June 12, 2009

President Obama's drive for government health care began in earnest on Saturday, June 6 in thousands of neighborhood House Meetings where his supporters listened to his sales talk via a video on the internet and participated in a live conference call. Those who attended were given their orders to reach out to neighbors, knock on doors, and build a grassroots network to force Congress to pass the legislation "the same way we won the election, building support one block, one neighbor, one conversation at a time."

Obama's promise that government health care will produce "reduced costs, guaranteed choice, and quality care for all" is as phony as a $3 bill. Based on all our experience with government programs, government-managed health care will result in much higher costs, the absence of choice, and inferior care for all.

We're already getting a taste of Obama-style government by Czars (who happen to be Obama's financial contributors), and now we are learning about government by stealth. The Obama legislative procedure is to write a massive piece of legislation in secret, without hearings, press coverage, open debate or public comment, and then tell Congress it's essential to hurry up and pass it quickly because "we've got to get it done this year."

Only the broad structure of the bill is shared with Congress, while the details will be filled in after passage by the Department of Health and Human Services or by Tom Daschle, who has re-emerged (without a title) as a key player on health care. The legislative vehicle for this health care deception is planned to be the budget reconciliation bill, which requires only 51 Senate votes for passage instead of the 60 needed to authorize new programs.

The Obama team is well aware it was the details that sank Hillary Health Care in 1994. So, goodbye to the transparency that candidate Obama promised.

Although Obama has referred to "my plan," there isn't yet any defined Obama plan. He apparently favors the plan drafted by Senator Ted Kennedy.

The Kennedy plan promises that all Americans will have health care, employers will have to contribute to the costs, a government insurance program will subsidize premiums for people with incomes up to 500 percent of the poverty level ($110,000 for a family of four), and private insurers will have to pay out a specified percentage of their premium revenues in benefits.

Kennedy's bill doesn't give a clue as to how this extravagance would be financed. No doubt it would be the same way the Stimulus and the Omnibus are being paid for: by printing money and by tacking more debt on younger generations.

The most unpopular features of the Obama and Kennedy plans are being kept under wraps, but here are some of the bad ideas being floated. Modified community rating is a euphemism for forcing young, healthy people to pay more for their insurance in order to subsidize older, less healthy people.

The liberals plan to impose fines on employers who don't provide health care for their employees. This will incentivize employers to terminate their current health-benefits and simply pay the fine, which is sure to be less expensive.

This will force at least 100 million employees (who are happy with their current health care) into the government plan, as well as create a new bureaucracy to impose and enforce the fines. The millions of workers who now have employer-paid health insurance will be very unhappy when they realize that nationalized health care makes them the losers.

Another very controversial and unpopular method of dealing with current employer-based health insurance is to make employees pay income tax on this benefit (which is now tax-exempt). Senator Max Baucus (D-MT), Finance Committee chairman, said this proposal is "on the table."

Obama promises cost savings by putting all Americans' health records on a uniform computer system so it can be accessed anywhere and avoid treatment duplication. In addition to requiring totalitarian controls to force all doctors to conform, this will terminate all medical privacy.

The final way to deal with escalating health care costs is hiding under another euphemism: "comparative effectiveness research." This means that government bureaucrats will assess all health treatments to determine whether or not they are cost-effective and can be approved for payment.

The not-so-polite word for this is rationing. Life or death decisions will be made by bureaucrats on the basis of treatment cost and patient age, rather than by medical diagnosis.

That's the way health care works in Socialist Canada and England, but it's not the American way. Free-market competition, health savings accounts, and letting individuals spend or save their own money are the best ways to cut health care costs.

President Obama, Speaker Pelosi, and others owe 1.2 Million Tea Party Patriots an Apology.

The American people deserve better from their Elected Representatives and are beginning to demand It.

Among the political class it has apparently become acceptable, and even fashionable, for American politicians from the President on down to mock the citizens they represent. In a development that can only further denigrate the discourse necessary to any effective democracy, politicians and the "serious" news media are now mocking citizens regularly and with impunity. Supported by mainstream journalists on MSNBC and CNN, who themselves use sexual slurs on national television to mock and attack the same citizens, the politicians openly demonstrate their feelings of superiority over those they were elected to represent. They now candidly express their disdain of a significant portion of the American population without the threat of reprisal by the mainstream media.

On the morning of the April 15th Tea Parties, the American public was informed on national news by one of the President's economic advisers, Jared Bernstein, that the President was "unaware" of the Tea Parties taking place in over 850 cities across the nation! On April 29th, the President informed a Town Hall meeting in St. Louis that he had just now become aware of the Tea Parties, but only from "certain news channels on which I'm not very popular." He referred disdainfully to the one million plus Patriots who came out in legitimate and constitutionally protected demonstrations of free speech on April 15th as "folks waving tea bags around..." While he collects royalties (last year about $2.6 million) from his books, "The Audacity of Hope" and "Dreams From My Father", the President has the audacity to imply that we the people have nothing legitimate to say about high taxes, wasteful spending and corporate bailouts. The President also seems to believe that it is appropriate to mock millions of Americans who are expressing their opinions publicly in a peaceful manner. Perhaps he feels that by mocking the Tea Parties and the Patriots who attended, that he can marginalizes them. But we know that real Patriots cannot be marginalized, and that they will continue to make their voices heard in ever greater numbers," says Elsie Gufler , San Mateo County Tea Party Coordinator and Tea Party Patriots National Leadership Council Member.

This sort of condescending approach to the Grassroots is a hallmark of politicians all across this land. We, the Grassroots are mocked by the President as "folks waving tea bags around"! Discussion of our legitimate complaints and concerns is avoided through the use of derogatory and condescending rhetoric. We've heard similar rhetoric from the Speaker Nancy Pelosi who says the Tea Parties are an "Astroturf initiative," and "contrived events backed by those who like tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans." Rep. Jan Schakowsky (IL), called people who attended the Tea Parties "despicable" and "shameful," "corporate interests" and said the events were created by "Republican lobbyists and politicians". At every level, the President and the majority of politicians nationally refuse to discuss the issues head on, and refuse to acknowledge the fact that a huge, non-partisan, Grassroots movement has coalesced around limited government, fiscal responsibility and lower taxes. As politicians, they are simply interested only in taking and spending more and more of our money, and in leaving our children to inherit the burdens of their excess. They mock, deride and oppose anyone who objects to what they are doing!

At this time, the President, and all other politicians who demeaned the protestors, Speaker Pelosi (CA), and Rep. Schakowsky (IL) included, owe 1.2 million Patriots an apology. If our politicians are truly interested in dialogue with the people they claim to represent, such a dialogue must begin with respect for the citizens of this country. That show of respect will begin when the politicians acknowledge that mocking and demeaning well-intentioned, peaceful Tea Party Patriots who love their country is the height of arrogance, and a terrible mistake. The American people deserve better from their elected representatives, and they are beginning to demand it!