ARE THE POLITICIANS IN WASHINGTON LISTENING?

Pay attention folks, the debate is poised to take a turn for the worse. Not only has the Democratic machine been placed in high gear, but the heat has been turned up on the voices of dissent. Apparently, the politicians received an ear full when they returned home for summer break. Not just about health care reform, but about run away spending, giant deficits, and record national debt levels, even more than the white House had projected as recently as the Spring.

With the President's poll numbers falling weekly, the American public is beginning to question whether we are on the right track to solve the economic crisis, retard the rate of growth of health care costs, effectively combat terrorism, reduce unemployment rates, and return America to growth and prosperity. President Obama campaigned on these themes, amongst other promises (end the occupation of Iraq, liberalize union voting rules, and other issues that pandered to the radical left of his party).

Today, Obama is more like the Emperor without any clothes. Behind the curtain in the land of Obama, sits an organ grinder turning the wheels of progress, not some wizard who can command by intimidation, golden voice, and conjure up magical solutions. Yes, Obama has been humbled! Did he really think his golden voice of rhetoric could actually convince people to do something that they instinctively know is wrong for the nation? Enough Independent voters and moderate republicans switched side to give Obama a wide margin of victory. The vote ushered in an unprecedented Democratic control of both the House and the Senate. "It will be a cake walk" must have been the battle cry by the Obamaniks readying themselves for the White House, check books in hand to start spreading the money around their liberal ideology.

At this stage in the presidency, Obama should be riding high with power. With the wind of Congress behind him, his signature domestic agenda item, the overhaul of the American health care system, should have been railroaded through the Senate and the House. Union voting rules should have forever changed the landscape of labor relations between the employer and the unions representing the workers. We should be one step closer to a more socialistic model for America as envisaged by the Obama and the liberal left. But we are not!

Irrespective of the causes, whether it is the lack of presidential leadership in the drafting of the health reform package, the ineptness of the House and Senate leadership to insist on party unity, a poor sales job by the President and his band of Obamaniks, or just a poorly written and explained health policy, the end result is the same. Obama is playing defense when he has the strongest team (A House that can pass any bill without the support of one single Republican and a Senate, up until the death of Sen Edward (Ted) Kennedy, that was filibuster-proof.

The one thing the Obama administration would like to have avoided is the void created with the summer Congressional break, a period that would allow the opposition to gain a better understanding of what the thousands of pages of legislation contained, to muster support to oppose the legislation at the grass roots level, and mount a public education campaign to inform the public exactly what Obama has in mind for their health insurance and access to benefits.

The Administration got what they feared most, a public backlash. People attending the townhall meetings of the legislators greeted their representatives with hostility, questioning not just the health reform bills currently moving through Congress, but expressed their displeasure at the scope of spending, the effectiveness of the stimulus program, joblessness, and the increasing public debt. Stunned by the very act of questioning the Obama administration and its vision, the attack dogs mustered up the attack squads. Unions were dispatched to intimidate the voices of dissent. Advertising in vulnerable Congressional Districts were run to intimidate Democrats and Republicans alike who dared to disagree with the party manifesto, and I mean Manifesto. Shouting matches cropped up, each side attempting to silence the others. The Senators and Representatives were sent cowering behind the rostrums, whining about the pointed questions and disagreements that were hurled at them. Many cried out, "these people are not part of the district, they are from out of town". More than a few stopped the meetings. The brave few carried on, and in the spirit of American freedom of expression, stood by and took the questions and insults like a man.

Suddenly, townhall meetings became a political liability for both parties. The Democrats reasoned that the townhall meetings were not a good forum and suggested they conduct telephone conference calls so they could control dissent. Hardly an action any democracy should suggest if they want to hear what all the people think; great, if you just want to be stroked and field softballs from party loyalists.

The geniuses leading the House and the Senate came up another strategy equally repulsive. The American people do not like the program, at least a majority of the people polled think it is in the wrong direction. Nancy Pelosi, between breaths calling the dissenters "un-American", pledged to pass the bill as writte pointing out they had the votes sufficient to pass the bill without any Republican vote. Harry Reid bellows that their majority is filibusterer-proof and pledges to pass the bill no matter what the public thinks. Chucky Shummer, Christopher Dodd, Steny Hoyer, they all line up and propose to use a Parliamentary maneuver to pass the health care reform package with a simple majority. While within the rules, the original intention of the rule was to use it for appropriations not major legislation.

Thanks to the early Bush Republican years a precedent was set when the Republicans passed the 2003 tax cut legislation using the same rule. That time, there was not widespread dissent on the issue. The public generally approved of the tax cut. This time, there is not a general agreement by a public who supports the passage of a bill that will effect every American, most adversely, and will rearrange 17% of GDP. To the contrary, there is active dissent. The Republican cleaverness of 2003 is now potentially biting them in the rear as the Congressional Leaders giving serious thought to using the maneuver to pass the health care reform.

A sorry state of affairs for American ideals. Due to a rush to pass health care legislation for political purposes, we are about to possibly trample on the principles of a representative democracy, ignore the majority of the public who agrees that improving the health care system's cost and access should be a priority, but disagree with the plan that has been prepared, without any presidential leadership, as proposed by the pending bills in the House and Senate (the House passed a version in waning days of the session prior to the summer recess, but differs from the leading, but unpassed Senate version). Our elected leadership refuses to believe that the public is against the health reform plan or simply does not want to hear it.

But, as each day goes by, more of the truth of the plan emerges from the reading of the legislation, the comments from the "truth squads" dispatched to tell the public why they should like the plan, and from the opposition. We find out more about the Special Interests groups who were bought off by Obama to support the plan by agreeing to a minimal levels of cuts so a floor could be put under the damage to their industries represented.

This includes Big Pharma (the largest contributor to the rise in health care costs, agreed to direct negotiations with the government's Medicare program for the cost of pharmaceuticals incurred by Medicare beneficiaries and to provide a contribution to the cost reductions Obama needed by subsidizing the cost of drugs for low-income beneficiaries), The AMA (a law on the books as far back as the Clinton presidency called for a reduction of medical fees to achieve parity with other inflationary adjustments. Congress repeatedly ignored the law and gave an annual reprieve, the reduction required growing to a 25% reduction in 2009. In exchange for a floor of damage limiting the annual increase to the same rate as given to other health care providers and no across the board reduction and eliminating the provisions of the more severe law mandating a 25% reduction, the AMA agreed to support the legislation), AHA (agreed to live with a lower, but not crippling cost of living increase applied to the reimbursement rate for Medicare beneficiaries).

Off the table was any consideration of tort reform, opposed by the plaintiffs bar, a decision made strategically to minimize the number of dissenters. Not that anybody in the White House does not understand that tort reform is a key to the reduction in the over utilization of services and waste of health care dollars, they were not ready to have a powerful lobby, the plaintiff's bar, as an adversary at this time. The American public was a far easier target to roll over and quiet, so they thought! Now that's change we can believe in!

Then comes articles written by Dr. Ezekiel Emanuel, a White House health policy advisor and brother of Rhamm Emanuel, the President's Chief of Staff. There is something about Chicago and it's politicians. Rhamm built his reputation as an attack dog in the Clinton years and is accustomed to the elbowing tactics of the Chicago political machine, a bare-knuckles approach perfected in the seedy street-fighting conducted daily in Chicago politics. Dr. Ezekiel prescribes a different sort of medicine to solve the issue of the high cost health care. Anyone with any interest should google Dr. Ezekiel to read his theories. They are scary at the least, and down right Un-American at the most. Dr. Ezekiel proposes to throw out the Hippocratic oath, an oath that every physician who is trained has taken that admonishes every physician to "use my power to help the sick to best of my ability and judgment". Why? Because DR. Ezekiel believes that that oath leads physicians to over-utilize health resources and channels the physician to think only about their own patient's need. Wow, amazing! Dr. Exekiel would rather have the physician think as a communitarian, placing the greater good ahead of the patient's need, upending over three thousand years of an ethic that physician's have committed to and that patients have grown accustomed to in their relationship with the physician who cares for them.

Is this because there is a need to modernize an old concept? Is it because these ancient concepts are, well you know, old-fashioned and out of step with today? Is this the kind of change we can believe in? I would venture to say, no, it is just another liberal concept, doing things for the greater good.

But, it gets worse than that. He is also championing a concept called "complete lives system". This is a formula-based system of allocating resources, not based on need, but to further the concept of "the greater good". In this system, scarce resources are allocated. "One maximizing strategy involves saving the most individual lives.." (Lancet, Jan 31, 2009). It goes on to view that everything being equal saving five lives is better than one.

In an Aug. 16, 2009 Washington Post interview, Dr. Ezekiel argues that decisions on allocation of resources should focus on a "communitarian perspective so resources are allocated to keep society going". In his thinking, the social guarantee is basic where service that ensure the future generations, where development of practical reasoning skills are achieved, and where it will ensure an active and full participation by citizens. Covering service to individual" are not basic and would not be guaranteed. He has devised a chart of the "lives system" that indicates a priority curve that benefit the 15 to 40 year age groups with the most substantial chance of resources being allocated to treat their disease, with the least chance assigned to the youngest and oldest people. Cold-hearted liberalism at it's finest!

This, from the man closest to Obama in health policy. Is there any question which direction health reform will go under the current House bill? Is there any question where Obama's head is? The American people are just learning the lies that have been told by Obama when he says, "if you like your health plan, nobody is going to take it away". Obama promises to generate savings from cutting waste, enhancing prevention, and wellness, installing electronic medical records, and reduce fraud and abuse.

Even his health policy wonk, Dr. Ezekiel is skeptical. He wrote in the Feb 27, 2008 issue of JAMA (the Journal of the American Medical Association),"Vague promises of savings from cutting waste, enhancing prevention and wellness, and improving quality of care are merely "lipstick" cost control, more for show and public relations than for true change." How can Obama think the public is stupid enough to buy his explanation when his own advisor calls it what it is. If you put lipstick on a pig, it is still a pig!

Before we rush off as a herd running towards a cliff supporting the current health reform bills, let's pause, refresh our computers, and start over with a transparent public debate without the attack dogs, the lobbyist that Obama promised to ignore and eliminate, and bring the parties together with a clean slate. Keep the public well informed, be honest and accept that 85& of the people are happy with what they have. Figure out how to add the people who are un and under-insured without killing health insurance for 85% of the people. Keep ideology out of the debate and consider what is best of the country and it's people, not what will score points with your special interest groups and party support base. No plan will be credible if there is not shared sacrifice. That does not mean one group gets all the upside and the other shares all the downside. Good reform will be evident when everybody is unhappy that they did not get what they want. That includes the politicians.

If you can not understand this, then the voters will decide in Nov 2010 whether you will continue to represent them. The choice is yours. But, don't dismiss the public opinion, and don't get cute with words and try to con them. We are pretty good at sensing when we are being conned. And we sense it now!

Obama's Little Engine That Could

Let's get one thing straight from the beginning: America's health care is too expensive, too over-utilized, uneven in delivering a quality product, and too damned dependent on the Federal government for over half of it's revenues and, for most of the rest, the business community continuing to provid health insurance as a benefit to their employees.

Moreover, many people are left without access to health care insurance through their own neglect, either by failing to enroll their children, who would otherwise be covered by Children's Healthcare programs in existence, and recently extended by the CHIPS program extension in the Stimulus package and in various add-0n features of the flurry of bills passed in the first one-hundred days of the Obama presidency. Yes, there are people who can not afford health insurance and are not provided health insurance through their employer or do not meet current thresholds for assistance, "the working poor". There are also people who could afford health insurance but decline to allocate the money to buy it.

Included in the group of un-insured is the demographic age group spanning the 18 year olds to 35 year olds, who often eschew health insurance. Of course there are a multitude of illegal aliens who are without health insurance, in spite of have employment, that daily tax the health care providers with unpaid bills. There are older adults who choose not to buy health insurance that add to the number of people who are un-insured.

That a nation as rich as America can not figure out how to assure every citizen has the opportunity to be insured against the risk of disease speaks more to the will of a nation than the ability of that nation. It also audibly cries out the need for honesty in the debate.

The populists politicians sound convincing as the assess the blame for this sorry state of affairs. It is the rich corporations who pass on to much cost to the employees and paternally dole out health care benefits at an alarming increase in cost to their employees, all for the sake of profit for their rich shareholders. Big Health insurers are blamed for being profiteers. Opposition parties are cast as fear mongers and "mobs" when they loudly rally to protect the health insurance they have from falling into government hands. "The party of 'no', is the rallying cry of those pushing for radical reform.

Few would argue against a serious attempt to improve access to health care, to make it more inclusive, to be less expensive for the insurer, the sponsor, and the insured, for "cost" are different for each stakeholder. Imperfect terms lead to imperfect interpretations. One man's cost (the insurance company or the government's cost) becomes another's benefit. If we move to reduce the cost of services covered by the government or the insurance company, it has to be taken out of someone's hide. In the case of the insurance company, it means either less service covered for the beneficiary or more out-of-pocket costs to the beneficiary. Simple!

In the case of the government's drive to reduce its costs, similar effects occur: services are reduced for beneficiries (as often happens when States experiencing cost overruns in their State Medicaid programs) or when the cost of Part B benefits increase for those enrolled in Part B under Medicare to offset the annual inflationary costs of the Medicare program. Who pays? Not the Federal Government. It is the beneficiary who pays, either in more dollar costs or in reduced covered service. In either case, the beneficiary either pays or defers service. Then there are those who take the service and leave the providers with bad debts, in which case it raises the cost to the provider, burned by the bad debt. Somebody pays and it is usually the beneficiary and the trade off is in dollars or in reduced benefits. There is no free lunch.

The liberals want government heath care and are glad to spend anyones money ecept their own to achieve this goal. The conservative like the status quo, private enterprise approach filled with incentive to make the right decision (what ever the right decision is) and take responsibility for one's own health care decisions. Now this make a lot of sense! Let people, ill equiped to make life or death decisions with little to no support but the internet and the Pharmacy industry advertisments on there favorite soap oprea. Now that is improvement!

Both major parties insist that it is possible to provide low cost, high quality health care to all regardless of financial or health status. (We usually are warned, "If it sounds to good to be true, it probably isn't). We are asked by both parties to suspend disbelief. The liberals want radical reform atany cost and ditch the existing system as a failed system. The conservatives want to find cost-savings, but take serious cost savings off the table. Neither party is willing to be honest with the American public.

During the aftermath of the recent financial meltdown and busting of the housing and credit bubbles, the politicians began to assess blame. First on the target, big business, big banks, and greedy executives. Having assigned the blame, their job was to come up with a solution: assign the government the job of preventing the abuses they identified, seek penalties against the perpetrators, raise taxes and impose restrictions on executive compensation. In short, re-regulate, for the Government is the only entity that can assure competency. We are to believe that these steps, imposed on the engines of growth, would have no unintended consequences. That there would not be a cost to somebody in all these actions. that banks would not figure out how to charge higher costs to offset punitive aspects of the government's drive to prevent financial meltdowns. They want us to believe that you can lower cost and not effect the quality of financial services.

What is scary, they want the same wrong-minded thinking applied to the one thing that trumps financial self interest, the health insurance system that pays our health care costs so we do not have to worry. Was the government successful in managing Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. How about our perpetually bankrupt US Postal Service? Is the VA well managed, how much waste do they experience annually as a result of Congressional tampering? Are we getting our moneys worth out of all the Amtrak subsidies? Were is the return for all the taxpayer money invested in AIG? Can you think of one governmental program that would give you comfort that the Government can get health care right?

Well, they know better than that. All that talk from Obama and his White House advisers about squeezing the excess out of Medicare, eliminating the abusive practices of doctors and hospitals, ending fraud, and reducing the costs of Medicare and Medicaid to a sustainable level is just talk. Remember during the Obama campaign, we heard Obama say, in response to points driven home by the challengers, "these are words, just words". We now know what that means. The program laid out are "words, just words" lacking any substance and merely to move the populist notions ahead to a naive body of listeners ready to drink the "next kool-aid" of Obama thoughts.

Of cousre, the Republican party is no better at coming up with hyperbole. What they lack is any measure of a plan. Obama has words as his plan, since he delegated the process to Congress and has remained aloof in it drafting. Read that, provided no leadership. Republicans have only one word, "no". Like a two-year old going through the "terrible twos", they cry out "no". They have nothing else. No plan to improve access, cost, and assure quality. The Republican National Committee only today announced the "senior's health bill of rights". As usual, the tone-deaf body is proposing to be opposed to any move to trim Medicare spending or limit end-of-life care.
Nice move, Mr Steele! You too, like Obama and Congress, have taken any serious attempt to reduce the cost of the Medicare program off the table. You and the Obamaniks must still believe everything keeps rising, housing prices, the stock market, and your poll numbers. Do you believe in the tooth fairy? Why, Obama has even cozied up to the special interest groups (Big Pharma, Hospitals, and Doctor lobbyists) and cut deals that are meaningless to cost saving (the savings woud come anyway, Obama just put a floor on the damage at a pittance of what could be saved under existing law). Why, to get there vote, to enlist them in his campaign to shove a costly health reform plan down the throats of an unwilling public.

We have heard the clear message from a majority of Americans. They don't like the snake oil Obama is selling. They want to know the truth. They want a debate, not a freight train, Yet, Obama and the Obamanik elites want to dismiss the voices of the rabble as the bable of a mob. Un-American mobsters to boot.

Yet, we have the Obamaniks and Congress hell-bent on pushing health care reform, including a public option (the White house handlers have banned the real term Government option). They believe that Choice and Control (they have also banned the use of the real term Competition when describing their plan). The plan they envisage will result in Quality, affordable healt care (The White House has also banned the true description "Universal coverage).

You get the drift? Words, just words used to manipulate the debate and keep the naive public in the dark by choosing words that the public likes and confirmed by focus groups and polls of words that describe the plan, well chosen words to obfuscate, manipulate and deceive. But don't worry, our friends at the loyal Republican opposition have their own obfuscating words. "Patient-centered health care" is substituted for "Private/free-market health care", "health care is seriously toubled and needs serious reform" is used instead of "health care is a good system but still needs tweaks". The list goes on and anyone interested can read more about this on the Wall Street Journal Part A article entitled "Obama Allies Find Words Fail Them". Health care reform by the polls, now that is change we can believe in!

When you think about a government designed program for health care reform, we should all keep in mind these simple phrases: Amtrak, Fannie Mae/Freddie Mac, AIG, USPS. Each a creation of government planning gone wrong. Each a financial disaster. Can we trust them with 17 % of our GDP? With out more conscientious debate, more open and honest dialog with the American public, we are on a collision course for a major train wreck with 17% of our GDP and trillions of dollars in deficits you and me, the taxpayers, will have to pay. That would eliminate most of the artificial savings targeted by the current plan, not to mention the increase tax that a growing number of Americans will pay to adopt a poorly thought out plan.

We must insist on a careful and thoughtful debate. We need to assess the health care system in its entirety. Do we wreck a system that is working for 85 % of the people in order to solve the problems of access for a yet undetermined number of un and under insured people. What do we do to strengthen the existing health care insurance system, make it affordable, lower costs, and improve quality outcomes that would fund the access for those who need a hand in buying health insurance and mandating those who can afford insurance, but chose not to buy it. Can this be done by providing incentives, negative or positive, that incorporates the many Democratic and Republican ideas being offered, but ignored by the Obamaniks.

Can we face the need to rein in health care costs to make the system affordable and turn a deaf ear to the lobbyists? Can we understand that this will have to be a shared sacrifice by all, not just a taxing exercising aimed at the rich?

With a more open debate, an informed public, and a slower pace, yes we can achieve change. Yes we can achieve improvements. But we can not tax our future generations and leave them with trillions of dollars of debt in the name of progressive (liberal) ideology. We can not accept the status quo in the name of conservative ideology. the answer is always at the mean.

At the entrance to Zhong He Dian at the Forbidden Palace, Beijing, is an inscription written by Emperor Qianlong. It reads, "the Way to Heaven is profound and mysterious and the way of mankind is difficut. Only if we make a precise and unified plan and follow the doctrine of the mean, can we rule the country well". This was written around 1627. It is a lesson our leaders would be wise to follow. For surely, as we hear the rhetoric from the liberals on the fringe of American society, a couse of action that bypasses customary legislative protocal in an attempt to ram through radical reform, is surely a road to a train wreck. If the Obama administration truely wants to govern well, they are heading on the wrong track to nowhere. The American people know that. Hopefully they will learn that, too.

Whose Company Is It Anyway?

Folks, we are witnessing a Board of Directors at it's finest! A company, newly emerged from bankruptcy, lead by a Board of the powerful and not-so-powerful, asserts its control over the former Bankrupt and its management, sallies forth to the bar, and orders it 's first drink of power? Screw the deal, management, go back and explore the option of retaining that dog you thought you had hived-off in an auction to European buyers in accordance with the Bankruptcy plan, the plan you and the government, who lent you a mere $50 billion of taxpayer's money, had negotiated.

See, if by September's Board Meeting, you can put together financing sufficient to capitalize the the German subsidiary. After all, we are the mighty Board of Directors of the Mighty GM. Are duty is to protect the shareholders interest and make the right decisions, no matter that the US Government owns 70% of us and they want the deal to go through. No matter, this action will have diplomatic consequences and put the US Administration in a relationship bind with some of our biggest trading partners. We know what is best and we do not have to explain a thing. For we are the Mighty Board of Directors of the Mighty GM.

Let's get one thing straight, we taxpayers own 70% of GM. You are their representatives. The US Government does not own you. If you now suddenly want to retain what some fine minds have concluded would be better to jettison, I would like a clearer understanding why you novices want to overrule a management that was executing on a plan everybody but you guys have singed off. What audacity you have, sounding as if you are providing leadership when you are just assesrting power. It is up to you to explian your rationale to the American Taxpayers. Just because you have been appointed doesn't suddenly make you geniuses.

Suffice it to say, I am unimpressed. I am sure you could care less, but as a shareholder/taxpayer, what you do will affect me personally. You owe us an explanation, don't you think? If it is the right decision, we are capable of making that determination if you provide us the information. But if you insist on doing things in secret, then GM will never acheive anythig but a modest improvement, and at worst, will fall back into bankruptcy. Maybe then, the European buyers , or for that matter the Asian buyers, will be able to pick up some assets at an even further discount. Nice job, so far.

Now It's Stock Manipulation-adding woes to King Wiedeking

Isn't it time, King Wiedeking, to give back your severance payment? How long do you want to punish Porsche and their shareholders for your misdeeds. It was enough for you to throw away a perfectly wonderful asset as Porsche Automobil Holding by taking on enough debt in a pure speculative play. But, to add fuel to the fire, stock manipulation? At least, that is the latest allegation. Where there is smoke, there must be fire. Think about it, using derivatives to accumulate sufficient shares to assert control over the Volkswagen company directors. Genius! Except for the leverage taken amidst a credit collapse. Brilliant? Sounds to good to be true, doesn't it?

If you do not get it, maybe the Porsche Automobil Holdings directors can claw-back the severance payment they were so generous in granting. There are other shareholders than company insiders. Perhaps they could execute on there fiduciary duty and push for a claw-back. If not, I say, let the government be the government and take the severence by force! The old fashion way, confiscate it after you have been convicted of a treasonable offense!

Seriously, how many times do we have to allow the government to do the dirty work of elected and appointed directors of Public Corporations. Take the right steps and correct your mistake before we see the government do your job.

What do you think?

Wow! Microsoft and Yahoo are getting together in a new pact. This is earth-shattering, a virtual temblor of temblor. The all-awaited final quake that will cement Microsoft's icon permanently on the face of Technology's Mt. Rushmore. At least that is what the bombastic head of Microsoft insists. The man, taken to lecture us more unfortunate idiots on just about everything, Mr. Humble pie says we mere mortals just don't understand the deal and that it is a "win-win" pact.

Try that thinking on a shareholder community burned by Governmental malfeasance in the handing of the economy since the accelerator was floored on the economy in early 2000, Wall Street tycoons finding a large vein of gold by overcharging fees, taking undo risk with the shareholders money, and handing the economy over to a group of neo-hippie liberals hell-bent on running up the shareholders (and the majority of the taxpayer who pay the largest share of taxes) tab with an unprecedented deficit created by spending best described as totally out of control.

Just as Obamaniks can't explain their policies, Mr. Dullmer can't explain, in concrete terms, the benefit of the pact with Yahoo to his Microsoft shareholders. At least that appears to be the case as more questions arise by the investor community. Before the Bombast explains the issue again in his patronizing way, he should look in the mirror and ask, "is this too good to be true?" If so, we all know the answer! Hopefully he will be able to see the answer through the haze of his self-importance.

Dance Monkeyboy! The world is watching.