Liberal solutions cause a Great Mediocrity

My own father died nearly destitute, largely because of my hypochondriac mother who required bags-full of prescriptions and a schedule filled with doctor appointments.

Another good friend was forced out of his home due to the oppressive expenses of caring for his wife with Alzheimer’s. The same happened to another relative whose wife had dementia. I see what long-term illness can do to a family’s finances and desperately wish something could be done to help.

But I also see how the present solution of Pelosi-Obama’s vast plan can reach into every corner of our lives; and make no mistake about it, this government or one like it will. Liberal solutions unfailingly bring about mediocrity in everything they touch and you can be sure this will happen to medical practice. I saw socialized medicine during a three-month stay at the Camp Lejeune hospital where dependents of Marines seeing doctors were given the standing appointment time of 0800.
There the room was filled with mothers and children, waiting in folding metal chairs for their turn with a doctor to come. Their numbers gradually grew smaller through the day while the remaining children grew more and more restless with no place for them to play, only to run around the rows of steel chairs where their mothers continued to wait.

By the afternoon, there were only a couple of families left, waiting since 8 a.m. All this because the hospital was government-run and had no incentive to encourage patients’ selection of them as medical provider.

I desperately wish those mentioned here could have been taken better care of, but never by committed socialists whose supporters hang Che posters and communist flags in their offices.
The Tunnel Dweller
My April, 2012 article originally printed in the Tillamook, Oregon Headlight-Herald
 

Grievance, incorporated

Obamacare ads called racist for targeting mostly white youths  "But the Gateway Pundit's Jim Hoft panned the ads on Wednesday as racist, saying that the collection of 21 ads only contains two African-Americans and no Asians.
" 'The rest of the models are white," he wrote."
Somehow one thinks  Mr. Hoft is being sarcastic and yanking the chains of the race pimps. TD

Michelle Malkin;  Obamacare’s Bros and Hoes

"Modeled after the “Got Milk?” ads, the latest print and web promos pander to young people with pop-culture memes and entitlement-friendly appeals. The dumbed-down website address: doyougotinsurance.com."

Related: Limbaugh: New ‘Hosurance’ Ads Selling Kids on Sandra Fluke’s ‘Promiscuity’  "Rush Limbaugh reacted to the Colorado progressive “hosurance” ads in a way that may generate another phone call from President Obama to Sandra Fluke."

 

Rich Lowry; Our culture is surreally obsessed with taking offense  "The Kimmel kerfuffle is worthy of a Monty Python skit, but also typical of the surreal theater of offense-taking in contemporary America. Are we, in such matters, a ridiculous country? One that encourages a sense of victimhood and grievance? One that lacks any sense of proportion? Yes, yes, and yes."

 

 Conan O’Brien Discovers: Muslim Polygamy Is No Joke   "Late-night comic Conan O’Brien tweeted Friday night: “Marvel Comics is introducing a new Muslim Female superhero. She has so many more special powers than her husband’s other wives.” The predictable self-righteous firestorm ensued."

Obama and veterans

Video from American Overlook

Obama and Veterans Day
"President Obama is giving a speech about veterans.

"I can’t listen. I didn’t serve, but both my parents did and I grew up on Camp Pendleton (Marine base) and Guam (Navy base).I can’t hear Obama talk about veterans as if he cares.Just hearing his voice today makes me angry. (Not that I enjoy hearing him on any other day, either. After all, if his lips are moving, he’s lying.)

"In the context of his making war, perhaps even nuclear war, so much more likely by his desperation to make a deal with Iran, I’m even angrier.

"But it’s Monday and I don’t want to be angry, so I’m just turning him off.Maybe later, someone who really cares, and who really has a clue what he’s talking about, will say something worth listening to.
"In the meantime, I just sent a “thank you” e-mail to a gentleman I know — a retired US Army Special Forces full-bird colonel who is also a medical doctor — who won a Silver Star for parachuting into the jungles of Viet Nam to set up field hospitals for wounded soldiers.

"That, my friends, is a hero.

"To think that President Obama (or his self-loathing Secretary of State who should look at what the hero I just mentioned did, and feel tremendous shame at his own life) represents that man or anyone like him does all veterans, indeed all Americans, a tremendous dishonor.
"The hero is too well-mannered to disrespect the commander-in-chief. So I’ll do it for him. 
"Barack Obama, please sit down and shut up, and let veterans be celebrated and honored by those who really know, and those who really care.

Did You Catch the Ironic Part in Obama’s Veterans Day Speech?  "President Barack Obama on Monday heralded one of the oldest living veterans in America, even talking about his trip to the nation’s capital this year as part of the Honor Flight program."

"That would be the same Honor Flight program that brought veterans to Washington, D.C., last month who entered the World War II Memorial in defiance of the government shutdown.

"Barricades were placed around the World War II Memorial and other monuments on the National Mall to keep visitors out during the shutdown. Some veterans, aided by members of Congress, ignored the barricades and went to visit the memorial anyway."

TO SPEAK TO A NIGERIAN PRINCE ABOUT YOUR HEALTH CARE, PRESS '1' NOW

arkansasgopwing

Ann Coulter "In a weird confluence of the nation's two most pressing issues -- Obamacare and our insane immigration laws -- this week we found out that the tens of thousands of "navigators" hired by the government to enroll people in Obamacare will include convicted felons.

"Despite some "navigators" having already been exposed as having arrest warrants against them, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has no plans to screen out the criminals. (But rest assured: If your identity is stolen as a result of trying to sign up for Obamacare, no one will be more upset about it than President Obama.)

"Maybe it's a blessing that the Obamacare website has crashed more often than the Soviet Union's commercial air fleet did.

"In addition to convicted felons, navigators are drawn from labor unions, community organizers, former ACORN staffers and front-groups for the Democratic National Committee."....

Meet Adriana, The Real "Obamacare Girl" (Transcript and Video)

Yid With Lid

"No pithy humor here.  Adriana, the woman who was the face of Healthcare.gov was interviewed by ABC news this morning. Apparently she was one more victim of Obamacare. She was consistently harassed because of her appearance on the failed website."

I wish all the anger and insults came from the left; they are the ones who have sharp knives and are good at destroying those who disagree with them. But I fear some conservatives can get into the gutter, though never as low as Maher and Letterman.

Hat tip to Jeffrey Dunetz at Conservative Bloggers on Facebook



Biggest children’s book publisher erases Israel from map

Times of Israel  "Arab textbooks are not the only ones erasing Israel from their maps. Scholastic, the world’s largest publisher of children’s books, has also eliminated the Jewish state in a book."....

"Adina Golombek, a Jerusalem resident who emigrated to Israel from Canada last year, said she was shocked to discover Israel’s absence while reading the book with her 7-year-old son.

“ 'I wanted to show my son where we lived in the Middle East, but it didn’t say Israel on the map; instead it said Jordan,” Golombek told The Times of Israel. “I showed him the problem and drew in the border of where Israel is today.' ”....

 

Scholastic's response on Thea Stilton and the Blue Scarab Hunt 

As you have probably heard, Thea Stilton and the Blue Scarab Hunt, a title in the Geronimo Stilton series, published by Scholastic, includes a map that omits Israel. Scholastic is immediately stopping shipment on this title, revising the map, and going back to reprint. We regret the omission which was in the original version of the book published in Italy and was translated by our company for English language distribution.

Thank you for your patience and understanding in this matter.

Another person who would like to see Israel wiped off the map:
 
 

Palestinian youth stabs sleeping soldier to death on Afula bus 

..."The soldier (right), 18-year-old Eden Atias of Nazareth Illit, was evacuated to the city’s Haemek Hospital. Doctors operated on him in an attempt to stabilize his condition but he succumbed to his injuries a few hours later."

Obamacare Navigators: this administration - and well, half the voters in America - are poor judges of character

John Fund; The Truth about Navigators  "James O’Keefe, the guerrilla videographer who helped bring down ACORN (the “community organizing” group that Barack Obama worked for as a lawyer and trainer) and got NPR’s president fired, is back.
"This time, his undercover investigators focused on Obamacare’s “navigators,” the nearly 50,000 people who, in the words of the Department of Health and Human Services, “will serve as an in-person resource for Americans who want additional assistance in shopping for and enrolling in plans” on the Obamacare exchanges (at least when they’re finally working)." 

 

.... "There’s much more in the video, which O’Keefe hints will not be his last. Left unexplored is how so many navigators nationwide were hired without any background checks required. While Texas and some other states have passed requirements of their own, the absence of such checks at the federal level was acknowledged by HHS secretary Kathleen Sebelius last week."  Full article.

One fired, three suspended after undercover health care video

 The President will find it very difficult to distance himself from this video.

And now for some perspective: Chicago TV Pitchman faces prison for lying about healthcare product  
"It took jurors in a Chicago courtroom only one hour of deliberation to decide that controversial TV pitchman Kevin Trudeau was guilty of criminal contempt for making misleading claims in TV infomercials for his best-selling weight loss book."

 

Poll: Majority Find Obama Dishonest, Untrustworthy  "But for the first time since the president took office, the majority of Americans find him dishonest and untrustworthy, 52 percent to 44 percent. "

We lied: We told Obama he could be popular. What we meant to say was he could be popular ... if he told the truth.   "Americans told President Obama in 2012, "If you like your popularity, you can keep it."

"We lied.

"Well, at least we didn't tell him the whole truth. What we meant to say was that Obama could keep the support of a majority of Americans unless he broke our trust. Throughout his first term, even as his job-approval rating cycled up and down, one thing remained constant: Polls showed that most Americans trusted Obama.

"As they say in Washington, that is no longer operable."...

Always look on the bright side of life

Phone sex line transfers callers to Obamacare  

"What do Obamacare and phone sex have in common? Answer: "intimate connections."
...
"An obliging voice gives you the option to press two to hear the phone number that President Obama read out during his press conference on the woes of healthcare.gov.
"Press three, and the phone sex service transfers you to the government line. (Option 1, naturally, asks for your personal preferences and a credit card number to verify your age.)" Via Weasel Zippers 

 

Latest Late-Night Jokes    

"As you may know, Thanksgiving began in 1621 when the Pilgrims feasted with the Indians and promised them, 'If you like your land, you can keep your land.'" –Jay Leno

"The Obama White House website still says if you like your health plan, you can keep it. That's false, of course. The president says they're trying to correct it, but his website people can't seem to log on." –Jay Leno

"President Obama's approval rating is now down to 39 percent. To which Congress said, how do you keep is so high?'" –Jay Leno

"The Obama administration asks Hollywood to work positive mentions of ObamaCare into its TV shows and movies. So AMCs new zombie drama is titled: “The Walking Dead But Not Due to Preexisting Conditions.” –Conan O'Brien

"President Obama met the Stanley Cup champion Chicago Blackhawks. Obama was excited to tell the hockey players that ObamaCare includes dental." –Conan O'Brien

"The ObamaCare website won't be accessible at night due to maintenance. And it won't be accessible during the day due to 'it sucking.'" –Conan O'Brien

More here.

Remember, Americans: no matter what this government does to us, they mean the best for us and they do it in love:
 (Brief language advisory)

Top Ten Obamacare Disasters to Come

Galen Institute  ..."But enrollment in Obamacare insurance ultimately does depend upon the website’s problems’ being fixed, because the information gathered via phone calls and paper applications must be entered into massive federal government databases to check eligibility. A delay of the individual tax penalties will be inevitable if the site isn’t fixed soon; you can’t penalize people if they can’t enroll.
"But eventually, software can be fixed. Obamacare’s epic policy flaws can’t.
The problems increasingly are going to be up close and personal, as people see for themselves the impact it has on their lives and pocketbooks. The top ten debacles to come..."
Here is just the first one:
1. Deductible shock: When consumers finally do get onto the Healthcare.gov website, they are in for a new kind of sticker shock. Avik Roy of the Manhattan Institute has exposed the high cost of Obamacare premiums — the next price shock will be the whopping cost of the deductibles.
A Chicago Tribune analysis showed that 21 of the 22 lowest-priced plans offered for Cook County residents on the Illinois exchange have annual deductibles of more than $4,000 for an individual and $8,000 for family coverage. (Deductibles are the money consumers must spend on health care before most insurance benefits kick in.)
Here are the other points with a more detailed discussion of each at the link:
2. Will people pay?...
3. Attracting the sickest...
4. Less expensive plans vanish...
5. Families lose out...
6. Repaying subsidies...
7. Public health-care costs are going to explode...
8. More jobs lost...
9. Identity theft and fraud will explode...
10. Federal-exchange subsidies eliminated?...

1880s Gettysburg photos by William H. Tipton, Gettysburg resident

This article is taken from the magnificent work done by Gettysburg scholar and local resident, Randy Drais and posted in his web site, Battle of Gettysburg Buff.

William H. Tipton's Photos at Devil's Den, Gettysburg
 Photographing the Gettysburg Battlefield   I"n 1868, Charles Tyson sold his entire collection of battlefield negatives, and his studio, to William H. Tipton. An apprentice of the Tysons at the time of the battle, Tipton went on to become the most important Gettysburg photographer of the late 19th century. He had a photo studio right in Devils Den and for years served as the official battlefield photographer. His work includes countless views of monuments surrounded by veterans and dignitaries. No group of tourists in the late 1800s would think of leaving Gettysburg without having Tipton capture their visit amongst the rocks of Devil’s Den.

"On the left is a photo from 1913 with my grandmother Hazel Putt Nilson and my grandfather Frank Herman Nilson. The other folks are Bill and Verna Hoover. On the right is a photo from June 2013, of me and my partner Joel at the exact same spot."

Of the photo below, the contributor writes: "The first thought that comes to mind when I see "Chamberlain" is that these are the men of the 20th Maine who held Little Round Top on Gettysburg's Second Day, against deadly fire, much of it coming from Devil's Den.

"I think that could be J.L. Chamberlain himself sitting front and center, in what is obviously a reunion photo. Perhaps whoever owned the photo is one of the men pictured here. "


Mr. Drais' Battle Walks   "If you are visiting Gettysburg and exploring the battlefield, I strongly encourage you to take advantage of the various Ranger Programs, particularly the "Battle Walks" that are devoted to an in-depth look at a particular phase of the battle or a specific and/or often overlooked area of the battlefield such as ..." More here. 


The Trostle barn after the battle:

The Trostle barn now: 

Another link: Gettysburg Battlefield Online

Islam vs. Islamism

By Salim Mansur at the Meighen Institute   Excerpts below:
...."At the center of the current convulsion in the Muslim world, or Islamdom, as in Turkey and Egypt, is the contest between Islamists and anti-Islamists, between theocrats and anti-theocrats. This contest is hugely complicated by the turmoil that inevitably accompanies the transition of societies and cultures from pre-modern to modern. Here, the relevant analogy to understanding this convulsion within Islamdom is to recall Christendom's long, tortuous, immensely bloody and violent transition in the making of the modern world. This is the history of the past 500 years, from the Inquisition through to the end of the Cold War -- and to be forgotten at our peril."....

Mr. Mansur tells us what he feels is the very incubator of violence in Islam:

"Islamism is an aberrant strain of Muslim thinking that can be traced back in the Arab-Muslim history to the earliest years of Islam. Its defining characteristic is intolerance of others, including Muslims, and glorification of violence against all who disagree with the Islamist rendition of Islam."....

I'm not sure the strain is, as he writes, "aberrant". The endorsement of violence is throughout the Koran and the more adherent to Islam one becomes, it seems the more violent he becomes.
It can be said that Christianity and Islam have shown brutality. Though history documents these things, I say that the more one draws closer to the Bible and the teachings of Christ, the more tolerant and compassionate they become; the more one absorbs the teaching of Islam and desires to be like Muhammad, the more they embrace violence.  This is my opinion and every day this becomes more ingrained in my mind.

..."For the West, the imperative in distinguishing between Islam and Islamism, at least since 9/11, is about working out the appropriate and relevant response to the political-military threats of Islamism and the ambitions of Islamists. This would be a response for containing Islamism and assisting over the long haul anti-Islamist Muslims in the effort to modernize their societies; it would be akin to the response conceived by George Kennan, the American diplomat and State Department official, soon after the Second World War ended, to contain Soviet Communism."...

Atlas Shrugs

Some would say this is what President Obama is attempting in his foreign policy. But why would he not have supported the protestors in Iran instead of currying the favor of the mullahs?  Why has Obama sided with Iran at the expense of US relations with allies such as Saudi Arabia, Israel, and other Muslim countries who fear a nuclear Iran?
Indeed, this president has transformed the US into a mere cypher among global powers and I feel certain that the US will not get this back, no matter who forms the next administration. The world has seen the intelligence of the American voter and must no longer feel the US is a stable, reliable ally; that any future president who is strong and courageous will be vilified and replaced by one that is acceptable to Hollywood and People magazine.
Yet conservative candidates must feel it is useless to campaign on foreign policy concerns because obtuse Democrat voters cannot wrap their minds around the dangers in this issue. 
The world is more dangerous because of the policies of guilt-ridden liberals
The Tunnel Dweller

Full article here.

Commandeerer in Chief

Hope n' Change


"First and foremost, Hope n' Change Cartoons wants to salute and express the deepest possible gratitude to every man and woman who has served this country in uniform. You are the best among us, and we are in your debt. Veteran's Day should be every day.

"But we couldn't bring ourselves to adorn this page with pictures of flags and parades today. Because such honors seem like a faux, feel good lie when we've saddled our military with a president who clearly has no respect for them, their mission, or the country and Constitution they've sacrified so much for.

"Our veterans deserve every honor we can give them. But more than another fireworks display, they deserve to see honor restored to the position of Commander in Chief.  

"Their Commander in Chief.

"Until the rest of us accomplish that, we not only owe our veterans deep thanks...but the sincerest of apologies."