House GOP poised to hold vote on repeal of ObamaCare after Supreme Court ruling [30th Time!]
[FoxNews.com]
Published July 10, 2012
House Republican leaders are forging ahead with plans to hold a vote Wednesday on a full repeal of President Obama’s health care law, after launching debate on the repeal measure Tuesday nearly two weeks after the Supreme Court upheld most of the law as constitutional.
Wednesday will mark the chamber’s second vote to repeal the Affordable Care Act in full, though this attempt is being given no greater chance of passing the Democratic-controlled Senate. Obama has vowed to veto any such measure, were it to reach his desk.
House Republicans have held 29 other votes aiming to gut specific parts of the law since 2011.
Obama’s Middle Class Tax Hikes
[RedState.com]
Posted by: Daniel Horowitz (Diary)
Tuesday, July 10th at 12:00PM EDT
While Obama is prosecuting a flaccid war overseas and apologizing for our troops when they defend against Taliban attacks, he is fighting a no-holds-barred class war at home. Once again, Obama has announced that he will orchestrate the largest tax hike in American history on those earning more than $200,000. After all, taxing the rich is a great way to raise revenue; it worked so well in Maryland. Oh, wait.
But fear not, he will renew the Bush tax cuts on those earning under $200,000, while repackaging them as his own tax cuts.
There’s one problem with Obama’s assertion that he hasn’t raised taxes on the middle class. YOU LIE! Government regulations and interventions that Obama supports will raise the cost of living on the middle class for the most vital goods and services. Those higher costs will trump any savings they actualize as a result of the tax cut extension. Oh, and there’s one other problem. He’s forgetting about the massive tax increase on all those who don’t purchase government-approved health insurance.
In that vein, let’s review some of the hidden [or not so hidden] tax increases on the “middle class” that Obama has orchestrated:
Santorum steps up to the plate
[HumanEvents.com]
A big day dawns for the dark-horse conservative candidate.
by John Hayward
February 07, 2012
Tuesday could be Rick Santorum’s big day – his chance to break back into the news cycle with some strong primary performances, and make the case that he’s a better choice than Newt Gingrich for those seeking an alternative to Mitt Romney.
On the national level, it’s really still a fairly close race. An ABC News / Washington Post poll concluded on the eve of this weekend’s Nevada caucuses had Romney in the lead with 38 percent support, but Gingrich, Santorum, and Ron Paul were fairly close together with 24, 18, and 14 percent, respectively. Very few delegates have been assigned by the primaries and caucuses held thus far. There is still plenty of time for the race to change.
It’s the local polling that makes Tuesday exciting for the Santorum campaign. Missouri is holding a “just for show” meaningless primary ahead of its March caucuses, but Santorum is looking very good there. He’s just a hair behind Gingrich, and a bit ahead of Romney, but Gingrich didn’t qualify for the primary, so Santorum has a great opening to win over those march Missouri caucus-goers.
Reason.tv: Will the Ohio Healthcare Freedom Amendment End Obamacare?
[BigGovernment.com]
Posted Nov 2nd 2011 at 1:13 pm
by Reason TV
“If you’re going to take away liberty and property, there has to be some sort of due process involved,” says Chris Littleton, the head of Ohioans for Healthcare Freedom and a Tea Party leader in the Buckeye state. “In this case, as citizens, we feel that those things are fundamentally inhibited and we want the Supreme Court to hear our case on this.”
Littleton’s group is pushing an upcoming ballot initiative that would amend the state constitution to prevent citizens’ involuntary participation in any health-insurance system. The U.S. Supreme Court is widely expected to issue a ruling on the constituationality of what’s known as the “individual mandate” in Obamacare and Littelton thinks passage of the Ohio Healthcare Freedom Amendment will give his state unique legal standing: “This is citizen-initiated, which is very unique. If it passes, Ohio will be the only state that’s done something like that.” While most challenges to the individual mandate revolve around the limits of Congress’ commerce clause powers, Littleton believes the amendment will activate due process and 10th Amendment considerations.
CNN Poll: 59% Believe Obama’s Policies Will Fail
[HotAir.com]
posted at 10:05 am on October 18, 2011 by Ed Morrissey
It’s hard to know what to make of this release from the latest CNN poll. Barack Obama continues to run underwater on overall job approval in the CNN poll, improving slightly since early September’s 43/55 to 46/50 today. However, American confidence in his policies hit a new low — well below his approval rating:
A CNN/ORC International Poll released Monday indicates that 46% of the public approves of the job the president is doing in the White House, basically unchanged from September, with 50% saying they disapprove of how he is handling his duties. …
According to the survey, 36% say they think the president’s policies will succeed, with 59% saying Obama’s policies will fail, up 12 points from last year and nearly double the 32% who said in 2009 that the president’s policies will fail. Most Democrats and independent voters say they hope Obama’s policies will succeed. But a majority of Republicans say they hope Obama’s policies will fail.
Weinergate: The Moment Democrats Lost Control of the Debt Ceiling Narrative
BigGovernment.com
Posted Aug 2nd 2011 at 2:29 pm
You might recall this extraordinary press conference on May 31, 2011, when then-Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-NY) called a reporter a “jackass” in refusing to answer questions about his (false) allegation that someone had hacked his Twitter account.
Instead, he wanted to talk about the debt ceiling: “We are, tonight…going to be casting a vote on something has monumental importance to our economy…I want to focus on that.”
Later that evening, a staggering bipartisan majority voted down the “clean” debt ceiling increase that President Barack Obama had wanted.
Appeals Court Fast-Tracks Obamacare Challenge
VisionToAmerica.com
March 24, 2011
A federal appeals court has cleared the way for a legal challenge to Obamacare to be put on a fast-track through the appeals courts — on its way to the U.S. Supreme Court.This decision will expedite the legal process that is necessary for federal courts to rule on the legislation’s constitutionality.
Last Thursday, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit granted a motion by The American Center for Law and Justice (ACLJ) to fast-track an appeal of a decision by a federal district court in February that dismissed its lawsuit against Obamacare.
A federal appeals court has cleared the way for a legal challenge to Obamacare to be put on a fast-track through the appeals courts — on its way to the U.S. Supreme Court.
This decision will expedite the legal process that is necessary for federal courts to rule on the legislation’s constitutionality.
Last Thursday, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit granted a motion by The American Center for Law and Justice (ACLJ) to fast-track an appeal of a decision by a federal district court in February that dismissed its lawsuit against Obamacare.
Bill Gates Supports Socialized Medicine: ‘I’d Take Any Rich Country’s Medical System Over Ours’
BigGovernment.com
Posted Mar 20th 2011 at 1:50 pm
[Editor: Either Bill Gates got a bad diagnosis from a U. S. doctor he didn't like, or Mr. Macrohard has been drinking some of that Socialist cool aid! If he like Germany or Swiss medicine, he should move there. As for me and my family, we're optimistic about American Health Care; not socialist or single payer, but GOOD AMERICAN HEALTH CARE.]
Bill Gates of Microsoft fame (or infamy) visited the Claremont Colleges this past week. You can watch that visit here. What follows is a transcript typed by one of my associates of that event.
Gates, after discussing his foundation’s work, had harsh words for America’s health care system.
Our health care system has huge problems. It’s got equity problems where the poorest in the country of all the rich countries our poorest quarter get the worst health care so the accessibility is a huge problem.
Patient Groups Speak Out Against FDA Rationing of Breast Cancer Drug
BigGovernment.com
Posted Feb 21st 2011 at 2:11 pm
The cancer drug Avastin has become ground zero in the debate of the future of our health care system. Will drugs and treatments be rationed under a government-run system? Will patients have the same access and options as they do under our current plan? Will patients be subject to a “cost-benefit” analysis by government bureaucrats – like in other countries — when deciding what drugs the government will cover and what drugs they won’t?
Recent actions by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to “de-label” the late stage cancer drug raise these and other issues critical to the future of our health care system. The FDA proposal would essentially allow Medicare and other insurance plans, including private ones – to tell patients they will need to cover the cost of the treatment on their own. There would no longer be an obligation to pay for treatment. If you want Avastin as an option in your efforts to fight breast cancer, you would have to pay for it. And what if you cannot afford the estimated $80,000 a year for treatment? The FDA won’t answer that question.
The maker of the drug has petitioned the FDA for a hearing on their actions and have yet to be granted even the ability to make their case. But they have strong advocates in their corner, including a number of influential patient advocacy groups that fear the FDA’s decision will limit patient and doctors choices in the future.
Obamacare ‘Void’ of Law and Sense
BigGovernment.com
Posted Feb 14th 2011 at 1:39 pm
by Jack Painter
A second federal judge has just ruled that Congress exceeded its constitutional authority when it mandated that most Americans must purchase health insurance starting in 2014.
Whatever the Supreme Court eventually decides on that constitutional question, the so-called “individual mandate” is an unprecedented expansion of government power.
The government has long claimed the power to coerce you not to act in specific ways. In other words, the government says “You can’t do X.” This happens, for example, when a law says you can’t drive above the speed limit or steal from your neighbor.
The government also claims the power to coerce you to act in specific ways, but when it does so, it rarely says “You must do X.” Instead it says, “If you choose to do X, you must do X in a certain manner.” For example, if you choose to build a house, you must comply with building codes. Or it says, “If you choose to do X, you must do Y as well.” If you choose to earn taxable income, you must file a tax return and pay a tax; or if you choose to drive a car on public roads, you must purchase auto insurance.
Until now, the only time the federal government has flat out said “You must do X” has been in the case of military conscription. In that case, the government coercion has had nothing to do with a choice you’ve made. It has applied merely because you reside in this country. (State laws requiring the education of children are similar.)
The Obamacare individual mandate is like military conscription.
The government coerces you to act in specific ways (purchase health insurance) merely because you are a citizen. You cannot make a choice to forego certain activities and avoid the government coercion.
CPAC Release of Explosive Pigford Undercover Audio Evidence
BigGovernment.com
Posted Feb 9th 2011 at 1:55 pm
How easy is it to file a false claim in the Pigford settlement?
Have people been signing up for Pigford under the belief that it’s reparations for slavery?
Was the settlement intended to help black farmers hijacked to benefit people who had never farmed?
There has been conjecture and circumstantial evidence about these controversial questions surrounding the Pigford “Black Farmers” settlement for years but a complicit mainstream media’s lack of serious investigation has meant there has been little ‘hard evidence’ to prove or disprove these allegations.
Until now.
The Democrats’ Healthcare Conundrum
PajamasMedia.com
The battle over President Barack Obama’s plan to change the U.S. health care system is far from over. Getting a bill through the Congress and signed into law may have won him the first round – but the debate renews with the opening of the 112th Congress.
As several legal and constitutional challenges work their way through the federal courts system, the U.S. House of Representatives, now controlled by the Republicans, has scheduled a vote (this week) to junk the whole thing. It’s likely to pass, perhaps even by a veto-proof majority if the Democrats who voted against it last year – and who are still in Congress – join with the GOP in pushing for its repeal.
This means, once again, that the action moves to the United States Senate where, it should be recalled, the original ObamaCare proposal languished for months until Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid could figure out a strategy to get it to the floor for a vote.
With the Democrats still in the majority in the Senate – albeit by a narrower margin – most political commentators expect the repeal language to die a slow, lingering death as Reid uses every parliamentary trick at his disposal to keep it from coming to the floor for a vote.
Report: Harmful Errors, Accidents Still Common in Hospitals
FoxNews | Reuters
Published November 25, 2010
AP
NEW YORK – Despite a decade of efforts to improve patient safety in hospitals — initially inspired by a seminal report on the problem from the U.S. Institute of Medicine in 2000 — harmful errors and accidents are still common, new research suggests.
The study, published in the New England Journal of Medicine, showed that between 2002 and 2007, the number of patients experiencing infections acquired in the hospital, medication errors, complications from diagnostic techniques or treatments, and other such “harms” did not change.
Researchers looked at 2,300 patient admission records from 10 randomly selected hospitals in North Carolina. They found 588 incidents of patient harm resulting from medical procedures, medications, or other causes. Two-thirds of these complications were considered preventable by reviewers at the hospitals themselves.
Recently, the U.S. Office of the Inspector General released a report estimating that medical complications contribute to 180,000 patient deaths per year, and that overall, these complications cost Medicare up to $4.4 billion annually.
Pelosi Knows the Tea Party Has Its ‘Most Effective Weapon’ Aimed At Her
BigGovernment.com
Glen Templeton \”God Bless Good Old Boys\”
Harvard Professor V.O. Key, Jr stated in his seminal work, “The Responsible Electorate”: “The most effective weapon of popular control in a democratic system is the capacity to throw a party from power.” That weapon is aimed at San Francisco liberal Nancy Pelosi and her cohorts who hijacked the peoples’ House.
There has been much said about the Tea Party blaming its views on right wing talk show hosts and political pundits. Many believe the Tea Party was formed by a Democratic Party and Administrations false conclusion that their success in the 2008 election was a vindication of their beliefs, the swing of the electorate response to the campaign positions taken, an indication of the intuitive mood of the people and, finally, as the respect it represents by an intelligent electorate.
Key concluded: “This narcissistic approach assumes it’s most repulsive form among election winners who have championed intolerance, who have stirred the passions and hatreds of people, or who have advocated causes known by decent men to be outrageous or dangerous in their long run circumstances.” The great Presidential scholar Richard Neustadt called it the pivotal nature of character to Presidential performance and James Barber of Duke University enhanced it with his classic book “Presidential Character”. They both concluded that it was character more than policy that determines Presidential performance.
Top 10 Failures of Obamanomics
BigGovernment.com
Posted Sep 23rd 2010 at 7:46 am
by Vince Haley
President Obama unveiled his latest economic proposal in Cleveland recently in a desperate attempt to boost the Democrats’ fleeting hopes of maintaining control of Congress this November. But after two years of massive government spending and job-killing policies, the damage has already been done and it’s clear this fall’s election will be boiled down to a simple choice: job killers versus job creators.
With unemployment at 9.6%, the American people are clamoring for candidates with a solutions-oriented agenda for job creation as an alternative to the job-killing policies of the Obama-Pelosi-Reid machine.
Intel CEO Paul Otellini described it this way: “I think this group does not understand what it takes to create jobs. And I think they’re flummoxed by their experiment in Keynesian economics not working.”
Simply put, candidates who propose job-creating policies and show how their opponent’s policies are killing jobs will win decisively in 2010.
American Solutions has already put forth its Jobs Here, Jobs Now, Jobs First plan, so let’s examine the top 10 job-killing policies of the Obama-Pelosi-Reid machine.
1. $1 Trillion ObamaCare
Despite being law for less than a year, ObamaCare has already had a devastating impact on the economy. For example, Milwaukee-based Assurant Health is eliminating 130 jobs due to the new healthcare law, while one of Iowa’s largest companies, Deere & Company, said ObamaCare will cost them $150 million. AT&T, meanwhile, was hit with $1 billion in new costs related to the law. And that is just the tip of the iceberg. According to a study from the National Federation of Independent Business, within the first five years of ObamaCare over 1.6 million jobs will be lost because of the employer mandate alone.
2. $800 Billion Failed Stimulus
Despite having no basis in economics—and widely mocked as unserious—the Obama administration foolishly continues to claim the stimulus “saved or created” millions of jobs. However, for a far more accurate characterization look no further than the Bureau of Labor Statistics, which calculates that more than 2.5 million jobs have been lost since the stimulus became law. If you factor in jobs “lost and dislocated,” that number could be as high as 4 million.
3. Cap and Trade Energy Tax
According to the Heritage Foundation, Waxman-Markey, the House-passed version of cap and trade, could kill more than 1 million jobs per year, raise annual energy costs by $829 for the average family, and increase gasoline prices by $1.38 per gallon. The Senate version of cap and trade, Kerry-Lieberman, is equally destructive. A study by Chamberlain Economics found the Kerry-Lieberman bill would kill 522,000 jobs in 2015, and up to 5.1 million jobs by 2050. Families would also face an additional burden of $1,042 per year as a result of the bill.
4. 2011 Automatic Tax Increases
If the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts are not extended by January 1, 2011, then a $3.8 trillion tax increase will hit every American who pays income taxes. According to the Tax Policy Center, expiration of these tax cuts will increase the average tax filer’s burden by $1,368 per year. Additionally, analysts at Deutsche Bank predicted that GDP could drop by as much as 1.5% if the tax cuts expire. Just last week, 31 House Democrats sent a letter to Speaker Pelosi and Majority Leader Hoyer indicating their support for extending all of the tax cuts.
5. $13 Trillion National Debt
If you add up the massive expansion of government outlined in this list and elsewhere, the national debt has increased by $2.4 trillion under President Obama’s watch to a total of over $13 trillion. Even worse, the White House projects the national debt to double by 2020 to over $26 trillion. As CBS News’ Mark Knoller wrote, “If you could buy stock in the National Debt, do it. It’s headed for the moon.”
Selling Obama’s Spending Plans: Just Pay Separate Processing and Handling
BigGovernment.com
Posted Aug 9th 2010 at 9:27 am
Sound familiar? Most everyone has heard it time and time again. It’s the way many TV sales pitches end after seeming to give the viewing audience something for nothing. It’s a sucker’s pitch. It usually works like this: you are offered the gadget of the moment for the bargain price (typically) of $19.95, and you get an additional gadget for free. Then comes the addendum (very quickly and often in a whisper) “just pay separate processing and handling.” The fee is never disclosed, but it’s always there (typically $9.95 for each gadget, or another $19.90 for both which brings the total to $39.85 exclusive of shipping charges) proving there are no free lunches. This deceitful advertising used by television pitchman works so well that its equivalent has become the new Obama-Pelosi-Reid pitch to disguise the true cost of their programs.
And while this may not be a precise analogy for the way things are done in Washington, it’s close enough. “Just pay processing and handling” is our metaphor for the entire panoply of Washington speak that produces programs, the costs of which are often orders of magnitude more than originally represented. We are, almost daily it seems, pitched free lunches or “benefits” by our government. And while the seemingly irreversible debt we are currently piling on our children and grandchildren is truly unprecedented in American history, this administration did not invent the government “free lunch” shell game; they’ve simply refined and extended it with complete abandon. As Ronald Reagan so aptly warned, “The nine most terrifying words in the English language are I’m from the government and I’m here to help.”
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