For Whom Was The Term "Imperial Presidency" Coined, Again?

Got an email from Barack Obama today. It says, in part (boldface in the original):

We have all been forced to ask if our politics had simply become too polarized and too short-sighted to meet the pressing challenges of our time. This struggle became a test of whether the American people could still rally together when the cause was right -- and actually create the change we believe in.

Yeah. Because when every Republican votes against your bill, that's not "too polarized".

He talks as if the American people rallied together around this cause; as if this were change that most Americans believe in; as if most Americans weren't against it.

This is the change that he believes in, perpetrated on us by a bunch of people with insufficient spine to stand up to Chicago politics.

It amazes me that people claimed that George Bush had an "Imperial Presidency". This whole process has been such a staggering display of ego it's hard to describe.

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Obama's Idea of "Common Purpose" and His Real Similarity To Abe Lincoln

I was struck by this graphic from the Wall Street Journal. The raw partisanship of it expresses so much.

No, I'm not surprised. Obama has been telling us that this is his modus operandi all along.

Of course, one could misinterpret Obama's candidacy announcement, and his talk of "common purpose".

In the face of a politics that's shut you out, that's told you to settle, that's divided us for too long, you believe we can be one people, reaching for what's possible, building that more perfect union....

It was here we learned to disagree without being disagreeable -- that it's possible to compromise so long as you know those principles that can never be compromised; and that so long as we're willing to listen to each other, we can assume the best in people instead of the worst....

This campaign has to be about reclaiming the meaning of citizenship, restoring our sense of common purpose, and realizing that few obstacles can withstand the power of millions of voices calling for change.

By ourselves, this change will not happen. Divided, we are bound to fail.

But nobody should be fooled by these musings of togetherness and common purpose. In the same speech, Obama talked about Lincoln rallying people during the Civil War, in which the South hated "Northern aggression" enough to fight and die for it -- and Lincoln was unwavering in bringing those renegade states to heel.

In the face of tyranny, a band of patriots brought an Empire to its knees. In the face of secession, we unified a nation and set the captives free.

That's what Abraham Lincoln understood. He had his doubts. He had his defeats. He had his setbacks. But through his will and his words, he moved a nation and helped free a people....

As Lincoln organized the forces arrayed against slavery, he was heard to say: "Of strange, discordant, and even hostile elements, we gathered from the four winds, and formed and fought to battle through." That is our purpose here today.

That's why I'm in this race.

Not just to hold an office, but to gather with you to transform a nation.

Is it possible that he really believes his statement that this legislation "runs straight down the center of American political thought"? I don't think so. I think he can see the same graphic that I did at the top of this post, and come to the same conclusion.

This is Obama's model: He believes his purpose to be as great as Lincoln's, and he has waged a total war to impose it. That he divides his nation to do it is immaterial to him.

As long as I'm calling this fight a war, perhaps it won't seem too melodramatic to quote Lincoln against Obama.

Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation, so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.

But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate...we can not consecrate...we can not hallow this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us—that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion—that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain—that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom—and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.

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Liveblogging the State of the Union Address

I wasn't sure I was going to do this, but I heard the ABC commentators claim that Nancy Pelosi was wearing purple because (paraphrasing) "it's not blue, it's not red, it's right in the center. I don't think that's an accident. I think it's symbolic." I had to laugh. Nancy Pelosi is right in the center, of course -- of the Politburo.

9:14 It's interesting that he can claim that "these are the reasons" -- the struggles of ordinary Americans -- are the reason he ran for President. He never could articulate that during the campaign.

9:18 We all hated the bank bailout. His discussion here assumes that it's better to prop up failing businesses and to prevent homes from being foreclosed upon.

Joe Biden grins like an idiot.

9:19 I love the way the banks are going to pay a "modest fee". Didn't they already pay back the bailout, with interest?

9:20 We cut taxes for 95% of Americans. Yet. I guess letting the GWB tax cuts lapse doesn't count. I guess if you don't count their efforts to force people to buy insurance as a "tax".

9:22 Economists on the right say that the ARRA worked? Please. Yes, it saved individual jobs. There are plenty of anecdotes for him to point to. Take enough opium and you'll feel great -- until you overdose.

9:24 He's calling for a new jobs bill. Wanna bet it's another stimulus package?

9:25 Outstanding. He's going to force banks to lend to small businesses. Mark my words, this will be like the Community Reinvestment Act -- it will force people to lend to minority-owned and women-owned businesses and those in depressed areas. Don't expect them to last as well as the average small business will. He didn't say it, but I'll bet you a dollar.

9:27 Create jobs through infrastructure: by which he means increase spending. Expect more government money to be spent on pet projects and pork.

9:30 He mentions education costs. If you ask me, we provide too much money in financial aid to students. Increasing the demand-side funding will increase the supply-side costs.

9:31 "China's not waiting." Does he know that China's emphasis on not waiting has caused them to expand their factories so much that they don't have enough manufacturing demand to keep them in business? Does he know how wasteful that kind of centralized planning is?

9:33 We need consumers and families to have the information needed to make financial decisions. As if they don't now? There's never been so much information as is available now. And when you demand that the government dictate how much information is provided, you're assuming that American legislators and regulators know more about the risks of various instruments than the people who invest in them do. I don't think so.

9:34 Hey! Nuclear power! I actually agree with him on something!

9:35 ...and the offshore drilling stuff, too. Of course, then he has to make tie this into a climate bill. But note what that means in practice -- the second item on this post.

9:39 The formula is simple -- reward success and not failure. Nice. Makes you wonder whether he felt the same way about the Palestinian problem, for which he now says, "It's hard. It's really hard."

9:42 Again with the subsidizing education, which will ultimately cause the cost of education to go up. And then he says that colleges and universities have to fix their part of the problem, too. But how, Mr. President, and why? What incentive do they have?

9:43 Finally mentions health insurance reform. Note they're not saying "healthcare reform" anymore. That's long dead.

9:44 IT'S SO not true that he didn't take healthcare on because it's good politics. Of COURSE he thought it was good politics. In the bubble he lives in, everyone believes it's a good idea.

9:45 Would your approach preserve the right of Americans to be left alone with respect to health insurance?

No. Didn't think so.

The CBO, by the way, crunches numbers according to the formulae that the the politicians give them. It's not like they're objective.

9:47 You won't turn your back on the Americans who are having trouble with healthcare. How about the unborn Americans? How about the elderly for whom there won't be sufficient resources?

You can't eliminate ill health. Therefore, the only thing that government-run health care will do is put bureaucrats in charge of what is considered "ill enough to treat, and not too expensive to treat." Everything else will go by the wayside.

9:51 Okay, let's hear the amount by which the federal government will tighten its belt.

Sorry, Mr. President, but a spending freeze is not tightening your belt. I'm waiting to hear about one program that will come down.

"We will not continue tax cuts." So part of his "cut" is forcing people and companies to pay more in taxes.

Oh, and we're going to tighten our belts -- um, next year.

9:55 "Do our work openly"? Is that really Barack Obama talking?

9:59 Did you notice that the President is doing a lot of calling on Congress to do stuff? It's how he can sidestep almost every issue, giving no details and making platitudes while still coming off like an "idea guy".

10:02 Saying "no" is leadership. It's opposition leadership, but it is leadership. And the Republicans haven't filibustered -- they've only threatened to do so. If the laws that the Democrats want to pass are so divisive and unpopular that the Republicans are willing to take this radical step, and that they're not sure they can get 60% of the senate to agree to call it up for a vote, then maybe we shouldn't be passing it.

10:05 Why does he insist on giving a timeframe? It's like telling your poker opponent that you're going to stop bidding at ten dollars.

All of our combat troops out of Iraq by this August. Just hang on a little longer, Al Qaeda. The Americans will leave, and you can fill the torture rooms again. (And by torture I don't mean "enhanced interrogation techniques".)

10:08 I don't get it. Why would the leader in nuclear technology cowtow to those who aren't nearly as capable as we are? It will disarm us, and won't stop Iran or North Korea.

Of Iran's leaders he says: "They, too, will face growing consequences." I believe that's the 21st-century cry of "Wolf!"

10:14 Oh, great -- more government regulation of business by forcing people to hire quotas of people in order to avoid lawsuits. Thanks, Mr. President.

10:15 Yes, we are a "nation of immigrants". But immigrants from everywhere don't simply have those values. Even legal immigration, if it's of too many people from a country that doesn't share our values -- Saudi Arabia, Kenya, perhaps, dare I say it, Mexico -- the more we dilute the American values that the President is praising.

10:16 Democracy in a country of 300 million people can be noisy and messy -- which is why I did everything I could possibly do to ram healthcare down your throat. And, he says, by the way, please ignore the voters. Don't worry about your poll numbers, do what you think is right, even if the public hates it. Mr. President, are you a populist who loves the American people and this nation of immigrants, or are you an oligarchist who knows better than the common man?

10:20 I totally agree that you don't quit, Mr. President. I'm not sure that's a good thing.

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Who is Ellie Light? What in the world is going on here?

Instapundit.com and Hot Air broke this story about an alleged citizen concerned over Barack Obama's issues after the Massachusetts election (and after the NJ and VA elections as well). From Hot Air:

Someone appears to be doing a little Astroturfing for Obama.
In recent days, a letter defending Obama has appeared in dozens of newspapers throughout the country — all signed by an “Ellie Light.” In the letters, which all use identical language, Ms. Light explains that Obama never promised to fix all our problems quickly or painlessly.

She declares:
Today, the president is being attacked as if he’d promised that our problems would wash off in the morning. He never did. It’s time for Americans to realize that governing is hard work, and that a president can’t just wave a magic wand and fix everything.

Editors all over the country found Light’s message strangely compelling. It was reprinted at The Politico; the Philadelphia Daily News; the San Francisco Examiner; the Washington Times; and a USA Today blog. In addition, the letter has appeared at literally dozens of small-town papers across the country, with names like the Los Banos Enterprise, the North Adams Transcript, and the Danbury News-Times.

What is going on here? I get that someone might make the attempt to rehabilitate the disaster that has become the Obama administration. But using the same name and same words? And how did all of these 'news' organizations ALL DECIDE to publish the same thing from the same person? From Hot Air:

With the help of my commenters, I have been keeping a running total at my blog of the places where Light’s letter has appeared. At last count, her letter has appeared in at least 47 newspapers in at least 23 different states.

What is going on indeed.

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Barack Obama: The Teflon President...NOT

Barack Obama today blamed the GOP for the economy and anything else that would make his life difficult (from Reuters):

U.S. President Barack Obama packed an economic speech with a political punch on Tuesday, blaming Republicans for creating high deficits, mismanaging bank bailouts and obstructing efforts to reform healthcare.

I am not sure what it is about this president. He is incapable is taking any responsibility. Anything bad is someone else's fault. In the rare case when he takes responsibility he doesn't really have his heart in it. This excerpt is from a speech in March regarding the AIG bonus fiasco(AFP):

"Listen, I'll take responsibility. I'm the president," Obama said at a "town hall" meeting in Costa Mesa, California, where his bid to sell his economic revival policies was swamped by news coverage of the bonus fiasco for a fourth day.

"We didn't draft these contracts. We've got a lot on our plate -- but it is appropriate when you're in charge to make sure that stuff doesn't happen like this," he added, amid outrage across the United States.

In the same sentence he takes responsibility he blames someone else. That isn't taking responsibility, it is deflecting it.

He can blame Bush because his liberal following lives for that pap. However, we remember who created the housing bubble and it wasn't Bush(just ask Barney Frank and Chris Dodd). TARP was a byproduct of his friends at Goldman Sachs just as much as Bush(he should know this, they all work in his administration now). And while we can forgive Bush for taking decisive action in the middle of a major economic crisis we may as well for the Democratic congress that authorized the "Bush" plan, isn't that right Mr Obama?

He wants to blame Bush for deficits? Sorry Mr President. President Bush was fiscally irresponsible. YOU sir, are a spending GLUTTON! Bush produced a deficit. You quadrupled it.

Grow up President Obama. And start fixing the problems that the average American thinks are important. Such as:

1. Jobs (and next time you hold a summit on jobs, talk to real job producers not your liberal donors and unions)

2. Spending (repeal the stimulus and try again without advice from Pelosi and Reid)

3. The Economy (stop sabotaging the greatest economic engine in the world. Between Cap and Trade, your new EPA regulations, threatening to tax everything that moves and 22 visits to the White House by your union "muscle", business is running scared and it is YOU that scares them)

4. Corruption (Democrat leaders promised to drain the swamp. I dare say you have found a way to pollute it!)

5. Borrowing (Stop borrowing money at the Federal level to pay States to avoid getting their fiscal house in order-you are actually prolonging the necessary steps to fix the problem. Every state that had a deficit this year before the stimulus will have one again next year only worse. And they will have to take action either with higher taxes or job cutbacks. And your policies will be credited with the "double dip recession" that is almost sure to come after the holidays when the states have to take action. Stop it!)

Then, once the economy starts to rebound and spending is under control and people are back to work...we can look at healthcare. Any maybe this time you might actually look at the problem instead of trying to socialize medicine and find jobs for your SEIU thugs.

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A must read on Obama's Afghanistan speech..."drunkblogging"

This was so good I had to share with our readers. Last night, Pajama's Media blogger Vodkapundit "drunkblogged" the speech. Excerpts like this give you a taste of the narrative:

5:23PM Afghanistan is not another Vietnam! Well, of course it isn’t. Obama would never have sent more troops to fight communists.

5:23PM “There are those…” First of the night! Everybody drink.

5:24PM “There are those…” number two! Shoot a double, folks.

5:26PM Camera shifted to Hillary, who looks more bored than the cadets, and more disdainful than Darth Vader confronting an Imperial Janitor who left a dustbunny trailing on Vader’s cape.

Read the entire post here. It is worth the time. Hat tip Instapundit!

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Obama: Who's in charge?

Today was an interesting day. Barack Obama left yesterday after a visit to Alaska to go to Japan (I am not sure why). Then the news broke this morning that the economy continues to melt down. Then the announcement that the terrorists responsible for 9/11 would be tried in New York. And then, the end of the line for the White House Attorney. And the replacement will be the husband of the White House Communications Director who was canned after losing a stupid battle against Fox news. What do these things have in common?

One. That they are all distractions. A series of announcements were made during the Friday news cycle when most people are not paying attention.

Two. That the President is one of the distractions.

Three. Someone other than the President is calling the shots.

We live in really strange times.

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Obama: "Teabaggers" not FT Hood Shooter are Extremists

I couldn't help not noticing that Barack Obama couldn't bring himself to pass judgement on the Muslim extremist who killed 13 people at Fort Hood in Texas. But he has no problem labelling citizens who are against his out of control spending sprees as such (from the Corner on National Review):

President Obama, in his pitch to Democrats on the Hill today (from the New York Times):

Mr. Obama, during his private pep talk to Democrats, recognized Mr. Owens election and then posed a question to the other lawmakers. According to Representative Earl Blumenauer of Oregon, who supports the health care bill, the president asked, “Does anybody think that the teabag, anti-government people are going to support them if they bring down health care? All it will do is confuse and dispirit” Democratic voters “and it will encourage the extremists.”

This man has some serious issues.

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Corzine and Obama Billboard - Keep what going?

As I am driving to Trenton today to catch and Amtrak to DC, I notice a billboard with Barack Obama in the foreground and Jon Corzine in the background. In large bold letters the billboard reads "Keep it going". That made me start to think...what is Jon Corzine trying to tell me? To understand the billboard, you must understand how Corzine or Obama define IT.

Let's take a shot from Obama's perspective:

Keep IT Going!

- does he mean New Jersey politicians voting in lockstep with you regardless of the impact on the state?
- could he mean that he wants more Acorn volunteers working in Trenton, Newark and Camden hustling "voters"?
- maybe he means NJ should keep adding more and more citizens to the roles of public assistance as jobs are driven from the state
- how about, keep the unions in charge of the state

Or from Corzine's perspective:

Keep IT Going!

- keep New Jersey as the state with the worst business climate
- keep New Jersey as the state with the highest in the nation property taxes
- Democrats in New Jersey could keep filling up the federal corruption dockets and going to jail
- Citizens in New Jersey can keep electing politicians who do not listen to their concerns and see them as a unending piggy bank for special interests
- Jon Corzine could keep paying off cronies when investigators dig into his ethics violations
- keep leading the charge to drive productive business out of the state
- pushing more and more of our citizens to states with a more family friendly tax policy
- laughing with his Democrat buddies knowing that no matter how many Democrats are arrested and jailed for corruption, they will be more to take their place!

I guess I get it after all.

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While Obama campaigns for Corzine: Afghanistan gets worse.

Many people are starting to question whether Barack Obama is delaying his decision on his Afghanistan strategy until after next weeks elections in New Jersey and Virginia. Whether or not you believe it is true, the lack of a decision is severely impacting the effort in Afghanistan as 8 more die today (from AP):

The deaths bring to 55 the total number of American troops killed in October in Afghanistan. The previous high occurred in August, when 51 U.S. soldiers died and the troubled nation held the first round of its presidential elections amid a wave of Taliban insurgent attacks.

President Obama is due in New Jersey on Saturday to campaign for Corzine having been here just last week. I would suggest that the President would be better served if he sat down and stayed in the Oval office and made a decision on this topic rather than run around campaigning. One of his advisers needs to tell him the role of the executive requires him to actually make decisions. Senators debate and discuss. Presidents decide.

If we no longer are committed to the mission, so be it. Remove the soldiers now. If not, so be it. Announce your strategy and start executing it now. The vacuum is helping no one. I am starting to worry that Hillary's famous campaign advertisement about the phone call in the middle of the night was off the mark. It wasn't a question of who was going to answer the phone. It was whether the President would answer it at all.

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Burlington County Embarassment - Education Indoctrination

By now everyone has seen and heard the Burlington County, New Jersey school children being indoctrinated to worship Barack Obama. My biggest issue is that I live in Burlington county and my tax dollars helped pay for this teacher to "teach" these children in this way. In addition, the school district allowed an outsider to film the students and then post the video on Youtube.

The controversy continues as more facts come to light but most disturbing is that the leaders of the school initially acted like nothing was wrong. In addition, the letter home from school district officials doesn't exactly suggest that they get it (from Foxnews):

The performance and the videotaping at the B. Bernice Young Elementary School in Burlington, N.J., have sparked a review by school officials, according to a letter to parents from Christopher Manno, Burlington Township's superintendent of schools.

"We are carefully evaluating what occurred and will implement any additional needed procedures to prevent children's images in school from being publicly posted without permission," Manno wrote on Friday. "We will also provide reasonable direction and guidelines so that classroom activities will not give the appearance of promoting a particular political perspective."

A lot of people are expressing the opinion "what's the big deal?" or "it's completely innocent!" and that may be true. But given that this song is originally an religious song about Jesus, what would those same people's reaction be if the teacher had the children sing these original lyrics in the assembly:

Jesus loves the little children
All the children of the world
Black and yellow, red and white
They're all precious in His sight
Jesus loves the little children of the world

Would THAT be indoctrination?

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Irresistible Gorrell Cartoon

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Healthcare: Alternative ideas but the White House and Democrats aren't listening!

Whenever you read in the paper that Republicans are obstructionists and the people are just complaining at town hall events, there is a common thread in the story. And it is that no one is offerring alternative ideas to the load of garbage being put forward by House Democrats and the White House. The sad thing is that there are a lot of ideas suggested to fix both the cost and the coverage aspects of healthcare that our current crop of politicians absolutely refuse to comprehend.

And all while Obama insists on demonizing insurers. The unfortunate thing is that the industry is far from healthy and is hurting in a major way. In my business, we work with all kinds of organizations and the insurance companies have been shedding employees for the past 5 years. They are not making massive profits. As a matter of fact, if you graph Barack Obama's and Chris Dodd's last eight years revenue against individual companies in the insurance industry, you will find that both Obama and Dodd fared far better in terms of growing their revennue base. The insurance industry in fact makes less than 1 penny for every dollar in premium received (Forrester research).

We have the Obama and Democrat narrative:

- Insurance companies are evil and healthcare unions are good
- Companies that provide insurance are bad and government providing insurance is good
- Competition is bad when private companies do it, good when the government fixes it
- People that speak at town halls are astroturf while union thugs beating them up are good
- Anyone questioning Democrats is fake while paid protestors are good
- Old people are bad but illegal immigrants are good
- Doctors are bad but Tort lawyers are good

It's no wonder people are fed up.

Here are some ideas that will never find their way into the debate despited being offerred up by Republicans, the insurance industry and free market advocates:

Controlling cost and adding flexibility

1. Insurance Portability. Make it a requirement that all insurance it portable. If every firm needs to accept the rule, it will be so. The insurance industry has already agreed to do this early into the debate.
2. Tort Reform. I know I know. The Democrats need to protect poor Dicky Scruggs so that he can own ten airplanes while filing bs lawsuits against doctors, hospitals and pharmaceutical firms. But you cannot control costs without addressing frivilous lawsuits.
3. Drop interstate limitations on competition for insurance. Right now we have 50 different states plus the Federal government regulating insurance and blocking competition. Remove these barriers and then maybe Joe Smith in New York will stop paying 5 times what Jim Smith in Tennessee is paying.
4. Have a discussion about moving the responsibility for insurance from the employer to the employee. And help provide a transition from the business entity which will gain long term in cost control to the employee. Then the employee will be free to take advantage of the increased competition to buy the kind of coverage that will be optimal for their family.
5. Health savings accounts. Cash is king even in the healthcare marketplace. Remove the requirement to submit claims for insurance completely and the doctor can perform certain care much more efficiently and cost effectively.
6. Eliminate government based care and hospital mandates so that the private sector can stop underwriting goverment programs and citizens are not paying twice for the same thing. For example, we all pay for medicare at both the state and federal level. Then the goverment only pays the hospital 5 dollars for a 20 dollar procedure. Who pays the rest? We do through private insurance as we will get charged 35 dollars to make up for it. This is goverment competition and is contributing to our current damaged system. Obama and Democrats just don't talk about it.
7. A national fraud database to track both doctors patients who abuse the system and real penalties when they are caught.

Once costs are brought under control, we can have the discussion about insuring the 12 million people who legitimately may need assistance. Not the illegal aliens. Not people who can afford insurance but choose to keep their money in their pocket. And not the fictitious people who cannot get insurance until you really investigate their story and find out they really do have coverage.

All of these things would add to the debate but you will never hear them proposed. Why? Because they don't add power to the unions and Democrats in congress.

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Healthcare Bill - Why are people so angry?

Many on the left trully do not understand why people are so angry about the healthcare legislation. And because they do not understand, they assume that the protestors are ginned up by insurance company and lobbyists. The sad thing is that their lack of understanding contributes to their ignorance and in a spiral to anger generated by their comments.

Reason 1. The holier than thou claim that they are the only ones who want to fix healthcare.

Perhaps the problem with this reasoning is that not everyone is trying to fix the same thing. Most people are happy with the current healthcare ranging from 54-80 percent agreeing depennding on the poll. The rub for many is the rising cost as a percentage of personal expenses that health insurance consumes (even if your company pays for most of it). To fix this problem you need to have a serious discussion of the subsidization of government Medicare and Medicaide patients by private health insurance patients. You also need to discuss torts and their impact on Doctor behavior, insurance company allocation and Pharmaceutical firm pricing policies. You also should add to the mix the growing number of illegals being treated for free at emergency rooms around the country.

But very little of the items above have been discussed. In addition, Barack Obama wants to fix the "50 million uninsured". We will discuss that below. Nancy Pelosi wants to penalize health insurance companies. If you cannot agree on the nature of the problem, you cannot take corrective action.

Reason 2. No one believes the 50 Million Uninsured number.

And the President keeps repeating it as fact. Lets take some facts from the Business Media Institute study on this number:

Myth: There are between 40 million and 50 million uninsured Americans. President Obama referred to “46 million uninsured Americans” in May 2009.

Fact: Anyone who reports that there are more than 46 million uninsured is exaggerating since the Census Bureau puts the number of uninsured at 45,657,000 people.

Fact: Nearly 10 million (9.7) of the 45.7 million uninsured are “not a citizen.” That makes every media claim of uninsured Americans higher than 35.9 million is wrong.

Myth: The 40 million to 50 million uninsured cannot afford health insurance.

Fact: More than 17 million of the uninsured make at least $50,000 per year (the median household income of $50,233) – 8.4 million make $50,000 to $74,999 per year and 9.1 million make $75,000 or higher. Two economists working at the National Bureau of Economic Research concluded that 25 to 75 percent of those who do not purchase health insurance coverage “could afford to do so.”

Myth: The 40 million to 50 million uninsured do not get health care.

Fact: The National Center for Policy Analysis estimates that uninsured people get about $1,500 of free health care per year, or $6,000 per family of four.

Fact: An Urban Institute study found that 25 percent of the uninsured already qualify for government health insurance programs.

Myth: People will remain uninsured without government assistance.

Fact: The Congressional Budget Office says that 45 percent of the uninsured will be insured within four months. CBO Director Douglas Holtz-Eakin also said that the frequent claim of 40+ million Americans lacking insurance is an “incomplete and potentially misleading picture of the uninsured population.”

Fact: Liberal non-profit Kaiser Family Foundation put the number of uninsured Americans who do not qualify for government programs and make less than $50,000 a year between 8.2 million and 13.9 million. (The 8.2 million figure includes only those uninsured for two years or more.)

Fact: CBO analysis found that 36 million people would remain uninsured even if the Senate’s $1.6 trillion health care plan is passed.

Reason 3. Democrats desire to ram the legislation through congress.

We have commented here many times on the "rush to bad legislation" technique perfected by this congress. Haste makes waste and this Congress and President are experts at waste. And the citizens have caught on. The know their legislators are not reading the legislation and are wondering why. They are also wondering who is really writing the legislation and suspect that there is far more influence coming from lobbyists than from many representatives. They KNOW that they do not have a seat at the negotiating table yet George Soros does and they don't like it.

Reason 4. You reap what you sow.

Democrats have long espoused that dissent is important to the democracy and they are correct. But once normal people start dissenting, all of a sudden they don't like it. For years they have dispatched unions, Code Pink, Al Sharpton, Jessie "extortion" Jackson and a variety of other organnized protestors to events to put pressure on various entuities and lawmakers. Regular people have woken up and after 7 years of watching these organnized groups protest George Bush, they have decided not to stand up for themselves.

Reason 5. Barack Obama, Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid have disdain for the citizens of this country.

We all know when we are being talked down to and mocked. Barack Obama tries to demonized those who do not agree lockstep with everything he espouses. Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid declared in the USA Today that the protestors are fake and un-American. Here is a statistic for you. Since I work in New York City, I know a lot of people who are very left of center. I also have numerous conservative friends. I do not know one single person who has attended a peace demonstration during the Bush years. And I know at least 10 who have attended tea parties or town halls on healthcare. And they didn't get bussed in-the drove their SUV's.

Astroturf. I don't think so. All of this is pissing people off. Assuming the Democrats continue on their current course, it will get worse long before it gets better.

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Want universal healthcare? Everyone shoulld pay.

The debate around universal healthcare has been too slanted for too long. The current debate purports to position a new benefit to every American (FREE HEALTHCARE) allegedly paid for by "THE RICH GUY". Despite the fact that it would be impossible to tax the rich guy enough to pull that whopper off, the Democrats are pushing that line because they think they can bring along all of those voters who believe that there is such a thing as a free ride.

The real debate around this topic should be as follows:

1. Do we all want universal healthcare?
2. Should it or can it be managed by the government?
3. What track record does the government or ANY government have in effectively and efficiently managing healthcare for its citizens?
4. Would this healthcare plan be so appealing that the congressman who are sponsoring it will drop their current gold plated system and move to this new one?
5. ARE YOU PERSONALLY WILLING TO PAY OUT OF YOUR POCKET TO ACHIEVE THIS GOAL?

I guarantee you, if the average person following this debate answered those questions honestly to themselves, the current approach being pushed by the Democrats would go nowhere. You see, this entire debate is about using a group of people who see a "FREEBIE" and want to take advantage. Some of these people are consumers. And some are business owners that believe that they may be able to drop the coverage the currently pay for and dump their employees into a government plan. Either way, each one want something for nothing. And as my father told me a long time ago, there is no such thing as a free ride.

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A Leadership idea for Obama - Fix the Current Stimulus!

Scott Rasmussen released numbers today that showed for the first time people who strongly disapprove of Obama over strongly approve at an 8 percent (negative) advantage. For some time Obama has been happy to take advantage of bad times to ram legislation through in the hope that the economy would improve on its own and his "revolutionary" changes would transform American into his brave new ideal. But the facts on the ground are working against him and his stimulus (while never read by a single congressman) has proven to be completely un-stimulating.

So, instead of a second stimulus, he would be far better off rebuilding the current stimulus. Here is how he could pull it off:

1. Rescind every spending item outside the next 12 months.
2. Re-evaluate all of the stimulus proposals ignore in round one and convene a bipartisan "executive panel" to do it-not party hacks on either side. Folks like Warren Buffet could really add value here.
3. Submit a set of proposals that could be discussed and evaluated with proper review in the congress.
4. Engage in constructive debate (not "I won" but "I want to fix it")
5. Create a bill that the country has confidence in and both parties could rally around.

While this would not be popular with either the hard left of the hard right, it would be VERY popular with an electorate that it turning strongly against the President. And it would also allow him to actually have the confidence of the people when presenting his ideas for health care and other programs which will not only have bipartisan support but likely no support outside of hard core liberals and toadies. And it would seperate him from his Democratic party approval boat anchors Pelosi and Reid (about 70 percent of the country would agree that these two deserve a place under the front wheel of the bus).

Just an idea. He won't do it. But if he was really the transformational LEADER he claims to be, he would.

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House Democrats want higher taxes for healthcare. Big shocker.

The word is that House Democrats will be proposing higher taxes on "high" wage earners to pay for their healthcare proposals. From Bloomberg:

Two people familiar with closed-door talks by committee Democrats said a House bill probably will include a surtax on incomes exceeding $250,000, as Congress seeks ways to pay for changes to a health-care system that accounts for almost 18 percent of the U.S. economy. By targeting wealthier Americans, a surtax may hold more appeal for House Democrats than a Senate proposal to tax some employer-provided health benefits.

“The surtax is obviously more attractive to Democrats in the House because it’s more progressive, which they find attractive in and of itself,” said Paul Van de Water, a senior fellow at the Washington-based Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, a research group focused on policies affecting low- and moderate-income families.

The real joke here is that Democrats and President Obama keep proposing taxes on the "rich guy". And for every one of these proposals, the "righ guy" keeps changing. I am willing to guarantee that this will eventually translate into a tax across the board for all productive members of society.

But the bigger problem is that Democrats said they were going to pay for the stimulus by taxing "rich people". Then they were going to pay for their irresponsible budget by taxing "rich people". Then they were targeting "rich people" for the carbon tax. It seems to me that they have used this tactic to "pay for" every spending increase they have proposed.

Time to wake up America. We cannot afford another House spending proposal.

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Health Care Reform - Mass vs Ga

I saw this today at The Corner on National Review Online. It's a must see.

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Palin resigns. What a shame.

Sarah Palin resigned today which is not news to many who follow this blog. What is sad in a way here is that she has become a target of a pathetic political class that includes both Democrats and Republicans. Whether or not you like her (and in the sense of full disclosure I do respect this woman for what she has done), she has handled herself quite well despite some of the most vicious attacks any politician has faced.

I don't blame her for bowing out as she has become a lightning rod for every liberal wacko who has a grudge and standing with a court in Alaska. I am sure Geoge Soros is laughing tonight thinking that he has eliminated another potential candidate against Obama next time around. Maybe if George Soros moves back to the United States, our citizens should take him more seriously but we are stuck with his influence whether we like it or not.

I often wonder if Barack Obama faced a similar level of scrutiny, we would not be referring to President Hillary Clinton. Just wondering.

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Cap n Trade Jobs Bill - 2,600 up 467,000 down

After Republicans went on the record calling the Pelosi/Waxman Cap and Trade Bill an energy tax, the Democrats went on every television show they could declaring the energy bill a "JOBS BILL". And they, including President Obama touted the big job gains in this bill(from Whitehouse.gov):

Make no mistake: this is a jobs bill. We’re already seeing why this is true in the clean energy investments we’re making through the Recovery Act. In California, 3000 people will be employed to build a new solar plant that will create 1000 permanent jobs. In Michigan, investment in wind turbines and wind technology is expected to create over 2,600 jobs. In Florida, three new solar projects are expected to employ 1400 people.

Today, unemployment numbers were announced and another 467,000 Americans lost their jobs this month. Maybe the President should stop trying to re-invent our country and concentrate on helping hard working Americans who want to work. Every move this White House makes seems to want to support those who "through no fault of their own" find themselve hurting instead of helping those hard working people who want to work and want to earn be successful.

I guarantee you that I have never worked as hard as the average PA coal miner. And I never will. And neither will you Mr President.

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