Wednesday, August 19. 2009
 16,000 year-old clay figure. In the Sabuniye tumulus. h/t, Jungleman. They always call them "mother goddesses" but I think it was just old-time T&A.
The Cahaba River. I knew nothing about this.
Forget Woodstock's anniversary. Tim Blair notes that this was the 45th anniversary of this very good stuff.
But it's groovy, man, that Arlo is a conservative. Like, far out.
Dick Armey: We'll march on Washington
Ban Ki-Moonbat Vies With Al Gore in Hysterical Self-Parody
Barone: Dear Young Obama Voter
Liberalism: Because we know what's best for you
Why the heck would they bring Howard Dean into this? Even more wacky, they bring in the E Word. Also, was that public option removal thing a head fake? What would Alinsky do? He would lie, wouldn't he? The ends justify the means.
Hey. What happened to the Anti-War Movement? Ah, my naive young friend. Now you see how the game is played.
From Yalie Never Yet Melted on Yale:
We have serious problems with expertise in the elite circles of the contemporary intelligentsia. Its members’ utter and complete lack of both testosterone and common sense tends to preclude the possibility of the combination of mastery of any particular specialized topic with demonstrated skill in the manipulation of words and symbols being associated with sound judgement or manly behavior.
Why Obama's Ratings Are Sinking: Americans will put up with a lot. But not with someone who imperils their future.
Dr. Sanity (I thought she retired from blogging):
All thuggish leftists and collectivists, including many of those we have elected to represent us in Congress; as well as the Taliban and other Islamofascist movements, intuitively understand that by controlling the education of the young, they can have an endless supply of fodder for their revolutionary utopia.
Controlling health care, as was pointed out in the previous post, helps them control everyone's life in the present. But, when they completely control education, then the political left will control the future and will have achieved their final victory.
BTW, "Hasta la victoria siempre" was the signoff used by Ernesto "Ché" Guevara in the last letter he wrote to Fidel Castro.
Dr. Melissa:
Who likes being treated like an idiot? No one. And yet, the Left and Liberals in general, speak to the American people like they’re morons. The absolute worst is Al Gore. The most insulting thing is the guy ain’t that smart and he comes across as a doltish buffoon and still has the nerve to lecture stupid Americans. It’s annoying...
And so, rather than engage Sarah Palin on the merits, even the editors at the National Review get lost in what they consider hyperbole. Elites hate hyperbole (except when they’re employing it to chastise the masses into using fluorescent lighting). The form-police ignore the substance because the messenger doesn’t have an air of hauteur and the Ivy league parchment required to engage in the “conversation”.
WSJ:
Right now the entire Beltway—including the West Wing—seems obsessed with finding out what went wrong with the administration's sales pitch. No one appears to think the problem might be substance. Or that the vague answers and vitriolic rhetoric we get from Democrats such as Mr. Reid convey a sense that the plans they favor will not hold up under public scrutiny.
Take this AARP and shove it
Goon Squads: Obama, ACORN, and the SEIU? They Go Way Back
Tuesday, August 18. 2009
Our contributor Roger de Hauteville, former King of Sicily and a Ted Kennedy fan, emailed me this artistic effort:
From The Panel, in the WSJ:
In fact, the logic of this moment was inevitable. Once government got its fingers on the health-care system, it was only a matter of time before it took it over completely. Now there's one limited pool of dollars while the costs are endless.
"You have the luxury of thinking only of yourself, but we have to think about everyone," says the professor of ethics. He's a celebrity and waxes eloquent every Tuesday and Thursday on Bill Maher Tonight. "This isn't the free market, after all. We can't just leave fairness to chance. We have to use reason. Is it better for society as a whole that we allocate limited resources for your operation when we might use the same dollars to bring many more high quality years to someone, say, younger?"
"I'm only 62."
He smiles politely.
"Look, it's not just about me," you argue desperately. "My daughter's engaged to get married next year. She'll be heartbroken if I'm not there for it."
"Maybe you should have thought of that before you put on so much weight," says the medical officer. "I mean, you people have been told time and again . . ."
But the chairwoman is uncomfortable with his censorious tone and cuts him off, saying more gently, "Perhaps your daughter could move the wedding up a little."
Read the whole thing. I like the way Mark Steyn put it on the radio today: "They want to nationalize your body." Yes, while pretending to do you a favor.
All doctors know this: The "Preventive Care" Myth from Krauthammer.
Preventive care is expensive, and has a very low yield. Things like mammograms do not exist because they are cost-effective: they exist because people want them.
A flower carpet at Biltmore, Asheville, NC
Are we having a "conversation" yet? Althouse
Bikinis, banned in Britain
Health care reform is about control, not health
Some lady figured out how to make money from the housing price crash. Ain't free markets amazing?
In which Mike Lupica reveals himself to be a non-serious person. Related from Riehl: It's all because he's black
Tim Pawlenty steps up to the plate
A doc responds to Obama: Am Thinker
Data about the last election, including this one:
The researchers found that 11 percent saw Obama’s race as a reason to vote against him, but roughly three times as many saw his race as a reason to vote for him.
I knew we were ordinary. Gallup: Conservatives now outnumber Libs in all 50 states. People just need the occasional reminder of what the Left tried to do to them.
Senators want Cap and Tax set aside
Tiger wonders Why, precisely, Ivy League Democrats think that identifying with African kleptocratic dictators will help either the people of Africa or the United States is beyond me.
At Doug Ross:
• jimfromthefoothills firmly states, "Remember, we are going to rebuild every school, bridge and road in the country. We will fix healthcare. We will restore the constitution, end illegal wars [and] reduce emissions of greenhouse gasses." ......... And then luscious chocolate-chip cookies will drop from the sky, multi-colored unicorns will everyone give free rides to work and school, and Karl Rove will get frogmarched out of Fox News in primetime. As an aside, Jim is still living in the foothills and apparently ate some bad possum before posting.
There is only one jurisdiction in which self-identified liberals outnumber conservatives: Washington, D.C. That figures. They feed off of us.
I'd like to see Barbara Boxer defeated. She irritates me.
If congressional Dems stay on this track, they will have problems. As neoneo discusses, it's the shocking radicalization of the center right. A quote:
People tend to be more driven to protest things that affect them personally rather than abstractions or faraway problems in distant lands. And it’s hard to imagine a government program that promises (or threatens) to affect people more personally than the health care reform bill, or one that has been more suspect in its claims and more murky in its lack of transparency. Therefore it should not be the least bit surprising that there’s a lot of energy in the fight against it.
What is surprising—to the Left—is that now they’re the objects rather than the perpetrators of the outrage. Their charge that opponents are astroturfers is partly a cynical ploy. But I suspect it’s also partly sincere, because they are experiencing shock and resultant denial that a populist movement has arisen against the Left itself.
Need a job? Here's one.
My college friends from Sha-Na-Na did OK in life. Glad to hear it. No slouches.
No, you could not keep your medical insurance if you like it. It's a lie.
A reprise of Dr. Zeke Emanuel: Docs take the Hippocratic Oath too seriously. Would you send a friend to him?
Is ObamaCare constitutional? Not at all, but who cares these days? That old Constitution was made for strong men and women. Speaking of pussies, here's one. And here's a brave pol who should also lose his job.
An ex-insurance guy has become an emotional crusader against private insurance companies. Trouble is, if we end up with a government monopoly he will have many more complaints. And there will be no exit. The No Exit and no choice is what folks fear most, I believe.
Real Health Reform: Republicans have a chance to advance some market-oriented reform ideas. Yuval Levin
Viking:
Color me green unsurprised - The Truth About Cars: "The Cash for Clunkers program is a car industry bailout dressed up as a green initiative."
Dick Morris on the seniors:
The legislation still plans to achieve 40% of its savings from cuts in Medicare, slicing reimbursement rates to doctors and hospitals encouraging them shortchange their elderly patients as a matter of economic necessity and shrinking further the population of doctors. The standards and protocols of the newly established Federal Health Board are just as likely to direct the denial of care to seniors for such surgeries as hip and knee replacements and even coronary artery bypass as before the Obama retreat.
A prediction of civil war in Germany. Gates. In a way, it looks as if it has already begun.
Coyote:
I am confused as to why a preference for overpriced organic foods and a preference for government monopoly control of health care are necessarily correlated at the 1.0 level. But apparently they are. Maybe its a common desire to overpay for basic necessities?
I hear too much of this sort of ignorant nonsense from Greenies. How is shutting off your tap in England supposed to help people in deserts get water? As the Englishman asks "Where does it go?"
Legal, but unbelievably stupid. The ignorant or excitement-seeking reporter refers to that A-15 as an assault rifle. Maybe it once was one, but that rifle will not do full auto. Here's full auto (via Am Digest):
Monday, August 17. 2009
Jay Cost at RCP: Obama misread his mandate. This essay is on the money. The Dems are acting as if the whole country were like San Francisco. One quote:
...the Obama administration has acted as if those hagiographical comparisons to FDR were apt. It let its liberal allies from the coasts drive the agenda and write the key bills, and it's played straw man semantic games to marginalize the opposition. For all the President's moaning in The Audacity of Hope about how the Bush administration was railroading the minority into accepting far right proposals - he was prepared to let his Northeastern and Pacific Western liberal allies do exactly the same thing: write bills that excite the left, infuriate the right, and scare the center; insist on speedy passage through the Congress; and use budget reconciliation to ram it through in case the expected super majority did not emerge.
Why you won't see medical tort reform (h/t, reader):
Despite the top sellers, the NYT still refuses to review conservative books. Very foolish of them. Thoughtful reviews and critiques would be a good thing.
The last swine flu vaccine in the 80s killed more people than the flu did. Now Guillain-Barre returns with the new flu vaccine. I think I'll pass.
Are the days of the classic car over? I kinda think so.
"Dutch embrace Islamic names." That's one way to put it, but I can think of other explanations.
Why Martha's Vineyard?
The tactic of manufactured crises. Am Thinker
Cry havoc, and leaf through some books on war with Jules, overlooking scenic Cape Cod Bay.
Putting the heat on ACORN. I don't mind political advocacy groups. I just mind when they are paid with my tax dollars, like ACORN. It's a huge scandal, but the MSM will not touch it.
Via Front Page:
It’s a new age of irony that we live in. The president is a self-described community organizer who used his skills at grassroots activism to launch a populist movement that swept him into office. Now his administration, along with its Congressional allies, is worried about a determined civic movement that is turning against it.
The folks turning up for the town-halls may be maligned by their elected officials. They may be painted as rage-filled lunatics by the media. But unfortunately for the Obama administration and its transformational vision for health care, they aren’t going away.
The O hires campaign ad firms to promote government medicine. That had better not be on my nickel.
Sissy remembers The women now went willingly into the field. Women like to do for their families. So do real men.
What's the deal? Dr. Emanuel isn't my doctor. He has no right to make my medical decisions.
The evil, evil anti-O racism of Tinky Winky. Yes, I think the O is a joke. I think all politicians are jokes.
From The American:
Hollywood seems to think that the government is either screwing up the country because it doesn't know what it is doing or it is destroying the country because it is trampling on the rights of its citizens. However, the people who hold these convictions are the exact same people who want to turn over the operation of all the key components of the country to the government to manage. Health care, energy, education, the economy itself -- these and dozens of other critical features of American society should be directed, according to the Left, from the hallowed halls in which the bumblers and betrayers work.
Who are the uninsured and should we pay to cover them?
Stunning Freudian slip by the MSM
How Canada is saving money on government medical care
Quoted at Carpe Diem:
Comprehensive health insurance is such an ingrained element of our thinking, we forget that its rise to dominance is relatively recent. Modern group health insurance was introduced in 1929, and employer-based insurance began to blossom during World War II, when wage freezes prompted employers to expand other benefits as a way of attracting workers. Still, as late as 1954, only a minority of Americans had health insurance. That’s when Congress passed a law making employer contributions to employee health plans tax-deductible without making the resulting benefits taxable to employees. This seemingly minor tax benefit not only encouraged the spread of catastrophic insurance, but had the accidental effect of making employer-funded health insurance the most affordable option (after taxes) for financing pretty much any type of health care. There was nothing natural or inevitable about the way our system developed: employer-based, comprehensive insurance crowded out alternative methods of paying for health-care expenses only because of a poorly considered tax benefit passed half a century ago.
Emails to House members overwhelm website. Keep 'em coming.
Enjoyed our Barrister identifying government and politicians as a powerful special interest: the most powerful one. Wish I had had that insight.
ACLU: Prior restraint for religious speech. This is insane, sick, evil, despicable. Related: More on Yale's voluntary restraint of speech
Who is really doing the astroturfing? As noted at Insty: "Have you ever seen a clearer case of projection in your life?”
Orthopedists slam the O for "blurring reality". Nice euphemism, docs.
Wizbang:
For the last year and a half, President Obama's arguments in favor of his health care reforms have consisted of little more than recycling every popular myth dreamed up by socialized medicine advocates to illustrate how wretched our private health care system has become/
Sunday, August 16. 2009
Even if you are not a fan of Rush, I think he nails it here. Worth a couple of minutes -
He makes some points which are similar to what Riehl has posted re the O:
What appears to be a lack of attention paid to political reality is actually a single-minded determination to ignore what Americans want and to use the tools of community organizing, intimidation, coercion and, most importantly, deception to achieve his goals.
And
Obama is not a man born to, nor interested in serving. He is someone convinced he exists to lead you to where he believes things, or America should be. Unfortunately, his unusual upbringing, life experience and classroom experience left him thinking unlike the majority of Americans. He is an elitist, through and through, not the man of the people he pretends to be.
Carter had similar traits, though of a different sort. He was self-righteous, while Obama is simply pretentious. In some ways that makes Carter the better man. What a frightening thought. At least Carter's ideas and goals had a noble quality, even if they were naive. That isn't the case with Obama.
Ultimately, his goals are selfish, or self-centered. Other than his own thinking, or the thinking of other liberal elites, he has no truly great tradition of thought to back him up. This is the self-centered and ultimately disastrous mindset of the post-sixties generation, bought into the mindset that went before and turned into an intellectualism it doesn't deserve to be.
“Grunts” are the front-line fighting Marines and soldiers. My friend R.J. DelVecchio is moved by the following article by a leading commentator on, and supporter of, the tasks faced by Grunts in Iraq and Afghanistan. Their comments are not intended as, nor should they be read as, despondent about either our mission or prospects. They, however, should be read as a necessary corrective to the thinking of those who feel that wars can be fought in comforts or oblivious to their primary necessities, especially that of crippling and killing the enemy. This is a long post, and for those who care to read it may help clarify our dilemmas in Afghanistan.
Here’s DelVecchio’s email:
Here is the question- if we are going to make our guys always carry 70+ (often up to 100) lbs of stuff all the time (as if there is no chance of chopper resupply of anything), and they have to use a Rule of Engagement sheet that runs over a page single-space last time I heard, and they have to worry about what some lawyer back at battalion will do to them if he even thinks they may have violated the ROE, and best of all, now the bad guys can fire at will from villages or buildings where there just may be civilians and we cannot fire back, and we can't really just use our masters of the night aircraft to kill anyone they see coming across the border into Afghanistan so that the people in the Pakistan bases of the Taliban finally figure out that to even start that journey is to die.... then have we put ourselves again in a situation where as long as the
other guys are determined enough to stretch this out long enough, eventually enough people at home and in Congress will decide they don't want to play this game anymore and we bring our guys home and everything they have fought, suffered, and died for goes to hell anyhow?
I always tell the high school classes I lecture at that the lessons of Viet Nam are three simple rules-
1- do not send Americans to fight somewhere unless you have a clear and
reasonably simple goal of what it is you want to get done
2- do not send Americans to go into that fight unless you have a pretty
good idea of what it will take to win not just the battles, but the whole war
3- do not sent Americans to go and fight and die in that war unless you are fully prepared to do whatever it really takes to win it
If that means using napalm sometimes, laying down minefields sometimes, using herbicides to kill foliage or crops sometimes, (none of which are now allowed to us) and accepting the sad fact that when the enemy deliberately hides among and uses the local population as a major tactic, collateral damage is utterly unavoidable if you are to really fight them, then those are the things you should be doing.
The most moral thing you do in any war is fight hard, as hard as you can, to smash the enemy and get it over with. A short nasty and intense war with mistakes and some tragic collateral damage is infinitely better than the long drawn out "let's be nice and careful and not upset anyone in the international community" attempt at war that ends in failure anyhow. That seems to be a lesson that has been utterly lost in America today.
That is what I think.... what about you?
S/F
Del
Here’s the column by Bing West from Small Wars Journal website (a link to his bio is at the end):
Tactics or Strategy?
I came back from my latest month in the field in Afghanistan disquieted about our basic military mission. Is the military mission to engage, push back and dismantle the Taliban networks, with population protection being a tactic to gain tips and local militia, or is the military mission to build a nation by US soldiers protecting the widespread population, with engagements against the Taliban as a byproduct?
It appears our strategy is nation-building, with fighting and dismantling of the Taliban a secondary consideration. Thus, the number of enemy killed will not be counted, let alone used as a metric. This non-kinetic theory of counterinsurgency has persuaded the liberal community in America to support or at least not to vociferously oppose the war. But we have to maintain a balance between messages that gain domestic support and messages that direct battlefield operations.
We must understand what our riflemen do in Afghanistan every day. The answer is they conduct combat patrols. That underlies all their other activities. They go out with rifles to engage and kill the enemy. That is how they protect the population. For our generals to stress that the war is 80% non-kinetic discounts the basic activity of our soldiers. Although crime isn’t eradicated by locking up criminals, we expect our police to make arrests to keep the streets safe. Similarly, our riflemen are trained to engage the enemy. That’s how they protect the population. If we’re not out in the countryside night and day – and we’re not – then the Taliban can move around as they please and intimidate or persuade the population.
I’m not arguing that we Americans can ever dominate the Taliban gangs. There’s a level of understanding and accommodation among Afghans in the countryside that culturally surpasses our understanding. During the May poppy harvest, the shooting stops on both sides and men from far and wide head to the fields to participate in the harvest. That’s an Afghan thing. Only the Afghans can figure out what sort of society and leaders they want.
That said, we should strive to do a better job of what we are doing for as long as we are there. I condensed several hours of firefights I filmed during various patrols into the 30-second clip I posted here on 10 August (Not a Tactical Hurdle). The purpose is to illustrate a tactical problem that is strategic in its dimensions. Simply put, our ground forces are not inflicting heavy losses on the enemy. However, the annual bill for the US military in Afghanistan exceeds $70 billion, with another four to six billion for development. We’ve already spent $38 billion on Afghan reconstruction. Congress may eventually balk at spending such sums year after year. The problem is we’re liable to be gradually pulled out while the Taliban is intact. Nation-building alone is not sufficient; the Taliban must be disrupted.
Our soldiers only get a small number of chances to engage the enemy. Our battalions average one arrest every two months, and one platoon-sized patrol per day per company that infrequently makes solid contact. On average, a US rifleman will glimpse a Taliban once a month. The Taliban initiate the fights because they know they can escape. Our patrols have firepower but lack mobility. Our soldiers are carrying 70 pounds; a Taliban is carrying ten pounds. The Taliban have the distinct edge in mobility. Because the Taliban are well-concealed and scoot away, our superior firepower does not yield precision aim points to do severe damage.
More senior-level attention must be paid to inflicting severe enemy losses in firefights and to arresting the Taliban, so that their morale and networks are broken. A recent directive forbids applying indirect fires against compounds where civilians might be hiding. That directive upholds human decency and may reduce enemy propaganda. But indirect fires – helicopter gunships and jets – used to be called “precision fires” and gave the US its enormous advantage in combat. Now that such fires are restricted, what provides our advantage when the enemy sensibly fights from compounds? Don’t expect Afghan soldiers to do it for us. We have equipped and trained the Afghans in our image. They are as heavy and slow-moving on the ground as we are, and rely upon our advisors to call in the firepower.
This is my third war. It has the highest level of military scholars. Those scholars who emphasized the concepts of non-kinetic counterinsurgency need also to design concepts that bring more lethality to the ground battlefield. We’re pumping billions into UAVs. Surely we can find technologies and techniques for the grunt.
Bing West’s bio
This may, also, be of interest: Why We Need More Troops in Afghanistan
The question still remains, whether President Obama will pursue half-measures or go full in to accomplish something more possibly lasting.
 I am going for a ride after church on this lovely August day. If I take a bad fall or hit a branch and break my neck, rest assured that I not only have private major medical insurance and thus will be no burden to you, but I also have a living will. If I am permanently wrecked, shoot me. (.45, base of the skull. Closed casket is fine with me anyway, because I hate having people staring at me whether I am living or dead unless they are shapely 20 year-old blonds. Also, undertaker take note: I am allergic to Formaldehyde.) I would do the same favor for a horse or a dog - and I have done so.
This a quote from Acton:
In a fast-paced society, we have a tendency to leap past the basic questions into a morass of detail. Single payer or government as one provider among many? Mandates requiring every citizen to buy health insurance? Control over utilization by some board of experts? These are all important questions, but they should come after a consideration of our core values. The United States prides itself on being a nation with citizens possessed of a freedom given by God and thus not subject to the whims of human government.
The great Wilhelm Roepke, architect of West Germany’s miraculous post-WWII economic recovery, viewed the tendency toward ever larger government with alarm. He correctly ascertained that the more areas of life the government brings under its responsibility, the more it will eventually dictate the basic conditions of those areas of life. Democracy combined with a lack of appreciation for human independence from the government results in a “pre-totalitarian” society.
It is a sober and somber essay.
Related: I think Whole Foods is a joke and a half - and a rip off joint for the Volvo and Chardonnay set - but their CEO gets it about medical insurance. Good on him. As he points out:
 Health care is a service that we all need, but just like food and shelter it is best provided through voluntary and mutually beneficial market exchanges. A careful reading of both the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution will not reveal any intrinsic right to health care, food or shelter. That's because there isn't any. This "right" has never existed in America
Even in countries like Canada and the U.K., there is no intrinsic right to health care. Rather, citizens in these countries are told by government bureaucrats what health-care treatments they are eligible to receive and when they can receive them. All countries with socialized medicine ration health care by forcing their citizens to wait in lines to receive scarce treatments.
Although Canada has a population smaller than California, 830,000 Canadians are currently waiting to be admitted to a hospital or to get treatment, according to a report last month in Investor's Business Daily. In England, the waiting list is 1.8 million.
Yes, the Socialist Utopia Awaits. All you have to do is to turn yourself into an ignorant, helpless infant first.
Friday, August 14. 2009
The New York Times:
"The stubborn yet false rumor that President Obama’s health care proposals would create government-sponsored “death panels” to decide which patients were worthy of living seemed to arise from nowhere in recent weeks."
Boy, the world sure is a mysterious place to the New York Times.
Bitchy Virgin is now closed, and a darn nesting Peregrine Falcon plus rockfalls have closed off some of my weekend climbing warm-ups in the Gunks. I do not do serious technical climbing, but I like to know how to handle gnarly rocks. I am headed for Banff (photo above) this week to catch some mountain air, then down to Maine 'til Labor Day. Will post when and if I have time on a machine, and will pre-post a few time-insensitive items if I have the chance. NYC is wonderful in the summertime - especially during this cool summer - but I need to hit the road and put some adventure under my belt while I have the chance, while I am still single and free. One of these days some adorable sexy little cutie is going to catch me in her web. I know my weaknesses, and I know I will play along with it if she is from a nice family, because having a partner is a good thing. Not having one is pretty good, too.
Here are a few important links:
Some gay guys' ideas of what Harvard students wear. I thought it was satire at first.
The O's obese Surgeon General nominee advises Burger King for $. On nutrition! Haha. The Dems crack me up. Burger King isn't the worst of the burger chains, though.
Goldberg: Healthcare is the key to controlling everything. That why this is war!
Forbes: Public Spending's Day Of Reckoning
GOP thinks Victory in 2010. My only concern is that it will be too late.
Note to Editor: Pls put Fabius Maximus on our Mostly Political blogroll.
Shootout in Harlem. Speedy justice.
Ugly dirt on Rahm Emanuel. Sheesh. The Dems crack me up. Their greed for money and power knows no bounds. Every Lefty I know is either filthy rich, or a born whiner with a serious case of ingratitude and/or entitlement.
Is Hillary back to being First Lady again? Althouse
"Bye bye ACORN. Don't come back. Get a job." Gateway
Sippican went to the doctor's.
Via Lucianne: Obama's Forfeited Credibility Sabotaging Obamacare
Rush: The left's fragile mask of sanity is peeling... Video with good song borrowed from Randy Newman
Did the Prez realise what he was saying when he said “I mean, if you think about it, UPS and FedEx are doing just fine, right? No, they are. It’s the post office that’s always having problems.”
It's a disease. Climate changist:
Schelling was quoted in The Atlantic as wishing for natural disasters: "I sometimes wish we could have over the next five or 10 years a lot of horrid things happening, you know, like tornados in the Mid west and so forth. That would get people concerned about climate change."
Morano called characterized such statement as insane.
Indeed. Freakin' nuts. Keep it up, Mr. Morano.
Wish I had written about the Genie. From Am Thinker, which begins:
He's not happy, this Genie. In normal times, he sits there quietly inside the bottle. Sometimes watching. Mostly not. He finds politics boring, if not disgusting.
He sat and watched in silence as the TARP bill passed. Told the sky was falling, he looked up and saw it wasn't. But he shrugged, trusting the bipartisan nature of the effort. Then, as TARP rolled out, he stood up. The bailouts plowed a furrow across his forehead; his eyebrows lowered; his gaze intensified. But he stayed inside the bottle.
"Obama has lost control of the debate, and when that happens, it's over," said health care consultant Robert Laszewski. "The well's been poisoned."
Let's hope so. There are plenty of good reforms which do not involve government power grabs.
Too many fun posts at Moonbattery for me to link separately.
Pharmaquiddick. Drug deal gone bad. Is secret collusion between government and industry legal?
Jammie on New York pols:
It's not only the fact people are very suspicious of government taking over an entire industry that's dooming this scheme, but it's the smug arrogance, the imperious pomposity of the Weiners of the world that will relegate this to the dustbin. Here you have a man whose entire career is based on focus group talking points and tired liberal cliches whining that someone is using talking points, as if a constituent who's speaking his or her mind is carefully coached on what to say in public like Weiner is.
Very comforting - Obama: We'll Ship Patients Anywhere. How about to a private clinic in Switzerland or Mexico?Quoted by Betsy:
Robert Wright notes that "we already ration health care; we just let the market do the rationing." This is a true point made by the proponents of health care reform. But I'm not sure why it's supposed to be so interesting. You could make this statement about any good:
"We already ration food; we just let the market do the rationing."
"We already ration gasoline; we just let the market do the rationing."
"We already ration cigarettes; we just let the market do the rationing."
And indeed, this was an argument that was made in favor of socialism. (No, okay, I'm not calling you socialists!) And yet, most of us realize that there are huge differences between price rationing and government rationing, and that the latter is usually much worse for everyone. This is one of the things that most puzzles me about the health care debate: statements that would strike almost anyone as stupid in the context of any other good suddenly become dazzling insights when they're applied to hip replacements and otitis media.
Quoted at Rick Moran:
It’s not like there aren’t free market ideas out there to reform health care - despite what our president and the Democrats want you to believe. They are attempting to ram this health care reform package through the Congress while saying that their opponents have no new ideas to solve the same problems.
But covering the uninsured by making insurance affordable for all, covering those with pre-existing conditions, bringing down the cost of health care, and assuring that the patient, in consultation with his doctor, has the most control over his own treatment are goals that can be achieved more cheaply, and by using a mostly free market approach to reform.
Unfortunately, a completely market oriented solution is not politically viable or realistic at this time. More than six dollars in every ten we spend on health care in America is spent by government. Medicare, Medicaid, Veterans benefits, Indian health care, active duty military care, and the children’s insurance program S-CHIP are just a few of the programs that have skewed the market in health insurance and health care so that a purely free market solution is not in the cards. And doing away with these government programs - even if it were possible - would not be the answer.
But believe me, we can do better than what the president and the Democrats are proposing.
Right. Fine with me, as long as politicians do not control my medical choices.
 California’s heavily Democrat legislature has twice in the past few years voted for a single-payer (that’s government-run monopoly) health care system. Governor Arnold Schwarzenneger vetoed. Even though he has advocated major government interventions into the health care market, they went too far.
There is little likelihood of the Democrats losing control of Sacramento's legislature. There is a strong possibility of the next California governor being a liberal Democrat, especially with the disappointments Arnold has visited upon the remaining Republicans who haven’t moved elsewhere.
San Diego Union-Tribune editor Chris Reed fills in the blanks.
Because [US Congress] Rep. Dennis Kucinich's amendment to the main health overhaul bill to give states the option of creating single-payer health-care systems looks like it has a good chance of being adopted. On July 17, the House Committee on Education and Labor voted 25-19 to approve the amendment. Allowing states to try single-payer is an easy way for Obama to mollify liberal Democrats who think his proposal is too modest. They believe that if states got a chance to go to single-payer, the results would be far superior to Obama's much more complicated approach and would show the need for a national single-payer system.
Reed also provides some experience from a leading doctor in our northern neighbor. For example: “… the vast majority of provinces now rely on American health care to provide radiation therapy. Provinces do this because the clinically recommended waiting time for treatment is often badly exceeded.”
Both the Democrat and Republican line-ups for 2010’s governor election are still fluid.
Look for, hopefully, this question to be prominently asked of the potential candidates. Of course, don’t look for it to come from most of our major newspapers or TV “news” stations. It will take a California centered Town Hall movement to demand clear answers, or expose the obfuscations and deceptions of the candidates.
Get ready.
Surber:
Senator Sanders asks "Why is there not a progressive television network?”
Technically, he is correct; “there is not a progressive television network.”
There are 6 (ABC, NBC, CBS, CNN, MSNBC and PBS).
Fastest-dying cities meet for a chat. What these folks do not get is that government policies (with the assistance of unions) chased the people and the jobs away from these once-prosperous and happy cities.
Sociologists upset that Obama isn't using them more. They are useful: they are able to give you the answer you want for any question you ask. As a group they seem more ideologically-motivated than truth-oriented, but I am sure some are not like that.
Skin and ethnic diversity damages "social capital," harms society. Yes, OK, but it's not the skin or the ethnic: it is the different cultures that cause the issues with trust, familiarity, and comfort. Everybody is more comfortable around their own peeps, because they know what to expect and know where they're coming from. We consider that to be wholesome, natural, and intelligent tribalism.
Via Phi Beta Cons, a new paper roasts three books favoring racial preferences in college admissions. I find racial preferences despicable, un-American, divisive, and overall damaging. I have no problem at all with cultural, sociocultural, talent, or experiential diversity as long as the basic standards apply to all.
Veterinary care in the UK more civilized and better than human care. Speaking of which, they won't let you buy your own medicines in England. How do Brits put up with this crap from their government?
This and other cool scorecard items at Surber:
President Obama took out a Craig’s List ad for $15-an-hour volunteers to Astroturf townhall meetings.
Wanted. Young man single and free. Experienced in protest, but will accept a new trainee.
Paglia, a big fan of the O, via Neoneo:
Obama’s aggressive endorsement of a healthcare plan that does not even exist yet, except in five competing, fluctuating drafts, makes Washington seem like Cloud Cuckoo Land. The president is promoting [a] colossal, brazen bait-and-switch operation…
You can keep your doctor; you can keep your insurance, if you’re happy with it, Obama keeps assuring us in soothing, lullaby tones. Oh, really? And what if my doctor is not the one appointed by the new government medical boards for ruling on my access to tests and specialists? And what if my insurance company goes belly up because of undercutting by its government-bankrolled competitor? Face it: Virtually all nationalized health systems, neither nourished nor updated by profit-driven private investment, eventually lead to rationing.
American College of Surgeons rightly blasts Obama's ignorance. As we often say, never mistake slick for smart.
More lies, this time about medical insurance profits.
More trickery. Why use tricks and lies? Why? Here'a another one re the fake doctor.
Chavez update. What a jerk. Who does he think he is? Stalin? I knew Joe Stalin, and Chavez is no Stalin.
The Kondratieff Wave looks bad for the US economy. Click the image to enlage.
Reid and Pelosi get into name-calling. That is mature debate. But polls say protesters motivated by fear of government control of their medical care.
Rove: Obama and the permanent campaign. "Turning critics into enemies is not presidential."
LaShawn has a Message for people who shamelessly invoke the old “legacy of slavery” excuse and view the government as some sort of savior
Rasmussen:
I think the Dem health care is what is driving this down so rapidly, but running around the world apologizing for America's existence probably didn't help. Thankfully, most Americans have not been contaminated by Howard Zinn.
From Megan McA in What Does It Mean To Have a Private Health Care System:
...they ask me how I can ignore the overwhelming evidence that national health care is superior to our terrible system. Now, what's odd about this is that all of those countries do precisely what I am concerned about: slap price controls on the inputs, particularly pharmaceuticals. Their overwhelming evidence indicates that I am 100% correct that a government run system in the US will destroy the last really profitable market for drugs and medical technology, and thereby cause the rate of medical innovation to slow to a crawl.
Valuable things that people want are expensive. Duh. That's one of the reasons people work.
From Sowell's latest Random Thoughts:
Political ideologies are fairy tales for adults.
Thursday, August 13. 2009
 One of the Dylanologist's favorite topics: The crisis of ACD. A quote:
The continents rest on massive tectonic plates. Until the beginning of the Industrial Revolution in the mid 18th century, these plates were fixed in place and immobile. However, drilling for oil and mining for minerals has cut these plates loose from their primordial moorings and left them to drift aimlessly. "The potential for damage is truly catastrophic," said Hans Brinker, a spokesman for the International Panel on Continental Drift (IPCD). "The continents are adrift due to the ruthless capitalist exploitation of the environment for profit. Unless immediate steps are taken to halt all oil and mineral extraction, we can expect a massive surge in earthquakes and volcanos by next Tuesday."
The chart is from the article.
 Who knew that Vermont has had a school voucher program since 1869?
Apple Cake! Why not make one today?
Michigan is determined to commit suicide. If they want to, nothin' you can do to stop 'em. It's a free country.
Jules on Boston fog.
Surging seas? What? Where? At the NYT, here we go again. Even worse, Bombay Mumbai is freezing. Time to burn some more rain forest jungle.
Obama as Hitler was a Dem plant to discredit the critics. Good stunt, jerks. I'm rubber and you're glue; it bounces off me and sticks on you.
Union orders to drown out opposition magically disappears from the web
Insty notes that American pols are unused to give-and-take. Brit pols seem to love it, as in Question Time. Dem terms protesters "political terrorists." What a weenie. The public seems to appreciate their challenging the pols. If the press won't, somebody has to.
The always-interesting Lefty Paglia on Pelosi
Via Kaus:
We should be having two debates. One should be about the obligation to ensure universal access to health care, which will directly benefit millions of struggling families and make this a better society. The other -- a more complicated, difficult and painful discussion -- should be about the long-term problem of out-of-control health-care costs, which would be a looming crisis even if President Obama had never uttered the word "reform."
Conflating the two has made the nation's nerves jump and its skin itch. And now, anything can happen.
Just for the heck of it, substitute the word "food," or "legal care," or "clothing," or "housing," or "ammo" or "car insurance" for the phrase "health care" in that paragraph.
The seasoned citizens are getting worried. They love their unlimited Medicare freebies. In Obamaland, Medicare will be folded into Obamacare.
From Human Events:
The notion that Americans may not want the federal government making health care decisions on their behalf appears to be truly beyond the comprehension of Democrats in Congress and the White House. So they have responded by slandering honest folks looking to have their voices heard.
The arrogance which the Democrats have displayed by name-calling and discrediting these people reveals their insolence and hypocrisy.
It appears that community organizing and grassroots are terms reserved solely for liberal activism. A number of taxpayer and patients rights groups post the location of town halls on the internet, and Democrats in charge act as though it is an abomination to democracy. Yet when then Senator Obama throws together an operation of a million liberal activists, so organic they created an iPhone app for it, that’s just good old fashioned political organizing. Right!
The less impact the government has on my life, the better. They can worry about the safety net, and leave the able-bodied alone.
But Q&O asks: What Does Parental “Education” Have To Do With Health “Insurance” Reform? Are there really experts on raising kids? If so, give me a chance first to check out their own kids.
Dorothy Rabinowitz on the O:
The president has a problem. For, despite a great election victory, Mr. Obama, it becomes ever clearer, knows little about Americans. He knows the crowds—he is at home with those. He is a stranger to the country's heart and character.
He seems unable to grasp what runs counter to its nature. That Americans don't take well, for instance, to bullying, especially of the moralizing kind, implicit in those speeches on health care for everybody. Neither do they wish to be taken where they don't know they want to go and being told it's good for them.
Who would have believed that this politician celebrated, above all, for his eloquence and capacity to connect with voters would end up as president proving so profoundly tone deaf?
Photo on loan from theo
Wednesday, August 12. 2009
I actively oppose ObamaCare for its many dangerous details and for its needless excess. At the same time, I regret that the tack taken by President Obama and Congressional Democrats has set back the prospects for constructive, needed reforms. They have bullheadedly and ideologically gone in wrong directions, too far, and inflamed natural and largely justified public doubts and passions.
We face some core problems, such as breakthrough technologies increasing medical costs – and survivals and comforts, about a quarter of the uninsured actually being citizens in need of help, individual insurance sometimes being difficult to get, payment rates tilted to discourage general practice doctors so specialists are overused and paid, inefficient paperwork, tort attorneys seeking largesse – sometimes more than justice – causing undue defensive medicine costs. Almost all agree they exist. Almost all agree they require remedy. And, almost all agree on the general nature of the remedies.
Strict focus upon these, with realistic expectations and clear details of treatment, would likely have led to broad consensus and rapid passage. They could be dealt with specifically, moderately, inclusive of proven ways, and incrementally to make adjustments.
The overreach by the president and Congressional Democrats, however, uses these core legitimate concerns to launch a wholesale reshaping of all of health care. Such overreach is inherently defective simply because it is impossible to run such a large-scale endeavor, in addition to how ill-defined or speculative much of it is. It is recognized as a major grasp for control over our lives by central government, arousing the fears and resentments of most Americans at being controlled by remote bureaucrats. When the enormous direct costs are calculated, and the major disruptions and restrictions imposed on most Americans are individually calculated, there is little payoff either to the economy, improved health care, or most individuals. To add to the debacle, some of the core ills are not even treated.
The lines of debate have been hardened into battle lines due to the sheer lies expressed by the president and leading Congressional Democrats, easily exposed by their own recorded words to the contrary, and the insults hurled by them and their minions against everyday Americans’ right to express their concerns.
Candidate for president Obama usually restrained from these excesses, broadly and amorphously referring to the broad consensus on the core problems, and his electoral supporters restrained their language and true intents in order not to undermine his election. Thus, President Obama began his administration with widespread faith for reasonable hope and change. President Obama and Congressional Democrats, and their ideological allies, have succeeded in near utterly destroying this faith, as demonstrated in the rapid large declines in their and their proposals’ poll ratings.
There are now three possible ways this may play out: The overwhelming Democrat majorities in the Congress may ignore their electoral fate in 2010 by ramming through their discredited and dangerous program. Unlikely. The entire enterprise may be abandoned or voted down. Most likely. Sane heads in Washington may come together to salvage and reshape remedies or improvements for the core issues. Possible, but not probable, as too much heat, resentment and distrust has been created by the course to now. But, possibly and hopefully, once the lessons have seeped in, saner heads come to the fore, and some of the angers cooled, the treatment of these core issues may come.
Now, for those who have read this far, what should health care reform look like?
First and foremost, each measure taken should be discretely restricted to a specific core issue. That will aid understanding and informed discussion. In itself, this will go a long way toward reforming the Congressional excess of loading down bills with hidden payoffs and extraneous issues, and contribute toward increased confidence in Congress’ intents and behavior.
Second, it must be recognized and accepted that some core issues may, thus, either be rejected or not go to the lengths that some may desire. Somes’ perception of the perfect should not delay or imperil the adoption of the good. Some reforms may be better than others, and some reform may be better than none. Again, in itself, this self-restraint and respect for a democratic and open process will go a long way toward restoring confidence in the sanity and trustworthiness of various policy proponents.
Third, all details must be widely published, with adequate time to read and discuss them. No more bums rush of the public.
Fourth, all such bills passed should contain a definite sunset provision, of say 5 years, upon which they must end or be readopted, and improved as experience may dictate. This will reduce the realistic fear that what may be bad legislation cannot be stopped and will continue to wreak its havoc.
Bird Dog is killing me with beautiful antique architecture. I needed a cleansing, ordinary, mis-spelled pizza joint to look at. I wonder how that little building started out. Shoe repair? Dressmaker? Hat shop?
Atlantic Salmon are returning to the Seine. Cool.
Stealing in childhood does not make a future crim.
What colleges are looking for in girls. Via Dr. Helen:
Selective schools are not interested these days in girls who like English and history, like to read and are able to write clearly and well. Those skills fill the bell curve for smart girls ... Selective schools have absorbed the folk myths of bobo culture. So cool girls are math smart, genetically destined to be hackers, risk takers, and into competitive sports. Cool girls for selective schools prefer engineering over history, math over English, computer science over political science, and economics over psychology. A touch of Asperger's isn't a bad thing for a girl, either. Actually, it's a great thing.
UN: We have only 4 months to save the planet. Will they promise to shut up after November, since it will be too late?
"It's free money." "Thank God for Obama. He's looking out for us."
The Seven Basic Plots. Love it.
Horseman, Pass By. Am Digest. Smart cops know when to leave well-enough alone.
Correcting the misinformation about Pelosicare
Faith is an alternate universe. Anchoress. Alternate to what?
A retreat on the public option?
Finally, the Prez himself brings up comparisons to the Post Office
How to screw up with your Alinsky tactics. Am Thinker
In the O's Potemkin Town Hall, even the little girl was a plant. She thinks I am mean. I am not.
We already know that gummint screws things up, then tries to come in as the savior. From the WSJ:
Mr. Obama does have a point about insurance security. If you develop an expensive condition such as cancer or heart disease, and then get fired or divorced or your employer goes out of business—then individual insurance is going to be very expensive if it's available. But what the President and Democrats won't tell you is that these problems are the result mainly of government intervention.
Because the tax code subsidizes private insurance only when it is sponsored by an employer, the individual market is relatively small and its turnover rate is very high. Most policyholders are enrolled for fewer than 24 months as they move between jobs, making it difficult for insurers to maintain large risk pools to spread costs.
Via Ace:
Health care in the US is covered by three main systems-- Medicare,
medicaid, and private insurance. Two of these systems are bankrupt, and will be unable to make payments beyond 2032 (insert correct date here, I don't know). The third is solvent, and can make all of its payments for the foreseeable future.
Barack Obama's plan is to take the one system meeting its obligations
and fold it into the two systems that are bankrupt.
Sissy gets it. Of course she does. A quote with her photo:
We had a Eureka Moment when we realized the affectless, top-down graphics of the "Health Care for America Now!" signs (above) are the precise visual equivalent of the statist's astroturf vision. Even as the we-know-best-what's-good-for-you, central-planning Utopianists and their fellow travelers in the media project their own top-down, Alinskyesque tactics upon us, Adam Smith's Invisible Hand is scrawling our grassroots messages upon a shining sea of one-of-a-kind protest signs. Check out our own efforts from Tea Parties past here, here, here, here and here. The Tenth Amendment lives:
The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively or to the people.
President Obama wants those who disagree with him to "stop talking" and "get out of the way." Begging your pardon, sir, but getting "out of the way" is not the America Way.
It's an excellent way to drive capital and jobs overseas. Via Tiger, the US keeps high corporate taxes while the rest of the developed world lowers theirs:
37% of Americans seem to want to entrust their medical care to Congress. The only person in DC I would trust for that would be Sen. Tom Coburn, MD.
Here's what the government did in Oregon (h/t, Dr. Clouthier) as a cautionary tale of how government and politics screw up everything they touch:
From Will Wilkinson on trust in government:
Our government — and by extension our fellow citizens — is capable of terrible things and proves it every single day. Is it really possible to love government so much, to invest so much hope in its benevolent efficacy, that we grow blind to its evident capacity for evil? Anyway, there must be some parts of the government that are not capable of madness. Ezra invites us to think about those when considering health care reform. Will you accept?
Related: "Don't you trust me?" Crowd shouts "No."
Roger Kimball has no particular faith in the virtuousness of government:
Why all the Sturm und Drang? What is it about the issue of health care, or, rather, the prospect of a government takeover of health care, that arouses such passions on both sides of the debate? Sure, there are important issues at stake. It is legitimate to ask whether the Democratic plan will lead to rationing of health care, especially for senior citizens. It is legitimate to ask whether it will limit choice, impede innovation, and lead to longer waiting times for various procedures. It is legitimate to ask about how the new system will be paid for.
But these concerns, while legitimate, do not really explain the level of passion that the prospect of government run health arouses. The real issue, I believe, concerns freedom.
and
Looking at the grinning rogues gallery of mountebanks yesterday — Ted “Chappaquiddick” Kennedy, Charlie “tax dodger” Rangel, and the rest — I thought of Ronald Reagan’s warning about how socialists so often use health care as a wedge to extract not only money but also freedom, including freedom of choice, from the citizenry. “One of the traditional methods of imposing statism or socialism on a people,” Reagan observed, “has been by way of medicine. It’s very easy to disguise a medical program as a humanitarian project. Most people are a little reluctant to oppose anything that suggests medical care for people who possibly can’t afford it.”
The not-so-stealthy plan to eliminate Medicare, quoted at Powerline:
That's the basic issue with Medicare...it's single payer, universal for those over 65, permits unlimited demand and choice....and has no cost controls...and is bankrupting the government while simultaneously;y through cost-shifting wrecking the private market. Politically, it's the only way to control Medicare costs: fold it into a universal single payer plan with effective global budgeting and cost controls.
I guess I am unAmerican to doubt the intentions of politicians. Riehl
Monday, August 10. 2009
Remember when protest was patriotic? Glenn Reynolds
Habla astroturf? Via Doug Ross:
I asked him if he could tell me what the signs said. “¿Quien sabe?” (who knows?) was all he said to me, with a big grin. I’m kicking myself for not asking them how much they were getting paid to support the grassroots...
Do economic stats depend on the eye of the beholder? Powerline
I guess a deal was made. Big Pharma to run ads supporting Dem health plans. The politics of medical care is shaping up in strange ways. However, even the folks in Mass. heap scorn on it.
Dr. Krauthammer has a better plan. Simpler, too.
House doubles size of their private jet buy. Audacity indeed.
The CBO gives a big Thumbs Down to the silly notion of Preventive Care. Duh. Everybody gets sick, and eventually dies. It costs the same whether you die at 50 or 89.
Saturday, August 8. 2009
Democrats are complaining loudly that the American people are stupid and should shut up about President Obama’s health care program, cap-and-tax program, spend us into deeper deficits program, tax away our incentives program, apologize to our enemies program, castigate our friends program, and all his other radical remakings of America. Democrats are moving from their virtual pogrom to annihilate us uncooperative American kulaks to the next step of more physical coercion by their SEIU thugs.
Which brings to mind these lines from Shelley’s poem Ozymandias:
`My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings:
Look on my works, ye mighty, and despair!'
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare,
The lone and level sands stretch far away".
During the past week, I’ve had conversations with old friends – leftist, centrist, and conservative – with whom I experienced the political battles of the 1960’s. All of us have a similar take on what’s happening now, compared to then. Then, it was a challenge against authority primarily by the privileged young who didn’t want to serve in the war, which dissipated rapidly once the draft ended, while their ideologues took refuge in academia to rise to insulated tenure of attachment to their old slogans and some of their ilk to gerrymandered seniority in Congress. Obama was a tot then, but raised on their radical bromides. Now, it is the broader swath of working and middle class Americans, a far larger and more potent population, who are fed up and angry with being exploited and insulted by those who feel it their right and duty to impose their schemes to rearrange and endanger everyone else’s lives and weaken the America that sustains us. We all feel the potential for violence is high. Enough everyday Americans will defend themselves against thuggish attacks upon their right to speak out.
I wasn’t a proponent of street violence then, nor am I now. I abhor it. And, just let any one of the Democrat thugs try to physically attack me or silence me or anyone nearby and they better stand the f*ck by for a real thumping. At 61, I still fit in my Marine Corps uniform, and know well how to defend myself. I’m just one member of a rapidly expanding, reluctant force of ordinary Americans who will. Those who have spent their lives cloistered in ivy and Congress have never met our resistance before, are shocked, and are in for more rueful surprises if they keep on their vile attacks on our democracy, peace and prosperity.
The final solution to the Health Care CRISIS
Friday, August 7. 2009
"I am a taxpayer by trade." Vanderleun. Also,
I have no doubt that as the post-racial, no-reparations-here, President of all Americans, in a full spirit of bipartisanship and concern for the little guy in the Taxpaying Industries of America, you will agree in this one instance to allow me to pay all my taxes next year with a check post-dated to 2013.
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