The longer we get to look at the Democrat healthcare bill, the more we learn about how they plan to subvert the Constitution and the will of the people. Hidden around page 1000 are some provisions to make it nearly impossible to repeal the bill. A vote of 66% will be required to repeal the bill. Also, the bill requires that the board that is established has to be funded every year. That could be called a poison pill inserted into the bill to prevent sanity from being restored.

The Democrats love to say that the bill will reduce the deficit. That is only true because the taxes are implemented on day one. The actual healthcare disaster does not start until January 2013. So, for the next three years, we will be paying high taxes that can be used to pay down the deficit. That will make the Democrats look great. Then, when the healthcare bill actually gets implemented the deficits will skyrocket. If the bill was judged on ten years of taxes and ten years of healthcare, the entire bill would increase the deficit.

The Democrats healthcare bill does nothing that the Democrats say that it will. It will not accomplish anything that the Democrats laid out was a goal for them to accomplish. All the healthcare bill will do is destroy the American system of healthcare and replace it with a third world system of healthcare. For that, we get to pay much higher taxes, longer waits for health care and earlier deaths. That does not sound like a great tradeoff.

The Democrats are in such a rush to get this healthcare bill passed by Christmas. It is not going to take effect for over three years, so what is the rush? The rush is because Barack Obama wants this bill as his primary piece of legislation. Since that is his goal, the Democrats will do anything to make that happen. If the bill should not pass, then Obama would lose his primary legislative goal. After he loses his primary goal, he would essentially be a lame duck for the rest of his term.

The one question the Democrats any anyone in Congress should ask about the bill should be: “Is this bill Constitutional?” Making sure that any legislation meets the constitutional question is the primary job of a Senator and Congressman. You would think that the first question that any Senator or Congressman would ask would be to insure that the bill was Constitutional. But, since almost all Democrats believe in a “living” Constitution, they never ask the question. A “living” Constitution can mean anything at any time to anyone. To boil it down to its basics, a “living” Constitution does not mean anything.

The only Constitutional question is really, what did the original writers of the Constitution mean when they wrote each phrase in the Constitution? The commerce clause has been perverted beyond all meaning through progressive interpretations by Congress. Other parts of the Constitution have been perverted as well through precedents established in the past. Anyone with a 7^th grade education can understand what the Constitution says. It does not take a Constitutional lawyer to understand what it says. It takes a Constitutional lawyer to understand all the bends and twists that have been put into the words written by the Founding Fathers. I think that a person selected to the Supreme Court should have no legal training at all. They should be able to read and understand the Constitution as written. If they can do that, they would be qualified to sit on the bench. I know that will never happen, but that would put common sense back into the Constitutionality of the Supreme Court rulings.

The healthcare bill is unconstitutional. There is no question that it is unconstitutional. The only problem is finding someone who will have standing and be willing to fight for the United States all the way to the Supreme Court. The person should be in a judicial district that would be the most likely to rule that the healthcare bill is unconstitutional. That would give us the best shot at defeating this in the courts. It would still be a long shot, but we cannot rest until we give it a try.

The Democrats in the Senate showed that they do not believe in the Constitution of the United States. This is true, regardless of how much they might give lip service to the Constitution. How can I make a statement like that? Harry Reid held a first cloture vote at 1 am this morning. The vote was 60-40 to end the filibuster. Of the 60 votes, 59 were Democrats and one was the Socialist from Vermont. It could be argued that all this vote did was allow the vote on the healthcare bill to be held. The problem with that argument is that the healthcare bill is unconstitutional. Anyone who knows anything about the constitution knows that it is unconstitutional. Even the Democrats know it is unconstitutional, that is why they will not discuss its constitutionality.

Each Senator has taken an oath to protect and defend the constitution against all enemies, both foreign and domestic. That means that any foreign threat should be defended against. This is something the Democrats are not likely to do, unless the enemy shows up with a gun. The domestic enemy is one who works to undermine the constitution. The Senators and Representatives that do not follow the Constitution are enemies of the Constitution. The Senators have to take action to prevent the Constitution being undermined. That means they cannot make laws that ignore the constitution.

Like Barack Obama said, the Constitution is a bill of negative rights. That means it tells government what it cannot do. It does not tell government what it can do. From a progressive’s viewpoint, that is the problem with the Constitution. But there is a reason the Constitution was written the way it was. The Founding Fathers did not trust government to be always benign. By writing the Constitution as negative rules, they prevent the progressives from making the government do too much. But, the Democrats do not believe the Constitution actually controls their actions. So, they can do anything they want and it is ok as long as they pass it. They are wrong. They have to account for the rights of the minority. But, to Democrats, the rights of minorities do not matter. Only what Democrats want is what they will do. What anyone else wants is obviously wrong in the eyes of the Democrats. Since it is wrong, it must be evil. Since it is evil, it must be stopped regardless of what you have to do, even lie, cheat and steal.

The supposed healthcare bill is not a healthcare bill. It is a control bill. It uses the healthcare system to grab more control over all of the citizens of the United States of America. If the Democrats can control the health care of all Americans, they can control the country. All they have to do is give breaks to their friends and punish their enemies. They will do this under the guise of compassion, but compassion it is not. When rationing of health care becomes the norm, then you will see the favoritism of the Democrats pet groups. All the groups that favor things the left does not like will be discriminated against by cutting their services. How can I make a statement like that? Just look at the stimulus funding and where it has gone. Democrat congressional districts have received over twice the funding of Republican congressional districts. This type of result will continue and accelerate when the Democrats take over the health care system.

America as originally conceived by the Founding Fathers is almost gone. We have slipped a long way from the freedom that our Founding Fathers wrote into the Constitution. The Democrats want to take the rest of our freedom away. This health care bill will go a long way to enslave the people of the United States. A country called the United States will exist past the passing of this health care bill. But, that country will not bear much resemblance to the country that was founded in 1776 or even the country that existed in 1945. It is sad that my generation gave America away to the slavers of the world. We did it without a fight. The fight is not over as the last nail on the coffin has not been driven in. But, things are looking rather black right now. The elections of 2010 might be too late to save the United States from extinction.

Harry Reid announced that the Senate will be voting on the takeover of 18% of the economy and total control of the population on Christmas Eve. The bill is called a healthcare bill, but the bill has nothing to do with healthcare. It has everything to do with control over the public. That is why the Democrats are willing to vote it in and take the political fallout of losing their majorities in the House and Senate. They know that when the bill kicks in that their eternal majorities are assured. All they have to do is demagogue the issue and people will vote to keep the lousy healthcare they have. People do this in Europe, even though there is a better option available.

The question remains as to whether the Democrats have their 60 votes necessary to pass the bill. Currently, Senator Ben Nelson of Nebraska has come out against the bill. His objection is about abortion. Ben Nelson is pro-life. The Democrats want this fake healthcare bill to pay for abortions. The two cannot co-exist. What will probably happen is that the abortion option will be dropped from the Senate bill and then put back in during the conference between the House and Senate. That way the bill gets the 60 votes it needs to get passed initially and only needs 51 votes for final passage.

Senator Joe Lieberman had opposed the bill until his wife was threatened with a loss of her job. Then, he caved in and has come out in support of the bill. He will deny that his wife’s job had anything to do with his change in position, but the timing is suspect. Though, Al Franken, the imposter from Minnesota, would not give Senator Lieberman one minute to finish his remarks. From reading the reports, that is highly unusual. The report could not recall a time that a request for additional time had not been granted. This kind of disrespect might just push Joe Lieberman back onto the correct side.

The Republicans have vowed to continue the fight for as long as they can. The Republicans do not have enough votes to stop anything if the Democrats all operate from the same page. The only reason they have any power right now is because the Democrats are in disarray.

The Radicals in the Democrat ranks want this bill passed regardless of what happens. The “true liberals” in the Democrat ranks are upset with the “important” parts of the bill being dropped to get votes. The public option and other parts like that were important to the true liberals. The radicals just want something passed so they can have a framework to institute the radical change they want. The radicals realize that all is needed is a foot in the door. The true liberals want the door done right. As long as that fight goes on, the opportunity to defeat this bill is there. If the two competing Democrat ideas ever get together, the bill will pass because of the huge advantage in votes for the Democrats. The other thing slowing the passage is that some Democrats like serving in the House and Senate. They know that if the bill passes they will not be back in 2011.

The Democrats are trying to set things up so that there are no controversial votes in 2010. They feel that no controversial votes will make life easier for those House and Senate members up for re-election. My hope is that the public has a long memory for a change. A long memory would enable us to get rid of a lot of the dead wood that has accumulated over the years. If the public has their usual short memory, we will be stuck with these losers for another two years and probably never recover from the disaster they would cause.

Joe Lieberman (I, CT) has been a stalwart against the Democrat government healthcare plan. When the Democrats found out that they could not get any Republicans to vote for the monstrosity, they decided to put pressure on poor old Joe Lieberman. He resisted pretty well, until it was suggested that his wife’s salary should be withheld until he supported the bill. Shortly after that he caved and is now suggesting that he will support the bill with some minor changes.

The problem with Joe Lieberman is that he was right on the issue up until he caved in to Democrat pressure. Joe Lieberman has a problem that way. He knows what is right and takes a stand on the issues that is right. Then, he gets pressure from Democrats and he caves. When he tells us what caused him to change his mind, it is always something rather trivial. I have a feeling that the real reason is something like the suggested withholding of his wife’s salary until he caves. I have no basis for that feeling, except that the reason given by Joe Lieberman does not make any sense. He had a sensible position and was defending it strongly. Then, for almost nothing, he changes his mind. That just does not pass the smell test.

This change by Joe Lieberman seems to give the Democrats their magic 60 votes to ram their healthcare bill down our throats. That the Democrats persist in ramming the bill down our throats when the polls show that over 60% of the public does not want the bill in any way, does not make sense on the surface. It only makes sense when you consider what the Democrats get out of the bill. They get control over everyone in the country when the bill becomes law. Then, they will regain their majorities by claiming that the Republicans will take away healthcare. The fatal flaw in this scenario is the fact that the healthcare bill does not become active for three years after being enacted by Congress. That would give us time to elect people to repeal the bill. If the bill gets repealed before the implementation starts, nobody will be impacted at all.

Since the Democrats are conducting most of their negotiations in secret, it is difficult to keep up with exactly what is in the bill. Things are going in and out of the bill on an almost hourly basis. When we finally learn what is really in the bill, it will be too late to do much about it.

That our Senators and Representatives are even debating this bill is something I do not understand. It is obvious that the bill is unconstitutional. Anyone who can read can understand that the Constitution does not include anything that gives Congress or the President the authority to take over our health care system. Our Senators, Congressmen and President all take an oath of office. In that oath, they all agree to defend the Constitution against all enemies, both foreign and domestic. You cannot defend the Constitution and ignore what it says at the same time. That is just not possible. You either believe in the Constitution or you do not believe in the Constitution. If you believe in the Constitution, you live by what it says. If you do not believe in the Constitution, you have no business being an elected representative of the people. Anyone who votes for this Democrat bill obviously does not believe in the Constitution as written. The Constitution puts handcuffs on the government by telling it what it cannot do and then reserves all other power in the people. People voting for this bill believe that there are no limits on the power of government. That is an unconstitutional position to take.

My hope is that this bill is challenged and sent to the Supreme Court to be thrown out. Even the Democrats, including Sonia Sotomayor, should be able to read the Constitution and see that this bill is unconstitutional.  I expect that the vote would be something like 6-3 to throw it out. This is a no brainer when it comes to whether it is constitutional or not.

With Lieberman’s flip-flop things are not looking good. That the bill still has not passed is a positive sign. That the Democrats are calling everyone names is also a good thing. If they were confident of victory they would not be calling everyone names. There is still hope that this bill can be defeated. With each Democrat that shows that they have no scruples, the hope diminishes. But, you hate to have anything go to the Supreme Court to determine if it is constitutional or not.

The Senate voted to disgrace themselves on Saturday evening by passing the destruction of the United States bill to discussion in the Senate. The bill should have been killed off at that point. Then, a bill that could truly solve the problems in healthcare could be constructed. This bill just trashes the good parts of American healthcare and adds lots of bad parts to replace those good parts. I cannot say one good thing about the bill in the Senate except that it was printed on paper.

The buying of votes was particularly disgraceful. Mary Landrieu (D) of Louisiana should resign in disgrace for even considering the bribe offered by Harry Reid (D-NV) and the Democrat Senate Leadership. The Democrat Senate Leadership should resign in disgrace for offering a bribe to Mary Landrieu (D) of Louisiana. Mary Landrieu (D-LA) was offered $100 million in Medicare funds to Louisiana for her vote. The actual wording on the bribe is that any state that was designated a national emergency within the past 7 years will receive funding under this provision. The only state that qualifies under that provision is: Louisiana. In other words, the bill will strip $500 million from Medicare and turn around to give $100 million to Louisiana. I do know that the $500 million comes from Medicare in general and the $100 million is for the state program with a similar name. Mary Landrieu (D-LA) estimates that the true benefit for Louisiana will be $300 million, not the $100 million estimated by the CBO. So, she is an even bigger crook than we originally thought.

Other Democrat Senators, who had been enjoying their time on the fence, were now expressing anger at people for trying to persuade them to vote a particular way. What is it with fence sitters? They sit on the fence so everyone will give them attention. Then, when everyone gives them the attention they want they cry that they did not want “that” kind of attention. I think they want everyone to believe that they did it for principles, not for the greed and graft that they were angling for in reality.

I will grant you that this vote only authorizes that the bill under discussion be discussed. The problem with that idea is that once bills get discussed in the Senate, they almost always get passed in some form or another. That is the problem. We do not need this bill in any possible form that resembles what is currently on the table. All you can hope for now is that some Democrats see the light of day. The odds on that happening are somewhere between slim and none. An Obamacare bill passing out of the Senate before the end of the year is almost certain. That means higher taxes, higher health insurance premiums, fewer choices in healthcare, poorer healthcare overall and an end to the America that existed for over 230 years. An America will still exist, but its heart will not be that of America it will be that of Europe or Moscow. An America without the heart of America is not America. At least, it is not the America that I want to pass on to my children and grandchildren.

You may argue, successfully, that other countries have been successful while having socialized medicine. I will grant that those countries appear strong, but their core is weak. If you push those countries, they will crack and fall because there is no inner strength that we have here in the US. We have that inner strength because of individualism. Socialized medicine destroys the concept of individualism in a very short period of time. Within one generation, the concept of individualism as an American ideal will be gone. Then, we are no different than any other country in the world. With the concept of individualism, we are the best country in the world. We are not perfect and have never claimed to be. We are the best and have claimed that for a very long time. To use the argument that we are not perfect, so we cannot be the best is silly. Anyone can be the best and not be perfect. If you want examples, just look at the National Football League. Only one time in its history has a team made it through an entire season with the playoffs and remained undefeated. For a country to be perfect would be impossible as it is made up of imperfect human beings. All a country can be is the best one in the world. One country has to be the best, right now it is us.

I want my grandchildren to be able to defend the “best” country in the world, not the second or third best. With socialized medicine, we will be one of the larger pack of countries in the middle, not at the top. That is why socialized medicine has to be defeated at the earliest level possible. We missed a chance on Saturday because of corruption. We will have another chance later, but corruption will be just as bad, if not worse, then.

Since the Obama administration is like the, “Gang that Couldn’t Shoot Straight”, in foreign affairs as well as domestic affairs, doesn’t this give you pause when they now come to you and ask to run healthcare? I mean it is easy to see that terrorists are terrorists and want to kill us. It is easy to know that what they want more than anything is to have a forum to spout their terrorist drivel. The Obama administration has given some of the more important terrorists we have caught, a forum in New York City. How stupid is that? Then, they have the audacity to say that they can run healthcare efficiently. That is definitely the height of chutzpah.

Right now, there is not a single Democrat in or near to power that I trust to give me the truth at any time. That comes from many years of being told something is true by a Democrat and checking to find that the Democrat was 180 degrees out of phase in his/her comments. That means they were wrong 100% of the time. I do not mean they were a little bit wrong or that you could debate whether they were wrong, I mean the facts show they were wrong 100% of the time. The Republicans haven’t been much better, but at least they are right 50% of the time or more. Some Republicans are nearly 100% and others are much less. But I cannot think of any conservative Republican that even approaches the Democrat 0% accuracy rate.

Sarah Palin is one of the Republicans whose accuracy rate up near 100% in her comments. You may disagree with what she says, but you have to admit that she tells the truth. That is the same kind of thing people said about Ronald Reagan. And, just like Reagan, she is being vilified by the press for just breathing. The interesting thing is that the more the press and the Democrats demonize Sarah, the more the public likes her and her comments. People get interested when the Democrats and the media are so violently antagonistic against an individual. That only happens when the person is perceived as a real “threat” by the Democrats and their media lapdogs. Also, she does not care what the media and the Democrats say about her. That is a strength that goes a long way to add to her popularity. Anyone who wants the media to like them is doomed to failure from the start. They may win some elections, but if there is an important election that it is critical to win, they will lose. People like Sarah win those tough elections.

Back when Sarah Palin stepped down as Governor of Alaska, many people wrote her off as finished in public life. I was telling my friends that while I did not agree with her move, she will be back. I thought it would be for 2016, but it looks like she is on board for 2012. If she throws her hat into the ring, she would be the obvious Republican front runner. Mitt Romney would be in second place with Mike Huckabee in third place. Mike Huckabee would show his tender side and allow all his bigotry to come out against Mitt Romney again. That would destroy his candidacy with an important constituent group in the Republican Party. As a result, Sarah Palin would be the beneficiary of the internecine fight between Romney and Huckabee over religion.

No matter how many times Mike Huckabee says he is not a bigot, he is one and he is one in spades. Had he not been a bigot, Mitt Romney would most likely have been the nominee in 2008 instead of John McCain. Mitt Romney might still have lost, but it would have been a lot closer and the Democrats would not have a stranglehold on the House and Senate. I am a strong conservative, but I cannot stand bigots. I would actively work against a Huckabee nomination. I would also actively work against him to be President. We do not need bigots in the office of President of the United States.

You cannot trust government to do anything right. As President Reagan so eloquently said so long ago, “In our present crisis, the government is not the solution to our problem. The government is the problem.” Any candidate who advocates smaller government in 2010 or 2012 will get my vote and my support, unless than candidate is a bigot. I do not think that Mike Huckabee could get nominated or elected on a platform of smaller government. He believes in bigger government, just a smaller big government than Barack Obama. We need a TRUE smaller government person in the job who will get us back to what is written in the Constitution of the United States. That should be our guiding light, not what feels good.

Last night, Harry Reid unveiled his new $849 Billion version of healthcare. The best part of it is the fact that the cost is below $1 trillion. The bad part of the bill is that we do not have the entire bill that will be implemented. Listening to the Mike Gallagher show today, Mike and his guest brought out that what Harry Reid unveiled is not the bill that will be implemented. He likened it to making a budget for your house. You have all the information except for where you are going to live, so you make a budget based on the information you have on hand and ignore the information you do not have. You will eventually have to put in the part you do not have, but your budget sure looks good in the mean time.

The problem with Harry Reid’s bill is that even without the missing parts, it still is a bloated bill. Like all the Democrat bills, it protects the Trial Lawyers and punishes the Doctors. That is backwards, Doctors provide healthcare. Lawyers make it difficult or impossible for doctors to practice various kinds of medicine. A certain Trial Lawyer, who was a Senator from North Carolina and ran for Vice-President with Al Gore in 2000, almost single-handedly raised the cost of having a baby. He was responsible for suing doctors for causing genetic birth defects. Genetic birth defects are caused because of genetic problems that the parents have, not something the doctor did or did not do. This Trial Lawyer would bring in “experts” who would testify that it was all the fault of the doctor. Then, the Trial Lawyer would channel the baby and tell the juries what the baby wanted them to do. As a result, he got seven figure settlements from juries and made his clients and himself rich. Doctors insurance rates went through the roof and many doctors stopped providing services to assist mothers in delivering babies. In some states there is a severe shortage of baby doctors. Still Democrats refuse to institute Tort reform to stop this travesty from happening. The reason is that the Trial Lawyers give generously to the Democrat party and help elect Democrats to keep Republicans from instituting Tort Reform.

That is just one example of the problem with healthcare in the United States. Lawyers get involved and get juries to award outrageous settlements to clients. Tort reform would correct this problem. A real problem could still be addressed and adequate compensation could be awarded. The outrageous awards should be minimized. The trial lawyer/Senator/Vice-Presidential candidate/Presidential candidate, got juries to award settlements when the problem was with the sperm and/or the egg provided by the parents, not anything done by the doctor. The cases should have been thrown out of court because of stupidity on the part of the Trial Lawyer, but nobody knew enough about genetics to stop the cases. The Trial Lawyer knew that the doctors were innocent of any wrong doing, yet he proceeded with the cases anyway. This is the kind of thing Tort Reform is supposed to stop. This is the kind of thing that the Democrats do not want to stop because this Trial Lawyer is a “respected” member of the Democrat party. He should be considered lower than the low. He is considered by Democrats to be worth listening to. I figure that as long as he is a “respected” member of the Democrat party, I know that they have no standards of conduct or shame.

I figure that the Democrats will keep churning out Healthcare plans until they get one that people line up and salute to. So far, their problem is that the number that approves of a plan goes down with each new plan proposed. Right now, people do not want socialized medicine. They are willing to stand up and be counted in the fight against socialized medicine. That is great for America that we have people willing to stand up and be counted. For a while there, I was afraid that Americans were going to lie down and let Democrats walk all over them. Now, I have hope for the future.

In an unrelated, yet related, note, the Copenhagen Treaty is being watered down because of the protests in almost every country in the world. The Communist leaders that wrote the Copenhagen Treaty have to put the brakes on their plan for a world-wide communist country. Americans are leading in this fight and it is also having an impact on the healthcare debate, which is really not about healthcare, but about government control of your life.

On Saturday, the Democrats voted 220-215 to ignore the Constitution and do what they pleased. Nancy Pelosi cackled and the Democrats put forth a rousing cheer when the vote total was announced. As Rush Limbaugh put it on his show today, many of the Democrats may have just voted themselves out of office by voting for the bill. Hugh Hewitt’s suggestion in his column today is to target the 20 most vulnerable of these Democrats and start a campaign to get good candidates and fund them.

I do agree with both Rush and Hugh Hewitt that many of these Democrats have just put themselves on notice as candidates to not be there in January 2011. I did a quick scan of the Democrats that voted for the bill and it looked to me like all the Democrats from Arizona voted for the bill. That would mean that all of them, except for maybe Ed Pastor, would be targeted. Ed Pastor comes from the most Democrat area of the state. Rep. Pastor could be caught with a smoking gun and a dead body and still be elected from his district it is so heavily Democrat. The other Democrats in the state are not so lucky. They come from districts that are more evenly split between Democrats and Republicans. That means in a situation like this, they could easily be targeted for defeat. The easiest would be Harry Mitchell of Tempe. His district is normally a Republican district. The others are 50/50.

The Associated Press reports that the House Unconstitutional Power Grab for Pelosi/Obamacare is dead on arrival in the Senate. The reports say that the “public option” is the part that will make the bill unpalatable to the Senate. I would hope that the bill is dead on arrival. That would show that someone over in the Senate might actually know what is in the Constitution. There are 219 Democrat Representatives and one Republican Representative that do not have any idea what is in the Constitution. Their job is to defend and protect the Constitution from all enemies, both foreign and domestic. How can they protect the Constitution when they have no idea what it says? Maybe people should have to take a test on the Constitution before they could actually take a seat in Congress. That way we know that they know what they are doing. Right now, they can claim ignorance and they would obviously be right.

Even though the House bill is DOA in the Senate, I do not hold any great hopes that there are any Democrat Senators who are Constitutional Scholars. All of the Democrat Senators have come out for some sort of universal healthcare system. Since a universal healthcare system would be unconstitutional, they obviously are not educated on what is included in the Constitution any more than their House brethren. They just have a higher hurdle to overcome in the 60 vote minimum to pass a healthcare bill. That means that any healthcare bill would have to be less intrusive than the House bill that was just passed.

As long as we have “Progressives” in the Congress we will have to worry about this kind of abuse. Progressives do not believe in the rule of law. They believe in the rule of man. The rule of man says that the rules can be changed to whatever you want, whenever you want. The rule of law says that you have to follow the law as set forth in the original documents. If you want to change those laws, you have to go through complicated steps to change them. The object of making it difficult to change the law is to look out for the rights of the people that are in the minority. The problem with Progressives is that they believe that they are smarter than you and so they should be able to tell you what to do. The Progressive does not have to follow those rules because they know better and can decide for themselves. But everyone that is not a Progressive has to follow restrictive laws to make things “fair”. By making things “fair”, Progressives make things unfair. But, Progressives cannot see that because they are already on to the next thing they want to mess up.

The more I learn about Nancy Pelosi’s version of Obamacare, the less I like it. The bill creates 111 new federal agencies. There is one rule about federal agencies, when you create one, it never dies. What we do not need is more federal agencies. We need fewer federal agencies. In fact, we need a smaller federal government overall. That would solve so many of the problems that we are having in this country that all except the federal employees impacted, we would all cheer the day they were eliminated.

The Wall Street Journal calls Nancy Pelosi’s version of Obamacare the worst bill ever written for Congress. That is saying some because there have been some truly dreadful bills come before Congress. To be labeled the worst, you really had to work to get that designation. It was not something that you got just for showing up.

Democrats that have consumed their gallon of Democrat Kool-Aid are saying that the Pelosi version of Obamacare is ready to be passed as written. I tried to read the bill, but the legal wording was too baffling and hard to understand. I will rely on the people that have the experience in reading this type of material to give me a summary of what is included. There are some like the Heritage Foundation and NCPA (National Center for Policy Analysis) that give excellent reviews of the monstrosity. Now, their analysis will have a conservative bias. But, I share their conservative principles so that fits exactly my take on the situation. I have not differed at all from the NCPA or Heritage Foundation on any item in the bill.

The elections that are being held today will impact this bill greatly. If the Democrats sweep the three major races (Governor in Virginia and New Jersey and the House in District 23 of New York), then this bill will get passed before we can say Jack Robinson. If the Republicans sweep the three major races, then the bill will face much tougher sledding. The reason is the “Blue Dog” Democrats. These are Democrats in the House and Senate that were elected from Republican leaning districts. They tend to be more conservative than the Democrat party generally. But, they cave if Nancy Pelosi or Harry Reid even so much as blow in their direction. A sweep by the Republicans will give these Democrats a wake-up call to say that they better be watching what they do if they want to return in 2012. A sweep by the Democrats tells them that the Republicans are too weak to challenge them during their re-election campaigns.

From scattered news reports, there appears to be some voter fraud occurring in New Jersey. Now, that would be a shock. New Jersey is so corrupt that if the Republican wins, he probably actually got 75-80% of the vote. There are already reports of people that went to vote and found they already voted. That could only occur during one of ACORN’s famous voter fraud pushes. Look for areas where over 100% of the voters in a precinct voted. There have already been 3000 absentee votes that came in without matching signatures. The Democrats are trying to have those votes counted. You can guess which way those votes are expected to go. You can also guess where those votes actually came from. Expect more of this type of thing as the day progresses.

In Virginia, the Democrat is so far behind that even ACORN could not save him. In New York, ACORN could save the Democrat, but ACORN does not have a presence in this part of the state. It is a conservative rural area. ACORN only works in the more liberal areas and tends to stick to cities. Do not expect much voter fraud in these two states, unless Mr. Deeds in Virginia starts to get close. But, that is not expected to happen.

The country waits on the outcome of these votes to see which way things will go. Will the Republicans be energized by wins or will the Democrats. Whoever gets energized by the wins will have a big say in how this healthcare legislation goes from hereon out.

In response to some comments received from a previous blog, where I disparage Nancy Pelosi’s monstrosity, I am going to say what should be done to solve the healthcare problem in less words than Nancy Pelosi used pages. I thought this would be a great challenge.

The first thing that should be done to solve the healthcare problem is get the cost of health insurance down. That is easily done by repealing all of the required items that are now part of every policy. My wife and I are 60+ years old. We have no need of maternity coverage, yet we pay just the same. Removing the required items, people could choose what they want and need covered.

Second, people should be allowed to purchase their health insurance from any authorized provider in the United States, even across state lines. This will introduce market forces on insurance. The insurance companies will compete for everyone’s business and the costs will come down.

Third, there needs to be tort reform. There are too many people that are trying to get rich by suing doctors. Putting limits on how much attorneys can receive as well as how much the aggrieved person can recover would reduce the malpractice insurance for doctors. This would enable the doctors to charge lower fees to their patients. This would also reduce costs to the public and help reduce insurance costs.

Also, as the cost of insurance and doctor visits are reduced, the quality of care will go up. That is because market forces have been re-introduced to the system. For those who doubt that this would happen, just look at what has happened with Lasik eye surgery. It used to cost three to four times what it does today and was of a much poorer quality. This all happened because it was to the doctors benefit to reduce their price and increase their quality. The same thing would happen with healthcare.

Government would have a limited role to licensing doctors and other healthcare professionals. This will insure that those that treat us are competent. The government should also be involved in licensing the people that sell health care insurance. This will insure that people are paying for a product that will deliver what it is supposed to do. Other than that, government should stay out of the health care business. I know that we have the VA system for veterans that should continue. Medicare should be targeted for elimination as it would not be needed after all the reforms kicked in. But, people have used it for years and so it will take some time for them to get off of the system.

There, I used less than 500 words to describe exactly what should happen to reduce healthcare costs in the country. If these reforms are enacted, healthcare would be affordable for everyone. It will never happen because of the reduced role for government.

I am not an expert in economics or medicine, so this is quite an experiment for me. I do know a little about medicine as my students generally end up as nurses. That means I have to know what the requirements are to be a nurse and also the prospects for employment. So, that does give me a little insight into the world of medicine. But it is no more than a peek. I do have some friends that are doctors, but we do not talk about medicine as a general rule. Translating that into English, I know little more than the average person. I hope that this plan is good. It is probably not unique. I gleaned it from the many sources I get my information from.  

The Democrats rolled out the “Elect Republicans in 2010 Bill”. They called it a different name, but that is what it is. They called it their version of the Obamacare legislation. Nancy Pelosi praised the bill saying that it would cover 96% of all working families and that it would make health insurance cheaper and more affordable for all. Steny Hoyer said that the process of developing this bill has been the most open and transparent in the 29 years he has been in Congress. Count me as an unbeliever because those comments do not ring true.

First let’s look at Madame Pelosi’s comments. She said the bill would cover 96% of all working families. I may have my figures wrong, but that percentage is essentially the same as under the current private insurance system. That does not seem to be much of an increase in any case, even if it is an increase.

Madame Pelosi’s second statement is even further from the truth. I was looking at the costs for families under this plan last night. I then compared that estimate to what I am paying for my insurance today. After deciding that my calculator was not telling me the truth, I determined that I would pay almost 50% more to get worse coverage under Obamacare. That does not sound like much of an appealing proposition.

Steny Hoyer’s comments were chilling. If he is telling the truth, that these were the most open and transparent meetings to develop this bill, we are in big trouble my friends. These meetings were held in secret for the most part. What came out of the meetings were trial balloons to see what would or would not fly. There was nothing open about the debates. Transparent is a complete joke if you think these were transparent. They were a closely guarded secret for the most part. The Republicans had almost no input into the debate, so the meetings were definitely not open. The Republicans were locked out of the final drafting of the bill.

If those meetings were the most open, then what about the other bills that come through Congress? Barack Obama promised us the most open and transparent administration in history. Of course, every President since John Adams has promised a more open administration than the ones that came before. Nobody lines up for secrecy.

Well, the first bill is actually written. The “bill” that came out of the Senate the other day was not even written on paper. It was just the idea that a bill might be written to possibly include these probable things. Notice all the weasel words in the last statement. That is the “bill” the Senate committee voted on. At least the House of Representatives came up with a bill that was written on paper for people to read. That is if they allow anyone near the actual bill. These Democrats have a problem with people reading anything. It is probably because if you read what they wrote, you would figure out what they intended to do to you. Then, you would rise up with pitchforks to storm the Congress to take back what is ours. The Democrats do not want us to know anything about what they intend to do, until they have actually accomplished their task. Then it will be too late. You will be stuck with that mess forever, just like all the other failed Democrat programs like Social Security, Medicare and the war on poverty.

The battle is joined. Madame Pelosi said she wanted to vote on this bill in six weeks. That means we have six weeks to stop the Democrats from destroying the heart of America. They already have a good start on the bone and muscle. They should not get the heart. We have to stop them by letting our Congressional delegation know the consequences of voting against America on this bill.

Edward M. Kennedy died last night. His death ended one of the more controversial Senate careers in memory. He is being lionized by the left and acknowledged as a Senate leader by the right. After his brother Robert Kennedy was killed in 1968, the mantle of the Kennedy’s fell upon him. At that time, it was thought that Ted would someday become President of the United States. That was not to be after he ran a car off of a bridge and a woman drowned. He ended up taking the Democrats where nobody ever thought the Democrats would ever go under the leadership of a Kennedy. Both John and Robert were strong supporters of the military. Ted became very anti-military.

Mary Jo Kopechne died in the car that Ted ran off the bridge. Ted managed to escape from the car. Mary Jo did not escape and died. After escaping from the car, Ted walked up and down in the area near the accident before deciding what to do. This action has always puzzled me. I would have thought that a great swimmer like all the Kennedy’s would try and help Mary Jo escape from the car as well. Ted never made any attempt to rescue Mary Jo Kopechne. After he decided what to do, he walked into the nearest town and called his attorney. Again, this is puzzling to me. I would think that calling the police or rescue teams would be high on the list of things to do. Ted called his attorney first. I don’t remember much about the rest of the experience, except that the Massachusetts town decided not to prosecute Ted for the death of Mary Jo Kopechne.

Senators that worked with Ted Kennedy say that if Ted gave you his word that he would do something, he would do it. That is always prized when working with people. That is one reason that Ted was so universally well liked in the Senate during his time there. He was even well liked by those that were politically opposed to everything he was trying to do. Ted could demonize you from the floor of the Senate one minute and be your friend in the hallway the next. The demonization was for the TV cameras and the actions in the hallway were the true Ted Kennedy.

Through the years, Ted Kennedy became more and more radical and out of touch with reality. His push for universal health care for America is one such item. Universal health care would be un-Constitutional on its face. There is nothing in the Constitution that says that health care is any responsibility of the US government. But, that made no difference to the “Lion of the Senate”. He just ignored the Constitution and proposed universal healthcare anyway. As the years went on, the Constitution lost all meaning for this supposed “Lion of the Senate”. If he was truly a “Lion of the Senate”, he should have had the interests of the Constitution high up his priority list. Unfortunately for the United States, he disregarded the Constitution for years.

An example of Ted trying to have everything his way is on his replacement. When Mitt Romney (Republican) was Governor of Massachusetts, Ted pushed through a law that required an election 5 months after the death of a Senator or Congressman. That way a Republican could not pick a replacement for a Democrat Senator. Then, when Deval Patrick (Democrat) was elected, Ted started pushing for a change in the law to allow the Governor to appoint a replacement Senator. That is playing politics, pure and simple. Unfortunately for Ted, he died before the Massachusetts State Legislature could act on his request. That means an election will be held in 5 months to elect his replacement. It also means that with 59 votes, the Democrats cannot break filibusters any more. Democrats will be frantic to replace Ted ASAP.

The amount of disinformation coming from the White House, Democrats in general and the President in particular is astounding. They know that we have “hot buttons” that if pressed would immediately destroy the subprime healthcare bill. (The term subprime healthcare bill is borrowed from Hugh Hewitt) So, in the interest of saving their bill, they tell us what we want to hear, regardless of what is really in the bill. Some people might call that making mistakes. But, the consistency with which it happens makes me think that the intent is to tell something that is not true. By definition, telling something that is not true is a lie.

Let’s look at a few examples of what I am talking about. First would be the insistence by the President that if we like our insurance carriers we can keep it and if we like our doctors we can keep our doctors. Anyone with half a brain knows that cannot possibly be true. Since over 80% of people are happy with their current insurance coverage there would be no possible space for a “public option”. The estimates are that the “public option” will cover over half of the country initially. The two ideas are not compatible. Either we keep our existing coverage or we will be forced into the “public option”. Since the obvious goal is to get everyone in the public option, the truth has to be that the public option would cover most Americans initially and all Americans eventually.

The second part of the President’s statement is that we would be able to keep our current doctors. Listening to talk radio and doing research on the internet, I understand that doctors that are currently near retirement age would retire if this subprime healthcare bill gets passed. That would lower the number of doctors available to see patients immediately. Since this number would greatly exceed the number of doctors that would enter the workforce in that first year, the total number of doctors available would go down. Also, many doctors have said that under no circumstances would they take payment from any “public option” patients. That means if you are forced to the public option you would most likely lose your doctor at the same time. Democrats have to know this as they are much more connected to this information than I am. They also have large numbers of employees that can check the information as it becomes available.

The next one I want to look at is funding for abortions. Since over half of the country does not believe in public funding for abortions, the Democrats have been telling everyone that there are no provisions in the bill to pay for abortions. The wording in the bill is a big ambiguous, but bills that attempt to clarify the language by making it policy that there is no public money spent on abortions is immediately rejected by the Democrats in Congress. If there was no language in the bill to fund abortions, there should be no objection to clarifying the language. Since they obviously did not want the language clarified, it can be assumed that the Democrats want the language to be interpreted to mean that there CAN be public money spent on abortions.

The other thing that really amuses me is whenever Barack Obama brings up an example of a government program that works well, it never does. Even the “Cash for Clunkers” program that simply gave money to people to buy cars could not be done right. If the Congress cannot get a simple program like giving away money correct, what are the chances they can get a complicated program like the subprime healthcare bill correct?

Democrats are not telling the American people the truth. There is no reason for them not to know what is contained in the bill, as they wrote it. Republicans might get things wrong every now and then because they did not write the bill. But Democrats should have a record of getting their facts correct almost all of the time. Since their record of getting the facts on the subprime healthcare bill is near zero, there has to be a reason for the discrepancy. Either they truly do not know what is in the bill or they are lying. Since there is no excuse for them not to know what is in the bill, the only conclusion is that the Democrats are lying about what is in the bill. They have to be lying for a reason. The only reason I can think of is so that they can get some Republican support for this subprime healthcare bill. That would give them some cover when the bill goes belly up within a few months of implementation.

Plus, I still do not know why the emergency when the bill will not be implemented until 2013. If it will take that long to get it implemented, we can take a year or two to get it right. The only reason for speed is to pull a fast one over on the American people.

The wheels are definitely coming off of the Obama Express. In November, 2008, he seemed unstoppable. He had a Democrat Congress to work with and the news media in his back pocket. Then, on inauguration day he seemed to step in it a bit with his speech. Still, with a fawning press, what could go wrong?

Today, seven months into the Obama Presidency, the wheels have come completely off the bus. His healthcare proposal is facing opposition from the public and even members of his own party. There are polls out today that show that for the first time in a very long time, more Americans consider themselves conservative than liberal in every state in the country.

Also 57% of the public does not believe that the stimulus bill has done anything to stimulate the economy. Only 19% think that the stimulus bill has actually stimulated the economy. Looking to the future, 60% of the public does not think that the stimulus bill will do anything to stimulate the economy. These are not the kind of numbers that help keep Democrats warm at night. They are the kind of numbers that give Democrats nightmares of election debacles. They appear to be staring at one in 2010.

There is a report out that Senator Barbara Boxer is likely to face stiff competition for her seat in the Senate. She is likely to face a Republican that will have enough money to at least match her dollar for dollar, if not outspend her. Also, the potential Republican challenger is articulate and obviously intelligent. She has run major businesses in the past. Barbara Boxer is widely known to be one of the Senate’s least intelligent Senators. This would be a major pick-up of a seat in the blue state of California.

Other Democrats across the country are looking at potential challengers and are seeing people that are well-funded and articulate. Democrats are known for walking in lock step with the Democrat leadership, which makes them vulnerable to quick thinking challengers in areas that are not solidly Democrat blue. In marginal districts or districts that generally vote Republican, Democrat Congressmen and Senators will face opposition that could easily dislodge them from their cushy digs.

I also read an article on World Net Daily by Hilmar von Campe. He grew up in Germany during the 1930’s and saw the rise of Hitler. He has written a book about his experience called, “Defeating the Totalitarian Lie”. His parents were forced to enroll him in the Hitler Youth at age 10 and the army at age 18. According to Mr. von Campe, the steps Hitler took in the 1930’s and the steps Barack Obama is taking today are remarkably similar. He is particularly worried about the euthanasia program that Hitler endorsed and implemented and the one that Obama has written into the healthcare legislation. Neither was called euthanasia by their authors. Once Hitler got his plan approved, he started with making the Jews non-people. Obama hasn’t had his plan approved, but he has talked about needing to reduce the cost of medical care for seniors. The easiest way is to deny services to those deemed too old to be useful to the country. That would make the healthcare plan delivery unequal.

We can only hope that the Democrats cling to this failing health care proposal for a while longer. The more they talk about implementing government healthcare, the lower their polls go. Pretty soon, we might even hear about Democrats in the Northeast being worried about their seats. That would be a good thing. Fear of losing your seat makes you a better Senator or Congressman. You suddenly take an interested look at what the people in your district (state) are telling you.

I always thought the wheels would come off for Obama. I just never thought they would come off so fast. The fact they have come off so fast gives us some clear shots at cleaning up the current mess. It also minimizes the amount of mess that he could create. Those are good things.

Today, the accomplished world traveler, Barack Obama, is visiting Phoenix to speak at the Veterans of Foreign Wars Convention. He is expected to try and mend fences with the military and maybe speak about his government healthcare takeover.

Yesterday, Barack Obama visited the Grand Canyon. I have no objections to him visiting the Grand Canyon. I also understand that when a President visits somewhere, there are understandable restrictions on the people that are in the area. What made the event memorable is that Obama tried to play himself off as some sort of a westerner. He looked and acted so out of place that when he put on the act, it was truly laughable. Those in the east might not pick up on it because they do not live out here, but we in the west know what a true westerner acts like.

One bit of good news is that Senator Kent Conrad (ND) announced that the “public option” will be dropped from consideration from any healthcare reform bills. That is good news on the surface. They can still achieve their goal by government regulation, but the easy way through insurance is not on the table right now. The fight is not over as any revision that allows the government to stick its nose in the business of health care is not good for the country. I hope that most people are not disarmed by this “sop” to the masses. It is a victory and it should be savored, but it is not final victory. It is like winning a battle in a war, it is good, but not the final objective. Right now, the Democrats are on the run. If we keep the pressure on, we can achieve a lasting victory. If we take the pressure off, we will lose everything we ever won.

What we need to do now, is get government out of the business of regulating health insurance. Licensing companies and agents who sell insurance is still a good thing. You want to make sure that the insurance you get is legal. But, that is where government regulation should end. We need to be able to buy our insurance anywhere we want. If I find a policy in Vermont that is cheaper and gives me what I want, I should be able to buy it. Right now, that would be illegal.

I should also be able to pick and choose what is included in my policy. That way I am paying for what I might potentially use. My wife and I are over childbearing age. We have no need for maternity services. Why should I pay a fee each month to pay for maternity services that I will never use? Why can’t I drop maternity services and save a small amount each month? The same can be said for many of the other required things in health insurance. Some things I want included are not included. Some things I want excluded are included. I should be able to pick the things I want included and then pay what I want to pay. If I want cheaper insurance, I could choose to have fewer things covered or lower amounts. The choice would be between me and the insurance company. The government would not be involved. This would not cost the government any money. In fact, it would save the government a lot of money because the cost of health insurance for government employees would go down. The Democrats would never go for this option because it gives them less power, not more power. Democrats are into power. Anything that gives them more power, they support. Anything that takes power away from government they are against.

That is just one simple idea that would save at least millions of dollars each year. It would most likely save billions. There are other ideas that are simple to adopt that would save people billions. As the costs go down, more people would have health insurance. But, only the people that want health insurance would have health insurance. If you do not want health insurance, you should not be forced to buy health insurance. People should not be forced to do something that they do not want to do, just because the government says they should do it. We should support freedom for Americans. More freedom means a stronger America. It also means some people will not choose to do things the way that we want them to do them. That is just fine as long as they are not harming anyone by making those choices. We own ourselves and as long as we are making choices that affect just us, the government should stay out.

At least that is one man’s opinion, as long as there is still freedom to say what you believe. That time is rapidly closing, but it was fun while it lasted.