Health Care Reform's Bloated Bureaucracy, China-Cuba-Honduras, Obama Loses Popular Support

Dear Friends:

Here are some items I thought would interest you.

Blessings,

Barrett

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Health Care Reform’s Bloated Bureaucracy


The more we learn about Congress’ vision of health care reform, the more we should become alarmed. Henry Waxman’s bill, HR 3200, proposes no less than 53 distinct oversight bodies, programs, and positions to empower his committee’s health care monstrosity. Here is a list being circulated. It includes page numbers so you can verify it for yourself.

1. Health Benefits Advisory Committee (Section 123, p. 30)
2. Health Choices Administration (Section 141, p. 41)
3. Qualified Health Benefits Plan Ombudsman (Section 144, p. 47)
4. Program of administrative simplification (Section 163, p. 57)
5. Retiree Reserve Trust Fund (Section 164(d), p. 70)
6. Health Insurance Exchange (Section 201, p. 72)
7. Mechanism for insurance risk pooling to be established by Health Choices Administration Commissioner (Section 206(b), p. 106)
8. Special Inspector General for the Health Insurance Exchange (Section 206(c), p. 107)
9. Health Insurance Exchange Trust Fund (Section 207, p. 109)
10. State-based Health Insurance Exchanges (Section 208, p. 111)
11. “Public Health Insurance Option” (Section 221, p. 116)
12. Ombudsman for “Public Health Insurance Option” (Section 221(d), p. 117)
13. Account for receipts and disbursements for “Public Health Insurance Option” (Section 222(b), p. 119)
14. Telehealth Advisory Committee (Section 1191, p. 380)
15. Demonstration program providing reimbursement for “culturally and linguistically appropriate services” (Section 1222, p. 405)
16. Demonstration program for shared decision making using patient decision aids (Section 1236, p. 438)
17. Accountable Care Organization pilot program (Section 1301, p. 443)
18. Independent patient-centered medical home pilot program under Medicare (Section 1302, p. 462)
19. Community-based medical home pilot program under Medicare (Section 1302(d), p. 468)
20. Center for Comparative Effectiveness Research (Section 1401(a), p. 502)
21. Comparative Effectiveness Research Commission (Section 1401(a), p. 505)
22. Patient ombudsman for comparative effectiveness research (Section 1401(a), p. 519)
23. Quality assurance and performance improvement program for skilled nursing facilities (Section 1412(b)(1), p. 546)
24. Quality assurance and performance improvement program for nursing facilities (Section 1412 (b)(2), p. 548)
25. Special focus facility program for skilled nursing facilities (Section 1413(a)(3), p. 559)
26. Special focus facility program for nursing facilities (Section 1413(b)(3), p. 565)
27. National independent monitor pilot program for skilled nursing facilities and nursing facilities (Section 1422, p. 607)
28. Demonstration program for approved teaching health centers with respect to Medicare GME (Section 1502(d), p. 674)
29. Pilot program to develop anti-fraud compliance systems for Medicare providers (Section 1635, p. 716)
30. Medical home pilot program under Medicaid (Section 1722, p. 780)
31. Comparative Effectiveness Research Trust Fund (Section 1802, p. 824)
32. “Identifiable office or program” within CMS to “provide for improved coordination between Medicare and Medicaid in the case of dual eligibles” (Section 1905, p. 852)
33. Public Health Investment Fund (Section 2002, p. 859)
34. Scholarships for service in health professional needs areas (Section 2211, p. 870)
35. Loan repayment program for service in health professional needs areas (Section 2211, p. 873)
36. Program for training medical residents in community-based settings (Section 2214, p. 882)
37. Grant program for training in dentistry programs (Section 2215, p. 887)
38. Public Health Workforce Corps (Section 2231, p. 898)
39. Public health workforce scholarship program (Section 2231, p. 900)
40. Public health workforce loan forgiveness program (Section 2231, p. 904)
41. Grant program for innovations in interdisciplinary care (Section 2252, p. 917)
42. Advisory Committee on Health Workforce Evaluation and Assessment (Section 2261, p. 920)
43. Prevention and Wellness Trust (Section 2301, p. 932)
44. Clinical Prevention Stakeholders Board (Section 2301, p. 941)
45. Community Prevention Stakeholders Board (Section 2301, p. 947)
46. Grant program for community prevention and wellness research (Section 2301, p. 950)
47. Grant program for community prevention and wellness services (Section 2301, p. 951)
48. Grant program for public health infrastructure (Section 2301, p. 955)
49. Center for Quality Improvement (Section 2401, p. 965)
50. Assistant Secretary for Health Information (Section 2402, p. 972)
51. Grant program to support the operation of school-based health clinics (Section 2511, p. 993)
52. National Medical Device Registry (Section 2521, p. 1001)
53. Grants for labor-management programs for nursing training (Section 2531, p. 1008)

We shouldn’t be surprised by HR 3200’s $1.5 trillion price tag when we see this kind of bureaucracy set up to empower it. Even if the liberals actually drop the public option, no one should think that this health care take-over will actually work. It’s just another liberal, bureaucratic, utopian vision that ignores reality. Surely, we can do better than this.

Strengthening Communism and Weakening Democracy

It is being reported, http://www.jbs.org/jbs-news-feed/5302; http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2009-07/13/content_8422505.htm, that the White House has granted the request of a Chinese group to have the national flag of China flown on the White House South Lawn on September 20 in honor of the communist nation’s 60th anniversary. No one remembers a time when a nation’s flag has been flown at the White House for such an event. It is normal to fly the flag of another country when its dignitaries are visiting, but not otherwise. There are no dignitaries visiting during this celebration. The sponsors of the event expect about 1,000 people to turn out for the celebration, but no official delegation from China. So, on September 20, our nation will help celebrate the rise of communism over the world’s most populous nation, and its ongoing subjugation of its people. This is no way to promote democracy!

This isn’t the Obama administration’s only recent bow to communism. This week the Obama administration announced major changes in the U.S. stance toward Cuba. Cuban Americans will now be able to enjoy unlimited travel to family members in Cuba. They will be able to send unlimited money and certain other items to them as well. And communication companies are going to be given the right to set up more communication channels between Cuba and the United States.

While campaigning in May 2007, President Obama said, “It's time for more than tough talk that never yields results. It's time for a new strategy. There are no better ambassadors for freedom than Cuban Americans. That's why I will immediately allow unlimited family travel and remittances to the island. It's time to let Cuban Americans see their mothers and fathers, their sisters and brothers. It's time to let Cuban American money make their families less dependent upon the Castro regime.”

He is now following through with that pledge. I’m glad that separated Cuban families will be able to spend more time together and that some of Cuba’s suffering masses will have a little extra money. I’m sure they need it. Unfortunately, the decision is likely going to have a much more negative impact on the country by strengthening the Castro brothers’ hands. You can be sure that much of the money sent will end up in the Castros’ coffers.

The Cuban people are not poor because they are cut off from the world. All the rest of the world trades freely with Cuba, and numerous U.S. companies trade regularly with Cuba to supply the country with “humanitarian” agricultural products. If sending more money into the country would make the people less dependent on the Castro regime, they would already be free. More money for Cuba simply means more money and power for the Castros. In fact, Cuba has been in the midst of a major restructuring of its economy due to the worldwide financial decline. Raul Castro has already started to dismantle some of the nation’s massive bureaucracy as he recognizes that the communist system cannot be sustained. More money poured into the country at this time will weaken the incentive to continue to loosen government control over the nation’s business sector.

These sympathetic actions toward two communist nations are even more disturbing when contrasted with the way our country is treating Honduras simply because it is trying to prevent a despot from turning their nation into another Venezuela. It was reported on Thursday that the State Department, under Hillary Clinton’s leadership, has decided to cut off non-humanitarian aid to Honduras in response to that nation’s refusal to restore the deposed former president Zelaya to power. Zelaya was in the midst of illegal efforts to consolidate his power base in that nation when the Honduran legislative branch and its Supreme Court ordered the military to remove him from power for seeking to subvert Honduras’ democratic principles.

It is shocking that the Obama administration has chosen to honor a nation that drove tanks over students who insisted that their nation should be more responsive to the will of the people and to punish a nation for removing from office a man who sought to subvert the will of the people. The New York Times, http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2009/09/04/us/politics/AP-US-US-Honduras.html, includes this paragraph in their story about the State Department’s disgraceful treatment of a friend of democracy: "Honduras' interim government sent a letter to Clinton vowing it would withstand any price to defend democracy in the Central American country. 'Whether you wish us well or not, we will pay any price, we will bear any burden, we will take on any difficulty, we will support any friend and oppose any enemy to ensure the survival and the success of liberty and democracy in our country,' interim Interior Minister Oscar Raul Matute said in the letter, echoing President John F. Kennedy's 1961 inaugural address."

I wish them well in their efforts to withstand the pressure of communist dictators and our own misguided leaders in this country.

President Obama Loses Popular Support

The latest polling shows that less than half the country supports President Obama’s policies. Two recent pieces are worth reading for a good take on why things have gone so badly for him. Steve Chapman, http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2009/08/30/what_voters_meant.html, makes a good case for the primary cause. He opens, “Barack Obama came into office championing change, and he apparently assumed that if Americans voted for him, it was because they wanted the future to be different from what went before. Actually, what they wanted was a future much like the not-so-distant past -- before the financial crisis, before the recession, before the Iraq war, before the most unpopular president since the invention of polling.” (Remember, Chapman is an Obama supporter.) Chapman argues that the nation is turning on President Obama because it is rejecting his plans to increase government encroachment in their lives.

No doubt, the vast majority of Americans have rejected Obama’s policies. However, it isn’t clear that Obama came into office with the belief that he had a mandate from the American people to make radical changes. What is clear is that the person many millions of people thought they were electing isn’t really who they thought he was. Obama the candidate moved to the center on practically every major issue as the campaign progressed. In other words, he knew what most of the country wanted, and he told them what he needed to tell them to get elected.

The reason most people didn’t pay attention to the transformation of his message is because the major media outlets didn’t point it out, and much of the public seemed perfectly willing to be oblivious. In the end, many people thought Obama was a centrist. In the same article, Chapman quotes Mike Duncan, then Chairman of the Republican National Committee, “Barack Obama just ran the most successful moderate Republican presidential campaign since Dwight Eisenhower.” Now that he won, he is showing his true colors, and most of the nation is repulsed.

A major case of buyer’s remorse is now setting in across the country as millions who voted for President Obama see what he is doing. David Brooks, who has moved further left since becoming a regular contributor at the New York Times, makes much the same argument as Chapman. At one point in his article, http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/01/opinion/01brooks.html?emc=eta1, he says, “The public has soured on Obama’s policy proposals. Voters often have only a fuzzy sense of what each individual proposal actually does, but more and more have a growing conviction that if the president is proposing it, it must involve big spending, big government and a fundamental departure from the traditional American approach.”

Yes, President Obama is a liberal ideologue and the nation is not interested in living under his vision of America. That’s what has the country in an uproar now. But that is only the beginning of President Obama’s troubles. The President looks less and less in control with each passing week. He is now responding to criticism and setbacks rather than leading. His political appointees are now making decisions on their own that are outside of the mainstream of American convictions. Ultra-liberals in congress are running the legislative process. Soon, it is likely that the vast center of the populace will begin feeling like no one in Washington is looking out for their interests and that the ultra-liberal wing of the Democrat party is running things. Once that feeling sets in, things are going to get even more tense.