values, falling home prices, massive inflation, an ever-higher tax burden, and fewer job prospects. At some point, this rubber band will break.
Conclusion
To sum up my thoughts, this bill is a disaster. It will crush the stupid states, it will crush the middle class. It will damage our healthcare system a lot. The Supreme Court’s ruling has damaged our Constitution. BUT this will wake up the public and will help to finish off the Democrats. It will also force the Republicans to act. In the end, this decision may prove to be the moment which spurred the Republicans to actually fix the healthcare crisis, and thereby save the country. Let’s hope.
Finally, by popular demand, here are some links for you to consider:
First, here’s what’s wrong with our healthcare system: Out of Control Costs, Out-of-Control Costs II, Access, and Quality Control Problems.Have a happy and free Fourth everyone!
Secondly, we have a report card on why ObamaCare fails to address these problems: FailureCare.
Lastly, we have CommentaramaCare, a proposal on how the system should be fixed: Com-Care Tort Reform, Com-Care Medical Reforms, Com-Care Coverage Reform, and Com-Care Summarized and Priced.
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Monday, June 25, 2012
Obama’s “Week From Hell” Coming Up
Everybody’s had one of those weeks, where everything goes wrong. Obama is about to experience a big one! Indeed, this week will likely be the week which will define his Presidency as a total failure in the history book. And it starts with ObamaCare.Obama bet his entire Presidency on ObamaCare, and that’s going down in flames this week. Yep. Sometime this week, the Supreme Court will finally issue its decision. We’ve discussed that a lot, including the likely outcomes (LINK), but any way you slice it, this will end poorly for Obama. At the very least, the individual mandate will be struck down. But more likely, the Supreme Court will strike down the entire law. Either result, however, will be seen by the public as a complete reversal of ObamaCare, and with it, a complete undoing of his entire term in office.
My biggest concern here is if only the mandate gets struck down. That could kill the momentum for a repeal of the entire bill, which is what is truly needed. Indeed, the individual mandate is the least harmful of the provisions. The rest of the bill raises taxes, hands out favors, reshapes how hospitals function, limits the way doctors can arrange their businesses, slashes Medicare, subsidizes some people’s healthcare, imposes requirements on insurers, and forces states to create these massive insurance exchanges which will never go away. That is the real heart of ObamaCare and that’s what needs to be eliminated. On the plus side, once people think ObamaCare is gone, it will be hard to stop the Republicans from repealing the rest. On the downside, once the pressure is released, Washington tends to return to rest and let things stay as they are. Let’s hope the Supreme Court does the right thing and kills the whole bill.
But ObamaCare is just the beginning. This week the Supreme Court will also uphold Arizona’s law to let its police enforce the nation’s immigration laws. If immigration truly is THE issue for Hispanics, and this bill is as bad as the left claims, then Hispanic won’t be too happy that Obama proved impotent on this issue.
More importantly, as more and more states pass these laws, the ability of the Democrats to ignore the illegal immigration problem by sabotaging ICE efforts in Washington will vanish. Instead, the states will start taking care of these issues, with a likely first round resulting in a demographic shift as illegals flee to welcoming states like California. . . which can’t afford them.
On Thursday, Obama’s lawyer, Attorney General Eric Holder, will find himself held in contempt of Congress for lying and withholding documents from Congress related to his “Fast and Furious” program which resulted in thousands of weapons being given to drug cartels in Mexico. Interestingly, even the left is mocking Obama’s claim that Holder has the right to withhold the requested documents under Executive Privilege. Apparently, young Barack Obama once said Bush’s identical claims were illegal.
On Friday, Obama’s latest effort at a stimulus bill, a $109 billion highway bill, will probably fail in the House. So much for spreading around a little bribe money before the election.
Finally, student loan rates will double unless action is taken by June 30, and the House Republicans don’t seem all that interested in stopping this. This will upset yet another key Obama demographic, students. This one might pass, but we’ll see. But it won’t help the mood on college campuses that Obama let this happen.
That’s a big week for Obama and from the looks of it, it’s all going to go wrong. :)
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Thursday, May 3, 2012
Deciding Who Lives And Dies
Liberals love to control everyone around them. From demanding seatbelts to banning salts and transfats to banning soda in schools, liberals just can’t stop telling you how to live your life. But how far would they really go? Would they deny you medical care if you don’t conform to the way they think you should live? Take a wild guess.Today’s story comes from Britain, which is often a trendsetter for our left. This story specifically involves a poll conducted by the UK of 1,096 doctors in the National Heath Service. They were asked if the NHS, i.e. the government agency which controls all healthcare in Britain, should have the right to deny non-emergency treatments to smokers and to people who are overweight. Fifty-four percent (54%) answered “YES”.
Think about that for a moment. A slight majority of British doctors (“do no harm” types) felt that the British government should have the right to deny Britons medical care if they were smokers or fat. And don’t forget, in Britain, there really is no other choice for medical care, so this is effectively a ban, not simply a demand that they fund it themselves.
The ostensible reason for this is a shift in attitudes resulting from the need for medical cut backs. In other words, because money is scarce, they want to decide who they consider worthy of receiving treatment and ban everyone else from getting it. But when is money ever not scarce?
And don’t think this is theoretical either. A prior investigation has already found that 25 of 91 Primary Care Trusts in England (think “Obama Insurance Exchange”) have imposed treatment bans since April 2011 in an attempt to save ₤20 billion by 2015. Indeed, in parts of England, smokers and obese people are being rejected for hip and knee replacements so these trusts can allocate their resources to people whose lifestyles they deem more justified of receiving treatment. And you can bet that once it’s acceptable to deny “non-emergency” care to undesirables, emergency care will be next. . . like in euthanasia countries, where doctors now decide if your life is worth saving or if the state wouldn’t be better off letting you shuffle your now-worthless ass off this mortal coil.
So once again, liberals are dividing the world into those they like and those they don’t and they are trying to use the power of government to punish those they don’t. The NHS is a system from which Britons cannot escape. . . just like a single payer plan would be here. They make you pay massive taxes for that system your entire life, i.e. they turn you into a slave, with the promise that you will be taken care of. Then they deny medical care to those they dislike. So much for medical care being a basic human right.
This is the problem with liberal “do-gooder-ism.” It quickly becomes fascism of the worst kind. From banning things you eat to taking your children if you teach them the wrong lessons to imprisoning you for having the wrong thoughts to letting you die if they don’t like you. Don’t ever believe a liberal when they start whining about human rights or dignity because they don’t really mean it. . . they always omit the critical words they are really thinking: “for some.”
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Wednesday, April 4, 2012
And The Hits Just Keep On Coming. . .
● Tom Hanks: As you may recall, right after Team Obama released a campaign video narrated by Tom Hanks, Hanks got caught on stage playing along with a hedgefund manager in blackface. He tried to lie his way out of this by claiming that he was shocked and offended by the appearance of the man. But the tape shows otherwise. Indeed, it shows Hanks blasting Bill O’Reilly. Tom has now been forced to apologize to O’Reilly. People are also beginning to ask why this liberal school has no minority kids. Whoops.
● Solyndra Part 15: Meanwhile, yet another Obama-sponsored company is going broke. This time it’s a solar energy company called Solar Trust for America. They received $2.1 billion in loan guarantees from Obama’s Department of Energy. This is “the largest amount ever offered to a solar project,” said Energy Secretary Steven Chu back when he was handing out the cash. He called this an “historic moment in America’s new energy frontier.” And both he and Slow Joe Biden were there for the groundbreaking in Blyth, California. But less than a year later, the company is in bankruptcy. And apparently there are more solar companies planning bankruptcies as well.
Nice job Mr. President: $2.1 billion spent, no worthwhile product produced, no jobs created.
● Joe Biden: Somebody let Slow Joe out of his box the other day and he’s been gaffing as fast as he can ever since. First, after saying that Romney is consistently wrong, Slow Joe referred to Scott Community College President Dr. Theresa Paper as “Dr. Pepper.” And also he decided that Governor Romney was really Senator Romney. But that was just a warm up. Biden next said that Republicans “have a legitimate argument that the government should not be engaged health care.” Only he “strongly disagrees” with that legitimate argument. A “legitimate” argument is a correct or valid argument. Thus, what Biden has said translates to him agreeing that the Republicans are correct that the government should not be engaged in the health care market, but he doesn't care that they are correct and he will stick with what he knows to be wrong.
He then strangely added that he doesn’t want to “dictate” your health coverage. . . ignore the man behind the mandate.
Biden later said, “I don’t want to make fun of-- I’m not saying our Republican friends don’t care about people. They care about people just as much as we do.” That’s nice of Joe to say, since he routinely says the opposite. Indeed, while talking about Medicare this week, he said Republicans don’t care about people: “Look us over, look into your heart and ask . . . who do you believe is genuinely committed to preserving the dignity of people in terms of their healthcare and their basic, basic ability to live?” This, by the way, comes from a man whose healthcare reform plan stripped Medicare of $500 billion.
Biden also invited police and fire officials to an official government dinner, i.e. the kind where it is ILLEGAL to engage in politics, and he said that the Republicans favor low taxes over policies that would save the lives of police officers and firemen. In other words, Republicans want to let police and firemen die so taxes can stay low. He then attacked the rich for supposedly not being willing to pay for fire and police:
What an ass.“The first guy who’s going to have a problem is the guy whose $3 million home is on fire and you can’t get a truck out there. The first guy that’s going to have a problem is the person who has real assets and finds their house burglarized or robbed, or their Porsche is stolen.”
● Robert Reich On The Truth: Former Clinton Labor Secretary Robert Reich just made a fascinating claim about the ObamaRecovery -- 93% of the gains in 2010 went to the top 1% of earners in the country. The bottom 10% of the public saw no gain at all. In fact, most of the bottom 90% lost ground, with average income falling $127 between 2009 and 2010 and $4,843 compared to 2000. So much for Obama helping the poor and middle class. Maybe we can’t tax our way to prosperity after all?
Obama never has had teflon coating like Reagan, but he has had an MSM provided bulletproof vest to protect him from bad news. But it sounds like his vest is failing him and the bad stories are beginning to pile up. Personally, I credit the new-conservative media with forcing the MSM to take note. So it’s no wonder they want bills like SOPA to regain their monopoly on information. In any event, these are not good times at Rancho Obama.
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Thursday, March 29, 2012
Supreme Court ObamaCare Wrap-up!
● Thought One: Down she goes! The Supreme Court will strike down the individual mandate. Kennedy was considered the weak link for the conservative side but even he observed that ObamaCare “changes the relationship of the Federal government to the individual in a very fundamental way.” That’s lawyer speak for “unprecedented power grab.” This court will not sanction an unprecedented power grab. The mandate is toast.
● Thought Two: Incompetence. The MSM’s legal analysts should be fired for incompetence. When this lawsuit was first filed, they claimed it was “frivolous.” In legal parlance that means the arguments are so ludicrously wrong that no rational attorney could possibly make those arguments in good faith. Even as late as two days ago, these same “experts” predicted ObamaCare would win on a 7-2 vote. Now they’re despondent that ObamaCare will be beaten. To give you a sense of how wrong this is, it’s like an “expert” in aviation claiming that airplanes are too heavy to fly. . . after having flown to the interview on a Boeing. Everyone who claimed this was frivolous should be fired for incompetence.
● Thought Three: Incompetence (redux). Everyone now wants to blame the solicitor general for blowing this case. That’s wrong, and the “experts” know that. The Supreme Court does not base decisions of national significance on which side brought the better lawyer. All Verrilli’s incompetence means is that the court will do its own research into these issues. And don’t forget, “it’s own” in this case also means hundreds of legal briefs filed by friends of both sides (amicus curiae briefs). This case never hinged on the performance of either attorney. So don’t let liberals get away with pretending that the law should have been found valid if only Donald Verrilli weren’t such a moron. That is false and it’s meant to distract from the fact this law was an abuse of power.
● Thought Four: Severability. The hardest part of guessing Supreme Court decisions is guessing how far they will go. Right now, we have no way to know if the Supreme Court will strike down the entire law or just the individual mandate. They essentially have three choices: (1) strike the whole thing, (2) strike the mandate but leave the rest, or (3) strike the mandate and send the case back to the lower court to gather more evidence on what other parts also should be struck. Logic tells me, they will pick number three, but this court has proven to be bold.
Politically and legally speaking, it makes sense for the Supremes to strike the mandate and send the rest back to the lower court to gather evidence on which parts of the law rely on the mandate. Why? Because the court doesn’t like to decide things it doesn’t need to, and with the Republicans likely to control the House, Senate and Presidency after the election, the Supremes have the luxury of waiting to see how things go, i.e. Congress may do their dirty work. BUT. . . should Romney NOT win, then the 5-4 Court could end up a 4-5 Court. That fear may give this court an incentive to firmly decide as many things as possible right now -- hence, they are unexpectedly taking an affirmative action case next year.
Right now, the comments of the justices indicate they are leaning toward striking the entire thing. Scalia took the lead here and said that when you “take the heart out of the statute, the statute is gone.” His reasoning is simple: it distorts the congressional process for the court to pick and choose what survives. He also said it would be unrealistic to comb through the 2,700-page law to decide which parts were independent of the individual mandate. Liberal Justice Breyer actually echoed this when he asked the government, “What do you suggest we do? I mean, should we appoint a special master [to go through the law]?” He then placed the blame on the government for not specifically pointing out each provision which should stand. That’s usually a sign of a justice washing their hands of the case. I don’t believe Breyer will vote to strike the entire law, but this tells me he thinks the conservatives will and he is at peace with it.
Kennedy, who is viewed as the swing vote, also appears inclined to throw out the entire law. When Ginsburg said that the court should perform a “salvage job” rather than “a wrecking operation,” Kennedy retorted that doing surgery on the law would be “a more extreme exercise of judicial power.” And he said that “by reason of the court, we would have a new regime that Congress did not provide for, did not consider.” In other words, this would be court-created legislation and that is unacceptable.
The justice who concerns me a bit is Roberts. When it was argued that leaving the rest of the law in place would leave “a hollowed-out shell,” Roberts responded by saying, “but Congress would have passed part of that hollowed-out shell.” That could indicate a desire to leave the repeal up to Congress or at least get more information about Congress’s intent (i.e. send it back to the lower court for more evidence). That was the thrust of Ginsburg’s argument, that Congress must decide this, so they should leave the rest in place and let Congress fix it. But the thing about Ginsburg’s argument is that you can flip it on its head and make an equally valid argument. In other words, you can just as validly say that if Congress must make the decision, then the court should strike the law to give Congress a clean slate. That makes her argument worthless and if that’s all she’s got, then her side is out of ammo.
So while I really can’t tell you what will happen, it looks like it’s 4-4 with Roberts at bat, and I suspect he will strike the entire law because I’m not hearing a good reason not to.
As an aside, let me clarify the severability clause issue. People are claiming the absence of the severability clause means the whole law should be automatically struck down. That’s not accurate. That was the law 200 years ago -- if any portion of the law is bad, the whole thing gets struck down. That’s why people invented the severability clause, because it told courts that the legislature’s intent was to leave the rest of the law in place. Over time, the law morphed to the point that courts no longer automatically strike down whole laws. And the severability clause now is interpreted like this: if the clause is present, then the court must automatically uphold the rest of the law. But if the clause is absent, then the court MAY strike the entire law, IF the court finds that the unconstitutional piece is so vital to the intent of the legislation that the rest of the law could not continue without it -- there is no automatic striking. And we know the Supreme Court has accepted this interpretation of this missing severability clause here, because the arguments outlined above are the court working its way through the legal test of how integral this mandate is to the rest.
● Thought Five: Can’t win by losing. The Democrats are trying to put a brave face on this. They claim that losing would wipe the slate clean for the Democrats and would remove the toxic stain of ObamaCare which cost them the 2010 election. Wrong. Their ObamaCare abuse was so bad it spawned a new political party -- the Tea Party, and it led to an historic thrashing at the polls. Having the Supreme Court declare ObamaCare unconstitutional does NOT wipe away that stain anymore than being convicted of murder makes people forgive you for killing your wife. To the contrary, this will confirm to the public that the Democrats massively abused their power.
James Carville also claims a loss will help because once ObamaCare goes down, “health care costs are gonna escalate unbelievably.” Hardly. ObamaCare does nothing to restrain costs, so why would its death cause costs to rise? To the contrary, with the elimination of the taxes, requirements and restrictions imposed by ObamaCare, one would expect costs to go back down -- or more likely stay flat. Moreover, health rates are generally fixed for the year at the end of the year and won’t go up until after the election, so even if Carville is right, it won’t happen before the election. Nice try, idiot.
● Thought Six: Who are the ideologues? Finally, it’s fascinating that the left can simultaneously call the conservative justices “ideologues” as they admit that they don’t know which way three of the five justices will vote. At the same time, they ignore the fact the liberals made up their mind before they arrived and all spouted lockstep opinions. Who are the real ideologues?
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Tuesday, March 27, 2012
Obama's Bad Week Continues. . .
● El Stupido One: Obama really screwed up this week. While speaking to Vladimir Putin’s mini-me, Dmitri Medvedev, in South Korea, Obama said into an open microphone that he needed more time to surrender our missile shield as Putin demanded because of the election. Said Obama, “after my election, I will have more flexibility.” Whoops.
It is a scandal that Obama plans to surrender our missile shield and thereby expose Poland to an aggressive Russia. But that’s not why this was a problem for Obama. The real problem for Obama is the broader implication of what he said. This statement reminds voters that the only thing keeping him in check is the need to get re-elected. Once he gets re-elected, he will act like “real Obama.” That prospect will frighten conservatives, who will wonder how much worse he can get, and it will turn-off moderates, who had hoped he would moderate his views with a Republican Congress. What this does is rally conservatives behind Romney (now that the primaries are effectively over), and it will cause moderates to see Romney “the moderate” as more likely to be moderate than Obama, who has been using moderate rhetoric in public but is privately promising to go full-retard after the election. This hurts Obama.
● El Stupido Two: This Trayvon Martin thing will blow up on Obama. He should have kept his trap shut. Why? For one thing, because it reminds people that Obama is a racist and he only seems to care about the suffering of blacks. . . “what state was that flood in again?” Indeed, people are starting to ask why Obama commented on Trayvon, but didn’t comment on the shooting death of a white Mississippi State student by three black males this week, or why he hasn’t commented on the shooting of two unarmed British tourists by a black Sarasota, Florida teen. Americans do not like presidents who play racial favorites and this reminds people that Obama is such a president.
Further, the misconduct of Trayvon’s exploiters will turn off the segment of the electorate that took Obama at face value when he said he would be the first post-racial president. Indeed, since his election, his allies have smeared anyone who criticized him as racist. Blacks in the Congressional Black Caucus cried racism when they were caught breaking laws. They made up false claims of racism against the Tea Party. Eric Holder has pursued a truly racist “civil rights” agenda. And now, Jessie Jackson, Al Sharpton, the Black Panthers and others are busy inciting racial hatred. This is the exact opposite message Obama needs to send to win over moderate whites. And as more evidence comes out that Team Race is trying to lynch a possibly innocent man, the blowback is building. This appears to be Duke Lacrosse all over again. Indeed, we’ve now learned that a 13 year old witnesses says Zimmerman was the one being attacked -- and his wounds were consistent with that, we’ve heard the 911 call which is not at all what it was portrayed, and we’ve learned that Trayvon was a thug. Add in a mother who has trademarked his name so she can profit from his death and you have a recipe for significant blowback.
● El Stupido Three: Finally, let’s discuss Obama’s campaign video. Obama has produced a 17 minute video pimping his re-election. The video is narrated by Tom Hanks. And it is fascinating.
First, this was a stupid thing to release because only diehard supporters or opponents will watch a 17 minute video. So there was nothing to be gained here. Then it got worse because right after its release another video was released of Tom Hanks getting caught on stage with a hedge fund manager who is in blackface and who makes racist comments. Hanks now claims that he was blindsided by the appearance of this man, but he wasn’t. He doesn’t leave the stage or chastise the man. Nope. Instead, he launches into an attack on Bill O’Reilly. This has neutered the 17 minute video entirely and raised the question of the double-standard liberals use. And following Slutgate, where the left tried to defend people like Bill Maher, the timing couldn’t have been worse.
Moreover, when you look at the video’s contents, you quickly realize that Obama has no idea how to get re-elected.
● The video itself is dark, depressing and defensive. And it’s crawling with self-pity as it keeps whining about how much responsibility has been dumped on our oft-golfing president. You can’t win the White House being whiny or pessimistic.So what does this mean? It means he’s planning to run a depressing campaign. That’s a loser. He’s planning to blame Bush. Good luck. It means he’s afraid of his record. But without a crazed Republican in the race, that’s what this race will be about. Hence, he’s doomed, especially since the only achievements he’s willing to discuss either can’t get above 50% support in the polls or got him no credit with the public.
● Most of the video blames Bush. That’s not going to work four years after Bush left office.
● He’s terrified of his record. He never says “the stimulus package,” though there is one mention of the “Recovery Act.” He doesn’t tout Dodd Frank. He does talk about the auto bailouts, but he’s defensive as he tries to claim they extracted significant concessions from the unions. He mentions ObamaCare a lot, but only the promised benefits, which is the same sale pitch which keeps ObamaCare at the 40% support level in the polls. There’s almost no foreign policy mentioned except the killing bin Laden, which got Obama a 3% bounce which faded immediately. What the video does contain is a laundry list of promises to his different constituent groups (blacks, gays, feminists, enviros, etc.). That won’t play well if someone puts them all together for a general election commercial. Also, the whole video has been torn apart for being packed with lies and distortions. Even the leftist mouthpiece The Washington Post awarded it 3 out of 4 Pinocchios. That’s bad.
Add in the above, and you also have the Democrats going out their way to alienate the electorate by stirring up racial tensions, and Obama’s Medvedev comment putting the lie to his plan to run as a moderate. Right now, Obama and friends are doing everything wrong. They are alienating moderates, alienating whites, and energizing the conservative base. This could be one of the least competent campaigns in human history.
Finally, before you say, “don’t underestimate him,” keep in mind that Obama has never won a competitive election. All of his opponents imploded on their own. What’s the one thing Romney has shown cannot happen with him? He won’t implode.
Don't forget, it's Star Trek Tuesday at the film site. Today we resume the Politics of Trek series!
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Monday, March 19, 2012
The “Dangers” Of Obamacare
In the past couple weeks, there have been a series of articles BY LEFTISTS pointing out that Obamacare may not be all it’s cracked up to be. They identify four “dangers”:
● Danger One: Obama made a big deal of promising that “if you like your current plan, you’ll be able to keep it.” Yet, according to a CBO report, under the best-case scenario, 3-5 million people will lose their current plans. Under the CBO’s worst-case scenario, this number could be 20 million people. That would be 12% of people who are currently insured.This is what the Democrats get for massaging the law and lying about it to get it passed. And now the law goes to the Supreme Court. In two weeks, the Court will hear the oral arguments in the case. They’ve scheduled an incredible SIX hours for oral argument over three days. They have not give a case this much time in 45 years. The implication is they plan to make a major decision, which bodes poorly for the Democrats, who will in all likelihood now lose the very thing they risked so much to pass.
Of course, the reality is that this will be much worse. For one thing, historically, government “worst-case scenarios” are almost always understated by a factor of five. That would mean 60% is a more likely number. And there are several reason to believe that’s the case here. The CBO scores these things using a static model, meaning they don’t take into account how people will change their behavior over time. Instead, the CBO just does the math based on how the world is today. Thus, they did not factor in the increasing costs of policies, nor did they factor in that once companies see their competitors gaining an advantage by dumping their healthcare plans, more companies will follow.
The left is trying to downplay this by saying that businesses can’t really dump their coverage without upsetting their employees -- an interesting argument for the left to make, as they regularly claim businesses don’t care about employees. But of course, this isn’t true. Employers do things for financial reasons, not sentimentality, and financially it will be stupid not to dump the healthcare plan onto the government.
● Danger Two: The Democrats promised Obamacare would reduce healthcare costs. Of course, it actually contained nothing to bring costs down, and costs have continued to soar. Recent polls show that 49% of people blame Obamacare for the rising cost of premiums! The left is whining that it’s unfair to blame Obamacare for this because Obamacare “wasn’t intended to bring down costs,” but that’s how they sold it. I guess they shouldn’t have lied?
● Danger Three: They are starting to realize the law will not pay for itself, and the cuts in Medicare which were supposed to finance it aren’t happening. Whoops. Bankruptcy, here we come.
● Danger Four: The Democrats bet heavily on the idea that “the more the public knows, the more they’ll like it.” But that’s not happening. Obamacare’s favorability sits around 41%. And the reason for this is obvious -- it hasn’t helped anyone, but its negative effects are already being seen everywhere: higher premiums, lost insurance, doctors quitting the business, higher taxes, etc. That’s the way the Democrats set it up to hide the true cost so the law could be passed. Now they are paying the price for that deception. Moreover, according to polls, in just one year, the number of people who know what the supposed benefits of Obamacare are (subsidies, can’t be turned down, etc.) has fallen by half. Basically, it’s now seen as all pain and no gain.
Nevertheless, the left is trying to put on a brave face. Indeed, they are making all kinds of bizarre and contradictory points to explain why the various conservative justices might vote to keep Obamacare.
For example, the Washington Post argues that “Roberts is protective of the court’s reputation and sensitive to the perception that its decisions are politicized.” Thus,
he won’t want five Republican-appointed judges throwing out a law written by Democrats. Hardly. For one thing, if the Court cares about its reputation being apolitical, then it will do what it believes is correct about the law -- not what the Washington Post thinks needs to be done to please Democrats.
Moreover, this court has proven fearless at both making big decisions and making unpopular decisions. The left likes to claim that this is an “activist court” and to a degree they are right. This is not a court which respects the assertions of government that it has cart blanche power. Between this, the prior gun case, Citizens Union striking down campaign finance, and next year’s unexpected affirmative action case, this is clearly a court determined to start taking away the government’s power to control the rights the Constitution leaves to the people.
The left also argues that some of the other conservative justices might join the liberals because they have supported the use of the Commerce Clause to invade personal privacy before. Yeah, but... those were criminal cases, where conservatives have less love for the Constitution. Those also didn’t force anyone to take any affirmative actions, those laws only forbade people from doing things the Federal government wanted to make illegal. That’s a HUGE distinction.
It is interesting to note that the same leftists who are now predicting that anywhere from 1-3 of the conservative justices will jump ship are the same people who claimed that the lawsuit brought by the states was frivolous in the first place. Clearly, they had no idea what they were talking about then, and I expect they have no idea now. It seems clear to me that the Court will strike down the individual mandate, but not the rest, on a 5-4 vote.
Now here comes the part you won’t like. This COULD actually be bad for us. Here’s why. Because of the way conservatives have played the entire Obamacare debate, the public is outraged at the individual mandate, but oblivious to the rest. If the Supremes strike down the individual mandate, then the desire of the public to repeal the rest might fade. Thus, conservatives will need to pound away at the idea that the rest needs to go because it won’t work without the mandate.
On the other hand, this might actually make it easier to repeal and replace Obamacare because the public will already view the law as having been struck down by the Supremes. Thus, it shouldn’t be particularly controversial if Republicans start repealing the law’s parts piece by piece.
It’s hard to tell which way this will play. But no matter what happens, it is clear that Obamacare will continue to hurt the Democrats in November and possibly even the November after that.
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Tuesday, January 31, 2012
Obamacare Bureaucracy vs. Religious Belief
I recently introduced our readers to a small victory for religious freedom over bureaucratic absolutism (Score One for the Christians). In that case, the Supreme Court told the National Labor Relations Board that a religious organization has sole power to determine its own rules regarding hiring and firing based on religious belief. But Leviathan never sleeps, and the Obama administration is at it again.This time, the issue is much larger than that in the employment case. It is a bold attack on religious freedom, and the attack is grounded on the idea that the mission of a religious institution can be entirely separated from its non-religious functions. The bureaucracy this time is Health and Human Services, its commander is Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, and the law from which the conflict stems is nothing less than Obamacare.
Simply put, the Catholic Church and some Orthodox Jewish organizations are religiously opposed to contraception. Obamacare requires that all employers, including those groups, must provide health insurance which includes coverage for contraception, certain abortifacients and sterilization at no additional charge to the employee. Contraceptive services are controversial among those groups, but it is the mandate to provide coverage for abortifacients and sterilization that has brought the issue to a rolling boil.
Obamacare does allow for some exemptions, but they are narrowly-written and are being interpreted by a bureaucracy that demands universal health care coverage whether you like it or not. In describing which employees the "religious employer" may exempt from contraception, abortifacient and sterilization coverage, Sebelius and her people rely on the preliminary regulations (which will undoubtedly remain unchanged in the final version) that require four concurrent things to be true:
1. The inculcation of religious values is its purpose.
2. It primarily employs persons who share its religious tenets.
3. It primarily serves persons who share its religious tenets.
4. It is a non-profit organization under sections of the code that refer to churches, their integrated auxiliaries, and conventions or associations, as well as to the exclusively religious activities of any religious order.
Paying careful obeisance to and obfuscation of the ruling in the NLRB employment case, HHS has issued a statement that specifically says: "The Departments seek to provide for a religious accommodation that respects the unique relationship between a house of worship and its employees in ministerial positions." By pretending to honor the unanimous decision in the NLRB case, HHS is actually carving out a rule that defeats religious belief outside the confines of the "ministry."
One student of the Department's position lays it out rather well. "The group insurance covering nuns in a Catholic religious order would probably not have to cover contraception. But insurance provided by the same order's elementary school probably would. The latter would also be true of a hospital established by the nuns."
The NLRB case was based on religious freedom ("the ministry"). This issue revolves more around religious worship and what information a religious organization must provide to non-members. So even in those cases where the Department may find the exemption applies, it will still require the organization to pass out information about "preventive" services which it does not provide under the exemption. Essentially, this means that the exempt religious organization must tell its employees where and how to obtain those services which are anathema to the organization and church teaching.
Sebelius's official statement explains how the new rule should be applied: "We intend to require employers that do not offer coverage of contraceptive and sterilization services to provide notice to employees, which will also state that contraceptive services are available at sites such as community health centers, public clinics, and hospitals with income-based support." At its most basic it means that Father Flanagan will meet with his employee and tell her that the Church utterly opposes artificial contraception, abortifacients, and sterilization, but since the Church's medical insurance doesn't cover it, here's a list of all the places that will provide the services we find abhorrent and contrary to scripture.
So as it stands, Catholic employees at non-Catholic institutions must pay for insurance for preventive services as part of their insurance package, but cannot be charged anything additional for them. Likewise, Catholic and non-Catholic employees of a Catholic institution may be required to purchase contraception and sterilization insurance through their employers depending on how the Department classifies the religious employer. In the latter case, both the religious institution and its employees are bound by entirely secular rules determining the religious status of the employer and employee.
Church charities, hospitals, universities and other non-church activities are affected. Current organizations preparing to challenge the HHS ruling are Catholic Charities USA, Notre Dame University and the Catholic hospital network. Regardless of the outcome, or even a later softening of its position for political gain, this is another example of how the Obama administration and its leftist supporters are innately hostile to religion. It also demonstrates how a bureaucracy can hide its anti-religious agenda in gentle-sounding legalese.
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Monday, January 2, 2012
Welcome Back Peeps! :)
Welcome back! We’ve missed you! Hopefully everyone had a nice Christmas?! Anyhoo, here’s a quick update on what you missed followed by a brief discussion of negative campaigning. This will all be on the year-end test...Wha’d I Miss?● The big news is that Ben Nelson (D) of Nebraska announced his retirement. This is great news for several reasons. First, I suspect Nelson had a solid chance of getting re-elected. Nelson was down in the polls, but polls this far out are unreliable because they are little more than a means of registering a protest. And come election time, people rarely look at the past but instead focus on the future. That’s where things like seniority, client services, and comfort level with candidates all come into play and Nelson scored well in those. Secondly, if Nelson had won, then the MSM narrative would have been that ObamaCare obviously wasn’t a problem with voters. This cuts that off.
● Speaking of ObamaCare, the Supremes have agreed to hear the ObamaCare case, and they’re giving it an unprecedented three hours for oral argument. Except in rare instances, each side normally gets 30 minutes.
● Still speaking of ObamaCare, there are more problems arising. Remember how the plan calls for subsidizing everyone’s healthcare? Well, it turns out the bill was written poorly and this may not be possible. Even the Obama people admit it will require a Congressional fix to solve this problem. That ain’t happening. So even if the Supremes don’t strike it down, ObamaCare may collapse under Obama/Reid’s incompetent drafting.
● Gingrich, Bachmann, Santorum and Perry all failed to get their names on the Virginia ballot. This shows a lack of seriousness as candidates which should alarm their supporters. Gingrich then doubled-down on stupid by blaming one of the people he hired to get signatures. Apparently, this individual submitted 1,200 fake signatures. . . like ACORN. But this shows Gingrich’s stupidity. First, everyone knows you hire people to cross-check the names against voter rolls. What competent candidate could let someone get away with making up 1,200 fake names? Secondly, Gingrich played too fast and loose with the rules by only giving himself about an 11% margin of error. This is stupid. Romney and Paul gave themselves 50% margins. In any event, Gingrich sued and apparently will be let on the ballot if he agrees to stop crying.
● Rick Perry also sued Virginia for not protecting him from his own stupidity. Nice conservative values there, Rick: when you don’t follow the rules and things don’t work out. . . sue. Perhaps a homosexual/teletubby conspiracy slipped Rick litigious pills? In any event, recent reports have his whining working and he too will be let on the ballot.
● American Idol Kelly Clarkson endorsed Ron Paul. While I would have preferred she picked a different Republican, I am thrilled that a young, single female in the pop music world would endorse a non-leftist.
● A new video has emerged of Gingrich praising RomneyCare when it was passed and saying it would lead to great things.
Negative CampaigningNegative campaigning is a tricky thing. Almost everyone professes to hate negative campaigning and it’s pretty clear that truly negative campaigns backfire on the candidates who wage them. But on the other hand, negative ads do work.
In fact, negative ads can be so effective, that some blame them for bringing about the current cynical state of our politics. I understand the logic in this -- if everyone attacks everyone else, then everyone is brought down in the public’s estimation and there’s nothing positive to latch onto -- but I don’t actually buy this argument. I think the cynical state of our current politics is a reaction to the lack of clear ideological choice, deep-seated corruption in both parties, and Democrats and Republicans blatantly lying about their intentions.
But what constitutes a negative ad? The Economist just wrote a stupid little piece in which they “worried” (read: hoped to promote the idea) that the Republican candidates were becoming so negative that no one would support them in November. Interestingly, the ad they discuss is a Ron Paul ad about Gingrich which shows:
● Gingrich sitting with Pelosi “warning of the dangers of climate change”;This is hardly “going negative.” These are legitimate policy questions. Does Gingrich or does he not support global warming legislation? He did before and he’s hazy on it now. That’s a pretty important issue. Gingrich claims to be an outsider, yet he’s bragging about his speaking fees at large corporate gatherings. Is it not valid to question who his supporters are? And how can Gingrich’s support for the central abuse of ObamaCare not be a policy issue? (Also, isn’t it funny that supporting a Democratic agenda is “going negative”?)
● Gingrich bragging about receiving “speaking fees of $60,000 a pop”; and
● A voiceover pointing out that “Gingrich once supported the individual health mandate.”
The reality is none of this is negative. Negative is false statements, distortions of records, and baseless smears hinting that someone is a racist, a harasser, a philanderer or a bigot. Negative is repeating isolated, context-less quotes from decades ago and pretending they represent a lifetime record. Negative is smearing a candidate’s family or invading their bedroom. Negative is suggesting Barry Goldwater is unstable and will start a nuclear war, suggesting Ronald Reagan is old and senile or that he cut a deal with the Iranians, and publishing fake rumors about affairs that never happened, spreading lies about military records, and springing stories about a drunk driving arrest 40 years prior. Negative is NOT pointing out that your opponent supports political policies with which you disagree.
I am not a believer in negative campaigning. I think it cheapens your victory and destroys your mandate, and positive candidates will always be better leaders. But I also think we need to stop calling the pointing out of policy disagreements negative campaigning. And we really need to stop letting the MSM spin any criticism of another candidate as negative just so they can drive the narrative that Republicans are all negative.
(P.S. Don't forget, Star Trek Tuesdays start tomorrow morning at the film site.... 9:00 AM, be there.)
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Tuesday, December 13, 2011
Kagan Sets Up The Sucker Punch
U.S. Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan has recused herself from the upcoming appeal of the State of Arizona challenging the ruling of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals which struck down the major enforcement provisions of Arizona's tough immigration enforcement law. She has done the right and ethical thing.Simply put, Arizona's law included among other things a provision that during the course of a lawful stop or arrest, the police officer could inquire into the individual's immigration status if he had a reasonable suspicion that the person was in the country illegally. The police could then hold the suspect pending determination of his immigration status. If the person turned out to be in the United States illegally, the Arizona authorities would then turn the suspect over to the federal immigration authorities. The Obama administration successfully took Arizona to court, claiming that this was unconstitutional interference with the federal government's sole authority over immigration.
Arizona argued unsuccessfully that it had a compelling state interest in protecting its lawful citizens, and that the new law merely provided a means by which the federal authorities could be made aware of an illegal immigrant by use of ordinary and established state and local police procedures. The law did seem to grant power to the state to establish its own rules on immigration, and did provide for certain non-investigatory detention beyond the initial inquiry into the person's immigration status. The law did not allow or require the state to take any further action against the detainee such as deporting him from the United States, but there were some criminal sanctions for being present in Arizona illegally. Arizona argued that its law merely reported illegal immigration, while the Obama administration argued that it regulated immigration, a solely federal prerogative.
The law does make it a crime for an undocumented worker to be present in the state. And the law makes it a crime to fail to register with the federal government or attempt to take work or hold a job without government authorization. Unlike the "reasonable suspicion" provision, these provisions do seem to skate very close to the edge of federal supremacy. In any event, all the provisions mentioned were stricken by the federal judge, and his ruling was upheld by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. It will be up to the Supreme Court to sort these provisions out.
A federal judge and ultimately the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals found against Arizona. Arizona appealed, and the US Supreme Court has now granted certiorari (agreed to hear the case). Justice Kagan immediately recused herself and made a public statement as to why she was doing so. As a senior attorney at the Justice Department (Solicitor General), she had played a major role in the early litigation against the Arizona law. Good for her. She did the right thing. Why she did the right thing may yet turn out not to be quite so honorable.
Caution: What follows is comprised largely of my opinions about anyone or anything having to do with the Obama administration, combined with a healthy dollop of paranoia and suspicion. I'm not stating anything except the jurisdictional matters as fact, and if this turns out to be a debate over Kagan's intentions versus my wariness, that would be a good thing.
I'm sure that every one of you is sophisticated enough to know that the state challenges to Obamacare will be wending their way to the Supreme Court. Different appellate districts have made diametrically opposite decisions, and it's up to the Supreme Court to resolve them. Mounting evidence shows that Justice Kagan was deeply involved in the preparation and final versions of Obamacare while she was Obama's Solicitor General. In fact, within just a few days before the passage of Obamacare, Kagan wrote to the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel that a lawsuit was being prepared to block the House from "deeming" the measure passed by a quirky procedural rule if it didn't get enough votes. She not only alerted them, but made suggestions as to how to defend against the lawsuit.
She even went so far as to alert the Office of Legal Counsel of all the arguments which were being prepared against the procedural trick (by a former Tenth Circuit US Appeals Court judge who is now Director of the Constitutional Law Center at Stanford University). During her confirmation proceedings, Kagan was asked for a written response to the following question posed by the Republicans on the Judiciary Committee:
"Have you ever been asked about your opinion or offered any view or comments on the underlying or constitutional issues related to any proposed health care legislation, including, but not limited to Pub. L No. 111-148 PPACA (the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act) or the underlying legal or constitutional issues related to potential litigation resulting from such legislation?" Kagan answered "no."
Kagan's early opinions of the efficacy of socialized medicine offered as a professor of law at Harvard (pictured) would not automatically require her to recuse herself from considering the Obamacare cases at the Supreme Court. Every professor of law (except possibly Barack Obama) has legal opinions. They'd be pretty dumb if they didn't. Most prominent law professors have written law review articles (again, except Barack Obama, editor of the Harvard Law Review). Those articles frequently go against current prevailing law. But those opinions are largely political abstract law in nature until they start coming down from the bench. So her early legal career was important to the process, but not necessarily to her ultimate confirmation.
So where am I going with this? From everything I've seen and read, Kagan's involvement in Obamacare was at least as deep as her involvement in the Arizona statute controversy and litigation. Her self-recusal from the Arizona case leads me to think that doing the right thing in that case was a red herring, designed to draw attention away from Kagan's personal views and actual involvement in the preparation of the Obamacare legislation.
She, her liberal Democratic friends and their errand boys in the mainstream media can now point out how upright, honest and ethical she is about not hearing cases in which she has been personally and professionally involved. When she refuses to recuse herself from the Obamacare decision, as I expect she will, they can all say "why look, she recused herself in the Arizona case, so if she doesn't recuse herself here, it's because her hands are clean and she is justified in hearing the matter."
Along with her "recusal credentials" she is likely to claim that if she has to recuse herself, the same should be required of Justice Clarence Thomas. Well, hooey. Thomas had no personal or professional involvement in passing or litigating Obamacare. His wife is an ardent anti-socialized medicine advocate. So what? She's not sitting on the bench, he is. And unlike Obama, Thomas does not allow his wife to make his decisions for him. Double red herring.
Maybe I'm just getting old and cynical. But I suspect Kagan's self-recusal in the Arizona case is even more cynical. Sorry, folks, I just don't trust their phony good intentions. So, what do you think?
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Sunday, October 16, 2011
Is There Anything This Woman Won't Say?
Just a short time before the House took a vote forbidding the use of federal funds to pay for any part of a health plan that covers abortion, former Speaker Nancy Pelosi announced that the bill would mean that "women can die on the floor." Fifteen House Democrats joined the Republicans in voting for what the president of NARAL called The Let Women Die Act.The bill is aimed at one portion of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (Obamacare). Prior law forbade direct use of federal funds for abortion, but Obamacare slipped in provisions which did by the back door what it couldn't do through the front. Rather than pay for the abortion directly, Obamacare allowed abortion to be paid for by insurance plans which accept federal funds. The bill bans that practice.
The bill also covered another problem created by Obamacare. It prevents punitive action against any health care provider who refuses to perform or assist in performing an abortion based on moral or religious objections. It's important to note that as we review the Democratic hysteria over the bill, it doesn't ban abortion, just direct or indirect federal funding of it. Multiple polls have shown that somewhere between 65% and 70% of Americans who may otherwise have divergent views on abortion itself oppose federal funding of abortion in any form.
The Republican position on the bill was that Obamacare contains loopholes galore that allow the use of federal subsidies and stimuli for the purpose of purchasing insurance plans that cover abortion. Many of the supporters of the new bill (called the Protect Life Act) clearly believe that Obamacare must be repealed in its entirety, but wanted to take an early step in that agenda by eliminating one of the most egregious of Obamacare's flaws. Unlike many of the provisions of Obamacare which are purely economic nostrums or bureaucratic "solutions," this flaw flagrantly allowed federal funding for a medical procedure abhorrent to a substantial number of Americans.
Pelosi went off on a journey of free-association in discussing the bill. "Under this bill, when the Republicans vote for this bill they will be voting to say that women can die on the floor and health care providers do not have to intervene. It's just appalling. It falls right into their--all, it's a health issue." In other words, if the doctors don't perform a procedure which would terminate a perfectly normal pregnancy, a woman will die on the floor while the doctors stand by and swap golf stories.
Perhaps she doesn't realize that if a woman comes into a Catholic hospital bleeding heavily from a botched abortion performed elsewhere, those Catholic doctors will do everything in their power to save the mother (and the baby, if it still lives). But what can you expect? This is a practicing Catholic woman who lectures the bishops and the Pope on their misinterpretations of the Bible and their incorrectness on Church doctrine.
For a woman her age, Pelosi has amazing lung power. She can string together thoughts in random order and pronounce them without taking a breath. Example: "This is a health care issue and it falls right in with a lot of other initiatives that they [the Republicans] had coming up on the floor (where the women are dying?) about clean air, clean water, mercury, you name it--America's families deserve better than this and, again, today is another example of a wasted opportunity, instead of taking up even an aspect of the president's job bill that could create jobs they're--I can't even describe to you the logic of what is is that they are doing, I just know that you will see a large number of women on the floor today (dying women?) fighting for women's health issues, as well as to point out how savage this is about withholding care for a woman because of this legislation." Whew! I'll bet she could blow out a 150 birthday candle cake without taking a second breath.
Pelosi also went on to say "this is not a jobs bill." No, really? "Everybody in America has the creation of jobs as their top priority and what we are doing is wasting time. Every woman in America should be concerned with this assault on women's rights. This is just one aspect of women's health. But it has an impact across the board on how women get their health insurance. It's a waste of time." So if I'm hearing her right, women's health and access to abortion is vitally important, but it's a waste of time because jobs are at stake.
National Right to Life Director Douglass Johnson said: "President Obama won enactment of Obamacare in 2010 partly by pretending that the bill did not expand abortion. But now the mask is coming off. Obamacare contains multiple provisions designed to authorize federal subsidies for abortion." The Protect Life Act removes those subsidies. But it does not prevent any woman who wants health care insurance with abortion coverage from purchasing it. It just prevents them from purchasing federally-subsidized insurance which provides coverage for abortions.
The bill passed the House on a vote of 251-172 (236 Republicans and 15 Democrats in favor). There are two hurdles remaining. First, the Senate helmed by Democrat Harry Reid may never even get to vote if Reid uses his parliamentary tricks to keep the vote away from his colleagues. Even if Reid doesn't manage to table the bill, passage in the Senate is far from a sure thing. And in the event that the bill does pass the Senate, there's that final roadblock in the White House.
President Obama will have to do some serious spinning to come up with a reason to veto the bill. But spin he will. He spent months on the political trail obscuring the Obamacare loopholes for abortion because he claims to believe that federal funding should not be used for abortion. He can't veto the bill on that basis, then, without having another lie added to the long list of lies he has told. He might try to do his new "capitalist" thing, and claim that the bill interferes with the right to private contract. Who knows? But it is highly likely that he will veto the bill if it ever gets to his desk.
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