Health Care and the 47 Million: A Breakdown

The absurd figure being tossed about by the Socialists in an effort to ram socialized health care and rationing down our collective throat are the "47 million uninsured Americans." Before I break that figure down, let's examine it just on its face. One, some simple math says that 253 million Americans have insurance. That's a lot of people to punish. The other key word here is "uninsured". It's not "47 million Americans with no access to health care at all", but that's the way the Socialists are selling it, as if one necessarily leads to the other: No insurance = no health care. That in itself is false and a lie. And now it's time for the breakdown:

20%, 9.4 million, aren't even Americans; they are non-U.S. Citizens (1)
43%, 20 million, earn enough to buy insurance but are healthy and choose not to (2)
25%, 11 million, already qualify for government-subsidized health care but choose, for whatever reason, not to get it (3)
12%, 6.6 million, those who make too much to qualify for Medicare but truly don't make enough to purchase private insurance.

So, if we are to do anything to reduce the number of uninsured, we should be targeting that last 6.6 million. Or better yet, let's understand why health care costs have skyrocketed (Hint: it's not 'greedy' doctors or insurance companies). Let's not punish the rest of American for a lie.

(1) U.S. Census Bureau estimates
(2) Employment Policy Institute
(3) Urban Institute

Sen. Barbara Boxer: A Racist Revealed

There's nothing I can say to add to this. It speaks for itself.

State of the Stimulus

So what have we gotten for our trillions of dollars in stimulus? Nothing, apparently. The fine folks at Innocent Bystanders have plotted out the actual unemployment figures vs the Obama economic team's pie-in-the-sky predictions. Not surprisingly, not only were Obama's predictions wrong, the stimulus has failed, badly:


For clarification, the dark blue line is Obama's "with recovery" projections, and the light blue line is without. The maroon dots are actual unemployment data as reported by the Labor Department. Now, granted, Obama has since said unemployment might top 10% this year, as if that makes it all better. Joe "The Fall Guy" Biden has come out and said they guessed wrong. Guessed wrong?! When it comes to putting my kids into debt to the Chinese by TRILLIONS, no had better be guessing.

Just as a reminder, here is the Heritage Foundation plot of Obama's deficit spending:


Remember this in 2010.

Bill Watch: HR 1913

The so-called hate crimes bill that passed under everyone's noses back in April (didn't even hear about this one on the Interweb). I particularly like this section:



So if the AG can dig up some politically-motivated reason, he can federalize the state courts. That's just great.

Call your Senators. This thing must die.

It can't hurt

So, I fired off a letter to Chairman Steele this morning, after finding out about the 8 Republican traitors (thanks to Ms. Malkin for compiling that). that voted for the steaming pile that is Obama's carbon tax. I fully expect it to dropped into the bit bucket (flames to dev/null and such), but as the title says, it can't hurt.

Dear Chairman Steele,

I'm surprised you keep a e-mail address publicly available, as I'm sure you get plenty of hate mail. The following will probably read rough and acerbic, but sometimes such is the nature of truth. The GOP leadership needs to, in short, grow some stones and a spine. The last few months have seen the Obama administration waste literally TRILLIONS of dollars on "stimulus" which has failed utterly to stimulate anything other the national debt and Obama's quest for power, the characterization of Constitution-loving conservatives as "extremists" (read: potential threats to the Obama regime), and now this monstrous, demon-from-hell carbon tax bill, based on bogus pseudo-science, that passed because 8 REPUBLICANS voted yes. The GOP can't even keeps its own people in line, and, as the GOP chairman, the buck stops with you.

I supported your run for GOP chairman, because you seemed like a solid conservative. The problem is, you're a nice guy. Under other circumstances, that wouldn't be an issue. But now is not the time for nice guys. When Obama and his socialist ilk are fulfilling 80 years of running roughshod over the Constitution, it is not the time to be nice. Obama has weaknesses; he can't stand up to truthful, fact-based criticism for long. You must shine the withering light of Truth on him; everywhere he goes, you must be there waiting. Stop trying to parse the citizens of the country like the Democrats do; educate them. People know Liberty when they see it and hear it, and believe me, people WANT to hear Liberty shouted from every rooftop. Hispanics want to hear Liberty; Asians want to hear Liberty; You KNOW blacks want to hear Liberty; AMERICANS want to hear Liberty. Give it to them. Stop the whining about how the media is tank for Obama; Witness the power of the Internet in Iran, and tell me that can't work here also. Stop being nice, and start fighting for this Union and our Constitution.

Best Regards

It's Tea Party Day!

Well, I must admit, I'm not the most regular of bloggers. Darn that job and family responsibility...

So it's Tea Party Day here in the Austin-area, and I've taken hard-earned time off to be there. Like A1, yeah, it's that important. Pictures of the event will be posted, so stay tuned.

In the mean time, to whet your appetite, our lovely Big Government public servants have declared political war on conservatives everywhere, declaring us "right wing extremists" and "terrorists" for entertaining "anti-government" sympathies, or "rejecting federal authority in favor of state or local authority". Link is here (WARNING: Link is directly to the report, in PDF format). This is typical tin-hat dictator stuff. Every totalitarian regime of the 20th Century used the organs of government to silence its political opponents. It's just amazing to see this come to America, and it seems very convenient that this would be released the day before the Movement to Retake America begin...

Long break is over...

Well, after weathering household sickness and the Nativity season, I'm back. Yeah.

I found this over at New Republic:

“Liberalism wagers that a state... can be strong but constrained – strong because constrained... Rights to education and other requirements for human development and security aim to advance equal opportunity and personal dignity and to promote a creative and productive society. To guarantee those rights, liberals have supported a wider social and economic role for the state, counterbalanced by more robust guarantees of civil liberties and a wider social system of checks and balances anchored in an independent press and pluralistic society” – The New Republic

Absurd, isn't it? Despite being completely unfounded in any of the traditions that founded this country, it's full of logical holes. Let's tear it apart.

1. A state cannot be both strong and constrained. A strong entity seeks to break free of or subvert its constraints, by definition. Otherwise, it is not strong. History shows a strong state will exert its strength and trample on the rights of its subjects, on a continuum from simple self-preservation to the consolidation of maximum power and control in the hands of a few, with the rest being functional chattels of the state

2. If a man is truly free, his personal development and security (physical, social, economic) is his responsibility alone to secure, and is limited only his own innate ability and desire. To suggest that the state has a role in providing for an INDIVIDUAL’S development and security is to admit that a man is NOT free. For men to be free, government must be limited to the protection of the lives and property of the people and enforcement of contacts freely entered into between people.

3. Government cannot counterbalance itself, and strong government inevitably tramples on civil liberties. A “social” system of check and balances, as opposed to the constitutionally defined system, is inherently flawed. Society is fickle and prone to sway by demagogues, and a “pluralistic” society can be set against itself by fear-mongers and people who would exert control over others for personal gain. The press is only as independent as the political attitudes and opinions of its members, and indeed each member’s concept of the role of journalism in society. Should a majority of journalists become aligned with a particular political philosophy, or be of the opinion that it is the journalist’s duty to press for change rather then report events, the press ceases to become independent.

As always, comments are welcome.