The Council Has Spoken!! This Week’s Watcher’s Council Results

JoshuaPundit on Apr 13 2012 

The Council Has Spoken!

The Council has spoken, the votes have been cast, and the results are in for this week’s Watcher’s Council match up.

As a number of commentators have said (including yours truly)if someone isn’t willing to look at tort reform, they’re not serious about controlling the riding costs of healthcare.

This week’s winner,The Razor’s Why There Are No Such Things As Unnecessary Tests examines this from a physician’s viewpoint. Here’s a slice:

My wife is a family doctor working in a small rural practice owned by a regional hospital. While she has not yet been sued for malpractice she knows many doctors who have, and while the vast majority of these suits never reach court they still inflicted many sleepless nights and higher malpractice premiums on the innocent doctors. She recognizes that everything she does may have to be justified someday so that if she is forced to testify she can explain the rationale of her treatment. This is the essence of defensive medicine.

The American Board of Internal Medicine Foundation in partnership with Consumer Reports has announced Choose Wisely, an educational initiative recommending physicians avoid 45 unnecessary tests and procedures the group believes are performed unnecessarily. These include routine EKGs and Stress Tests as well as prescribing antibiotics for minor ailments such as mild sinusitis. Oncologists are also encouraged not to perform cancer screens on breast cancer and prostate cancer patients diagnosed with non-metastatic forms of these cancers.

But as the New York Times article states, these recommendations are controversial and there is fear among some patients and doctors that they will be applied too broadly. The newspaper quotes Dr. Eric Topol, chief academic officer of Scripps Health who says, “These all sound reasonable, but don’t forget that every person you’re looking after is unique…This kind of one-size-fits-all approach can be a real detriment to good care.”

As a resident of the great state that raised John Edwards to the heights of power on the backs of doctors he sued for malpractice, I’m skeptical over this recommendation for a number of reasons. Dr. Topol makes an excellent point. Those who aren’t health care practitioners may fail to understand that patients often do not present with clear cut symptoms. There is a finite number or reasons your car won’t start in the morning such as the battery is dead, the tank is empty or the ECM needs replacement. But the human body is infinitely more complex. What may present as back pain from too much Pilates can turn out to be bone cancer that had metastasized from the esophagus, as happened to my father-in-law. The chronic tickle in the back of the throat that drove my mother-in-law crazy for months, turned out to be an atypical and rare form of breast cancer. Both were dead within months of their initial complaints both were misdiagnosed by their primary care physicians, though it is unlikely in either case the proper diagnosis would have mattered much. But both cases of cancer could have been treated had they been detected early. Obviously doctors cannot perform these tests on everyone because it would take too much time and cost too much, but this decision should be left to the judgment of the doctor and not interfered with by the government, an insurance company or a non-elected body such as the American Board of Internal Medicine Foundation.

These recommendations will no doubt be cheered by insurance companies and the government (since Medicare, Medicaid and Obamacare make the government a de facto insurance company I’ll lump it together with the likes of Kaiser Permanente and Blue Cross for the rest of the article.) Insurance companies can now refuse to pay for these tests or at the least requiring doctors jump through time-consuming and money-losing hoops such as requiring pre-authorization to do them. The article claims that as much as 1/3 of the $2 trillion spent on health care in the USA is unnecessary, so imagine the savings to their bottom lines these companies will enjoy by cutting nearly $700 million from their payments. The problem with this figure is that it’s like the old saying about half of marketing dollars being wasted, but no one knows which half. Because it is impossible to accurately determine which person needs a test and which doesn’t it will be impossible to reap the savings hinted at in these recommendations.

In our non-Council category, the winner was Sultan Knish for One Hundred Broken Mirrors submitted by The Political Commentator, a fascinating look at how history repeats itself and how America looks to the countries we’re trying to ‘sell’ our brand of democracy to.

Here are this week’s full results. New Zeal Gay Patriot and Simply Jews were unable to vote this week.

Council Winners

• *First place with 2 1/3 votes! The Razor –Why There Are No Such Things As Unnecessary Tests
• Second place *t* with 1 2/3 votes – The Noisy Room – A Wicked Financial Storm Descends On America
• Second place *t* with 1 2/3 votes – The Right Planet – The Dialog About Race
• Third place *t* with 1 1/3 votes – Bookworm Room- Stockholm Syndrome, Victimization, and the media’s version of American men
• Third place *t* with 1 1/3 votes – The Independent Sentinel-Nationalization of the United States Inches Closer to Reality
• Third place *t* with 1 1/3 votes – Gay Patriot- On the unrecognized(?) loneliness in the gay male community
• Fourth place *t* with 1 vote – Rhymes With Right-A Study In Moral Obtuseness
• Fourth place *t* with 1 vote – VA Right!-Holder’s Justice
• Fifth place *t* with 2/3 vote – The Colossus of Rhodey – One BIG reason to be glad you live in the United States
• Fifth place *t* with 2/3 vote – The Political Commentator – The New York Times: Purveyor of unbiased news or of artitorials masquerading as unbiased news?
• Sixth place with 1/3 vote – GrEaT sAtAn”S gIrLfRiEnD – Little Satan”s Strike Package

Non-Council Winners

• First place with 3 votes! – Sultan Knish-One Hundred Broken Mirrors submitted by The Political Commentator
• Second place *t* with 1 1/3 votes – Pat Condell – Israel and the United Nations submitted by Joshuapundit
• Second place *t* with 1 1/3 votes –The Blaze/Billy Hallowell –Rev. Wright Unleashed: ‘White Supremacy’ Drives ‘World Policy,’ Allah & Yahweh Are the ‘Same’…and Clarence Thomas Is Worshipping ‘Some Other God’ submitted by The Noisy Room
• Third place *t* with 1 vote – Gatestone Institute<The Silent Terrorists: Muslim Brotherhood’s Political Terrorism Strategy submitted by The Independent Sentinel
• Third place *t* with 1 vote –Les Jones NBC fires editor for altering Zimmerman 911 call; when will MSNBC fire the writer who did the same? submitted by The Glittering Eye
• Third Place *t* with 1 vote -The Troglodyte –When Does Socialism Begin? submitted by The Mellow Jihadi
• Third place *t* with 1 vote - Melanie Phillips – A lethal game-changer for British politics? submitted by The Watcher
• Third place *t* with 1 vote - Giulio Meotti/FrontPage –The Christian Era in the Middle East Is Over submitted by The Watcher
• Fourth place *t* with 2/3 vote -Pressure Points – Will Assad Return To Killing Lebanese Leaders? submitted by GrEaT sAtAn”S gIrLfRiEnD
• Fourth place *t* with 2/3 vote -Via Meadia – Don’t Know Much About Theology submitted by The Razor
• Fourth place *t* with 2/3 vote -Truth On The Market –My Professor, My Judge, and the Doctrine of Judicial Review submitted by Rhymes With Right
• Fifth place with 1/3 vote -Yourish.Com –Your Easter media bias submitted by The Colossus of Rhodey

See you next week! And don’t forget to follow us on Facebook and Twitter..’cause we’re cool like that!

Impeach Obama 2012. Join the National Campaign

Video:  Impeach Obama 2012! Join The National Campaign!

InfoWars.com

CITY COUNCIL AWAKENS TO EVIL AND DEFEATS IT

The City of Colfax, CA reportedly defeated UN Agenda 21 by a 4-0 vote and passed Resolution No. 12-2012.

Ken Delfino, one of the City Councilmen, reportedly wrote a letter describing what he learned about UN Agenda 21 and urges others to educate themselves about it too.

You can help by sending these three items of information to your City Council Members. If they’re uninterested, be sure to campaign against them so that they are defeated when they run for re-election.

1. Here is the reported letter in its entirety (a link to the letter is not yet available).

Dear friends, constituents and colleagues:

This evening the attached resolution was introduced and discussed...and was passed by a 4-0 vote.

This particular topic has been discussed in previous council meetings as more and more people are becoming aware of this United Nations program that has been hidden under a myriad of titles starting with the "New World Order" in 1992 and the addition of many of these restrictive and business-killing environmental initiatives that have been introduced and passed in the past 2-3 years.

On-line searches of anti-American U.N. bias and statements will show you just how much this organization despises the success of our country. We are railed against by the likes of Hugo Chavez, the Castro brothers, Daniel Ortega, Moammar Khadaffy and other anti-American leaders not just from their capitols, but worse, from the United Nations building in New York City!

The ultimate goal of United Nations' Agenda 21 is global governance with the U.N as the head agency.

Many of my council colleagues from other jurisdictions have gotten together to find ways to fight this cancer that has crept into our government. We all took an Oath to support our state and United States constitutions and protect our citizens and community against all enemies...foreign and domestic...and this is the statement our city made tonight to this effect.

We believe other cities and counties have made such stands and we hope others will join us.

I ask that if you have not done so, to at least [sic] research this program and come to your own conclusion.

In closing, I want to stress that this is not a Republican v. Democrat v. Libertarian, left v. right, religious [sic] v. atheist issue...this is purely an anti-American issue aimed at eliminating our national sovereignty!

In continued service to my country and community,

Ken Delfino

Councilman

City of Colfax, CA

2. Nancy Pelosi Pushes Agenda 21 On House Floor

http://noisyroom.net/blog/2012/02/29/nancy-pelosi-pushes-agenda-21-on-house-floor/

What you are about to see in this video is Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) spearheading HC Res 353 on the House floor to pursue United Nations (UN) Agenda 21. She calls out “Agenda 21” twice and clearly states that it is the “United Nations Sustainable Development” program…

3. RESOLUTION No. 12-2012: City of Colfax, California (see page 21 at this link: http://www.ci.colfax.ca.us/3-Docs/PDF/Agenda/4-11-12%20Agenda.pdf)

R E S O L U T I O N No. 12-2012

A RESOLUTION OF THE CITY COUNCIL OF COLFAX, CALIFORNIA EXPOSING THE UNITED NATIONS’ AGENDA 21 PROGRAMME…

WHEREAS, the United Nations Agenda 21 is a comprehensive plan of extreme environmentalism, social engineering and global political control that was initiated at the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED) held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil in 1992 and…

WHEREAS the United Nations Agenda 21 has been and continues to be covertly pushed into local communities throughout the United States of America through what was the International Council of Local Environmental Initiatives (ICLEI) through local “sustainable development” policies such as ‘Smart Growth’, ‘Wildlands Projects’, ‘Resilient Cities’, ‘Regional Visioning Projects’ and similar names and…

WHEREAS this United Nations Agenda 21 plan of radical so-called “sustainable development” views the American way of life of private property ownership, single family homes, private car ownership and individual travel choices and privately owned farms all as destructive to the environment and…

WHEREAS according to the United Nations Agenda 21 policy, social justice is described as the right and opportunity of all people to benefit equally from the resources afforded us by society and the environment which would be accomplished by redistribution of wealth and…

WHEREAS according to the United Nations Agenda 21 policy, National Sovereignty is deemed a social injustice.

BE IT THEREFORE RESOLVED that in order to help protect property rights of our citizens, the Council of the City of Colfax, California recognizes the destructive and insidious nature of United Nations Agenda 21 and hereby exposes to the public and public policy makers the dangerous intent of the plan and be it further

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that neither the United States government nor state or local government is legally bound by the United Nations Agenda 21 treaty in that the treaty has never been endorsed by the United States Senate and therefore be it further

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that the implementation of the United Nations Agenda 21 destructive strategies for “sustainable development” at the federal, state and local governments across the country will have harmful repercussions and we hereby reject all of its radical policies that are not in the best interests of our citizens and the City of Colfax and our Sphere of Influence.

PASSED AND ADOPTED, this 11^th day of April, 2012, by the City Council of the City of Colfax, by the following roll call vote:

AYES:

NOES:

ABSTAIN:

ABSENT:

Steve Harvey Karen Pierce

Mayor City Clerk

It is time to recognize evil, inform others about it and defeat it.

And So It Begins… Ann Romney critic frequent White House visitor

There was a time when the goal of all Americans was to have moms stay home and raise their own children with their family’s values and run their households.  Look at this nice family.  Ann and Mitt Romney did a great job.  

Women married to businessmen often are also invaluable to their husbands in organizing entertainment, social and charity events as well as being active in their churches and their children’s schools; all of which is true of Ann Romney!

Ann Romney has M.S. & is a breast cancer survivor.  If she were a Democrat or a NOW member she would be a hero just for surviving.  But because she was a stay at home conservative mom married to the presumptive GOP nominee, where she is an invaluable asset… her life just isn’t enough?!?  Targeted by friend of radical Obama advisors Valerie Jarrett and David Axelrod the low life Democrat Hillary Rosen, demeans stay at home moms.  

What is it with Progressive women?  Why is there this need to go after their more conservative sisters?  Look what they did to Sarah Palin and Michelle Bachmann for starters, both women have degrees, smarts, are successful in their own rights, have stable families and children, only married once to the same husband and are good looking to boot.  So why are they and more traditional conservative women like Laura Bush and Ann Romney fader for the left’s negative comments… while Hillary Clinton can do no wrong?  Envy would be my initial reaction!

As long as we allow the progressives to divide us, whether it is through using race, religion, color, politics, income level or personal preferences… they win and our nation, our values and principles and all groups lose!

Divide and conquer is part of the Progressive playbook that is in full use right now and will continue through the November election and into Obama’s second term and beyond, if there is one.  This week alone they have hit the Romneys on their religion, remodeling their home and now Ann being a stay at home mom.

Game on… the stakes are high.  And congratulations to Ann Romney for winning this round!

Ask Marion~

WND Exclusive: Democrat consult ant met with top Obama advisers Jarrett, Axelrod  

By Aaron Klein

While the Democratic National Committee was quick to distance itself today from marketing strategist Hilary Rosen, WND has found that Rosen held strategy meetings with top Obama aides Valerie Jarrett and David Axelrod.

Rosen also sits on the board of a progressive organization described as the “idea factory” of the Obama administration.

Rosen is now under fire after she insulted Ann Romney and stay-at-home mothers, saying the wife of GOP candidate Mitt Romney never held a job.

“Guess what, his wife has actually never worked a day in her life,” Rosen said in an interview with CNN’s Anderson Cooper about women’s issues.

Ann Romney took to Twitter to respond, writing, “I made a choice to stay home and raise five boys. Believe me, it was hard work.”

Rosen is a partner at SKD Knickerbocker, the public relations and strategy firm of former White House communications director Anita Dunn. SKD handled Obama’s 2008 campaign.

Among those distancing themselves from Rosen is David Axelrod, who tweeted his disapproval: “Also Disappointed in Hilary Rosen’s comments about Ann Romney. They were inappropriate and offensive.”

WND has found that Rosen held five White House meetings, including a March 11, 2009, meeting with Jarrett and a March 12, 2009, meeting with Axelrod described as a “communications message meeting.”

Rosen’s meeting with Axelrod was reported by the Associated Press and CBS News in November 2009.

CBS News noted Axelrod’s White House meeting with Rosen and 18 other strategists demonstrated “the political element of the health care debate.”

Rosen, meanwhile, serves as political director and Washington editor-at large for the Huffington Post and also is a regular commentator for CNN.

She’s on the board of the Center for American Progress Action Fund.

The center is deeply involved in helping to influence White House policy under Obama.

Its founder, John Podesta, directed Obama’s 2009 transition into the White House.

Time magazine called CAP Obama’s “idea factory,” noting that “not since the Heritage Foundation helped guide Ronald Reagan’s transition in 1981 has a single outside group held so much sway.”

Time reported it is “difficult to overstate the influence in Obamaland of CAP.”

Rosen serves on the board of the George Soros-funded Human Rights Campaign Foundation and the Creative Coalition.

Already, the DNC has commented on Rosen’s remarks, with an official telling Politico, “Hilary Rosen is not an adviser to the DNC. Our contract for media services is exclusively with Anita Dunn.”

Rosen took to Twitter to further her remarks, writing, “When I said on [CNN] Ann Romney never worked I meant she never had to care for her kids AND earn a paycheck like MOST American women!”

Rosen later tweeted that Mitt Romney “now makes up false concern for women’s economic struggle” and “he should stop saying that she is his guide to women’s economic problems. She doesn’t have any.”

Rosen seemed to backtrack a bit when she posted an explanation at the Huffington Post.

“I have nothing against Ann Romney,” Rosen wrote. “She seems like a nice lady who has raised nice boys and struggled with illness and handles their long term effects with grace and dignity. …What is more important to me and 57 percent of current women voters is her husband saying he supports women’s economic issue because they are the only issues that matter to us and then he fails on even those.”

But don’t feel sorry for Ann… Ann Romney destroys attacking Obama advisor in 1 tweet!  Obama advisor Hilary Rosen’s mockery of Ann Romney for ‘never having worked a day in her life’ backfired in a huge way. Given she is a mother of 5 boys, has M.S. & is a breast cancer survivor - trying to go after her for ‘never working’ is not smart (and not true). Ann joined Twitter and dismissed Rosen in 1 tweet.

TPN:  Low Life Democrat Hilary Rosen Attacks Stay at Home Moms

WARREN BUFFETT SUED BY OBAMA’S IRS… EVEN HE ISN’T SAFE - WAIT UNTIL THEY COME AFTER YOU FOR OBAMA’S SECOND-TERM TAXES AND OBAMACARE

WARREN BUFFETT SUED BY OBAMA’S IRS

By AJ

Obama and his rich pals think you are just another useful idiot like the Occupy (OWS) crowd.

While Obama seeks to enact the “Buffett Rule” to place a higher tax burden on families/small businesses who make $250K per year or more, his Internal Revenue Service (IRS) is suing Warren Buffett.

Obama’s pal just doesn’t want to pay his taxes… but he has no problem stumping for Obama and calling for a higher tax burden on families and small businesses.

“Get this: Uncle Sam is suing Warren Buffett's company over taxes. Yes, taxes. The US government, in a little-followed case in Ohio, filed a lawsuit this month against a unit of Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway, seeking $366 million in taxes and penalties. The Berkshire division at the centre of the suit is NetJets, the private-aircraft company that caters to the nation's wealthiest - the people Buffett says should pay more in taxes.

It is an odd twist that a company controlled by Buffett - perhaps the most outspoken businessman in the country in support of raising taxes on the 'mega-rich' - is now in a dispute with the government over his company's paying too little in taxes.”

But it gets better… Buffett’s NetJets has now filed a lawsuit against the IRS.

“Now, NetJets and its sister division, which have filed their own suit against the IRS, say they "are stuck with a $642 million-plus bill for past taxes the IRS never indicated they were required to collect".

Obama’s rich friends do not want to pay their taxes, but they want to instill envy in the hearts of the uneducated and sing their “tax the rich” song.

Obama’s pal and Jobs Adviser, Jeffrey Immelt, has benefited since Obama took office through the same tax loopholes that Obama criticizes on the campaign trail. General Electric paid no Taxes in 2009, General Electric Paid No Federal Taxes in 2010.

“…GE's success at avoiding taxes is nothing short of extraordinary. The company, led by Immelt, earned $14.2 billion in profits in 2010, but it paid not a penny in taxes because the bulk of those profits, some $9 billion, were offshore. In fact, GE got a $3.2 billion tax benefit.”

Before blindly jumping on the “Tax the Rich” bandwagon, people should ask two simple questions:

1. If Obama makes people pay even more in taxes, will I get some of that money? (Answer = No).
2. Why are Obama’s millionaire and billionaire friends unwilling to pay more in taxes themselves?

Video:  Patriotic Millionaires Higher Taxes Treasury Department Donation The Daily Caller

Maybe it’s time to rethink the envy that Obama is selling, or at least see it for the BIG LIE that it is.

Video:  Milton Friedman: Why soaking the rich won't work. Reference:

Private jets, Warren Buffett and tax lawsuit

http://articles.economictimes.indiatimes.com/2012-03-28/news/31249610_1_ticket-tax-tax-battle-first-tax

General Electric paid no Taxes in 2009

http://www.politisite.com/2010/04/12/general-electric-paid-no-taxes-in-2009/

General Electric Paid No Federal Taxes in 2010

http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/general-electric-paid-federal-taxes-2010/story?id=13224558

Obama's Second-Term Taxes 

By DICK MORRIS  - Published on TheHill.com on April 10, 2012

If Obama is reelected, the tax increase he and a Democratic Congress would impose on middle- and upper-middle-income Americans would be disastrous. It's easy to lose sight of his tax plans because he has hidden them in a variety of nooks and crannies, including the Simpson-Bowles Commission Report, the Pelosi budget of 2009 and the various tax proposals advanced by his party. But, should he win, they will all come out of hiding, and together, they will be the principal legislative thrust of his efforts in 2013.

For a couple making $250,000, these tax hikes would add another $3,000 to $4,000 a month in taxes (depending on whether they were self-employed).

For a couple making $150,000, they would add another $1,200 to $1,400 per month.
Let's all realize that Obama let a massive deficit accumulate precisely because he realized that doing so gave him the leverage he would need to raise taxes and increase, permanently, the size of government in America. Reagan let the deficit pile up so liberals couldn't spend more money. Obama did so in order to make conservatives vote for higher taxes.

How will he tax us? Let us count the ways:

• Most basic, of course, will be an increase in tax rates. Those paying 33 percent will now pay 36 percent. People paying 35 percent will now pay 40 percent. Most people accept and expect that Obama will raise these brackets if he is reelected. But they don't realize what else he will do.

• As he advocated in the 2008 campaign, he will eliminate the ceiling on wages that must be taxed for Social Security. Currently, wages are taxed at 6.2 percent (now, temporarily, at 4.2 percent) up to a ceiling about $100,000 per year in income. The ceiling rises with the cost of living. But Obama will eliminate the ceiling and subject all wages to FICA taxation. (In his campaign, he spoke of a "carve-out" for those making between $100,000 and $200,000, where income would be exempt from FICA, but don't count on it.) For those who are employed, the increase in FICA taxes will mean an effective increase in their tax bracket of 6.2 percentage points. For the self-employed, it will mean a whopping 12.4 percentage point increase, bringing their effective tax rate, if they are in the top bracket, over 52 percent. Obama has refrained from addressing Social Security's financial problems and will do so until after the election. But his solution will be higher taxes, not curtailed benefits.

• All deductions for mortgage interest, charitable giving and state and local tax payments would likely end for those making more than $250,000.

• Even for those making less than $250,000, the Bowles-Simpson recommendations call for replacing the current tax deduction for mortgage interest, charitable giving and state and local taxes with a tax credit. Usually 8 percent is mentioned as the tax credit level.

So add it up:

Case A
Married couple
Income: $250,000
Home: $300,000 (mortgage interest: $20,000)
Property taxes: $15,000
Self-employed
Basic tax rate: +5% +$12,500
FICA on full income: +$18,600 ($9,300 if employed)
No deduction
Mortgage interest +$ 6,500
Prop Taxes +$5,000
State income tax (9%) +$7,500
Total additional tax: +$50,100 ($40,800 if employed)

Case B
Married couple
Income: $150,000
Home: $200,000 (mortgage interest: $10,000)
Property taxes: $10,000
Self-employed
Basic tax rate: +3% +$ 4,500
FICA on full income +$6,200 ($3,100 if employed)
8% credit, no deduction
Mortgage interest +$ 2,500
Property taxes +$ 2,500
State income tax (6%) +$ 1,500
(calculation replaces deduction at 33% bracket with an 8% credit)
Total additional tax: +$17,200 ($14,100 if employed)

Can we afford Barack Obama for four more years? No way! And don't say you weren't warned!

Related:

A Wicked Financial Storm Descends on America

Nothing to Do With Health Care!  It’s All About New Taxes and Tax Collection

Justice Served To Obama

April 10, 2012 By Matt Barber   -  The Western Center for Journalism

Eric Holder is a busy man. When President Obama’s chief law enforcement officer isn’t tied up selling guns to Mexican drug cartels, refusing to prosecute self-serving cases of voter intimidation or ignoring “wanted dead or alive” bounties placed by black militants on the heads of private citizens, he’s busy conspiring with pro-abortion extremists to bring the full weight of the federal government down upon innocent pro-life advocates.

So much tyranny, so little time.

Eric Holder is much more than just incompetent. He’s an extremist pro-abortion activist who shares his boss’s goal of “fundamentally transforming America” to reflect both men’s secular-socialist self-image.

The most recent and obvious example of this administration’s serial abuse of power in furtherance of a radical pro-abortion agenda came when the Department of Health and Human Services mandated, in contravention of the First Amendment, that all religious organizations provide contraception, sterilization and various forms of abortion to employees. This may be the single greatest violation of our constitutionally safeguarded religious liberties in our lifetimes. The mandate remains in place to this day.

But individual citizens haven’t escaped a forced fiduciary tie to abortion homicide. A few weeks later HHS arbitrarily attached a “final rule” to Obamacare requiring that every American, pro-life or otherwise, pay one dollar per month earmarked expressly for an abortion services pool. This validates pro-life forewarnings that the president was simply lying when he issued a toothless executive order supposedly banning federal dollars for abortion. (What do we call someone who chronically lies?)

Still, every once in a while the good guys win one.

For several months now the Obama administration has been abusing our judicial system through a concerted political intimidation campaign via the federal courts. Obama has instructed the Justice Department to sue a number of pro-life counselors and volunteers for allegedly violating the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrance (FACE) Act.

You won’t hear it from the mainstream media, but the Justice Department has just faced an embarrassing smack down on the highest profile of these cases. It has dropped an appeal in Holder v. Pine against pro-life sidewalk counselor Mary “Susan” Pine, who is represented by the civil rights firm Liberty Counsel. The DOJ has agreed to pay $120,000 for this frivolous lawsuit which, as the evidence indicated, was intended to intimidate Ms. Pine and send a shot over the bow of pro-lifers around the country.

Mr. Holder unsuccessfully sought thousands of dollars in fines against Ms. Pine, as well as a permanent injunction banning her from counseling women on the public sidewalk outside the Presidential Women’s Center (PWC) abortion mill (or any other “reproductive services” clinic).

After 18 months of litigation, the DOJ’s case was thrown out of federal court, and the department was chastised in a scathing ruling by U.S. District Judge Kenneth Ryskamp for filing a case with no evidence.

Judge Ryskamp wrote that Holder’s complete failure to present any evidence of wrongdoing, coupled with the DOJ’s cozy relationship with PWC and their apparent joint decision to destroy video surveillance footage of the alleged “obstruction,” caused the court to suspect a conspiracy at the highest levels of the Obama administration. “The Court is at a loss as to why the Government chose to prosecute this particular case in the first place,” wrote Judge Ryskamp. “The Court can only wonder whether this action was the product of a concerted effort between the Government and PWC, which began well before the date of the incident at issue, to quell Ms. Pine’s activities rather than to vindicate the rights of those allegedly aggrieved by Ms. Pine’s conduct.”

After the ruling the DOJ appealed on the last day possible and gave indication that President Obama had personally ordered the appeal. A little over a week later, the president apparently decided to cut his losses and reversed course.

Harry Mihet, senior counsel for Liberty Counsel, said of the judge’s ruling: “It’s not every day that a federal judge accuses the Justice Department of a full-blown conspiracy.”

Ironically, this past December, in the midst of the case, Ms. Pine actually counseled a woman outside of PWC and convinced her not to have an abortion, thus saving the life of the child and possibly the mother as well. Her email to Liberty Counsel read simply: “We saved a life today.”

Mathew Staver, founder and chairman of Liberty Counsel, pulled no punches:

It is irresponsible for the U.S. Department of Justice to place politics above principle when deciding to prosecute, and thus attempt to silence, a pro-life sidewalk counselor without any evidence of wrongdoing.

When the nation’s highest law enforcement officer files suit against any citizen, the suit must be based on the law coupled with compelling evidence. Anything less is an abuse of the high office. Susan Pine will not be silenced or detoured from her mission to save the lives of innocent children.

Indeed, “politics above principle,” intimidation of private citizens and jaw-dropping abuses of power are but a few hallmarks of this Obama administration.

History will be no more kind to this president than he has been to the citizens he was sworn, and failed, to honorably serve.

Matt Barber (@jmattbarber on Twitter) is an attorney concentrating in constitutional law. He serves as Vice President of Liberty Counsel Action (LCA on Facebook).

Santorum Suspends Campaign… Romney Clear To Be GOP Standard Bearer… Game on for General

After 3-year old daughter Bella’s illness Santorum suspends campaign for his daughter's health and family.

Rick Santorum, the only real possible challenge to Romney, suspended his campaign just minutes ago after a 309-day campaign.

Stephanie Strasburg for The New York Times

Rick Santorum has suspended his campaign for the Republican presidential nomination, bowing to the inevitability of Mitt Romney’s nomination and ending his improbable, come-from-behind quest to become the party’s conservative standard-bearer in the fall.

"We made the decision over the weekend that while this presidential race for us is over for me and we will suspend our campaign effective today, we are not done fighting," Santorum said during a speech in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. "We will continue to fight for those voices for those Americans who stood up and gave us that air under our wings."

Santorum, the former Pennsylvania senator, said the past weekend was a "time of prayer and thought" as he and his family cared for his daughter Isabella.

Santorum's organization announced they were halting campaign events on Friday because the candidate's three-year-old daughter Bella was admitted to the hospital. Bella, the youngest of Santorum's seven children, suffers from a rare chromosomal disorder called Trisomy 18, which causes severe medical and developmental problems.

Before the official suspension, Santorum held a conference call with his wife, Karen, campaign manager and staff, according to a source. He said the decision was based on personal and political factors, according to a Santorum source.

He also spoke with Republican presidential frontrunner Mitt Romney, according to a GOP source.

Newt Gingrich was not given a heads-up before Santorum’s speech.  He immediately jumped in after Santorum’s speech to say he was not dropping out, but he had already appeared on TV the past few days saying he knew he could not win and was just in to be part of the platform decision making process.

(CNN) – Republican presidential front-runner Mitt Romney released a statement shortly after opponent Rick Santorum announced a suspension to his campaign on Tuesday, praising Santorum for his presidential bid.

"Senator Santorum is an able and worthy competitor, and I congratulate him on the campaign he ran. He has proven himself to be an important voice in our party and in the nation. We both recognize that what is most important is putting the failures of the last three years behind us and setting America back on the path to prosperity," Romney said in the statement.

It is now time for the party to heal and come together.  Time to change focus… game on for the general!!  Time to focus on beating Obama and turning our country around.

A Wicked Financial Storm Descends On America

By: Terresa Monroe-Hamilton – The NoisyRoom

Ever since 2008, this blog has been warning about economic devastation heading our way. You see it everywhere you look today, if you bother to look that is… Gas prices are at close to an average of $4 a gallon and in parts of California, it is now hitting $7, with no end in sight. Food inflation that is rising so precipitously, it takes your breath away – but the government says there is no inflation.

In the world that is America now, all things seem to be upside down and sliding full-blown out of control. This includes the Communist who is our current Commander-in-Chief. He claims he is drilling for oil, when the opposite is true. He is blocking all of it and piling so many regulations on our coal plants in lockstep with his bud, Cass Sunstein, that they are shutting down as well. Lie after lie after infernal lie.

As for unemployment, the government is manipulating the hell out of those numbers in an attempt to calm the sheep before the slaughter. They claim it has fallen to 8.2%. Take a long look at the U6 rate, which tracks not only those out of work, but those who’ve essentially given up looking for work. It currently sits at 14.5% – close to double what is being claimed by our ‘progressive’ leadership. Real unemployment stands at closer to 19.1% and is perhaps substantially higher than that.

People are giving up on finding work. A second, even more brutal wave of foreclosures is also on the horizon. Real hunger is coming to the US and hard times that will make the Great Depression seem like the good ole days are pounding on our door. A majority of states are now close to being unable to cover pensions and other entitlements as well as expenses. Bankruptcy is an understatement for what these states are facing. So, to “solve” the problem, a number of them are taxing more which makes it worse and worse. All the while, the rising flood of fuel prices surges against the levee.

When truckers cannot fill their tanks anymore because of the cost, store shelves will become barren wastelands. Real food deserts. When people get hungry, especially when their children are hungry, they get mean and desperate. Just what the Progressives had in mind. Violence, chaos and mayhem in the streets.

So, you say… the election is not far off and we can get rid of Obama then. Maybe, maybe not… I understand a company owned at least in part by Soros will be handling voting results. It doesn’t take a genius to see how that would be manipulated. Then there is a potential war with Iran. If Obama feels his reelection is in jeopardy, war with Iran will look like just the right emergency. Or, there could be any other number of emergencies, real or ginned up like the Trayvon Martin murder that is sparking racial unrest.

If nothing else, the debt we owe will literally drag us into hell all by itself. We’re broke and we aren’t going back to yesteryear anytime soon. That would take massive cuts and pain and no one with that kind of spine exists today in our government. But until the last penny is stolen and the last party is thrown by the Progressives, they will keep spending until there is nothing left but death, war, famine and blood. And they are okay with that, trust me. We face the abyss and our leaders are embracing the gulf.

From The Economic Collapse Blog:

#1 According to one new survey, approximately one-third of all Americans are not paying their bills on time at this point.

#2 The U.S. housing industry is bracing for another huge wave of foreclosures in 2012. The following is from a recent Reuters article….

“We are right back where we were two years ago. I would put money on 2012 being a bigger year for foreclosures than 2010,” said Mark Seifert, executive director of Empowering & Strengthening Ohio’s People (ESOP), a counseling group with 10 offices in Ohio.

#3 The Citigroup Economic Surprise Index, a key indicator watched by many economists, is on the verge of heading into negative territory.

#4 We are supposed to be in the middle of an economic recovery in the United States, but bad news just keeps pouring in from major companies. For example, Yahoo is firing thousands of workers and Best Buy is closing dozens of stores.

#5 Richard Russell says that the “big money” is starting to quietly exit from the financial markets….

“My guess is that this is the big money that has been holding off as long as it decently can — and then dumping their goods just before the close. I don’t think the big money likes this market, and I think they have been slowly exiting this market, as quietly as they can.”

#6 Goldman Sachs is projecting that the S&P 500 will fall by about 11 percent by the end of 2012.

#7 All over the country, local governments are going into default and we have not even entered the next recession yet.

#8 The U.S. government will add more to the national debt in 2012 than it did from the time that George Washington became president to the time that Ronald Reagan became president.

#9 The Federal Reserve is desperately trying to control interest rates. The Fed purchased approximately 61 percent of all government debt issued by the U.S. Treasury Department in 2011. This is the only thing that is keeping interest rates in the United States from soaring dramatically.

#10 German industrial production is falling at a pace that is far faster then expected.

#11 Italy’s debt-to-GDP ratio is now up to 120 percent.

#12 The Spanish government admitted on Tuesday that Spain’s debt-to-GDP ratio will rise by more than 11 percent this year alone.

#13 Yields on Spanish bonds are rising to dangerous levels.

#14 The Spanish government is projecting that the unemployment rate in Spain will exceed 24 percent by the end of the year.

#15 Unemployment in the eurozone as a whole has risen for 10 months in a row and is now at a 15 year high.

#16 In the aftermath of a 77-year-old retiree killing himself in front of the Greek parliament in protest over pension cuts, the economic rioting in Greece has flared back up dramatically.

#17 At this point, Greece is experiencing an economic depression with no end in sight. Some of the statistics coming out of Greece are really hard to believe. For example, one port town in Greece now has an unemployment rate of approximately 60 percent.

#18 The IMF is asking the United States to contribute more money for European bailouts.

#19 At this point, even some of our top scientists are projecting economic trouble. For example, researchers at MIT are projecting a “global economic collapse” by the year 2030 if current trends continue.

We don’t have till 2030… I personally don’t think we have until 2013. As the stock market (which is hideously manipulated) teeters on the edge of Armageddon and those with any money at all are running for the exits, the warnings of a wicked financial storm descending on America are blaring for all they are worth. And it would seem America is still asleep. Prepare to reap the whirlwind of an economic collapse – we are at its door.

Breitbart.com: As mention above:  Record 87,897,000 Americans Not in the Labor Force amid  disappointing unemployment numbers that fell 80,000 jobs short of projections, another number is raising eyebrows: the number of Americans not in the labor force has hit a record high 87,897,000.

This figure explains why overall unemployment dropped from 8.3% to 8.2%, as the Department of Labor's unemployment figure does not include people who have given up hope and are not actively seeking employment.

When the number of individuals who have stopped looking for a job and/or who are working part-time but desire full-time employment is included--a figure known as the "underemployment rate"--real unemployment stands at 19.1%.

The Origins of Communism in California

By AJ

Examining the long march to Communism in California shows that it took Progressives over a hundred years to achieve their totalitarian California dream.

In 1879, the NY Times reported on the new California Constitution which was instigated by... wait for it... the Labor Party. Wouldn't you know, community organizers peddling their Communism way back then. In the article, "Communism in California", notice that their oppressive, totalitarian dream was instituted through taxation and taking control of land and railways. Does this sound similar to what they're doing at an accelerated pace today? It certainly parallels what Nancy Pelosi brought to the House floor in 1992, which she called "Agenda 21" and said it is the United Nations (UN) Sustainable Development program.

Most notable in the 1879 NY Times article is the authors apparent realization of the danger of enacting a mild form of Socialism that would lead to a Communist California, while at the same time finding comfort in the fact that it's happening in a "distant part of the country". The author may have presumed it would prove disastrous before infecting other States and spreading throughout the US like a violent and deadly virus. Little did the author know that it would be emanating from our very own White House, with an iron fist, within 130 years.

COMMUNISM IN CALIFORNIA (Published May 9, 1879) – Full article HERE 

Excerpts:

"... it is clear that the efforts of the conservative people of California have not been able to stem the tide which has lately set toward Communism in the Golden State. It must be said that the experiment of a mild form of Socialism is now about to be tried in one of the States of the Republic. Perhaps it is just as well that it should be tried in a distant part of the country, and in a State which always makes much of its own griefs, as well as of its own advantages. There never was a serious desire for a remodeling of the Constitution of California until the so-called Labor Party became an important factor in the politics of the State..."

"The adoption of the new Constitution, absurd as it may be in some of its provisions, is the manifestation of a rebellion against what is called "the tyranny of capital." It is a violent remedy for actual ills. It is a practical overturning of the principles that have governed American commercial life ever since the foundation of the Republic. Many requirements of the new Constitution are impossible of execution. Others will be evaded by corrupt officers. But enough will remain to bring disaster and financial distress upon the people."

Many lament what California has become and, despite the beauty of this State, people and businesses are leaving as fast as they can. On the other hand, Communists like Van Jones and the Union leaders who control this State enjoy calling California their "home" while they live in the lap of luxury courtesy of people like George Soros and Barack Obama (through our tax dollars, of course).

A May Day rally in Los Angeles, co-sponsored by the SEIU and various communist groups, as well as other unions, reflected yet another step in the normalization of self-identified communist and socialist ideologies in the Obama era. Not only did the SEIU help to organize the rally in conjunction with communists, they marched side-by-side with communists, while union members carried communist flags, communists carried union signs, and altogether there was no real way to tell the two apart.

The communists freely and proudly declare their affiliation. And the SEIU has no problem marching arm-in-arm with them.

"Smash Capitalism" is a slogan the SEIU apparently endorses - or at least doesn't mind marching behind. In case you think the SEIU is some peripheral out-of-the-mainstream organization:

The SEIU devoted $28 million to Obama's campaign, making the SEIU "the organization that spent the most to help Barack Obama get elected president."

Furthermore, who is Obama's favorite White House guest and one of his closest confidants? The individual who has visited the Obama White House the most: SEIU President Andy Stern, who has visited 53 times. Obama is closely linked with the SEIU. The SEIU is closely linked with communists. You do the math.

Did I say communists? Sorry, I meant Communists (with a capital "C"). Note how the Communists that day (like the women on the right in this photo) carried solid red flags symbolizing their ideology. Keep that in mind as you view the next photo.

One of the SEIU leaders picked up a Communist flag and led a contingent of rank-and-file SEIU members. Everyone was OK with that.

The way you can identify the SEIU members in all these pictures: They're the ones in purple T-shirts carrying blue-and-yellow signs.

So, as you can see, the communists and the union members intermingled as the march progressed.

In case you were wondering what the SEIU was saying during all of this, There is a video of the SEIU chanting "Legalization or REVOLUTION!" Clear enough?

And it wasn't just the SEIU at the march - other "normal" unions like the AFL-CIO were on hand as well.There were plenty of teachers' unions attending too, and they brought along many of their public school students for some good old-fashioned communist indoctrination.

Most in the US who walk around with Che buttons or Che shirts do so simply because they foolishly think he's "cool." These hardcore communists carry his image not because he's "cool," but because he was one of the most radical revolutionaries who ever lived. Right up there with Lenin, apparently.

No comment necessary!

In order to have a more "civil dialogue" with their political opponents, the marchers made a puppet of a demonic Statue of Liberty aligned with the "Tea Bag Party."

OK, I guess Hitler comparisons are off the table for now - too many people have called it taboo. So what's second best? The Devil!

Tell me the honest truth: If the Tea Party had marched in a rally behind a banner held up by fascists or neo-Nazis, don't you think it would have been national news? But the nation's biggest Obama-supporting political organization marched behind banners like these, and not a peep about it in the media. Hmmmm..

Until recently, the average American has regarded fascists and communists as equally noxious and equally malignant. As well they should have. But the drive these days by the left side of the spectrum is to make communism and socialism somewhat less remarkable and more palatable. For two years they angrily denied the Tea Party accusation that Obama's policies and supporters had a socialist bent.

But in recent months, as the accusation had started to gain traction, the new leftist tactic has become: "What's so bad about socialism after all? You're demonizing a very popular and respectable ideology!"

Here is Communist California today... (h/t MamaKat)

Video: Communists and SEIU Members march together at May Day Demonstration, L.A., CA

Video:  Young Communists at May Day protest, Los Angeles, Ca 5/1/2011

Related:

How California’s Colleges Indoctrinate Students

Why the Supreme Court Will Strike Down All of Obamacare

By Peter Ferrara  -  Forbes

Barack Obama made a national laughingstock out of himself with his recent comments on the Obamacare law now before the Supreme Court. Obama said on Monday, “I’m confident that the Supreme Court will not take what would be an unprecedented, extraordinary step of overturning a law that was passed by a strong majority of a democratically elected Congress.” (emphasis added).

President Obama is not stupid. But he thinks you are. He knows the Obamacare health care takeover was not passed by a strong majority. But he figures you’re so dumb he can rewrite recent history in plain sight. The law passed a House with a huge Democrat majority at the time by only 219-212. It did not get a single Republican vote, but the opposition was bipartisan.

The law also barely squeaked past a Senate filibuster despite an overwhelming 60 Senate Democrats, and even then humiliating buyoffs were necessary. Public opposition was so strong that the ultraliberal Democrat controlled Massachusetts, the only state to go for George McGovern in 1972, elected a Republican in a special election for Sen. Ted Kennedy’s seat, to terminate the Democrats’ filibuster-proof majority. That required final passage of the law improperly in violation of Congressional rules as a reconciliation measure, which is only to be used to clean up the budget and so cannot be filibustered.

And given that Obama is so certain you can’t remember what happened just two years ago, he is more than certain that you have never heard of the ancient history of Marbury v. Madison, where the 14-year old Supreme Court in 1803 took the then unprecedented step of overturning a provision of law adopted by a strong majority of a democratically elected Congress, in the Judiciary Act of 1789. That case was where the Supreme Court first recognized its power of judicial review, under which it is empowered to strike down laws found unconstitutional. As the Wall Street Journal observed on Tuesday:

“In the 209 years since, the Supreme Court has invalidated part or all of countless laws on grounds that they violated the Constitution. All of these laws were passed by a ‘democratically elected’ legislature of some kind, either Congress or in one of the states. And no doubt many of them were passed by ‘strong’ majorities….probably stronger majorities than passed the Affordable Care Act.”

As a former constitutional law professor and President of the Harvard Law Review, Obama no doubt knows all about Marbury v. Madison and judicial review. But he figures he can safely assume a majority of you know nothing about it, and his party controlled media will not tell you anything concerning it at this inopportune moment. Hence, another classic example of what I have called Calculated Deception.

President Obama further assailed any Supreme Court decision ruling his Obamacare health care takeover unconstitutional as “judicial activism, or a lack of judicial restraint, that an unelected group of people would somehow overturn a duly constituted and passed law.” Alexander Hamilton disagreed over 200 years ago in Federalist 78, writing, “There is no position which depends on clearer principles, than that every act of a delegated authority, contrary to the tenor of the commission under which it is exercised, is void. No legislative act, therefore, contrary to the Constitution, can be valid. . . .”

Or, as the Wall Street Journal explained on Monday:

“Judicial activism is not something that happens every time the Supreme Court overturns a statute. The Justices owe deference to Congress and the executive, but only to the extent that the political branches stay within the boundaries of the Constitution. Improper activism is when the Court itself strays beyond the founding document to find new rights or enhance its own authority without proper constitutional grounding.”

The Journal added, “Far from seeking an activist ruling, the Obamacare plaintiffs aren’t asking the Court to overturn even a single commerce clause precedent.”

In my role as General Counsel of the American Civil Rights Union, I filed 3 amicus curiae briefs with the Supreme Court in the Obamacare litigation. I also filed amicus briefs in the lower federal courts in the cases in Virginia and Florida.

The reason that at least 5 Justices are going to find the law’s individual mandate unconstitutional is that it is contrary to the fundamental federalism architecture of the Constitution. Under the Constitution, the federal government is an authority of limited, enumerated, delegated powers. All other powers of government are reserved for the states, including the broad authority labeled the “police power.” That is the power to compel individuals to take specific actions for the public good, such as actions for the public health like vaccinations or quarantines, or obtaining car insurance, or attending school. Notice that all such laws are adopted at the state or local level. (Any federal laws compelling action are based on specific delegated powers other than the Commerce Clause, like those providing for national defense, or taxation).

The power to compel the purchase of health insurance for the public good, as in Obamacare’s individual mandate, is a function of the police power reserved to the states, and denied to the federal government by the Constitution and Supreme Court precedents. If the federal government is now to hold a national police power, then the constitutional framework of federalism, with limited, enumerated powers delegated to the federal government, and the remaining powers of government retained by the states, would be obliterated.

That is why the Supreme Court held in United States v. Morrison, 529 U.S. 598 (2000), “We always have rejected readings of the Commerce Clause and the scope of federal power that would permit Congress to exercise a police power.” The Court added, “the principle that the Constitution created a Federal Government of limited powers, while reserving a generalized police power to the States, is deeply ingrained in our constitutional history.” The Court explained in New York v. United States, 505 U.S. 144 (1992) that Congress may not exercise its enumerated powers in a way that “infring[es] upon th[at] core of state sovereignty.” The Court in Morrison rejected the argument that women who are sexually assaulted would need medical care provides a sufficient interstate commerce connection under the Commerce Clause.

As Justice Kennedy explained in United States v. Comstock, 130 S. Ct. 1949 (2010), “the precepts of federalism embodied in the Constitution inform which powers are properly exercised by the National Government in the first place.” The Court added in Gregory v. Ashcroft, 501 U.S. 452, 457 (1991), “[t]he Constitution created a Federal Government of limited powers [and] withhold[s] from Congress a plenary police power that would authorize enactment of every type of legislation.”

The Obama Administration tried to shoe horn the individual mandate into the federal enumerated power of the Commerce Clause, which grants Congress the power to regulate interstate commerce. Their argument boiled down to the claim that millions of people choosing to not buy health insurance substantially affects interstate commerce. But every economic decision, when aggregated across the whole market, substantially affects interstate commerce in this way, including decisions not to do something. So that would leave the Commerce Clause eating up the whole Constitution and its most fundamental doctrine that the federal government is an authority of limited, enumerated, delegated powers. Federal power would then be without limit, contrary to the whole concept of the federal government in the Constitution.

That is why the Court kept asking the government for a principle that would limit its interpretation of the Commerce Clause, and its failure to come up with one is fatal to the government’s case. All prior cases under the Commerce Clause were based on the principle that some action had been taken that the federal government could then regulate as interstate commerce. To hold that inaction could be regulated as well as itself substantially affecting interstate commerce would break through any limitation on the power, and so was not what was intended. That would also again tear down the Constitution’s fundamental federalism architecture and any distinction between limited federal and plenary state power.

That is why the Supreme Court in United States v. Lopez, 514 U.S. 549 (1995) rejected the notion of unlimited Commerce Clause power, holding that it will strike down regulation under the Commerce Clause which leaves no principled limit to federal power under the Clause. The Court said, “the Constitution’s enumeration of powers does not presuppose something not enumerated and that there will never be a distinction between what is truly national and what is truly local.” Justice Kennedy added, “[T]he federal balance is too essential a part of our constitutional structure and plays too vital a role in securing freedom for us to admit inability to intervene when one or another level of Government has tipped the scales too far.”

Once the Court finds the individual mandate unconstitutional on these grounds, as it will, the question becomes whether the whole Obamacare Act must be struck down as unconstitutional as a result. The law does not include a traditional severability clause providing that if one of provision of the Act is found unconstitutional, the rest of the law should stand.

Consequently, the question becomes whether the remaining parts of the Obamacare law can still remain fully operative and function as Congress intended, and whether Congress would have passed the Act without the individual mandate. The answer in both cases is indisputably no.

Obama’s lawyers themselves have repeatedly argued in courts all over the country that the Obamacare law cannot function without the individual mandate. That is because of the Act’s regulatory requirements for guaranteed issue and community rating. The Act requires all insurers to cover all pre-existing conditions and issue health insurance to everyone that applies, no matter how sick they are when they first apply or how costly they may be to cover. Moreover, the insurers can only charge them the same, standard, market rates as everyone else.

Under these regulatory requirements, younger and healthier people delay buying insurance, knowing they are guaranteed coverage at standard rates after they become sick. Sick people show up applying for an insurer’s health coverage for the first time with very costly illnesses such as cancer and heart disease, which the insurer must then cover and pay for, out of the same standard premiums as everyone else pays. This means the insurer’s covered risk pool includes more costly sick people and fewer less costly healthy people, so the costs per person covered soar. The insurer then has to raise rates sharply for everyone just to be sure to have enough money to pay all of the policy’s benefits.

Those higher rates encourage even more healthy people to drop their insurance, leaving the remaining pool even sicker and more costly on average, which requires even higher premiums, resulting in a financial death spiral for the insurers and the insurance market.

If regulation required fire insurers to issue policies to people whose houses were already on fire at standard rates, the fire insurance pool would include only all burned down houses, which would obviously be dysfunctional.

The Obamacare law tries to counter this problem by adopting the individual and employer mandates, seeking to require everyone to be covered and contributing to the pool at all times. Without these mandates, the government itself has repeatedly argued, those who would remain uninsured would substantially affect the interstate market for health insurance, by allowing the remaining regulatory requirements to cause soaring health insurance premiums through the above process and ultimately a financial death spiral.

That financial death spiral would cause the costs of other provisions of Obamacare to soar, such as the subsidies for purchase of health insurance on the Exchanges, which would be even more costly than expected, and the costs for the Medicaid expansion, where more people would qualify given the decline of private insurance.

Indeed, Obamacare itself in its very statutory language recognized the essential role of the individual mandate in the statute’s overall framework, saying in Section 1501(a)(2)(I):

“[I]f there were no [individual mandate], many individuals would wait to purchase health insurance until they needed care….The [individual mandate] is essential to creating effective health insurance markets in which improved health insurance products that are guaranteed issue and do not exclude coverage of pre-existing conditions can be sold.”

As the court said in Alaska Airlines v. Brock, 480 U.S. 678 (1987), “Congress could not have intended a constitutionally flawed provision to be severed from the remainder of the statute if the balance of the legislation is incapable of functioning independently….” Moreover, the Court also recognized that in the absence of a statutory severance clause the entire statute must be struck down if Congress would not have enacted the statute without the unconstitutional provision.

Consequently, the loss of the individual mandate so centrally affects the entire structure of the Act that without it the entire structure must fall. Trying to determine what could be salvaged would embroil the Court in rewriting the statutory policy and framework to govern one-sixth of the entire U.S. economy, which is obviously not a judicial function.

The only other foreseeable outcome is for the liberals on the Court to agree to go along with a ruling declaring the mandate unconstitutional if the Court will just decide to hold back on deciding severability to give Congress the chance to figure out how it wants to fix it. But Congress could just pass a whole new law in any event if the Court just strikes down the whole thing, which based on its precedents is exactly what it should do.

But liberals should not despair. There is broad bipartisan agreement on alternative means of covering the uninsured with a health care safety net, which would not be expensive if done right, and addressing health costs through market competition and incentives, which altogether could well actually reduce federal spending sharply. The end result would be a much better bill that satisfies all desirable social goals. But that would still require a different President, because Obama’s anti-market, left wing, ideology would not allow him to accept that desirable result.

Cross-Posted at True Health Is True Wealth! and at Ask Marion

The Greatest Story Ever Told…

I was looking for words for my Easter greeting and then received the following in my inbox… it was exactly what my husband Tim and I had been talking about on our walk earlier in the day.  I couldn’t write or say it better: 

Many of us grew up celebrating Easter as the holiday where a cute little bunny rabbit brought chocolate and other delicious treats for everyone to eat. All we had to do was look diligently for the eggs hidden around the house and eventually it would lead us to the only thing we cared about: that giant basket of goodies.

Many are still celebrating Easter in a similar fashion. It's become tradition - it's just what we do. This year I have a radical suggestion: start a new tradition. Something that goes much, much deeper than a furry rabbit & candy.

Now don't get me wrong - I'd be lying if I told you there was no chocolate involved in my Easter weekend. I'd also be lying if I told you there were no Peeps or other marshmallow-y related food products. Or jelly beans. Or Twizzlers. There's nothing wrong with having a little egg hunt & candy at Easter - it's fun. But there is something wrong when Easter becomes all about the bunnies and the eggs and the chocolate.

Easter is actually The Greatest Story Ever Told - yet mankind has managed to water it down to an opportunity to devour a few extra M&M's and are actually 'offended' when they hear it. How could that be? What's offensive about this: The very first Easter weekend - three days that changed the world forever - took place over 2,000 years ago. Mankind was lost, floundering - headed for destruction. But because God so loved the world, He gave his one and only begotten Son, so that whoever believes in him will never die & have eternal life. And like the good Shepherd, Jesus laid down His life for the flock - and suffered greatly in doing so. He didn't have to - but He did. That is why we celebrate.

And that is why we need to start a new tradition this Easter - whether you're Christian, Jewish, Muslim, Wiccan, still thinking about it (come on already!), etc - because the holiday has nothing to do with chocolate. It's about showing love. Instead of just pounding some creme eggs & jelly beans - reach out to a friend or neighbor or total stranger. Get to know them - and look for ways you can help them. Donate your time. Donate some food. Whatever it is, just find a way to help someone in need.

America's woes are easily solvable with that one, powerful, incredible word: love. That is why we are gathering this summer for Restoring Love in Dallas at Cowboys Stadium - to remind people of our greater purpose and stir us to action. It's also why I have great hope - because I know the American people & what we are capable of when we put our minds, and more importantly our hearts, to something.

I look forward to hearing about your new Easter tradition - one that I believe will save the country.

Have a great Easter!

Laus Deo, 

Glenn Beck - April 6, 2012 (A man who has been demonized and could use our prayers as well!)

If you don’t know the story make it a goal to go to a church on Easter Sunday or an Easter pageant, watch a video, pick up the Bible or ask someone to tell you the story… It could change your life, even if it doesn’t convert you.  As Glenn says… It is a story of love.

I grew up a Christmas-Easter Catholic; my parents were burnt out Catholic school survivors from Europe, where the nuns ruled the classroom and the church had a lot of affect over their lives… until the Nazis took over. My husband occasionally went to church with the neighbors when he was a child and neither of us went to church regularly until we found a church together and re-dedicated our lives at age 40.  Yet because life was different when we grew up, we had enough of the basics and knew enough of the teachings that God and tradition were always part of our lives and decisions.  ‘He’ was at the center of American life.

The 14 years we spent involved with our children in the Glory of Easter (and Christmas) pageants and other church activities were some of the best of our lives.  They gave each holiday real meaning… not just baskets, bunnies, presents, trees, parties and celebrations.