Truth in advertising?

What Obama said...

On the campaign trail here is what candidate Barak Obama said:

"We'll negotiate with the drug companies for the cheapest available price on drugs,"

Candidate Obama, Oct. 15, 2008 in a debate with Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.).

You cannot tell a lie more clearly than that.

Perhaps...

Perhaps Joe Lieberman acts the way he does because it always gets Harry Reid to coddle him?

At the very least Joe should have to act on his threat. This would show voters in Connecticut that where money is concerned, Joe won't keep his word to voters.

Harry Reid is being Sisyphus to Joe's hill of beans.

Quick hit

A study conducted with Kentucky health records found that uninsured women with breast cancer were 44 percent likelier to die than their insured counterparts.

Source

Rockin' Roger

"The nearest thing we have to a death panel in the United States is an insurance company claims adjuster."

- Roger Ebert -

Roger Ebert has written one of the best essays about healthcare that I have read. What makes it so good, in my view, is that it makes a forceful moral case for socialized medicine.

Here is the link: I'm safe on board. Pull up the life rope

A Gun Control Bumper Sticker Idea

It used to be...

It used to be that you had to do something "newsworthy" to wind up in the news.

Now all you need is celebrity status and an appearance on Oprah Winfrey.

Why can't newsrooms let Sarah the Palin fade away?

Redemption Song

We Are Alone

Quick hit

14,000 Americans lose their health coverage every day.

Money talks

Today is an important day in the future history of the USA, not because Sonya Sotomayer has taken a seat on the Supreme Court, but because of the case of judicial activism that will cross her bench.

Today the US Supreme Court is scheduled to rehear Citizens United v. the FEC. The decision in this case could allow corporations to exercise their right to "free" speech by spending unlimited money to influence elections.

What this case would do is equate speech with money, and dismantle McCain/Feingold campaign finance law.

Shareholder activist Robert A.G. Monks has been heroically striving to bring this to the nations attention and you can read all about it here:

Corporate speech

Swimming with the pigs

A pig farmer might tell you that if you want a clear stream you've to keep the hogs out of the spring.

When it comes to healthcare proposals, politicians seem to be telling us that the way to clear up a stream is to make the pigs a little fatter.

Who would believe such transparent stupidity?

Quick Hit

80 percent of registered Democrats, want universal, single-payer not-for-profit health care for all Americans.

Source: Reform or Rip-Off?

If Obama doesn't deliver it is easy to predict what will happen in the mid-term elections, since it will be deja vu all over again.

Strange juxtaposition

Legislators handed billions of taxpayer dollars over to the auto industry to fund a cash-for-clunkers program and it turns out that the company that profited the most by it was Japanese automaker Toyota.

How did they show us the love?

By shutting a car plant in California.

The storyline is this: Americans are going broke propping up the Japanese economy, and the Japanese response is to remove jobs from our economy.

That sounds like a lose-lose situation to me, unless you own a Japanese car company.

A Lion Sleeps Tonight

A disappointment for Senator Ted Kennedy on his deathbed surely had to be the lackluster efforts of president Barak Obama and his fellow democrats to pass a public healthcare plan. Even as his death became imminent Senator Kennedy struggled everyday just to work, and what he worked on was Medicare for all.

I wish there were more people like him today, that is, people that were born into privilege but feel the call to serve the public interest.

Sometimes I feel it is a generational trait that is being lost. It is hard to sacrifice for something as ambiguous as "future generations", but men like Kennedy seemed motivated by that very thing when morality was a factor.

When it comes to president Barak Obama, YouTube shows the type of pledge he gives:



If anything good comes of Ted Kennedy's death, I hope it will be an awakening in the breast of Barak Obama to take up where Ted left off, to finish his good work so he can face the voters with honor.

Quick Hit

According to the Congressional Budget Office (CBO), 29 percent of premium dollars in the individual insurance market go toward administrative costs; the average policyholder spends roughly $300 more on administrative costs each year than if he or she purchased coverage through a group policy.

Source: Dean at TPM Cafe

No isms?

Michael Moore has a new movie on the way about Wall Street corruption. Here is the trailer:




Slavery was a systemic problem in America, so much so that it was difficult for decent people to avoid using the system in their daily lives. The simple act of buying pants became a moral act.

I wonder if Michael Moore is asking whether or not capitalism exhibits such a systemic problem.

People have wondered this before. For instance, Teddy Roosevelt said, "I am for honest business, big or little, and against dishonest business, big or little".

Capitalism has become such a holy idea in America that I wonder if people can draw a distinction between honest and dishonest corporate conduct.

Clown-school

Here is yet more evidence that Barney Frank should be speaker of the House:



Republicans have become Republicants.

Quick Hit

Removing the "public option" from a public bill paid for by public money is not in the public interest.


- Congressman Dennis Kucinich -