That’s Right Nate

[We're very lucky tonight to have a guest column by Congressman Jack Kimble (R-CA) who is writing in praise of Senator Joe Lieberman (?-CN)]

I happen to be a great fan of Joe Lieberman.  I took some heat for this in 2000 when he was brainwashed by Al Gore and ran against our beloved President Bush.  I have to admit, I could even feel empathy for the many Democrats who were crestfallen at the thought of Joe being denied the Vice-Presidency in such a close election.    I’ve been a big fan of Joe Lieberman for nearly 20 years since he first won my heart as Willie on the television show Alf.  His deadpan, put upon, whining delivery has served him well as a Senator as well.

Though Joe is older now, I can attest that he looks like a man half his age in a spedo.  He’s living proof that with good living, you really don’t need health care.   Today, he took a lot of flack from his own party, or former party, or whatever the Democrats are when he announced he would not vote for a health care bill with the public option and in fact he wouldn’t even vote to end a filibuster unless the public option was removed from the legislation.

Joe’s problems with the public option is the same as my own:

1. The government cannot handle things like this efficiently and it would do a terrible job insuring people.
2. The public option will increase competition and lower the profit margins of insurance companies at a time when they can least afford it.
3. The public option will lead to communism by 2012.

Joe has said that he would to keep the rest of the bill and in 3 or 4 years revisit things to see if we might want to investigate the possibility of creating a trigger that if reached would possibly bring us the public option.   Without the public option, the current program will work to lower health care costs and insure people by fining people heavily if they don’t buy health insurance   This will help the insurance companies by increasing their profits and help the uninsured by making them by health care.

Joe has once again shown himself to be a figure of integrity and courage.  A lot of people would have been scared to stand against the public option when like Lieberman, they were so heavily financed by the insurance industry.   I had the same problem just last year when I had to make the difficult decision of supporting the tobacco industry despite the fact that they heavily funded my campaign.  I made the right choice and went with my conscience the same way that Joe Lieberman has today.  This is truly what being a member of Congress is all about.

Jimmy "Superfly" Snuka--the 37th Greatest Mormon of All-Time

It strikes me as absurd that liberals want to put down our health care system.   They complain that we pay more than any other country and our health care is only the 37th best in the world right behind Costa Rica and ahead of Slovenia.   Well, that may be true, but is 37 bad?  Heck no.  The 37th best health care in the world is still world class.  When I was growing up a man by the name of Casey Kasem did a top 40 radio show and you know what, they played the 37th top song one time, just like the number one song.  Let’s not stop there though–Here are some other #37s.

The Billboard 37th hottest song right now is Uprising by Muse–I’m sure it’s great.

Rolling Stone rates Bob Marley and the Wailers’ No Woman No Cry as the 37th greatest song of all time.

Internet Movie Database users votes Taxi Driver as the 37th greatest movie of all time.

TV.COM rated CSI: NY as the 37th most popular show on television now.

The 37th greatest tv episode of all time is Chrylser Theatre’s “Kicks” from 1965.

Terry Kath of Chicago was named the 37th best rock guitarist by DigitalDreamdoor.com.

Topper Headon of The Clash was ranked the 37th best rock drummer by the same website.

In 1998 The Sporting News named Hank Greenberg as the 37th best baseball player of all-time.

The Sporting News called Deon Sanders the 37th greatest football player of all-time.

The 37th ranked college is The University of Maryland according to ULinks.com.

The 37th best restaurant in the world is Le Quartier Francais, South Africa according to San Pellegrino’s 2009 awards.

Beeradvocate.com rates Surly Brewing Company’s Furious as the 37th best beer in the world.

The 37th greatest Mormon is Jimmy “Super Fly” Snuka

The board of RandomHouse.com named The Bridge of San Luis Rey by Thornton Wilder as the 37th greatest novel of all-time.

The 37th greatest television quote is  “…if it weren’t for you meddling kids! (The bad guy, “Scooby Doo, Where Are You?”) according to TV Land.

So you see, if you intend to call our health care system anything less than world class, then you need to make the same comments about a whole lot of great things.  That’s why no matter what the liberals and democrats may claim, top 40 isn’t that bad at all.

7:02 – I really like the parade of sick people.  That’s class.

7:06 – Oh Congressman Kimble.  I don’t think Hillary was expecting tongue when she kissed you.   That’s not going to go over well.

7:13 – Ah, the President found the parade of sick people

7:15 – Hmm, what was in the over sized envelopes he gave Pelosi and Biden? The real death panel info?

7:18 – Starting with a pledge to find Sarah Palin work is very bipartisan

7:20 – Did Obama just say he was determined to be the last President? Glenn Beck was right.

7:21 – My TV just switched to the X-Files. Oh wait, that’s John Dingell

7:29 – Bipartisan is the best ideas from the Democrats and the best ideas from Olympia Snowe

7:32 – This sounds like socialism to me

7:35 – Wow! John McCain has such a heartwarming smile

7:37 – I went to a Presidential news conference and a town hall broke out

7:40 – Congressman Kimble just confessed he was the heckler.

7:47 I will not sign a plan that makes Senator Grassley smile.

7:53 – Tort reform is how they keep medical costs so low in Texas and Missouri

7:55 – I think there’s an auction going on.  Somebody just made a bid.

8:03 – An awful lot of indoctrinating tonight.

8:07 – Good that the Republicans are going back to Louisiana for the Rebuttal.  Jindahl went so well.  This guy is a pretty dynamic speaker.

One of the conditions of my trip with Emily to visit self storage places in the West was that I’d allow her to give her opinion on the health care debate.   As I have Emily this weekend, this seemed like the ideal time to have her give her opinion.  However, my blog has a reputation for hard hitting conservative commentary and while my daughter is quite intelligent for a girl, she’s only 13 years old.   Therefore, I thought I’d let her give her opinion in the form of a debate, which I thought would be educational for both her and my readers.

Nate: Welcome Emily.   Why do you want socialist health care that would kill your grandmother?

Emily: Dad, it’s not socialist.   That’s just a talking point you Republicans use.  We pay more for health care then anybody else in the world yet the World Health Organization ranks us 37^th right after Costa Rica.   Don’t you think that as Americans we can do better?

Nate: Emily, the World Health Organization is a biased liberal organization.  They have a bunch of scientists working for them of course they’re going to be on the socialists’ side.

Emily: Knowing stuff doesn’t make you a liberal dad…Hmm, maybe it does.

Nate: Getting back to health care.  I don’t want my tax dollars paying for some illegal immigrant’s medical care.

Emily: You are already dad.

Nate: How do you figure?

Emily: When an illegal immigrant is injured they go to the emergency room.   In fact, that World Net Daily link you sent me last year said that ¼ of all emergency room patients in Florida were illegals.  The government spent $40 billion covering the medical costs of the uninsured last year, so figure we spent $10 billion or so on the medical care for illegal aliens.

Nate: That’s ridiculous.  If it’s life threatening sure, but if they’re going to the emergency room for the flu or something then throw the bums out.

Emily: The flu? You mean like swine flu dad?  Have you ever heard the word pandemic?

Nate: That’s like a disease striking pandas right?

Emily: Yeah, sure dad.   Anyway,  if we don’t treat people with the flu it can spread.

Nate: It’s still socialism Emily and that’s something I won’t put up with in this house?

Emily: You mean like the electricity and the running water?  How about that reduced price lunch I get at school everyday.

Nate: Don’t blame me for that.  I’ve been telling your mother you don’t need to eat lunch until you’re under 110 pounds.

Emily: I know dad and running in the hot Oklahoma sun chasing after the car is good for me.

Nate: It builds character.  Listen, I don’t want a medical system like Canada?

Emily: Canadians love it, but besides that as Americans why would we ever put the Canadians accomplishments as the upper limit of our own potential in anything, but ice hockey.  No offense to Canada, but don’t you love this country?  Don’t you think we’re better than Canada?

Nate: Yes, of course.

Emily: Then why couldn’t our health care be better than theirs if we tried a public option?

Nate: We can’t have a public option competing with private insurance.  The public option doesn’t worry about profits and can undercut the private companies.  The Heritage Foundation says it’s ridiculous for a private company to try to compete with the government when the government sets the rules?

Emily: This is the same Heritage Foundation that’s a huge advocate of charter schools like the one you keep trying to send me to?

Nate: Yeah

Emily: I wonder if they teach irony in charter schools.

Nate: You are so pigheaded young lady.   How can you defend death panels?

Emily: There are no death panels.

Nate: Yes there are.  Sarah Palin and Michelle Malkin say there are.

Emily: So what would a death panel do?

Nate: When I get old, they’ll come and ask me if I get sick if I want them to pull the plug.

Emily: Who makes that decision now?

Nate: You do.

Emily: You know if I had a daughter that I tried to make run after the car in 95 degree weather in Oklahoma or fought with her teachers every year because they were trying to make her a liberal or had her first 11 birthday parties at my self storage business, I might want an impartial panel making that decision instead.

Nate: Go to your room Emily.

Emily: Did I mention having to give my friends unclaimed self storage items for Christmas and birthday presents?

Nate: Emily!

Emily: I’m going.

I apologize for the awkward ending, but hopefully both Emily and my readers have learned exactly why the Obama health care scheme would be horrible for our country and needs to be stopped.

If President Obama has his way, public and private insurance programs will compete against each other in a socialist system not unlike college football’s Bowl Championship Series.   The way that Obama put the public vs. private competition was to compare it to mail delivery, “I think private insurers should be able to compete…I mean. If you think about it, UPS and FedEx are doing just fine. It’s the Post Office that’s always having problems.”

I look at the way that private and public institutions compete and I look at the way that private companies like Aquafina kick tap water’s ass or the way that cabs are better than buses, and while charter schools score considerably lower than traditional public schools on national tests we all know school isn’t just about testing.

To me, the best analogy for comparing the public option is to compare the University of Michigan and public schools of its ilk to private universities like Liberty University or Hampshire College.   Now granted, a student at U of M is going to be spending $40,000 less per year than a Hampshire student, but Hampshire allows its students a chance to design their own educational program while Michigan students get rationed education based on what the administration believes they should have.   If you are not making significant progress towards graduation, the University of Michigan will eventually kick you out just like a death panel.  If you are lucky enough to get a diploma, who is going to hire you with a Michigan diploma?

For the lucky student at Hampshire College, you know you are on your way to future success like PBS commentator Ellen Fitzpatrick or Joe Minton and Robert Eng who created Game Table Online when they discovered a need for nerds to be able to play Risk despite living in their parents’ basement in homes a continent apart.  Hampshire not only gives a first rate college education, but provides a large number of opportunities for it’s students.  It can do that because it’s not burdened down with government bureaucrats like the ones at University of Michigan.

As a safety school, I guess the University of Michigan is OK, but the school fails in all areas.  The academics are suspect at best and their entire course catalogue doesn’t offer a single class in creationist studies.  On top of that, Michigan’s football team was a joke last year.  They brought over Rich Rodriguez to run the spread offense despite that fact that many top recruits don’t want to play in the spread.   How do we know that Obama won’t do the same thing to aspiring doctors who will go to practice in other countries because of Obama’s policies?  We must act now before we wind up with a substandard University of Michigan type health care.

I previously posted about the Investor’s Business Daily editorial on health care that stated, “People such as scientist Stephen Hawking wouldn’t have a chance in the U.K., where the National Health Service would say the life of this brilliant man, because of his physical handicaps, is essentially worthless.”

Recently, Hawking fired back by saying, “I wouldn’t be here today if it were not for the NHS.  I have received a large amount of high quality treatment without which I would not have survived.”  Thus Stephen Hawking establishes himself as the Thatsrightnate Moron of the Week!  Investor’s Business Daily has taken a lot of heat over this editorial despite changing the article to omit the claims about Hawking.  Furthermore, Hawking’s robotic voice does not have a British accent so nobody knew he was British.  Sorry, Hawking if you listened to people who know about health care like Michelle Bachmann and Dick Armey, you’d know how wrong you are.

It has been heartwarming for me to see Americans who are willing to sacrifice and at times do without welfare to look out for the well being of their brothers and sisters in the insurance industry.   The insurance industry is huge in this country and it pays a lot of employees very well.  It is unlikely that health care costs won’t go down without the public option, but they are also a slippery slope to covering all Americans.  That’s not something we can stomach in this country.  As Jim Demint said, “government never competes in a private market; it takes the market over.”  One need only look at the problems charter schools, private universities, and cabs are having competing with public education and public transportation to see the truth in this.

As Americans we look out for our neighbor.  In this case, we need to look out for our neighbors in the insurance industry.   They’ve been there for us haven’t they?   Now, it’s time to be there for them.

People, it’s time to stand up for your rights.   The Socialists…I mean Democrats seem bound and determined to put a public health care plan in place to compete directly with our good old American private insurance companies.   At patientpowernow.org, they come right out and say it, “If the “public plan” is so good, show, do not tell.  Show us by creating a better product on the the (unfree) market, and let consumers decide.  Do not tell us it’s better and make it a crime for taxpayers not to fund it.”

That’s a clear and concise summary of the issue.  If the government can make such a great plan, then why should tax payers fund it?   The always insightful Heritage Foundation claims, “The likely incentives for government officials would be to set rules to advantage the government’s own health plan and to disadvantage the private health plans, including setting the government’s health plan premiums artificially low, reducing or eliminating cost-sharing requirements, or more heavily subsidizing certain benefits to make the government health plan more attractive than the private health plans. These plans would operate without incurring any of the normal financial risks that private health plans must bear.”

I couldn’t agree more.   We can’t expect a publicly funded enterprise to compete fairly with a privately funded one.  What’s odd though is that the Heritage Foundation is also a big advocate for increasing charter schools in this country.   Since charter schools are privately run schools  that compete directly with public schools in a system with public school districts are player and umpire in pretty much exactly the same way.  Of course the answer is simple–eliminate public schools in this country and let the charters provide education in a free market system.  We know that charters are better than public schools, but they score poorer on standardized tests than their public counterparts because it’s the public school districts that create the tests through the State Boards of Education.

It’s already troubling that UPS and Fed Ex are expected to compete with the United States Post Office, but the increased funding in the stimulus plan for public transportation is only going hurt the auto industry’s attempts to rebound.   Why would anybody buy a $50,000 car and fill it with expensive gasoline when you can ride on the tax payer’s back plus a buck or two?  Don’t even get me started on public broadcasting.

I’ve never even liked government funded roads.  I believe that the government went way above their Constitutional powers when it built the first national road in 1806.  Privately funded roads like the Lancaster Turnpike were doing just fine before the government got involved.   Let’s get the government out of businesses better left to private companies like roads, mail delivery, education, transportation, security, and insurance.   Socialism is not the American way.