The ObamaCare Trap

Republicans must be careful to not fall into the Democratic trap of "fixing" ObamaCare. The President and his allies have been adamant in saying the Republicans have been trying to repeal ObamaCare, but have not offered an alternative. The truth is Republicans should not offer an alternative; that is the trap. The solution is to be found in the market, not in the Congress. It is government involvement in medical care that has led to the situation we now found ourselves in. Medicare is not in trouble yet, but will be if ObamaCare related cuts in service continue. Medicaid is a well-known disaster providing inferior healthcare to America's poorest and needy. Medicare and Medicaid are both rife with corruption in every state. Without the constantly renewed "Doc Fix" Medicare too would be in big trouble. So Republicans must fight the "alternative" argument of Obama and the Democrats by saying Health Care requires a market solution, not another government program. It is time for the government to get out of the healthcare business and leave it to the professionals who know what they are doing.

Is the President Walking on Broken Glass?

Just how bad is the situation with ObamaCare? Has it driven the President to the edge? As the truth emerges and we discover that He and the Democrats understood the healthcare market would be utterly unraveled to accomplish the long-sought liberal goal of national healthcare. We learned that while he and other Democrats assured us if we liked our policy we could keep it was a lie.  If we liked our doctors we could keep them, period, was a lie too. Worse yet, they knew it was a lie and told it anyway. It was as bold a lie as you could tell. As brazen as a lie could be. Even as he said it he knew it was untrue and he thought he could get away with it. Like a kid in a candy store, the President thought he could pocket that one piece and walk out without getting caught. But as the lies piled on and the truth became a victim of the knockout the President has been caught and is now walking on the broken glass of a shattered healthcare scheme? How will the bloodbath end?

ObamaCare: The Road to Single-Payer

Those that think the Republicans have never offered an alternative to ObamaCare are wrong. The simple truth is Democrats don't want reform. What they want is "Single-Payer." They want government run healthcare to control people's lifestyles and medical choices. They want to eliminate insurance companies from the equation and impose a healthcare tax on every working person and subsidize the cost for those they deem "can't afford it." What is occurring now is the intermediate step toward single payer; make policy management so impossible that it becomes a losing proposition for insurance companies, hospitals and doctors and they get out of the business. Both are happening right now.If you think this is a paranoid view consider the following: Before ObamaCare was passed 85% of people with healthcare insurance were satisfied with the policies. It wasn't perfect, but 85% is not bad. There were said to be 40 million people uninsured. Some who did not want insurance and some who did not have it because they were too poor or ineligible. Rather than legislate reforms to provide wider coverage and lower prices, which could have been easily done, the Democrats decided to go after the whole enchilada. To accomplish this they have to destroy the current system. The Democrats have told what they think you deserve: MedicAid, also known as healthcare for the poor, except for the ruling class of course. Be careful what you wish for.

Have we become a nation of men?

That is the question I pose on this July 4th, 2013. Have we surrendered our loyalty to the Constitution to become a nation of men who pick and choose which laws we will defend and which we will ignore? Or do we remain a nation of laws where the laws are larger than any man, whether he be rich man, poor man, beggar man thief, doctor, lawyer, Indian chief. If we were to judge the activities of our government of late you might have to conclude we have become a nation of men. Whether it's the Executive Branch's failure to obey and defend the Constitution and the laws that govern the various departments in the bureaucracy. Or, the Legislative Branch's failure to follow its own procedures to produce a budget and keep the bureaucracy in check. Or, the Judicial Branch's penchant to rule in a vacuum as if men, women and the nation were not affected by the decisions they make. I have always been an optimist about our nation, but I must admit that on this Independence Day, pessimism is getting the better of me.

Obama Pal Mark Zuckerberg a Conservative?

I have never yet seen true conservative individuals or groups pretend to be liberal and try get their political opponents to vote them by trickery, but over the past decade I have seen liberal individuals and groups do it many times. For example a few years ago in New Jersey some liberals’ candidates offered themselves to the electorate as "Tea Party" candidates to dilute the conservative electorate and engineer Democrat wins. The new "Americans for a Conservative Direction" immigration group is a new twist on an old strategy; It is just a blatant spit in your eye advertising campaign by Obama and the Democrats, fronted by FaceBook CEO and Obama pal Mark Zuckerberg to portray supporters of Amnesty as in favor of conservative positions on immigration. I went to the site to have a look for myself: www.americansforaconservativedirection.com. It looks okay. Has a few well thought out paragraphs that repeat the common goals; pay a fine, learn English, join the back of the line, etc. It includes a background check, no benefits, E-verify, all the buzz phrases to make conservative swoon. The only problem is many of these things will not be in the final bill or the immigration situation would be worse. Leaving illegal aliens to care for themselves for 13 years without assistance would leave our cities in chaos. Taking note that only half of the three million illegal residents eligible for amnesty in 1986 joined the program, what do we do with those who do not sign up this time? If we do not deport them you could say that is "de facto amnesty." This ad in now running on television and the conservative talk radio circuit, but it is an ad developed by and for liberal supporters of the Democrat Immigration Reform bill now in the Senate, but pretending to be a conservative voice. I am not the first to discover this, but I can't resist pointing it out. 

Is Snowden a Snow Job?

It has occurred to me that the NSA leak story is just too convenient to be anything but a planned diversion to take the IRS, EPA, and other Obama data abuse scandals off the front page and replace them with the biggest data mining story of them all. By smushing all the data into one big story, you can confuse the difference between what is legal behavior and what is not. You can confuse which data is legal to collect and use and which data is not. You can confuse what data is usable and what data is not. Always remember the old KISS principle: Keep it Simple Stupid. Data mining of the type done by the NSA is legal, though it may be questionable. Data dumping and targeting of political enemies as done by the IRS and the EPA is illegal. Of that there is no question. So why then is the media suddenly focused on what will blow over, and ignoring that which can be fatal to Obama? Ask yourself that question. In the meantime, Keep it Simple Stupid and bring a snow shovel.

It's not the Surveillence, it's the Misuse of Information

Wasn't it Seinfeld's mailman nemesis Newman who said "When you control information, you control the world?" Well that is the problem President Obama now faces. While there are some arguments against data mining on such as scale it cannot be argued that we must have some weapon against enemies of the nation. Surveillance of the kind now being reported, which is truly amazing in scope, is a way to accomplish that goal. Obama's problem is that he and those that support him have demonstrated they are willing to collect and use illegally obtained data to defeat their political enemies. The IRS scandal clearly shows the extra-prosecution and extended investigation of conservative non-profits during the 2010-2012 period. It is now apparent that Mitt Romney's tax info was obtained illegally by Senator Harry Reed during the election cycle. Is is clear that the IRS audits of conservatives, such as the Koch brothers, was politically motivated. It is also clear that some IRS employees made the confidential tax data of some individuals available to liberal-leaning publications and think thanks. One of the conservative groups awaiting a long three-year struggle for a 6-month 501c process was not only harassed by the IRS, but visited by several federal departments as well. For most Americans this is cheating and while many have gotten used to it, most of us resent it and rightfully so. The only real consolation is that  the scope of the data being collected is so vast, it's unlikely it will be useful except in the rare circumstance, but that doesn't make cheating okay.