Why does Obama only meddle when the pro-democracy side is winning?
(Image from IBD’s Michael Ramirez, sent to me by ECM).
First, I really recommend you take a look at this beautifully-written article by Mary Anastasia O’Grady in the WSJ. It explains how the Honduran military was authorized by their Supreme Court to prevent their leftist dictator from extending his reign beyond the term limits required by law.
Excerpt:
It seems that President Mel Zelaya miscalculated when he tried to emulate the success of his good friend Hugo in reshaping the Honduran Constitution to his liking.
…That Mr. Zelaya acted as if he were above the law, there is no doubt. While Honduran law allows for a constitutional rewrite, the power to open that door does not lie with the president. A constituent assembly can only be called through a national referendum approved by its Congress.
But Mr. Zelaya declared the vote on his own and had Mr. Chávez ship him the necessary ballots from Venezuela. The Supreme Court ruled his referendum unconstitutional, and it instructed the military not to carry out the logistics of the vote as it normally would do.
But O’Grady is not optimistic that it will stick, especially with the pro-dictator Obama offering support to the dictator Zelaya via Hillary Clinton:
But Honduras is not out of the Venezuelan woods yet. Yesterday the Central American country was being pressured to restore the authoritarian Mr. Zelaya by the likes of Fidel Castro, Daniel Ortega, Hillary Clinton and, of course, Hugo himself. The Organization of American States, having ignored Mr. Zelaya’s abuses, also wants him back in power. It will be a miracle if Honduran patriots can hold their ground.
Read the whole thing, it’s worth it.
But the best ongoing coverage of the Honduras situation is at Fausta’s blog. The main the thing I want to note from her coverage is that she has many links to other sites.
Excerpt:
This is why Zelaya was removed from power: all branches of government and the country’s institutions recognized that he had broken the law.
The Obama administration worked in recent days to prevent President Manuel Zelaya’s ouster, said a senior U.S. official. The State Department, in particular, communicated to Honduran officials on the ground that President Barack Obama wouldn’t support any nondemocratic transfer of power in the Central American country.
“We had some indication that a move against Mr. Zelaya was afoot,” said a U.S. official briefed on the diplomacy. “We made it clear it was something we didn’t support.”
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton joined Obama Sunday in criticizing the Honduran coup and calling for the restoration of the democratic process.
“We call on all parties in Honduras to respect the constitutional order and the rule of law, to reaffirm their democratic vocation, and to commit themselves to resolve political disputes peacefully and through dialogue,” Clinton said in a statement.
We saw above that everything that the Honduran government did was within the rule of law, and yet Obama and Hillary are following Chavez’s lead and making it sound like Zelaya was following the law!
These video clips feature one of the conservatives I like, Senator Tom Coburn! (H/T Club for Growth)
Tom Coburn is a medical doctor, and ran a medical business. He gives you the inside view of why American health care needs changing, and why big government socialism is not the answer. This is not just a lesson in health care. Listen closely – this is a lesson in economics, and it shows the vision of free-market capitalism, liberty and personal responsibility that drives the policies of the right-wing.
Part 1:
Part 2:
And here is Ronald Reagan talking about the loss of liberty that follows when a country adopts socialized medicine. (H/T Club for Growth)
This is the easiest way to learn about health care policy.
Note: If you prefer to learn about socialized vs consumer-driven health care with podcasts, click here.
More details from a think tank
Here is a comprehensive treatment of the problems of health care today, and the right way to reform it. This article by the founder of the Heritage Foundation, Edwin Feulner, Ph.D., is so long that it is exactly the kind of thing that lefties like commenter Jerry won’t have the patience to read! This is the best thing to read in this post if you can only read one thing.
Here is are some of the myths he corrects:
If you like your health care package you can keep it
“…a public plan will lead many employers to drop private health coverage for their workers and dump them into the public plan… According to independent analyses, as many as 119 million Americans could end up in a public plan….”
The end goal is not a single payer system
“…The “single payer” here is Uncle Sam, using taxpayers’ money, and not just paying the bills but calling the shots and deciding what care every American will get—or not get….”
The end goal is not a single payer system
“…Congress’s own watchdog–have issued preliminary estimates that the cost could be high as $2 trillion over 10 years, with most of that borrowed money…”
The quality of your health care will get better
“…Medicare has huge gaps in coverage. Medicaid’s quality is notoriously bad. They both offer substandard care compared to most private insurance plans…”
And of course his letter also gives conservative solutions to the problem of rising health care costs. The Heritage Foundation is my favorite think tank. Conservative across the board – not just on fiscal issues.
James Demint
And conservatives like James Demint are getting this message out to the public, too.
Sen. James Demint
Here is Senator Demint’s article in Forbes magazine. He answers the question: “What is the cause of our current health care problems? Is it the free market? Or is it government intervention into the free market?”
Excerpt:
…Washington politicians make it hard for individuals to own their own health insurance policies. Government gives tax benefits to businesses to provide group health plans to employees, but offers no such tax benefit to individuals who try to buy their own plan for themselves or their family. Government prevents consumers from shopping for better plans across state lines, which limits competition and drives up prices. Government health care programs like Medicare and Medicaid pay doctors and hospitals less than the full value of their services, and the difference gets priced into the higher premiums paid by people who do have insurance.
In other words, politicians deliberately restrict consumer choice, drive up prices, underpay doctors and hinder both access and portability. Then they turn around, blame the free market for the health care crisis and say the only way to save the system is a government takeover of health insurance in the form of a so-called “public option.”
And he’s goes on to explain conservative solutions to the problem of rising health care costs. A great article from one of my favorite conservatives.
The real costs of Obama’s plan
Keith Hennessey has an analysis of the costs of Obama’s new government-controlled, rationed health care plan. You may have heard that the CBO has issued an estimate about the costs of Obama’s plan: 1 Trilliion over 10 years. Keith says that the number is actually closer to 1.3 trillion.
Health care subsidies over 6 years
Keith took at closer look at the CBO’s 1 Trillion estimate, which includes only ONE area where money will need to be spent (subsidies for the poor). He found that many items in the Democrats’ health care bill were not included in the CBO estimate!
Excerpt:
The budgetary effects of neither the individual mandate nor the employer mandate are included in this score. I think CBO will find these provisions would raise revenues for the government and reduce the deficit. While the leaked draft of Kennedy-Dodd was specific about the employer mandate, the official version has just the placeholder language, “Policy under discussion.” Both mandates leave wide discretion for the Secretaries of Treasury and HHS to create a level and structure of taxation “to accomplish the goal of enhancing participation in qualifying coverage.” It is extremely difficult for CBO and their tax counterparts, the Joint Committee on Taxation (JCT) staff, to estimate something like this.
The estimate does not include the budgetary cost of expanding Medicaid to childless adults with income below 150% of the poverty line. I expect that this will add hundreds of billions of dollars to the cost over the next decade.
It does not include the requirement that health plans define “children” as dependents up to age 27. I expect this will raise costs.
It does not include the effects of the Medical Advisory Council’s ability to define benefits, or the requirements that plans rebate premiums to the insured. I think this too will raise costs.
It does not include the budget effect of having a “public plan option.”
There are a bunch of other programs in the bill, including a new disability program and lots of new public health programs.
Keith will be posting more articles on his blog as he calculates the real costs of Obama’s plan.
Obama thinks that you are more satisfied with the service at your local DMV than you are with Amazon.com. And he plans to make sure that you are dealing with government bureaucrats, not with private businesses, when you need health care. Who gives you better service? The government, that isn’t trying to compete with anyone to meet your needs? Or private businesses, which do need to compete to earn your business?
Further study
You can watch some videos containing horror stories from countries that have adopted single-payer health care, too.
WINTERY KNIGHT 
