Friday December 18, 2009
The contrast on scientifically-based concerns over global warming couldn't be greater between Presidents Barack Obama and George W. Bush, as President Obama
illustrated today in his brief, bold speech at
U.N. Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen.
Obama may be stumbling on health care reform legislation, but he scored resoundingly in his landmark remarks on the urgent international need for a climate change treaty, when the President insisted:
"... all major economies must put forward decisive national actions that will reduce their emissions, and begin to turn the corner on climate change.
"I'm pleased that many of us have already done so, and I'm confident that America will fulfill the commitments that we have made: cutting our emissions in the range of 17 percent by 2020... "
And in great historical contrast to President Bush, whose administration alternatively denied and ignored climate change altogether, President Obama orated:
"This is not fiction, this is science. Unchecked, climate change will pose unacceptable risks to our security, our economies, and our planet. That much we know. So the question before us is no longer the nature of the challenge - the question is our capacity to meet it."
President Bush, of course, famously refused to allow the U.S. to sign on to the Kyoto international pact to stem global warming.
Take a few minutes to savor President Obama's Speech at U.N. Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen, and to rejoice at the positive difference for our great country, and the world, that an election can make!
(Photo taken on December 12, 2009 at the U.N. Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen: Miguel Villagren/Getty Images)
Wednesday December 16, 2009
I fully agree with Dr. Howard Dean that the Senate health care "reform" bill, which President Obama has permitted to be neutered by Sen. Joe Lieberman, must be killed.
My logic is simple: without either a public plan option or buy-in to Medicare or a similar plan, the Senate bill does not reform the existing system. In fact, it clearly exacerbates the existing system. Hear me out:
- The sole purpose of a Medicare-like plan is to provide lower-cost competition to private insurers. Competition will naturally force them to lower their exorbitant costs to consumers.
- The Obama-Lieberman health care plan eliminates all proposed competition for private insurance corporations in what Dean calls "a bigger bailout for the insurance industry than AIG."
- It's unclear whether or not the Obama-Lieberman Health "Reform" Plan still contains a mandate that all Americans must buy health insurance coverage. But both stances have major conundrums.
- An Obama-Lieberman plan mandate that all Americans purchase health care coverage will translate into tens of billions more annually for private insurers, but with absolutely no measure to control costs charged to consumers.
Thus, the same private insurers who caused our current unaffordable mess can (and will, according to history!) charge sky-high prices, and we have no choice but to pay.
- If the Obama-Lieberman plan does not mandate that all Americans purchase health care coverage, then only the sickest uninsured people are likely to purchase coverage... which, of course, will raise premiums prices charged to consumers by the private insurers.
It's easy to blame Joe Lieberman... which I do... but let's be honest: Joe's been a preening, obstructionist jerk for years now. We should have expected no less than this last-minute attention-getting stunt from him.
Besides, "Mr. Lieberman has taken more than $1 million from the industry over his Senate career... He doesn't seem to have forgotten that," per the New York Times.
The buck stops squarely with President Obama, who got himself elected by solemnly promising "a new national health plan to all Americans" that offers "quality, affordable and portable Coverage for all" and that "lowers costs for the U.S. health care system ." (Source: Obama Campaign Promises: Health Care.)
But President Obama rolled over and acquiesced to Sen. Lieberman's demands to neuter the bill, in order to eliminate reform of private insurance corporation practices.
I committed earlier this week that if Senators Russ Feingold and Sherrod Brown and Dr. Howard Dean expressed full-on support for the Senate health care bill, count me in.
Per The Hill, "Feingold said that responsibility ultimately rests with President Barack Obama and he could have insisted on a higher standard for the legislation. 'This bill appears to be legislation that the president wanted in the first place, so I don't think focusing it on Lieberman really hits the truth,' said Feingold."
About the fate of the Senate bill, Sen. Feingold said, "I am not making a judgment until I see the CBO numbers and that's only the beginning."
Per The Columbus Dispatch, "Sen. Sherrod Brown acknowledged last night that he is 'disappointed' that the compromise health-care package does not include a federal plan or expand Medicare, but he said he will support the current version because it would extend insurance to 30 million more Americans... it could be better. I think it's a good bill, but it's not a great bill."
This morning on ABC-TV, Howard Dean stated, ""You will be forced to buy insurance. If you don't, you'll pay a fine. It's an insurance company bailout... This is an insurance company's dream. This is the Washington scramble, and it's a shame."
Another rich bail-out of greedy corporations. More costs and fees foisted on the American people. And the benefits are quite questionable, at best.
I say kill the Obama-Lieberman health care "reform" bill, and let the Senate start over from scratch.
Monday December 14, 2009
My 2010 New Year's resolution is to judge President Obama by his actions, and not by his words.
Sure, it'll be hard to do. Very hard. His smooth words and ringing sentiments are usually metaphorical water for the thirsty, food for the hungry, liberal manna for the Democratic masses. It's difficult to separate the substance of the 44th U.S. president from his extraordinary eloquence.
Indeed, his transcendent ability with the orated word first brought him to national attention with his charismatic 2004 Democratic convention speech when he pronounced to startled, thunderous liberal acclaim:
"The pundits, the pundits like to slice-and-dice our country into Red States and Blue States... But I've got news for them...
"We worship an awesome God in the Blue States, and we don't like federal agents poking around in our libraries in the Red States. We coach Little League in the Blue States and yes, we've got some gay friends in the Red States."
But five years later, Obama has done absolutely nothing to either help his "gay friends," or to scale back the intrusiveness of the Patriot Act.
He campaigned brilliantly in 2007-08, and won our hearts and minds with seemingly sincere promises for wonderful ideas, including:
- Health Care for "All" - "Quality, affordable and portable health care coverage for all"
- Iraq War - "Obama will immediately begin to remove our troops from Iraq. He will remove one to two combat brigades each month, and have all of our combat brigades out of Iraq within 16 months."
- Jobs - "Barack Obama believes we need to double federal funding for basic research and make the research and development tax credit permanent to help create high-paying, secure jobs."
- Rural America - "Obama will invest in rural small businesses and fight to expand high-speed Internet access. He will improve rural schools and attract more doctors to rural areas."
But health care legislation is struggling, in large part due to hs presidential silence. Mr. Obama often alludes to ending the Iraq War, but 120,000 U.S. soldiers remain quietly stationed there. Until lately, jobs creation has been a back-burner issue for the Obama White House, and new federal funding for research is anemic. And new investment in rural areas... education, small businesses, doctors... is zilch.
The list of Obama's other grand plans followed by half-completions, slipping timelines, and missed deadlines goes on and on and on... Think Guantanamo Bay detention camp closure, think green technology, think teacher residency and mentoring programs.
Just today in colorful, TV-ready remarks, President Obama lambasted bankers for failing to do their part to "rebuild our economy" after Americans saved banks and bankers from imminent disaster.
If you heard Obama's bitten words, you were definitely on the President's side. But where's the follow-up action-plan by this President, who bailed out the bankers with no-strings billions, turned a blind-eye to their obscenely rich bonuses, and hawks toothless "reform" of the banking industry?
Where are Obama's post-hot air mandates for banks? Does he still naively believe that bankers will change their ways out of conscience and fear of presidential scorn? Or is Obama's can-do fierceness reserved for TV cameras?
(Look closely at the photo, above, of today's meeting. How many frowning, worried bankers do you see? I see exactly NONE.)
If you listen to Obama's soaring words or read his masterly speeches, it's oh-to-easy to confuse his utopian thinking with boots-on-the-ground reality.
Yet last night, President Obama told Oprah that he grades himself "a good solid B+" for his first year performance in office. My first reaction was to wonder about the President's self-aggrandizing grade inflation.
But then I realized: President Obama seems to confuse polished wordsmithing and speaking with the heavy lifting of actual leadership. And he doesn't seem to grasp that anyone can sermonize; the hard task of principled leadership takes more effort, more energy, more commitment, more involvement, more boldness.
As I stated before, my 2010 New Year's resolution is to judge President Obama by his actions, and not be blindsided by his words. Based on his actions in 2009, I grade his first year in office a shaky C.
And I pray that in 2010, President Obama snaps out of his dreamy cocoon of ivory-tower intellectualizing, and starts providing the sharp-edged, hands-on leadership that everyday Americans desperately need and deserve. He failed to do that in 2009.
Thursday December 10, 2009
About the rumored new Senate health care plan proposal, I agree with Dr. Howard Dean, former DNC chair and author of
"Prescription for Real Health Care Reform," who
commented to the Washington Post's The Plum Line:
"The question is, is there enough of a kernel of real reform in the bill to make it possible for progressives to vote for it? Given the details we know today, I think there is.
"The group at largest risk is being taken care of, those over 55. There really is reform. Is there enough reform? No. But significant reform matters."
I call it "rumored" because full details haven't been released... and because the "facts" of the plan vary widely, depending on the political persuasion of the particular U.S. senator commenting on the "deal."
The expansion of Medicare, which now covers Americans 65 years and older, to cover Americans starting at 55 years old, is pure genius... and cleverly designed to embarrass Republican senators into supporting the measure. For weeks, a plethora of Republicans has railed against any Medicare cuts that might be economically necessary to pay for health care reform that includes a public plan option.
Truth is, the public plan option is merely a watered-version of single payer health coverage, which is much more desirable to liberals. Medicare, which is universally admired by both conservative and liberal users, is a successful single-payer system.
But much remains unknown about this new Senate health care plan proposal. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid sent the plan to the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office this week for scoring, which will provide many answers. One fact I need to know before throwing my support behind this latest bill is: how many uninsured Americans will remain uninsured under this plan?
In the most inspired move of the entire 2009 Democratic drive for health care reform, Sen. Reid established a working group of ten Democratic senators... five centrists and five liberals... who have worked, and will continue to work, together on this latest iteration of health care legislation. The ten Democratic senators are:
One definitive statement I can make today about this newest Senate health care plan proposal: I deeply respect the hearts, minds, and voting records of Sen. Feingold and Sen. Brown.
If these two progressive senators, and Howard Dean, give the Senate health reform bill a hearty YES, count me in, too!
(Photo of Dr. Howard Dean: Mark Wilson/Getty Images)
