GBTV - Where the Truth Lives

Election Season 2014

And it has brought us to this trainwreck called ObamaCare and we have bankrupted our kids and grandkids!

We are now headed into the 2014 Election Season and common sense and conservatism are on the rise. Please stand-up and be counted!

Reading Collusion: How the Media Stole the 2012 Election is a great place to start!

The Founding Father's Real Reason for the Second Amendment

And remember the words of Thomas Jefferson "The strongest reason for the people to retain the right to keep and bear arms is, as a last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in government." See Video of Suzanna Gratia-Hupp’s Congressional Testimony: What the Second Amendment is REALLY For, below (u-tube HERE).

The Leaders Are Here... Palin, Cruz, Lee, Paul, Chaffetz....

T'S A WONDERFUL LIFE

Can You Really Still Believe That None of These People Would Have Done a Better Job???

Bloggers' Rights at EFF

SIGN THE PETITION TODAY...

Friday, July 31, 2009

From Congressman John Campbell’s Laptop 7-31-09

Quote of the day: "No man's life, liberty, or property are safe while the legislature is in session." – Mark Twain 1866

Samuel Clemens would be comforted to know that his life, liberty, and property are now safe for the next 5 weeks as the House of Representatives has adjourned for the traditional August recess. The Senate is in for another week, but it can do little damage without our concurrence. Here is my brief synopsis of the state of some current issues:

Healthcare: As of this writing, the last committee in the House to mark-up the ‘socialized health care bill,’ Energy and Commerce, is still meeting. So, there isn’t much I can tell you right now. But one thing you ought to know is that I am a cosponsor of a resolution that says that if the bill passes, Members of Congress should be placed onto the government plan. Currently there are 66 cosponsors of the resolution, all Republicans. So, no one who is going to vote to force you into government run health care is willing to commit that they too will go into the government run health care plan.

So-Called Stimulus Funds: The Vice President was kind enough to send me (and the other 434 members of Congress) a summary of stimulus funds being “put to work” in my district in California. Interestingly, one of the biggest ticket items on the list, is $2,648,620 for “high performance green building” work at the government owned Ziggurat (Chet Holifield) building in Laguna Niguel. OK. But what Mr. Biden’s letter did not point out is that this building will likely be torn down. The Federal General Services Administration (GSA), which manages the property says that the building needs security, seismic, electrical, ceiling, and other work estimated to cost $100 million. The realty officer for the GSA recently told the Orange County Business Journal, that “from a pure efficiency (and) economic standpoint, most people would say demolish (the building) rather than throw $100 million at it. The GSA is currently in discussions with several developers to sell the 78 acre property and building.

So, the Obama administration is borrowing another $2.6 million to make this building “green”……..and then tear it down. Wonderful. Just wonderful.

Real Stimulus Funds: Of all the actions that this Congress and this Administration have taken to try and stimulate the economy, none have worked…….except for one, the ‘Cash for Clunkers' program. Regular readers of this missive will remember that among the stimulative action that I have called for, since last year, includes tax credits or other purchase incentives to encourage people to buy homes and cars. The one element of this that was passed into law is the 'Cash for Clunkers' program. The program is unnecessarily complex and, there are and will be, problems and complications with the program administration. But even with those problems, the program is working. After less than a week, it is estimated that 250,000 new cars have already been sold under the program. These car sales will clear inventories that have been stagnant from months of poor sales. That means factories will fire up again to replace those now depleted inventories, and people will go back to work. They will work in factories, in dealerships, in trucking firms, in rail yards, and for suppliers. Cities, counties, and states all over the country are highly dependent on new car sales for revenue. So, more car sales will also help fill their depleted coffers.

Because of the program’s success, the entire $1 billion allocated to it has already been depleted. $1 billion is a lot of money, but it is only about 1/10th of 1 percent of the total stimulus package passed earlier this year that resulted in such fine expenditures as the aforementioned Ziggurat building.

However, I am pleased to report that earlier today; the House passed, by a margin of 316-109, an additional $2 billion to continue this program. The $2 billion is NOT new money. It will be taken out of the so-called stimulus package. So, instead of that $2 billion being spent on something that will not work, it will be spent on the 'Cash for Clunkers' program which we know, has and will, create jobs. Instead of the money going to bureaucrats, it will serve to benefit hundreds of thousands of people around the country.

I may not write these quite as frequently over the next 5 weeks as Congress will not be in session doing any damage, but I do have a backlog of things to tell you about so you will hear from me a few times between now and Labor Day. Happy Summer!

Until next time, I remain respectfully,
Congressman John Campbell's signature
Congressman John Campbell
Member of Congress

Posted: Knowledge Creates Power

Government’s Big Behavioral Science Experiment

Government's Big Behavioral Science Experiment - Glenn Beck - FOXNews.com

FNC - Rep. Dana Rohrabacher, R-Calif.

This is a rush transcript from "Glenn Beck," July 30, 2009. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.

GLENN BECK, HOST: Hey, for all you lab geeks out there, you're going to be excited to know that the government is gearing up to conduct one of the biggest scientific experiments ever and you get to be a part of it.

It's called H.R. 3247. It's a bill proposed by Congressman Brian Baird.

It seeks to, and I quote: "Establish social and behavioral science research programs. They would seek to identify and understand social and behavioral factors that influence energy consumption, to promote the utilization of the results of social and behavioral research to improve the design, development and demonstration and application of energy technologies policies and programs."

Oh, this is fantastic. Remember the book "1984"? Sure. It's nothing like that. Really, this is completely different.

There'll also be a director of social and behavioral research. Oh man, I doubt if it will be, you know, like anybody with crazy beliefs, you know, like every other "czar." This one is going to be totally just like you.

Video: Watch Beck's interview

They're going to study us and find ways to essentially trick us into driving crappy hybrids and I bet that's just the beginning. As Time magazine summarized on April 2: "The president — President Obama is still relying on behavioral science. But now, his administration is using it to try to transform the country" — they didn't say this like it was a bad thing, either — "because when you know what makes people tick, it's a lot easier to help them change."

Well, that doesn't sound creepy at all. It doesn't.

And interestingly enough, it doesn't sound very American, either. But what is that now that we're in a global community? When has that ever stopped Barack Obama before? I mean, hey, if it's for the betterment of the collective — you know what I'm saying?

Joining me now is Congressman Dana Rohrabacher of California.

Congressman, you were one of the guys that were actually, really fighting against this bill yesterday. What — what in Crazy Town — AKA Washington — is going on?

REP. DANA ROHRABACHER, R-CALIF.: Well, this exemplifies something that has been happening underneath the surface. Rarely do you get someone as honest as Brian Baird and as sincere as he is, explaining the real purpose behind his bill, which is behavior modification.

So, he wants to set up a behavior modification "czar" at the Department of Energy. You know, we Republicans feel government is supposed to be controlled by the people, and obviously, the frame of mind that comes from this bill is: The government should control the people.

BECK: Well, I'm just thinking, gosh, Congressman, some might say this sounds like — oh, I don't know — propaganda.

ROHRABACHER: Well, that is exactly what they intend and, actually, I think the word was used in the debate. They believe that people just aren't doing the right things, because they're not making choices that these liberal leftists want them to make, and thus, there must be something wrong with them.

BECK: Sure.

ROHRABACHER: Let's psychoanalyze them.

BECK: They're insane.

ROHRABACHER: And, this is — this is as arrogant as it comes. And I will tell you, and Brian is a very nice guy, he is well intended, but you know what the people who put us on the road with all good intentions, they can put us on the road to you know where.

BECK: I'm going to say it — hell or Moscow.

ROHRABACHER: That's right.

BECK: One of the two.

Help me out with this one. This is what Representative Baird said —
he said: "We are not only going to unleash psychiatrists on you, it's going to be anthropologists and economists and psychologists. This is vicious, freedom-grabbing mind control at its most pernicious. And I think we should desperately hide in fear, because without a doubt, the Martians and the communists are right behind."

He was mocking anyone who had a problem with a behavioral research czar and propaganda — mocking.

ROHRABACHER: That's right. Well, the trouble with this debate was
— and by the way, it was passed by party-line vote: All of the Democrats voted for it; all the Republicans voted against it. But you can't tell when they're being facetious or not.

You heard some people there making arguments that, "We have to tell our children whether or not to turn the lights on and off." Well, you know, we — our retort was, you don't treat the American people like children. Children shouldn't have all the rights and make independent decisions. But adults in this country don't deserve to be sent to a psychiatrist if they disagree with some little liberal guru.

BECK: OK. Thank you very much, Congressman. You keep up the good fight.

Content and Programming Copyright 2009 FOX News Network, LLC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. Transcription Copyright 2009 CQ Transcriptions, LLC, which takes sole responsibility for the accuracy of the transcription. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. No license is granted to the user of this material except for the user's personal or internal use and, in such case, only one copy may be printed, nor shall user use any material for commercial purposes or in any fashion that may infringe upon FOX News Network, LLC'S and CQ Transcriptions, LLC's copyrights or other proprietary rights or interests in the material. This is not a legal transcript for purposes of litigation.

POSTED BY ASK MARION – Knowledge Creates Power

WARNING - DO NOT LOG ON TO CARS.GOV

WARNING - DO NOT LOG ON TO CARS.GOV - If you log on to cars.gov and accept the privacy terms, the government now has the right to take all the information on your computer. That will include all your personal information, bank records, transactions, web site log ins, EVERYTHING ON YOUR COMPUTER.

I am not saying the government will take your personal information. I am telling you that accepting the terms will allow them to.

   A sign welcoming consumers to participate in the "Cash for Clunkers" program is posted outside the Pride Chevrolet dealership in Lynn, Mass., Friday, July 31, 2009. After hours of confusion about whether the Cash for Clunkers program had run out of money, it was game on again Friday for car dealers, TV stations and newspapers, who had worried that one of the few bright spots for their industries would end after just one week.

A sign welcoming consumers to participate in the "Cash for Clunkers" program is posted outside the Pride Chevrolet dealership in Lynn, Mass., Friday, July 31, 2009. After hours of confusion about whether the Cash for Clunkers program had run out of money, it was game on again Friday for car dealers, TV stations and newspapers, who had worried that one of the few bright spots for their industries would end after just one week.

Also, cars cannot be re-sold. They must be destroyed, and although parts can be recovered, no engines or drive trains; these will be sold to China, where they can keep polluting. (Man-made 'global' warming being used as one main reason for program... Can someone say "global... same globe?!?")

Side effect: If you choose to keep and old car, getting parts will become come exceedingly more difficult and more expensive, forcing you to buy one of the new Government Motor cars...

Posted: Knowledge Creates Power

The Coming Demise of the Strange Co-Presidency of the United States

This was a good cop / bad cop pairing, if ever there was one: he, the dreamer, the spinner of words and the perfect front man; she, the partisan bully and de facto shaper of policy. The co-presidency of Barack Obama and Nancy Pelosi is one of the stranger outcomes of the last election.

Imagine if it had been her name instead of his at the top of Democrat ticket last November. That is a race that even old, tired and badly confused John McCain could have won by the widest of margins.

The American people elected Barack Obama, but what they have gotten -- in domestic policy matters -- is a snootful of Nancy Pelosi. To quote long-time Democratic Party activist Ted Van Dyk, what they have gotten is "an expensive mess" -- a series of hastily conceived bills "loaded with costly provisions designed to gain support from congressional leaders and special-interest constituencies."

While the president has been running around the world giving speeches, Pelosi has taken charge of domestic policy. It was she who cobbled together the stimulus package and she who has taken the lead in setting energy and healthcare policies.

Mr. Van Dyk, who was active in Lyndon Johnson's White House, hoots at the idea -- floated by White House staffers -- that the Obama's strategy in pushing health-care and energy initiatives brooks comparison with the way Johnson pushed his Great Society legislation. In an article in the Wall Street Journal he wrote:

Johnson's initiatives were framed in the White House by his administration…. Your (Obama) strategy, by contrast, has been to advocate forcefully for health-care and energy reform but to leave the details to Democratic congressional committee chairs. You did the same thing with your initial $787 billion stimulus package. Now, you're stuck with a plan that provides little stimulus until 2010. A president should never cede control of his main agenda to others.

But it is questionable how much the president knows or cares about domestic policy issues, beyond wanting to present himself -- first, last and always -- as the champion of urgently needed change.

In his book Dreams from My Father, he tells how he came to give his first speech as a student at Occidental College in Los Angeles. "As something of a lark," he says, he became involved in a campaign calling for disinvestment in South Africa. Obama says he approached the microphone "in a trancelike state" and began:

"There's a struggle going on," I said. My voice barely carried beyond the first few rows. A few people looked up and I waited for the crowd to quiet.

"I say, there's a struggle going on!"

The Frisbee players stopped.

"It's happening an ocean away. But it's a struggle that touches each and every one of us. Whether we know it or not. Whether we want it or not. A struggle that demands we choose sides. Not between black and white. Not between rich and poor. No -- it's a harder choice than that. It's a choice between dignity and servitude. Between fairness and justice. A choice between right and wrong …

Whatever those words were supposed to mean, they had an electric effect upon the audience. This, then, was vintage Obama -- at the tender age of 20 -- speaking in a way that seems to transcend both race and class. But listen to his response a couple pages later when a co-worker compliments him on his speech:

"It was short, anyway."

Regina ignored my sarcasm. "That's what made it so effective," she said. "You spoke from the heart, Barack. It made people want to hear more…"

"Listen, Regina," I said, cutting her off, "you are a very sweet lady. And I'm happy you enjoyed my little performance today. But that is the last time you will ever hear another speech out of me…"

"And why is that?"

I sipped on my beer, my eyes wandering over the dancers in front of us. "Because I've got nothing to say, Regina. I don't believe that we made any difference by what we did today. I don't believe that what happens to a kid in Soweto makes much difference to the people we were talking to. Pretty words don't make it so. So why do I pretend otherwise. Because it makes me feel important. Because I like the applause. It gives me a nice, cheap thrill. That's all."

"You don't really believe that."

"That's what I believe."

Now perhaps those are the thoughts an immature and angry young man -- who has yet to discover his calling in life. However, on almost every page of the book we find a man who loves to give speeches and pass out free and unsolicited advice. At all times, he seems acutely conscious of his effect upon an audience, yet strangely indifferent to the substance or content behind his words.

There is, for instance, the revealing story of how he quelled an incipient revolt by five volunteers who were working for him when he had a $10,000 a year job as a "community organizer" in Chicago. They are all on the verge of quitting. "It has nothing to do with you," one tells him. "The truth is, we're just tired. We've all been at this for two years, and we've got nothing to show for it" -- nothing, that is, in the way of tangible results, though there have been endless meetings and rallies.

The young Obama's response is to -- launch into a speech. Happening to spot some boys who are vandalizing a vacant apartment, he points out the window and demands to know, "What do you suppose is going to happen to those boys out there?… Who's going to make sure they get a fair shot? The alderman? The social workers? The gangs?… You know, I didn't come here 'cause I needed a job. I came here 'cause Marty said there were some people who were serious about doing something to change their neighborhood."

While the purported purpose of his community organizing job was to rally support for a plan to save manufacturing jobs in metropolitan Chicago, there is no evidence that he and co-workers saved a single job. Indeed, he himself says, "The big manufacturers had opted for well-scrubbed suburban corridors, and not even Gandhi could have gotten them to relocate near Altgeld (a big public housing project) anytime soon." So if everything was destined to fail, what was the point in doing it in the first place?

That is also a question that should be asked of the stimulus plan, which doesn't seem to be stimulating much of anything; the cap- and trade bill, which will raise taxes without, seemingly, doing anything to limit carbon emissions; and the health care plan, which carries the scarcely believable promise of greatly expanded care at greatly reduced cost through the mechanism of greater government control in the decision-making process. All this adds up to the sacking of America's resources for the salving of the liberal conscience.

Obama is fast coming to a point where he must choose sides. To paraphrase the words of his first speech, this is not a choice between black and white, or between rich and poor. Nor is it a choice between dignity and servitude, or between fairness and justice. It is none of those things.

Leaving rhetoric aside, it is a simple and less-than-heroic choice between playing to a small audience and playing to a much larger audience. The small audience consists of power-hungry politicians and their friends in Hollywood, academia and the media, who want to ratchet up taxes and launch a raft of expensive social programs, of little or no practical value, in the midst of the worst recession in 60 years. The larger audience consists of the people who elected him in 2008, and who may very well turn against his party in the 2010 Congressional elections.

Surely, he will choose to play to the larger audience. If so, Nancy Pelosi may remain the Speaker of the House but she will deposed from her unofficial position as co-President of the United States. No doubt the Republic will survive this loss.

By Andrew B. Wilson on 7.29.09 @ 6:08AM - a former Business Week bureau chief in Dallas and London, is a freelance writer living in St. Louis, Missouri

I’m not sure I agree with all of this, but I found it to be an interesting Article – Ask Marion~

Senate Conservatives Update

Co-ops = Public Option = Single Payer

Knowing that Americans would reject the idea of a "single payer" government health care system, Democrats began calling their plan a "public option." Now that Americans have rejected that idea too, Democrats are peddling another proposal called health care "cooperatives."

Unfortunately, these federally-backed co-ops are nothing more than a public option by another name. Washington will set up and subsidize them so private health plans are squeezed out of the marketplace. Then, like Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the costs will catch up with these government-sponsored entities and Congress will tell us they are "too big to fail" and must be nationalized.

Some Democrats are willing to admit that co-ops are the same as a public option. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) said earlier this month that, "We're going to have some type of public option, call it 'co-op,' call it what you want."

Some Democrats are also willing to admit that the public option is the same as a single payer system. Congressman Barney Frank (D-MA)

said this week that, "I think if we get a good public option it could lead to single payer, and that's the best way to reach single payer."
It's becoming clear that no matter what name Democrats put on it, all of their ideas lead to a government takeover of our health care.

Join the Recess Rally

At noon on Saturday, August 22, 2009, citizen rallies will take place outside congressional offices across the country. If you would like to participate, click

here to find your Congressman's local office and get more information.

Recess Rally

The latest government bailout

This week, the Senate moved beyond bailing out industries that it has driven into the ground to bailing out its own programs that it has failed to manage.

Proving once again that the federal government is incapable of managing the federal highway system, the Senate passed $7 billion to shore up the failing program. The bill also provides $7.5 billion to bail out the failing unemployment insurance program and $185 billion to bail out several government-managed home-ownership programs.

Only 17 Republicans had the courage to vote against this rip-off. Click

here to see how your Senators voted.

Question: If the government cannot manage these programs, what makes anyone think it can manage our health care?

Who Will Tell Michael J. Fox He Needs to Die?

"If they would rather die they had better do it, and decrease the surplus population." -- Ebenezer Scrooge in A Christmas Carol

Should Michael J. Fox be put to death?

Celebrities and death. Now there's a potent cocktail.

Several parts fame, a few jiggers of Hollywood and a splash each for sports, business and journalism. Did I mention politics and government bureaucracy? Sorry. Without that essential element the mixture has no wallop. And a wallop this concoction surely will have, particularly if you believe actor Michael J. Fox has overstayed his welcome on the planet.

Let's pour the dry ingredients of politics and government bureaucracy into the pitcher first, beginning with the politics of death and dying.

Laws in America come into being because someone somewhere saw a problem, devised a would-be answer and then persuaded politicians to pass the law based on the philosophy and politics one group or another saw as underlying that answer. Need revenue? Raise taxes. Global warming? Shut down the coal plants. Dopey kids? Pay more to teachers. Everyone knows how this works.

So what is the driving philosophy underpinning the Obama health care plans for all of us? Let's begin with a few short quotes and one definition that outlines the idea succinctly.

President Obama; "There is a whole bunch of care that's being provided that every study, every bit of evidence that we have indicates may not be making us healthier."

• Peter Singer, Professor of Bioethics at Princeton University: "Life as a whole has no meaning. Life began, as the best available theories tell us, in a chance combination of gasses; it then evolved through random mutation and natural selection. All this just happened; it did not happen to any overall purpose."

• America's Affordable Health Choices Act of 2009 as introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives (H.R.3200) by Congressmen Dingell, Waxman, Rangel, Stark and others: "The Secretary shall establish within the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality a Center for Comparative Effectiveness Research…with respect to the outcomes, effectiveness, and appropriateness of health care services and procedures."

QALY: Quality-Adjusted Life Year. A formula devised by left-wing policy wonks that purports, as David Catron has so ably illuminated on these pages, to measure the worth of your life by assigning a numerical value to each year of your existence. In Catron's words: "A year of perfect health, for example, is given a value of 1.0 while a year of sub-optimum health is rated between 0 and 1. If you are confined to a wheelchair, a year of your life might be valued at half that of your ambulatory neighbor. If you are blind or deaf, you also score low. All that remains is to assign a specific dollar value to the QALY and, voilà, your life has a price tag."

This is all a bit dry to the taste, isn't it? QALY, Center for Comparative Effectiveness Research, HR 3200. Blah blah blah. Let's add the fizz to this baby.

So. Who will tell Michael J. Fox he needs to die?

Which health care mouse out there will have the guts to bell the cat who is one of the most famous Parkinson's Disease sufferers in America? Who is going to tell him that the treatments that are associated with Parkinson's -- drugs like Sinemet, Symmetrel, Eldepryl, Parlodel, Permax, Mirapex, Requip, and surgery with the quaint name "deep brain stimulation" -- are just no longer possible for Fox because, well, Mike, your QALY just isn't up to snuff, babe. You have Parkinson's. You boozed (according to you). As a result, the government has decided treatment for you, Mike, lacks "appropriateness." The "outcome and effectiveness" of treating you -- which is to say the worth of your 47-year old life -- just isn't worth it for the rest of us.

Sorry Mike. Say Goodbye to Hollywood. Close your Parkinson's Foundation (waste of scarce resources, to wax Singeresque). Just go home to the wife and kids, cut off these expensive meds and please die. Quietly. And for heaven's sake, get yourself buried in private. We don't want any of this Michael Jackson type-hoopla disrupting our favorite programs. We have lives to get on with.

A bit harsh?

Heck, we haven't begun to shake this cocktail. There's more to mix.

You see, the philosophy behind ObamaCare, as promoted just a week ago in the New York Times Sunday Magazine by Professor Singer, is the hard cold necessity Obama sees for government to ration health care for people like, well, Michael J. Fox. As Mr. Singer says: "Health care is a scarce resource, and all scarce resources are rationed in one way or another." And quite obviously, with Mike Fox's QALY being what it is (and Singer is a big proponent of using QALY to judge the worth of a life), the time to cut his treatment off was... yesterday. Actually, a lot of yesterdays ago.

This is what President Obama believes when he says "there's a whole bunch of care" that someone -- this would be the government -- will have to decide not to employ in treating someone like Mike Fox. What about the idea that Michael J. Fox -- not to mention his wife and children, extended family and friends who might actually love the little lug -- think Mike's spirit should count for something here? After all, he did an entire documentary on The Adventures of an Incurable Optimist. In the President's words: "I don't think that we can make judgments based on peoples' spirit. That would be a pretty subjective decision to be making. I think we have to have rules...."

Right. Rules. Got it. Government rules. Which is another way of saying decisions on Mike Fox's life will, if Obama and company get their way, be resting in the hands of this whiz bang group of policy wonks and bureaucrats called the Center for Comparative Effectiveness Research. Located, but of course, within the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality. Where the Rule of QALY will reign. Did I leave out that this will all be established by The Secretary?

Let's get rid of the bureaucratese here and just call this agency what it really is: The U.S. Bureau of Death (or "BOD" in the acronym form loved by bureaucrats everywhere).

Now let's toss in all the rest of this cocktail's ingredients and give it a shake. Take a real, deep drink.

So. Whose bod in Hollywood will BOD be coming for? Who in celebrity land -- and here we can add in journalism, sports and business -- will be on the BOD Squad's hit list when the information is received that well, sadly, like poor old Michael J. Fox, their QALY just doesn't make the grade? Let's take a look into this perilously close future for all of us as the BOD Squad makes its rounds.

Elizabeth Taylor. La Liz. Born in 1932, her age alone raises the appropriateness question She's had more health problems than husbands, as one BOD Squad staffer apparently scribbled on a report. Are you kidding? The Secretary of the Department (known internally as the SOD BOD) was furious to see what the American people had been putting up with from this woman: Congestive heart failure, a benign brain tumor, skin cancer, a back five-times broken, both hips replaced, bouts with pneumonia, osteoporosis and scoliosis. In the succinct observation on her leaked file: "Toast." Say hello to Jacko.

David Letterman: A quintuple bypass was given to Dave. That was under the old pre-Obama system and it won't be allowed again. Dave's QALY is nowhere near that of a healthy teenager who might have a case of pneumonia that is cheaper to treat and not likely to recur. Former Governor Palin's last official act as Governor of Alaska was to file an addendum to Dave's file at BOD Squad HQ. To be officially classified a "dirty old man" takes 10 points off anyone's QALY.

Patrick Swayze: As this is written, the National Enquirer is on the stands proclaiming this famous cancer victim has had a heart attack. According to news accounts, Swayze has been undergoing "pioneering Cyberknife radiotherapy at California's Stanford University Medical Centre." Cool. But alas this kind of thing doesn't meet the BOD Squad standards for appropriate or effective treatment. Loved you, Patrick, but the government says you have to go. Worse, you wasted a lot of people's resources with all this dancing around that you were going to fight on. Shameful.

Magic Johnson: Eighteen years ago, the legendary Los Angeles Lakers star had to quit because he contracted the AIDS virus. He is still here, healthy and active at 50. The problem: every day Magic has to swill a "multidrug cocktail" of GlaxoSmithKline's Trizivir and Abbott's Kaletra to keep himself healthy. Let's face it, if you're a BOD Squad staffer eighteen years ago looking at the paperwork from Mr. Johnson, you will believe that if his primary activity in life was professional basketball -- and he has had to quit because he has AIDS -- well, no more magic for Magic. The Glaxo cocktail will go elsewhere.

Larry King: CNN's talk star suffered a heart attack in 1987 and had quintuple bypass surgery. In signs of just what a racket this Hollywood-Big Surgery connection is, Larry and Dave Letterman had the same surgeon. I guess that's one Doc who can retire, huh? Sounds like one of those thieving tonsil doctors the President gripes about. Larry's father had died at 44 of a heart attack, and Larry was a smoker. Gee, you think this QALY is gonna be wearing brassy suspenders? Ole Lar was supposedly so shocked by his experience that he has written not one but two books on the subject. Mr. King, You're Having a Heart Attack: How a Heart Attack and Bypass Surgery Changed My Life and Taking On Heart Disease: Famous Personalities Recall How They Triumphed over the Nation's #1 Killer and How You Can, Too. As with Michael J. Fox, King too set up a foundation based on his illness, the Larry King Cardiac Foundation. Alas, this kind of thing can now easily be deemed irrelevant if not a stealer-of-resources by the BOD Squad. Who cares if Larry has a Foundation? Do we really need more heart attack books? Sorry Larry, if the BOD Squad had been here in 1987, you wouldn't be. Memo to Mrs. King: Stop sending Larry's daily QALY updates to the SODBOD.

Regis Philbin: Regis had a triple-bypass at 75 years of age, after having an angioplasty fourteen years earlier. Seventy-five? Whoa! There's no QALY statistic in the world that will say these resources were better used on Regis than on some 21-year-old. Regis, buddy. What were you trying to pull? The BOD Squad almost had a coronary when they saw this. Sorry. But if ObamaCare were here, you'd be chatting with your friends Dave and Larry somewhere not on the planet. Or maybe nowhere at all, as Professor Singer says life is meaningless anyway.

David Hasselhoff: News reports out there say the ex-Baywatch star and current judge on America's Got Talent was rushed to the Cedars-Sinai Medical Center back in May, yet again undone by a battle with the bottle. The Hoff's alcohol level registered at .39, more than four times the legal limit in California. Alcohol poisoning, yet again, came close to doing him in, say the stories, this one in Radar Online.com. This, says the always juicy quote from a Hollywood source, "is about the 7th time he's been taken to a hospital over the last few years with alcohol poisoning. How many visits will it take before he dies?" Well, considering the BOD Squad has that video of a while back taken by the Hoff's daughter, which displayed the star's agonizing battle in disturbing detail, the answer is: not long. Sadly, the Hoff just drank himself into a seriously bad QALY. Sorry to say, the bottom of the bottle has at last been reached. America will be one talent less.

Joan Rivers: Can we talk? A dozen plastic surgeries? A dozen…meaning twelve? Joan, sweetheart, America can't grow plastic fast enough to do this. You're surely in violation of a good dozen environmental laws before we even get to the health care issues. Multiple facelifts? OMG! That's before or after the "brow lift, botox, soft tissue fillers, jaw implants, multiple nose jobs, veneers, blepharoplasty (eye work), liposuction, cheek implants, breast implants" catalogued on FamousPlastic? Honey, the BOD Squad has a memorandum from the EPA and determined that you can't be buried, burned or dumped with all this stuff inside you. Please have your lawyer file an "Extinction and Burial Application Form 1A." Immediately.

And now, one last report. Perhaps the most interesting in the celebrity death struggle with ObamaCare.

Steve Jobs: A liver transplant for the creator of Apple? Well, well, well. Now this celebrity death struggle is particularly interesting. Why? Because Mr. Jobs had his transplant only three months ago, just as the ObamaCare toxin was seeping into the political atmosphere. This has already resulted in news stories speculating that the secrecy of the operation, the fact that Jobs traveled unannounced and unknown to Tennessee to have it, means that Jobs was, in the words of an actual news report, "gaming the system." How? The wait-time for a liver in Tennessee is about 48 days, on average. The United Network for Organ Sharing says the national wait time is 306 days. In other words, before the BOD Squad legislation has even passed Congress, one prominent American celebrity is under fire for "gaming the system" when it comes to transplants. Another couple of months and Mr. Jobs would have been either dead because of instructions on his QALY or brought up on charges for getting around "the rules." There will be penalties for trying to save your life, right?

Gaming the system. An interesting concept. You mean government rules can be manipulated? Nooooooo! Really?

Perhaps you've heard of a federal agency called the IRS? Like the soon-to-be bureaucrats at the BOD Squad, the Internal Revenue Service is in theory designed to be a "just-the-facts" kind of agency. And yet….hmmm.

In 1952, a controversial Senator from California named Richard Nixon found his tax returns leaked from the Truman-run IRS to a virulently anti-Nixon columnist named Drew Pearson. (In those days, candidates did not release their tax returns as they frequently do today.) In 1963, a few months after Nixon lost a humiliating race for governor of California, his political life was presumed by all seers of the day as dead. Yet low and behold, private citizen Nixon found himself subject to a lengthy and exhaustive audit by the IRS. Years later, the IRS supervisor of the case admitted that, well, his Washington superiors in the Kennedy administration had ordered him three times to re-open the original audit and try and get Nixon for tax evasion.

Thus, when Nixon became president at last, he tells us he was so furious at his treatment by the IRS when in the hands of Democrats that he personally and repeatedly "urged Haldeman and Ehrlichman [the Rahm Emanuel and David Axelrod of the day] to have IRS checks made on [1972 Democratic nominee] McGovern's key staff and contributors."

In other words, power can be abused. In a blink. You think David Letterman is sorry now for the things he said about Sarah Palin's daughter? Wait 'til ole Dave discovers he has a recurrence of heart problems down the road and appeals for a little Obama-esque empathy from the BOD Squad -- and the response he receives telling him to go pound sand and die is coming from an appointed bureaucrat of President Palin's. FYI to the Reverend Jeremiah Wright: Watch your QALY, brother.

Or imagine the current kerfuffle with Harvard's Professor Henry Gates and Cambridge police Sergeant James Crowley. Let's change the story a bit. Instead of Crowley being a policeman, let's make him Dr. James Crowley, a member of the BOD Squad. He and his fellow bureaucrats have told the sick Professor Gates that, gee, sorry. Your QALY just isn't that good. Please file an Extinction Application. To which Professor Gates snaps off from his hospital bed exactly the same reply he gave to Sergeant Crowley in his house: "Why…because I'm a black man in America?"

What's the racial composition of the BOD Squad? How many Wise Latinas are there to decide on the worth of a brown-skinned life over the worth of a white-skinned life? Have Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson gotten wind of this yet? If civil rights activists believe there are too many blacks in American prisons, what will they say if the number of blacks being sent off by the BOD Squad is, percentage wise, higher than the number of whites? Whose life has more -- or less -- value? A white? Or a black, brown, yellow or red life? Does the black guy live or the Latina? The American Vietnamese or the Native American? Just what Washington, D.C. needs -- more lobbyists. Not to mention the QALY law practices that will quadruple the size of the trial bar.

You think the gay community is upset over same-sex marriage prohibitions? This is as nothing compared to the fuse that will be lit when gays come to believe the BOD Squad is filled with homophobics intent on claiming AIDS is such a disqualifying QALY feature that simply being gay means a death sentence ASAP.

We haven't even gotten to Senator Kennedy's brain surgery, the latest hospitalization for West Virginia's 91-year old Senator Robert Byrd, Lance Armstrong's testicular cancer or Tiger Woods's knee operation. Needless to say, the agonized Farrah Fawcett would never have been allowed to struggle on as she did from the moment of her cancer diagnosis, Ed McMahon's QALY, with a broken neck and two neck surgeries in his eighties on file, would have had him announcing himself to God long before the other week. And Michael Jackson? Maybe the Bod Squad already made their first call.

Which returns us to Michael J. Fox. Remember the dust-up a while back when Mr. Fox was appearing in political ads supporting stem-cell research? One can agree with Mr. Fox, or not. But without doubt his opponents on the issue believed the importance underlying the issue was the larger point of respect for human life. The issue was at play in Missouri, where state funding was under discussion, and it elicited this fairly standard response from a Missouri State Senator: "I believe that a human embryo is worthy of legal protection," said state Sen. Matt Bartle (R), who vows to press the fight. "Western medicine has been founded on a principle: First, do no harm."

For Fox, this issue now falls precariously close to the old caution about being careful what you wish for. Once upon a time in America the issue of "life" was about the death penalty for murderers. Then it was abortion. Next it was about stem cell research. Now, it's about whether Michael J. Fox's life has sufficient QALY points to justify letting him live.

Does Michael J. Fox's life deserve respect? Of course.

But if they can come for Michael J. Fox, they can come for you.

And they will.

By Jeffrey Lord on 7.28.09 @ 6:08AM - Jeffrey Lord worked on five Supreme Court nominations as a Reagan White House political director, including that of Robert Bork. He is the author of a book on the Senate's judicial confirmation process and writes from Pennsylvania at jlpa1@aol.com

Source: American Spectator

First They Came

When the Nazis came for the communists,
I remained silent;
I was not a communist.

Then they locked up the social democrats,
I remained silent;
I was not a social democrat.

Then they came for the trade unionists,
I did not protest;
I was not a trade unionist.

Then they came for the Catholics,
I did not protest;
I was a Protestant.

Then they came for the Jews,
I did not speak out;
I was not a Jew.

When they came for me, there was no one left to speak out for me.

If you think this article is way out there… you aren’t paying attention!!

Our country has always valued life and individual rights above all else. And there are more Centurions in good health alive and contributing than ever before. Wasn’t that the goal… living longer healthy lives. We’ve spent millions and millions on the research. And in most cultures, the elderly are revered for their knowledge and connections with the past, a source of living history. But now all of a sudden people in their 70’s+ are taking up too much room… not worth the investment of surgeries, life extending procedures or newly developed medicines? What happened to living to 110 or 120?

As far as costs go… the government has been borrowing from social security and Medicare for years instead of investing and building up the coffers in the anticipation of the baby-boomers, who paid into the system all their lives, retiring.

Also, it has been pointed out by the experts that if we initiated serious tort reform; stopped insurance, social security and Medicare fraud; stopped paying for “un-needed” elective plastic surgeries and other unnecessary elective procedures; focused on prevention; included holistic and natural remedies, procedures and supplements in the system; did away with pre-existing condition exclusion for insurance, stopped gauging by big Pharma; allowed competition of insurance companies across state lines; allowed test sharing instead of duplication of tests, set-up co-ops for small business owners and the self-employed, limited abortion care, excluded illegal aliens from any type of free medical coverage, and made medical coverage portable (that you can take from job to job) etc, we would be well on our way to paying for covering everybody. Additional options could be to reduce coverage for the wealthy and minimal tax increases.

There is no country in the world where nationalized, government-run or socialized medicine has worked well!!!!!!!!!!!!!! America has the best medical system and coverage in the world and just needs common sense overhauls including cutting fraud and waste. The government needs to regulate the insurance industry, the AMA and Big Phama… but not run or pay for any additional programs. Just look at Social Security, Medicare, Veterans Healthcare and Indian Reservation Healthcare and any doubt that you might have that government is the answer will melt away instantly.

Read HR-3200 - full report for yourself or checkout the *overviews below, if you haven’t. The nightmare speaks for itself!

The experts are saying:

  • Scrap all 5-bills that are being debated in both Houses of Congress
  • No public option – it will eventually lead to single payer totally government controlled healthcare program
  • No central government electronic medical record system – the possibilities for its us are too scary!
  • Overall our private system and existing government programs using the above means, etc.
  • No rationing

Be Sure to Watch 20/20 Segment on Nationalized Healthcare tomorrow night with Jon Stossell – 7-31-09

Posted: Knowledge Creates Power

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Thursday, July 30, 2009

Bill Maher Says America Is A Stupid Country…

Maybe Bill Maher should move to a smart country and give us all a break!!!

Bill O'Reilly Slams Bill Maher Over His America Is "A Stupid Country" (Video)

Bill O'Reilly uses his "Talking Points Memo" to take Bill Maher to task for calling the United States "a stupid country." He closes by suggesting Maher "acted stupidly".

I guess the question is… what has Bill Maher done with his life vs. Sarah Palin's accomplishments.

Posted: Knowledge Creates Power

Video Shows ACORN Founder Wade Rathke Plotting America's Downfall

On his TV show today, Glenn Beck spotlighted a fascinating interview that ACORNcracked.com editor Kyle Olson conducted with disgraced ACORN founder Wade Rathke.

Olson visited Rathke's book signing in New Orleans to get the footage. The book is Citizen Wealth: Winning the Campaign to Save Working Families, in which Rathke serves up some community organizing war stories, and offers his thoughts on the future of organizing.

As I wrote here at the American Spectator, Rathke is a pioneer of the so-called welfare rights movement that aims to get Americans on welfare. He devotes an entire chapter of his book to what he calls "The 'Maximum Eligible Participation' Solution." It is a strategy for orchestrated crisis that savvy leftist groups across America are likely to embrace.

Rathke confirms in Olson's footage (during what appears to be a book talk) that he is pursuing this strategy that calls for all Americans eligible for welfare payments to pursue every penny the law "entitles" them to. He urges people to "make sure that other people in the community" are actually getting their due from the government.

The Maximum Eligible Participation Solution is just the old Cloward-Piven Strategy in new clothes. The strategy aimed at radical social and political change was articulated by Marxist university professors Richard A. Cloward and Frances Fox Piven in a 1966 Nation article, "The Weight of the Poor: A Strategy to End Poverty." The two academics called for "a massive drive to recruit the poor onto the welfare rolls" in an effort to overwhelm the system. [Italics in original.]

Rathke writes in his book, "it is hard to believe that we cannot assemble the troops to mount a campaign for maximum eligible participation that harvests the opportunities and dollars already available if we could achieve full utilization of existing programs."

As I noted previously, Rathke has also said that technology should be utilized to make it as easy as possible for people to claim welfare benefits.

Here is the segment from today's "Glenn Beck Program":

Here is Olson's interview with Rathke:

By Matthew Vadum on 7.29.09 @ 8:23PM – American Spectator

Wednesday, July 29, 2009

ObamaCare for Seniors: Sorry, You're Just Not Worth It

The debate over Barack Obama's health care plan continues. Senators are trying to cut deals and members of the House of Representatives are doing the same. Democrats are trying to push through a massive government plan that will cost Americans billions and billions of dollars all because Obama wants to take power away from the people and put it in the hands of government.

Throughout this debate, the voices of seniors have been strangely and disturbingly silent. Do they not know the details of ObamaCare? Are they so enamored with this "nice, young man" that they don't even look at what the plan has to offer? ObamaCare has a strong message for seniors, and it is one they shouldn't ignore: If you are old in America, then don't get sick... you're not worth the cost.

In a recent update by The Heritage Foundation, seniors can read for themselves some of the results of ObamaCare on their daily lives.

First, seniors would face an increasing risk of losing their doctor. With cuts to Medicare reimbursements, more and more physicians are no longer taking Medicare patients. ObamaCare makes it worse: "Obama plans to pay for up to a third of his plan by cutting $313 billion in Medicare reimbursements to health care providers over the next 10 years. This will only force more doctors to stop seeing Medicare patients."

Obama's plan also places a disincentive on people to become physicians as his "public" option "could decrease the annual net income of hospitals by $36 billion, while the annual net income of physicians could drop by $33.1 billion."

Then there is the worry that seniors will lose their coverage. As noted in The Heritage Foundation's report, "22% of all Medicare patients, which translates to 10.5 million seniors, are currently enrolled in Medicare Advantage plans. These health plans cover all of the traditional Medicare benefits and much more, including coor dinated care and care-management programs for enrollees with chronic conditions as well as additional hospitalization and skilled nursing facility stays. President Obama has proposed killing this program entirely."

And, of course, there is the issue that Obama and the liberal Democrats want seniors and all Americans to ignore: the rationing of health care. Under Obama's plan, there will be a new government bureaucracy known as a "federal health board." The purpose of this board is to determine whether various procedures and tests are deemed necessary in the eyes of the federal government. That notion is truly scary.

Obama supporter and infanticide advocate Peter Singer made the case for rationing health care recently in the New York Times, writing: "The task of health care bureaucrats is then to get the best value for the resources they have been allocated." Conservatives in Congress have given Obamacare supporters every opportunity to disavow government-rationed health care, but Obamacare supporters have voted down every anti-rationing amendment proposed. Make no mistake, Obama plans to pay for expanded coverage for the young and healthy by denying treatments to the old and sick.

As noted in a story by the Associated Press, a group of senators is actually working to squeeze more money out of Medicare. "Under the plan, an independent commission would be empowered to recommend changes in Medicare annually, to take effect automatically unless Congress enacted an alternative."

Cantor on Obama’s Healhcare Reform

As noted in a new Rasmussen Reports poll, only 23% of Americans believe that health care costs will go down under ObamaCare.

Most Americans are happy with their coverage. Most have coverage. Yet in order to cover the ten percent or so of Americans who don't have it and are having trouble getting it, he wants to impose a new government plan on the other 90% of the country. This is just crazy. ObamaCare is bad news for seniors and bad news for the entire population.

Source/Posted by Bobby Eberle – The Loft - July 29, 2009 at 7:32 am

-----------

++ Contact Congress Today! Hands Off My Health Care Decisions!

Posted: Knowledge Creates Power

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We've Figured Him Out - Updated

Why is President Barack Obama in such a hurry to get his socialized medicine bill passed?

Because he and his cunning circle realize some basic truths:

The American people in their unimaginable kindness and trust voted for a pig in a poke in 2008. They wanted so much to believe Barack Obama was somehow better and different from other ultra-leftists that they simply took him on faith.

They ignored his anti-white writings in his books. They ignored his quiet acceptance of hysterical anti-American diatribes by his minister, Jeremiah Wright.

They ignored his refusal to explain years at a time of his life as a student. They ignored his ultra-left record as a "community organizer," Illinois state legislator, and Senator.

The American people ignored his total zero of an academic record as a student and teacher, his complete lack of scholarship when he was being touted as a scholar.

Now, the American people are starting to wake up to the truth. Barack Obama is a super likeable super leftist, not a fan of this country, way, way too cozy with the terrorist leaders in the Middle East, way beyond naïveté, all the way into active destruction of our interests and our allies and our future.

The American people have already awakened to the truth that the stimulus bill -- a great idea in theory -- was really an immense bribe to Democrat interest groups, and in no way an effort to help all Americans.

Now, Americans are waking up to the truth that ObamaCare basically means that every time you are sick or injured, you will have a clerk from the Department of Motor Vehicles telling your doctor what he can and cannot do.

The American people already know that Mr. Obama's plan to lower health costs while expanding coverage and bureaucracy is a myth, a promise of something that never was and never will be -- a bureaucracy lowering costs in a free society. Either the costs go up or the free society goes away.

These are perilous times. Mrs. Hillary Clinton, our Secretary of State, has given Iran the go-ahead to have nuclear weapons, an unqualified betrayal of the nation. Now, we face a devastating loss of freedom at home in health care. It will be joined by controls on our lives to "protect us" from global warming, itself largely a fraud if believed to be caused by man.

Mr. Obama knows Americans are getting wise and will stop him if he delays at all in taking away our freedoms.

There is his urgency and our opportunity. Once freedom is lost, America is lost. Wake up, beloved America.

By: Ben Stein is a writer, actor, economist, and lawyer living in Beverly Hills and Malibu. He writes "Ben Stein's Diary" for every issue of The American Spectator - on 7.24.09 @ 9:45AM

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Stop the Obama Experiment


Barack Obama has proven with his words and actions that he knows no other strategy for addressing America's challenges but massive taxation and limitless government growth.

The Democrats in Washington have taken last year's election as a sign that voters want them to impose a liberal agenda on our society while we struggle with the present recession.

Billions of dollars are being wasted on pet liberal spending projects, but there is little evidence that the so-called Stimulus, government takeovers of banks and auto companies, and crushing deficit spending are having any positive effect.

Americans are starting to wake up to the radical nature of Barack Obama's agenda.

And now, as his popularity and influence start to slip away, he is trying to ram through Congress an unprecedented new government health care takeover.

Barack Obama's risky experiments must be stopped.

Right now the RNC is running this ad in an effort to counter the misleading claims of the Obama Democrats, and to keep the pressure on Democrats in battleground states like Arkansas, Nevada and North Dakota who may be pressured to vote for Obama's health care boondoggle.

But the RNC is running up against tens of millions of dollars in ads from liberal special interests who see the debate on health care as yet another way to get a government payout.

Help us keep our message on the air and prevent Barack Obama and the Pelosi-Reid Democrats in Congress from ending individual health care choice and using your tax dollars to treat only the patients they deem deserving.

After you watch our ad, please make a contribution to support our media effort to get our message past the liberal media filter and directly to the voters. If we do not stop the Obama Democrats' risky schemes for our health care system, we will face the end of health care choice in America and new burdensome taxes.

Now is your chance to defend health care freedom. We must hammer home the unacceptable costs and risks of the Obama Democrats' government imposed health care scheme now! End Barack Obama's experiments today.

Sincerely,

Michael Steele
Chairman, Republican National Committee

P.S. We can stop the Obama Democrats' assault on our hard earned incomes and health care freedoms. Now is the time to push back and dispel the Obama mystique! Please help us win this fight by making an additional online contribution of $25, $50, $100, $500, or $1,000 to the RNC today. Thank you.

21

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Also… In addition call, fax, email your Congress Person and Senator (and as many others as you can) TODAY… NOW

Just announced: Blue Dog Democrats have sold us out… again

Insist that everyone reads this bill before any vote!!!

Contact Info for Your Elected Officials

Call, email, fax, or write your congressperson, your Senator and Nancy Pelosi “daily” and say “no” to Nationalized Healthcare!

1-202-224-3121- Congress Switchboard

1-202-225-3121- Congress Switchboard

(202) 225-0100 - Speaker of the House Pelosi

Speaker Nancy Pelosi
http://speaker.house.gov/contact or http://www.speaker.gov/contact

Senators from your State.

Reparations By Way Of Health Care Reform

Legislation: Still believe in post-racial politics? Read the health care bill. It's affirmative action on steroids, deciding everything from who becomes a doctor to who gets treatment on the basis of skin color.

President Obama is on the record as being officially opposed to reparations for slavery. But as with other issues, you have to sift through his eloquent rhetoric and go beyond the teleprompter to get at what he really means.

His opposition to reparations is based on the fact they don't go far enough. In a 2004 questionnaire, he told the NAACP, "I fear that reparations would be an excuse for some to say, 'We've paid our debt,' and to avoid the much harder work."

Never mind there are those who thought we apologized at Gettysburg and that an African-American president is a recognition of the hard work that has been done.

At a press conference with minority journalists last fall, candidate Obama was pressed for more detail on his reparations position. He said he was more interested in taking action to help people who were just getting by. Because many of them are minorities, he said, that would help the same people who would benefit from reparations.

"If we have a program, for example, of universal health care, that will disproportionally affect people of color, because they are disproportionally uninsured," Obama said.

This may be a goal of Obama's health care plan: the redress of health care disparities on the basis of race and the punishment of those believed to be responsible, such as greedy doctors who perform unnecessary tests and procedures and greedy insurance and drug companies lusting for profits.

In his health care plan published during the campaign, it was written that Obama and Biden will "challenge the medical system to eliminate inequities in health care by requiring hospitals and health plans to collect, analyze and report health care quality for disparity populations and holding them accountable for any differences found."

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi repeated this when she addressed the NAACP this month, saying: "It is a moral issue for our country to reduce health disparities, whether in diabetes, asthma, heart disease, cancer and HIV/AIDS."

The racial grievance industry under health care reform could be calling the shots in the emergency room, the operating room, the medical room, even medical school. As Terence Jeffrey, editor at large of Human Events puts it, not only our wealth, but also our health will be redistributed.

Under the Democrats' plans, if a medical school wants to receive contracts and grants from the federal government, it must operate under a quota system and be able to prove it. On Page 909, the House bill states: "In awarding grants or contracts under this section, the (HHS) secretary shall give preference to entities that have a demonstrated record of the following: ... training individuals who are from underrepresented minority groups or disadvantaged backgrounds."

Jeffrey points out that in the name of eliminating "disparities" in health care, under the House version of the bill, payment to providers under the public option becomes a sort of Pavlovian reward and punishment system.

"The secretary," says Section 224, "shall design and implement the payment mechanisms and policies under this section in a manner that — (1) seeks to ... reduce health disparities (including racial, ethnic and other disparities)."

Everyone deserves the best health care and doctors. That will not happen under a plan that emphasizes affirmative action and leads to rationing.

As the case of the New Haven, Conn., firefighters shows, reverse discrimination is wrong and dangerous.

Whether it's that firefighter coming up the ladder, or the brain surgeon about to remove that tumor in your head, everybody wants that person to be the best regardless of race or ethnicity — and not admitted by quotas and promoted by political correctness.

That's what all Americans are owed.

Source: Investors.com

Posted: Knowledge Creates Power