ObamaCare: Regulations and Applications

 AP Exclusive: Applying for health care not easy 

"Applying for benefits under President Barack Obama's health care overhaul could be as daunting as doing your taxes.

"The government's draft application is now on the Internet.
"It runs 15 pages for a three-person family. The online version has 21 steps, some with added questions.
"At least three major federal agencies, including the IRS, will scrutinize your application.
"That's just the first part of the process, which lets you know if you qualify for financial help.
"You'd still have to pick a health plan."

The Obamacare Application   "The application itself runs 15 pages for a family of three. The draft questionnaire that will be used to determine eligibility for subsidized insurance, composed by the Center for Medicare & Medicaid Services, runs 61 pages. 
"The AP’s conclusion is apt: “The idea that picking a health insurance plan could be as simple as shopping on the Internet is starting to look like wishful thinking.” "

 

Senate rejects Republican effort to repeal ObamaCare  "The Republican sponsors of the repeal knew it would fail Wednesday but said it was important to put senators on the record. Twenty Democratic-held seats and 13 seats held by Republicans will be up for election next year."

More problems with implementing Obamacare 

How did we get here?  

First, government programs are always more expensive than anticipated.  It is the way it is.
Second, my guess is that most Democrats voted for this law expecting The Supreme Court to reverse it.  A judicial rebuke would have given the Democrats the best of both worlds:  they voted for it but those 5 guys appointed by Bush, Bush & Reagan took your universal health care away.
Well, Supreme Court Justice Roberts spoiled the party.  He approved BO-Care on the grounds that Congress can raise taxes.
So the Democrats are now stuck in a place that they do not want to be in:  

Raising Taxes Won’t Help

American Institute for Economic Research.
Whether or not higher rates are politically popular, they cannot solve the problem of the rising federal budget deficit.

"Federal tax revenues have averaged 19.6 percent of GDP since World War II. As the chart above shows, federal receipts broke the 20 percent ceiling only once, reaching 20.6 percent during the tech boom of 2000.
"This has led many economists to argue that it is irresponsible for the U.S. to make long-term commitments to expenditure levels above about 20 percent of GDP. Nonetheless, government expenditure was 25.5 percent of GDP in 2011 and is projected to be more than 24 percent this year."

The above is an argument from reason. An ad hominem argument would be if instead of the above, I merely said Democrats are Marxists or idiots. Many leftists -Chris Matthews comes to mind- would respond to the above argument by merely calling me a racist or a tool of the rich.
Unfortunately - if you will forgive the ad hominem attack - this worked with the half of the population who voted for Obama.
More on this subject in the next post. TD

Hate Speech: Telling the Truth about Economics and Islamic Terror

Godfather Politics   "Once liberals define a word or give meaning to a political verbal weapon like hate speech, they own it. Abortion is about being “pro-choice” not pro-abortion. Homosexuality is not about sexual relations with people of the same sex; it’s about “gay pride,” whatever that means. And that’s the point. Ambiguity is the name of the game.
"The same is true of hate speech. If you disagree with liberals on an issue, the disagreement is designated as hate speech. When liberals are losing an argument, they resort to rhetorical diarrhea and call it hate speech: racist, homophobe, propagator of hate, war on women."
....
"An ad hominem (“to the man”) is an attack on the person instead of against his or her argument."  Emphasis added    Read more:

Too bad McCain wasn't that direct in real life.

German pilot in WWII spared an American B-17 pilot over Germany only to reunite 40 years later and become fishing buddies

Don't you love stories like this?
War History Online

...."The B-17 pilot, Charles Brown, was a 21-year-old West Virginia farm boy on his first combat mission. His bomber had been shot to pieces by swarming fighters, and his plane was alone in the skies above Germany. Half his crew was wounded, and the tail gunner was dead, his blood frozen in icicles over the machine guns.
"But when Brown and his co-pilot, Spencer “Pinky” Luke, looked at the fighter pilot again, something odd happened. The German didn’t pull the trigger. He nodded at Brown instead. What happened next was one of the most remarkable acts of chivalry recorded during World War II. Years later, Brown would track down his would-be executioner for a reunion that reduced both men to tears."....

...."Stigler had lost his brother, his friends and his country. He was virtually exiled by his countrymen after the war. There were 28,000 pilots who fought for the German air force. Only 1,200 survived, Makos says.
“The war cost him everything,” Makos says. “Charlie Brown was the only good thing that came out of World War II for Franz. It was the one thing he could be proud of.”"
Hat tip to Javi Prieto Scv of Spain, whom I met through American Civil War Round Table (UK) on Facebook.

More on this incident:

Former adversaries Brown
 (standing) and Stigler
recount their first
meeting in the skies
 over wartorn Germany

Charlie Brown and Franz Stigler incident 
Brown's damaged bomber was spotted by Germans on the ground, including Franz Stigler, who was refueling and rearming at the airfield. He soon took off in his Messerschmitt Bf-109 and quickly caught up with Brown's plane. Stigler was able to see the injured crew through the damaged bomber’s air frame. To the American pilot's surprise, Stigler did not fire on the crippled bomber. Remembering the words of one of his commanding officers from the Jagdgeschwader 27, Gustav Rödel, during his time fighting in north Africa – “You are fighter pilots first, last, always. If I ever hear of any of you shooting at someone in a parachute, I'll shoot you myself." Stigler later commented, "To me, it was just like they were in a parachute. I saw them and I couldn't shoot them down."
Twice, Stigler tried to get Brown to land his plane at a German base and surrender, but Brown refused and flew on. Stigler then flew near Brown's plane, escorting it until they reached the North Sea and departing with a salute.

Brown, left and Stigler

 

‘My Dad Separated From Me’: Ted Turner’s Son Blames Jane Fonda For Dad Becoming A Communist Revolutionary

Pat Dollard

Excerpted from Fox News: Teddy Turner, son of billionaire media mogul Ted Turner and Republican candidate for Congress, said his father’s marriage to Jane Fonda prompted his major left turn.
“I was raised in a different time at the Turner household … a very conservative household with capitalism and all of that kind of stuff,” the younger Turner told Newsmax TV’s “The Steve Malzberg Show.”
....
Ted Turner, who founded CNN and once owned the Atlanta Braves, married Fonda in 1991. The actress ...apparently had an influence that outlasted their marriage.
... “Then when you start hanging around and everybody you’re hanging around with is liberal, then you tend to move more liberal.’’

Steyn declares America ‘doomed’ in wake of Pop Tart gun suspension

Daily Caller

"Steyn, author of “After America: Get Ready for Armageddon,” compared this generation of children, who may have felt threatened by the so-called Pop Tart gun, to the American generation that stormed the beaches of Normandy.
" “You’re doomed, America,” Steyn said. “You’re done for. No society can survive this level of stupidity. The school counselor is available to meet with any students who are traumatized by hearing reports of some guy four grades below them who nibbles a Pop Tart into a gun-like shape." Read more:

missoulian.com

From Free-Range Kids:  Right to Bear Gun-Shaped Pop-Tarts Law Drafted  "There’s hope! In a way, all the ridiculous Zero Tolerance incidents of the past few weeks — the kids suspended for the Hello Kitty bubble gun, and the Lego gun, and the imaginary grenade throw in a game of imaginary save-the-world, and last but not least the terrifying pastry gun — have given impetus to a bill proposed by Maryland State Senator  J.B. Jennings (R). His “Reasonable School Discipline Act of 2013″ would de-criminalize kids who are playing and happen to make or mention a play gun."....

Common sense 1, Bloomberg 0

From the twisted genius of Rich Terrell

Democrats, the leaders of our economy

netrightdaily

 

Ryan Plan Restores Welfare Work Requirements   ...."In addition to those reforms, the Ryan budget “calls for time limits and work requirements.”

"Both of which were quietly removed by Obama as part of his stimulus package, back in 2009. A detail that no one in the news media has ever bothered to report.
"Bear in mind, this work requirement is different from the welfare work requirement, which Obama also gutted back in July of 2012."
Emphasis in the original.

A Ryan Reboot  "The political class seems to be scandalized that Paul Ryan had the cheek Tuesday to propose another reform budget. Doesn't the House Budget Chairman understand that the 2012 election settled every political question in President Obama's favor?"

Obama’s approval drops as Americans take a dimmer view of his economic policies  "At 50 percent, Obama’s overall standing in the poll is lower than that of most other modern second-term presidents at this point in their terms."

MyJihad campaign spreads across America

Very effective PR campaign and one we wish we could believe represents Muslims worldwide. However I cannot get the images out of my mind of Muslims dancing in the streets over 9-11 and over the death of the Israeli shuttle astronaut . TD

MyJihad.org is a public education campaign that seeks to share the proper meaning of Jihad as believed and practiced by the majority of Muslims. Jihad means "struggling in the way of God". The way of God, being goodness, justice, passion, compassion, etc. It is putting up the good fight against whatever odds or barriers you face in your life. It is a central tenet of the Islamic creed that has unfortunately been widely misrepresented due to a) first and foremost, the actions of Muslim extremists, b) attempts at public indoctrination by Islamophobes who claim that the extremists are right and the rest of us are wrong, and c) a selective media that understandably focuses on the sensational."... 

Pamela Geller of Atlas Shrugs sees MyJihad in a different light and has placed ads countering it's representations in several metropolitan areas including San Francisco.  The ads sponsored by AFDI use the words of the jihadis themselves:

"Those are hateful words, to be sure: “Killing Jews is worship that draws us close to Allah.” They come from Hamas, and it would be impossible to overstate the evil of that organization. For just one example, check out this post on how Hamas teaches kindergarteners in Gaza. How hateful can you get?"

....This is one of the most perverse reversals of common sense ever. Praising the killing of Jews isn’t hate speech, that is perfectly fine! But exposing the fact that Hamas advocates killing Jews–that is “hate speech,” and “Islamophobic bigotry” which “good people” are obligated to condemn! And those who seek to let people know that Hamas views Jew-killing with unalloyed favor are “well-known hate extremists!”

Video; Palestinian children taught to anticipate end of Israel on PA TV

More on the AFDI advertising campaign

 

Savaged for Daring to Name Savagery: Pamela Geller Attacked by Critics of Free Speech  "Pamela Geller, conservative commentator and blogger provocateur, is the executive director of the American Freedom Defense Initiative.  AFDI created and paid for an ad campaign to run in several urban transit systems, in response to anti-Israel ads that ran in the same spaces.

Pamela Geller on CNN: Erin Burnett cuts segment at Hamas-CAIR description, Audio secretly taped:
(At about the 8:57 mark in the interview.)

The Obama administration’s response to the Falklands referendum is insulting, wrong and mean-spirited

Nile Gardiner "The Obama administration has just responded to last night’s Falklands referendum result, where more than 99 percent of the Falkland Islanders voted to remain a British Overseas Territory. As I noted earlier, the emphatic vote was “a victory for the principle of self-determination, and a powerful rebuke to those who wish to suppress it.” That’s not how Washington sees it, however, in the latest slap in the face from the Obama presidency for America’s closest friend and ally."

Barack Obama should watch this video on the Falklands before knifing Britain in the back (again)


"The Obama White House and State Department have refused to condemn the Kirchner regime’s campaign of intimidation against the Falklands, a self-governing British Overseas Territory in the South Atlantic, including the boarding of fishing vessels bearing the Falklands flag, and threats to mount a naval blockade."
Nile Gardiner is a Washington-based foreign affairs analyst and political commentator. A former aide to Margaret Thatcher, Gardiner has served as a foreign policy adviser to two US presidential campaigns. He appears frequently on American and British television, including Fox News Channel, BBC, and Fox Business Network.

"Charm offensive"? Let's not call it that, shall we?

WH Advisers: Obama GOP Outreach a 'Joke' and 'Waste of Time'  Even as they criticize Republicans for their lack of bipartisanship, White House advisers see President Barack Obama's outreach to Republicans as a "joke" and a publicity stunt for the mainstream media. They think it is beneath him--and them--and a waste of time. 

carlsontoons

  “This is a joke. We’re wasting the president’s time and ours,” a senior White House official complained to the National Journal. “I hope you all (in the media) are happy because we’re doing it for you.”
Obama was elected president by promising to unite "red" and "blue" America, and the White House often laments the lack of bipartisanship in Washington. Obama has often refused to develop personal relationships with Republican leaders, most notably during the 2011 negotiations over the debt ceiling.

Rush Limbaugh; Media Mantra: Obama's "Charm Offensive"

In 2000, it was "gravitas"; today it is "charm offensive"

...."Now, why would this be taking place?  It appears, ladies and gentlemen, that Obama's in some kind of trouble.  Either in the polls or in the arena of public perception.  There is a polling story out from yesterday.  McClatchy-Marist has a poll and the headline of their story here says "Obama Tumbling in Voters' Eyes." "....

Krauthammer: Obama on Charm Offensive Because ‘Media Could No Longer Cover for Him’  "Charles Krauthammer credited President Obama’s charm offensive toward Republicans to his losing the news media which couldn’t any longer abide his ridiculous sequester “cut” exaggerations.
" “Obama’s strongest constituency, which is not the left, it’s the mainstream media, could no longer cover for him without being entirely embarrassed,” Krauthammer observed Friday night on FNC, “It had to expose the one exaggeration after another on the sequester.” " 

Where your money goes

PJ Media   "One of the most irritating aspects of the carnival of fiscal irresponsibility we’ve been subjected to in recent decades is the fact that no matter how much money we send to our masters in Washington and in our state capitals and local bursaries, they always spend more, a lot more, than they get. .... Why’s that?"
....
 "A public-spirited chap called Adam Andrzejewski got fed up with the lack of governmental transparency and decided to do something about it.  Hence his invaluable website Open the Books, a project of For the Good of Illinois, Inc., a non-partisan, non-profit organization founded by Mr. Andrzejewski in 2007. The goal of Open the Books is something that the Obama administration came to office promising but never delivered: transparency.  Hence its motto: “Every dime. Online.” "

US Government Spending; Search it Now.
"From the federal to state to local government, the Books are Open… Search salary, pension and spending databases by state."
Click on any state to research salaries of public officials there.

Here are US Government salaries in Washington, DC for 2011

...."Not bad, eh?  I mean not bad for the folks collecting on your money because various unions have  the politicians in their pockets."
I hope that Open the Books will become more widely known.  There is a trove of information there about the expenditures of every state, many localities, and the federal government. It is partly sobering, partly infuriating.  Perhaps Mr. Andrzejewski will take up my idea and start a new not-for-profit called Throw The Bums Out.org.

Presidential perks for all presidents  "The president’s dog gets its own high-paid staffer: “Bo made the news when he and his handler were flown to join the president on vacation in  Maine,” Gray wrote about the Obama family dog. “It has been reported that the first family’s dog handler was paid $102,000, last year.” " I do not know about the Bush's dog, Barney and if he got to go on Christmas vacations with the First Family.