Poor Obama...

Health Care Reform Made Simple

I was very fortunate to find this organizational chart to help understand ObamaCare... I hope this helps clear up any confusion regarding the recent landmark change in health care legislation.

U S S A

United Socialist States of America...

Wow, that sucks. So Heath Care Reform... Yah us.

Let's see now... we get increased fees... new higher taxes... and immediate starting unfunded benefits that current insurance companies MUST follow, with the remainder of the benefits and the millions of currently uninsured not actually being covered for 4 years yet.

EVERY insurance company in the country (including those that were/are in favor of this reform package) have already come out and said that in order to pay for all the mandated benefits that this bill includes, insurance premiums will be going WAY up.

So more taxes and fees... Higher insurance premiums... and no new people actually being insured... This is a good idea why again?

OMG!!!!! Say goodbye filibuster proof senate!

Scott Brown takes the Kennedy Senate Seat!!!

Wow! Who would have EVER thought that would happen... Hey Dems... The American People have spoken and told you how they feel about ObamaCare... KENNEDY'S SEAT wasn't safe... How's yours?!?

THE COMING DEMOCRAT IMPLOSION

Written by Dr. Jack Wheeler

Thursday, 14 January 2010

For all their power-grabbing fascist arrogance, the Democrats in Washington are coming to resemble Mack Sennett's bumbling-fumbling Keystone Kops more with each passing day. Republicans in Washington are in a certain kind of awe over the Dems' performance. Walk around the halls of Capitol Hill. You don't need name tags to identify the Pubs from the Dems. The former are walking with zest and smiling cheerfully - except when they cast a glance of astonished puzzlement at the latter shuffling dejectedly along and refusing to look at their cheerier colleagues in the eye. How could everything go to hell so quickly? That's the question both are asking themselves. It is a mystery to both. "I guess we really are in a state of shock and awe over what they have done to themselves," says a buddy of mine who's chief of staff to a principal GOP Senator. "I just hope we learn the right lesson from it." The Dems had the whole enchilada, he said - solid control of the House and Senate, an enormously popular new president with a press that literally worshipped him, they had it all. You just can't ask for a more powerful setup in Washington. Yet in less than a year, they've thrown it all away - they've "shot their bolt," he said - and "the weirdest part, Jack, is they've shot their bolt while getting nothing for it." "You think the TeaParty folks are mad at the Pelosi-Reid-Obama Gang?" he asked me rhetorically. That's just anger in a teapot compared to the cauldron of hate boiling the Left. One by one, he listed the Dem constituencies that are in a state of disgusted rage. The unions are enraged at the Dems for not passing Card Check. The enviros are enraged at the Dems for not passing Cap & Trade. The Hispanics are enraged at the Dems for not passing amnesty for illegal aliens. The homosexuals are enraged at the Dems for not legalizing homosexual "marriage." And the moonbats across the board are enraged at the Dems for continuing the war in Afghanistan and being deeply in bed with Wall Street "fat cat bankers." The last straw for all of them is the Dem "sell-out" on the full socialization of medicine via the "public option" now deleted from ObamaCare. Typical, my buddy said, is a rant by a political science professor at Hofstra University, David Greene, who is so left wing he calls non-"progressives" (meaning anyone not a moonbat) "regressives". "All the (Senate) staffers are reading it - the Dems seriously, us for comic relief. It's hilarious - you've to see it, Jack." So he called it up on his computer, and soon I was laughing my head off. Greene starts off calling Zero a "little prick," and says he's so angry at him that: "...the thing I want most from the 2010 elections is for his party to get absolutely clobbered, even if that means a repeat of 1994. And that what I most want from 2012 is for him to be utterly humiliated, even if that means President Palin at the helm." He goes on to detail how ObamaCare is "a total train wreck" for the Democrat Party, both if it passes and if it doesn't. He calls ObamaCare "President Nothingburger's great gift to America, along with doing nothing about jobs, doing nothing about the Middle East, nothing about civil liberties, nothing about civil rights, and now doing nothing at Copenhagen (about global warming)." This guy is seriously steamed (you can read the whole rant here) - and he speaks for millions of liberals (they call themselves "progressives" now) who formerly worshipped Zero and now hate his guts. It's one thing for TeaPartyers and conservatives to despise Zero and his party. It's one thing for a majority of voters to say they would vote against him today. But for him and his party to be despised by his once most fervent supporters - that is an achievement of incompetence truly on a Keystone Kops level. Perhaps the strangest aspect to all of this is the feeling of inevitable doom pervading Dems on the Hill. They know they're headed for disaster yet they keep marching toward disaster in lockstep anyway. "We've crossed the Rubicon" is the expression you now hear them all say, meaning there's no turning back from passing ObamaCare no matter what the political cost to them. (The Rubicon river in northeastern Italy marked the boundary between Cisalpine Gaul and Italy proper which no Roman Army legion was allowed to cross. When Julius Caesar defied the law of the Roman Senate and led his army across the Rubicon in 49 BC, he initiated thereby a civil war to control Rome. At the time of the crossing, he uttered the famous words ālea iacta EST , "the die is cast.") Caesar thought destiny was on his side. The Democrats think doom is on theirs. They cannot understand how they have worked their way into this trap, where no matter what they do now, they're screwed. The Republicans are happy about all of this, of course - but the happiness is superficial. It wasn't that long ago when they had the whole enchilada - the White House, Senate, and House under Bush - and that ended poorly. My friend and I agreed -- Hubris teaches you the lessons of life the hard way. And we agreed - "Hubris is what we have got to most avoid once the Dems implode," he said. "We've all read Peggy Noonan's ‘The Risk of Catastrophic Victory.' We've got to be, as she says, ‘worthy of victory.' I'm spending a lot of time thinking how we can be. All of us here are." "By victory, you mean a Senate majority?" I asked. "A House majority this November is in the cards, but the Senate?" He fussed with what hair he had left on his head. "Well, the best in the business, Charlie Cook, is now saying the Dems could lose net nine seats in November, including Boxer. So maybe. But I mean something more catastrophic than losing their majority." All I could do was make a grimace of incomprehension. "You know those buildings that are demolished? They don't blow up, they blow in, the building collapses in upon itself and implodes. That's what may happen to the Democrats. And it may happen a lot sooner than next November." I paused. "You mean...?" "Jack," he explained, "if Brown loses next week in Massachusetts in the single digits, say by 8 or 9%, it's an enormous victory for us. If he loses by 5% or less, it's massive." "And if he wins?" He answered with just two words: "Game over." He looked at me intensely. "As in finita la musica, the music is over. These guys will turn on themselves with a viciousness you will not believe, Jack. Chuck Schumer will kneecap Harry Reid in a heartbeat, so we'll have a new Majority Leader. But Schumer is smart enough to realize the whole Democrat agenda is in ruins and that he can't blame it all on Reid. So the hunt will be on for the right scapegoat." He let me guess. I took a stab. "The knives seem to be coming out for Geithner." He nodded. "Yes, he probably will be tossed overboard by Obama - in order to save himself." I looked at him like a deer looks into headlights. He belly laughed. "Jack, you look like you need a drink. Where did I hide that bottle of Famous Grouse you got me for my birthday?" He found it. He was right - I did need it. "Jack - didn't you predict sometime last year there would be calls for Obama to resign? You just never thought they'd come from his own party!" I was still trying to process this. "This is still a huge if, you know. The anger among the left against Obama is steadily building and it's going to blow sometime. The Democrats to save themselves will have to scapegoat him. If the Massachusetts Miracle happens next week, then the demands that he resign will start soon. If not, then the demands may not start until after the debacle in November. And they may never happen. But the odds are growing, my friend." He smiled to himself. "You know they'll try to get us to join their call to ‘Resign!' We'll send them a smoke signal - ‘He's all yours, guys...' This could be a lot of fun." He raised his shot glass. "Here's to our not screwing it up this time." "I'll drink to that," I responded, and we did.

SOME INTERESTING PARALLELS OBSERVED HERE ?

In the early 20th century, Argentina was one of the richest countries in the world. While Great Britain's maritime power and its far-flung empire had propelled it to a dominant position among the world's industrialized nations, only the United States challenged Argentina for the position of the world's second-most powerful economy.

It was blessed with abundant agriculture, vast swaths of rich farmland laced with navigable rivers and an accessible port system. Its level of industrialization was higher than many European countries: railroads, automobiles and telephones were commonplace.

In 1916, a new president was elected. Hipólito Irigoyen had formed a party called The Radicals under the banner of "fundamental change" with an appeal to the middle class.

Among Irigoyen's changes: mandatory pension insurance, mandatory health insurance, and support for low-income housing construction to stimulate the economy. Put simply, the state assumed economic control of a vast swath of the country's operations and began assessing new payroll taxes to fund its efforts.

With an increasing flow of funds into these entitlement programs, the government's payouts soon became overly generous. Before long its outlays surpassed the value of the taxpayers' contributions. Put simply, it quickly became under-funded, much like the United States' Social Security and Medicare programs.

The death knell for the Argentine economy, however, came with the election of Juan Perón. Perón had a fascist and corporatist upbringing; he and his charismatic wife aimed their populist rhetoric at the nation's rich.

This targeted group "swiftly expanded to cover most of the propertied middle classes, who became an enemy to be defeated and humiliated."

Under Perón, the size of government bureaucracies exploded through massive programs of social spending and by encouraging the growth of labor unions.

High taxes and economic mismanagement took their inevitable toll even after Perón had been driven from office. But his populist rhetoric and "contempt for economic realities" lived on. Argentina's federal government continued to spend far beyond its means.

Hyperinflation exploded in 1989, the final stage of a process characterized by "industrial protectionism, redistribution of income based on increased wages, and growing state intervention in the economy."

The Argentinean government's practice of printing money to pay off its public debts had crushed the economy. Inflation hit 3000%, reminiscent of the Weimar Republic. Food riots were rampant; stores were looted; the country descended into chaos.

And by 1994, Argentina's public pensions - the equivalent of Social Security - had imploded. The payroll tax had increased from 5% to 26%, but it wasn't enough. In addition, Argentina had implemented a value-added tax (VAT), new income taxes, a personal tax on wealth, and additional revenues based upon the sale of public enterprises. These crushed the private sector, further damaging the economy.

A government-controlled "privatization" effort to rescue seniors' pensions was attempted. But, by 2001, those funds had also been raided by the government, the monies replaced by Argentina's defaulted government bonds.

By 2002, "government fiscal irresponsibility induced a national economic crisis as severe as America's Great Depression."

In 1902 Argentina was one of the world's richest countries. Little more than a hundred years later, it is poverty-stricken, struggling to meet its debt obligations amidst a drought.

We've seen this movie before. The Democrats' populist plans can't possibly work, because government bankrupts everything it touches. History teaches us that ObamaCare and unfunded entitlement programs will be utter, complete disasters.

Today's Democrats are guilty of more than stupidity; they are enslaving future generations to poverty and misery. And they will be long gone when it all implodes. They will be as cold and dead as Juan Perón when the piper must ultimately be paid.

References: A tear for Argentina's pension funds; Inflation in Argentina; The United States of Argentina. Cross-posted at: Doug Ross @ Journal.

ON SHEEP, WOLVES, AND SHEEPDOGS

ON SHEEP, WOLVES, AND SHEEPDOGS
In brief, Jill Edwards, a junior math major at the University of Washington, and a member of the UW student senate, opposed a memorial to UW grad "Pappy" Boyington. Boyington was a U.S. Marine aviator who earned the Medal of Honor in World War II. Edwards said that she didn't think it was appropriate to honor a person who killed other people. She also said that a member of the Marine Corps was NOT an example of the sort of person the University of Washington wanted to produce.

What follows is Gen. Dula's letter to the University of Washington student senate leader.
To: Edwards, Jill (student, UW)
Subject: Sheep, Wolves and Sheepdogs

Miss Edwards, I read of your 'student activity' regarding the proposed memorial to Col Greg Boyington, USMC and a Medal of Honor winner. I suspect you will receive a bellyful of angry e-mails from conservative folks like me. You may be too young to appreciate fully the sacrifices of generations of servicemen and servicewomen on whose shoulders you and your fellow students stand. I forgive you for the untutored ways of youth and your naiveté.

It may be that you are, simply, a sheep. There's no dishonor in being a sheep - - as long as you know and accept what you are. Please take a couple of minutes to read the following. And be grateful for the thousands - - millions - - of American sheepdogs who permit you the freedom to express even bad ideas.

Brett Dula
Sheepdog, retired
----------------------------------------------------------
ON SHEEP, WOLVES, AND SHEEPDOGS

By LTC(RET) Dave Grossman, RANGER,
Ph.D., author of "On Killing."

Honor never grows old, and honor rejoices the heart of age. It does so because honor is, finally, about defending those noble and worthy things that deserve defending, even if it comes at a high cost. In our time, that may mean social disapproval, public scorn, hardship, persecution, or as always,even death itself. The question remains: What is worth defending? What is worth dying for? What is worth living for? - William J. Bennett - in a lecture to the United States Naval Academy November 24, 1997

One Vietnam veteran, an old retired colonel, once said this to me: "Most of the people in our society are sheep. They are kind, gentle, productive creatures who can only hurt one another by accident." This is true. Remember, the murder rate is six per 100,000 per year, and the aggravated assault rate is four per 1,000 per year. What this means is that the vast majority of Americans are not inclined to hurt one another.

Some estimates say that two million Americans are victims of violent crimes every year, a tragic, staggering number, perhaps an all-time record rate of violent crime. But there are almost 300 million Americans, which means that the odds of being a victim of violent crime is considerably less than one in a hundred on any given year. Furthermore, since many violent crimes are committed by repeat offenders, the actual number of violent citizens is considerably less than two million.

Thus there is a paradox, and we must grasp both ends of the situation: We may well be in the most violent times in history, but violence is still remarkably rare. This is because most citizens are kind, decent people who are not capable of hurting each other, except by accident or under extreme provocation. They are sheep.

I mean nothing negative by calling them sheep. To me, it is like the pretty, blue robin's egg. Inside it is soft and gooey but someday it will grow into something wonderful. But the egg cannot survive without its hard blue shell.

Police officers, soldiers, and other warriors are like that shell, and someday the civilization they protect will grow into something wonderful. For now, though, they need warriors to protect them from the predators.

"Then there are the wolves," the old war veteran said, "and the wolves feed on the sheep without mercy." Do you believe there are wolves out there who will feed on the flock without mercy? You better believe it. There are evil men in this world and they are capable of evil deeds. The moment you forget that or pretend it is not so, you become a sheep. There is no safety in denial.

"Then there are sheepdogs," he went on, "and I'm a sheepdog. I live to protect the flock and confront the wolf."

If you have no capacity for violence then you are a healthy productive citizen, a sheep. If you have a capacity for violence and no empathy for your fellow citizens, then you have defined an aggressive sociopath, a wolf.

But what if you have a capacity for violence, and a deep love for your fellow citizens? What do you have then? A sheepdog, a warrior, someone who is walking the hero's path. Someone who can walk into the heart of darkness, into the universal human phobia, and walk out unscathed

Let me expand on this old soldier's excellent model of the sheep, wolves, and sheepdogs. We know that the sheep live in denial, that is what makes them sheep. They do not want to believe that there is evil in the world. They can accept the fact that fires can happen, which is why they want fire extinguishers, fire sprinklers, fire alarms and fire exits throughout their kids' schools.

But many of them are outraged at the idea of putting an armed police officer in their kid's school. Our children are thousands of times more likely to be killed or seriously injured by school violence than fire, but the sheep's only response to the possibility of violence is denial. The idea of someone coming to kill or harm their child is just too hard, and so they chose the path of denial.

The sheep generally do not like the sheepdog. He looks a lot like the wolf. He has fangs and the capacity for violence. The difference, though, is that the sheepdog must not, can not and will not ever harm the sheep. Any sheep dog who intentionally harms the lowliest little lamb will be punished and removed. The world cannot work any other way, at least not in a representative democracy or a republic such as ours.

Still, the sheepdog disturbs the sheep. He is a constant reminder that there are wolves in the land. They would prefer that he didn't tell them where to go, or give them traffic tickets, or stand at the ready in our airports, in camouflage fatigues, holding an M-16. The sheep would much rather have the sheepdog cash in his fangs, spray paint himself white, and go, "Baa." Until the wolf shows up. Then the entire flock tries desperately to hide behind one lonely sheepdog.

The students, the victims, at Columbine High School were big, tough high school students, and under ordinary circumstances they would not have had the time of day for a police officer. They were not bad kids; they just had nothing to say to a cop. When the school was under attack, however, and SWAT teams were clearing the rooms and hallways, the officers had to physically peel those clinging, sobbing kids off of them. This is how the little lambs feel about their sheepdog when the wolf is at the door.

Look at what happened after September 11, 2001 when the wolf pounded hard on the door. Remember how America, more than ever before, felt differently about their law enforcement officers and military personnel? Remember how many times you heard the word hero?

Understand that there is nothing morally superior about being a sheepdog; it is just what you choose to be. Also understand that a sheepdog is a funny critter: He is always sniffing around out on the perimeter, checking the breeze, barking at things that go bump in the night, and yearning for a righteous battle. That is, the young sheepdogs yearn for a righteous battle. The old sheepdogs are a little older and wiser, but they move to the sound of the guns when needed, right along with the young ones.

Here is how the sheep and the sheepdog think differently. The sheep pretend the wolf will never come, but the sheepdog lives for that day. After the attacks on September 11, 2001, most of the sheep, that is, most citizens in America said, "Thank God I wasn't on one of those planes." The sheepdogs, the warriors, said, "Dear God, I wish I could have been on one of those planes. Maybe I could have made a difference." When you are truly transformed into a warrior and have truly invested yourself into warriorhood, you want to be there. You want to be able to make a difference.

There is nothing morally superior about the sheepdog, the warrior, but he does have one real advantage. Only one. And that is that he is able to survive and thrive in an environment that destroys 98 percent of the population.

There was research conducted a few years ago with individuals convicted of violent crimes. These cons were in prison for serious, predatory crimes of violence: assaults, murders and killing law enforcement officers. The vast majority said that they specifically targeted victims by body language: Slumped walk, passive behavior and lack of awareness. They chose their victims like big cats do in Africa, when they select one out of the herd that is least able to protect itself.

Some people may be destined to be sheep and others might be genetically primed to be wolves or sheepdogs. But I believe that most people can choose which one they want to be, and I'm proud to say that more and more Americans are choosing to become sheepdogs.

Seven months after the attack on September 11, 2001, Todd Beamer was honored in his hometown of Cranbury, New Jersey. Todd, as you recall, was the man on Flight 93 over Pennsylvania who called on his cell phone to alert an operator from United Airlines about the hijacking. When he learned of the other three passenger planes that had been used as weapons, Todd dropped his phone and uttered the words, "Let's roll," which authorities believe was a signal to the other passengers to confront the terrorist hijackers. In one hour, a transformation occurred among the passengers - athletes, business people and parents. -- from sheep to sheepdogs and together they fought the wolves, ultimately saving an unknown number of lives on the ground.

There is no safety for honest men except by believing all possible evil of evil men. - Edmund Burke

Here is the point I like to emphasize, especially to the thousands of police officers and soldiers I speak to each year. In nature the sheep, real sheep, are born as sheep. Sheepdogs are born that way, and so are wolves. They didn't have a choice. But you are not a critter. As a human being, you can be whatever you want to be. It is a conscious, moral decision.

If you want to be a sheep, then you can be a sheep and that is okay, but you must understand the price you pay. When the wolf comes, you and your loved ones are going to die if there is not a sheepdog there to protect you. If
you want to be a wolf, you can be one, but the sheepdogs are going to hunt you down and you will never have rest, safety, trust or love. But if you want to be a sheepdog and walk the warrior's path, then you must make a conscious and moral decision every day to dedicate, equip and prepare yourself to thrive in that toxic, corrosive moment when the wolf comes knocking at the door.

For example, many officers carry their weapons in church. They are well concealed in ankle holsters, shoulder holsters or inside-the-belt holsters tucked into the small of their backs. Anytime you go to some form of religious service, there is a very good chance that a police officer in your congregation is carrying. You will never know if there is such an individual in your place of worship, until the wolf appears to massacre you and your loved ones.

I was training a group of police officers in Texas, and during the break, one officer asked his friend if he carried his weapon in church. The other cop replied, "I will never be caught without my gun in church." I asked why he felt so strongly about this, and he told me about a cop he knew who was at a church massacre in Ft. Worth, Texas in 1999. In that incident, a mentally deranged individual came into the church and opened fire, gunning down fourteen people. He said that officer believed he could have saved every life that day if he had been carrying his gun. His own son was shot, and all he could do was throw himself on the boy's body and wait to die. That cop looked me in the eye and said, "Do you have any idea how hard it would be to live with yourself after that?"

Some individuals would be horrified if they knew this police officer was carrying a weapon in church. They might call him paranoid and would probably scorn him. Yet these same individuals would be enraged and would call for "heads to roll" if they found out that the airbags in their cars were defective, or that the fire extinguisher and fire sprinklers in their kids' school did not work. They can accept the fact that fires and traffic accidents can happen and that there must be safeguards against them.

Their only response to the wolf, though, is denial, and all too often their response to the sheepdog is scorn and disdain. But the sheepdog quietly asks himself, "Do you have any idea how hard it would be to live with yourself if your loved ones were attacked and killed, and you had to stand there helplessly because you were unprepared for that day?"

It is denial that turns people into sheep. Sheep are psychologically destroyed by combat because their only defense is denial, which is counterproductive and destructive, resulting in fear, helplessness and horror when the wolf shows up.

Denial kills you twice. It kills you once, at your moment of truth when you are not physically prepared: you didn't bring your gun, you didn't train. Your only defense was wishful thinking. Hope is not a strategy. Denial kills you a second time because even if you do physically survive, you are psychologically shattered by your fear, helplessness and horror at your moment of truth.

Gavin de Becker puts it like this in Fear Less, his superb post-9/11 book, which should be required reading for anyone trying to come to terms with our current world situation: "...denial can be seductive, but it has an insidious side effect. For all the peace of mind deniers think they get by saying it isn't so, the fall they take when faced with new violence is all the more unsettling."

Denial is a save-now-pay-later scheme, a contract written entirely in small print, for in the long run, the denying person knows the truth on some level. And so the warrior must strive to confront denial in all aspects of his life, and prepare himself for the day when evil comes.

If you are warrior who is legally authorized to carry a weapon and you step outside without that weapon, then you become a sheep, pretending that the bad man will not come today. No one can be "on" 24/7, for a lifetime. Everyone needs down time. But if you are authorized to carry a weapon, and you walk outside without it, just take a deep breath, and say this to yourself..."Baa."

This business of being a sheep or a sheep dog is not a yes-no dichotomy. It is not an all-or-nothing, either-or choice. It is a matter of degrees, a continuum. On one end is an abject, head-in-the-sand-sheep and on the other end is the ultimate warrior. Few people exist completely on one end or the other.

Most of us live somewhere in between. Since 9-11 almost everyone in America took a step up that continuum, away from denial. The sheep took a few steps toward accepting and appreciating their warriors, and the warriors started taking their job more seriously. The degree to which you move up that continuum, away from sheephood and denial, is the degree to which you and your loved ones will survive, physically and psychologically at your moment of truth.

My personal Signature

"If It Weren't For The United States Military"
"There Would Be NO United States of America"