The Health Care Follies Continue

I don't expect Congressmen to be top-flight Constitutional scholars, but Congressman Phil Hare's breezy brush-off of Constitutional concerns related to the health care reform legislation is more damaging than Hank Johnson's stupidity...

He doesn’t mean “I don’t worry about it because I’ve studied the Commerce Clause and I’m confident we’ll win in court.” When pressed, he flatly says he doesn’t know which part of the Constitution justifies the law, which is his way of saying he doesn’t care and hasn’t thought about it. In fact, the best he can do by way of legal authority is to cite life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness — which of course comes from the Declaration of Independence. His response, when corrected? “Doesn’t matter to me. Either one.”

Imagine the outrage on the left if a GOP-controlled Congress passed, and then the President signed into law, a bill outlawing abortion. I will grant that such a bill would fly in the face of existing precedent, but there is plenty of good faith debate among top-flight Constitutional scholars as to whether different parts of Obamacare (particularly the individual mandate) are constitutional. I don't need a Congressman to weigh in with an expert opinion, but I would like to know that he's considered the issues and understands them well enough to articulate a coherent rationale for why he believes it's not an issue. I'd like to think that's part of the job. At least John Conyers made up a "Good and Welfare Clause" to justify Obamacare. On the whole, it's rather disturbing that the constitutionality of such far-reaching legislation is of little importance to those who passed it. If you want to know why the Tea Party activists are offended by our current governmental elite, there's a basic summary of it.

I doubt the Supreme Court would overturn Obamacare, based on existing precedent. But I think I'd enjoy watching Democrats try and debate the finer points of constitutional law with the Supreme Court.

What Annoying Song Is Stuck In My Head Today?

If I need to suffer with a song stuck in my head, why shouldn't you have to do the same? Sometimes they're good, most times they're bad... but no matter what, they make you suffer. So I like to share the suffering whenever it happens.

This is a great song, if you can ignore the ridiculous Socialist underpinnings of the lyrics.  Then again, I could probably type that sentence about a number of great songs.  And for the record, I'm still confused as to why you're going hungry -- seems kinda pointless, but then again, much of Socialism is about empty symbolic gestures, so go ahead.  Me, I'm planning to eat.

But great music is great music, and this rocks.  So I'll play this in the background while I eat.



You're welcome.

I'm Guessing He Voted For Health Care Reform

The Lord of Truth sends us the video that made the rounds of the Interweb yesterday, featuring Congressman Hank Johnson wondering whether Guam will "tip over" if we station 5,000 additional Marines there.

Yes, tip over.



The best part is, Johnson replaced Cynthia McKinney in Congress. And I think he's preferable to her.

Just Ridiculous

Good for Bill O'Reilly for stepping up to pick up the tab in this gawdawful case.  Shame on the 4th Circuit for its decision.

Album Cover Nostalgia

A new recurring series inspired by the Lord of Truth. We all remember certain album covers fondly -- here's one more.

I saw a gallery today that was selling somone's rendition of a Devo album cover. Art is weird. So is Devo. But they are definitely memorable.

We're Not Any More Crooked Than Normal

I'm sure this is totally unrelated to Bart Stupak's vote on the health care reform legislation...

The 11 House Democrats led by Rep. Bart Stupak who dropped their opposition to health care reform mere hours before the final vote have requested $3.4 billion in earmarks -- and one watchdog group wants to know whether the money represents business as usual, or a political payoff.


The Sunlight Foundation says it plans to track the earmark requests, which were put in one day after health care reform cleared Congress, to see whether they're approved and whether it appears lawmakers are being rewarded for their vote.


...Stupak's office said there's absolutely no link between the earmarks and the health care bill's passage.


"The congressman's vote for health care has no connection to annual appropriations requests," spokeswoman Michelle Benoche said. "Appropriations requests were submitted on Monday, March 22, because that is the deadline of the Appropriations Committee."

See, I'm not sure the "business as usual" defense really helps here. I think what Congress and the Democratic majority in particular don't understand is that they're now being subjected to the same glaring scrutiny they've tried to impose on others for years, and the public finds their practices appalling. And that's before you get to things that a reasonable person could and likely would interpret as a quid pro quo; Stupak's office would likely be in the clear in a court of law, but the court of public opinion doesn't require proof beyond a reasonable doubt (or even a preponderance of evidence) to reach a different conclusion. Hell, Congress probably would interpret such actions by individuals in industry as corrupt -- are we supposed to think they're not corrupt when committed by members of Congress?

The Healthcare Follies Continue

Democrats told us that if they passed the health care reform bill, we'd find out what was in it.  It turns out that major companies have found out, and reacted to it.  Unfortnately, their reaction is at odds with Democrats' view of reality...

Even before AT&T Inc. said Friday that it will take a $1 billion charge in the first-quarter because of the new health-care law, the issue was front-and-center with key lawmakers.


Earlier this week, Caterpillar Inc., Deere & Co., and AK Steel Holding Corp. announced their own hefty one-time charges.


Almost immediately, House Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Henry Waxman of California and Rep. Bart Stupak of Michigan, chairman of the Oversight and Investigations panel, announced plans to hold an April 21 hearing on “claims by Caterpillar, Verizon, and Deere that provisions in the new health care reform law could adversely affect their company’s ability to provide health insurance to their employees. These assertions appear to conflict with independent analyses, which show that the new law will expand coverage and bring down costs.”


The committee wants the companies’ CEOs testify and provide evidence of the law’s projected impact.


The companies have said they are compensating for the expected loss of a tax deduction on tax-free government subsidies they receive when they provide retirees with prescription drug reimbursement under Medicare Part D. The current tax structure won’t change until 2013, but company executives say they’re preparing for the higher costs now.

Dennis the Peasant has some nice points on this...

You see, these companies did not just decide to release press statements disclosing the horrors of Obamacare to a shocked and dismayed citizenry. In fact, they didn't release press statements at all. What they did was what was required of them by law:


They filed an 8-K with the S.E.C.


For those of you who are unfamiliar with financial regulation, the law requires all publicly held companies to file a Form 8-K with the S.E.C. when said company becomes aware of either a (1) unscheduled material event, or (2) a company change. As a matter of fact, that's what a Form 8-K is called, a "Report of unscheduled material events or corporate changes". And according to the law, when a company becomes aware of an unscheduled event that will probably have a material impact on the earnings or operations, it must file a Form 8-K with the S.E.C. or risk sanction.


That's exactly what AT&T, Caterpillar, Deere & Co., Verizon, AK Steel and others did: They complied with the law. Financial regulatory law. You know, the sort financial regulatory law Democrats are saying they are real keen to strengthen. Anybody think the irony of Henry Waxman's stooge Bart Stupak bitching out Randall Stephenson for doing what financial regulatory law requires is going to be lost on the Congressional Republicans in the room?


Beyond that, you can bet the staffers working for Democratic Representatives sitting on the Energy and Commerce committee, and especially those involved with Energy and Commerce's investigation subcommittee are, at this very moment, completely horrified. They're quite aware, even if Waxman isn't, that because each of the companies named above have filed a Form 8-K and booked losses related to the event described in the Form 8-K, those companies have documentation that has been labored over by tax and accounting professionals for months; documentation that was then reviewed thoroughly by the company's independent auditors. Everyone that was involved is a damn site better than any of the staffers Waxman and Congressional Democrats will have available for investigation.


What Waxman is now laying himself open to is the charge that he is attempting to force these companies to manipulate their financial data to suit the political aims of President Obama and Congressional Democrats. Since there is absolutely no hope of investigative committee staffers finding evidence that AT&T's (or others') calculations are materially incorrect, Waxman simply comes across attempting to force the managements of publicly held companies to circumvent the law.


This is the part the Democratic/liberal/progessive political classes and commentariat doesn't get: Once Obamacare became the law of the land, its effects are no longer solely a matter of politics. Now there are real-world effects, and many of those real-world effects will not go away when political pressure is applied. The next week will be filled with more companies filing more 8-Ks describing just how much "health care reform" is going to cost them, and by implication, their employees, and there is nothing that Henry Waxman can threaten that will make those companies stop.

I am reasonably certain (based on my own time doing corporate work) that the 8-Ks were vetted to hell and back, and no in-house attorney, outside counsel, or auditor with half a brain would allow a major company to file an 8-K solely to make a political point. I am guessing that the companies could have waited to file, but that the decision to file now may help them fend off future shareholder lawsuits ginned up by plaitiffs' attorneys and keep the SEC off thier backs. These companies are filing their 8-Ks and will have more than adequate documentation to back them up; what will happen now is that staffers for Waxman and Stupak (who are smart) will now search for otherwise innocuous statements in emails and documents that can be turned into something sinister. Waxman and Stupak will breathlessly claim that these statements seem to prove these companies are guilty of trying to undermine the brilliance of Obamacare and even more corrupt then... um, Congress.

This is an awfully stupid whipsaw that Democrats are constructing -- they want further disclosure to be required by financial regulatory reform, but even under the current law (that they view as inadequate) they want that disclosure only insofar as it accords with their understanding of reality.  If the disclosure doesn't agree with what the Democrats want, then they don't want it, although they probably won't jump forward to defend the company if it gets hit by the SEC and shareholder lawsuits.  It's also more troubling than they realize --  Congress is essentially interested in substituting its judgment for a company's business judgment, solely because the company's business judgment impacts Congress' political priorities.  Congress can't even draft legislation appropriately, which is its job; now they want to handle financial and legal judgment calls at major businesses?

That's just the practical side of it.  On the political theory side of it, such actions -- Congress calling on the carpet those who, in trying to comply with the complex regulatory state designed in part by Congress, dared to make announcements that disagree with Congress' view -- could be construed as an attempt to chill dissent.  Other companies may choose to wait to make their disclosures, at least until January, when Henry Waxman will (hopefully) no longer be the chairman of a House committee.  Maybe he'll call for an investigation into that as well.

The Exchange

I have a new favorite bar the next time I visit NYC.  Then again, I rarely get to visit bars anymore, so maybe I just enjoy the idea of going to any bar.

Latest Dumb Statement By A New York Times Communist... Oops, I Meant Columnist

New York Times editorial columnist Frank Rich makes a bid for dumbest column of the year by comparing the Tea Party activists to Nazis...

How curious that a mob fond of likening President Obama to Hitler knows so little about history that it doesn’t recognize its own small-scale mimicry of Kristallnacht. The weapon of choice for vigilante violence at Congressional offices has been a brick hurled through a window. So far.

I'd call Rich a douchebag, but that would insult feminine hygeine products. And that's before we get to Rich's decision to compare anti-government Tea Party activists to the fascist big government of Hitler. Professor Bainbridge wipes the mat with Rich's stupidity and that of Dem. Rep. Alan Grayson...

What we're seeing here are continuing efforts on the part of some left-liberals to use the ravings of a small fringe to delegitimize any dissent...


Indeed, at this point, an observer with a predilection for conspiracy theories would be wondering whether these efforts are being coordinated by dark forces. My money's on the Free Masons and the Trilateral Commission as being at the center of the vast left-wing conspiracy.

I'd also blame the reverse vampires.

What Annoying Song Is Stuck In My Head Today?

If I need to suffer with a song stuck in my head, why shouldn't you have to do the same? Sometimes they're good, most times they're bad... but no matter what, they make you suffer. So I like to share the suffering whenever it happens.

When I was reading Bill Simmons' Book of Basketball, he mentioned in a footnote a list of things he likes that would lead to having to explain that he's not gay despite liking these things (not that there's anything wrong with that). In a totally unrelated point, I admit that I like Elton John's music.

Although I really don't think this song should play in a gym, which happened today at the gym while I was working out. Apparently, Hawaii is too laid back.

And That's After Only 14+ Months

Jim Geraghty has an insanely long list of broken Obama promises.  What's most surprising?  That the list could probably be longer.

The Healthcare Follies Continue

Looks like passing Obamacare is really helping those poll numbers.

My predicitions for the next few months:

1.  President Obama will make speeches designed to sway the public to favor his policies.
2.  The speeches will fail to move the poll numbers.
3.  White House spin machine and mainstream media (sorry if that's repetitive) will proceed to say that the poll numbers are irrelevant, because the public is being misinformed by opponents of Obamacare.  Leftwing blogosphere will creatively analyze pollig data and claim the problem is that legislation is not progressive enough, which is why the poll numbers are underwater.
4.  White House, random Democrats, and left-wingers will accuse opponents of Obamacare of being racist.
5.  The President will insist that he doesn't care about the poll numbers, that he's just did the right thing.  He will continue to fail to articulate a rationale that convinces anyone that his point of view is correct.
6.  The President will claim the opposition is guilty of obstruction and not having any ideas of their own.
7.  The opposition will point out that they presented their ideas to the President, who will respond with some variation of "I won/the time for debate was over/we needd to act now".
8.  Repeat steps #1-7 as necessary.
9.  When they lose control of the House in November, the Democrats will claim the loss had nothing to do with Obamacare and will creatively analyze poll numbers to prove it.
10.  When no one believes the poll number analysis noted in #9, the Democrats will blame racism.

The Island Will Make You Pay

Wojr informs us that ABC is charging $900,000 for a thirty-second spot on the Lost season finale.  As a Lost fan, I'm impressed.  As a taxpayer, I'm praying the Census Bureau doesn't buy a spot. In the meantime, I will try to decide which of the following parodies is better.



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It's The Spending, Stupid

Robert J. Samuelson points out the obvious...

Should the United States someday suffer a budget crisis, it will be hard not to conclude that Obama and his allies sowed the seeds, because they ignored conspicuous warnings. A further irony will not escape historians. For two years, Obama and members of Congress have angrily blamed the shortsightedness and selfishness of bankers and rating agencies for causing the recent financial crisis. The president and his supporters, historians will note, were equally shortsighted and self-centered -- though their quest was for political glory, not financial gain.


Let's be clear. A "budget crisis" is not some minor accounting exercise. It's a wrenching political, social and economic upheaval. Large deficits and rising debt -- the accumulation of past deficits -- spook investors, leading to higher interest rates on government loans. The higher rates expand the budget deficit and further unnerve investors. To reverse this calamitous cycle, the government has to cut spending deeply or raise taxes sharply. Lower spending and higher taxes in turn depress the economy and lead to higher unemployment. Not pretty.


...So Obama is flirting with a future budget crisis. Moody's emphasizes two warning signs: rising debt and loss of confidence that government will deal with it. Obama fulfills both. The parallels with the recent financial crisis are striking. Bankers and rating agencies engaged in wishful thinking to rationalize self-interest. Obama does the same. No one can tell when or whether a crisis will come. There is no magic tipping point. But Obama is raising the chances.

If there was a magic tipping point, we've now surpassed it. I'm sure President Obama will solve the problem -- he's shown so much competence thus far.