Health Care: Obama's Abuse of Power
From The WSJ
A string of electoral defeats and the great unpopularity of ObamaCare can't stop Democrats from their self-appointed rendezvous with liberal destiny—ramming a bill through Congress on a narrow partisan vote. What we are about to witness is an extraordinary abuse of traditional Senate rules to pass a bill merely because they think it's good for the rest of us, and because they fear their chance to build a European welfare state may never come again.
***
The vehicle is "reconciliation," a parliamentary process that fast-tracks budget measures and was created in 1974 as a deficit-reduction tool. Limited to 20 hours of debate, reconciliation bills need a mere 50 votes in the Senate, with the Vice President as tie-breaker, thus circumventing the filibuster. Both Democrats and Republicans have frequently used reconciliation on budget bills, so Democrats are now claiming that using it to pass ObamaCare is no big deal.
Yet this shortcut has never been used for anything approaching the enormity of a national health-care entitlement. Democrats are only resorting to it now because their plan is in so much political trouble—within their own party, and even more among the general public—and because they've failed to make their case through persuasion.
"They know that this will take courage," Nancy Pelosi said in an interview over the weekend, speaking of the Members she'll try to strong-arm. "It took courage to pass Social Security. It took courage to pass Medicare," the Speaker continued. "But the American people need it, why are we here? We're not here just to self-perpetuate our service in Congress."
Leave aside the irony of invoking "the American people" on behalf of a bill that consistently has been 10 to 15 points underwater in every poll since the fall, and is getting more unpopular by the day, particularly among independents. As Maine Republican Olympia Snowe pointed out in a speech last December, Social Security passed when Democrats controlled both Congress and the White House, yet 64% of Senate Republicans and 79% of the House GOP voted for it. More than half of the Senate Republican caucus voted for Medicare in 1965. Historically, major social legislation has always been bipartisan, because it reflects a durable political consensus.
Reconciliation is the last mathematical gasp for ObamaCare because Democrats can't sell their policy to Senator Snowe, any other Republican, or even dozens of Democrats. This raw exercise of political power is of a piece with the copious corruption and bribery—such as the Cornhusker kickbacks and special tax benefits for union members—that liberals had to use to get even this far.
Democrats often point to welfare reform in 1996 as a reconciliation precedent, yet that bill passed the Senate with 78 votes, including Joe Biden and half of the Democratic caucus. The children's health insurance program in 1997 was steered through Congress with reconciliation, but it, too, was built on strong (if misguided) bipartisan support. The Balanced Budget Act of 1997 that created Schip passed 85-15, including 43 Republicans. Even President Bush's 2001 tax cuts, another case in reconciliation point, were endorsed by 12 Senate Democrats.
The only precedent within historical shouting distance is Ronald Reagan's 1981 budget, which was controversial because it reshaped dozens of programs. But the Senate wasn't the problem—it ultimately passed the budget 80 to 14. The real dogfight was in the Democratically controlled House, where majority rules have always obtained, yet Reagan convinced 29 Democrats to buck Speaker Tip O'Neill. Reconciliation, in other words, wasn't used to subvert the 60-vote Senate threshold, but rather to grease the way for deficit reduction.
The process was designed for items that cut spending or affect tax revenue, to meet targets in the annual budget resolution. Democrats want to convert it into a jerry-rigged amendment process: That is, reconciliation wouldn't actually be used to pass ObamaCare per se. Instead, it would be used only to muscle through substantive changes to the bill that passed the Senate on Christmas Eve, without which 216 House Democrats won't vote for it. So Democrats would be writing amendments to current law that isn't in fact law at all—and can't become law without those amendments.
President Clinton preferred to use reconciliation to pass HillaryCare in the 1990s, but he was dissuaded by West Virginia Senator Robert Byrd, who argued that it would be an abuse of the process. Mr. Byrd, author of a four-volume history of Senate rules and procedures, told the Washington Post last March that "The misuse of the arcane process of reconciliation—a process intended for deficit reduction—to enact substantive policy changes is an undemocratic disservice to our people and to the Senate's institutional role," specifically citing health reform and cap and trade.
***
Regrets, they've got a few. Yet these Democratic Sinatras will still do it their way. President Obama is expected to endorse reconciliation in remarks this morning.
The goal is to permanently expand the American entitlement state with a vast apparatus of subsidies and regulations while the political window is still (barely) open, regardless of the consequences or the overwhelming popular condemnation. As Mr. Obama fatalistically said after his health summit, if voters don't like it, "then that's what elections are for."
In other words, he's volunteering Democrats in Congress to march into the fixed bayonets so he can claim an LBJ-level legacy like the Great Society that will be nearly impossible to repeal. This would be an unprecedented act of partisan arrogance that would further mark Democrats as the party of liberal extremism. If they think political passions are bitter now, wait until they pass ObamaCare.
Mar 4, 2010 at 5:23 PM
Reader Comments (29)
This is How Corporate Crooks and Wall Street Bankers have taken over USA Republic
VIdeo Cameras Churn Traffic tickets and thsi company manufactures, installs and process traffic ticket fines and get 50% cut from citation revenues.
Welcome to the Redflex Group
http://www.redflex.com/
What we don't know about Barry Soetoro could be the biggest blunder this country has ever made in its entire history.
Keep in mind, the same people who vetted and now protect Obama also vetted and worshipped John Edwards. Yes, the same people who act like shocked schoolchildren when someone mentions his lack of credentials and his lack of a birth certificate.
Barry has a destructive narcissistic personality disorder and we have he may follow in the footsteps of John Edwards if we all wise up and start the right questions.
In the next campaign debate with Barry Soetoro, I hope that his opponent walks up to him with their hand extended for a firm handshake with the following questons…
Can I call you Barry?
Can I see your birth certificate?
Here is my birth certificate.
Here in California:
High Robbery of Innocent Working class, speeding citation cost in city of Fremont is $300 minimum
USA Working class Perma Debt and Tax burden slaves: Welcome to USA turned into Mexico next
http://www.highwayrobbery.net/
By: Andy Barr February 18, 2010 05:22 PM EST
House Minority Leader John Boehner said Thursday that there is a “political rebellion brewing in America.”
Speaking to the Conservative Political Action Conference, Boehner urged the Republican Party to listen to the tea party activists protesting in anti-tax rallies but to not too overtly court the movement toward the GOP flock.
“The Republican Party should not aim to co-opt the tea parties. I think that is the dumbest thing in the world,” the Ohio Republican said.
“I think all of you know there is a political rebellion brewing in America,” he said of the tea party movement. “While the other side is mocking tea partiers and calling them names, we’re going to work with them, listen with them and stand amongst them. ... The other party will never, ever do that.”
While Boehner was careful to not count the tea parties as part of the GOP ranks, he said the energy that has propelled the movement may also make him speaker of the House.
If Republicans are able to retake the House, Boehner promised to change procedures and create a more transparent process.
“If I’m fortunate enough to be the speaker of the House, I will pledge to you right here, right now that we are going to run the House differently,” he said. “And I don’t mean differently from the way Democrats are running it today. I’m mean differently from the way Republicans and Democrats have been running it.”
(Excerpt) Read more at politico.com ...
China insider sees revolution brewing
Posted: March 2nd, 2010 by Militant Libertarian
http://militantlibertarian.org/2010/03/02/china-insider-sees-revolution-brewing/
Posted: December 20th, 2009 by Militant Libertarian
by Baak Ravid and Natasha Mozqovaya, Haaretz
U.S. President Barack Obama has warned his Chinese counterpart that the United States would not be able to keep Israel from attacking Iranian nuclear installations for much longer, senior officials in Jerusalem told Haaretz.
http://militantlibertarian.org/2009/12/20/obama-told-china-%E2%80%93-i-can%E2%80%99t-stop-israel-strike-on-iran-indefinitely/
Goldman Sachs Authors a Greek Tragedy
by Jim Hightower
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2010/03/03-3
What we don't know about Barry Soetoro could be the biggest blunder this country has ever made in its entire history.
Keep in mind, the same people who vetted and now protect Obama also vetted and worshipped John Edwards. Yes, the same people who act like shocked schoolchildren when someone mentions his lack of credentials and his lack of a birth certificate.
Barry has a destructive narcissistic personality disorder and we have he may follow in the footsteps of John Edwards if we all wise up and start the right questions.
In the next campaign debate with Barry Soetoro, I hope that his opponent walks up to him with their hand extended for a firm handshake with the following questons…
Can I call you Barry?
Can I see your birth certificate?
Here is my birth certificate.
What time line you folks have for civil unrest in USA?
My time line prediction look like will be quiet precise: Nov 2010-2011
Millions Rally As Students 'Day Of Action' Protests Grow
SAN FRANCISCO - Millions of students, teachers and parents rallied in schools and college campuses across California and many other states to protest deep spending cuts to schools and universities.
http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2010/03/04-7
Like Bush, Obama Moves to Bury Bad Economic Data
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2010/03/04-9
BIGGEST CRIMINAL BRAIN BEHIND BARRY(OBAMA).......LARRY SUMMERS.........GS PUPPET CONTROLLING WHITE HOUSE
What we don't know about Barry Soetoro could be the biggest blunder this country has ever made in its entire history.
Keep in mind, the same people who vetted and now protect Obama also vetted and worshipped John Edwards. Yes, the same people who act like shocked schoolchildren when someone mentions his lack of credentials and his lack of a birth certificate.
Barry has a destructive narcissistic personality disorder and we have he may follow in the footsteps of John Edwards if we all wise up and start the right questions.
In the next campaign debate with Barry Soetoro, I hope that his opponent walks up to him with their hand extended for a firm handshake with the following questons…
Can I call you Barry?
Can I see your birth certificate?
Here is my birth certificate.
One Nation, Two Economies”–As Obama Nominates Bernanke to Second Term, a Look at Who Benefits from Economic “Recovery”
http://www.democracynow.org/2009/8/25/one_nation_two_economies_as_obama
FED=GOLDMAN SACHS+JPM RULES USA
How Does Goldman Sachs Make Its Profits (1/2) (UNDERSTANDING NWO ECONOMICS SERIES)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S6vRmw7NtR0&feature=related
How Does Goldman Sachs Make Its Profits (2/2) (UNDERSTANDING NWO ECONOMICS SERIES)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PnjEMcM8P4Q&feature=related
What we don't know about Barry Soetoro could be the biggest blunder this country has ever made in its entire history.
Keep in mind, the same people who vetted and now protect Obama also vetted and worshipped John Edwards. Yes, the same people who act like shocked schoolchildren when someone mentions his lack of credentials and his lack of a birth certificate.
Barry has a destructive narcissistic personality disorder and we have he may follow in the footsteps of John Edwards if we all wise up and start the right questions.
In the next campaign debate with Barry Soetoro, I hope that his opponent walks up to him with their hand extended for a firm handshake with the following questons…
Can I call you Barry?
Can I see your birth certificate?
Here is my birth certificate.
I take that to mean that you will be voting against your divinely inspired Senator who voted against the Constitutional powers to let him run? Only the Sublime Court had this authority to settle this issue before the election, not a unanimous vote by his fellow Senator critters.
Because you did vote for McCain, who also voted yes... Remember, unanimous means all...
If what you say is true, the blunder lies squarely on the feet of the Senate.
Start there...
Michele Bachmann Calls for an investigation into Obama's "judgeship for a health care vote." It's no coincidence that a Democrat holdouts brother got a circuit court judge position days before he was brought into the private White House meeting to get his vote. Yes the White House is buying votes and they don't care if you know about it either. The arrogant corruption and in your face bribery is unbelievable!
Video Here>>
Michele Bachmann Calls for an investigation into Obama's "judgeship for a health care vote." It's no coincidence that a Democrat holdouts brother got a circuit court judge position days before he was brought into the private White House meeting to get his vote. Yes the White House is buying votes and they don't care if you know about it either. The arrogant corruption and in your face bribery is unbelievable!
Video Here>>
http://governmentmess.blogspot.com/2010/03/bachmann-calls-for-investigation-into.html
SEC COO is from Goldman, amazing
Apparently, the U.S. government didn't have enough Goldman Sachs executives in key financial and regulatory positions, so the following happened this week:
A Goldman Sachs executive has been named the first chief operating officer of the Securities and Exchange Commission's enforcement division.
The market watchdog says Adam Storch, vice president in Goldman Sachs' Business Intelligence Group, is assuming the new position of managing executive of the SEC division.
The move comes as the SEC revamps its enforcement efforts following the agency's failure to uncover Bernard Madoff's massive fraud scheme for nearly two decades despite numerous red flags.
Goldman Exec Named COO of SEC Enforcement - CBS News
Oct 16, 2009 ... 29-Year-Old Adam Storch is First to Take Position, Created in Wake of Madoff Ponzi Scheme.
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/10/16/business/main5390062.shtml
BBC NEWS | Business | The secretary who stole £4 million
Jun 7, 2005 ... A new drama-documentary tells the extraordinary story of Joyti De-Laurey, the Goldman Sachs secretary who stole £4.5m from her bosses.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/4616635.stm
Ohbummer going for everything he can to transform and collapse America...
9.7% unemployment and he wants to give illegals to stay and enjoy the party...more for his socialism and welfare party
http://hotair.com/archives/2009/12/30/here-we-go-white-house-gearing-up-to-push-amnesty-in-2010/
Break up USA by Russian Economic Professor may come true
Federal Govt Criminal Traitor Rulers Bailing criminal Bankers and Corporate crooks
but
States making working class suffer in hell via massive budget , jobs and service cuts ..setting up for civil unrest
Mercy My lord
AMEN
As if Things Weren't Bad Enough, Russian Professor Predicts End of U.S.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123051100709638419.html
the obfuscation and denial is paramount to treason against the citizens of this country. the sheeple have no idea how close we are to collapse. the bond mrkt capitalization makes the stock mrkt look like a corner store!!
nothing to see here people, move along, everything A o.k., no worries!!
The U.S.: Land of the Free and Home of a Nearly Failed Treasury Auction of Its Own
http://seekingalpha.com/article/188380-the-u-s-land-of-the-free-and-home-of-a-nearly-failed-treasury-auction-of-its-own
Buddies become enemies next
EU vs USA
Currency Battle has begun..................
Financial Warfare Exposed: Soros, Goldman Sachs, Hedge Funds Attack Greece to Smash Euro
Webster G. Tarpley | The derivatives-based speculative attack on the southern flank of the euro has accelerated the arrival of the second wave of depression, which now appears likely to strike the world before the end of 2010.
http://tarpley.net/2010/03/04/financial-warfare-exposed-soros-goldman-sachs-hedge-funds-attack-greece-to-smash-euro/
That is all from me..........
GOD BLESS ALL
"SOVEREIGN CITIZEN" MOVEMENT GAINING ...YOU'RE GONNA SEE A LOT OF THIS...
I'VE BEEN LOOKING INTO IT....HASN'T GONE WELL FOR THE PIONEERS BUT AS THINGS GET WORSE YOU WILL SEE LOTS OF THIS
An increasing number of Indiana residents are declaring themselves "sovereign citizens" and personally seceding from the United States, says a report from ABC channel 6 in Indianapolis.
By doing so, residents contend that they no longer have to pay taxes, claiming their homes as embassies and using identification cards that show them as diplomats, 6News' Rafael Sanchez reported.
Indiana authorities call such proclamations both illegitimate and illegal. About 10 people every month ask the state to put a seal on a document so that they can claim freedom from taxes.
Channel 6 profiled Donald Moore, a father of seven who has made himself "official- looking" identification that he says exempts him from U.S. laws and U.S. taxes by making him an "ambassador" to the United States.
The ID card "gives me diplomatic immunity," Moore said. "The way I understand it, the federal government is incorporated, and all the states are incorporated. This takes me out of the corporation."
But his assertion was rejected by Indiana's secretary of state.
"Just because you allege something or concoct yourself a document doesn't mean you're getting off the hook," Todd Rokita told channel 6. "You're going to get in worse trouble."
The "Sovereign Citizen" movement, which the Southern Poverty Law Center says has been around since the 1970s, focuses on laws and government paperwork its adherents believe allow them to effectively declare independence from the US.
But that assertion is often challenged in court. Earlier this week, a Florida man was sentenced to two years in prison after followers of the Sovereign Citizen movement convinced him to file a tax return in which he claimed the US government owed him $14 trillion.
According to the Miami New Times, "sovereign citizenship" is proliferating in prisons because of its promises of easy cash from the government and independence from laws.
Channel 6 in Indianapolis notes the case of Jonathan Dilley, who was sentenced to four years in prison for printing his own currency to pay off an $800,000 debt.
According to the Southern Poverty Law Center, which tracks extremist groups in the United States, the sovereign citizen movement originates "in the ideology of the Posse Comitatus, an anti-Semitic group that raged through the Midwest in the late 1970s and 1980s. ... Some of the more famous adherents of sovereign citizens' ideology include Oklahoma City bombing conspirator Terry Nichols and members of the Montana Freemen."
Keep ignoring the Senate involvement Gobie, and the lack of the Sublime Court. JBJD's article was very good. While we will see change in the next election, we will not see all wrongs created since 1913 corrected, just further protections of the self proscribed elite.
I do like how the picture looks like Obama is passing gas.
USA Bamboozled Generation on titanic deck heading for the wreckage next
Kucinich orders Afghan War debate, vote: “Trillions for war, no money for Americans!”
* The US is the principle author of the UN Charter, a treaty that under the US Constitution has equal power with all US law that requires all nations to eliminate wars of choice.
* The only lawful uses of war are self-defense upon armed attack by a nation’s government (or imminent threat of such) and/or authorization of the UN Security Council (UNSC).
* UNSC Resolutions correctly categorized 9/11 as a terror attack and authoritatively declared the legal response of international cooperation with intelligence, arrest, and prosecution of those responsible for the criminal conspiracy of 9/11.
* The US violated those UNSC Resolutions by attacking the country of Afghanistan; committing the worst crime a nation can damn another to suffer: an invading War of Aggression.
* The US refused to provide any evidence of who was responsible for the 9/11 attacks, claiming they “knew” who did them, and refused the Afghan government’s offer to help locate, arrest, and extradite anyone who the evidence shown was involved.
* The official version of 9/11 by the Bush Administration self-study was dependent upon torture-induced “confessions,” (and here) and now asserted as a provable lie by literally over a thousand professionals (and here) in qualified fields of academic and professional training who are legally classified as “expert witnesses” to walk people through the objective evidence. These people include members of the 9/11 Commission, members of Congress, military leaders, intelligence agency professionals, scientists, structural engineers and architects, legal scholars, professional firefighters and police, and over half the members of groups supporting 9/11 victims’ families. To compare pro-government to counter-government evidence, consider this.
The objective evidence proves the US war against the people of Afghanistan is paper-thin propaganda of “self-defense” masking a psychopathic War of Aggression; but the world will continue to suffer from this and related vicious policies until the American people lead in understanding of verifiable evidence and law, thought, voice, and acts to force these unlawful policies to end.
Dennis Kucinich, addressing Congress with H. Con. Res 248:
There is a new way to fight war in Afghanistan. U.S. Commanders are publicly telling the Taliban when we are coming and where we are going to wage war. This, while Karzai tries to cut a deal with the Taliban!
Meanwhile a large offensive is being mounted--an assault on Kandahar. The U.S. is going to have 100,000 troops ready for a big battle by autumn and logistical problems abound. Here is a quote from the February 20th National Journal, "So, despite the immense effort to push out supplies, the front-line fighters sometimes don't even have the minimum they need. 'We had guys out there at outposts in my area of operations starving because we couldn't get resupply in to them,'" said one Major.
What is this all about? To strengthen corrupt central government officials building villas in Dubai? I am introducing a privileged resolution to get us out of Afghanistan and I urge your support!
Below is a 3-minute video of Mr. Kucinich addressing the American public on this crucial turning point in restoring our Constitution and national virtue. The following 6 paragraphs is the transcript:
http://www.examiner.com/x-18425-LA-County-Nonpartisan-Examiner~y2010m3d5-Kucinich-orders-Afghan-War-debate-vote-Trillions-for-war-no-money-for-Americans
very bad death. it will cost me.and the country of money printers .
If it does i will fill ALL my squirt guns and change my name to Ken Gobias
I just need a couple million to be on the other side .Sooo if you would like to donate please let me know.
http://www.boston.com/business/healthcare/articles/2011/07/07/blue_cross_to_refund_ceos_42m_exit_pay_to_customers/?p1=News_links
[snip]
But Killingsworth will keep his $4.2m