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Here are some thoughts on the President’s speech last night.
- I believe that President Obama understands and cares about keeping health insurance competitive.
- I believe that he wants to protect capitalism. I don’t think he realizes the problems that can come about in the future, when he is no longer in office to maintain what he promised tonight.
- If you take out the politics out of this debate there are opportunities to improve health care, but there are still huge issues remaining. The biggest issue is how to maintain the President’s promises after he leaves office.
- No matter what side you are on in this debate you should be angry because this vote is about getting reelected. It is not at all about what is best for the country.
- The President did a very good job of laying out the problems that every one of us face with health care.
- I still have not seen anything that would suggest that the President understands that health care reform is something that many Democrats want to use as a stepping stone to much greater government control of health care and the economy. This is true, just as it is also true that many of the President’s opponents see health care reform as an opportunity to score political points.
- He claimed that the public option will not be taxpayer funded. It will have to survive on the premiums it collects. Would that be like the Post Office? Medicare? Social Security?
- If I were an Obama supporter I would have been very upset with tonight’s speech because he should have given this speech several months ago. Had he given this speech before summer he would have his health care reform.
- Illegal aliens will get health insurance because they will get amnesty. They are too valuable as voters to Democrats and too heavily courted by Republicans. Joe Wilson of South Carolina shouted out, “You lie,” when the President made the statement on illegal aliens. He apologized. He should have. Bad behavior is bad. Simple as that.
- He will make sure no government nor insurance company bureaucrat gets between us and the care we need. How can he do that? How can he make sure that this happens after he is no longer the President?
- The President talked about “patient safety first.” He didn’t say tort reform but, there is promise.
- He thinks he can find savings in the health care system. There is certainly a lot of waste in the system. We’ve all seen it. But how does he plan to get that out of the system? He said they would reduce unwarranted subsidies and appoint a panel of experts to find the waste. Is that enough? Not according to Ed Rollins after the speech.
- Yesterday I challenged him to find common ground among his supporters and opponents. I suggested that as part of that he ask whether reformers need single payer universal care. He challenged those demands and that was good.
- He said that he wants to bring the best ideas of both parties together. Why hasn’t he done that up until now? Will he really do that going forward? How?
- Several Republicans were waving their proposals whenever Obama talked about bipartisanship. They have proposals.
- He acknowledged that there is still a lot of details to be worked out. No kidding!
- I don’t care that we are the only advanced democracy on earth that does not have government run insurance. No one should care. The issue is that people could lose their coverage by getting sick or by losing their job. Until we understand that there are other options besides government control we will continue to fight this out. Remember when your mother would ask, “If your best friend jumped off a bridge would you do it too?”
- I think that he truly understands what he caused to erupt this summer. He opened wide an enormous gap that has always raged in this country over the role of the Federal Government. It is the same battle that is fought out in the Federalist and anti-Federalist papers and made the battle for the Constitution so difficult.
- Tax cuts are not a cost to government. They are a reduction of tax revenues in the short term. That is all. This is not semantics. It is an important distinction in understanding and reinforcing that the money we earn is ours, not the government’s.
- He will not sign a plan that adds to deficits. He will require a provision requiring spending cuts to keep from adding to deficits. Will that provision remain in affect after he is gone? In an interview afterward, Barney Frank said that wouldn’t work, but Frank is willing to work with the President on deficit spending. Funny, I thought that the President told an audience a few weeks ago that he wanted the people that caused the economic crisis to get out the way, yet there was Barney.
- Former President Bush was frequently criticized for surrounding himself with yes-men. When will President Obama appoint someone to his cabinet that fundamentally disagrees with his philosophies of government?
- The Republican response was… yawn. I’m getting sleepy just thinking about it. Going to post for tomorrow before I fall asleep.
In summary, I do see some opportunity from this speech but to take advantage of that opportunity the President has a lot of work to do and has to REALLY take a bipartisan approach. That should have been done months ago.
{ 3 comments… read them below or add one }
The only way President Obama has any possibility of passing health care reform, is a commitment to remove illegal immigrants from gaining entrance to any public option? In the health care bill they must–PROVE–to the majority of the American People that–NO ILLEGAL FOREIGN NATIONAL–will be able to bleed the government extension in the package. An amendment to the 1000 page reform bill, must guarantee–IN THE WORDING– that a very thorough background identity check is performed on any applicant who applies? E-Verify would be a progressive identifier, with an initial examination of Social Security number in conjunction with Homeland Security Databases.
To complete the operation of E-Verification this PC application, must branch out across the country as a permanent tool in business and industry for every worker newly hired or long time employee. Thousands or even millions of illegal workers could be hiding in plain site in the workplace, as they have never been checked as a citizen or legal residency compliance? It also seems that the auditing of 1-9 forms around the country, that the federal authorities forget to mention that irregularities by employers only allows them to dismiss the applicant? The fact is that ICE raids have trailed off, so that any illegal workers–ARE NOT DEPORTED–they can move onto yet another workplace. Anybody who is suspected of being in this sovereign nation illegally should be detained and held for ICE inspection, not released into the public mainstream?
We all know that Fraudulent ID is so prevalent, that all security systems have been compromised, with even al-Qaeda murderers who brought down three passenger jets. On 9/11 these terrorists had in their possession numerous authentic drivers’ licenses and other picture ID. E-Verify is not perfect and can be cheated, but as it’s modified, collecting more tools to compliment the enforcement program it success rate will become exemplary. Those hired workers who then find themselves under suspicion, can have errors resolved through any Social Security agency. That special interest groups have remained silent about this matter, doesn’t need any explanation? most Americans want enforcement at our borders, the workplace, so contact your reluctant politician at 202-224-3121 MORE HONEST INFORMATION AT NUMBERSUSA & JUDICIAL WATCH. REMEMBER NO MORE BLANKET AMNESTIES!
” Joe Wilson of South Carolina shouted out, “You lie,” when the President made the statement on illegal aliens. He apologized. He should have. Bad behavior is bad. Simple as that.”
Actually, I wish someone would have shouted out when Bush was President. Look what good behavior has gotten us so far. We have a tendency to put these politicians on pedestals. They don’t listen to us becauses they know better. They give themselves raises, debase their positions with corruption, and basically consider themselves in “rarified air”, when they are meant to represent their constituents and do the peoples work. Finally, someone stood up and called out a U.S. president with the truth. Obama gets to slide through because he tells half truths, the most dangerous truths of all. Of course, there will be the knee-jerk reaction that the only reason someone stood up now is because he is bi-racial. That is B.S. That is their default response for everything. The left is just pissed off because with all their whining about the terrible, horrible things George W. Bush was doing, none I repeat NONE of the Democratic representatives had the cajones to challenge him to his face in front of the American people as did Rep. Joe Wilson.
No more Mr. nice guy from the general public, who must demand that E-Verify becomes a stable, in-perpetuity federal immigration enforcement tool for everybody? No half-measure, but full implementation across the country. For new workers and those who have been on the payroll forever. Why has it taken so long to coordinate this computer illegal immigrant recognition software? The answer is evidently politicians who have been manipulated by campaign money, special favors from lobbyists. They are like a Monarchy buying and selling favors for distracting the unknowing public from strong enforcement, from the border line and enforcement in the working locations throughout our nation. Significant pieces of law have been reduced to weakened, insufficient laws that do nothing for the American people. The stimulus package was compromised, with no terminology to reduce illegal workers from applying for jobs in construction and other industries. ACORN is an undesirable organization that has been headlined lately in the national press. Under surveillance and being investigated by numerous state attorney generals for possible violating voting laws and other nefarious activities? Surely the Obama administration is not contracting them to perform serious counting of the population in the 2010 US census after these accusations?
To me this is premeditated and likewise with public access to health care, because there was no restrictions to identify illegal immigrants in the package. Until yesterday the Democratic committee members realize they had been discovered and added amendments blocking illegal persons from applying, by running their names through Social Security. It’s common knowledge that illegal immigrants receive free treatment in emergency hospitals, which have for decades have been exploited for any minor ailments. The main conspirators within the Democratic leadership are Sen. Harry Reid of Nevada and Nancy Pelosi House Speaker. Both represent states of mass illegal immigration. Reid for his abandonment of the American worker may soon be ousted from office? He was the main contender in the near disintegration of E-Verify. On one hand Democrats saliva over millions of extra votes if another Blanket Amnesty is enacted, while the alternate party status quo are wanting to keep an unceasing supply of illegal labor.
Running scared Pelosi and Napolitano have changed sides and displaying a different attitude towards the millions of jobless Americans, whose work has been appropriated by foreign labor. In many cases large companies have clearly knowingly hired cheap labor, in placement of citizens and legal residents. In ICE raids its positive proof that mega- businesses built their labor force on foreign nationals? Yet the majority of companies isolated themselves from major penalties and only the lesser management was punished. E-verify would have remained non-existent if it was not for the adamant pressure of bloggers comments and articles on the internet that enlivened public attention.
Believe me when I say the bombardment of American voices over the switchboards in a harassed Washington, made a extraordinary difference? THEY ACTUALLY LISTENED and the Special interest organizations couldn’t even delay the courts, in ordering the en-masse contractors and sub-contractors from obeying federal law. Years of neglect by previous administrations on both sides of the aisle, has allowed the unregulated droves of foreign illegal aliens along with families into our neighborhoods. TODAY! RIGHT NOW! We must have millions more bona-fide Americans calling this number 202-224-3121 in the muck hole at the Capitol, really do have the ultimate power of changing things.
For me health care reform is a priority because family members have suffered too long under the umbrella of shady insurance companies, as being declined of pre-existing condition was a factor in my daughter’s coverage dying of cancer at an early age. But any kind of public health care must not be rationed and must not give access to people who should never entered our country illegally. E-Verify a composite of the SAVE ACT must—NOT–be devalued by the corrupt politicians in the Democratic Party, nor the 287 G. cities, county and state police training to question and apprehend foreign nationals. In conclusion, the President wants to push another path to citizenship for those who came here through the back door? Awarding people for wrongdoing is not in my book?
If it’s anything like the 1986 Simpson/Mazzoli bill it was overloaded with fraud and ended up costing taxpayers billions. New immigrants must come in orderly, signing documentation that they will not be public welfare charges. Without mitigating circumstances anybody who violates this law must be deported.It makes more sense, if such legislation exists in DC to only approve entry visas, for new immigrants with heavily vetted credentials of highly skilled engineers and professional career individuals. After all, they are unlikely to become an unemployed welfare recipient? The 1986 immigration law was intentionally engineered from the beginning, but already contains important factors in enforcement of laws.
Strengthen the same 1986 laws with amendments, instead of starting again. This legislation is already on the books? The truth is that it’s not broken, but heavily under funded from the beginning and bloated with fraud. Guest worker programs and special visas for skilled tradesman has remained a nemesis. This includes fraudulent partnership of businesses entities, attorneys in hiring agricultural workers for the fields? Many have lied to the government authorities and who have been instrumental in its corrupt notorious character. If new guest workers programs enacted by a Nancy Pelosi’s AGjobs bill are eminent, the applicants must be carefully screened with the knowledge that working visas on expiring, that those individuals must return to their original place of residence. That they cannot qualify for a legal resident visa, nor can America anymore accommodate their family members with chain migration?
Another anomaly is the border fence? It was—NEVER BUILT—to Rep. Duncan Hunters original specs? His short fence expanse in San Diego remains a strong classic example of following the law. Currently along our international border we have a single line fence, not a two tier fence, with a no-mans land for patrolling border patrol vehicles in between. The previous administration shall ever be haunted by the fact they installed a virtual barrier in many places, with malfunctioning cameras, sensors, obsolete vehicle barriers that could easily be maneuvered around, that cost millions of dollars in taxpayers backing. Expenditures to support illegal immigrants through corporate welfare, over generation would leave a trail of hundred dollar bills from Earth to the Moon and back again. We need to repair our collapsing infrastructure, stop the erosion of bridges, tunnels and dams. Even our water supplies are compromised by the irreversible course of OVERPOPULATION
Federal legislation must be written to correct and heavily fine states that promote Sanctuary Alcoves such as Los Angeles and San Francisco. Warning them that no funding will be appropriated who violate federal law, instead of purposely looking the other way.
The majority of these enforcement laws have been weakened, many left to rot in a dormant state at the National Archives. Immigration laws have been compromised time and time again by lobbyists offering favors to our public servants. Facts not fiction can learned at NUMBERSUSA & JUDICIAL WATCH.