Obama Getting Desperate to Nationalize Health Care

When a politician says "It's not about me", you can rest assured that it is all about him. It is like that Seinfeld episode where George gets dumped with the old "It's not you it's me" routine, to which he forcefully replies, "Nobody tells me it's them not me, if it's anybody it's me!" In this instance, George was stubbornly honest.

So Obama says health care reform isn't about him. Never mind his pledge to work in a bipartisan spirit. This is the same guy who told Republicans, "I won" when the complained about the process of pushing through the stimulus bill. This is mostly about him and his cult like supporters. This is the guy who ran a messianic campaign extolling that "We are the ones we have been waiting for."

Again, setting aside his promise to work across the aisle, this is a bill that was crafted by Democrats but now has a growing contingent of Democrat opposition.

According to National Journal, Obama told a Democrat Congressmen who was concerned about the cost of the legislation, that if they don't support the bill (even though Obama has admitted he isn't clear on all the bill's details) they will "destroy [his] Presidency."

Better his Presidency than the fabric of the nation and the principles of its founding.

The Cost of Health Reform

CATO's Chris Edwards reminds that budget forecasts for major health programs are usually extremely optimistic, short by a wide margin:

When Medicare was launched in 1965, Part A was projected to cost $9 billion by 1990, but ended up costing $67 billion. When Medicaid’s special hospitals subsidy was added in 1987, it was supposed to cost $100 million annually, but it already cost $11 billion by 1992. When Medicare’s home care benefit was added in 1988, it was projected to cost $4 billion in 1993, but ended up costing $10 billion. Or consider that when Massachusetts Commonwealth Care was put into place in 2006, it was expected to cost about $725 million annually, but the expected cost for 2009 is now almost $1 billion.

http://www.cato.org/pubs/tbb/tbb_0609-57.pdf

Sherry Palmer?

Today's

The CEO of Overstock.com has an op/ed in the Washington Times about interchange fees charged by the credit card companies. Note in the comments section, some credit card company stooge has a rebuttal.

Thomas Sowell - Magic Words in Politics

NextGov.com - Heritage's Web 2.0 Activism

WSJ - More States Look to Raise Taxes

Mercatus Center - Analysis of BO's Budget

UKTimes - US General says Iraq withdrawal timetable might be skipped to fight terrorists

Science - Dramatic Images Volcano's Lightning

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An interview with Laetitia Sadier and Tim Gane of Stereolab:

Today's Reading/Listening List

I've never understood the left's infatuation with communist, thug dictators. In the latest chapter of this romance, seven Members of Congress just went to Cuba to kowtow to Fidel Castro. Apparently, they went with concerns about human rights, but not about the retched situation in Cuba, but in regard to Cuban spies arrested in the U.S.

NY Post - BO's Amateur Hour: Appeasing Islamists in Turkey

Obama bows before the Saudi King?!

ABCNews - TARP Panel Says Crisis far from Over
Reuters - Govt to Delay Stress Test to Prevent a Market Reaction
USAToday - Housing Agencies that repeatedly fail audits to get $300 million in "stimulus" funding
"Congress gave the Obama administration permission to withhold stimulus aid from housing authorities that the Department of Housing and Urban Development lists as "troubled" because of factors such as poor maintenance and financial management. But HUD decided to release the money to these authorities because they "should have the opportunity to improve their housing," spokeswoman Donna White said."

The Universe Divided (Blog) - 10 Worst Excel Practices
"2. Using cell references

Don’t you hate those formulas like =C1*B6-H3+F5?. They’re horrible to work with. Wouldn’t it be easier to see =Rate*Hours-Discount+ExtraCost?
Well, that’s possible. Just click on the C1 in the top left corner and type the name ‘Rate’, then press Enter. From then on, C1 has an alias of ‘Rate’, and you can use it in formulas."

The Marines Greet the President:




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Martin Denny - Quiet Village

Biden Has a WIBDIT Moment

Biden the Boneheaded credited the stimulus for creating a fire station funded during W's term.

WIBDIT?

WIBDIT? What If Bush Did It?

This President is getting away with all kinds of stuff that would have been excoriated by the media. Nearly every day he gets a pass on something that would have been amplified and repeated everywhere under the previous Admin. So next time the Obamateur, his boneheaded VP Biden, or his disgraceful Secretary of State does something stupid, just imagine, WIBDIT? What if Bush Did It?

So, BO goes across the pond and gives the Queen of England an iPod. You know if W did this Letterman and all those other late night jerk asses would be having a field day. But here comes the kicker, the iPod was full of Fraudbama's own speeches.

Today's Reading/Listening List

Budget:
AP - Analysis: Dems Punt Hard Choices on BO's Budget
CRS - THE BUDGET RESOLUTION AND SPENDING LEGISLATION
CRS - THE FEDERAL BUDGET: CURRENT AND UPCOMING ISSUES
CRS - SUBMISSION OF THE PRESIDENT'S BUDGET IN TRANSITION YEARS

AP - Another Obama Nominee with Tax Trouble

AP - Obama's No Tax Hike Pledge Up in Smoke

http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/8_tools_to_track_your_footprin.php

Joseph Stiglitz - BO's Ersatz Capitalizm

Google Tip: If unread messages in your inbox are still hidden by other mail, it's easy to find them by searching for is:unread label:inbox. You can search for unread messages with other labels, too - just replace "inbox" with the label in question.

AFP - Russian Locks up 6 in Capsule for 3 Month Experiment


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Al Green now available on eMusic.

Listening to music from 1956.

Today's Reading List

FoxNews - The UN's Climate Change Program Involves Trillions in Wealth Transfers

NY Post - New Era of Spend and Blame

Michelle Malkin - BO's Favorite Solar Panels - The Rest of the Story

Google Blogoscoped - Google Docs Gets a Drawing Program

NY Post - Girardi to Try Jeter as Leadoff Hitter

Today's Reading/Listening List

Jonah Goldberg posted a letter from an NRO reader questioning Obama's claim that his potentially trillion dollar "investment" in health care will ensure long-term economic solvency.
Jonah; I have never seen this point made: all of Europe, which has nationalized health care already, is also experiencing the current economic crisis. Why does Obama believe that bringing national health care here will in any way save us a similar economic crisis in the future? He keeps repeating that only if we get health care costs under control will we have “real” prosperity, but the countries that have already “tackled” this problem in the past were not spared their own economic meltdowns.

Back on March 4, Obama boasted:
"The budget plan I outlined next week includes $2 trillion in deficit reduction. It reduces discretionary spending for non-defense programs as a share of the economy that -- by more than 10 percent over the next decade, to the lowest level in nearly half a century. I want to repeat that. I want to make sure everybody catches this, because I think sometimes the chatter on the cable stations hasn't been clear about this. My budget reduces discretionary spending for non-defense programs as a share of the economy by more than 10 percent over the next decade, and it will take it to the lowest level in nearly half a century."
Note that time frame. All these reductions will be achieved in 10 years. And the actions taken toward this are conveniently planned for the out-years. In the meantime, his budget proposes a 11.5 percent increase in non-defense spending

TPC - Analysis of Tax Provision in BO's Budget

There may be no such thing as a free lunch, but 2 Congressmen insist the highways are free, and they should stay free, dammit!
HR 1071, Keeping America's Freeways Free Act! To prohibit the imposition and collection of tolls on certain highways constructed using Federal funds.

http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=NmNkNzNhZDA2ODMzNGVlZmM3YmI5NmNiNWUxNDUyZDI=

http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=NDEzMGE2ODA4ZjU2NDlmNDU4MzY5ZTY1NGZiNjkzMjc=

http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=ODQyMGQwNWUxYjk4ODcyNWJkMzU5MjBkMmNjYTVjYjA=


GovExec - The Stimulus Czar

NewScientist.com - Space storm alert: 90 seconds from catastrophe

Bird Talk - Parrot Gender Quiz

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Music from 1950 and 1951.

Including Yma Sumac:

Today's Reading/Listening List

You know things are bad when the EU is blasting your budget:

AP - EU presidency: US economic plans 'a way to hell'

NextGov - Officials criticize Defense's 'unreliable' health record
The Defense Department's top health officials lambasted the department's central electronic heath record system that manages patient files for millions of active duty and retired service members, saying it frustrates doctors because it crashes as often as once a week and generates duplicate records. ... MHS has developed new versions of AHLTA based on a Web services model, which it plans to field in less than three years, according to Morris. Casscells declined to estimate the cost of the new system, because he said he is working with the Office of Management and Budget on the details. But he said the cost will come in "well below" the $15 billion he estimated a year ago.

NYT - Dear AIG, I Quit

Live Science - Why Toddlers Don't Do What They're Told

Washington Post - Clouded Leopards Cubs Born at National Zoo


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Django!

Today's Reading/Listening List

GovExec.com - Postmaster General to face Congress over compensation
The Postal Service, which is a semigovernment agency that has not received an operational subsidy from Congress since 1982, faces another massive deficit that Potter estimates will reach $6 billion in fiscal 2009.

This follows deficits of $2.8 billion in fiscal 2008 and $5.1 billion in fiscal 2007. The service last turned a profit of $900 million in fiscal 2006. Potter's $857,459 package in includes base compensation for fiscal 2008 listed at $263,575, according to Postal Regulatory Commission records with a $135,041 performance incentive bonus, deferred until he leaves office. His other compensation includes $77,347 in perks, including parking, life insurance premiums, airline clubs, spousal travel and security, plus his $381,496 pension.

Also deferred until he leaves office is accrued annual leave totaling more than $245,000, as of September 2008, which he will receive in a lump sum. He has been in office since June 2001.

GovExec.com - Budget resolution comes into focus

DC Examiner - Why can't we decline Medicare benefits?George Will - And So Begins Another Week Of Malfeasance

Newsbusters - CNN's 'Vast Grassroots Network' for Obama Not So Vast

Arnold King - A Metaphor: The Toxic NCAA Bracket

AP - Parrot awarded for yelling about choking baby

SearchEngineWatch.com - LinkedIn Enables RSS Feeds to Enhance Sharing in Groups
Cool Tool - http://www.wordle.net will generate word clouds if you can get it to work.

A few useful HTML codes: http://net.tutsplus.com/articles/web-roundups/10-rare-html-tags-you-really-should-know/

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I'm glad to hear Letterman finally got married. His son deserves it.

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Today's Reading/Listening List

Two weeks until opening day of regular season baseball!

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Lil' Timmy "Turbo" Geithner is releasing the long-promised details on the administration's toxic asset security plan. They want public-private partnerships to buy up the bad assets that are causing the credit crunch.

Question: What private entity is going to participate in this relationship when they would clearly be the junior partners? Who would want this government dictating salaries?

AP - Treasury's toxic asset plan could cost $1 trillion

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GovExec.com - Obama releases guidance on acceptable stimulus spending
"Whenever a project comes up for review, we're going to ask a simple question," the president said. "Does it advance the core mission of the Recovery Act? Does it jump-start job creation? Does it lay the foundation for lasting prosperity?"

Umm, sir, with all due respect, much of your Recovery Act doesn't advance that mission.

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Politico - Is BHO punch drunk?

Politico - Sen. Conrad looks to cut BO's budget

Reuters - Economic crisis dire, risk of unrest and war - IMF

Gov. Mark Sanford in the WSJ - Why South Carolina Doesn't Want "Stimulus"

NRO - Democracy in Europe: It’s lethargic and uninspiring — and ours could be like it soon.

NRO - Going Galt: Ayn Rand’s books are booming — but what about her ideas?

The Bulletin -Obama Continues To Set Records For Incompetence

Science's 10 most beautiful physics experiments

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Last week I finished up a chronological listening tour of classical music. This week I am beginning a new tour of the non-classical music in my collection from the late 1920's through 2009. Starting with:

Nipper's Greatest Hits of the 1930s and assorted Benny Goodman. I was surprised I couldn't find a youtube clip of Cab Calloway's Zah Zuh Zaz.

Love

Obama and Biden's Greatest Hits

http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/toby_harnden/blog/2009/03/20/top_10_gaffes_by_barack_obama_and_joe_biden_

Today's Reading/Listening List

Politico - Obama gets into trouble without his teleprompter.The Hill - 1 Rep gives back AIG political donations

Alaska - Palin to refuse 30 percent of the Stimu-Lie

GovExec.com - So-called "fiscal conservative" Blue Dogs release budget guideline
"The group supports Obama's "very ambitious agenda," Rep. Allen Boyd, D-Fla., a Blue Dog leader and senior member of the Budget Committee, said on Wednesday."

So under their rational, it is fiscally conservative to back an unprecedented expansion of the government, as long as you tax the crap out of productivity to pay for it. The media should stop calling them "fiscally conservative," because that is pure BS. They are tax and spend liberals.

GovExec.com - Stimulus oversight panel continues to staff up
Committee Chairman Edolphus Towns, D-N.Y., agreed that preventing fraud was necessary to ensure that billions of dollars aren't wasted. Citing fraud analysts, he estimated that U.S. organizations lose 7 percent of revenue to fraud and waste annually. When applied to the stimulus package, that 7 percent would amount to $55 billion in lost funds.
"And the sad truth is, once fraudulent dollars go out the door, the federal government historically is only able to collect pennies on the dollar," Towns said.

TaxVox - Taxing AIG Bonuses: Worse Than Paying Them

GoogleBlogoscoped - Gmail gets an undo for sent mail

AP - Macaw photo

Obama's NCAA bracket picks performed on par with his presidency so far - poorly.

When BO gave Brit PM Gordon Brown that DVD box set, lots of people jokingly wondered whether they would work on DVD player, to prevent piracy, DVD formats vary in different regions of the world. Well it turns out they do not work.

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Punky Irish band, Blood or Whiskey.

Obama and His Best Friend

Found this picture on the front page of www.whitehouse.gov.

As an added bonus for his hyper-inflated ego, it also looks like his teleprompter can double as a mirror.

Today's Reading/Listening List

NRO - LBJ Returns

Fascinating bit of info from the Cold War:
Sky.com - Undercover Putin in Reagan Ruse

Bastard Nation
AP - 40% of births to unwed mothers

CNNMoney - Keeping an Eye on the $timulus

Reuters - UN pushing for global tax again

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Wrapping up my 6 month-long tour of Classical and 20th Century Music today with:
Steve Reich - You Are (Variations)

And a piece I haven't heard before, Aaron Jay Kernis's Symphony in Waves.

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Went to see if The Tossers had anything new on eMusic, but all of the studio albums that used to be there are gone. Similar thing happened with Josh Rouse, but in that case I still had a few of his previous albums in my "Saved for Later" list and hadn't downloaded them yet. The biggest example of music disappearing from eMusic is of course, the Rolling Stones, whose catalog was available on the website for only a week or two.

Today's Reading/Listening List

Washington is all in outrage over the AIG bonuses. Some Members are contemplating a punitive tax on the recipients to get the money back. Will they consider giving back all the campaign contributions they received from TARP-corporations through the years of the bubble?

For example, Obama received $101K from AIG.

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Michelle Malkin -The Kabuki Theater of AIG Outrage

Washington Times - Obama climate plan could cost $2 trillion
Tax Foundation - Cap-and-trade average annual household burden would be $1,218

AP - Health care overhaul cost may reach $1.5 trillion

More change you can believe in!
MSNBC - Obama Budget Strategy Breaks Bipartisan Pledge

No wonder Obama wants to run the 2010 census directly from the White House:
Fox News - ACORN to Play Role in 2010 Census

SkyNews - The Teleprompter President's Teleprompter Blunder

"Irish Prime Minister Brian Cowen was just a few paragraphs into an address in Washington when he realised it all sounded a bit too familiar.

It was. He was repeating the speech President Barack Obama had just read from the same teleprompter.

Mr Cowen stopped, turned to the president and said: "That's your speech."

A laughing Mr Obama returned to the podium to take over but it seems the script had finally been switched and the US president ended up thanking himself for inviting everyone to the party.

Mr Obama is an accomplished orator but is becoming known in America as the "teleprompt president" over his reliance on the machine when he gives a speech.""

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Obama is trying to cram a lot of government expansion through Congress this year. Some Democrats are concerned that the Hill will be overloaded, but Obama's Teleprompter defends tackling many problems at the same time.

Taxpayer Rallies Continue!


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Paste - Demetri Martin's 224-Palindrome Poem

Lisa de Moraes - Idol's Twangy Grand Ole Opry Week

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Steve Reich - Nagoya Marimbas


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The major piece that was on my listening list today was Glenn Branca's "Symphony No. 5" and I will have to channel Simon Cowell by declaring it to be self-indulgent, vapid rubbish. On to Arvo Part's De Profundis to clear my head.