John Fund: Mystery Meat Health Care Reform
The effort to ram a health care bill through Congress has turned the institution into a theater of the absurd. During the 2008 campaign, neither Barack Obama nor leading Democrats talked about a so-called “public option” or government-run insurance plan. But this year it became the centerpiece of both the Senate and House bills. Now Senate leaders are dropping the public option and embracing a controversial expansion of Medicare for those 55 and older that wasn’t even on the radar screens of most legislators until this week.
“I’m very puzzled ideas like this are being cooked up behind closed doors two weeks before Christmas, and we don’t know what they are,” said Sen. Lamar Alexander, a Tennessee Republican.
Even Democrats were skeptical of the late addition of Medicare expansion to the debate…
Something Obama did talk about during the campaign: mandates, fines and jail time for Americans who don’t buy health insurance. And he was against it! Wonder what happened between 2008 and 2009?
December 13, 2009 No Comments
Michelle Malkin on Howard” There is No Such Thing as Pure Fact” Zinn
The two most important questions for society, according to the Greek philosopher Plato, are these: What will we teach our children? And who will teach them? Left-wing celebrities have teamed up with one of America’s most radical historians to take control of the classroom in the name of “social justice.” Parents, beware: This Hollywood-backed Marxist education project may be coming to a school near you.
On Sunday, Dec. 13, the History Channel will air “The People Speak” — a documentary based on Marxist academic Howard Zinn’s capitalism-bashing, America-dissing, grievance-mongering history textbook, “A People’s History of the United States.” The film was co-produced and bankrolled by Zinn’s Boston neighbor and mentee Matt Damon. An all-star cast of Bush-bashing liberals, including Danny Glover, Josh Brolin, Bruce Springsteen, Marisa Tomei and Eddie Vedder, will appear. Zinn’s work is a self-proclaimed “biased account” of American history that rails against white oppressors, the free market and the military.
via Investors.com – Hollywood and Howard Zinn’s Marxist Education Project.
Sounds like television worth watching. Don’t be fooled by the fact that along with such insightful documentaries as The People Speak, the History Channel also brings America, on a nightly basis, such important history programming as The Nostradamus Effect and UFO Hunters. Perhaps that’s why Howard “There is No Such Thing as Pure Fact” Zinn, has found a home at the History Channel.
December 13, 2009 No Comments
Moving Gitmo Stateside a Jobs Program?
Good people of Thomson, Illinois — you should all be thrilled. Your esteemed United States Senator, Dick Durbin believes y’all would be good candidates to work at the New Gitmo prison coming to, well.. coming to a neighborhood near you.
Thousands of jobs would be created in Illinois if the U.S. government purchases a nearly empty prison there to house terror detainees, a study indicates.
The study, performed by the Obama White House Council of Economic Advisers and obtained by The Chicago Sun-Times, asserted that 2,290 to 2,960 jobs would be created in and around Thomson, Ill., in the first year after its conversion to house some of the prisoners now held at the Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, detention facility, the newspaper reported Sunday.
Local residents in the Illinois-Iowa border town would be “good candidates” to fill 1,240 to 1,410 of those jobs, the report indicated.
December 13, 2009 No Comments
What Recession? Boom Times for Federal Government Workers
The number of federal workers earning six-figure salaries has exploded during the recession, according to a USA TODAY analysis of federal salary data.
Federal employees making salaries of $100,000 or more jumped from 14% to 19% of civil servants during the recession’s first 18 months — and that’s before overtime pay and bonuses are counted.
Federal workers are enjoying an extraordinary boom time — in pay and hiring — during a recession that has cost 7.3 million jobs in the private sector… The trend to six-figure salaries is occurring throughout the federal government, in agencies big and small, high-tech and low-tech…
The growth in six-figure salaries has pushed the average federal worker’s pay to $71,206, compared with $40,331 in the private sector.
via USATODAY.com.
December 13, 2009 No Comments
Big Brother Barack: Uncle Sam Wants YOUR MONEY
Actually, Uncle Sam NEEDS your money, because Uncle Sam is bankrupt. And bankrupt people, companies and countries do desperate things… like taking money that isn’t theirs.
A new Internal Revenue Service unit set up to catch rich tax cheats hiding their wealth in complex business entities is rapidly taking shape with the hiring of hundreds of employees.
The IRS high wealth unit, part of a broader effort to combat international tax evasion, is focusing on “the entire web of business entities controlled by a high wealth individual,” IRS Commissioner Doug Shulman told a tax conference this week.
Another IRS official told Reuters “hundreds” of people have already been hired to staff the new unit, including some from within the agency.
“We have drawn top talent within the IRS that have expertise involving wealthy individuals as well as examination of their related entities,” said Mae Lew, an IRS special counsel.
Tax authorities in Japan, Germany and the UK have also created similar units.
The U.S. House of Representatives on Thursday approved a $387 million boost for the IRS… in part to fund the high-wealth unit…
The IRS is also opening new criminal offices in Beijing, Panama City and Sydney…
via Exclusive: IRS hires hundreds for new wealth unit | Reuters.
December 13, 2009 No Comments
Bipartisan Deficit Reduction Task Force? Pelosi: No Way!
Democrats plan to allow the government’s debt to swell by nearly $2 trillion…
The move has anxious moderate Democrats maneuvering to win new deficit-cutting tools as the price for their votes…
…moderate Senate Democrats… are demanding a bipartisan deficit reduction task force with special powers to recommend spending cuts or tax increases that would be guaranteed House and Senate votes. That idea is a total no-go with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif…
Under a pay-as-you-go regime, if offsetting cuts or revenue hikes are not found to pay for new policies, across-the-board spending cuts would hit selected programs such as farm subsidies and Medicare.
via My Way News – Democrats plan nearly $2 trillion debt limit hike.
December 13, 2009 No Comments
Charles: The Once and Future Prince
The leak will add to speculation that the Queen believes William, rather than Charles, represents the best long-term interests of the monarchy…
The reaction reflects the extreme sensitivity over the issue of the Queen’s future in public life – and how to promote Prince William without undermining the monarch or Prince Charles.
It is bound to lead to new speculation that when the Queen dies, the monarchy could skip a generation, with the Crown bypassing Charles and being handed straight to William…
December 13, 2009 No Comments
Jersey Shore. Sopranos Redux.
Since MTV is in the business of reinforcing negative stereotypes, we eagerly wait their next New Jersey-based projects currently in development, reality show Newark Crackhouse, and drama series Paterson Jihad.
Not true? Oh, yeah, sorry… MTV must only be in the business of reinforcing Catholic, Italian-American stereotypes. Judy McGrath, you should be ashamed of yourself. Thank you, Andre DeMino.
“MTV is resorting to trash television that panders for ratings at the expense of the Italian American community,” DiMino said in a letter to MTV Network’s Chair and CEO Judy McGrath. “This type of programming represents a direct affront and attack by MTV on the character of Italian Americans, the fourth-largest ethnic group in America. Neither this attack, nor any similar attack on any other ethnic group, should ever be tolerated.”
DiMino further added the program “sends the wrong message” to all as a whole by promoting and glamorizing poor behavior, the use of ethnic stereotypes, racial and ethnic slurs. “In the name of decency and fairness to millions of Italian Americans whose hard work helped build this Country, and provide a steady source of sponsorship, revenues, and support for your network, I am writing to your office to demand that you immediately pull this series before it airs,” DiMino noted.
December 13, 2009 No Comments
