CORRUPTION: 40% of top Obama fundraisers get posts

“Your doing a good job Brownie.” Those are the words spoken by President Bush to the soon after to be doomed FEMA Director Michael Brown. Democrats including Barack Obama chastised the Administration for appointing cronies to government positions. Obama promised to appoint professionals based on merit. As we can see this was just another lie.

USA Today:

WASHINGTON — More than 40% of President Obama’s top-level fundraisers have secured posts in his administration, from key executive branch jobs to diplomatic postings in countries such as France, Spain and the Bahamas, a USA TODAY analysis finds.

Twenty of the 47 fundraisers that Obama’s campaign identified as collecting more than $500,000 have been named to government positions, the analysis found.

Overall, about 600 individuals and couples raised money from their friends, family members and business associates to help fund Obama’s presidential campaign. USA TODAY’s analysis found that 54 have been named to government positions, ranging from Cabinet and White House posts to advisory roles, such as serving on the economic recovery board charged with helping guide the country out of recession.

Nearly a year after he was elected on a pledge to change business-as-usual in Washington, Obama also has taken a cue from his predecessors and appointed fundraisers to coveted ambassadorships, drawing protests from groups representing career diplomats. A separate analysis by the American Foreign Service Association, the diplomats’ union, found that more than half of the ambassadors named by Obama so far are political appointees, said Susan Johnson, president of the association. An appointment is considered political if it does not go to a career diplomat in the State Department.

That’s a rate higher than any president in more than four decades, the group’s data show, although that could change as the White House fills more openings. Traditionally about 30% of top diplomatic jobs go to political appointees, and roughly 70% to veteran State Department employees. Ambassadors earn $153,200 to $162,900 annually.

 

The list of donors who got jobs:

RAISED MORE THAN $500,0000

Nicole Avant     Ambassador to the Bahamas

Matthew Barzun     Ambassador to Sweden

Don Beyer     Ambassador to Switzerland and Liechtenstein

Jeff Bleich     Ambassador to Australia**

Richard Danzig     Member, Defense Policy Board

William Eacho     Ambassador to Austria

Julius Genachowski     Chairman of Federal Communications Commission

Donald Gips     Ambassador to South Africa

Howard Gutman     Ambassador to Belgium

Scott Harris     General Counsel, Department of Energy

William Kennard     Ambassador to the European Union**

Bruce Oreck     Ambassador to Finland

Spencer Overton     Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General

Thomas Perrelli     Associate Attorney General

Abigail Pollack     Member, Commission to Study the Potential Creation of a National Museum of the American Latino

Charles Rivkin     Ambassador to France and Monaco

John Roos     Ambassador of Japan

Francisco Sanchez     Under Secretary of Commerce for International Trade

Alan Solomont     Ambassador to Spain and Andorra**

Cynthia Stroum    Ambassador to Luxembourg**

RAISED BETWEEN $200,000 and $500,000

A. Marisa Chun     Deputy associate attorney general

Gregory Craig     White House counsel

Norman Eisen     Special counsel to the president for ethics and government reform

Michael Froman     Deputy assistant to the president and deputy national security adviser for international economic affairs

Mark Gallogly     Member, Economic Recovery Advisory Board

Max Holtzman     Senior adviser to the Agriculture secretary

James Hudson     Director, European Bank for Reconstruction and Development

Jeh Johnson     General counsel, Department of Defense

Samuel Kaplan     Ambassador to Morocco

Nicole Lamb-Hale     Deputy general counsel, Commerce Department

Andres Lopez     Member, Commission to Study the Potential Creation of a National Museum of the American Latino

Cindy Moelis     Director, Commission on White House Fellows

William Orrick     Counselor to the assistant attorney general

John Phillips    Chairman, Commission on White House Fellows

Penny Pritzker***    Member, Economic Recovery Advisory Board

Bob Rivkin     General counsel, Transportation Department

Desiree Rogers     White House social secretary

Louis Susman     Ambassador to the United Kingdom

Robert Sussman     Senior policy counsel, Environmental Protection Agency

Christina Tchen     Director, White House Office of Public Engagement

Barry White     Ambassador to Norway

RAISED BETWEEN $100,000 and $200,000

Preeta Bansal     General counsel, Office of Management and Budget

Laurie Fulton     Ambassador to Denmark

Fred Hochberg     President, Export-Import Bank of the United States

Valerie Jarrett     Senior adviser to the president

Kevin Jennings     Assistant deputy secretary of Education

Steven Rattner     Treasury Department adviser

Miriam Sapiro     Deputy U.S. trade representative**

Vinai Thummalapally     Ambassador to Belize

RAISED BETWEEN $50,000 and $100,000

Eric Holder     Attorney general

David Jacobson     Ambassador to Canada

Ronald Kirk     U.S. trade representative

Rocco Landesman     Chairman, National Endowment for the Arts

Susan Rice     Ambassador to the United Nations

** Nominated, not yet confirmed by Senate

*** National finance chairwoman

Sources: Obama campaign, Public Citizen; White House; USA TODAY research

CBO: Obama is wrong, cuts in Medicare will result in benefit cuts. The corrupt AARP angle. UPDATED!

Yahoo/AP News:

WASHINGTON – Congress’ chief budget officer on Tuesday contradicted President Barack Obama’s oft-stated claim that seniors wouldn’t see their Medicare benefits cut under a health care overhaul.

The head of the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, Douglas Elmendorf, told senators that seniors in Medicare’s managed care plans could see reduced benefits under a bill in the Finance Committee.

The bill would cut payments to the Medicare Advantage plans by more than $100 billion over 10 years.

Elmendorf said the changes “would reduce the extra benefits that would be made available to beneficiaries through Medicare Advantage plans.”

This is the key AARP angle. The number one seller of AARP medicare Advantage gap insurance is the AARP. AARP will have to raise rates to make up for the gap and more people will have to buy gap insurance due to the cut in benefits. AARP will make millions. Now you know why AARP is all for the latest health care proposals.

Hotair.com is reporting that the Senate Finance Committee Staff is saying the same thing:

SHAWN BISHOP, SENATE FINANCE COMMITTEE PROFESSIONAL STAFF MEMBER: “The $113 billion dollars is a reduction in the extra benefits, the added, additional benefits that Medicare Advantage enrollees have available to them. And those benefits come in the form of vision, dental, reduced hospital deductible. It’s unstatutory, it’s unlawful for any Medicare Advantage plan to reduce the AB covered benefit that they provide. That’s by statute. They have to provide that. They are going to have a reduction in the added benefits that they have in Medicare Advantage. So there’s a reduction in benefits but its additional extra benefits that they have above what they’re entitled to by law on the fee for service side.” (Finance Committee, U.S. Senate, Hearing, 9/22/09)

Ed Morrissey comments:

Only an idiot would conclude that $500 billion in cuts to Medicare over 10 years would mean no reduction in benefits. We budgeted $413 billion for this year, which makes a $50 billion “savings” target about 12% of its budget.  Obama keeps talking about how efficient Medicare is compared to private health insurance, but how efficient can it be if he can slice 12% out of the budget without affecting benefits?  In comparison, private health insurers spend 96.7% of all income on care and administrative costs, with only a 3.3% average profit margin.

Elmendorf is speaking not just from hard data but also common sense.  Any attempt to get that level of “savings” from Medicare will necessarily cut the benefits going to its recipients. Trying to cast that as a myth is either an indication of mathematical incompetence, political dishonesty, or both.  It’s also worth noting that when previous administrations attempted to cut Medicare spending by much lower amounts, Democrats would scream from the rafters about Republicans trying to steal Medicare away from seniors.  In this case, the CBO confirms that Democrats have engaged in projection.

And what happens in the media when the CBO exposes the President as a mythmaker, not a mythbuster?  Well, it’s like the proverbial tree in the forest.  None of the major newspapers covered the story that ObamaCare means cuts in Medicare benefits.  Not one.

UPDATE (10/20/2009) – While googling about I see that Michelle Malkin has a post on the AARP rip off angle as well. I should have known that Malkin would be all over this story. As always Michelle, nice work.

Regulation costs California economy $492 Billion – That is $134,122.48 per small business …

Our friend Michael van der Galien at Poligazette posted a link to a study that explains the degree in which bad government can destroy wealth, kill jobs and raise the prices of everything you buy.

http://www.sba.ca.gov/Cost%20of%20Regulation%20Study%20-%20Final.pdf

Poligazette explains that the total cost of regulation to the State of California is $492.994 billion per year. That is ‘almost five times the State’s general fund budget, and almost a third of the State’s gross product.’ 3.8 million jobs are lost because of overregulation which is a tenth of the State’s population. Furthermore:

Since small business constitute 99.2% of all employer businesses in California, and all of non-employer business, the regulatory cost is borne almost completely by small business. The total cost of regulation was $134,122.48 per small business in California in 2007, labor income not created or lost was $4,359.55 per small business, indirect business taxes not generated or lost were $57,260.15 per small business, and finally roughly one job lost per small business.

Some people feel better “when that rich guy” or “that business owner” gets taxed. Democrats play the class warfare game and tell us how they are going to “make them pay” etc… How does $500 Billion in lost wealth every year make you feel now? How many jobs could that money create? How many movie tickets bought, homes built, computers made, policeman trained, schools improved, cars repaired, and the list goes on?

It is important to keep in mind, every regulation is an arbitrary barrier to creating products, wealth and jobs. Getting rid of regulation does NOT mean getting rid of good policing. While rhetorically there may not be much difference between regulation and policing, in practice the difference is massive. We all want an active but limited government to protect us from fraud, abuse and crooks.  

As I commented on Poligazette:

I hate to throw soot on a gloomy picture, but it is even worse.

Why does California, a state that has more ability to create wealth than most countries, have this level of regulation that is causing the state to fall apart and its population vote with their feet and leave?

For each of these regulations, someone benefits either monetarily or ideologically. Many of these regulations simply serve to pick winners and losers by tilting the scale to help some business while harming their competition; with the winners kicking money back to interest groups and legislators.

The California Legislature is so strapped with the corruption otherwise known as “political market economics” (aka corporatism light) that it is a wonder the state went this long before starting to fall apart economically. But until the people who vote there learn a lesson I do not expect things to change in any meaningful way.

These regulations keep coming and the latest proposals are to have the state ban certain colors from cars, mandate the color of the roof of buildings and even have your home thermostat connected to the internet so the state can control the temperature of your home.

Obama Czar Mark Lloyd next to go? Said we need to get rid of white media execs and replace them with black ones. Praises Hugo Chavez’ take over of radio & TV. Plans to tax talk radio out of existance.

And yes he has said all of this in front of a video camera folks.

The Hugo Chavez and censorship remarks are HERE. This next video is a synopsis of his plan.

Washington Times:

Diversity czar’ takes heat over remarks.

President Obama’s diversity czar at the Federal Communications Commission has spoken publicly of getting white media executives to “step down” in favor of minorities, prescribed policies to make liberal talk radio more successful, and described Hugo Chavez’s rise to power in Venezuela “an incredible revolution.”

Mark Lloyd’s provocative comments – most made during a tenure at the liberal Center for American Progress think tank – are giving fodder to critics who say Mr. Obama has appointed too many “czars” to government positions that don’t require congressional approval. They are also worrying to some conservatives who fear the FCC might use its powers to remove their competitive advantage on talk radio and television.

Many of the remarks have been unearthed by conservative-leaning writers and bloggers and discussed on cable television amid a broader critique of Mr. Obama’s penchant for czars that exploded with the ouster this month of “green jobs czar” Van Jones.

In one of his more eye-opening comments, Mr. Lloyd praised Mr. Chavez during a June 2008 conference on media reform, saying the authoritarian Venezuelan president had led “really an incredible revolution – a democratic revolution.”

~

At another conference, Mr. Lloyd spoke about the need to remove white people from powerful positions in the media to give minorities a fairer chance.

“There’s nothing more difficult than this because we have really truly, good, white people in important positions, and the fact of the matter is that there are a limited number of those positions,” he said.

“And unless we are conscious of the need to have more people of color, gays, other people in those positions, we will not change the problem. But we’re in a position where you have to say who is going to step down so someone else can have power.”

He added: “There are few things, I think, more frightening in the American mind than dark-skinned black men. Here I am.”

Andrew Breitbart published the audio of the conference on his Breitbart.com Web site on Monday. Mr. Breitbart said the recording was made during a conference on media reform and racial justice in May 2005.

Politico: Congressional Committee confirms: Buy Insurance, Pay ObamaCare Penalty or Go to Jail!

Politico:

This doesn’t happen often enough.

Sen. John Ensign (R-Nev.) received a handwritten note Thursday from Joint Committee on Taxation Chief of Staff Tom Barthold confirming the penalty for failing to pay the up to $1,900 fee for not buying health insurance.

Violators could be charged with a misdemeanor and could face up to a year in jail or a $25,000 penalty, Barthold wrote on JCT letterhead. He signed it “Sincerely, Thomas A. Barthold.”

The note was a follow-up to Ensign’s questioning at the markup.

Here We Go Again: Democrats Trying to Lower Mortgage Loan Standards – UPDATED!

They are calling it the Community Reinvestment Modernization Act (CMRA). The Old Community Reinvestment Act played an important role in lowering mortgage standards and creating so many of these high risk loans that broke the system. While the CRA was just one layer of a multi layered problem created by government that culminated in the largest economic collapse since the Great Depression, it was still an important layer, so naturally the far left wants to do it AGAIN.

As we have reported before and have taken a lead in reporting on, the original CRA was intended to make it illegal to stop “redlining”; the practice of not giving loans to people based on race. But CRA was used by the Clinton Justice Department to make it an affirmative action program for loans, forcing banks to give mortgages to people who had no business getting a home loan simply because it was very unlikely that they could pay the loan back. They say it was about giving loans to poor minorities, when it fact it was about getting loans to Democrat constituent groups.

The rub is, that giving out high risk loans did not do them any favors. Many thousands of people in high risk loans defaulted, they lost their homes, their credit was destroyed and mortgage securities based on those loans brought down AIG, Lehman Brothers and dozens of banks.

Of course ACORN was at the heart of this problems as they filed CRA lawsuits to force banks to make high risk loans, under the faux guise of “fighting racism”.

We reported on this activity extensively HERE and HERE.

ACORN and SEIU have already created an atroturf support group to help get it passed – LINK.

The CRMA takes the old CRA one step further and mandates that loans be given to minorities regardless of income. Is giving a home loan to anyone regardless of income a wise move?

The Washington Examiner has details:

Dems push expanded Community Reinvestment Act; deny Act’s role in mortgage meltdown; GOP cites ACORN connection

By: BYRON YORK

Chief Political Correspondent

09/16/09 4:13 PM EDT

A number of experts believe that aggressive enforcement of the 1970s-era Community Reinvestment Act contributed to the mortgage meltdown, and thus to the greater financial crisis, by requiring financial institutions to lend to unqualified borrowers. Now, the Democratic majority in the House of Representatives is responding to that situation by proposing to expand the scope and power of the Community Reinvestment Act.

This morning House Financial Services Committee chairman Rep. Barney Frank held a hearing on H.R. 1479, the “Community Reinvestment Modernization Act of 2009.” The bill’s purpose is “to close the wealth gap in the United States” by increasing “home ownership and small business ownership for low- and moderate-income borrowers and persons of color.” It would extend CRA’s strict lending requirements to non-bank institutions like credit unions, insurance companies, and mortgage lenders. It would also make CRA more explicitly race-based by requiring CRA standards to be applied to minorities, regardless of income, going beyond earlier requirements that applied solely to low- and moderate-income areas.

Republicans on the committee strongly oppose the plan. “Instead of looking to expand the number of institutions that must abide by Community Investment Act regulations,” California Rep. Ed Royce said in prepared opening remarks at today’s hearing, “I think we should reassess the role this and other government mandates played in the financial collapse and consider scaling it back.”

In private conversation, other Republicans were more emphatic. “There is clearly arguable evidence that the CRA is at the root of this financial meltdown,” says one GOP committee member. “So what do they do? They try to expand CRA.”

But Democrats, led by H.R. 1479 sponsor Rep. Eddie Bernice Johnson, claimed that expansion of CRA is much-needed. “Congress has passed a number of laws designed to combat redlining and eliminate housing discrimination,” Johnson said at the hearing. “Unfortunately, we all know that redlining still occurs.”

Then there is the ACORN angle. Republican critics point out that the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now has used the CRA to pressure banks to pour money into ACORN and its affiliates, allowing ACORN to facilitate loans to clearly unqualified borrowers. Now, with ACORN under fire after a series of undercover videos showing ACORN workers in Baltimore, Washington DC, New York, and California openly encouraging prostitution, tax evasion, and other crimes, Republicans on the committee are citing the CRA-ACORN connection as yet another reason the Act should not be expanded.

Johnson’s bill has 51 co-sponsors, including some of the most liberal members of the House, like Reps. Dennis Kucinich, John Conyers, Bobby Rush, Steve Cohen, and Barbara Lee. Given the Democrats’ tremendous numerical superiority in the House, if the majority wants to expand CRA, Republicans will be unable to stop it.

UPDATE – Byrom York gives an analysis of the CRA that is spot on and tells the same story we told when the collapse took place. Well done Byron.

Washington Examiner Byron York:

Democrats on path to repeat housing disaster
By: Byron York
Chief Political Correspondent
September 22, 2009

With all the attention paid to the health care battle, ACORN, and the president’s “Full Ginsburg” appearances on five Sunday talk shows, few people noticed a hearing with an exceedingly boring title — “Proposals to Enhance the Community Reinvestment Act” — held last week in the House Financial Services Committee. But the session marked a key moment in the ongoing battle between Republicans and Democrats over what caused our current financial woes — and how we might best avoid getting into the same trouble again.

At the hearing, and in others across Capitol Hill, Democratic majorities are pressing hard to expand some of the very policies that led to the reckless home lending that in turn helped lead to the great financial meltdown. If Chairman Barney Frank and his fellow Democrats have their way, we’ll do it all again — and more.

At issue last week was H.R. 1479, the Community Reinvestment Modernization Act of 2009, sponsored by Democratic Rep. Eddie Bernice Johnson. It would expand and strengthen the 1977 Community Reinvestment Act, which required banks to make loans in low-income areas that many lenders had traditionally shunned.

After the meltdown, some conservatives blamed the CRA for almost solely causing the crisis by requiring banks to make risky loans to unqualified borrowers. It was an unfair charge. “CRA had at best an incremental role in the U.S. housing debacle,” says J.D. Foster, an economist at the Heritage Foundation. But CRA did help create the conditions in which disaster could occur.

The problems began in the 1990s, when Congress made it harder for lenders to do business if they had not passed the CRA “exam” — that is, if they had not met the government-imposed standards for loans to low- and moderate-income borrowers.

“From 1995 on, there was an incredible push by the Clinton and Bush administrations in every way they could — CRA, Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, and other ways — to increase the homeownership rate,” says Russell Roberts, a professor of economics at George Mason University. “What that did was to push up the price of housing, and that made it imaginable to lend money to people you never would have lent money to, on terms you wouldn’t have done before.”

In particular, Fannie Mae began to aggressively promote homeownership using the Community Reinvestment Act to give loans to people who couldn’t afford them. Fannie went to bankers and said, make as many CRA loans as you can; we’ll buy them and take them off your hands. “Our approach to our lenders is ‘CRA Your Way,’ ” top Fannie executive Jamie Gorelick told the Mortgage Bankers Association in 2001. “Fannie Mae will buy CRA loans from lenders’ portfolios; we’ll package them into securities; we’ll purchase CRA mortgages at the point of origination. …”

Fannie promised to buy billions and billions of dollars worth of CRA loans because it was under pressure to do so from the Department of Housing and Urban Development, which in turn was under pressure from Congress, which set ambitious quotas for low- and moderate-income loans.

The policy ended in a lot of people losing their homes. Now, Johnson’s bill would ensure more of that by applying CRA’s lending requirements not just to banks but to non-bank institutions like credit unions, insurance companies, and mortgage lenders. It would also make CRA explicitly race-based by, in Johnson’s words, “requiring CRA exams to explicitly consider lending and services to minorities in addition to low- and moderate-income communities.”

Republicans on the Financial Services Committee strongly oppose the plan. “Instead of looking to expand the number of institutions that must abide by CRA regulations, I think we should reassess the role this and other government mandates played in the financial collapse and consider scaling it back,” California Rep. Ed Royce said at the hearing.

In private conversation, other Republicans were more emphatic. “There is clearly arguable evidence that the CRA is at the root of this financial meltdown,” said one GOP committee member. “So what do they do? They try to expand CRA.”

That’s an overstatement of CRA’s role in the housing mess, but it’s right about the Democratic plan. Denying that CRA, Fannie and other institutions played any role in setting the stage for disaster, they’re proposing more of what helped get us into trouble in the first place. It’s no way to fix the problem.

Limbaugh Exposes New York Times ‘Attitude Change’ Propaganda

Listen to Limbaugh very carefully. As he reads the NYT article on the ACORN scandal he points out the information and important details that the article leaves out. Then Limbaugh does a brilliant job of expressing the attitude and tone of the article which is filled with buzz words (words that evoke an emotional response or narrative) designed to invoke an attitude in the reader. I did a 40 page paper on this very type of propaganda. it is called “Attitude Change Propaganda Theory”. With this type of propaganda you are given only some of the pertinent information and that information is delivered with an attitude that can include a false narrative.

This type of propaganda is taught in journalism schools so it is unlikely that the NYT isn’t perfectly aware of what this piece is really all about.

Another good example of this is HERE and HERE.

Government Report: Cap & Trade (tax) Bill will cost $1700 per household. Democrats caught lying about the bills impact.

CBS News Liberty Blog (amazing that they have a libertarian guy who has a liberty blog):

The Obama administration has privately concluded that a cap and trade law would cost American taxpayers up to $200 billion a year, the equivalent of hiking personal income taxes by about 15 percent.

A previously unreleased analysis prepared by the U.S. Department of Treasury says the total in new taxes would be between $100 billion to $200 billion a year. At the upper end of the administration’s estimate, the cost per American household would be an extra $1,761 a year.

A second memorandum, which was prepared for Obama’s transition team after the November election, says this about climate change policies: “Economic costs will likely be on the order of 1 percent of GDP, making them equal in scale to all existing environmental regulation.”

The documents (PDF) were obtained under the Freedom of Information Act by the free-market Competitive Enterprise Institute and released on Tuesday.

See the timing of this, they knew in November that this would take a huge chunk of money out of the economy. 1% of GDP is massive (dont sound much but in economic terms its huge). This means that the clips of Democrats and the White House saying that this would not cost much that Glenn played above…. well they were lying and full well knew it.

Federal Reserve claims it is not monetizing the debt, while it is monetizing the debt. – China alarmed by US money printing

Charles Payne

Glenn Beck asks Charles Payne, a famed author and CEO of Wall Street Strategies, to explain.

Telegraph UK:

By Ambrose Evans-Pritchard, in Cernobbio, Italy
Published: 9:06PM BST 06 Sep 2009

The US Federal Reserve’s policy of printing money to buy Treasury debt threatens to set off a serious decline of the dollar and compel China to redesign its foreign reserve policy, according to a top member of the Communist hierarchy.

Cheng Siwei, former vice-chairman of the Standing Committee and now head of China’s green energy drive, said Beijing was dismayed by the Fed’s recourse to “credit easing”.

“We hope there will be a change in monetary policy as soon as they have positive growth again,” he said at the Ambrosetti Workshop, a policy gathering on Lake Como.

“If they keep printing money to buy bonds it will lead to inflation, and after a year or two the dollar will fall hard. Most of our foreign reserves are in US bonds and this is very difficult to change, so we will diversify incremental reserves into euros, yen, and other currencies,” he said.

China’s reserves are more than – $2 trillion, the world’s largest.

“Gold is definitely an alternative, but when we buy, the price goes up. We have to do it carefully so as not to stimulate the markets,” he added.

Obama Chief Economic Advisor: Unemployment to stay high for years

Politico:

The president’s chief economic adviser warned Friday that the nation’s unemployment rate could stay “unacceptably high” for years to come — a situation that would seriously complicate Barack Obama’s ability to convince Americans that he’s beating back the recession.

“The level of unemployment is unacceptably high,” National Economic Council Director Larry Summers said Friday. “And will, by all forecasts, remain unacceptably high for a number of years.”

Summers’ comments came in a briefing with reporters ahead of Obama’s speech in New York City on Monday, marking the one-year anniversary of the collapse of Lehman Brothers, an event widely regarded as having created a panic that caused the global economic meltdown.

ABC News: If You Oppose Democrat Policies or Lies Your Racist – UPDATE Michael Steele Responds! – UPDATE Gary Bauer Responds!

[Editor's Note - So what the Democrats are saying is that if Joe Biden were president the Tea Parties would not be protesting the wasteful spending, the corrupt pork earmarks for corporate lobbying clients, the porkulus bills, the government take over of health care and the banks etc? So I ask, was it racist when they opposed HillaryCare in 1994?

Is anyone who criticizes Michael Steele (a black American), the head of the Republican Party a racist? By this standard the entire DNC is racist. Yup thats it, anyone who criticizes any Republican is a racist because they just can't take it that the leader of the Republican Party is a black man.]

The Media Research Center provides this segment from ABC News. This is one of the most irresponsible pieces I have ever seen. ABC takes short clips and runs them together with a false narrative and cry racism. This just isn’t propaganda its bad propaganda because most people see right through this.

The National Park Service says that the 9/12 Tea Party event in Washington DC was the largest DC protest in US history.

This whole idea that pointing out socialist and/or corporatist (corporatism is the economics of fascism in the strict academic sense) policies and corruption is racist is rather silly, especially from a political science perspective.

Charles Krauthammer responds to this nonsense from the NYT, Maureen Dowd and ABC quite correctly:

Indeed, the entire point at hurling the racism charge when substantive arguments are against you is to put the mark of the beast on someone and try to either shut them up, or make others afraid to listen to you in fear that they may be called a racist too. ABC and the rest of the elite media culture have gone from the watchdogs for the people to the watchdogs of the Democrat Party. With Obama as president, the elite media has abandoned the whole idea that it is to have a somewhat adversarial and skeptical view of government.

Every bloggers friend Gateway Pundit has this picture that he posts on his web site from time to time and in this case it is warranted.  

For contrast, here is some RESPONSIBLE media coverage of the first Tea Party events back in March:

UPDATE – GOP Chairman Michael Steele responds rather brilliantly in the face of NBC’s Andrea Mitchell who was trying desperately to best him:

UPDATE II – Glenn Beck responds. Beck points out that NBC’s Brian Williams said that the 9.12 Tea Party was a “violent crowd”. There were no arrests at the event…not one.

Beck continues and shows how NBC is even doctoring and misrepresenting video to make a racist charge against protesters.
While NBC doctored the video and told you that the man with the gun was a racist white man. The raw video clearly shows the man is black. Come to find out he is part of a public awareness group that wears guns openly at events to educate people on the states open carry law.

UPDATE III-  Gary Bauer speaks on the issue (Via The Anchoress):

Bauer noted that when Obama was inaugurated, he had an approval rating of 75 percent.  Yet, today, his approval rating is in the neighborhood of 50 percent.  If racism is the explanation, Bauer wondered aloud, are we to believe that the quarter of the electorate that seems to have abandoned President Obama just discovered that he is black?

As Bauer made his argument, it was obvious that he was speaking directly to the reporters present.  He went further by asking the crowd the question (and this is from memory so it may not be exact), “If a party were to run a candidate who was black, Asian, or hispanic and who was pro-life, in favor of free markets, traditional morality, and strong national defense, would you support that candidate?”  The crowd erupted in massive, enthusiastic applause.  Bauer joked with the crowd and the reporters present, “I can’t wait to run home and see that positive reaction from the crowd toward racial diversity played on CBS, NBC, and ABC!”  Of course, the enthusiastic reaction in favor of a candidate of color who is also a conservative doesn’t fit the press narrative and the audience reaction  would never be played on the news.  Bauer knew that.  The crowd knew that.  And so did the press.

UPDATE IV - The B-Cast news program did a special on how the elite media is dishonestly portraying the protests as “racist” LINK.

Savage Monologue on Obama Health Care Speech to Congress

I am not a huge fan of Savage, but he really has a great analysis here. This is definitely worth the listen.

UK DAILY MAIL: Two Million for Glenn Beck 9/12 Protest. NY Times says “thousands” and does not even mention Beck’s name.

[Editor's note: Welcome Gateway Pundit readers!]

UPDATE II – National Park Service: Largest DC event EVER – LINK and LINK.

UPDATE – More video of the crowds and University of Illinois has a method of using area to judge a crowd and estimated 1.7 million.

[Editor's Note - The fact that the UK papers cover American politics and some other domestic news better than our own elite media really is indicative of just how far ethical and professional standards have fallen in the United States.]

UK Daily Mail:

Up to two million march to US Capitol to protest against Obama’s spending in ‘tea-party’ demonstration

By Mail Foreign Service
Last updated at 9:39 PM on 12th September 2009

Up to two million people marched to the U.S. Capitol today, carrying signs with slogans such as “Obamacare makes me sick” as they protested the president’s health care plan and what they say is out-of-control spending.

The line of protesters spread across Pennsylvania Avenue for blocks, all the way to the capitol, according to the Washington Homeland Security and Emergency Management Agency.

People were chanting “enough, enough” and “We the People.” Others yelled “You lie, you lie!” and “Pelosi has to go,” referring to California congresswoman Nancy Pelosi.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldnews/article-1213056/Up-million-march-US-Capitol-protest-Obamas-spending-tea-party-demonstration.html#ixzz0QxBFUuRr

The NY Times misreporting is HERE.

Hotair.com has YOUTUBE:

Hotair.com is also reporting that those who claim to have a monopoly of love and tolerance had phoned in several bomb threats against the protest.

Video from the middle of it:

Indiana’s own Mike Pence at the 9/12 tea party protest:

Beck Goes Ballistic: 2009 and the the WTC site is STILL a hole in the ground! “Freedom Tower” project renamed “One World Tower” because they didn’t want people to be offended by the word “Freedom”…

ABC’s John Stossel on nationalized health Care, Canada, and Obama.

Krauthammer: Why Obama’s speech was a fraud.

One minute and thirty-nine seconds of devastating logic and reason.

ACORN Caught with Hidden Camera: Conspiring to aid in prostitution, tax fraud, bank fraud, child sex trafficking! UPDATE – The other shoe drops, they did the video sting at multiple offices!

UPDATE V – ACORN office number five! San Diego ACORN offered to help smuggle the teen sex workers through Mexico! This video was released on the Sean Hannity Show moments ago September 16th 2009.

UPDATE IV – San Bernardino ACORN office sting. Worst yet so far –  LINK.

UPDATE III – Now the New York office has been caught, same sting – LINK.

UPDATE II –

UPDATE – ACORN has a problem, they are blaming a couple of rogue employees at one office and saying that they are not representative of the organization, but after this startling revelation at the Baltimore ACORN office, it has been revealed that multiple offices engaged in illegal conduct on hidden camera.  - LINK

One day after two ACORN officials in Baltimore were fired for offering to help a man and woman posing as a pimp and prostitute to engage in child prostitution and a series of tax crimes, another secretly shot videotape has surfaced that shows the same couple getting similar advice from ACORN officers in Washington.

The newly released videotape, shot on July 25, shows ACORN staffers explaining to the pair how they can hide the woman’s professed work — prostitution — and get a loan that will help them establish a brothel.

James O’Keefe, a 25-year-old independent filmmaker, posed as the pimp while visiting the ACORN office, accompanied by 20-year-old Hannah Giles, who posed as the prostitute. On a videotape provided to FOXNews.com, they are seen receiving guidance to establish the woman as the sole proprietor of a bogus company to mask the nature of her business.

“She’s not going to put on (the loan application) that she’s doing prostitution … she doesn’t have to,” the ACORN staffer says. “You don’t have to sit back and tell people what you do.”

• Click here to see video.

ACORN is taxpayer funded and Obama used to work as a trainer and them a lawyer for them.

On video and totally, totally busted. ABC, NBC, CBC etc… refuse to report it.

Congressman Ellison: Public Option is a Path to Government Take Over

WURZER: Politics is the art of compromise.

REP. ELLISON: It is.

WURZER: So how are you all gonna compromise?

REP. ELLISON: Most of us are co-authors of HR676, which is a single-payer bill so we feel like we’ve already compromised. I think that the reality is the public option has been scored by the Congressional Budget Office as saving $150 billion, so this actually helps deal with the fiscal responsibility issues…It offers choice, which is a good thing…

ESKOLA: Isn’t the public option really just a step towards the single payer that you want so much?

REP. ELLISON: Yes but the reality is that for many people that’s not what it is.

This is a full admission, just as Congressman Jankowski and Frank have stated, just a way to put regular health insurance out of business and prepare for a government take over of health care. This means that all of the Democrats and news pundits who have said that this blog and people like Glenn Beck, Newt Gingrich, Sarah Palin and others are liars, are themselves lying…and this includes the president. Of course, to anyone who has read the bill as we have this is obvious.

Hat Tip Hotair.com for the video.

Obama blew it on unemployment. Now at 26 year high….

The Obama Administration shouted from the rooftops that their stimulus plan was the only thing that would keep unemployment from rising above 8%. Of course that figure was blown away months ago.

Yesterday the Labor Department Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) released their August unemployment data. The Wall Street Journal summarized the data in their article:

Job Losses Weigh on Recovery

Layoffs Slow but Unemployment Rate Hits 9.7%, Highest Since 1983

Nonfarm payrolls fell by 216,000 jobs in the month, fewer than the 276,000 lost in July, the Labor Department said Friday. The economy has shed 6.9 million jobs since the recession began in December 2007. The data reinforced expectations that employers will begin adding jobs by early next year, though the pace of job creation remains uncertain.

The latest figures are consistent with an economy pulling out of the deepest downturn since the Great Depression. But rising unemployment portends persistent weakness in consumer confidence, income and spending, even as manufacturers start bouncing back and stocks revive. The construction and manufacturing sectors together accounted for more than half of August’s job losses. Losses in retail and business services narrowed. The biggest gains came in health care.

The rise in unemployment, after dipping to 9.4% in July, came as more Americans returned to the work force. Teenage unemployment hit 25.5%, the highest since the government began keeping records in 1948. Most economists expect the rate to top 10% in coming months and stay over 9% through 2010.

NPR goes after Obama for breaking his crony appointments promise.

After Obama criticized the appointments of cronies in the Bush Administration and lecturing us on the problems they make…. well let NPR say the rest…

Chicago style politics is alive and well in DC…

NPR:

Coveted Ambassadorships Go To Obama Fundraisers

Japan’s recent elections have ushered in a period of political change, and the new government is likely to revise its relationship with the United States. The Obama administration’s new ambassador to Japan is not an expert on the region, but rather a Silicon Valley lawyer and political fundraiser.

This is just one sign of how President Obama is continuing a time-honored tradition of rewarding donors with plum assignments abroad.

When Obama came into office talking about change, he raised some expectations that he would alter the way he would choose new ambassadors.

But so far, more than half of the ambassadors he has named are political appointees — including several so-called bundlers, or superfundraisers who organize and collect campaign contributions, according to Dave Levinthal of the Center for Responsive Politics.

“They are people who are financiers who’ve helped the Obama campaign from the outset, and they are getting some plum positions — France, Spain, Germany, the U.K., Japan, Canada,” he says.

British news reports highlighted the fact that the new U.S. ambassador there, Louis Susman, has been called “the vacuum cleaner” for his ability to pull in political donations.

In Japan, Silicon Valley lawyer Roos — who had never been to the country prior to his appointment — is already settling in as ambassador. Levinthal says Roos was a bundler who brought in more than $500,000 for the Obama campaign.

Hat Tip to Hotair.com for reading NPR so the rest of us don’t have to. NPR so rarely breaks news so they just aren’t in my rotation.

Thuggary Blowback: Labor Unions See Sharp Slide in U.S. Public Support For first time, fewer than half of Americans approve of labor unions

Gallup Poll:

PRINCETON, NJ — Gallup finds organized labor taking a significant image hit in the past year. While 66% of Americans continue to believe unions are beneficial to their own members, a slight majority now say unions hurt the nation’s economy. More broadly, fewer than half of Americans — 48%, an all-time low — approve of labor unions, down from 59% a year ago.

These results are from the 2009 installment of Gallup’s annual Work and Education survey, conducted Aug. 6-9. The 48% of Americans now approving of unions represents the first sub-50% approval since Gallup first asked the question in the 1930s. The previous low was 55%, found in both 1979 and 1981.

Woman to Congressman: If you want to plunder my money for Obamacare COME AND TAKE IT!

This has gone viral on the net. Via Hotairpundit:

Bremerton resident and blogger Keli Carender challenges Norm Dicks to come and take the first $20 for healthcare from her. He refuses. Shot at his August 31st, 2009 town hall meeting in Bremerton, WA.

HCAN/SEIU/ACORN Organizer instructs the rent-a-mob how to shout down anyone asking a tough question about Obamacare at meeting.

Via Gateway Pundit.

There is the video, notice the HCAN stickers he is handing out. This was before Representative Jankowski’s meeting. Rep. Jankowsky (D-IL) is the one who boasted to a group of radical supporters that a government provided insurance plan would put private insurers out of business.

The man who shot that video interviewed. It is a must see:

Who is the Apollo Alliance and Why Did They Write the Stimulus Bill (that isn’t working)

And now you understand why the Stimulus Bill is mostly just growing government and not creating jobs.

By the way, one of the founders of Apollo Alliance is Jeff Jones, the other guy who founded the “Weather Underground” terrorist group with Bill Ayers who was Barack Obama’s employer before he ran for Senate. (LINK)

More Violence: ObamaCare Supporter Bites Finger Off 65 Year Old Man

AP:

THOUSAND OAKS, Calif. (AP) — California authorities say a clash between opponents and supporters of health care reform ended with one man biting off another man’s finger.

Ventura County Sheriff’s Capt. Frank O’Hanlon says about 100 people demonstrating in favor of health care reforms rallied Wednesday night on a street corner. One protester walked across the street to confront about 25 counter-demonstrators.

O’Hanlon says the man got into an argument and fist fight, during which he bit off the left pinky of a 65-year-old man who opposed health care reform.

There were 25 of them and one of him, hmm wanna guess who initiated the attack? Interesting that every reported case of violence has been from the SEIU/ACORN pro ObamaCare people. Well at least the people opposing ObamaCare have not have had to advertise for rent-a-mobs on Craigs List.

UPDATE: Allegedly the Obamacare thug charged at the 65 year old man and the man threw a punch to defend himself. The Obamacare thug then bit his finger off.

Dick Morris on the proposed Federal Health Board: The whole thing is a death panel.

Dick Morris gives a dead on analysis of yet another portion of the proposed federal health care law.

Democratic Health Care Bill Divulges IRS Tax Data

CBS News:

One of the problems with any proposed law that’s over 1,000 pages long and constantly changing is that much deviltry can lie in the details. Take the Democrats’ proposal to rewrite health care policy, better known as H.R. 3200 or by opponents as “Obamacare.”

Section 431(a) of the bill says that the IRS must divulge taxpayer identity information, including the filing status, the modified adjusted gross income, the number of dependents, and “other information as is prescribed by” regulation. That information will be provided to the new Health Choices Commissioner and state health programs and used to determine who qualifies for “affordability credits.” 

Section 245(b)(2)(A) says the IRS must divulge tax return details — there’s no specified limit on what’s available or unavailable — to the Health Choices Commissioner. The purpose, again, is to verify “affordability credits.” 

Section 1801(a) says that the Social Security Administration can obtain tax return data on anyone who may be eligible for a “low-income prescription drug subsidy” but has not applied for it. 

Over at the Institute for Policy Innovation (a free-market think tank and presumably no fan of Obamacare), Tom Giovanetti argues that: “How many thousands of federal employees will have access to your records? The privacy of your health records will be only as good as the most nosy, most dishonest and most malcontented federal employee…. So say good-bye to privacy from the federal government. It was fun while it lasted for 233 years.”

In The Tank: NBC & ABC Refuse Health Law Ads from Conservative Groups. – UPDATE: ABC Medical Correspondent is Obama $$$ Donor!

This is of course after ABC ran an infomercial for ObamaCare during prime time and as we and many others have documented, no one is in the tank for the Democratic Party on a day to day basis more than NBC News whose parent company, General Electric, has billions in government contracts at risk.

Dick Morris with Greta Van Susteren:

This is a rush transcript from “On the Record,” August 27, 2009. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.

GRETA VAN SUSTEREN, FOX NEWS HOST:Why won’t ABC and NBC run an ad critical of President Obama’s health care plan? This is the ad by the League of American Voters that won’t make it onto those two national networks.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE:How can Obama’s plan cover 50 million new patients without any new doctors? It can’t. It will hurt our seniors, end Medicare as we know it, ration coverage and care, limit life-saving medicines, impose long delays on cancer treatment and other vital surgery. It’s happening in England and in Canada. Don’t let it happen here.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Tell Congress to protect American health care. Paid for by the League of American Voters.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VAN SUSTEREN: All right, the group behind that ad wants to know why the networks won’t run it. Their local affiliates have aired it, but the two national networks that we named will not. Why not? Well, ABC, who hosted an hour-long special on health care reform from the White House, says they rejected the ad because its policy is not to sell time for advertising that presents a partisan position on a controversial public issue, while NBC says it will reconsider the ad once the network gets some more information.

And still with us is Dick Morris, the author of “Catastrophe.” He’s also, though, the chief strategist for the organization the League of American Voters. And I’ve done a little research myself, not a lot, but says FOX is in talks about putting it on and CBS has approved.

So tell me, first of all, what is this organization, Dick?

DICK MORRIS, AUTHOR OF “CATASTROPHE”:It’s a conservative group that is opposed to health care, Obama’s health care proposal and feels very strongly about it. And the point that I made to them in my consulting with them was that this debate has to be focused on the elderly. The concerns about socialized medicine and government and taxes and so on are all well and good, but if you’re going to back the Democratic Party off this bill, it’s got to be by explaining to the elderly what this bill means.

In fact, I was just thrilled yesterday because Congresswoman Betsy Markey of Colorado, a Democrat, strong supporter of this bill, told her town hall meeting there’s going to be some people who are going to give up some things honestly for this health care reform to work, but we will do this because we’re are Americans. And she spoke about the cuts in Medicare that are coming. And this ad really explains those cuts.

Now, Obama says, I don’t have any cuts in benefits. There’s nothing here that says I won’t cover cancer or I won’t cover heart disease. But there is something in the bill that says that you have to cut $500 billion out of Medicare over 10 years. Now, when Gingrich tried to cut Medicare, he enumerated those cuts. Here Obama punts on it and says, We’ll set up a commission that will make the decision as to what to cut, and Congress will have a very limited window to modify it or override it, effectively no way of doing it.

And then he also says, We’re going to cut reimbursement rates to hospitals, which obviously means there’ll be less care and the people that’ll hurt the most will be the elderly.

VAN SUSTEREN: You know, Dick, the thing that bothers me about the bill most of all is I can’t even get to the substance of it because it’s 1,500 pages that, frankly, I find incomprehensible, very poorly written. And I think that a bill can be plainly written. And so I can’t understand reforming a system with, basically, you know, a pile of chaos. That’s the first thing.

But one of the — one of the things that is said is that this bill will cause rationed care.

MORRIS: Right.

UPDATE – Via the Media Research Center:

ABC’s newly hired senior medical editor is also an Obama donor, having contributed $400 to the Democratic presidential candidate in 2008. TV Newser reported on Thursday that Dr. Richard Besser, the director of the Centers for Disease Control, would assume the position in September. A search on the website Open Secrets finds two donations by Dr. Besser on August 22, 2008.

As senior health correspondent, Dr. Besser can be expected to play a major role in ABC’s coverage of the health care debate this fall.

Dr. Tim Johnson, who currently holds the position for ABC, has long been an advocate for government-run solutions to the health care problem in America. Going back to the last big push in the early ’90s, he told then-First Lady Hillary Clinton on July 19, 1994: “So at least from the physicians represented here, you get a 100 percent vote, including mine, for universal coverage.” Johnson will become the “chief medical editor” for ABC News.

Besser was the acting Director of the CDC for the first five months of the Obama administration, but had a long professional career there as an expert on foodborne illnesses and epidemics.

Here’s a screen capture of the OpenSecrets search result:

On a related topic, the MRC’s Brent Baker observed on July 29, 2009 that, so far, 12 journalists have made the jump from reporting to actually working for the Obama administration, including former ABC News reporter Linda Douglass and ABC News Justice correspondent Beverly Lumpkin.

Big Business Goes Big for Health Care Reform

Just how bad is lobbying and corruptive influence in Congress? Follow our “Corporatism” category for some details. Here is ABC’s John Stossel with an important report.

John Stossel:

Wednesday, August 12, 2009

“What disturbs Americans of all ideological persuasions is the fear that almost everything, not just government, is fixed or manipulated by some powerful hidden hand,” Frank Rich wrote in Sunday’s New York Times.

That manipulation should disturb us. But contrary to Rich, it is not the work of “corporatists” who have sprung up to attack progressive reforms proposed by Obama and the Democratic majority. Manipulation is what we got many years ago when we traded a more or less free market for the “progressive” interventionist state. When government is big, the well-connected always have an advantage over the rest of us in influencing public policy.

Observe: Although President Obama and big-government activists demonize health-insurance companies, the companies “are still mostly on board with the president’s effort to overhaul the U.S. health-care system,” the Wall Street Journal reports; and …

Although the activists criticize Big Pharma, “The drug industry has already contributed millions of dollars to advertising campaigns for the health care overhaul through the advocacy groups like Healthy Economies Now and Families USA. It has spent about $1 million on similar advertisements under its own name,” the Times reports.

Big Pharma and Big Insurance want Obama-style health-care reform?

It’s not so hard to understand. “The drug makers stand to gain millions of new customers,” the Times said.

And from the Journal: “If health legislation succeeds, the [insurance] industry would likely get a fresh batch of new customers. In particular, many young and healthy people who currently forgo coverage would be forced to sign up.” No wonder insurers are willing to stop “discriminating” against sick people. (Forget that the essence of insurance is discrimination according to risk.)

Not that Big Pharma and Big Insurance like every detail of the Democratic plan. Drug companies don’t want Medicare negotiating drug prices — for good reason. If it forces drug prices down, research and development will be discouraged. (Depending whom you believe, Obama may or may not have agreed with the drug companies on this point.)

As for the insurance companies, they worry — legitimately — that a government insurance company — the so-called public option” — would drive them out of business. This isn’t alarmism. It’s economics. The public option would have no bottom line to worry about and therefore could engage in “predatory pricing” against the private insurers.

But despite these differences, the biggest companies in these two industries are on board with “reform.”

It illustrates economist Steven Horwitz’s First Law of Political Economy: “No one hates capitalism more than capitalists.” In this case, big business wants to shape — and profit from — what inevitably will be an interventionist health-care reform. Can you think of the last time a major business supported a truly free market in anything?

In light of all this, it’s funny to watch Democrats and their activist allies panic over the protests at congressional town meetings around the country. Tools of the corporate interests! they cry. But anyone opposing “socialized medicine” at the meeting can’t be a mouthpiece for big business because, as we’ve seen, big business supports government control. Conservative groups may be encouraging people to vent their anger at congressmen who pass burdensome legislation without even bothering to read it, but that’s no reason to insult the protestors as pawns. What’s wrong with organizations helping like-minded people to voice their opinions? Why do Democrats, such as Speaker Nancy Pelosi, dismiss citizen participation as “AstroTurf” — not real grassroots — only when citizens oppose the kind of big government they favor?

They weren’t so dismissive when George W. Bush was president and people protested — appropriately — his accumulation of executive powers.

“When handfuls of Code Pink ladies disrupted congressional hearings or speeches by Bush administration officials,” Glenn Reynolds writes, “it was taken as evidence that the administration’s policies were unpopular, and that the thinking parts of the populace were rising up in true democratic fashion. … But when it happens to Democrats, it’s something different: A threat to democracy, a sign of incipient fascism … House Speaker Nancy Pelosi calls the ‘Tea Party’ protesters Nazis. … “

So when lefties do it, it’s called “community organizing.”

When conservatives and libertarians do it, it’s “AstroTurf.”

Give me a break.

Gingrich: Three Reasons Why Government Can’t Run Health Care

by Newt Gingrich

Facta, non verba.

For those of you who have forgotten your Latin, it means “deeds, not words.”

There’s been a lot of overheated rhetoric about health care reform, but this saying is one that all Americans should return to when considering plans for a government-dominated health system.

In other words, we should judge government, not by its words, but by its deeds.

With this simple principle in mind, what follows are three examples why government can’t – and shouldn’t – run our health care system (at least not any health care system you or I would want to be dependent on).

Reason No. 1: Government Can’t Be Trusted With a Credit Card

Every family knows about making a budget and living within its means. Government, to put it bluntly, does not.

What if your husband had come home last Friday night and announced that he had racked up almost 30 percent more debt on the family credit card – including the mortgage and car loans – than he had told you about just a month ago?

Would you trust him to go out and start spending money to remodel the kitchen? And do you think he could get a loan to do it?

But that’s exactly what the Obama Administration did with their weekend news dump. They announced late Friday that the amount of money they don’t have but are nonetheless planning on spending over the next ten years isn’t the astonishing $7 trillion they estimated in May but is instead an astounding $9 trillion.

Add this to the fact that, after the administration sold its health care reform proposal on the grounds that it will reduce costs to the Treasury, the independent Congressional Budget Office determined that the House plan will actually cost an astounding $1 trillion-$1.5 trillion in the next ten years, which will be added directly to the federal debt. The director of the CBO testified before Congress last month that “[i]n the legislation that has been reported we do not see the sort of fundamental changes that would be necessary to reduce the trajectory of federal health spending by a significant amount. And on the contrary, the legislation significantly expands the federal responsibility for health care costs.”

Which do you have more faith in, the government’s happy talk of “bending the cost curve” or its record of out-of-control spending?

Deeds, not words.

Reason No. 2: Government Can’t Even Give Away Money Effectively

As the inimitable Andy McCarthy of National Review put it, “Compared to the infinite complexity of healthcare and health-insurance, cash-for-clunkers is kindergarten stuff. You trade in your old car for a new one that gets (slightly) better mileage and the government gives you money – between $3,500 and $4,500. How hard is that?”

Too hard for government bureaucrats, it turns out.

Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood has boasted that the cash-for-clunkers program provided “a lifeline to the automobile industry, jump starting a major sector of the economy and putting people back to work.”

But look at the deeds, not the words.

Last week, cash-for-clunkers ended in a bureaucratic morass of red tape, failed promises and unanticipated costs.

Air Traffic Controllers Manning the Cash-for-Clunkers Hotline

Only a government bureaucracy could mess up a program designed to give away free money.

The government wizards who set up cash-for-clunkers initially budgeted to sell 250,000 cars in three months.

The program sold that many in four days.

And because the central planners who think they can provide government “competition” to the private health insurance market failed to accurately estimate how many government workers it would take to administer cash-for-clunkers, they had to take employees from the FAA – air traffic controllers, no less – to help manage the demand.

And what about the car dealerships the program was supposed to help in the first place? Even though the rebates were supposed to be paid within 10 days, only 7 percent of federal promises under cash-for-clunkers have been paid so far, leaving dealers with millions of dollars in unfunded government promises.

More Than Bureaucratic Incompetence, Political Business as Usual

But there’s more to the cautionary tale of cash-for-clunkers than just bureaucratic incompetence.

This is a case study in what happens when politicians get involved in the marketplace.

Despite all the rhetoric of jump starting the auto industry, politicians’ priorities are to give free goodies to their constituents. So as far as they’re concerned, cash-for-clunkers has been a resounding success.

Forget the fact that they’re spending money they don’t have, or that car dealerships are left holding millions of dollars in empty government promises. They’re not concerned with the long-term, just the next election.

So tell us again why should we think bureaucrats and politicians will perform any better with our health care?

Reason No. 3: Government Would Rather Pay Crooks Than Manage Efficiently

There’s been a lot of worrying about the inevitability of government rationing health care under the Democratic reform bills in Congress.

Economists have known about this inevitability for a long time. Well, Americans can stop worrying. Government is rationing care already – and doing it in a particularly stupid way.

Studies have shown that early use of home health care after hospitalization – allowing patients to go home and be visited by a nurse to manage their care – saves Medicare billions of dollars.

So here is a case where an innovative government program actually saves the government money. Home health care is both more compassionate and more efficient. It reduces the likelihood a patient will be readmitted to a hospital by allowing her to heal in a more familiar setting.

Home Health Care Works, So Naturally Medicare Bureaucrats Cut Its Funding

So naturally bureaucrats at the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services cut $34 billion from this compassionate, efficient program last week.

And if the House health care reform bill becomes law, an additional $56.8 billion will be cut from the program – an amount equal to almost the entire federal budget for home health care services in 2007.

What makes rationing care to the homebound all the more immoral is the fact that there is a much bigger pot of savings available to Washington if it only had the political will to look.

Instead of Seeking Savings from the Homebound, Why Not the Crooks?

As a new book by the Center for Health Transformation’s Jim Frogue details, criminals rip off the taxpayers to the tune of $80 billion to $120 billion each year in the current Medicare and Medicaid programs.

We’re not talking about inadvertent bill errors but outright fraud. Government health programs are currently paying men maternity benefits, giving taxpayer dollars to pizza parlors that are supposed to be HIV transfusion centers, and even paying dead patients federal health care benefits.

If ever there was a reason not to turn our entire health care system over to government it is this: Government can’t run the health care programs it already has. It would rather ration compassionate, effective programs than do the hard work of rooting out and punishing the crooks who are stealing our taxpayer dollars.

Facts are Stubborn Things

Americans have already heard a lot of rhetoric about health care reform, and we can expect to hear a lot more.

But as Ronald Reagan used to say, facts are stubborn things. And the facts of government’s track record in managing our money and delivering on its promises speak louder than any televised presidential speech or stage-managed town hall ever could.

So as the summer winds down and the debate rages on, let this be our mantra:

Facta, non verba.

Make a bumper sticker out of it.

Put it on a tee-shirt and wear it to a town hall.

And when someone asked you what it means, tell them that before we hand over more of our lives to government, we should consider how they’ve treated us so far.

Leftists Vandalize Democrat Headquarters – Democrats Falsely Blame Health Care Protesters.

Michelle Malkin has more HERE.

Newt Gingrich: Democrats use Sopranos-style tactics in health care

Newt Gingrich:

Rep. Henry Waxman is making America’s health insurance companies an offer they can’t refuse.

Like a mafia underboss trying to face down a rival crime family, the powerful California Democratic chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee has resorted to ugly intimidation tactics with opponents of government-run health care.

In the spirit of Joe McCarthy, earlier this week, Waxman and House Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee Chairman Bart Stupak, D-MI, sent a letter to 52 of the nation’s largest health insurance companies that contained a not-so-veiled threat.

Democrat Congressman Henry Waxman

Waxman and Stupak’s letter demanded detailed information from health insurance companies about executive pay, corporate conferences and retreats, and other business practices.

For any employees or officers making more than $500,000 a year in the past six years, the congressmen are demanding details on salaries, bonuses, pensions and other compensation.

They’re asking for a list of conferences and retreats that are paid for by insurance companies. They’re also insisting that insurance companies disclose the identity of all board members and their compensation.

According to the letter, all this information must be provided by Sept. 14 as part of an investigation of “executive compensation and other business practices in the health insurance industry.”

Imagine that. An investigation of health insurance compensation launched by two powerful Democratic House Committee Chairmen in the midst of a coordinated campaign to vilify health insurance companies.

As far as intimidation tactics go, this latest move by Waxman and Stupak makes the White House’s effort to “flag” online political opponents look small time.

Waxman and Stupak are attempting to use raw political power to silence their opponents, plain and simple. If that’s not the case, why single out one sector of healthcare and not others, like physician groups, hospitals, and drug companies? Could it be because many of these groups have publicly supported the emerging Democratic legislation?

The problem for Democrats is that making health insurance companies the cartoon villains of heath care reform is a sign of desperation, not strength.

President Obama and his congressional allies have insisted for months that government health insurance is necessary, not to lay the groundwork for a single payer system, but to provide healthy competition for insurance companies.”To keep them honest,” in the president’s words.

But the more they talk down private health insurance in order to talk up government health insurance, the more the public distrusts government health insurance.

The latest NBC news poll found that 47 percent of Americans now oppose the government health insurance plan while just 43 percent support it. That’s a reversal of opinion from last month’s poll, in which 46 percent supported the government plan and 44 percent were opposed.

Americans have a lot to be dissatisfied with when it comes to private health insurance, but we’re not buying the argument that “competition” from government run health insurance will fix things.

If the White House is so interested in creating competition, why not give health care consumers real choices of better plans by creating a national health insurance market?

Today, there are more than 1,300 health insurance companies in America divided among 50 different state markets with 50 different sets of regulation of what level of coverage private health insurance plans must offer in each state.

Consumers are currently prohibited from buying less expensive health insurance policies issued by a private health insurer in another state. Creating a nationwide health insurance market in which individuals or groups can choose better and less expensive coverage from another state would create real competition and force private insurers in each state to create better products, improve service and lower prices.

Americans know the public option is declining rapidly in support, and Waxman and Stupak know that we know it. That’s why they’ve resorted to Sopranos-style tactics with health insurance companies.

For them, private insurance companies aren’t legitimate options for Americans seeking higher quality, lower cost health care. They’re poll-tested straw men in a desperate campaign to create government run health care.

Maybe that’s why Americans view their health insurance companies more favorably than their congressmen.

Former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich has published 19 books, including 10 fiction and nonfiction best-sellers. He is the founder of the Center for Health Transformation and chairman of American Solutions for Winning the Future.

White House Used Tax Dollars to Spam Politics to Citizens

Campaign dollars and party money is supposed to be used for this, not YOUR money.

FNC:

The White House hired a private communications company based in Minnesota to distribute mass e-mails, helping to shed light on how some recipients received e-mails in support of President Obama’s health care plan without signing up for them, FOX News has learned.

The company, Govdelivery, describes itself as the world’s leading provider of government-to-citizen communication solutions and says its e-mail service provides a fully-automated on-demand public communication system.

It is still unknown how much taxpayer money the White House provides to Govdelivery for its services.

Click here to view Govdelivery’s Web site.

The revelation comes after the White House acknowledged this week that people were receiving unsolicited e-mails from the administration about health care reform and suggested the problem was with third-party groups that placed the recipients’ names on the distribution list.

Republicans quickly pounced on the news.

“This is yet another ominous chapter in the administration’s rabid campaign to jam its radical health care scheme onto an unwilling public by any means necessary,” Rep. Thaddeus McCotter of Michigan said in a statement.

Govdelivery sent hundreds of e-mails from senior adviser David Axelrod asking supporters to help rebut criticism of Obama’s health care plan circulating on the Internet. It also sent e-mails highlighting Obama’s speech to the Muslim world in Cairo and the announcement of Sonia Sotomayor as a Supreme Court nominee.

Several FOX News viewers complained they received these e-mails even though they had never requested any communication from the White House.

JP Morgan/Chase Bank gets bailout money – gives $5 million to ACORN

[Editor's Note: Welcome Pajamas Media readers! To see more corruption in action see our "Corporatism" category.]

It is amazing how many companies who get bailout funds give money to ACORN and the Democrats.

Remember ACORN, the vote fraud people?

Obama gives $2 billion to Brazil to drill for oil. WHAT? UPDATE – Sarah Palin Responds!

We could be using this money to drill here. Check this out. Number one far left Democrat money man George Soros owns 811 million dollars worth of the company Obama is giving the money to. So it looks like Soros is getting the millions he spent on Democrats back courtesy of the US taxpayer.

Sarah Palin:

YOUR TAX DOLLARS HARD AT WORK: FIRST CARS, NOW FOREIGN OIL.

Today’s Wall Street Journal contains some puzzling news for all Americans who are impacted by high energy prices and who share the goal of moving us toward energy independence.

For years, states rich with an abundance of oil and natural gas have been begging Washington, DC politicians for the right to develop their own natural resources on federal lands and off shore. Such development would mean good paying jobs here in the United States (with health benefits) and the resulting royalties and taxes would provide money for federal coffers that would potentially off-set the need for higher income taxes, reduce the federal debt and deficits, or even help fund a trillion dollar health care plan if one were so inclined to support such a plan.

So why is it that during these tough times, when we have great needs at home, the Obama White House is prepared to send more than two billion of your hard-earned tax dollars to Brazil so that the nation’s state-owned oil company, Petrobras, can drill off shore and create jobs developing its own resources? That’s all Americans want; but such rational energy development has been continually thwarted by rabid environmentalists, faceless bureaucrats and a seemingly endless parade of lawsuits aimed at shutting down new energy projects.

I’ll speak for the talent I have personally witnessed on the oil fields in Alaska when I say no other country in the world has a stronger workforce than America, no other country in the world has better safety standards than America, and no other country in the world has stricter environmental standards than America. Come to Alaska to witness how oil and gas can be developed simultaneously with the preservation of our eco-system. America has the resources. We deserve the opportunity to develop our resources no less than the Brazilians. Millions of Americans know it is true: “Drill, baby, drill.” Alaska is proof you can drill and develop, and preserve nature, with its magnificent caribou herds passing by the Trans Alaska Pipeline System (TAPS), completely unaffected. One has to wonder if Obama is playing politics and perhaps refusing a “win” for some states just to play to the left with our money.

The new Gulf of Mexico lease sales tomorrow sound promising and perhaps will move some states in the right direction, but we all know that the extreme environmentalists who serve to block progress elsewhere, including in Alaska, continue to block opportunities. These environmentalists are putting our nation in peril and forcing us to rely on unstable and hostile foreign countries. Mr. Obama can stop the extreme tactics and exert proper government authority to encourage resource development and create jobs and health benefits in the U.S.; instead, he chooses to use American dollars in Brazil that will help to pay the salaries and benefits for Brazilians to drill for resources when the need and desire is great in America.

Buy American is a wonderful slogan, but you can’t say in one breath that you want to strengthen our economy and stimulate it, and then in another ship our much-needed dollars to a nation desperate to drill while depriving us of the same opportunity.

- Sarah Palin