TightyRighty.net

Just so readers don’t think this is a single issue, anti-Obama administration blog, I thought I’d comment on the yesterday’s release from prison in Scotland of Abdelbeset Ali Mohmed al Megrahi, the mastermind of the bombing of Pan Am flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland.  Al Megrahi, who is suffering from terminal prostate cancer and reportedly has only 3 months to live, was released from prison and returned to a hero’s welcome in his native Libya.  Scottish Justice Secretary Kenny MacAskill cited compassionate grounds for the release, saying al Megrahi was “going home to die.”

This is a travesty!!  Did the 270 people he murdered have an opportunity to “go home to die”?  Absolutely not.  Many of the victims were  college kids (from Syracuse, I believe) who were returning home for Christmas.  Did their parents have an opportunity to say good-by to them?

Did this man ever show remorse, ever admit to his crime?  NO!  Why should Scotland show compassion to this man after he show no compassion or remorse for his 270 victims?  I say he should have rotted in prison until his death whereupon he will likely rot in hell.

ps.   I was pleased to hear the President issue a statement against this release.  However, I found Atty. General Eric Holder’s statement that he was “deeply disappointed”  in the release rings a little hollow after his role in the pardon of the FALN terrorists who blew up a NYC restaurant, killing 4 people.  (I’m sorry, I couldn’t help it!)

Nothing galls me more than when this President wraps himself in the trappings of religion and tries to persuade people of faith that they should fall in with him.  That happened again today as the President held a con call with a number of faith leaders.

In his comments, the President stated “I know there’s been a lot of misinformation in this debate and there are some folks out there who are, frankly, bearing false witness,”.   No question there has been a lot of misinformation (on both sides) but to slip into Biblical jargon is really pandering.  Isn’t this the same President who claimed the question of when life begins is “above my pay grade” and who voted not once, not twice, but voted three times against the Born Alive Infant Protection act.  Where was his Bible then?

Secondly, he stated “That I am my brother’s keeper, I am my sister’s keeper and in the wealthiest nation on Earth right now, we are neglecting to live up to that call.”   I do not dispute that we have a responsibility to our brother and sister.  However, does the Bible ask us to go more than a TRILLION dollars FURTHER into debt in order to meet this responsibility?  I think not.

Come on Mr. President.  If you are going to rely on the Bible, don’t pick and choose the verses you like and support your deal.  It’s all in or not in.

The Democrats in Congress repeatedly paint the opposition to the proposed health care legislation (the Republicans) as “the Party of No”.

However, have the Democrats given any consideration to Representative Paul Ryan or Senator Tom Coburn’s proposed health care plans?  Have the Democrats included any tort reform in the proposed bills?  Have the Democrats considered any bills that don’t provide a public option (precursor to a single payer system)?

Who is really the Party of No??

I am bummed!  I have really enjoyed riding in the MS 150 for the last 4 years.  However, 2009 will have been my last ride in support of MS research.   I can no longer support the National MS Society.

I have come to this decision based on the position the NMSS has taken with respect to the current proposed health care legislation, in particular, H.R. 3200 – America’s Affordable Health Choices Act.

As a rider in the Dallas-Ft.Worth MS 150, I rec’d an email from the NMSS asking me to contact my representatives in Congress and request that they support health care reform.  They even provided a link with a pre-formatted letter.

After reading the proposed letter, I was concerned my representatives would interpret this letter as my support for the current legislation in Congress (no, not the Republican legislation nobody ever talks about!).  If you read this blog, you know I am deeply opposed to the legislation the left has put forward.  So I responded to the email and requested the position of the NMSS regarding the legislation currently before Congress.  Following is the response I received yesterday:

Dear Mr. Lavey –

Thank you for your feedback regarding health care reform, your email has been forwarded to me for response.

While pursing health care reform, the Society has been adamant that patient choice and access are protected.  The Society is also working to ensure that efforts to lower costs for everyone will not result in limited access for anyone.  In fact, a key component of health care reform is that pre-existing condition clauses used by insurance companies will be eliminated. This will help ensure that people with MS and other chronic diseases are not denied services because of their health status.

The Society is working closely with Members of Congress and other partners to achieve meaningful and comprehensive health care reform.  The focus is on fixing and strengthening our existing employer-sponsored health care system, while figuring out how to get health insurance coverage for those who are uninsured, better health insurance for those who are underinsured, and help those who struggle with the cost of prescription drugs or obtaining other medically necessary treatments.

The legislation emerging in Congress called the America’s Affordable Health Choices Act – HR 3200 will help provide more choice, expand coverage and access to care, limit out-of-pocket costs, and improve quality of care for people with MS.  This legislation will let you to keep your insurance if you like it.  There is a common misconception that this bill will create a government run health insurance system, which is just not the case.  Rather the legislation outlines scenarios where you can choose to stay with the coverage you have, seek other private coverage, or choose a government sponsored plan.  There will be more choice.

We encourage you to take a look at our National Health Care Reform Principles (pdf), which were developed by a broad-based group of volunteers including many living with MS.  These principles are a blueprint for our advocacy work on health care reform that ensures the needs of people with MS are being met as health care reform takes shape and becomes a reality.

Many pieces of the Society’s reform principles are being discussed in the legislation including the elimination of lifetime coverage caps, ending discrimination based on pre-existing conditions, the expansion of home and community based services, and efforts to lower out of pockets costs.

The Society has been working on these issues separately for many years.   The America’s Affordable Health Choices Act provides an opportunity to accomplish many goals in one bill.  After working to shape the bill and analysis of the legislation that emerged, the Society has joined other organizations such as the American Medical Association, the American College of Physicians, the Epilepsy Foundation and many other doctor and patient groups in supporting the effort.

Thank you again for your email.

Best wishes,

Kim Cantor

Kimberly Cantor
Manager, Federal Government Relations
National Multiple Sclerosis Society

While I generally support the principles the NMSS espouses for health care reform, I can’t accept the transition of these principles into HR 3200 and the other legislation the left has proposed.  So next year on the first weekend in May, I will not be riding the MS150.  If anyone else can suggest a worthy cause for which I could ride my bike, I’d be glad to consider it.  I hear there is a guy in Austin who is doing some good work in the fight against cancer.  I think I’ll look into his position regarding the current proposed legislation.

Although the battle for Health Care legislation is far from over, a review of the process to date can be very instructive with respect to understanding the tactics of the left.  What began as health care reform in the spring transformed into health insurance legislation in the summer and has morphed into a PR debacle in August which has put the Obama administration in full court defense in order to stem the tide of anger rising from the American people.

This debate has highlighted a few things (we already knew) about the President, his administration, the Democrats and their compatriots in the main stream media: they don’t care about bipartisanship, seeking input, playing fair, being hypocritical, who they trash or any other thing which may stand in their way.  They have such an elitist, statist attitude that they are convinced they know what is best for the American people so don’t get in their way.  A few examples:

How may times have we heard the President call for “honest” or “full and open debate” of whatever issue was at hand?  Why then the rush to pass the health care legislation before the August recess?  Specifically so we would not have full and open debate.  The townhall meetings affirm this fact.  Once the contents of the bills were made public (open) the discussion moved from a bunch of Dems pontificating in Congress to the American people strongly sharing their opinions (full).  The Obama administration knew the American people would not want this kind of legislation rammed down their throats so they did everything they could to have this legislation passed before the August recess.  They thought (correctly) that it would be easier for congressmen visiting their districts to get forgiveness rather than permission.

This highlights a continuing trend of the Obama administration – why the rush?  Why must the stimulus be done in a couple of weeks with minimal debate?  Why the rush to complete the Cap and Trade bill?  Why must health care legislation be enacted before the August recess?  We are told it is because the need is so urgent.  If that is the case, why is most of the stimulus $ spent after 2009?  Why has the Cap and Trade bill sat languishing in the Senate (thankfully!) for several weeks now?  (How much has the global temp gone up since that bill was passed?  Oh, it has been trending down for most of the decade.)  Why don’t we want our representatives to have the input of the American people before they vote to turn over 15% of the US economy to the control of the government?  Because we are stupid peasants and we don’t know what is good for us.  The left knows that government control of our lives is necessary for us, even if we don’t like it.  Andrea Mitchell of MSNBC stated this very eloquently when she said that American people opposed to health care reform “may not know what is good for them.”  What an arrogant attitude!

Why would an administration continually claiming its “transparency” create an email address (flag@whitehouse.gov) where you can snitch on your neighbor for being against the health care legislation?  I thought that “enemies lists” went out with Nixon, but perhaps not.  What happens to the information collected from this email address?  Can you say “big brother”?

How is it that the Speaker of the House, the 2nd in line to the President, can call American citizens who speak out at townhalls “un-American” after this same Speaker of the House told anti-war demonstrators that “your advocacy is very American”?  This is the height of hypocrisy.  To say that speech she agrees with is patriotic and that speech she disagrees with is unpatriotic is unbelievably elitist.  Who made her the patriot meter?

How many enemies have been demonized in this process?  First it was the insurance companies.  The Speaker of the House called these companies “immoral” and “villainous”.  Then it was the doctors.  The President himself implied that doctors would amputate diabetics feet rather than continue to treat them because there is much more financial return.  Finally, it was the aforementioned “un-American” citizens who protested this plan to their representatives in the public square.  This is right out of Saul Alinsky’s Rules for Radicals rule #12:  “Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it.”

Have you noticed the one group NOT demonized by the left in this process?  Clearly it is the Trial Lawyers.  The only discussion of tort reform related to this bill was when the President addressed the AMA and told them it was not going to happen – end of discussion.  Everyone knows that the cost of defensive medicine is a huge drag on the health care system, but there is no way the left is going to gore the ox that pulls its cart.

Finally, how many times has the President claimed this will not create a single payer system.  The public option is just to keep the insurance companies honest.  Is this the same Barack Obama who stated “I happen to be a proponent of the single payer universal health care plan”.  Unless he has had a major epiphany, he still favors a government control of health care and your life.  But he is willing to wait 10, 15, 20 years in order to obtain this goal.  But he needs the camel’s nose under the tent so the government can incrementally take over control of health care.  So when you hear the President say its about competition and you can keep your current insurance and doctor, know that he is not telling you the full story.  These things are true, FOR NOW, but are not in the long term plan – long term defined as no more than 5 years, the duration of “grandfathered plans” in H.B. 3200.

In summary, the left has gone deep into its toolkit on this battle.  However, the stakes are very high – 15-20% of the American economy.  I could claim they are liars, slanderers, hypocrites, elitist, statists and I don’t think that I would be overstating the facts.  But to the left, the ends justify the means and these ends are very, very important to them so telling a few (many) half truths, outright lies, obfuscating their mis-deeds by claiming the high ground, denigrating whole industries or professions, etc. is not a problem.

Let’s learn from this and recognize these tactics as this battle and many more continue to play out over the next few years.

It appears that the administration is backing down on the requirement for a “public option” in the Health Care legislation being debated in Congress and townhalls around the country.  It would seem that our representatives (and I use that term very loosely) are hearing the will of the American people loud and clear.

Great!  However, now is not the time to declare victory and move on to living our normal lives.

The left wing of the  Democratic party is not happy and will do whatever they can to make sure the public option is included.  This morning, former Democratic Party chairman Howard Dean said that “You can’t really do health care reform without it.”.

He also discussed an insidious means by which the public option might be incorporated into law – the “reconciliation process”.  Under this process, the House and Senate would pass bills (with great fanfare undoubtedly) which do not include the public option.  However, since the House and Senate never pass identical bills, they must be “reconciled” at which point the public option would be re-inserted into the bill and then only a majority of House and Senate votes would be required for passage.

I would not put it past the Dems to stoop to this level.  They have shown they will use any means possible to achieve their goals, because they believe their goals are so noble that the ends justify the means.

Additionally, the public option was a critical component and much of the legislation played off the public option – insurance company and employer mandates, etc.  What would happen to these if the public option is scrapped?  How will these be rewritten?  Who knows?

We must be VIGILANT!

Bill Clinton popularized the term “Politics of Personal Destruction” during his impeachment process.  He was obviously feeling somewhat persecuted (and would soon feel very prosecuted.)

We don’t really have that going on in connection with the Health Care legislation debate.  We have more of the Politics of Industry Destruction.

It started with Nancy Pelosi claiming the insurance companies make “immoral” profits and calling them “villains“.  How is it that 80% of the American people are happy with their insurance coverage, yet these companies are immoral and villains?

Last night our President took it to a new level, implying that since doctors don’t make enough providing on-going care to Diabetics (“a pittance”), their patients undergo amputation procedures where the reimbursement $ are significantly more.  This is ludicrous and if I were a doctor, I would be pissed!!  I am not a doctor and I am upset that he would demonize the profession like that.

Let me share with you from my experience.  There is a well known Lasik doctor in town (Dallas) who advertises that he has done 110K procedures.  Jenny and I went in to see him, and it was clearly an assembly line process to get tested, measured, financial counseled, etc.  An assemply line – no question about it.  However, when it was my turn to see the doctor, he looked at my test results and recommended that I not have the surgery.  He explained the upside and downside to having the procedure, and let me decide.  I decided not to have the Lasik done.  This is a guy who runs a high volume medical process, who could have done my surgery, knowing that I might be inconvenienced 10 years down the line.  But he recognized that I did not have all the facts and provided these to me so I could make and informed decision, even though it cost him $2,000 in revenue.  He even gave me an updated eyeglass and contact prescription based on my tests, without charging me!

This doesn’t sound like a doctor who is going the surgery route because there is a lot more money than on-going care.

p.s.    Jenny had both of her eyes done and it worked out great for her.

Whenever we face major legislation, such as Health Care Reform, there is always a lot of misinformation in the air.  Usually, the proponents and opponents of the legislation double their efforts to refute this information, such as conducting advertising campaigns, going before the voters, etc.  The Obama team has taken a fresh approach – creating an enemies list.  (I guess Nixon did this also, but that was almost 40 years ago).

Linda Douglass, the communications director for the White House’s Health Reform Office, has posted a blog on the White House website, in she comments on the misinformation and spreads a little more of her own.  In underlined text, she states:

“the President has consistently said that if you like your insurance plan, your doctor, or both, you will be able to keep them“

As I have addressed previously, this statement, with no qualifiers, is patently untrue.

However, that is not my biggest grievance with this blog.  In order to combat misinformation regarding the Health Care legislation (presumably only misinformation opposed to the legislation and not the misinformation President Obama is spreading himself), the White House has established an email address, flag@whitehouse.gov, which is collecting this “misinformation” and the sources thereof.

What would be the purpose of collecting this information?  Is the White House intending to send rebuttal emails to all the folks who rec’d the prior “misinformed” email?  Is the White House intending to go to each blog identified as spreading misinformation about the Health Care legislation and post a comment refuting the blog?  Are they planning to call in to every misinformed talk radio show and refute the misinformation?  I think not.

My guess is the White House is compiling as list of offending sources of misinformation (e.g. “enemies”).  Do you want your name on that list?  Perhaps that list will be released to the Administrations blogger cronies for a frontal assault on your blog.  Perhaps the list could be released to the IRS where you become a victim of a gang audit.

Perhaps nothing happens.  Perhaps this is just an attempt to chill opposition to this legislation.  Whatever happened to “the most transparent Administration ever” and “let’s have a full and open debate”?  Perhaps that is only the campaign rhetoric.  What we are seeing now is full-on Chicago-style politics with a good measure of Saul Alinsky principles thrown in.

Bummer – I was really “Hoping” for “Change”, and not politics at its lowest level.

Today’s headline from the WSJ:

Congress Gets an Upgrade
$500 Million Slated for Purchase of Eight More Planes as Lawmakers’ Travel Soars

Is the same gang who publicly humiliated and castigated the auto execs for flying to hearings in corporate jets?  Is the same bunch who has killed the corporate aircraft industry?

Why do these folks, our elected officials, think that somehow their time is more precious than the CEO of a major company (too big to fail)?  What an elitist attitude.  This congress is totally out of touch with reality and their constituents.

Pitiful!

My mother was born and grew up in Canada.  All her family still lives there (except my cousin David and his lovely wife Shelley who live in Birmingham, AL and are about to become my son Josh’s “parents away from home”).

So my mom gets a phone call a couple of weeks ago from her sister Margo (Mugs).  Mugs tells her she just rec’d a call from some Canadian medical board and her MRI has been approved and scheduled.  Mugs indicated she didn’t need an MRI and asked when it had been requested.  She was told it had been requested 11 months previously, when she was dealing with some medical issues since resolved.

She told the caller she did not need the MRI and to take her off the schedule.  She was then told if she did not have the MRI she no longer requires, she would not be able to obtain an MRI the next time the doctor prescribed this test.  So I guess she is going to have the MRI she no longer needs.

Is this really the kind of medical care we want?  I think not.