Thursday, September 17, 2009
Wednesday, September 16, 2009
Wilson Gauranteed Not Racist
Jimmy Carter Cites 'Racisim' in Joe Wilson's Outburst
If Jimmuh thinks Joe is a racist, that is absolute proof to me that he isn't. It seemed like Jimmuh was right one time, but then he changed his mind.
If Jimmuh thinks Joe is a racist, that is absolute proof to me that he isn't. It seemed like Jimmuh was right one time, but then he changed his mind.
ACORN Video
Just take the time to watch it, and THEN give just a TINY bit of thought. This ranks amoung the most AMAZING things I've ever seen!! In some ways I almost hope it is a hoax -- one would think it almost has to be. If it isn't, the level of corruption in the Democrat party and the MSM is WAY beyond anything I ever imagined.
If true (which I find increasingly hard to imagine, but if NOT true, why doesn't someone expose them???to one of the liberal dodges to press bias."They just print what sells". Are you KIDDING!!! We have a cute young woman, scantilly dressed running around looking like the college Halloween party version of Pimp and Hooker, but it is WORKING, over and over with employees of a national organization that has both helped and been paid by the current President!!! BO wanted to have these stooges do the CENSUS for crying out loud. The ONLY sort of legit job that BO ever had was as one of these folks!!!!
You've got sex, scandal, stupidity cubed, connection with the President. This is a GREAT story -- except, except -- well, it is the MSM's guy!!! They can't run this, it makes BO look like the idiot he is. If they could have had something like this connected to Bush, it would have been 24x7 -- "when will he resign"!!!
If true (which I find increasingly hard to imagine, but if NOT true, why doesn't someone expose them???to one of the liberal dodges to press bias."They just print what sells". Are you KIDDING!!! We have a cute young woman, scantilly dressed running around looking like the college Halloween party version of Pimp and Hooker, but it is WORKING, over and over with employees of a national organization that has both helped and been paid by the current President!!! BO wanted to have these stooges do the CENSUS for crying out loud. The ONLY sort of legit job that BO ever had was as one of these folks!!!!
You've got sex, scandal, stupidity cubed, connection with the President. This is a GREAT story -- except, except -- well, it is the MSM's guy!!! They can't run this, it makes BO look like the idiot he is. If they could have had something like this connected to Bush, it would have been 24x7 -- "when will he resign"!!!
To Almost Get It
Op-Ed Columnist - High-Five Nation - NYTimes.com
Brooks sees the disease, and he ALMOST gets the cause:
Brooks is right -- most of the nation is self absorbed, self promoting, out to "get it all", "only going around once -- and grabbing for all the gusto". We used to have "shared values" -- actually we basically had ONE "shared value" -- that we were all children of God that would finally be judged by a standard that was much higher than our own. Gayle Sayers said it as "God is first, my friends are second, and I am third". I'd argue that God, Family, Friends, Country, and then self might be good, but the only REALLY important think is that God in position one. See, it IS always "God" in position #1 -- for some folks it is self, for some political party, for some money, for some the Packers (OK, so that one is hard for me) ... the point is that EVERY human has a "God" -- the issue is just which one.
The difference in America is that the vast majority of folks have took the eternal, the transcendent and the redeeming person of Christ out of their lives and replaced it with some earthly idol -- for a lot of folks and the media, it is his holiness BO, but one idol is pretty much like another.
The idea that of the supposed "civility thing" being somehow worse now is absurd. The Democrats booed Bush in at least '05 during the SOTU, and I think at other times. John MacEnroe made swearing at the line judges a standard part of tennis, and odd happenings at celebrety awards events are also so normal that they hardly bear reporting except for the media to make some tenuous connection with Joe Wilson and claim that somehow "town meetings" are responsible for the "loss of civility".
Egads, "Bush lied, people died", "Bush=Hitler" and at least some screaming and chanting set of protesters at any sort of a Republican event has been old hat for as long as I have known. It is true that it IS very different to get Republicans away from family, church, job, hobbies, volunteer work, etc to speak out. Democrats figure that leftward demonstrators are "comforting" and supposed "right wingers" are somehow "chilling". The left is always hot to defend your right to agree with them and pretty certain that anyone that doesn't agree with them is dangerous, racist, evil, stupid or all of the above. Democrats don't believe in debate -- they have all the correct positions, it is up to the Republicans to shut up, work hard and pay for whatever crazy scheme the Democrats dream up.
Nothing important ever changes. If it changes, it is just mechanism.
Brooks sees the disease, and he ALMOST gets the cause:
And there was something else. When you look from today back to 1945, you are looking into a different cultural epoch, across a sort of narcissism line. Humility, the sense that nobody is that different from anybody else, was a large part of the culture then.
But that humility came under attack in the ensuing decades. Self-effacement became identified with conformity and self-repression. A different ethos came to the fore, which the sociologists call “expressive individualism.” Instead of being humble before God and history, moral salvation could be found through intimate contact with oneself and by exposing the beauty, the power and the divinity within.
Brooks is right -- most of the nation is self absorbed, self promoting, out to "get it all", "only going around once -- and grabbing for all the gusto". We used to have "shared values" -- actually we basically had ONE "shared value" -- that we were all children of God that would finally be judged by a standard that was much higher than our own. Gayle Sayers said it as "God is first, my friends are second, and I am third". I'd argue that God, Family, Friends, Country, and then self might be good, but the only REALLY important think is that God in position one. See, it IS always "God" in position #1 -- for some folks it is self, for some political party, for some money, for some the Packers (OK, so that one is hard for me) ... the point is that EVERY human has a "God" -- the issue is just which one.
The difference in America is that the vast majority of folks have took the eternal, the transcendent and the redeeming person of Christ out of their lives and replaced it with some earthly idol -- for a lot of folks and the media, it is his holiness BO, but one idol is pretty much like another.
The idea that of the supposed "civility thing" being somehow worse now is absurd. The Democrats booed Bush in at least '05 during the SOTU, and I think at other times. John MacEnroe made swearing at the line judges a standard part of tennis, and odd happenings at celebrety awards events are also so normal that they hardly bear reporting except for the media to make some tenuous connection with Joe Wilson and claim that somehow "town meetings" are responsible for the "loss of civility".
Egads, "Bush lied, people died", "Bush=Hitler" and at least some screaming and chanting set of protesters at any sort of a Republican event has been old hat for as long as I have known. It is true that it IS very different to get Republicans away from family, church, job, hobbies, volunteer work, etc to speak out. Democrats figure that leftward demonstrators are "comforting" and supposed "right wingers" are somehow "chilling". The left is always hot to defend your right to agree with them and pretty certain that anyone that doesn't agree with them is dangerous, racist, evil, stupid or all of the above. Democrats don't believe in debate -- they have all the correct positions, it is up to the Republicans to shut up, work hard and pay for whatever crazy scheme the Democrats dream up.
Nothing important ever changes. If it changes, it is just mechanism.
Admonish the Democrats!
The Democrats have gone nuttier than usual.
In the words of our most holy and illustrious leader, BO; "Wiith all that's going on in the country with health care and the economy and the wars abroad, it doesn't make sense to arrest a guy in his own home if he's not causing a serious disturbance."
That was over the Gates arrest, for which it made no sense at all -- it isn't a policeman's job to think about those issues, but it IS the job of congress!! Does it make any sense to take a day of Congressional time to admonish a guy who apologized already? Especially when Bush was booed at a SOTU by the Democrats and called a "liar" CONSTANTLY for saying that Saddam had WMD --- which Bill and Hillary Clinton, John Kerry, Teddy Kennedy, Harry Reid, and virtually everyone else ALSO said?
We just got done with 6+ years when the MSM and the Democrats succeeded in making "Bush=Liar" essentially the national view over a position that their leadership virtually unanimously shared prior to the Iraq war.
But now when BO spews lies that he MUST know to be lies a mile a minute, it is a HUGE breach of decorum to call him on it? I agree it IS a breach of decorum (in congress) and the ONE Republican that told the truth from the floor OUGHT to have apologized ... which he did.That ought to have MORE than ended it given the past history of the other party.
In the words of our most holy and illustrious leader, BO; "Wiith all that's going on in the country with health care and the economy and the wars abroad, it doesn't make sense to arrest a guy in his own home if he's not causing a serious disturbance."
That was over the Gates arrest, for which it made no sense at all -- it isn't a policeman's job to think about those issues, but it IS the job of congress!! Does it make any sense to take a day of Congressional time to admonish a guy who apologized already? Especially when Bush was booed at a SOTU by the Democrats and called a "liar" CONSTANTLY for saying that Saddam had WMD --- which Bill and Hillary Clinton, John Kerry, Teddy Kennedy, Harry Reid, and virtually everyone else ALSO said?
We just got done with 6+ years when the MSM and the Democrats succeeded in making "Bush=Liar" essentially the national view over a position that their leadership virtually unanimously shared prior to the Iraq war.
But now when BO spews lies that he MUST know to be lies a mile a minute, it is a HUGE breach of decorum to call him on it? I agree it IS a breach of decorum (in congress) and the ONE Republican that told the truth from the floor OUGHT to have apologized ... which he did.That ought to have MORE than ended it given the past history of the other party.
Tuesday, September 15, 2009
Who Are they Kidding?
RealClearPolitics - The Media's Pathetic Double Standard
The link covers fairly well the amazing double standard in the MSM. Bush/Cheney were called every name in the book in any venue you can imagine. Bush was booed by Democrats during the SOTU.. **NOW** we are worried about "incivility"???
People are so biased they have lost all contact with reality.
The link covers fairly well the amazing double standard in the MSM. Bush/Cheney were called every name in the book in any venue you can imagine. Bush was booed by Democrats during the SOTU.. **NOW** we are worried about "incivility"???
People are so biased they have lost all contact with reality.
Wisdom on Getting More
RealClearPolitics - Fables for Adults
Sowell is always a fount of wisdom. Here on how when you try to take something away from someone else -- Doctors, Insurance Companies, Rich People, etc, you can often end up losing what you have now.
Sowell is always a fount of wisdom. Here on how when you try to take something away from someone else -- Doctors, Insurance Companies, Rich People, etc, you can often end up losing what you have now.
Defining "Community Organizer" (ACORN)
Power Line - My Heroes
You really need to go off and watch at least a little of one of the videos -- remember, your tax dollars are helping fund ACORN!!
We have a "Community Organizer" as President. ACORN is "the Association of Community OrganNizers". Most people know very little about it because the MSM tells them very little about it. They ended up with indictments against them for voter fraud in how they got out the BO vote, they get millions in GOVERNMENT money as well as millions from Democrats. It is a really cozy relationship -- BO wanted them to do the census for him!!
A couple of young folks enterprisingly did a hidden camera operation posing as a pimp and a prostitute trying to get a house -- AFTER the Sub-Prime meltdown. ACORN took it in stride -- no concerns that they were going to import underage prostitutes (hey, 98% of prostitutes vote Democrat!!!), they were just interested in how they could scam the system in order to get a house! BTW, ACORN was a MAJOR part of creating the Sub-Prime debacle.
Don't see much MSM coverage of this!!!
You really need to go off and watch at least a little of one of the videos -- remember, your tax dollars are helping fund ACORN!!
We have a "Community Organizer" as President. ACORN is "the Association of Community OrganNizers". Most people know very little about it because the MSM tells them very little about it. They ended up with indictments against them for voter fraud in how they got out the BO vote, they get millions in GOVERNMENT money as well as millions from Democrats. It is a really cozy relationship -- BO wanted them to do the census for him!!
A couple of young folks enterprisingly did a hidden camera operation posing as a pimp and a prostitute trying to get a house -- AFTER the Sub-Prime meltdown. ACORN took it in stride -- no concerns that they were going to import underage prostitutes (hey, 98% of prostitutes vote Democrat!!!), they were just interested in how they could scam the system in order to get a house! BTW, ACORN was a MAJOR part of creating the Sub-Prime debacle.
Don't see much MSM coverage of this!!!
Monday, September 14, 2009
Perspective of a Russion Immigrant
Take the time to read this. Someone else understands that while greed is a bad human propensity, so is envy. The result of greed as been proven to be more for all, but MUCH more for some. The result of envy driving a system is less in aggregate, far less for 98%, and a "decent living" for a couple % -- but only in relation to the impoverished 98%. Even the "richest" leaders in the USSR had less than the middle class in the US.
Read it and weep. We didn't know what we had, so now we are heading fast down the road to destruction.
Read it and weep. We didn't know what we had, so now we are heading fast down the road to destruction.
The Perspective Of A Russian Immigrant
In the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, I was taught to believe individual pursuits are selfish and sacrificing for the collective good is noble.
In kindergarten we sang songs about Lenin, the leader of the Socialist Revolution. In school we learned about the beautiful socialist system, where everybody is equal and everything is fair; about ugly capitalism, where people are exploited and treat each other like wolves in the wilderness.
Life in the USSR modeled the socialist ideal. God-based religion was suppressed and replaced with cultlike adoration for political figures.
The government-assigned salary of the proletariat (blue-collar worker) was 30%-50% higher then any professional. Without incentive to improve their life, professionals drank themselves to oblivion. They — engineers, lawyers, doctors, teachers — earned a government-determined salary that barely covered the necessities, mainly food.
Raising children was a hardship. It took four to six adults (parents and grandparents) to support a child. The usual size of the postwar family was one or two children. Every woman had the right to have an abortion and most of them did, often without anesthesia.
There is a comparative historical reality that plays out the consequences of two competing ideologies: life in the USSR and in America. When the march to the worker's paradise — the Socialist Revolution — began in 1917, many people emigrated from Russia to the U.S.
In the USSR, economic equality was achieved by redistributing wealth, ensuring that everyone remained poor, with the exception of those doing the redistributing. Only the ruling class of communist leaders had access to special stores, medicine and accommodations that could compare to those in the West.
The rest of the citizenry had to deal with permanent shortages of food and other necessities, and had access to free but inferior, unsanitary and low-tech medical care. The egalitarian utopia of equality, achieved by the sacrifice of individual self-interest for the collective good, led to corruption, black markets, anger and envy.
Government-controlled health care destroyed human dignity.
Chairman Nikita Khrushchev released facts about Stalin and his purges. People learned of the horrific purge of more than 20 million citizens, murdered as enemies of the state.
Those who left Russia found a different set of values in America: freedom of religion, speech, individual pursuits, the right to private property and free enterprise. The majority of those immigrants achieved a better life for themselves and their children in this capitalist land.
These opportunities let the average immigrant live a better life than many elites in the Soviet Communist Party. The freedom to pursue personal self-interest led to prosperity. Prosperity generated charity, benefiting the collective good.
The descendants of those immigrants are now supporting policies that move America away from the values that gave so many immigrants the chance of a better life. Policies such as nationalized medicine, high tax rates and government intrusion into free enterprise are being sold to us under the socialistic motto of collective salvation.
Socialism has bankrupted and failed every society, while capitalism has lifted more people out of poverty than any other system.
There is no perfect society. There are no perfect people. Critics say that greed is the driving force of capitalism. My answer is that envy is the driving force of socialism. Change to socialism is not an improvement on the imperfections of the current system.
The slogans of "fairness and equality" sound better than the slogans of capitalism. But unlike at the beginning of the 20th century, when these slogans and ideas were yet to be tested, we have accumulated history and reality.
Today we can define the better system not by slogans, but by looking at the accumulated facts. We can compare which ideology leads to the most oppression and which brings the most opportunity.
When I came to America in 1980 and experienced life in this country, I thought it was fortunate that those living in the USSR did not know how unfortunate they were.
Now in 2009, I realize how unfortunate it is that many Americans do not understand how fortunate they are. They vote to give government more and more power without understanding the consequences.
Svetlana Kunin, Stamford, Conn.
What About "Settled Science"?
Scientists discover surprise in Earth's upper atmosphere / UCLA Newsroom
That bastion of conservative thought, UCLA discovered a "surprise" that interaction of the Solar Wind and the Magnetosphere is heating the upper atmosphere. They make no mention of Global Warming (I suppose because that is "Settled Science"), but if we live in an era where "Scientific Surprise" is possible, then how can Global Warming be settled?
That bastion of conservative thought, UCLA discovered a "surprise" that interaction of the Solar Wind and the Magnetosphere is heating the upper atmosphere. They make no mention of Global Warming (I suppose because that is "Settled Science"), but if we live in an era where "Scientific Surprise" is possible, then how can Global Warming be settled?
Sunday, September 13, 2009
Tim Walz Healthcare Town Hall
I went to the Tim Walz local healthcare town meeting Saturday. There were around 3000 folks there and it looked and sounded like about 2 to 1 against the current healthcare proposal. In some ways it was almost laughable -- ex Senator Durenberger was there, a big guy from Mayo, a guy from Blue Cross and Blue Shield and a business owner. All agreed that "the biggest problem is medicare" -- it sets the standards for forms, procedures, charges, etc. MN, WI, N&S Dakota, Nebraska, Wyoming,, etc have an average cost of $6K a head for medicare and their results are the best in the nation. NY, California, TX, FL, IL, Michigan, etc cost greater than $13K per medicare recipient (adjusted for pop age, cost of living, etc), but their results are the worst in the nation.
Why? Medicare pays on "what you do", NOT on "what are your results" -- and since medicare is by far the largest single payer TODAY, the hospitals, insurance companies, etc have really no choice but to generally follow that lead -- it would increase their costs horribly if they did not. Mayo (and others in the the low cost states) buck that trend -- Mayo lost $800 million on medicare last year, but if they were to try to break even, they would have to spend LESS time with their patients and order more tests that would allow them to get more reimbursement, but would mean that elderly patients were transported, pricked and prodded more often with poorer results.
So why don't they fix it? Well, this is the funny part -- Walz essentially says "they can't" -- those high cost states are bigger and get a lot more money for the way they are doing business now, and they aren't about to admit that "MN / WI do it better" AND take a lot less money from the federal coffers. So the PRESSURE is to "do it worse" -- for Mayo and others to operate like medicare operates even though they know it is wrong. Walz is a Democrat though, so the ONLY thing he can think of to make things better is to pass is "a big new program -- NOT fix medicare, that can't be touched because folks PERCEIVE it to be what they want" -- since the Democrats hope in big government is boundless, even though everyone up there (all brought in by Walz) is in agreement that medicare is the root cause of our rising and inefficient medical costs, the only way to fix it is with ANOTHER government program, and HOPE that one somehow came out better.
Naturally, the 2 to 1 ratio kept trying to say "JUST FIX MEDICARE" !!! they know what to do, there is a big set of states doing it and getting cheaper and excellent results --- all Walz could keep doing was explaining that "CA and NY have more representatives than all the states that are doing it right combined" -- it is politically impossible to do the right thing!!! BUT, "we need to do something"!!! -- and the votes might be there for another Trillion dollar program, so we do a huge new program and HOPE that SOMEHOW whatever political greed, kickbacks and screw ups it was that made medicare into the gold plated albatross that it has turned out to be, "this is different".
I guess just keep repeating "Yes We Can" over and over and click your ruby red slippers together and maybe somehow it will all work out!!!
The highlight of the day was a Russiian immigrant that was lucky enough to get to speak and in broken english said "I grew up in the USSR, I've SEEN what government healthcare is, you people would be CRAZY to go that way! I came to America because I believed it is different, I can't believe that this discussion is even going on here in America!!" He got a standing ovation from the 2/3 of the people opposed to BOcare. The other 1/3 looked mighty unhappy that we allowed legal immigration from the old USSR.
Some closing thoughts:
Why? Medicare pays on "what you do", NOT on "what are your results" -- and since medicare is by far the largest single payer TODAY, the hospitals, insurance companies, etc have really no choice but to generally follow that lead -- it would increase their costs horribly if they did not. Mayo (and others in the the low cost states) buck that trend -- Mayo lost $800 million on medicare last year, but if they were to try to break even, they would have to spend LESS time with their patients and order more tests that would allow them to get more reimbursement, but would mean that elderly patients were transported, pricked and prodded more often with poorer results.
So why don't they fix it? Well, this is the funny part -- Walz essentially says "they can't" -- those high cost states are bigger and get a lot more money for the way they are doing business now, and they aren't about to admit that "MN / WI do it better" AND take a lot less money from the federal coffers. So the PRESSURE is to "do it worse" -- for Mayo and others to operate like medicare operates even though they know it is wrong. Walz is a Democrat though, so the ONLY thing he can think of to make things better is to pass is "a big new program -- NOT fix medicare, that can't be touched because folks PERCEIVE it to be what they want" -- since the Democrats hope in big government is boundless, even though everyone up there (all brought in by Walz) is in agreement that medicare is the root cause of our rising and inefficient medical costs, the only way to fix it is with ANOTHER government program, and HOPE that one somehow came out better.
Naturally, the 2 to 1 ratio kept trying to say "JUST FIX MEDICARE" !!! they know what to do, there is a big set of states doing it and getting cheaper and excellent results --- all Walz could keep doing was explaining that "CA and NY have more representatives than all the states that are doing it right combined" -- it is politically impossible to do the right thing!!! BUT, "we need to do something"!!! -- and the votes might be there for another Trillion dollar program, so we do a huge new program and HOPE that SOMEHOW whatever political greed, kickbacks and screw ups it was that made medicare into the gold plated albatross that it has turned out to be, "this is different".
I guess just keep repeating "Yes We Can" over and over and click your ruby red slippers together and maybe somehow it will all work out!!!
The highlight of the day was a Russiian immigrant that was lucky enough to get to speak and in broken english said "I grew up in the USSR, I've SEEN what government healthcare is, you people would be CRAZY to go that way! I came to America because I believed it is different, I can't believe that this discussion is even going on here in America!!" He got a standing ovation from the 2/3 of the people opposed to BOcare. The other 1/3 looked mighty unhappy that we allowed legal immigration from the old USSR.
Some closing thoughts:
- Walz talked about "roads and schools" and made the comment "try driving home without roads". Certainly a specious argument in any case ("did you buy your clothes at a government store?" ... it ISN'T "all or nothing"). The idea that there isn't a difference between "federal and local" is especially stupid given the big chart he showed multiple times of the difference between MN and places like NY. Locality matters!!! ... that is a good reason to NOT have FEDERAL healthcare!!
- The idea of "we HAVE to do SOMETHING ... so, it may as well be THIS" ... when "this" is nearly totally undefined borders on insanity. "First do no harm" is an INCREDIBLY good piece of advice. It was WAY easier to screw things up than to make them better -- and the fact that Medicare has screwed things up was very apparent.
- Walz had the big show of hands on Social Security and Medicare -- how many are on it, how many want to give it up. Gee, people like "free stuff" -- BUT, when people get exposed to how much it is COSTING, how many TENS OF TRILLIONS we are in the hole with those programs with NO IDEAS on how to get us out, it is different. The fact that the masses like the stuff that they are given is EXACTLY what killed Democracy prior to the US, and exactly why we are killing ours!
Friday, September 11, 2009
Humor and Politics
A more liberal friend of mine sent me this Archie Bunker on Gun Control in good fun. I've been a bald guy since I was 21, I learned to laugh at myself a long time ago. I also find the human condition in general to have a lot of humor. So even though I know what Archie is "up to", he is still funny.
Carroll O'Connor, the actor that plays Archie, and Norman Lear, the producer of "All in the Family" are VERY far to the left of the political spectrum. There is nothing wrong with that, and it is exceedingly common in all of our media, from news, television, movies and music to be fairly far left. It is in fact "the dominant culture". News, entertainment, or even entertainers that are not generally left are in fact "called out" -- Fox News, Rush Limbaugh, the late Charlton Heston, etc. The general media makes sure to tell everyone, "these outlets are biased -- they have an axe to grind, be careful". Again, it is a free country, that is fine -- although one wonders what it really means when the pot calls the kettle black. What does the claim of "bias" against those found to somehow be "conservative" say about those pointing??
The Archie character uses his malappropisms and bigoted attitude to malign and belittle the idea of "guns making us safer" by the assertion that "we ought to just hand out guns to people getting on planes" in order to stop hi-jacking. While Archie was well in advance of 9-11, I find it interesting as a CC holder thinking of those folks on the aircraft being flown into the WTC buildings faced relatively well trained men that had almost certainly killed or were holding a Stewardess or worse (maybe kids, we don't really know) under the threat that they would "slit their throats".
A 9mm slug to the forehead will pretty much abate throat slitting. If US citizen CC permit holders were allowed to carry on domestic aircraft, I sincerely doubt that 9-11 would have happened at all ... at least not the way it did. The non-us citizens could not have got a permit at and would have known that it was highly likely that their box cutters would have had to face one or more armed citizens that they would not have been able to discover in advance. Even if they DID manage somehow to illegally obtain a permit, not knowing who is going to draw a gun on you increases your difficulty.
The combination of educational system attitudes and the general media makes it seem like "legal gun owners are stupid" (I often wonder if they think that criminal gun owners are smarter than the legal ones?) -- BO's 2nd book has the quite laughable thinking that "conservatives think of their guns like liberals think of their books". It is always comfortable to think that folks that think differently from us are "less intelligent". Given the vast limits of human intelligence, the sad fact is that we are all stupid enough relative to the problems of existence, let alone meta-existence, that it is more than likely that ALL human positions are far more inaccurate to actual reality than we realize. On a universal scale, the difference between "Archie Bunker and Albert Einstein" is likely about as significant as the difference between the smartest ant in the ant hill and the least intelligent. From our vaunted position, we feel such discussions about ants are meaningless.
You can go look around the web and find a lot of evidence that CC laws seem to reduce crime. Like anything on the web, I'm sure you can find some counter examples, but it seems that if there was even a SHRED of evidence in the other direction, at least one of the 39 states that have liberalized CC laws in the last couple decades would have repealed the change. While my view is that criminals are generally less intelligent, one might think that the thought that your intended victim may be legally armed isn't all that comforting. As a criminal, it isn't very likely you get out to the range very often in order to improve your competence with your weapon, so the prospect of a gun owner that does silver dollar multi-tap groups on a regular basis is likely not to help your sleep. That seems like common sense to me, and when statistics and common sense go together, it seems pretty plausible.
More RTC, less crime: Since 1991, 23 states have adopted RTC laws, replacing laws that prohibited carrying or that issued carry permits on a very restrictive basis; many other federal, state, and local gun control laws have been eliminated or made less restrictive; and the number of privately-owned guns has risen by about 90 million.2 There are more RTC states, gun owners, people carrying firearms for protection, and privately owned firearms than ever before. In the same time frame, the nation's murder rate has decreased 46 percent to a 43-year low, and the total violent crime rate has decreased 41 percent to a 35-year low.3 RTC states have lower violent crime rates, on average, compared to the rest of the country (total violent crime by 24 percent; murder, 28 percent; robbery, 50 percent; and aggravated assault, 11 percent).4
Thursday, September 10, 2009
You Lie!
PostPartisan - Republicans Behaving Badly
Naturally, the MSM has been all over the one congressman that said "you lie!" to BO. I agree, that is bad behavior and he was right to apologize. Listen to the Democrats boo and guffaw away in the background while Bush tries to make progress on overhauling Social Security in the video below -- another multi-Trillion dollar bad debt hanging over our collective heads. Remember any outcry in the MSM over the impropriety of that show of disrespect? Neither do I!
How many times has Bush been called a "liar" for WMD? I'd think thousands by just the Democrat elected officials alone, yet a "lie" assumes that one KNOWS the truth. Saying "the stock market is going to go down" and then seeing it go up isn't a LIE, it is making a bad prediction. The Republican that blurted out "liar" apoligized and could validly claim "heat of the moment", but what about the same rule of decorum being followed by the President since he is speaking in the chamber? Certainly he can't assert that he said this in "the heat of the moment":
While "death panel" is certainly incendiary speech, that sort of speech is far from unusual in congress. I recall Reagan's "Dirty Water Bill", and BO recently appointed Van Jones (who had to resign) that claimed that Bush did 9-11 as an "inside job". BO himself mentioned "And we will also create an independent commission of doctors and medical experts charged with identifying more waste in the years ahead." So what is "waste"? Is it a waste to give expensive brain cancer treatment to a guy in his late '70s with brain cancer? (like Teddy Kennedy) I honestly don't know -- to one set of folks, it is probably "wasteful", but to another set, not doing it would be a "death panel". How about if he was 85? 95? 105? Does it EVER become "wasteful"? What does it mean when someone is too old for national health care to pay for some treatment?
Isn't this EXACTLY what is "uncivil" -- one side says "independent commission", the other says "death panel" and then the president escalates it to "lie"? Can we talk about some age where "heroic measures" are just going to prolong suffering rather than improve life? Who decides that? A "commission"? the individual? insurance companies (including maybe the "government option"?). Isn't that what the discussion is supposed to be about?
Oh, and while we talk about that, last night's speech had a lot of examples of the Democrat's favorite argument -- SHUT UP!!
Reminds me of Global Warming -- "the debate is over".
So Medicare and Medicaid are growing out of control. Wouldn't a sane person say to control the costs of Medicare and Medicaid FIRST, then we will give the government more control over health care once they have proven that they can control the costs on these two programs that they have owned for decades? If the government can't control the costs of these key programs, how in the world is it going to control the costs by taking on MORE??? If the CURRENT burden is "unsustainable", then why in the world would we want to ADD to that burden?? "These are facts, nobody disputes them". In other words, "shut up". But you follow it with "the question is how". My goodness, "Death is a real issue that causes a lot of grief, nobody disputes this. We must reform death. The question is how."
Indeed -- the question very often is "how" -- sometimes just because in the case of winning the game, making a really good cherry pie, or getting a kiss from Cindy Lou, it is the HOW (execution) that is difficult not the goals, even if we have decided on the outcome that we would like. Sometimes, like the death case, and possibly like the health care case, even though the problems are obvious, the solutions (how) are anything but. They are flat out impossible (like death), or they require a whole set of trade-offs that are so difficult or costly that they are fraught with peril. In those cases, the obvious answer is INCREMENTAL! Show the brilliance and resourcefulness of the US government by fixing medicare and medicare FIRST. Instigate various programs at a STATE LEVEL and verify that they work, and THEN see if they SCALE!! Things that work for 30 million people are not guaranteed to work for 300 million people. If you doubt this, put 300 lbs in your trunk, see how your car drives, and then try it with 3,000lbs!! (10x, same scale factor as 30 million to 300 million). The scale factor alone is one of the reasons that our situation is different from Canada, England and others.
BO did very little to help on that path. One man's "bickering" is another mans "discussion of issues" -- were a Republican trying to deal with a real problem (as Bush did with Social Security), no matter how much he "reached out", there would be ZERO help from the other side (as there was with FICA) and he would be 100% demonized over "trying to kill social security" (as Bush was). It is really interesting to watch the MSM be 100% on the reverse side -- all BO's motives are pure, he would NEVER try to create a bunch of big government unionized bureaucracy that would vote Democrat!! or (perish the thought), try to pay off one section of the population that he thinks will vote for him with money taken from those he thinks will not!!! Certainly, the great and pure BO is above that!!
Naturally, the MSM has been all over the one congressman that said "you lie!" to BO. I agree, that is bad behavior and he was right to apologize. Listen to the Democrats boo and guffaw away in the background while Bush tries to make progress on overhauling Social Security in the video below -- another multi-Trillion dollar bad debt hanging over our collective heads. Remember any outcry in the MSM over the impropriety of that show of disrespect? Neither do I!
How many times has Bush been called a "liar" for WMD? I'd think thousands by just the Democrat elected officials alone, yet a "lie" assumes that one KNOWS the truth. Saying "the stock market is going to go down" and then seeing it go up isn't a LIE, it is making a bad prediction. The Republican that blurted out "liar" apoligized and could validly claim "heat of the moment", but what about the same rule of decorum being followed by the President since he is speaking in the chamber? Certainly he can't assert that he said this in "the heat of the moment":
Some of people's concerns have grown out of bogus claims spread by those whose only agenda is to kill reform at any cost. The best example is the claim, made not just by radio and cable talk show hosts, but prominent politicians, that we plan to set up panels of bureaucrats with the power to kill off senior citizens. Such a charge would be laughable if it weren't so cynical and irresponsible. It is a lie, plain and simple.
While "death panel" is certainly incendiary speech, that sort of speech is far from unusual in congress. I recall Reagan's "Dirty Water Bill", and BO recently appointed Van Jones (who had to resign) that claimed that Bush did 9-11 as an "inside job". BO himself mentioned "And we will also create an independent commission of doctors and medical experts charged with identifying more waste in the years ahead." So what is "waste"? Is it a waste to give expensive brain cancer treatment to a guy in his late '70s with brain cancer? (like Teddy Kennedy) I honestly don't know -- to one set of folks, it is probably "wasteful", but to another set, not doing it would be a "death panel". How about if he was 85? 95? 105? Does it EVER become "wasteful"? What does it mean when someone is too old for national health care to pay for some treatment?
Isn't this EXACTLY what is "uncivil" -- one side says "independent commission", the other says "death panel" and then the president escalates it to "lie"? Can we talk about some age where "heroic measures" are just going to prolong suffering rather than improve life? Who decides that? A "commission"? the individual? insurance companies (including maybe the "government option"?). Isn't that what the discussion is supposed to be about?
Oh, and while we talk about that, last night's speech had a lot of examples of the Democrat's favorite argument -- SHUT UP!!
Finally, our health care system is placing an unsustainable burden on taxpayers. When health care costs grow at the rate they have, it puts greater pressure on programs like Medicare and Medicaid. If we do nothing to slow these skyrocketing costs, we will eventually be spending more on Medicare and Medicaid than every other government program combined. Put simply, our health care problem is our deficit problem. Nothing else even comes close.
These are the facts. Nobody disputes them. We know we must reform this system. The question is how.
Reminds me of Global Warming -- "the debate is over".
So Medicare and Medicaid are growing out of control. Wouldn't a sane person say to control the costs of Medicare and Medicaid FIRST, then we will give the government more control over health care once they have proven that they can control the costs on these two programs that they have owned for decades? If the government can't control the costs of these key programs, how in the world is it going to control the costs by taking on MORE??? If the CURRENT burden is "unsustainable", then why in the world would we want to ADD to that burden?? "These are facts, nobody disputes them". In other words, "shut up". But you follow it with "the question is how". My goodness, "Death is a real issue that causes a lot of grief, nobody disputes this. We must reform death. The question is how."
Indeed -- the question very often is "how" -- sometimes just because in the case of winning the game, making a really good cherry pie, or getting a kiss from Cindy Lou, it is the HOW (execution) that is difficult not the goals, even if we have decided on the outcome that we would like. Sometimes, like the death case, and possibly like the health care case, even though the problems are obvious, the solutions (how) are anything but. They are flat out impossible (like death), or they require a whole set of trade-offs that are so difficult or costly that they are fraught with peril. In those cases, the obvious answer is INCREMENTAL! Show the brilliance and resourcefulness of the US government by fixing medicare and medicare FIRST. Instigate various programs at a STATE LEVEL and verify that they work, and THEN see if they SCALE!! Things that work for 30 million people are not guaranteed to work for 300 million people. If you doubt this, put 300 lbs in your trunk, see how your car drives, and then try it with 3,000lbs!! (10x, same scale factor as 30 million to 300 million). The scale factor alone is one of the reasons that our situation is different from Canada, England and others.
BO did very little to help on that path. One man's "bickering" is another mans "discussion of issues" -- were a Republican trying to deal with a real problem (as Bush did with Social Security), no matter how much he "reached out", there would be ZERO help from the other side (as there was with FICA) and he would be 100% demonized over "trying to kill social security" (as Bush was). It is really interesting to watch the MSM be 100% on the reverse side -- all BO's motives are pure, he would NEVER try to create a bunch of big government unionized bureaucracy that would vote Democrat!! or (perish the thought), try to pay off one section of the population that he thinks will vote for him with money taken from those he thinks will not!!! Certainly, the great and pure BO is above that!!
Wednesday, September 09, 2009
Blogging BO Address
So why do Democrat Presidents seem to have trouble just getting to a speech on time? Slickster was notorious for it, and now it seems that BO has followed along. Would you be late for a job interview? A meeting with your boss? Whatever the great BO says, his actions speak louder than his words. He simply has no respect for the American people.
Man, the lies are thick and heavy.
Man, the lies are thick and heavy.
- "Nobody will have to give up what they have". He really can't believe that. Unless you are filthy filthy rich, you can't avoid Medicare. Once the government steps in, every current business providing healthcare is going to step out.
- "Preventative testing saves money". Preventative testing is a great idea, but it does NOT save money, it costs more. The VAST amount of tests will be NEGATIVE ... which means that they incur a cost, but don't save anything. While SOME set of early detections may well save money, the amount isn't enough to cover the huge percentage that don't.
- EEK, Does he REALLY believe that a public option can be cheap enough just because there are no profits!!! PROFIT and the attempt to cut costs to make more of it is one of the largest pushes for efficiency. Take it away and let everything go "cost +" and you are going to get a more massive disaster than Medicare!
- Not one dime to the deficit?? Gee his own CBO says it will cost over $1.6 Trillion extra over the next 10 years. How can you lie like that with a straight face??
- Gee, I faced a Trillion dollar deficit ... and RAISED it to $1.6 Trillion!!! That is one hell of a performance!!
Tuesday, September 08, 2009
Bipartisanship
CNN Political Ticker: All politics, all the time Blog Archive - Clinton’s advice to Obama: Forget about Republicans « - Blogs from CNN.com
Isn't this special? Remember back to when Bush and the Republican's were "arrogant" because they managed to pass a few things on a party line vote? Of course they never had even 55 votes in the Senate, so they did MUCH more than "consider" the Democrats else they get stopped with a Fillibuster. Any move the Republicans made that wasn't basically kissing the Democrat minority boots was "divisive" and "hyperpartisan" and a whole bunch of new words thought up to cover the horror of the MSM's Democrat party not owning a single branch of government. It was the time of boo hoo, boo hoo.
My my, how times have changed. Now it is just fine to "Forget about Republicans". Why Slick Willie, the great triangulator as decreed it!! If the Republicans disagree, they are "insane", "obstructionist", "irrelevant", and whatever other derisive adjective can be conjured at the moment.
Isn't this special? Remember back to when Bush and the Republican's were "arrogant" because they managed to pass a few things on a party line vote? Of course they never had even 55 votes in the Senate, so they did MUCH more than "consider" the Democrats else they get stopped with a Fillibuster. Any move the Republicans made that wasn't basically kissing the Democrat minority boots was "divisive" and "hyperpartisan" and a whole bunch of new words thought up to cover the horror of the MSM's Democrat party not owning a single branch of government. It was the time of boo hoo, boo hoo.
My my, how times have changed. Now it is just fine to "Forget about Republicans". Why Slick Willie, the great triangulator as decreed it!! If the Republicans disagree, they are "insane", "obstructionist", "irrelevant", and whatever other derisive adjective can be conjured at the moment.
Van Jones Who? Truthers
Why did the press ignore the Van Jones scandal? | Washington Examiner
After a rather long break, BO has thrown another victim under the bus -- to keep Jerimiah Wrght, Tom Daschle, the whole Anti-War movement and a quite a few others company I suppose. If you are no longer useful to BO, you get to be thrown under there right away!! Nobody is ever going to accuse BO of being "too loyal".
The press never saw fit to publish the reason that Jones ended up there, so many folks are confused. It isn't because he called Republicans "A**holes". It is because he is a a "Truther", one of those many lefties that feels that 9-11 was "an inside job" -- created and executed by the evil Bush Administration.
One would think that such people would be certifiably insane, and I'd tend to be on your side -- but the fact is that as many as 20% of the Democrat party at least "wonder" on the "inside job" issue. Not surprisingly, the MSM tends to not like to talk about this very much -- and the fact that BO would think it a reasonable idea to have a Truther as a "Czar" kind of boggles the mind.
Now the right has it's "Birthers" who wonder if BO is really a US citizen. While I don't subscribe to their concerns, I find it somewhat more rational a question if a man that we KNOW had a Kenyan father that was NOT a US citizen met the requirements of being born here. Last I checked, the number of Presidents that we have had anytime in the last 100 years that didn't have both parents be US citizens is very low (zero I believe). I think it is a bit easier to imagine how someone MIGHT have a birth in Kenya and decide to get to the US quickly to gather the benefits of US citizenship, rather than postulate how and why a US President would engineer a set of attacks on his own nation, and how such a conspiracy would be kept secret.
Again, I'm not a "Birther" --- I just find it very odd how really really unhinged the media finds them to be, but somehow thinks that the "Truther" idea is "sort of reasonable by comparison". But, I'm sure I only think that way due to the horror of conservative bias.
After a rather long break, BO has thrown another victim under the bus -- to keep Jerimiah Wrght, Tom Daschle, the whole Anti-War movement and a quite a few others company I suppose. If you are no longer useful to BO, you get to be thrown under there right away!! Nobody is ever going to accuse BO of being "too loyal".
The press never saw fit to publish the reason that Jones ended up there, so many folks are confused. It isn't because he called Republicans "A**holes". It is because he is a a "Truther", one of those many lefties that feels that 9-11 was "an inside job" -- created and executed by the evil Bush Administration.
One would think that such people would be certifiably insane, and I'd tend to be on your side -- but the fact is that as many as 20% of the Democrat party at least "wonder" on the "inside job" issue. Not surprisingly, the MSM tends to not like to talk about this very much -- and the fact that BO would think it a reasonable idea to have a Truther as a "Czar" kind of boggles the mind.
Now the right has it's "Birthers" who wonder if BO is really a US citizen. While I don't subscribe to their concerns, I find it somewhat more rational a question if a man that we KNOW had a Kenyan father that was NOT a US citizen met the requirements of being born here. Last I checked, the number of Presidents that we have had anytime in the last 100 years that didn't have both parents be US citizens is very low (zero I believe). I think it is a bit easier to imagine how someone MIGHT have a birth in Kenya and decide to get to the US quickly to gather the benefits of US citizenship, rather than postulate how and why a US President would engineer a set of attacks on his own nation, and how such a conspiracy would be kept secret.
Again, I'm not a "Birther" --- I just find it very odd how really really unhinged the media finds them to be, but somehow thinks that the "Truther" idea is "sort of reasonable by comparison". But, I'm sure I only think that way due to the horror of conservative bias.
The BO Shuffle
RealClearPolitics - What Obama Says vs. What He Does
BO has a way with words, that is for sure. It also that the press just finds everything he says to be so doggone wonderful that there is no reason to check any of it.
As this article points out, the massive healthcare makeover that is being rushed with all possible speed won't take effect until 2013, when BO hopes to have been elected to his 2nd term. Why? If it is a really good thing that will save a lot of money and make everyone happy, wouldn't he put it into effect as rapidly as possible? Uh, well, NO!!
BO KNOWS that it is gong to cost WAY more than what we have now -- that is why the CBO projected it as a Trillion dollars over the next 10 years -- but of course they know that is a Trillion for only 2013 on, not '10 on. BO also knows that it is going to be painful -- to the folks that get sick. There is NOTHING better than the PROMISE of Universal Healthcare to people that are WELL!!! It is like asking you "How good is your fire insurance or your life insurance". It MUST be GREAT!!! ... if you had somehow come to the conclusion that it wasn't you would have gotten a new policy that you THINK is great! Of course, you certainly aren't dead (in which case your heirs would know how good your life insurance REALLY was) and it is pretty darned unlikely that your house just burned.
BO has a way with words, that is for sure. It also that the press just finds everything he says to be so doggone wonderful that there is no reason to check any of it.
As this article points out, the massive healthcare makeover that is being rushed with all possible speed won't take effect until 2013, when BO hopes to have been elected to his 2nd term. Why? If it is a really good thing that will save a lot of money and make everyone happy, wouldn't he put it into effect as rapidly as possible? Uh, well, NO!!
BO KNOWS that it is gong to cost WAY more than what we have now -- that is why the CBO projected it as a Trillion dollars over the next 10 years -- but of course they know that is a Trillion for only 2013 on, not '10 on. BO also knows that it is going to be painful -- to the folks that get sick. There is NOTHING better than the PROMISE of Universal Healthcare to people that are WELL!!! It is like asking you "How good is your fire insurance or your life insurance". It MUST be GREAT!!! ... if you had somehow come to the conclusion that it wasn't you would have gotten a new policy that you THINK is great! Of course, you certainly aren't dead (in which case your heirs would know how good your life insurance REALLY was) and it is pretty darned unlikely that your house just burned.
BO Accomplishments
Hey, who says that BO hasn't been able to do much as President! Here is a good list of some of his top accomplishments. It is quite a list for someone that hasn't been in office very long. Just think what he might get done in a whole term!
1. Offended the Queen of England
2. Bowed to the King of Saudi Arabia
3. Praised the Marxist Daniel Ortega.
4. Kissed Socialist Hugo Chavez on the cheek.
5. Endorsed the Socialist Evo Morales of Bolivia
6. Sided with Hugo Chavez and Communist Fidel Castro against Honduras
7. Announced we would meet with Iranians with no pre-conditions while they're building their nuclear weapons.
8. Gave away billions to AIG also without pre-conditions.
9. Expanded the bailouts.
10. Insulted everyone who has ever loved a Special Olympian.
11. Doubled our national debt.
12. Announced the termination of our new missile defense system the day after North Korea launched an ICBM.
13. Released information on U.S. intelligence gathering despite urgings of his own CIA director and the prior four CIA directors.
14. Accepted without comment that five of his cabinet members cheated on their taxes and two other nominees withdrew after they couldn't take the heat.
15. Appointed a Homeland Security Chief who identified military veterans and abortion opponents as "dangers to the nation."
16. Ordered that the word "terrorism" no longer be used and instead refers to such acts as "man made disasters."
17. Circled the globe to publicly apologize for America 's world leadership.
18. Told the Mexican president that the violence in their country was because of us.
19. Politicized the census by moving it into the White House from the Department of Commerce.
20. Appointed as Attorney General the man who orchestrated the forced removal and expulsion to Cuba of a 9-year-old whose mother died trying to bring him to freedom in the United States.
21. Salutes as heroes three Navy SEALS who took down three terrorists who threatened one American life and the next day announces members of the Bush administration may stand trial for "torturing" three 9/11 terrorists by pouring water up their noses.
22.Low altitude photo shoot of Air Force One over New York City that frightened thousands of New Yorkers.
23. Sent his National Defense Advisor to Europe to assure them that the US will no longer treat Israel in a special manner and they might be on their own with the Muslims.
24. Praised Jimmy Carter's trip to Gaza where he sided with terrorist Hamas against Israel
25. Nationalized General Motors and Chrysler while turning shareholder control over to the unions and freezing out retired investors who owned their bonds. Committed unlimited taxpayer billions in the process.
26. Passed a huge energy tax in the House that will make American industry even less competitive while costing homeowners thousands per year.
27. Announced nationalized health care "reform" that will strip seniors of their Medicare, cut pay of physicians, increase taxes yet another $1 trillion, and put everyone on rationed care withgovernment bureaucrats deciding who gets care and who doesn't.
Bloomberg: Daschle says,
"Health care reform will not be pain free. Seniors should be more accepting of the conditions that come with age instead of treating them," while former Colorado Governor Dick Lamm says seniors have "a duty to die."
1. Offended the Queen of England
2. Bowed to the King of Saudi Arabia
3. Praised the Marxist Daniel Ortega.
4. Kissed Socialist Hugo Chavez on the cheek.
5. Endorsed the Socialist Evo Morales of Bolivia
6. Sided with Hugo Chavez and Communist Fidel Castro against Honduras
7. Announced we would meet with Iranians with no pre-conditions while they're building their nuclear weapons.
8. Gave away billions to AIG also without pre-conditions.
9. Expanded the bailouts.
10. Insulted everyone who has ever loved a Special Olympian.
11. Doubled our national debt.
12. Announced the termination of our new missile defense system the day after North Korea launched an ICBM.
13. Released information on U.S. intelligence gathering despite urgings of his own CIA director and the prior four CIA directors.
14. Accepted without comment that five of his cabinet members cheated on their taxes and two other nominees withdrew after they couldn't take the heat.
15. Appointed a Homeland Security Chief who identified military veterans and abortion opponents as "dangers to the nation."
16. Ordered that the word "terrorism" no longer be used and instead refers to such acts as "man made disasters."
17. Circled the globe to publicly apologize for America 's world leadership.
18. Told the Mexican president that the violence in their country was because of us.
19. Politicized the census by moving it into the White House from the Department of Commerce.
20. Appointed as Attorney General the man who orchestrated the forced removal and expulsion to Cuba of a 9-year-old whose mother died trying to bring him to freedom in the United States.
21. Salutes as heroes three Navy SEALS who took down three terrorists who threatened one American life and the next day announces members of the Bush administration may stand trial for "torturing" three 9/11 terrorists by pouring water up their noses.
22.Low altitude photo shoot of Air Force One over New York City that frightened thousands of New Yorkers.
23. Sent his National Defense Advisor to Europe to assure them that the US will no longer treat Israel in a special manner and they might be on their own with the Muslims.
24. Praised Jimmy Carter's trip to Gaza where he sided with terrorist Hamas against Israel
25. Nationalized General Motors and Chrysler while turning shareholder control over to the unions and freezing out retired investors who owned their bonds. Committed unlimited taxpayer billions in the process.
26. Passed a huge energy tax in the House that will make American industry even less competitive while costing homeowners thousands per year.
27. Announced nationalized health care "reform" that will strip seniors of their Medicare, cut pay of physicians, increase taxes yet another $1 trillion, and put everyone on rationed care withgovernment bureaucrats deciding who gets care and who doesn't.
Bloomberg: Daschle says,
"Health care reform will not be pain free. Seniors should be more accepting of the conditions that come with age instead of treating them," while former Colorado Governor Dick Lamm says seniors have "a duty to die."
Hearings On Presidential Speech to Students
When Bush spoke to students, Democrats investigated, held hearings | Washington Examiner
Bush 41 had a nationwide hookup to students in '91. Now I really doubt that the original plan for the speech included lesson plans on kids writing down what they could do to "support the President", or videos of any famous people "pledging allegiance to Bush" (as BOs did when the plans first got out). Very few conservatives cared about the FACT of a president addressing the children, the issue was if this was a pep talk or an indoctrination talk. Generally, the MSM has failed to report what was planned and just reports on the content AFTER it was modified in response to conservative voices.
I'm guessing there won't be any investigation into the cost of the speech after the fact this time!
Why did the press ignore the Van Jones scandal? | Washington Examiner
Bush 41 had a nationwide hookup to students in '91. Now I really doubt that the original plan for the speech included lesson plans on kids writing down what they could do to "support the President", or videos of any famous people "pledging allegiance to Bush" (as BOs did when the plans first got out). Very few conservatives cared about the FACT of a president addressing the children, the issue was if this was a pep talk or an indoctrination talk. Generally, the MSM has failed to report what was planned and just reports on the content AFTER it was modified in response to conservative voices.
I'm guessing there won't be any investigation into the cost of the speech after the fact this time!
Saturday, September 05, 2009
Teddy The Traitor
Ted Kennedy's Soviet Gambit - Forbes.com
I find it absolutely incredible that this was never covered in the US.
This is from Soviet archive information and was published in the London Times in 1991!!! My GOD!! A US Senator offering to work with Soviets to bring down an American President!
Now that bozo is buried in Arlington?? Can't we have him dug up and buried in Moscow?
We all ought to have been clear that the man had no morals, but no patriotism either? I guess once you have no values, it really means NO values!
I find it absolutely incredible that this was never covered in the US.
"On 9-10 May of this year," the May 14 memorandum explained, "Sen. Edward Kennedy's close friend and trusted confidant [John] Tunney was in Moscow." (Tunney was Kennedy's law school roommate and a former Democratic senator from California.) "The senator charged Tunney to convey the following message, through confidential contacts, to the General Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, Y. Andropov."
This is from Soviet archive information and was published in the London Times in 1991!!! My GOD!! A US Senator offering to work with Soviets to bring down an American President!
Now that bozo is buried in Arlington?? Can't we have him dug up and buried in Moscow?
We all ought to have been clear that the man had no morals, but no patriotism either? I guess once you have no values, it really means NO values!
I Pledge Allegiance to BO
Many conservatives enraged over Obama school speech - CNN.com
One can read this fine CNN article top to bottom and come to the conclusion that they would like you to "conservative opposition to BO is nuts". Maybe so, I'm not going to say that I'm unbiased, but I always like to ask myself a question that I really think CNN and their liberal buddies ought to consider.
What if it was Bush?
How would you feel then? The same? or different? Why? Would THAT be "nuts"? ... and of course I understand that many on the left are going to say that is COMPLETELY different, because BO is great, Bush was all wrong and evil to boot, and naturally anyone stupid enough to vote for Bush is BOTH stupid and nuts! That is why America is (was?) such a great country -- wildly divergent opinions got aired and people were able to compare reality to those opinions. We beleive (ed) in "principles not people".
Apparently, many classrooms intended to show the video that I embedded below. While some of the symbolsm might border on the spooky, it is mostly bubble gum grade propaganda about stupid stuff "I Pledge" ... to be nice to old ladies, shut off lights, study hard, etc ... but at the end, they "Pledge Allegiance to Barack" ... to the President". Now, go look in the mirror, and say "A YouTube Video of Bush supporters saying that they pledged allegiance to Bush that was directed at school kids by using stars that appeal to them would NOT have gotten liberals up in arms" (independent of trying to combine it with a message to school children). Look yourself in the mirror and then think about where you think the media in this country is at left or right??
"I Pledge Allegiance to George Bush" -- for kids. Think about it, and then read the CNN article. Could you pry them off the ceiling? I doubt it. Frankly, it creeps me out about 98% as much to hear "Bush" as it does "I Pledge Allegiance to Barack". Which country is this? Demi Moore and Ashton Kucher may be idiots, but they are well known idiots -- this isn't some "right wing militia" or "Marxist zombies". Frankly, I have an awfully hard time understanding how one can be American at all and not be somewhat concerned about this.
One can read this fine CNN article top to bottom and come to the conclusion that they would like you to "conservative opposition to BO is nuts". Maybe so, I'm not going to say that I'm unbiased, but I always like to ask myself a question that I really think CNN and their liberal buddies ought to consider.
What if it was Bush?
How would you feel then? The same? or different? Why? Would THAT be "nuts"? ... and of course I understand that many on the left are going to say that is COMPLETELY different, because BO is great, Bush was all wrong and evil to boot, and naturally anyone stupid enough to vote for Bush is BOTH stupid and nuts! That is why America is (was?) such a great country -- wildly divergent opinions got aired and people were able to compare reality to those opinions. We beleive (ed) in "principles not people".
Apparently, many classrooms intended to show the video that I embedded below. While some of the symbolsm might border on the spooky, it is mostly bubble gum grade propaganda about stupid stuff "I Pledge" ... to be nice to old ladies, shut off lights, study hard, etc ... but at the end, they "Pledge Allegiance to Barack" ... to the President". Now, go look in the mirror, and say "A YouTube Video of Bush supporters saying that they pledged allegiance to Bush that was directed at school kids by using stars that appeal to them would NOT have gotten liberals up in arms" (independent of trying to combine it with a message to school children). Look yourself in the mirror and then think about where you think the media in this country is at left or right??
"I Pledge Allegiance to George Bush" -- for kids. Think about it, and then read the CNN article. Could you pry them off the ceiling? I doubt it. Frankly, it creeps me out about 98% as much to hear "Bush" as it does "I Pledge Allegiance to Barack". Which country is this? Demi Moore and Ashton Kucher may be idiots, but they are well known idiots -- this isn't some "right wing militia" or "Marxist zombies". Frankly, I have an awfully hard time understanding how one can be American at all and not be somewhat concerned about this.
Wednesday, September 02, 2009
Indoor Aerial Robot
Pretty impressive. Suppose this is the most advanced thing that exists? Maybe, but I'm not sure I'd bet on it. Make this a little smaller, give it Bin Ladin recognition capability, "sleeps" by day and re-charges with solar power and hunts at night? Little C4? Little nerve toxin projectile? Audio of a BO speech? (no wait, that last one would violate the torture prohibition, I apologize)
Mass produce a couple 100 thousand and make a lot of areas of the world "less terrorist friendly". True, countermeasures might be "netting", strong fans on openings to buildings, etc -- but putting a little window breaking firepower on something seems like a potential, as well as maybe a bit of a "swarm capacity"? "Hey, I've found him, all units converge!!" ... say each one of them carry's a few oz of C4 -- 100 of them going for a building/vehicle/etc in unison should be impressive.
Yes yes, it might be tough on tall skinny guys with beards in the assumed area, but how many tall skinny guys does the planet really need?
Reality Speaks At Boston Globe?
Obama’s soak-the-rich mentality - The Boston Globe
Wow. The Boston Globe, deep in the heart of leftville. THEY are looking at things an starting to wonder??
Wow. The Boston Globe, deep in the heart of leftville. THEY are looking at things an starting to wonder??
High taxes can have unwelcome, and unintended, consequences.
Governments delude themselves when they imagine they can easily raise all the money they want by soaking the rich. The rich always have other options. When taxes grow too onerous, high earners can adjust their economic behavior. Some move to Spain to play soccer for La Liga. Others, less glamorously, cut back on their investments, forgo new business opportunities, seek out tax havens, or work fewer hours. The impact is felt not only in lower-than-expected tax revenues, but in lower rates of growth and productivity and job creation. Jobs are disproportionately created by those who have money to invest. “You can’t have employment and despise employers,’’ Massachusetts Senator Paul Tsongas used to say. “No goose, no golden eggs.’’
Holy Moly Batman! You think? Folks with more money, more skills, etc have more options? Tell me it isn't so! I thought they were stationary money cows that could be miked at will. Perhaps the Globe needs to bulk up on some frothy BO rhetoric:
“While middle-class families have been playing by the rules, living up to their responsibilities as neighbors and citizens, those at the commanding heights of our economy have not,’’ charges Obama’s 2010 budget. “There’s nothing wrong with making money, but there is something wrong when we allow the playing field to be tilted so far in the favor of so few.’’ Accordingly it vows “to restore a basic sense of fairness to the tax code’’ and to ensure “that the wealthiest pay more.’’
There you go, how can you argue with that? Well, if one was reality based (not that we will be accusing the BO administration of any of that), one might look at the following:
By any reasonable standard the rich pay far more than their fair share. According to the latest (2007) IRS data, the top 1 percent of US taxpayers earn 22.8 percent of adjusted gross income but pay 40.4 percent of all federal income taxes. By contrast, the bottom 95 percent of taxpayers, who earn 62.5 percent of the income, pay just 39.4 percent of the income tax burden. That bears repeating: The income tax burden of the top 1 percent, who comprise just 1.4 million taxpayers, now exceeds that of the bottom 134 million combined.One doesn't have to think very long to realize why the BO Administration and the MSM tend to be very fact averse. They are such "stubborn things". You go to all the work of devising a brilliant class warfare strategy, and much like your Afghanistan strategy, the rich just don't cooperate. Go figure. Why don't your targets ever sit still?
Tuesday, September 01, 2009
Lion of Leinenkugel
iowahawk: "Lion of Leinenkugel" Norm Snitker, 62, Laid to Rest
Any resemblance to drunks living or dead is intentional -- forget moderation, just enjoy it!
Any resemblance to drunks living or dead is intentional -- forget moderation, just enjoy it!
BO Breaks A Non-Spending Record
Op-Ed Columnist - The Obama Slide - NYTimes.com
Hey, who says BO isn't special? His popularity has fallen the farthest the fastest of any newly elected President!! Wow! It seems that from '05 to '08, falling Bush poll numbers were being trumpeted from front pages with regularity. I wonder why it is that our unbiased press feels so differently about BO?
The result is the Obama slide, the most important feature of the current moment. The number of Americans who trust President Obama to make the right decisions has fallen by roughly 17 percentage points. Obama’s job approval is down to about 50 percent. All presidents fall from their honeymoon highs, but in the history of polling, no newly elected American president has fallen this far this fast.
Hey, who says BO isn't special? His popularity has fallen the farthest the fastest of any newly elected President!! Wow! It seems that from '05 to '08, falling Bush poll numbers were being trumpeted from front pages with regularity. I wonder why it is that our unbiased press feels so differently about BO?
Oh The Morality!
Cheney’s dark side - and ours - The Boston Globe
As I read through this column I'm struck by a certainty that goes well beyond the farthest reaches of the "religious right" in the US and heads directly into Islamic Fundamentalist "morality". The horrid moralizers of the religious right are only trying to work with the law to control things like infanticide in the service of convienience and to prevent the conversion of a rite that has been between a man and a woman for all of human history into "something new". Those discussions are about using a political system that was supposedly suggested for exactly what it was intended for -- what exactly is the "mechanism" that might be suggested by the columnist below to deal with Americans "not getting their polls right"?:
As I read through this column I'm struck by a certainty that goes well beyond the farthest reaches of the "religious right" in the US and heads directly into Islamic Fundamentalist "morality". The horrid moralizers of the religious right are only trying to work with the law to control things like infanticide in the service of convienience and to prevent the conversion of a rite that has been between a man and a woman for all of human history into "something new". Those discussions are about using a political system that was supposedly suggested for exactly what it was intended for -- what exactly is the "mechanism" that might be suggested by the columnist below to deal with Americans "not getting their polls right"?:
The rot in our national morality is evident in a June poll by the Associated Press, which found that 52 percent of Americans said torture was sometimes or often justified to obtain information from terror suspects. An April CNN poll found that even though 60 percent of Americans thought harsh techniques including waterboarding constituted torture, 50 percent approved of them. A Washington Post/ABC News Poll was almost evenly split between Americans who say we should never use torture (49 percent) and should use torture in some cases (48 percent).
Whether it is because of the politics of fear that defined the Bush-Cheney years, the recession engulfing the Obama administration, or simply an indifference to foreigners languishing in jail, Americans have displayed scant curiosity about the dark side. A May McClatchy poll found Americans to be almost evenly split on having a “bipartisan blue-chip commission’’ on interrogations, and the CNN poll found nearly two-thirds disapproving of either a congressional investigation or independent panel.
This is a level of apathy, even civic debasement that makes it no wonder Cheney can spout off despite leaving America in a disgraceful place. He feels empowered to defend the dark side, because we have yet to shine a light.
Nobody on the Christian right that I know of expects that the minds of many of those who support Gay Marriage or Abortion on Demand are somehow going to get "educated" to "get it right". The politics is about getting people who SAY one thing (like 70%+ against Gay Marriage and later term abortions) to stand up and be politically counted. We don't expect Planned Parenthood and or the folks that march in the parades in San Francisco to suddenly "see the light".
When faced with people that fly planes into buildings to kill as many civilians as possible with their minds firmly fixed on 72 virgins in paradise, many Americans suspect that prissy Boston Globe columnists might not be the final moral authority on "what's fair in love and war". If they manage to put together some inquisition that puts a bunch of CIA folks and maybe even Dick Cheney in jail, is that going to change their minds.
Maybe. The reality that puts the numbers where they are today is that while the MSM and the Democrats have told us REPEATEDLY that "The policies and methods of the Bush Administration have made us less safe", there hasn't been any obvious evidence of that, such as an attack equivalent or greater than 9-11. If what the MSM and Democrats have said had any foundation in fact, we ought to have been attacked repeatedly during the Bush administration or shortly thereafter. The old low point for the security policy environment left to an administration was 2001 as Clinton handed off to Bush. Eight months later, 9-11. I write this on Sept 1, 2009 -- while BO and the MSM were so very certain that we were made "less safe" by Bush, the Clinton administration saw the first WTC bombing, Kovar Towers, 3 African Embassies and the USS Cole, the Bush Administration saw NONE after changing security policy on 9-11-2001.
We have now changed our policies sufficiently that we ought to be able to see over the next 4 years how much safer we have become with the great and powerful BO at the helm.
Monday, August 31, 2009
Grim Fairy Tales
RealClearPolitics - End to Two Grim Fairy Tales
Short and sweet, just read it. Teddy and Michael -- without all the false sugar coating.
Short and sweet, just read it. Teddy and Michael -- without all the false sugar coating.
Parsing Change
Michael Kinsley - Health Care: Americans Want Change While Keeping Status Quo - washingtonpost.com
Kinsley is a very smart guy, but the effect of being part of the "anointed elite" is somewhere between sad and humorous. Like the fish that finally thinks it is getting a handle on being wet, Kinsley is so unable to smack himself in the head and say "oh, it's all around me!" that one feels sorry and giggly all at the same time. It is the feeling that I suspect that Christians might get at the moment of death -- "Oh Wow, it's been obvious the whole time".
"To believe in your country's institutions is virtually unpatriotic". How much ink has been used on Abu Ghraib? "lies" about WMD? the "complete botching of Katrina"? The list could go on, but I believe that we just came out of 8 years of history where the institutions of the government were assailed on a daily basis as being completely corrupt and incompetent. I fully understand that the MSM and the Democrats INTENDED all that ire at the government to suddenly go away on the day the shining BO administration walked in the door, but is that really reasonable? Even the smartest of "smart bomb sniping" is going to have SOME collateral damage. I'd argue that the level of completely ridiculous lefty "carpet bombing" is going to have fallout for years to come!
If the US government was anything at all like the horror that has been portrayed for especially the last 4 years, it would be impossible to turn it around in many years. I happen to think that it was handed over in better shape than when the the semen stained oval office was handed over in 2001 without a whole lot of the furnishings, but I know the press and the Democrats have done all they can to convince us that that things have been in a horrible mess for 8 years.
Kinsley, journalists and the chattering classes in general REALLY believe "it's all in our minds", and "reality IS what THEY think it is". To THEM, on the day that BO took office, the horrible US government was transformed from a decrepit evil broken down hag into a beautiful shining maiden. I suspect to their minds, it looks something like what happens after Belle kisses the beast in "Beauty and the Beast" -- "the spell is broken" and the castle, help and all around is transformed from evil and ugly to good and beautiful in the twinkling of an eye.
Kinsley finds the idea that not everyone shares his view of a Fairy Godmother transformation to be "immature". Now that the evil Bush has been vanquished and we have entered the sunny rule of his lordship BO, why do the common vermin not scrape and bow as is befitting of the royalty that as now deigned to rule their "misinformed" and "immature" carcasses?
How indeed one might ask?
Kinsley is a very smart guy, but the effect of being part of the "anointed elite" is somewhere between sad and humorous. Like the fish that finally thinks it is getting a handle on being wet, Kinsley is so unable to smack himself in the head and say "oh, it's all around me!" that one feels sorry and giggly all at the same time. It is the feeling that I suspect that Christians might get at the moment of death -- "Oh Wow, it's been obvious the whole time".
The reason Americans have turned against health-care reform, afterAs he discusses later, "change" is abstract. People LOVE "change" when it is "whatever they are dreaming it is at the moment" -- it gets to be less positive if it is "change underwear with the guy on your right".
electing President Obama in part for promising it, is simple: Despite
protestations to the contrary, Americans don't like change.
Why does this happen? Some people (including me) say the voters are immature. Politicians (and those talk radio fellows again) are always telling them that they are wise and those folks in Washington are fools. Pollsters seek and validate their opinions on subjects they haven't bothered to learn anything about. Politicians drown them in benefits with no thought of how the bills will be paid. No wonder thatRemember how BO ran on what he was specifically going to do? Niether do I ... his platform was "Change!" ... and "Yes We Can!". It is hard to imagine a more vacuous platform than "change" and "yes we can". How about "Different" and "yes"??
citizens turn out like spoiled children.
But "immature" is a label, not an explanation. It's just a guess, but my own suspicion is that the raucous town hall meetings that blindsided pols and press alike reflect the voters' true feelings -- misinformed, perhaps, but sincere -- and their previous passionate demands for what they now passionately oppose -- in a word, "change" -- were empty ritual. Discontent verging on anger is almost the price of admission to our political culture these days. You're nobody if you're not furious at Congress and/or the media and/or your health care and/or the president. To believe in your country's institutions is virtually unpatriotic.
"To believe in your country's institutions is virtually unpatriotic". How much ink has been used on Abu Ghraib? "lies" about WMD? the "complete botching of Katrina"? The list could go on, but I believe that we just came out of 8 years of history where the institutions of the government were assailed on a daily basis as being completely corrupt and incompetent. I fully understand that the MSM and the Democrats INTENDED all that ire at the government to suddenly go away on the day the shining BO administration walked in the door, but is that really reasonable? Even the smartest of "smart bomb sniping" is going to have SOME collateral damage. I'd argue that the level of completely ridiculous lefty "carpet bombing" is going to have fallout for years to come!
If the US government was anything at all like the horror that has been portrayed for especially the last 4 years, it would be impossible to turn it around in many years. I happen to think that it was handed over in better shape than when the the semen stained oval office was handed over in 2001 without a whole lot of the furnishings, but I know the press and the Democrats have done all they can to convince us that that things have been in a horrible mess for 8 years.
Kinsley, journalists and the chattering classes in general REALLY believe "it's all in our minds", and "reality IS what THEY think it is". To THEM, on the day that BO took office, the horrible US government was transformed from a decrepit evil broken down hag into a beautiful shining maiden. I suspect to their minds, it looks something like what happens after Belle kisses the beast in "Beauty and the Beast" -- "the spell is broken" and the castle, help and all around is transformed from evil and ugly to good and beautiful in the twinkling of an eye.
Kinsley finds the idea that not everyone shares his view of a Fairy Godmother transformation to be "immature". Now that the evil Bush has been vanquished and we have entered the sunny rule of his lordship BO, why do the common vermin not scrape and bow as is befitting of the royalty that as now deigned to rule their "misinformed" and "immature" carcasses?
How indeed one might ask?
Sunday, August 30, 2009
Goodbye Harry?
SHERMAN FREDERICK: Enough is enough, Harry - Opinion - ReviewJournal.com
Seeing the oh so sanctimonious Senate Leader Tom Daschle go down in '04 was a political highlight. One would hope that nearly everyone in the nation would now agree after realizing he skimmed $5million off various groups after his boys the Democrats took control back in '06 and somehow he neglected to pay over $100K of taxes due on the loot!
Could it be that the "power and the glory" has gone to Harry Reid's head enough so that the fine folks of Nevada have had enough? One can only hope.
Seeing the oh so sanctimonious Senate Leader Tom Daschle go down in '04 was a political highlight. One would hope that nearly everyone in the nation would now agree after realizing he skimmed $5million off various groups after his boys the Democrats took control back in '06 and somehow he neglected to pay over $100K of taxes due on the loot!
Could it be that the "power and the glory" has gone to Harry Reid's head enough so that the fine folks of Nevada have had enough? One can only hope.
The Real Lincoln
The subject book by Thomas DiLorenzo brings home one point that is much worth the read. We are taught in school that "Lincoln saved the union" and he was "the great emancipator". Those two items are somewhat true, but vast oversimplifications.
The greatest insight of the book is that "the union" that was "saved" wasn't what used to be called "The United States". The cost of the civil war was that the idea of "rights moving from God to the people to the states to the federal government" was destroyed at gunpoint, and replaced with the idea that once a state, always a state, or we will deal out death until you get it right.
The right of secession is a MUST in a country where the rights come from the people! The America of our founders and of the Constitution they created would have allowed the South to secede peacefully. Lincoln could not, and in fact pushed the South to war with "The American Plan" -- 1). Central Banking 2) High Tariffs 3). Internal Improvements.
For the South, this meant that they paid all the tariffs and all the "improvements" (which were essentially payola for companies) ended up in the North.
As the author pointed out, slavery was ended peacefully all around the world, and prejudice against blacks was at least as strong and in many ways stronger in the north. Lincoln himself wanted to ship the blacks back to Africa and felt that the two races were never tended to coexist. Were the south to have seceded peacefully, it is quite likely that slavery would have been ended in a decade or two via compensation to owners or a scheme where the children of the slaves were freed on their 21st birthday. Having over 620K Americans die wasn't required to end slavery.
I was personally struck by some of the sentiment that I first experienced when we had some friends from southern Indiana that would have been just south of the Mason Dixon line. Going to public school in the north, the Civil War is cut and dried -- the North is just, the South is unjust, Lincoln is a hero, the war was the only way to end slavery, and everyone ought to be thankful that it was fought. Not so in the South. This book is a more academic look at the kinds of sentiments that many of the folks of the South still carry over 100 years since the war. Being on the losing side makes a difference.
In reading the book, one realizes how expensive the Civil War was not only in lives and treasure, but in the loss of liberty and autonomy of the states that may well have been an irrecoverable blow that will eventually completely destroy the liberty that the country was founded on.
The greatest insight of the book is that "the union" that was "saved" wasn't what used to be called "The United States". The cost of the civil war was that the idea of "rights moving from God to the people to the states to the federal government" was destroyed at gunpoint, and replaced with the idea that once a state, always a state, or we will deal out death until you get it right.
The right of secession is a MUST in a country where the rights come from the people! The America of our founders and of the Constitution they created would have allowed the South to secede peacefully. Lincoln could not, and in fact pushed the South to war with "The American Plan" -- 1). Central Banking 2) High Tariffs 3). Internal Improvements.
For the South, this meant that they paid all the tariffs and all the "improvements" (which were essentially payola for companies) ended up in the North.
As the author pointed out, slavery was ended peacefully all around the world, and prejudice against blacks was at least as strong and in many ways stronger in the north. Lincoln himself wanted to ship the blacks back to Africa and felt that the two races were never tended to coexist. Were the south to have seceded peacefully, it is quite likely that slavery would have been ended in a decade or two via compensation to owners or a scheme where the children of the slaves were freed on their 21st birthday. Having over 620K Americans die wasn't required to end slavery.
I was personally struck by some of the sentiment that I first experienced when we had some friends from southern Indiana that would have been just south of the Mason Dixon line. Going to public school in the north, the Civil War is cut and dried -- the North is just, the South is unjust, Lincoln is a hero, the war was the only way to end slavery, and everyone ought to be thankful that it was fought. Not so in the South. This book is a more academic look at the kinds of sentiments that many of the folks of the South still carry over 100 years since the war. Being on the losing side makes a difference.
In reading the book, one realizes how expensive the Civil War was not only in lives and treasure, but in the loss of liberty and autonomy of the states that may well have been an irrecoverable blow that will eventually completely destroy the liberty that the country was founded on.
Healthcare Protest
Went over to a health care protest in front of the local offices of Klobuchar and Walz (Senator, Representative) Friday. 50-100 folks, no chanting, very civil signs, one guy across the street doing a "counter protest". Ran into a guy I used to work with whose wife died of cancer a couple of years ago -- he has spent a good long time studying the issue / Canada / England and was what I would call "quietly passionate". He had gone over to Owatonna for a town meeting and said they had come in with a couple of union buses of folks. Folks were pretty angry that anyone that disagrees is "a nut" -- thought that seemed to be different from what the war was at this time last year, although the war seems "all better now" for some odd reason.
A few of us walked into the offices and just asked "where were the Senator/Representative, when might they be in town?" we were told that information was not being given out due to "security". No coverage at all in the local paper on Saturday -- I recall a few years back that if they could get a couple of war protesters out, it was very newsworthy.
The media powers are doing their best to make anyone that disagrees with federal takeover of health care seem somewhere between "nuts and dangerous".
A few of us walked into the offices and just asked "where were the Senator/Representative, when might they be in town?" we were told that information was not being given out due to "security". No coverage at all in the local paper on Saturday -- I recall a few years back that if they could get a couple of war protesters out, it was very newsworthy.
The media powers are doing their best to make anyone that disagrees with federal takeover of health care seem somewhere between "nuts and dangerous".
Friday, August 28, 2009
How Disaster Happens
RealClearPolitics - Can Dems Rescue ObamaCare?
It is hard to say whether the BOcare debacle will be ended quite the way Krauthammer suggests here, but it will likely have similar results in any case.
It is hard to say whether the BOcare debacle will be ended quite the way Krauthammer suggests here, but it will likely have similar results in any case.
(5) Promise nothing but pleasure -- for now. Make health insurance universal and permanently protected. Tear up the existing bills and write a clean one -- Obamacare 2.0 -- promulgating draconian health-insurance regulation that prohibits (a) denying coverage for pre-existing conditions, (b) dropping coverage if the client gets sick, and (c) capping insurance company reimbursement.
What's not to like? If you have insurance, you'll never lose it. Nor will your children ever be denied coverage for pre-existing conditions.
The regulated insurance companies will get two things in return. Government will impose an individual mandate that will force the purchase of health insurance on the millions of healthy young people who today forgo it. And government will subsidize all the others who are too poor to buy health insurance. The result? Two enormous new revenue streams created by government for the insurance companies.
This "plan" is WAY more detailed than "Coverage for all, cheaper, better with more choice"!! This "plan" actually has something about HOW!!! But, like all things in this world that are "only pleasure" ....
Isn't there a catch? Of course, there is. This scheme is the ultimate bait-and-switch. The pleasure comes now, the pain later. Government-subsidized universal and virtually unlimited coverage will vastly compound already out-of-control government spending on health care. The financial and budgetary consequences will be catastrophic.
However, they will not appear immediately. And when they do, the only solution will be rationing. That's when the liberals will give the FCCCER regulatory power and give you end-of-life counseling.
But by then, resistance will be feeble. Why? Because at that point the only remaining option will be to give up the benefits we will have become accustomed to. Once granted, guaranteed universal health care is not relinquished. Look at Canada. Look at Britain. They got hooked; now they ration. So will we.
Government is a lot like drugs, smoking, gambling or other vices. When you "start", it seems "all good" -- it is just after you have been in it for awhile, realize how dependent you have become, how few other choices you now have, and how much power you have given up to your addiction, that you realize "they've got me". Then, as intended in the beginning, it is too late!!
Thursday, August 27, 2009
Healthcare
Kennedy's dream is our inspiration :: CHICAGO SUN-TIMES :: Mary Mitchell
Working in a technical job and from time to time with people who have emigrated from Canada, England or other places to GET the health care they need, I'm often reminded of the difference between reality and emotion. Our feelings have very few limits -- reality has a good deal more.
That thought process seems like it is on the way to how we might reform health care in this country. Right now we ALL expect "Teddy Kennedy care", and indeed we all pay so even Teddy gets that level of care without having to take it from his own pocket. I like to call it "Private Jet Care". Virtually none of us can afford to have a Private Jet, yet all of us now expect to have health care that is the equivalent of a Private Jet. Unsurprisingly, providing everyone with that level of care -- insured or not, is EXTREMELY expensive. We complain about it pushing 20% of our GDP, but in many ways, it is surprising it isn't more.
My "goals" may be "simple". "Health care for all that is cheaper, higher quality and provides more choices". How can anyone disagree with that? How about with an investment plan that "has less risk, higher returns, and only invests in sustainable business"? Of say, a diet, where you can "eat the foods you want, when you want, and excise only when convienient to you and reach your target weight in less than a year".
The "simple" problem is the complete confusion of ends with means. I heard Amy Klobochar on MPR today from at the fair repeat more than once "covers all, less expensive, higher quality and adds to the choices that people have today". She said not a single word about "how", since in the real world were MEANS are a MAJOR part of reality, the devil is very much in those "details of how".
So the left this is a simple moral issue. Other countries that have only 10-30% of the population of the US "have it" (although there is precious little study of what "it" is other than the lable "universal health"). But they say that "we don't" -- because there are 47 million people without insurance. But wait -- insurance is a MEANS to PAY for healthcare! It isn't healthcare at all! Teddy Kennedy could have paid for his treatment out of pocket with EASE had he been uninsured! Had the poorest 77 year old in the country walked in to the same hospital as Teddy, they too would have gotten the same care. Only in a country with "universal health" would Kennedy have received care, but another 77 year old of less than top 1% wealth would not have.
We live in a supposed democracy where it is immoral to discuss how we pay for out health care because the left had decided so. Welcome to BO America.
Working in a technical job and from time to time with people who have emigrated from Canada, England or other places to GET the health care they need, I'm often reminded of the difference between reality and emotion. Our feelings have very few limits -- reality has a good deal more.
It is pretty simple.So what is "health care"? Were Kennedy in England and on their "universal" plan, the only treatment that he would have gotten for his brain cancer would have been hospice and pain relieving drugs. I'm assuming that the author of this column would consider that to be health care?As a country, we either believe that health care is a right or we don't.
So the "real issue" is simply "ensure that all Americans receive quality health care"? So which ones don't? The uninsured? I don't think so -- if they show up at clinics, they will get health care just like Teddy. What exactly is it that makes it "a disgrace"? In England, a person of less than Kennedy level extreme wealth would get hospice care only for the same cancer that felled Teddy. Is that decision a "death panel"? Yes and no. Hospice care only would have been $100's of K cheaper for Teddy, but he might not have been able to speak at the Democrat convention, or see BO elected. As a nation, we paid $100's of thousands of dollars for a very rich man to have a few more months of life. In England, **HE** would have had to pay, but 99% of us would not have gotten those months, because we could not afford them. I'd tend to argue that is reasonable -- but that is a major part of the shape of a REAL debate on health care.The raucous debates over a "public option," so-called "death panels" and "taxpayer sponsored abortions" are designed to obscure the real issue:
We live in the richest and most powerful country in the world, and we can't find the will or the compassion to ensure that all Americans receive quality health care.
It is a disgrace.
That thought process seems like it is on the way to how we might reform health care in this country. Right now we ALL expect "Teddy Kennedy care", and indeed we all pay so even Teddy gets that level of care without having to take it from his own pocket. I like to call it "Private Jet Care". Virtually none of us can afford to have a Private Jet, yet all of us now expect to have health care that is the equivalent of a Private Jet. Unsurprisingly, providing everyone with that level of care -- insured or not, is EXTREMELY expensive. We complain about it pushing 20% of our GDP, but in many ways, it is surprising it isn't more.
Being liberal means being "morally pure" where it counts for liberals. The fact that some conservatives and Christians may have "morals" about whom one can sleep with, drowning your secretary, helping your nephew get away with rape and other mundane things like that is "chilling", "full of hypocricy" or "turning the clock back to tghe 19th century". If one espouses liberal principles, one can hold the wealth of a Kennedy or a Kerry and be 100% free from the charge of hypocracy. Being liberal is a "matter of the heart", and only foul conservatives would somehow imply that not all matters of the heart can be conjured in the real world.Frankly, some of the arguments against health care reform that are made by ordinary people sound hard-hearted.
How did we get to the place where so many of us think that health care reform boils down to paying the medical bills of "those" people who are "shooting each other" or who are "immigrants."
Ironically, it won't be "those" people who won't get treatment when they need it.
My "goals" may be "simple". "Health care for all that is cheaper, higher quality and provides more choices". How can anyone disagree with that? How about with an investment plan that "has less risk, higher returns, and only invests in sustainable business"? Of say, a diet, where you can "eat the foods you want, when you want, and excise only when convienient to you and reach your target weight in less than a year".
The "simple" problem is the complete confusion of ends with means. I heard Amy Klobochar on MPR today from at the fair repeat more than once "covers all, less expensive, higher quality and adds to the choices that people have today". She said not a single word about "how", since in the real world were MEANS are a MAJOR part of reality, the devil is very much in those "details of how".
So the left this is a simple moral issue. Other countries that have only 10-30% of the population of the US "have it" (although there is precious little study of what "it" is other than the lable "universal health"). But they say that "we don't" -- because there are 47 million people without insurance. But wait -- insurance is a MEANS to PAY for healthcare! It isn't healthcare at all! Teddy Kennedy could have paid for his treatment out of pocket with EASE had he been uninsured! Had the poorest 77 year old in the country walked in to the same hospital as Teddy, they too would have gotten the same care. Only in a country with "universal health" would Kennedy have received care, but another 77 year old of less than top 1% wealth would not have.
We live in a supposed democracy where it is immoral to discuss how we pay for out health care because the left had decided so. Welcome to BO America.
Wednesday, August 26, 2009
Sorry, Not Safe
Marc Thiessen: Obama Versus the CIA - WSJ.com
We are 16 days away from knowing for sure that the Bush policies made us safer than the Clinton policies. We know what happened on September 11, 2001. Our MSM and the Democrats told us over and over that "The policies of George Bush make us less safe", yet there as not been an attack on US soil since 9/11/2001. If the MSM and the Democrats were correct, there needs to be an attack at least as significant as 9/11 in the next 16 days, otherwise, they "lied" (in the same way as Bush "lied" about WMD).
Is BO making us less safe? I think so, the only thing I disagree with in the paragraphs below is that we will be sorry in 10 years. I'm sorry already, I think we all will be sorry in less than 4 years.
We are 16 days away from knowing for sure that the Bush policies made us safer than the Clinton policies. We know what happened on September 11, 2001. Our MSM and the Democrats told us over and over that "The policies of George Bush make us less safe", yet there as not been an attack on US soil since 9/11/2001. If the MSM and the Democrats were correct, there needs to be an attack at least as significant as 9/11 in the next 16 days, otherwise, they "lied" (in the same way as Bush "lied" about WMD).
Is BO making us less safe? I think so, the only thing I disagree with in the paragraphs below is that we will be sorry in 10 years. I'm sorry already, I think we all will be sorry in less than 4 years.
Can you even IMAGINE the outcry had the Bush administration started investigations into the Slick Willie WH?Now Attorney General Eric Holder, a political appointee, is overruling the decisions of career Justice Department officials and appointing a special prosecutor. If the Bush administration had done the same thing to its predecessor, the mainstream media would be howling.
The decision to prosecute will have a devastating effect on the intelligence community—pushing the agency back into a risk-averse, pre-Sept. 11, 2001, mentality. Indeed, the IG report itself indicates that agency officials knew this day was coming. "One officer expressed concern that one day, Agency officers will wind up on some 'wanted list' to appear before the World Court. . . . Another said, 'Ten years from now, we're going to be sorry we're doing this . . . [but] it has to be done.'"
Tuesday, August 25, 2009
BO Like Which President? Carter
Fouad Ajami: Obama’s Summer of Discontent - WSJ.com
Good article here is the section that points out that BO clearly isn't some great heroic figure as the MSM and a bunch of folks in his spell held him out to be:
Good article here is the section that points out that BO clearly isn't some great heroic figure as the MSM and a bunch of folks in his spell held him out to be:
The Obama devotees were the victims of their own belief in political magic. The devotees could not make up their minds. In a newly minted U.S. senator from Illinois, they saw the embodiment of Abraham Lincoln, Franklin Delano Roosevelt and John F. Kennedy. Like Lincoln, Mr. Obama was tall and thin and from Illinois, and the historic campaign was launched out of Springfield. The oath of office was taken on the Lincoln Bible. Like FDR, he had a huge economic challenge, and he better get it done, repair and streamline the economy in his "first hundred days." Like JFK, he was young and stylish, with a young family.
I suspect that by the time we are done here, Carter will seem like a MUCH better President than BO.
Freedom vs Free Stuff
RealClearPolitics - The Great Escape
I saw a little PJ O'Rourke video the other day where he said something like the following in his forever humorous style "Americans love freedom, as in Ronald Reagan -- Freedom to make money, spend money, get rich, get stupid, etc. But, Americans also love "free stuff" ala Obama -- free healthcare, free education, free hou, etc. Since Americans (like all people), hate Responsibility, work and stuff like that, when tend to forget after awhile that free stuff costs a lot in individual freedom -- to make money, spend money, etc, and they swing back the other way. Right now, they are intent on getting a lot of free stuff."
The following is from the Sowell article:
I saw a little PJ O'Rourke video the other day where he said something like the following in his forever humorous style "Americans love freedom, as in Ronald Reagan -- Freedom to make money, spend money, get rich, get stupid, etc. But, Americans also love "free stuff" ala Obama -- free healthcare, free education, free hou, etc. Since Americans (like all people), hate Responsibility, work and stuff like that, when tend to forget after awhile that free stuff costs a lot in individual freedom -- to make money, spend money, etc, and they swing back the other way. Right now, they are intent on getting a lot of free stuff."
The following is from the Sowell article:
Many of the issues of our times are hard to understand without understanding the vision of the world that they are part of. Whether the particular issue is education, economics or medical care, the preferred explanation tends to be an external explanation-- that is, something outside the control of the individuals directly involved.
Education is usually discussed in terms of the money spent on it, the teaching methods used, class sizes or the way the whole system is organized. Students are discussed largely as passive recipients of good or bad education.
Much like students, BO assumes that he can treat the US population, economy, world business, foreign countries, etc as "objects" that will predictably respond to his various nostrums. All the world is a stage for the "director", BO to move the parts around on as he sees fit. Ah, what a fine production it is!
Monday, August 24, 2009
Loony As a Way of Life
Op-Ed Columnist - The Guns of August - NYTimes.com
Note this is not from some fringe rag or wingnut blog, this is from the NYT. Mr Rich is convinced that any minor whiff of thought that doesn't agree with the lefty view of the world means that we are on the verge of armed conflict. He doesn't say what we ought to DO about this horror, but it is implied in various columns that confiscation of weapons, controls on any group that is somehow identified as "right wing", maybe "education" (forced?) ... it is all very fuzzy, but at least to Mr Rich, we have a "Clear and Present Danger".
Oddly, I'm sure he has probably "forgotten" that Reagan was actually shot and easily could have died, Gerald Ford was shot AT by ex-Manson follower Squeaky Frome -- but in true lefty fashion, she missed entirely (thankfully). My point here would be that while Rich seems to think that violence is an affliction only of the right, any sort of perusal of the facts is going to make that case hard to support.
Bell wrote this fine analysis in '62, but the panic on the left that somebody still thinks differently from them is just as great. JFK was shot by a Castro supporter that had visited the USSR -- not PRECISELY what one might call a "right wing attack". Sirhan Sirhan claimed that he shot RFK because of his support for Israel -- Sirhan was born in Palestine. James Earl Ray was a poor repeat criminal with no identified ideology. I must admit that there is some strong evidence that the 1979 swimming rabbit that attacked Carter in GA was a member of a radical fringe militia group -- so I'll grant him one!
Note also how it is somehow "the right" that can't handle "change". One might argue that globalization, the internet, the end of the USSR and much of the various technical revolutions had much more to do with "the right" than with the left. Is it simply because Rich is certain that "left = smart, right = stupid" that he is convinced of the right's inability to deal with complexity? I know a whole bunch of guys that Rich would call "rightists" that design and code operating system software for a living -- is that less complex than writing bad opinion for the NY Times?
Can a rational person look at the facts of the past 50 years and conclude that there is any significant danger from the right in this country? The war protests, the campus bombings, the race riots in cities, union violence and rampant crime. What of that is a phenomenon of "the right"? Sure, there is Timothy McVeigh and some abortion doctor killings. So the "right" is going to have some crackpots as well. In many ways, Rich ought to be saying "Thank God" -- if Timothy McVeigh didn't exist, it was almost getting to the point that the left ought to have faked him in order to keep them from looking bad!
Of course, how can you really look bad when you have the NYT on your side!
Note this is not from some fringe rag or wingnut blog, this is from the NYT. Mr Rich is convinced that any minor whiff of thought that doesn't agree with the lefty view of the world means that we are on the verge of armed conflict. He doesn't say what we ought to DO about this horror, but it is implied in various columns that confiscation of weapons, controls on any group that is somehow identified as "right wing", maybe "education" (forced?) ... it is all very fuzzy, but at least to Mr Rich, we have a "Clear and Present Danger".
Oddly, I'm sure he has probably "forgotten" that Reagan was actually shot and easily could have died, Gerald Ford was shot AT by ex-Manson follower Squeaky Frome -- but in true lefty fashion, she missed entirely (thankfully). My point here would be that while Rich seems to think that violence is an affliction only of the right, any sort of perusal of the facts is going to make that case hard to support.
No, the biggest contributor to this resurgence of radicalism remains panic in some precincts about a new era of cultural and demographic change. As the sociologist Daniel Bell put it, “What the right as a whole fears is the erosion of its own social position, the collapse of its power, the increasing incomprehensibility of a world — now overwhelmingly technical and complex — that has changed so drastically within a lifetime.”
Bell wrote this fine analysis in '62, but the panic on the left that somebody still thinks differently from them is just as great. JFK was shot by a Castro supporter that had visited the USSR -- not PRECISELY what one might call a "right wing attack". Sirhan Sirhan claimed that he shot RFK because of his support for Israel -- Sirhan was born in Palestine. James Earl Ray was a poor repeat criminal with no identified ideology. I must admit that there is some strong evidence that the 1979 swimming rabbit that attacked Carter in GA was a member of a radical fringe militia group -- so I'll grant him one!
Note also how it is somehow "the right" that can't handle "change". One might argue that globalization, the internet, the end of the USSR and much of the various technical revolutions had much more to do with "the right" than with the left. Is it simply because Rich is certain that "left = smart, right = stupid" that he is convinced of the right's inability to deal with complexity? I know a whole bunch of guys that Rich would call "rightists" that design and code operating system software for a living -- is that less complex than writing bad opinion for the NY Times?
Can a rational person look at the facts of the past 50 years and conclude that there is any significant danger from the right in this country? The war protests, the campus bombings, the race riots in cities, union violence and rampant crime. What of that is a phenomenon of "the right"? Sure, there is Timothy McVeigh and some abortion doctor killings. So the "right" is going to have some crackpots as well. In many ways, Rich ought to be saying "Thank God" -- if Timothy McVeigh didn't exist, it was almost getting to the point that the left ought to have faked him in order to keep them from looking bad!
Of course, how can you really look bad when you have the NYT on your side!
Saturday, August 22, 2009
Open Conspiracy, Cloward Piven
CHANDLER: The Cloward-Piven strategy - Washington Times
This a good little article that does some "connecting the dots" on ACORN, BO, and Cloward-Piven. I covered Cloward-Piven here. How much is BO following this? One can never tell for sure, but I'm pretty sure he is well aware of it and one of the reasons that he is very cavilier about making policy choices that are highly likely to destroy the fabric of America is because he sees America as basically a "racist, imperialist, war oriented, unfair, bully that has had things going it's way for way too long for a lot of damage to the rest of the world and the environment".
While complete destruction of America and having it "bombed back to the stone age" may not be his specific agenda, he finds the country as he found it to be completely unacceptable -- the TOP priority is "change". The content of that "change" is extremely secondary.
How democratic nations are destroyed is sadly almost too predictable. Sadly, our founders were well aware of this, so VERY explicitly created a nation that WAS NOT a "Democracy", but rather a Representative Republic -- unfortunately, our aristocracy became an elite. Think of the aristocracy as having real skin in the future of the Nation -- wealth, family history, connection and subsctiption to the American ideals. They are examples of "what it means to be an American". If they allow the nation to be destroyed, they lose what they cherish, they are one with the nation, they look to the nation to give them a form of immortality. Washington, Jefferson, Adams, Hamilton, Franklin -- they were all part of the American aristocracy. If America descends into a tribal third world look alike, those names will be lost to history.
Think of "the elite" as academic, noveau rich, the famous, the chattering classes -- their card is CURRENT "influence and power". Hitler is still well known and would be even if Germany ceased to exist. It isn't important for Einstein, Gates, Buffet, Michael Jackson or even Thoreau that America continue to exist in any recognizable form -- their names are "world names", like BO, they are "citizens of the world", not primarily "Americans".
So is BO TRYING to "overload and reset"? I don't believe so, but I do believe that he would see that outcome as much more positive than the horror of a largely "unchanged America". He did not run on the greatness of America, he ran on "Hope and Change". While he did very very little to specify what either of those meant, I think we can assume he thought that "hope" was lacking and that things needed to be more different than the same (change). The country had become too democratic, so the masses were taken in by the most dangerous president in US history so far. We are in grave peril.
This a good little article that does some "connecting the dots" on ACORN, BO, and Cloward-Piven. I covered Cloward-Piven here. How much is BO following this? One can never tell for sure, but I'm pretty sure he is well aware of it and one of the reasons that he is very cavilier about making policy choices that are highly likely to destroy the fabric of America is because he sees America as basically a "racist, imperialist, war oriented, unfair, bully that has had things going it's way for way too long for a lot of damage to the rest of the world and the environment".
While complete destruction of America and having it "bombed back to the stone age" may not be his specific agenda, he finds the country as he found it to be completely unacceptable -- the TOP priority is "change". The content of that "change" is extremely secondary.
How democratic nations are destroyed is sadly almost too predictable. Sadly, our founders were well aware of this, so VERY explicitly created a nation that WAS NOT a "Democracy", but rather a Representative Republic -- unfortunately, our aristocracy became an elite. Think of the aristocracy as having real skin in the future of the Nation -- wealth, family history, connection and subsctiption to the American ideals. They are examples of "what it means to be an American". If they allow the nation to be destroyed, they lose what they cherish, they are one with the nation, they look to the nation to give them a form of immortality. Washington, Jefferson, Adams, Hamilton, Franklin -- they were all part of the American aristocracy. If America descends into a tribal third world look alike, those names will be lost to history.
Think of "the elite" as academic, noveau rich, the famous, the chattering classes -- their card is CURRENT "influence and power". Hitler is still well known and would be even if Germany ceased to exist. It isn't important for Einstein, Gates, Buffet, Michael Jackson or even Thoreau that America continue to exist in any recognizable form -- their names are "world names", like BO, they are "citizens of the world", not primarily "Americans".
So is BO TRYING to "overload and reset"? I don't believe so, but I do believe that he would see that outcome as much more positive than the horror of a largely "unchanged America". He did not run on the greatness of America, he ran on "Hope and Change". While he did very very little to specify what either of those meant, I think we can assume he thought that "hope" was lacking and that things needed to be more different than the same (change). The country had become too democratic, so the masses were taken in by the most dangerous president in US history so far. We are in grave peril.
The Prevention Scam
Charles Krauthammer - Preventive Care Isn't the Magic Bullet for Health Care Costs - washingtonpost.com
Like most things in BOworld, his claims that "prevention saves money" are pure lies. Note that these are REAL LIES as opposed to fake lies like "Bush lied about WMD". Every intelligence service in the world was certain Saddam had WMD, it was common knowledge. When common knowledge turns out to be wrong, it is just wrong -- nobody "lied" about the world being flat, they were just WRONG. If BO doesn't know that spending a lot of money on thousands of people for preventative care costs more, he is is such a fool that he should resign -- if he does know and keeps saying it, then he ought to forced from office because he is a liar.
Should we do prevention? Sure, but we need to be aware that it costs money -- as to many things, so it is a TRADEOFF, not a panacea. The real world has very few panaceas -- BOworld seems to be loaded with them.
Like most things in BOworld, his claims that "prevention saves money" are pure lies. Note that these are REAL LIES as opposed to fake lies like "Bush lied about WMD". Every intelligence service in the world was certain Saddam had WMD, it was common knowledge. When common knowledge turns out to be wrong, it is just wrong -- nobody "lied" about the world being flat, they were just WRONG. If BO doesn't know that spending a lot of money on thousands of people for preventative care costs more, he is is such a fool that he should resign -- if he does know and keeps saying it, then he ought to forced from office because he is a liar.
That's a hypothetical case. What's the real-life actuality? In Obamaworld, as explained by the president in his Tuesday town hall, if we pour money into primary care for diabetics instead of giving surgeons "$30,000, $40,000, $50,000" for a later amputation -- a whopper that misrepresents the surgeon's fee by a factor of at least 30 -- "that will save us money." Back on Earth, a rigorous study in the journal Circulation found that for cardiovascular diseases and diabetes, "if all the recommended prevention activities were applied with 100 percent success," the prevention would cost almost 10 times as much as the savings, increasing the country's total medical bill by 162 percent. That's because prevention applied to large populations is very expensive, as shown by another report Elmendorf cites, a definitive review in the New England Journal of Medicine of hundreds of studies that found that more than 80 percent of preventive measures added to medical costs.
Should we do prevention? Sure, but we need to be aware that it costs money -- as to many things, so it is a TRADEOFF, not a panacea. The real world has very few panaceas -- BOworld seems to be loaded with them.
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