Spitballing the numbers

Remember how Nancy Pelosi told the National Association of Counties that they needed to “pass the bill so that you can find out what is in it, away from the fog of the controversy." Well unfortunately they did pass the bill and we are beginning to find out what's in it.

On Wednesday, Kathleen Sebelius appeared before the House Appropriations Committee to discuss the appropriations for high-risk pool subsidies that ObamaCare provides to the states. The bill appropriated $5 billion for this program, but as Sebelius tells the committee, that was just a spit-balling number. In reality, no one has the faintest clue how much money will actually get spent on this program.

And according to an AP summary, a new report "found that the law falls short of the president's twin goal of controlling runaway costs, raising projected spending by about 1 percent over 10 years. That increase could get bigger, since Medicare cuts in the law may be unrealistic and unsustainable, the report warned."

It also "projected that Medicare cuts could drive about 15 percent of hospitals and other institutional providers into the red, 'possibly jeopardizing access' to care for seniors." So when the President told AARP members that "nobody is talking about reducing Medicare benefits," presumably he meant nobody but Medicare's chief actuary.

With these kinds of results coming to light, either President Obama and the Democrats don't know what they are talking about or do know, but decided to simply deny the truth. In either case, this doesn't bode well for this administration. Perhaps we'll soon be hearing, Obama lied and seniors died.

Miscellaneous

Which is more outlandish?

A. A senior Iranian cleric says women who wear revealing clothing and behave promiscuously are to blame for earthquakes.

or

B. New research compiled by Australian scientist Dr. Tom Chalko shows that global seismic activity on Earth is now five times more energetic than it was just 20 years ago. The research proves that destructive ability of earthquakes on Earth increases alarmingly fast and that this trend is set to continue, unless the problem of "global warming" is comprehensively and urgently addressed.

If you can't make up your mind, remember Jay Leno talked about the first one indicating that most men felt it was a worthwhile tradeoff.

Which is one is true?

A. The world's 1.5 billion cattle are most to blame. Livestock are responsible for 18 per cent of the greenhouse gases that cause global warming, more than cars, planes and all other forms of transport put together.

or

B. Livestock could actually be good for the environment according to a new study that found grazing cows or sheep can cut emissions of a powerful greenhouse gas

Both are from studies with B being the most recent. Old slogan, "don't eat meat." New slogan, "Eat a cow and save the world."

How much faith do you have in the IPCC?

The IPCC (the gold standard for global warming) disdains non-peer reviewed literature. In it's last report how many references out of 18,531 sources cited turned out to be not peer-reviewed?

A. 183 or less than 1%
B. 1753 or less than 10%
C. 2,752 or less than 15%
D. 5,587 or over 30%

I'll give you a hint. It's after C.

More Bad News if you are a Democrat

More Bad News for the Democrats.

Just as the Obama Administration is seeking to control more and more of the US economy another "wake up" call has been received.

WASHINGTON — America's "Great Compromiser" Henry Clay called government "the great trust," but most Americans today have little faith in Washington's ability to deal with the nation's problems.

Public confidence in government is at one of the lowest points in a half century, according to a survey from the Pew Research Center. Nearly 8 in 10 Americans say they don't trust the federal government and have little faith it can solve America's ills, the survey found

http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/politics/ap/poll-americans-confidence-in-the-federal-government-at-a-50-year-low-80-percent-are-wary-91448384.html#ixzz0lYOchR74

\\

New Global Warming Problem

Here is the latest from the world of AGW alarmists.

"You're likely to hear a chorus of dire warnings as we approach Earth Day, but there's a serious shortage few pundits are talking about: air pollution. That's right, the world is running short on air pollution, and if we continue to cut back on smoke pouring forth from industrial smokestacks, the increase in global warming could be profound.

"

And actually they aren't kidding. Certain types of air pollution reflect sunlight back into space and makes the earth cooler.

So when the warmists tell you the only explanation for the warming we saw in the 1980s and 1990s was greenhouse gases, remind them this was the period when most of the industrialized nations were cleaning up their air and reducing their pollution.

News and Comments

Inconsistency from the Left

Both sides of the aisle (left and right) have discontinuities in what they say when they take opposite sides on similar issues. For instance, when it comes to being pro-life, leftist generally support abolition of the death penalty unless you haven't been born and then it's Katie bar the door. In the meantime right leaning people generally oppose abortion, but see no problem in using the death penalty. Of course being from the right I see less than 40 executions in the USA per year while 820,121 abortions were performed in 2005 (the latest year I could find information on). Moral equivaleny here is being stretched to the maximum.

The left right now is looking to raise the taxes on gasoline and even any carbon energy people may use. They see this as a way to decrease the useage of these fuels. When the left deems something bad, they want to tax it to cut back on people doing a particular behavior. Hence we have "sin" taxes on tobacco, liquor, and now the left is looking to add carbon to the plethora of sins we tax. Now I agree with them about taxing these items having an effect of decreasing demand (I believe in the supply and demand curves). But these same leftist deny any relationship between cost and demand when it comes to raising the minimum wage.

More People Angry with the Obama Administration.

At the TEA Party protest in Denver, I talked with a number of the anti-TEA Party protestors. They were unhappy with Obama because he wasn't leftist enough. I heard anger from these people that Obama didn't institute a single payer system and was forcing people to subsidize a private industry (insurance industry).

And today online we read that the White House press corps (that is pronounced "core" not "corpse").

White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs met with a delegation from the White House press corps for 75 minutes on Thursday in an effort to improve frayed relations between the two sides.

Ed Chen, a White House correspondent for Bloomberg News who is president of the White House Correspondents’ Association, said he asked for the meeting “to clear the air because in my 10-plus years at the White House, rarely have I sensed such a level of anger, which is wide and deep, among members over White House practices and attitude toward the press.”

Read more: http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0410/35944.html#ixzz0lT5w0CF7

Politics by the Numbers

Much is being said about the lack of a bounce by the Democrats after passing the Healthcare legislation. One of the arguments the Democrats put forward to their members was that once the bill was passed the American people would embrace it and the popularity numbers of the President and the Democrats would go up.

The President's numbers.

After the passage of Healthcare, strong support for Obama grew about 5 to 7 points. From about 25% strongly supporting the president this went up to 32%. However those strongly opposed to BHO went stayed pretty much the same about 42%. However just recently the president's numbers have dropped back to about 27%.

Healthcare numbers.

Three weeks after Congress passed its new national health care plan, support for repeal of the measure has risen four points to 58%. That includes 50% of U.S. voters who strongly favor repeal.

The latest Rasmussen Reports telephone survey of likely voters nationwide finds 38% still oppose repeal, including 32% who strongly oppose it.

Congressional Democrat's numbers.

Finally, the congress has basically stayed the same.

For the second straight week, Republican candidates hold a nine-point lead over Democrats in the latest edition of the Generic Congressional Ballot.

A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that 45% would vote for their district's Republican congressional candidate, while 36% would opt for his or her Democratic opponent. This is virtually unchanges since the Democrats passed the healthcare bill as 43% would vote for the Republican then and 35% would vote for the generic Democrat.

In short, the Democrats have not helped themselves with the Healthcare bill.

The Law of Unintended Consequences--A New Example of Chutzpah

Once again the Democrat and their policies though well intentioned are suffering from the Law of Unintended Consequences.

BP Solar, a solar-cell manufacturing in Frederick, Maryland, dates back to the mid-1970s. It was an American success story that was so profitable it was in the middle of building a $97 million expansion to create more jobs in the solar panel industry. Now the BP Solar building is being demolished and 320 people in Maryland are unemployed.

What happened?

The answer is, the federal government got involved and destroyed the free market generated profitability of the making of solar panels. Here's how: the Obama Administration has spent billions of dollars to create “green jobs.” Through his tax incentives and credits for those businesses that manufacture renewable energy products, he created a glut in the marketplace. With so many businesses now producing solar panels (most of them overseas in anticipation of a booming U.S. market), the cost of panels has been nearly cut in half, making it impossible for businesses like BP Solar to stay in business in the U.S. In an effort to create green jobs, hundreds of green jobs that had been around for 30-plus years were lost. Ironic isn’t it?

Chutzpah--BHO redefines it

From today's stories:

"President Barack Obama said Thursday he's amused by the anti-tax tea party protests that have been taking place around Tax Day. Obama told a fundraiser in Miami that he's cut taxes, contrary to the claims of protesters.

"You would think they'd be saying thank you," he said.

At that, many in the crowd at the Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts stood and yelled, "Thank you!"

Not since Woodrow Wilson ran for reelection on the slogan, "He kept us out of war" has an American president been so dishonestly bold. He must think no one is paying attention to the tax increases in his Healthcare bill, the expiration of the Bush tax cuts, the stealing from Medicare to fund HCR, his proposed increases in costs of energy due to cap and trade, and even the talk of a VAT tax. Saying thank you to President Obama for this is like thanking a bank who lowers your interest rate right before they evict you.

Tax Day: TEA anyone?

IPCC failing grade

First the IPCC, the supposed gold standard of all things climate, got a grade from a band of citizen reviewers. Claiming that they only use "peer reviewed" literature, the citizens auditors found of 44 section in the report the IPCC earned 21 Fs, 4 chapters get a D, and 6 get a C. There are also 5 Bs and 8 As. Translated to a GPA, the IPCC 4 th report earns a 1.43 overall GPA.

You can read about it here: http://nofrakkingconsensus.blogspot.com/2010/04/climate-bible-gets-21-fs-on-report-card.html

Waxman backs off

In the meantime Henry, the brain, Waxman Chairman of the Energy and Commerce Committee has canceled a hearing intended to grill CEOs who took a charge against profits because of the health care reform bill.

It seems that Waxman finally found out what every else aready knew, that Federal Law requires companies to take write offs in the same quarter the law is changed.
Waxman and other Democrats had reacted with outrage and accused the companies of doing it - in essence, to make health care reform look bad. Instead they just made themselves look bad.

You can follow this story here: http://congress.blogs.foxnews.com/2010/04/14/canceled-hearing-that-would-have-grilled-ceos-on-health-care/

Bad News for Barack

Just to show you how far the mighty have fallen a recent Rasmussen poll has President Obama neck and neck with Republican Representative Ron Paul. Ron who hold economic policies that were popular a bit over 100 years ago is at 41% in a mytical poll while President Obama collects 42% of the vote.

In the meantime in the generic Democrat vs the generic Republican, the Republican remain 9% ahead of the Democrats. The mood of America is not a good one if you have a donkey by your name.

Here's more: http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/elections2/election_2012/election_2012_barack_obama_42_ron_paul_41
http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/mood_of_america/generic_congressional_ballot


Barack's promise

"If you make less than a quarter of a million dollars a year, you will not see a single dime of your taxes go up. If you make $200,000 a year or less, your taxes will go down."

Now that is change we can believe in, or is it? According to the Joint Committee on Taxation:

"Taxpayers earning less than $200,000 a year will pay roughly $3.9 billion more in taxes—in 2019 alone—due to healthcare reform." And this is just healthcare!!! It won't address the out of control deficit that Mr. Obama and his band of Merry spenders have put us in.

The American Enterprise Institute has released a 97-page report, Public Opinion on Taxes, 2010 -- "[t]he most comprehensive collection of polls ever compiled on the subject of taxes":

The 2010 Public Opinion Study on Taxes brings together up-to-date trends from major survey organizations and commentary on the tax burden, value for tax dollars, tax fairness, progressivity, taxes and the deficit, politicians' credibility on taxes, and finally, views of the Internal Revenue Service, and preparing taxes. The document includes a new section on President Barack Obama handling taxes and a new section on Obama, taxes, and the deficits.

Do you approve/disapprove of the way Barack Obama is handling taxes?

•Mar. 2009: 62% approve, 37% disapprove
•Jan. 2010: 44% approve, 53% disapprove

Under the Obama administration do you think your taxes will go up or down, or do you think they will stay about the same?

•Jan. 2009: 35% go up, 13% go down, 50% stay the same
•Jan. 2010: 59% go up, 5% go down, 35% stay the same

http://reason.com/blog/2010/04/14/lies-damn-lies-and-campaign-ta

Finally, I invite you to take this week's poll. How many seats do you think the Democrats will lose this November? We need your opinion.

Hoisted on their Own Petard?

House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-Md., told reporters today that the Tea Party movement is making some members of Congress mull retirement.

“Do I think the negative atmosphere that has been created by the Tea Party and by others certainly goes into the thinking of members? I think it does. I think you have to honestly point out that it does,” he told reporters Tuesday.

I want to speak to the characterization by Hoyer of "the negative atmosphere that has been created by the Tea Party." I am sure that this is something a lot of liberals feel. In fact, they probably can't for the life of themselves understand why the American people aren't cheering them on.

But one person's negative atmosphere is another persons Garden of Eden. As one blogger stated: "If negative means believing less government is better government as in the Constitution!!!"

Most TEA Party people have never come out and protested before. They vote, but they weren't active in politics. The Obama Administration's policies have created a negative atmosphere for job growth, personal income, access to medical treatment, the value of the dollar, etc. And that negative atmosphere has created a positive atmosphere for conservatives to come out and protest. It's a question of balance, and the Democrats so far overestimated what the last election meant, that they are now suffering the consequences. As the sign in the picture says: "We only want what is owed to us. Isn't that only fair?"

The atmosphere the Democrats are facing is not caused by the TEA Party, but simply a reflection of what the Democrats have created for themselves. As it were they are now being hoisted on their own petard.

Coffee, TEA or Kool Aid?

You no doubt have read about the TEA Party. From the opponents we hear it is racists, hateful, and astroturf rather than grass roots. From the supporters it is patriotic, fiscally responsible and made up of ordinary Americans. The liberal left in an attempt to counteract the growing influence of the TEA Party has created the Coffee Party.

The Coffee Party doesn't just think Tea Partiers are unhelpful. The party thinks they're a threat to the democratic process, and suggests it's a civic duty to oppose them.

Taking their name from America's favorite beverage, this group is trying to capture the energy and effectiveness of the TEA Party. But perhaps they should have thought out the name of their new movement a bit more before they chose it.

In the match between tea vs coffee, you may expect there to be a clear winner. The truth is however, that coffee and tea remain two very different beverages that do different things for different folks.

First off, one is made from the leaves of a plant called Camellia sinensis, and the other is made from a bean.

When it comes to health benefits, tea will always beat coffee, especially white and green tea. This is not my opinion, it is a fact! And I'm sure I can get a lot of scientists to back this up.

Tea has more antioxidants per cup than coffee does, and also contains less caffeine. There is no need to put up a boring chart explaining the differences, so instead I'll put it this way.

A cup of black tea has half the amount of caffeine than a cup of coffee, and a hell of a lot more antioxidants such as flavonoids, catechins, and tannins. Coffee does not have as much as these properties present, but does have its share of minerals.

Oolong, green, and white tea have even less caffeine and even more antioxidants. In fact, white tea has shown to contain the highest levels, and is one of the best sources when measured by volume for antioxidants in the world! So if drinking for your health, tea will always beat coffee.

This is a good analogy for the TEA Party versus the Coffee Party. It's too late for the Democrats, they've already drunk the Kool Aid.

Treason? Not really

If you watched the video from Thursday April 8th you will see and hear the hypocrisy of the left in full view. But one of the things that really offends me in the video is the chant by the anti-war radicals. "F*ck the US and all of its might, revolution is the only war we'll fight."

Maxine Waters told these protesters that they were the real patriots, and it is this kind of language which makes the right call into question the patriotism of the left. While there are those on the left who say they love their country, but they just want it to be better, Maxine Waters comments reminds me of an abusive husband who says he only hit his wife because he loves her. Now we've learned that abuse is abuse. Evidently the hard left hasn't.

Now of course there are those on the left who are very patriotic. And to protest against a war or anything else in this country is not a sign of a lack of patriotism. But cursing your country and calling for revolution goes way beyond simple protest. I don't consider it treason, but it appears that the protesters were breaking the law (18 USC Sec. 2385).


Whoever, with intent to cause the overthrow or destruction of any
such government, prints, publishes, edits, issues, circulates,
sells, distributes, or publicly displays any written or printed
matter advocating, advising, or teaching the duty, necessity,
desirability, or propriety of overthrowing or destroying any
government in the United States by force or violence, or attempts
to do so; or

Shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than
twenty years, or both, and shall be ineligible for employment by
the United States or any department or agency thereof, for the five
years next following his conviction.

So far the TEA Party has been guilty of making nasty signs with swatiskas and President Obama. The left wants to call that racism, while their seditious acts were according to Maxine Waters patriotism. Both the right and the left have fringe groups, but I fear the fringe of the left is running the Democrat Party.

Miscellaneous

Number of States Suing Uncle Sam about Health care is now at 16

Arizona and Nevada will be states 15 and 16 to sue the federal government over national healthcare legislation. Democrats have their hands full as Obamacare bankrupts the states with unconstitutional, unfunded mandates.

VAT Tax on its WAY?

Acknowledging it would be a highly unpopular move, White House economic adviser Paul Volcker said Tuesday the United States should consider imposing a "value-added tax" similar to those charged in Europe to help get the deficit under control. So those of you who counted on not paying one penny more in any kind of taxes if you made under $200,000 per year--You're screwed.

Ally McBeal may be coming to bathroom near you soon.

In the TV show Ally McBeal, they had a trendy uni-sex bathrooms. Not to be outdone
Maine Has Elevated Liberal Clap-Trap To A High Art: The little girls' room won't be just for little girls anymore, if the Maine Human Rights Commission has its way. The issue came to light last year when the commission ruled that, under the Maine Human Rights Act, a school had discriminated against a 12-year-old transgender boy by denying him access to the girls' bathroom. Now Maine is proposing to ban schools from enforcing gender divisions in sports teams, school organizations, bathrooms and locker rooms. It says forcing a student into a particular room or group because of his or her biological gender amounts to discrimination Yeah, that will work out real well.

Could Obamacare get worse? Of course it can

In the coming national healthcare debacle, you can always count on the government to make matters worse. In Massachusetts, the state's individual insurance market effectively shut down Tuesday because Governor Deval Patrick demands to set prices. You have the government interfering with capitalist enterprises and the result is market chaos. Are we having an Atlas Shrugged moment in the Bay State?

You can find these and other storys at http://www.conservapedia.com/Main_Page

Hypocrisy

Hypocrisy is nothing new to politics, but the web makes it easy to not only find political hypocrisy and document it, but it lets you see it in video with the person own words.

The Democrats have tried to demonize the TEA Party members acting as if they and the Republican Party are kooks and radicals and are doing horrible things that offend the Democrats sensibilities. They will refer to past demonstrations that Democrats supported but somehow find what the Republicans have done with the TEA Party is unconscionable.

I invite you to watch this video and see the truth.

Tort Reform Democrat Style

With Obamacare the law of the land we are just beginning to find out what is in it. Contrary to what President Obama said about taking the best ideas even from the Republicans, we now find that there is tort reform in the bill. The problem is that it is the wrong kind of reform.

The Republicans wanted limits on the awards available for errors made by doctors. Right now many doctors pay over $100,000 per year for insurance and practice defensive medicine where they will order tests that really aren't called for in order to avoid a possible lawsuit in the future or at least have a good defense.

So what does Obamacare do? Section 2304 of the inappropriately named "Patient Protection Affordable Care Act" is entitled "Clarification of Definition of Medical Assistance." The section amends the Social Security Act and, by all appearances, fundamentally redefines Medicaid.

The requirement of what the states provide for Medicaid recipients apparently shifts from making payments to their doctors-- to ensuring the medical "care and services themselves." What this means is that if there is a shortage of doctors, or a shortage of doctors who will take Medicaid patients, the states could be legally judged to have failed in their obligations if a Medicaid patient had been unable to get a doctor's visit in timely fashion.


Louisiana health secretary Alan Levine in a memo to fellow state officials, "With the expanded definition, it leaves every state vulnerable to a new wave of lawsuits any time someone cannot access a service, even if that service is limited by virtue of the rates we pay."

It is no wonder that 14 State Attorney Generals have sued the federal government over the healthcare plan. Right now they are suing just because of the individual mandate part of the bill, but this new exposure to lawsuits of individual states may drive more to be part of the suits.

Pot meet Kettle

It seems to be a rule of nature that you will hear the Democrats revile the Republicans for the tone of the TEA Party protests. And the MSM is only too happy to pile on giving those charges plenty of publicity.

"Some protesters were clearly prepared for violence," a news account noted in 2003. "Some demonstrators fired bolts from slingshots, and others slashed the tires of squad cars. Police clearing a mob from Seventh and Mission streets early in the afternoon came away with a haul of pipe wrenches, rocks, and other makeshift weapons . . . .Protesters shut down Market Street and many surrounding intersections and streets off and on throughout the day . . . . Protesters also gathered by the hundreds at several points during the day outside the Federal Building on Golden Gate Avenue, where they blockaded entrances and kept employees from entering."

Media accounts back then were rather different, however -- frequently and sympathetically noting that the demonstrations were "largely peaceful" -- "the vast majority of demonstrators were peaceful as they denounced the U.S. war with Iraq," as a typical news story noted -- which is a more pleasant way of saying they were somewhat violent. Contrast that with Time magazine's censorious observation the other day that "ugly signs abounded" at a recent Tea Party event in Nevada. Ugly signs? You've got to be kidding.

Here is a trip down memory lane for those of you who remember that you think there were ugly signs along with those mostly peaceful anti-Bush and anti-war protests:

http://www.binscorner.com/pages/d/death-threats...

Are the Democrats Victims?

It appears the Democrats with a failure to get a bounce from their healthcare vote are working on playing the victim while condemning the TEA Party movement.

Today we hear the Harry Reid canceled an appearance because of angry calls, e-mails and even threats. His press secretary said there were no threats of violence initiated against Reid but he canceled because of the threats against his invitation to speak. If you don't understand what this means, neither do I.

In the meantime Chris Matthews raised another nonissue regarding Rush Limbaugh referring to the Obama regime. "I never heard the word 'regime,' before, have you?" he said to NBC's Chuck Todd. "I don't even think Joe McCarthy ever called this government a 'regime.'"

However a brief check on google for Bush regime and you are welcomed with over 1.5 million hits. It appears that Matthews has suffered a major memory loss.

On June 14, 2002, Chris Matthews himself introduced a panel discussion about a letter signed by many prominent leftists condemning the Bush administration's conduct of the war on terror. "Let's go to the Reverend Al Sharpton," Matthews said. "Reverend Sharpton, what do you make of this letter and this panoply of the left condemning the Bush regime?"

Andrew Breitbart returns to the theme, to devastating effect.

"On March 20th, something truly extraordinary happened. On the eve of the health care vote, a group of black Democrat Congressmen (eschewing the private tunnels they usually use to cross from their offices to the Capitol) chose to walk en masse through a crowd of protesters, confident that the knuckledragging Tea Party goons they and their media pals have reviled for a year now would respond with racial epithets.

And then, when the crowd didn't, the black Congressmen made it up anyway. Representative Andre Carson (Democrat, Indiana) insisted he heard the N-word 15 times. He's either suffering from the same condition as that Guam-flipper from Georgia, or he's a liar. At a scene packed not only with crews from the Dem poodle media but with a gazillion cellphone cameras, not one single N-word has been caught on audio. (By contrast, see my post yesterday for how easy it is to get it on tape when real epithets are flying.)"

http://bigjournalism.com/abreitbart/2010/04/02/barack-obamas-helter-skelter-insane-clown-posse-alinsky-planes-to-deconstruct-america/

So be prepared. We will hear over and over again how racists and hateful the opponents of Obama, the Democrats, and the Healthcare bill are. Be prepared to be vilified and condemned. But use this as a motivation to vote those who do this out of office.

Is Obama a Good Speaker?

One of the attributes of Barack Obama that appears to be in dispute is his speaking ability.

But this is being questioned more and more. Commentary's Jennifer Rubin noted Sunday:

"The mainstream media is slowly waking up to the fact that Obama is a bore. No, really. He’s long since stopped saying anything new or interesting, and he talks constantly, at great length. "

Read more: http://newsbusters.org/blogs/noel-sheppard/2010/04/04/wapo-headline-obamas-17-minute-2-500-word-response-womans-claim-being#ixzz0k9kGpiZF

Although dubbed "articulate" by the likes of Harry Reid and swooned over by the MSM, many people are having their doubts. It appears to some that without a teleprompter and a set speech, BHO is just as mortal as any of us when it comes to public speaking.

So this week's question is for you to express your opinion. Is President Obama a wonderfully gifted speaker or is he more a great reader of a set speech?

Last week's poll asked people what you thought the President's approval rating would be by next November's election.

74% thought it would be under 40%

19% thought it would be between 40% and 44%

2 % pulled the lever for between 45% and 49%

2% saw it coming in between 50% and 59%

and a single voter saw it coming in over 60%

Now we won't know the right answer until the election but it fun to prognosticate.

I invite you to leave some comments here as well.

With the passage of the healthcare bill, one of the premises of it is that it will reduce costs by having fewer patients use the emergency room for thier healthcare?The Weekly Standard has an article that looks at that issue. From the article we see:

"In 2005, researchers from Yale University writing in the journal Academic Emergency Medicine approached uninsured patients using emergency rooms in New Haven, Conn. for their medical care and intervened by assigning half the patients to an intensive case management program where the patients were guided to community health centers or to specific primary care practitioners, all of whom were funded by a pre-existing federal program to provide underwritten medical care to the uninsured. These patients were compared to a similar group who were randomly assigned to receive a referral to the free care program but no intensive case management. The researchers found that the patients receiving the intense support were 4 times more likely to see a primary care physician (51% vs. 14%), but there was no difference between groups in either subsequent number of inpatient admissions or subsequent visits to an emergency department!"

http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/now-obamacare-law

This is an interesting read pointing out the question. With a limited number of primary care physicians will we really see a decrease in people using the emergency room for their care or will we just be changing who the people are that use the emergency room that way.