Month: July 2009

Random Thoughts

Once again I have been busy making notes and losing sleep…..these are the ones that did not make it to a post.

1–Repubs say the Dem health care bill is not bi-partisan….but at last count there were 160 Repub amendments….sounds like it is pretty bi=partisan to me.

2–Health care again—notice the guys that are opposition have an excellent health care policy….but they are to decide what the American people will get as far as health care is concerned….that is pretty sick.

3–The American Conservative Union tried to sell its endorsement for $2 million to FedEx….since they would not pay…the ACU endorsed UPS…how much did they pay?

4–Only about 20% of the stim money has actually gone out…but the Repubs are calling it a failure and want the payments to stop.  The really sad part is that the BS is starting to play with the people…..sorry to say that it is another example of the Rational Ignorance Effect (read the page on the RIE) if you have a hard time grasping what is meant.

5–Does anyone give a crap what type of jeans the Prez wears?  If we do….we need to get a flippin’ life!

6–GOP is up to their usual tactics of delaying and lying in Congress…..this time it is for the health care debate…..I guess it is their only option at this point.

7–looks like Palin’s attempt to raise money to pay for the $500,000 in legal fees accured while fight ethic charges….it seems that her attempt may have violate ethics statutes…..No Really!….I cannot make this stuff up!

8–CNN’s Lou Dobbs is back in the news and it is not over immigration.  This from the LA Times:

Lou Dobbs had David from Freeport, N.Y., on the line, the caller musing darkly about President Obama “rushing all these programs through by whatever means,” knowing he will soon be exposed as a fake, a fraud, a . . . Kenyan.

At that point, a scrupulous radio host had three options: (A) hit the kill button (B) laugh and hit the kill button or (C) offer some push-back against the fantastical notion that Barack Obama was born on foreign soil and thus serves — illegally — as the Oval Office’s first resident alien.

Instead, Dobbs chose the maximum complicity-minimum integrity route, or (D): “Certainly your view can’t be discounted,” the host said.

He will be featured in Anal-Ocity.

9–Somewhere on 23 July 2009—Info Ink went over 50,000 hits….a milestone finally achieved.

What Is The Hurry?

Professor’s Classroom

That is the question that the Repubs and the cowardly Dems are asking the prez..Mr. President, why the rush?

In the 90’s Clinton was big on health care and it went the way of the do-do….because the industry was against any change.  Then in the 70’s it was brought up by Sen. Kennedy and once again it sank quicker than the Titanic…the industry was not on board with any change to their status quo.  Harry Truman in 1948 made health care an important issue….and can you guess what happen back then?  Yep….a bomb that was a dud.

Back to the original question….why the hurry?  First of all it has been at least 61 years that health care was a major issue…although it had been considered back in the day when Teddy was running, year 1912.  Why the hurry?  To me at least 61 years in the making is not a rush job by any stretch of the imagination.

Ask again–why the hurry?  This is possibly the first time in 61 years that it is possible to give the American people something they deserve…adequate health care for them and their families.  So why not take adbvantage of the numbers and the times and pass the healthcare issue?

Repubs have made the money, the issue….the truth is we already pay about 14+% of our GDP in health care….I believe that Defense is at about 9%.  The money is a diversion, a talking point, and above all misinformation.

The time is NOW, if not then health care will be once again something that no one wants to talk about and may never get Americans health care.

What Is This “Birther” BS?

A Daily Agitation

Okay dipsticks….enough is more than enough!

I cannot believe the BS flying around about the citizenship of Obama…..I have a page entitled Rational Ignorance Effect, but these morons take the word “stupid” to new heights.  I understand the crazies on the right that have this lack of knowledge and want to believe the BS, but we now have people like The Rush, Liz Cheney, CNN’s Lou Dobbs and now we have 9 Congress people that have jumped on this bandwagon.  Why?

The more this plays the more it is looking like the GOP is playing and feeding these whackos for their own advancement.  I understand the old white guy from Alabama, Sen. Shelby, he probably still living in the pre-civil rights days.

Obama’s birth certificate has been published in many places….but it looks like that the people are most upset because of the two lines that state mother–Caucasian and father African…they can justify this any way they choose…but it is still the fact that Obama is an African-American that has them the most upset.

John McCain was born in Panama and that is no question of his citizenship …but he is white…what do I mean by that?  Would these same questions be asked of Clinton or Reagan or Bush under similar circumstances?  Of course, they would not be…why?  The are WHITE!

All this uproar is nothing more than an ugly political game been used by the Extreme Right to divide the people and feed the last remnants of racism….you have noticed that most of the people that are questioning Obama on this are old and mostly white…..how obvious must it get?

2009 Anal-Ocity

When will the right wing whackos give this crap a rest?  I mean rthere are people that state the most anal BS around and then there are those that pretend to be the voice of people that cannot help themselves.

When talking about whether Obama is a citizen or not he said in response to a right wing dipstick:

Lou Dobbs had David from Freeport, N.Y., on the line, the caller musing darkly about President Obama “rushing all these programs through by whatever means,” knowing he will soon be exposed as a fake, a fraud, a . . . Kenyan.

At that point, a scrupulous radio host had three options: (A) hit the kill button (B) laugh and hit the kill button or (C) offer some push-back against the fantastical notion that Barack Obama was born on foreign soil and thus serves — illegally — as the Oval Office’s first resident alien.

Instead, Dobbs chose the maximum complicity-minimum integrity route, or (D): “Certainly your view can’t be discounted,” the host said.

Hopefully CNN will do the right thing and put this a/hole on the carpet for being a moron.  He is not doing the public a favor he is feeding the extreme right all for the ratings game.

PETA Goes To The Circus

I have been one of PETA’s harshest critics in the past.  I have made fun of them for their Sea Kittens, the KKK outfits, and so on….but I will give props where props are due….and PETA deserves a huge thum up for their undercover work at the circus.

From an article on circus.com:

Horses Beaten and Whipped
Horses are one of the most commonly used animals in circuses, but they receive the least protection, as they are not covered by the federal Animal Welfare Act.

Hundley and Tom reported severe alleged abuse of horses, including the following:

  • Horses are grabbed by the throat and shoved, jabbed with pitchforks, and given “lip twists,” a sadistic way to inflict pain on one of the most sensitive areas of a horse’s body.
  • Most of Ringling’s horses are head-shy from being punched in the face so many times. If you try to pet them, they jerk their heads away because they fear being hit.
  • A handler allegedly tethered a horse named Sonny and whipped the horse with the metal snap of the lead for 10 minutes. The horse was later found to have a broken tooth.
  • A miniature horse got loose and was repeatedly punched on the back and sides when he was recaptured.
  • Sacha Houcke allegedly slugged a shrieking miniature horse named Gunther in the face twice with such force that it would have knocked down a full-grown person. The sound of his fist, which could be heard 20 feet away, knocked the horse senseless.
  • A horse named Mizean had cuts across his sides and back from being viciously whipped.

Elephants Live in Fear of Beatings
Both Hundley and Tom worked on the animal crew and tell PETA that they witnessed a violent beating of an elephant that lasted at least 30 minutes when Ringling had a layover at the fairgrounds in Tulsa, Oklahoma. When an elephant refused a command to lie down, Ringling’s head elephant trainer, Sacha Houcke, allegedly beat the elephant with a bullhook, hooking her behind the ear, on the leg, and on the back. At one point, he reportedly inserted the hook inside the elephant’s ear canal and pulled on the handle using both hands and the full force of his body weight. The elephant cried out in agony and was left bleeding profusely from severe wounds.

The following were among the whistleblowers’ declarations to PETA:

  • Elephants are so terrified of the trainers that they begin urinating, defecating, and trumpeting in fear at the sound of their voices.
  • Elephants are aggressively hooked on a daily basis, and handlers rub dirt into bloody bullhook wounds to conceal them from the public.
  • Elephants suffering from arthritis are kept on the road.
  • Elephants are only unchained when the public is around.
  • Some employees were outraged at Sacha Houcke’s recklessness when he brought Luna and another elephant perilously close to a PETA staffer and assaulted him in Oklahoma City. Luna is extremely dangerous and unpredictable. She has attacked handlers and frequently shows aggression toward people, and employees are regularly warned not to go near her.
  • The circus knows in advance when U.S. Department of Agriculture inspectors are coming for what are supposed to be unannounced inspections.

PETA went undercover and vid taped many of the offenses these a/holes are commiting against these animals.  Personally, they should be shot for mistreating animals….beyond that I pray that these animals get justice and these sadistic assholes got prison.

I have a new found respect for PETA and the work they are doing.

Obama Calls On Bloggers

The president is calling on bloggers to help keep the health care issue on the minds of Americans.

As reported by Sam Stein in the Huffington Post:

“It is important just to keep the pressure on members of Congress because what happens is there is a default position of inertia here in Washington,” the president said during an invitation-only conference call. “And pushing against that, making sure that people feel that the desperation that ordinary families are feeling all across the country, every single day, when they are worrying about whether they can pay their premiums or not… People have to feel that in a visceral way. And you guys can help deliver that better than just about anybody.”

In a roughly 25-minute session with a handful of prominent progressive bloggers, the president also asked for help combating disinformation about his health care plan.

“I know the blogs are best at debunking myths that can slip through a lot of the traditional media outlets,” he said. “And that is why you are going to play such an important role in our success in the weeks to come.”

This is a great idea from a Prez with a wealth of great ideas…..but there is a problem, IMO.  Bloggers like myself and many others have been doing just what the president is asking bloggers to do.  But we are not cheerleaders, while we do make sure that the “whole” story on the issue is examined….but what Obama is doing is asking his bloggers the cheerleader like Daily Kos and reporters with their little blogs.

Sad part is that many bloggers have been doing this type of thing since the beginning of Obama’s rise to power, but since they are not in the right “corner” they are ignored.  While I think that his attempt should be applauded…he should expand his field of bloggers to include those that may not be on the “A” list……for they have been pointing out the BS for a lot longer than some of the mainstream bloggers.

A Sad Consequence Of War

Since I do so much reading I find stories all the time and just cannot find time or space for a post, but this story I saw in Al Jazeera and made room for it.  There are so many consequences of war, the creation of massive poverty, being one such consequence.

Abject poverty across Iraq is fuelling an illegal trade in human organs.

Hundreds of people are believed to have sold kidneys and other organs through dealers in the capital, Baghdad, over the last year.

About 23 per cent of Iraqis live in poverty, meaning that they are forced to survive on $2.2 a day or less, according to government figures.

Unemployment is also high, with at least 18 per cent of the population out of work, UN and government reports suggest. Unofficial estimates have put the figure as high as 30 per cent.

The organ brokers who arrange the deals between the desperately poor and those desperate enough to pay to save the life of a loved one, typically congregate around the hospitals.

Although Iraqi law allows people to donate their organs, their sale is illegal.

However, one of their customers said that he had paid more than $15,000 to one of the dealers outside the hospital.
The majority of customers buying the organs are other Iraqis, but with news of the growing market spreading across the region, there have been reports of people travelling from across the Middle East to secure an organ.

Old Answers For Health Care Reform

A Professor’s Classroom

It is my intention to give my readers as much info as possible on the issues and the solutions that are offered up.

The debate has revved up and it is slowly coming to a boil….health care is the latest issue to get the spin doctors working.  Drug industry is about to lose their collective minds trying to find a way to retain their hold on the medication market….the  insurance industry is near stroke potential…they also are losing their way…they see their profits going out the window…they see their influence drying up…they see……yada…yada…..

A report shows the the Health care industry, most noticeably the insurance companies are spending about $1.4 million a day trying to defeat any substantial reform.  Even when 80% of the people want a good health care plan from Washington…at least they are putting people to work…was this part of the jobs creation that Obama predicted?  Just asking.

I listen to the GOP and their pundits throw some ideas out there…..tort reform, that is frivolous lawsuits, they want to limit these. but these lawsuits account for about 1% of the cost of health care, so even if they were compl,etely eliminated the savings would be microscopic….but yet it is a pillar of the opposition and their plan to reform health care.

Next is an issue that McCain, among others , have thrown into the mix.  This was first brought out in the mid 80’s, I believe…it is the old reliable Medical Savings Accounts (MASs).  There was a lull on the insistence of these accounts, but the resurrection has begun.

Just what is a MSA?

MSA was a solution offered up as a cure for the health cost crisis.  It was a personal savings account, tax free, where an individual could deposit money to help cover the cost of any illness that could show up, supposedly to see the depositor through illnbess and retirement.  Hell of an idea, but to me it sounds like rationing.  Why?  The well off could deposit more than the working poor, which would mean that the wealthy would get better health care than the poor.

The newest argument against a public option for health care for all Americans is the cost.  I have read that the GOP is saying that it would cost over $4.9 trillion dollars over the next ten years.  Damn!  That ain’t chump change!  But my question is where did those figures come from?

I mean a public option is where the people would pay into a Medicare-esque health plan, if that is true and there is income, where does the $4.9 trillion come from?  Not everyone will be ill at the same time.  I would like to see the formula that was used to figure the cost listed.

Sorry I digress….the MSA is not the way to get everyone insured…it is that simple …the only major benefit would be to banks…it would help their bottom line.  These accounts would be raided by the depositor in times of economic crisis….kinda like now….and the problem of unisured people would return.  This IS NOT a fix that deserves any consideration at all.  It is a joke…a cop-out….and a looney tune.

Labor Gets Pumped –Again!

Probably on of the best pieces of proposed legislation to come out of Washington in years was the Employee Free Choice Act…this piece of work would have made it easier for workers to organize in their workplace….many industries and Repubs hated it, whic h is understandable because those two groups hate the worker, they tolerate them out of necessity.

But of all groups, Dems are at the heart of a weakening of the Act.  Democrats!  Yes, Dems…moderate Dems….or as I like to call them the Blue Turd Dems…..

Sam Stein writing for the Huffington Post:

On Thursday, The New York Times reported that a half-dozen senators “friendly to labor” decided to drop the majority sign-up provision from the Employee Free Choice Act. The measure would have made it easier to organize workers by allowing the formation of a union once more than 50 percent of workers signed cards in support of it.

Critics had dubbed the provision “card check” and had pledged to fight any legislative vehicle that contained it. Faced with the possibility of a heated political fight and a dead-certain filibuster, several major unions and congressional allies tried to muster the 60 Senate votes needed for cloture. The avenues weren’t there. And over the past two months,

The compromise legislation, as described to the Huffington Post, will contain several major labor priorities including requiring shorter time periods for a union election and containing some form of binding arbitration to prevent employers from dragging out a contract negotiation process. The measures, according to AFL-CIO spokesman Eddie Vale, will let workers choose to join a union without intimidation, ensure that those who join a union get a first contract, and institute meaningful penalties for violations of labor law.

Once again, politicans are tweaking instead of finding a solution.  The fun part about this is these gutless wonders are deemed “labor friendly”….what a joke!  This whole strategy was a piece of crap…it was handled poorly and is going to set labor back even though there was high hopes with a Dem Congress and a Dem prez.

Silly voter….fooled again!

How About A Millionaires Tax?

As the health care debate heats up and the war of words begins in earnest, much has been said about the cost of the proposed health care plan.  Repubs keep harping on the cost and citing a CBO report that substantiates their figures….but there is a small problem brewing according to the Huffington Post:

The Congressional Budget Office has not released scores on the House health care reform proposal, despite reports that it had estimated the plan would cost taxpayers upwards of $1.5 trillion.

The report caused a stir on the Hill and stoked fears of a setback.

“THERE. IS. NO. SCORE,” e-mailed one frustrated committee aide.

UPDATE: In a statement unusual in its harsh wording, all three committees are pushing back against the story.

The Press Offices of the House Ways and Means, Energy and Commerce and Education and Labor Committees released the following statement today in response to an inaccurate report published in CongressDaily asserting that the House Tri-Committee health care reform legislation has been scored by the Congressional Budget Office:
“This report is premature and entirely fabricated. In fact, none of the reporters working on this piece contacted our press offices to fact check their story. The three House committees are still working to develop legislation and have not yet received a score from CBO on the discussion draft. As the three chairmen have made clear, our health care reform legislation will be paid for and we’re still considering revenue options.”

This is the second time that a non existent CBO report has been used to attack a proposal.  There is a possibility that there will be a report issued in the near future but as far as I can tell that day has not arrived yet.

Sorry..I digress……a millionaires tax?  This would be a surtax on people making more than $350,000 as a way to help pay for health care.  But a piece written in Bloomberg made me think of something:

While how to pay for health care is the biggest challenge, the idea of imposing a so-called millionaire’s tax to help fund the expansion is drawing fire from Republicans and Democrats. Senator Ben Nelson of Nebraska has expressed skepticism, as have House Democrats in the Blue Dog Coalition, who describe themselves as fiscally conservative.

The surtax is “not my first choice,” said one Blue Dog Democrat, Stephanie Herseth Sandlin of South Dakota. “I’ve got some concerns.”

Sounds good right?  Think about one more thing…..about 72% of the American people want substantial health reform, at is one….now of the guys spouting crap about health care and shows such concern for the millionaire tax….but ask yourself, how many of those in Washington dealing with this issue are millionaires?  My guess would be just about all of them.

Here is another thought for you to consider–the most popular cost for health care being tossed around is $1.2 trillion—damn!–that is a lot, huh?  But there is more the possible amount to be raised by the surtax is $500 billion and in 2011 the Bush tax cuts will ecpire and that would bring in about $700 billion….you do not have to be a math whiz to figure that 500 plus 700 would equal $1.2 trillion….oops….does that mean that it would be almost budget neutral?  If so, why is everyone opposed?

Just what is the hub-bub, eh?