Monthly Archives: November 2013

Why I Started This Blog

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I am pretty much the average news junkie. During the early nineties, I realized that a lot of information I was getting from the media was not making sense to me. When the first Iraq war began, I started listening to talk radio and hearing things that I was not hearing anywhere else. As I began to pay attention, I realized that I was not hearing the full story on the news and began to look for other sources of information. As the internet grew, more of those sources became available (without having to subscribe to fifty newspapers and have a pile of paper in your house at all times}. During the 2008 primary campaign, I became very concerned about the things I was reading versus the things the news was reporting. I began this blog. Last Thursday, Newsbusters posted a story that convinced me that I need to keep blogging for as long as it takes for everyone to evaluate carefully what they hear on the news from the mainstream media or on the internet.

The headline in the article in Newsbusters is,”ABC, CBS Notice Obama’s ‘Lowest Ever’ Approval Rating; NBC Out to Lunch.”

The article reports:

On Tuesday, ABC’s World News and CBS Evening News both reported the latest poll numbers from the “respected” Quinnipiac University, as CBS’s Scott Pelley labeled the institution, regarding President Obama’s “lowest ever” approval rating, along with Americans’ dim view of the politician’s honesty. ABC’s Diane Sawyer noted that “for the first time in his presidency, a majority of American voters – 52 percent…say President Obama is not honest and trustworthy.”

The fact that 52 percent of Americans think that President Obama is not honest and trustworthy is important. Admittedly, in the past thirty years Americans have lowered their standards in expecting honesty from politicians (although we have sent a few of them to jail), but that is an astonishing number that we as voters need to be aware of.

Please follow the link above and read the entire article. All of us (including me) need to be better informed.

 

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When Your Lobbyists Just Don’t Do Their Job

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Yesterday the Washington Examiner posted an article yesterday about a change in the United States renewable fuel policy.

The article reports:

But the EPA officially proposed cutting the renewable fuel target for 2014 to 15.21 billion gallons — down from 16.65 billion gallons this year and a scheduled 18.21 billion gallons for next year.

…”It clearly caught folks by surprise,” said Michael McAdams, president of the Advanced Biofuels Association.

The biofuel industry felt it didn’t have to worry about the White House, sensing it had several key allies in the Obama administration.

The Obama Administration doesn’t even seem to be consistent in its cronyism. They have alienated their friends and their foes on numerous occasions. The EPA justified the decrease by saying that the demand for gasoline is lower because cars are becoming more efficient.

Ethanol has resulted in higher food prices around the world, damage to boat engines, more expensive gasoline, and higher environmental damage in its refining. This is not a product we want to see more of. Carbon-based fuels do work better, and America is beginning to use its own carbon-based resources.

 

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Why In The World Should We Support These People???

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Today’s New York Post posted an article about a recent beheading by the Syrian rebels.

The article reports:

A group of Al Qaeda-linked Syrian rebels beheaded a fighter then triumphantly waved his head in the air as a trophy — only to discover the poor guy was actually one of their own, London’s The Telegraph reports.

…The rebel group apologized for the gruesome case of mistaken identity on Thursday , asking for “understanding and forgiveness.”

There was no remorse at all about beheading someone–the remorse was that they beheaded one of their own. Is this the level of civilization that we need to encourage or fund?

 

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Forward Progress Is Hard When Members Of The Team Are Pulling In Opposite Directions

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Today the Washington Free Beacon reported that Russia is helping Iran build a second  nuclear power plant. Iran claims that the plant will be used to generate electricity, but the plant will also give Iran access to plutonium, which could be used to fuel a nuclear weapon. Meanwhile, Congress is trying to put new economic sanctions on Iran, and the White House is blocking them.

The article reports:

However, the White House continues to pressure lawmakers to hold off on passing a new round of sanctions, arguing that they would likely spark a war with Iran.

Democrats and Republicans balked at this assessment during a congressional hearing on Wednesday, saying that sanctions are the only way to rein in Tehran’s ongoing nuclear work.

“Sanctions have forced Iran to the table and we should build upon this success with additional measures,” House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Ed Royce (R., Calif.) said during a hearing to assess Iranian President Hassan Rouhani’s first 100 days in office.

“The Iranian regime hasn’t paused its nuke program,” Royce said. “Why should we pause our sanctions efforts as the admin is pressuring Congress to do?”

The sanctions on Iran have had a major impact on the Iranian economy. On October 8, 2013, the Washington Free Beacon reported:

The Iranian economy is just 18 months away from collapse according to Israeli intelligence minister Yuval Steinitz.

Steinitz, speaking at a conference Monday at the Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies, said that international sanctions have effectively caused major damage to Iran’s economy.

It is no wonder that Iran is willing to negotiate to save its economy. What Iran is not willing to negotiate is the continuation of its nuclear program. We need to remember that.

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Protecting Religious Liberty

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Yesterday CNS News reported that the U.S. Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals has ruled that both the owners of a company and their company have religious liberty rights that are burdened by the HHS mandate.

The article reports:

The (American Center for Law and Justice ACLJ) represents Korte & Luitjohan Contractors, Inc., a family owned, full-service construction contractor located in Highland, Illinois. The company provides a group health insurance plan for its non-union employees, which number about 20. Cyril B. Korte and Jane E. Korte own a controlling interest in the company and contend the HHS mandate violates their Catholic faith. The ACLJ filed a federal lawsuit on behalf of both the individuals and the company in October 2012.
Below is an excerpt from the ruling:

We hold that the plaintiffs–the business  owners and their companies — may challenge the mandate. We further hold that compelling them to cover these services substantially burdens their religious-exercise rights.

Under RFRA the government must justify the burden under the standard of strict scutiny. So far it has not done so, and we doubt that it can.

Because the RFRA claims are very likely to succeed and the balance of harms favors protecting the religious-liberty rights of the plaintiffs, we reverse and remand with instructions to enter preliminary injunctions barring enforcement of the mandate against them.

This decision is good news for those attempting to preserve religious freedom in America.

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Honesty In ObamaCare???

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Yesterday, John Fund posted an article at the National Review featuring some recent undercover videos produced by James O’Keefe. These videos include quotes from ObamaCare navigators telling people asking about the cost of their new insurance policies to lie about their income.

The article reports:

“You lie because your premiums will be higher,” one navigator advises an investigator for O’Keefe’s Project Veritas, who tells the worker he sometimes smokes. “Don’t tell them that. Don’t tell ’em.”

The investigator then poses as a low-income worker at a university who has unreported cash income on the side, worrying about how that might affect his premium subsidies. That’s no problem for a navigator, who says, “Don’t get yourself in trouble by declaring it now.”

“Yeah, it didn’t happen,” another navigator says. One more chimes in: “Never report it.”

Records show that the National Urban League was paid $376,000 by the federal government for its Obamacare outreach in Texas.

John Fund concludes:

The law’s problems are coming from more sides than a pentadecagon. But one of the most serious things undermining its credibility is the Obama administraion’s seemingly complete indifference to corruption within one of the key groups tasked with its implementation. We’ll have to see just how much worse it gets.

Where do the problems end?

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This Is No Way To Fund Pet Projects

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Yesterday The New York Post reported that money will be taken out of the food stamp program to fund Michelle Obama’s pet project, Let’s Move.

The article reports:

On Nov. 1, sizable cuts were gouged into the federal food-stamp program (or, as it’s now called, SNAP, Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program), which feeds 47.6 million people, or nearly one in six Americans. In the city, 1.9 million folks get the bulk of their Jell-O and Campbell’s Soup from stamps.

But news has spread among the poor, like leafy green vegetables, that it wasn’t heartless Republicans who triggered the cuts.

Rather, some of the food-stamp cash was snatched to pay for Michelle Obama’s pet project, Let’s Move. What?

It’s come to this. Some 76 million meals a year will vanish from this city — poof! — partly because the president diverted money from SNAP to the first lady’s signature program, part of her Let’s Move anti-obesity initiative — the bean-sprout-heavy, $4.5 billion Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act.

This project will not create healthy, hunger-free kids. Instead it will create more hungry kids. Another problem with the Let’s Move project is that the school children don’t like Michelle Obama’s healthy lunches. It seems to me that it would be a good idea to mix healthy lunches with things children like to eat for a successful program. However, in no way is it appropriate to take money away from a program that provides children with meals at home that they will eat and invest that money into lunches they will not eat at school.

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Is There Any Part Of This Plan That Will Improve Healthcare?

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My husband and I are in the process of moving, which is why posts have been rather erratic lately. In the process of getting everything done, I had a chance to listen to Rush Limbaugh today. He made some very interesting points about ObamaCare. In his comments, Rush Limbaugh mentioned a Forbes article written by Steven Hayward predicting that even if the ObamaCare website is repaired, ObamaCare will be repealed before the 2014 election.

The article states:

Senate Democrats endangered for re-election will lead the charge for repeal perhaps as soon as January, after they get an earful over the Christmas break.  They’ll call it “reform,” and clothe it in calls for delaying the individual mandate and allowing people and businesses to keep their existing health insurance policies.  But it is probably too late to go back in many cases.  With the political damage guaranteed to continue, the momentum toward repeal will be unstoppable.  Democrats will not want to face the voters next November with the albatross of Obamacare.

Rush Limbaugh pointed out some basic facts about this “reform.” He pointed out that if healthy people do not sign up for ObamaCare and pay the higher premiums, there will be no way to pay for healthcare for sick people and the whole system will collapse. The Democrats will probably attempt to solve the problem by offering subsidies to middle class families. America cannot afford to do that–we are already running unsustainable deficits, but the Democrats won’t care about that–they simply will be looking for a way to be re-elected.

Meanwhile, the Western Center for Journalism reported the following:

Lisa Martinson called customer service after she forgot her password. That’s when she was told that three different people were given the password to her account, her address, and her Social Security number. Then she was told it would take up to five days to get her personal information offline.
Please follow the link to the article to watch a short video of her story.
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It’s Not The Unemployment Numbers–It’s The Number Of People Who Have Dropped Out Of The Labor Force

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Today’s Daily Caller reported that the percentage of Americans in the labor force has reached a record low–62.8 percent. According to the article, a record high 91,541,000 Americans did not participate in the labor force this October. Since January 2009, more than 11 million people have dropped out of the labor force.
The article concludes:

The economic blog Zero Hedge notes that at the current rate, the number of people not participating in the labor force could exceed those working in about four years.

This is unlike any economic recovery from a recession we have ever had.

The Official Israeli Navy SEALS Association in Stoughton

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Date:November 14th, 2013
Location:
Ahavath Torah Congregation
1179 Central Street
Stoughton, MA

Time: 7:00 PM

Cost:  $10 Donation Suggested.

Event Details:

The Israeli Navy SEALs, also known as the Naval Commandos and Shayetet — or “Shin” — 13, is one of the elite combat units in Israel’s Defense Forces (IDF).  Its insignia is a bat (in Hebrew “Atalef” ) carrying a hand grenade. Its moto: “Like a bat out of the darkness, like a grenade exploding in thunder”.

About Atalef:  

The Atalef Foundation is dedicated to supporting the SEALs during their demanding regular and reserve military service, and to supporting them during their re-entry to civilian society. It is also committed to helping the SEALs realize their promise to Israeli society by encouraging and assisting each of them to contribute to society the unique skills and talents that they exhibited and acquired during their years of military service.

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A Post From The Gates Of Vienna Website

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Yesterday was the 75th anniversary of Kristallnacht. The following commentary was taken from the Gates of Vienna website. I am not going to comment on it, it speaks for itself:

What made the Nazi Holocaust possible? Gun control

The Night of the Broken Glass, the Nazi pogrom against Germany’s Jews [occurred] on Nov. 9-10, 1938. Historians have documented most everything about it except what made it so easy to attack the defenseless Jews without fear of resistance. Their guns were registered and thus easily confiscated.

To illustrate, turn the clock back further and focus on just one victim, a renowned German athlete.

Alfred Flatow won first place in gymnastics at the 1896 Olympics. In 1932, he dutifully registered three handguns, as required by a decree of the liberal Weimar Republic. The decree also provided that in times of unrest, the guns could be confiscated. The government gullibly neglected to consider that only law-abiding citizens would register, while political extremists and criminals would not. However, it did warn that the gun-registration records must be carefully stored so they would not fall into the hands of extremists.

The ultimate extremist group, led by Adolf Hitler, seized power just a year later, in 1933. The Nazis immediately used the firearms-registration records to identify, disarm and attack “enemies of the state,” a euphemism for Social Democrats and other political opponents of all types. Police conducted search-and-seizure operations for guns and “subversive” literature in Jewish communities and working-class neighborhoods.

Jews were increasingly deprived of more and more rights of citizenship in the coming years. The Gestapo cautioned the police that it would endanger public safety to issue gun permits to Jews. Hitler faked a show of tolerance for the 1936 Olympics in Berlin, but Flatow refused to attend the reunion there of former champions. He was Jewish and would not endorse the farce.

By fall of 1938, the Nazis were ratcheting up measures to expropriate the assets of Jews. To ensure that they had no means of resistance, the Jews were ordered to surrender their firearms.

Flatow walked into a Berlin police station to comply with the command and was arrested on the spot, as were other Jews standing in line. The arrest report confirmed that his pistols were duly registered…

…which was obviously how the police knew he had them. While no law prohibited a Jew from owning guns, the report recited the Nazi mantra: “Jews in possession of weapons are a danger to the German people.” Despite his compliance, Flatow was turned over to the Gestapo.

This scenario took place all over Germany — firearms were confiscated from all Jews registered as gun owners. As this was occurring, a wholly irrelevant event provided just the excuse needed to launch a violent attack on the Jewish community: A Polish teenager who was Jewish shot a German diplomat in Paris. The stage was set to instigate Kristallnacht, a carefully orchestrated Nazi onslaught against the entire Jewish community in Germany that horrified the world and even the German public.

Kristallnacht has been called “the day the Holocaust began.” Flatow’s footsteps can be followed to see why. He would be required to wear the Star of David. In 1942, he was deported to the Theresienstadt concentration camp, where he starved to death.

One wonders what thoughts may have occurred to Flatow in his last days. Perhaps memories of the Olympics and of a better Germany flashed before his eyes. Did he have second thoughts about whether he should have registered his guns in 1932? …

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The Impact Of Voter Identification Laws On Voter Turnout

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Yesterday National Review posted an article about the impact of voter ID laws on a recent election in Texas. The article quotes a a New York Times headline Thursday stating: “Texas’ Stringent Voter ID Law Makes a Dent at the Polls.” However, the facts cited in the article in the New York Times does not seem to support the headline.

There are four so-called victims of the voter ID law named in the article, but all of them were given the right to vote.

The article at National Review further quotes the New York Times article:

It does, however, note, “Officials also said there was little traffic at the offices set up by the state to provide free voter-ID documents for those without another approved form of identification.” So, in other words, the state had conscientiously prepared for the contingency of people needing voter-ID documents, and had set up offices to provide them for free. That’s a good thing, right? And what’s more, it turns out that there was really no problem after all. Contrary to the hysterical claims of those opposing voter-ID requirements, there apparently are not large numbers of Texas voters who lack identification.

The article concludes:

Texas’s secretary of state, who might know something about all this, is quoted belatedly as follows: “This was our first statewide election with a photo ID requirement in place, and it was smooth, secure and successful.” Somehow, that pithy summary was not quite up to snuff for the Times’s headline writer.

Consider the things you have to show identification for. If you want to enter any government building, you have to show identification. If you want to sign up for any government program, you have to show identification. If you want to board an airplane, you have to show identification. Isn’t voting at least as important as those activities?

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We Have Lost The Divide Between Government And Political Organizations

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Breitbart.com reported today that the Obamacare exchange for Washington, D.C. has been using its official Twitter account to tweet out support for Organizing for Action (OFA) materials. OFA is the remnants of the Obama campaign machine.

The article reports:

“Our friends @OFA_DC are looking to hear your experience with #Obamacare. Share your feedback with them,” the official @DCHealthLink Twitter account tweeted earlier this week, with a link to a website survey at my.BarackObama.com—OFA’s website. After filling out the OFA survey, respondents are then prompted with an ask to donate money to the organization.

The official @DCHealthLink Twitter account has also retweeted an OFA tweet praising Obamacare, which as of 4:30 p.m. on Friday has the OFA campaign website’s Twitter account appearing on the homepage of the official Washington, D.C. Obamacare exchange.

The government is coordinating its activities with a political campaign organization. How long will it be before someone in government develops a backbone and puts a stop to this?

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I’m From The Government…

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Michael Graham is a Massachusetts talk show host who writes a blog called “The Natural Truth.” As a resident of Massachusetts, he understands some of the unbelievable things that go on in this state. Today he posted an article entitled, “I’m From The Government And I’m Here To Inspect Your Guns.” No, in Massachusetts that is not a joke .

A Swampscott Massachusetts Board of Selectman member introduced an enforcement discussion Wednesday that he hopes will lead to the safeguarding of guns in town — keeping them out of the hands of children. Keeping guns out of the reach of children is a good idea. However, his methods were unconstitutional. Under the laws of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, gun owners are required to keep their firearms locked away or rendered inoperable. That’s not a bad thing, but the problem is how to enforce the law.

The article states:

If this incredibly bad goose-stepping attack on gun ownership sounds familiar, it should. The state of Washington considered it earlier this year. Then some lawyer read this thing called the Constitution and it went away.

But we’ve never been big on that whole “Bill of Rights” thing here in Kennedy Country. And so the town of Swampscott is going to decide whether or not to send the local cops door-to-door to visit lawful gun owners and, you know, just have a look around.

What could possibly go wrong?

At some point, we need to get back to the U. S. Constitution. We are in danger of losing our most basic rights.

 

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These Are The People Who Will Be In Charge Of ObamaCare

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Every time someone threatens to cut government spending, big government types begin screaming that spending is already cut to the bone. Well, if that is true, why don’t we just cut government waste and fraud?

Today The Blaze posted a story about some recent tax refunds mailed out by the Internal Revenue Service (IRS).

The article reports:

The Internal Revenue Service issued $4 billion in fraudulent tax refunds last year to people using stolen identities, with some of the money going to addresses in Bulgaria, Lithuania and Ireland, according to an inspector general’s report released Thursday.

The IRS sent a total of 655 tax refunds to a single address in Lithuania, and 343 refunds went to a lone address in Shanghai.

Again, 343 payments to one address.

There are certain red flags that result in American taxpayers being audited–a change in giving habits, a drastic change in income, and various other things will set off a flag and result in an audit. Doesn’t the IRS software have the capacity to set off a flag if 343 people have the same address? I realize a large apartment building could easily house 343 people, but wouldn’t they have individual addresses? Shouldn’t that many people at the same address raise a question with someone?

Florida is a prime target for identity theft for the purpose of  tax fraud. The article reports:

Among individual homes, one address in Orlando received 580 tax refunds totaling $870,000 last year, the report said. Another Orlando address received 291 refunds totaling $466,000.

The article reports that the IRS has developed a computer program to deal with the problem of identity theft and false tax returns. Let’s hope it is more secure than the ObamaCare website. Meanwhile, let’s see if we can end enough fraud to help with the budget deficit.

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Celebrate The Season

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This video was posted on YouTube by Kehillah Schechter Academy (www.ksa-ne.org) in Norwood, MA – it’s the official Ballad of Thanksgivukkah. Enjoy.

Happy Thanksgivukkah.

These are the words:

The Ballad of Thanksgivukkah
Rabbi David Paskin, Ayelet Paskin and Dana Reichman Gitell

Imagine Judah Maccabee sitting down to roast turkey
Passing the potatoes to Squanto
And pilgrims in Jerusalem standing with Hasmoneans
Got to get this temple cleaned up pronto

Like applesauce with cranberries, turkey stuffed with fried latkes
It’s clear that this is one heck of a mitzvah
Let’s celebrate this great country, religious minorities
Everybody loves Thanksgivukkah
I had a little turkey(toykey), I named him Macabee
I tried and tried to spin him but I was not lucky

CHORUS
Thanksgivukkah, Thanksgivukkah
Let’s celebrate across America
Thanksgivukkah, Thanksgivukkah
Happy Holidays, Thanksgivukkah!

Nun, Gobble, Hay, Shin
Apple, rhubarb and pumpkin

167 BCE the Has-mo-ne-an dynasty
Was challenged by the lure of Hellenizers
But Greek culture could not compare to spinning tops and Jewish prayer
The miracle of light kept burning brighter

In 1620 pilgrims came across the ocean here to claim
A new land where the Mayflower could dock
At a place we must mention they met native Americans
When they landed here at Plymouth…
Rock of Ages let our song
praise Thy saving power

CHORUS
Thanksgivukkah, Thanksgivukkah
Let’s celebrate across America
Thanksgivukkah, Thanksgivukkah
Happy Holidays, Thanksgivukkah!

I Guess Practicing What You Preach Is Just Not In Style Anymore

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We have heard a lot of Democrats protesting the Citizens United ruling by the Supreme Court and also demanding that all groups making political donations be required to name their donors.

Breitbart.com reported yesterday:

Open Secrets describes “dark money organizations” as “501(c)(4) and 501(c)(6) nonprofits that don’t have to disclose their donors.” Democrats have tried unsuccessfully to pass the DISCLOSE Act, which would “require unions, nonprofits and corporate interest groups that spend $10,000 or more during an election cycle to disclose donors who give $10,000 or more.”

Open Secrets posted two interesting graphs yesterday: saveddarkmoney2

darkmoneyConsidering that the IRS targeted conservative groups and asked them to reveal their donors (which is against the law), I find this graph very interesting. Maybe they were targeting the wrong people.

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Giving Away The Store

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One of the major threats to world peace is the acquisition of nuclear weapons by Iran. Because of that threat, most of the world has agreed to impose economic sanctions against Iran until Iran abandons its nuclear program. Unfortunately, Iran is not likely to do that.

The Daily Beast posted a story revealing that Obama administration began softening sanctions on Iran after the election of Iran’s new president in June.

As I quoted in an article posted on June 17th (rightwinggranny.com):

Ultimate power in Iran rests in any case with Mr. Khamenei and his fellow clerics, who are backed by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, which has expanded its control over business and other parts of society in recent decades. Iran today is best understood as a Shite fascist state with a democratic electoral veneer and ambitions to dominate the region.

Lifting the sanctions on Iran will most surely result in a nuclear Iran.

The article at the Daily Beast reports:

A review of Treasury Department notices reveals that the U.S. government has all but stopped the financial blacklisting of entities and people that help Iran evade international sanctions since the election of its president, Hassan Rouhani, in June.

On Wednesday Obama said in an interview with NBC News the negotiations in Geneva “are not about easing sanctions.” “The negotiations taking place are about how Iran begins to meet its international obligations and provide assurances not just to us but to the entire world,” the president said.

The article goes on to explain the Obama Administration’s justification for loosening the sanctions.

The thing we need to remember about Iran is that ultimately the clerics control Iran. No one gets to be President of the country unless he has shown loyalty to the clerics and the clerics approve. There was an election, but the government of Iran has not changed. The goal of the leaders of Iran is still a world-wide caliphate. We need to consider that fact when we deal with Iran.

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We Knew This Was Coming

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One of the main problems with the programs put forth by the Obama Administration is that they have a way of rewarding friends and punishing enemies. We saw that in the stimulus and we saw that in the green energy programs. Now we are seeing it in ObamaCare.

Breitbart.com is reporting today that President Obama has changed ObamaCare to give a financial break to labor Unions.

The article reports:

The tax, known as the reinsurance fee, requires self-insured organizations, such as unions and some large companies, to pay $63 for each covered member and an additional $63 for each additional family member on a health plan.

The fee was expected to raise $25 billion over three years, with the funds going to insurance companies to offset the cost of covering pre-existing conditions and other mandatory benefits.

Meanwhile, on top of the carnage already hitting millions middle class families in the individual market, there is a coming ObamaCare tax in the employer-based market that’s about to affect millions who are apparently not among the president’s top donors.

We, as voters, are responsible for the leadership we have. Yuck.

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Some Observations On This Week’s Election

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This article is based on three articles, the first posted at Politico yesterday, the second posted at bizpacreview yesterday, and the third posted by Michael Barone at the Washington Examiner yesterday. My focus is on the election in Virginia. Bill Bolling was the preferred candidate for governor of Virginia by many Republicans. A technicality in the way the candidate was chosen resulted in the selection of Ken Cuccinelli. Ken Cuccinelli is a good man, but he was not an ideal candidate.

Politico reported:

The main news stories of the last two weeks of the race were about the botched rollout of the health exchanges and troubling revelations about people getting kicked off their health plans.

Cuccinelli called the off-year election a referendum on Obamacare at every stop during the final days.

“Despite being outspent by an unprecedented $15 million, this race came down to the wire because of Obamacare,” Cuccinelli said in his concession speech Tuesday night.

Bizpacreview reported:

As close as the race was, a report out Tuesday by The Blaze indicates that there were shenanigans at play:

“A major Democratic Party benefactor and Obama campaign bundler helped pay for professional petition circulators responsible for getting Virginia Libertarian gubernatorial candidate Robert C. Sarvis on the ballot.”

According to the report, campaign finance records show that the Libertarian Booster PAC made the largest independent contribution to Sarvis’ campaign.

The Blaze identified Austin, Texas, software billionaire Joe Liemandt as the Libertarian Booster PAC’s major benefactor. He also happens to be a top bundler for President Barack Obama.

Michael Barone observes:

1. The Obamacare rollout fiasco and Obama’s lies hurt Democrats.

2. The government shutdown didn’t much hurt Republicans.

3. Millennials are souring on Democrats.

Some conservative pundits have cited the lack of funding given to Ken Cuccinelli by the Republican party as a problem for conservative candidates. I am not sure whether or not these complaints are valid, but the Democrats outspent the Republicans by almost $15 million. One of the major problems with the election of Terry McAuliffe is what it will mean for the 2016 Presidential election. Terry McAuliffe is a very strong supporter of Hillary Clinton and will be an asset for her in the state of Virginia. However, the good news is that ObamaCare will be a problem for the Democrats in 2014 and possibly in 2016.
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Why ObamaCare Will Not Work For Everyone

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President Obama sold ObamaCare as a program that would provide healthcare for everyone who needed it, improve healthcare and lower cost for those who already had insurance, and generally do wonderful things for the American healthcare system. The Wall Street Journal posted an article yesterday explaining why ObamaCare is potentially a death sentence for Edie Littlefield Sundby. On Monday I posted an article about Ms. Sundby (rightwinggranny.com). Ms. Sundby has been fighting stage-4 gallbladder cancer for seven years. Stage-4 gallbladder cancer has a five-year survival rate of less than 2% after diagnosis. She has survived with the help of good doctors and good health insurance. Under ObamaCare she can no longer keep that insurance or all of her doctors.

Yesterday’s article in the Wall Street Journal explained:

Dan Pfeiffer, President Obama’s chief political spinner, sent out a now infamous tweet on Monday linking to a left-wing website that blamed Mrs. Sundby’s policy loss on UnitedHealthcare. The White House default is always to blame the insurers. But UnitedHealthcare only fled the state because ObamaCare’s subsidized exchanges are meant to steal their customers. As more people are pulled into government coverage, policies like Mrs. Sundby’s are harder to sustain economically, so insurers bail.

…As it imposes these policy cancellations, ObamaCare is also systematically destroying one of the best features of the current individual market, known as “guaranteed renewability at class-average rates.” This meant that once an insurance policy was issued, people could renew their coverage year after year at the same rates as their peer group. So someone like Mrs. Sundby who got sick would not pay higher premiums than average and her insurer could not deny coverage—unless UnitedHealthcare quit the business. This guaranteed renewability is no longer a guarantee thanks to ObamaCare.

…The reason Edie Sundby had to lose her plan is because her needs, and her measure of her own well-being, are different from Mr. Obama’s, and that is now unacceptable.

Healthcare should be a decision made between people and their doctors. The government has no place dictating medical care. If the government wants to provide health insurance and healthcare to Americans without health insurance, it should do that with tax credits–not in a way that disrupts those Americans who already have insurance and doctors they like. We also need to remember that being a profitable company is not a sin–profitable companies employ people and help the economy.

 

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Elections And Laws Have Consequences

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America was promised, “If you like your health care plan, you can keep your health care plan.” Many Americans believed that and were told that the people who were saying it wasn’t true were fear mongering. Well, here we are, ObamaCare is about to be in force, and we have discovered that the warnings were true. There is now a website called MyCancellation.com that shows cancellation letters from health insurance providers to policy holders. In some cases insurance premiums of the people who have received these letters will increase 300 percent.

Meanwhile, many insurance executives have been intimidated to the point that they are afraid to speak up about the damage ObamaCare will do to healthcare in America. Yesterday National Review posted an article about some of the comments health-care consultant Larry Thompson is hearing from insurance company executives.

The article reports:

Thompson predicts that by the end of next year, two phenomena will begin to unfold: first, that insurance companies, taking losses, will begin to remove themselves from the federal exchanges, and second, that wait times for doctors will rise. He even suggests that some of the exchanges may close by 2015. 

The crux of the problem: “Expectations are high, and delivery is going to low. When those two things converge, the law is going to get a pretty bad rap.”

We are only beginning to see the negative impact of ObamaCare.

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The Lies

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On November 1, John Hinderaker at Power Line posted an article entitled, “Lies of ObamaCare, Documented.” The article is a detailed analysis of what Americans were told and what the law actually does.

Here are some highlights:

In the context of announcing its rules, the administration predicted that because of their restrictiveness, many millions of Americans would lose their existing insurance coverage, whether they liked it or not. Further, it has been widely reported (as by CNN, here) that Republicans tried to reverse the administration’s “grandfather” rules so that those who liked their insurance would be allowed to keep it, but Senate Democrats voted them down.

This is a chart showing what was actually predicted:

https://www.rightwinggranny.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/FederalRegister092.jpg

…Those numbers starkly contradict Obama’s “if you like your insurance, you can keep it” assurances. But it is worth noting that the percentage of pre-Obamacare plans that would terminate within the first few years after the law was enacted isn’t the main point. The administration never intended to allow any American to keep a non-Obamacare insurance policy for any length of time.

…Finally, it should be noted that John McCain, now the bete noire of some activists, weighed in powerfully against the administration’s Obamacare rules. Among other things, he pointed out that they do not apply to unions. They can negotiate changes in the pre-Obamacare plans that cover their members without having them terminate. This is one of the weird features of gangster government: the administration passes terrible laws, and then excuses its friends from complying with them.

The article concludes:

As of 2010, it was blindingly obvious–was baldly stated by the Obama administration itself–that under Obamacare, far from being permitted to keep your health care coverage if you like it, most Americans’ policies would speedily be terminated, and all would soon cease to exist. Given the dozens of misrepresentations by Barack Obama and other members of his administration, and given the entirely dishonest basis on which Obamacare was rammed through the Democratic Congress without a single Republican vote, and given that Republicans’ warnings were indisputably coming true–was there not a news story here? How can it be that three more years went by before our one-party media thought to mention what happened back in 2010? One can only imagine how the 2012 election might have been different if the electorate had understood that Obamacare was sold on a scaffold of lies.

Our current media is a danger to Americans’ freedom.

 

 

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A Simple Guide To ObamaCare

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Heritage.org posted an article detailing who is impacted by ObamaCare. The simple answer is everyone, but they posted an detailed list:

If You Have Insurance Through an Employer:  The administration claims that employee-provided coverage will not change–but it will. The administration promises better coverage, but there is a large price tag on that coverage. ObamaCare also requires maternity care for men and for women past child-bearing age. They have to pay for that coverage.

If You Buy Insurance Yourself:  If your insurance is not Obama-compliant, you will lose it. Your new policy will have higher premiums and a smaller network of doctors and hospitals.

If You Qualify for Subsidized Insurance:  Many Americans will be forced to buy insurance plans they do not want subsidized by other taxpayers. The $1.8 trillion spent on exchange plans and Medicaid will be a burden for future taxpayers.

If You Are a Senior Citizen on Medicare:  Half a trillion dollars was taken out of Medicare to fund ObamaCare. The reductions in Medicare spending could cause 15 percent of hospitals to become unprofitable by 2019, and 40 percent to become unprofitable by 2050. That could significantly impact senior citizens access to healthcare.

This really does not sound like a good deal for anyone.

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