Pedro's Podium: November 2013

Thursday, November 14, 2013

Anatomy of a Betrayal

Once again the president has shown that he doesn't understand the limitations of his powers. He took to the podium and declared that private insurance companies would have to offer insurance plans that were in effect canceled 3 years ago. He has become so accustom to getting everything that he desires from Congress, the Left Stream Media, or through Executive Orders that he doesn't believe there are any limits on his power. But with the collapse of his approval ratings he is finding out that more members of Congress are getting a backbone and standing up to him. Many of his opponents now smell blood in the water and are attempting and take advantage of the situation.

One of the problems with those who are now coming forward and attacking, is that they don’t realize that much of that blood is their own. Sen. McCain is now calling for Obamacare to be repealed. This from the man who nearly broke his neck in a rush to the Senate floor to do Harry Reid’s bidding and denounced Sen. Cruz for simply asking to defund or delay the ACA. McCain, McConnell and the rest of the GOP Progressive wing were quite happy to see Americans suffer under the individual mandate and the projected failure of this monstrosities train wreck of a law. Of course these members of the GOP how had no problem lying to their constituencies and betraying promises they made, to get themselves reelected, suddenly found that their hypocrisy had been exposed. Now they want to claim that they were all along for repealing the law while not just a month ago they were supporting it. The establishment betrayal of the Tea Party and their promises are no less than that of the Democrats in Congress and the President. I say a pox on both houses. The Progressives of both parties only wish to maintain power and control. They are not interested in what is best for the people or the nation.

Many Red State Democrat Senators are in a panic for a very good reason. They are looking for ways to salvage what remains of their political careers. Senators Landau and Hagan were totally on board with the, if there was ever one this is it, Oxymoron law known as the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. There is no doubt in anyone’s mind, that looks at what has been presented, that this law doesn't protect anyone and is not affordable by any measure. The dangers of Identity Theft are so great that anyone who signs up under the law should lay awake at night wondering when they will be cleaned out by some crooked Obamacare Navigator. With the now shrinking insurance pool the idea that anyone’s premiums are going down is a pipe dream. These Senators now want to deny that, not only did they vote for the ACA, but also voted against the bill that would have protected people’s current health insurance in 2010. They knew at that time that Obamacare is dependent upon moving everyone into the exchanges. Anything else will cause it to collapse due to an imbalance in the insurance pool.

The root of the problems lies in the Progressive assumption that bigger is better and that Technocrats can run something better than an industry with centuries of experience. They looked at numbers and thought that they were the smartest people in the world and could do better. It’s not the first time that this has happened but this is the largest failure of its type. Arrogance and stupidity are a very dangerous mixture. The whole idea seems plausible as long as you don’t get too deep into the details. I honestly believe that the technocrats in Washington really believed that they could take over the healthcare system and make it better for everyone. They should have realized from the beginning that it would fail when so many exemptions were required to get it passed. But they were so determined to succeed in a goal that had alluded Progressives for over 100 years, they were not going to accept defeat until they experimented on the entire country at once.

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The grand lie that is causing so much trouble, and it is a lie, was the ("If you like your plan/doctor, you can keep your plan/doctor. Period") lie. The America people, in general disagreement with what most Progressives say, are generous and forgiving people. We pull for the underdog. We want to help those who need help. The part they really underestimated was the part about self-preservation. They really believed that they could tell us that we could keep out plans/doctors and that we would overlook the lie once they delivered cheaper, better plans through the exchanges. But this is where the wheels came off. They really thought that the cult of personality and the "likeability" of President Obama could transfer to Obamacare and the majority would continue to support it until any small bugs were worked out. They were expecting the technology to work. They thought that the prices would not cause sticker shock. They expected the major parts of the plan to go without any problems.

When they had to start hiding the true prices at the eleventh hour it caused major technical problems for those building healthcare.gov. They also put their faith into crony capitalism to select the company to build their web portal. This provided the first signs of what problems were to come. Then when the expected cancelation notices started hitting people’s mailboxes and there were not any cheaper alternatives. (The rules set forth for the policies are so broad that it is impossible to guarantee cheaper rates plus the promised web site is broken.) This has caused enough doubt that it has taken away the goodwill that many would have given the president. Even with his obvious lies. Their plan required everything to work out as planned, but never had any hope of working. The perfection that the Progressives seek does not allow for the human factor. The desire and overriding expectations of perfection of the architects all but guaranteed failure for the whole enterprise from its inception. Everything had to work on time without failure to keep the illusion alive in the eyes of the American people and to hide the underlying betrayal of trust that the system was built upon.

But after the great Obama lie, which caused most Americans to not question the law, the implementation didn't go as planned. The Obamacare's handlers were presented some cold hard facts. Many of their assumptions were proven wrong. Instead of listening to any criticism, they decided that they had all the answers. Now looking back, most of the predictions by the critics from 3 to 5 years ago have become facts. So this totally partisan law, being implemented in a totally partisan manner is taking a heavy toll on the partisans who passed it. It is also showing many Americans how corrupt both parties have become, by shining a lot of sun light on Washington politics.

Their assumption was that they could actually grow the failed and bloated single payer system (Medicare and Medicaid) to replace the current system by creating a controlled crash. They wanted this plan to fail, but they wanted the blame to go toward the industry, not the government. The overriding thought seemed to be that through force of will, people would overlook the flawed new system mainly because of their love for the president. That seems to be the turning point in this whole tragedy. The president told his lies. People believed him and went back to their daily lives of trying to survive. The law was pushed through with many of his true supporters not even knowing what it meant to them. Now suddenly they find that the promise was a lie. Too many have started to look at all the other things that have happened and were overlooked. They have to be wondering about other promises.

The president’s cornerstone accomplishment was sold with lies and deception. This laser like focus on Obamacare could be the death nail for his presidency. Already Congressmen are now looking at moving forward with impeachment of Eric Holder. Could they next be looking at overturning his executive orders? For a president who once seemed to have no boundaries or limits on the amount of power he could grab, things have changed quickly. His seemingly iron grip on power doesn't seem so secure. His rush to transform the nation may have caused him to overplay his hand. Likeability and charm only go so far. His constant campaigning may have kept his face in the minds of his truly loyal believers. His leadership skills have never been as good as his ability to transfix crowds at campaign rallies. Sooner or later he had to show something for all the promises. What he showed was that he was no different than any other politician. But he was much better when it came to telling lies to those who trusted him the most to protect them.

This is becoming a crisis of confidence in Mr. Obama. He has gone to the well too many times. It is one thing to promise something that is impossible, when most people realize it and give you credit for trying, it is another when your broken promise directly damages a large segment of the population. As I said before; we are a generous people and we want to help those who cannot help themselves, but most Americans are going only so far down that road. When government policies start to affect our mortality and long term health we awaken. One of the major goals of the Tea Party was to oppose the government takeover of our healthcare system. Many Americans didn't want Obamacare to fail; they knew that it would fail. The math and reality don’t match up. They chose to not just ignore, but attack and attempt to discredit anyone who disagreed with their plan. They truly believe that the ends justify the means. In this case we see that the ends are not matching up to what was promised or expected.

The idea that millions of Americans could and will be hurt by this plan is not something that I desire. But there have been too many lies told about the goals of it to believe anything good would ever come from its implementation. The denial of “Death Panel” that now is commonly known to exist under this law, which will select what treatments will be allowed and will all but condemning people to death through neglect, calls into question the true goals of anyone involve. It is time for a public apology to Sarah Palin for all the lies told about her as she pointed out the flaws is long overdue.

We find ourselves betrayed by too many people in our government. This was a total betrayal that cannot be easily forgiven. They put policy goals and politics ahead of caring for those they serve. Their goals took away one of the basic freedoms that most people see as sacred. They took away people’s right to decide their own fate. A free person has the right to decide how we live, what chances we take, and who decides our basic life and death decisions. Life is dangerous. We make life altering choices every day. I don’t think a cold and uncaring government, who will tell me any lie to get its way, is going to make the right choices for me. It is my life and there are too many things I can’t control, but I want to have some say in the decisions of how I spend my money and what chances I’m willing to take. It is not the job of Obama or the Progressives in Congress to decide for me.

They have overstepped their authority and endangered people’s lives to implement a half-baked plan created by amateurs who thought they could take a complex system and improve it by making it more complex and designed by people who didn't understand how the system worked before they tore it down. They thought they could save a system from going bankrupt by bankrupting the entire healthcare system. They underestimate the American people and how we would react to a betrayal that goes to the heart of what it means to be alive. This betrayal is one that I hope will at last wake up enough Americans to what we have lost and who is stealing it from us. The ultimate betrayal is that those who are sent to serve us in Washington have taken it upon themselves to decide that they can run our lives by lying to us.

Anatomy of a Betrayal by Pedro Sykes is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

Sunday, November 3, 2013

If You Like Your Nation…

Well we are now into 5 years of the fundamental transformation promised to you by President Obama. One of the first promises of the newly elected president was his promise to fundamentally transform the nation. This is unlike his other promises to the public don’t seem to be as much a priority in his mind. My overriding question at the moment would be: How’s that transformation going for you? As more and more Americans lose their preferred healthcare insurance and/or their doctors we’re seeing what that transformation will lead to in the future. The elites in Washington and the Progressive planners have shown that their vision of a country run for the elites and their cronies may not be the vision of many Americans. It is not what I was to believe was the American Dream. It is more of a nightmare than a dream.

For years the Federal Government has meddled in the healthcare systems of the states. It started with the imposition of Medicare and then Medicaid payments based upon government formulas, not the reality of delivering necessary lifesaving medical procedures. Through the growth of medical knowledge things that only a few years ago that were thought to be impossible are now relatively common. The idea that just because something can be done makes it something that the masses of people need forgets a major factor. Although medical procedures are possible, it requires highly talented and knowledgeable PEOPLE to do these things. If there is a shortage of these types of people you can not just go out and create them out of whole cloth. It requires more that training, it requires a high intelligence and skills not possessed by everyone.

But the government thinks that they can go into the market place and require certain things and that by fiat their orders will be carried out. It is easy when you are detached from reality to think that laws that are passed with little or no debate will actually change human behavior. It is easy to mandate change, but much harder to actually have mandates that are impractical or impossible to be implemented. It is easy to spend other people’s money or to tell other people how to live if you are not under the same constraints. Why else would Congress exempt themselves and their staff from the Affordable Care Act (ACA) or Obamacare? They are within the top wage earners in the nation, but they decided that they could not afford it. Sure they say that the poorest among us will get subsidies or will be put on Medicaid. The only problem with that plan is that they are still spending other people’s money with no thought as to how it will be paid for in the end.

It is very easy for a millionaire to sit in Washington and decide what you must, not can, afford for your healthcare premium. They have taken it upon themselves to determine you budget. They’ve decided what type of care or lack of care you deserve. They’ve ignored warnings about doctor shortages. They are willing to endanger the safety and wellbeing of the nation as a whole to push a 100 year old Progressive agenda. They have an agenda that says that they can build a perfect world by enslaving everyone to their demented ideas. They believe that although it may take time, that they can force everyone to comply and fall into step behind them and march into a bright future. This would be a grand idea to make a better world but in the past it has always ended it tragedy.

The forced sterilizations of the first half of the 20th century are now looked upon as a mistake, but have been replaced by other eugenic programs with similar goals. The mass abortion push that has occurred since the Roe v. Wade decision of the US Supreme Court has been sold throughout the nation as a woman’s right to choose. But it is still eugenics pushed by an organization known as Planned Parenthood and is a still, no matter how much it is denied, a major component of the misnamed Obamacare. The Progressives idea of building a perfect society can only be obtained through population control and genetics.

The so-called “war on women” used by the Democrats in 2012 was a war on our children. They have played upon the greed and envy of many Americans. Their overspending to buy votes through government programs and welfare are master strokes that play upon the selfishness of the average Democrat voter. They are spending the future of our children and condemning them to a life of debt to pay for our generation desire to live above our means. While the politicians make their political supporters rich.

They know that they can play upon the emotions of their base to tell them what they want to hear and give them whatever they want to get them to blindly follow. Their belief that the ends justify the means allows for corruption beyond anything seen before on a national level. This has not only changed the nature of the nation, it has redefined civility. Now a civil tone is when you are either lying about your opponent or making threats and attempting to intimidate anyone opposed to looting the treasury.

It is amazing how one party has embraced voter fraud to such an extent that they no longer fear not only being caught, but that there will ever be any backlash. As long as the corruption is so deep within a political party the dangers of uncontrolled corruption may have already grown too far to be turned back. With the wiling compliance of the media the possibility of true reform becomes remote. There are attempts to reinstate voter IDs in many states, even though the corruption is well within the Department of Justice and courts to the point that these actions may be declared illegal. If voter ID laws are overturned by the Democrat operatives within the government then there is no hope for the United States. Our republic dies once there is no longer even the resemblance of an opposition party. Don’t get me wrong, in many ways there is no longer an opposition party. The Republican leadership by far is more concerned with befriending and compromising with the Democrats, including supporting every Progressive policy put forth, than acting in opposition to this corruption of the system.

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I hope that all is not lost. The American people have begun to awaken to the threat from Washington. But I fear it maybe too little too late. There are so many who look to the government for too much. Too many have sold their souls to servitude to the state. It is hard to convince people that they should turn down “free” stuff when they no longer have the desire to make a change. The Progressives have had such a large head start and are so entrenched in the government that it is a huge task to dislodge them and shutdown so many leaches on our society. Too many people now believe that only the government can provide the solutions to our problems. That is where the rollout of the ACA could be a stepping stone to a real solution.

The failure of healthcare.gov is a golden opportunity to point out the glaring incompetence of the Progressive system. With the overreach of the Democrats to try and take on such a massive task as the takeover of the healthcare system there is an opportunity to beat them at their own game. It is important that people understand that the root of the cause of the problem is the government. They are the ones who attack the free market to begin with and did not allow the normal ebb and flow of the market to correct and adjust. The government’s court system, the bar system, and lawyers allowed and sometimes encouraged lawsuits that crippled and corrupted the medical system. There has been for a long time too much interference in the practice of medicine where it should have not been. On the other side there has been little or no government oversight of the abortion industry which has been supported by the Progressives as if it had nothing to do with the practice of the medical arts. The change will have to come from within and without the government. It may not be too late, but time is running out at a fast pace.

So no Mr. Obama did say: If you like your nation, you can keep your nation. For that would have been as a big a lie as the one about keeping your current doctor and healthcare. He most definitely has no plans to allow you to keep your doctor, healthcare, or your nation. When he said that he was going to fundamentally transform the nation, he meant it. Healthcare was just the beginning. If he is allowed a third term or Hillary Clinton is elected in 2016 then by 2020 there will be no United States of America as we know it. There will be a one party dictatorship run by crony billionaires who will be so far above the law that the rest of us will no longer matter. Even if Obama or Clinton loses and a Progressive Republican is elected the process will only slow slightly. By 2020 or 2024 the ending will still be the same. But by 2016 we may already be too far gone to pull back any of the damage done by this current regime on both sides of the aisle.