Some Good Sites About Health Care Reform

These sites are available to anyone and the first is from the Kaiser Family Foundation, which is Non-Partisan and has no agenda in this reform battle. It is a calculator to enable you to estimate what your insurance will cost after the reform bill is signed into law.

This is something everyone needs to look at and use.. If you have no insurance at this time, and have an income, it will tell you how you will benefit from the reforms we are about to have at your fingertips. You can choose either bill, the House version or the Senate version and compare the two.

You can access this calculator by clicking here.

As an example a family of 4, with an income of $80,000 a year, will pay about $9,241 a year. They will also receive a subsidy of $1,401. So the actual amount they will pay is $7,840. That is for the Senate version of the bill.

The House version for the same family, same income will still pay about $9,241 a year, but the subsidy they will receive will only be $236, so the actual amount they will pay is $9,005.

Now, which one do you think we should support? Remember the Senate bill is cheaper, yet has more subsidies in it for the lower incomes and helps more of the uninsured faster than the House bill does.

For the differences and the similarities in the bills.. There is a link on the same web site for that and you can access it here. It will open another page and allow you to print out a .pdf file so you can look at them side by side.

If you would rather just take a look at them on the web, without the pdf files, you can go to AARP and see the comparison on their web site. That site is always available but you realize they have supported the Health Care and if you quote them, some may say it is biased. But the charts are here.

Both of these are very good sites.. Even if there are changes in the final bill, and there most assuredly will be, this should show everyone how close the two bills are, and how much the final reform will help or will cost each of us who need insurance.

I am one of the lucky ones in this country.. I am covered. But there are millions who are not covered and need this. I have family who isn't. This is something they need desperately. We as a country need this also. It will help us all in the long run. As the President and others have pointed out more than once, it will bring down costs, bring down the deficit and help small and large businesses.

But the most important thing it will do is insure the uninsured. This is what matters more than anything. The people who are protesting the Senate bill, who are calling for it to be killed, who are asking that Sen. Sanders, Feingold, Franken and others stand up and vote against the final bill with the Republicans is just wrong. Not just wrong but in my opinion is immoral.

How can we sacrifice the needs of all these people who so desperately need this, just because they don't think it goes quite far enough.. Well sorry, I know some of you think compromises should never be made.. but it doesn't work that way. They are made every day, every time bills are written and laws are passed.

Do you really think when Social Security was written it was the exact way it is now? No it wasn't. FDR had to settle for a compromise and take what he could get, even with a greater majority than what Pres. Obama has now. Even with Republicans that voted FOR the bill, and a much more Liberal bunch than what Pres. Obama has to deal with.

Do you really think when the Civil Rights bill was written and passed it was the exact way it is now? Do you really think when the Medicare Bill was written and passed it was the exact way it is now. No, it wasn't. LBJ settled for a compromise. Even with Republican votes FOR the bill, and a much more Liberal bunch and a greater majority than Pres. Obama has to deal with, he still settled for much less than he wanted.

But those bills and those laws were good enough to build on. That's what we have NOW. Something to build on. Let's support this, pass this and then we can work on making it better.

We have to make sure we work hard to re-elect Democrats, strong Liberal, Progressive Democrats who will vote and write legislation that we want.. Get rid of the Traitor Joes, the Ben Nelson's, the Blanche Lincoln's and all the other DINO's that are in the Senate.. Then we can truly have the Senate to carry out what we want and not compromise... MAYBE.

The President's Weekly Address: Health Reform's Benefits in 2010

From the White House blog:

The President discusses the benefits of health reform that Americans will receive in the first year, and how reform will help build a new foundation for American families.

This is some of the most important parts of what he is saying that needs to be repeated I think, over and over... This is what starts no matter which bill is signed no matter what happens.. and it is important we see and understand these things.. This is REFORM!

But what every American should know is that once I sign health insurance reform into law, there are dozens of protections and benefits that will take effect this year.

Uninsured Americans with a pre-existing illness or condition will finally be able to purchase coverage they can afford.

Children with pre-existing conditions will no longer be refused coverage, and young adults will be able to stay on their parents’ policy until they’re 26 or 27 years old.

Small business owners who can’t afford to cover their employees will be immediately offered tax credits to purchase coverage.

Early retirees who receive coverage from their employers will see their coverage protected and their premiums go down.

Seniors who fall into the coverage gap known as the donut hole will receive discounts of up to 50 percent on their prescriptions as we begin to close that gap altogether.

And every patient’s choice of doctor will be protected, along with access to emergency care.

Here’s what else will happen within the first year. Insurance plans will be required to offer free preventive care to their customers – so that we can start catching preventable illnesses and diseases on the front end. They’ll no longer be allowed to impose restrictive annual limits on the amount of coverage you receive or lifetime limits on the amount of benefits you receive. They’ll be prohibited from dropping your coverage when you get sick and need it most. And there will be a new, independent appeals process for anyone who feels they were unfairly denied a claim by their insurance company.

In short, once I sign health insurance reform into law, doctors and patients will have more control over their health care decisions, and insurance company bureaucrats will have less. All told, these changes represent the most sweeping reforms and toughest restrictions on insurance companies that this country has ever known. That’s how we’ll make 2010 a healthier and more secure year for every American – for those who have health insurance, and those who don’t.

Those are just the things that go into effect this year.. as soon as they can be implemented after the President signs the bill into law. Why are these not good things?

It does almost everything we have stated we wanted. Lowers costs, insures the uninsured and covers the people with pre-existing conditions. I think this is a win win for us all. No it may not have everything, but it has the big parts of it.. and it is sure something that makes a HUGE step in the right direction to getting what everyone says they want.

So, lets support this, get it done and then move on to the next step. Can we all agree on that?

VicePres. Biden's Mother, Jean, Dies at 92

From an AP report:

WILMINGTON, Del. – Jean Biden, who raised her son Vice President Joe Biden to believe in what he called "America's creed ... everyone is your equal," died Friday after falling seriously ill in recent days. She was 92.

In a statement, the vice president said she died in Wilmington surrounded by her family and loved ones. She had suffered a broken hip in a fall in March 2009.

"Together with my father, her husband of 61 years who passed away in 2002, we learned the dignity of hard work and that you are defined by your sense of honor," he said in the statement. "Her strength, which was immeasurable, will live on in all of us."

Joe Biden Jr. was first elected to the Senate in 1972, shortly before his 30th birthday. His mother helped out by organizing coffee klatches — part of a family effort that also included Biden's father, sister and brothers.

"Those of you who have met my mom, you know she's fairly politically astute, and she still runs the show," the vice president quipped shortly after she fell last year.

"You think I'm joking? I'm not," he said.

The former Catherine Eugenia Finnegan was born July 7, 1917, in Scranton, Pa. In 1941, she married businessman Joseph Biden Sr., with whom she had four children. The couple moved from Scranton to Claymont, Del., in 1953, when their eldest son, Joe, was 10 years old.

According to Biden's 2007 autobiography, "Promises to Keep," his mother had some reservations about whether he should risk a promising career as a young lawyer to enter politics.

"You're not going to run for Senate and ruin your reputation, are you?" he recalled his mother asking.

"And once Mom was reassured that my future was safe, win or lose, she would do anything," Biden wrote.

Biden was elected vice president as Barack Obama's running mate. In his speech at the Democratic National Convention in August 2008, he paid tribute to his mother, who was in the audience.

"My mother's creed is the American creed: No one is better than you," he said. "Everyone is your equal, and everyone is equal to you. My parents taught us to live our faith, and to treasure our families. We learned the dignity of work, and we were told that anyone can make it if they just try hard enough."

Biden said he also learned honor and loyalty from his mother.

"When I got knocked down by guys bigger than me, and this is the God's truth, she sent me back out the street and told me, 'Bloody their nose so you can walk down the street the next day.' And that's what I did."

Raised in a family with a strong Irish Catholic tradition, Jean Biden leaned on her faith in comforting her eldest son after his wife and daughter were killed in a car crash in December 1972, the month after he was elected to the Senate. His two sons were seriously injured.

"After the accident, she told me, 'Joey, God sends no cross that you cannot bear,'" Biden recalled.

In his autobiography, Joe Biden recalled being mocked by a seventh-grade nun for his stuttering, an incident that sent his mother to his school in a fury, her children in tow.

"If you ever speak to my son like that again, I'll come back and rip that bonnet off your head. Do you understand me?" she told the nun.

Joe Biden also recalled how when his mother couldn't find a pair of cufflinks for him to wear to an eighth-grade dance, she fashioned a pair from nuts and bolts, which left him mortified.

"Now look, Joey, if anybody says anything to you about these nuts and bolts, you just look them right in the eye and say 'Don't you have a pair of these?'" she told him.

Jean Biden is survived by the vice president, daughter Valerie Biden Owens of Kennett Square, Pa., and sons James Brian Biden of Merion Station, Pa., and Francis W. Biden of Florida. She had 10 grandchildren and five great-grandchildren.

Details of services will be released in coming days, the vice president's office said.

Recovery Act Protecting Millions From Poverty

The other day Bob from BobCesca.com posted part of a report from the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities and it had some very interesting information.

First, let me remind everyone that the CBPP is a Non-partisan research and policy institute working on federal and state fiscal policies and public programs that affect low- and moderate-income Americans. So, like the Congressional Budget Office, (CBO) they do not have an agenda and it matters not which political party is in office.

There are charts and graphs at the site and the entire report can be accessed at their site.. I am just going to point out some highlights.. There are some very good things that need to be seen and read in this report. They need to be pointed out and I think should be shared with some of the wingnuts out there so they will shut up about the Recovery Act not doing anything good.

While the recession is expected to drive states’ poverty rates up for 2009, new analysis based on Census data shows that the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA) is keeping large numbers of Americans out of poverty in states across the country. In addition to boosting economic activity and preserving or creating jobs, the recovery act is softening the recession’s impact on poverty by directly lifting family incomes.

The Center’s analysis, which covers 36 states and the District of Columbia, examines the effect on poverty of seven ARRA provisions: the expansion of three tax credits for working families, two provisions that strengthen unemployment insurance assistance, a provision that boosts food stamp benefits, and a one-time payment for retirees, veterans, and people with disabilities.[1] Nationally, these provisions are keeping more than 6 million Americans out of poverty and reducing the severity of poverty for 33 million more. (These figures include both people whom ARRA has lifted out of poverty and people whom ARRA has kept from falling into poverty.)

These estimates are conservative. The seven provisions examined cover only about one-fourth of the recovery act’s total spending. The remainder of the act contains an array of provisions that also have an effect on poverty either through direct job creation or through increased spending (on areas such as education, health care, and housing) that leads to more consumer demand in the economy, which in turn preserves or creates jobs. The Congressional Budget Office has estimated that the legislation as a whole had increased employment by 600,000 to 1.6 million jobs as of September 2009 and is expected to boost employment by 900,000 to 2.3 million jobs by the fourth quarter of this year.[2]

Moreover, this analysis does not capture the full anti-poverty impact of the seven provisions it examines. It considers the provisions’ direct effects on the incomes of the families that receive added income or benefits as a result of these provisions, but not the provisions’ additional effects on the economy and private-sector employment. For example, increased jobless benefits or food stamps preserve private-sector jobs in a recession by enabling consumers to continue purchasing goods and services they otherwise could not have afforded. That additional spending, in turn, ripples through the economy, helping stores and companies to stay in business and avoid steeper layoffs and reductions in work hours, and thereby averts larger increases in poverty.

That is my emphasis.. I felt it needed to be seen and so I put it in bold.. I think that is the biggest part of this that needs to be told over and over. There is more..

Congress designed the recovery act to reach a wide spectrum of low-, moderate-, and middle-income Americans. Policymakers took care to include provisions that provide assistance to low-income families, not only because they stand the greatest risk of hardship during downturns but also because of evidence that they are the most likely to spend quickly whatever money they receive, thereby pumping more money back into the economy in a timely manner.

Our analysis considers seven of the act’s temporary provisions, totaling $205 billion over five years:

* a new Making Work Pay tax credit of up to $400 for workers ($800 for a couple) earning up to $95,000 ($190,000 for a couple);
* an expanded Child Tax Credit for lower-income working families with children;
* an expanded Earned Income Tax Credit, including increased tax-credit benefits for a working family with three or more children and for married families to lessen the marriage penalty the EITC can otherwise impose;
* additional weeks of emergency unemployment compensation benefits (paid after a worker’s 26 weeks of regular state unemployment benefits expire);
* an additional $25 per week for unemployed workers to supplement their unemployment benefits;
* a $250 one-time payment to elderly people and people with disabilities who receive Social Security, SSI, or veterans’ benefits; and
* an increase in food stamp benefit levels.

The state-by-state findings presented here build on a Center analysis released in September 2009, which focused on figures for the nation as a whole as well as five large states. Details of the methods used here are described in the appendices of that report. [3]

In brief, the analysis uses Census data to examine how these policy changes will affect family income and poverty status by state. The estimates start with data collected in March 2004, March 2005, and March 2006 through the Census Bureau's Current Population Survey. Data for three years are combined to increase the reliability of the state-by-state estimates.

We make three adjustments to these Census data. First, we correct the tendency of Census and other surveys to undercount receipt of certain public benefits, using the data and methods for making such adjustments that are reflected in the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ TRIM model. [4] Next, we adjust the data to approximate recent economic and demographic conditions in each state, including labor-market conditions and state population levels in April through June of 2009. Finally, we adjust the food stamp participation data to approximate actual food stamp participation levels by state in May 2009. For each family in the resulting data, we estimate the family’s 2009 income with and without the seven recovery act provisions.

The analysis considers a family to be kept out of poverty if its estimated income is below the poverty line without the recovery act provisions but above the poverty line with the provisions. We use a measure of poverty that adheres to National Academy of Sciences poverty measurement recommendations by including after-tax cash and non-cash income, while subtracting child care and work expenses and out-of-pocket medical expenditures.

We provide estimates for 36 states and the District of Columbia. For the remaining 14 states, our data are insufficient to show reliable results. [5] Given the uncertainty associated with using a sample of the population, we show a range of estimates for each state. This range can be substantial, particularly for states with the smallest survey samples. For example, estimates for Iowa range from 25,000 to 55,000 residents kept out of poverty, with our best estimate falling in the middle (40,000).

The end notes are important too..

End Notes:

[1] As explained below, data were insufficient to estimate the antipoverty impact in the remaining 14 states.

[2] Congressional Budget Office, "Estimated Impact of the American Economic Recovery and Reinvestment Act on Employment and Economic Output as of September 2009," November 2009; and letter from CBO Director Douglas W. Elmendorf to Senator Charles E. Grassley, March 2, 2009.

[3] See Arloc Sherman, “Stimulus Keeping 6 Million Americans Out of Poverty in 2009, Estimates Show,” Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, September 9, 2009 (appendices).

[4] Specifically, we correct the Census data for underreporting of food stamps, TANF, and SSI benefits using the data and methodologies to correct for underreporting that are used in the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services' TRIM model.

[5] For seven of these 14 states, we do not show results because of very small sample size. In addition, we checked to ensure that our predicted state-to-state distribution of ARRA benefits is generally consistent for each state with the actual distribution of benefits paid through October 30, 2009, as reported on the government website, www.recovery.gov. We do not show results for another seven states because we determined that the state's share of benefits in our model differed by more than 10 percent from the state’s actual share of the benefits (due to random sampling error, the inability of our model to fully capture some complex program interactions, or other reasons).

There are charts on the web site and other facts you can read, I didn't want to post the charts, some times they are hard to see when we post them.. so thought the link would be best..

Please take the time to look at this and feel free to link to it, post it, share it or whatever you would like to do.. This needs to be shared and told.. the media is not covering this.. they would rather talk about how bad it is.. not the good things.

I hope you see that while not all the news is good, there are at least some things in the ARRA that did benefit a lot of people. We have heard so many times, it wasn't big enough, it wasn't targeted enough, it was all pork.. so on and so on.. This shows it was good for the ones who needed it most. That's the bottom line.

10 Lessons for Tea Baggers, Hey Wing Nuts.. That Means YOU!

I posted this back on September 16, 2009, right after Glenn Beck's 9-12 project.. Sue @ Hellooooo Mr President has been having some discussions with some conservatives about some of these ideas and I thought maybe it was time to revive it. Hopefully they will read it and learn a little something.. and some of us might learn some things too.


Jon Perr who posts at Crooks and Liars and also at his own blog Perrspectives has this great piece up that gives a wonderful write up of all the things wrong with your protest. You really need to look at this and study it and learn something.

Now you have all been here and wanted a debate.. Here is your debate. Will you honestly, truthfully read this and debate with me and others about this? I really doubt you will. But I will be glad to do so.

You attack, you scream, you cry we just want to call you names, but when we try to really have a debate you are nowhere around.. so here is your chance.. Like I said no anonymous comments.. You have to have a name.. something anyway.. Now, read this..

Back in April, the Daily Show's Jon Stewart offered some sound advice for frothing at the mouth Tea Baggers, "I think you might be confusing tyranny with losing." Now five months after their Tax Day outburst, thousands of vein-popping Obama opponents descended Saturday on Washington for Tea Party II. But while Glenn Beck's furious followers alternately slandered the President as a "fascist," a "communist" and worse, they remained unencumbered by either the thought process - or the truth.

Now for the list of 10 things you need to remember and learn.. These are very important.

1. President Obama Cut Your Taxes
2. The Stimulus is Working
3. First Ronald Reagan Tripled the National Debt...
4. ...Then George W. Bush Doubled It Again
5. Republican States Have the Worst Health Care
6. Medicare is a Government Program
7. Barack Obama is Not a Muslim
8. Barack Obama was Born in the United States
9. 70,000 Does Not Equal 2,000,000
10. The Economy Almost Always Does Better Under Democrats

Each of those links will take you to a detailed explanation of the statement. In easy to read terms and back up to show you proof of the statments.. Also I want to help you with some other things besides what Jon has given there.

From one of my commenters here who was answering one of you who left an answer and then ran away with no other way of contacting you or debating you in anyway, I am going to quote MrBrink:

In 2007, Pearl Jam was censored by AT&T during their live webcast for saying: "...George Bush, leave this world alone" and "George Bush find yourself another home..."

Anti Bush speech was censored by the corporate media or people like the Dixie Chicks were threatened with death as an example of what happens when you criticize Republican presidents.

In respone to anonymous coward's comments:

The Bush family dynasty was built to a fair extent doing business with Nazi Germany and had to have their assests seized as a result.

President Obama has no such family history. There is no elitist "Obama family dynasty."

The Bush dynasty expounded upon Prescott's activities by G.H.W Bush's years as a CIA spook and his subsequent ties to the Carlyle Group engaging in international arms deals using his position as an American government official to enrich his private dealings blurring the line between public and private representation. In other words, when 41' was brokering deals for Carlyle, he was using what I like to call "America's integrity capital" as a bargaining chip in business negotitations.

Hitler rose to power through an odd parliamentary procedure after losing the popular vote handily.

Bush was appointed president through an unprecedented decision by the Supreme Court, after Bush lost the popular vote handily. Scalia and Cheney are, and have been, good friends and hunting buddies in an obvious conflict of interest to everyone but wingnuts.

Clinton left a surplus. To argue this is typical revisionist history. Clinton also upheld the successful policy of containment and no fly zones in the 90s. Information recently revealed that Saddam was bluffing and tried to communicate as much through intermediaries to offset the threat of increasing Iranian influence. A threat that Reagan and Bush41' compounded with a shady proxy war in the 80's.

I disagreed with sanctions responsible for the deaths of over 200,000 women and children and oil for food, but to claim Clinton's approach was more harmful than Bush's pre-emptive Shock and Awe campaign is idiocy.

We actually count the efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan in the budget now. Bushco tried to hide the costs through emergency funding that was used for no-bid contracts and plastic wrapped billions unloaded off a flying warehouse on a Baghdad tarmac. Waste, fraud, abuse, and no accountability were Bushco norms.

Only republicans hypocritically complain about pork. That "pork" funds all kinds projects and does more good than harm in the grand scheme of things.

This is republicans holding democrats to a standard they ignored. Reagan took America from the world's foremost creditor nation to the world's foremost debtor nation. Bush's watch resulted in the near collapse of the global economy.

President Obama received more votes than any elected president in history.

That's a mandate. Deal with it.

And while you're dealing with it by calling the president a liar/communist/fascist/marxist and an illegal alien, remember that nobody is censoring your speech like they did with Pearl Jam and and all the "free speech zones," and nobody is threatening your lives.

And when Mark Kirk(R-IL) tells Chinese officials that President Obama's budget(a budget that cuts taxes for over 95% of tax-paying Americans)is "not to be believed", directly undermining American interests, he's practically a traitor.

And in case the wingnuts don't know. The president consults with MANY Capitalists and Philanthropists and independent thinkers in trying to clean up the Bush Republican pile of shit they so recklessly, perhaps methodically, left behind.

Conservative Republicans failed America over the past 30 years and did so without shame or apology using hypocrisy and false equivalency as tools of deciet and revisionist history.

Now, once again, there are facts, with back up and you provide none.. You throw things out and just run away with no way to debate, yet you charge that we here on the left are not open to debate.

I nor anyone here is saying that we have all the answers, nor do we believe that we are perfect as you seem to think we believe. We do not idealize our Presidents as you seem to have done with Reagan and even Bush to a certain extent. We know he has feet of clay, we don't agree with everything he has done, nor will we agree with everything he will always do.

We need at least a 2 party system in this country for it to survive. But it needs to be a healthy 2 party system and right now we don't really have a healthy second party. The republican party is sick.. it is infected with bigots and racists and idiots who are following the lead of idiots like Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck who are getting pain millions of dollars to say outlandish and stupid things.

The more outlandish and the more stupid the better, it garners a wider audience. People watch and listen just to see what they will say next. You know it must be getting bad when even some of the other wing nuts are calling them to task.

When Alex Jones, wing nut of the nth degree tells Glenn Beck he is getting too far out there for him.. Beck is WAAAAY out there.. So come on people.. are you serious.. this is the guy you want to follow.

An excerpt of the letter to Beck from Jones:

During your Monday September 22 2008 TV broadcast, you expressed your vehement support for the bailout, stating, “The $700 billion dollars that you’re hearing about now is not only I believe necessary, it is also not nearly enough.” However, as soon as Bush left office and Obama picked up the baton and continued the same financial policy, you changed your tune and routinely attacked the bailout as an example of how socialism was taking over America.

The bailout was bad news for America under Bush just as it is under Obama, both were merely performing a transfer of wealth from America to offshore banks and giving the Federal Reserve total dictatorial control over the economy, but you only opposed it when Bush was out of office, proving that your opinions are not wedded to right or wrong, but to which puppet is in the White House.

A host of mainline conservative talking heads opposed the banker bailout, as did the majority of the American people, but you went on television and publicly supported it. This is irreconcilable with you being “a libertarian at heart” as you claim.

In addition, you aggressively attacked Ron Paul and his supporters during the election campaign when it looked like the Texan Congressman might have a real chance of winning the nomination. You implied that Ron Paul supporters were domestic terrorists and should be dealt with by the U.S. Army, but later tried to side with Ron Paul supporters when the infamous and discredited MIAC report echoed your own talking point that people who support Ron Paul were dangerous.

The smear came during a November 2007 show when you were still hosting on CNN. Yourself and ex-Marxist David Horowitz smeared Ron Paul supporters, libertarians and the anti-war left as terrorist sympathizers and inferred that the U.S. military should be used to silence them, parroting a talking point that traces back to a September 2006 White House directive. When asked about the issue, Ron Paul dismissed you as “pretty discourteous” and a “demagogue”.

You Glenn Beck have acted as a cheerleader for the wars of aggression launched since 9/11 and in addition called for Iran to be attacked, claiming that President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is preparing a “second holocaust.” Once again, these political opinions stand completely contrary to libertarian principles, which follow the founding fathers’ view that an expansionist aggressive foreign policy is bad for America.

You have attacked Obama for unraveling the Bush war machine to give you left cover, when in fact Obama has done everything in his power to expand Bush’s wars, beefing the campaigns in Afghanistan and Pakistan while removing a token amount of troops from Iraq and replacing them with an even greater number of contractors.

By attacking Obama for being different to Bush, when in reality he offers not change whatsoever, you keep people locked in the left-right paradigm and ensure that instead of coming to the realization that the whole system is rigged, they will merely vote in another puppet for the new world order in 2012.

Glenn Beck – you are controlled opposition, you are there to co-opt and ensure the Tea Parties are under control and that they never focus on taking on the real power behind the American economy – the Federal Reserve.

Bearing in mind that you almost died not too long ago, wouldn’t you rather come to the end of your life, whether that be in one year or 30 years from now, knowing that you stood up for true liberty and freedom? Isn’t that more valuable than your $50 million dollars a year contract? When I was approached ten years ago and offered large sums of money every year to sell out and become what you are today – the new Rush Limbaugh – while accepting tight controls on what I could and could not discuss – I said no and I thank God every day that I made the right decision.

50 Million .. is that what they are paying this lying piece of garbage to cry on demand and convince you people of what he wants you to do .. hell for 50 million even I would .. no, no I wouldn't.. I still have principles.. and it is obvious this idiot has none.

But, did you read what this said.. he praised the bailouts.. before he was against them.. Folks you are being duped by the master here.. look at that again. I will put it in bold so you can see it very plainly. I want to repeat this part again.. Just so everyone can see this for sure..

During your Monday September 22 2008 TV broadcast, you expressed your vehement support for the bailout, stating, “The $700 billion dollars that you’re hearing about now is not only I believe necessary, it is also not nearly enough.” However, as soon as Bush left office and Obama picked up the baton and continued the same financial policy, you changed your tune and routinely attacked the bailout as an example of how socialism was taking over America.

Here is a clip put together by Jones of Beck's greatest hits...and his take on what Beck is saying.. I think he has him nailed.. and I believe you all had better open your eyes.



I really hate to quote Alex Jones, he is not my cup of tea, but he has a point and makes some very valid arguments here.

So, here is the challenge people, wingnuts, tea baggers, whatever you want to be called.. you want a debate.. lets debate.. just do it with facts and come armed with back up.. not with ad hominem attacks and no way to prove what you say.

Dems intend to bypass GOP on health compromise

From the AP I find this story tonight on Yahoo News.. Normally I don't use them as a source but this would make me very happy if it is true..

House and Senate Democrats intend to bypass traditional procedures when they negotiate a final compromise on health care legislation, officials said Monday, a move that will exclude Republican lawmakers and reduce their ability to delay or force politically troubling votes in both houses.

The unofficial timetable calls for final passage of the measure to remake the nation's health care system by the time President Barack Obama delivers his State of the Union address, probably in early February.

Democratic aides said the final compromise talks would essentially be a three-way negotiation involving top Democrats in the House and Senate and the White House, a structure that gives unusual latitude to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada and Speaker Nancy Pelosi of California.

These officials said there are no plans to appoint a formal House-Senate conference committee, the method Congress most often uses to reconcile differing bills. Under that customary format, a committee chairman is appointed to preside, and other senior lawmakers from both parties and houses participate in typically perfunctory public meetings while the meaningful negotiations occur behind closed doors.

In this case, the plan is to skip the formal meetings, reach an agreement, then have the two houses vote as quickly as possible. A 60-vote Senate majority would be required in advance of final passage.

You can read the entire story at the site above.. However that's the gist of it.. Basically, Harry and Nancy and some of the White House staff are getting together to write the final bill.. without the GOPers.. Finally they are putting a stop to the obstructionism.. Hip Hip Hooray!

The President's Weekly Address: The Fight Against Al Qaeda

From the White House Blog:

The President discusses the recent attempted act of terrorism on the Christmas day flight to Detroit, and his broader strategy to fight Al Qaeda.

We have to stand up and help the President in this. We need to be loud and long in our support of him against the attacks made as he tries to fix this problem.

The attacks on him are coming because he didn't wear a tie, he waited until he had all the facts before he spoke.. a whole 3 days, and because he was in "exotic Hawaii" which you know is barely even a state, and he should have come back to Washington immediately.

Never mind that all of those things pertain to Bush after Richard Reid, the so called Shoe Bomber tried to blow up an airplane. Well except Hawaii, and Bush, not only did not come back to Washington, he left Washington and went to Texas, after it happened. He also didn't speak for 6 days after the attack.. yes, that's right SIX days.. not 3, not 72 hours.. but 6, count them SIX days after the attack.

Sam Stein has a great write up of the entire set of events surrounding the Bush Shoe Bombing Debacle in the Huffington Post. He lays out the time line and talks about the lack of criticism from people then. And all of this was less than 4 months after September 11th.

But, I guess it is like the acronym we have all seen.. IOKIYAR, I think we all know what that means.. and if you don't.. just ask.. I will tell you..

So with Cheney coming out from his hiding place, and speaking out again, different Senators and Congress people trying to raise money off this, we have to stand firm and speak out against this.

Let people know they are wrong to criticize this President for his strong stand against the extremists who are trying to harm us all. This doesn't have anything to do with the war, this is against the people who are still determined to blow up airplanes, or do something else to harm Americans, right here on our soil. They are there, and we have to support our President as he does all he can to protect us.