Fact-Checking Obama

Both USA Today (via HotAir) here and The Heritage Foundation here offer up fact-checking on Obama's statements at the New Hampshire Townhall.

Whole lotta whoppers going on.

How To Field Questions Like The President

From Esquire magazine complete with video samples.

I am not entirely certain what the slant of this article is but it's all in good fun. Right?

Hawking and the NHS

(Originally posted by my husband at NRO-The Corner)

Following up on that silly IBD statement that Stephen Hawking wouldn't survive in the U.K., where of course he lives, I contacted Professor Hawking's office, and they sent me this statement he dictated yesterday:

I wouldn’t be alive today if it weren’t for the NHS. I have received a large amount of high quality treatment without which I would not have survived.

This is undoubtedly true. Many brilliant doctors and surgeons work for the NHS. So yes, there are indeed centers of excellence in the NHS. David Cameron, leader of the British Conservatives, has a favorable view of the NHS because of the wonderful, world-class care it gave for many years to his severely handicapped son, who sadly died earlier this year. A close friend of mine would have lost his handicapped daughter at birth were it not for the efforts of his local NHS hospital, which again provided world-class care. And this isn't world-class in the sense of "the NHS is the envy of the world," it is world-class in the genuine sense.

However, all this is true in spite of rather than because the NHS is financed the way it is. Professor Hawking in Cambridge and David Cameron in Oxford are lucky enough that their hospitals are associated with world-class universities. The trouble is that for every child saved, there is one or more elderly people left to die or literally killed by the NHS. One family I know lost two grandparents as a result of NHS incompetence, one of them having a feeding tube set at the wrong rate, with the result that they were fed so much they died as a result of the complications brought on. Just as there are excellent hospitals in the NHS, there are others that any informed person would avoid like, or even because of, the plague.

And much of the reason for the dark side of the NHS is clearly its funding structure. A relative of mine, an award-winning doctor, resigned from her job as head of a certain department at her hospital because she couldn't take having to make decisions every day over who lived and who died as a result of granting or denying treatment. The NHS is predicated on this model. That is why Theodore Dalyrmple, a doctor working within the NHS at the time, wrote as far back as 2001:

Just try going to the casualty department of an NHS hospital and telling them that you want to be operated on in another hospital! You will be lucky if they find you a bed in under 10 hours. Not far from Walsall, incidentally, is Kidderminster, whose hospital the Government closed down, despite the local appreciation of its care, its balanced budget, and the clearly expressed wishes of the town's population that it should be kept open. So much for consumer choice when it conflicts with the Government's plans.

I am far from supposing that all is well with the NHS. No one who works in the system could possibly suppose any such thing. It even seems to me likely that treatment in Walsall is not as good as at UCH.

But the real problem with the health-care services in Britain lies elsewhere, and we should not be diverted from recognising it by crude and sensational comparisons. What is needed is a subtle interplay of patient choice and professionalism, of the kind that can never now be achieved so long as health care in this country is funded solely by central taxation. It would take courage and honesty for a politician to recognise this, so it is extremely unlikely to happen.

Will that subtle interplay be encouraged or discouraged by Obamacare? All evidence points towards the latter, but that is the argument that has to be made.

All respect to my husband but what he neglected to mention regarding his friend's child was that the baby was found to be in the breech position and the NHS doctor went ahead with a vaginal birth, causing the infant to suffer the lack of oxygen which lead to her brain being damaged.

I know this because in the times after this tragedy I spoke with this friend quite frequently. When he described the events and I told him that in such situations, US hospitals would do a cesearan rather than continue birthing a breech baby vaginally - he was shocked.

So while my husband is right to defend the extraordinarily rare centers of excellence where the NHS accidentally gets things right, that by no means should be constructed as support for such a healthcare system anywhere. At least as far as I am concerned.

Cost of Government Day

You now have to work from January 1st to August 12th in order to "meet all costs imposed by government. In other words, the cost of government consumes 61.34 percent of national income."

Read all about it at the Americans for Tax Reform Center for Fiscal Accountability website, here.

I love FDR Pebbles - Now they're on sale!

We've vacationed here three times in four years, scroll down for sample pictures of our last vacation July 09. So when I got this email, I had to share.

FDR RESORTS JAMAICA in Association with Air Jamaica's "A Great Time to Fly to Jamaica" Special Introduces


With fares of $99 per person + Taxes, FDR Pebbles Resort and the Franklyn D. Resort & Spa are matching this excitement with Room Rates starting at US$92 and US$124 per person per night respectively- 60% off their rack adult rack rates this FALL.

Book your family vacation between now and August 31st, 2009 and get 60% off the adult rate for travel between now and December 20th, 2009!

For Hotel Reservation call 1-800-654-1337 or visit www.fdrfamily.com

Airline Reservation: Call Air Jamaica's North American Sales Office at: 1-800-523-5585 or visit: www.airjamaica.com

Important Information on Booking your Air Jamaica Seats:
Booking Window is very small - between: AUGUST 3-10, 2009
Valid for Travel between: SEPTEMBER 3 - OCTOBER 31, 2009
Valid Gateways: Baltimore, Fort Lauderdale, New York, Chicago and Philadelphia

Another Democrat Class Act

More Liberal Hypocrisy - this time on Voter IDs

Tom Blumer over at NewsBusters reports in an article titled "Can't Make It Up: Dem Rep Who Opposes Photo ID To Vote Requiring Photo ID For Town Halls" that democrat Congressman Eugene Green is now requiring photo IDs from the attendees at his townhalls.

Ironically, Green has voted AGAINST the use of photo IDs when voting.

I do think that townhalls should be limited to the folks who live in the constituency and I do think that requiring photo IDs is a reasonable means to confirming habitation in a particular constituency.

I do not think, however, that anyone who voted against the use of photo IDs in voting should be allowed to require photo IDs at townhalls. You created this mess Green, you deal with it.

HA!

Obama Astroturfed The NH Townhall?

Gatewaypundit makes that claim here complete with video (I'm having trouble with the sound).

Here is the local New Hampshire news channel's take. At the 2:20 mark, please note the man in the red "Capitalism" t-shirt from a group - BureauCrash - that is associated with my husband's organization. To my knowledge, no one from that group sent anyone up to New Hampshire. That's grass-roots, baby!

Bashing Insurance Companies

The strategy for supporters of Obamacare has been switched to bashing insurance companies. This change is explained here in the New York Post.

Reportedly, Obama's top advisers gather every Wednesday night to discuss the latest polling on health-care reform and how to use the results to advance the president's agenda. And public sentiment is clear: People trust their doctors and are generally pleased with their medical care's quality -- but mostly distrust insurers. Most voters also care more about their own out-of-pocket medical costs and the portability of their coverage than about the uninsured

.

Reconsidering Whole Foods

I've always found the Whole Foods shopping experience a little choked with smug. All that high-priced organic-food-cum-environmentalism-guilt-indulgence-purchases were just a little too fey for me. (They do have a decent cheese counter (Wegman's is better) and some interesting items in general.)

But now after reading this Wall Street Journal op-ed by John Mackey, the co-founder and CEO of Whole Foods, I may make a special trip to our closest store and give him some of my business.

Titled "The Whole Foods Alternative to ObamaCare", Mr. Mackey starts with a famous quote from the awesome Margaret Thatcher “The problem with socialism is that eventually you run out of other people’s money.” He then continues to list the things he would do to improve the US healthcare system and, quite frankly, I whole-heartedly support each and every one of his suggestions.

• Remove the legal obstacles that slow the creation of high-deductible health insurance plans and health savings accounts (HSAs).

Money not spent in one year rolls over to the next and grows over time.

• Equalize the tax laws so that that employer-provided health insurance and individually owned health insurance have the same tax benefits.

• Repeal all state laws which prevent insurance companies from competing across state lines. (He's right! If car and life insurance is portable, why isn't health insurance? - me)

• Repeal government mandates regarding what insurance companies must cover.

• Enact tort reform to end the ruinous lawsuits that force doctors to pay insurance costs of hundreds of thousands of dollars per year. These costs are passed back to us through much higher prices for health care.

• Make costs transparent so that consumers understand what health-care treatments cost.

• Enact Medicare reform. We need to face up to the actuarial fact that Medicare is heading towards bankruptcy and enact reforms that create greater patient empowerment, choice and responsibility.

• Finally, revise tax forms to make it easier for individuals to make a voluntary, tax-deductible donation to help the millions of people who have no insurance and aren’t covered by Medicare, Medicaid or the State Children’s Health Insurance Program.

He ends with a teeny plug for healthier eating via vegetables but otherwise his entire column is a truthful, accurate, efficient and viable solution to the US healthcare system and I thoroughly endorse his views in this matter.

Obama is Losing Camille

Well Camille Paglia over at Salon.com is still infatuated with Obama-as-US-Ambassador, the gloss is wearing off with Obama-as-Domestic-Leader.

Having said that, I must confess my dismay bordering on horror at the amateurism of the White House apparatus for domestic policy.

She continues here to proclaim her growing and deepening alarm at the entire Obamacare debacle. I don't always completely agree with her but I completely respect her views.

Read her page two about Sarah Palin and Prof. Gates. Camille hits nails on heads quie regularly, I must say.

CNN Bans Talk Radio Hosts

(The post below is copied in its entirety from Andy McCarthy's post on NRO-The Corner because his points are so irrefutable and Jonathan Klein is an ass.)

CNN/US president Jonathan Klein has directed his producers to avoid booking talk-radio hosts on CNN news programs. In a burst of arrogance remarkable even by mainstream media standards (especially given some of the dross that passes for news coverage at CNN), Klein is quoted in NewsBusters as saying, "Complex issues require world class reporting," and that talk-radio guys are all noise and "all too predictable." Would that there were anything on the planet more predictable than some of CNN's "world class reporting."

The NewsBusters report also indicates that the talk-radio hosts who are CNN regulars (e.g., Lou Dobbs and Bill Bennett) are exempt from the new policy.

I wonder if the folks at CNN ever actually listen to the in-depth coverage complicated issues get for hours at a time on Rush's show and Sean's show. I wonder how Mr. Klein's assessment of talk-radio dullards squares up with, say, Mark Levin — an authentic scholar of constitutional law and American history, a mega-bestselling author of books on those subjects, and a former chief of staff to an attorney-general of the United States. Or, say, Hugh Hewitt, a cum laude graduate of Harvard, Order of the Coif student at UMichigan Law School, veteran of two prestigious federal court clerkships, like Mark a former Reagan Justice Department official, and now a professor at Chapman Law School. I wonder if Mr. Klein has ever heard Laura Ingraham or Steve Malzberg or Dennis Praeger (and I could go on and on) mixing it up with advocates for every side of every important issue.

To disagree with them is fine — that's what makes an interesting debate. But to ban them because you find yourself unable to refute them? That's class-A cowardice.

There's a reason talk-radio's audience is growing while CNN's is evaporating.

I wish Mr. Klein would just come out and say he'd like to keep to a bare minimum the insights of effective conservative voices. At least that would be honest.

[Thanks to Lucianne.]

Democrats Caught AstroTurfing

The Black man holding a picture of Obama-as-Hitler has been exposed as a Dingell supporter who was planted by DNC operatives.

Read the whole expose here.

The PJTV Trifecta debates whether this is real grassroots protest or astroturf, here.

Is Obama Plotting Against Doctors?

Roger Simon makes a case over at PJTV in his "Talking Through My Hat" series that Obama is plotting against doctors.

The interesting thing about Simon is his grasp of history gives an interesting perspective on current events which makes even his most paranoid sounding video column reasonable.

Give it a watch and tell me what you think.

Erosion of Trust

You know, I remember the 90s and would have believed this article from Yahoo titled "Officials see rise in militia groups across U.S." if Obama's government hadn't been so quick to tar all opposing thought as "right-wing extremists" here and here.

Yes, I know you're not paranoid if somebody really is out to get you but seeing darkness in every heart is a pretty foul worldview as well.

Deep Denial

Specter and his cohorts are still in deep denial over many Americans rejection of Obamacare.

Sample quotes from this Yahoo.com article, here.

McCaskill said she was "proud of the people that showed up and I don't take that personally."
"It's that they don't trust government right now," she said on NBC's "Today" show.

No, sweetcheeks, we do not trust you. Because (and it is a shame I have to explain this to a sitting member of Congress) here in America our government is the People. The government is not some separate entity from Congress or the President or the Supreme Court (although the Supreme Court has the least direct connection to the People). Here in America, no "government" is too big to fail if the American People decide that government is no longer representing them.

And from Specter we get this...

"I'm not going to complain about being organized. They have a right to speak," he said, "but I think we have to explain, they're not necessarily representative of America. I think they're vocal. I don't think they're representative."

Clearly, Specter is so old that he has forgotten these things are recorded. I watched a fair portion of this townhall and there were supporters on both sides of the issue. It's just that the opponents of Obamacare were clearly in the majority. That seems pretty representational to me, Congressman Crypt-Keeper.

Run, Citizen, Run

PJTVs suggests in this "Beyond The Angry Mob" that if ever there was an opportunity for US citizens to run for Congress, now is the time.

In some ways, this makes a lot of sense - especially in the House of Representatives where districts are smaller and an active grassroots movement would happily support an alternative to these jokers.

Here is my platform.

Thin-Skinned Need Not Click

This "alert" from RealClearPolitics reminds us how small the sense of humor is on the left.

Updates on ObamaCare

Here you can find the Arlen Specter Townhall in its entirety from C-SPAN. He starts getting patronizing and snippy right around 5:54 and real interesting by 12:30. I couldn't watch the whole thing because Specter's voice started to make my ears bleed. Just out of curiosity, why is this crypt-keeper still in office?

ABCNews catches Obama in a lie, here. Calling it Obama's "senior moment", Obama claimed that the AARP was "on board" the healthcare plan. Rather quickly, the AARP raised its hand and said, ummm, no we're not.

Duelling videos are the theme here at BelowTheBeltway, as two videos demonstrate that Obama did indeed say to an AFL-CIO audience that he supports a single-payer plan. The video on top shows him denying this. Whatever, liar.

Proving the oppositions point, in this video here, Obama answers a question about government health plans "competing" with private plans by stating that Fedex and UPS are doing just fine against the USPS. Ummmm, isn't the USPS dying? Doesn't that prove the US government can't run anything better than private industry?

Rasmussen is now saying 57% oppose single-payer plans here.

The Heritage Foundation released this report that Obamacare will definitely eliminate private insurance.

Losing 5 Healthcare Freedoms

A close reading of the two main bills, one backed by Democrats in the House and the other issued by Sen. Edward Kennedy's Health committee, contradict the President's assurances. To be sure, it isn't easy to comb through their 2,000 pages of tortured legal language. But page by page, the bills reveal a web of restrictions, fines, and mandates that would radically change your health-care coverage.

The above is from an article titled "5 freedoms you'd lose in health care reform" from Fortune Magazine here.

How Not to Argue Against Obamacare

(Originally published by my husband)

I'm a fan of Investors' Business Daily, and their editorials are normally top-notch, but I've no idea how they let this one get through:

People such as scientist Stephen Hawking wouldn't have a chance in the U.K., where the National Health Service would say the life of this brilliant man, because of his physical handicaps, is essentially worthless

.
Whoops.

Gotta Love Parady

Louder with Crowder reviews the "hate-filled mob" at Obamacare protests, here at PJTV.

Over-reaching His Over-Reach

First, the ghastly non-stimulating Stimulus Bill (aka Porkulus). Then the economy-destroying Cap-and-Trade failure-to-be. Followed by the kill-all-old-people-by-copying-failed-socialist-policies Obamacare.

Now, Obama is attempting to also over-reach and over-extend his political capital by taking on immigration as well.

Yes, because failing to revive the economy while passing bills that raise taxes, increase our energy bills, impose a national sales tax (aka VAT - its coming soon), and decicating US citizens' healthcare is not enough.

According to the New York Times, here, Obama wants to flood our weakened economy with foreign-born, non-English-speaking, generally illiterate workers.

No offense to illiterate workers, but how exactly is that sort of immigration reform going to help the US economy, let alone other US citizens? Wouldn't getting US workers employeed first be the priority?

Global-Warming Policies Are the Real National-Security Threat

(Originially posted by my husband on NRO-The Corner, here)

Sen. John Kerry (D., Mass.) is trying to win Senate support for the ruinously expensive cap-and-tax global-warming bill, claiming it will prevent threats to national security, according to the New York Times. He argues that global warming will destabilize the developing world, creating climate refugees and exacerbating conflict. The American military will need to respond to these problems through either humanitarian-relief missions or armed intervention. This argument is flawed for two reasons. First, there is no reason to believe the bill being debated will stop any of this. Second, there is every possibility that the bill might make things worse.

If global warming is as bad as Senator Kerry fears, this bill will do nothing to avert its effects. Most honest proponents of the bill admit that it will do nothing to reduce global temperatures. At most, according to climatologist Chip Knappenberger, the bill will reduce warming by about nine-hundredths of a degree Fahrenheit by 2050, a difference too small to be measured.

Could anything avert those supposed effects? Yes — much more stringent climate policies, which would have adverse effects of their own. The national-security establishment uses “futurist” scenarios to establish possible national-security risks. In that spirit, it should also look at scenarios in which more stringent policies are implemented. Consider the following such scenario.

Developed countries enact strong restraints on emissions, along with high taxes on gasoline and coal energy. The coal, oil and automobile industries collapse. In America, the Gulf Coast states suffer particularly badly. Old automobiles are crushed. The second-hand car market also collapses. Poor people cannot find affordable vehicles. Poor rural families cannot get to work. They and the populations of former oil and coal producing areas move to cities where there is transportation but there are fewer and fewer jobs, leading to widespread urban discontent. Illegal immigration increases as employers bring in thousands of workers whom they house in barracks near their farms and factories. The car once again becomes a symbol of the rich. Is this a recipe for domestic tranquility?

Europe could also be destabilized by carbon restrictions. European politicians call for a de facto reduction of household income so that people will be less tempted to buy frivolous things. Car ownership reaches the level of social stigma. The European Union increases trade barriers on goods from long distances to pay for the external costs of their shipping, with leads to soaring costs. Inflation becomes a serious problem, but politicians defend it as an indicator of social good. Populist politicians rail against immigrant populations, denouncing them as environmental criminals for leaving their home countries. “Economic migrant” becomes a new insult.

Yet, even worse can be imagined. The developed countries set up a World Carbon Organization, which would impose severe economic sanctions on any country that did not enact carbon restrictions. China and India call the organization’s bluff and continue to build coal-fired carbon plants to fuel what is rapidly becoming the world’s economic base. The WCO tries to blockade Chinese exports. Western militaries, however, have been depleted by their own governments’ carbon constraints, and prove inadequate to the job of blockading. A potential “trigger” for a disaster scenario is easy to imagine: A frustrated French captain accidentally sinks a Chinese vessel carrying MP3 players to Australia. What happens then?

This is the sort of scenario the Pentagon should be examining. If global warming can destabilize the globe, so can global-warming policies. That is one reason the world has not reached an international agreement on reducing emissions that binds everyone to reductions, and why we never shall with current technology.

Senator Kerry says that he wants a world free from the dangers of global warming. But the cap-and-tax bill he is promoting is more likely to give us a world with the dangers of global warming and the dangers of protectionist nationalism. That is a bad deal for the security of America — and the world.

P.S. My colleague Marlo Lewis examined the various supposed threats to national security in very great detail for the a hearing held by House Intelligence Committee. You can read his excellent testimony here. You can also see his documentary, Policy Peril, at CEI On Demand.

Over at PlanetGore, there's this tidbit about Clinton's huge carbon-footprint eating habits while at climate conferences. Ah, the smell of hypocrisy in the evening...

Today's Protest Roundup

The Washington Examiner has a well-linked article, here, covering all the protests to date and why Democrats are "flummoxed".

ABCNews reports that the White House is distancing itself from Pelosi and Hoyer's USA Today article calling Americans who disagree with Obamacare, "UnAmerican".

Support for Obamacare has fallen to a new low of 42% according to this Rasmussen Report here. (May it continue to fall!)

Obamacare will face deep Senior-Citizen disapproval according to The Washington Examiner here. The article states...

So far, the health care battle has not focused specifically on the proposed Medicare cuts. But older Americans are the most avid voters in the country, and the latest Gallup poll shows that just 48 percent of people age 65 or older approve of the job Obama is doing as president -- the lowest of any age group. Much of Obama's problem with them can be traced directly to the health care issue.

Democrats aren't defending Medicare the way they did in the 90s and Senior Citizens are taking notice. This is politics on fire.

The Wall Street Journal has a critical piece on Obamacare and it's inflexible orthodoxies here. The change in Obama's pledges to be "open-minded" does not give the WSJ hope.

I'm sure there will be updates.