They seem like the Three Stooges. And they make Moe look like a good leader.

This week's entry will be relatively short.

As I write this, the AHCA act has yet to be brought to a vote before the full House. And it doesn't have that great a chance of passing. Then, if it does, it still doesn't have a ghost of a chance in the Senate.  What does this say about the GOP as a political party?

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For the past several years, the GOP has been stirring up its base, saying that the Affordable Care Act (A.K.A. "Obamacare") is bad for the American people and would be repealed on the first day that the GOP had control of government.  So far, it has been a little over 2 months since the GOP got its wish, and they were unprepared to do what they promised.

The key features of Obamacare (I use the word as a compliment to the man) are:

1. A mandated definition of what basic health care coverage is, so that people buying this care on exchanges could make "apples to apples" comparisons.
2. A mandated participation in the health care market (with subsidies, if needed) to insure that both the poor are covered, and that the insurance pool is large enough to absorb the expenses of the old and infirm who were unable to get affordable insurance.
3. A mandate that insurers accept people with pre-existing conditions and cover those conditions in their policies.
4. An establishment of government sponsored (state or federal governments) health care exchanges, so that people could easily buy insurance from a marketplace.

There are more features, such as the expansion of medicaid that could be mentioned here. But they only serve to make the discussion a little more complex than needed.

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The problem with health care is that many things dovetail with each other.  Take away mandatory participation in a health care market, and the insurance pools do not cover enough young and healthy people to absorb the expenses of the old and infirm. Isolate the old and infirm into assigned risk pools, and they will not be able to afford health care without subsidies. Take away coverage of pre-existing conditions, and the people who need coverage will not be able to get it.  Take away the public exchanges and mandated definitions of "coverage", and the public will not be able to make informed choices. In short, one has to address many requirements in order to maximize coverage across as many people as possible in a nation's population.

The GOP attacks the first two elements in the above list in all their proposals to repeal the ACA. They do not care that less people will be covered by insurance.  They do not care that insurance will become unaffordable to the old and infirm.  They only care about restoring a dysfunctional prior status quo.  The GOP has had several years to design a better health care plan than the ACA, and yet had not done so.  Instead they kept making noises about the free market being better than the ACA's "solution" - even when the other major industrialized nations have shown that "socialized medicine" has resulted in more available health care at a lower price to society.  In fact, one staunch GOP loyalist made the claim that if Stephen Hawking had to use Britain's National Health Service (NHS), that Hawking would be dead today.  Well, Hawking uses the NHS and is still alive as I write this.

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The GOP is now in charge of the Executive branch of government, as well as both legislative branches of government. And the three stooges in the above photo have yet do produce a health care reform that would be better than what we now have.  It should be the duty of any opposition party, that when it comes to power, that it has well thought out policies and actions ready to go.  This was not the case when the GOP gained power this year.

I don't need to say much about Trump, except that he is a malignant narcissistic sociopath who has no loyalty to anyone but himself, who has no taste, and who has no empathy with other people. In short, he is a social cancer that can cause damage when left unchecked. Paul Ryan is an idealog who can be very dangerous as he gets more power, as he does not believe that the fortunate in society have any duty to those less well off. And Mitch McConnell may not be an ideolog, as he has no ethics to guide him except a loyalty to his party.

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The public is enraged - and that includes many in the "Red States" who are seeing how the party they voted into power is about to betray them.  The GOP had no Obamacare replacement, so they slapped something together and called it reform. The public knows better, as they can see how they will lose their ACA benefits when what they derisevely called "Obamacare" is repealed. They see that giving away park lands in places like Montana will hurt their local economy. They see that polluting the water with mining waste will take away their clean drinking water. In short, they are willing to the Democrats if the Democrats have leaders who will address the needs of the people in "Fly Over Territory".

Luckily, we're seeing the Democrats get energized, as they are getting ready for the 2018 elections. But do they have enough of the right people in place for the future?  I doubt it. Their leadership is getting long in the tooth, and they don't have enough young leaders who can energize the public. The one person who can lead them, Bernie Sanders, is an older man who has captured the imagination of youth. He is the same man, when in a forum of Trump supporters received the ultimate compliment from a person in mining country. This compliment took the form of being told that Sanders, from the Northeast, is doing more for people in Coal Country than Mitch McConnell next door. 

My question is: Will the Democrats be ready in time to topple "Larry" and "Curly" in 2018, and take care of "Moe" in 2020?

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PS: After I wrote this, the GOP Bill went down in flames.  As expected, Trump had to find someone else to blame the failure on, and he blamed the Democrats for not working with him.  Hmmmm.  The GOP refused to help when Obamacare was passed 7 years ago. So why should the Democrats respond any differently.  Trump claims that Obamacare will implode, and it may yet in some states. But if it fails in 2018, it will be an election year, and I doubt that Trump will be able to stop the upcoming disaster that an honest attempt to repair what was in place could have prevented.

There are 3 kinds of lies about Healthcare

Mark Twain once said that "There are three kinds of lies: Lies, Damn Lies, and Statistics." And in the case of Obamacare, Trumpcare and the Healthcare debate, all three kinds of lies are in play.

When the Affordable Care Act was enacted, it had no support from the GOP, even though the design came out of a GOP think tank. The GOP was so focused on making Obama a one term president, that it became an extremely polarized opposition to anything supported by Obama. And this included the beginnings of a national health care system based on free market principles, yet tempered by the realities of unequal wealth distribution and unequal health across subgroups of our nation's population.

I was surprised to find that a president and party would have spent so much political capital oh health care. And in retrospect, I am reminded of LBJ who noted that by standing up for civil rights, he was giving the "Old South" to the GOP. It seems like healthcare reform may symbolize something similar for Democrats, as the GOP has used Obamacare as a tool to rally the base.

Over the past few years, the Democratic party has been losing seats in both the House and the Senate. In 2016, the Democrats finally lost the presidency, which gave the GOP a chance to remake healthcare in ways that may reflect either an ideological purity or a pragmatic recognition of reality. Unfortunately, the first important draft at a reform bill will only serve to double the number of uninsured people, and give excessive tax cuts to the rich.

Designing reforms to a health insurance system is not something that can be done in days. It took the Democrats months to flesh out a plan, and then they had to pull out all stops (including bringing in a sickly Ted Kennedy to help break a filibuster) to get the bill passed. Even then, the bill was far from perfect - and was signed into law with known problems. The Obama administration figured that Healthcare reform was now in play, but repeal would be political suicide once the average citizen started to receive the benefits of this new entitlement.

President Trump promised that he would sign a repeal of Obamacare the day he took office. It's been roughly two months since he took office, and no repeal or replacement bill has been signed into law at the time I'm writing this entry. The GOP never thought that they would be in a position to fulfill its promises to repeal Obamacare, and now they are caught between keeping this promise and doing the right thing.

The GOP is saying lies of varying magnitudes in regard to the ACA. What they are not saying is that their lack of cooperation in congress and in their statehouses helped to cause major problems in the "Red States". Obamacare is in trouble in many of the Red States, as quite a few did not accept federal monies for Medicaid expansion.  As a result, many people who could have gotten medical care were caught in a gap - between Medicaid eligibility and being able to afford healthcare. So they got screwed by their own leaders, just because of a political game that was being played.

In the "Blue States", we see a system that is relatively successful. Yes, there are problems. But people are accessing healthcare who could never have afforded it in the past. So, what's going to happen to them now that the GOP is in charge? Trump and the rest of the GOP do not want to look at the statistics regarding Obamacare. The Congressional Budget Office did predict a $370+ million savings due to the GOP's most recent health care reform bill. But it said that the number of uninsured would more than double. This means that the GOP will need to tell big lies to mollify its base - a base which is finally coming to terms with the Affordable Care Act, not realizing that it is one and the same as the dreaded "Obamacare".

There are Senators warning GOP house members that the current bill will be DOA if it reaches the Senate. Both the President and the Speaker of the House are saying that this bill is the only one that might pass muster in the House. Yet something more may be going on here.  Could a bad bill be written up, making it possible for purists to say they voted for an acceptable bill that will never come to law - and please their constituents?  Could a future bill be designed to "repeal" the ACA, but merely be a set of tweaks to make the existing law more palatable?

What is most telling is that TRUMP, a man who puts his name on everything, boils red when he hears the phrase "Trumpcare". He doesn't want his name associated with a GOP suicide pact. And yet, that's what seems to be happening right now - GOP Congressmen and Senators are avoiding their constituents in order not to address their fears of losing affordable health care.  Does this mean that because of ideological concerns that the GOP may commit political suicide?  Who knows?

The other night, Bernie Sanders held a town hall in "Trump Territory". And it is amazing how he addressed the concerns of West Virginia voters better than that of their own leaders.  In fact, one person there said that he was amazed that Sanders was looking out for retired coal miners more than Mitch McConnell, a Senator from a nearby coal mining state. What does this say about our 2 party system? To me, it says that if a party ignores the concerns of people who are minorities in the party, it will lose the votes to the other party - even if the only things given are lip service and lies, as the GOP has done for years.

Even in a state that bleeds red, the ACA has shown to be useful. It made sure that coal miners suffering from Black Lung disease got the benefit of the doubt when claiming benefits - something that would be lost in an ACA repeal.  People in Trump Country see this, and do not want the ACA repealed - they want it fixed.  Even so, our VP went to Kentucky and talked about all of Obamacare's failures - even when the little guy is starting to see the benefits of the law.  I can only imagine what would happen to the GOP if more people started seeing the lies for what they are - mistaken tribal and ideological opposition to a "lesser of evils" law.

In the major Western nations, there is no country which has free market health care - not even us.  In a free market, people would die if they were taken to the hospital without money or insurance coverage. Out of humanity, we require hospitals to treat all people regardless of ability to pay, and then those hospitals shift their unreimbursed costs to those least able to pay "rack rate" for medical care. And yet, the GOP keeps arguing that a free market can work with health care when there are no examples in the world of a free market working for health care.  What lies will they tell to bamboozle their base to convince them that a return to healthcare's past is what is needed in a "reform" effort?

Luckily, there are a few GOP Congressmen and Senators willing to buck party ideology and demand that a replacement bill actually be better than the system we have now. It's not important that they dress up their verbiage in fantasy talk or pragmatic statements. Instead, it's important that they are realizing that if the GOP breaks Obamacare without having a better Trumpcare ready to roll, then the GOP could lose both houses in the next election, and possibly start losing the statehouses as well.

I predict that we will hear a lot of misinformation spouted over the next few weeks while ACA repeal is being discussed. Luckily, the Democrats still have the ability to filibuster many bills that come through the Senate, and have an effective veto that can be used for most half-assed attempts to repeal the ACA. Hopefully, the Democrats will use what little power they have left in both a wise and effective manner.  And I hope that in the middle of this political game being played, that people lose the ability to purchase healthcare that they once enjoyed under the ACA.

I'm not sure about to write about this week

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The "Gray Lady", as the New York Times is often called, had a lot to report on the day I wrote this post.  And I was unsure about what was the most important thing out there.  Was it the resignation of Michael Flynn, after less than a month into Trump's regime? Was it Trump's statement that Israel need not pursue a "two state" solution with the Palestinians? Was it the revelation that senior Trump assistants were in constant contact with Russia during his campaign?  Was if the assassination of Kim Jong Un's half brother in Malaysia? Was it the revelation that Russia broke one of the nuclear anti-proliferation treaties, by testing a new type of missile? Or, was it the revelation that the American intelligence agencies no longer trust Trump or his staff to keep America's secrets secret, and are now withholding information from the president?  Any one of these things could be major news items in their own right.  But all of these things happening at once has gotten me worried.

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Our current president is as inept as he is corrupt.  Couple this with a GOP that is ethically bankrupt, and wants power over doing things for the public at large, and we are in serious trouble. One Republican that I once respected, Rand Paul, has just lost any support I might have given him.  He would prefer to dismantle the ACA (Obamacare) than to determine how close a relationship the Trump Campaign had with the Russians.  Paul believes that no Republican should be investigating other Republicans.  Paul Krugman notes that the GOP would rather choose treason to give tax cuts to the wealthy, as corruption is endemic to the GOP. Whether I'd go this far, I don't know.  But it seems as if the GOP wants power for power's sake, and not to exercise it wisely.

I am concerned about giving Netanyahu options NOT to pursue a two state solution in Israel/Palestine. This region is dangerous enough now.  Why give extremists any more fuel to add to the fire?  Our previous Secretary of State noted that Israel could be either a Democracy or a Jewish State. But it could not be both if a two state solution is not pursued. If we support Netanyahu's actions, we may just light the fire of the next Middle Eastern war without realizing it.

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Often, what North Korea does is an interesting side show to the world.  They tend to make bellicose statements, but can't do much to cause trouble elsewhere.  Yes, they have forged $100 bills so perfect that the Federal Reserve told US banks to honor the "funny money" until they had a reliable way to detect the bogus bills. Yes, they have hacked into many computer systems, and caused organizations such as Sony Pictures much grief. But now, they have started to assassinate people outside their borders.  Can this be tolerated? Yes, the fellow who was poisoned was the half brother of the "supreme leader". But who might be killed next?

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Russia has tested a new cruise missile that the US says violates previously signed treaties. Would this have taken place had Hillary Clinton been in office?  I doubt it.  With Trump in office, Putin can do no wrong. Now that US intelligence agencies no longer trust the president to keep secrets, I wonder what comes next.  

These are scary times, and I don't trust our leaders to do the right things, nor do I trust the system of checks and balances to work in the presence of this much corruption in the system.  I could be wrong.  But when Joe Scarborough started worrying about the White House and its lack of respect for the Judiciary, we should see this as the canary in the coal mine alerting us to big problems ahead.  No president should have unchecked powers, and Joe makes this clear after reviewing Steven Miller's comments on the power of POTUS.

By now it has happened

Obamacare.  The GOP promises that we'll have something bigger and better.  With all the rhetoric that has been spewed to the party loyalists, I doubt that they can deliver anything that is half as good as what they pledge to destroy, if only because they never have worked to design something that can replace Obama's signature accomplishment.  It saddens me that the only thing unifying the GOP has been a pledge to destroy healthcare for millions. Yet, it could be much worse.  We don't know what the "new normal" will be in the near future.  

Recently Meryl Streep came out and protested the president elect's style in a recent speech at the Golden Globe award show. She didn't even have to mention him by name.  Was she justified?  She decried the bullying that passes for strength nowadays, and attacked a subculture that wants power for its own sake, and not to do something good with it.  What is wrong with that?

There is a rush to undo the gains made in society over the past 8 years.  We have a president who is likely owned by the Russian government.  He is already breaking some of his many promises, pledging to build a wall along our Southern border with our money, then convincing Mexico to pay for it.  Does anyone really believe that they will do so?  I doubt it very much.  Strangely enough, some of his nominees have more class than Trump has, including Jeff Sessions.  Sessions is willing to say that Waterboarding is torture, something that Trump can't bring himself to say.  Why is that?  Could it be that many Trump supporters only care about their rights, and not the rights of humanity?  Could it be that they have no empathy for others, and like Trump, are on a narcissistic ego trip?  

It is troubling how extreme how today's GOP seems for a centrist.  Abortion should have been a question settled 40 years ago, and it is still in play because of cultural politics. White supremacists have cleaned up their message, and use phrases such as "Southern Heritage" when they fly the Confederate Battle Flag.  (Heck, most of these people don't know that the "Stars and Bars" referred to a different flag, the flag the South wanted to use for its national standard.)  Centrists fear a government led by people who would shut down polling places heavily used by poor people.  Centrists fear a government who would take rights away from the GLBT community because it angers a small religious minority. Centrists fear a government run by people who can not compromise in any way.  And now, we will get to see what a "Right Wing" government will do.

There is a big problem in America, and it is the Urban/Rural divide.  Maybe it is about time that we think of dividing this nation into three separate nations: (1) States along the Pacific Coast, (2) States along the East Coast, and (3) The "Heartland" states.  Each would inherit the US Constitution, but would make its own laws following the dissolution of the America we once knew.  Only then would we be able to see which nation's laws makes the most sense.  But until then, we have this social conflict that can not be resolved, and can result in a second civil war. Hopefully, we will not see that happen....

Thoughts on the coming change in control.

Like it, hate it, but Obamacare (or, the Affordable Care Act) has been a political hot point for the last 6+ years.  If it had been enacted by a Republican administration, the Democrats would be looking to dismantle it.  But it was enacted by Democrats, and the GOP will soon be in charge of that den of iniquity called Washington, DC.

This year's group of Republicans is worse than most one-party governments.  They have already set their sights on dismantling programs designed to help the poor and needy. And they have decided to eliminate a non-partisan ethics office that helped keep politicians in check. There are very few GOP politicians willing to check and balance the incoming president and his tangled web of conflicted interests. And there are even fewer in congress who want the Office of Congressional Ethics keeping an eye on their affairs. What is surprising to me is that the President Elect has chastised congress for not having its priorities in order - they should be focused on things like healthcare instead of the Ethics Bureau.

The President Elect has been amazingly friendly to Russia, given that both the CIA and FBI have stated that the Russians have hacked the computers of the DNC.  I'd bet that Putin is calling Trump a "Useful Idiot" in private circles. Unlike many loyal Americans, I am not angry at Putin. He is acting in the best interests of Russia as he sees it.  Instead, I am angry at many in the GOP who refuse to stand up and tell the President Elect that he must take the hacking allegations seriously.  

Right now, the entire GOP appears to be like a kid in a candy store.  They can have anything they want, and as much of it as they want.  The big question is: Will they over do it?  Given current behavior, the answer appears to be "Yes".  Only time will tell.

Throwing a "Monkey Wrench" into the system.

The American people have spoken, and they have thrown a big monkey wrench into the system.  Should this have been seen beforehand?  Yes!  But there are many tired voters, people tired of having their views ignored, people tired of changes that don't benefit them, people tired of an elite which doesn't care for America first.  And it is these voters who have chosen to take a dose of "Fuckitall" instead of letting someone like Hillary run this country.

As much as I think these people were making a big mistake, I think the common person has a real grudge against the elites. And I can't blame them much for voting for someone who spoke their language, used their metaphors, and echoed what they feel are the "real" truths in life - regardless of how little these so-called truths are based in reality.  This happened in Central Europe during the 1920's and 1930's, and it could happen here to the same disastrous affect - if we don't wake up, and listen to the alienated people who live in both rural and urban areas.

Sadly, I feel that Trump is not qualified for the job he has at hand.  But he is what we got now.  Supposedly, he was very surprised to find out how large a staff he and his minions must appoint in the next 2 months. At least, Trump has demoted Chris Christie even further, so that Trump is able to keep his distance from "Bridgegate" as much as possible.  (No, Trump had no hand in that debacle.  But why should he get his reputation prematurely tarnished by association with his former chief of transition?)

For the most part, I do not worry much about Trump yet.  It will be hard for him to dismantle Obamacare without a major backlash.  Even Obama himself was uncomfortable with the individual mandate, but was shown that insurance would cost much less for old people because the insurance pool would contain enough healthy young people to offset the cost of providing care to old people.  He will not be able to overturn Roe v. Wade without the cooperation of the "Blue States" - and this is unlikely to happen anytime soon.  He will find it hard to unwind many of the treaties we have enacted, and his military advisors will likely keep him from using the codes in the "Biscuit" with the "Football" an aide carries with him at all times.  But there are people who have legitimate fears, most of whom are poor, and are in populations marginalized in "Red States" - such as gays, lesbians, and transgender folk. With a Vice President like Pence, I have good cause to worry.

With things the way they are now, I'm tempted to utter the simple phrase:

"Houston, we have a problem."

All we have to go on are the lies of our president elect, and the lessons of history.  Yet, there's a part of me that believes that our founding fathers may have thought someone like this would be elected president, and held the belief that honorable men would strip this man from power if he went too far.  If he does go too far, I hope that my faith in the founding fathers forethought still holds true.

And now, the real work must begin

The Affordable Care Act, or "Obamacare" as many people call it.  It's a flawed law meant to put true healthcare reform in play.  But the dysfunction of both political parties has locked in this law's provisions, the worst of them requiring people to buy unsubsidized insurance because their states didn't accept the medicaid expansion to cover these people.

One of the problems insurers have in America is that there is no price control on prescription drugs.  The largest buyer of these drugs is Medicare, and yet, the federal government prohibits Medicare and Medicaid from negotiating prices for drugs.  As a result, we have the highest costs for healthcare in the world.  No wonder why many insurers are bailing out of the Obamacare health insurance markets.

Another problem is the inability to force the states to expand Medicaid, even with a 90% Federal government subsidy for those costs. Without nationwide participation, a law like this will fail, as people will blame the law for their problems and not the law makers who won't tweak the law to make it work for all.  One might argue that this part of the law was a failure from the start. But in any law this complex, the drafters were likely to make errors.  If we looked at law as we do for computer systems, we accept the fact that there will be computer bugs, and that they will be fixed.  Why are many people condemning a law, when they should be condemning congress for not doing anything important in this area for generations, and then not fixing mistakes when they do something?

To me, an understated problem is the inability of insurers to get young adults to sign up for the higher levels of healthcare.  The ACA depends on a large number of young workers (who are in good health) to pay into the insurance plans, so that older, less healthy, people can buy affordable insurance.  Obamacare is a health care transfer from the young to the old, in the same way as Social Security is an income transfer program from the young to the old.  In both cases, it only makes sense.  In traditional societies, the young take care of the old. In an age of the sub-nuclear family, government mandated wealth and health transfers from young to the old make sense. Most people can no longer depend on their extended families for help.

There were many lies used to sell the public on the need for this law.  This is not uncommon with politicians.  FDR lied about keeping America neutral before WW2, even with the obvious signs that we could not avoid getting involved with this worldwide conflict.  And yet, people accept the story given by their political tribes, instead of seeing the reality behind the scenes of the kabuki theater of politics.  

Obamacare needs fixing.  There are not enough insurers willing to participate in markets where they can't make money.  There are not enough people covered by this law.  There are not enough choices available to people in need.  But let's not throw the baby out with the bathwater.  If we get rid of Obamacare, we will return to a worse system than we have now. The only question is: Do we provide a "Public Option" or not?  If there is a public option, the average person will likely pay roughly the same rate as state employees do for their insurance plans.  (I use COBRA rates for my analysis.)  Without a public option, people will go uninsured.

Are we heading towards single payer healthcare?  Maybe.  But if private industry wants to keep making profits, it will have to find a way of fixing a system that was broken way before the ACA was enacted, and will need to find a way to do it within the spirit of the ACA.

6 years since Obamacare was signed into law.

It's almost been 6 years since Obamacare was signed into law, and we're now seeing the problems in the law.  Democrats rightfully say that more people are covered by health insurance, while Republicans rightfully say that there are fewer choices in medical care. What is the objective truth?

To look at this law objectively, one has to look through the lens of American politics, and what happens when the political system periodically breaks down in this country. The other day Rachel Maddow talked about an interesting phenomena on her show. It had to do about "Nativism" and when it pops up in our society.  Nativism, as I like to describe it, relates to a frustration held by native born citizens related to their place in society (and in the economy), a tendency to blame their problems on the foreign born, and a remedy to stop (or reverse) immigration by unwanted foreigners. 

When Nativism first became important, it was in the guise of the "no nothing" movement. Our political system was breaking down over the festering issue of slavery, there was political paralysis caused by the Northern and Southern states refusing to work together to govern effectively. In the end, the Whig party died, the GOP was born, and we had a brutal civil war before we had a government that could govern again.

We are again seeing the signs of our political system breaking down.  Donald Trump is only a symptom of a much larger problem. 

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America is again at a crossroads.  Every so often, its politicians tend to become so opposed to each other, that the normal business of government doesn't get done.  We have a Supreme Court nomination that the GOP controlled Senate refuses to act upon, simply because it wants to deny the current Democratic president any ability to make constitutionally mandated decisions that may affect the balance of power for years to come. They falsely claim that a lame duck president has no right nominate a person for a Supreme Court opening, stating that the next president should be the one making the nomination. Tribal loyalty is trumping (no pun intended here) duty to the nation. And we all suffer for it.

As a nation we have serious problems that are not being addressed.  We have refused to act on rationalizing America's immigration policy for years, effectively encouraging a "catch and release" policy for illegal immigrants.  Many people believe that the big problem is Mexican immigration to the USA, when the reality is that Mexicans are going home because of opportunities opening up there.  We have people who want "forever wars", and a Military-Industrial complex which is all too eager to oblige them.  We warehouse many of our poor in prisons, locked away for trumped up charges, all in the name of keeping our nation safe from crime.  (We'd be better off legalizing hard drugs, and taking away the reasons people commit crimes to buy these substances, and imitate Portugal in this area.)  We still have not been able to cover 100% of Americans in a medical insurance program, in part because of political bickering, in part because of big pharma having prevented some of the meaningful reforms that would allow medical insurance to be profitable for both the customer and the corporate entity providing it, and in part because because we do not have a "Public Option" ("Medicare for All", as Bernie Sanders would call it) where private industry can't afford to provide care.  Our political class is paralyzed, and the people are revolting at the polls.

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This situation has happened in other countries, and we've seen the disasters. To me, the most notable disaster was the fall of Weimar Germany and the ascent of Hitler and the "Thousand Year Reich".  We all know what happened there. Europe's economies were destroyed for at least a generation, and many of the continent's scars are visible to this day. Yet, Nativism still flourishes there, with far right parties trying to throw the immigrants out. And I can't blame the Nativists, because many of these immigrants have not assimilated into European society, many still live in cultural ghettos, and many cause problems by trying to bring the failed social values of their old homelands to the new.

The Nativists are just as much of the problem as are the unassimilated immigrants. Neither has adapted to change.  In many ways, both cling to a past which has not served them well, and has left them unprepared for the future.  It's sad, as neither group realizes that the past is the problem and not the solution.  In both the US and in Europe, Nativists resent immigrants who they feel are stealing their jobs. In reality, they are doing the kinds of work that the native born consider beneath themselves to do.  To make things worse, the jobs that many of the Nativists once did are no longer available.  Both Britain and the US have reduced their needs for coal, but no one has provided for the displaced workers. They have good reason to feel angry.  Immigrants are also part of the problem, as they bring ways of life which are incompatible with life in the new countries.  Muslim immigrants are often shocked that Western countries do not, and will not accept Sharia law in their midst.  The native born Christians in these lands rightfully see this as a problem, as it could lead to an all out war between them, and a growing Muslim population.

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The future is not as bleak as one might think. Mexican immigrants have assimilated more easily into American society the further away they are from Mexico.  In the lands which once were part of Mexico, they have tended to maintain a stronger cultural identity, and pose an interesting problem for America.  How do we insure their primary loyalty is to America? Most Muslim immigrants do not want any part of Sharia law, nor do they want the customs of their homelands.  They see the problems in places such as Egypt, where the government has no value to the common person.  They also see that government in the USA has a rightful place in public life, and is much of an asset here, as much as it was a liability in the lands from which they came. And in virtually all cases, it is education that has made the difference.

It's hard to learn to think critically without a good education.  And many of Obamacare's greatest opponents come from the masses who have not been educated well.  They do not see the law as an important first step towards an effective health care system for Americans, as they have not been taught civics in our schools.  They do not know how the government functions, nor do they know how to achieve their goals using the powers reserved for the people.  Instead, they look for a strong leader to deliver them from the mess that they, themselves have made. The masses have caused their own problems, because they, themselves have delegated their thinking to others.

Luckily, we still have a critical mass of Americans who have been well educated, and they still outnumber the "unwashed masses".  Hopefully, these people will stop the "unwashed masses" from electing a bombastic demagogue as a strongman leader, and instead, force the two parties to work together again and govern.  I still have hope for America, as the structure of the government handed to us by the Founding Fathers is still resilient enough to deal with today's problems.  They saw the objective truth, and it wasn't pretty then.  And our objective truth is just as ugly today as it was then.  So I have faith that what was given to us by Hamilton, Franklin, Jefferson, Adams and others is strong enough to weather the likes of Trump or Clinton....











https://www.morningstar.com/news/Market-watch/TDJNMW_20160831501/update-how-gilead-broke-obamacare.html


http://www.politico.com/story/2016/07/obamacare-prescription-drugs-pharma-225444

http://www.forbes.com/sites/scottgottlieb/2015/01/08/what-a-drug-price-debate-reveals-about-obamacare/#6eed2d1578c2

Disgust!

Yes, we are in danger.  Years ago, the GOP nominated David Duke for governor of Louisiana, because of the fouled up politics of that state.  And then, almost all of the GOP elite (including the sitting president, George Bush #41) rejected Duke, and many encouraged Louisianans to vote for a Democrat (who happened to be a crook).

Sadly, today's GOP will not disavow racists - because it sends a signal that there are democrats who are better qualified for office than anyone nominated by the GOP.  Why is this sad?  Well, it means that tribal loyalty now is valued more than national loyalty, or loyalty to any principle.

What would happen if Hillary Clinton wins in the fall?  Not much. The dysfunctional elite who have been running the this country into ruin for the past 50+ years would stay in power for another 4 years.  But what happens if Donald Trump wins?  Chaos. The financial markets already worry about Trump defaulting on the national debt. Whereas, I worry about things such as ignoring the Geneva Conventions on War, and saying that anything goes.  I wonder what our military thinks of that?

I am totally disgusted by today's GOP, as it no longer stands for true market based economic conservatism, and social restraint. One writer sees the Goldwater nomination as the root of today's GOP insanity - and I can't argue against him.  Today's GOP is willing to transfer wealth from the poor to the rich (it makes sense economically, but creates great social unrest), and radically affecting the freedoms most Americans love - all in the name of security and a "Forever War".

Does the Democratic party have much more to offer?  I doubt it.  As Will Rogers once put it, 

"I am not a member of any organized political party. I am a Democrat."

Because they are less organized than the GOP, the Democrats usually cause much less trouble than the GOP does. Sometimes, they can do a lot of good - as in the case of setting up Obamacare. Obamacare with its flaws, is meant to be tinkered with.  So the GOP does have the ability to fix what's broken - but won't do so.  Will the Democrats fix Obamacare? No, because they keep playing defense to preserve it.  It will take a leader beholden to none of today's political factions to repair what's broken without removing access to affordable health care from people who currently have it.  (For this discussion, let's ignore the GOP states NOT accepting Medicaid expansion funds which would have kept health care affordable for the upper tier of the working poor.)  Are we better because of the GOP?  No. It took the Democrats to make it possible to tinker with America's health care system.

So who do I support?  I'm not sure, but I'm thinking that it might be good to see the Libertarians win a few electoral votes to force the presidential election to the House of Representatives, and see if the GOP blinks.  No one I know likes Trump or Hillary, but yet will hold their noses and vote for one or the other (unlike Jeb Bush - a worthless, spineless, gutless Republican who can't keep his promises).  But I do see people liking the Libertarians or the Greens - and I wouldn't mind either forcing the election into the House for the first time in over 200 years....


PS: On the evening this post was published, Donald Trump made a veiled statement regarding the assassination of the democratic nominee (assuming she were elected president) to prevent her from nominating leftist judges.  Many in the GOP still defend Trump, saying he was misunderstood. There is no excuse anymore for anyone in the GOP to support Trump in the general election, or in the House, if this unlikely scenario were to occur. If this threat doesn't turn people away from Trump and all of his apologists, then I feel very afraid for this country - very, very afraid..

None of the Above

The elite of the GOP wants anyone but Donald Trump.  They are afraid that he is both unelectable, and that his presence at the top of the ticket will affect the downstream races. But what will happen if Ted Cruz is at the top of the ticket?

Right now, the GOP is not a party which believes in anything that benefits the common person.  They want to destroy a healthcare system designed by a conservative think tank, taking away health care from people who'd never have access to it if the ACA had never passed.  They want to take away a social safety net from people who need it, saying the "sins" of a small minority of abusers excuse the punishment of all. They are are party who supports radicalism over conservatism, looking to restore a status quo that never existed.

When Joe Scarborough (a noted conservative) from the "Morning Joe" show openly states that neither party has bothered to address the needs of people earning under $50,000, something is very wrong.  To me, it is the very greed for power which causes most presidential candidates to such on the tit of Wall Street in order to get elected.  Once they accept any Wall Street money, they are owned by the big banks - and banks have no heart. Everything and everyone is just a number to them, and the poor are simply liabilities to be scrubbed from the balance sheet.

Sadly, it looks like Hillary Clinton will be the likely opponent of whoever the GOP selects. Trump offends me, but Cruz horrifies me even more.  Neither are fit to serve in this country's highest office.  Hillary is owned by Wall Street, and she can't be trusted to do much more than line her own coffers.

So....

Unless Bernie Sanders is nominated (and he has big flaws as well), I want none of the above.  Neither party deserves votes when they are trying to game the election to prevent the peoples' choices from being on the ticket.  One could argue that Bernie is not the choice of the Democrats.  But with the way the game was rigged to coronate Hillary, who knows what would have happened if the Democratic party had not shown such bias?  

I still have hopes for a Sanders vs. Trump election.  But the way it's going, we will never know which direction the people really want this country steered - and we will never have a chance to check and balance the power of Wall Street....

Why is everybody always picking on me?

Trump Steaks.  One of the many failed products sold with "the Donald's" name, for which he got paid for the use of his name.  Were they good?  I have no clue.  Given a choice, I'd rather spend the same money and go to either Gallagher's Steakhouse in Manhattan, or Peter Luger's in Brooklyn.  At least, in these two restaurants, I know I'd get a better steak than anything Trump could sell to me.

It is Trump's attitude of selling the sizzle and not the steak that worries me.  His followers know he's lying to them, and they don't care.  He has brought issues into public debate which the GOP elite would rather not address. And the elites are now trying to figure out a way to prevent him from winning the nomination, so that they have a chance of retaining some political power. As for me, I want to see him trash the GOP's structure and collapse the party.  Trump has no real plan.  Trump has no governing philosophy.  And Trump has no ethics.  He's dangerously close to winning the GOP nomination, and that poses a great risk to our republic.

With all this being said, the GOP gets what it sows.  They have given lunatic religious fundamentalists power, and these Christianists have used their bully pulpits to attack the GLBTIQ communities across the United States.  Strangely enough, Trump is a moderate compared to the rest of his party.  People know that he has supported Planned Parenthood, Obamacare, and other positions which are in conflict with the GOP platform. And they don't care. They want the sizzle, because they know they won't get the steak. And Trump is just the candidate who will give them that sizzle.

The GOP elite first wanted Jeb Bush, and then shifted to Marco Rubio.  The public rejected those clowns. However, it is a race between Trump and Ted Cruz to see whether one or the other will get the nomination.  Sadly, the elite will tolerate Cruz, even when he will do much more damage to their ticket than Trump will.  Can you see people voting for a theocracy, as Cruz would have (but would never openly say it)?  At least, Trump has a chance of winning against Hillary....

Sadly, Trump's lies are more palatable than Ted Cruz's lies.  It looks like the GOP may just self-destruct instead of figuring out a way to control Trump.  And I fear what is likely to happen if the GOP loses the election, as I expect they will....

You can't make this shit up!

As the title of this entry says - You can't make this shit up!  We have an admiral in charge of US Navy intelligence who has not been able to see military secrets for years.  Politics and institutional inertia has made it impossible to replace someone in his position, as a replacement must be confirmed by the Senate ....And the GOP isn't approving any of Obama's nominees these days.

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I'm a person who says that the larger the organization, the more inefficient it becomes. There are positions that must be filled - not because the person does that much real work, but is there to be nominally in charge of things.  In short, this position is the interface between the political side of the organization and the side that is responsible for the day to day operation of the organization.

In the case of the Admiral mentioned in the article, he is under suspicion because of a corruption investigation involving a foreign defense contractor and Navy personnel. The Navy had to suspend his access to classified material, but no one would expect that he wouldn't be cleared or indicted over two years later.  So the Navy has had to have a Kafkaesque situation of having this man perform the administrative responsibilities of his job, but have subordinates and colleagues perform ALL the tasks requiring classified information.

Given that we have deadlock between the Executive and Legislative branches of government, there is virtually no chance that we could get a replacement nominated by the President and approved by the Senate in today's toxic environment. So, we have a situation where politics is getting in the way of the Navy doing its job in keeping this country safe.

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What could we do to prevent situations like this from happening?  First, we could have a process developed where certain backup personnel would already be nominated and approved in advance to take over these responsibility while the person nominally in charge is indisposed.  We already have a constitutional amendment which provides for the temporary disability of a president, and who is in power and able to act when he or she is unable to perform his or her duties.  Why not do the same thing for many of these critical positions?

This doesn't address the underlying problem - Political Gridlock.  We are electing leaders in the Executive and Legislative branches who check and balance each others' actions. We are afraid of either party doing anything, so we do not let them do anything.  Neither political party is trustworthy. The success of Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump in the 2016 POTUS election cycle is a reflection of the public's disgust for the two political parties who promise the world to their bases, but do not deliver anything - except to the plutocrats who fund their political campaigns.

How can we change this situation?  To me, people have to stop "drinking the toxic Kool-Aid." When Ted Cruz's father, Raphael, says that Obamacare is a plot to bring ISIS terrorists over to the US as Doctors, why aren't the GOP loyalists shouting this lunatic down?  (One could have had many of the same criticisms of leftist extremists, but they have been mostly muted and ignored by the press during this election cycle.) That's because the political elite in the party no longer have much power to keep things in line.  They gave a seat at the table to extremists, and the extremists have since been allowed to bully everyone into submission.

- - - - - -

We have to stop giving the Wingnuts power, and force both political parties to again represent the center. When only one party represents the political center, we run a major risk that our political system will fail totally.  It happened in Central Europe in the 1930's. Can we risk having it happen here?

Is Bernie for real, or does he just represent our need for real change?

Bernie Sanders - the "Independent" senator from Vermont who caucuses with the Democrats.  The big question for many is - Is his candidacy for real, or is he, like Elizabeth Warren from the sides, trying to pull Hillary Clinton to the left?

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There is one key element in play that benefits both Sanders and the Democratic party. By running on the Democratic ticket, he prevents a three way race (GOP Wingnut, Hillary Clinton, and Bernie Sanders as an independent) that would give the presidency to the GOP. Since Bernie plays nice with the Democrats (look at his debates with Hillary for example), the Democrats are more than happy to let him play in their sandbox.  Even if he loses to Hillary, he has done his job - keeping the Democratic contender for the office of the president from going too far to the right to win votes.

However, Bernie's candidacy throws a monkey wrench into the expected coronation of Hillary Clinton as the Democratic Party's candidate.  Debbie Wasserman Schultz is an avowed Hillary supporter, and has gamed the Democratic Party debate schedule to prevent Bernie from getting name recognition. And yet, he may just yet win both the Iowa caucuses and the New Hampshire primary.  Can you imagine if Hillary is doomed to lose before the real campaign starts?

- - - - - -

As I see it, the important differences between Hillary's platform and Bernie's platform focuses on two areas: Regulation of the Banking Industry and Healthcare.  Hillary has said that Wall Street needs greater regulation, but falls short of a restoration of Glass-Steagall. She is also pragmatic, and says that any attempt to change the healthcare system, Obamacare, with a Republican congress might make things worse.  On the other hand Bernie says that restoring Glass-Steagall and Medicare for All is absolutely needed.

Bernie has yet to issue a detailed plan on how America can afford "Medicare for All", but his logic does make sense.  A recent estimate from people unconnected with Bernie's campaign estimates that the average family savings under his plan would roughly be between $500-$1,800/year.  Given the GOP and its willingness to repeal Obamacare, does Bernie really think that he could implement his plan?

However, I think that the reregulation of Wall Street is possible, as even the wingnuts of the GOP right wing hate the banking industry.  But could Bernie unite enough people to dislodge some of Wall Street's corrupting influence on Washington politics?  I'm not so sure of this.

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In the past, I have noted that both Sanders' and Trump's candidacies have been propelled by the same fuel - the ruling elite of both parties has betrayed the public, and that public is mad as hell and won't take it any more.  At this point of time, I still predict a November election with Trump and Sanders being their parties' candidates. And it will be very interesting.

But the big question is - Does Bernie have a real chance to win?  And if so, will the Democrats (other than Debbie Wasserman Schultz) try to scuttle him before he wins too many delegates?

Like it, Hate it, SCOTUS has its mysterious ways.

As I write this, the Supreme Court has just weighed on two topics which divide the Left from the Right in our country - (1) The Affordable Care Act (a.k.a. "Obamacare"), and (2) Same Sex Marriage. And the rulings exposed some interesting things about the court - more noteworthy than the rulings themselves. 

- - - - - -

When the court's polarization reflects the nation's polarization as a whole, one is likely to get some interesting verdicts. One of these verdicts was the original one supporting the ACA, where Justice Roberts used the government's right to impose taxes as a rationale to support the ACA. Why such a reason?  The man likely wanted to be on the right side of history, but didn't see another "conservative" way of getting to the majority decision.

Justice Roberts tends to support a Federalist reading of the law - delegating as much power as possible to the States, instead of accumulating that power in the Federal Government. So his votes on both the second round of the ACA and Same Sex Marriage would not be a shock to anyone. However, Justices Scalia and Thomas tend to be highly political, and very easy to predict, as they were chosen to reflect a "hard right" point of view. In fact, Justice Scalia has all but indicated that he believes in a "6 Day Creation" - and his rulings tend to support the political views of the members of his "tribe" - even though Justice Roberts has pointed out the inconsistency of his votes, as he cited Scalia's prior opinions in his position on the ACA.  Of course, the Liberal members of the court have their inconsistencies as well - but they didn't get cited in this week's rulings.

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One of the things about the court that many people overlook is that its members hold their positions for life. When Justice Roberts was originally selected, he was meant only to be on the "right wing" of Justice Rehnquist's court - and then Rehnquist died.  This might have been a blessing for the "left wing" of the court, as he seems to be intellectually honest, in comparison to some other justices. And it is not a bad thing if we have a moderate conservative leading this court, than a political hack from either wing.

The right wing notes that virtually none of the recent advances in civil rights (e.g. Gay Rights) have originated from the elected branches of government. And the Left correctly counters - that's because those who demand their rights have had to fight for them.  No rights are ever recognized for free. So it may just make sense to have a court that leans a little to the right, as to make sure that any rights are recognized by society, that these rights are the type that basic and inalienable, regardless of the dominant culture at the time.

- - - - - -

Justice Rehnquist noted that the Supreme Court should be the weakest branch of government.  And I'm not sure if I can agree with him.  Sometimes, I feel that we need a "sane man" court to check and balance the elected branches of government when they run amok. But then one question always comes to mind....

Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?

(Who will guard the guards themselves?)

Reading between the lines

It seems like the GOP establishment is taking the 2016 election seriously. The two most electable contenders recently had a "social meeting", and if I read between the lines properly, they discussed how they could avoid bloodying each other before the main event", the 2016 election. 

Romney's departure from the race only makes sense for the GOP establishment. He is damaged goods. Not only did he have to disavow his greatest achievement as the Governor of Massachusetts, but he had to take on relatively extreme positions (due to the Tea Party and other GOP wingnuts) that alienated him from the moderates he needed to be elected.

Jeb was the Bush brother who should have been elected president in 2000. Instead, we got George W. and his neo-con friends, and a "Forever War" that no average American really wants. To give Jeb credit, he did not pursue higher office when the establishment may have wanted him to do so - he seems to have followed his own path. He was smart enough to know that his brother damaged his chances of running for president. And even more so, waiting until 2016 when Hillary Clinton would likely run again.

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Hillary has some baggage which may be able to become assets. She was working on healthcare long before Obama became a US Senator. The question is - can she turn her prior failed efforts in this arena into an asset among the Democratic base, while separating herself from Obamacare to attract a small number of independents.

Although Hillary seems to be the Democratic candidate in all but name, the question is: How far to the left will she need to steer to keep the loyalty of the base, before tacking to the right to pick up independent votes? If I'm reading the tea leaves correctly, she'll need to cut a big deal with Elizabeth Warren in order to keep the loyalty of the base.

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We're seeing the GOP hopefuls say strange things to the base. I find it amazing that anyone could believe that legalizing "gay marriage" would trigger the end of civilization. Even more so, I find it amazing that anyone would believe this malarkey.  But they do.  

In another forum, I had a discussion about a controversial issue with some die-hard supporters of a certain status quo.  I stated I supported the status quo, but didn't give a reason why I did so. And then I asked, religion aside, why should we support this position? A person responded not with a reason, but with an echo taught to the loyalists of a political party. I then said that "I believe that group loyalty trumps the need to examine why its causes should be supported." Then, I noted that I always test ideas presented by any leader to see if I'm being lied to, or are earning my respect. And what did I get? A middle class version of the "Whatever" one would hear from someone who couldn't support his/her position on Jerry Springer. 

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Sadly, this fatalistic inability to articulate support for a position is not limited to GOP loyalists - it is present in the Democratic party as well. It is not that I want to agree with people. Instead, I want to understand where they come from - they are not sure themselves, and are unable to say much than to regurgitate 2 second sound bites such as "defending marriage". What makes things worse is history and its marriage with politics. Deciding to slowly normalize relations with Iran should be a no-brainer, as well as negotiating a halt to the weaponization of their nuclear stockpile. But some say that this betrays Israel. Others say that Obama is being this generation's Chamberlain. Maybe, just maybe, there is a multidimensional game going on which is influenced by many things:

• America's relationship with Israel
• America's and Iran's desire to end their cold war
• Stabilization of the Middle-East (shut down ISIS)
• Sunni Islam vs. Shiite Islam (an ongoing battle to legitimize one group of mullahs)
• Arab hatred of Jews 
• The GOP Congress and its wish to emasculate Obama for the last 2 years of his term
• Israel's vulnerability in a hostile neighborhood
• Israel vs. Palestine
• Israel's nuclear stockpile (estimated at 150+ warheads)
• Iran's nuclear stockpile (not enough pure "yellow cake" for 1 warhead)
• Israel's lobby and its effect on both the GOP and the Democrats
• Christian Fundamentalists and the litmus test they use on GOP hopefuls
• Christian Fundamentalists and a desire to speed up Christ's second coming
• Iran, Turkey, Saudi Arabia - which Muslim nation dominates the Middle-East

The above is only a short list of the factors which are influencing what is going on in the Middle-East, and few people have a clue as to how any of these factors relate to each other on a given day. I'd bet that only Obama's cabinet and a handful of Republicans in the House and Senate have enough information to read between all of these lines. And as such, any noises we make and opinions we have are those of "armchair quarterbacks" - meaningless, as we are only spectators to the main event.