I received the following email today from Citizens Against Government Waste; all emphasis is added:

The HillaryCare proponents in Congress are making good on their campaign promise!

Under the guise of helping children without health insurance, the advocates of a government-run, universal healthcare system for all Americans are pushing for a massive expansion of the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) - increasing the cost of this program to you, me, and all taxpayers

If they succeed, this would be a giant first step toward making their vision of a socialist, Canadian-style healthcare system a reality in this country.

The House and Senate will consider legislation on SCHIP as early as next week, and it’s urgent that you tell your Senators and Representative to oppose the expansion of SCHIP and the tax increases that would be required to pay for it.

SCHIP was originally designed to help low-income families who earn too much to qualify for Medicaid gain access to health insurance for their children. The proposals being pushed by the HillaryCare advocates would increase the SCHIP income eligibility level from the current 200 percent of the federal poverty line (approx. $40,000 in annual income for a family of four) to 300 or even 400 percent of the federal poverty line (approx. $61,950 and $82,600 in annual income, respectively); might allow states to expand coverage even further to other individuals; and might even increase existing benefits to a practically unlimited benefits package.

These proposals could triple spending on SCHIP, from $25 billion to as much as $75 billion over five years, and make more than 71 percent of American children - including many who already have private insurance - covered under either SCHIP or Medicaid.

To pay for this big-government healthcare expansion, its advocates have proposed increasing the federal cigarette excise tax by as much as 156 percent and raising taxes elsewhere. Trust me, this will be just the first of many tax increases to come as SCHIP, like virtually every other entitlement program before it, ends up costing more than expected and sucking up increasing amounts of your tax dollars!

[A]fter the failure of HillaryCare in the 1990’s, the universal healthcare proponents have wised up. They know they can’t impose a government takeover of America’s healthcare system - and the massive tax increases needed to pay for it - all at once without provoking a resounding public outcry. Instead, they’ve adopted an incremental approach, where they will slowly expand existing government healthcare programs until they crowd out private insurance.

The backers of this plan think they can get all Americans dependent on the government for our healthcare before we know what hit us!

Please tell your Senators and Representative to oppose legislation that would expand SCHIP and increase the federal cigarette excise tax, or any other taxes, to pay for it.

Sincerely,

Thomas A. Schatz
President

Socialized medicine, by focusing solely on the patients - who, of course, should be the PRIMARY focus - makes no allowance for research and development. R&D is VERY expensive and is currently funded by the profits made by privately owned medical facilities. The U.S. has been the world leader in medical research because our capitalist system makes this very expensive R&D profitable which, besides being good for the patients, is good for the economy.

Socialized medicine strangles R&D. Countries with socialized medicine just ride on the coattails of the U.S. If we also socialize medicine on whose coattails will we ride?

Economic crisis notwithstanding, the U.S. is a wealthy enough country to provide medical care for its people - ALL of its people. The best way to ensure that the poor and uninsured get care is to provide, not a medical system funded and controlled by a government with limited resources, but an insurance program that allows them to get care in the privately owned system.

Don’t miss this very important point - truly socialized medicine does not allow competition by private businesses. They sign up for the government program or they shut their doors. Socialized medicine equalizes healthcare, not by raising the standard of care overall, but by lowering it overall, to the lowest common denominator. It takes away the basic right to choose from whom we get our health care. It will be from the government program or not at all.

Is that really the direction we want to take? Do we want to leave our children a country with third rate medical care and crushing entitlement spending?

I don’t.

Fact or just a blog rumor?

While it is reported that 32 states have so far called for a U.S. constitutional convention I can verify only one:

Ohio

and that after searching the legislative bills of 18 states. Anyone have more info or is this just BS?

As I noted in an earlier post, the Donofrio case that was today denied for certiorari was not the only case challenging Obama’s eligibility for the office of POTUS filed with the SCOTUS. Another case has been distributed by Justice Scalia for the conference of December 12: Cort Wrotnowski v. Susan Bysiewicz, Connecticut Secretary of State, No. 08A469.

As plaintiff is just a citizen voter and not a government official or candidate for office it is most likely (IMHO) that the SCOTUS will deny the petition for lack of standing.

No, it has nothing to do with Obama being elected or the control of Congress by the Dems. It’s something my husband and I have been discussing for a couple of years now and just hadn’t done.

I bought a gun.

Hubby already has several - a rifle, a shotgun and a handgun. He’s ex-military so is completely comfortable with firearms. Me - I have a vague memory of firing a rifle at tin cans as a child (once) and firing a handgun into a river as a college student (also once). As a college student and good little liberal I was all for strict gun laws, the shooting into the river event notwithstanding. As I matured I gained a new respect for the second amendment but gun ownership still was not for me. When my children were young I was staunchly against having a gun in the house for fear of their safety, but also because I wasn’t sure I could ever actually shoot someone.

But as the horror stories of kidnapped and tortured children multiplied I came to know that I could shoot someone under certain circumstances, and protecting my children was one of them. But I had no money, no one to tell me what kind of firearm to get, how to care for it or how to use it.

Then 9/11 happened, and school shootings happened - at least one of which would have been worse if not for students who carried handguns in their cars - and I knew it was past time, but still I waited.

Then I married my wonderful husband and put the matter aside other than to have him show me how to use his firearms. I still haven’t taken them out for actual firing practice, though, and really I depended upon him to be there to protect me. But we are not together 24/7 and really I was just putting the burden of making life or death decisions on his shoulders so I wouldn’t have to.

So this weekend we finally went out and purchased a handgun just for me. Small enough to carry (although I won’t be carrying it around on my person unless I ever qualify for a conceal-carry), light enough for me to handle, lethal enough to make up for my amateur aim, and sufficiently dangerous-looking to be taken seriously. (Hubby liked the little Dillinger revolver but it was just too darned cute! Self-defense is NO time for cute!)

The handgun safety test was common sense, so I passed easily and paid my money. We pick it up in 10 days after the mandatory waiting period and the background check, which gives me plenty of time to read up on gun laws. Then I learn to care for it and finally, to use it.

This post is not just a personal tale. Reflect again on this: I was just putting the burden of making life or death decisions on his shoulders so I wouldn’t have to.

How often do we do that? How many pacifists wouldn’t want the police showing up with firearms if they had a violent intruder in their homes? And more - how many of those pacifists would be okay with the police just leaving and allowing the intruder to carry on if he wouldn’t stop just because they were waving their guns around, because they wouldn’t actually USE them? (That was the argument, by the way, that cured me of my pacifist phase.)

How many pacifists would be okay with a crowd of onlookers who allowed an innocent person to be beaten to a bloody pulp because no one was willing to commit violence to save her?

How many gun control advocates would be okay with 50 students dying in a school shooting instead of 10 because no one at the scene had a gun?

How many advocates of only peaceful solutions are willing to let crowds of innocents be slaughtered because they won’t commit violence to save them? Oh now that’s getting a little farther removed, isn’t it? The force it would take to slaughter a crowd of innocents would require force to stop it that is beyond what most individuals could achieve alone even if they wanted to. And there is the safety in numbers - since I myself can’t do it someone else has to, and from the safety of my inability I am free to decry the use of violence by both sides.

Or how about this example: Drilling for and refining oil are damaging to the environment, therefore I actively resist any and all attempts to do it in my state and my country. I advocate clean energy sources and put my money where my mouth is. But…all-clean-energy choices are not available yet, so I still need to put gas in my hybrid and take a jet-fuel burning aircraft when I travel. But I still won’t allow drilling for or refining oil in MY backyard. Am I not, then, just putting the burden on others? Is drilling less harmful to the environment in Canada, Mexico and Saudi Arabia? Are the citizens of those countries less deserving of a clean environment because they “allow” their governments and industries to drill?

I’m all for ending our dependence on fossil fuels, but as long as we use it we have a responsibility to share in the burden that its extraction and production require. I’m all for peace, but I’ve seen that it sometimes takes violence to stop violence. In both areas I have to do my share. To do otherwise is hypocritical and harmful to others.

On Friday, December 5, the SCOTUS held full conference on the matter of whether to grant or deny a writ of certiorari - essentially whether or not to review the case - on the matter of Donofrio v. Wells, the New Jersey challenge to the Obama election.

The SCOTUS did not issue their decision on the matter yesterday which experience tells us means it is likely to be denied on Monday. However, once in a great while, such a delayed decision DOES result in a granting of the writ.

So, while Donofrio’s case is not dead yet, it likely will be on Monday.

However, at last count there were 2 other cases pending before the SCOTUS and numerous others pending in state courts:

SCOTUS:

Berg v. Obama, 08-570
The due date for Obama’s response, Dec. 1, has passed. No response shows on the docket, but then neither does the emergency motion for immediate injunction that Berg is said to have filed Dec. 2.

Wrotnowski v. Bysiewicz, 08A-469
Submitted to Justice Scalie Nov. 29; no further docket activity.

The state info is taking a lot of time to compile so will be the subject of a subsequent post.

The firing of a college administrator over her criticism of gay rights has sparked a debate about free speech and whether universities have the right to regulate what employees say outside of their jobs.

Crystal Dixon filed a lawsuit Monday in federal court seeking to be reinstated to her University of Toledo job, which she lost after writing in a newspaper column that gay rights can’t be compared to civil rights because homosexuality is a choice…

…School officials said her views contradicted university policies, according to the lawsuit.

If this administrator came out of the closet in her private life, what would be the reaction if she were fired for it? Employers do not have the right to regulate the private lives of their employees, nor can they require that they hold only approved views and opinions as long as those views and opinions do not interfere with their jobs. Clearly that was not the case here since, until the column was published, the university was unaware of her opinions.

Today it’s the universities… where will the thought police patrol tomorrow?