Less government is infinitely better. More government is corrupt, inhibiting, anti-business, anti-individual rights and freedoms and counterproductive with actions that result in unintended (though not unpredictable) consequences.

'Atlas Shrugged': The CliffsNotes Today
Scott Powell 08/17/2010

'Atlas Shrugged" — Ayn Rand's fourth and last novel, published in 1957 — may be second to the Bible as the most influential book read in America, according to a Library of Congress survey. It is required reading in management training at BB&T, the 12th-largest bank in the U.S. and one that resisted taking TARP bailout funds.

Since the Obama administration took office, "Atlas Shrugged" has been enjoying a renaissance with rising sales and library waiting lists, partly because it explains our current economic woes more straightforwardly than most of what we hear from today's experts.

What happened in Rand's narrative is coming to pass today, with an anti-business administration reviling private industry and capitalizing on crisis to expand and redirect investment within and between sectors of the economy — setting quotas, prices and compensation.

Businesses responded by retrenching — ceasing to invest, innovate and expand. Whole industries contracted, closed down or moved offshore, much like the U.S. gas and oil drilling industry is doing today. Then, just as now, management became frustrated, discouraged and reluctant to create jobs in an environment of excessive government meddling.

A record $2 trillion now sits on corporate balance sheets waiting to be invested amid reasonably cheap asset prices. What holds back investment is uncertainty and fear stemming from an overbearing and free-spending government. Businessmen and investors would never attempt spending and borrowing their way back to prosperity.

The debt-financed Obama stimulus plan is not only failing to create jobs. It ratchets up systemic risk, inviting a currency crisis and bond-market collapse — from which recovery might be impossible.

President Obama recently took credit for a 0.2 -percentage-point drop in the nation's unemployment rate to 9.5% and the creation of 71,000 private-sector jobs, claiming his policies were working. In fact, many of those jobs were in the socialized automotive sector. The supposed decrease in unemployment resulted from 611,000 Americans giving up on finding work and dropping off the official rolls of the unemployed.

Official statistics mask the underlying truth of a private-sector economy that is failing to create jobs. In fact, when all those who have given up looking for work are accounted for since the recession began, the real unemployment rate may be closer to 18% — almost double the official numbers.

While the private sector shed nearly 8 million jobs in the last 2 1/2 years, the federal government increased its payroll by 240,000.

So the private sector that is the primary source of national wealth has been shrinking while supporting a growing public sector that generally produces nothing.

That burden is made greater by the fact that government workers have incomes that are 30% higher and benefits 50% more costly on average than those received by equivalent private-sector workers.

This shift of wealth from the productive private sector to the unproductive public sector is stickier today than it was in "Atlas Shrugged" because government is now a union shop, with pay having little to do with performance. Unionized government cannot be downsized easily, and its employees have effectively become the country's most powerful entitlement special-interest group.

Thus, government-run schools controlled by the teachers unions can fail decade after decade without consequence or substantive reform. The government takeover of the health care industry — aka "ObamaCare" — was a high priority not because it was good for the majority of Americans, but because the ruling elite want to expand unionization, entitlement and dependency.

The media chase scandal and sensationalism but largely ignore the most consequential story of our time: the Obama administration's drive to shift wealth and power from the productive private sector to the nonproductive public sector. Rand calls this appropriation of wealth by the government nothing less than looting.

For her, the primary source of social good is in ingenuity and hard work that produce wealth in the form of invention and technological breakthrough. Crony capitalism and forced redistribution of wealth by faceless government bureaucrats is anything but virtuous.

Rand warns us that government policies that engender entitlement and cause business owners to go on strike and withhold their capital are detrimental to the economy. What compounds this problem today is that an out-of-control profligate government that enlarges dependence also sets us up for a greater economic crisis than the last one.

Fortunately, the catalyst for course correction is around the corner. Ironically, President Obama can be thanked for making this midterm election an overdue referendum on liberalism. Average Americans are now more informed and engaged than they have been in generations, and they are highly motivated to vote.

The most credible and successful candidates, whether incumbents or new entries, are likely to be those resolutely committed to deficit- and debt-reduction and getting government out of the way of private-sector job creation — the essence of Ayn Rand.

Powell is a director at RemingtonRand and Alpha Quest LLC and a visiting fellow at Stanford University's Hoover Institution.

http://www.investors.com/NewsAndAnalysis/Article/544033/201008171834/Atlas-Shrugged-The-CliffsNotes-Today.aspx

Don’t believe any of this rhetoric. There is an ulterior motive to these specious statements: to win election by whatever it takes. After that, expect most of these Democrats to toe the party line, either by coercion or personal convictions, and therefore not repeal Obamacare.

Only the Republicans can be trusted to attempt to repeal or defund Obamacare.

Vote Republican in November if you want to fight Obamacare … and to take back our country from the arrogant, elitist and radical Democratic politicians.

Dear Patients: Vote to Repeal ObamaCare
Don't believe Democrats who promise to fix the bill once they're re-elected.
By Hal Scherz

Facing a nationwide backlash, Democratic congressional candidates have a new message for voters: We know you don't like ObamaCare, so we'll fix it.

This was the line offered by Democrat Mark Critz, who won a special election in Pennsylvania's 12th congressional district after expressing opposition to the law and promising to mend it—but not to repeal it. As a doctor I know something about unexpected recoveries, and this latest attempt to rescue ObamaCare from repeal needs to be taken seriously.

For Democrats who voted for ObamaCare, this tactic is an escape route, a chance to distance themselves from the president with a vague promise to fix health-care reform in the next Congress.

To counter this election-year ruse, my colleagues and I at Docs4PatientCare are enlisting thousands of doctors in an unorthodox and unprecedented action. Our patients have always expected a certain standard of care from their doctors, which includes providing them with pertinent information that may affect their quality of life. Because the issue this election is so stark—literally life and death for millions of Americans in the years ahead—we are this week posting a "Dear Patient" letter in our waiting rooms.

The letter states in unambiguous language what the new law means:

"Dear Patient: Section 1311 of the new health care legislation gives the U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services and her appointees the power to establish care guidelines that your doctor must abide by or face penalties and fines. In making doctors answerable in the federal bureaucracy this bill effectively makes them government employees and means that you and your doctor are no longer in charge of your health care decisions. This new law politicizes medicine and in my opinion destroys the sanctity of the doctor-patient relationship that makes the American health care system the best in the world."

Our doctor's letter points out that, in addition to "badly exacerbating the current doctor shortage," ObamaCare will bring "major cost increases, rising insurance premiums, higher taxes, a decline in new medical techniques, a fall-off in the development of miracle drugs as well as rationing by government panels and by bureaucrats like passionate rationing advocate Donald Berwick that will force delays of months or sometimes years for hospitalization or surgery."

We cite the brute facts of ObamaCare's passage:

"Despite countless protests by doctors and overwhelming public opposition—up to 60% of Americans opposed this bill—the current party in control of Congress pushed this bill through with legal bribes and Chicago style threats and is determined now to resist any 'repeal and replace' efforts. This doctor's office is non-partisan—always has been, always will be. But the fact is that every Republican voted against this bad bill while the Democratic Party leadership and the White House completely dismissed the will of the people in ruthlessly pushing through this legislation."

Then we address the Democrats' evasive campaign maneuver:

"In the face of voter anger some Democratic candidates are now trying to make a cosmetic retreat, calling for minor modifications or pretending they are opposed to government-run medicine. Once the election is over, however, they will vote with their party bosses against repealing this bill."

The letter's final lines are the most important:

"Please remember when you vote this November that unless the Democratic Party receives a strong negative message about this power grab our health care system will never be fixed and the doctor patient relationship will be ruined forever."

This message is going out to an electorate that is already frustrated over what they see happening to health care. Missouri voters rejected ObamaCare overwhelmingly in August, voting by a margin of 71%-29% to reject the federal requirement that all individuals purchase health insurance. Democratic pollster Douglas Schoen has assessed that ObamaCare is "a disaster" for Democrats. And around the country many little-noticed primaries have reflected voter rage—including the Republican primary victory of surgeon, political newcomer, and advocate of repeal Daniel Benishek in Michigan's first district.

Meanwhile, the Obama administration's damage-control efforts have fallen flat. The latest round of pro-ObamaCare television spots targeting the elderly and starring veteran actor Andy Griffith have not only failed to move the polling numbers. They have caused five U.S. Senators to ask for an investigation of the ads as a violation of federal laws barring the use of tax dollars ($750,000) for campaign purposes.

America's doctors have millions of personal interactions each week with patients. We have political power. And we intend to use it by working to defeat those who have disrupted and gravely endangered the best health-care system in the world.


Dr. Scherz, a pediatric urological surgeon at Georgia Urology and Children's Healthcare of Atlanta, serves on the faculty of Emory University Medical School and is president and cofounder of Docs4PatientCare.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703369704575461840575037482.html

He states:   “I don’t think you want me to waste my time to read every page of the healthcare bill… We hire experts.”

Are you kidding, Max?

You want Americans to be forced to pay trillions of more dollars for your health care system that severely restricts their rights and choices and will result in rationing of care. Many will be refused medical care that would have received it before and for significantly less. It is arcane and burdened by multilevel bureaucracies.

And, best of all, you and all your Democratic buddies in Congress won’t have to use it as you have your own, expensive, gold-plated plan with countless choices and ease of access.

That’s why the Democrats in the House and Senate who are up for reelection in November, must be voted out of office.

Vote Republican in November!

Key Senate Democrat suggests that he didn't read entire healthcare reform bill
Jordan Fabian     08/25/10

Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus (D-Mont.), one of the chief authors of the healthcare law, suggested Tuesday he did not read the entire piece of legislation.

Speaking at a forum in his home state, Baucus and Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius were asked by an audience member if they had read the whole bill and “if not, that is the most despicable, irresponsible thing.”

“I don’t think you want me to waste my time to read every page of the healthcare bill,” Baucus said, according to the Flathead Beacon. “You know why? It’s statutory language. ... We hire experts.”

Republicans, who opposed the law in lockstep, frequently criticized Democrats for the length of the bill and often pressed members if they had read the legislation or not. In March, Congress passed the legislation and President Obama signed the 961-page final bill into law.

At least one Democratic lawmaker, Sen. Claire McCaskill (Mo.) made a public showing of reading the bill.

Democrats dismissed the criticism, saying it did not have anything do to with the contents of the legislation.

Baucus's office said that his comments did not mean that he does not know what it is in the law.

"Senator Baucus wrote the bill that passed the Finance Committee and then worked with his colleagues to write the health care bill that is law today. He has spent years crafting this policy and hundreds of hours reading and perfecting it," spokeswoman Erin Shields said. "There is simply no question that he understands the provisions in the health care law and knows it is a historic improvement that will make our health care system more affordable and accessible for families in Montana and across America."

Baucus held frequent hearings and published multiple reports about the legislation during the process of its passage.

At the town-hall event, Baucus defended the sweeping law.

“It’s not perfect, nothing’s perfect, but I’m telling you, ma’am, it’s a good start,” Baucus said. “Mark my words, several years from now you’re going to look back and say, ‘Eh, maybe it isn’t so bad.’ ”

http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/115749-sen-baucus-suggests-he-did-not-read-entire-health-bill

Fast Track To Government Health Care
Grace-Marie Turner    08/20/2010

While there is broad agreement there are problems in our health sector that must be solved, the American people consistently have said they oppose government control. Yet many of the decisions now being made in the bowels of the bureaucracy could lead to a government system that people fear.

The consequences of government involvement in health care have become more and more apparent as people have become informed about what the health overhaul law would do. No longer does the government seem to be a fairy godmother but rather a tough enforcer of an avalanche of new mandates, taxes and regulatory requirements.

The assurance that government would make sure all Americans have health care coverage has turned into a mandate that we all must have insurance defined by the government and with the government determining what our "choice" of health policies will be.

The latest example of our loss of individual control over health care decisions is playing out deep in the weeds of definitions over what must be counted as medical care and what counts as administrative expense in health insurance — the so-called "medical loss ratio," or MLR. According to the new law, at least 85% of premium dollars must be spent on medical care for large firms and 80% for smaller ones.

It sounds like a simple and straightforward issue, but a world of challenges and complexity lies beneath the surface. The National Association of Insurance Commissioners (NAIC) has been charged with making recommendations to the federal government about what should and should not be counted in the equation.

To show how consequential the decision is, President Obama briefly scheduled, then canceled, a trip to speak to the NAIC meeting in Seattle in mid-August where the MLR issue was being debated.

Many of the decisions being made by regulators could make it almost impossible for private insurance companies to comply, leading inevitably to a government-run health system.

Connecticut state insurance commissioner Thomas Sullivan warned, "What we've learned since March, is that if you like your health insurance you may not be able to keep it," he told the Seattle meeting, "and state regulators will have a role in implementing health care as long as that role supports the goals of HHS (the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services), which may not necessarily be what's in the best interest of consumers."

He later told reporters: "I'm concerned there's still a lot left to be done in interpretation ... I fear that some have an agenda to interpret ... with the express purpose of getting to a single-payer option."

Many other health actuaries and experts at the Seattle meeting said they believed the MLR was meant to be so disruptive to private insurance that it would eventually push us into a single-payer system.

HHS is not obligated to take the recommendations of the NAIC. Ultimately, the bureaucracy will decide. And their decision will be hugely consequential.

An issue that is being most hotly debated right now is whether the federal, state and payroll taxes that insurance companies are required to pay must be counted today as administrative expenses or whether they can be subtracted from premium collections before the calculations are made.

Health insurers say the decision could determine whether they have the money to invest in fighting fraud, setting up networks of qualified physicians and updating information technologies. For other companies, the decision very well could determine whether they survive.

Six senior members of Congress also weighed in on the issue with a letter to the president of the NAIC, saying they meant for taxes to be counted as an administrative expense.

America's Health Insurance Plans, which represents insurance companies, countered that the legislation specifically says taxes shouldn't be counted. Other independent analysts have validated the AHIP position.

So the politicization of health care begins, with even the president set to weigh in on a decision that would make most people's eyes glaze over in the minutia. The president will meet with the NAIC at the White House in September or so to discuss the issue.
It now is clear that decisions about what kind of health insurance we have, how much we must pay, what it covers or doesn't cover, will be made by politicians and bureaucrats.

This evokes a statement by health economist Paul Starr in his Pulitzer Prize-winning book, "The Social Transformation of American Medicine": "Political leaders since Bismarck seeking to strengthen the state or to advance their own or their party's interests have used insurance against the costs of sickness as a means of turning benevolence to power."

The process has begun. Unless ObamaCare can be rolled back, the politicization of American medicine will reach into the smallest decisions affecting our medical care for decades to come.

And, just five months after the health overhaul law was enacted, we see how the regulatory bureaucracy may well push us into the single-payer, government-run health care system that even the very liberal 111th Congress couldn't enact.

Turner is president of the Galen Institute, a nonprofit research organization based in Alexandria, Va., that specializes in patient-centered ideas for health reform.

http://www.investors.com/NewsAndAnalysis/Article/544589/201008201902/Fast-Track-To-Government-Health-Care.aspx

This is of monumental significance and yet few people are aware of this crisis. Why?

Because the very liberal Los Angeles Times refuses to report on it for political and ideological reasons.

This is inexcusable and a dereliction of their professional responsibility yet the Times has no shortage of vitriol and racist charges against Arizona and those who are against illegal immigration and for secure borders.

Media Miss Cartels' War In U.S.
Investor’s Business Daily     08/16/2010

Media: As Mexico's drug war and Arizona's bid to defend itself take center stage, the growth of cartels in Los Angeles is another leg of the story. But to know about it you need to read Spanish.

Los Angeles and its suburbs are in grave danger of becoming outposts for Mexican drug- and immigrant-smuggling cartels, according to local law enforcement officials.

"We have detected the Gulf cartel and Los Zetas," Alvin Jackson, head of the Narcotics Division of the L.A. Police Department, said in a recent interview. "They are operating on a middle and street level."

In Mexico, the Gulf and Zeta gangs are among the most violent, known for beheading opponents, setting off car bombs and shooting up border cities from Tijuana to Matamoros. In L.A., they've set up "distribution centers" not just in the slums, but also the San Fernando Valley and on the well-heeled Westside near Santa Monica.

Five other Mexican cartels — Sinaloa, Beltran-Levya, La Familia, Arellano Felix and Carillo Fuentes — also operate in L.A. They're busy recruiting gangs to carry on the same mayhem they're engaged in south of the border, Jackson said.

Steven Martinez, who heads the FBI in Los Angeles, agreed with Jackson's observations.

You'd think this would be news that merits front-page coverage in, say, the city's newspaper of record, the Los Angeles Times. But it's not. Jackson's and Martinez's assessments were reported in La Opinion, a Spanish-language daily that has no English translation.
It's not that the Times doesn't cover the cartel war in detail from Mexico. But when it comes to what's going on in Joe Friday's precincts, something that might have some relevance to its readers, the paper is derelict.

Perhaps it has something to do with the Times' near-monopoly on news in a one-newspaper town. Or maybe it's the paper's historically cozy relationship with the city's political machine, which panders to the Latino vote.

As illegal immigrants inundate the city and cartels come in behind them, the City Council declares L.A. a sanctuary city and wastes time boycotting Arizona for trying to beat back the same problems.

This is going to create serious problems down the road. L.A. District Attorney Steven Cooley told the Washington (not the L.A.) Times that gangs and drug traffickers may create gang- and cartel-controlled city governments.

It's already evident, he said, along the 710 Freeway towards the Port of Long Beach — a corridor that encompasses illegal-immigrant-majority towns such as Bell, the city whose officials were caught feathering their nests with million-dollar salary packages. The 710, by the way, has seen actual cartel shootings.

"If I was a drug dealer, and I didn't want to be interfered with, I'd move to a city where I could exploit dysfunctional city governments, corrupt the police or be left alone in a neighborhood where people are not as active in monitoring their communities," Cooley said.

Already in Cudahy, just south of Bell, Cooley says the FBI is investigating cartel-linked corruption as part of 30 ongoing corruption probes. No wonder even Mexico's president is complaining about U.S. official corruption going uninvestigated.

Meanwhile, even Hollywood is more aware of the cartel problem in Los Angeles. Locally produced TV shows such as "NCIS: Los Angeles" are incorporating cartel infiltration in city government into their L.A.-based story lines.

But at the Times, protecting the political establishment and its priorities means the growing power of the cartels will go unreported. It's a sad state of affairs when Angelenos have to rely on the ethnic press or newspapers based 3,000 miles away.

It's also ironic. Over the weekend, the Times reported that Mexican newspapers are not reporting drug-war news out of well-founded fear of retribution from cartels.

The Times seems to be practicing the same kind of self-censorship on its turf — not out of fear of gangs so much as a reluctance to cross a political establishment that is invested in unchecked illegal immigration.

http://www.investors.com/NewsAndAnalysis/Article/543965/201008161858/Media-Miss-Cartels-War-In-US.aspx

Unfortunately, "president?" Obama and most Democrats are pursuing actions that is in their best interests and diametrically opposed to our wishes.

Obamacare. Intentionally unsecured borders. Reckless federal spending of money that we don't have. Pork projects. Pro-Muslim/anti-Christian actions including Ground Zero support for a Trojan Horse mosque. ETC.

People are extremely nervous. Corporations are frugal and being quite provident with whatever cash they have.

What is going on? Why is this happening.

Read: What's Holding Back The Hiring? Start With Obama's 10 Job Killers