The Justice Department is prepared to defend the new federal insurance mandate as an exercise of Congress’s “power to lay and collect taxes”.  You might remember that when the White House was pushing the new health care legislative they insisted that the bill’s passage would not create a tax increase.  The truth is the mandate is not a tax – and if it were, it would be unconstitutional.

A tax is when the government takes money from you, puts it in the Treasury with plans  to spend it (usually before they  get it).   The mandate requires  you to give your money to another private entity – not the Treasury – and if you don’t obey the mandate, you must pay a penalty to the Treasury – penalties are not taxes.   The mandate is legally separate from the penalty.   AND, even if the Justice Department were to get the mandate considered a tax – it would be an unconstitutional tax. 

Under the 10th Amendment, the government only has those powers enumerated by the Constitution.  Every federal action must be authorized by a Constitutional provision.  IF THERE IS NO PROVISION, THE ACTION IS UNCONSTITUTIONAL.   And, the last time I read the Constitution, there was no provision authorizing the government to command anyone to buy health insurance.

While Article l of the Constitution gives the federal government broad power to tax, that power was originally  limited to three (3) types of taxes:  DUTY (an  indirect tax on imports), EXCISE (an  indirect tax for the privilege of doing something),  and lastly, DIRECT.  The only type of direct tax authorized by the Constitution was a capitation tax (head tax) which everyone was required to pay.  And, that capitation tax was to be apportioned – meaning that every person in a given state had to pay the same amount.  

When Income Tax was created in the late 1800’s, the Supreme Court struck it down  on the grounds that it was a direct tax but not apportioned.  Which brings us to the 16 Amendment  that  instituted a national income tax.  Since 1913, income tax became the fourth type of tax the government could impose. 

THE HEALTH INSURANCE MANDATE FITS INTO NONE OF THESE 4 CATEGORIES AND IS THEREFORE NOT CONSTITUTIONALLY JUSTIFIED AS A TAX. 

By 2014, under the terms of the stimulus law that Obama signed last year – Electronic Health Records must record not only the traditional measures of height and weight, but also the body mass index: A Measure of Obesity. The law requires everyone’s electronic health records be available – with appropriate security measures – on a national level. Read the entire article here. You can thank Obama’s wife for this one, she’s made obesity her main theme.

Obamacare is nothing more than a piece of unconstitutional legislation that discriminates against the unborn, children of special needs, the elderly (to include anyone over 50), the disabled and the obese.

Have you heard the expression; ‘pretty is as pretty does?’ Well it’s a good thing there’s no legislation against ugly because our government would be in for a world of hurt….But in the mean time, this is what we’re stuck with………

The Annual Report of the Social Security Board of Trustees is missing in action.  Rumor has it that the Obama administration had either delayed the April/May report until August hoping we’ll be on vacation or, he is trying to strong-arm the preparers into falsifying the data.  

The CBO recently reported in its Long Term Budget Outlook  that Social Security was already running a deficit which wasn’t supposed to happen until 2015.  With the disastrous Obameconomy running full throttle, the great Social Security surplus that started in President Reagan’s administration is gone!  Every year the government has been raiding that mythical “trust fund” to take the annual surplus and spend it – leaving behind IOU’s backed by nothing but hot air.  A link to the CBO Outlook in pdf  format is here. 

After passage of  Obamacare,  the CBO   reported that the legislsation  contained  $500 billion in Medicare cuts for the first 10 years.     The Minority Senate Budget Committee estimated the actual figure to be more like $800 billion.  The Senate estimate is probably closer to the truth since the Obama administration boasted that the new healthcare legislation would cut the deficit by $1 trillion dollars during the first 10 years.   See video of Congressman Todd Tiahrt of Kansas talking about Obamacare here and Congressman Boozman of Arkansas here.

HOW CAN THEY CUT MEDICARE  with the Baby Boomers reaching retirement age?   You slash payments to doctors, hospitals and nursing homes, eliminate Medicare Advantage for everyone except those living in Florida, and then you ration, ration and ration some more.  Floridians, I wouldn’t get too comfortable with Medicare Advantage.  I’m pretty sure Obama would never lie  to you but, you know what Nancy and Harry are like.  One, or maybe both, could accidently slip an amendment in as a last minute appendage to some obscure legislation passed at 11:00 p.m. on a Sunday night during a holiday weekend and boy, the embarrassment come Monday morning when they realize they had put  you in the titanic with the rest of the country.  Representative Allen Simpson  recently said at a  meeting of the National Governor’s Association  that the entirity of the nation’s current discretionary spending is consumed by the Medicare, Medicad, and Social Security programs.   Are they giving us fair warning of  additional cuts?

Since the Obama administration has trouble accepting blame for anything, he has found a fall-guy willing to take on the daunting task of   cutting services to senior citizens.  Meet our new rationing, oops, Medicare Czar, Dr. Donald Berwick.  Dr. Berwick believes that “any healthcare funding plan that is just, equitable, civilized and humane, must redistribute wealth from the richer among us to the poor and less fortunate. . .(which will be all of us once Obamacare kicks in)  Excellent healthcare is by definition redistribution.”    Dr Berwick also believes that limited resources require decisions about who will be able to access care and how much they should receive.  He feels that we can make a sensible social decision and say, well at this point, to have access to a particular benefit like a new drug or medical procedure, is just much too expensive for the taxpayer and there just has to be a better use for those funds.  Maybe we could give them to Al Gore or the Chicago Carbon  Exchange - wait, that’s redundant  -                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                  

Dr. Berwick couldn’t be as bad as he sounds – after all, he is madly in love with the British Healthcare System (NHS).  He says all he has to do “to rediscover the romance is to look at healthcare in my own country. . .run in the darkness of private enterprise. . .”  What a guy!  But can you really blame him for getting a chill when he thinks about the NHS?  Those practical Brits – why in June of this year they decided they had to cut millions of operations  to save $29 billion of their taxpayers’ money.  Procedures to be “decommissioned” (social speak for eliminated) will include hip replacement for obese people (why do they need to walk), some hernia and gallstone operations (what’s a little pain when it’s for the greater good?), ear and nose problems, and cataract surgery (apparently senior citizens don’t need to see )   

Not that cutting costs are new to the NHS.  They, in their ultimate compassionate wisdom decided that a 61 year old woman was too old for heart surgery; that to cancel, for the third time, a 3 year old child’s heart surgery wasn’t extreme;  that making pregnant women drive close to 100 miles to deliver their babies was only a minor inconvenience; or that making disabled children wait up to two years to get a wheelchair is no big deal.  Then there was the premature baby born at 21 weeks and 5 days that was allowed to die because NHS guidlines only allow treatment of a premature baby born at 22 weeks.  And, to prove that they don’t discriminate, they decided not to let one of their own doctors, who is only 30 years old,  receive cancer drugs that could extend her life.  Then there is the British hospital accused of routinely neglecting patients.  The standard of care in some hospital wards and nursing homes “would shame a third world country.

The NHS uses the terminology “qualified adjusted life years” per British pound to make treatment decisions and have mandated that they cannot afford to spend, except in unusual cases, more than $22,000  to extend a life for 6 months.  (God forbid if your treatment cost $22,001)  But despite its Orwellian acronym and properly polite British exterior, NHS harbors a deep bureaucratic aversion to extended care for the elderly and those with chronic disease, an approach which Dr. Berwick explicity endorses.  What’s not to love in a system that has a waiting list for visits to specialists and for surgery that can sometimes last a year, where 40% of cancer patients never see an encologists, where rationing for kidney dialysis and open heart surgery and minimum wait times have been instituted for hospital admission to reduce costs, leaving 750,000 people on wait lists, and where faceless bureaucrats  routinely place a dollar value on human life.  The problem with socialism is you eventually run out of other people’s money to spend.  Margaret Thatcher

AARP Executive Vice President, John Rother  – “The nomination of Dr. Berwick comes at an important time as the administration begins implementing heath care reforms that add new benefits to Medicare while protecting the access of older Americans to their doctors and hospitals.  Dr. Berwick’s expertise on healthcare innovation and his dedication to quality improvements and patient safety would benefit the millions of low-income and older Americans served by Medicare and Medicaid.”    AARP is more concerned with the money it receives promoting insurance programs than it is in the health and well being of  senior citizens.  Why else would they give Dr. Berwick such a glowing review?

The evidence of global and redistributive thinkers like Dr. Berwick, Cass Sunstein, Obama and most of the democratic members of Congress that passed this massive healthcare disaster is compelling evidence that in the end, they are not about better health care but an avarice for power.  Unfortunately, it’s power at the expense of the weak and helpless.

President Obama pledged that no federal dollars would be used to fund abortions and that federal conscience laws would remain in place after passage of Obamacare.    The Department of   Human & Health Services  is giving Pennsylvania $160 million to set up a high-risk insurance pool that will cover any abortion that is legal in the State.  During debates over his healthcare bill, Obama called the Family Research Council “deceivers” and his allies called them “liars” for declaring that Obamacare would fund abortions.  GUESS WE NOW KNOW WHO THE REAL DECEIVERS AND LIARS ARE.           

Representative Steve King of Iowa has introduced a Discharge Petition in the House that would force a new vote on Obamacare pursuant to clause 2 of rule XVI.  While Nancy Pelosi would never allow a vote to overturn Obamacare, she can not stop the Discharge Petition.  All they need is 218 signatures to force a new vote –  so far they have 109 signatures incuding   Eric Cantor, Bob Goodlatte, and Randy Forbes of Virginia.    CALL OR WRITE YOUR REPRESENTATIVE AND DEMAND THEY SIGN THE DISCHARGE PETITION.  

As of 7/16/10 – they have collected  117 names AND DESPERATELY NEED YOU TO CONTACT YOUR REPRESENTATIVES.  Also need to sign on-line petition.

Doctor Donald Berwick, new Administration of CMS “The decision is not whether or not we will ration care – the decision is whether we will ration with our eyes open.”

Donald Berwick has been nominated for Administrator of the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services.

“Any health care funding plan that is just equitable civilized and humane must, must redistribute wealth from the richer among us to the poorer and the less fortunate. Excellent health care is by definition redistribution. Britain, you chose well.” Donald Berwick, 2008

Please see the following video

Berwick is president & Chief Officer of the Institute for Healthcare Improvement, (IHI), a non-profit organization based in Boston, MA, cultivating change and implementing programs for putting those ideas into action. He is Clinical Professor of Pediatrics and Health Care Policy at the Harvard Medical School and Professor of Health Policy and Management at the Harvard School of Public Health. He graduated from Harvard 3 times, has won numerous awards, co-authored several books and helped tweak the UK’s National Health System (NHS) with Tony Blair. He’s so special that even the Queen of England slapped a knighthood on him.

Berwick told a UK crowd, “I am romantic about the NHS, I love it! All I need to do to rediscover the romance is to look at the health care in my own country.”  Sounds like a Hallmark moment. Is this a love affair or what!

In Robert Goldberg’s article, “The Fix Is In”, he states that Berwick will get control of the practice of medicine. In a Health Affairs article last year Berwick argued, “for a radical transfer of power of patient-centered care, whether it be in a medical home or the hospital,” and thinks a “Commissioner of Care” should limit health care spending nationally by dividing the county into health regions. “It could be a small state–or part of a large state—“We could start with the current per capita cost.” Berwick also complains that “the American health care system is toxic, fragmented and because of it’s independence on consumer choice, runs in the darkness of private enterprise,” stating “I cannot believe that the individual health care consumer can enforce through choice the proper  configuration of a system as massive and complex as health care. That is for leaders to do.”

Believing a single-payer system would be the most efficient and easily managed because of government-rationed health care, Berwick would support bringing the UK’s National Institute for Clinical Health and Excellence to America. (NICE) Check out some NICE stories here.

My dad always told me if you take a fool and educate him you have an educated fool.

We are NOW faced with the possibility of this flower being planted amongst the other Blooming Idiots in Obama’s  Garden.

Senator Landrieu

$300 Million dollars for a legal bribe and boasting of it.

Doesn’t it Make you sick?

Check out her statement here.

Donna Holt, Interim State Coordinator – Campaign For Liberty, announced the effort as follows.

“The Virginia Campaign for Liberty will be mobilizing on two very important pieces of legislation in the 2010 session of the Virginia General Assembly. Both are state’s rights issues that pose a challenge to the federal government under the 10th amendment.

The Virginia Firearms Freedom Act – See full text of the bill here.

The Virginia Healthcare Freedom Act – See full text of the bill here.

In the upcoming weeks leading up to the legislative session, we will be forming a committee of people to assist in our lobbying effort for legislators to sponsor the bills.  If you wish to volunteer to join the committee, please email me at donna.holt@campaignforliberty.com.”

Please contact our representatives (below) in Richmond and urge them to support these bills! Also, I again invite you to join Campaign for Liberty!

Senator Robert Hurt Republican – District 19 P.O. Box 2 Chatham, VA 24531 Email*: district19@senate.virginia.gov

What we do TODAY AND THIS WEEK is what counts. This is where the rubber meets the road!

MAKE SURE YOU VOTE on Tuesday, November 3rd!

Marietta

http://franklincountypatriots.net

“The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing.”  ~ Edmund Burke 1729-1797