Obamacare and Death Panels

About Those Death Panels . . .

The very real threat of government health care rationing.

When Sarah Palin warned that Obamacare could lead to medical rationing and “death panels,” supporters were outraged. ALARMISM! THEY ROARED. A LIE! RIGHT-WING PROPAGANDA! Alas for supporters of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, PALIN’S PROVOCATIVE SOUND BITE WAS AT LEAST PARTLY GROUNDED IN REALITY—WHICH IS WHY THE TERM ENTERED THE POLITICAL LEXICON….

…..Oregon, a decidedly liberal state, provides an unequivocal example. IN 1993, THE CLINTON ADMINISTRATION GAVE PERMISSION TO THE OREGON HEALTH PLAN, THE STATE’S MEDICAID PROGRAM, TO INTRODUCE RATIONING. The system involves a treatment schedule that lists 649 potentially covered procedures. THE STATE PEGS THE NUMBER OF PROCEDURES THE STATE WILL COVER TO THE AVAILABLE FUNDS. PATIENTS REQUIRING PROCEDURES ABOVE THE CUTOFF LINE ARE OUT OF LUCK.

As of October 2010, only the first 502 treatments were covered. But even that low number doesn’t tell the full story of rationing in Oregon. The Oregon Health Plan also rations covered procedures under certain circumstances. CHEMOTHERAPY, FOR INSTANCE, IS NOT PROVIDED IF IT IS DEEMED TO HAVE A 5 PERCENT OR LESS CHANCE OF EXTENDING THE PATIENT’S LIFE FOR FIVE YEARS, MEANING THAT A PATIENT WHOSE LIFE MIGHT BE EXTENDED A YEAR OR TWO WITH CHEMO MAY NOT RECEIVE IT.

Worse, even though it is not a formally ranked procedure, ASSISTED SUICIDE IS COVERED UNDER STATE LAW. Thus, when two RECURRENT CANCER PATIENTS WERE RATIONED OUT OF RECEIVING POTENTIALLY LIFE-EXTENDING CHEMOTHERAPY IN 2008, AN ADMINISTRATOR WROTE A LETTER ASSURING THEM THAT THE STATE WOULD PAY FOR THE COSTS ASSOCIATED WITH THEIR ASSISTED SUICIDES. TALK ABOUT A DEATH PANEL!

http://www.weeklystandard.com/articles/about-those-death-panels_536874.html?page=1


Given a red headline, because this is certainly something you want to read. Much more information that will demonstrate where we are going with Obamacare. Mean while overseas where they do have single payer healthcare….

I’d sooner let a Tesco butcher fix my toe than ask the NHS

For three weeks I’ve been limping around on a broken toe. The horse stamped on it and I’m in agony, but I’M NOT GOING TO GET IT SEEN TO BECAUSE I DO NOT WANT TO GO ANYWHERE NEAR MY LOCAL HOSPITAL. I’m sorry, I know I will get complaints from doctors and nurses about how hard they work. I know the NHS is a sacred institution that must not be criticised. But I have been to St George’s Hospital in Tooting in London, and my nearest alternative, King’s College in Denmark Hill, and HELL AND HIGH WATER WOULDN’T DRAG ME BACK TO EITHER.

I consider a little toe the size of a big toe far preferable to the horrors that might await me at either of those emporiums of state-sponsored, one-size-fits-all, “SIT DOWN AND DO AS YOU’RE TOLD” TOTALITARIANISM.

The last time I went to St George’s, THEY MADE ME FILL IN A QUESTIONNAIRE ABOUT MY DRINKING HABITS BEFORE THEY WOULD EVEN LOOK AT MY INJURY, which was a hole through the middle of my hand where I had got it stuck in my horse’s mouth. I told them I had been teetotal for most of my adult life, but that didn’t put them off. THEY MERCILESSLY INSISTED I TICK ABOUT 30 BOXES WITH A “NO” OR “NEVER”, WHILE GRIPPING AND WRITING WITH ONE HAND, BEFORE I QUALIFIED FOR ANYTHING APPROACHING CARE.

And all the while, I could see people being admitted for emergency dental work. This is not my NHS, I thought. It’s someone else’s. I just pay for it. It quite likes my tax money but is not the least bit concerned about me. If it does care, it cares only in so much as I am fodder for its next risk assessment......

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/8277821/Id-sooner-let-a-Tesco-butcher-fix-my-toe-than-ask-the-NHS.html


Death panels, poor service, intrusive questioning are all hallmarks of government run healthcare.

The Obama Code

“INVESTMENT,” SENATE REPUBLICAN LEADER MITCH MCCONNELL NOTED, IS A CODE WORD when uttered by President Obama and Democrats. It means, he said on Fox News Sunday, “WE WANT TO SPEND.” Indeed, that’s what Obama and Democrats most want to do.


But “investment” isn’t the only code word you’re likely to hear from Obama in his State of the Union address tonight on Capitol Hill. He’s sure to use other words designed to mask what he and Democrats are up to. More often than not, THE CODE WORDS ARE INVOKED TO HIDE ONE THING: MORE AND MORE GOVERNMENT INTERVENTION IN THE ECONOMY.


OBAMA’S FAVORITE NEW WORD IS “COMPETITIVENESS.” This doesn’t mean he wants to enact free market reforms to increase competition in the private sector. Perish the thought. HE WANTS TO FUND PROGRAMS THAT AID OR SUBSIDIZE INDUSTRIES INVOLVED INTO GLOBAL MARKETS. Once again, it points to more spending, more intervention.


The president ALSO WANTS TO “WIN THE FUTURE,” as he put it in a 4-minute video he sent last week to followers from his 2008 campaign. Who takes the lead in achieving this? Not the private economy unleashed by tax cuts and deregulation. FREE MARKETS AND FREE INDIVIDUALS CAN’T BE TRUSTED WITH THIS TASK. THE GOVERNMENT MUST BE IN CHARGE.


Both winning the future and competitiveness have another role. Properly understood, they’re a diversion from the present, with its weak economy and high unemployment. You’re supposed to ignore what’s happening today and look to the future, when competitiveness has kicked in a few years down the road and the American economy is victorious.

http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/ryan-v-obama-round-4_537206.html



Here are some code words from the Republicans: Responsibility, Fiscal Sanity, Unsustainability and unleashing the free market. All these mean less spending, investments, government sponsored competitiveness and government directed “wins in the future.”


Mortgage Giants Leave Legal Bills to the Taxpayers

SINCE THE GOVERNMENT TOOK OVER FANNIE MAE AND FREDDIE MAC, TAXPAYERS HAVE SPENT MORE THAN $160 MILLION DEFENDING THE MORTGAGE FINANCE COMPANIES AND THEIR FORMER TOP EXECUTIVES IN CIVIL LAWSUITS ACCUSING THEM OF FRAUD. The cost was a closely guarded secret until last week, when the companies and their regulator produced an accounting at the request of Congress.

The bulk of those expenditures — $132 million — went to defend Fannie Mae and its officials in various securities suits and government investigations into accounting irregularities that occurred years before the subprime lending crisis erupted. THE LEGAL PAYMENTS SHOW NO SIGN OF ABATING.

Documents reviewed by The New York Times indicate that taxpayers have paid $24.2 million to law firms defending three of Fannie’s former top executives: Franklin D. Raines, its former chief executive; Timothy Howard, its former chief financial officer; and Leanne Spencer, the former controller.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/24/business/24fees.html?_r=2&nl=todaysheadlines&emc=tha2


The left continues to ignore the role of Fannie and Freddie in the economic crisis we had. Barney Frank was reelected and whenever F&F or the CRA are mentioned as drivers of the global crisis, the left pretends that they’ve never heard anything so foolish.

Why a Liberal is glad to say goodbye to Keith Olbermann

.....The show began in 2003, when large swathes of the journalistic profession appeared to have been cowed -- not just by the Bush administration per se but by a jingoistic atmosphere that lingered too long after 9/11 and took many unwise forms.

IN THAT ENVIRONMENT, OLBERMANN WAS FRESH, EVEN DARING. The show’s increasingly forceful liberalism through its early years made for some riveting TV moments, the best-known perhaps his 2006 takedown of then-Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.

THE FRESHNESS CURDLED SOON ENOUGH.

In his farewell remarks on Friday, OLBERMANN PROUDLY PROCLAIMED THAT HIS SHOW WAS "ANTI-ESTABLISHMENT." IN RECENT YEARS, THAT DESCRIPTION WAS A STRETCH, AT BEST.

Everything from the increasingly contrived "Worst Person in the World" segments to the host’s persona -- a kind of an ersatz version of Walter Cronkite, with infinitely more "attitude" but infinitely less real authority -- had settled into a rut. PREDICTABILITY AND SELF-IMPORTANCE WERE THE MAIN FEATURES.

"Countdown" had a niche -- a profitable one for both the network and its host, who was rumored to have negotiated a $30 million four-year contract in 2008 -- and Olbermann apparently saw little need for change......

But, more importantly, THERE WAS A YEARS-LONG PROCESSION OF PUNDITS WHOSE ONLY APPARENT PURPOSE WAS TO CONFIRM THE CORRECTNESS AND BRILLIANCE OF THE HOST’S EVERY UTTERANCE. The spectacle was one in which purportedly respectable journalists seemed to fall over themselves to play courtier to King Smug.....

http://www.salon.com/news/politics/war_room/2011/01/22/stanage_olbermann/index.html


Olbermann’s departure is causing the gnashing of teeth over at the Huffington Post, but I think this liberal has it correct.


Here’s another look at the Olbermann’s departure.

http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2011-01-23/keith-olbermann-how-anger-fueled-his-rise-and-fall-at-msnbc/?cid=hp:mainpromo2



Tucson, Piven, and the Left

DREIER’S DEFENSE OF PIVEN IS COMPLETELY AT ODDS WITH THE UPSHOT OF HER WRITINGS, WHICH LOVINGLY CHRONICLE EFFORTS BY COMMUNITY ORGANIZERS TO INTENSIFY RIOTS AND VIOLENT PROTESTS. I explain Piven’s strategy on NRO’s homepage today in “Frances Fox Piven’s Violent Agenda.” DREIER’S EFFORTS TO TURN PIVEN INTO A LATTER-DAY INCARNATION OF MARTIN LUTHER KING ARE ABSURD. Piven looks forward to rioting and urges community organizers not to waste time channeling violent protests into conventional politics but to escalate disruptions for maximum leverage. Dreier’s defense of Piven’s latest controversial editorial in the Nation leaves out the crucial passage where she calls for Euro-style protest riots in the United States.

THE HOPE OF SILENCING BECK IN THE WAKE OF TUCSON HAS LURED THE LEFT INTO A STRATEGIC BLUNDER. They’ve decided to turn Piven into a martyr. Yet in doing so THE LEFT HAS TIED ITSELF TO PIVEN’S WILD WRITINGS AND OVER-THE-TOP RADICALISM. Dreier acts as though Piven’s scholarly work is somehow different from the calls for rioting, crisis, and polarization in her two notorious Nation articles. Actually, Piven’s scholarly writings are worse. READ POOR PEOPLE’S MOVEMENTS AND YOU’LL SEE WHAT I MEAN. The left could and should have disowned Piven’s extremism long ago. Jack Beatty’s 1977 review of Poor People’s Movements in the Nation was actually negative, calling Piven to account for her counterproductive and intentionally polarizing tactics. A QUARTER CENTURY LATER THE NATION HAS EMBRACED PIVEN’S CALL FOR EURO-STYLE RIOTING IN AMERICA, allowing her to speak with the magazine’s editorial voice. It’s not Beck who’s tarring the left with the Brush of Piven’s radicalism. They’re doing it to themselves.

http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/257747/tucson-piven-and-lefts-strategic-blunder-stanley-kurtz


This is worth reading. The left’s radical agenda as exemplified by Frances Fox Piven is a violent one. Calling for civility in speech even while their members call for violence in the streets is simply disingenuous. Dreier defends her and attacks the right. Here’s a link to Kurtz’s article Frances Fox Piven’s Violent Agenda.


http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/257733/frances-fox-piven-s-violent-agenda-stanley-kurtz


And here’s another one giving you more information of Piven and how the MSM is playing the story

http://bigjournalism.com/dloesch/2011/01/24/suddenly-radical-frances-fox-piven-is-old-widowed-college-professor/


Bury Lenin: Majority of Russians say

TWO-THIRDS OF RUSSIANS WANT VLADIMIR LENIN TO BE REMOVED FROM HIS RED SQUARE MAUSOLEUM IN CENTRAL MOSCOW, A NEW POLL HAS SHOWN. The poll, organised by Vladimir Putin’s ruling United Russia party, comes after a senior figure in the party sparked a lively debate on the issue, saying THE TIME HAD COME TO RESPECT LENIN’S LAST WISHES AND BURY HIM IN ST PETERSBURG ALONGSIDE HIS MOTHER.

“Lenin was an extremely controversial political figure and his presence as the main figure in a necropolis in the heart of our country is absurd,” Anatoly Medinsky, an MP and member of the party’s governing committee, said.

Only 10 per cent of Lenin’s corpse remained, he said, alleging that the rest had been “ripped out and replaced a long time ago”. The body’s presence in a purpose-built mausoleum on Red Square had turned the country’s central square into a cemetery and was “blasphemous”, Mr Medinsky added. Lenin’s waxy corpse remains a popular tourist attraction and is regularly treated with a special cocktail of chemicals to stop it from degrading. But with a parliamentary election looming later this year and a presidential poll next year, analysts believe that the ruling United Russia party may be considering closing the Red Square mausoleum in order to show the world it is serious about modernising the country

.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/russia/8276991/Russians-want-Lenin-removed-from-Red-Square.html


This is better than what they did to unpopular rulers in ancient Rome. They would throw their bodies in the Tiber River like a common criminal. The horror Lenin brought to Russia might make people consider a similar fate.


Waiting For Betelgeuse To Explode: 2012? Second Sun?

Either we won't live to see it or Betelgeuse could do a supernova explosion at any time and for a couple of weeks it'll be much brighter out.

THE SECOND BIGGEST STAR IN THE UNIVERSE IS LOSING MASS, A TYPICAL INDICATION THAT A GRAVITATION COLLAPSE IS OCCURRING.

When that happens, WE'LL GET OUR SECOND SUN, ACCORDING TO DR BRAD CARTER, Senior Lecturer of Physics at the University of Southern Queensland.

I think this means it will be bright at night if Earth is at the right point in its orbit. Anyone know the direction of Betelgeuse as compared the plain of our solar system? Do we have the Sun between us and Betelgeuse during some part of the year?

If it is bright enough to appear as a second sun then won't it heat up the atmosphere? What fraction of the Sun's radiation would that supernova provide?

BUT SINCE BETELGEUSE MIGHT NOT EXPLODE FOR A MILLION YEARS SOME ASTRONOMERS THINK THE ARTICLE ABOVE MAKES TOO MUCH OF THE POSSIBILITY. One astronomer says it will only get as bright as the moon. I guess I'll go back to worrying about VEI 7 (volcanic explosivity index 7) and VEI 8 eruptions. A VEI 7 would repeat the 1816 Year Without Summer. A VEI 8 would probably cause an ice age. Billions would die.

http://www.futurepundit.com/archives/007846.html


So it might be as bright as our sun, or perhaps the moon. It might fry us or not and we might plunge us into an ice age. It might happen in a few months or it might be a million years from now. Sometime science is not only not precise, but it's unknown.