Friday Digest
November 15, 2013
THE FOUNDATION"[T]he duty imposed upon [the president] to take care, that the laws be faithfully executed, follows out the strong injunctions of his oath of office, that he will 'preserve, protect, and defend the constitution.' The great object of the executive department is to accomplish this purpose; and without it, be the form of government whatever it may, it will be utterly worthless." --Joseph StoryGOVERNMENT & POLITICSThe Fix? Another BIG Lie
Barack Obama added another
chapter to his politically motivated unconstitutional rewrites of the
so-called "Affordable Care Act" Thursday. After more than 5 million insurance cancellations mandated by his ACA regulations, and the political consequences for Democrats, he declared that you can keep your plan (at least until after next year's elections). This was his latest political lie to cover his previous round of lies to cover his oft-repeated original lie that "you will be able to keep your health care plan. Period."
His latest "pledge to the
American people" is: "[W]e're gonna solve the problems that are there,
we're gonna get it right, and the Affordable Care Act is going to work
for the American people." (He forgot to add, "Trust me!") Obama plans to
"fix it" through "enforcement discretion," a patently unconstitutional
maneuver typical of autocratic ineptocracies, but he has never allowed Rule of Law to be an impediment to this administration's political agenda.
Obama is crafting his latest blame-shifting cover story on the theme
that insurance companies are the bad guys. But, the 2010 HHS regulations
his administration wrote, and he signed into law, mandated that any policy adjustment
in a plan after that enactment would require cancellation of that plan
if it did not fully comply with ObamaCare's "comprehensive coverage"
requirements. Now, with a wave of his magic wand, Obama says none of
that applies, and that, as long as state insurance commissioners permit
it, insurance companies can continue to offer the plans that they
previously had to cancel due to regulations. In other words, he put this
600 lb. gorilla on the back of state commissioners and insurance
companies.As noted, Obama has no authority to enforce this proposed retrofit -- or, as he put it, to "improve" the law. But he has a history of "selective law enforcement" according to his political agenda, and in the case of ObamaCare, he already unilaterally declined to enforce the employer mandate -- now he's unilaterally declining to enforce the coverage mandate, at least until after the 2014 elections. He admits "we did fumble the ball" on the Healthcare.gov rollout, which directly affects a person's ability to replace a plan that was forcibly cancelled. He claims he only wants to fix what he broke. Apparently, Bill Clinton, who declared that Obama ought to let the American people "keep what they got," is now calling the shots. In reality, Obama's executive action is an effort to preempt a lawful Republican legislative correction to ObamaCare, aptly titled the "Keep Your Health Plan Act" -- scheduled for a vote Friday. Many panicking Democrats were hinting at voting for the bill, mainly to save their own skin in 2014, but that would be too embarrassing for the president. He even threatened to veto the bill, likely because it would bolster private competition for his exchanges, and he simply can't tolerate that.
Responding to Obama's latest
alteration, America's Health Insurance Plans (AHIP) warned that his fix
will "destabilize the market" and drive prices higher. Insurance
industry analyst Robert Laszewksi explained, "This means that the
insurance companies have [six weeks] to reprogram their computer systems
for policies, rates, and eligibility, send notices to the policyholders
via US Mail, send a very complex letter that describes just what the
differences are between specific policies and Obamacare compliant plans,
ask the consumer for their decision -- and give them a reasonable time
to make that decision -- and then enter those decisions back into their
systems without creating massive billing, claim payment, and provider
eligibility list mistakes. All by January 1." And Obama could not get
the Healthcare.gov website operational in three years with $600 million.
Then again, destabilizing the market is the express purpose
of ObamaCare -- not that we feel sorry for those insurance companies
that conspired with Democrats to remand health care to government
control.To recap ObamaCare's sordid history, it was rammed through Congress on a partisan vote; it was unconstitutionally launched in the Senate instead of the House, where revenue bills should begin; it was redefined by the Supreme Court in order to find it "constitutional"; and it was illegally amended by Obama after its passage to delay mandates, provide political favors and remove accountability. This latest rewrite simply fits the pattern and further seals Obama's lawless legacy -- and unfortunately, the demise of the finest health care system in the world. (See objections raised by WashPo, NYT and other editorial pages.)
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ECONOMY, REGS & TAXESThe High Cost of Ethanol
One advantage for Iowa in being
first on the presidential calendar is that candidates get an earful of
talk on rural and agricultural issues. This, among other reasons, is why
we have ethanol mandates.
Unfortunately, the "clean, green" energy that promised to eventually
wean us off our dependence on foreign oil has turned out to be neither
clean nor green. According to a lengthy Associated Press report
on the subject, for example, over 1.2 million acres of formerly
pristine prairie in Nebraska and the Dakotas have been plowed under for
cornfields. Farmers are now eschewing modest conservation payments in
favor of chasing a corn market where prices top $7 a bushel, leaving
observers to bemoan the "raping [of] the land" and the "ecological
disaster" ethanol has created.
With all that new acreage in
mainly marginal land being used for crops, additional supplies of
nitrogen-rich fertilizer are required. While it helps boost corn yields
to some extent, the fertilizer that leaches away from the fields makes
its way to local streams that eventually wind their way to the Gulf of
Mexico, contributing to an expanding "dead zone" in that body of water.
It's also affected water supplies downstream, with the city of Des
Moines, Iowa, asking consumers to curtail their water usage this past
summer because of excess nitrogen in two local rivers that supply the
city.
Yet the EPA, which first mandated the usage of ethanol as a fuel in
2007, is reluctant to curtail its mandated use as a blend for gasoline
despite the economic and environmental effects their flawed assumptions
have led to. Notably, the Obama administration refuses to give the oil
industry a victory. One big change since the ethanol law was passed six
years ago is the boom in domestic production, which has kept oil prices
low and made ethanol even less attractive price-wise. But farmers have
to be able to make a living.
So eliminating or reducing
these corn-earmarks would be political suicide for a number of
politicians of both parties who represent those states where corn is
king. With Obama in office, these regulations are going nowhere.
NATIONAL SECURITYCBS's Flawed '60 Minutes' Report
Two weeks ago, CBS's "60 Minutes" featured a report on Benghazi that we noted.
The report included an interview with a former British soldier and
security officer at the installation with the pseudonym Morgan Jones. We
now know his real name is Dylan Davies. He told CBS's Lara Logan that
he was at the compound the night of the attack, when he confronted an
attacker and saw the body of Ambassador Chris Stevens.
However, prior to the interview Davies filed a report with the FBI indicating that he was not
at the compound the night of the attack. When CBS realized their
mistake, Logan apologized. "We worked on this for a year," she said. But
"we were misled and we were wrong and that's the important thing,
that's what we have to say here. We have to set the record straight and
take responsibility."
The error, of course, is
regrettable for "60 Minutes," especially given that the media outlet had
the guts to go after the story of the Obama administration's gross
dereliction at Benghazi. Yet even had the report been completely
accurate, it still missed the essence of the story. The Obama White
House left the U.S. consulate in Benghazi woefully under-defended, and
then didn't respond when they received calls for help. Four Americans,
including the ambassador, were killed by al-Qaida-related terrorists,
and then Obama and his cadres spent the 2012 presidential campaign lying
about the attack and the status of al-Qaida as "on the run" in order to
ensure the president's re-election. "60 Minutes" would have been better
off taking that angle than interviewing a guy with a thrilling but
phony story.
CULTURE, SCIENCE & FAITHWill the Church Be Obsolete?
On Oct. 1, 2012, Rev. Gary Hall
became dean of the National Cathedral in Washington, DC. He wasted no
time in entering the political fray, making speeches about gun violence
(criticizing the NRA, of course) and homosexual rights. Hall said that,
before he was appointed, church officials told him of their "desire to
have the pulpit once again be a place where the issues of the day were
addressed." Hall agreed, and wants to "use the cathedral's symbolic
presence in American culture effectively."
But it wasn't long before he seemed to contradict himself. Hall
responded to a question about "three things that will be obsolete in 10
years" by pointing to the church: "Institutions will be defined in
another way. The issues that defined institutions are no longer issues."
Newsbusters' Tim Graham observed,
"We know that liberals try to offer the cartoonish argument that
conservatives should not be granted positions in government because they
don't believe in government. By that statement, why would you offer the
job of Dean of Washington's stately National Cathedral to a minister
who believes the church as an institution is obsolete?"
Hall added, "People want to
explore God in their lives but they look at the churches and synagogues
and say, 'This is not where I want to explore these issues.'" Perhaps
that's the case because pulpits like his choose to redefine God,
Scripture and religion in the image of leftism, instead of looking to
what Scripture teaches about life and learning from it. The liberal
church has indeed nearly become obsolete because of its own false
teaching. That's just one reason why it's critical for conservative
Christians to engage the culture. There is an opening, and culture is
the foundation for every other aspect of public life.
 BRIEF OPINIONEssential Liberty
Historian Victor Davis Hanson:
"The president seems determined that America should become
unexceptional, and his five-year-long efforts are now bearing fruit. The
result is that no one knows where global violence will break out next,
much less who will stop it. France, not the United States, pushes for a
tougher front against radical Iran, Islamism and WMD proliferation. Its
socialist government is to the right of the United States. Germany is
the more adult fiscal power, Japan the more realistic about Chinese
aggression, Israel and the Gulf states the more accurate in assessing
Iranian nuclear ambitions, and Russia the more dependable
problem-solver. ... Obama has misled over Benghazi, flipped and flopped
over Syria and Egypt, and deceived the American people on the Affordable
Care Act. When the American secretary of state has to assure the world
that its proposed military action 'will be unbelievably small' while the
president is forced to explain that our military doesn't 'do
pinpricks,' we appear hardly credible or formidable. ... Riding the
tiger's back was always risky, but not as much as jumping off and
allowing it to run wild. The world now wants someone to get back on --
but is unsure about who, when, how and at what cost."
Political Futures
FRC's Tony Perkins: "At a
private event [recently], President Obama bragged that he was 'remaking
the courts.' And if his nomination of controversial professor Cornelia
Pillard had succeeded, he would have taken a major step toward that
goal. ... Fortunately, the U.S. Senate was as shocked by her resume as
the rest of us and refused to give her nomination a final vote. ... But
if Pillard's nomination has taught us anything, it is what's at stake
for America in this overlooked debate. If the President can't get the
legislature to embrace his big government vision, then he'll appoint
judges to do it for him. As FRC's Ken Klukowski points out, 'President
Obama understands that so much of what he wants to accomplish runs afoul
of the historical understanding of the limits on federal power and the
proper meaning of the Bill of Rights that he can only achieve that
agenda if a critical mass of federal judges agree with his idea that the
words of the Constitution can be completely redefined to grant such
sweeping and transformational power to the federal government.'"
UprightColumnist Cal Thomas: "A friend of mine once said, 'Humility is so light a grace that once you think you've achieved it, you've lost it.' In so many places -- from Washington to Hollywood -- people have never had to worry about losing humility, because most have never possessed it. And that is said in all humility."
For more, visit The Right Opinion.
CHRONICLE QUOTESThe BIG LiePart I. Barack Obama: "[W]e've got to move forward on [ObamaCare]. It took 100 years for us to even get to the point where we could start talking about and implementing a law to make sure everybody's got health insurance. And my pledge to the American people is, is that we're going to solve the problems that are there, we're going to get it right, and the Affordable Care Act is going to work for the American people."
Part II. House Minority Leader
Nancy Pelosi: "There's nothing in the Affordable Care Act that says that
your insurance company should cancel you. That's not what the
Affordable Care Act is about. It simply didn't happen."
Part III. House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer: "You understand that if
you had a policy on the day that this bill was adopted, you got to keep
it. Now, you didn't get to keep it if the insurance companies didn't
want to offer it to you."Part IV. Rep. James Clyburn: "When [consumers] become aware of what they did not have, I don't think there's anything to apologize for." Non Compos Mentis
Obama adviser Valerie Jarret:
"There isn't an American who isn't going to be touched in a positive way
by the Affordable Care Act. Change is difficult. Even change for the
better is difficult."
DezinformatsiaMSNBC's Ed Schultz: "Nearly a million people have been approved for a private plan under ObamaCare. They're still shopping. They haven't chosen. It's the shopping season. ... This is the way the law was designed to work. They give you options. Nobody's holding a gun to your head that you have to do it in the next six hours."Demo-gogues
Barack Obama: "[G]rowing our
economy, creating new jobs is my top priority. We've got to stop the
self-inflicted wounds in Washington. Because for many tribal nations,
this year's harmful sequester cuts and last month's government shutdown
made a tough situation worse. Your schools, your police departments,
child welfare offices are all feeling the squeeze. That's why I'm
fighting for a responsible budget that invests in the things that we
need in order to grow."
Braying Jackass
Sen. Elizabeth Warren:
"[Republicans] keep looking for ways to keep this president from doing
his job. ... We need to call out these [Republican] filibusters for what
they are: naked attempts to nullify the results of the last
presidential election -- to force us to govern as though President Obama
hadn't won the 2012 election."
Village Idiots
Oprah Winfrey: "There's a level
of disrespect for the office that occurs. And that occurs in some cases
and maybe even many cases because he's African American. There's no
question about that and it's the kind of thing nobody ever says but
everybody's thinking it."
Short Cuts
Humorist Frank J. Fleming: "The
actual name of the legislation is not Obamacare, but the Affordable
Care Act, named in the same playful manner as how the bald stooge is
called 'Curly.' Not to imply that Obamacare is as capable or helpful as
any of the three stooges."
Semper Vigilo, Fortis, Paratus et Fidelis!
Nate Jackson for The Patriot Post Editorial Team
Join us in daily prayer for our
Patriots in uniform -- Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen, Marines and Coast
Guardsmen -- standing in harm's way in defense of Liberty, and for their
families.
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Friday, November 15, 2013
THE PATRIOT POST 11/15/2013
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