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Is there anything our President likes about America other than leisurely destroying it? I’m searching for an answer, trying to find something that our President not only says he likes, but something he acts like he likes. Let’s run a list. Here goes.
Free Enterprise: No way does our President likes free enterprise. He says he does but his actions betray his words. He bailed out the banks, the auto industry, AIG, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. He wants hyper control over our financial system. He is drooling over the possibility of shutting down the oil industry. He is in favor of the redistribution of wealth. He actually believes the Constitution is flawed because it does not address “redistributive justice,” his words. He is in favor of Cap and Trade which will be a monumental shroud on free enterprise, and freedom itself in that Cap and Trades’ tendrils will reach right down to a persons domicile. Nope, our President is not an advocate of free enterprise.
Border Control and Security: Our President does not want our borders controlled. He says he does but refuses to act until we get “comprehensive” immigration policy. Unfortunately, “comprehensive,” to him, means amnesty for thirteen million illegal aliens and probably a lot more. He still hasn’t made good on his promise to Arizona to send 1200 National Guardsmen to the border, actually breaking his promise of doing so within two weeks after the meeting with the Arizona Governor. Let’s face it folks, our President does not even view the very land we occupy as worthy of protection. As to National Security, he nixed the missile defense system in Eastern Europe. He has done nothing to keep Iran non-nuclear. He’s cutting defense spending. He wants to treat foreign terrorists as common criminals, trying them in criminal courts rather than military tribunals. He won’t even use the phrase “Islamic Extremist.” You know those guys who are willing to die to destroy us.
Self Reliance: Our President does not respect self-reliance. Redistributive Justice does not co-exist with self-reliance. His health care bill does not co-exist with self-reliance. He believes it is the government’s job and duty to provide and not the individual’s responsibility. He believes it’s government’s fault if you don’t own a house, have a job, have health care, can’t afford education, don’t have insurance, not the individual’s fault.
American Exceptionalism: Our President does not believe we are exceptional. Actually, we’re just human, but we’ve been blessed with a nation that was founded on freedom and liberty which allowed us to actualize and be exceptional. But does our President praise this truth? No. He apologizes to the world for our behavior. He ignores our principles and wants us to be more like other nations, that Mr. President, in case you haven’t watched the news of late, are failing. He does not like the idea of a nation with our principles dominating the world, or even leading it for that matter. And that says a lot about the man because if you don’t like us leading with our principles, then you don’t understand the magnificence of our principles.
Environment: The Gulf Oil Spill reveals that our President doesn’t care too much about the environment. He views the Gulf Oil Spill as an opportunity to impose his priorities of more regulation, less freedom (pass Cap and Trade) and less free enterprise rather than a dire call to action to save the environment. He views the Gulf Oil Spill as a “fat pitch” to further attack free enterprise, all the while, actually thwarting the efforts to thwart the environmental impact of the spill. He took two weeks to respond to Louisiana’s request to build barrier islands. He turned down offers of help to deal with the oil spill from thirteen nations. Under his rule, the coast guard moth balled skimmers in order to make sure they met government regulations, further delaying remedial measures to save the environment. His only non-urban activity is golf and that’s not saying much. Cap and Trade won’t fix the environment. China and India aren’t signing on and even if they did, Cap and Trade only imposes more government. Scientifically, there is no evidence that it will do anything for the environment.
State’s Rights: He is suing Arizona for exercising their state’s rights. He does not like State’s rights, the very right that is set forth to create a sort of governmental competition. The very right that allows state’s to innovate in their policies in an attempt to improve life. He doesn’t agree with a state’s right to ban abortion.
Free Speech: He doesn’t like it. He attacks free expression regularly, even going so far as to say that free expression gets in the way of progress. He appointed Justice Kagen who is no fan of the First Amendment, who believes that there should be a redistribution of free expression which means government control. He is in favor of the Fairness Doctrine which in classic Ayn Randian style, has nothing to do with fairness but rather equality of points of view which means, government control of speech. He is in favor of net neutrality, meaning more government control, less free speech.
The Right to Bear Arms: He does not believe in the Second Amendment. His votes in the Illinois Legislature prove this.
What’s left? Does it even matter? By having contempt for the principles stated above, does one even need to go further? It’s akin to saying, “I like Nuclear Reactors, I’m just not fond of the nuclear reaction that goes on inside.” You cannot love America and what it stands for if you don’t stand for the American Principles. And our President does not stand for the American Principles. It’s as plain as day. He says it. He acts upon his words. He has contempt for those who disagree. We have enough information to finalize the diagnosis.
Folks, his rhetoric sounded good during the campaign. But now, at this critical time, it is imperative to realize and act upon the truth that it was just rhetoric, nothing more. He doesn’t like our country and if you don’t join him in his effort to destroy that which made us great, he doesn’t like you. And folks, here’s the kicker: He not only doesn’t like America, what he really doesn’t like is our freedom to save it. Freedom is his nemesis. Freedom is the stalking horse that threatens his skewed un-American vision. Freedom is what he really despises.
On a psychological note, a note based upon my observations and education, if a child is raised by an abusive parent, it is likely that the child will be grow up to be an abusive parent as well. This is particularly true with sexual abuse. It is called the Cycle of Sexual Abuse. Here’s the reach. Our President views his history, whether it is the cultural African American history or his history personally, as abusive and unfair. Is there a possibility that he is metaphorically the abused child playing his role in the cycle of abuse? To him, America wasn’t that good to him. (Rather amazing, he became President) He had a broken home. He was raised by a cacophony of anti-American mentors. He was bounced around from place to place, home to home. And now he’s an adult, repeating the anti-American mantra through his words, but more so through his actions. Is this the case? It sure seems like it, but I’m just asking.
So, going back to the premise of this piece, what is it that our President likes about this country? I come up with not a single fundamental American thing. I am not saying that he isn’t enjoying the fruits of our Nation’s labor. He is, but the fruits, the opulence he enjoys is not an American Principle. All dictators live opulent lives by the way. Opulence has nothing to do with American Principles. Opulence is a by-product but not a fundamental of Americanism. So please don’t argue that he loves America because he appreciates the opulence it has bestowed upon him. To love America is to love its principles. And he does not. And that is the dire dilemma that faces us today.
That’s my Reetzality for the Day.
Thanks for the read.
Brett Reetz
The Obama administration wants to build infrastructure. They say that infrastructure is our problem. We need, bridges, public works, high speed internet, high speed rail, and if we get these things, bingo, the economy will get great, it will rebound. That’s what they say. The problem is that they are supporting the wrong infrastructure. Let me ask this question; can you point to a foundering economy that is foundering because it doesn’t have a bridge, a new public works project, high speed internet, or high speed rail? Nope. Well that’s revealing if not ridiculous. These Obamafites think that if we spend more money on their infrastructure, then things will get better. Wrong. Here’s the problem. They are betting on the wrong infrastructure.
The infrastructure we need is not material. It is not a bridge or a damn or a high speed internet, it is fundamental, it is our principles. That’s the infrastructure that needs rebuilding because right now, it’s broken. Given the current political leadership, values and traits like honesty, responsibility, consequence, and more, are broken. They are almost non-existent. American Business wants a rebuilding of the infrastructure, but not the false infrastructure the Obama administration tenders, the real infrastructure, the values. American business wants the fundamental principles that made our country great returned.
Nobody cares about a bridge or a rail or high speed internet, they care about principles. I.E. If I take a risk and make some money, will Obama take it away from me? Will my success be punished? Those are the true infrastructure questions. And Obama doesn’t get it, he doesn’t respect it, he has contempt for it, because Obama loves Government. That is his environment. His environment is not a place where there is accountability, responsibility, consequence. He has never so much as run a lemonade stand. And yet he is in charge.
And he doesn’t understand that the true efficacious infrastructure that we as Americans are longing for is liberty, the ability to succeed and keep our spoils and the ability to fail and pay the consequences. He is intent on building the wrong infrastructure. Come on guys, spirit, ingenuity, liberty and drive built the Hoover damn, not some government program. Spirit, ingenuity, liberty and drive built Microsoft. Not some bridge, not some government program. Individual spirit built it all. And yet, this administration is warped and stupid enough to believe that productivity is an offspring of government.
We need infrastructure rebuilding but not the one that Obama is pushing. It isn’t even infrastructure that he’s pushing, it’s suppression. What we need is to rebuild (re-vibrate) is the true infrastructure in this nation which is opportunity, hope, ingenuity, profit, success, responsibility and more. Not bridges, not government programs, not anything inspired by government other than government going into the back room and leaving us alone. Then we will again have prosperity. Like Rush Limbaugh, I pray Obama fails, just like you’d pray a mass murderer intent on killing your family would fail. What is the saying? Death by a thousand cuts? We’re there. Time to fight back.
That’s my Reetzality for the day. I’m all for infrastructure, just the right infrastructure. (Not Obama’s)
President Obama, during Thursday’s (May 27, 2010) press conference, said that every morning when he’s shaving, his daughter comes in and asks, “Did you plug the hole yet, Daddy?” It is reported that Glenn Beck hit a new low by mocking this asserted inquiry of Malia, President Obama’s daughter. I disagree. Here are my thoughts as to why I do not think Glenn Beck was mocking Malia Obama:
1. I do not believe the question was asked by Malia Obama. In order for her to ask the question, President Obama would have to be posing the problem of the oil leak in the Gulf of Mexico as his responsibility. He would have to have been telling his daughter, literally and only, “I have to plug a hole.” It is inconsistent with President Obama to ever leave any doubt laying around that something might be his fault. He would have tagged his mission to “plug the hole” with some blame gaming.
2. It is inconsistent with President Obama to take responsibility for anything without first blaming somebody else. If you have to bet on the “somebody else,” put your money on George Bush. So, if acting in character, and if actually consulting with his daughter Malia, he would have said, something akin to “I have to plug the hole George Bush caused,” or “I have to plug the hole the Oil industry caused.” Thus, his daughter would have asked, “Did you plug the hole George Bush caused, Daddy?” Or maybe, “Did you plug the hole the oil industry caused, Daddy?” Or “Did you plug the hole Republicans caused, Daddy?” Or even, “Did you plug the hole that unregulated free enterprise caused, Daddy?” Now if these were the question his daughter asked, I’d believe the story.
3. Consistent with President Obama’s inability to accept responsibility on steps one and two of crisis management (Step one: What happened and who is at fault? Step two: What is the solution and who’s going to be responsible for the solution?) and President Obama’s narcissistic inability not to take credit for the third step, the actual solution, there is no way he would allow his daughter to surmise that if he didn’t “plug the hole,” it would be his fault. Nothing is his fault according to him. I’ve wracked my brain and I can’t come up with a single example of him taking the blame for anything. On the other hand, and in the opposite, he does have an inclination to take credit for most everything, regardless of two important points of consideration. POINT 1. Did he actually do anything allowing him to take credit? POINT 2. Is there anything for which he can take credit? As an example, see the economy. Notwithstanding the Stimulus Package’s failure to keep unemployment at 8%, President Obama is taking credit for an improved economy that is not improved.
4. Even if his daughter did ask such a question, and if President Obama told the entire story of the routine morning dialogue with Malia, he would have told us of his response, which if the story is to be believed, would have been, “What hole are you referring to Malia?”
Because, and this is a transitional paragraph, President Obama has a lot of holes to plug. He has the economy hole which is going down the drain due primarily to the tangible fear of business of Obama’s policies. He has the national debt hole. It is almost literally off the charts. He has the foreign policy hole. His apology tour didn’t work. North and South Korea are no longer hugging. Iran is going nuclear. Israel is miffed at us. He has the war hole. No end in sight. He has the immigration hole. Huge numbers of illegals are leaking in. And he has the Joe Sestak hole, the primary point of my commentary today. Here goes:
Here’s the news: Former President Bill Clinton was tasked by White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel to make an approach to Rep. Joe Sestak — allegedly offering him an unpaid advisory role on an intelligence board in exchange for getting him to drop his primary bid against Sen. Arlen Specter (Pa.). Rep. Joe Sestak says he declined the offer. This stinks of tripe in so many ways. No way. Here’s why it is nothing more than a cheap charade.
QUESTION NUMBER ONE: Who would go to a candidate in a senatorial race and offer him an unpaid job in exchange for pulling out of a race?
ANSWER NUMBER ONE: Nobody.
QUESTION NUMBER TWO: Why would Joe Sestak state that he was offered a “job” when, if you believe the White House, it was an unpaid position?
ANSWER NUMBER TWO: He wouldn’t.
QUESTION NUMBER THREE: If it was so legal, innocent (and worthless) a proposal, why wouldn’t Joe Sestak reveal its details?
ANSWER NUMBER THREE: Because it wasn’t so legal, innocent and worthless a proposal?
QUESTION NUMBER FOUR: If it was so legal, innocent (and worthless) a proposal, why wouldn’t the White House reveal the details?
ANSWER NUMBER FOUR: Because it wasn’t so legal, innocent and worthless a proposal?
QUESTION NUMBER FIVE: If it was so innocent (and worthless) a proposal, why did the White House employ Bill Clinton as a go between to make the offer?
ANSWER NUMBER FIVE: Because it wasn’t so legal, innocent and worthless a proposal?
QUESTION NUMBER SIX: Given the merits of the alleged proposal, give up your costly senate race and the White House will give you an unpaid position, would Bill Clinton actually go to Joe Sestak and make such a proposal?
ANSWER NUMBER SIX: No way. He would have laughed in their face and said, (think Bill Clinton’s voice after he laughs) “No way in hell he’s going to take that deal! What if we offered him women?” (The second sentence in Bill Clinton’s predicted response is a joke.)
QUESTION NUMBER SEVEN: If it was so legal, innocent (and worthless) a proposal, why did the White House and Joe Sestak employ so much delay in their response to repeated inquiries of the media?
ANSWER NUMBER SEVEN: Because it wasn’t so legal, innocent and worthless a proposal?
Come on folks. These guys are lying. If a five year old answered a poignant and imperative question with so much delay, distraction, ambiguity, and illogical response, you would never believe the child. You would know that something was amiss. And there is something amiss. The White House and President Obama are lying to us. This truth is right there in their false, taunting, demeaning, insulting, arrogant and audacious words and actions. They are betting on Americans being stupid. A bad bet Mr. President, a real bad bet.
Here’s a recap. President Obama is lying about his morning father-daughter dialogue, just like he is lying about “nothing improper occurring” with Joe Sestak and just like he is lying about not knowing the circumstances of the director of the U.S. Minerals Management Service, Elizabeth Birnhaum’s departure, (he had to know or he has to be inept, pick).
It was not Malia Obama that Glenn Beck mocked, it was President Obama. I believe he brought this on himself when he exploited his daughter for political gain and to massage his disturbing and troublesome ego. I also believe it was low brow to use his daughter in the way he did.
Note One: It has been learned that the “Top Kill” attempt to “plug the hole” was stopped and was in a holding strategy well prior to the press conference. Thus, and equally nefarious, President Obama could have been aware of this and, metaphorically, bet on a horse that had already won the race when he held his press conference. Another way put, he could have been demonstrating faux bravado and faux responsibility for the task of “plugging the hole” that had already been plugged by somebody else.
Note Two: I once used reference to my daughter in a closing argument. I was remanded by the District Attorney and the Judge. They were right and my reference to my daughter to make a point was improper in all respects.
Note Three: I looked up the definition of the word “mock.” By definition, if Glenn Beck was imitating Malia, regardless of whether the morning father-daughter conversation occurred, then he was “literally” mocking her. However, his obvious intent was to mock her father. I’m sure Mr. Beck feels bad about this. President Obama should feel worse.
Of late, as the primary election season gets under way and America’s anger at Washington and government continues to manifest itself into positive change, (See Virginia, New Jersey, Massachusetts, polls, Spector, Lincoln, Obey, etc.) President Obama is again attacking Republicans in a feeble attempt to lend support to this threatened minions. President Obama is attacking Republicans for not cooperating with his agenda in the midst of one of America’s greatest crisis when “they caused it.” His words. Wow! Is he really saying this? Yes he is. Almost unbelievable. Here’s why:
The crisis he is referring to is a financial crisis with tendrils reaching into home ownership, employment, every aspect of the economy and most importantly, the survival of America. Obama says Republican’s caused it, not democrats, and not Washington. Republicans “caused it” according to Obama. He’s lying or he is ignorant, pick. Yes, George Bush spent way too much money and George Bush, while aware the dire financial woes on the horizon with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, did not succeed in fixing the problem. George Bush has some culpability. But was he alone? Absolutely not. Barney Frank and democrats defended Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and their insane endorsement of even more insane lending practices. Democrats went right along with Bush’s spending spree. It is not a Republican or Democratic problem, it is a problem with Washington. Apparently America understands this and Obama does not.
How can I say that Obama doesn’t understand this? Easy. Obama is Bush on Steroids. He is doing everything he and democrats criticized Bush for doing. Spending, he makes Bush look like a cheap pauper. Government control, invasion into our lives, the destruction of liberty, think Patriot Act which was condemned by democrats, Obama has pounded on the accelerator when it comes to growth of government and the attack on liberty.
Obama is spending our nation into Bankruptcy. Earlier this week, the Bank of England Governor, Mervyn King, irked US authorities by pointing out that even the world’s economic superpower has a major fiscal problem – “Even the United States, the world’s largest economy, has a very large fiscal deficit” were his words.
Obama has taken away our freedom to control our own health care while, and this is quite consistent with his un-American view, making us responsible for other’s health care.
War? He’s in the thick with little beyond rhetoric and his campaign promises to indicate he has an exit strategy.
He wants to monitor the internet. He is in favor of the fairness doctrine although he is pursing his free speech control administratively rather than legislatively, he still does not like free speech. He recently said that too much information and argument injures the “emancipation” and democracy. I still don’t know what “emancipation” information and argument are injuring.
He is pushing cap and trade under a different name, fleeing terms like carbon tax, regressive tax, global warming, even cap and trade. He is honing in on calling his agenda the American Energy Act.
Immigration? A closed for the season sign is apparently hanging in the office of the folks in the Administration that should be dealing with the immigration problem.
See my point? Obama is pointing fingers at the Republicans for a problem, a crisis, that is absolutely not owned exclusively by Republicans. And let’s talk about pointing fingers. Last week Obama pointed fingers at the Oil industry. Why? Amazingly, to accuse them of pointing fingers; rather gutsy for the greatest finger pointer in history to attack an entire industry for doing just that, pointing fingers. It is especially amazing when according to the Associated Press, the Obama Administration failed miserably in their inspection of the oil rig that exploded. What is that old trite saying? When you point your finger at me, there are three fingers pointing back at you? Perfectly appropros.
Obama’s latest attempt to point fingers is reveals further (not that we need any more revelation of the real Obama) the utter immaturity and incompetence of our President. Mr. President you don’t lead by blaming, you lead by being responsible. Responsibility is the foundation of leadership and you are not being responsible. Our President continues to further reveal an arrogant and ignorant condescension for the intelligence and mental proficiency of America. America sees and knows what Obama refuses to acknowledge, admit and accept any blame. America sees through Obama too. Thank God and I am being literal here.
The Crisis we are in is a Washington crisis now being lead in the most faulty direction by Obama. It is not any past politician’s problem, maybe fault, but not problem. It is Obama’s problem and he is failing to do a damn thing about it other than point fingers and accelerate the very behavior that got us into this mess. He is a governmentaholic and his solution, more government. And that is what is perpetuating the crisis, nothing else. So keep pointing your finger Mr. President, it doesn’t work for any positive purpose other than this: It further reveals your un-American fundamental beliefs, immature character, lack of principle, political agenda, and most horrifyingly, your contempt for the country that we love and cherish. Not that we need it Mr. President, but thanks for the reminder.
Thanks for the Read.
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL HAS HIM FIGURED OUT!
The Obama Presidency – by Eddie Sessions:
I have this theory about Barack Obama. I think he’s led a kind of make-believe life in which money was provided and doors were opened because at some point early on somebody or some group took a look at this tall, good looking, half-white, half-black, young man with an exotic African/Muslim name and concluded he could be guided toward a life in politics where his facile speaking skills could even put him in the White House.
In a very real way, he has been a young man in a very big hurry. Who else do you know has written two memoirs before the age of 45? “Dreams of My Father” was published in 1995 when he was only 34 years old. The “Audacity of Hope” followed in 2006. If, indeed, he did write them himself. There are some who think that his mentor and friend, Bill Ayers, a man who calls himself a “communist with a small ‘c’” was the real author.
His political skills consisted of rarely voting on anything that might be deemed controversial. He went from a legislator in the Illinois legislature to the Senator from that state because he had the good fortune of having Mayor Daley’s formidable political machine at his disposal.
He was in the U.S. Senate so briefly that his bid for the presidency was either an act of astonishing self-confidence or part of some greater game plan that had been determined before he first stepped foot in the Capital. How, many must wonder, was he selected to be a 2004 keynote speaker at the Democrat convention that nominated John Kerry when virtually no one had ever even heard of him before?
He outmaneuvered Hillary Clinton in primaries. He took Iowa by storm. A charming young man, an anomaly in the state with a very small black population, he oozed “cool” in a place where agriculture was the antithesis of cool. He dazzled the locals. And he had an army of volunteers drawn to a charisma that hid any real substance.
And then he had the great good fortune of having the Republicans select one of the most inept candidates for the presidency since Bob Dole. And then John McCain did something crazy. He picked Sarah Palin, an unknown female governor from the very distant state of Alaska . It was a ticket that was reminiscent of 1984’s Walter Mondale and Geraldine Ferraro and they went down to defeat.
The mainstream political media fell in love with him. It was a schoolgirl crush with febrile commentators like Chris Mathews swooning then and now over the man. The venom directed against McCain and, in particular, Palin, was extraordinary.
Now, nearly a full year into his first term, all of those gilded years leading up to the White House have left him unprepared to be President. Left to his own instincts, he has a talent for saying the wrong thing at the wrong time. It swiftly became a joke that he could not deliver even the briefest of statements without the ever-present Tele-Prompters.
Far worse, however, is his capacity to want to “wish away” some terrible realities, not the least of which is the Islamist intention to destroy America and enslave the West. Any student of history knows how swiftly Islam initially spread. It knocked on the doors of Europe, having gained a foothold in Spain .
The great crowds that greeted him at home or on his campaign “world tour” were no substitute for having even the slightest grasp of history and the reality of a world filled with really bad people with really bad intentions.
Oddly and perhaps even inevitably, his political experience, a cakewalk, has positioned him to destroy the Democrat Party’s hold on power in Congress because in the end it was never about the Party. It was always about his communist ideology, learned at an early age from family, mentors, college professors, and extreme leftist friends and colleagues.
Obama is a man who could deliver a snap judgment about a Boston police officer who arrested an “obstreperous” Harvard professor-friend, but would warn Americans against “jumping to conclusions” about a mass murderer at Fort Hood who shouted “Allahu Akbar.” The absurdity of that was lost on no one. He has since compounded this by calling the Christmas bomber “an isolated extremist” only to have to admit a day or two later that he was part of an al Qaeda plot.
He is a man who could strive to close down our detention facility at Guantanamo even though those released were known to have returned to the battlefield against America . He could even instruct his Attorney General to afford the perpetrator of 9/11 a civil trial when no one else would ever even consider such an obscenity. And he is a man who could wait three days before having anything to say about the perpetrator of yet another terrorist attack on Americans and then have to elaborate on his remarks the following day because his first statement was so lame.
The pattern repeats itself. He either blames any problem on the Bush administration or he naively seeks to wish away the truth.
Knock, knock. Anyone home? Anyone there? Barack Obama exists only as the sock puppet of his handlers, of the people who have maneuvered and manufactured this pathetic individual’s life.
When anyone else would quickly and easily produce a birth certificate, this man has spent over a million dollars to deny access to his. Most other documents, the paper trail we all leave in our wake, have been sequestered from review. He has lived a make-believe life whose true facts remain hidden.
We laugh at the ventriloquist’s dummy, but what do you do when the dummy is President of the United States of America ?”
That’s my Reetzality for the day. Thank you Mr. Sessions.
I’m listening to Laura Ingram who is replacing Bill O’Reilly as I write this. There is some tree hugger defending Obama’s initiative to open up off-shore drilling. Now, before you rush to your email accounts to attack me for using the term “tree hugger” slow down. I’m a tree hugger. I love cleanliness and a pure environment. My biggest gripe is that approximately eighty percent of our rivers are contaminated. Clean rivers are awesome. We need to, bare with me on this one, redistribute some wealth to get our rivers clean. You can raft, fish, kayak, canoe, swim, frolic, on a clean river. The reality is that we don’t have, the big picture, a high percentage of clean rivers. It’s about eighty percent toxic rivers as of late. What concerns me is this passion about our atmosphere. Why? Our atmosphere is pretty clean. We aren’t dying of lung disease, like China. We aren’t scraping smog off our cars, but the reality is, our rivers are sordid. They stink. I want to clean them and I want them to be a priority. Why aren’t they? I mean, if the rivers were clean, folks in Chicago could frolic in the Des Plaines river. Instead, they hold their nose while Obama preaches about carbon dioxide, the stuff you, a human, exhales. Why not clean up the rivers? Here’s the sad answer. There’s no control and domination in that solution to the dirty river problem. Obama’s claim to care about a clean non ice-cap melting world has nothing to do with the environment. Why would it? He doesn’t fish, hunt, camp, kayak, hike, anything in the environment. He is a city boy. Yet, he claims to be an environmentalist. Why? Because of control. Have you read the cap and trade bill of late? It is all about control and not about the environment. This is scary stuff.
It is time for the people on the “right” to sell the truth that they care, sincerely, about the environment. And the people on the right need to sell the other truth, that the left, the Obama folks, only care about the environment as a tool to grow government and take control of our individual liberties. If you read the stuff, the cap and trade bill, it’s a no brainer. If you don’t, you might fall victim to the Obama fraud which is more government and a dirtier environment.
Please, please, please, read the bills. Get to know what they are imposing under the guise of their environmental statements, that on their face, are appealing, but underneath, are appalling.
Obama wants control. He could care no less about a clean environment. It is simply his tool to control. I want a clean environment. I don’t want a fascist one.
That’s my Reetzality for the day.
Here’s an interesting analysis of big government. Maybe there’s hope after all, although its tough to root for embedded incompetence. Read on.
PROGRESSIVES CAN’T GET PAST THE KNOWLEDGE PROBLEM
By: Glenn Harlan Reynolds April 4, 2010
“If no one among us is capable of governing himself, then who among us has the capacity to govern someone else?” — President Reagan, Jan. 20, 1981.
Economist Friedrich Hayek explained in 1945 why centrally controlled “command economies” were doomed to waste, inefficiency, and collapse: Insufficient knowledge. He won a Nobel Prize. But it turns out he was righter than he knew. In his “The Use of Knowledge In Society,” Hayek explained that information about supply and demand, scarcity and abundance, wants and needs exists in no single place in any economy. The economy is simply too large and complicated for such information to be gathered together.
Any economic planner who attempts to do so will wind up hopelessly uninformed and behind the times, reacting to economic changes in a clumsy, too-late fashion and then being forced to react again to fix the problems that the previous mistakes created, leading to new problems, and so on.
Market mechanisms, like pricing, do a better job than planners because they incorporate what everyone knows indirectly through signals like price, without central planning.
Thus, no matter how deceptively simple and appealing command economy programs are, they are sure to trip up their operators, because the operators can’t possibly be smart enough to make them work.
Hayek’s insight into economics and regulation is often called “The Knowledge Problem,” and it is a very powerful notion. But recent events suggest that it’s not just the economy that regulators don’t understand well enough — it’s also their own regulations. This became apparent when various large businesses responded to the enactment of Obamacare by taking accounting steps to reflect tax changes brought about by the new health care legislation. The additional costs created by Obamacare, conveniently enough, weren’t going to strike until later, after the November elections.
But both Generally Accepted Accounting Principles and Securities and Exchange Commission regulations require companies to account for these changes as soon as they learn about them. As the Atlantic’s Megan McArdle wrote:
“What AT&T, Caterpillar, et al did was appropriate. It’s earnings season, and they offered guidance about , um, their earnings.”So once Obamacare passed, massive corporate write-downs were inevitable.
They were also bad publicity for Obamacare, and they seem to have come as an unpleasant shock to House Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., who immediately scheduled congressional hearings for April 21, demanding that the chief executive officers of AT&T, John Deere, and Caterpillar, among others, come and explain themselves. Obamacare was supposed to provide unicorns and rainbows: How can it possibly be hurting companies and killing jobs? Surely there’s some sort of Republican conspiracy going on here! More like a confederacy of dunces. Waxman and his colleagues in Congress can’t possibly understand the health care market well enough to fix it. But what’s more striking is that Waxman’s outraged reaction revealed that they don’t even understand their own area of responsibility – regulation — well enough to predict the effect of changes in legislation. In drafting the Obamacare bill they tried to time things for maximum political advantage, only to be tripped up by the complexities of the regulatory environment they had already created. It’s like a second-order Knowledge Problem.
Possibly this is simply because Waxman and his colleagues are dumb, and God knows there’s plenty of evidence that Congress isn’t a repository of rocket scientists. But it’s just as likely that adding 30 or 40 IQ points to the average congressman wouldn’t make much difference. The United States Code — containing federal statutory law — is more than 50,000 pages long and comprises 40 volumes. The Code of Federal Regulations, which indexes administrative rules, is 161,117 pages long and composes 226 volumes.
No one on Earth understands them all, and the potential interaction among all the different rules would choke a supercomputer. This means, of course, that when Congress changes the law, it not only can’t be aware of all the real-world complications it’s producing, it can’t even understand the legal and regulatory implications of what it’s doing.
There’s good news and bad news in that. The bad news is obvious: We’re governed not just by people who do screw up constantly, but by people who can’t help but screw up constantly. So long as the government is this large and overweening, no amount of effort at securing smarter people or “better” rules will do any good: Incompetence is built into the system. The good news is less obvious, but just as important: While we rightly fear a too-powerful government, this regulatory knowledge problem will ensure plenty of public stumbles and embarrassments, helping to remind people that those who seek to rule us really don’t know what they’re doing.
If that doesn’t encourage skepticism toward big government, it’s hard to imagine what will.
Examiner Contributor Glenn Harlan Reynolds, a law professor at the University of Tennessee, hosts InstaVision at PJTV.com and blogs at InstaPundit.com.
Back to Reetzality. Thank you for the read Mr. Reynolds.
And thank you readers for the read.
Is our President a Communist? He’s certainly been accused of being one. I thought I should check it out. So I, Reetzality, went to work. So, let’s check it out, but first, let’s get a definition of communism. Here it is:
“Communism is a social structure in which classes are abolished and property is commonly controlled, as well as a political philosophy and social movement that advocates and aims to create such a society.” (See Wikepdia)
REETZALITY! O.K. Now we know what a communism is. Let’s see what President Obama has to say on the subject. Here are some excerpts from Obama’s speech to Berlin in front of the Brandenburg Gate. Thank you http://thebobofiles.com/?p=211. Check it out.
“Yes, there have been differences between America and Europe. No doubt, there will be differences in the future. But the burdens of global citizenship continue to bind us together. A change of leadership in Washington will not lift this burden. In this new century, Americans and Europeans alike will be required to do more – not less. Partnership and cooperation among nations is not a choice; it is the one way, the only way, to protect our common security and advance our common humanity.”
“The walls between old allies on either side of the Atlantic cannot stand. The walls between the countries with the most and those with the least cannot stand.” “This is the moment when we must build on the wealth that open markets have created, and share its benefits more equitably. Trade has been a cornerstone of our growth and global development. But we will not be able to sustain this growth if it favors the few, and not the many. Together, we must forge trade that truly rewards the work that creates wealth, with meaningful protections for our people and our planet. This is the moment for trade that is free and fair for all.”
REETZALITY! So let me get this straight. We’re in bed with other nations? We should share our wealth with other nations? We are no longer Americans, we are world citizens? Sounds pretty communal to me. Another question, what about our Constitution, you know the fundamental principles of our great nation? Does that cooperation he’s speaking of require us to blend our Constitution with other nations without a Bill of Rights? It appears President Obama is not really concerned with the principles of nations but only the wealth of nations. And he wants to share it. How do I know? He said so, that’s how. Don’t believe me? Go back to the beginning of this blog and re-read.
Here are some more Obama quotes:
“I chose my friends carefully. The more politically active black students. The foreign students. The Chicanos. The Marxist professors and structural feminists.”
“It’s not that I want to punish your success; I just want to make sure that everybody who is behind you that they’ve got a chance to success, too. I think when you spread the wealth around, it’s good for everybody.” (Said to Joe the Plumber)
“If you look at the victories and failures of the civil rights movement and its litigation strategy in the court, I think where it succeeded was to invest formal rights in previously dispossessed people, so that now I would have the right to vote. I would now be able to sit at the lunch counter and order and as long as I could pay for it I’d be OK .
But, the Supreme Court never ventured into the issues of redistribution of wealth, and of more basic issues such as political and economic justice in society. To that extent, as radical as I think people try to characterize the Warren Court, it wasn’t that radical. It didn’t break free from the essential constraints that were placed by the Founding Fathers in the Constitution, at least as it’s been interpreted, and the Warren Court interpreted in the same way, that generally the Constitution is a charter of negative liberties. Says what the states can’t do to you. Says what the federal government can’t do to you, but doesn’t say what the federal government or state government must do on your behalf.
And that hasn’t shifted and one of the, I think, tragedies of the civil rights movement was because the civil rights movement became so court-focused I think there was a tendency to lose track of the political and community organizing and activities on the ground that are able to put together the actual coalition of powers through which you bring about redistributive change. In some ways we still suffer from that.” (Emphasis added) (Said by President Obama, before he was President, on National Public Radio)
REETZALITY! O.K. He’s said some significantly communist-like things in his career. Who hasn’t? Well, me, and I suspect about 99.9999% of Americans, but who am I to judge? Let’s keep investigating. Let’s check out some of his friends.
HERE ARE SOME OF HIS FRIENDS, care of: http://theobamafile.com/_associates/ObamaAssociates.htm:
William Charles Ayers (born December 26, 1944) is an American elementary education theorist and former leader in the anti-war movement that opposed U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War. He is known for the radical nature of his activism, which began within the anti-war movement of the 1960s. In 1969 he co-founded the violent radical left organization the Weather Underground, which conducted a campaign of bombing public buildings during the 1960s and 1970s. He is now a professor in the College of Education at the University of Illinois at Chicago, holding the titles of Distinguished Professor of Education and Senior University Scholar.
Bernardine Rae Dohrn (née Ohrnstein, born January 12, 1942) is an American former leader of the Anti-Vietnam War radical organization Weather Underground. She is an Associate Professor of Law at Northwestern University School of Law and the Director of Northwestern’s Children and Family Justice Center.
David Axelrod also has connections that that stretch back to post-War Chicago communism. While a New Yorker by birth, David Axelrod studied political science at the University of Chicago in the early 1970s. Later, while a start-out journalist with the Hyde-Park Herald, Axelrod was mentored by two older journalists cum political activists, Don Rose and David S. Canter.
Obama had an admitted relationship with someone who was publicly identified as a member of the Communist Party USA (CPUSA). The record shows that Obama was in Hawaii from 1971-1979, where he developed a close relationship, almost like a son, with Davis, listening to his “poetry” and getting advice on his career path. But Obama, in his book, “Dreams From My Father,” refers to him repeatedly as just “Frank.”
Graham-Felsen ran the Obama campaign’s blog. He spent time in France taking part in labor riots, has written for a socialist magazine, hung a communist flag in his home, and was a fan of Marx while at Harvard.
Obama administration Communications Director Anita Dunn commended the wisdom of mass murdering Communist Chairman Mao in her address to high school students this past June. Dunn cited Mao as one of her two favorite political philosophers.
A former Jesuit priest and executive director of the Gamaliel Foundation, Galluzzo was interview by New Republic’s Ryan Lizza and showed him the training manual he uses with new organizers. Galluzzo told Lizza that many new trainees have an aversion to Saul Alinsky’s gritty approach because they come to organizing as idealists rather than realists. Galluzzo, along with fellow trainer Mike Kruglik, schooled Obama in Alinsky tactics. The Developing Communities Project, Obama’s first employer in Chicago, was part of the Gamaliel network of organizations.
In June 2009 Patrick Gaspard, a Brooklyn-based, 41-year-old Democratic operative, became White House director of the Office of Political Affairs. Gaspard’s ties to the groups behind ACORN-the groups that helped President Obama during his Chicago days-Democratic Socialists of America and the Communist Party offshoot Committees of Correspondence for Democracy and Socialism. Like Obama, Patrick Gaspard wrote poetry. Like Obama , Patrick Gaspard grew up admiring third world leftists and revolutionaries. He reportedly idolized Aime Cesaire, a radical poet/politician from the French colony of Martinique.
Jeff Jones is a co-author of Obama’s Stimulus Bill. He used to be a terrorist. Jones was a national officer in Students for a Democratic Society, a founding member of Weatherman, and a leader of the Weather Underground. Jones is part of the Apollo Group, which was founded by Van Jones — Obama’s former “Green Czar.” The Apollo Group, under Jeff and Van Jones’ direction, basically wrote Barack Obama’s stimulus bill. During World War II, Jones’ father was a pacifist and conscientious objector who was assigned for the duration of the war, to a civilian work camp in the Sierra Mountains of California. Ironic, a pacifist breading a terrorist.
Jones was the leader and founder of a radical group, the communist revolutionary organization Standing Together to Organize a Revolutionary Movement, or STORM. STORM worked with known communist leaders. It led the charge in black protests against various issues, including a local attempt to pass Proposition 21, a ballot initiative that sought to increase the penalties for violent crimes and require more juvenile offenders to be tried as adults.Speaking to the East Bay Express, Jones said he first became radicalized in the wake of the 1992 Rodney King riots, during which time he was arrested. “I was a rowdy nationalist on April 28th, and then the verdicts came down on April 29th,” he said. “By August, I was a communist.” “I met all these young radical people of color — I mean really radical: communists and anarchists. And it was, like, ‘This is what I need to be a part of.’ I spent the next 10 years of my life working with a lot of those people I met in jail, trying to be a revolutionary,” he said.
Marilyn Katz is a Chicago public relations consultant and political operative, who has known David Axelrod for 30 years. Katz claims it was she who introduced Obama to the “activist network” in Chicago.
Rashid Khalidi, an apologist and spokesman for the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO), is the Edward Said Professor of Arab Studies at Columbia University, and Director of the Middle East Institute (MEI) at Columbia’s School of International and Public Affairs. In his role as MEI Director, Khalidi presides over a $300,000 annual grant from the federal government. He ranks among the most prominent members of the Middle Eastern studies community in the United States. His books are among the most frequently assigned works on the Middle East in American college syllabi. Arab and American media outlets alike seek him out regularly as a leading authority on the Middle East. In the 1990s, Obama and his wife were regular dinner guests at Khalidi’s Chicago home. During the 2000 election cycle, Mr. and Mrs. Khalidi organized a fundraiser for Barack Obama’s unsuccessful congressional bid.
Klonsky is an unabashed communist whose current mission is to spread Marxist ideology in the American classroom. Obama funded him to the tune of nearly $2 million. Obama, moreover, gave Klonsky a broad platform to broadcast his ideas: a “social justice” blog on the official Obama campaign website.
State Senator Barack Obama probably knew Saul Mendelson through their mutual activism in Independent Voters of Illinois, an organization investigated for communist infiltration as far back as the 1940s. On March 13th 1998, Saul Mendelson, a lifelong socialist activist died in Chicago. Mendelson had been a member of various Trotskyist factions in the 1930s and ’40s before joining the US Socialist Party and later DSA. In 1983 Saul Mendelson played a significant role in the election of Harold Washington. The Saul Mendelson Memorial Service was held on Sunday, March 29, 1998, at the First Unitarian Church, Chicago.
According to Chicago DSA leader, the late Carl Marx Shier (who addressed the gathering);
At the memorial service held at the 1st Unitarian Church on South Woodlawn, speaker after speaker recounted Saul’s contributions…speakers included Deborah Meier…Senator Carol Moseley Braun, Alderman Toni Preckwinkle, State Senator Barak Obama, Illinois House Majority Leader Barbara Flynn Currie and a good friend from New York, Myra Russell.
The concluding remarks were made by an old friend, Harriet Lefley, who is now Professor of Psychology at the University of Miami Medical School. Alderman Toni Preckwinkle and Illinois House Majority Leader Barbara Flynn Currie, are both leftist Democrats with ties to Chicago’s socialist community. Both endorsed Barack Obama in his successful 2004 bid for the US Senate.
Eulogies also came from Quinn Brisben, (Socialist Party presidential candidate 1976, 1992) and David McReynolds (Socialist Party presidential candidate 1980, 2000).
Deborah Meier was a former Trotskyist and Socialist Party comrade of Saul Mendelson’s and a leader of Chicago and Boston DSA.
Taught Barack Obama in the Alinsky method.
Linda Rae Murray left the Communist Party in 1992 and has since worked closely with Committees of Correspondence and Democratic Socialists of America. She is a prominent Chicago health professional and the the immediate past president of Quentin Young’s Health and Medicine Policy Research Group. Murray is a leading and very active advocate for “single payer” and has just been elected president of the American Public Health Association — a post Quentin Young held in 1988. There is a picture of her with President Obama and his wife.
In 1995, Alice Palmer represented the state’s 13th District, and decided to run for the United States Congress. She hand-picked Barack Obama to run to replace her. She was an executive board member of the U.S. Peace Council, which the FBI identified as a communist front group, an affiliate of the World Peace Council, a Soviet front group. She participated in the World Peace Council’s 1983 Prague Assembly, part of the Soviet launch of the nuclear-freeze movement. In June 1986, while editor of the Black Press Review, she wrote an article for the Communist Party USA’s newspaper, the People’s Daily World, now the People’s Weekly World. It detailed her experience attending the 27th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union and how impressed she was by the Soviet system. Palmer gushed at the “Soviet plan to provide people with higher wages and better education” and spoke of the efficiency of the Soviets’ most recent five-year plan, attributing its success to “central planning.” She praised their “comprehensive affirmative action program, which they have stuck to religiously — if I can use the word — since 1917.”
New evidence has emerged that Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama was closely associated as early as age 25 to a key adviser to a Saudi billionaire who had mentored the founding members of the Black Panthers.
DSA member, former communist and long time Obama friend. The New Zeal blog is reporting that Dr. Quentin Young has been a close friend, personal physician and political mentor to Barack Obama for more than 20 years. He is the father of the US socialized healthcare movement and proudly admits to having tutored his friend Barack Obama in the subject. Young, a member of Democratic Socialists of America, was a member of the Young Communist League in his teens. He was also accused of membership of the Bethune Club of the Communist Party ( a party doctor’s group) by a government commission investigating the 1968 Democratic Party Convention riots in Chicago. Young has been the US’s most active proponent of “single payer” or socialzed healthcare for decades — firstly through his medical committee for Human Rights, then his Physicians for a National Health Program and his Health and Medicine Policy Research Group.
Leftist black nationalist preacher, who preached African-American unity through antipathy toward whites. The Rev. Jeremiah A. Wright, who acted as Obama’s personal spiritual adviser, is militantly Afrocentric. His website proudly claimed, “We are an African people, and remain ‘true to our native land,’ the mother continent, the cradle of civilization.” On March 21st, 2010, Rev. Jeremiah Wright, said that people voted for socialism when they voted for Obama. He said it to Geraldo Rivera.
Former Weatherman, Zach Pollet, became ACORN’s political director and the head of ACORN’s Project Vote, now embroiled in voter fraud investigations in several states.
REETZALITY! So he’s got some unsavory and close friends. By the way, these “friends” are each one degree of separation away from President Obama. That means he knows them personally. Heck, who doesn’t have some unsavory friends? I do, but then, I’m a criminal defense lawyer. I’m not judging Mr. President. To use a phrase I find humorous, “I’m just saying . . .” Actually, I’m just “posting.” . . . things I found on the Web.
O.K. Let’s do an interim run down. I gave you a definition of communism. I listed some communistic quotes of President Obama. I listed some communistic friends of President Obama. Let’s try to bring it together. Let’s use Obama-Care to assess whether his policies are communistic.
Here we go. Here are some of our loss of freedoms, thank you Obama-care and thank you, Dr. Jamie Mitchell and David Hogberg at: http://walkinginwisdom.com/archive/2010/03/24/loss-of-freedom-thru-health-care.aspx
1. You are young and don’t want health insurance? You are starting up a small business and need to minimize expenses, and one way to do that is to forego health insurance? Tough. You have to pay $750 annually for the “privilege.” (Section 1501) 2. You are young and healthy and want to pay for insurance that reflects that status? Tough. You’ll have to pay for premiums that cover not only you, but also the guy who smokes three packs a day, drink a gallon of whiskey and eats chicken fat off the floor. That’s because insurance companies will no longer be able to underwrite on the basis of a person’s health status. (Section 2701). 3. You would like to pay less in premiums by buying insurance with lifetime or annual limits on coverage? Tough. Health insurers will no longer be able to offer such policies, even if that is what customers prefer. (Section 2711). 4. Think you’d like a policy that is cheaper because it doesn’t cover preventive care or requires cost-sharing for such care? Tough. Health insurers will no longer be able to offer policies that do not cover preventive services or offer them with cost-sharing, even if that’s what the customer wants. (Section 2712). 5. You are an employer and you would like to offer coverage that doesn’t allow your employees’ slacker children to stay on the policy until age 26? Tough. (Section 2714). 6. You must buy a policy that covers ambulatory patient services, emergency services, hospitalization, maternity and newborn care, mental health and substance use disorder services, including behavioral health treatment; prescription drugs; rehabilitative and habilitative services and devices; laboratory services; preventive and wellness services; chronic disease management; and pediatric services, including oral and vision care. You’re a single guy without children? Tough, your policy must cover pediatric services. You’re a woman who can’t have children? Tough, your policy must cover maternity services. You’re a teetotaler? Tough, your policy must cover substance abuse treatment. (Add your own violation of personal freedom here.) (Section 1302). 7. Do you want a plan with lots of cost-sharing and low premiums? Well, the best you can do is a “Bronze plan,” which has benefits that provide benefits that are actuarially equivalent to 60% of the full actuarial value of the benefits provided under the plan. Anything lower than that, tough. (Section 1302 (d)(1)(A)) 8. You are an employer in the small-group insurance market and you’d like to offer policies with deductibles higher than $2,000 for individuals and $4,000 for families? Tough. (Section 1302 (c) (2) (A). 9. If you are a large employer (defined as at least 101 employees) and you do not want to provide health insurance to your employee, then you will pay a $750 fine per employee (It could be $2,000 to $3,000 under the reconciliation changes). Think you know how to better spend that money? Tough. (Section 1513). 10. You are an employer who offers health flexible spending arrangements and your employees want to deduct more than $2,500 from their salaries for it? Sorry, can’t do that. (Section 9005 (i)). 11. If you are a physician and you don’t want the government looking over your shoulder? Tough. The Secretary of Health and Human Services is authorized to use your claims data to issue you reports that measure the resources you use, provide information on the quality of care you provide, and compare the resources you use to those used by other physicians. Of course, this will all be just for informational purposes. It’s not like the government will ever use it to intervene in your practice and patients’ care. Of course not. (Section 3003 (i)) 12. If you are a physician and you want to own your own hospital, you must be an owner and have a “Medicare provider agreement” by Feb. 1, 2010. (Dec. 31, 2010 in the reconciliation changes.) If you didn’t have those by then, you are out of luck. (Section 6001 (i) (1) (A)). 13. If you are a physician owner and you want to expand your hospital? Well, you can’t (Section 6001 (i) (1) (B). Unless, it is located in a country where, over the last five years, population growth has been 150% of what it has been in the state (Section 6601 (i) (3) ( E)). And then you cannot increase your capacity by more than 200% (Section 6001 (i) (3) (C)). 14. You are a health insurer and you want to raise premiums to meet costs? Well, if that increase is deemed “unreasonable” by the Secretary of Health and Human Services it will be subject to review and can be denied. (Section 1003) 15. The government will extract a fee of $2.3 billion annually from the pharmaceutical industry. If you are a pharmaceutical company what you will pay depends on the ratio of the number of brand-name drugs you sell to the total number of brand-name drugs sold in the U.S. So, if you sell 10% of the brand-name drugs in the U.S., what you pay will be 10% multiplied by $2.3 billion, or $230,000,000. (Under reconciliation, it starts at $2.55 billion, jumps to $3 billion in 2012, then to $3.5 billion in 2017 and $4.2 billion in 2018, before settling at $2.8 billion in 2019 (Section 1404)). Think you, as a pharmaceutical executive, know how to better use that money, say for research and development? Tough. (Section 9008 (b)). 16. The government will extract a fee of $2 billion annually from medical device makers. If you are a medical device maker what you will pay depends on your share of medical device sales in the U.S. So, if you sell 10% of the medical devices in the U.S., what you pay will be 10% multiplied by $2 billion, or $200,000,000. Think you, as a medical device maker, know how to better use that money, say for R&D? Tough. (Section 9009 (b)). The reconciliation package turns that into a 2.9% excise tax for medical device makers. Think you, as a medical device maker, know how to better use that money, say for research and development? Tough. (Section 1405). 17. The government will extract a fee of $6.7 billion annually from insurance companies. If you are an insurer, what you will pay depends on your share of net premiums plus 200% of your administrative costs. So, if your net premiums and administrative costs are equal to 10% of the total, you will pay 10% of $6.7 billion, or $670,000,000. In the reconciliation bill, the fee will start at $8 billion in 2014, $11.3 billion in 2015, $1.9 billion in 2017, and $14.3 billion in 2018 (Section 1406).Think you, as an insurance executive, know how to better spend that money? Tough.(Section 9010 (b) (1) (A and B).) 18. If an insurance company board or its stockholders think the CEO is worth more than $500,000 in deferred compensation? Tough.(Section 9014). 19. You will have to pay an additional 0.5% payroll tax on any dollar you make over $250,000 if you file a joint return and $200,000 if you file an individual return. What? You think you know how to spend the money you earned better than the government? Tough. (Section 9015). That amount will rise to a 3.8% tax if reconciliation passes. It will also apply to investment income, estates, and trusts. You think you know how to spend the money you earned better than the government? Like you need to ask. (Section 1402). 20. If you go for cosmetic surgery, you will pay an additional 5% tax on the cost of the procedure. Think you know how to spend that money you earned better than the government? Tough. (Section 9017).
REETZALITY! OUCH! Let’s revisit the definition of communism to begin to close this discussion. Here it is, again:
So, where are we? Let’s break it down and see if the pegs fit in the holes. Here we go:
1. Communism is a social structure in which classes are abolished. . . Certainly, under Obama-care, everybody has health care, supposedly, and because the “secretary” controls it all, everybody has the same health care. Under Obama-care we are all in the same social class when it comes to health care. So do you mean that no matter how much and how hard I work, a person who smokes, drinks, and doesn’t work is “entitled” to the same health care? Yes, class has been abolished. Damn! The first prong of the communist analysis went, well, communism. Damn again! (However, this may not be entirely true. Due to the Physicians leaving the field, running from Obama-care, and the impending shortages of physicians, there may still be classes. Unfortunately, I think upper class will mean that you are first in line and lower class means that you are last in line.) 2. . . . and property is commonly controlled . . . O.K , I’m going to fall back on my B.S. degree in Economics to explain and question this one. “Commonly controlled” means that control is not vested in the individual, it is “commonly controlled” by a government for all. Under Obama-care, the property, being the money, services, and the actual physical structures, are not controlled by the individual. Under Obama-care they are “commonly controlled” by the government. The individual’s property is taken and redistributed so that all class status in the access to health care is abolished. Damn, for a third time. The second prong of the communist analysis went communist too. 3. . . . as well as a political philosophy and social movement that advocates and aims to create such a society. Uh Oh! President Obama’s philosophy, if consistent with his statements, propounds a social movement. That’s for sure. More Uh Oh! If his philosophies are consistent with his policies, see Obama-care, he “aims to create such a society.” Damn, for a fourth time. It appears President’s health care plan, now law, passes the communist test. IT’S IN! But I’m just saying. . .
But how can this be? This is America. It is of the greatest contradictions to impose communism on America. This cannot be true! It cannot be reconciled with the Constitution, you know, the one that President Obama said the Warren Court “didn’t break free from . . . ,” that one. He also said, he wants to fundamentally change America. I know I’m repeating myself from past blogs, but this is important: Fundamental is defined by Webster’s College Dictionary as “the origin of existence.” So again, given that the constitution is the origin of our Nation’s existence and President Obama wants to “fundamentally” change our Nation, is it a great a leap of faith to surmise that Obama isn’t a fan of the Constitution? I’m just asking . . .
But who am I to question the President? Of course he’s a fan of the Constitution, the origin of our existence. He’s just says things that inherently contradict its principles, has numerous acquaintances who are un-American, and passes law that fit eerily into the definition of communism and cannot co-exist (I love those bumper stickers-sarcasm) with constitutional principles. But I’m just saying. . .
But really? Is it possible that he does love the Constitution because it provides him the freedom and liberty to destroy it? Is it possible he has a love-hate relationship with it? No, no, no! It’s oxymoronic to love something (the Constitution) because the thing (the Constitution) gives you the freedom to destroy it. He wouldn’t think that way, would he? He’s a progressive after all. Again, I’m just asking. Just posing questions President Obama, that’s all. Utilizing the Socratic method of inquiry like you probably used when you taught Constitutional law, that’s all I’m doing. Like we all should be doing.
And that’s my longest Reetzality for the Day.
Thank you so much for the long, long, read.
Note 1: Mind you, I never called him a communist, not once. I posted information I found on the web with links so you can check it out. I then did some rudimentary analysis. So keep me off the no-fly list, if you don’t, it will screw up my skiing and my family’s skiing too. Because, Mr. President, I’m just saying . . . I’m just asking . . .
Note 2: Why is there a hint of fear in my heart as I write this? I mean, even if it is concluded that President Obama has communist’ tendencies, how bad can a communist be? See Castro, Mao, Pol Pot, Stalin, Chavez for the answer.
Note 3: We need to speak out, loud and clear, and consistent with American principles, that’s why I write this stuff. We need to do so to prevent our nation from being fundamentally changed and we no longer can.
Note 4: Enough already. Well, for now anyway.
Today, although I’m writing this at 10:34 p.m. Wednesday night, there will be the health care summit. What in the hell is a summit anyway? I’ve never yet seen one that wasn’t a collective effort to shed blame, responsibility, accountability, and truth. So be it. Tomorrow, today actually (as you read this) Obama has his summit on health care. So what would be the best outcome? Here are my thoughts.
Obama has no respect for alternative thoughts. It’s not his style. It is not who he is. He has been a spoiled child for most of his life. He didn’t think of this event, somebody else did. He will be well prepped and the powers that are, will be in control.
So now, it’s up to the Republicans, better folks, but in no way as pure as the driven snow. I mean come on, they had control of the house, senate, and the executive branch for two years and they failed to shrink government or get us a flat tax. They are not as pure as the driven snow. Still, it’s up to them to save our country. So what do they do?
Here’s what they do:
Don’t back down. Stick to the principles of freedom and choice. It’s rather amazing that the left pro-choice movement rallies around choice and in contrast, the current bill denies choice. What a beautiful oxymoronic position? Really, you can chose to end a future life but you don’t have the ability to chose your provider and the terms under which you pay for the provider and take care of your present life? You can chose to end an unborn life but can’t chose about your health care? Reconcile that! To me, it makes no sense. But I digress.
Are there really folks, like Obama, who would socialize one sixth, actually more, of our economy because thirty one million folks don’t have health insurance? Yes there are! Make note, we have three hundred million people in this nation. Thirty one million is basically ten percent of the nation. Are we really going down a path to fundamentally change that which makes us great for one tenth of our population. Talk about throwing the baby out with the bath water.
Come on folks, there is a right to get the best health insurance, but a right is not an entitlement. Is anybody asking the question, “why don’t these folks have health insurance?” No. But I am. They are folks who didn’t put in the effort to get it or folks who are illegal or folks who simply don’t want it. Sure, there are folks with pre-existing conditions, but I’m all for taking care of those folks. But that’s not the mass. That’s not the heart of the problem. Let’s face it, most folks who don’t have health insurance brought it on themselves. They chose not to have it. Their priorities are askew. They chose smokes or booze or the absence of self improvement, something, but they just chose not to have health insurance. And my objectionists, don’t insult my intelligence by telling me about the poor soul who just couldn’t afford it; unless you have an affidavit that says, no cigs, no booze, high school degree, no crime, no vacations, no big screen TV . . . get my point? Where is your poster child? You know, the one who legitimately suffering from the lack of health care? I’m waiting.
And the bigger question, why is Obama and the left doing this? Why would they crush our economy with this extreme government control, this take over of our freedom, this condemnation of free enterprise, this assault on liberty and most importantly, this assault on what makes our nation great?
I’ve thought long and hard on this issue. The big why? question. I’ve been unable to reconcile their intent with much of anything other than one thing. Evil.
Let’s face it folks. Their policies hurt us. Their policies discriminate. (They claim to be un-racist but routinely they identify folks by race). Their policies take. (Obama told Joe the Plumber he was into some redistribution) Their policies deny individualism. Their policies contradict our God given principles, the Bill of Rights. Their policies hurt folks. Their policies stymie the economy. Their policies retard personal responsibility. Their policies don’t work with the exception of keeping them in power.
These guys want to be on top of the pile but they are ill equipped to be on top of a righteous principled pile, so they destroy the mass and they get to be king of the dredges. How do they destroy the masses? They addict as many people to need for one. For two, they skew public opinion by focusing on need rather than principle and responsibility. That’s what they do. Historically, and history is important, it gives us a window into the future, their policies always hurt folks. They always fail.
So what is it that causes people to strenuously push an agenda that hurts folks? I’ve thought about it a lot. What is it? Is it that they care about people? History proves that their policies (big government) don’t help people. Is it that they think their system is better? Check out Russia and Cuba. Nope. The only thing I can come up with to reconcile, find a purpose behind their agenda, an agenda that hurts folks, denies freedom and liberty, is this: They are possessed by evil.
And tomorrow, today, we are going to witness the fight between good and evil. Think I’m being extreme? The President’s proposal on the table will take over one sixth of our economy. It will deny freedom. It will institute government control. It will crush liberty on the most fundamental level, our ability to take care of our own bodies. That sounds evil to me. Hopefully the Republicans will arrive without their evil. Hopefully, they will have shed it for tomorrow.
And more hopefully, having shed their evil, they will throw the holy water on the president, meaning they will, in an articulate manner, expose the President as an anti-American, un-freedom loving, big government adoring, guy. They will cut through the faux respect and be honest. We are fighting evil, plain and simple.
If they don’t, we should all be worried. We should go to church. You know, the place where God resides, the place where the entity resides that gave us our freedoms. Because there is no way that I will ever accept the principle that my freedoms come from the tolerance of Harry Reid, Obama, and government over all. God gave me, us, the freedom, not government. Let’s pray for an exorcism tomorrow. Let’s pray that the Republicans do the right thing and go there baring arms. Let’s pray that they have the strength to be honest, stick to the principles, and be Americans. We’ll see.
Because if tomorrow is done right, it will be an exorcism. The good guys, if they show up as Republicans, will shun and condemn and out the evil of the bad guys.
I’ve watched Obama. The devil is nervous. Not that Obama is the devil, he’s only a minion of the devil. He’s possessed, I’ll forgive him, I’m Christian. But right now he is the spokesperson of evil Wow Brett! You’ve gone off the wall! Really? Then explain to me what could motivate a person to injure a nation, defy reason and logic, and pursue an agenda that will decimate the greatest nation on earth?
Evil is the absence of logic, reason and truth. This pretty much sums up the current agenda in Obama controlled Washington. Sorry to bring it on, but it is time.
That’s my Reetzality for today.
Captain Obonga to the Rescue!
I am so relieved. Thank you, thank you, thank you, Captain Obonga. I had no idea that the government, that failed to prevent a terrorist on the watch list whose father reported him as a radical without a passport from getting on a plane headed to Detroit with a bomb hidden in his underwear, no idea whatsoever that that government could fix everything else. The next thing you know they’ll be joking that the government can’t even keep strangers out of White House dinners? But you set me straight Captain Obonga. Thank you.
O.K., on a more serious note (although the first note was serious, I just utilized humor to demonstrate the seriousness, now I’ll get rid of the humor) was that a speech or what? Shoot, here comes the humor again. Captain Obonga is going to do everything. Pheewww! Say good bye to worries my little friends, I mean you American People. You “they” people.
O.K., O.K. O.K., I took a serious pill, so here goes, firm, fair and frank. The State of the Union address was a rambling cacophony of lies, misrepresentations, false promises, insincerity, rewriting of recent history, bragging, blaming, arrogance, ignorance, condescension, and otherwise consistent with a complete ripper of a marijuana fest. Thus, the “Obonga” nick name. We’ll call it a “BS”-afest instead.
Folks, he’s going to raise our taxes either directly or indirectly and has already done so with his deficit spending. Wait, small correction-maybe. He may have only raised our childrens’ taxes. Folks, he’s not going to endorse nuclear energy or off shore drilling. Folks, he has no desire to assist small business. He doesn’t even respect business for what it does. He said that all student loans would be forgiven in twenty years but in ten years if a graduate goes into public service. That’s right, we need more social workers and bureaucrats in our future than business people because social workers and bureaucrats are just so damn critical. See folks, this is another window into Captain Obonga’s soul. He values government more than the private sector. And he doesn’t understand basic values either; like paying off your debt. What in the world would justify a person to stop paying a debt if it’s not paid off? Shoot, that’s that pesky “keep your word” stuff. God that’s irritating. So what’s the big deal? I cut a deal, borrow some money for a four year degree which I actually spend six getting, drag the payments out for twenty years and then tell the lender that Captain Obonga told me I didn’t have to pay anymore after twenty years. Wait, wait, wait. I thought of something. Why don’t I just grab a public sector job in let’s say year nine, work it for a year, stop paying which is absolutely justified since I’ll be doing something so critical to America, actually serving the public for America, like for example, collecting tolls on a turnpike, and then, when I’m free of my promise to re-pay my student loan, I quit my cherished public sector job and go into the private sector and stick the tax payer with the rest of my debt. So many possibilities.
O.K. Folks, now I’m really going to be serious, actually I have been. I was just using humor to exemplify how much of a joke the State of the Union Address was. Our president has never made a bottom line, hangs out with communists and terrorists, loves Government, big government, is a progressive democrat, wants to socialize medicine, (He said he’s not quitting in his pursuit of his anti-American Agenda (He didn’t say “anti-American” but it is)), has no understanding of the economy, nothing is his fault, and after listening to his speech, wants to run everything.
Prior to his address, it was suggested that the Obama Administration was going to do a “re-set” on its agenda due to the rapidly growing trend against them. The pundits got it half right. Obama did do a reset but not on his agenda. He did a reset on the focus button so that the picture we see is different than before, blurred; but the content, the actual content, is exactly the same.
Beware folks, this guy does not like us “they” people. But he’s afraid of us and that’s why he reached out last night and spun the focus button. He changed the focus to hide. What he didn’t change was the content of his ambitions which are very un-American. Only our ability to see it was changed. But folks, you need not worry. I know this guy and his ambitions will come back into focus sooner than you think, definitely by November.
NOTE: I use the “Captain” title to remind folks of the Titanic, you know that unsinkable ocean liner that sank on its first voyage. Of course, America could never be like the Titanic.
