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Even as Obama’s proposals for health care changes attracted two key swing votes in the Senate Finance Committee (Republican Olympia Snowe and Democrat Blanche Lincoln), public opinion is turning ever more hostile to the proposed changes. Inside the beltway, the plan looks unstoppable. Outside it, the legislation looks DOA.
Which version of reality is the correct one?
Published on TheHill.com on October 20, 2009
Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton has fallen for Iran’s line that it is not developing nuclear weapons, but only wants the ability to develop one to achieve its place in the sun among the great nations of the earth.
In an interview on a Sunday show and in a leak in The New York Times that seems to have come from her (since it uses the same language), she notes that “there’s a small space for doubt [about Iran’s intention to build a bomb] because there are some contrary indicators. There is no doubt in my mind that they want nuclear energy and nuclear power, which they are entitled to, to be able to use it for peaceful purposes. The real problem is once you do that and you get what’s called a breakout capacity, it’s not long before you could do the other [build a bomb]. So that’s why this is so important to address now.”
As the health care fight reaches the Senate floor, we took a new national survey to figure out how best to battle against this proposal that would so deform our nation’s vital health care system. We found out how to do it: Reach young people.
Our work, and that of the League of American Voters - with whom we are affiliated but have no financial relationship - have been aimed at the elderly in the past few months. As a result of these and other efforts, the elderly now oppose Obamacare by more than twenty points (31-54 in our poll). The survey shows that we have about gotten all the support from them we are going to get. Some of those over 65 are just masochists who will sit by and watch their Medicare and Medicare Advantage get shredding to bits.
Is FOX News “an arm of the Republican Party” as White House Communications Director Anita Dunn says?
Democratic and Independent voters beg to differ. A national survey shows that 46% of those who watch FOX News “just about every day” are Democrats or Independents as are 50% of those who watch it “several times each week” or more.
Overall, the survey showed that 21% of all American voters watched FOX News every day and 18% watched it several times each week. So, combined, 39% watched the station several times each week or more.
Whether or not you now have health insurance, Obama’s healthcare bill will cost you dearly. If you don’t have insurance, you will be required to buy it. The legislation specifies how much you will have to pay for the coverage before any subsidy kicks in. All during the campaign, Obama kept speaking about affordable coverage. Now it appears that his definition of “affordable” might be a bit elastic.
* If your household income is $66,000 a year, slightly above the national average, Obama’s healthcare bill will require you to spend 12 percent of your income — about $8,000 a year or almost $700 a month — to buy health insurance before you get any federal subsidy.
Published on TheHill.com on October 13, 2009
Will a young, healthy, childless individual or couple buy health insurance costing 7.5 percent of their income, as required by Obama’s health legislation? Not until they get sick. Then they can always buy the insurance, and the Obama bill requires the insurance companies to give it to them. And if the premiums come to more than 7.5 percent of their income because they are now sick, no problem. Obama will subsidize it.
President Obama has won the peace prize, but nobody thinks he deserves the Nobel in economics. Despite $800 billion of economic stimulus and the accumulation of a $1.4 trillion deficit, he has been unable to lower the unemployment rate below 9.8%.
So why, after nine months of Obama, do voters, in the latest Rasmussen poll, still blame Bush - and not Obama - for the economic situation by 55-37? How can Obama skate by without having to account for the failure of his economic program?
Whether it was rewarding Jimmy Carter for criticizing the Iraq War or supporting Al Gore in his crusade against global warming, the Norwegian Parliament - which chooses the winners of the Nobel Peace Prize - has sought to use the award as a political tool to influence American politic s. Its prestige and moral power make the prize a potent weapon with which to help steer the direction of the colossus beyond the seas that controls a quarter of the world’s economy and most of its military power.
Now, the Norwegians have weighed in to support Barack Obama in his bid to reshape America so it looks more like, well, Norway, or at least like Europe.
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