The Post-Freedom Presidency

As I transported my daughter aboard a gas guzzling sedan to middle school Wednesday morning, even one the of the local FM rock stations was getting in on the Veterans’ Day spirit. We sang along to the Lee Greenwood classic, “Proud to be an American”.

The central lyric is so familiar it just rolls off the tongue: “And I’m proud to be an American where at least I know I’m free.”

As we coasted through suburbia on a sun-washed autumn morning that line hit me like a brick wall. At least I know I’m free? Do I? Am I?

In the age of Obama, we were promised the post-racial Presidency. Looks like we were handed the post-Constitutional, post-Declaration of Independence Presidency. For now, we’re still essentially “free” but the scope of that freedom no longer feels like it has infinite boundaries.

It begins with speech. With words. With meaning. And with manipulation of meaning in the name of political correctness and the crushing Socialist agenda sweeping across Washington, D.C.

Consider the following list I drew up in just a matter of minutes. It could be much lengthier for sure, but I fear it demonstrates where we are in the post-Lee Greenwood era.

Not Islamic radicalism … religious diversity.

Not terrorism … alleged shooting incident (Ft. Hood).

Not free-market capitalism … unregulated wealth building.

Not death counseling … an affordable health care option.

Not politically correct … tolerant and fair-minded.

Not Socialist … transformational.

Not a War on Terror … routine law enforcement.

Not freedom of speech … hate-crime speech.

Not productivity … greed.

Not Communism … redistributive justice.

Not Tea Party patriotism … angry white people.

Not Commander in Chief … Campaigner in Chief Barack Hussein Obama.

As Veterans’ Day 2009 slips into history, I am proud to be an American because our brave men and women who wear the uniform make me proud. And because civilians who rise up in the face of violent Jihadist insanity make me proud. I’m thinking about the NYFD and NYPD on 9/11, and about the brave Ft. Hood police officer, Kim Munley, who last week gunned down the terrorist Nidal Hasan.

I’m proud, but I no longer know I’m free. In 2009, my fellow Americans and I are left to pray that we are.

The Dim Reaper

Liberal Florida Congressman Alan Grayson is an ideological terrorist. He is now using the deceased as pawns in his quest to impose government monopolized health care reform on our citizens.

His pathetic web initiative, Names of the Dead, exploits people who have died. He claims they are deceased because we -- the collective "we" -- did not pay for their health care. What a load of unsubstantiated crap. Where were the family members of these people? Friends? Fellow churchgoers? Did we all let them down? Or were they neglected by their own? Grayson's site can not back up its claims. It is a joke.

Acclaimed columnist and blogger Michelle Malkin agrees. She writes that Names of the Dead is based on a flawed, out of date study by single payer health care advocates that concludes around 44,000 people die every year solely due to lack of access to care.

"(The study) attributed deaths to lack of health insurance for all the participants who initially self-reported that they had no insurance and then died for any reason over the 12-year tracking period," Malkin writes. "At no time did the original researchers or the single-payer activists who piggy-backed off their data ever verify whether the supposed casualties of America's callous health care system had insurance or not."

I pledge to launch a new site in 2010, Names of the Politically Brain Dead. Grayson will be its poster boy. But he will be among a sea of discredited names.

This disgusting excuse for a public servant needs to be returned to the rock from under which he crawled, and the people who voted for him should be institutionalized. That would be true health care "reform". Put the mentally deranged away for good. Start with Pelosi, Reid and "Swamp Thing" (Grayson). And their supporters.

Vacation Reading

I'm out of town this week so I won't post much, except sporadic links to good articles. Like this one on health care. It's written by a self-identified Democrat who makes no outlandish claims that all opposition to Obamacare is by right-wing, racist, profiteers (which in Demoland, is redundant). He more thoroughly articulates what RSP has said in different ways:

1. Health insurance isn't health care.
2. Health care costs are driven by the industry's complete lack of consumerism and the distorted incentives mandated by government.
3. There's a broad misuse and misunderstanding of what insurance can/should provide.

Address those issues, says the author, and health care costs can rationalize. IMHO, Obamacare, to the extent it relies on price controls and faux competition will accomplish nothing.

We Scooped Another One!

Evidently, leading conservative commentator (and medical doctor), Charles Krauthammer, has been reading RSP or has been listening in on our weekly lunch meetings. His health care reform is exactly what we've been taking about for years and writing about since January. The only elements that he is missing are to allow the sale of medical insurance across state lines and to allow for the sale of mandate free policies (in addition to, not in lieu of, mandate policies). There, we've fixed healthcare, or more accurately health insurance. Charles, as admirers of yours, we're glad that we paved the way for your article this morning!

Immoral Profit is Redundant

Remember how the saintly, beneficient Speaker Pelosi called out the unadulterated, unregulated profits of those horrible, profiteering, no good, terrible, dastardly, evil villains health insurance companies? Here are net after-tax margins (relative and absolute) of United Healthcare (UNH), Wellpoint (WLP) and Aetna (AET). Also included are number of medical policy holders, according to each company.

UNH: 3.7%/$2.97B/30M (est.)
WLP: 4%/$2.49B/35M
AET: 4.4%/$1.38B/19M

Dear reader, please don't take this as a defense of insurance companies. I don't like them any more than you do. But let's pretend Pelosi's right and health insurance profits are immoral. Fine. Take them all and distribute them evenly across all policyholders.

Thanks for the $80 check Nancy. Great job reforming healthcare.

How Uncynical of You

Thoughts on the rhetoric of the smartest, least cynical, least partisan head of state in the history of the Republic, maybe even in the history of self-determination. From his speech to the AMA (emphasis mine):

Let me also say that -- let me also address a illegitimate concern that's being put forward by those who are claiming that a public option is somehow a Trojan horse for a single-payer system. I'll be honest; there are countries where a single-payer system works pretty well. But I believe -- and I've taken some flak from members of my own party for this belief -- that it's important for our reform efforts to build on our traditions here in the United States. So when you hear the naysayers claim that I'm trying to bring about government-run health care, know this: They're not telling the truth.

When elected officials speak in public they speak for the Government of the United States. They are perfectly free to ignore or disagree with critics all they want, but claiming oppositional views are illegitimate is actual squelching of dissent, which the left prattled on about from exactly 1/18/01 until noon, 1/20/09 (yes, W. did it all the time, too. When he did it the left went bat shit. Now, silence).

Moreover, he positions his as the honest view, and explicitly states the opposition is lying, i.e. saying something they know to be factually incorrect. Since PBO hasn't documented an actual health care plan how could criticism be factually wrong (in his defense, putting a plan in writing is pointless. It's not like Congress actually, you know, reads this stuff)? Critics are expressing an opinion, which by definition can't be a lie. What's more, the criticism is entirely valid. Government funded programs routinely expand beyond their original scope and intent. It's the politician's natural path: if a plan works, it should be larger. If a plan doesn't work, it's because it wasn't large enough.

So, in addition to Obama just being logically wrong, the critics he tries to delegitimize and accuses of lying have a perfectly valid justification for their views. Yeah, it's one paragraph in one speech. But hardly the work of post-partisan, non-cynic.

Socialized Medicine

President Obama is attempting to push us to one of the ultimate dreams of the left – socialized medicine. He even claims that he can pay for it. That would be quite an accomplishment considering that the Congressional Budge Office has estimated the cost over the next ten years to be $1.6 trillion. Of course, this doesn’t include the inevitable cost overruns that occur every time the government proposes a new program. For example, when Medicare was introduced in 1965, the estimated cost in 1990, as adjusted for inflation, was $12 billion. The actual cost in 1990 was $98 billion. Not exactly within the margin of error.

Every one an a while, Congress attempts to rein in the costs of Medicare by reducing the payments to doctors and other health care providers. This creates an incentive on the part of these providers to schedule unnecessary tests or to send patients from specialist to specialist in order to increase revenue. This also forces these providers to charge more from private insurance companies in order to offset the low rates of Medicare.

This causes damage to the entire society. Those covered by Medicare are hurt because the medical profession is less efficient. Those not covered by Medicare are hurt because they are charged more to offset the lower rates paid by Medicare.

The American norm of having employers pay for their employees’ health insurance is a relic of the 1940s when the federal government imposed wage controls. In order to attract employees, businesses were forced to offer non-cash benefits, such as health insurance. The government allowed the businesses to deduct these insurance payments without a corresponding inclusion of these payments in the taxable income of the employees. This, of course, distorted the traditional fee for service system. It also created the incentive to get medical care through employers rather than each person obtaining it on his own. As RSP founder and managing editor, The Daily Pander, points out, employer provide health insurance has really become employer provided pre-paid health care. The insurance component, as traditionally defined, has been lost.

Think about government provided health care as a large buffet in Las Vegas. You pay a relative small fee compared to the amount that you are allowed to consume. Sure, if everyone eats a lot, the cost will increase, but it will be defused over all of the customers at some point in the future. It has no effect on the cost that you are going to pay now. Therefore, you are incentivized to consume as much as you possibly can. Once small passing twinge in your chest, go see a cardiologist. Your nose is running, you’ve got to the infectious disease specialist. There is no incentive to compare costs among providers.

In order to control costs, the government will impose rationing. This has happened in both Canada and the United Kingdom. In Canada, the rates of death from colon cancer is 25% greater than in the US. In the UK, Her Majesty’s government recently announced that they will not make state of the art breast cancer drugs available to those women suffering from that disease because of the cost.

Government imposed rationing sacrifices quality and innovation. It also imposes long wait times. There is no way to control costs without long lines and a lack of incentive to innovate. Can anyone name the last major medical breakthrough or new drug that occurred in either Canada or England?

If our medical system is so bad, why to foreigners come here for treatment that is unavailable in their home countries. Canada can ration its health care in large part because we act as their safety net. Remember all of the royals that have come to the US for treatment when they are sick – Jordanian and Saudi kings ring a bell?

President Obama’s plan will eliminate all that is best with our health care system. We must ask ourselves if this is worth covering the relatively few who are truly uninsured. I think not.

Stimulus Plan Wasn't Political. Why Would Health Care "Reform" Be?

From The Hill.com (emphasis mine):

Senate Democrats are bracing for what they expect will be a huge price tag connected with revamping the nation’s healthcare system.

The soon-to-be-delivered estimate on Democratic healthcare reform proposals is expected to be so expensive that lawmakers are talking about changing the chamber’s normal accounting procedures.

Some Democrats are arguing behind the scenes that they should not use the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office’s (CBO) cost estimate, as is custom. Instead, they would use cost estimates from the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB).

Don't like the facts? Change the facts.

Next thing you know, the White House will be saying it doesn't support Ted Kennedy's health care bill, now that CBO has preliminarily reviewed it.

Oh, wait, that's what the White House did this morning.

Now, why would the WH put some daylight between it and EMK's bill (even though the WH hasn't explicitly endorsed it yet)?

Perhaps, and I'm just spitballing here, because CBO estimates the legislation will:

• Increase federal budget deficits ~$1.0 trillion between 2010 and 2019.
• Decrease the number of people uninsured ~16 million.
• Allow parents to claim as dependents for the purposes of the legislation children up to 27 years old (the budget estimates don't include this, nor does it include administrative cost estimates).

I'll concede "fixing" health care is really f**king hard. There are huge vested economic and political interests, an uninformed electorate and perverse incentives built up and reinforced over decades. I'll also concede federal and state governments have a meaningful role. But the smartest guy ever was happy to use fear to sell a crap stimulus bill that could have been a good one because he's as political as anyone who's ever been President, maybe even more.

Keep that in mind when he says he doesn't intend to make health care, like GM, an owned and operated subsidiary of the U.S. Government.