The Man Who Called Urgent

So, Obama cried “urgent!” and railroaded through a “stimulus” plan that has worked wonderfully to fix the economy.

(Just ask the more than 1 million Americans who lost their jobs in just the past two weeks.)

Then Obama called “Urgent!!” and pushed through the outright theft of two American automobile companies and gifted the ill-gotten gains to his union supporters.

(The June sales figures report GM and Chrysler down 33% and 42%, respectively.)

Then Obama called “URGENT!!!” and pushed to have his “Salvation for All People in Foreclosure Act” passed.

How’s that working out?

Um, well, not really well at all.

The Obama administration’s $50 billion program to curb foreclosures isn’t working, and the White House knows it.

Administration officials blame the mortgage servicers charged with carrying out the mortgage modifications and refinancing

under the federal program. Many of their Democratic allies on Capitol Hill back them up, but others are criticizing the White House for fumbling the execution. Whatever the reason, the program hasn’t stopped the rising tide of foreclosures: Experts predict that at least another 2 million homes will be lost this year, and the administration’s plan has so far reached only about 160,000 of the 3 million to 4 million homes it was supposed to protect over the next three years.

That’s bad news for the economy – and bad news for the Democrats.

The Democrats’ political and policy fortunes rest on their ability to persuade voters that they’re fixing the economy. But experts say that rising foreclosures will only exacerbate the nation’s economic woes, pushing down home prices, slashing state and local tax revenues and imperiling consumer confidence.

In fact, there are 1.5 million homes that went into foreclosure this year.

Into this record of urgent success – or lack thereof - Obama is now pulling out all the stops to shout “UURRGGEENNTT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”  about passing his health care “reform”.

Gee, with a record like that I feel really confident in how effective the latest “urgent” measure will be. Don’t you?

Obama is attacking Democrats who are not toeing the line right now. (Yeah, it is the DNC, yeah it is done through proxies, but is anyone really stupid enough to think that the attacks are not directed from the White House itself?) 

They are desperate. The “urgency” is a sign of just how weak they are right now. Passing another urgent demand from Obama right now is suicidal, given the results of his past urgencies.

Rationing And You

Shamelessly glommed from Glenn Reynolds.

How’s that hope, America?

Democrats, Petard, Some Assembly Required

Which the Democrats have cheerfully supplied. When members of the Senate health committee were asked to vote on an amendment – supplied by Republican Tom Coburn – that would require all Senators and their staffs to enroll in the exact, same health care plan they are forcing onto the American public, the Democrats declined. (Not all did, for various procedural and political reasons and one Republican refused on Humanitarian grounds – read the whole thing to get that last one. Which is a true classic one liner.)

On Tuesday, the Senate health committee voted 12-11 in favor of a two-page amendment courtesy of Republican Tom Coburn that would require all Members and their staffs to enroll in any new government-run health plan. Yet all Democrats — with the exceptions of acting chairman Chris Dodd, Barbara Mikulski and Ted Kennedy via proxy — voted nay.

In other words, Sherrod Brown and Sheldon Whitehouse won’t themselves join a plan that “will offer benefits that are as good as those available through private insurance plans — or better,” as the Ohio and Rhode Island liberals put it in a recent op-ed. And even a self-described socialist like Vermont’s Bernie Sanders, who supports a government-only system, wouldn’t sign himself up.

Of course, they also qualify now for generous Congressional coverage. Most Americans won’t have the same choice. Some will be transferred to the new entitlement as it uses its taxpayer bankroll to dominate insurance markets. Others work for businesses that will find it easier to dump their policies and move employees to the federal rolls. Democrats also know that the public option will try to control health spending by squeezing payments made to doctors and hospitals, and by not paying for treatments that Washington decides are too expensive, which will result in inferior care.

The amendment will, of course, never survive any conference vote but it gives Chris Dodd some political cover without actually being a danger to the Senator’s (and their staff’s) cushy coverage. But the Democrats – and the avowed socialist – who declined the coverage should tell you all you need to know about the merits of the health care plan.

It sucks and they know it – after all, they wrote it. 

The plan is only for those who will be forced to pay for it. Not for the ones cramming down America’s throat.

Give a round of applause for Tom Coburn on this - he got them on record.

Job Killer, Economy Destroyer

Obama’s health care “reform”, it’s two for the price of one! Investor’s Business Daily:

The president’s runaway-train approach is the same one he used with the economic “stimulus” package. On the very day the House health bill was released, newspapers reported the Treasury Department’s announcement that we have amassed our first one-year deficit of $1 trillion – and we have accomplished this in just six months. If the $1.2 trillion House bill becomes law, that record likely won’t last for long.

The three central problems in American medical insurance are the rising costs of care, the deficit spending resulting from the rising costs of Medicare and Medicaid, and the number of uninsured.

The House bill does nothing to deal with costs, would increase deficits and would apply a multitude of new taxes to pay for those who are uninsured.

The bill contains a pay-or-play provision that would require all but the smallest businesses to provide health insurance or else pay a fine equal to 8% of payroll.

The White House’s own internal estimates – based on a model developed by Council of Economic Advisors Chairwoman Christina Romer – say this would cost employers $300 billion and would cost workers 5 million jobs.

Hide Those Dollars

The bill would increase income taxes by $583 billion. The White House says only the rich would be taxed. The truth is, this would be a tax on job creation. More than half of all those taxed would be small-business owners, and the taxes would be substantial.

Gee, and this is on top of the job killing, economy destroying crap and tax bill. It’s a double twofer. The only field that appears to be poised for growth is in the wonderful new field of fitting contraceptive devices to wild mustangs. 

Maybe they should have told us that the biggest “shovel ready” project they had in mind was burying the US economy.

Our government, hard at work.

Kindling A Firestorm

Why I won’t buy a Kindle from Amazon. They send books down the memory hole:

On Friday, it was “1984″ and another Orwell book, “Animal Farm,” that were dropped down the memory hole – by Amazon.com.

In a move that angered customers and generated waves of online pique, Amazon remotely deleted some digital editions of the books from the Kindle devices of readers who had bought them.

An Amazon spokesman, Drew Herdener, said in an e-mail message that the books were added to the Kindle store by a company that did not have rights to them, using a self-service function. “When we were notified of this by the rights holder, we removed the illegal copies from our systems and from customers’ devices, and refunded customers,” he said.

Amazon effectively acknowledged that the deletions were a bad idea. “We are changing our systems so that in the future we will not remove books from customers’ devices in these circumstances,” Mr. Herdener said.

A truly, stupendously stupid move by Amazon. This could very well be a disaster for the Kindle. As the article acknowledges, the people who bought this edition did nothing whatsoever wrong, nor was Amazon within its rights to do what they did.

I’m betting lawsuits will be forthcoming on this.

A lot of people just got an education on how easily technology can be abused, too. 

We are trying to ascertain if there is any truth to the rumor that politicians are interested in publishing their campaign promises via Kindle from now on.

It’s A Mad, Mad, Mad House

Mark Steyn:

…On Friday, the House passed the Restore Our American Mustangs Act – or ROAM. Like all acronymically cute legislation, its name bears little relation to what it actually does: It’s not about “restoring” mustangs. The federal Bureau of Land Management aims for a manageable population of 27,000 wild mustangs. Currently, there are 36,000, and the population doubles every four or five years. To prevent things getting even more out of hand, the BLM keeps another 30,000 mustangs in holding pens – or, if you prefer, managed-care facilities. That’s to say, under federal management, one in every two “wild” horses now lives in government housing. The American mustang population is road-testing the impending demographic profile of Japan and Germany: one worker for every retiree.

The welfare mustangs are supposed to be put up for adoption. But, what with the government taking all our money to fund the Barney Frank Institute of Bureaucracy Studies, many of us no longer have the necessary discretionary income to stable a mustang in the rec room. A lot of the nags in managed-care facilities are getting a bit long in the tooth, and thus are unlikely ever to find homes. So, rather than go on attempting to flog near-dead horses, the BLM was considering inviting the seniors to do the decent thing and sign up for “assisted suicide” – or, in the designated euphemism, “death with dignity.” In the Netherlands, pretty much everyone over 47 who goes into hospital for a minor hernia winds up getting talked into “death with dignity.” And, given that mustangs were introduced to America by the Spanish, it’s not inappropriate that they should meet a European end.

ROAM would prohibit this option…..

Read the whole thing. There is a lot more that will simply amaze you in this bill.

This little gem of madness will cost a mere $700 million or so. Certainly not much compared to other mega-spending the House is playing with. But it does come out to around $10,500 for each mustang.

This is our money they are playing with, not their own. This is just part of the completely mad agenda in Washington these days. With the idea of “cost effective” (read “No care for you”) medical treatment for the elderly already being floated openly, they are giving money away to wild mustangs. Granny gets a handful of pills jammed down her throat, the burro gets Federal support.

No death with dignity for horses, Federal employees, Congressmen or Senators.

Just for you and yours. Thanks for paying for all this, have some pills.

Here’s the roll call vote, feel free to thank your Congressman for their important vote on this matter.