Whistleblowers idea by Barney Frank: The fox is in the henhouse and the fox’s name is Barney

Frank pushed for loans to be made to people who did not have enough money to secure those loans and that is why we have this problem to begin with.

“New Agency Proposed to Oversee Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae,” The New York Times, September 11, 2003:

”These two entities — Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac — are not facing any kind of financial crisis,” said Representative Barney Frank of Massachusetts, the ranking Democrat on the Financial Services Committee. ”The more people exaggerate these problems, the more pressure there is on these companies, the less we will see in terms of affordable housing.”

 Take a look at this video clip below.

Mark Calabria from the Cato Institute on Financial Regulation

Mark Calabria from the Cato Institute joins Crane to discuss financial regulation

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Reuters reported on March 21, 2011:

Corporate whistleblowers are getting bigger and bigger payouts for reporting fraud, sparking a fresh debate about whether the rewards are justified.

Whistleblowers have collected billions of dollars since the late 1980s by suing government contractors under the False Claims Act and other federal laws. The new Dodd-Frank financial reform law could lead to more payments, something plaintiff attorneys say will provide checks on businesses but companies fear will circumvent their own internal anti-fraud systems.

Awards for reporting fraud hit a record high of $385 million in the 12 months ended Sept 30, 2010, Justice Department data showed. The total rose nearly 50 percent from the previous year and was the third increase in a row.

The Dodd-Frank law calls on the Securities and Exchange Commission to pay awards to people who report violations leading to at least $1 million in sanctions.

Workers should have to report problems to internal company monitors as well as to the SEC, some business groups say. Some want the agency to limit payouts if the worker did not try to solve matters internally first.

As proposed SEC Dodd-Frank rules are written, workers would have an incentive to circumvent their companies’ compliance systems in hopes of getting a big cash payout, chemical maker Huntsman Corp wrote in a comment letter to the SEC.

Employees “have been deputized and promised huge riches to bypass their companies and report to the government” under the new law, said David Baris, head of the American Association of Bank Directors.

But Steven Kohn, executive director of the National Whistleblowers Center in Washington, said internal company programs often fail to fully investigate wrongdoing. He said employees should have a choice where to raise concerns.

Big payouts are the price of getting good information from people who risk their careers to report problems, he said.

“If you want to get the big fish, you have got to pay the big award,” Kohn said.

Kohn has made a career representing people bringing False Claims Act cases. The Civil War-era law was changed in 1986 to give individuals up to 30 percent of recoveries from government contractors. Since then, fraud settlements and court judgments rose to $3 billion in 2010, up from $176 million in 1988.

GROWING RECOVERIES

False Claims cases are “qui tam” lawsuits, a Latin phrase meaning a plaintiff is suing “for the King as well as for himself.” A record 573 new qui tam cases were filed in fiscal 2010, up from 433 the year before.

In October, a former GlaxoSmithKline employee was awarded $96 million, the largest payment ever in such a case. Her reward was part of the $750 million the drugmaker paid to settle a manufacturing fraud case.

False claims cases in state courts also are up. Lawsuits against Bank of New York Mellon contend it overcharged pension funds in Florida and Virginia for foreign exchange services. The cases resemble one pending against State Street Corp in California. Both banks deny wrongdoing.

Various groups have called in the past for caps on these awards, but those arguments have found little traction. For instance, a 2009 proposal by Arizona Republican Sen. Jon Kyl to cap whistleblower awards at $50 million was defeated. Another Republican, Iowa Sen. Charles Grassley, has been a chief defender of the rewards as a way to root out waste.

Critics have gotten an ally, however, in Skadden Arps attorney Michael Loucks, who until 2009 was a top Justice official prosecuting fraud cases. He won settlements from companies including Serono Labs, now part of Merck KGaA, based on whistleblower claims.

In a recent paper in trade journal Health Care Fraud Report, Loucks argued that Congress should cap payments under the False Claims Act to $2 million. That would vastly increase recoveries to taxpayers, he argues.

Of the 14 largest settlements since 2008, whistleblowers received $650 million — $622 million more than if the cap were in place, he wrote.

(Reporting by Ross Kerber, editing by Matthew Lewis)

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It is interesting to me that people like Barney Frank who is responsible for this mess in the first place, are in charge of cleaning up this. Frank pushed for loans to be made to people who did not have enough money to secure those loans and that is why we have this problem to begin with. Take a look at this article below. 

Mark Calabria wrote the excellent article “Financial Reform Bill Won’t Stop Next Crisis,” National Review Online, June 25, 2010. Here it is:

The House and Senate will soon vote on a finalized financial-regulation bill, one that was mostly hammered out in a closed-door conference between the two chambers. Legislators will have a stark, simple choice: support a bill that gives us more of the same flawed banking regulations, or reject it in the hopes that new congressional leadership next year will address the actual causes of the financial crisis.

Perhaps it should come as no surprise that Sen. Christopher Dodd and Rep. Barney Frank, the bill’s primary authors, would fail to end the numerous government distortions of our financial and mortgage markets that led to the crisis. Both have been either architects or supporters of those distortions. One might as well ask the fox to build the henhouse.

Nowhere in the final bill will you see even a pretense of rolling back the endless federal incentives and mandates to extend credit, particularly mortgages, to those who cannot afford to pay their loans back. After all, the popular narrative insists that Wall Street fat cats must be to blame for the credit crisis. Despite the recognition that mortgages were offered to unqualified individuals and families, banks will still be required under the Dodd-Frank bill to meet government-imposed lending quotas.

Mark A. Calabria is director of financial-regulation studies at the Cato Institute.

 

While apologists for government-mandated lending are correct in pointing out that much of the worst lending was originated by state-chartered lenders, such as Countrywide, and not federally chartered banks, they either miss or purposely ignore the truth that these non-bank lenders were selling the bulk of their loans to Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, or the government corporation Ginnie Mae. About 90 percent of loans originated by Countrywide, the largest subprime lender, were either sold to Fannie Mae or backed by Ginnie Mae. Subprime lenders were so intertwined with Fannie and Freddie that Countrywide alone constituted over 25 percent of Fannie’s purchases.

While one can debate the motivations behind Fannie and Freddie’s support for the subprime market, one thing should be clear: Had Fannie and Freddie not been there to buy these loans, most of them would never have been made. And had the taxpayer not been standing behind Fannie and Freddie, they would have been unable to fund such large purchases of subprime mortgages. Yet rather than fix the endless bailout that Fannie and Freddie have become, Congress believes it is more important to expand federal regulation and litigation to lenders that had nothing to do with the crisis.

The legislation’s worst oversight is to ignore completely the role of loose monetary policy in driving the housing bubble. A bubble of such historic magnitude as the one we went through can only occur in an environment of extremely cheap and plentiful credit. The ultimate provider and price-setter of that credit was the Federal Reserve. Could anyone truly have believed that more than three years of a negative real federal-funds rate — where one is essentially being paid to borrow — would not end in tears?

As the Federal Reserve’s monetary policy is largely aimed at short-term borrowing, the Fed also drove the spread between short- and long-term borrowing to historic heights. This created irresistible incentives for households and companies to borrow short — sometimes as short as overnight — and lend long. Many households chose adjustable-rate mortgages that would later reset as interest rates rose, increasing monthly payments. For banks, this spread provided an opportunity for handsome profits by simply speculating on the yield curve.

Avoiding the issue of loose monetary policy may well be the result of Congress’s possessing almost no understanding of it. The first obvious step toward building such an understanding would be to have the GAO audit the Fed’s monetary policy. Yet Congress continues to ban the GAO from examining the issue. It is as if Congress does not even want to understand the causes of the crisis.

Nor has there been any discussion in Congress about removing the tax preferences for debt. Washington subsidizes debt, taxes equity, and then acts surprised when everyone becomes extremely leveraged.

Until Washington takes a long, deep look at its own role in causing the financial crisis, we will have little hope for avoiding another one. And the Dodd-Frank legislation, sure to be heralded as strong medicine for perfidious financiers, is actually not even a modest step in the right direction.

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May 27, 2011 – 12:19 pm Categories: Cato Institute, Current Events | Post a comment

Andrew Breitbart spoke to Little Rock, Arkansas group May 25, 2011 (Part 3,one time default cultural liberal, but now a conservative )

Andrew Breibart spoke in Little Rock on May 25, 2011

Andrew Breitbart in Arkansas Dave Elswick Chicago and Introduction.wmv

Conservative film activist Andrew Breitbart spoke in Little Rock on Wednseday May 25th at the Hilton Hotel. The room was packed with conservative activist and Tea Party members. Breitbart talked about dealing with the liberal media and how the left indoctrinate the public on so many levels. Americans for Prosperity hosted the event.

The second monthly luncheon with featured speaker Andrew Breitbart was excellent. (Check out the Tolbert Report for more coverage of this event.)

First, we got to hear from Dave Elswick of KARN   who came up with the idea of this luncheon, and then from Teresa Crossland of Americans for Prosperity. 

Below is a story Breitbart told at the luncheon today. He had earlier told it on Sean Hannity’s show: 

HANNITY: Can I ask you, why all the personal stuff? I mean, there’s too much information —

BREITBART: In my book, are you talking about or —

HANNITY: I’m talking about your book because — I didn’t know this about you. I didn’t know you were a radical hippie —

BREITBART: I wasn’t a radical hippie, I was a party boy.

HANNITY: All right, big party boy –

BREITBART: Yes.

HANNITY: And you give the details — there’s a reason to your madness because you advise people that want to get in this fight, you better be ready to be smeared and you better tell your story yourself.

BREITBART: Well, the huge problem with the conservative movement as I see it, most of the people have gone through the conservative movement and they don’t realize that there’s so many people out there of value who are default cultural liberals.

If you’ve graduated from a college, if you’ve watched MTV your entire life, if you have gone to the movies, you are a default cultural liberal and I was one of them, and I awakened to that.

HANNITY: Great story.

BREITBART: What I’m trying to show people in the book is that 50 percent of the people who consider themselves independent or even liberal may actually be conservative and what I want to do is awaken them by showing them how I awakened. And then what you can do about at least neutralizing the imbalance in the media.

HANNITY: You addressed the issued that if you are somebody like Andrew Breitbart and you are going to take on ACORN with Hanna and James, if you are going to take on the media, the complex as you call it in the book, you go into specific details.

First of all, you are telling people that there are plenty openings if this is what you want to do, but be prepared for, you know, being demonized, beaten up, smeared, slandered and how to deal with it. By the way, I think you have become one of the most hated man out there in the country.

Andrew Breitbart in Arkansas Media destroying our culture.wmv

May 27, 2011 – 9:45 am Categories: Current Events | Post a comment

Balanced Budget Amendment the answer? Boozman says yes, Pryor no, Part 33 (Input from Dan Mitchell of the Cato Institute Part 5)

Classic Ron Paul: “This is a small effort in the right direction”

4/19/1997, C-SPAN

Photo detail

Steve Brawner in his article “Safer roads and balanced budgets,” Arkansas News Bureau, April 13, 2011, noted:

The disagreement is over the solutions — on what spending to cut; what taxes to raise (basically none ever, according to Boozman); whether or not to enact a balanced budget amendment (Boozman says yes; Pryor no); and on what policies would promote the kind of economic growth that would make this a little easier.

Dan Mitchell wrote a great article called “Why a Tax Limitation/Balanced Budget Amendment is Needed to Control Spending,” Cato Institute, Feb 19, 1997. I will be posted portions of that article the next few days. Here is the fourth portion:

How Would the Amendment Affect Social Security?

Senior citizens worry that a balanced budget requirement would pressure Congress to reduce Social Security benefits. This is a legitimate concern, but the amendment is not the problem. Social Security has an unfunded liability of between $7 trillion and $11 trillion. Whether the amendment is approved or not, lawmakers will be forced to address this issue, especially once the system begins to run a deficit shortly after the turn of the century.

The privatization of Social Security is the best way for senior citizens to protect their retirement benefits. When Chile privatized its retirement system, participants were given bonds equal to the value of their promised benefits. These bonds became the participants’ private property, which meant that benefits no longer were subject to the whims of politicians. This privatization should occur in the U.S. system as well, regardless of whether the Constitution is changed to require a balanced budget. It is the only way senior citizens and those nearing retirement can ensure their retirement income.

Some opponents of the balanced budget amendment have argued that Social Security funds should be excluded because the surplus “masks the true size of the deficit.” But Social Security is a government program; the money spent on retirement benefits is government spending, and payroll taxes are government revenues. The only proper and reasonable definition of the deficit is the amount of money the government has to borrow from private credit markets when total spending exceeds total revenue.

To exclude Social Security from the balanced budget requirement would be to create a gaping loophole that lawmakers could use to promote new spending at the expense of the economy and future generations. It does not take a vivid imagination, for instance, to foresee future lawmakers creating new programs and making them part of the Social Security system in order to avoid having to pay for them.2 Critics of the amendment will deny this is their goal, and will argue that their real intent is simply to protect Social Security from future cuts. If that were the case, however, they would support privatization.

Rather than use Social Security as a way to add loopholes, policymakers should see the balanced budget amendment as absolutely essential to dealing with the looming Social Security crisis. In less than 15 years, Social Security will begin to run deficits — shortfalls that will grow rapidly to alarming levels. Defenders of the status quo say there is nothing to worry about until the Trust Fund runs out around 2030, but this ignores the fact that the Trust Fund is nothing more than the “IOUs” that the government has issued to itself.

As a result of this recurrent practice, the moment Social Security goes in the red shortly after the turn of the century, lawmakers will come under enormous pressure to deal with the system’s unfunded liabilities. Needless to say, this may require significant benefit reductions or crippling payroll taxes.3 To the extent that the government still is running large deficits when the Social Security crisis hits, the steps that must be implemented will have become even more severe.

Endnotes:

  1. The “gross” federal debt is about $5.3 trillion, but this includes $1.5 trillion the Department of the Treasury owes to other parts of the federal government (such as the Social Security Trust Fund). Thus, this $5.3 trillion figure, like the Trust Funds themselves, is meaningless. The only debt that has any real economic meaning is the amount “held by the public” (in other words, the amount the government has borrowed from private credit markets).
  2. For those who doubt this could happen because politicians would be reluctant to add programs to Social Security that are not related to old-age retirement, the food stamps program is instructive. Even though welfare programs usually are administered by the Department of Health and Human Services, the food stamp program was given to the Department of Agriculture. Supporters put forward the weak rationale that the food people eat usually comes from farms, which is rather like arguing that housing programs should fall under the Department of the Interior because so much lumber comes from national forests. The real reason, however, was to create an alliance for more spending: Supporters of agriculture subsidies wanted votes from Members of Congress representing urban areas, and supporters of more welfare wanted votes from Members of Congress representing rural areas. Lumping these two programs together created precisely that dynamic.
  3. The ideal way to avoid the Social Security crisis would be through privatization, as Chile, Australia, and Great Britain already have done. For more detail, see Daniel J. Mitchell’s forthcoming Heritage Foundation paper on Social Security.
May 27, 2011 – 12:11 am Categories: Cato Institute | Post a comment

Kate Middleton and Prince William: Marriage made in Heaven? (Part 37)

The Older Generation

Kate’s in-laws, Prince Charles and Camilla, Duchess of Cornwall. Charles must be thinking, “one down, one to go!”
I really do wish Kate and William success in their marriage. I hope they truly are committed to each other, and if they are then the result will be a marriage that lasts their whole lifetime. Nevertheless, I do not think it is best to live together before marriage like they did, and I writing this series to help couples see how best to prepare for marriage.

80% of children in co-habiting families are under the age of 6, in part because these families are two to three times more likely to break up in a child’s early years than married families. But the preliminary evidence strongly suggests that, even when cohabiting families stick together, children don’t fare as well on average as when they are blessed with a mother and father who got and stay married. That makes sense, if you think about it. What is a man saying when he marries? That he and his child and the child’s mother are one family unit, and they will be his most important priority; that he will be faithful to his wife, and that he will share his time, love, energy and money. People don’t always live up to their ideals, but it helps to begin with the right idea.

By contrast, when a man refuses to marry, what is he saying? Something like this: “I reserve the right to find someone better in the future, which includes the right to break up this family, the right to make love and children with another woman in the future. And by the way, my money is my own. What I choose to share with you, I hope you’ll be grateful for.” Naturally, no decent guy would say things like that out loud to the woman who is having his baby. But actions speak far louder than words, and so does inaction. (From the article: Dave Letterman: Be a Man, Get a Wife -By Maggie Gallagher, January, 2004- sent by Smart Marriages Monday, 2/02/04)

God designed sex for oneness in marriage. …He designed it as a means of intimate communication between a man and a woman who have committed themselves to each other for life. In any other context, the purpose of sex gets twisted. (Sexual Intimacy in Marriage” by William Cutrer, MD and Sandra Glahn)

Chip Ingram – Why Conflict is a GOOD Thing (pt 1)

Adrian Rogers – [1/3] How to Cultivate a Marriage

Weekend to Remember “Getaway” Half Price Discount

May 27, 2011 – 12:05 am Categories: Adrian Rogers | Post a comment

Will Maria Shriver’s marriage survive Arnold Schwarzenegger’s admission of infidelity? I hope so (Part 16)

The private driveway to former California Governor ...
 The private driveway to former California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger’s home is seen in Brentwood, Los Angeles, California May 17, 2011. Schwarzenegger,newly estranged from his wife of 25 years and seeking to resume his Hollywood career, has acknowledged fathering a child more than a decade ago with a member of his household staff
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File photo of California Governor Schwarzenegger, ...

California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger

California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, his son Christopher, 9, and his wife Maria Shriver hold hands as they walk to their vehicle after voting inthe U.S. midterm elections at the Crestwood Hills Recreation Center in Los Angeles, California, in this November 7, 2006 file photo. Former California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger has acknowledged that he fathered a child more than ten years ago with a member of his household staff, the Los Angeles Times reported on May 17, 2011. REUTERS/Danny Moloshok/Files

Schwarzenegger fathers a love child

Maria Shriver Asks – How Do You Handle Transitions in Your Life?

Arnold Schwarzenegger admitted to his wife several months ago that he had fathered a child about 10 years ago with a member of their household staff. Maria moved out, but has not filed for divorce. In the you tube clip above she comments:

“Like a lot of you I’m in transition: people come up to me all the time, asking, what are you doing next?” she said, adding: “It’s so stressful to not know what you are doing next when people ask what you are doing and they can’t believe you don’t know what you are doing.”

“I’d like to hear from other people who are in transition,” she said. “How did you find your transition: Personal, professional, emotional, spiritual, financial? How did you get through it?”

Mrs. Shriver has asked for spiritual input and I personally think that unless she gets the spiritual help that she needs then she will end up in the divorce court. I am starting a series on how a marriage can survive an infidelity. My first suggestion would be to attend a “Weekend to Remember” put on by the organization “Family Life” out of Little Rock, Arkansas. I actually posted this as a response to Mrs. Shriver’s request on you tube.

I got a lot out of a recent article that I read the other day and I wanted to  share it with you. Below is the article, “Can One Weekend Really Change a Marriage?:We were pretty close to the end if we didn’t do something,”by Briana Brunner:

Last year, my husband, Mark, and I were not getting along well. We had been in and out of counseling, and it seemed like we were always going over the same problems.

June and lamar sims

Mark and Briana Brunner

That all began to change in November 2007 when I happened to hear about the Weekend to Remember® marriage conference while listening to a local radio station. I told Mark that we needed to go to it. At first he kind of fought me on it. I told him that we didn’t have a choice and said, “I’m signing us up. We are going.”

Until then, I don’t think Mark had really admitted to himself that we were pretty close to the end if we didn’t do something. I had been through one divorce and didn’t want the kids to have to go through that again.

Things didn’t begin well for our Weekend to Remember. Mark and I had an argument as we drove to the conference, and we really didn’t like each other when stepped into the ballroom. Only God could have turned that evening into a weekend that transformed our marriage, our lives, our family … forever.

A turning point

The conference was an eye-opener for Mark and me as we heard God’s purpose and plan for marriage. One phrase that struck us both very powerfully was, “My spouse is not my enemy. My spouse is a gift given to me by God.”  I think grasping that truth was a turning point for both of us. 

It was neat to see couples who on Friday night were just bodies sitting by one another transform into lovers on Sunday. They sat with their arms entwined around each other and hands clasped.  Mark and I were among those couples.

Today we still use a lot of what we learned at the Weekend to Remember. One of the biggest changes is that neither one of us ever mentions the word divorce any more. We made a commitment to never threaten divorce because we love each other—and it’s not even a consideration when things don’t seem so bright.

Remembering that “My mate is not my enemy,” has also been huge for us. If we are in an argument one or the other one will say (depending on who is more upset), “I’m not the enemy, I love you. I’m your spouse.” Those words always remind me that whatever we’re disagreeing about is temporary. It instantly makes me tone it down to a level where Mark and I can calmly talk.

We’re also much better about listening to one another. Now we sit back and let each other finish a sentence instead of instantly getting mad and trying to jump in to defend ourselves or blame the other person. We’ve learned to listen and really try to hear what’s being said and not what we think someone means.

Nine times out of ten our arguments have come from one of us misinterpreting what the other one was trying to say. Sometimes one of us will now say, “Hey, that’s not what I meant.”

Mark and I work together and that can be very trying at times. In the past, when things didn’t go right, we blamed each other. Now, if Mark or I start to point fingers and say something is “your” fault, the other will say what we learned at the Weekend to Remember, “This isn’t about blaming each other. It’s not a you or a me problem. It’s just a conflict that needs to be resolved.” And that’s really helped quite a bit.

The weekend taught us huge things about dealing with conflict in front of the kids. We learned that it’s okay for them to notice that we’re not exactly happy with each other. But today we say, “We need to go talk for a few minutes and when we are all done talking things will be fine, but we just need to talk by ourselves.”

The older kids have noticed a difference in the way we communicate. It’s really funny because if they see things getting a little tense once in a while they say, “Remember what you guys learned [at the Weekend to Remember].”

The most important change

As wonderful as these changes are, the most important thing that happened at the Weekend to Remember was that Mark and I prayed and invited Jesus Christ into our lives. That was really powerful for both of us.

I had heard people in our business talk about finding God and I wondered, What are they talking about? I can’t really explain what happened at the conference spiritually, but it was like an “Aha!” moment, and I finally understood what finding God meant.

Having Christ at the center of our lives and marriage has been huge. When we are having difficulties I will pray, “Lord, I can’t do this on my own. Will you help me to get over this?”

Today Mark is much more open about talking about God with me, our kids, and others. I have seen him say to people, “I’ll pray about this.” I had never seen that side of him before.

When I first heard about the Weekend to Remember and read some of the testimonials about the conference, I wondered how one weekend could really change marriages that were so close to ending. I no longer have to wonder. Mark and I just have to look in the mirror and remember what God did in our lives and legacy.

Benefits of Attending a Weekend to Remember

May 27, 2011 – 12:02 am Categories: Current Events | Post a comment

Vermont moving to single payer healthcare system (Free Market response part 1)

Reuters reported today: 

BRATTLEBORO, Vermont — Vermont became the first state to lay the groundwork for single-payer health care on Thursday when its governor signed an ambitious bill aimed at establishing universal insurance coverage for all residents.

“This law recognizes an economic and fiscal imperative,” Democratic Governor Peter Shumlin said as he signed the bill into law at the State House.

“We must control the growth in health care costs that are putting families at economic risk and making it harder for small employers to do business.”

Legislators say the plan, approved by the Democratic controlled House and Senate this spring, aims to extend coverage to all 620,000 residents while containing soaring health care costs.

A key component establishes a state health benefits exchange, as mandated by new federal health care laws, that will offer coverage from private insurers, state-sponsored and multi-state plans. It also will include tax credits to make premiums affordable for uninsured Vermonters.

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I would like to respond the idea of a single payer healthcare system by quoting from David Hogberg’s article “Free Market Cure – The Myths of Single-Payer Health Care.” He notes:

A single-payer health care system is one in which a single-entity — the government — collects almost all of the revenue for and pays almost all of the bills for the health care system. In most single-payer systems only a small percentage of health care expenses are paid for with private funds. Countries that have a single-payer system include Australia, Canada, Sweden and the United Kingdom.

Single-payer is popular among the political left in the United States. Leftists have emitted tons of propaganda in favor of a single-payer system, much of which has fossilized into myth.

Here are some of the more prominent single-payer myths:

Myth No. 1: Everyone has access to health care a single-payer system.

Everyone in a single-payer system has health insurance, not necessarily health care.

While the government in a single-payer system will pay for everyone’s health care, it limits the access to health care. In a single-payer system, citizens often believe that “the government” is paying for their health care. When people perceive that someone else is paying for something, they tend to over-use it. In a single-payer health care system, people over-use health care. This puts strain on government health care budgets, and to contain costs governments must ration care.

Governments in a single-payer system ration care using waiting lists for surgery and diagnostic procedures and by canceling surgeries. As the Canadian Supreme Court said upon ruling unconstitutional a Quebec law that banned private health care, “access to a waiting list is not access to health care.

May 26, 2011 – 11:43 pm Categories: Healthcare | Post a comment

Bill Clinton: Warned Democrats not to shy away from tackling entitlement programs (Part 1)

Paul Ryan meets Bill Clinton

Clinton tells Ryan that he’s glad Dems won the New York congressional race this week, but he’s afraid that Dems will never do the right thing on Medicare as a result. Amazing truth telling.

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CNN Money reported yesterday:

 Bill Clinton had a word of warning on Wednesday for fellow Democrats: Don’t get too cocky about voters’ rejection of Paul Ryan’s Medicare plan.

In a special election for a vacant House seat on Tuesday, a Democrat candidate upset a Republican in a GOP-stronghold in upstate New York.

The race was widely seen as a proxy on Ryan’s controversial Republican proposal plan to convert Medicare into a voucher program.

Clinton, speaking at a fiscal summit sponsored by the Peter G. Peterson Foundation, said the race showed that voters don’t like the Republican plan.

But he also told Democrats not to shy away from tackling entitlement programs.

“You shouldn’t look at the New York race and think that nobody can do anything to slow Medicare costs,” Clinton said.

House budget chief Ryan’s proposal would convert Medicare — the health care program for seniors — into a voucher program in 2022. Seniors would choose from a Medicare-approved list of private insurance plans. Wealthier seniors would pay more and poorer seniors would get federal subsidies.

Ryan, who spoke after Clinton at the summit, wasn’t asked directly about the New York race. But he did accuse Democrats of trying to use Medicare to scare seniors.

“Democrats are shamelessly demagoging and distorting this,” Ryan said. “Trying to scare seniors and (making) these things as political weapons creates political paralysis,” he said.

 Fmr President Clinton: Cannot Have Health Care to Devour Economy

Former President Bill Clinton chastised fellow Democrats today for employing scare tactics while on the campaign trail. Clinton also commented on House Budget Committee Chair Paul Ryan’s Medicare plan, saying that although it may not be the best proposal, “you cannot have health care devour the economy.”

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Republicans Voted to End Medicare: How Will You Pay?

May 26, 2011 – 2:33 pm Categories: Bill Clinton | Comments (2)

Andrew Breitbart spoke to Little Rock, Arkansas group May 25, 2011 (Part 2, video clips )

Andrew Breibart spoke in Little Rock on May 25, 2011 to a packed room.

The second monthly luncheon with featured speaker Andrew Breitbart was excellent. (Check out the Tolbert Report for more coverage of this event.)

First, we got to hear from Dave Elswick of KARN   who came up with the idea of this luncheon, and then from Teresa Crossland of Americans for Prosperity. Here are some video clips.

Andrew Breitbart in Arkansas Breitbart talks about the Clintons.wmv

Conservative film activist Andrew Breitbart spoke in Little Rock on Wednseday May 25th at the Hilton Hotel. The room was packed with conservative activist and Tea Party members. Breitbart talked about dealing with the liberal media and how the left indoctrinate the public on so many levels. Americans for Prosperity hosted the event.

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Andrew Breitbart in Arkansas Media destroying our culture.wmv

Andrew Breitbart chatting before the speech starts.wmv

Andrew Breitbart on 2012 GOP Presidential Candidates (from Tolbert Report)

Concerning the above clip Jason Tolbert wrote:

Brietbart also offered his thought on the current Republican Presidential candidate pointing at that it is still very early and we still need to get to know the candidate better and hopes more candidates get in the race. He pointed specifically to Rep. Thaddeus McCotter of Michigan, Herman Cain who has announced and is now “being taken seriously by the grassroots,”  and Rep. Allen West of Florida.

“I don’t want the Republican establishment to think that it has the ability after all its year of ineptitude, that it thinks it is going to come in and give us another John McCain or give us another Bob Dole or give us the inferior product.”

He said the he appears in Sarah Palin’s upcoming movie defending her because she is being attacked by what he called “the Democrat media complex” because of her ability to connect with conservatives. He also blames Republicans for “kicking her when she down” following the criticism against her after the Tucson shootings.

“When the Republican establishment does not stand up for those that stick their necks out for conservative principles, then the conservative establishment has become worthless,” said Breitbart

May 26, 2011 – 2:10 pm Categories: Current Events, Jason Tolbert | Post a comment

230 people still missing after Joplin tornado

 

Volunteer firefighters William Jackson, left, ...

Volunteer firefighters William Jackson

Volunteer firefighters William Jackson, left, and Ashley Martin, center, from Oklahoma, and Johnny Ward of Joplin look through the wreckage of a home whereit was feared a pregnant woman as feared to be trapped following a tornado in Joplin, Mo., Sunday, May 22, 2011. A large tornado moved through much of the city, damaging a hospital and hundreds of homes and businesses. The three did not find anyone during their search.

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CBS News reported today:

Missouri’s government announced Thursday that more than 230 people are still unaccounted for after a powerful tornado hit the southwestern city of Joplin Sunday.

 

Andrea Spillars, deputy director of the state’s Department of Public Safety, told reporters in a morning news conference that 232 people are missing. She urged survivors to check in. 

“Our goal is to get that number to zero,” Spillars said of the missing. “We will dedicate as much state resources as needed around the clock to ensure those family who have loved ones that they cannot find are connected.” 

But Spillars also said officials know some of the people on the missing list are dead. She wouldn’t say how many or say when names of the deceased would be released. 

One example of the potential overlap: 12 residents of the Greenbriar Nursing Home are listed as missing. But nursing home administrators reported earlier that 11 people died in the tornado; only one resident was known missing. 

Officials said previously they believe people who are unaccounted for aren’t necessarily dead or trapped in debris. They say many are probably safe and but failed to tell friends and family where they are. Cell phone service in Joplin remains spotty. Officials released a list naming all of the missing people soon after the press conference. 

The death toll rose Wednesday to 125 people, not all of them identified, and officials have estimated more than 900 were injured. 

Some families have complained about not being allowed into the morgue to try to identify missing relatives. Asked about that Thursday, Don Bloom, the deputy commander for family assistance for the mortuary team, said “the process has to take it’s time. We have to be 100 percent accurate.” 

Search-and-rescue teams have made multiple sweeps through the destruction, using dozens of dogs and listening devices in hopes of picking up the faint sound of anyone still alive beneath the collapsed homes and businesses. No new survivors have been pulled from the rubble since Tuesday. 

The list of the missing was checked against shelter populations, the Safe and Well list run by the American Red Cross, federal agencies, lists of hospital patients, ambulance logs and cell phone companies, Spillars said. 

An increasingly desperate group of people in Joplin are pleading for help in tracking down one of the dwindling number of people still missing in the wake of Sunday’s storm, which leveled much of the southwest Missouri city and now ranks as the nation’s single deadliest tornado since the National Weather Service started keeping records. 

They’re scrawling signs in wreckage, calling in by the hundreds to local radio stations and posting on the Internet. They are inspiring city officials to continue search and rescue efforts, yet there is no talk yet of recovery. 

“I am hopeful,” Joplin Fire Chief Mitch Randles said. “We’ve had stories from earthquakes and tsunamis and other disasters of people being found two or three weeks later, and we are hopeful we’ll have a story like that to tell.” 

Randles and others leading the search effort say it’s impossible to know exactly how many people are truly missing, since many may have simply left the area without getting in touch with their families. They believe most will be OK. 

Amid that confusion, away from formal grid searches in the debris fields, children are looking for their parents and friends are searching for neighbors in any way they can. 

With erratic cell phone service throughout Joplin and travel hindered by damaged cars and blocked streets, many residents have turned to local radio stations as a hub of information, sifting through around-the-clock reports of missing family members. 

The Zimmer Radio Group, which operates seven radio stations in Joplin, abandoned its various music formats for 24-hour tornado coverage starting late Sunday afternoon. Newscaster Chad Elliot, whose home was destroyed, slept in his office when he wasn’t on the air. His dog Rusty barked loudly behind a closed door. 

“I thought we were going to do a normal severe weather broadcast,” he said. “Obviously, that’s not the case.” 

Calls flowed in — hundreds of them — from people looking for displaced loved ones, or calling in to say they were OK. By Wednesday, reports of missing friends and relatives were decreasing, replaced by updates of successful, tearful reunions. 

“Folks wondering about Larry Allen, who was living near the Stained Glass Theater, he is fine,” an announcer said Wednesday afternoon. “He’s staying with friends.”

 Another listener reported, “I want everyone to know that Alice DuBois, 94 years old, is alive and well. We hadn’t heard from her until yesterday afternoon. We thank everyone for their thoughts and prayers.” 

Pleas were rampant on social networks. 

“This little boy was taken to Memorial Hall,” one poster wrote next to a picture posted on KRGZ-FM’s Facebook page. “His name is David and all he know’s is that his mother’s name is Crystal and his brother is Zachary. He was airlifted to Tulsa. Please help find his mom.” 

Other cries for help were low-tech: A tornado-battered pickup truck was spray-painted with the message, “Looking 4 Zachary Williams Age 12,” along with a phone number. 

At the Red Cross shelter at Missouri Southern State University, a steady stream of people visited a table where Bill Benson took down the names of people for a “safe and well” database. Some people entered their names; others hoped to find the name of their loved ones in the database. 

Benson has seen parents looking for missing children, saying “we had one where a 17-month-old infant was lost.” He contacted police and had not heard if the child was found. But more people have come to Benson searching for seniors — more than 100 were listed as missing Wednesday. 

At Freeman Hospital, Karen Mitchell waited Wednesday hoping for word on her missing son, Robert Bateson, or her grandson, Abe Khoury. Khoury was found and taken to Freeman, where he was in critical condition. But Mitchell and her family continued to search for Bateson. 

When she arrived in Joplin on Tuesday, Mitchell walked through the wreckage of her son’s apartment building. She recognized his mattress sitting in a pile. Her family continued to post Bateson’s information online. She prayed for a miracle. 

“I am waiting on God to tell me where he’s at,” she said. “God is going to take him to me.” 

Kathy Watson, a marketing team member and front desk volunteer at Freeman, said the hospital was deluged with calls and visits from searchers, sometimes in vain. 

“You want to be able to say, ‘Not only do we have your loved one, but they’re fine,’ but you can’t say that,” Watson said. 

Mike Hare has scoured the ravaged neighborhood where his 16-year-old son Lantz was seen last. He’s called hospitals from Dallas to Kansas City and taken dozens of calls offering advice, prayers and hopeful tips. 

None of the calls came from Lantz. None offered any hope he might still be alive.

 Hare has been looking for his son since Sunday. 

“We know he’s hurt somewhere,” Hare said Wednesday, his voice breaking. “We just can’t sit and keep calling. You’ve got to be moving.” 

The evening of the tornado, Lantz Hare was driving with a friend who said the two tried to take cover in the parking lot of a grocery store. The tornado shattered the windows and crumpled the car, and Mike Hare found Lantz’s backpack in the wreckage. 

He said he would keep searching until he found his son, dead or alive. 

“If you look at the ground, life will pass you by,” he said. “I won’t let life pass me by.”

Joplin Missouri Tornado – Hospital Destroyed – 5/22/2011

All posts dealing with Joplin Tornado

Best Storm Chaser videos of Joplin Tornado May 22, 2011

Destructive Joplin Missouri Torando On May 22, 2011 a destructive and sadly a deadly tornado tore through the town of Joplin, MO. Here is video of the tornado entering the southwest side of town. Filmed by TornadoVideos.net Basehunters Colt Forney, Isaac Pato, Kevin Rolfs, and Scott Peake. Good Morning America: Joplin, Missouri Tornado Video: Storm […]

Pictures of Tornado damage in Joplin, MO May 22, 2011

  Destroyed helicopter lies on its side A destroyed helicopter lies on its side in the parking lot of the Joplin Regional Medical Center in Joplin, Mo., Sunday, May 22, 2011. A large tornadomoved through much of the city, damaging the hospital and hundreds of homes and businesses Emergency personnel walk Emergency personnel walk through […]

Video clips of tornado in Joplin,MO May 22, 2011(includes footage from the air, and storm chaser video)

 The last video listed does not have very good pictures but you hear when the tornado hits a building where people inside are filming. The sounds are just horrible and a cold feeling went through my body just listening to it. Joplin, Missouri tornado damage from the air Tornado damage of Joplin, Missouri. Aerial coverage […]

At least 89 dead, but still counting in Joplin, MO

    Volunteer firefighters William Jackson Volunteer firefighters William Jackson, left, and Ashley Martin, center, from Oklahoma, and Johnny Ward of Joplin look through the wreckage of a home whereit was feared a pregnant woman as feared to be trapped following a tornado in Joplin, Mo., Sunday, May 22, 2011. A large tornado moved through […]

Fox News reported today:   Rescue crews dug through piles of splintered houses and crushed cars Monday in a search for victims of a half-mile-wide tornado that blasted much of this Missouri town off the map and slammed straight into its hospital. At least 116 people died, making it the nation’s deadliest single tornado in nearly […]

May 26, 2011 – 1:23 pm Categories: Current Events | Post a comment

John Brummett :Are public forums on redistricting a sham without Democratic maps provided? Will there be lots of little Fayetteville Fingers? (Part 24)

Governor Schwarzenegger Pumps GERRYMANDERING on Leno

Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger on Jay Leno promoting GERRYMANDERING, which will hit theaters later this year.

“An exceptionally entertaining film!” – New York Magazine

“Snappy, engaging…succeeds in holding one’s attention the way a good thriller does. It is cinematic – in the best way – all the way through.” – Screen

http://www.gerrymanderingmovie.com
www.endgerrymandering.com

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John Brummett in his article, “It’s a ‘little-bitty controversy,” Arkansas News Bureau, May 26, 2011 noted:
It is the job of state political party operatives to be ridiculous and to seek to make mindless partisan points out of the most common or routine matter.
The staff at the Arkansas Republican Party’s headquarters is, sure enough, doing its job.
On Tuesday the GOP’s hyperactive public information people issued a news release essentially alleging that Gov. Mike Beebe and Attorney General Dustin McDaniel, being Democrats who will compose two-thirds of the board that must redraw state legislative districts, might very well behave as partisan Democrats in their execution of this constitutional responsibility.
What might be the basis of this … well, I started to say “charge,” but will go instead with “belaboring of the painfully obvious?”
It is that neither Beebe nor McDaniel has released any of the redistricting maps that they surely already have prepared without the courtesy of conferring with the third member… Republican secretary of state, Mark Martin.
It is that Beebe and McDaniel are supposedly making a mockery of the public hearing process now being undertaken by seeking pointless public comments with no plan on the table for any context.The eventual issue here — the one to which I alluded by invoking potential little-bitty Fayetteville Fingers — is whether Beebe and McDaniel can be sufficiently deft and subtle. The Fayetteville Finger was a brazen overreach, the mapping of which revealed its own heavy-handedness.
So let us take a few deep breaths and wait for Beebe and McDaniel to show us what they have in the desk drawer. Brazen overreaching and heavy-handedness — those, if evident, will be cause for Republican whining. Even a left-leaning columnist would agree.
P.S. — If the state is tilting Republican in the way I think, maps will matter less than moods, anyway
May 26, 2011 – 11:53 am Categories: Uncategorized | Post a comment