Say Anything

In the past month it has become apparent that many Democrats are willing to say anything to try and get President Barack Obama reelected, including comments that would border on being slander in most circumstances.

First, in a debunked effort to link Republican candidate Mitt Romney to investments in companies that outsourced some jobs, the Obama campaign's surrogates suggested that he may have committed a felony in signing some of the SEC filings for Bain Capital when he was running the Olympics.  The attack was revived by Congresswoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D. FL) as head of the Democratic National Committee (she is also rumored to have won Best In Show as a poodle during the Westminster dog show in 1988).

After this baseless attack went nowhere, they returned to saying that Mr. Romney should release more than the two years of tax returns (though it didn't seem to bother them when Sen. John McCain (R. AZ) or John Kerry (D. MA) released that same amount).

Now, Sen. Harry Reid (D. NV), has come out saying an unnamed former official with Bain Capital tells him that Mr. Romney had not paid any taxes in a period of 10 years.  In doing so, Mr. Reid himself admits that he doesn't even known if the unnamed source's information is accurate.  Thank God the brave Mr. Reid is willing to put himself out there in support of such a well founded accusation.  Luckily it appears serious journalists (you know, people who don't work at the Huffington Post) have so far treated the allegation with the proper amount of derision.

But then, what do you expect from a campaign strategy that was summed up simply as "Kill Romney" by Ann Romney.

Projecting Leftists Reveal Own Racism

Leftists (i.e. Statists and Progressives) consistently engage in two types of open bigotry towards minorities. The first of these might be termed the soft bigotry of lessened expectations. An example of this might be Attorney General Eric Holder addressing the NAACP in Houston this week saying the voter identification laws are racist poll taxes because minorities have a harder time than whites in obtaining identification. This while the NAACP requires two forms of ID for people to see AG Holder speak. Apparently Mr. Holder has stumbled across the secret policy that all white folks have greater access to transportation as a birthright. The true racism is that leftists believe that minorities are incapable of achieving on their own and that they need their leftist elite protectors in the ruling class to ensure they can manage to even get by.

The second prevalent form of open bigotry is projection. In truth, it is probably a subset of the first, because it is this inherent soft bigotry that causes them to project. Projection is the phenomenon where a person projects his own faults upon another. Or as Ann Coulter often says, if you want to know what liberals are doing, look to what they are accusing conservatives of doing. A great example of this revolves around Republican Presidential candidate Mitt Romney speaking to that same NAACP crowd in Houston. Mr. Romney was roundly booed when he reiterated his position on repealing Obamacare. Leftists have taken this to be a subtle plan by Mr. Romney to win over racist conservatives. Yes, you read that correctly. MSNBC anchor Lawrence O'Donnell, an avowed socialist, put forth the idea that Mr. Romney (who was invited to speak at the convention by the NAACP) cleverly planned to be booed at the convention in order to attract white racists voters. One could simply dismiss Mr. O'Donnell and his band of merry morons as outliers and not representative of the Democrats. Of course, that doesn't explain House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D. CA) saying essentially the same thing. Now she didn't go as far as O'Dumbass did, but her implication was clear.

It is too difficult for leftists to believe that Mr. Romney actually stayed on message, spoke as if he were in front of any other crowd, and refused to pander to the NAACP crowd just to get their adoration. After all, they respect the NAACP. That's why people like Secretary of State Hillary Clinton suddenly adopted a different accent in front of a black crowd.

Call me crazy, but I think it's more racist to think that a black person is somehow inherently less able to achieve than a white person, that one has to tailor a message specifically for each group, that groups matter more than individuals.

Just a Brief Discussion of the Economic Causes of Health Care Costs

The biggest generator of rising costs in health care is that, unlike other services, people do not pay for it directly, they use a third party that does not know the value of the service to the recipient or the provider, and must assume that all people are the same based on a some other criteria, the economic value to the payor of the service it did not receive nor did it request or experience delivery of. Thus the decision of price is made not based upon quality or the other myriad individual circumstances which might raise or lower the value of the services performed. Therefore, it is impossible for the market to properly set the price. The consumer is encouraged to over access the system do to hidden costs (a process known as moral hazard) and the provider is encouraged to do the most he can to justify the services rendered to ensure his costs are covered. This includes the costs of administrative staff who deal solely with the recovery of the cost of services from the third party payor, who pays others to determine what those services are worth, and to dispute the costs at times. The provider then has to wait several month to recoup his costs. All of these people have absolutely nothing to do with the delivery of health care, only with shifting money from one place to another. Like any bureaucracy, they siphon money from the system, removing it from the actual delivery of the service, driving up the price, despite not knowing the actual economic value.
And that, Constitutional arguments aside, emotional arguments disregarded as retarded (it was too tempting to rhyme that) is why centralized systems of health care drive up costs. The true solution is competition and realization that health insurance should be for emergencies, not oil changes.

A Few Additional Thoughts

Adding to my earlier blog post, which I'm certain you've all ready by now, there may be an interesting twist to the tax v. mandate decision in combination with the inability to force states to expand medicaid rolls. This would allow states to refuse compliance without penalty, cost shifting the additional millions onto the feds and making the plan unworkable unless the feds vote on a direct tax to cover the expenses they were passing on to the states. No one is going to intentionally bankrupt their state (minus California) on the program when they can cost shift to the feds without penalty. No fed is going to vote for the even more massive tax hike that would be needed to fund it. Roberts may have effectively gutted the funding for the program by holding the mandate as a tax.

Thoughts On Today's Supreme Court Action

Before the Minnesota Rates Case in 1913, it was questionable whether or not the Congress had the ability to grant rule making authority to an agency that operated under the Executive Branch. It was deemed in many respects as an abdication of law making authority to an branch of government that had no power to make laws. How far we've come. Today, the Supreme Court ruling upholding Obamacare has ensured that the Secretary of Health and Human Services and the Department she presides over are the most powerful branch of the federal government. The rule making authority of that branch, as laid out under the Affordable Care Act (how anyone could name it that without laughing is beyond me. It should be written in crayon on the cover) and its thousands of pages is immense. The Act essentially cedes most of the health care choices to be made in this country to that agency in Washington, D.C. Congress' investment of rule making authority in executive agencies has enabled the government to become more and more bloated to its current level, and no party is free from blame.

The Supreme Court today also said the individual mandate was not constitutional as an exercise of the Commerce Clause. The Court reasoned that this power was not sufficient to allow government to force people to participate in commerce. However, they, at least at first glance, expanded the power to tax to include punishing people who do not participate in commerce. If this strikes you as logically inconsistent, it may be because you have more than one operating brain cell. I will note that this is a first impression and I have not had time to review the nearly 200 page decision. I'm not sure if this decision was made because the arguments did not address the taxation power, which if the case would leave open another avenue of appeal on that issue.

Another potential question is that if the mandate is, in fact, a tax, it may not have been passed pursuant to the Constitution as that provision did not originate in the House of Representatives. All revenue raising bills are to originate from the House. I'm not optimistic that this will end up being much of an issue.

Another of the reported rulings is that the federal government may not punish state governments for not complying with expanding Medicaid rolls. This has the potential to seriously undermine the part of the expansion of coverage. States are going to look hard at this position as they look to the effect on their own budgets. This could result in serious blow back against the law from the individual statehouses.

Was the Court wrong? Technically, no. As the last word on what is and is not an act complying with the Constitution of the United States of America, the Court cannot be wrong. From a personal perspective, I see a massive expansion of federal power into an area I highly doubt the Founding Fathers ever would have conceived. But, that has been happening for 100 years now and frankly, I think all of it has been well outside the scope of the Constitution.

The political fallout is a different matter entirely. If the House can successfully pass a bill to repeal the Act, they will force the Democratic Senate to make a stand in favor of what is now not a mandate, but potentially the largest tax increase in U.S. history. I don't know how that will play out, but keep in mind, the large gains in the House and minor gains in the Senate by Republicans in 2010 came largely as a result of the health care debate. People who didn't like the mandate aren't likely to be more favorable to the idea if it is characterized as a tax which does the same thing. This could energize the Republicans and independents who disliked the law and result in a win for Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney. Romney's campaign reportedly raised $1 million in just three hours after the decision. On the other hand, liberals...excuse me...statists may see this as a vindication of President Obama's policy and re-energize those who have been, to date, somewhat on the sidelines. We will see quickly if his donations pick up in a similar manner.

As a practical matter, the Bush tax rates are due to expire at the end of the year already, and with this massive tax raise coming, the economy stands to be hit hard at a time where it is least able to absorb the blow. If something isn't done, and soon, I'm not optimistic about the direction the economy will take. If Mitt Romney prevails in November, he can stop this by issuing waivers to all 50 states to comply with the Act. This is also likely to further the trend of a "jobless recovery". Employers are faced with a non-wage increase in the cost of employment that will discourage them from hiring new employees.

It is too early to say what effects this will have long term. The good thing is a precedent has been set on the limitation of the Commerce Clause, but the taxing authority of the Congress becomes an open question which may need resolution.

This is a long decision and to try and sum up the impacts here in a few paragraphs is an exercise in futility. But then, at this point, dialing back big government and restoring the Constitution feels the same way right now. I'm not going to stop doing that either.

Rubio Running the Rubicon

Senator Marco Rubio who is a potential candidate for Vice President on the Republican ticket was on the Daily Show with John Stewart. Here is a link to Part 1 of the extended interview. Mr. Rubio was fantastic with the interview, and honestly, if he's not the VP pick, I think it's a mistake, and it has nothing to do with the hispanic vote, he is just a wonderful candidate. I would also point out that John Stewart attempts to deflect categorization as a pundit claiming he's just a comedian. While he made some funny comments, it's pretty clear he's trying to have a serious policy debate and defend a liberal position. Rubio hands him his ass in the process, with Stewart becoming visible uncomfortable, shifting his legs and seating position, an indication he feels exposed. It's a beautiful thing to see.

The Presidential Monarch

Under monarchies, the crown was the state. As such, they embodied the law and could technically do no wrong. They determined what the law was, and at a whim, what it wasn't. That is the nature of fiat rule. America is a nation of laws, not of men. This ideal was articulated by no less than the second president of the United States, John Adams. President Obama has consistently shown his belief that he is a monarch, not a president.

Recently, the President waived enforcement of immigration laws against a class of 800,000 illegal immigrants in the United States. The excuse for this is "prosecutorial discretion". Prosecutorial discretion is not meant to waive enforcement of laws against a class of people, rather it is meant to be used on a case by case basis to accommodate for extraordinary circumstances. So that excuse is utter nonsense. It is instructive, however, to note that President Obama claimed he had done so because it was the "right thing to do" (more on that in a moment). Left unsaid, is that it was the right thing for him to do to ensure the Latino vote and shore up swing states in his rapidly flagging campaign. It is a bit curious that he had consistently said he didn't have the power to do exactly what he did.

Today, the United States Supreme Court ruled on the controversial Arizona immigration law. The most controversial tenet of the law was a provision that, if, during a lawful stop made for other reasons, an officer developed probable cause to believe that the person was not legally in the United States (i.e. no driver's license or insurance, doesn't speak English, has Mexican identification) was entitled to look into that persons immigration status and take appropriate action. While the Court struck down several provisions of the law, it unanimously upheld this provision. So, the Court unanimously said that police could investigate immigration status and report to federal immigration officials. However, President Obama instructed federal agencies to not cooperate with Arizona officials on immigration law. So the President, the man at the head of the branch responsible for enforcing the laws of the United States, has explicitly decided he will not do so on a law that has been expressly upheld by the United States Supreme Court. I cannot overstate the significance of this. Not since the FDR court packing scandal has a President shown such disrespect for the Supreme Court and the laws of the United States.

What effect does law have when the man meant to enforce the law believes he is above it? That he rules by fiat and whim? President Barack Obama is now the most dangerous threat to our Constitution which he swore to uphold. I warned about this man before he was President and those that listened, heard and understood. But my voice did not reach far, and it still doesn't. I can only hope someday it will.