Whiplash

clipped from justoneminute.typepad.com So let me get these messages from TimesWorld straight - even though in April Obama said he expected the final health care legislation to include panels to review end-of-life treatment with an eye towards cost control, rumors that Obama would support such a thing are utterly false.  However, its a great idea. Can I sue for whiplash?

I Am Crying Because I Can't Comprehend The Violence

clipped from reza.malakut.org

The Whole Point

clipped from pajamasmedia.com I am all for freedom of speech. Mr. Mackey had every right to express his views on health care in the WSJ, even as anathema as those views might be to progressives. Similarly, we progressives have every right to decide whether or not we want to spend our food dollars in a store whose CEO clearly doesn’t support the most important progressive cause of the moment. Fair enough. Of course, Obama’s plan — and Big Government in general — is all about ensuring that we don’t have the right to decide how to spend our dollars but should instead let somebody else take them at gunpoint and decide how they’re spent. If the health care “reform” passes, you won’t have the option of directing your health care dollars where you think they should go (and I’m not so sure about your food dollars, either . . . ) . And to the pro-Obamacare folks, that’s not a bug, it’s the whole point.

Did I Forget To Mention That Ken Gladney Fell Into The Memory Hole?

clipped from www.realclearpolitics.com Last week, a black gentleman named Kenneth Gladney went to a town-hall meeting hosted by Rep. Russ Carnahan, Missouri Democrat. While passing out "Don't Tread on Me" flags, he was viciously attacked by Service Employees International Union (SEIU) members. One called him a "nigger." These union thugs were directed by the White House to go to the protests and "punch back twice as hard." And they did. While the attack was captured on video and is available on YouTube, Mr. Gladney's horrifying story is absent from MSNBC's 24/7 media cycle. Mr. Krugman has yet to write about it. And Mr. Cooper has yet to condemn the attack.

Heh Again

clipped from www.federaltimes.com The National Association of Postal Supervisors has fired back at President Barack Obama for dragging the U.S. Postal Service further into the health care debate. In an Aug. 14 letter, NAPS President Ted Keating accused Obama of using the Postal Service as a “scapegoat” and unfairly painting it as “an example of inefficiency” during a health care town hall meeting last week. Obama told a crowd in Portsmouth, N.H., Aug. 11 that private health care insurance providers should be able to compete with a government-run public option because “UPS and FedEx are doing just fine. … It’s the Post Office that’s always having problems.”

Ignorance And Outcomes

clipped from online.wsj.com On the defensive because of an increasingly skeptical public, President Barack Obama has recently spoken extemporaneously about his health plan. In doing so, he has revealed his lack of understanding about aspects of medical practice and the reasons for rising health-care costs. Medicare data shows that for the most part, major surgeries aren't the source of waste in health care. These kinds of procedures are typically guided by clear clinical criteria and are closely scrutinized by doctors and patients alike. Rather it is in routine procedures and treatments that economic incentives factor heavily into doctors' decisions. Mr. Obama says as much as one-third of medical spending is wasted on services that provide little or no benefit. But closer scrutiny of these kinds of marginal medical decisions can't be imposed by government regulation. Cost consideration must be internalized at the point of care by patients and doctors with a stake in the price, as well as the outcome.

Profit To Earnings Ratio Update

clipped from www.northstarwriters.com President Obama does not understand economics. All you have to do is watch his press conference of this past Tuesday to understand that.   He doesn’t understand how wealth is created. He doesn’t understand how and why people earn and receive rewards. He doesn’t understand how and why employment agreements are made and kept.   Of course, this is no surprise to many of us. It was clear during the presidential campaign that Obama did not understand economics. As he talked about the need to “reward work instead of rewarding wealth,” he demonstrated his cluelessness about the relationship between labor and capital – and the crucial need each has for the other. And we will continue to do whatever is necessary in the weeks ahead to ensure the banks Americans depend on have the money they need to lend, even if the economy gets worse.   So let me see if I have this straight. We can’t build a prosperous economy on debt, but a key element of the prosperity strategy is to kick-start lending

Yes Massa

clipped from www.qando.net MASSA: Listen, I tell every audience I’m in favor of single payer. PARTICIPANT: If there was eighty twenty in the room? MASSA: If there was a single payer bill? PARTICIPANT: And there was a single payer…. MASSA: I will vote for the single payer bill. PARTICIPANT: Even if it meant you were being voted out of office? MASSA: I will vote adamantly against the interests of my district if I actually think what I am doing is going to be helpful. (inaudible participants’ comments regarding the “interests” of the district statement from Mr. Massa) Massa: I will vote against their opinion if I actually believe it will help them. Folks it doesn’t get any clearer than that. Mr. Massa isn’t there to “represent” anyone. He’s made it clear that his agenda and his party’s agenda take precedence over anything his constituency wants. They should just sit down and shut up and let their betters decide what’s good for them.

I Call Bullshit

clipped from www.northstarwriters.com In a devastating commentary in the Wall Street Journal, Dr. Scott Gottlieb – a practicing internist, former official at the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services and currently a fellow at the American Enterprise Institute – demonstrated convincingly on Friday that President Obama simply doesn’t know very much about the practice of medicine.   If you want the details, read Gottlieb's piece. But I reference it here because it fits a larger and very troubling pattern about the president: The more he talks, the more he reveals himself not to understand the very subjects about which he waxes on with such seeming eloquence.   There is a name for a person with a talent like this: He is an expert bullshitter. President Obama is one of the most talented bullshitters I have ever seen. He knows all the tricks. He reframes every issue so he can keep it focused on the stuff he wants to talk about, and avoids having to address things he knows nothing about. I call bullshit.

I Know! Let's Put These People In Charge Of Healthcare!

clipped from www.foxnews.com The federal government has only reimbursed auto dealers for 2 percent of the claims they've submitted through the popular "cash for clunkers" program, a Pennsylvania congressman said, calling on the Obama administration to help speed up the process.  Rep. Joe Sestak, D-Pa., called for "immediate action" to address the problem in a statement Sunday, after writing a letter to President Obama Saturday expressing his concerns.  In the letter, Sestak said only 2 percent of claims have been paid and that four of every five applications have been "rejected for minor oversight."

Nauseous In Montana

clipped from citizenwells.wordpress.com It was very obvious that it was meant to be totally controlled by the White House. Everything was orchestrated down to the last detail to make it appear that Montana is just crazy for Obama and government healthcare. Even those people that talked about their insurance woes……..the White House called our local HRDC (Human Resource and Development Committee) and asked for names. Then the White House asked those folks to come. Smoke and mirrors…EVERYTHING was staged!!!!!!!!!!! I am very dismayed about what I learned about our current White House. The amount of control and manipulation was unbelievable. I felt I was not living in the United States of America, more like the USSR!! I was physically nauseous. Joe and I have been around when Presidents or Heads of State visit. It has NEVER been like this. I am truly very frightened for our country. If they are willing to put forth so much effort to BULLY a small town one can only imagine what is going on in Washington DC. Scary!!”

The Snarling Underside

clipped from pajamasmedia.com Andrew Breitbart calls it the “George Bush by proxy syndrome.” Now that Mr. Bush is quietly going about his retirement, this strain of rage — the GWB43 virus — has spread like wildfire, finding unsuspecting targets, each granting us greater perspective into what not long ago seemed like a mysterious phenomenon isolated only on our 43rd president. The first person to catch the virus was Sarah Palin, whose family also was infected, including, unforgivably, her children. Then it was Joe the Plumber, for asking a question. Next were the Mormons. Then it was Rush Limbaugh — who hit back. Next, tax-day “tea party” attendees were “tea bagged.” Then there was a beauty contestant. And a Cambridge cop, too. And now we have town-hall “mobs.” Smile … you’ve been “community organized.” What has perhaps been less widely appreciated is the snarling underside of that vision, a compact of paranoia and scapegoating that is as dangerous as it is unattractive.

Hate Update

clipped from pajamasmedia.com Every day at 11:00, work would stop as people congregated around the ubiquitous two-way telescreens for the ritual two-minute hate: As usual, the face of Emmanuel Goldstein, the Enemy of the People, had flashed on to the screen. There were hisses here and there among the audience. Goldstein was the renegade and backslider who once, long ago (how long ago nobody quite remembered), had been one of the leading figures of the Party In his inaugural address in January, Barack Obama promised to put “an end to the petty grievances and false promises, the recriminations and worn-out dogmas that for far too long have strangled our politics.” I hope you’ve noticed how free from petty grievances, false promises, recriminations, and worn out dogmas public discourse has been since that glorious new dawn, 20 January 2009. He doesn’t explain it. He blames others, especially President Bush. What was unseemly in January is almost risible now.

Did I Forget To Mention That He's Nuttier Than A Cuckoo Clock?

clipped from online.wsj.com You read that headline correctly. Unfortunately, the Obama Administration is financing oil exploration off Brazil. The U.S. is going to lend billions of dollars to Brazil's state-owned oil company, Petrobras, to finance exploration of the huge offshore discovery in Brazil's Tupi oil field in the Santos Basin near Rio de Janeiro. Brazil's planning minister confirmed that White House National Security Adviser James Jones met this month with Brazilian officials to talk about the loan. The U.S. Export-Import Bank tells us it has issued a "preliminary commitment" letter to Petrobras in the amount of $2 billion and has discussed with Brazil the possibility of increasing that amount. Ex-Im Bank says it has not decided whether the money will come in the form of a direct loan or loan guarantees. Either way, this corporate foreign aid may strike some readers as odd, given that the U.S. Treasury seems desperate for cash and Petrobras is one of the largest corporations in the Americas.

Clear As Mud

clipped from politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com PERRY, Florida (CNN) – Acknowledging his amazement at the crowds gathered to debate health care at his town halls, Rep. Allen Boyd, D-Florida, faced three large gatherings on Monday with many questioners voicing skepticism about the proposals being debated in Washington. When a questioner, Ray Evans, said he believed the President wants to do too much at once and asked whether Boyd would "be willing to scrap everything" and start over to do pursue reform more incrementally, the congressman responded: "I think that is an excellent idea … we may end up there." Several people at different events asked whether Boyd would vote to mandate that members of Congress get the same coverage Americans would get under the bill. His response did not go over well with the audience: "Let me make this clear. I don't want all Americans to have the same. I want you to have your choice about what you have."

Heh

clipped from gatewaypundit.blogspot.com Call off the race baiters... The Joker artist is a Palestinian-American Kucinich supporter.

The funny part is that given his alignment with the Dems on foreign policy, there's a good chance he *is* actually racist.

Antisemitic that is.

Liquidity Hogs

clipped from articles.moneycentral.msn.com Turning to last week's main event, the Federal Reserve's Open Market Committee meeting, here's what I wrote ahead of the release: "There is just too much pressure on the Fed (not the least of which is Bernanke's view of the 1930s) for it to do anything that even remotely resembles tightening." The Fed did not contradict me, as it chose to continue pursuing the policies it had previously articulated. That must have put a smile on the face of Paul McCulley of Pimco, who recently stated in an interview on Bubblevision that he wanted the Fed to avoid raising interest rates too soon and that the economy needed to see more inflation. That, ladies and gentlemen, coming from the country's largest holder of bonds. In the old days, bondholders were thought to be inflation vigilantes. But as we can see from McCulley's statements, they are now really just liquidity hogs.

A Consumer Speaks

clipped from www.theatlantic.com I’m a Democrat, and have long been concerned about America’s lack of a health safety net. But based on my own work experience, I also believe that unless we fix the problems at the foundation of our health system—largely problems of incentives—our reforms won’t do much good, and may do harm. To achieve maximum coverage at acceptable cost with acceptable quality, health care will need to become subject to the same forces that have boosted efficiency and value throughout the economy. We will need to reduce, rather than expand, the role of insurance; focus the government’s role exclusively on things that only government can do (protect the poor, cover us against true catastrophe, enforce safety standards, and ensure provider competition); overcome our addiction to Ponzi-scheme financing, hidden subsidies, manipulated prices, and undisclosed results; and rely more on ourselves, the consumers, as the ultimate guarantors of good service, reasonable prices, and sensible trade-offs

The Disguise

clipped from michellemalkin.com As for Democrat Sen. Kent Conrad’s health care “co-op” idea, the devil — as always — is in the details. Edmund Haislmaier pointed out a few weeks ago at The Foundry: If by health care “co-op,” Congress means allowing private associations to collectively buy health insurance for their members or operate a health insurance exchange, or allowing people to buy health insurance from a non-profit, member-owned private insurer, then those would be positive, pro-consumer developments. However, simply slapping the word “cooperative” onto a new “insurer,” but then specifying that the government — not the policyholders — picks the board of directors (as Sen. Schumer wants), or that taxpayers will subsidize it, or that it has to pay doctors and hospitals at Medicare rates, would just be an exercise in trying to disguise a “public plan.” Distrust and verify.

Serendipity

clipped from www.powerlineblog.com The Washington Post reports that, according to a State Department official, the release of the American prisoner was "serendipitous." The Burmese ruling junta, naturally, would like to become less of an outcast while continuing its repressive ways. Thus, it wasn't exactly serendipitous that it responded to Webb's visit by releasing the American prisoner. Rather, as human rights groups have noted, the release was a cynical ploy intended to divert attention from the regime's decision to extend the house arrest of Burmese hero Aung San Suu Kyi. As Jeremy Woodrum, director of the U.S. Campaign for Burma put it: "The regime played its hand perfectly; they get a whole host of publicity from Webb's visit. . .and they have a pretext for keeping Sun Kyi under arrest." While Webb is trying to relieve Burma's isolation, Human Rights Watch is calling on the U.N. Security Council to impose an arms embargo on Burma and to create a commission to investigate the commission of war crimes.

Rent-Seeking (Part 83,935)

clipped from www.windsofchange.net "China mostly invests in activities that raise productivity, raising the amount of goods and services that they can produce. This could be manufacturing or infrastructure or various kinds of services. Agriculture lags but continues to get some new investment. And of course they pour money into education. I'm not a fan of the Chinese way of organizing their economy or their society.... But contrast their pattern of investment in recent years with ours. What sector in our economy has expanded more than any other? ....Finance.... What has this really added in terms of productivity?" He adds: "The ATM and the credit card were great breakthroughs, but they are old. What has "financial innovation" brought us since the 1980s? ....Because financial innovation has mostly facilitated a big increase in finance. ....Rent-seeking means effectively a tax extracted by one sector from the rest of the economy.... Finance is rent-seeking.

American Train Wreck

clipped from www.windsofchange.net "What if we don't have cash to buy milk, eggs, bread or diapers? What if our unemployment benefits run out? What if we never find jobs?....Scott got a job on a paint crew at an RV plant, and by the end of 2007 his income had climbed to $53,000, more than he had ever earned. After work he was the man at the bar with the thick roll of bills, the man he had always wanted to be, buying round after round for himself and his friends. The man with "the full pocket," as he liked to say. He took his son on a fishing trip. He took his family out to eat and told them to order whatever they wanted." To add insult to stupidity... His wife turns down an $8 hour job because she makes more on unemployment benefits. Which are going to expire very soon, of course. The story just breezes on by that. I have nothing but sympathy for people who have worked hard, made efforts to save, and are struggling. A completely self-inflicted train wreck like this one is different.

Forfeited Goodwill Watch

clipped from www.windsofchange.net So, Al-Jazeera (yeah, I know) commissions a poll from Gallup in Pakistan. 2,600 people across the political spectrum, in all 4 Pakistani provinces. Might be methodologically flawed for all I know, but doesn't look like it to casual inspection. And the question is which is the greatest threat to Pakistan - India, the Taliban/Al-Qaeda who are waging an internal civil war in Pakistan, or the USA. 11% say the Taliban. 18% say India. 59% say the United States. Clearly, President Obama has forfeited the USA's reserves of goodwill. Other conclusions are possible, of course, for people who realize the globe doesn't revolve around them and their wishes, and who weren't stupid enough to believe nonsense about squandered goodwill in the first place. For instance: "Pakistan is a Potemkin State with nukes, poor development, limited capacity to deal with its Islamist civil war, justifiably low government legitimacy (note other poll), and a cultural penchant for blaming others

Implosion Eh?

clipped from www.google.com SASKATOON — The incoming president of the Canadian Medical Association says this country's health-care system is sick and doctors need to develop a plan to cure it. Dr. Anne Doig says patients are getting less than optimal care and she adds that physicians from across the country - who will gather in Saskatoon on Sunday for their annual meeting - recognize that changes must be made. "We all agree that the system is imploding, we all agree that things are more precarious than perhaps Canadians realize," Doing said in an interview with The Canadian Press. His thoughts on the issue are already clear. Ouellet has been saying since his return that "a health-care revolution has passed us by," that it's possible to make wait lists disappear while maintaining universal coverage and "that competition should be welcomed, not feared." In other words, Ouellet believes there could be a role for private health-care delivery within the public system.

Shut Up With The "Conversation" Already

clipped from althouse.blogspot.com Man, "conversation" has become one of those Orwellian words. There it is in Obama's NYT interview, where he's saying something that invites the relabeling that Sarah Palin so effectively slapped on it — "death panels." It is very difficult to imagine the country making those decisions just through the normal political channels. And that's part of why you have to have some independent group that can give you guidance. It's not determinative, but I think has to be able to give you some guidance. And that's part of what I suspect you'll see emerging out of the various health care conversations that are taking place on the Hill right now. Conversations! Damn! As if the government does not have power! Oh, but it's "not determinative," you say. It's just "some guidance." He said that, see? Ugh! Spare me! We're right to be afraid now, while the man is burbling about conversation. You know damned well he's about to say and now the time for conversation is over

Times-World

clipped from justoneminute.typepad.com However, the Times has now pointed themselves into a corner - their recent faux-careful examination of the "death panel" rumors that have dogged Obama completely failed to note Obama's own contribution to the debate in April.  The Times has decreed that the notion that Obama has ever hinted at support for anything like a death panel (or cost oriented trade-offs for end-of-life care) is "false", despite their own past reporting to the contrary. So what are they going to do when Obama starts talking about his grandmother and insisting that his only takeaway from that experience was that he is opposed to death panels or any sort of government advisory role in end-of-life care?  Are you kidding?  They are going to move on.  Nothing in the latest Gay Stolberg story hints that Obama is re-spinning his grandmother's tal It's Times-world - Obama can say whatever he wants and later say whatever else he wants, then denounce the people still grappling with the previous version. Imagine my surprise.

Incumbistanis

clipped from thejacksonianparty.blogspot.com From memory I had dredged up that this was a modern symptom due solely to the changes of the 'Progressive' era.  Thus I dredged through my posts and found the lovely graph of the problem, itself: My initial feeling was that it had been a long time since there was even a 30% turnover in Congress, and I was right.  The last times that happened in the post-'Progressive' era were: 1904, 1912-1916, 1922, 1934.  As the top graph's red line is percentage, the startling artifact is that all Congresses prior to 1902 had never REACHED a 70% return rate.  That era of 1896 to 1902 was the one-way 'ratchet' to modern Incumbistani politics, in which America went from 'throwing the bums out' on a continual basis to 'throwing the bums back in' on a continual basis.  That percentage shift is as clear as night and day where the left half never reaches up to 70% turnover and the right half rarely reaches below 70%.

Spindled And Mutilated

clipped from bluecrabboulevard.com I’ve never seen any of them do anything except . . . supervise. They’re as useless as mall cops. If you should have to pick up a package, go to the window in the corner. Usually there is no clerk here. There is a doorbell-like buzzer. For a year or so it was labeled “Broken.” So if you need a package, just stand there for a while. Someone will come by . . . eventually. Please, go read the whole piece. It is a stark reminder of what an indifferent bureaucracy has done to a once state of the art industry. That, my friends is exactly where ObamaCare would take the US health care industry. To a trash-strewn wasteland run by civil masters rather than civil servants. They’ll make the decisions - when they get around to it - you’ll wait in line. They’ll decide if you get the hip replacement or the pills - don’t bet on the former.  Keep pushing back folks. Unless you want to be bent, folded, spindled and mutilated by a bureaucracy run amok.

Back To The Cheney

clipped from hotair.com How’s that pragmatic socialist thing working out for the Left? Well, let’s just say that being mentioned in the same breath as Dick Cheney isn’t quite the change BO would be looking for. Enter Greg Palast, who — after lambasting Obama for striking a secret deal with pharmaceutical companies that would, by his calculations, save a whopping 2% on the drugs Americans buy — wonders: What else went down in Obama’s drug deal? To find out, I called C-SPAN to get a copy of the videotape of the meeting with the drug companies. I was surprised to find they didn’t have such a tape despite the President’s campaign promise, right there on CNN in January 2008, “These negotiations will be on C-SPAN.” This puzzled me. When Dick Cheney was caught having secret meetings with oil companies to discuss Bush’s Energy Bill, we denounced the hugger-muggers as a case of foxes in the henhouse. And so, here we are. No real reform, no real cost savings, no leadership, lots of new debt

Repeal The Stimulus

clipped from www.bloomberg.com Medicare now pays for treatments deemed safe and effective. The stimulus bill would change that and apply a cost- effectiveness standard set by the Federal Council (464). In 2006, a U.K. health board decreed that elderly patients with macular degeneration had to wait until they went blind in one eye before they could get a costly new drug to save the other eye. It took almost three years of public protests before the board reversed its decision. Hiding health legislation in a stimulus bill is intentional. Daschle supported the Clinton administration’s health-care overhaul in 1994, and attributed its failure to debate and delay. A year ago, Daschle wrote that the next president should act quickly before critics mount an opposition. “If that means attaching a health-care plan to the federal budget, so be it,” he said. “The issue is too important to be stalled by Senate protocol.”

We're babes in the woods folks. The death panel has already been created by the "stimulus" bill. The one that stimulates O Duce's political allies. And your death.

Beck Exposes Rahm's Chicago Way

clipped from www.youtube.com

Inside Corruption

clipped from pajamasmedia.com How do you keep someone from using what he knows? The Los Angeles Times describes a warning by Neal Barofsky, the special inspector general for the banking rescue program, who says the government bank rescue package can wind up enriching the very people who put it into effect. A controversial $40-billion government program to buy toxic securities from ailing banks has a flaw that law enforcement and financial experts say could allow traders to illegally profit from inside information. … The danger is that traders in the government program could wield enormous influence in the market — and there are no explicit restrictions on how they could use that influence to profit inside deals of their own. For example, a trader could privately buy up groups of toxic mortgages on the cheap then later drive up the price by purchasing similar mortgages using government money. The practice, known as “front running,” could be technically illegal

Hostages

clipped from gatewaypundit.blogspot.com Remember: Private Sector-- Bad Government Control-- Good Obama accused insurance companies of "holding Americans hostage" on Friday. Instead he wants to take away all competition and allow government to hold Americans hostage.

It Already Exists

clipped from www.americanthinker.com Former Alaskan Governor Sarah Palin has come under fire for her Facebook post accusing President Obama and the Democrats of including a "death panel" provision the health care bill. The Associated Press recently ran a ‘Fact Check' article rebutting Palin's claim.  The AP is technically correct in stating that end-of-life counseling is not the same as a death panel.  The New York Times is also correct to point out that the health care bill contains no provision setting up such a panel. What both outlets fail to point out is that the panel already exists. H.R. 1 (more commonly known as the Recovery and Reinvestment Act, even more commonly known as the Stimulus Bill and aptly dubbed the Porkulus Bill) contains a whopping $1.1 billion to fund the Federal Coordinating Council for Comparative Effectiveness Research. Who is on the Council? One of its most prominent members is none other than Dr. Death himself Ezekiel Emanuel.

Every Blade Of Grass

clipped from theblogprof.blogspot.com What is it with liberals and gun rights. Liberals simply cannot find an individual right to carry in the U.S. Constitution, even though it is explicitly cited in amendments that specifically address only individual rights, but can find a right to abortion which is somehow invisibly inserted somewhere in the same document. Just recently, a Macomb Township ordinance banning guns in public places came under scrutiny when a gun rights group, Michigan Open Carry, was to hold a picnic in a park - by definition a public location. From The Macomb Daily: Law backs right of gun group to hold picnic.