Congress passed yet another extension of the payroll tax cut and unemployment benefits. The Republicans did it to take the political issue off the table for the election. Tim Bishop and the Democrats passed it because they think it is good governing.

Payroll taxes are for a very specific purpose, to fund Social Security and Medicare, the two entitlement programs that are growing at a dangerous rate. So, hey, what better idea than to take money away from them. Let’s look at it very simply.

Suppose there was no Social Security and instead everyone had individual retirement plans and were contributing the same amount to those plans that they currently pay into Social Security. In tough times, maybe you scale back those contributions, but you fully realize that there will be an impact down the road. Either you will have less money when you retire, or you will have to contribute more when you are back on your feet to catch up. That is living in a responsible world. But Tim Bishop doesn’t live in a responsible world. He lives in an entitlement world which means he hands out goodies to buy votes and when later comes, he won’t be around to answer for it. He will be too busy admiring some post office that got named after him for his dedicated service.

The payroll tax is basically robbing from Social Security. There is no choice involved. If you had your own plan you would have the liberty to decide if you wanted to cut back on contributions to your retirement or not. Some would, some might not. There is nothing being discussed in Congress to increase the payroll tax once the Obama administration stops killing the recovery. Again, if there were private plans, you could decide to pay more into the plans when you are working again. There is nothing being discussed in Congress to decrease future benefits to make up for the shortfall in contributions. Once more, if you had a private plan those would be options you would be at liberty to choose among. Instead we have this from The New York Times:

Democrats could count far more policy victories in the bill: the payroll tax break will not be paid for, large changes that Republicans sought to the unemployment insurance program were not realized, and the program was extended far beyond what the opposing party sought.

Did you get that folks? It is a victory for Democrats that we don’t pay for this so that the Social Security problem that President Obama so scrupulously avoided in his latest budget fantasy just gets kicked down the road. What we really need to do is kick Tim Bishop and the rest of his Democrat colleagues in the House and the do-nothing Democrats in the Senate under Harry Reid out of Congress. Let’s replace them with grown-ups who will make the tough choices to get us back on the same track for the good of the country rather than their personal self-interest.

That’s my opinion; I’d like to know yours. Please comment below.

Democrat Tim Bishop recently sent an e-mail to his constituents blaming Republicans, although they only hold the House while Democrats hold the Senate and the White House, for being against bipartisanship. So what does Tim Bishop do when the opportunity for bipartisanship presents itself? He cements his far left credentials by voting against it.

Three free trade agreements, with Colombia, South Korea, and Panama, passed the House by wide margins (262-167, 278-151, 300-129, respectively). They passed the Senate by similarly large margins (66-33, 83-15, 77-22, respectively). President Obama supports the passage of all three. So, Tim Bishop, Nancy Pelosi, and Harry Reid hung tough in their fight against a strong bipartisan measure.

Proponents of the trade deals, including Mr. Obama, Republican leaders and centrist Democrats, predict that they will reduce prices for American consumers and increase foreign sales of American goods and services, providing a much-needed jolt to the sluggish economy.  — New York Times, October 12, 2011.

The House also passed a measure that would provide expanded benefits for workers who lose their jobs to foreign competition.

Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton hailed the deals Wednesday as an important victory for American foreign policy. And she said she expected that the South Korea pact alone would create 70,000 American jobs. “By opening new markets to American exports and attracting new investments to American communities, our economic statecraft is creating jobs and spurring growth here at home,” Ms. Clinton said at a Washington event.

Perhaps instead of having to fight Washington so that Long Island vintners can get their wine bottles and labels approved, Tim Bishop should encourage the US Trade Representative to promote those wines to Columbia, South Korea and Panama. How about Tim Bishop doing something useful rather than spending money we don’t have, loading debt upon his constituents to pay for government spending elsewhere in America, trying to prop up a bankrupt postal service, and asking constituents how we can make Washington bigger and more costly and get more deeply involved in our lives. Please, Tim, don’t help us any more.

That’s my opinion; I’d like to know yours. Please comment below.

Chuck Schumer by DonkeyHoley

Today in New York City, the bastion of blue, in the bluest of states there is an upset in the making. Republican Bob Turner is leading Democrat David Weprin for the Congressional seat vacated by the disgraced Anthony Weiner, a protegé of Senator Chuck Schumer.

The margin is a remarkable 6% (47%-41%) the day before the election. I walked two election districts yesterday, and not a Weprin sign was visible and the support for Turner was strong. Registration in the district is 3:1 Democrat. The national party is pouring money into the race on the Democrat side, $500,000 – $800,000 recently, and robocalls featuring Bill Clinton have begun. Unions are also being summoned to get out in force.

Why is this so important to the Democrats? Part of it is history. This seat was held by Chuck Schumer before he ran for the senate. His hand-picked protegé, Anthony Weiner, replaced Schumer in Congress. These were two of the most strident, aggressive progressives in Congress (Schumer still is)  and two politicians who never worked in the private sector, but have all the knowledge and experience to tell everyone else how to run their lives and what is good for them.

The Democrats also puffed out their chests when Kathy Hochul won a special election in upstate New York in a traditionally Republican district, where another Democrat ran on the Tea Party line. Hochul attacked her opponent’s support for Paul Ryan’s budget plan that would actually save Social Security, in the typical “scare the seniors” tactic. The Democrats felt they had the signature issue they needed to carry them all the way to 2012. When Weprin tried to carry that ball forward, he ran into a buzz saw named Ed Koch.

“This is former Mayor Ed Koch. I’m calling set the record straight on something. David Weprin is making phone calls trying to scare seniors. They’re NONSENSE. Weprin should be ASHAMED of himself. Bob Turner is running for Congress to PROTECT your Medicare and Social Security. It’s why I ENDORSED BOB TURNER for Congress. If anyone tries to scare you with LIES about BOB TURNER, tell ‘em ED KOCH told them to KNOCK IT OFF. BOB TURNER is the BEST candidate for senior citizens in this race. Don’t believe anything else. Send Washington a message:  Vote for Bob Turner for congress on September 13th. Bob Turner is supported by Rudy Giuliani, the Liberal Party and me.”

If the Social Security scare tactics don’t work in a district with a 3:1 Democrat edge, Team Obama is in serious trouble. In a recent New York Times article, other Democrat candidates are starting to distance themselves from Obama so they don’t go down with the ship. This will get very interesting.

That’s my opinion; I’d like to know yours; Please comment below.

Phot by Amanda M Hatfield

Congressional members high tailed it out of Washington after passing a debt limit agreement, but Democrats Steve Israel and Tim Bishop wasted no time in holding a press conference at MacArthur airport on Long Island to blame Republicans for a crisis they created.

“They’re now injecting ideology into our runways,” Rep. Steve Israel, D-Dix Hills, said of Republicans in the House. “They’ve allowed Congress to return home without reauthorizing critical FAA airport safety.”

Wow, that sounds pretty serious. Those Republicans are at it again working hard to make America unsafe.

“Ask yourself if there’s a single company in this country that would solve a $16 million problem at the expense to their corporation of $1.2 billion,” said Bishop, a member of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee. “No, the answer is absolutely not.”

Tim Bishop, a man who has spent his entire career in academia and government is now an expert on what private businesses would do in a given situation. But as we have all learned by now, that when Democrats lips are moving and they are calling people terrorists (which you know are never real terrorists), hostage takers, racists, etc., etc. that they are probably covering up the real issue.

The Two Real  Issues

As you have probably guessed by now the issues are not safety and they are not about foolish fiscal management. The issues are a Democrat union power grab and wasteful spending. First, the union issue.

The House passed an FAA funding bill that the Democrats in the Senate, led by Jay Rockefeller of West Virginia, stopped cold, and then, of course, blamed the Republicans. The labor issue was described by the New York Times as follows:

The House also passed a long-term F.A.A. bill that included a measure to repeal a rule of the National Mediation Board, which oversees union and labor issues in the airline and railroad industries. The new rule, which passed after President Obama appointed two of the board’s three members, reversed a 76-year-old rule and made it easier for unions to win a representation election. Under the old rule, workers who did not vote were counted as “no” votes; under the new rule, only those casting ballots were counted.

So we have a labor rule that had been in place since 1935, on how union representation elections would be conducted. President Obama appoints two far left members to the National Mediation Board and they reverse the rule. Unions represent only about 7% of workers in the private sector but they are bedrock supporters for the Democratic Party. While Obama tries to refashion America in his own image, the Democrats blocked this bill for that reason and somehow it is the Republicans who are the villains.  The Republicans keep doing what they were elected to do, they keep passing legislation in the House; the Democrats do not seem to pass anything and they block whatever legislation the Republicans pass. Who do you think is the problem?

Wasteful Spending

The other issue concerns funding for a program called Essential Air Service (EAS). EAS, by law, was supposed to expire twenty three years ago, but Congress keeps it alive. It was created after Jimmy Carter deregulated the airlines in 1978 as a way to ease the impact on rural airports by subsidizing them over the ten years after deregulation. The budget for EAS has grown from $50 to $200 million. This program should be eliminated. Those heartless Republicans wanted to cut $16.5 million from the program. The Republicans said that in the overall scheme of things it’s not a lot of money, but we have to start somewhere. Tim “I haven’t found a program I can cut” Bishop naturally jumped in to call the move foolhardy. Well, just what is the EAS?

Essential Air Service

This program subsidizes air service to 140 airports around the country. Here are some examples:

• An airport in Lewiston, Montana. In 2007 it reported that it averages 0.6 passengers per flight. In other words, for every ten flights, six of them had ONE passenger and four of them took off EMPTY! You, my fellow Americans are paying for this.
• Three airports in Kansas in Dodge City, Garden City, and Liberal (no pun) are all within 75 miles of each other and yet we subsidize all three
• Chuck Schumer’s favorites in Messina, Plattsburgh, Ogdenburg, and Saranac Lake are about as close to the large airports in Montreal and Ottawa as Stamford, Connecticut is to JFK airport in New York.

Sen. Charles E. Schumer, D-N.Y., issued a typical defense of EAS, which supports service to six airports in New York. “There is no question about it,” he said. “Access to air travel is good for businesses, good for jobs, and good for the financial health of the community.”

The politburo has spoken. The central committee of the Democrat party has decided which airports are important and which ones are not, the free market be damned.

Okay but what about places were there are no alternatives such as the 45 subsidized airports in Alaska? In Alaska there are no Interstate highways. The Alaska Railroad only runs from May to September, and air travel is the only transportation available to some remote areas. Surely these places deserve the subsidy. Do they?

In Alaska there is something called the Alaska Permanent Fund, which was created at about the time the North Slope opened up to oil exploration. It collects about 25% of the oil royalties and invests it for Alaska and Alaskans. As of 2008 there was about $28 billion in that fund. There is also the Permanent Fund Dividend which is an annual payment from that fund to Alaskans and in 2010 it paid out $1,281 to every Alaskan who was eligible. If 45 airports, that benefit Alaskans, are in need of a subsidy, why not use this fund to subsidize it instead of using the taxes of someone in New Jersey? The same should go for other states. It’s called the Tenth Amendment. If we eliminate this program, as Congress said it should be eliminated after 1988, we could save $200 million. If we can’t agree to save $200 million, how are we going to save $2 trillion?

Circling back to Mr. Bishop’s remarks, “Ask yourself if there’s a single company in this country that would solve a $16 million problem at the expense to their corporation of $1.2 billion,” it is chutzpah at its highest. The FAA is losing $1.2 billion in tax revenue during this shutdown because Tim Bishop, Steve Israel, Chuck Schumer can’t stand the idea that their union power grab or their automatic pork would be curtailed. As a result jobs are on hold, construction projects stopped, because they won’t even allow a $16.5 million cut, let alone my suggestion to eliminate the whole $200 million. To hold a press conference to blame anyone but themselves is absolutely shameless, but then where is the news in that?

That’s my opinion; I’d like to know yours. Please comment below.

Photo by BlueRobot

A contentious battle has concluded today with the passage of the debt limit deal. It was a hard fought battle where no one is entirely happy with the outcome. Before we leave this field of battle, we should take stock of the accomplishments and the players involved.

President Obama

President Obama is damaged goods. His poll numbers have been falling due to the economy and he was disengaged in the debt limit debate until the very end. He has angered the left, the right, and the center. According to Scott Rasmussen, the only reason his approval rating is not lower is that he still has strong, albeit reluctant, support from Democrats. The economy is not likely to improve with him at the helm and the silver lining of the flaws in the debt deal, is it won’t help him on the economy although he managed to push another round of this past the election.

Vice President Joe Biden

Gaffe machine Joe Biden went beyond the gaffe by saying the Tea Party was a band of terrorists. Terrorists? Biden and the main stream media get all clutched up when it comes to calling real terrorists, terrorists, but easily call patriots and a large percentage of Americans, terrorists. It is a badge of dishonor he will carry for a long time.

Senator Harry Reid

Senator Harry Reid has proved, that while an adept parliamentarian in using procedures to try to play Goliath against “David” John Boehner, he just can’t get it done. He couldn’t or chose not to pass a budget for over 800 days. President Obama’s own budget went down to ignominious defeat 97-0 in his chamber. He didn’t bring Cut, Cap, and Balance up for a vote in the Senate because to do so would be lose-lose. If he brought it up he would have to defeat it. If he defeated it, many of the  twenty-three Democrat senators up for election in 2012, would  be on record for more spending and against sound fiscal policy and against two-thirds of Americans who support it. When he and President Obama hit that ball back over the net by saying Boehner walked out of the talks, that Obama has been left at the alter, etc., Boehner couldn’t just ignore it, from a political perspective, he had to respond. And so he prepared another round to put the ball back in the Democrats court. Reid tried to gut that proposal to stuff it with his own and send it back to the House but Boehner outflanked him by copying Reid’s bill and put it up for a vote, the result being it went down in flames. Reid could not even get his own version passed in the Senate. In the end the negotiations proceeded with Obama, McConnell, and Boehner; Reid was sidelined.

Nancy Pelosi

Nancy Pelosi was Obama’s right hand legislator slamming through ObamaCare, stimulus, TARP, etc. She has been essentially muzzled. When the final deal was negotiated she agreed with one of her members that this was a “Satan sandwich with a side of Satan fries.” Satan? Write that one down folks, it will come in handy along with , “We have to pass the bill to find out what is in it.” She voted for the deal, but told her members to “vote your conscience.” Sounds like “every man for himself.”

John Boehner

Sell out. Traitor. He got rolled. He is done. Not strong praise for playing the role of David, controlling one-third of the legislative power against two-thirds. But he must be doing something right when the New York Times editorial board screams

There is little to like about the tentative agreement between Congressional leaders and the White House except that it happened at all. The deal would avert a catastrophic government default, immediately and probably through the end of 2012. The rest of it is a nearly complete capitulation to the hostage-taking demands of Republican extremists.

Terrorists, hostage taking, brinkmanship. One need only look back to where this started: just raise the debt limit without condition just like every other debt limit increase. The taxes that Obama and the left wanted, were declared a non-starter; cuts equal to or greater than the amount of the debt limit increase were held firm; a vote on a balanced budget amendment in both houses and although it is not likely to pass, every member of Congress will have to go on record where they stand on it. Would this have even seen the light of day in Reid’s Senate without this deal?

There is a lot not to like in the deal, but it is a lot better than where it started. Most important is that it has brought the debt and the consequences of dealing with it into laser focus. It is up to the Tea Party to keep it there over the next fourteen months with a simple question, “If you want the spending to continue, elect Democrats; if you want to get our fiscal house in order, elect Republicans.”

 Mitch McConnell

McConnell also gets scorched for selling out, making deals to undermine real reform, etc. McConnell is the equal if not the superior parliamentarian to Reid. Many of us do not understand how the “sausage” is made in Congress and do not like it when we see it, but McConnell does. Remember when there were only forty Republican senators in the Senate it was McConnell who held them all together, even the RINOs, until Scott Brown was elected to be able to block legislation. It was McConnell who checked Harry Reid’s maneuver to sneak through his version of a deal with a simple majority. It prompted the news conference with Reid, Dick Durbin, and Chuck Schumer to chant, filibuster, filibuster! But McConnell and his deft maneuvering has been holding down the fort until reinforcements arrive.

The Tea Party

The Tea Party was not in complete agreement on this deal but everyone should take something positive out of this. This debate would not have happened at all without them. This would have passed quietly with no strings attached without the efforts of the Tea Party. Some members took a hard line that there should be no increase in the debt limit at all. Others argued caution that the political reality of only controlling one-third of the legislative process meant fighting for the best deal possible, without seeking a “bridge too far,” and triggering Treasury not sending out some checks. If that happened, which checks those would be is anyone’s guess. If the most political damage could be done and tagged to the Tea Party through that process, the left could turn a big defeat into a big victory. With seventy percent of the public disgusted with the process in Congress, if the blame could be hung on those “stubborn, inflexible, terrorist” Tea Party members, instead of having momentum to pick up more seats in November 2012, it could be turned around to “get those crazies out of there,” which would mean electing more RINOs and more Democrats and the disaster that would follow. The spirited debate in  the Tea Party was a good thing, one side kept pulling for a better deal, the other provided enough resistance to keep it from going over the edge. The goal is to get as close to the edge as possible without going over.

Where We Go From Here

Some are saying the deal will allow tax increases when the joint committee convenes. Is it possible? Yes. Is it likely? No. Boehner and McConnell, if they are smart, will appoint hardliners to the committee. My suggestions: Paul Ryan, Allen West, Connie Mack from the House and Rand Paul, Mike Lee, and Jim DeMint from the Senate. I believe there is zero chance that they would vote for a tax increase, regardless of what the Democrats want. Even if such a calamity would come to pass, it would still have to get through the House and I don’t see that happening.

Where do we go from here? We need to get more like minded people elected to Congress and the White House. This deal was by no means a great deal, but it was far better than no deal. We often lament that many people in America are just not focused on what is going on in Washington and what it means to us. This debt debate was front and center on the national news for weeks. This is something we need to leverage and expand on. We have come a long was since the fall of 2008 in getting people involved, getting them interested, and getting them educated. This event is an opportunity to get more people enraged and engaged. We must seize the opportunity, formulate the message, and drive it home as we close in on November 2012.

Consider if we had a great budget deal, everything we wanted. The stock market would rebound, the economy would start to recover with some uncertainty lifted, and if the employment picture improved, who do you think would take credit for it? It would be Obama crowing all day, every day, how it was a tough struggle, but he alone saved the day. Everything bad was Bush’s fault, but everything good was his doing. Therefore American must obviously give him four more years. A imperfect deal is a gift. Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth; ride it to the finish line.

That’s my opinion; I’d like to know yours. Please comment below.

Two-faced can be such an overused term, but on the other hand two doesn’t seem to be enough to capture Harry Reid.

“Their unwillingness to compromise is pushing us to the brink of a default on the full faith and credit of the United States,” Mr. Reid said of Mr. Boehner and Senator Mitch McConnell, the Senate Republican leader who also attended the session. “We have run out of time for politics. Now is the time for cooperation.

That’s how Harry Reid characterizes the Republican position in an article in today’s New York Times. They are stubborn, they won’t compromise, they have left poor President Obama standing at the alter, etc., etc. But just a little further on in the same article we have these gems.

Democrats, who have dug in against anything they see as a short-term extension that would require multiple votes on the debt increase before the end of next year, said they accepted the two-stage plan but wanted the full increase in the debt limit now.

“I will not support any short-term agreement, and neither will President Obama nor Leader Pelosi,” Mr. Reid said in a written statement earlier on Saturday. “We seek an extension of the debt ceiling through at least the end of 2012. We will not send a message of uncertainty to the world.”

“Dug in,” “not support,” sounds somewhat stubborn to me. So Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi and Barack Obama “will not send a message of uncertainty to the world.” Really? How certain is not passing a budget for the past two years? How certain is not having any plan of your own other than to shoot down every proposal the Republicans put forth? How certain is not letting Cut, Cap, and Balance, which passed the House and according to a CNN poll is supported by two-thirds of Americans, even come up for a floor vote?

So how is the Republican demand that this is a spending problem best solved by cutting back on the $5 trillion that Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid added to the debt since they took control of Congress in 2006, being stubborn, but Harry, Nancy and Obama’s insistent on taxing Americans more and more so that this trio can spend and spend, not unreasonable? The other demand that the debt be raised high enough not to be discussed again before 2013 is pure politics. Reid, Pelosi, and Obama want to bury this until after the next elections.

The Republicans are drawing a line in the sand, because they told the voters that they would get our fiscal house in order. The voters agreed and put Nancy Pelosi out of the Speaker’s chair and cut back on Reid’s power. They are standing up and honoring their campaign promise and in many cases saying they don’t care about the election of 2012. They came to Washington not to get reelected as their number one priority but to fix the problem. How refreshing is that?

But the Republicans have a tough fight as they are outgunned 3:1. The Republicans only hold the House of Representatives, while the recklessly spending Democrats hold the Senate, the White House, and the Main Stream Media who pump out whatever propaganda is fed to them by the White House. Hint: that’s why after months of no press conferences, Obama is holding daily press briefings.

The Republicans showed the courage to tackle the tough issues, put forth a budget, pass Cut, Cap and Balance in the House and are fighting to stop the runaway spending. All the Democrats have to say is No. We want to spend more. What do you say?

That’s my opinion; I’d like to know yours. Please comment below.

Congressman Eliot Engel writes a letter to the editor of the New York Times titled, “Banning Gun Imports.” He was prompted to write because of an editorial in the Times titled “Hypocrisy, Locked and Loaded,” but I’ll address that one later. Here is how Congressman Engel sees it. There is a tremendous illegal drug business in Mexico. It has gotten so big and contentious and violent that thousands are killed every year. His solution to the problem in Mexico? Ban the importation of guns into the U.S.

The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives created a program that would allow the illegal purchases of guns in the U.S. and let the guns walk across the border to Mexico with the idea that it would lead them to the cartel bigwigs. Instead the program backfired, they lost track of the guns, and the guns turned up at the scene of a shootout with U.S. Border Patrol agents where an agent, Brian Terry, was killed. When Congressman Darrell Issa’s government oversight committee started investigating what happened, Democrats circled the wagons to deflect criticism of the Obama administration and instead brought out that old bromide gun control. Chairman Issa would have none of it, provoking the ire of the New York Times editorial board and thus their editorial.

Why not focus on the root causes? The root cause is not guns. The root cause is drugs. Why doesn’t New York’s mayor Michael Bloomberg, instead of launching crusades against trans fats and table salt, launch a crusade against the glamorization of recreational drugs? Perhaps if he could get his Hollywood pals to stop taking drugs and stop glamorizing drugs then maybe there wouldn’t be cartels in Mexico killing each other to supply the drugs, or would that be too uncool?

These drug cartels are swimming in money. They are as well equipped as some armies. Do we really think that instead of buying fully automatic AK-47s at one of the world’s arms bazaars, they instead are buying “cheap AK-47 ‘knockoffs’”, to quote Congressman Engel, at retail in the U.S.? No doubt there are guns flowing into Mexico, where gun ownership is tightly controlled. When there are reports of guns being smuggled across the border in containers of powdered milk, do you think that is destined to a drug cartel, or perhaps a frightened citizen who is trying to protect himself and his family from the cartels?

The left doesn’t want to totally alienate gun owners in America because they could never win another election if all gun owners voted against them. So what you will typically hear is, “I support the right of Americans to own guns, but…” You will hear that from Carolyn McCarthy, who along with Bloomberg is perhaps the most anti-gun politician in American and you will hear it from Congressman Engel:

While I support the right of American citizens to own firearms for legal purposes, there is nothing sporting about AK-47s, which are military-style weapons.

Excuse me, Congressman, but my copy of the Constitution doesn’t include the word “sporting” in the Second Amendment. It is not about sports, it is not about hunting, it is not about target shooting. What it really is about is the people being protected against the tyranny of government. So instead of focusing on guns, perhaps you and your Democrat colleagues all the way up to the White House, should start a campaign with your pals to make drugs “uncool”. While you waiting for the guffaws from your friends to die down, perhaps you should work on sealing the Mexican border. Third, perhaps you should convince the Mexican government to relax their gun control laws so that their citizens won’t be coming here to buy guns to protect themselves, since their government won’t or can’t because they are too corrupt. Focus on solving the problem, not on getting an applause line from your base.

That’s my opinion; I’d like to know yours. Please comment below.

In article in the New York Times titled, “Squandering Medicare’s Money,” the article itemizes a number of procedures that are routinely perfomed under Medicare, but have little or no medical value. So why are they done? One reason is alluded to in the article while another is not.

The 800 pound gorilla that drives medical costs continually skyward are the personal injury lawyers. Doctors practice defensive medicine because of these lawyers since they don’t want to be sitting in a witness chair answering the question, “Well why didn’t you perform test or procedure X?” Since it wasn’t performed, no one can say what the outcome would have been. In the doctor’s learned opinion he may say that it wasn’t relevant. The lawyer will argue otherwise, but if the doctor can produce negative test results, well, there’s your proof it wasn’t relevant. So the tests get done and billed and medical costs climb.

In Texas, they are reforming the system there. The have put caps on personal injury awards, and are passing legislation that would have someone who brings a frivolous lawsuit pay the legal fees of the winner. Applications for new doctor’s licenses have risen 60% and malpractice insurance premiums have fallen 27%.

The odd thing in the article is it criticizes a number of tests that would be considered preventative. ObamaCare supporters have been pounding the drum for more preventative measures. But sometimes preventative measures are not the best idea. Having a colonoscopy when you are 85 years old, is probably going to be of little value and may actually increase the risk of infection or a perforation of the colon. But when the patient is not involved in the payment process, who cares?

Which brings up the point I make in my book, Liberty’s Lifeline, the need to eliminate third party payers. If you go to a restaurant that has an all you can eat buffet, and you know that someone else is picking up the check, do you not reach for that extra dessert? If you had to lay out the money, or at least part of it, you might question why the procedure was necessary or effective. Gee, that sounds a lot like the Ryan plan. Putting patients in charge of their health and their families, not a nameless, faceless, unaccountable panel of bureaucrats. Just imagine medical care modeled on the Department of Motor Vehicles instead of the doctor’s office that you know today. The former is ObamaCare, the latter is the Paul Ryan plan. Which do you prefer?

That’s my opinion; I’d like to know yours. Please comment below.

The Democrats have a new leader of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee and the New York Times is swooning that Debbie Wasserman Schultz, the new chairwoman of said committee is speaking out.

At a rally Monday for Mayors Against Illegal Guns…[s]he called as well for improving the information available to law enforcement about people with histories of mental illness.

The Times editorial cheers the Democrats making gun control a campaign issue and rounds up the usual suspects, Virginia Tech and Tucson. But what happened at Virginia Tech and Tucson was not a lack of gun control laws. It was a glaring example of the nanny state and political correctness run amok. It is against federal law for a person who is mentally ill to purchase a gun. In both cases multiple witnesses had observed both Seung-Hui Cho and Jared Lochner as being frighteningly unhinged. But it is not politically correct to draw attention to someone like that. The nanny state says we should try to integrate them into society. In the Virginia Tech case, Linda Roy, chair of the English department was raising red flags but the administration tut-tutted her concerns, saying you can’t force a student to get counseling. In Tucson, it was a similar situation but no one wanted bring Jared Lochner before a magistrate to have him declared mentally ill, which if it was done and entered into the system, he would have been denied the ability to buy the gun he used, legally.

Gun laws should be about what a person does, not what they own. You cannot keep anything out of the hands of anyone determined to get it, whether it is a gun, a knife, a club, or fertilizer and diesel fuel. When you pass such laws, who follows them? Right, law abiding citizens. By focusing more and more on stopping things rather than stopping acts, people who are responsible and law abiding cannot get the things they need to defend themselves (because they are law abiding) while criminals are not. So the guy breaking into your house downstairs and going into your daughter’s room has a gun, you have a baseball bat. Good luck, buddy. When you hear your child cry out because four nasty, smelly miscreants are in your house, take your time, rummage through your closet make sure you can find your gun, your holster, your magazine holder and a couple of spare magazines, because your elected officials insist you cannot lawfully load more than ten bullets in your gun, so if you don’t carry enough equipment to be able to re-load if you get in a gunfight, you and your family will probably die. Thank you, Congresswomant McCarthy.

Congresswoman Carolyn McCarthy’s husband was killed and her son injured by a gunman named Colin Ferguson on the Long Island Railroad. The fallacy that Congresswoman fails to see is that a determined gunman like Ferguson, Cho, or Lochner take time to prepare for their rampage. In each situation these gunmen faced a sea of defenseless people, and while they may have carried a high capacity magazine, they didn’t need to. A trained person can perform an emergency re-load of a ten round magazine in about two seconds. Facing defenseless people, these gunmen were not under time pressure. So what exactly does McCarthy’s ban on magazines that hold more than ten bullets accomplish? Nothing. Just a smug sense of accomplishing something among the statists, until the next tragedy of defenseless people being slaughtered because their elected officials rendered them so.

If only New York’s gun laws (you know, the ones law abiding citizens pay attention to) had allowed citizens to carry weapons to defend themselves, Congresswoman McCarthy’s husband might be alive today. Instead she wants to pass laws that will be ignored by the lawless to make sure that you and your family meet the same fate as hers. No thanks.

That’s my opinion; I’d like to know yours. Please comment below.

The order in the Middle East has been crumbling, but it seems that the only place President Barack Obama knows where to lead is on the dance floor or when ramming through his socialist programs. When it comes to real solutions to fix the economy or on foreign policy he is utterly lost.

When students rose up against the mullahs in Iran, the Obama administration was strangely silent while demonstrators were murdered in the streets.  But Israel is condemned at the drop of a hat. When the Mubarak regime started to wobble so did the president’s position, for Mubarak, against Mubarak, for Mubarak, against Mubarak. In capitals across the Middle East and around the world our enemies rubbed their hands in glee, while our friends started looking for new friends.

When Khadafy rattled his saber at Ronald Reagan and bombed a discothèque in Berlin that killed two American servicemen, Reagan responded with a raid on Libya that landed 277 hits with 5 misses. Khadafy went back in his cage. When violence broke out from this terrorist slaughtering his own people, President Obama remained silent for days due to a “scheduling conflict.” The scheduling conflict concerned getting Americans out of the country. Between Reagan’s action and Bush’s taking out of Hussein in Iraq followed by Khadafy’s throwing in the towel on his nuclear program, it seems clear that Khadafy does not want a military conflict with the U.S. So a clear message to him that the fastest way to get into a military conflict with the U.S. would be to impede the evacuation of any U.S. citizens will give him pause. To back that up the Sixth Fleet should have been put on station in the Gulf of Sidra and Obama could then be a leader and speak out forcefully against this terrorist.

Instead our leader made it clear he was ready to follow the United Nations. So look out, Khadafy, we’re going to let you have it in Switzerland and kick you off the Human Rights panel. Take that! You can almost see Khadafy’s wrist getting red and starting to swell. I’ll bet that any American left in Libya is bursting with pride over that step. Now we are going to start applying sanctions. Am I the only one who thinks Libya will deteriorate to chaos, if it is not already there, before any sanctions can have an effect? How many people think, Khadafy is going to pull up short because we have frozen his assets like his mansion in New Jersey? With all due respect to the Garden State, I don’t think that is top of mind for Khadafy.

Budget Matters

On budget matters we are now kicking around $4 billion in cuts to prevent a government shutdown for two weeks. How about Harry Reid getting back to Washington and putting the Senate in session to consider the bill already passed by the House that cut $61 billion from the budget? We are running a $1.6 trillion single year deficit. A cut of $61 billion may change that number to $1.5 trillion after rounding. Let’s get serious! Where is the leadership from the White House. His budget was a joke, boasting of saving $1.1 trillion over TEN YEARS. We will be that much deeper in the hole by NEXT YEAR.

Meanwhile my congressman is out fighting the spending cuts that were included in the House bill that passed that chamber. Doesn’t anyone understand the urgency of the problem? We are hemorrhaging red ink and it is time to stop blaming Bush and start looking at the people who are doing the spending.

All the Democrats want to talk about is that the Republicans want to shut down the government, the Republicans want to shut down the government, while they pick up their fiddles and play a tune. If President Obama was a leader, the leader of the Democratic party, he would be on the phone to Harry Reid and tell him to get back to work. Put together the best deal you can, but this is a crisis. But President Obama doesn’t see any crisis. He is more focused on preventing  a solution in Wisconsin than in doing his duty.

The Ultimate Organizer

The president is organized, if nothing else. In this realm he shows his strength. He manages to play a round of golf about every other week. He has top union leaders to the White House about every other week and his White House is on the phone with them several times per week. He has hosted swell parties at the White House and today the New York Times introduces us to his personal trainer. But to show his community spirits, he shares his personal trainer with other White House staffers.

Instead of a President Obama with nice six pack abs, I would much prefer the leadership and waistline of Chris Christie.

That’s my opinion. I’d like to know yours. Please comment below.