Happy Birthday Government Health Care

As Congress debates the destruction of the Health Care industry in the United States – let us pause to say “Happy Birthday” to Medicare and Medicaid, signed into law today in 1965. At 44 years old, these two government programs have ballooned to unimaginable levels since they were imposed on a trusting US population. Medicare consumed 16% of the Federal budget in 2007 ($440 Billion) and spent more than the taxes it brought in last year. It is on track to be completely insolvent by 2019. Medicare was imposed on the several States and estimates are the nearly 17% of State budgets are consumed by Medicare expenses in addition to the $204 Billion kicked in by the Federal government in 2008.
Medicare is covering 43 million Americans while Medicaid covers an estimated 49 million. These are the two programs which are designed to prevent having that 47 million uninsured Americans number that you keep hearing. That number has been bogus from the beginning and remains so.
At 44, how are Medicare and Medicaid doing? The government’s invasion of the free market has driven up prices and been the subject of widespread fraud, waste, and abuse. See today’s Washington Times article - Medicare fraud sting nets 30 (http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2009/jul/30/medicare-fraud-sting-nets-30/)
Americans are carrying around a huge Federal bureaucracy as well as mandated bureaucracies in their respective States. Americans have surrendered financial and other freedoms to achieve inefficient and wasteful coverage – and the democrats want to take over more of the system? They should be prosecuted now for the criminal way they have wasted the wealth and potential of citizens of this Nation. No more – get the government out of Health Care.
Conservative Resistance – Day 269

Stop the Health Care Madness

The Honorable James Webb,
Thank you for your response to my e-mail on Health Care. I must point out however that you are not on the same wavelength with the vast majority of your constituents. I am very disappointed in your response:
“addressing the health care crisis in our country is a top priority for me” – by now you must know that there is no crisis in this country and polls indicate that anywhere between 70 and 90 percent of the people in the United States like their current health care arrangement.
“There are 47 million Americans without health insurance and millions more who are underinsured” You must also be aware that around 25% of those mythical 47 million persons are actually not Americans at all but rather they are illegal aliens. Half of the remainder could afford medical insurance if they chose to make it a priority in their lives and the other half already qualify for existing government programs. Again – there is no crisis.
“our health care system ranks lower than many countries on quality, access, efficiency, equity, and preventative care.” I don’t believe any of that for a minute. Health Care is in crisis in Canada, Britain, France, Sweden, Germany, Japan, and all of the modern nation states that have chosen socialism over freedom. The reason that they are in as good a shape as they are is because they are subsidized and buoyed by American Health Care. Foreigners benefit from advances in medicine driven by American doctors, hospitals, and laboratories. Further, America is the safety net for all of those countries. When Canada’s Health Care system fails (which it frequently does), Canadians come here as do other people throughout the world.
Our Health Care is the best in the world and we shouldn’t destroy it to help the tiny fraction of the population that can’t or won’t participate. You need to do what is best for the grand majority of Virginians, not turn the world upside down to take care of a tiny minority. If you don’t focus on us, the majority of Virginians will take care of you later at the polls.
Do the right thing – cross the aisle and spend some time with Senators McConnell or Gregg. It would be child’s play to turn their ideas into a truly bi-partisan bill that would benefit all Americans. The Republicans are on the right side of history on this one – it’s not too late for you to join them.
Sincerely Yours,

“A Teachable Moment”

Dear President Obama,

I have had a lot of time to think and I have had my “Teachable Moment.” Let me tell you what I learned from the incident between Professor Gates and Sergeant Crowley in Cambridge, Mass:

- Maintaining “Black Studies” departments in colleges is counter productive to improving race relations. Teaching hate in any form is bad. Black studies produced a professor who is hypersensitive to any encounter with any white person and views every potential encounter through the prism of hate and racism. Marinating a mind in hate is bad no matter what color you are.

- At enormous expense the white community has trained, coached, and sensitized itself to the plight of our black brothers and sisters however it will never be enough. The Cambridge incident is proof positive. The policeman who encountered Gates was uniquely qualified to have dealt fairly, impartially, and compassionately with that situation. However you can’t deal rationally with a person like Gates who is consumed by hate.

- There are race-based industries like Jesse Jackson’s Rainbow/PUSH, Al Sharpton’s National Action Network, and indeed the Nation Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) whose best interest lies in the continuation of a race-based confrontation-based and separatist view of society in order to continue their existence. In short they seek advantage not equality.

- You need to avoid being what Sociologist Orlando Patterson calls a “Racial Arsonist” (a phrase he used to describe Al Sharpton). I know now that you don’t believe this, but everything involving a person of color isn’t about race. Black and Hispanic men are stopped, questioned, and arrested more frequently because they commit crimes in greater proportion to their numbers than white men do – every statistical study on crime will tell you that. It is not racist to identify, arrest, charge, convict, and jail a criminal who happens to be Black. It is racist to indicate that Blacks guilty of crimes are being unfairly treated when they are guilty.

- Perhaps the most important thing that I learned is that in those unguarded moments, when you aren’t reading from a teleprompter – we learn what is really in your heart – and it scares me.

The Nation had its “teaching moment” on this incident, but it wasn’t what you thought it would be. I certainly hope that you had your “teaching moment” – but based on all your public statements, it doesn’t appear that you learned anything.

Sincerely Yours,

Health Care - First Do No Harm

The Honorable James Webb and Mark Warner,
I suspect that even the most ardent supporter of President Obama and the most enthusiastic proponents of government run Health Care must have been deflated by the absurd presentation by the President on Wednesday night. I am not a fan – but even I couldn’t believe how badly the President performed. I am actually pleased in that Americans are finally getting a solid look at how destructive his policies would be for the United States. Virginians do not want you messing with our Health Care. If anything, you should be finding ways to pull the government back from interference with the free market delivery of quality, affordable Health Care.
If you want to drive down the cost of Health Care, focus on tort reform. Catch and prosecute those who defraud Medicare and Medicaid. Jail politicians who collude with profiteers and provide sweet deals to donors. Repeal government mandates on insurance companies and hospitals. Require all persons treated at tax payer expense to prove that they are citizens or legal immigrants.
If you decide to do none of these positive things to improve the delivery and cost of Health Care – then at least do no harm. The President is wrong – doing nothing would be infinitely preferable to following some ridiculous hodge-podge that Congress will piece together. Remember the (Non)Stimulus Package? If that is the best you guys can do – you should go on vacation early and often. You absolutely shouldn’t mess with Health Care.
Lastly – all of those countries that the President admires for their health care – remember, when those people get really sick – they come here to get well. What does that say about our system and theirs?
Sincerely Yours,

Bully-In-Chief

Dear President Obama,
I watched every minute of your Press Conference on Wednesday night. The most interesting thing about it did not concern health care, but rather the statements you made about the arrest of Professor Gates. As the truth comes out today, you appear to be nothing short of the bully-in-chief. You owe an enormous and unequivocal apology to Sergeant James Crowley and the entire Cambridge Police Department. To take the opportunity of a Press Conference to discredit a police officer for which the union provided its "full and unqualified support” is astonishing. It appears that rather than an innocent, Gates acted like a common street thug and as Sergeant Crowley pointed out Gates “controlled the outcome of that event.” Oddly enough I was pulled over by the police yesterday. I can tell you, I was polite and I cooperated with the officer. He determined that my actions behind the wheel were appropriate. If I had insulted that policeman’s mother, refused to offer up my driver’s license, followed him back to his police car while yelling at him – I would expect him to have cuffed me and arrested me – end of story. For you to descend into a treatise on race given that facts about Gates’ action - was absurd.
Sincerely Yours,

Health Scare – Crying “Wolf” yet again

I think that Health Care is only in crisis when democrats are in power. I really don’t remember talking about Health Care over the past 14-15 years, not since the utter failure of Hillary-Care in the early days of the Clinton abomination. All of a sudden Health Care became an issue again as Barack Obama started running for office. I don’t buy that it is a crisis just because Obama says so – virtually nothing else that he has said has come true – so why this?

Deroy Murdock had a really good piece in my beloved Washington Times on Sunday that is well worth a read: Why not try ownership? Reform bill too ambitious for real problem

Of course the essence of the issue is that the democrats have completely misidentified the problem. Everyone except a hardcore liberal knows that the number of uninsured Americans (that has inextricably risen dramatically in the last 6 months) – 47 million – is a load of crap. So that really isn’t the problem. Having Congress (a group that couldn’t run a restaurant on a budget) weigh in to run Health Care is utterly absurd on the face of it.

So what is wrong with Health Care – sure it cost too much, but government is part of that problem’s equation. I like Murdock’s question about why we couldn’t treat Health Care as we do car insurance. For routine maintenance (new tires, oil change, safety inspections, etc.) you drive to your dealer or the local mechanic and pay to have your car repaired. You are only insured against a catastrophic event like an accident. We need to get away from the government and push store front Health Care – “Doc-in-the-box.”

If we got the insurance companies AND the government out of routine health care, prices would drop dramatically. If you walked into the doctor with an ailment, he treated you, you went to Wal-Mart to get your prescription filled, and you paid for it all – prices would collapse. If we had a pay-as-you-go system and only relied on insurance for the big stuff, the reduction in the preparation, transmission, analysis, and confrontation over paperwork would be radically reduced.

What we do need the government to do is crack down on fraud, waste, and abuse. Estimates are that more than 10% of the cost of Medicare and Medicaid are lost right off the top to fraud and waste. Add to that the cost of a huge government bureaucracy and you have monumental waste. The Congress should immediately strap on tort reform to prevent people from winning the lottery when their doctor makes a mistake. Cap lawsuits at $3 million and for those who bring frivolous lawsuits, have a loser pays the court costs of the winner system and prices would plunge further still.

We might have to toughen up a bit as a Nation and tell people who game the system that they can’t use our emergency rooms as their personal physicians. While I suppose it is wrong to reject people from emergency rooms because they don’t have the ability to pay, we shouldn’t absolve them to the requirement to pay for that service in the future. We may have to actually expect people to exhibit a little personal responsibility. I don’t begrudge the people that need help, but we have to reject the free-loaders.

This isn’t rocket science – write your representatives and demand that they reform and not take over our Health Care.

Conservative Resistance – Day 260

So Long Walter

What a difference a week makes. Last night the news hit that Walter Cronkite had died at age 92. I don’t recall feeling particularly bad about that, but my thoughts were captured this morning when a Fox News military correspondent pointed out that “Walter Cronkite was worth a 100,000 Michael Jacksons.” No doubt. At least they aren’t talking about Michael Jackson anymore.

However in addition to them endlessly saying that “Cronkite was the most trusted man in America” there is one very important piece that is droning over and over again as the news lavishes coverage on one of their own. The story that is part of nearly every Cronkite memorial segment is of when in 1968 after the convulsion of violence that was the Tet Offensive in Viet Nam – Cronkite went to Viet Nam. In the one hour special that resulted Walter Cronkite told the American people (and the world for that matter) that the Viet Nam War was a stalemate that could not be won. It was a stunning revelation and one that rocked the nation and its President, Lyndon Johnson. What is most astonishing today is that in this his most important opinion piece - Uncle Walter was utterly and completely wrong.

What we should have learned from that event was that one more liberal icon was not just wrong; he was for our Nation disastrously wrong. The North Vietnamese had thrown everything that they had at the combined South Vietnamese and American forces. Though you can say all you want about the lack of preparation or the element of surprise that the communists achieved, they were completely defeated. The communists had delivered their best shot, the allies had absorbed it and counter punched with devastating results. Estimates vary, but there is little question that more than half of the communist troops engaged were killed – probably more than 50,000 young men. They lost and they didn’t field a credible threat to South Viet Nam again until after US troops left leaving it to American advisors and the South Vietnamese to try and stem the tide.

But what is clear now is that a news guy with some impressive credentials, but absolutely no strategic military insight or experience said with great authority that we couldn’t win. Again – he couldn’t have been more wrong. We are seeing a very similar situation today as people like Joe Biden, Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, Dick Durbin, Barney Frank, Chris Dodd, and . . . yes . . . President Barack Obama are speaking with great certainty about Health Care – they are disastrously wrong.

When Cronkite made his disastrous mistake, people were yelling – you are wrong! But he won out because people were comfortable with him, they liked him. Unfortunately, they believed him. President Barack Obama can look right through a teleprompter and into our eyes and with great conviction tell us a lie – we have to stop him.

Write your Congressman and your Senators we might stop the madness with the weight of public opinion.

Conservative Resistance – Day 257

Al Franken – Are you kidding me?

I keep hoping to wake up and find out that the words “Senator Al Franken” are part of a nightmare I’m having and not reality. Wesley Pruden echoed my thoughts in a recent editorial in the Washington Times that is worth a read: PRUDEN: Franken, a clown for all seasons, arrives in time

However the dummy who stole an election and made it to Washington should make Minnesotans of all stripes cringe every time he opens his mouth. Here is his opening statement at the Judge Sotomayor hearing – 9 minutes of ridiculous fluff: Senator Al Franken's Statement At Sotomayor Confirmation Hearing

And how trivial will the business of the Senate be with his inane banter about old television shows like Perry Mason? Franken's First Joke In the Senate Here is the most august deliberative body in the history of the World – and they are bantering about a fictional character on TV.

I feel more like this about Franken:

Mark Levin on the Spiteful Troll a.k.a. Al Franken (7-13-09)

Please hurry 2010 so we can start getting rid of these clowns and save our country.

Conservative Resistance – Day 255

Vote No on Judge Sonia Sotomayor

The Honorable James Webb and Mark Warner,

Virginians expect you to reject Judge Sonia Sotomayor’s nomination to the Supreme Court. This Senate kabuki dance for the media is absurd and doesn’t prove anything. Judge Sotomayor’s opinions and concepts of judicial activism are far outside the mainstream. Send President Obama the strongest possible message and tell him to find someone who reflects the way Americans think and live. We are watching and we will remember – your slavishly liberal voting record is going to come back and haunt you later – we promise.

Sincerely,

Finally - a good speech overseas

Dear President Obama,

I watched your speech in Africa (a continent that loves America for what President George W. Bush did there) and it was one of your best. I don’t say that because of your skill with the teleprompter, but rather it hit right at the core of the very real problems in Africa – bad governments.

As you stated, the “West” is not responsible for the horrible governments, vicious warfare, desperate poverty, or the widespread nepotism in Africa. Africans are responsible.

Some of the points that you made in Ghana are lost on your own party at home – indeed as you stated “development depends on good governance” you should point that out to your co-conspirators in Washington D.C. Certainly the problems behind the destruction of Chicago, a once great city are all due to the lack of “good governance” and the ingrained nepotism that you warned Ghanaians to avoid. Indeed we have been pouring billions in aid into Africa for decades and that economic stimulus package only served to make despots rich and mire African nations in misery – very similar to results of your own stimulus package.

I actually agree with all four of your points for Africa and wish that you would give this speech to our own Congress:

1. You said - Democracy “is about more than just holding elections. It's also about what happens between elections.” We didn’t elect you king so you and your fellow democrats shouldn’t run the country like we did.

2. You said - Support for “development that provides opportunity for more people.” When talking to Africans you sound almost like a free marketer – how about remembering that when you come home?

3. You said - “America can also do more to promote trade and investment.” You sound like a free-trader here – as you should. Get the government out of the middle of trade and businesses will flourish.

4. You said - “It is never justified, never justifiable to target innocents in the name of ideology.” Does it include the slaughter of innocents in the womb (40,000,000 and still counting) or just post-birth Americans?

Pardon me if I am astounded that you can point Ghanaians in the right direction, while you Congress run rough-shod over our Nation. Your government is not the solution – it’s the problem.

Sincerely Yours,