Big Nannies Of The Year

 

by Michelle Malkin

12/29/2010

It was a nefarious year for nettlesome nosy-bodies employed by the Nanny State. Here are the top power-grabbers of 2010 who just can't leave us alone:
       
-- New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg. Two feet of snow paralyzed trains, buses, plows and emergency vehicles in the Big Apple this week. Perhaps if Bloomberg -- the nation's top self-appointed municipal food cop -- spent more of his time on core government duties instead of waging incessant war on taxpayers' salt, soda, trans-fat and sugar intakes, his battered bailiwick would have been better equipped to weather the storm.
       
-- Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood. He proposed meddling mileage taxes, mused about a system to track drivers' routes, lobbied for high-speed rail boondoggles and promoted a "livability initiative" to limit suburban growth and force dwellers into public transportation. Then America's driving czar floated a plan earlier this fall to disable cell phones through some kind of centralized government mechanism. LaHood backed off that creepy crusade, but he is still intent on waging war against drivers who choose to use cell phones, entertainment systems and GPS devices on the road. Just last week, the unstoppable control freak proposed a new rule banning truck and bus drivers from any use of cell phones while driving -- including emergency calls on hands-free devices. His anti-car agenda is stuck in overdrive.

-- The city of Cleveland. The green police in this Midwestern metropolis made headlines in February with an intrusive plan to roll out electronic snooping trash cans -- "smart" rubbish bins bugged with radio frequency identification chips and bar codes to monitor residents' recycling habits. Violators can be fined $100. Federal stimulus money has gone to fund similar programs in Dayton, Ohio. The technology originated in Germany, was adopted by eco-authoritarians in England (where at least 500,000 trash cans are now embedded with snitch chips) and has spread across Europe. Welcome to the age of Bin Brother.
       
-- The city of San Francisco. The city board of supervisors recently took the "Happy" out of McDonald's Happy Meals by banning all restaurants from serving toys with children's meals that exceed arbitrary limits on calories, fat, salt and sugar. Even the mayor of the People's Republic of San Francisco opposes the latest food-control scheme. But the bossy City by the Bay continues to assault consumer freedom with bans on everything from plastic bags to pet sales and soda pop. By executive order this summer, Mayor Gavin Newsom outlawed Coke, Pepsi and Fanta Orange drinks from vending machines on city property. The decree dictates that "ample choices" of water, "soy milk, rice milk and other similar dairy or non dairy milk" must instead be offered. It's not clear how vendors will be able to circumvent the city's hostility toward plastic bottles. Maybe beverages will be served straight out of those noxiously trendy reusable cloth bags?
       
-- The architects of Obamacare. After ramming a trillion-dollar package of unconstitutional federal health mandates down our throats, they said children and seniors would be saved, we could keep our doctors, costs would go down, and the economy would be boosted. Reality: Premiums have continued to skyrocket. Insurers nationwide have dropped child-only plans in the individual market. Obamacare taxes forced the AARP to raise its members' rates. Hospitals have stepped up layoffs and shutdowns. And millions of Americans have only been able to keep their doctors and coverage after their employers, unions or health providers begged the feds for special waivers. Heckuva job, health bureaucrats.
       
-- First lady Michelle Obama and Republican Mike Huckabee. Mrs. Obama first played the anti-childhood obesity card in September 2009, as a rationale for using her office to crusade for taxpayer subsidies supporting her hometown Chicago's failed Olympics bid. Her argument: Kids would stay fat, lazy and uninspired if the Daley machine didn't get its share of massive sports corporate welfare.
       
Next came Mrs. O's push for the $5 billion expansion of federal child nutrition programs. As I first reported in February 2010, the legislation was a pet project of the Service Employees International Union, which seeks to swell the ranks of dawn-to-dusk year-round public school food service workers who organize under the progressive activist slogan "serving justice, and serving lunch." In addition to school breakfast and lunch, the kiddie food patrol is now pushing subsidized dinner plans and summer food service to create a "stronger nutrition safety net."
       
Nanny State Republican Mike Huckabee, who used his bully pulpit position as Arkansas governor to campaign for Big Government-endorsed "healthier living" in public schools and private life, naturally sided with Mrs. Obama -- and took a swipe at Sarah Palin last week for criticizing the White House usurpation of parental responsibility and rights. Huckabee scoffed at the idea that the feds are "trying to force the government's desires on people." But school bake sales are already under siege, and Mrs. Obama's childhood obesity task force has already called for new and dramatic controls on the marketing of unhealthy foods. Did Huckabee miss (or does he agree with) Mrs. Obama's officious rallying cry on child nutrition: "We can't just leave it up to parents"?
       
God save us from more busybody bipartisanship in 2011.

 Human Events

Greece Stumbles

December 30, 2010
By Brian Koenig

Greece risks Mediterranean isolation as government debt accumulates and international confidence weakens -- especially now that Moody's Investors Service is reviewing a possible downgrade of its current Ba1 credit rating.  With debt levels rising to 127 percent of GDP, Moody's noted that the "review will focus on the factors, namely nominal growth and fiscal consolidation, that will drive the country's debt dynamics over the next few years."

Translation: the leadership of Greece's near-bankrupt country better tighten the financial ropes and cease government handouts and trivial spending projects.

The Greek government has been spending blank checks for decades.  Eurostat, a directorate-general of the European Commission, amended debt and deficit figures, labeling Greece as the region's most "indebted country."  Financial insolvency has nearly stomped Greece's hopes of returning to the international bond market and has aroused negative sentiment among European neighbors.

From Italian and German invasions in World War II to political division resulting from the Greek Civil War, the country's political structure has become deeply instilled with socialist principles.  A truly debt-financed socialist country, Greece has a labor force that exhibits a bloated public sector, with roughly a third of the workforce working for the government. 

Though the government may be facing some fiscal reality, with Greece's new prime minister George Papandreou's claims of spending cuts, the country carries heavy baggage.  The problem is that Greeks as a whole are not committed to change, something expected from a country with such a massive public sector.  They are content in their cozy government jobs, as they omit decades of high wages and political operations funded by borrowed money. 

Greek society is ingrained with the ideology that government, rather than individual investment and private enterprise, creates wealth.  Citizens are comfortable working short hours and receiving as many government benefits as possible. 

Another problem is the government's view towards the market economy.  The Heritage Foundation and Wall Street Journal's 2010 Index of Economic Freedom described Greece's limits on economic latitude:

Challenges to economic freedom remain in such areas as government spending and labor freedom. High government spending chronically causes budget deficits and places upward pressure on an already high public debt. The rigidity of the labor market impedes productivity and job growth, undermining long-term competitiveness.

This intrusive business environment has exerted a prominent impact on the market.  Greece's economy is tanking, while the third-quarter unemployment rate reached 12.4 percent, leaving 622,000 currently out of work.  Labor unrest has sprung as riots ensue and labor strikes flood businesses and government agencies.  

Despite an ever-mounting wall of government debt, labor unions screech as the government plans to cut state subsidies by 20 percent, including wage cuts and involuntary job transfers.  In the name of "global capitalism," union workers criticize their government as fiscal responsibility threatens their professional lives.

Spending itself is not the only problem; government transparency is practically nonexistent.  The OECD, the World Bank, Transparency International, and other international organizations all agree that bureaucracy is the primary deterrent to Greek investment and business operations.  Arbitrary business inspections and financial monitoring produce rampant corruption.  Government officials are swayed to favor some private entities over others, generally for political clout and financial incentives.

In the business world, investors and lenders are highly regulated, with "international norms" determining compensation.  And in true socialist form, private property may be requisitioned for public purposes.  Shady tax practices present a system that is unstable and unpredictable, while the government frequently adjusts tax levels, sometimes compelling retroactive taxation.

The solution to Greece's fiscal meltdown is not tax hikes, as the country has a top income tax rate of 40 percent, a top corporate tax rate of 25 percent, and other taxes such as inheritance and value-added taxes.  The solution is a combination of pro-business tax policies, an expanded private sector, and decreased government spending.  Furthermore, bureaucracy must be thwarted and politicians made accountable by increasing transparency and loosening the government's reins on economic freedom.

With such a vast public sector, labor regulations in Greece must be amended.  Rigid regulations on labor hours and government oversight of business layoffs impede on the corporate environment.  And though corrupt private business practices should not be ignored, unreasonable searches and seizures and regulatory oversight must subside. 

For Greece to revive its feeble global reputation, it must prove fiscal responsibility and pro-market growth.  Progress in privatization will make businesses more competitive and will open the door to technological innovation and development.

Moody's warning should be a wake-up call to both the government and the populace, and unless the Greek people embrace individual responsibility, their nation's financial and economic decline will endure.

Brian Koenig writes about politics and economics and has been published in The New American, Intellectual Conservative, and Taki's Magazine, among others.  He resides in St. Louis, MO.

American Thinker

Obama's Inaugural Address: Two Years of Broken Promises

December 30, 2010

By Lee Cary

Along with the annual turn of the calendar from one year to the next comes the musing over where our lives have been and where we hope they'll go.  This year the icy currents of our musings as a people will run deep.

Certainly, they won't be equivalent to a nation fighting a bloody Civil War.  Nor do we face the daily trauma of a Great Depression with one of four Americans unemployed.  Nor are these days as ominous as when we were reeling from the attack on Pearl Harbor and suddenly at war with powerful and evil nations in Asia and Europe.

This time, the threats ride in on a slow tide, now washing around our ankles as we wonder just how deep the water will become.  This time, it's different.  This time, we lack what we always assumed would emerge when America found herself facing a crisis.  We lack presidential leadership and will for at least the next two years.

There's no immediate value in reviewing the litany of presumptions and assumptions that brought us the current regime.  But the consequences of the 2008 election are there for all with eyes to see and ears to hear.  Besides, it's a long-done deal -- just not the deal that many who voted for the freshman senator from Illinois thought they were getting.

To prove that, all we need do is review the trail of broken promises in President Obama's January 2008 inaugural address.  Back then he said, "We the People have remained faithful to the ideals of our forebears, and true to our founding documents."

But, during the Obama administration, the Constitution has become a founding document to be subverted rather than served.

Obama said, "Our economy is badly weakened, a consequence of greed and irresponsibility on the part of some, but also our collective failure to make hard choices and prepare the nation for a new age."

But the irresponsibility over several administrations whereby banks were forced to artificially support a sub-prime interest rate that led to the housing bubble and brought down a financial house of cards gets translated into the president's distorted notion of class warfare, where the greedy and irresponsible "some" are at fault.

Obama said, "On this day, we gather because we have chosen hope over fear, unity of purpose over conflict and discord."

But hope and unity have not been byproducts of the Obama style of boot-on-the-neck governing -- one that most closely resembles the one-party tyranny of his hometown, Chicago.

Obama said, "On this day, we come to proclaim an end to the petty grievances and false promises, the recriminations and worn-out dogma that for far too long have strangled our politics."

But petty grievances and false promises have flourished during the last two years as recriminations and worn-out dogma rule.  And the promise of a post-partisan era of politics now seems, in retrospect, at best to have been adolescently naïve and at worse duplicitous.

Obama said, "We will act not only to create new jobs but to lay a new foundation for growth."

But even Pollyanna must admit that new jobs are not being created, and the only new foundation being laid for growth is a thicker concrete upon which debt grows toward national bankruptcy.

Obama said, "We will build the roads and bridges, the electric grids and digital lines that feed our commerce and bind us together."

But when none of that happened, he announced that there really never were any "shovel ready" projects after all.  It's like the punchline from the old skit from "Saturday Night Live..."Never mind."

Obama said, "We will restore science to its rightful place and wield technology's wonders to raise health care's quality and lower its costs."

But the legacy media never asked, "Just what does 'restoring science' mean?"  And anyone today who thinks that Obamacare will lower costs is delusional.  It's clear now that government control was always the primary goal -- never lower costs.

Obama said, "What the cynics fail to understand is that the ground has shifted beneath them, that the stale political arguments that have consumed us for so long, no longer apply."

But the translation to that became "I will decide the lay of the land, and I'm not interested in any political debate, since I won the election. And those who oppose me are cynics."

Obama said, "Those of us who manage the public's dollars will be held to account, to spend wisely, reform bad habits, and do our business in the light of day[.]"

But the myth of federal government transparency is as great, if not greater, than during any previous administration.  And major legislation drafted during the last two years was done, out of all places, least often "in the light of day."

Obama said, "The nation cannot prosper long when it favors only the prosperous."

But the nation doesn't prosper at all when its leader pits one group of citizens against another and plays the Marxist class warfare card over and over again.  It's a big world.  And the big money will find somewhere else to go, just as the deep-water drilling rigs that the Obama administration has banned from the Gulf of Mexico are today moving elsewhere.

And, two years ago, Obama also said, "With old friends and former foes, we'll work tirelessly to lessen the nuclear threat and roll back the specter of a warming planet."

But the nuclear threat from Iran and North Korea has increased.  And the hoax of man-made global warming has been exposed, as has its High Priest, a former U.S. vice president, who's made a mess of his private life and a fool of himself.

Finally, the president closed his inaugural address by quoting George Washington.

America, in the face of our common dangers, in this winter of our hardship, let us remember these timeless words: with hope and virtue, let us brave once more the icy currents, and endure what storms may come; let it be said by our children's children that when we were tested we refused to let this journey end, that we did not turn back, nor did we falter; and with eyes fixed on the horizon and God's grace upon us, we carried forth that great gift of freedom and delivered it safely to future generations.

These were Obama's truest words -- read by him, but not his own.  And ironically, today the icy currents of our common dangers are borne to us largely by the inept leadership of the president who quoted them two years ago.

American Thinker

Actually, Bush Vetoed Bill with ‘End-of-Life’ Provisions

by SusanAnne Hiller

I’m going to take the death panel end-of-life planning conundrum down one point at a time to make this very clear for Americans to understand what the Pelosi-led Democrats have done to your healthcare and their attempt to take cover under a Bush-era law–the Medicare Improvement for Patients and Providers Act of 2008.



The Hill reported that the Obama White House attempted to calm Americans’ fears of the dreaded death panels:

The Medicare policy will pay doctors for holding end-of-life-care discussions with patients, according to the Times. A similar provision was dropped from the new healthcare reform law after Republicans accused the administration of withholding care from the sick, elderly and disabled.
However, an administration spokesman said the regulation, which is less specific than the reform law’s draft language, is actually a continuation of a policy enacted under former President George W. Bush.
“The only thing new here is a regulation allowing the discussions … to happen in the context of the new annual wellness visit created by [healthcare reform],” Obama spokesman Reid Cherlin told The Wall Street Journal.
In 2003, Medicare added a consultation visit for seniors new to the program, according to the Journal. Another 2008 law, enacted under Bush, said the visit can include “end-of-life” planning discussions.

However, what The Hill’s Jason Millman forgot to mention in his article was that President Bush VETOED the 2008 bill and the Democrats, along with some “good-willed” Republicans OVERRODE Bush’s veto forcing him to sign the legislation into law.  The bill dealt with doctors’ reimbursements and more, but the Democrats slipped in the end-of-life planning by opening up the Social Security Act, which I have stated many times is dangerous. Once the act is changed, it is difficult to amend again and allows for tinkering with the Medicare fee schedule and covered services definitions and requirements
.
For the record, here is the text that the Democrats changed:

(b) Revisions to Initial Preventive Physical Examination-

(1) IN GENERAL- Section 1861(ww) of the Social Security Act (42 U.S.C. 1395x(ww)) is amended–

(A) in paragraph (1)–

(i) by inserting ‘body mass index,’ after ‘weight’;

(ii) by striking ‘, and an electrocardiogram’; and

(iii) by inserting ‘and end-of-life planning (as defined in paragraph (3)) upon the agreement with the individual’ after ‘paragraph (2)’;

Comedy gold indeed, when Democrats blame Bush for, um, everything wrong in America, and then use him for cover on healthcare.

Big Government

Boehner taps Alabama Republican to lead ethics committee in GOP House

12/29/10 03:14 PM ET
By Susan Crabtree

Incoming Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) has tapped Rep. Jo Bonner (R-Ala.) to be chairman of the ethics committee in the GOP-led House.

In his announcement, Boehner said Bonner is “widely respected” on both sides of the aisle and has a “deep appreciation for the importance of both ethics education and enforcement in the House.”

“The American people have every right to expect the highest standards of ethical conduct from their elected leaders, and it is important for members of both the majority and the minority to work together to ensure that such standards are observed and respected at all times within the institution,” Boehner said in a written statement. “A functioning Ethics Committee will be central to that effort in the 112th Congress.”

“I am confident that as chairman, he will work with the other members of the Ethics Committee to ensure there is accountability at all times in the People’s House,” Boehner continued. “I look forward to working with him, and I’m grateful for his willingness to serve.”

Although not surprising, the move amounts to a rejection of calls to reconstitute the panel and appoint an entirely new roster. Bonner served as the committee’s ranking member during a rocky period for the panel throughout the last Congress.

Over the last two years, the panel was fraught with partisan infighting, and faced criticism for its handling of several investigations, including probes of Reps. Charles Rangel (D-N.Y.) and Maxine Waters (D-Calif.).

At one point during the summer, Bonner took the unusual step of publicly criticizing then-ethics Chairwoman Zoe Lofgren (D-Calif.) for failing to schedule Rangel’s ethics trial before the November midterm elections. He accused her of playing politics with the ethics process.

The House censured Rangel in early December, but the Waters case is still pending. The panel indefinitely delayed her public trial in late November and put the lead attorney on the case, as well as an assisting attorney, on administrative leave without explanation.

Blake Chisam, the ethics committee chief counsel and staff director who was hand-selected by Lofgren, wanted to fire the two attorneys on the Waters case on Nov. 19, but Bonner objected, according to knowledgeable sources.
Chisam tendered his resignation before the election and left the committee in mid-December.

Also in mid-December, Rep. G.K. Butterfield (D-N.C.), a member of the panel, said the committee’s integrity was in jeopardy unless Boehner appointed an entirely new slate of members. Several ethics watchdogs echoed that call.

Democrats have not said whether Lofgren will remain on the panel as ranking member.

The Hill

PBS Glorifies Cuban Health Care System

Posted by Jim Hoft Dec 29th 2010 at 11:15 am in Healthcare, Mainstream Media, PBS, media bias 

Your taxpayer dollars at work promoting Cuba’s failed socialist system … PBS recently aired a report on Cuba’s outstanding health care system.

This was simply unbelievable.
Out state-run media is no longer just liberal – It’s communist:

They forgot to mention that Cuban President Raul Castro just warned his fellow Cubans that they are running out of time and if they don´t change now, their will be an economic collapse.

Mary Anastasia O’Grady at The Wall Street Journal corrected this latest leftist fairy tale.

A Cuban Fairy Tale From PBS
In his memoir covering four years in Cuba as a correspondent for Spanish Television, Vicente Botín tells about a Havana woman who was frustrated by the doctor shortage in the country. She hung a sheet on her balcony with the words “trade me to Venezuela.” When the police arrived she told them: “Look, compañeros, I’m as revolutionary as the next guy, but if you want to see a Cuban doctor, you have to go to Venezuela.”

That story was not in the three-part report by Ray Suarez on Cuban health care that aired on PBS’s “NewsHour” last week. Nor was the one about the Cuban whose notice of his glaucoma operation arrived in 2005, three years after he died and five years after he had requested it. Nor was there any coverage of the town Mr. Botín writes about close to the city of Holguín, that in 2006 had one doctor serving five clinics treating 600 families. In fact, it was hard to recognize the country that Mr. Suarez claimed to be describing.

The series was taped in Cuba with government “cooperation” so there is no surprise that it went heavy on the party line. Still, there was something disturbing about how Mr. Suarez allowed himself to be used by the police state, dutifully reciting its dubious claims as if he were reporting great advances in medical science.

Castro’s military dictatorship marks 52 years in power next week. But the “revolution” is dead. A new generation of angry, young Cubans now vents on Internet blogs and through music, mocking the old man and his ruthless little brother. On Nov. 29, in the city of Santa Clara, hundreds of students launched a spontaneous protest when they were denied access to a televised soccer match they had paid to watch. What began as a demand for refunds soon turned to shouts of “freedom,” “down with Fidel” and “down with socialism,” according to press reports.

Dissent is spreading in Cuba like dengue fever because daily life is so onerous.One of the best documented sources on this subject is the Botín narrative (“Los Funerales de Castro,” 2009, available in Spanish only), which pulls back the curtain on “the Potemkin village” that foreigners see on official visits to Cuba. Behind the façade is desperate want. Food, water, transportation, access to health care, electricity, soap and toilet paper are all hard to come by. Even housing is in short supply, with multiple families wedged into single-family homes. The government tries to keep the lid on through repression. But in private there are no limits to the derision of the brothers Castro.

Mr. Suarez’s report, by contrast, is like a state propaganda film. In one segment, an American woman named Gail Reed who lives in Cuba tells him that the government’s claim of its people’s longevity is due to a first-rate system of disease prevention. He then parrots the official line that Cuba’s wealth of doctors is the key ingredient. What is more, he says, these unselfish revolutionary “foot soldiers” go on house calls. “It’s aggressive preventive medicine,” Mr. Suarez explains. “Homes are investigated, water quality checked, electrical plugs checked.”

An abundance of doctors? Not in the Cuba Mr. Botín lived in. In 2006 the government claimed there were 65,000 doctors. That number, he says, was “a figure that many professionals considered inflated.” When Cubans complained they couldn’t get care, he notes that the state upped the number “magically” to 71,000 five months later. Given Fidel’s habit of making things up, it’s hard to know how many competent doctors the government has trained. But there is no disputing the fact that thousands of medics have been sent overseas in large numbers to earn hard currency for the regime. There is also no question that Cubans are paying the price at home … [my emphasis]

Crossposted from Gateway Pundit

 Big Journalism

Society of Professional Journalists Launches Illegal Alien Amnesty Campaign

Posted by Dan Riehl Dec 29th 2010 at 7:58 pm in Featured Story, Media Matters, journalism, media bias

Of course the Society of Professional Journalists would have a “Diversity Committee.” How else could liberals continue on with the thought policing of which they became so fond in college? Now, according to the SPJ’s The Quill, they think the AP style book should be changed to provide amnesty to illegal aliens until they are proven to be in the U.S. illegally.

Frequent use of the phrases “illegal immigrant” and “illegal alien” by our mainstream media is being questioned in order to remain faithful to the principles of our U.S. Constitution.
SPJ’s Diversity Committee met during the 2010 convention in Las Vegas and decided to engage in a yearlong educational campaign designed to inform and sensitize journalists as to the best language to use when writing and reporting on undocumented immigrants.

Megyn Kelly picked up on the topic at Fox News. Now, TPM is taking out after her. Given that so many self-professed journalists so routinely perform journalistic malpractice of the JournoList variety today, in the spirit of being certain, I propose we stop calling all of them journalists. We can just call them something fun, like typing monkeys, until we’re absolutely convinced they are capable of producing something akin to objective journalism, as opposed to the usual liberal spew they regularly regurgitate on cue.


Unfortunately, thanks to foolish constructs like the SPJ’s diversity committee, what was once thought to be a vital, objective and independent force in American democracy – journalism, is very often little more than liberal tripe. Genuine free thinkers need no longer apply.

Plenty of conservatives are pretty upset over a campaign by the Society of Professional Journalists to convince reporters to stop using the terms “illegal aliens” and “illegal immigrants” in favor of “undocumented immigrant.” But none are as livid as perpetually outraged Fox News host Megyn Kelly, who on Wednesday afternoon asked if journalists were going to start calling rapists “non-consensual sex partners” next.
“You could say that a burglar is an unauthorized visitor. You know, you could say that a rapist is a non-consensual sex partner which, obviously, would be considered offensive to the victims of those crimes,” Kelly said. “So how far could you take this?”

Big Journalism