Art therapy rehabilitation program

This news story gives us a glimpse of things to come:

http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/men-believed-northwest-airlines-plot-set-free/story?id=9434065&page=1

This is what we have to look forward to:

• Two of the four leaders allegedly behind the al Qaeda plot to blow up a Northwest Airlines passenger jet over Detroit were released by the U.S. from the Guantanamo prison in November, 2007, according to American officials and Department of Defense documents.

But the part of this story that will bring a smile to your face and a warm feeling to your heart is here:

• American officials agreed to send the two terrorists from Guantanamo to Saudi Arabia where they entered into an "art therapy rehabilitation program" and were set free, according to U.S. and Saudi officials.

• Saudi officials concede its program has had its "failures" but insist that, overall, the effort has helped return potential terrorists to a meaningful life.

• One program gives the former detainees paints and crayons as part of the rehabilitation regimen.

The best part of this story is not explained in this article but I am willing to bet that the US Taxpayer is footing the bill for this “Therapy”.

The system worked

Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano is confident that her department is keeping us safe. Her interview today with CNN is at the following link. I encourage you to play the video and listen to what Secretary Napolitano says as this is much more interesting than reading the CNN text of the interview:

http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/12/27/airline.terror.napolitano/index.html

I think that these quotes are most important:

• “One thing that I’d like to point out is that the system worked.”
  

The only reason that we are not picking through the remains of a burning aircraft is that the detonator on the bomb malfunctioned. How can this be considered a success for the “system”.

• “Within literally an hour to 90 minutes of the incident occurring all 128 flights in the air had been notified to take some special measures in light of what had occurred on the Northwest Airlines flight.”
  

Napolitano thinks that a 90 minute lapse in notifying flights in the air is a “success”. If this was part of a larger plot it would have most likely been planned as a coordinated attack. This means that the other bombers on other flights would have been attempting to detonate their explosive devices at approximately the same time.

When asked how the bomber was able to bring the explosives through security Napolitano said:

• “We are asking the same questions..”
  

Napolitano says the following:

• “He was stopped before any damage could be done”
  

This must be repeated, it is clear that the only reason he was stopped was a malfunction in the detonator.

• “He was on a tied list that has half a million names on it.”
  

So if you have ties to terrorists it is still ok to obtain a visa and fly into the USA. Napolitano implies that because the tied list has so many names it is ignored.

When asked about the fact that the bomber’s own father reported him as a terrorist to the US Embassy Napolitano says:

• “We need to ascertain who said what to whom and when.”

Irredeemable

Charles Krauthammer’s latest column cuts through all of the disinformation in the health care reform debate with laser accuracy:

http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=ODFkNjliY2FkMGNmNDU5NmNlZjE3YmE4MjQzOTI1NmQ=

He highlights a few of the irrational regulations written into the Senate bill:

• You’ll find mandates with financial penalties — the amounts picked out of a hat.

• You’ll find insurance companies (who live and die by their actuarial skills) told exactly what weight to give risk factors, such as age. Currently, insurance premiums for 20-somethings are about one-sixth the premiums for 60-somethings. The House bill dictates the young shall now pay at minimum one-half; the Senate bill, one-third — numbers picked out of a hat.

• You’ll find sliding scales for health-insurance subsidies — percentages picked out of a hat — that will radically raise marginal income tax rates for middle-class recipients, among other crazy unintended consequences.

His conclusion:

• The bill is irredeemable. It should not only be defeated. It should be immolated, its ashes scattered over the Senate swimming pool.

He then submits three recommendations for improving the efficiency of our existing health care system:

• First, tort reform. This is money — the low-end estimate is about half a trillion per decade — wasted in two ways. Part is simply hemorrhaged into the legal system to benefit a few jackpot lawsuit winners and an army of extravagantly rich malpractice lawyers such as John Edwards.

• Second, even more simple and simplifying, abolish the prohibition against buying health insurance across state lines.

• Third, tax employer-provided health insurance. This is an accrued inefficiency of 65 years, an accident of World War II wage controls. It creates a $250 billion annual loss of federal revenues — the largest tax break for individuals in the entire federal budget.

These three suggestions would repeal or correct inefficiencies in our health care system that exists today due to government policies. The results of these three suggestions would be as follows:

Tort reform will eliminate or reduce the use of unnecessary medical procedures undertaken to avoid future malpractice claims.

Allowing the purchase of health insurance across state lines will open a competitive marketplace for health insurance policies.

Repeal of the corporate tax loophole that allows employee health insurance to be tax deductable to corporations and also tax free to individuals will place health insurance on the same footing as all other employee benefits. Over time individuals will decide to purchase their own health care insurance just as they purchase their own auto insurance or homeowners insurance. When individuals own their health care insurance they will not fear loss of coverage due to changing jobs.

That's nothing new

The following article is from the Chicago Tribune:

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/chi-aldermen-payroll19nov19,0,280697.story?page=1

For those of you unfamiliar with the history of Chicago’s hiring practices here is a brief summary:
In 1969 a lawsuit was filed against the Democratic Party of Cook County alleging that government hiring was unduly influenced by political operatives. A 1979 ruling led to a court order in 1983 that made it unlawful to take any political factor into account in hiring public employees. Those decisions along with companion consent judgments—collectively called the Shakman decrees—are binding on more than 40 city and statewide offices. Circumventing these decrees has become a routine way of life for politicians and government employees.

What we have learned from the Tribune article is that the City of Chicago has a payroll account that is used by City Alderman to hire friends and family. This payroll account is not listed in the City budget and until now was not know about by those who oversee the Shakman decrees.

Here are some of the highlights from the Tribune article:

• "All of us (aldermen) have family members on the payroll," said Ald. Isaac Carothers, 29th, who has paid a relative more than $30,000 since January 2008. "That's nothing new."

• Carothers refused to say if the William Carothers on his payroll was his father or brother, who have the same name. Carothers faces federal bribery charges, and his father, a former alderman, went to prison for public corruption.

• City officials said the employees paid through the fund are contract workers because they do not receive a city pension or other city benefits.

• But Shakman questioned that statement, because the city withholds the employees' taxes and sends each one a yearly W-2 tax form. "W-2s are a pretty good indication they are common-law employees," Shakman said.

• On paper, the only oversight of the obscure payroll appears to come from the veteran chairman of the Council's Finance Committee, Ald. Edward Burke, 14th. According to the city budget, payments must be approved in writing by Burke.

• Burke spent the largest chunk of the payroll -- $70,164 -- in 2008, according to city records. That total was higher than any other ward by more than $26,000.

• Nevertheless, Daley and city attorneys said last week the city is in "substantial compliance" with the federal court consent decree. They plan to ask a judge early next year to end the court's supervision of city hiring.

The public transportation money pit

Today’s Chicago Tribune contains the following article:

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/chi-getting-around-16nov16,0,3657428.column

The following data tell the story:

• The average fare collected by the CTA is 98 cents, according to the transit agency. It takes into account full-priced fares, reduced fares, passes and free rides.
• The cost for the CTA to provide service averages $7 per ride, including some capital costs such as maintenance and some system improvements.
• The cost per ride jumps to $9.90 if major projects such as the ongoing Brown Line capacity-expansion project or the planned extensions of the Red, Orange and Yellow/Skokie Swift Lines are factored in, CTA officials said.

How is that for a business plan? Your cost is $9.90 but you only collect $0.98. Brilliant! The CTA is constantly in financial crisis and this explains why.

Note that the published full fare for a CTA ride is $2.25. So in addition to having a cost structure that is totally unjustified by revenues we find that the CTA is offering so many discounts that they are actually collecting less than 50% of the full fare for each ride provided.

This is an appropriate case study to be presented to local governments that are currently considering additional public transportation expansion. Public transit is always and everywhere a money losing proposition.

GM stands for Government Mendacity

In the following Reuters article GM describes its current financial performance:

http://www.reuters.com/article/businessNews/idUSTRE5AF0SO20091116?feedType=RSS&feedName=businessNews&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+reuters%2FbusinessNews+%28News+%2F+US+%2F+Business+News%29&utm_content=Google+Feedfetcher&pageNumber=1&virtualBrandChannel=0

Note the following paragraphs in this article:

• General Motors Co posted a quarterly loss on Monday but said stabilizing sales since its bankruptcy would allow it to begin paying down $8.1 billion in debt to the United States and Canada next month.
  
• Bolstered by its bailout, GM ended September with almost $43 billion in cash compared with $14 billion a year earlier.
  
• That included $17.4 billion in a special account created with bankruptcy financing provided by the U.S. government. GM said it had allocated $8.1 billion from that taxpayer-funded account to pay down its government debt.

Yes, you read that correctly. GM is bragging about its ability to pay back Federal Government loans using “debtor in possession” funds obtained from the Federal Government during its bankruptcy. Take the Federal Government’s money from your right pocket to pay off the Federal Government debt in your left pocket. This is truly hilarious; unfortunately America the joke is on us.

Kill off “too big to fail”

Kansas City Fed President Thomas Hoenig understands the root cause of our financial crisis. Read the following Reuters article:

http://www.reuters.com/article/topNews/idUSTRE5AF17U20091116?feedType=RSS&feedName=topNews&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+reuters%2FtopNews+%28News+%2F+US+%2F+Top+News%29&utm_content=Google+Feedfetcher

The following quotese from Hoenig cuts directly to the heart of the problem:

• "As we look at reform and the way forward I think the most important think we need to do is to make first of all an accurate assessment of fundamental weaknesses in our financial system and then begin to create better foundations," he said.
  
• "Our institutions must be allowed to fail no matter what their size or political influence," he said.
  
• "Our reluctance to deal with 'too big too fail' provides these largest institutions with important advantages over any competitors who are not seen as important," Hoenig said.

Blatantly contradictory objectives

In the following Washington Post article Robert J. Samuelson examines the contradictions in the health care reform bill:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/11/15/AR2009111502212.html

The following paragraph leads us to one of my favorite topics:

• The disconnect between what President Obama says and what he's doing is so glaring that most people could not abide it. The president, his advisers and allies have no trouble. But reconciling blatantly contradictory objectives requires them to engage in willful self-deception, public dishonesty, or both.
  

What Robert Samuelson is trying to tell us is that the health care debate and the Obama administration’s proposals are a classic example of George Orwell’s concept of doublethink from his novel 1984. Doublethink is defined as Reality Control. The power to hold two completely contradictory beliefs in one's mind simultaneously, and accept both of them.

The No. 1 earmarks guy

The following news article by Herbert A. Sample of the Associated Press ran in the 11/9/09 edition of the Honolulu Star Bulletin:

http://www.starbulletin.com/news/20091109_inouyes_earmarks_go_to_his_donors.html

The following quote is a very gentle attempt to describe our current political situation:

• "I think what that shows you is, at the very least, there's the appearance of a quid pro quo between campaign contributions and then how decisions are made to allocate taxpayer resources," said Mandy Smithberger, of the Project on Government Oversight, a nonpartisan watchdog group in Washington, D.C.
  

The blatant political corruption that was revealed by the investigation of former Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich was a national news story. Most who followed that story reassured themselves by rationalizing that corruption on that scale was unusual and certainly not part of their state or local politics. Things like that only happen else ware.

The above news story explains “pay to play” on a national scale. Here you have an eight term US senator bragging that "I'm the No. 1 earmarks guy in the U.S. Congress."

Senator Inouye is not beholden to his constituents, only to his large campaign contributors. The root of this problem is the power of incumbency. 95% of federal officeholders are reelected. This removes any real need to represent the will of the citizens.

A better economic and social contract

The following article from Reuters provides insight concerning the origin of our recent worldwide financial crisis:

http://www.reuters.com/article/businessNews/idUSTRE5A60NF20091107?feedType=RSS&feedName=businessNews&pageNumber=1&virtualBrandChannel=11604

There is a lot of liberal doublethink quoted in this article. Doublethink is a process defined in George Orwell’s novel 1984. Doublethink is defined as: Reality Control, the power to hold two completely contradictory beliefs in one's mind simultaneously, and accept both of them.

We must be aware that all doublethink propaganda is intended to provide the casual reader with will only the rosy scenario portrayed by the speaker. This is of course the intent of the speaker.

Consider the content of the Reuters article:

• World governments should consider urgently a levy on banks to fund future bailouts, British Prime Minister Gordon Brown said on Saturday, departing from London's longstanding resistance to a global tax.
  
• "We should discuss whether we need a better economic and social contract to reflect the global responsibilities of financial institutions to society," Brown told a meeting of financial policymakers from the G20 nations in Scotland.
  
• "There have been proposals for an insurance fee to reflect systemic risk or a resolution fund or contingent capital arrangements or a global transaction levy," he said.
  

“A better economic and social contract” is a liberal doublethink slogan that in reality means increased government intervention that will result in worse economic and social outcomes.

The purpose of this meeting is to promote the concept of a worldwide tax on financial transactions. This is being promoted as a method to prevent future financial crisis. The rosy scenario is that if a financial crisis is looming then the taxes collected will be waiting in a “rainy day” fund and these funds will be used to offset the effects of the crisis.

The reality is that financial institutions will accept more risk if they have an explicit guarantee of bailout. The recent crisis has as its root cause this exact mechanism, the belief in the “too big to fail” myth.

I am surprise to read that U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner (king of bailouts) is opposed to this idea for exactly the reason stated above:

• In recent Congressional testimony, U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner was cool to an idea from a domestic regulator who called for big financial firms to pay risk-based assessments into a fund that would be available for use if they hit trouble. Geithner opposed pre-funding bank bailouts on the basis that it makes banks less wary of risk taking.
  

The real motive behind this new global tax is revealed in this paragraph:

• Officials at the G20 meeting said a levy and the funds raised could be used not only to pay for future bank bailouts but also to fund development and other areas.
  

I am sure that this was an unintended admission by the bureaucrats. The real purpose of this new tax is not for a financial backstop but is instead a redistribution of wealth. The taxes paid on financial transactions will be spent on “development and other areas”. If this tax is put into effect financial institutions will be encouraged to engage in excessively risky speculation under the pretext that an insurance fund is available to bail out any failing firms. In reality the fund will be empty as it will be looted for spending on pork barrel projects.

In Illinois reform begets corruption

The Illinois State legislature recently passed a campaign finance reform bill. Some discussion of this bill can be found in this Chicago Tribune article:

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/chi-campaign-finance-sundaynov01,0,4798276.story

The new law places restrictions on campaign spending:

• The proposal would limit donations to candidates to $5,000 each for the primary and general elections from individuals, $10,000 from corporations and unions and $50,000 from political action committees.
  

This sounds like real reform but the following section of the law reveals its true intention:

• Madigan and Cullerton -- as well as reluctant Republican leaders, Sen. Christine Radogno of Lemont and Rep. Tom Cross of Oswego -- would be allowed to spend unlimited sums of money from their special leadership campaign accounts on individual legislators or candidates in highly competitive general election races.
  Since Madigan also serves as state Democratic chairman, he also could devote unlimited party campaign resources to the dozen or so targeted legislative races that are the true battleground contests.
  

This new law which was written and approved by the State’s legislative leaders will now magnify their power over candidates in future elections. Under the current system a candidate must pander to the legislative leaders to receive their endorsement. Currently if a candidate does not receive the support and endorsement of the party elite that candidate can still go out raise funds and run against the parties' selected candidate. With the new law the independent or renegade candidate who is not baptized by the “machine” will no longer be able to raise enough money to mount a viable campaign. This will lock in the “machine” politicians and build legions of candidates beholden to them.

There is a moral to learn from this sad situation. Campaign reform laws are all written by entrenched politicians. These politicians will fashion the reform law so as to enhance their own political careers. This is one reason that incumbents win reelection 95% of the time.

The cycle of taxes

We are continually told that residential real-estate foreclosures are a product of greedy manipulation by bankers and Wall Street. We are also told that if we spend more taxpayers’ earnings on hand outs to low income home owners we can mitigate the effects of these foreclosures.

The following Chicago Tribune article reports the latest residential real estate tax increases in Cook County, Illinois:

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/chi-property-tax-27-oct27,0,3685132.story

The message that this article delivers is the real estate taxes are going up:

• Most Cook County residents are in for another round of sticker shock when new property tax bills arrive in the mail in a few days, with the median increase in many suburbs topping 10 percent and, in a handful, 20 percent.
  
• Median increases in many city neighborhoods will also hit double digits, with some lower income areas seeing the highest percentage spike. The median rise in the West Garfield Park neighborhood will top 46 percent, according to figures provided to the Tribune by Cook County Assessor James Houlihan.
  
• In the city, the median increase in the trendy Lincoln Park neighborhood is a modest 3 percent and in the North Side Lakeview neighborhood it will be even less, 2.1 percent. On the flip side, however, the median increase in the Englewood neighborhood on the South Side nears 25 percent. The median rise in President Obama's Kenwood neighborhood is 9 percent.

For those of you who are not familiar with Chicago neighborhoods you may be surprised to learn that West Garfield Park and Englewood are arguably the 2 poorest neighborhoods in the city. The fact that real estate taxes are rising by 46% and 25% in these 2 areas will inevitably lead to more foreclosures. When these foreclosures occur we will be told they are due to “greedy manipulation by bankers and Wall Street”. The local politicians will be leading the cry for Federal funds to “save our homeowners”. After the Federal funds arrive, those same local politicians will push through more local tax increases.

Subsidies for the politically connected

The following article by Robert Bryce discusses corn based ethanol and plug in electric vehicles:

http://www.energytribune.com/articles.cfm?aid=2485

The following paragraphs explain how the “Green Movement” works:

• Then again, the entire electric car push may just be another over-hyped flavor-of-the-month whose main effect will be the transfer of billions of dollars from the pockets of taxpayers to the coffers of politically favored industries that have effective lobbyists in Washington.
• Among the most notable recipients of the government’s largesse: Fisker Automotive. In September 2009, Fisker received a $529 million loan from the US government to help finance its startup costs. One of Fisker’s main financial backers is the venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, a Silicon Valley firm where Al Gore is a partner.

If a thorough audit of any Government subsidy to industry is carried out you will find some type of unsavory relationship. There will always be someone who can benefit from convincing the Government that their industry is promoting the “common good”. Government should never fund private enterprise.

"Is that about the coolest thing you've ever heard?"

Where is another example of why the Federal Government should never be allowed to spend our money. This is a story from the Wall Street Journal published on 10/17/09:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704107204574473724099542430.html

The details of this fiasco would once again be funny if not for the fact that we are paying for this nonsense:

• 
  We thought cash for clunkers was the ultimate waste of taxpayer money, but as usual we were too optimistic. Thanks to the federal tax credit to buy high-mileage cars that was part of President Obama's stimulus plan, Uncle Sam is now paying Americans to buy that great necessity of modern life, the golf cart.
• The federal credit provides from $4,200 to $5,500 for the purchase of an electric vehicle, and when it is combined with similar incentive plans in many states the tax credits can pay for nearly the entire cost of a golf cart. Even in states that don't have their own tax rebate plans, the federal credit is generous enough to pay for half or even two-thirds of the average sticker price of a cart, which is typically in the range of $8,000 to $10,000. "The purchase of some models could be absolutely free," Roger Gaddis of Ada Electric Cars in Oklahoma said earlier this year. "Is that about the coolest thing you've ever heard?"
• The golf-cart boom has followed an IRS ruling that golf carts qualify for the electric-car credit as long as they are also road worthy. These qualifying golf carts are essentially the same as normal golf carts save for adding some safety features, such as side and rearview mirrors and three-point seat belts. They typically can go 15 to 25 miles per hour.
• This golf-cart fiasco perfectly illustrates tax policy in the age of Obama, when politicians dole out credits and loopholes for everything from plug-in cars to fuel efficient appliances, home insulation and vitamins. Democrats then insist that to pay for these absurdities they have no choice but to raise tax rates on other things—like work and investment—that aren't politically in vogue. If this keeps up, it'll soon make more sense to retire and play golf than work for living.

It is easy to attribute this policy to “unintended consequences” from a large federal spending program. I think that some research would lead to a different conclusion. I believe that the wording of this federal law was intentionally vague so that those who were positioned to gain from the sale of these vehicles would directly benefit from this legislation.
Imagine the “unintended consequences” that have been inserted into the 1,500 page health care legislation.

A Nobel gesture

Coming to a neighborhood near you soon will be some of the most dangerous criminals of modern society. You can read the details here:

http://www.reuters.com/article/topNews/idUSTRE59E4X120091015?feedType=RSS&feedName=topNews

The Federal Government will move ruthless criminals dedicated to the death and destruction of the USA from a fortress prison in Cuba to prisons in our major cities. This will make Europeans happy. This is the type of nonsensical self destructive behavior that is required for us to keep the Europeans happy. In return the Europeans will show their gratitude by giving our political leaders prizes.

Redistributing Health

Alan Reynolds of the Cato Institute has written the following article which was published in the New York Post on 10/12/09:

http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=10623

Alan Reynolds exposes one of the goals of the current health care legislation:

• The fundamental Proponents of compulsory, government-designed health insurance can't seem to understand why others disagree. Perhaps the public is realizing that these proposals are fundamentally about redistributing health?
• The major proposals, the AARP Bulletin explains, "include around $500 billion in savings carved from future growth in Medicare spending over a 10-year period. "Even in the Obama era, $500 billion is a lot. Yet we're supposed to believe that less is somehow more — that seniors will benefit from these spending cuts. "The Obama administration and congressional leaders," intones a recent New York Times editorial, "are hoping to save hundreds of billions of dollars by slowing the growth of spending in the vast and inefficient Medicare system that serves 45 million older and disabled Americans. The savings would be used to help offset the costs of covering tens of millions of uninsured people."
  
• President Obama, in an Aug. 16 Times op ed, made such redistribution seem easy and painless: "We'll cut hundreds of billions of dollars in waste and inefficiency in federal health programs like Medicare and Medicaid," he said.
  
• Such efforts to appease seniors are not working because they are transparently dishonest.
  First of all, the Congressional Budget Office figures that cutting "waste, fraud and abuse" might save $200 million a year — that's millions, not billions.
  
• Second, the hundreds of billions in "savings" are to be carved out of the hides of Medicare providers and Medicare Advantage benefits, not Medicaid. In the Senate Finance Committee proposal, Medicaid gets $345 billion more money from 2014 to 2019.
  
• The Times claims the cuts should actually make Medicare better "for most beneficiaries," partly by "helping keep Medicare solvent." That is either a hoax or fraud. If "the savings would be used to help offset the costs of covering tens of millions of uninsured people," as the Times says, then the same savings can't also be used to shore up the Medicare trust fund.
  
• The president and his allies in Congress believe they can use deep cuts in Medicare — plus steep new taxes on health insurance, drug and medical device companies — to pay for a vast expansion of Medicaid and new health-insurance subsidies.
  
• These grandiose redistribution schemes are grounded in lethal economics and suicidal politics. Because bad ideas are hard to sell, politicians and journalists have been peddling health redistribution with the rhetorical and statistical equivalent of waste, fraud and abuse.
  
• American voters, particularly seniors, don't like to be lied to. They are just as leery of the political redistribution of health as they are of the redistribution of wealth.

It's a 12-day miracle!

Chicago Tribune columnist John Kass has an enlightening commentary about the Nobel Peace Prize. The article can be read here:

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/columnists/chi-kass-11-oct11,0,6621520.column

John’s commentary is of course satirical in nature, but he points out a remarkable fact:

• Isn't it great that President Barack Obama has won the Nobel Peace Prize?
  
• He'd been in office only 12 days when the Nobel nominations were due. That's a mere 288 hours for Obama to have been credentialed as President Peace.

If you are not familiar with John Kass’s writing you may have missed his original column about “hopium” (note that the date of this column is 7/30/2008):

http://archives.chicagotribune.com/2008/jul/30/news/chi-kass-30-jul30

"the image of success"

Charles Krauthammer’s latest column in the Washington Post comments on how President Obama manipulates foreign policy to enhance his self image:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/10/01/AR2009100104208.html?nav=rss_opinion/columns

Some of the highlights of this article are:

• Don't take it from me. Take it from Sarkozy, who could not conceal his astonishment at Obama's naivete. On Sept. 24, Obama ostentatiously presided over the Security Council. With 14 heads of state (or government) at the table, with an American president at the chair for the first time ever, with every news camera in the world trained on the meeting, it would garner unprecedented worldwide attention.
  
• Unknown to the world, Obama had in his pocket explosive revelations about an illegal uranium enrichment facility that the Iranians had been hiding near Qom. The French and the British were urging him to use this most dramatic of settings to stun the world with the revelation and to call for immediate action.
  
• Obama refused. Not only did he say nothing about it, but, reports the Wall Street Journal (citing Le Monde), Sarkozy was forced to scrap the Qom section of his speech. Obama held the news until a day later -- in Pittsburgh.
• And from Obama's star turn as planetary visionary: "The administration told the French," reports the Wall Street Journal, "that it didn't want to 'spoil the image of success' for Mr. Obama's debut at the U.N."

Out of the past

For those of you familiar with Chicago corruption, a ghost of scandals past has reappeared:

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/columnists/chi-kass-01-oct01,0,5966158.column

If you make a deal with the devil he will expect you to keep up your end of the bargain. After paying bribes to high ranking City of Chicago officials it is expected that you will never testify against those officials. If you do begin to testify you will receive a visit from that official’s “associates”.

The above article describes one such visit:

• If you've been following the story in this column and in news accounts in the Tribune, you know that Morales once told federal investigators about large bribes he paid to a Daley administration chieftain, former Transportation Department boss Anthony Pucillo, who has vehemently denied Morales' allegation.
  
• Then came a death threat telling him to keep his mouth shut, Morales said. Marco had pleaded guilty to bribery and corruption charges, but instead of reporting to prison, he ran to the Yucatan, to the town of Merida. While on the run, as the statute of limitations on the Daley administration bribery investigation was running out, his son Marc Morale began receiving the bulk of more than $60 million in contracts from the Daley administration.
  
• "You know when Marco got the death threat, that same day, they came to our house too," Stella said. "We were divorced by then. And then came the men. They knocked on the door."
  
• "This was after Marco was arrested, after he was talking to the grand jury about the bribes to Pucillo," Stella said. "They said to me, 'You have a son. Do you want your son to be able to walk and talk? Then tell Marco to keep his mouth shut about the bribes. Capisce? "

"an undue burden"

Would it surprise you to learn that EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson has no grasp of basic economics? This news article gives us her perspective:

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_EPA_GREENHOUSE_GASES?SITE=OHWIL&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT

Here is her view of economic interactions:

• "By using the power and authority of the Clean Air Act, we can begin reducing emissions from the nation's largest greenhouse gas-emitting facilities without placing an undue burden on the businesses that make up the vast majority of our economy," EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson said. "We know the corner coffee shop is no place to look for meaningful carbon reductions."

In her mind raising the costs for large industries has no effect on small business. Maybe she intends to subsidize the increased costs of raw materials, electricity, and transportation that will be borne by all small businesses.

Do your sit-ups

Your federal government wants you to be healthy! Don’t you feel better already?

http://www.reuters.com/article/topNews/idUSTRE58T7IU20091001?feedType=RSS&feedName=topNews&pageNumber=1&virtualBrandChannel=0

This paragraph from the above article describes the new plan:

• The Senate Finance Committee voted for an amendment offered by Republican Senator John Ensign and Democrat Thomas Carper that would allow health plans to provide financial incentives for people to quit smoking, exercise more, and engage in other healthy activities.

Will we be able to earn $5.00 for every mile that we jog, or how about $0.10 per push up? And who will be our fitness czar? It’s too late to name Teddy Kennedy to this important post.

Is there any better of example of a government that is out of control? The same people that have no self control over any impulse that brings them personal gain will now set up a system of rewards to encourage us to live a “healthy lifestyle”!

Maybe we can learn from Europe

The Germans have elected a conservative-free market government. The following Wall Street Journal article highlights some of the new government’s proposals:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704471504574438884290190804.html?mod=googlenews_wsj

Some of the highlights of the new policies:

• The Free Democrats campaigned on a €35 billion tax cut combined with a radical simplification of one of the most complex tax codes in the world. The current rates, which rise gradually from 14% to 45%, would be replaced with three brackets of 15%, 25% and 35%. The proposal has come to be known as the "beer-coaster reform"—as in, you could fit the whole tax return on a beer coaster. The reform would make Germany's tax code among the most competitive and transparent in the industrialized world.
  
• The FDP also wants to loosen the "Kündigungsschutz"—the country's strict dismissal rules, which make it so costly to lay off employees that it hinders hiring them in the first place.

FDP also proposes to cut the size of government and reform the government health-care system.

Combining the legendary German work ethic with these free market policies will create an economic miracle in the center of socialist Europe.

"Capitalism is the prime enemy of earth and the entire humanity"

The President of Bolivia is providing us with extraordinary insight into the environmental movement and the global warming agenda. In an interview today after his UN speech president, Evo Morales of Bolivia reiterated that “Capitalism is the prime enemy of earth and the entire humanity ‘‘.

In a press conference held in New York on the sideline of the UN special meeting on climate change, president, Morales said: “Climate change phenomenon is a product of capitalism that seeks to gain the greatest possible profit at others expense “.

The ultimate goal of the climate change agenda is the destruction of free markets and the installation of government control over your economic decisions. We are fortunate that there are members of this coalition like Mr. Morales who are willing to tell the truth.

Mystery of fish mercury levels solved

Another claim of a man made environmental disaster turns out to be false:

http://www.starbulletin.com/news/20090922_Mystery_of_fish_mercury_levels_solved.html

Here are the facts as outlined in the above article:

• Kaneko said there is an assumption that mercury in open-ocean fish is directly related to atmospheric mercury emissions and pollution, but there is no evidence of that.
• Studies done in 1971 and again in 1998 on the amount of mercury in Hawaii yellowfin tuna showed no differences despite a 26 percent increase in atmospheric mercury emissions, he said.
• Mercury is a natural trace element in the environment that has never been associated with toxicity in Hawaii's ocean fish, said Kaneko, whose research focuses on public health.
• But methylmercury, an organic form of the mineral converted by bacteria, can be toxic if eaten at high levels by animals or people.
• Kaneko said there is substantial scientific evidence that high levels of selenium in ocean fish counteract toxic levels of mercury. Selenium, also a natural element, has antioxidant functions and is known to bind to mercury, he said. "When those two elements bind together, they're biologically inert.
• "What we're finding, in some research we're just finishing now, is it's the ratios of mercury to selenium that is more important than the amount of mercury in fish," Kaneko added.

Rising mercury levels in the ocean food chain is one of the arguments used against burning coal. This study debunks that argument. If this study had confirmed that man’s activities are raising the levels of mercury you would hear about it insistently in the media. I predict that this study will be buried by the media.

A subprime primer

In commemoration of the first anniversary of the Lehman Brothers Holdings' bankruptcy please enjoy the following Power Point presentation (a brief account of the technicalities behind the financial nonsense that helped to put us all in the poor house). Please note that there is some obscene language in this presentation.

http://docs.google.com/present/edit?id=0ATCcaHAnYX28ZDJtMnhqMl80YzdieDVtaGY&hl=en

How Wishful Thinkers Are Forced To Reconnect With Energy Reality

The following article was published on 9/10/09 on the Investors.com website:

http://www.investors.com/NewsAndAnalysis/Article.aspx?id=505738

This article lists several examples of governments saying one thing and then doing exactly the opposite when reality sets in. Here are a few of the best examples:

• One day Energy Secretary Ed Milliband sets out his proposed expansion of the U.K.'s wind power-led alternative energy revolution; the next day, Vestas, the U.K.'s largest wind turbine manufacturer, shuts down a big part of its British operations citing "low demand" and public opposition to onshore wind farms.
• In 2006, Germany's Angela Merkel was hailed as the "Green Chancellor" for promising to rid her country of coal and nuclear power in its bid to give a clean energy "world lead." Three years on and Merkel's government actively supports the construction of a new generation of 26 coal-fired power plants as well as keeping Germany's nuclear power stations open.
• "Capitalism and consumerism have brought the world to the brink of economic and environmental collapse," the U.K.'s Prince of Wales ruminates, adding that "the age of convenience is over." As international columnist Mark Steyn comments, "The Prince then got in his limo and was driven to his other palace."
• As we have seen, however, national leaders will ultimately refuse to impoverish their industries even to "save the planet." The still-"disconnected" flower-power generation and its idealistic offspring would do well to grasp that the energy future is not green. It is hydrocarbon, and will continue to be for another century at least.

Dead men tell no tales

Christopher Kelly, the person who knew the most damaging information about former Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich is dead. The investigators have decided that his death was either murder or suicide.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/chi-christopher-kelly-dead-13sep13,0,6335509,full.story

The facts of this case:

• Kelly's death ended a tumultuous year in his life. He twice pleaded guilty to federal charges. He was estranged from his wife. And he faced serious financial problems, partly due to gambling debts. But Kelly indicated he was not going to turn on Blagojevich despite pressure from prosecutors.
  
• The chief Blagojevich fundraiser -- who also was one of Blagojevich's closest advisers -- had been indicted three times by federal authorities in recent years, the last time in April in the sweeping conspiracy case against the ex-governor.
  
• The Cook County medical examiner's office said Stroger Hospital officials told them that Kelly apparently died of an overintoxication of salicylate, a drug used in anti-inflammatory and pain relief medications such as aspirin.Authorities said Kelly was in his 2007 Cadillac Escalade in the parking lot of a lumber yard at 173rd Street and Cicero Avenue in Country Club Hills -- a few miles from his Markham office -- Friday night when he began vomiting. Sources said a girlfriend of Kelly's drove him to nearby Oak Forest Hospital of Cook County.

In my opinion there are 2 possible explanations for Kelly’s death:

1. Kelly chooses to end his own life by taking an overdose of aspirin while in the company of his girlfriend in the parking lot of an abandoned lumberyard.

2. Kelly was poisoned and fell ill from the poison while in a clandestine encounter with a woman in the parking lot of an abandoned lumberyard.

I find scenario number 2 to be more realistic. This leads to the interesting question, who poisoned Kelly?

Kelly had intimate knowledge of the inner workings of Illinois and Chicago politics. This knowledge would give Kelly the ability to negotiate a reduction in jail time with the Justice Department. In return Kelly would have to testify against someone higher up in political office. If we can find who Kelly was about to testify against we will find the killer.

Sorry, Charlie

The National Legal and Policy Center has led the investigation into the financial misrepresentations by House Ways and Means Chairman Rep. Charles Rangel (D-NY). Today the NLPC has a new ally, The Washington Post. In an editorial dated 9/3/09 The Washington Post is calling for Charles Rangel to resign from the chairmanship:

http://www.nlpc.org/stories/2009/09/03/washington-post-calls-rangel-resign-ways-and-means-chairmanship

The Washington Post editorial:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/09/02/AR2009090203082.html?sub=AR

The NLPC makes an important point that resignation should not be the end of this investigation, there must be criminal prosecution:

• We welcome the Post editorial but it does not address an even more serious matter— whether Rangel will face criminal prosecution.
  
• The scale of Rangel’s omissions means they could have only been willful and deliberate.
  
• Yes, the Post is right. Rangel should resign. If he refuses, it is incumbent upon House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to remove him. But that should not be the end of it. He should also be subject to criminal prosecution.

Scientifically Illiterate and Innumerate

The following article by Robert Bryce examines the question: why are Americans so easily swayed by politicians and others when it comes to energy matters?

http://www.energytribune.com/articles.cfm?aid=2210

The answer to this question is unsettling:

• A 2007 study by Michigan State University determined that just 28 percent of American adults could be considered scientifically literate.
  
• Indeed, while most moderately cultured people will be familiar with the Bard’s A Comedy of Errors or The Merchant of Venice, the laws of thermodynamics -- the rules that ruthlessly police the world of energy -- are considered by most people to be the domain of nerds and wonks. Thus, the first law of thermodynamics: energy is neither created nor destroyed; and the second law: energy tends to become more random and less available -- are relegated to the realm of too much information. For most people, basic physics is seen as nerdy, beyond their ken, too troublesome to learn.

We are quickly losing the ability to understand the physical world around us along with the technology that we employ each day to function in our modern society. Science and math are the pathways to future advancement. We must encourage our young students to study these fundamental fields.

Town Hall Meeting with U.S. Congressman Brian Baird

A friend of ours sent us the following video link:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_rRE5UK6NQU

There is little that anyone can add to these poignant town hall comments. I will only add the following reference material. In his comments the speaker David William Hedrick refers to the Marine Corps oath of enlistment and the US Congress oath of office. These 2 oaths are listed below for your reference.

Marine Corps
Oath of Enlistment:
I, ____________, do solemnly swear that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; and that I will obey the orders of the President of the United States and the orders of the officers appointed over me, according to regulations and the Uniform Code of Military Justice. So help me God.

US Congress
Oath of office:
I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter: So help me God.

Note that our elected officials and our military personnel have only one responsibility and that is to “support and defend the Constitution of the United States”.

Cato Experts Dissect Obama's Health Care Town Hall Meeting

A friend of ours sent me the following video in which Michael Tanner and Michael Cannon of the Cato Institute analyze and refute President Obama’s health care claims:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z-1ZfFBMf8s

Federal Pay Continues Rapid Ascent

The Cato Institute summarizes a study on Federal Employee wages at this link:

http://www.cato-at-liberty.org/2009/08/24/federal-pay-continues-rapid-ascent/

The distressing results:

• In 2008, federal worker compensation averaged a remarkable $119,982, which was more than double the private sector average of $59,909.

This is unconscionable. The size and expense of the Federal Government must be reduced.

Recess Rally

http://recessrally.com/

Today you can make your voice heard in the fight against socialized medicine. Click on the above link to find the location of the rally in your congressional district.

CASH FOR CODGERS

Democrats, realizing the success of the President's "Cash For Clunkers" rebate program, have revamped a major portion of their National Health Care Plan.
President Obama, Speaker Pelosi, and Sen. Reed are expected to make this major announcement at a joint news conference later this week. I have obtained an advanced copy of the proposal which is named....

"CASH FOR CODGERS" And It Works Like This...

Couples wishing to access health care funds in order to pay for the delivery of a child will be required to turn in one old person. The amount the government grants them will be fixed according to a sliding scale. Older and more prescription dependent 'codgers' will garner the highest amounts.

Special "Bonuses" will be paid for those submitting codgers in targeted groups, such as smokers, alcohol drinkers, persons 10 pounds over their government prescribed weight, and any member of the Republican Party.

Smaller bonuses will be given for 'codgers' who consume beef, soda, fried foods, potato chips, lattes, whole milk, dairy products, bacon, Brussels sprouts, or Girl Scout Cookies.

All 'codgers' will be rendered totally useless via toxic injection. This will insure that they are not secretly resold or their body parts harvested to keep other 'codgers' in repair.

Rose D. Friedman

The cause of liberty and personal freedom has lost one of its most ardent supporters. Rose D. Friedman passed away today at the age of 98. Please take a moment to read these 2 statements about her:

http://www.friedmanfoundation.org/friedmans/statement_rose.jsp

http://www.friedmanfoundation.org/friedmans/statement_rose2.jsp

Rose was a leading voice in the advocacy of monetary restraint, deregulation, the volunteer army, school choice and the flat tax. Her vision will live on through all who continue to struggle against the overbearing burden of government expansion.

What's in a name?

There is much debate in today’s reporting that the Obama Administration is backing away from its support of the “Public Option” for health insurance.

Do not believe this public relations stunt. Listen to what has been said:

• 
  There is no reform without a public health insurance plan. Handing the private insurance companies 50 million more lives to cover and giving them a monopoly over health insurance coverage for working people is not reform.
  Healthcare for America Now! (HCAN)
  
• The only health care reform worth doing is the public option. If you give away the public option you have no health care reform.
  Howard Dean
  
• We do not see real, systemic change in the health-care system if there is not a robust public option…The public option is going to happen.
  Nancy Pelosi
  
• Any plan I sign must include an insurance exchange: a one-stop shopping marketplace where you can compare the benefits, cost and track records of a variety of plans – including a public option…
  Barack Obama

The Obama Administration is committed to moving the USA to a single payer health care system. The first step on this path is to institute a “Public Option”. Faced with vocal opposition to the “Public Option” plan the administration will find a new route to get to the single payer system. The first step on this new route is now called an insurance co-op.

Do not be fooled by this rebranding. The insurance co-op will be a government controlled health insurance system. The co-ops will be able to price private insurance out of the market. Eventually only the government will pay for health care.

What's in a name? That which we call a “Public Option” by any other name would smell as foul.

The Great 'Prevention' Myth

The following article by Charles Krauthammer debunks the latest health care policy claims:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/08/13/AR2009081302898.html?nav=rss_opinion/columns

The following paragraphs summarize this article:

• The central contradiction of Obamacare was fatally exposed: From his first address to Congress, Obama insisted on the dire need for restructuring the health-care system because out-of-control costs were bankrupting the Treasury and wrecking the U.S. economy -- yet the Democrats' plans would make the problem worse.
  
• Desperation time. What do you do? Sprinkle fairy dust on every health-care plan, and present your deus ex machina: prevention.
  
• Obama followed suit in his Tuesday New Hampshire town hall, touting prevention as amazingly dual-purpose: "It saves lives. It also saves money."
  
• Reform proponents repeat this like a mantra. Because it seems so intuitive, it has become conventional wisdom. But like most conventional wisdom, it is wrong. Overall, preventive care increases medical costs.
  
• This inconvenient truth comes, once again, from the CBO. In an Aug. 7 letter to Rep. Nathan Deal, CBO Director Doug Elmendorf writes: "Researchers who have examined the effects of preventive care generally find that the added costs of widespread use of preventive services tend to exceed the savings from averted illness."

In the case of health care, as always, the proponents of big government programs are basing their arguments on false assumptions.

“Never insult me with that question”

Mayor Daley is giving us an insight into the thought process of a successful politician. He has never liked answering questions but he recently explained why:

http://newsblogs.chicagotribune.com/clout_st/2009/08/daley-declines-to-answer-questions-about-insiders-olympics-deal.html

It turns out that Mayor Daley feels personally insulted when asked an uncomfortable question. Here is his quote:

• Daley, however, said he would only be taking questions on the city's construction plans.
  
  "I'm sorry I can't answer questions every day. Every day, I do it enough," Daley said.
  
  Asked by a Tribune reporter when he would be available to talk about Scott's project, Daley said the question insulted him.
  
  "Oh, I do it everyday, you've been with me every day. Never insult me with that question," Daley said. "You're insulting me because every day I'm here, you're never here. And don't print that, so I know you'll print it."
  
  Daley's press staff then ended the news conference.

Keep Mayor Daley’s perspective on answering questions in mind when you scrutinize the responses given by President Obama and his administrators during the debate over health care.

The health-care wedge

The following Wall Street Journal article summarizes the folly of the Obama Administration’s efforts to control the health care system:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204619004574324361508092006.html

Here are the reasons why the Administration’s proposals must be defeated:

• 
  The health-care wedge is an economic term that reflects the difference between what health-care costs the specific provider and what the patient actually pays. When health care is subsidized, no one should be surprised that people demand more of it and that the costs to produce it increase. Mr. Obama’s health-care plan does nothing to address the gap between the price paid and the price received. Instead, it’s like a negative tax: Costs rise and people demand more than they need.
  
• The bottom line is that when the government spends money on health care, the patient does not. The patient is then separated from the transaction in the sense that costs are no longer his concern. And when the patient doesn’t care about costs, only those who want higher costs—like doctors and drug companies—care.
  
• Thus, health-care reform should be based on policies that diminish the health-care wedge rather than increase it. Mr. Obama’s reform principles—a public health-insurance option, mandated minimum coverage, mandated coverage of pre-existing conditions, and required purchase of health insurance—only increase the size of the wedge and thus health-care costs.
  
• According to research I performed for the Texas Public Policy Foundation, a $1 trillion increase in federal government health subsidies will accelerate health-care inflation, lead to continued growth in health-care expenditures, and diminish our economic growth even further. Despite these costs, some 30 million people will remain uninsured.
  
• Implementing Mr. Obama’s reforms would literally be worse than doing nothing.

The next three paragraphs brilliantly outline the correct plan to improve our health care system:

• 
  Rather than expanding the role of government in the health-care market, Congress should implement a patient-centered approach to health-care reform. A patient-centered approach focuses on the patient-doctor relationship and empowers the patient and the doctor to make effective and economical choices.
  
  A patient-centered health-care reform begins with individual ownership of insurance policies and leverages Health Savings Accounts, a low-premium, high-deductible alternative to traditional insurance that includes a tax-advantaged savings account. It allows people to purchase insurance policies across state lines and reduces the number of mandated benefits insurers are required to cover. It reallocates the majority of Medicaid spending into a simple voucher for low-income individuals to purchase their own insurance. And it reduces the cost of medical procedures by reforming tort liability laws.
  
  By empowering patients and doctors to manage health-care decisions, a patient-centered health-care reform will control costs, improve health outcomes, and improve the overall efficiency of the health-care system.

A fishy request from the White House

Macon Phillips, the Director of New Media for the White House recently posted this message on the White House blog:

http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/Facts-Are-Stubborn-Things/

This blog post contains the following paragraph:

• There is a lot of disinformation about health insurance reform out there, spanning from control of personal finances to end of life care. These rumors often travel just below the surface via chain emails or through casual conversation. Since we can’t keep track of all of them here at the White House, we’re asking for your help. If you get an email or see something on the web about health insurance reform that seems fishy, send it to flag@whitehouse.gov.

What does the White House intend to do with the list of email addresses and websites that it will collect from this call to action?

The keyboard is mightier than the sword

If you wish to make an impact on the health care debate you should email your US Congressional Representative and both of your US Senators. In addition you could contact the White House . Also send the White House an email to their new “fishy” email address: flag@whitehouse.gov.

If you are lost for words to describe your position on health care you can copy and paste the following link to the Wall Street Journal by Arthur B. Laffer:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204619004574324361508092006.html

I also suggest a reference to the following website:

http://healthcare.cato.org/

The following is the text of my message to my US Congressmen and my US Senators:

If you are interested in studying the facts of the health care debate I suggest that you read the following Wall Street Journal by Arthur B. Laffer:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204619004574324361508092006.html

I agree with Mr. Laffer's conclusions.

You will also find that the following website is a comprehensive source for facts on the health care debate:

http://healthcare.cato.org/

I agree with the following Cato Institute health care reform recommendations:

A government takeover of the health care system, as proposed by the president and some in Congress, would be a step in the wrong direction. Instead, we should pursue a uniquely American solution, one that builds on free markets, competition and choice.

1. Let individuals control their health care dollars, and free them to choose from a wide variety of health plans and providers.
2. Move away from a health care system dominated by employer-provided health insurance. Health insurance should be personal and portable, controlled by individuals themselves rather than government or an employer. Employment-based insurance hides much of the true cost of health care to consumers, thereby encouraging over-consumption. It also limits consumer choice, since employers get final say over what type of insurance a worker will receive. It means people who don’t receive insurance through work are put at a significant and costly disadvantage. And, of course, it means that if you lose your job, you are likely to end up uninsured as well.
3. Changing from employer to individual insurance requires changing the tax treatment of health insurance. The current system excludes the value of employer-provided insurance from a worker’s taxable income. However, a worker purchasing health insurance on their own must do so with after-tax dollars. This provides a significant tilt towards employer-provided insurance, which should be reversed. Workers should receive a standard deduction, a tax credit, or, better still, large Health Savings Accounts (HSAs) for the purchase of health insurance, regardless of whether they receive it through their job or purchase it on their own.
4. We need to increase competition among both insurers and health providers. People should be allowed to purchase health insurance across state lines. One study estimated that that adjustment alone could cover 17 million uninsured Americans without costing taxpayers a dime.
5. We also need to rethink medical licensing laws to encourage greater competition among providers. Nurse practitioners, physician assistants, midwives, and other non-physician practitioners should have far greater ability to treat patients. Doctors and other health professionals should be able to take their licenses from state to state. We should also be encouraging innovations in delivery such as medical clinics in retail outlets.
6. Congress should give Medicare enrollees a voucher, let them choose any health plan on the market, and let them keep the savings if they choose an economical plan. Medicare could even give larger vouchers to the poor and sick to ensure they could afford coverage.
7. The expansion of “health status insurance” would protect many of those with preexisting conditions. States may also wish to experiment with high risk pools to ensure coverage for those with high cost medical conditions.

The following is the text of my message to the "fishy" email address:

attn: Mr. Macon Phillips, re: fishy motives

Dear Mr. Phillips,

Your recent blog post requesting citizens to report “fishy” internet activity as related to the health care debate was an ill-advised directive. Coercing citizens to spy on each other was the hallmark of the Stasi (the East German secret police). This appears to be an act of desperation by the Presidential Administration.

The title of your blog post is “Facts Are Stubborn Things”. If you are interested in studying the facts of the health care debate I suggest that you read the following article:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204619004574324361508092006.html

You will also find that the following website is a comprehensive source for facts on the health care debate:

http://healthcare.cato.org/

I agree with the following Cato Institute health care reform recommendations:

A government takeover of the health care system, as proposed by the president and some in Congress, would be a step in the wrong direction. Instead, we should pursue a uniquely American solution, one that builds on free markets, competition and choice.

1. Let individuals control their health care dollars, and free them to choose from a wide variety of health plans and providers.
2. Move away from a health care system dominated by employer-provided health insurance. Health insurance should be personal and portable, controlled by individuals themselves rather than government or an employer. Employment-based insurance hides much of the true cost of health care to consumers, thereby encouraging over-consumption. It also limits consumer choice, since employers get final say over what type of insurance a worker will receive. It means people who don’t receive insurance through work are put at a significant and costly disadvantage. And, of course, it means that if you lose your job, you are likely to end up uninsured as well.
3. Changing from employer to individual insurance requires changing the tax treatment of health insurance. The current system excludes the value of employer-provided insurance from a worker’s taxable income. However, a worker purchasing health insurance on their own must do so with after-tax dollars. This provides a significant tilt towards employer-provided insurance, which should be reversed. Workers should receive a standard deduction, a tax credit, or, better still, large Health Savings Accounts (HSAs) for the purchase of health insurance, regardless of whether they receive it through their job or purchase it on their own.
4. We need to increase competition among both insurers and health providers. People should be allowed to purchase health insurance across state lines. One study estimated that that adjustment alone could cover 17 million uninsured Americans without costing taxpayers a dime.
5. We also need to rethink medical licensing laws to encourage greater competition among providers. Nurse practitioners, physician assistants, midwives, and other non-physician practitioners should have far greater ability to treat patients. Doctors and other health professionals should be able to take their licenses from state to state. We should also be encouraging innovations in delivery such as medical clinics in retail outlets.
6. Congress should give Medicare enrollees a voucher, let them choose any health plan on the market, and let them keep the savings if they choose an economical plan. Medicare could even give larger vouchers to the poor and sick to ensure they could afford coverage.
7. The expansion of “health status insurance” would protect many of those with preexisting conditions. States may also wish to experiment with high risk pools to ensure coverage for those with high cost medical conditions.

Lessons from China

The following article discusses the government of China’s economic stimulus policy:

http://www.reuters.com/article/businessNews/idUSTRE5740B620090805?feedType=RSS&feedName=businessNews

These paragraphs are significant:

• But Huang Yiping, a professor at Beijing University and former chief Asia economist at Citigroup, argued that the government needed to adjust its fiscal policies to prevent the economy from becoming too reliant on public investment.
• 
  "The government should be more cautious in approving new projects in the coming months, as the investment rush could sow the seeds of an increase in bad bank loans and could also crowd out private sector investment," Huang said at a forum.
• 
  Beijing wants to keep its budget deficit to within 3 percent of GDP this year, a target that economists say will be tough to hit given current spending and revenue trends. The deficit in 2008 was about 0.5 percent of GDP.

This article discusses the Congressional Budget Office forecast for the US deficit:

http://www.reuters.com/article/topNews/idUSTRE52J3SR20090320

• The Congressional Budget Office forecast a record $1.8 trillion deficit for the fiscal year that ends September 30 under Obama's budget proposal -- or 13.1 percent of gross domestic product.

Which country is presenting a brighter future for its children? Is it the USA with a budget deficit of 13.1% of GDP or communist China with a budget deficit of 3% of GDP?

Preferential treatment

The following news article reports on a new policy agenda envisioned by Chicago’s Mayor Richard M. Daley:

http://newsblogs.chicagotribune.com/clout_st/2009/07/daley-backs-business-setasides-for-gayowned-firms.html

The text of this article is as follows:

• 
  Mayor Richard Daley said today he would support an effort to give preferential treatment in city contracting to businesses owned by gays and lesbians.
  The city already sets aside a portion of contracts for businesses owned by blacks, Hispanics, Asians and women. Now Ald. Thomas Tunney (44th), the City Council’s openly gay member, wants companies owned by gays and lesbians to enjoy the same consideration in doing business with the city.
  “I think it’s good,” said Daley, who enjoys strong support from gays and lesbians. “It helps small businesses. It helps businesses grow in the city, and that’s what you want.”

How does this help small business?

How will the City Administration verify that the owners of business are gays and lesbians? Will there be a gay and lesbian audit committee? If there will be an audit committee then will the committee have a list of sexual activities that the business owners must perform in order to qualify as gays and lesbians?

"the moral thing to do"

The Wall Street Journal published an article about Charlie Rangel chairman of the Ways and Means Committee:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB20001424052970203946904574300013592601036.html

This article describes Charlie Rangel’s various violations of federal tax reporting, New York housing assistance rules and Washington DC real estate tax rules. The following are some of the highlights:

• 
  Ever notice that those who endorse high taxes and those who actually pay them aren’t the same people? Consider the curious case of Ways and Means Chairman Charlie Rangel, who is leading the charge for a new 5.4-percentage point income tax surcharge and recently called it “the moral thing to do.” About his own tax liability he seems less, well, fervent.
• 
  Mr. Rangel soon admitted having failed to report rental income of $75,000 over the years. First he blamed his wife for the oversight because he said she was supposed to be managing the property. Then he blamed the language barrier. “Every time I thought I was getting somewhere, they’d start speaking Spanish,” Mr. Rangel explained.
• 
  Besides not paying those pesky taxes, Mr. Rangel had other reasons for wanting to hide income. As the tenant of four rent-stabilized apartments in Harlem, the Congressman needed to keep his annual reported income below $175,000, lest he be ineligible as a hardship case for rent control. (He also used one of the apartments as an office in violation of rent-control rules, but that’s another story.)
• 
  The National Legal and Policy Center also says it has confirmed that Mr. Rangel owned a home in Washington from 1971-2000 and during that time claimed a “homestead” exemption that allowed him to save on his District of Columbia property taxes. However, the homestead exemption only applies to a principal residence, and the Washington home could not have qualified as such since Mr. Rangel’s rent-stabilized apartments in New York have the same requirement.

Yes you read that correctly Charlie Rangel lives in a rent controlled apartment in New York. How about Charlie’s comment about the language barrier causing him to understate his income? When he was having these conversations why not just "press 1 for English"?

It is unlikely that the registered voters in Charlie Rangel’s 15th congressional district would ever vote him out of office. There is one avenue for Charlie to be removed from office:

• 
  The House Ethics Committee is investigating Mr. Rangel on no fewer than six separate issues, including his failure to report the no-interest loan on his Punta Cana villa and his use of rent-stabilized apartments. It is also investigating his fund raising for the Charles B. Rangel Center for Public Service at City College of New York. New York labor attorney Theodore Kheel, one of the principal owners of the Punta Cana resort, is an important donor to the Rangel Center.

Email the members of the House Ethics Committee. Let them know that you expect a hearing on Charlie Rangel to begin soon. Also let them know that if the charges against Charlie Rangel are true then you expect the Committee to recommend expulsion from congress as punishment.

For more details on the Charlie Rangel scandal, view this website: http://www.nlpc.org/

Friends of Angelo

Here is another example of your government officials enriching themselves at your expense:

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_SENATORS_MORTGAGES?SITE=OHWIL&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT

Here are some of the details:

• Despite their denials, influential Democratic Sens. Kent Conrad and Chris Dodd were told from the start they were getting VIP mortgage discounts from one of the nation's largest lenders, the official who handled their loans has told Congress in secret testimony.
  Dodd got two Countrywide mortgages in 2003, refinancing his home in Connecticut and another residence in Washington. Conrad's two Countrywide mortgages in 2004 were for a beach house in Delaware and an eight-unit apartment building in Bismarck in his home state of North Dakota.
• 
  Robert Feinberg, who worked in Countrywide's VIP section, told congressional investigators last month that the two senators were made aware that "who you know is basically how you're coming in here."
• Both senators were VIP borrowers in the program known as "friends of Angelo." Angelo Mozilo was chief executive of Countrywide, which played a big part in the foreclosure crisis triggered by defaults on subprime loans. The Calabasas, Calif.-based company was bought last July by Bank of America Corp. for about $2.5 billion.
• Countrywide VIPs, Feinberg told the committees, received discounts on rates, fees and points. Dodd received a break when Countrywide counted both his Connecticut and Washington homes as primary owner-occupied residences - a fiction, according to Feinberg. Conrad received a type of commercial loan that he was told Countrywide didn't offer.
• 
  "The simple fact that Angelo Mozilo and other high-ranking executives at Countrywide were personally making sure Mr. Feinberg handled their loans right, is proof in itself that the senators knew they were getting sweetheart deals," said Feinberg's principal attorney, Anthony Salerno.

Senator Christopher Dodd is a US Senator from Connecticut and the Chairmen of the U.S. Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs.

Kent Conrad is a US Senator from North Dakota and is a member of the Senate Committee on Finance.

We must convince voters in Connecticut and North Dakota that Dodd and Conrad must be defeated in the next election cycle.

THROW THE BUMS OUT!

TAKE TWO ASPIRIN AND CALL ME WHEN YOUR CANCER IS STAGE 4

One of our friends sent me the following health care essay by Ann Coulter:



http://docs.google.com/fileview?id=0BzCcaHAnYX28MDNmZTZkZDMtNDI1NC00MGJlLWIyMWEtNDdhNDNhMDM4MTRh&hl=en

This essay is brief but gets directly to the root of the problem. Using common sense and logic Ann describes the current state of the health care system. Also using common sense and logic she points out the inherent flaws in introducing more government intervention into the health care system.

Consider the following four paragraphs:

• The reason seeing a doctor is already more like going to the DMV, and less like going to the Apple "Genius Bar," is that the government decided health care was too important to be left to the free market.

• The whole idea of insurance is to insure against catastrophes: You buy insurance in case your house burns down -- not so you can force other people in your plan to pay for your maid. You buy car insurance in case you're in a major accident, not so everyone in the plan shares the cost of gas.

• Even two decades after the collapse of liberals' beloved Soviet Union, they can't grasp that it's easier and cheaper to obtain any service provided by capitalism than any service provided under socialism.

• Instead of making health care more like the DMV, how about we make it more like grocery stores? Give the poor and tough cases health stamps and let the rest of us buy health care -- and health insurance -- on the free market.

The two most highly regulated industries in our economy are finance and health care. We have been told that the problems of the financial sector must be cured by more regulation. Now we are being told that the health care system is broken and can only be cured by more regulation.

We must fight back against this every expanding government intervention. Do not hesitate to punctuate your arguments with the following quotation:

GOVERNMENT IS NOT THE SOULTION TO OUR PROBLEMS, GOVERNMENT IS THE PROBLEM!

(click on the above quotation to view a video)

Freedom in health care

The Cato Institute has started an ad campaign to educate the public on the subject of health care reform. You can view the ads at the following website:



http://healthcare.cato.org/campaign

The Cato Institute is promoting a commonsense approach to healthcare reform:

• 
  There is a better, uniquely American solution: freedom. Freedom to choose your doctor and health plan. Freedom to spend your health care dollars as you choose. Freedom to make your own medical decisions. Freedom to keep a health plan you are satisfied with.

To support the Cato Institute in its efforts to promote freedom in health care follow this link:

https://www.cato.org/support/healthcare/

Health Care or Freedom

The following article by Dr. Thomas Szasz was published on 7/15/09 in the Wall Street Journal Online:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124761945269242551.html

Dr. Szasz makes several interesting points:

• Everyone recognizes that the more fully we wish insurance companies to defray our out of pocket expenses for our car repairs, the higher the premium they will charge for the policy. Yet foregoing reimbursement for trivial or unnecessary health-care costs in return for a more suitable health-care policy is an option unavailable under the present system. Everyone with health insurance is compelled to protect himself from risks, such as alcoholism and erectile dysfunction, that he would willingly shoulder in exchange for a lower premium.
• The idea that every life is infinitely precious and therefore everyone deserves the same kind of optimal medical care is a fine religious sentiment and moral ideal. As political and economic policy, it is vainglorious delusion. Rich and educated people not only receive better goods and services in all areas of life than do poor and uneducated people, they also tend to take better care of themselves and their possessions, which in turn leads to better health. The first requirement for better health care for all is not equal health care for everyone but educational and economic advancement for everyone.
• If we persevere in our quixotic quest for a fetishized medical equality we will sacrifice personal freedom as its price. We will become the voluntary slaves of a "compassionate" government that will provide the same low quality health care to everyone.

The solution to our current problems in the system of health care is less government involvement not more. In our health care decisions as in all other aspects of our lives we must be “free to choose”.

CIA Assassination Program

This is an interesting article discussing the recent action by CIA director Leon Panetta:


http://www.stratfor.com/weekly/20090715_u_s_reaction_cia_assassination_program?utm_source=SWeeklyS&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=090715&utm_content=readmore


The following paragraphs give an overview of this article:

• That a program existed to assassinate al Qaeda leaders should certainly come as no surprise to anyone.


• Furthermore, since 2002, the CIA has conducted scores of strikes against al Qaeda targets in Pakistan using unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) like the MQ-1 Predator and the larger MQ-9 Reaper. These strikes have dramatically increased over the past two years and the pace did not slacken when the Obama administration came to power in January. So far in 2009 there have been more than two dozen UAV strikes in Pakistan alone.


• During the 2004 and 2008 presidential elections in the United States, every major candidate, including Barack Obama, stated that they would seek to kill bin Laden and destroy al Qaeda. Indeed, on the campaign trail, Obama was quite vocal in his criticism of the Bush administration for not doing more to go after al Qaeda’s leadership in Pakistan. This means that, regardless of who is in the White House, it is U.S. policy to go after individual al Qaeda members as well as the al Qaeda organization.


• In light of these facts, it would appear that there was nothing particularly controversial about the covert assassination program itself, and the controversy that has arisen over it has more to do with the failure to report covert activities to Congress. The political uproar and the manner in which the program was canceled, however, will likely have a negative impact on CIA morale and U.S. counterterrorism efforts.


• Furthermore, there are certain parts of the world — including some countries considered to be U.S. allies — where it is very difficult for the United States to conduct counterterrorism operations at all. These difficulties have been seen in past cases where the governments have refused U.S. requests to detain terrorist suspects or have alerted the suspects to the U.S. interest in them, compromising U.S. intelligence efforts and allowing the suspects to flee.


• The fear that details of a sensitive program designed to assassinate al Qaeda operatives in foreign countries could be leaked was probably the reason for the Bush administration’s decision to withhold knowledge of the program from the U.S. Congress, even though amendments to the National Security Act of 1947 mandate the reporting of most covert intelligence programs to Congress. Given the imaginative legal guidance provided by Bush administration lawyers regarding subjects such as enhanced interrogation, it would not be surprising to find that White House lawyers focused on loopholes in the National Security Act reporting requirements.


• In April we discussed how some of the early actions of the Obama administration were having a chilling effect on U.S. counterterrorism programs and personnel. Expanding the minimum reporting requirements under the National Security Act will serve to turn the thermostat down several additional notches, as did Panetta’s overt killing of the covert program. It is one thing to quietly kill a controversial program; it is quite another to repudiate the CIA in public. In addition to damaging the already low morale at the agency, Panetta has announced in a very public manner that the United States has taken one important tool entirely out of the counterterrorism toolbox: Al Qaeda no longer has to fear the possibility of clandestine American assassination teams.

The actions of our Presidential Administration and Congress are diminishing the ability of our security agencies to pursue and eliminate terrorist threats. Congress does not need and should not be given broader oversight powers.

The decline and fall of the Wall Street Empire

The following article is by Luigi Zingales a business school professor at the University of Chicago. (As you may remember President Obama was a faculty member of the University of Chicago Law School.) This article discusses the ebb and flow of financial centers:

http://www.forbes.com/2009/07/13/wall-street-changed-opinions-contributors-luigi-zingales.html

Professor Zingales' outlook for the future of New York as the financial capital of the world can be summed up in these 2 parpgraphs:

• The biggest threat of all to the Big Apple's financial supremacy, however, comes from Washington. The Founding Fathers wisely decided that the nation's political capital should be separate from its financial capital (in both senses of the word). Now this splendid segregation has ended. If the outcome of the Chrysler bankruptcy is any indication, Washington is willing to flex its muscle in financial decisions, altering the substance of contracts freely agreed to by private parties. In so doing, the national government has undermined the certainty of the rule of law, which was the American capital market's strongest asset.
• 
  Unfortunately, since Washington is the source of the problem, New York City can do little by itself to defend its position. Perhaps the city's best bet is to offer favorable tax treatment to the financial industry--but to do that, it had better first put its finances in order.

Strategic Calculus and the Afghan War

The following link will take you to a very interesting article from Stratfor Global Intelligence about the strategy of waging a counterinsurgency war:

http://www.stratfor.com/weekly/20090713_strategic_calculus_and_afghan_war?utm_source=GWeeklyS&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=090713&utm_content=readmore

This article is very interesting and the subject matter is exceptionally relevant when considering our course of action in Afghanistan. I have not provided any outtakes as this article should be read in its entirety.

Boycott GM and Chrysler

The following opinion article was published on the Cato Institute site today:

http://www.cato-at-liberty.org/2009/07/09/strike-a-blow-for-freedom-dont-buy-gm/

This paragraph sums up the argument:

• But in all seriousness, this legislative effort is an affront to common sense and an insult to our heritage of free enterprise and capitalism. It is stunning enough to watch the slow-motion nationalization of an iconic behemoth like GM, but Congressional meddling at the operational level to stop the company from following through on an obviously wise cost-cutting measures should be a wake up call to all Americans that we are doomed to politically-driven micromanagement of the economy–into the ground no less–unless we register our disgust and dissent now!

The Government’s solution to the Chrysler saga sounds like the punch line of a joke. It would be funny if it wasn’t costing all of us billions of our hard earned dollars. Chrysler is in financial trouble due to management inefficiencies and low labor productivity. The solution that we all are contributing to is to have the Federal Government take over the Board of Directors, then give the UAW a controlling ownership interest and finally bring in an Italian automaker to manage the company. Incredible! The Federal Government, the UAW and an Italian automaker, to solve inefficiency and low productivity.

GM and Chrysler have become vampire corporations and will feed on the US Treasury for years to come. It is time to drive a stake through the hearts of these living dead corporations before they drain us of what little savings we have left.

An admission of guilt from Timothy Geithner

In an appearance before the House Financial Services Committee and the House Agriculture Committee today Timothy Geithner made a startling admission. The following article gives the overview of this testimony:

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_FINANCIAL_OVERHAUL?SITE=OHWIL&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT

Geithner’s admission:

1. …the ease with which derivatives were bought and sold in an era of easy credit encouraged financial institutions and investors to take on too much risk.
2. The federal regulatory system "failed in its most basic responsibility to produce a stable and resilient system for providing credit and protecting consumers and investors," he said.
   

The Secretary of the Treasury has finally admitted that the Federal Government was responsible for the current financial crisis. Statement 1 above is an admission that easy credit encouraged financial institutions and investors to take on too much risk. Statement 2 above is an admission that the most basic responsibility of the federal regulatory system is to produce a stable and resilient system for providing credit and protecting consumers and investors.

The Federal Reserve was then and is now guilty of a reckless policy of easy credit. In an effort to support maximum employment the Federal Reserve created a financial bubble in the housing market by forcing interest rates to below market levels. The actions of the Federal Reserve were compounded by the expansion of Federal intervention in the US housing mortgage market. The Federal regulators ignored obvious acts of fraud by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

His testimony is designed to convince congress that the Federal financial regulators should be granted more powers. To prevent future financial bubbles the Federal financial reform that should be enacted is a rewriting of the Federal Reserve mandate. The Federal Reserve’s current mandate is as follows:

"conducting the nation’s monetary policy by influencing the monetary and credit conditions in the economy in pursuit of maximum employment, stable prices, and moderate long-term interest rates"

The new mandate should eliminate the pursuit of maximum employment clause. If the Federal Reserve only concentrated on stable prices and moderate long-term interest rates we would have a smoother business cycle without the huge financial bubbles that we have suffered in recent years.

The following quote from Milton Freidman is listed in the “Quotation section” in the right column of this Blog page:

"Inflation is always and everywhere a monetary phenomenon in the sense that it is and can be produced only by a more rapid increase in the quantity of money than in output. ... A steady rate of monetary growth at a moderate level can provide a framework under which a country can have little inflation and much growth. It will not produce perfect stability; it will not produce heaven on earth; but it can make an important contribution to a stable economic society."