Why we allow journalism majors to communicate science to the general public is beyond me. They don’t even know when some fool with a PhD or two is making completely dumb claims – which tends to be the case with the global warming mythology. In this case I think the scientists might have been trying to be balanced, but when you scream ‘global warming’ the liberal media swoons into a faint.

Here is the BBC’s strange story of gas bubbles from the ocean floor:

Scientists say they have evidence that the powerful greenhouse gas methane is escaping from the Arctic sea bed.

Actually, this happens all the time and has for millions of years. Sadly, it takes a while for the reporting to get to the point that the methane gas is not actually making its way into the atmosphere, but that would make this such a non-story. It gets worse:

Researchers say this could be evidence of a predicted positive feedback effect of climate change.

As temperatures rise, the sea bed grows warmer and frozen water crystals in the sediment break down, allowing methane trapped inside them to escape.

OK everyone, let’s remember where we are – the ARCTIC, because this is important. It’s really cold in the Arctic, especially in the deep waters.

The gas is normally trapped as “methane hydrate” in sediment under the ocean floor.

“Methane hydrate” is an ice-like substance composed of water and methane which is stable under conditions of high pressure and low temperature.

As temperatures rise, the hydrate breaks down. So this new evidence shows that methane is stable at water depths greater than 400m off Spitsbergen.

Trust me when I note that pressure and temperature are not the only factors – by far – which dictate when the methane can be released. The make up of the sea floor is also important. If it is not stable or strong then the methane can be released in one area and not another under the same temps and pressures. There is also the chemical make up of the water, which varies from region to region and across depths. But wait, it gets even worse:

However data collected over 30 years shows it was then stable at water depths as shallow as 360m.

Sounds like they have something? No – let me skip ahead to show how little we know about this phenomena , in their own words:

Professor Minshull said: “Our survey was designed to work out how much methane might be released by future ocean warming; we did not expect to discover such strong evidence that this process has already started.”

“We were slightly surprised that if there was so much methane rising why no one had seen it before. But I think the reason is that you have to be rather dedicated to spot it because these plumes are only perhaps 50m to 100m across.”

“The device we were using is only switched on during biological cruises. It’s not normally used on geophysical or oceanographic cruises like ours. And of course you’ve got to monitor it 24 hours a day. In fact, we only spotted the phenomenon half way through our cruise. We decided to go back and take a closer look.”

They have no idea when these plumes occur, how often and under what conditions. They tripped over one and called it global warming. And the 30 years of data may clearly did not use this technique, so we are comparing to completely different data sets.

So here is the part that makes me shake may head in embarrassment:

Temperature records show that this area of the ocean has warmed by 1C during the same period.

Any oceanographer worth his/her salt is laughing their heads off at this ignorant statement. First off, the only temperature records we have with any history are sea SURFACE temperatures. Even the most modern sensors only drop down a few meters down to get a snapshot of the upper layer of water.

But ocean water follows Bernoulli flows, where bands of different temps (and salinity) flow like rivers on top of each other, not mixing much at all. In many regions the sea surface layer and sea bottom layers are literally worlds detached with no connection. Conflating sea surface warming with deep sea temperature levels belies a cheap PhD.

If you have ever been to the beach or did scuba diving or snorkeling you know the water is warmest near the beach (where it is shallow) or near the surface, and cools rapidly with depth. 400 meters is over 1300 feet, or just under a quarter of a mile down. The sea surface temperature readings (of a yet to be proven 1°C increase) has no bearing on the icy water at the bottom of the water column.

In fact, we would have to know WHERE the water at the sea floor was coming from to know what other causes there may be for the methane gas release, other than temperature. If that region happens to be fed by land runoff, then it could be metals or sediments changing the chemical make up of the water causing the methane release. Something the scientists tried to explain to the journalism major:

However methane is already released from ocean floor hydrates at higher temperatures and lower pressures – so the team also suggest that some methane release may have been going on in this area since the last ice age.

Too bad this one little note, buried in the middle, makes all the rest of the story simply a poorly supported and amateurish theory – at best.

If for that region of the Norwegian coast, given the composition of the sea floor and the source of the deepest water layers, it is ‘normal’ for methane to be released in this way then there is no feedback loop, no end of the world.

BTW, since the methane gas is not getting into the atmosphere, there is no adding to the supposed green house gases:

The team found that most of the methane is being dissolved into the seawater and did not detect evidence of the gas breaking the surface of the ocean and getting into the atmosphere.

False alarm folks, the Earth is just passing a little gas. Go back to building your carbon footprints.

I have been seeing all sorts of silly posts on how, if the GOP doesn’t support health care of some form, they will pay a heavy political price. The fact is the electorate is so shocked by the liberal experiment of government run healthcare most people don’t want government to do a damn thing anymore! It is not about getting the GOP on board libs, its about not losing the center-left to center-right of the country nor all the seniors and their families.

As long as the liberals keep scaring the daylights out of everyone with their ideas of government run death panels doling out treatments to those deemed worthy, all the GOP just has to do simply oppose the madness of their plans – everybody else does! If Obama and the Dems keep the ‘public option’ alive, they will continue to lose political ground build a path to a resounding defeat on 2010. The longer it stays alive, the stronger the backlash will be.

It is not the GOP (or insurance companies, or the rich) rising up in opposition that should concern Libs and Dems. It is the seniors and centrists rising up that should worry them. So far as I can tell, they are blissfully unaware of the wave they themselves are creating.

This heart rending story of a denied test on a young woman not only underscores how the ‘death panels’ operate, it thrusts the human tragedy of government run health care deep into one’s soul:

Mrs Brickell, first asked for a smear test at the age of 19 but was told she didn’t need one until she was 20-years-old. A year later, when she returned to her doctor, she was told that the age had been raised to 25. At 23, she was diagnosed with an incurable cervical cancer.

My oldest daughter is 24, and this just tears at my heart. This woman has been condemned to die by a faceless, cost obsessed death panel trying to skimp on costs by delaying a simple, life saving and inexpensive test. This is Obamacare if we go with a government run health care system. This is unacceptable.

Update: This condition is easily treated if caught, which makes me all the angrier at the NHS Scrooge’s who denied a simple screening test to this young woman.

One of the strange by-products of the UK National Health Service (the UK’s version of a ‘public option’. a.k.a. government run health care, single payer, Obamacare, etc.) is the complete lack of transparency and accountability regarding malpractice. Government entities usually have the nasty ability to cover up their mistakes and hide them from the public footing the bill and paying the price, in more ways than one.

It seems that under these government run disasters, there are great efforts to hide the devastating screw ups and the victims of the screw ups:

The number of patients killed by hospital blunders has soared by 60 per cent in just two years, the Daily Mail can reveal.

Official records show that 3,645 died as a result of outbreaks of infections, botched operations and other mistakes in 2007/08. That was up from 2,275 two years before.

Critics say quality of NHS care has suffered as doctors and nurses come under pressure to meet Government waiting time targets.

But experts say the true toll is certain to be even higher, because many hospitals still do not record all of the ‘patient safety incidents’ – meaning that lessons which could have been learned are lost.

In America’s current market based health care system there is more transparency and accountability it seems, especially given the constant threat of litigation. I think I would prefer our system of checks and balances and choice over the nightmare that is socialized medicine as practiced in the UK and elsewhere.

I know some people are mocking the term “death panel” as it applies to government run health care, but sadly the term is a good summation of what happens when faceless bureaucrats dole out treatments based on cost and not need.

What is just ridiculously ironic is how the UK and Canadian models of government run health care are falling apart at the same time as mindless liberals are pushing for that same health care nightmare to come to America.

A study out in January 2008 claimed that the UK’s National Health System allowed 17,000 people to die unnecessarily from poor treatment – making this one of the largest crimes of medical malpractice I think I have ever seen in my life:

More than 17,000 people receiving treatment in the UK have died unnecessarily because of the inadequacies of the NHS, it is claimed today.

The figure, in a paper published by the Taxpayers’ Alliance, is calculated using data given to the World Health Organisation. It compares the number of people who died prematurely, even though their illness was treatable, in five European countries.

The NHS performs worse on this measure of “mortality amenable to healthcare” than Spain, France, the Netherlands and Germany. If it had achieved the average of those four, 17,157 fewer deaths would have occurred in 2004, the most recent year for which the data is available, says the alliance.

That is more than five times the death toll from road accidents, says the alliance, which claims that the extra money for the NHS from the Labour government has been wasted.

Emphasis mine. Would America stand for a health care system which causes more deaths than automobile accidents? What kind of crock of a system is this? If you read the whole article the UK doesn’t even deny the claim!

Update: More heartening news about the NHS – ugh.

Update: Even more great news:

Data collected by the National Patient Safety Agency (NPSA) shows that 1,282 people in England died in what it calls “patient safety incidents in mental health settings” in the period 2007-08.

…

Campaigners claimed last night that the high death rates showed that many of the hundreds of thousands of mentally ill people who seek help each year receive a second-class service.

“These figures are shocking. It’s a scandal that four people a day are dying while under the care of the NHS, and nearly three a day are ending up seriously harmed.

And the liberals wonder why the ‘public option’ is DOA.

Update: Oh Cananda – you too?

Dix said a Vancouver Coastal Health Authority document shows it is considering chopping more than 6,000 surgeries in an effort to make up for a dramatic budgetary shortfall that could reach $200 million.

Delays in treatment usually result in greater damage to the body, leading to shorter life. That is a scientific and medical fact.

Updates Below!

The Liberal Democrats in DC and liberal organizations that have been pushing their far left proposals on government run health care are facing an uprising the likes of which I have never seen before. It is an uprising of the seniors, the soon to be seniors, and their families, and it is spreading like a wild fire:

CBS News has learned that up to 60,000 people have cancelled their AARP memberships since July 1, angered over the group’s position on health care.

…

“I think that probably the seniors are most upset with cuts in Medicare,” said ASA President Stuart Barton.

The American Seniors Association is flat-out against President Obama’s plan, which calls for $313 billion dollars in Medicare cuts over ten years. The AARP is widely viewed as supporting the President.

I wonder how the AMA and other groups are holding up? The seniors and soon to be seniors represent the largest element of our electorate because they include the baby boomers and all those who are still alive from World War II generation. When you add in their kids and their families facing issues of care and health, the number of people in this group is staggering. And the number who vote regularly must be a strong majority (given how few of the younger generations get around to voting).

And it is this enormous and powerful group of American the liberals picked a losing fight with:

If the Democratic Party’s attempt at health care reform perishes, senior citizens will have done it in, not talk-radio listeners and Glenn Beck acolytes. It’s the skepticism of over-65 Americans that’s dragging support for reform southward. And it’s their opposition to cost-cutting that makes finding the money to pay for it so difficult.

That’s because they’re the ones whose benefits are on the chopping block. At present, Medicare gives its recipients all the benefits of socialized medicine, with few of the drawbacks. Once you hit 65, the system pays and pays, without regard for efficiency or cost-effectiveness.

For liberals trying to find the money to make health insurance universal, these inefficiencies make Medicare an obvious place to wring out savings. But you can’t blame the elderly if “savings” sound a lot like “cuts.” When the president talks about shearing waste from Medicare, and empowering an independent panel to reduce the program’s long-term costs — well, he isn’t envisioning a world where seniors get worse care, but he’s certainly envisioning a world in which they receive less of it.

It’s not just a political peril, it is political suicide. When the liberals decided they would insert themselves into the hard, but loving decisions all seniors and their families face they tried to pry into a very private place in America. It was a arrogant and dumb move. People are fed up with the preachy DC elites telling them how to live their lives. And they sure as hell don’t want DC telling us how to end our lives (good intentions or not).

It was the latest in a series of historically bad liberal blunders, which have reminded Americans why they dumped the Democrats during the Clinton escapades.

Update: In case anyone needs statistical proof of how bad the liberals are blowing this health care topic, there is a new CBS News poll out which is quite illuminating, and which confirms my points above:

Americans’ confidence about their health care future and access to care is dropping, particularly among older people, as debate grows more contentious over President Barack Obama’s health overhaul agenda.

A monthly survey of consumer sentiment on health care issues shows that Americans’ confidence in insurance coverage, affordability and access dropped more than 5 points in July, after having risen slightly in June.

Among seniors eligible for Medicare the drop was even more striking – 10.4 points – suggesting the health care debate is raising alarm bells for older people. The survey was conducted even before coverage of raucous town hall meetings that highlighted public opposition to Mr. Obama’s Democrats’ health overhaul plans.

Seniors are very smart people with lots of experience. When they rise up in opposition everyone should take notice  - especially Democrats.

Update: A very observant piece on how President Obama is damned if he does and damned if he doesn’t on health care:

If he fails to deliver health legislation, Obama will prove right those who said he was in over his head. That would make him something of a lame duck after only seven months in office.

But if he does manage to squeeze a bill out of Congress, it would be a Pyrrhic victory. By delivering unwanted changes to unwilling voters on a life-or-death issue, the president would squander the goodwill he earned during the campaign.

As the piece notes, much of this is due to rookie mistakes. President Obama’s inexperience is now overshadowing his gift at speechifying.

Update Below!

It is clear now that our young President probably blew his whole first term when he handed over to the liberals in Congress the design of an economic stimulus package. These people are so wrapped up in fantasy they actually thought government spending, as sluggish as it always has been, could ’stimulate’ job creation. They were, of course, spectacularly wrong and naive in this assumption, as is clearly evident in the fact we are ending the summer of 2009, 6 months after the bill’s passage, and no money as been spent on job creating projects.

Now large majorities have come to realize what a failure this liberal experiment has been:

A USA TODAY/Gallup Poll found 57% of adults say the stimulus package is having no impact on the economy or making it worse. Even more —60% — doubt that the stimulus plan will help the economy in the years ahead, and only 18% say it has done anything to help improve their personal situation.

I feel for that 18%, they will have a challenge getting through life if they still think the stimulus bill has done a damn thing to date. I have been tracking the recovery spending directed at creating jobs for 6 government entities which represent a third of the job creating stimulus money. To date 98% of the job creating money authorized by congress is still unspent, and will not be spent for months and months to come.

In the first graph there are 4 sets of columns showing: (from left to right) (1) the amount budgeted for stimulus programs for that organization, (2) the amount allocated to to date to specific programs, (3) the amount actually spent to date creating jobs and (4) the amount left unspent from the total budget. (click image to enlarge)

The second chart translates the dollar amounts for the last three sets of columns in the previous chart into percentages of the budgeted amounts for each organization, showing what is the percent allocated, spent and unspent. (again, click image to enlarge)

Summary:

• $105 billion was budgeted for job creation efforts across the 6 organizations (1/3rd of all job creating stimulus programs in the stimulus bill)
• Nearly 1/3rd, or $33 billion, has been allocated to programs (the only bright spot in this bleak picture)
• Just under 2% has been spent creating jobs, which totals $1.9 billion
• Over 98% of the money, or $103 billion of the money budgeted for job creation, has yet to make its way out of the federal bureaucracy.

It is not surprising most people want this doomed effort to be stopped and the money given back to the people to spend, stimulate the economy and create jobs. In fact, if the liberals weren’t so short sighted and arrogant, they would have used the tried and true method of tax cuts to individuals and small businesses to get the economy back onto its feet. But they could not resist their fantasy, where government comes riding to the rescue of the little people and they get to play Santa Claus.

What we have here is a failure of hubris.

Update: This is a great video ‘history’ of the failed liberal stimulus experiment (H/T Gateway Pundit)

Not sure why but we’ve been taken offline twice today. Good thing AJ left me in charge while he’s out watching his Dolphins play!
-LJStrata

It is no surprise to most people that America on average leans far more to the conservative side of things than the liberal side. In fact, Gallup has come out with a large study showing that self described ‘conservatives’ outnumber ‘liberals’ in all 50 states. It is so one sided that there is only one part of the nation (DC of course) considered liberal – the rest of the nation is scored by how much more conservative it is than liberal:

So why do we have a Democrat Congress and President if the nation leans very much to the right? Well, it must have something to do with how ‘true conservatives’ on the far right (now in exile) repulsed the center of the nation to the point it was willing to experiment with centrist sounding Democrats. It was a big risk, but the angry, insulting, pure conservatives pretty much had run out their welcome over many issues where they derided anyone who looked to progress on issues over purity.

The fact is the largest political affiliation is independents, followed by democrats, with Republicans coming in last place at half the size of the independents, as shown in this recent survey from Pew Research:

I have had a lot of ‘true conservatives’ making the laughable claim the drubbing of the GOP was due to centrist approaches to prescription drugs under Medicare and Medicaid, as well as centrist proposals on comprehensive immigration reform. These delusional fantasies are really hysterical since, if this was really what ‘America’ wanted the Dems would not be in power today. The more the Amnesty Hypochondriacs raged at reasonable solutions and penalties to immigration, the more elections the GOP lost.

At I must note that the Iraq war also could not be the source of the center bailing on the GOP. So far President Obama is getting high marks for his continuation of President Bush’s policies on Iraq, Afghanistan and the FISA-NSA changes made since 9-11.

The place where the Democrats screwed up was in far left policies (along with demagogic rage at the middle mirroring the GOP blunders) that have failed or scared the center. The failed stimulus bill, the threat of government run health care rationing services to the needy, and the idea of taxing energy to cool a planet that has been cooling for over a decade (and will continue to do so for another decade or two longer) was a naive over reach.

The thing the GOP needs to take from all this is not to  repeat the mistakes both fringes have made over the last few years. You need to cater to the middle, not insult them with single minded solutions no one really believes in outside the fringe echo chambers. One key thing to note in the Gallup survey, with its precise +/- 1% MoE and large samples, is that moderates are always around a third of the population in all states. Insult them and demand allegiance to partisan purity and you will be dumped next election.

So far the liberals have given a broad conservative coalition an wide opening to take control of the government in the coming election cycles. The only way to screw that up is for some to destroy that potential coalition by not accepting and respecting the conservative middle of the nation – and giving them their just seats at the table of governance.

I have been noting the draconian steps the UK is taking and considering to cut costs to its government run health care system. These cost cutting measures include panels who decide what life styles should be barred from treatments, whether the system should be designed to only deal with the sick and not focus on cures, and whether growing old is one of those nasty life style habits (like smoking, drinking and being obese) that makes patients unworthy of treatments. Here are the key points and links to the ongoing debate about the future of the UK NHS:

The UK is already consideringchanging their government run system from curing the ill to only keeping the healthy healthy:

Already around one in ten hospitals refuse to carry out joint replacements for obese patients or orthopaedic surgery on smokers.

The contract, first floated by Tony Blair was proposed by Gordon Brown in a New Year message to Health Service staff today.

The Prime Minister believes a new focus on the prevention of ill health, rather than curing it, is essential for a modern NHS.

The shift in focus has clear results for the UK, as noted here:

Smokers, heavy drinkers, the obese and the elderly should be barred from receiving some operations, according to doctors, with most saying the health service cannot afford to provide free care to everyone.

These are from main stream media outlets in the UK and illustrate quite clearly what will happen to America if it follows the foolish proposals of the DC liberals and their fantasy driven base to introduce government run health care. A second example of why we don’t want a government run health care system here is now popping up in Canada (the other example of what liberals want for American health care):

Dr. Anne Doig says patients are getting less than optimal care and she adds that physicians from across the country – who will gather in Saskatoon on Sunday for their annual meeting – recognize that changes must be made.

“We all agree that the system is imploding, we all agree that things are more precarious than perhaps Canadians realize,” Doing said in an interview with The Canadian Press.

The pitch for change at the conference is to start with a presentation from Dr. Robert Ouellet, the current president of the CMA, who has said there’s a critical need to make Canada’s health-care system patient-centred. He will present details from his fact-finding trip to Europe in January, where he met with health groups in England, Denmark, Belgium, Netherlands and France.

His thoughts on the issue are already clear. Ouellet has been saying since his return that “a health-care revolution has passed us by,” that it’s possible to make wait lists disappear while maintaining universal coverage and “that competition should be welcomed, not feared.”

In other words, Ouellet believes there could be a role for private health-care delivery within the public system.

Anyone else find it ironic that Canada might be moving to a system more like ours to deal with the challenges of their faltering government run option? What is happening in Canada is disturbingly similar to what is happening in the UK:

The Fraser Health Authority confirmed Thursday it intends to cut surgeries, seniors’ programs and services for the mentally ill to help deal with a budget shortfall of up to $160 million.

It seems that in this part of Canada being senior and mentally ill is worthy of being denied treatments. More cost savings, Canadian style, are coming in other parts of Canada:

This spring, nurses were shocked by a sudden hiring freeze and talk of reducing their numbers. Managers scrambled when 100 positions were cut. The Royal Alexandra Hospital cancelled 15 per cent of elective surgeries to meet a new budget directive, and two Edmonton hospitals cut back on MRIs. Frustrated doctors say the cuts will only lengthen wait times. Like nurses, they don’t like a new code of ethics for health-care workers that looks like a gag order to them.

The Alberta public, taken aback by the out-of-the-blue budget cuts and already wary of health reform, just got more nervous. What, they ask, is happening with their health-care system?

It’s always the elderly (with their massive health care costs) who seem to be the target of government cost savings. So why is America aiming at a system of health care which has been soundly proven in Canada and the UK to have failed financially to the point both countries has started deciding who is worthy of care?

I was perusing the left wing fevered swamps and noted a lot of crazy reactions to the news Team Obama and the Dems in the Senate are preparing to dump the ‘public option’ of health care reform – a.k.a. government run health care (maybe they could just run it out of spare space in the US Post Offices to save money?). The responses range from the delusional who feel betrayed by Obama (but are being actually betrayed by reality of course, since they have yet to figure out they are a massive minority on this issue), to the delusional who think this is all a slick way to call the liberal/netroots to arms and fight back against the growing wave of rejection.

In all cases, the display of ignorance of America and how things work in America is sadly stunning. Just peruse some of the comments, it really is amazing how many people believe whole heartedly in the mythology of socialism. But, then again, it has been many decades since socialism has demonstrated its ugly path to stagnation and living hell. Time dulls the memory, and romantics can take the most brutal concepts and make them seem worth trying to those who’ve never experienced those concepts in action.

Anyway, I digress. The fact is America has risen up in intense opposition to any government run health care option. The polls have been turning on this idea for weeks now. And to underscore it, one of the commenter in the see of anger on the left noted (bassackwardly of course) that only a slim majority of the most far left fringe actually demand a government run health care option:

The online poll of 252 attendees, which took place Thursday and Friday at the annual gathering of progressive bloggers and activists, found that 48 percent supported Sestak for the Pennsylvania Democratic Senate nomination, compared to just 10 percent who backed Specter.

OK, these numbers clearly indicate this is the left of the left wing inside the Democrat party. So how much support do they have for government run health care:

The straw-poll results showed that progressives are sharply focused on passing comprehensive health care reform, with 60 percent of attendees rating health care reform as one of their top two priorities. Roughly a quarter—23 percent—said they are already personally working to pass reform.

A majority of attendees—53 percent—said they cannot support a health care reform bill that does not include a public option.

That measly 53% number was touted as strong support, but this is the group who should be lock step, do-or-die behind the idea nearly 100%. While not addressing the other side of the equation might fool some true believers into false hope, the poll clearly shows that 47% of the far left IS able to support health care reform without a ‘public option’.

The demand for government run health care disappears when you hit the center-left voters, replaced by serious concern and opposition to the idea. By the time you get to the center right voters there is almost no support and the heated opposition is already at a high level.

There is no support for government run health care. Stick a fork in that idea.

Liberals came to DC thinking America would allow them to indulge in their most extreme left wing fantasies. They horribly misread the public’s mandate when they threw the GOP out of power and gave President Obama and a Democrat led Congress a chance to prove they could solve problems. As usual, a party dominated by the zealots on the extremes always creates more problems than not. History is about to repeat itself.

The GOP did not lose because of Iraq – that has been a hard won success and no one in their right mind thinks the world was better off with Saddam Hussein in place in the heart of the Arab Muslim world, conniving with terrorists of all forms and types (and he did that for sure). After years of war since 9-11 (and everyone who knew what they were talking about said this effort would extend beyond even two Bush terms) we have the cancer of Islamo Fascism encircled and fighting for its life back in its birth place in the mountainous region covering southern Afghanistan and northern Pakistan. The Taliban and al Qaeda are on the run, and only a far left liberal would say this is a bad thing. Their evil was spreading into Muslim Arab communities, it was amazing we were able to turn the tide, because now al Qaeda is the enemy of Islam in Iraq, not its future. America supports Obama’s continuation of Bush policies in Iraq – clearly America sees Iraq differently than the echo chambers of DC.

The GOP stepped too far in their successes, and paid the price. That is where they lost the American electorate. They destroyed comprehensive immigration reform twice, leaving our country with the same growing problems which have been taxing our resources for decades. They became corrupt power brokers, spending more time reaping the rewards of power than using that power to solve problems. They had become preachy and insulting to all who disagreed with them. They were insufferable – to put it mildly. And they therefore lost elections in stunning defeats in 2006 and 2008. It was not a minor shift, their insults thrown at the centrists did a lot of damage, damage that has to this day not been corrected.

When President Obama ran for office he ran as a non-partisan, center of the road, ‘let’s role up are sleeves as Americans and solve problems’ type. That was the “Hope”, that we would “Change” from partisan zealots running amok. As did most of the Democrats in Congress who benefited from the ‘throw the insufferable GOP bums out’ mood and took over GOP districts and conservative leaning states (like VA).

Did the Democrats and President Obama keep their word? Did they govern in a non-partisan manner? Hell no! They did the same things that got the GOP tossed out on its ear. They became insufferable know-it-alls who knew nothing of what America wanted. They ran on wild, unproven political theories that no one in real America supports.

Case in point – the bogus stimulus package which had no ’stimulus’ in it but was filled with endless pork. It was advertised as a way to create jobs now, but it was actually a liberal smorgasbord of projects and payoffs (turns out many of its programs are union only jobs) that would not come on line until next year. Here is the status of the spending across 6 government entities, two of which were the premier job creating departments (at least that was what the DC liberals claimed).

In the first graph there are 4 sets of columns showing: (from left to right) (1) the amount budgeted for stimulus programs for that organization, (2) the amount allocated to to date to specific programs, (3) the amount actually spent to date creating jobs and (4) the amount left unspent from the total budget. (click image to enlarge)

The second chart translates the dollar amounts for the last three sets of columns in the previous chart into percentages of the budgeted amounts for each organization, showing what is the percent allocated, spent and unspent. (again, click image to enlarge)

Summary:

• $105 billion was budgeted for job creation efforts across the 6 organizations (1/3rd of all job creating stimulus programs in the stimulus bill)
• Nearly 1/3rd, or $33 billion, has been allocated to programs (the only bright spot in this bleak picture)
• Just under 2% has been spent creating jobs, which totals $1.9 billion
• Over 98% of the money, or $103 billion of the money budgeted for job creation, has yet to make its way out of the federal bureaucracy.

As has been the case since February when this bill passed, the job creation money is stuck in the bowels of the federal government. That is why the job market has stayed bad all summer, and why it will probably take another small dive this fall once the summer job bubble ends. The stimulus hasn’t stimulating anything but record deficits, 4 times the level of President Bush’s worst year:

Americans are becoming fed up with the liberals in DC – who do more shouting at, and insulting of, America’s center than they do in solving the nation’s problems. It is so bad the American people are ready to stop the only major legislative win for the Dems in its tracks, and demand instead the feds ‘return’ the stimulus money to the people and let them spend and stimulate the economy and jobs:

With improvements in the economy and only a fraction of the stimulus money having been spent so far, most Americans — 72 percent — say returning the unused portion of the $787 billion dollar stimulus to taxpayers would do more to boost the economy than having the government spend it. Majorities of Democrats (59 percent), Republicans (87 percent) and independents (70 percent) think the money should be returned to taxpayers.

(H/T Ed Morrissey) Not only is there a massive majority of independents (centrists) ready to junk the stimulus mess, even a majority of democrats are ready to walk away from this liberal fantasy. 28% verses 72%, the liberals verses everyone else. The only way to get ‘everyone else’ lined up in firm opposition is to go so far people have to oppose. As a nation we tend to tolerate a lot of well meaning screw ups, but it is very possible to go beyond this tolerance zone, and the liberal leaders of the Democrats have done just that.

But the liberals are also about to lose on their signature nightmare fantasy – government run health care. The backlash has been so broad and deep against the government run option, and handled so badly by President Obama’s young and inexperienced team, that Democrat leaders themselves are starting to lay the ground work for the defeat of a ‘government option’ in any health care bill:

After the toughest week yet for health reform, leading Democrats are warning that the party likely will have to accept major compromises to get a bill passed this year – perhaps even dropping a proposal to create a government-run plan that is almost an article of faith among some liberals.

…

But the signs were everywhere this week that Democrats, stung and seemingly caught by surprise by the vehemence of the opposition to President Barack Obama’s overhaul plans, were already gaming out September and what it would take to get a bill to Obama’s desk.

…

Writing in a Washington Post op-ed, Democratic strategist Paul Begala, who is close to White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel, warned progressives against turning their backs on reform if it doesn’t include everything they want. As a former consultant to Clinton during the health care battle, Begala said he carries “a heavy burden of regret from my role in setting the bar too high the last time we tried fundamental health reform.” He had urged Clinton to veto any bill short of guaranteeing universal health care.

Even the administration is publicly walking away (sometimes) from the public option.

Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius says Obama still believes there should be choice and competition” in the health insurance market — but that a public option is “not the essential element.”

If the pressure keeps up in the Town Halls and the polls keep dropping, this ‘ground work’ will become part of history’s record.

Update: More reports that the government takeover of health care is DOA – along with government run death panels. - end update.

An the dominoes of liberal failure may not stop here. There are also cracks beginning to form in the the crackpot plan to tax energy to reduce global warming (which has not been around for over ten years now).

The U.S. Senate should abandon efforts to pass legislation curbing greenhouse-gas emissions this year and concentrate on a narrower bill to require use of renewable energy, four Democratic lawmakers say.

“The problem of doing both of them together is that it becomes too big of a lift,” Senator Blanche Lincoln of Arkansas said in an interview last week. “I see the cap-and-trade being a real problem.”

Removal of the government run option from health care reform, repeal of the failed stimulus bill and a permanent delay on the truly silly idea of taxing energy to change the Earth’s massive and complex climate system. I doubt liberals could take so many losses, which is why I expect them to come out angry and arrogant – and seal those very same losses for prosperity.

Well it seems the liberals are going to self destruct ugly, because now they are harrassing handicapped women in Town Halls who have very valid concerns with the liberal take over of health care and all these plans to triage care to only those who can become useful cogs in society:

It seems this angry mobster from the far right has some serious and chronic medical issues, which is clearly why she came out to make her voice heard:

I am disabled. I currently have a ruptured spinal wire from a spinal implant and will be having my SEVENTH surgery since 2001 within the next week. I also have multiple health problems including little use of my left arm from nerve damage and horrible problems walking since the wire ruptured. I am in such pain it’s difficult to describe, but being there today was important.

…

Upon returning a group of pro-reform women were standing in front of my seat waving their ready made ACORN designed signs. My husband tapped one of them on the shoulder and courteously asked her to move as his wife needed her seat. She ignored him. I said “excuse me” THREE times and she looked at me and said, “You can sit over there where the other handicaps are sitting.” (Mind you this was in the hot sun on metal folding chairs and we had brought my own chair. That area was for handicapped and elderly constituents of Mr. Schiff’s …) I told her “I need my chair NOW!” as my arm was giving out and I was about to fall. My husband finally screamed “MOVE!” She and her coven screamed, “NO! WE DON’T HAVE TO MOVE ANYWHERE!” I had no choice but to shove her aside with my walker as I was about to fall and SHE STOMPED MY FOOT! I collapsed in the chair and screamed in pain. She and her friends started screaming “She’s LYING! SHE’S LYING! SHE ASSAULTED HER!!”

Of course other onlookers immediately swept in and backed us having seen her interfere with me getting in my seat and saw her stomp my foot…

If these left wing nuts don’t care about how they treat the needy in a Town Hall, what makes anyone think they will worry about their health care needs behind closed doors? Obama needs to pull the entire package back and start over – else this will spin completely out of control.

Someone remind me, how does that old saying go again? Oh yeah: “Don’t Tread On Me!”

I have to agree with Scott Gottleib over at the Wall Street Journal – the health care debacle (can we call this mess a debate?) has exposed our young President’s disturbing naiveté about health care, government and America in general. It’s like his entire life experience base is was formed from watching network TV shows and nothing else.

One theme the president has focused on is doctors’ motives. During a prime-time press conference on July 22, the president referred to a doctor who muses that she makes “a lot more money if I take this kid’s tonsils out”—even if the child might not need surgery.

Does this made for TV view of doctors bear any resemblance to the millions of doctors and health care providers across this nation who sacrifice long hours and brutal conditions to help their fellow human beings? A career in medicine is not a cake walk. It is filled with dealing with people in all dire straights, scared, worried and needing assistance. I dabbled with it as a career choice when I was young and realized, while I had the math and science skills in spades, I did not have the bottomless emotional fortitude it took to face decades have dealing with people in serious need of help – day in and day out.

The fact that anyone, let alone our President, takes away from this army of well intentioned, highly skilled and dedicated people fellow American some made up story caricature of greed like he did is a not only an affront to these good people, but an insult to our general intelligence. And it doesn’t stop there:

Responding to a woman whose spry 100-year-old mother was given a needed pacemaker despite her age, the president said a few weeks earlier (at an ABC News town-hall event at the White House) that doctors should let patients know that sometimes “you’re better off not having the surgery, but taking the painkiller.”

By trying to play doctor in this exchange, he clearly shows why he could never be a doctor. His flippant answers reflect a lack of gravitas and understanding that is just stunning. Does he really think there are pills that can do what a pacemaker can do? Is he that scientifically illiterate? It seems so:

Instead of addressing the distorted financial incentives that influence these kinds of routine tests and treatments, Mr. Obama’s policies seek to directly regulate doctors and their decisions.

Well sadly for him and all of us, he has yet to show even a basic knowledge of health care and medicine to be smart enough to regulate doctors’ decisions. In fact, I don’t think he has demonstrated sufficient grasp of the topic to even recommend how to deal with a low grade fever in a child.

Furthermore, President Obama’s ignorance is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to government intervention in the health care arena:

For doctors whom Medicare pays per intervention, the problem isn’t the fee-for-service model, but the way that the government program sets the fees. Fees are set according to a fixed price schedule with no tie to the physician’s quality, experience level, or the outcome of the service.

A more rational system would pay doctors for entire “episodes of care,” rather than individual procedures. Private health systems like the Geisinger Clinic and some Blue Cross plans have adopted this model and pay doctors for taking care of an entire illness.

Medicare doesn’t have the ability to track episodes of care. It has struggled to adopt even modest payment reforms such as restricted panels of providers, value-based insurance, and account-based coverage, where consumers control their own spending—all techniques used by private insurers to improve efficiency.

Medicare’s size demands that it keep payment systems simple. Thus it relies on fixed prices for checklists of services tied to discrete billing codes. These uniform payment rules reward low and high quality care the same. What’s troubling is that the heart of the president’s plan—a government-run “public” insurance program—is modeled directly on Medicare.

When President Obama let slip is very silly comparison of private industry leaders FedEx/UPS to the government run US Post Office, he very nicely summarized the entire problem with Obamacare and government run plans. Why should Americans cough up more taxes, sink our economy further and lose more jobs to expand a completely broken down system like Medicare? My guess is Medicare would love to work as well as the Post Office does – but it clearly does not.

President Obama and the DC liberals pushing government care are not our best and brightest – not by a long shot. They speak in 3rd grade level sound bites (we need ‘cheap’ healthcare), they see themselves as smarter than the masses of health care professionals and their patients. What we see in DC is the most egregious display of hubris and ego the nation as probably ever seen.

And it is destroying the credibility of the democrat leaders – America is losing faith and trust in these people. Sadly, rightfully so.

Major Update: Incredibly we have two examples of the Inquisitor’s death panels in action today. There is one operating in the State of Oregon (one place I was once thinking about retiring to – clearly not anymore):

Oregon’s Health Plan does not cover everyone in the state as Obama’s Gov’t Care Plan eventually aims to do. The Oregon Health Plan covers only low-income people, and a panel ranks diseases and conditions in order of priority for treatment.

…

If you have a deformity of your upper body, arms, or legs, no treatment for you! Ditto if your vocal cords are paralyzed. Live with it! Advanced breast cancer? Go home and, you know. . . .

If you are a pathological gambler, a drug user, or want to stop smoking , you can get treatment! Want to be sterilized or get an abortion? Step right up.

You just can’t make this stuff up – too scary. So, we have a ‘panel’ in Oregan that ranks an gambling and smoking addictions as higher priority than serious cancers. I feel like we have stepped into an alternate universes where America has turned into its opposite.

Update: Sarah Palin comes out again today, noting as I did, this is not about end-of-life consultations, it is about the core essence of any cheap, government run healthcare system - end update.

The liberals are now all up in arms because someone (i.e., Governor Sarah Palin) was finally able to label the core problem with any and all government run health care options. That label is “death panels”, and it is very appropriate and accurate, and is only marginally attached to end-of-life consultations.

Today’s liberal know-it-alls march around with the pompous, busy-body attitude reflecting a modern day inquisition. They tell everyone how to think, how to live, how to talk to each other, what myths to follow (global warming comes to mind). And if we lowly peasants violate these holy liberals we are chastised, attacked and can be punished under the law for our digressions from orthodoxy.

Interestingly, right now the opponents of the liberals’ government run dreams of conquest don’t need to theorize or extrapolate about the possible outcomes, because the UK clearly shows us all where a government run health care ‘option’ will lead us. What they are going through now, in terms of ‘cost savings’, is what ANY government controlled health spending program for individuals will end up. And realize, this is not about consultations – it is about cost savings (aka ‘cheap healthcare’, ‘affordable health care’, ‘universal access’, etc) and how the liberal inquisitors will chose the worthy.

Remember, a government run health care systems is where the government confiscates YOUR money through taxes and tells YOU what you can spend it on in terms of YOUR health care. And they will mandate that YOU save costs by doing what they say under threat of penalty. Under todays options the government cannot touch our health care dollars. Companies provide insurance pools. But if individuals could pool outside corporate and state lines, we could remove all outside parties from our health care decisions. And isn’t that what we want?

It is no secret the prime intent of the government run system is to ’save money’, which everyone with two brain cells to rub together knows actually means to NOT SPEND money. They take our money and determine how not to spend it for us. Voilà! Health care cost savings.

So, how does the government save/not spend money on health care? Let’s hear from President Obama’s lead architect and advisor, in his own words (which he is today trying to deny are his words) on how this can be accomplished:

Start with Dr. Ezekiel Emanuel, the brother of White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel. He has already been appointed to two key positions: health-policy adviser at the Office of Management and Budget and a member of Federal Council on Comparative Effectiveness Research.

Emanuel bluntly admits that the cuts will not be pain-free. “Vague promises of savings from cutting waste, enhancing prevention and wellness, installing electronic medical records and improving quality are merely ‘lipstick’ cost control, more for show and public relations than for true change,” he wrote last year (Health Affairs Feb. 27, 2008).

…

Emanuel, however, believes that “communitarianism” should guide decisions on who gets care. He says medical care should be reserved for the non-disabled, not given to those “who are irreversibly prevented from being or becoming participating citizens . . . An obvious example is not guaranteeing health services to patients with dementia” (Hastings Center Report, Nov.-Dec. ‘96).

These are exact quotes from the man’s own writings. He admits there are no efficiencies or waste that can really cut costs/not spend. The only real option – deny treatment. He can deny he wrote this all day long, but only a liberal dupe will believe it (these people are as sane as the 9-11 truthers and the Obama birthers). But I digress.

Here is another quote from this presidential health care advisor:

Under this system, patients would receive scarce care according to the graph shown below.

The paper concludes: “the complete lives system combines four morally relevant principles: youngest-first, prognosis, lottery, and saving the most lives. In pandemic situations, it also allocates scarce interventions to people instrumental in realising these four principles. Importantly, it is not an algorithm, but a framework that expresses widely affirmed values: priority to the worst-off, maximising benefits, and treating people equally. To achieve a just allocation of scarce medical interventions, society must embrace the challenge of implementing a coherent multiprinciple framework rather than relying on simple principles or retreating to the status quo.”

Emphasis mine. Look at the graph. Look were health care spending is maximized (money spent) and minimized (money withheld, not spent = SAVED!). Then read the words I put into bold: in order achieve ‘just allocation’. This is not rationing, this is worse. Under rationing everyone gets an equal share, but to allocate is to distribute unequally.

Under advanced triage, which is the essence of the liberal government run plans as outlined above, a panel of bureaucrats and appointed ‘experts’ decide what is a ‘just allocation’.

In advanced triage, doctors may decide that some seriously injured people should not receive advanced care because they are unlikely to survive. Advanced care will be used on patients with less severe injuries. Because treatment is intentionally withheld from patients with certain injuries, advanced triage has ethical implications. It is used to divert scarce resources away from patients with little chance of survival in order to increase the chances of survival of others who are more likely to survive.

Yes, there is even a formal definition of what these panels do when cutting costs. They decide who lives or dies by deciding who to spend money on (see graph above). This ‘advanced triage ‘ or ‘communitarianism’ process  or  ’complete lives system’ is rightfully summed up as a government ‘death panel’. The liberals will try and hide its true nature under pleasant sounding words strung together to lull the poor victims to sleep, but the label ‘death panel’ makes sense. And that is why it is sticking.

Most importantly, this has NOTHING to do with end of life consultations. If you can’t convince the patient to cut costs by getting on with their dying – thereby reducing the surplus population (think Ebenezer Scrooge) – then there are other ways to cut costs/not spend.

Let’s look at how it is done in the UK’s National Health System right now today. The UK’s NHS is the liberals model for the kind of system they want to push on us here in America. In the UK, they too are ‘cutting costs’. Here is one completely acceptable way for hospitals to cut costs in the UK:

Already around one in ten hospitals refuse to carry out joint replacements for obese patients or orthopaedic surgery on smokers.

It is legal, in the UK NHS system, to designate who is worthy and who is not for health care dollars. Who sat on the panel of inquisitors and decided what life styles were worthy of national health care money? What is it’s real name and the names of its membership? Who knows – who cares! All we need to know is some body exists and decided what lives were worthy for care.

Now, this is a future NHS concept for making more cost savings/not spending, which sounds a lot like that “communitarianism’ and ‘complete lives systerm’ old Doc Ezekiel was writing about above:

The contract, first floated by Tony Blair was proposed by Gordon Brown in a New Year message to Health Service staff today.

The Prime Minister believes a new focus on the prevention of ill health, rather than curing it, is essential for a modern NHS.

So, the UK ‘death panels’ at NHS hospitals, faced with tight budgets (keep it ‘cheap’ healthcare folks) already decided obese people and smokers are not as worthy as others. When will the drinkers and meat eaters be added? When will NHS be for non smoking, tea-toting, young vegans only?

Not too long it seems. The UK’s Cost Cutting Inquisition is looking to expand its definition of unworthy behavior – and those obese people and those smokers have some scary new company:

Smokers, heavy drinkers, the obese and the elderly should be barred from receiving some operations, according to doctors, with most saying the health service cannot afford to provide free care to everyone.

The inquisitors on the UK’s death panels are seriously considering to define ‘growing to a ripe old age’ as abhorrent and unworthy behavior – right up there with heavy drinking smoking and over eating!

The liberal news media has no ability or desire to show the connection between the words of the president’s health care advisor with the actions and discussions now ongoing regarding the UK’s NHS. They keep blaming the conservatives and independents who oppose government run health care of being evil because we have the brain wattage to process the concepts expressed (presidential advisor) and the results produced (UK NHS) to date to see how they will impact us here in the US. Damn us and our brains!

The fact that the liberal media is refusing to connect the dots is a sad commentary on the left and the liberal media. It doesn’t change the facts. They are all trying to deny that there is any ‘death panel’, but the only way to not spend money is to decide which procedures and patients are not worthy of the expense. This doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out.

While the liberal left is in the throws of denial so deep that they make truthers and birthers look sane, America gets it:

Elderly Americans are turning out in droves to fight ObamaCare, and President Obama is arguing back that they have nothing to worry about. Allow us to referee. While claims about euthanasia and “death panels” are over the top, senior fears have exposed a fundamental truth about what Mr. Obama is proposing: Namely, once health care is nationalized, or mostly nationalized, rationing care is inevitable, and those who have lived the longest will find their care the most restricted.

Seniors are most at risk. They represent 80% of the health care spending. To cut costs/not spend is to limit their options. Look at the funding curve under Doc Ezekiel’s chart at the top once again. After 55 it is literally downhill for folks in an advanced triage or ‘complete lives system’ of health care approach. Not to mention how cheap the stingy government will be with children of all ages and needs. Governor Sarah Palin is correct to look at that chart of ol’ Doc Ezekiel’s and realize her youngest child is targeted to help cut costs/not spend.

Americans of all ages have a right to be scared, because we don’t know where the Obamacare Death Panel of Life Style Inquisitors will be hidden in the legislation. Of course they are not called out! If they were, we could make sure they would never see the light of a congressional bill at a presidential signing ceremony. The only way to make sure there are never government inquisitors sitting on death panels determining who is worthy of health care is to never let the government get into the health care business – ever.

If the Dems think the voters are going to chose death panels of life-style inquisitors, doling out our hard earned tax money which the government confiscated from us, in order to cut costs/not spend, then they truly deserve the wrath of voters. The best response to this kind of sick thinking is to throw the bums out and cut off their money supply. Instead of the government taking control of our health care decisions and dollars, it may be easier to just take back over government and cut it out of any all decisions. It would lower costs and stop the red ink if we cut the cost of government instead of health care.

We The People hold the power, not DC liberals. In 2010 that will be more than evident.

Update: Tom Macguire notes that President Obama has been talking ‘death panel’ talk (albeit using those soothing, vague, trance-setting words) for some time:

THE PRESIDENT: Well, I think that there is going to have to be a conversation that is guided by doctors, scientists, ethicists. And then there is going to have to be a very difficult democratic conversation that takes place. It is very difficult to imagine the country making those decisions just through the normal political channels. And that’s part of why you have to have some independent group that can give you guidance. It’s not determinative, but I think has to be able to give you some guidance. And that’s part of what I suspect you’ll see emerging out of the various health care conversations that are taking place on the Hill right now.

Excuse me? what kind of ‘discussion’ requires an ethicists? Life and Death discussions? Where is the patient and their family in this mix?

They don’t get a seat at the Death Panel – they are the subject of the Inquisitor’s decision to determine worthiness.