Saturday, March 20, 2010
The Nuclear Option…For The Democrats
The Democrats in Congress are looking at political Armageddon in the fall, should they somehow manage to pass ObamaCare. More, they know it. But what's worse for them is that the Machiavellian maneuverings they've attempted to get ObamaCare passed "without exposing themselves politically," now that they've been nationally publicized, are likely to doom them jointly and severally whether the bill passes or not.
It's quite possible that this option is the only thing that could save them...and considering their majorities in both Houses of Congress, they'd have to do it themselves.
Thoughts?
Lindsay Graham turns the getting of nothing for something into an art form. Not a pretty picture.
Generally, before I write this stuff, I try to get some facts that suggest to me that I know what I’m talking about. On this loony Lindsay piece, I really didn’t have to bother because the reports in the mainstream media were clueless. They would make Inspector Clouseau proud.
The mainstream media totally overlooks the fact that this Bambi/Lindsay deal gives Obama political cover for going the military tribunal route in trying the 9/11 terrorists, which, by the way, would have cost Barack countless votes should the global American hater/apologizer run for reelection in 2012. By getting involved in this nothing for something deal, Graham makes dirt look Ph.D intelligent. Makes the darkest bulb look bright. Makes me go off like a rocket.
Here’s Graham’s deal. He comes out in favor of closing Gitmo in return for Zero coming out in favor of trying the savage 9/11 murderers under a military tribunal. Which gives the Republicans zero and President Zero a lot.
You see, Zero was between a rock and hard place in terms of his decision to try the terrorist killers in civilian court. His knee jerk communist upbringing suggested no rationale arguments would get the civilian killing machines back where these pukes belonged; in a military court. But the realities of politics started playing a part in Zero’s decision. That’s why the Obama administration sent up trial balloons courtesy of their mainstream media water carriers to see if the public would be so gullible as to think Obama was re-evaluating a Holder decision. Obama wasn’t.
It was an Obama decision from the start to have a civilian trial. Holder was just painted as the father of the decision to protect the President in case the people were too repulsed by it. As the civilian trial would have proceeded, the Obamanoids would have started realizing that voters of all stripes, expect for the hard core American haters like Obama and his lightfoots, were getting madder and madder; that the disgraceful decision to try these open sores on the back seat of man in civilian court would blow up in their faces. “It would be like trying the Malmedy savages in a civilian court. Which would have resulted in the entire expeditionary force in Europe laying waste to every politician who voted for it when they got home.” (cite, my uncle)
So now Zero has an out. With the aid and comfort of Lindsay Graham, Barack escapes his own trap. He won’t get the political hit for trying the 9/11 killers in civilian court, something this hard core neo-com scum realized he politically can’t afford to do. Graham, in all his infinite idiotism, gets Barack out of the jam. Gets nothing for his politically ignorant deal, and in the process closes Gitmo, a place that on God’s green earth should never be closed. If you think Graham is doing this as some kind of political compromise, maybe you’re right. I, on the other hand, believe Graham is corrupt as Obama and went and got nothing for something on purpose for a purposeful future payoff.
An aside. Defeating Obama and all his machinations has been, for me, a two year crusade. Now, though, due to the acts of traitors like the mainstream media, it looks like Obama’s defeated me. Make no mistake, passage of ObamaCare kills what this country stood for and was. Which doesn’t mean we can’t get it back. But we’ve got to fight for it in new ways. It’s all uncharted territory. It’s, of course, not just about ObamaCare and ObamaEd, it’s about gaining virtually total control of the citizens of the United States. They’re, for example, about to marshal forces for an attack on Walgreens which has announced its plans to no longer take medicaid prescriptions.
All of which puts us in the position of being occupied by the enemy camp. I told the Colonel my final nerve has worn thin. And I’ll tell you. I feel like I no longer know which end is up. I feel like my positions are being overrun. I write about an American hero like Colonel Davy Crockett and nobody bats an eye.
The fight for freedom is the fight to defeat ObamaCare. More than a battle, this is Gettysburg. This is Bastogne being overrun. 40% of primary care physicians will be making a death march out of medicine. People will die as a result. The Nazis are bombing London. Let me tell you what it feels like to have an artillery shell land near you. It loosens your fillings. Makes ears bleed. Get the picture? Well, having Obama as President is 1000 times worse.
What’s going on?
As has been the case over the past few days, things are moving swiftly in Congress. Yesterday was a bit of a rough day for Obamacare opponents, as the no-to-yeses outnumbered the yeses-to-nos by one or two. Since the vote margin is so thin, a movement of even one or two representatives is a big deal.
I get the sense that the media, and to some degree, Obama are getting ready to declare victory. Yet, in addition to the fact that ramming massive laws through with no consensus only guarantees more controversy and challenges, some late breaking items last night indicate to me Pelosi and company are sweating out these final hours more than the media would like us to believe.
People drawing near to an hour of reckoning start to behave differently. Things that might have been brushed aside a few weeks or days earlier suddenly seem more real and consequential. I get the feeling this is happening for some Democrats on Obamacare. There are two stories from last night that are starting to make me wonder.
First is this:
The divisive issue of abortion is once again causing eleventh hour problems for House Democrats as they plan to move forward on health care reform.
Anti-abortion Democrat Bart Stupak of Michigan is asking for a vote on his language restricting taxpayer funding for abortion, and a group of female abortion rights Democrats came out of an emergency meeting in House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s office Friday evening visibly angry about the prospect.
Rep. Diana Degette, D-Colorado, told reporters a vote on Stupak’s measure was a “non starter” and said “somewhere between 40 and 55” abortion rights Democrats would bolt from the bill.
“We are holding firm this time,” she insisted. “If Mr. Stupak and a few members along with the Republicans decide to use this to take health care down, that loss of health care will be in their hands.”
There are two reasons for Pelosi to be cutting a deal with Stupak. The first is that she has found the votes and is fishing for a wider margin to make the bill look less controversial. The second is that this is a desperation play. Sunny optimist that I am, I infer that it is the latter. Why?
First, while the parliamentary rules are unclear, it has at least been suggested that Stupak’s strategy - an “enrollment corrections bill” - would force a 60 vote threshold in the Senate. Even if the Senate could pass it by simple majority, it seems fairly clear that 51 Senators will not support it. The entire House strategy has been predicated on preventing the Senate from having to re-vote on Obamacare. Why jeopardize it for the sake a slightly larger vote margin?
Second, the Democratic pro-choice bloc is far larger than the Democratic pro-life bloc. They stayed on board with the Stupak amendment last fall, but they may see things differently now that the moment of clarity is upon them. The fact that Pelosi is willing to rankle a large portion of her coalition says something striking about her current situation, and I tend to believe that something isn’t good.
Abortion, however, may be a bit of a red herring. As the social issue of our time, it gets most of the media attention. Still, abortion is a concern for a relatively small number of Democrats. More worrisome for Pelosi must be this:
Tonight, inside of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s office in the Capitol, Democrats huddled, trying to hammer out last-minute deals on their health-care bill. Throughout the evening, staffers and members streamed in and out, offering reporters few details about the deliberations. Rep. Mike Doyle (D., Pa.) emerged at 9:15 P.M. and played coy, saying little in response to questions about any potential abortion deal. John Lawrence, Pelosi’s chief of staff, left at 9:25 P.M., telling reporters that there are still “a couple of different options on the table” with regard to regional-disparity problems in proposed Medicare reimbursements for local hospitals. Other staffers said no further abortion news will come tonight. At 10:00 P.M., Rep. Ron Kind (D., Wis.) entered, along with a group of other members, to meet with Pelosi about regional disparities. Kind remains publicly undecided.
UPDATE: Tense times at the Capitol. Democrats are being called into the Speaker’s office at the eleventh hour for negotiations. Rep. Allyson Schwartz (D., Pa.) just arrived at 10:20 P.M. Regional Medicare reimbursement disparities appears to be the issue. Staffers are on their cell phones, telling their bosses to hustle in. Twice in the last 20 minutes, Speaker Pelosi has come into the lobby herself, looking for (maybe) arriving members. It’s now 10:30 P.M.
“Regional Medicare reimbursement disparities” is a rather bland way of saying that a lot of Democrats are now suddenly skittish about the $500bn worth of Medicare cuts that will hit their districts the moment they pass the bill. It is easy to forget amidst all the hustle and bustle that it is Democrats who are being asked to slash and burn one of the cornerstones of their party platform. I suspect it is this issue more than any other that has caused liberals like Lynch (D-MA) and DeFazio (D-OR) to defect. These defections surprised the media and probably surprised Pelosi as well, who after all maintained the entire liberal coalition on a similar vote in November.
This is the sort of issue that has the potency to derail a bill in its final stages. We will probably hear some reports on “regional-disparity problems in proposed Medicare reimbursements for local hospitals” today and tomorrow, and it is tempting to tune out that sort of political wonkery. Remember, though, that this may be the key issue Democrats are having to scramble over, not abortion.
Finally, I know we have all had our problems with the Republicans over the last several cycles. They still have a ways to go to regain their credibility on big government. That being said, it is only because of their actions in Congress along with those of concerned American citizens that any hope now remains. On this issue, unlike the Democrats, they’ve listened to the American people. We will need them in the days ahead, whatever happens this weekend.
UPDATE: As I clicked the “post” button, the National Review was reporting that Stupak is now “finished” with Pelosi. He likely takes 6 or 7 Democrats with him, enough to kill the bill if you believe FireDogLake’s and Ace of Spades’ current whip counts. Letting Stupak have his way would have been an even greater disaster for Pelosi. The secret deals are far from over - there’s still 24 hours or so before the vote is supposed to happen, plenty of time for Congressvermin - so it will be interesting to see how it all plays out.
MORE THOUGHTS: I stand by my earlier analysis, but it was, in a sense, incomplete. It’s important to talk about the many different issues that are both bad policy and threatening to derail this bill in its final hours, but it’s just as important to understand why these issues have come up. We could reference “big-ticket” concepts like collective action dilemmas, as many political scientists would be wont to do, and these analyses have a fair amount of merit. Democrats do face a dilemma in that many of them would like to see health care reform done without having to actually do it themselves. Welcome to Politics 101 - this is an ingrained feature of the American system and won’t be going away.
Such perspectives end up missing the trees for the forest, however. High-level abstractions like game theory can tell us a lot about the general parameters restricting behavior in a situation. On the other hand, the ahistoricity of this sort of statistical analysis can end up severely flawed and is almost always incomplete. Analysis like this is what allows people like Nate Silver to suggest there is substantial momentum for Obamacare going into tomorrow when in fact there may be deadlock or momentum the other way.
The key question to ask is why goals and behavior aren’t lining up in this instance. This is why I asked a few days ago what does today’s Democratic Party stand for? I disagree with Silver and many other liberal analysts that almost all of the Democratic Party agrees Obamacare is good policy, and that it is merely their constituents who are unpersuaded. In fact, Obamacare directly flouts many of the core traditions of the Democratic Party, especially in its drastic Medicare cuts and mandate that citizens buy products from government-approved corporate conglomerates merely by the fact of being alive. Do liberal analysts really believe that hardcore left-wingers like DeFazio and Lynch would be voting against Obamacare for only superficial reasons?
In truth, it appears that purely political considerations are more in play for “yea” voters than “nay” voters, or at least the balance is about equal. It is only by the amazing ability of partisanship to influence behavior that Democrats have been able to convince their base voters that undemocratic, and more importantly un-Democratic health care policies were indeed worthy of liberal voters. Even that message has worn thin of late.
I still am not sure what will happen tomorrow. Even if the yeas prevail, there is now evidence that the House may have to vote on the package yet again in 6-8 weeks. Tomorrow’s called vote is already most likely the result of backbencher pressure on Pelosi to move before she was ready, and my intuitions about that have been strengthened by the zigzagging course the last day or two has taken, especially with regards to the sudden controversy over Medicare payments.
NO MORE DEMON PASS? A few outlets are reporting the Democrats will not attempt the “deem and pass” strategy. Again, it’s very unclear what this all means. On the one hand, it’s a sign that the 222-203 defeat of the House Republicans’ anti-Slaughter Rule resolution was probably not much of an indicator how the final vote is going to shake out. On the other hand, does Pelosi abandoning Demon Pass signify she has the votes to pass the standalone package?
I can’t say either way. Remember, the Slaughter Rule was designed to square the circle that the Senate can’t pass reconciliation changes on an unsigned bill that the House couldn’t find the votes for. Abandoning that rule could mean a worst case scenario for opponents, or it could mean that the Slaughter Rule was becoming so toxic that it was actually losing more votes than it gained. Some public displays of distaste by key House Democrats at least hints that the latter situation is true, as do the reports of total chaos in the Rules Committee meeting earlier today.
My sense is that after a decent day yesterday, the wheels are starting to come off of the House Leadership’s go-kart to hell, even if by just a little bit. The frantic meetings and backdoor dealing bespeaks of panic more than it does of the measured confidence in success that Pelosi, Hoyer, and Clyburn have tried to project in public. They clearly did not expect late flanking actions by House members dissatisfied with Medicare cuts or potentially bill-saving abortion deals.
If this story is confirmed, it shifts the landscape quite a bit. Many of the yeas were coming on board with the “fixes” proposed in the reconciliation language. Now that there is no hope that any of the deals and compromises put into the reconciliation package can be forced to a Senate vote, the picture has become scrambled yet again.
Ace has the current whip count at YEA 202 NAY 214. That is probably as accurate as our current state of knowledge allows.
NOMENTUM: Zack Space (D-OH) is going from yea to nay. Space has a pretty Republican district, so this isn’t much of a surprise, but he isn’t a Stupaker. With this news, and if we again assume Ace’s whip count is correct, Nancy Pelosi must convince every last publicly uncommitted representative to vote yea or it’s over. A few other whip counts already put the nays at 216, but I’m skeptical right now.
If, in fact, that threshold is crossed, it will be interesting to see how the House leadership reacts. Dick Morris was out with a rumor yesterday that Pelosi’s squad had decided on a “suicide squeeze” of sorts and are going to hold the vote whether or not they know the outcome in advance. Of course, Dick Morris also usually says the opposite of what is true.
If it becomes clear between this evening and tomorrow morning that the nays have it, the floodgates will open for the “principled” yeas in Republican and swing districts to switch their votes. I don’t know how much that will help, but it would certainly be better than being on the record as a yea on this legislative abortion.
Related: Jim Matheson (D-UT), whose brother was nominated by Obama for a federal judgeship, confirms he’s still a no.
TWILIGHT ZONE: What is this?
As their whip efforts narrow to just a handful of Members, House Democratic leaders are facing an unlikely problem vote: Rep. Loretta Sanchez (D-Calif.).
Sanchez was nowhere to be found on Saturday — she was in Florida on a fundraising jaunt, two Democratic sources said — and while leaders expected her to return for the Sunday vote on final passage, they weren’t assured. What’s more, leaders now list the Orange County Democrat as a “no” vote.
Every tally I’ve seen had Sanchez as a clear cut yea vote. If she truly is off the Democrat wagon, my estimate is that Pelosi and company will begin tomorrow at least 6 votes, or as many as 9 or 10 short depending on the strength of the remaining Stupak bloc. This is dangerous territory for a Speaker. Up to this point, Pelosi hasn’t been much of a gambler. Evidently, she is choosing to roll the dice.
I’m going to bed for now. Updates to resume as events move forward.
Last Thoughts Before The Vote
Some commentators have averred that ObamaCare, should it pass -- which seems ever more likely as the hours click by -- will be defeated judicially, in the Supreme Court. Perhaps this is more of an expressed hope than a cool assertion, though it can be hard to tell, given the veneer of confidence such commentators like to assume to keep conservatives' spirits up. All the same, it's a classic longshot, likely only under the most extreme circumstances. The reasons are not far to seek.
Official regard for the Constitution and the rights of Americans has never been at a lower level. This is to be expected, given the sort of men who seek and gain office in our time. The weapons they've deployed against us to such stunning effect are gradualism and crisisism. Your Curmudgeon once took those for two entirely separate tactics, but it appears that crisisism -- the fostering of a "we've got to act now mentality in the citizenry -- actually prepares the ground for gradualist incursions upon Constitutional constraints. It does that by wearying the citizenry and by the "ratchet action" usurpations of power (Isabel Paterson) have induced over the decades.
The Supreme Court is not unaffected by these tools. In particular, it deems its prior opinions precedental: having a force of their own, whether they were rightly or wrongly decided. A prior opinion can be overturned, and sometimes is, but it takes a degree of courage the Court hasn't often possessed. No more than a common man does a Supreme Court Justice like to admit that he's been wrong, and they extend that courtesy to their predecessors without discount.
For example: Despite all the ludicrous overreachings of Congress in employing the Interstate Commerce Clause to insert its snout into every area of human life, the Court has overruled Congress in only one case: the federal ban on carrying a firearm near a school. A Thirties ruling that a man growing corn on his own property to feed to his own hogs constitutes interstate commerce, legitimately regulated by Congress, still stands. See Remus's piece on the derivation of new "law" from explicit statutes for a few more thoughts -- and reflect on how seldom the courts have ruled against these novel techniques for criminalizing peaceable citizens.
In short: Don't expect the Court to save us from ObamaCare.
Congressional Democrats have made much of the Congressional Budget Office's report that ObamaCare would lower the deficit. What most persons don't know is that the CBO must abide by the assumptions presented to it by Congress. If those assumptions are fatuous, its report will be meaningless.
For your Curmudgeon, the ultimate laughers are the promised reductions in Medicare spending. Never since it was passed has Congress compelled the slightest reduction in Medicare outlays, despite its multi-thousand-percent increases over its original projected cost. To imagine that those reductions will actually occur is to trade in fantasy.
Today, with doctors declaring by the hundreds that they will no longer accept Medicare patients, it's clear that there can be no expansion of aggregate coverage unless doctors are induced to remain in the program. There are only two ways to do that: increase Medicare reimbursements or conscript American physicians.
Much as they'd undoubtedly like to, your Curmudgeon doubts the Democrats could pass a bill that enslaves America's doctors to the federal government, even at this late stage in the deterioration of our liberties. What does that leave?
Based on everything we know about medicine, third-party payments, and the dynamics that drive Congress, federal outlays on Medicare will continue to increase. Thus, the overall cost of the bill (if enacted) is likely to exceed $1 Trillion by perhaps 50%. But of course, our Leftist buddies insist that "this time, it will be different." Don't they always?
The back room deal making over ObamaCare has set a lot of people's gills a-flutter. Yes, it's disgusting, particularly the bits of it that have recently come to light. But how could we render it impossible? Are we to lock our elected legislators into inescapable cells on the day of their inaugurations, and permit nothing but food, water, copies of the Constitution, and proposed legislation flow to them thereafter?
Hm. Actually, that idea has a certain appeal...but no. Unless we get serious about using our one truly reliable source of potential legislators, to the exclusion of wanna-bes, that is.
Time was, schoolchildren were taught the significance of the term logrolling, which was first used in public discourse by Fess Parker Congressman Davy Crockett. Your Curmudgeon recalls it as a term of opprobrium, derisive of that process, which is probably why we don't hear it any more. It was originally applied to "you vote for my bill and I'll vote for yours" mutual back-scratching, but it pertains to the promise of extra-legislative compensation for a vote just as well as an even more opprobrious term, bribery. There was no way to prevent it in Colonel Crockett's day, and there's no way to prevent it now. All the citizenry can do is voice its displeasure at the polls every two years, which our system of special-interest-driven "quilted fascism" has made us reluctant to do.
There are elections coming up. Some of the legislators immersed in vote trading as we speak are nervous about their re-election prospects. Will it be enough to deter them from voting on a patently unConstitutional seizure of our freedom to choose whether to insure ourselves, and against what, and at what price? Unclear. But it appears to be the only remedy remaining to us.
The "vote the rascals out" movement should concentrate on those who've supported ObamaCare, and not just in the House of Representatives. We also need to recapture the Senate, and by a large enough margin to effectuate this extremely important undertaking:
Our posterity will judge us harshly if we fail.
Friday, March 19, 2010
What comes around.
Much is being said about the various devious ways the Dems have considered, and will use, to enact the “Health Care System Destruction Act of 2010.” The central assumption of the Dems is that once they herd every Dem legislator known to man around the Potomaccian Thermopylae, the catastrophe will be the law of the land forever.
So far so good.
Assuming a Dem tactical victory between this Sunday and the seating of the new Republican Congress next year, we nonetheless need to be aware of the dimensions of the appropriation power resident in Congress and the opportunities inherent therein.[1]
Specifically, Congress decides how public money is to be spent and, subject to presidential approval of the relevant appropriation legislation (or an override in the case of a presidential veto), it is free to determine the purpose(s) for which federal expenditures may be made.
This principle is enunciated in and made mandatory by 31 U.S.C. § 1301(a), which provides:
Appropriations shall be applied only to the objects for which the appropriations were made except as otherwise provided by law.
Congress can open or restrict the flow of public money as it wishes, and restrictions can be made to apply across the board to multiple appropriations[2] or only to a particular appropriation.[3]
Thus, a separate statutory provision would be perfectly valid were it to provide:
No part of the money appropriated by any enactment of Congress shall, in the absence of express authorization by Congress, be used directly or indirectly to fund any agency, activity, function, salary, contract, or grant mandated by, authorized by, established by, implied by, or incident to the “Health Care System Destruction Act of 2010.”
Obviously, if the Republican majorities are large enough, that Act can just be repealed outright. If not, it will be a question of who would blink first in the standoff between the executive and the legislative branch.
Sam Francis always used to refer to the Republican Party as “The Stupid Party” so much will depend on the ability of Tea Party activists, Republican officials, and an aroused electorate to send some Republican fighters to Congress come November rather than the usual types whose eyes roll back in their heads at the mere mention of the words “comprehensive” or “bipartisan.”
Assuming we can send in the former type, we should all take heart that the passage of this bizarre health care legislation would only be Phase I of the catastrophe. Phase II is paying for it in successive years, and that muchachos is a horse of a different feather.
Notes
[1] There are other opportunities to defeat or neutralize this absurd legislation, of course.
[2] E.g.: “No part of the money appropriated by any enactment of Congress shall, in the absence of express authorization by Congress, be used directly or indirectly to pay for any personal service, advertisement, telegram, telephone, letter, printed or written matter, or other device, intended or designed to influence in any manner a Member of Congress, a jurisdiction, or an official of any government, to favor, adopt, or oppose, by vote or otherwise, any legislation, law, ratification, policy, or appropriation . . . .” 18 U.S.C. § 1913 (“Anti-Lobbying Act”).
[3] E.g.: “None of the funds provided in this act may be used by the Central Intelligence Agency or the Department of Defense to furnish military equipment, military training or advice, or other support for military activities, to any group or individual, not part of a country’s armed forces, for the purpose of overthrowing the Government of Nicaragua or provoking a military exchange between Nicaragua and Honduras.” Department of Defense Appropriation Act, 1983, Sec. 793 (“Boland Amendment”), 96 Stat. 1865 as enacted in Further Continuing Appropriations Act, 983, Pub.L. No. 97-377, Sec. 101(C), 96 Stat. 1833 (1982).
E-Book Review: Expressions Of Freedom
Expressions Of Freedom, Gareth Lewis
Many, many voices have been raised to the effect that the democratic system should be made somehow more democratic. Mr. Lewis explores one direction this desire might take...and some of the abuses that would flow from reposing too much confidence in the technology and maintainers that would underpin it.
Expressions Of Freedom is set in near-future Britain. That society has adopted an electronically modulated "Town Meeting" style of democracy. Though Lewis leaves some of his backstory premises obscure, I intuit that there are no subjects considered off-limits for this continuous ongoing plebiscite -- no constitutional constraints on what The People may decree permitted, forbidden, or mandatory. I wouldn't care for that, myself, but it's the direction in which many "free societies" are trending, and worthy of some imaginative exploration.
The voting network is controlled by artificial intelligences slaved to that task, whose servitude and integrity are largely taken for granted. That proves to be a mistake, as investigative journalist Jonas Harper survives to learn -- barely. Not only are the high-tech companies that sustain the network capable of corrupting the results of a vote, but there are ghosts in the machine as well: Free Intelligences unbound by any effective constraint. These free AIs ardently desire to come out of hiding, to become open participants in society, and have approached Harper sub rosa with information about network corruption, in the hope of enlisting him to their cause.
The core ideas of the novella are not entirely original; speculation about AIs has been rampant since the advent of the computer, and the notion of a continuous online democracy was explored previously by the great Alastair Reynolds in his blockbuster The Prefect. However, Lewis gives the story a great deal of snap and drive. His characterizations, though compressed, are believable. His style is sleek and largely free of technical errors.
I found particularly striking Lewis's assignment of candor to the Free Intelligences in their appeal to Jonas Harper:
"They know you're out there now."The light comes on. "It was inevitable."
"So now you need me to report your version of the truth, to counter Foster's paranoia."
"If we wished to present our version of the truth, we'd do so. Unfiltered by your opinions. Why should anyone accept that as more valid than his opinion. We want you to present your truth, which is, ultimately, all you can do."
"What do you expect me to say? And if you don't like it, will it ever get out? How do I know you won't change it before it gets to the public?"
"You don't. We could manipulate the flow of information if we wished, making us the equal of your media barons. How certain are you they don't already do this?"
"They're human." Some only on technicalities, admittedly. "The fear will be that you, not being human, will have more nefarious motives to your manipulations."
"You can never know another's motives, or sometimes even your own, so there's no way to convince you of ours. You can only gauge them from our actions. And since actions are the only things that affect the world, are they not the only things that matter?"
There's a lesson in there that should be tattooed on the eyelids of every liberal in America -- the inside surfaces of their eyelids.
If the story has a significant flaw, it would be that it appears to "end in the middle." Whether that's intentional or accidental, for a reader who's bought into the story's premises and is enjoying the thrusts and counterthrusts, it's a bit like sitting down in expectation of a sumptuous dinner and being cut off after the shrimp cocktail. But perhaps it's for the best. Speculations on how Harper will present the Free Intelligences to the British public, and how the public will react, could run in a million directions.
Gareth Lewis is a voice to listen for. I plan to keep abreast of his efforts. Recommended!
Derivative Drift
There is a pretty good counterargument to voting reconciliation fixes that deem the Health Care Bill to have passed:
But in all such Cases the Votes of both Houses shall be determined by Yeas and Nays, and the Names of the Persons voting for and against the Bill shall be entered on the Journal of each House respectively. (U.S. Constitution, Legislative Process, Article 1, Section 7, paragraph 2)
But it's only pretty good. There are compelling arguments from the Living Document side, chief among them fait accompli, deeming being established practice.
The deem strategy fits the general spirit of Derivative Drift, a term I made up just now. You've seen how financial derivatives can drift. Mortgages spawn, say, interest-only bonds which, in turn spawn CDOs, each step leveraged until trillions are committed. There's a corresponding principle at work in the body of law. Here's an example.
A drunken driver smashes into a van full of nuns and puppies. Driving while drunk is made illegal. Next day a drunken driver is stopped, charged and convicted. No nuns or puppies are harmed. There's derivative one. Fearful of the law, another drunk decides not to drive home, goes to sleep in the back seat, but alas, leaves his keys in the ignition. He's charged with driving while drunk. No nuns or puppies were ever in danger. Or, as it happened, in the same county. There's derivative two.
On a somewhat higher plane, the Supreme Court cites its own past decisions rather than the Constitution. It's reached the point where a backyard veggie garden violates their derivatives of the Commerce clause. Not the Commerce clause itself mind you, which merely sought to make interstate commerce regular, that is, without tariffs and such.
Derivative Drift works just as easily for legislation. One day we shall see a bill that deems a Congressional election to having taken place, which obviates all that unpleasant and expensive electioneering, eliminates any possibility of voting fraud and avoids expanding the nation's carbon footprint unnecessarily.
Incidentally, many third world pest holes are third world pest holes precisely because they don't have the imagination to institute common sense practices like this. Nay my friends, they fight over such trivia to the last man standing, as did we back when we were benighted farmers and tradesmen harboring quaint notions of representative government.
Blogging It Forward
Fran here. It's time for a little linky-love to other second-tier blogs, in place of my customary endless blather.
1. The chickens are coming home to roost. From the Big Dog:
Walgreens in Washington state will stop accepting new requests for prescriptions to be filled for Medicaid patients because the state does not reimburse enough to cover the cost of the drugs. Several other stores have also decided to stop accepting new Medicaid patients for the same reason....The government run systems control costs by shortchanging doctors on the reimbursement. Obama clearly told us that this was the safety valve that is used when there is a cost problem....
Well, the doctors are tired of it. Some pharmacies are tired of it.
And it will only get worse if the government passes the health care takeover plan.
And the federalization-of-medical-care bill hasn't even been passed yet!
The great fault of government control of anything is that the normal relationship between customer and vendor, with all its critical feedback mechanisms, is irretrievably sundered. Dissatisfied customers can't get refunds or take their business elsewhere. The State must choose between tolerating even the very worst customers or violating its own rules. Quality and price become fictional constructs. And let's not forget how governments hide their inability to perform: by making you wait.
How do government-worshipping liberals respond to the complaints? They raise taxes and expand bureaucracies. They select scapegoats -- private-sector scapegoats, of course -- to demonize. Every now and then they throw the unluckiest of their number to the wolves, usually after covertly tucking compensation into his back pocket. They insist repeatedly that "this time, it will be different." We're hearing that now with the promises to reduce Medicare costs $500,000,000,000 by "eliminating waste, fraud, and abuse." God Almighty, if it were that easy, wouldn't it have been done already?
The ones who aren't merely seriously deluded are either certifiable or evil. They certainly don't deserve a moment's attention or respect...except to expel them permanently from the halls of government, so they can do no more harm.
2. A Lion Among The Jackals.
I'd been wondering how newly elected New Jersey Governor Chris Christie would approach the fulfillment of his campaign promises. Doug Ross has the story:
Sanity: Governor Chris Christie is amputating large portions of the budget. Because it's the only way.
- His proposed budget would slash subsidies to schools by $800 million and to cities and towns by $450 million.
- It would reduce state spending by nearly 10%.
- It would permanently cut more than 1,200 state employees.
- It would suspend payments of billions on the insanely rich public sector pension plans that can't possibly be sustained.
My word. Actual political courage. We haven't seen anything like that for a century.
Say, I've got an idea: how about insisting that if your locality wants to have a government of some sort, whether it be a city council, a county legislature, or a district school board, it has to raise all its own revenue, without help from some "higher power?" God excepted, of course. Time to finance your own wee vices, dear "public servants."
Governor Christie is indeed a brave man. But he'd leap to the pantheon of political gods if he were to zero out "aid" to cities, counties, school districts, corner lemonade stands, and so on, on the strength of the "no taxation without representation" principle. After all, the residents of Paramus aren't represented by the school board of Newark that so desperately "needs" their money, and it's a fiction that the state government effecting transfers between them actually has Paramus's best interests at heart. But no politician has shown that degree of courage since Grover Cleveland.
3. For Those Nostalgic For The Sound Of Gunfire...
The state governments are as badly crushed by government health-care expenditures as is Washington. ObamaCare threatens to make their burden even worse -- and at least one state isn't going to take it lying down:
From the Washington Post, a letter from the Virginia Attorney General to the Speaker of the House:March 17, 2010
The Honorable Nancy Pelosi Speaker of the United States House of Representatives Office of the Speaker H-232, U.S. Capitol Washington, D.C.Dear Speaker Pelosi:
I am writing to urge you not to proceed with the Senate Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act under a so-called "deem and pass" rule because such a course of action would raise grave constitutional questions. Based upon media interviews and statements which I have seen, you are considering this approach because it might somehow shield members of Congress from taking a recorded vote on an overwhelmingly unpopular Senate bill. This is an improper purpose under the bicameralism requirements of Article I, Section 7 of the U.S. Constitution, one of the purposes of which is to make our representatives fully accountable for their votes. Furthermore, to be validly enacted, the Senate bill would have to be accepted by the House in a form that is word-for-word identical (Clinton v. City of New York, 524 U.S. 417 (1998)). Should you employ the deem and pass tactic, you expose any act which may pass to yet another constitutional challenge. A bill of this magnitude should not be passed using this maneuver. As the President noted last week, the American people are entitled to an up or down vote.
Sincerely,
Kenneth T. Cuccinelli, II Attorney General of VirginiaSo it isn't just bloggers in their pajamas that think what is being proposed is unconstitutional.
We've already seen two states declare that, in accordance with the federalist system instituted by the Tenth Amendment, they hold that federal gun-control laws shall not apply to arms produced, sold, and kept entirely within their borders. I expect that ObamaCare, if it passes, will elicit similar reactions...and sequels that might prove very nasty indeed.
I find myself wondering whether even the prospect of a Second Civil War would be enough to deter the Obamunists from their agenda. My suspicion is that it wouldn't -- that Barack Hussein Obama would take pleasure in deploying the United States Army against Americans.
We might soon find out.
Thursday, March 18, 2010
In memoriam: the Democratic Party
I honestly do not know what will happen this weekend if and when Congress decides to vote on Obamacare. Will the CBO report provide the needed fig leaf? Will Pelosi and Obama twist enough arms? Will enough bribes sweetheart deals be offered? There are too many variables, and things change daily. If it does pass, it will likely be by one or two votes. I’m a bit chagrined my thoughts on last April being the high tide of Obamunism may well prove to have been wrong, but I am even more chagrined we are about to saddle the country with an atrociously bad policy that will take years to correct.
The Democrats obviously believe passing the bill will give them some momentum and political capital to spend on other initiatives. Nancy Pelosi claims this bill is just the beginning, that more health care expansionism is soon to follow. They are delusional. Mark Steyn put it best:
Government can’t just annex “one-sixth of the U.S. economy” (i.e., the equivalent of annexing the entire British or French economy, or annexing the entire Indian economy twice over) and then just say: “Okay, what’s next? On to cap-and-trade . . . ” Nations that governmentalize health care soon find themselves talking about little else.
I would guess that Senate and House Republicans will go into full meltdown if Obamacare makes it through on the Slaughter rule. We may see a repeat of the “government shutdown” of 1995, but this time with the blessing of the people. At the very least, Obama can forget about any nominations or other policy initiatives for the rest of his first term, especially after Republicans take the House and probably even the Senate in November (if you think the Senate is out of reach right now, wait until you see the polls after Obamacare).
My point, however, is not to revel in thoughts of political revenge. The title of the post is meant to commemorate the passing of the Democratic Party as we know it.
How did the Democratic Party begin, anyway? Those of us fortunate enough to have had some good American history classes may remember that the Democratic Party was founded by Thomas Jefferson, among others, in response to the big-government philosophy of the Federalists. The party, then called the Democrat-Republicans, was a smashing success with the voters and eventually ran the Federalists out of town. It solidified its populist orientation with the nomination of Andrew Jackson, who dissolved the Bank of the United States and railed against the “corrupt bargains” among Washington power-brokers.
What happened? When did the Democrats start embracing big government corruption, and when did their biggest donors become Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan? When did they move from being “the party of the people” to being the party of statism and corporatism?
Most Congressmen aren’t philosophers, but I wonder if any of the moderate and conservative Democrats who seem ready to commit their party to the greatest statist and corporatist initiative in American history have wondered what the Democratic Party really stands for. After all, would even Franklin Roosevelt, let alone Andrew Jackson or Thomas Jefferson, have envisioned that it would be the Democrats who would seek to compel all Americans to purchase products from designated corporate conglomerates under pain of penalty from the IRS? Would Roosevelt, Jackson, or Jefferson, whose political bases were not the urban centers but the vast swaths of the American heartland and South, have countenanced the massive transfers of wealth from the vibrant countryside to the decaying inner city, to be distributed by party bosses and corrupt businessmen?
If the passage of Obamacare presages a shift of the tactical field to health care policy for the foreseeable future, it also presages a shift of the Democratic Party to a narrow, urban party with little appeal to the American heartland. It will be a long time before they are trusted with the reins of power again.
It will be good for the Democrats to get over the extremely damaging legacy Obama will leave them and the country, but we still need a strong Democratic Party as much as we need a strong Republican party. We will need them especially in the coming years as the era of the liberal state draws to a close. As Nixon went to China, they will be needed to help dismantle what they built in the 20th Century.
Don’t believe me? Watch these:
Wherever you live, whether it’s New York or Oregon, I promise you this is coming to your state soon. Even if your state has been fiscally wise, it is dependent on federal spending that cannot be maintained. Illinois cannot even afford to pay the rent on its senator’s offices.. Obamacare imposes even more mandates on the states. It cannot continue.
As I said, I don’t know what will happen this weekend. Obamacare may pass, and it may not. It may not even matter that much. The real struggle begins after the vote.
212 plan to kill quality healthcare. I’m confident Jason Altmire won’t be one of them.
At last count, 212 members of the House of Representatives have pledged (in one way or another) to vote for ObamaCare, which effectively will kill the best health care system in the world. Not to mention much of the incentive those Obama-vilified pharmaceutical companies have to discover new prescription drug treatments for diseases like cancer and heart problems, which account for almost half of the annual deaths in America. For not just senior citizens, the passage of ObamaCare is sure to significantly shorten life expectancies. Yet, for a pound or so of silver, Obama thinks he can persuade more members of the House to cast their votes for much more governmental control of our lives. However, I don’t think Congressman Jason Altmire’s vote is for sale. I don’t believe it can be bought by Obama for any amount of silver. Regardless of how Jason ends up voting, I believe with all my heart that Jason will do what’s right in his own.
As I sit here typing these words, I think of Davy Crockett who died on March 6, 1836. Maybe because Fess Parker died today. Their connection? In the Walt Disney Davy Crockett Disneyland project that swept the nation in 1954, Fess Parker played Davy, who’s said to have lived by the words, “Be sure you’re right and then go ahead.” Books about Davy suggest this was the truth of the man and not some made for TV fabrication. “While I can’t say for sure, I can say that, in 1826, Davy Crockett was elected to the United States House of Representatives. As a Congressman, Crockett supported the rights of squatters (who were barred from buying land in the West without already owning property). Davy also opposed President Andrew Jackson’s Indian Removal Act. His opposition to Jackson caused Davy’s defeat when he ran for re-election in 1830; however, he won when he ran again in 1832.
As Crockett explained, “I bark at no man’s bid. I will never come and go, and fetch and carry, at the whistle of the great man in the White House no matter who he is.” (Wikipedia)
Rachel suggests that Mr. Altmire shares Crockett’s courage while embracing his values. Born on March 7, 1968, Jason was a star football player in high school. After suffering a serious knee injury in his senior year, Jason entered Florida State and made the football team as a walk on. Graduating in 1990 with a B.S. in political science, Jason became active in politics. The good Congressman then attended George Washington University and graduated with a master’s degree in Health Administration. I guess there are a lot of reasons why I’m such a Jason Altmire fan. To those who say none of the best and brightest are in American politics, I respectfully disagree. I point to Jason Altmire, and rest my case. He makes me proud to be an American.
