So Obamacare has arrived. The House already voted for it, the Senate will do the same. Nothing can stop it socialized medicine now. It’s here.

Although Republicans lost the legislation battle, they won the PR war; and they know it. You can see it in the way the walk, talk and move around. They’re confident, very confident, even. They know that they’ll win the elections big time later this year. Voting for Obamacare, they understand, was the equivalent of political suicide for many Democratic members of the House.

I haven’t seen Republicans this optimistic in years. They believe they’ve got the American people in their pocket.

And that’s exactly where the GOP could lose it all two or, since Obama will undoubtedly continue to pursue highly unpopular leftist policies in the three remaining years of his first (and I believe only) term,* four years from now. You see, Republicans apparently fall in the old trap of believing that winning elections means that people like you and what you’re doing.

Especially in American politics, the opposite is true. Most voters don’t vote for the party they prefer over the other party but for the lesser of two evils. Their allegiance to one party or another is purely temporary and a matter of convenience.

If Republicans do what they did when Bush was president – in other words, forget all of the promises they made on the campaign trail about fiscal responsibility, federalism, etc. – they’ll won’t be in charge of Congress for long. No, they’ll win the elections this time around, only to lose ‘m next time.

Can the GOP establish a permanent majority? Yes, if they take the lessons of the last couple of years to heart and start actually implementing sane, conservative policies. If not, they’ll be run out of town before they’re used to their new offices – and rightly so.

* Republicans could still win two years from now because of the anti-Obama vote. Just like Democrats won in 2006 because of Bush’s low popularity ratings.

I was thinking about the reconciliation bill yesterday and I thought of something:

We know now that the only reason the Senate bill was passed in the House is that some uneasy Congressmen were promised changes in the reconciliation bill.  And yet, Pelosi didn’t keep the Senate bill at her desk until reconciliation was passed, as some observers predicted she might.

That means that the Democrats must be very confident that bill will pass.  That is a little ironic, considering how worried they were at this time last week.  So much so that they considered using the “deem and pass” method.  Up until, apparently, the objectors’ fears were allayed by means of this reconciliation bill.

Which doesn’t really make sense, as a reconciliation bill has been in play for some time now.  So to vote on the Senate bill without certainty that reconciliation would pass seems a little strange to me, given the Democrats’ behavior last week.  Maybe it’s just my lack of knowledge of the parliamentary procedure, but I think the Democrats are played it risky by letting Obama sign the Senate bill so early.

I think that if the reconciliation bill does not pass, all those Congressmen who voted for the Senate bill on an assurance that reconciliation would become law, will be feeling pretty disgruntled.

By golly, I got another email from President Obama! Last time he emailed me, it was to thank me for my efforts to push back against Obamacare, now it  is – a bit awkwardly – to co-sign the health care bill recently passed by Congress, and signed by his majesty himself earlier today:

This morning, I gathered with members of Congress, my administration, and hardworking volunteers from every part of the country to sign comprehensive health care reform into law. Thanks to the immeasurable efforts of so many, the dream of reform is now a reality.

How nice you contact me again, Mr. President. I’m both humbled and impressed. After all, one doesn’t receive an email from the most powerful socialist in the world every day, does one?

However, I’m afraid you still did not heed my advise to actually read my blog posts and columns. You see, I wasn’t being ironic when I said I did not support your attempt to “radically transform” America’s health care system. To the contrary, even. I opposed it passionately.

You see, I believed and continue to believe that socialism is not the answer to America’s problems. America’s health care system certainly needs fixing. But fixing isn’t the same as destroying it and starting anew. No, to fix something implies you work with what you have. That’s the opposite of what you’re doing with your precious bill, which is nothing short of revolutionary. And with revolutionary I mean, of course, “socialist.”

OK, back to your kind email: Read more…

Normally, when I write for this blog, I try to be moderate in tone and temperament, even though I make no effort to disguise my classical liberal outlook. Right now, though, I’m really pissed off about the vile, corrupt health care “reform” bill (soon to be law).

On his show today, Rush Limbaugh said of the liberals/progressives, “We need to defeat these bastards. We need to wipe them out. We need to chase them out of town.” Hearing that, Angry Patrick grumbled, “Tar and feathers, pardner.” But how can said bastards be ejected from town? While Angry Patrick is in charge, I thought I should put him to work doing some strategery. . .

Yes, the time for niceties is over. We must fight against progressivism in a merciless, no-holds-barred fashion. That does not mean, however, that we should abandon discipline and decorum. If anything, as we move into this next phase, it will be even more important for our side to be intellectually precise and strategically sharp. Don’t give the enemy easy opportunities to utilize their corrupt media outlets and cynical bags of tricks to depict us as racist, sexist cretins who hate poor people, orphaned children, and the infirm (like when ”journalists” print rumors of unnamed persons at a peaceful public protest allegedly saying racist things, without ever investigating the claims and/or ignoring the possibility that the actions were carried out agents provacateur).

How do we fight ugly, yet maintain discipline at the same time? For one thing, we should stop referring to the enemy as “progressives.” Unfortunately, most voters are unaware of the true historical legacy of progressivism and do not tend to attach negative meaning to the word. But we should also avoid calling them socialists, too. Sure, much of the Baby Boomer vanguard were sympathetic to socialism before 1989 and only blacklisted that label when it became too much of a liability. Nevertheless, a lot of progressives have never thought of themselves as socialists and there are important differences between socialists and social democrats. Read more…

In my last post, I incorrectly described the California Senate race as shaping between Boxer and Fiorina. Because — mostly — my attention has been off the race, I had the wrong impression of what was going on. Fiorina still has a primary challenge and a tough campaign to mount against her competition if she’s to win. Tom Campbell, her main opponent, has consistently polled ahead of her. If she’s to beat him, she has to both chip away at his support and win over supporters of Chuck DeVore, the third candidate in the race. She’s dominated a lot of media attention — making an impression at the California Republican convention and generating controversy with her viral ads — so sometimes it can seem like the race is about her.

As for the primary, most of the argument has been over who is a conservative and who isn’t.

Campbell has taken liberal positions on social issues such as abortion rights, gay marriage, and marijuana legalization. He promotes the viewpoint that his outlook is consistent with the real principles of conservativism, making him popular with California libertarians. Writing against a limit on marriage rights, he argues “government should be limited. Government has no business making distinctions between people based on their personal lives.” Understanding that other conservatives disagree with him, he’s pushed for tolerance within the party for different points of view. Read more…

Health care mayhem has passed the House of Representatives.  So has the Reconciliation disaster.  I’ll have more later, and no doubt MichaelvdG will have something today as well.

For the inevitable drive-bys: Safety nets are cool.  Mandates and national health standards: not so much.

Now that the health care reform bill has passed (thankfully no longer by “deem and pass”), the nation is on the brink of changes to its health care system that will affect generations to come.  It effects will be less than last year, when the public option was still a part of the package – the Dems tried to sneak it in to this one, but it’s my understanding it’s now out – but they will be significant none-the-less.  Tensions and stress are high, and many members of Congress and the President knew before they voted that that their jobs were on the line.

If Democrats think the battle is over, they are very mistaken.  So I’d like to make my appeal to legislators for future action.  I realize that I come very late to this, but I have not taken the opportunity to fully state my position on health care reform.  I have given bits and pieces away, but nothing in one, well written piece.  So I figure that I can kill three birds with one stone here:

• Discuss health care reform, with reference to my own personal history.
• Explain why I disliked this particular bill.
• Give a suggestion as to where I think Congress should go in regards to reform.

I don’t do this with any particular delusions that I’m going to convince one any particular members to change their minds, and suddenly call for repeal or lawsuits.  Instead, I mostly do this for myself, and to play my part (no matter how invisible) and in any future reform legislation that implements a much better system.

Here we go…

Page 2: Where I’m Coming From

Liz Blaine reports for NewsReal Blog that Democratic Representative Bart Stupak, one of the few pro-life members of his party in Congress, always intended to vote for health care reform, regardless of whether or not it would allow the federal government to fund abortions. See this video shot last year, when he was unaware he was being recorded:

This video proves, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that Stupak was acting when he threatened to vote against Obamacare if it would allow for tax payers’ funded abortions. He took pro-lifers seriously, he said. Well, guess what, he lied.

Instead of getting angry, though, perhaps social conservatives should thank Stupak for making clear that the “there are also pro-life and moderate Democrats”-talking point is little more than a sham.

As regular readers undoubtedly know, I’m quite a spiritual guy. I believe one of the major weaknesses of organized religion to be that there’s no room for spiritual development. It’s all about rules and about what your ‘teachers’ tell you. Orthodoxy and conformity rule. This is why I turn to spiritual people for guidance and inspiration.

Recently, I’ve (re)discovered the Stoics, the most influential school of philosophy in ancient Greece and, later, in ancient Rome. Some well known examples of Stoics are Heracles, Zeno, Epictetus, Marcus Aurelius, Plato, Seneca and Gaius Musonius Rufus. The Stoic philosophy can be summarized as follows:

Borrowing from the Cynics, the foundation of Stoic ethics is that good lies in the state of the soul itself; in wisdom and self-control. Stoic ethics stressed the rule: “Follow where reason leads.” One must therefore strive to be free of the passions, bearing in mind that the ancient meaning of ‘passion’ was “anguish” or “suffering”,[23] that is, “passively” reacting to external events — somewhat different from the modern use of the word. A distinction was made between pathos (plural pathe) which is normally translated as “passion”, propathos or instinctive reaction (e.g. turning pale and trembling when confronted by physical danger) and eupathos, which is the mark of the Stoic sage (sophos). The eupatheia are feelings resulting from correct judgment in the same way as the passions result from incorrect judgment. Read more…

If you’re a Republican member of Congress, you’ve got to feel pretty happy about your prospects of winning reelection later this year. Obama’s poll numbers are way down, as are those of the Democratic leadership in Cognress. ObamaCare is only supported by progressives, moderates, conservatives and libertarians don’t want anything to do with it. Polls show that incumbent Democrats will have a hard time holding on to their seats; it’s pretty clear that Republicans will stage a major comeback this fall.

That’s great. But what’s even better is that the best is yet to come.

As Democrats frantically tried to cobble together votes to pass their sweeping health care reform legislation Saturday, House Republicans began a victory lap of sorts.

First, in a meeting of the House Republican Conference, the GOP’s leadership rallied the troops with flourishing rhetoric about regaining the majority in the fall.

“I don’t know, quite frankly, whether victory will come on the third Sunday in March or on the first Tuesday in November, but victory will come,” House Republican Conference leader Mike Pence of Indiana told Republicans Saturday afternoon.

Those who are partisan Republicans first and foremost – note, not an ideological conservative, libertarian or moderate – have to hope that ObamaCare will be approved by the Democratic majority in the House of Representatives later today. If ObamaCare is defeated Republicans can certainly claim victory, but Blue Dogs – Democrats who are vulnerable later this year – can do the same thing. They can argue that they grew a spine, that they stayed true to their principles and that they, not the Republican minority in Congress, caused President Obama and Speaker Pelosi to fail.

It’s an interesting situation: Republicans may kill the bill, but they probably secretly hope that it will pass. After all, if there’s one thing a politician cares about it’s his own career.

At Pajamas TV, Roger L. Simon (author of Blacklisting Myself and Oscar-nominated screenwriter) and Lionel Chetwynd (Oscar-nominated filmmaker) talk about actor Tom Hanks’ recent outrageous statements about World War II. For those of you who don’t remember, Hanks said that America fought against the Japanese not because the latter were fascists bent on dominating and enslaving the entire region, but because they were “different.” The Japanese were seen as “yellow, slant-eyed dogs that believed in different gods. They wanted to kill us because our way of life was different. We, in turn, wanted to annihilate them because they were different” (emphasis obviously mine).

Chetwynd and Simon both believe that Hanks’ “heart is in the right place.” The problem, they say, is what’s in his head.

Since I don’t know Hanks personally, and these guys do, I won’t judge for myself. I always thought Hanks was a good guy, but I’ve got to say that his recent remarks made me lose most of my appreciation for him. They were so anti-American, so vile and so dishonest that I can’t help but wonder what kind of man could utter them.

Read the whole thing.

As the California gubernatorial race shapes up, Meg Whitman and Jerry Brown are now reported in polls as being in a dead heat, with Whitman at a slight advantage. The Field poll shows Whitman up 46 percent to 43 percent in a hypothetical matchup, which is within the margin of error.

I wanted to point out first, how bias can creep in reporting, in real ways, and not in the hundreds of ways people will claim there to be bias when there isn’t. The following is the first paragraph from an AP article on the topic:

“SACRAMENTO, Calif. — A new poll finds former eBay chief executive Meg Whitman, a billionaire Republican, is now in a dead heat with presumed Democratic nominee Jerry Brown in the race for California governor.”

Start off by asking this: if a Republican reporter had written this article, would he have described Meg Whitman as a ‘billionaire Republican’ — especially when her career had just been mentioned in the prior clause in the sentence? It’s a way to pigeonhole her, as well as a way to pigeonhole Republicans in general, with the suggestion that there’s a whole class of people that can be summed up with the description of being ‘billionaire Republicans’. Would Warren Buffet, if he were to run, ever be described as a ‘billionaire Democrat’, and would he be referred to as a ‘billionaire’ rather than as a ‘businessman’ or ‘industrialist’? Republicans aren’t the only target of that sort of framing. When Perot was running, for instance, every article on him would describe him as ‘Texas billionaire Ross Perot’, even though he was familiar enough to everybody that people knew he was a billionaire, while few people really understood what his career had been. Pigeonholing is a very common indicator of bias that’s unconscious on the part of the writer. Read more…

Writing for Big Government, actor Jon Voight calls on Americans to come to Washington D.C. Saturday to gather at upper Senate Park, across from the Capitol on Saturday, at 12 o’clock noon.

“We must come,” the father of actress Angelina Jolie writes, “by the thousands.”

Speaker Pelosi will stop at nothing to fulfill her corrupt conquests. She will bring all of the corrupt ACORN liars to try to bully all the Democrats that may be having pangs of guilt knowing quite surely what their votes can and will do. If they’re bullied into saying “yes,” it will destroy America.

Join me and Rep. Michele Bachmann in Washington DC at 12 noon EST so we can give all the Democrats who know what the end result will be the courage to say: “No, do not pass this destructive bill.” Read more…

Gallup reports that President Obama’s approval rating has hit its lowest point yet. Where only 46% of voters approve of Obama’s job performance thus far, 48% disapprove.

‘Obama’s approval rating has hovered around 50% since November, but in the last two days has declined to the point that slightly more Americans now disapprove than approve of his performance in office,’ Gallup explains.

It should be obvious to anyone with half a brain that support for Obama has hit rock bottom, because he and Nancy Pelosi are determined to shove ObamaCare through Americans’ throats.

Americans let Democrats know they had no interest in their health care reforms, but the latter don’t care. After all, they know what’s good for the American people, even when they don’t know it themselves.

Obama undoubtedly believes that, if just continues traveling down the path he has followed for the last year, his poll numbers will, eventually, improve. There’s no doubt in my mind that he’s mistaken. If he does not change his ways immediately, Republicans will win the elections later this year.

This Gallup poll confirms what I’ve been saying for quite some months now: Democrats are playing with fire. It won’t be long before many of them, including Obama, will be without a job.

Today, FrontPage Magazine published a must read article written by Barbara Kay.

The subject of the piece is FPM’s managing editor Jamie Glazov’s father, Yuri. Yuri Glazov was an outspoken critic of the Soviet regime. After signing the infamous “letter of the twelve,” the regime had enough and declared war on him. They trumped up some drugs related charges and prepared to send him to the Gulag.

Realizing his life was on the line, he told his family to pack their bags. They fled to Canada. Here, Yuri continued to and expose and fight communism and its many evils.

Living in the West and working for one of Canada’s major universities, Yuri quickly discovered that most Westerners had no idea what was happening. He dedicated his life to changing that. Read more…

How nice, I just received a thank you note from President Obama:

Michael –

I wanted to take a moment to thank you directly for the outstanding work you’ve been doing for health reform.

Why thank you sir. God knows I’m doing everything I can to prevent the United States from following in Europe’s (destructive socialized medicine) footsteps. Glad you’ve noticed my hard work in that regard. Appreciate it.

I can tell you that your voice is heard in Washington every day.

Wow, that’s quite a relieve! I feared you and your friends were too arrogant to notice the righteous anger from tens of millions of Americans and the criticism from ObamaCare critics. Glad to hear I was wrong on that one! Read more…

This crisis between Israel and the United States is worrying me tremendously. Of course I knew that Obama was no friend of Israel, when he was running for president, but I always hoped that, if he’d win, he’d be controlled somewhat by his pro-Israel friends and allies. Like Hillary Clinton, for instance.

From the looks of it, however, these officials don’t seem to be able to influence Obama in any way whatsoever. It’s becoming a serious problem by now.

Regular readers of PoliGazette have undoubtedly noticed that I’m not writing for it regularly anymore. To those who wonder why the heck not: well, some time ago, I officially became a pro-blogger. I make a living from writing about politics. Outlets that pay me (well), are obviously more important to me right now than outlets that don’t. And no, PoliGazette is not exactly making me rich. In fact, it’s costing me money. For now, that is.

So that’s why I’m spending most of my energy on other blogs. I do a lot of work especially for NewsReal Blog and Dutch blog De Dagelijkse Standaard; blogs that I’m extremely proud to be part of because I share their goals and values. I”m trying to help make these two websites big. Both have, I can say with some confidence, benefited greatly from my knowledge and understanding of the blogosphere and, of course, my writing skills, along with my intuitive understanding of what news is big and what isn’t. Read more…

Apparently I’ve been very far out of the loop, even though I’ve been keeping abreast of the news.  Only a couple weeks ago, the idea of passing a healthcare bill in the House of Representatives was laughable.  Now, Dems seem to have the votes.  Tentatively, anyway.  Any discussion of “deem and pass” may go out the window if this is true.

Allahpundit seems resigned to defeat.  He blogs for a living, so if he’s worried, I’d take that very seriously.

Of course, Democrats have an easier time getting the bill passed, seeing as they have a supermajority in the House.  Still, it’s going to be a party line vote, simply because so many Democrats are joining the Republicans.  That means they have to look elsewhere for the yays.

Enter Dennis Kucinich, who will apparently announce tomorrow that he’s voting yes, even though the bill isn’t liberal enough for him.  I guess I could see him being swayed by talk of a reconciliation bill, but I have my doubts about that.  I could be very wrong, but if it was this difficult to get the Senate bill passed, the reconciliation bill’s chances seem remote, despite whatever Pelosi and co. say.  Instead, Obama may have convinced him to wait it out, to take the incremental change route.

Now, I know that people will be tempted to consider that Obama offered him a Baucus-style backroom deal.  Problem with that is if it’s true, then the bill must be worked out in conference and voted on again.  I doubt the Dems want this battle to carry on for several more months.  They’d like to get the bill passed and then work on the reconciliation fixes.  Why create more headaches if you don’t need to?

Some people seem to think that Kucinich could be the cover other Dems need to vote yes on the bill.  I’m also skeptical on this, because short of a backroom deal or a very good argument on why to vote with the Dems, all the players who were already “decided” are unlikely to change position at this point.  Maybe a couple more Reps. will follow along, but I doubt many will.

So, with Kucinich on board, the Dems have a slightly more comfortable padding between passage and failure when the vote comes this week.  Now it will be up to the undecideds, and I think we’re going to have to wait until voting day to see what most of them decide to do.

At Time.com, Christopher Hayes suggests that blame for America’s recent economic decline should be principally directed at “the bright and industrious minds who occupy the commanding heights of our meritocratic order.” According to Hayes, the elites who are “supposed to make sure everything operates smoothly” have become increasingly corrupt and incompetent. Hayes makes a strong case, or at least Gallop does, that public trust in these elites continues to wane:  

For more than 35 years, Gallup has polled Americans about levels of trust in their institutions — Congress, banks, Big Business, public schools, etc. In 2008 nearly every single institution was at an all-time low. Banks were trusted by just 32% of the populace, down from more than 50% in 2004. Newspapers were down to 24%, from slightly below 40% at the start of the decade. And Congress was the least trusted institution of all, with only 12% of Americans expressing confidence in it.

Unfortunately, the second half of the essay goes downhill, as Hayes tries to prove that two of the primary causes of these institutional failures are concentration of power and the erosion of transparency and accountability.

His main example of why erosion of transparency and accountability are now lowering public trust in elites – the sexual abuse scandals of the Catholic Church - actually works against his argument. The Catholic Church has been secretive and hierarchical for going on 10+ centuries now. If anything, the Catholic Church of the 1970s – when Gallop started tracking public confidence in elite institutions – was more secretive and hierarchical than today’s version. Also, in previous eras, the former victims of childhood abuse were more reticent to share their experiences, in part because they encountered stronger social pressures from family and church members to keep quiet. Of course, the rising levels of transparency and accountability within religious institutions/communities have been a good thing, but they don’t do much for Hayes’ argument.

In his next example, Hayes’ pivots to go after another favorite target of the left: CEO pay. For the sake of argument, I’m willing to concede that rising CEO pay levels might contribute to ”concentration of power.” However, in making this shift, Hayes conveniently drops the part about transparency and accountability, I suspect because he knows that the general public has access to more information about CEO salaries and other internal corporate business matters than they did 35 years ago.

Hayes then loses track of his argument altogether,  to go after yet another favorite target of the left:  

Take the problem of climate change. It’s beyond our ability to recognize the imperceptible upward creep of global temperatures, so we must rely on the authority of those who are doing the highly complicated measuring. But at a moment when we desperately need élites and experts to use their social capital to warn the populace of the dangers of catastrophic climate change, skepticism is rising. A comprehensive Pew poll released in October found that only 57% of respondents think there’s evidence of warming (down from 71% last year), and just 36% think it’s because of human activity (down from 47%). This is the danger of living in a society in which the landscape of authority has been leveled: it’s not there when you actually need it.

In other words, rather than carefully build a coherent and complete argument, Hayes tosses out two weak examples, and then immediately rushes the stage, grabs a microphone, and begins preaching his faith. I would argue that one cause of public distrust in elite institutions is the inability of many elites to understand their own limitations. As the Washington editor of The Nation, Hayes is a bit of a media grandee, himself. An excellent writer, he is able to partly disguise the logical weaknesses of his essay with smooth, rhythmic prose. After watching him make such a flimsy effort at proving his own points, though, I wonder if he just tosses out the same groupthink explanations for every political question he considers. And, if so, what does that say about our elite institutions?

So, I thought for sure that this had to be misinterpretation by liberals at best, or a downright lie at worst.  They lied about the removal of the writ of habeus corpus for detainees, after all, claiming that it applied to all Americans.  So, before even reading the bill, I knew that the reports of McCain writing a bill that would call for the indefinite detention of American citizens who are labeled unlawful enemy combatants were incorrect.  It was just the liberals hyperventilating yet again.  Right?

Well, now I’m not sure.  While it still may be nothing to blink at in the end, I find one provision in this bill – to paraphrase Chief Justice John Roberts – very troubling.

Read more…

In February, Michelle Obama kicked off her Let’s Move initiative to combat childhood obesity in the United States. In many respects, the campaign is commendable and similar in spirit to past public health causes championed by Rosalyn Carter (mental health advocacy), Nancy Reagan (Just Say No), and other first ladies. When Michelle Obama appeared on The Today Show to talk about why it is important for children to eat healthy foods and stay active, or when she solicited the support of state governors to establish better guidelines for school lunches, she was performing a valuable public service without exceeding her proper role as first lady (by that, I mean her limited executive role, not anything to do with gender roles). Moreover, the Let’s Move campaign appears to promote a variety of public health initiatives that predated Michelle Obama’s childhood obesity campaign. For example, the President’s Physical Fitness Challenge might tilt a wee bit communitarian for my tastes, but its roots can be traced back to the Johnson administration.        

The Let’s Move website lists the campaign’s four main goals, which at first glance appear quite innocuous: supporting healthy choices, creating healthier schools, encouraging physical activity, and making healthy foods more accessible and affordable. Many people perusing the website will think that Let’s Move is reminiscent of a 1950s-era PTA drive. The campaign’s strategic “pillars” sound like were inspired by June Cleaver: “more nutrition information, increased physical activity, easier access to healthy foods and, ultimately, personal responsibility.” But when Americans are no longer distracted by the sweet aroma of Quinoa cupcakes cooling on the front counter, they might notice that there is something else cooking in the kitchen—and it is a recipe that usually debilitates rather than strengthens personal (and familial) responsibility, which will always be the most useful antidote to childhood obesity.   

In her fight against childhood obesity, Michelle Obama will not rely on rhetorical persuasion and public information alone. On February 10, she “rolled out her national initiative . . . with a show of force that included medical, business and government leaders, grassroots activists, celebrity public service announcements, cartoon characters as nutrition experts, as well as those most directly affected — the kids themselves.” This symbolic mustering of public health conscripts was consistent with Michelle Obama’s stated intention to utilize “government programs” and “public-private partnerships” as part of a “comprehensive approach” to ending childhood obesity within a generation. In other words, the war on childhood obesity sounds like a scaled-down version of the War on Poverty.

When the federal government declares war on social problems, it almost invariably engages in social engineering, the dangers of which are fourfold:

I. It is not the proper role of the government to use regulatory mechanisms in an effort to engage in social engineering. Often, when the government declares war on social problems such as poverty, homelessness, or childhood obesity, it must circumvent and/or expand the Constitution in new ways. For example, the Let’s Move campaign might contribute to the federal government taking an even more active role in local and state educational matters. It is perplexing that childhood obesity would be an administration priority in the midst of a major recession, especially if state governors are arm-twisted into playing along with the campaign’s more intrusive and fiscally ambitious features.

II. Insomuch as the “war” is spearheaded by government, the social engineering project will inevitably fail to achieve its goals, unless the goals are coincidentally reached by other “natural means,” i.e., as a result of economic and cultural forces largely beyond the control of social engineers. Actually, if high schools really want to prepare kids to become responsible adults, they should think about creating a course that explains why it is 100 times more realistic for the federal government to send a man to Mars within the next 30 years than it is for them to end childhood obesity in a generation. What social engineers fail to grasp, and young adults should understand, is that physical, discrete engineering problems—no matter how complex the “rocket science” might seem to us poor poets and politicians—involves far fewer variables than the best-intentioned social engineering project.

III. The government’s social engineering project will cause more harm than good. Take the following example from the Let’s Move website:

As part of the President’s proposed FY 2011 budget, the Administration announced a new program – the Healthy Food Financing Initiative — a partnership between the U.S. Departments of Treasury, Agriculture and Health and Human Services which will invest $400 million a year to provide innovative financing to bring grocery stores to underserved areas and help places such as convenience stores and bodegas carry healthier food options.  Grants will also help bring farmers markets and fresh foods into underserved communities, boosting both family health and local economies.  Through these initiatives and private sector engagement, the Administration will work to eliminate food deserts across the country within seven years.”

In other words, the federal government is going to subsidize the development and operation of grocery stores at locations across the country where the market cannot support them. Perhaps Mrs. Obama is unaware that, in the not too distant past, predominantly lower-income urban areas in the United States used to support relatively high numbers of mom & pop grocery stores and bodegas, which gradually went of business because neighborhood customers preferred to drive the extra miles to supermarkets that offered higher quality goods and services at lower prices. To get food stores and restaurants that emphasize healthy foods to locate in predominantly lower-income areas will require heavy, ongoing subsidies, which is bad economics, and invites corruption. If Michelle Obama wants to look at something that actually incentivizes the consumption of starchy and unhealthy foods by lower-income communities, she might look at the welfare system, food stamps, farm subsidies, etc. Instead, she proposes to create more “progressive” public/private rent-seeking programs, which have been on the rise in recent decades but are no longer sustainable, and which lead to less freedom and prosperity in the long run for the persons and causes they are alleged to help.

Besides, the idea that the administration could eliminate all “food deserts” in the next seven years is absurd. Of course, program advocates will respond, “aim for the sun to hit the moon.” Unfortunately, the government’s social engineering projects aim for the sun, but end up hurtling back to earth like a comet, forming a crater that wasn’t there before the government decided to fix things.     

IV. Like other social engineering projects, the war on childhood obesity will tend to contribute to an erosion of individual liberties and personal responsibility. Michelle Obama is calling on parents to be more aware of their responsibilities in raising healthy children and yet 80 percent of her campaign is sending the signal, “don’t worry, mom, Uncle Sam will take it from here.” When Michelle Obama kicked off Let’s Move, she announced:

It’s an issue [childhood obesity] that I care deeply about — not just because I’m a First Lady but because I’m a mother. And I’ve said this ever since I came into office — I approach this job first as a mother. And I’m thinking about all of you all as a mother, not as a First Lady.

To what extent will Michelle Obama’s “comprehensive” campaign overlap with the “progressive” campaign to define childhood obesity as a public health epidemic? The State of Michigan and San Diego County recently decided to employ their existing electronic immunization registries as a means of tracking the obesity rates of children, while some school districts are using Body Mass Index electronic surveillance models to alert parents when their children are defined as overweight. Parents are upset that they (and their children) are being “shamed” by school officials, saying that their kids are big boned, etc. (the BMI is a notoriously imprecise instrument). Meanwhile, fat groups and self-esteem advocates are concerned that shaming of obese kids might actually contribute to unhealthier habits, including bulimia/anorexia and other unintended consequences.

What we should really be concerned about, though, are the dangers inherent in defining social/individual behavioral problems as an “epidemic” that must be cured with AmeriCorps-style callisthenic revivals and the active assistance of the government. Before I conclude, let me be clear: I would never suggest that the doctors, school officials, public health advocates, politicians, and others who are demanding that childhood obesity be treated as a public health epidemic for which children must be immunized, are in any way, shape, or form really Nazis per se, or have any such sympathies. I hate it when political opponents play the Reductio ad Hitlerum card as much, if not more, than the average blogger. I am sure that the vast majority of the childhood obesity crusaders are completely unaware that parts of their campaign sound like they came out of the 1937 Nazi playbook (see: Jonah Goldberg, Liberal Fascism). They just don’t know any better, but that does not mean that other people have to be as clueless about the dangers as they are.

First watch this -

And now the reality.

While reconciliation has been abused to pass S-CHIP and the new drug entitlement and those indeed were abuses of this rule, she leaves them out for some reason. Reconciliation is only to be used for budget issues because the Constitution says that Congress has to pass a budget so it may not be filibustered. Even Senator Byrd says that passing health care sweeping regulations under reconciliation is illegal. The Democrats had a cow when the Republicans threatened to use reconciliation to stop their illegal filibuster of nominations (you see, confirmation votes on nominees is a Constitutional requirement too which is why filibustering a nominee is illegal); apparently what is good for thee is not good for we.

UPDATE - Video: Obama says health reform should not pass with a 50 plus 1 vote - LINK.

Almost every one of those acts she listed are budget bills. Tax legislation is a part of budget issues and using reconciliation for that is perfectly appropriate. By the way, government revenue skyrocketed after the tax cuts. When Maddow says tax cuts caused deficits she is lying and below is a small sample of the evidence of the increased revenue [I have more here].

You see, when your revenue shoots up and you still go in the red, that indicates a spending problem not a revenue one. Like I said before, correcting Maddow could fast become a full time job.

Reducing the capital gains tax rate from 20% to 15% increased capital gains tax receipts by 79% from 2000 to 2004. Cutting the dividend tax rate by more than half–from 39.6% to 15%–increased dividend tax receipts by 35% from 2002 to 2004. And corporate tax receipts have nearly tripled since 2003, reaching $250 billion for the past nine months, 26% higher than the same period last year. (WSJ July 25, 2006)

WASHINGTON — The federal deficit in the budget year that just ended fell to a four-year low of $247.7 billion _ a figure President Bush touted Wednesday as “proof that pro-growth policies work.” The deficit for the budget year that ended Sept. 30 was 22.3 percent lower than the $318.7 billion imbalance for 2005, handing Bush a welcome economic talking point as Republicans battle to hold onto control of Congress in the midterm elections. (AP Oct. 11, 2006)

One place it has come from are corporations, whose tax collections have climbed by 76% over the past two years thanks to greater profitability. Personal income tax payments are up by 30.3% since 2004 too, despite the fact that the highest tax rate is down to 35% from 39.6%. The IRS tax-return data just released last month indicates that a near-record 37% of those income tax payments are received from the top 1% of earners — “the rich,” who are derided regularly in Washington for not paying their “fair share.” (WSJ Oct. 6 2006) – The rich are paying more in real dollars since the tax cuts.

US Treasury Sets New 1-Day Tax Receipt Record Of $85.8 Billion
Tuesday September 19th, 2006 / 0h04

WASHINGTON -(Dow Jones)- The U.S. government recorded record-high overall and corporate tax receipts on Sept. 15, which was a quarterly deadline for tax payments, the Treasury said Monday.

Total tax receipts were $85.8 billion on Friday, compared with the previous one-day record of $71 billion on Sept. 15 of last year, the Treasury said.
Within the overall figure, corporate tax receipts Friday were $71.8 billion, up from $63 billion in September of last year.

Treasury Undersecretary for Domestic Finance Randal Quarles said Friday’s numbers provided a “continuing demonstration of the strength of the U.S. economy.”

“In fact, Friday’s gross receipts were the largest in a single day in the nation’s history – 20% higher than receipts on the same quarterly tax payment date last year,” Quarles said in a statement.

October 27, 2006 at 10:30 pm e
Laffer’s Victory – July 10, 2006 – The New York Sun
July 10, 2006 Edition
Laffer’s Victory
New York Sun Staff Editorial
July 10, 2006

It’s official — Arthur Laffer wins. New data show federal revenues surged in the first three quarters of the current fiscal year. Corporate tax receipts are up more than 26% over the same period last year, ringing in at $250 billion. Individual income tax collections, at $791 billion, are up 14% over the first nine months of fiscal 2005. The Congressional Budget Office projects corporate tax receipts will total $330 billion by the end of the fiscal year. As a result, the deficit for the year is expected to be about $300 billion, down from $318 billion last year and $412 billion the year before.

What, you ask, has led to this miraculous event? A tax cut, it turns out. Or rather, an array of tax cuts, on corporate income, personal income, and capital gains. These tax cuts, passed in 2001 and 2003, appear to be having the desired effect of spurring economic growth by creating addition incentives for work and entrepreneurship. The latest numbers, moreover, offer some hard data to challenge some of the charges leveled against President Bush and congressional Republicans in respect of tax cuts. These tax cuts haven’t exactly benefited “the rich.” A third of those higher income-tax revenues came from the highest-earning 1% of households, according to the New York Times.

Budget Deficit Drops $296B Under Estimate
Jul 11, 11:01 AM (ET)
By ANDREW TAYLOR
My Way
WASHINGTON (AP) – President Bush touted new deficit figures Tuesday showing considerable improvement upon earlier administration predictions, saying it shows the wisdom of his tax cuts.

Bush himself announced the figures – a task that for the most part has been left to lower-ranking administration officials in the past. The new figures show the deficit for the budget year ending Sept. 30 will be $296 billion – much better than the $423 billion that Bush predicted in February and a slight improvement over 2005.

October 27, 2006 at 10:33 pm e
Surprising Jump in Tax Revenues Is Curbing Deficit
Surprising Jump in Tax Revenues Is Curbing Deficit – New York Times
By EDMUND L. ANDREWS
Published: July 9, 2006

WASHINGTON, July 8 — An unexpectedly steep rise in tax revenues from corporations and the wealthy is driving down the projected budget deficit this year, even though spending has climbed sharply because of the war in Iraq and the cost of hurricane relief.

Graphic: Mixed Signals On Tuesday, White House officials are expected to announce that the tax receipts will be about $250 billion above last year’s levels and that the deficit will be about $100 billion less than what they projected six months ago. The rising tide in tax payments has been building for months, but the increased scale is surprising even seasoned budget analysts and making it easier for both the administration and Congress to finesse the big run-up in spending over the past year.

Tax revenues are climbing twice as fast as the administration predicted in February, so fast that the budget deficit could actually decline this year.

A flood of income tax payments pushed up government receipts to the second-highest level in history in April, giving the country a sizable surplus for the month. In its monthly accounting of the government’s books, the Treasury Department said Wednesday that revenue for the month totaled $315.1 billion as Americans filed their tax returns by the April deadline. The gusher of tax revenue pushed total receipts up by 13.4 percent from April 2005. (AP May 10, 2006)

WASHINGTON, July 8 — An unexpectedly steep rise in tax revenues from corporations and the wealthy is driving down the projected budget deficit this year, even though spending has climbed sharply because of the war in Iraq and the cost of hurricane relief. (NYT July 9, 2006)

Here is a Video of JFK talking about how tax cuts can increase revenue.
YouTube – Income Tax Cut. JFK Hopes To Spur Economy 1962/08/13 (1962)

SOURCE: CBO, White House Office of Management and Budget | The Washington Post – March 21, 2009

Mona Charen, who is one of the finest thinkers alive, has the best column explaining this:

Let’s imagine that President Obama decides to go help out in Fargo, N.D., where they are experiencing floods. Mr. Obama enters the home of a flooded family. The water is already six inches high in the living room. The president produces a fire hose and begins to douse the room with even more water. “What are you doing?” cry the anguished homeowners. The president fixes them with one of his impatient looks, and explains “May I remind you that I inherited this flood?”

President Obama has reminded us countless times that he inherited a $1.3 trillion deficit. Even if he were about to propose the most responsible, prudent, visionary budget imaginable, that complaint would still be petulant and unseemly. But considering what Obama’s own spending will do to the deficit, it’s jaw-droppingly galling. He now proposes to increase that deficit to $7 trillion in ten years. And that $7 trillion is probably a low estimate (the Congressional Budget Office estimates that it will be $2.3 trillion higher). When the new spending for programs like Pell grants, education for handicapped children, and so forth comes up for renewal in a few years, Congress is not going to let it lapse. So, to review, it was terrible for President Bush and the Democratic Congress (the president neglects to mention the latter) to saddle him with all this debt. His answer is to triple it. That’s showing ‘em!

Cross posted at IUSB Vision.

I have to hand it to the Republicans.  They are doing their job well.  Currently, Republicans are telling Americans that reconciliation is some sort of evil Senate rule being used by the Democrats.  That’s my inference, anyway, as the talking point remains that the Senate bill will create a government run health care system.  I’m not entirely clear on the details of what this government run health care system contains – given that the public option is dead – only that it will be a government run health care system.  And that the Democrats will ram it through Congress.  But they tell us no specifics on how exactly they will do that.  With a battering ram, perhaps?

Democrats, meanwhile, are stressing that health care reform must be passed now, lest our problems with the current system get even worse.  They tell Americans that reconciliation will save the day. Their talking point is that it is necessary at this point, due to their loss of the 60th vote (which wasn’t really helping them previously).  That, if they don’t do this now, big insurance will continue to rule the day, denying coverage for pre-existing conditions, and presumably keep telling people to “die quickly.”  They appeal to us to trust the future of American health care to reconciliation.  But do they tell us how exactly they will use it to pass reform?

Don’t be silly.  That’s for Congresspersons and Senators, not for little constituents like us.

Lets face it, people.  I don’t think most Americans actually know what reconciliation means.  Admittedly, I was not entirely clear on the process myself until today.  After doing a simple search, I learned more about it.

Update 2/3/09: To clarify my position on how both parties are approaching the issue of reconciliation.

Read more…

The Huffington Post reports that House Democrats want to phase out armed military contractors in our theaters of war:

On Tuesday, Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-Ill.) introduced the Stop Outsourcing Security Act, which would make it the military’s responsibility to use its own personnel to train troops and police, guard convoys, repair weapons, run military prisons and do military intelligence activity.

Great.  And replace them with…?  Last year the military met and exceeded their recruitment goals for the first time since ending the draft in 1973.  I wouldn’t expect that trend to last as the economy improves.

More:

There are strategic reasons to move away from a reliance on contractors, says Schakowsky, a senior member of the intelligence committee. They damage the U.S. reputation with reckless behavior, are overly costly and hurt the morale of troops, who see private guards earning much more money than they do.

Ah, I see.  It’s about morale and keeping up the image of the United States.  Both good things, both good things.  Not sure I agree that having private contractors in Afghanistan and Iraq hurts morale, but I can respect the argument.  And yes, Blackwater is a pretty nasty name out in the military world right now, so much so that they changed their name.

But wait, there’s more:

“That is just so unthinkable,” she says. “I really believe that were they an individual — and nowadays you can call corporations individuals; they have the same rights, right? — they’d get a dishonorable discharge for what they’ve done. How many people do they have to kill? How many missions do they have to screw up before we say, ‘No, we’re not going to do that’?”

Now we get to the real reason Schakowsky has introduced this legislation.  This bill isn’t so much about boosting morale or improving the standing of the United States around the world, or any other real reason.  No, it’s just another attempt by a liberal in her vendetta against private business, and her long-running anti-war campaign.  And I don’t think I’m too off on my assessment.  After all, Govtrack places her as the most liberal member of Congress (in the 110th Congress), even more so than Bernie Sanders, who has no qualms about calling himself a socialist.

The facts are that contractors, love ‘em or hate ‘em, do provide a necessary role, so that the actual troops can do the job of rooting out terrorists and stabilizing the countries.  It simply cannot be any other way in a nation that does not draft its armed forces.  With recruitment traditionally low, you simply would not have enough people to do every job if you replied on the regular army, national guard, or reserves.

So unless Schakowsky has a better idea of what we should replace contractors with, she should admit to herself that they are here to stay, and drop this unnecessary bill.