Mark Fiore has really outdone himself this time with what has to be the best cartoon satire of the week. Click on the image and see the full animation on Mark’s site… It’s worth the laugh…
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This has to be among the best call center comeback phone calls ever…
Too funny for words… We thought it was worth sharing with you considering all the insanity that surrounds us lately.
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If this don’t beat all. Here is an editorial in the Opinionator section of the New York Times from Eric Etheridge who maintains fundamentally that the present Congress leans too far to the Right and is TOO conservative!! Should anyone be surprised considering the source?
The Blue Dogs have been hogging the health care spotlight for the last week. Now they’re having to share with it with the Senate Finance Committee chairman, Max Baucus, and the rest of his small troupe.
The Gang of Six — Baucus and five committee colleagues — got their picture in The Times today, a snappily annotated photograph of a recent meeting. The six senators gather twice daily, according to the accompanying article, in hopes of hammering out a “bipartisan deal” on health care reform.
Though their efforts are ongoing, significant details of of their emerging agreement are now circulating. So far, says Brien Beutler at TPMDC, the gang’s plan seems to be one that the U. S. Chamber of Commerce can support. In a recent letter, the Chamber reminded the negotiators that it opposes any “new government-run insurance plan” as well an “any mandate” on employers to provide insurance to workers or pay a tax. “That’s basically the plan Max Baucus’ Senate Finance Committee is set to propose,” writes Beutler.
The synchronicity between the Chamber and Gang plans should not be surprising, says Ezra Klein at The Washington Post. All you have to do is look at the Gang’s group portrait in The Times.
Look at this picture. Study it. This is who is in the room helping Baucus put together his bill. Olympia Snowe, Mike Enzi, Chuck Grassley, Jeff Bingaman and Kent Conrad. In a Senate of 60 Democrats and 40 Republicans, the health care reform bill is being written by three centrist Democrats, one centrist Republican, and two conservative Republicans. And until last week, Orrin Hatch was in the room, too.
For Matt Yglesias, this lineup represents a structural problem that he is wont to harp on, the shortage of direct democracy in our current system… Read More — NYT
It seems clear that main stream media outlets like the New York Times are growing impatient with the Congressional leadership. The mutual agenda of driving out of America all vestiges of moderation and conservativism is not being driven fast enough by the “Browshirts” of the new left. The very people who espouse freedom of speech, and first amendment rights are the first to seek the elimination of those rights from anoyone who does not agree with their point of view. I hate to break it to this author, but all business on the hill is conducted in sub committes. The idea of bipartian subcommittee should be welcomed in a free democracy not vilified ! The entier body of the House and Senate get to cast their vote on a bill. Hopefull they all read it, but that is doubtful. (See post about “Page 425 of the House Healthcare Bill“)
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Shocking information about directives on Pages 425-430 of the House Health Care Bill.
Listen to the details regarding Pages 425-430 in the Health Care Bill focused on by Dr. Betsy McCaughey, former New York Lt. Governor and Chairman of the Committee To Reduce Infectious Deaths, in a Fred Thomson Show interview. She has actually taken to time to READ the details in the proposed House Bill of 1018 pages and was especially shocked at page 425 – 430. Page 430 mandates a “New Benefit” for patients and families which is essentially counseling on how to cut your life short. The government over time will begin to shape these “directives” and the conseling to reduce cost to the overall system. Translation, encourage the removal of life sustaining treatments. Counseling on foregoing antibiotics, nutrition and hydration to promote the termination of life. Now the government will be encouraging and counseling families, patients and doctors on how to withhold treatment to decrease the cost of treating the elderly.
Who will be paying for the health care bill ??? The elderly will pay indirectly by have access to LESS care as it rationalizes the value of life as the government regulates who should and should not get medical procedures.
HEAR THE FRED THOMPSON / Betty McCaughey Interview
PLEASE MAKE SURE YOU CHECK THIS OUT AND WRITE YOUR CONGRESSIONAL REPRESENTATIVES!!! (Unless of course you agree with this approach!) Let your friends know about this insanity unfolding in Washington and get active an write your representatives. Help STOP THE INSANITY !!!
Additional FOLLOW UP Interview with Betty McCaughey – Health Policy Expert and Patient Advocate also Founder of the Committee to Reduce Infectious Deaths in Hospitals.
DANGEROUS ASSAULT ON THE ELDERLY
Comparative Effectiveness Research — code for denying Care based on a patient’s birth date is being promoted in the plan. This is all about big brother government taking over your freedom of choice!!! The amount of power the government will have over the physician and nurse practitioner is mind boggling when you read it.
On page 425 it says in black and white that EVERYONE on Social Security, (will include all Senior Citizens and SSI people) will go to MANDATORY counseling every 5 years to learn and to choose from ways to end your suffering (and your life). Health care will be denied based on age. 500 Billion will be cut from Seniors healthcare. The only way for that to happen is to drastically cut health care, the oldest and the sickest will be cut first. Paying for your own care will not be an option!!
Now, CONTACT YOUR REPRESENTATIVE IN WASHINGTON!! Tell them to read page 425 if they don’t read anything else. Surely some of them have parents.
The elderly are going to especially hit hard by a socialist scheme to help pay for the health care plan. The modern day equivalent of putting the elderly out on an ice flow to be eaten by polar bears when they cannot contribute to the society and are increasing costs to the community.
Page 425 shows just to what degree the radical left is willing to push through in order to establish socialized health care in this country.
See other articles at: defendyourhealthcare.us
See also pages 16 and 17 of House Bill which confirms you will be forced to switch health plans to the one being pushed by the House of Representatives according to Ms. McCaughey.
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Shocking information about directives on Page 425 of the House Health Care Bill.
Listen to the details regarding Page 425 in the Health Care Bill focused on by Dr. Betsy McCaughey, former New York Lt. Governor and Chairman of the Committee To Reduce Infectious Deaths, in a Fred Thomson Show interview. READ MORE…
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Why should anyone be surprised at this reaction?? Just a matter of time… the mid-term elections will prove to be the flash back to this wham bam thank you mama approach of the Obama / Pelosi team. Why the hurry to slam dunk a plan that no one has figured out yet? That’s why Obama is trying to ram rod a health care bill through that no one has even had time to understand. His greatest fear is that moderate Democrats will be pushing back on his socialist agenda…
The following story is just the tip of the iceberg:
A group of Democrats elected in recent years from some of the country’s richest congressional districts have emerged as a stumbling block to raising taxes on the wealthy to pay for President Barack Obama’s ambitious health-care overhaul just as the plan has begun to meet increasing resistance over its cost.
Friday, two freshmen representatives — Dina Titus, from suburban Las Vegas, and Colorado’s Jared Polis, representing Boulder, Vail and some of the tonier suburbs of Denver — joined Republicans to vote against Mr. Obama’s top-priority health-care overhaul when it faced a vote in their House Education and Labor Committee. One reason was a one-percentage point-surtax on couples earning between $350,000 and $500,000 — gradually increasing to 5.4 percentage points on earnings more than $1 million — to pay for it.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, left, during a mock swearing in early this year for Rep. Gerald Connolly (D.,Va.), as family and friends look on. Mr. Connolly is one of the freshmen Democrats pleading against sharp tax increases.
The bill passed the committee anyway, but if the number of Democratic defectors grows it could pose a serious obstacle to the president.
Also on Friday a busload of freshmen Democrats went to the White House to plead their case against sharp tax increases with the president and his chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel. The organizer was Rep. Gerald Connolly, the president of the freshman class whose Northern Virginia district is the richest in the U.S. as measured by median household income.
“There could come a time,” said Rep. Michael McMahon, a freshman Democrat from New York City’s borough of Staten Island, when Democrats are in open rebellion. “We will certainly see in the next few weeks where we are going.”
Election gains in some of these affluent regions have helped give Democrats big majorities in the House and Senate. Of the 25 richest districts, 14 are represented by Democrats, according to Congressional Quarterly. In 1995, Democrats represented just five of those districts.
Journal CommunityRecently elected Democrats from higher-income areas also have been cautious about legislation that would make it easier for labor unions to organize, and about legislation imposing tough new rules on banks. Republicans have savaged the new Democrats for supporting legislation to stem global warming by capping greenhouse-gas emissions, then forcing polluters to purchase and trade emissions credits — a “cap and tax,” the GOP says.
But planned tax increases are likely the source of the toughest intra-Democratic tensions. The president wants to allow George W. Bush’s income-tax cuts to expire in 2011 for families earning at least $250,000 and to stop the estate tax from being repealed next year. Mr. Obama also campaigned on putting an additional payroll tax of two to four percentage points on incomes above $250,000 to help put Social Security back on solid footing. As the president confronts a surging budget deficit and presses his ambitious agenda, all those tax increases may be necessary to make ends meet.
All together, Democratic plans could push the top tax rate to 47%, the highest level since the tax code was rewritten in 1986. — John Weisman / WSJ
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This confrontational behavior of Obama towards Netanyahu can only end badly for the region and perhaps the U.S. as well. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out the prospects for a full scale confrontation between Israel and Iran if the U.S. / Israeli relations become even more strained than they are now. With Obama believing he can dictate to Israel what it should and should not do within their own country, Netanyahu will become even more focused on pushing back against the American President. Obama is best to keep his mouth shut and let his newbie Secretary of State handle the diplomacy. God help us all !!
JERUSALEM, July 19 — Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu on Sunday defended plans for a new Jewish housing development in East Jerusalem, rebuffing the Obama administration’s opposition to Israeli construction in the mostly Palestinian area.
“United Jerusalem is the capital of the Jewish people and the state of Israel. Our sovereignty over it cannot be challenged,” Netanyahu said in response to questions that U.S. officials raised last week with Israeli Ambassador Michael B. Oren about a 20-apartment project approved this month. “We cannot accept the idea that Jews will not have the right to live and purchase in all parts of Jerusalem.”
The Palestinians expect East Jerusalem to form the capital of a future Palestinian state, and the Obama administration has included the area in its demand that Israel stop building beyond the line that divided the sides before the 1967 Arab-Israeli war.
Israel captured that part of the city in the war and subsequently annexed it in a move that has not been recognized internationally.
Netanyahu’s comments are the latest blow to President Obama’s efforts to relaunch peace talks by persuading Israel, the Palestinians and surrounding Arab states to make concessions. The administration argues that a freeze on building Jewish housing in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem would be an important step toward renewing stalled peace negotiations, and Palestinian leaders have said they will not resume talks without it.
Asked about the East Jerusalem project while traveling in India, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton would not elaborate on the concerns raised with Oren by the State Department last week.
“I’m not going to comment on any specific point within the negotiations. The negotiations are intense, they are ongoing, they are extremely focused, and when we have something to announce, we will do so,” she said. More… — [Hat Tip: Washington Post]
Israel is not interested in silver slivered tongued lectures from Obama while uranium centrifuges continue to spin in Iran. Why do I suspect that we may see a resignation from Hillary Clinton say sometime around 2010 after the mid term elections? I have a feeling that these two will go head to head. Just a matter of time. One area ripe for such a conflict is his confrontational relationship with Isreal and his willingness to have talks without conditions with Iran.
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Reporting from Tehran and Beirut — Violent clashes erupted Thursday in downtown Tehran between thousands of defiant protesters chanting “Death to the dictator” and security forces wielding truncheons, as the political crisis over Iran’s disputed presidential election stretched into its fourth week.
Contingents of uniformed and plainclothes security forces flooded the city’s central squares and managed with batons and tear gas to eventually disperse the demonstrators, many of whom wore black and held up their fingers in V-for-victory salutes.
Reporting from Tehran and Beirut — Violent clashes erupted Thursday in downtown Tehran between thousands of defiant protesters chanting “Death to the dictator” and security forces wielding truncheons, as the political crisis over Iran’s disputed presidential election stretched into its fourth week.
Contingents of uniformed and plainclothes security forces flooded the city’s central squares and managed with batons and tear gas to eventually disperse the demonstrators, many of whom wore black and held up their fingers in V-for-victory salutes.
Protesters in and around Enghelab (Revolution) Square set fire to trash bins to ward off the effects of the tear gas, witnesses said, but mostly avoided engaging security forces in the rock throwing and running street battles that characterized the protests that erupted just after the June 12 election.
There were reports of clashes in other Iranian cities, but they could not be confirmed.
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