Wednesday, August 5, 2009

Sorry You're Not Used to Civilized Professional People

Sorry Republicans don't walk around screaming at anyone who disagrees with them and calling them racists to get attention. "Well dressed" is now a criticism? Bring on 2010 if that's all you got.

What a waste of space....seriously.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZV84OBtGpSQ

Saturday, July 25, 2009

You Do Not Have a Right to Free Health Care

It would be great if everyone could get quality health care for free while doctors get paid a fair wage, hospitals can pay their employees, and pharmaceutical companies get funded for research and development for your next life saving prescription for...well...free. If anyone has any ideas on how to make that work, I'm all for it. However, until someone invents that we're stuck with the old fashioned someone has to pay for it system. That basically leaves us with two options: 1)pay for it ourselves hopefully with the help of insurance or 2) have government foot the bill which basically means we're paying for it anyway. Neither option sounds very appealing.


Obama and company are pushing health care reform hard and the basic reform they are pushing is giving anyone who wants it the ability to opt in to a government funded health insurance system paid for by you and me. Not to sound selfish, but I don't really want to pay for your health insurance. I already pay for my own family's insurance to the tune of $400 a month for the premium alone. The basic tenant of the Obama plan is that health care is a right so it's the obligation of all of us to see that those who cannot afford to pay for their own health care aren't left without medical treatment. As a follower of God, or just as a decent person I feel the right and moral thing to do is to help those who can't help themselves. However, that does not mean that everyone has a right to free or even affordable health care. If something is a right, then anyone and everyone is entitled to it including those in our country who are here illegally, those who could work but don't, and those who simply do not want to pay for their health care.

On the radio today a caller to the Michael Medved show stated he was a teacher who was retiring soon and would have to begin paying $500 a month for his health insurance out of his pension which is only $3000 a month. He was incredulous that he would have to pay for his own coverage. Is it a shame that a man who worked as a teacher for 35 years would then have to pay so much money for health care during his retirement - possibly. However, it is definitely a shame that someone who was worked for 35 years, who probably no longer has a mortgage, no longer has kids to feed, and likely has a sizable savings expects my family with two kids feed, a hefty mortgage, and a savings that competes with my daughter's piggy bank to subsidize his health insurance premium. This attitude of entitlement has become so pervasive in this country with Obama leading the way. However, with Obama's approval rating quickly falling I can only hope that people are finally realizing what they got themselves into. I hope that people realize that the Democrat party can only be the party of the very rich or the very poor. The reality is the rich are the only ones that can afford it and the poor are the only who will benefit. Meanwhile the other 90% of us have to pay so the rich can feel good and the poor continue to have no encouragement from our government to help themselves. Well, I don't work all day so Alec Baldwin can feel good about himself and so that Billy Bob can play X-Box all day instead of bagging groceries.

Thursday, July 23, 2009

Obama Takes Race Relations Down a Peg

You would think the only and first black president in the western world would have the sensibility to not race bait the nation. The arrest of a black Harvard professor has set the wheels in motion for the next national race crisis and Obama is only adding fuel to the fire. On July 16th Henry Louis Gates, Jr. was arrested outside his Cambridge Massachusetts home for disorderly conduct by a white officer. Officer James Crowley responded to a call from a neighbor who witnessed the man later identified as Gates breaking into a home. As it turned out, Gates was breaking into his own home. When approached by the officer Gates immediately accused the officer of being racist and the situation escalated to Gate's arrest.

The police report published on thesmokinggun.com clearly shows the arrest of Gates was deserved. Gates is probably lucky he wasn't tazed, bro. If it isn't bad enough the usual suspects are getting bent of shape (Sharpton, etc) Obama has to chime in like a CNN pundit. Instead of waiting until he knew all the facts (which in his statement he admitted he did not) and if necessary releasing a sensible statement, our fearless leader goes off-prompter and tells the world:

1) "any of us would be pretty angry"
2) "the Cambridge police acted stupidly"
3) "there is a long history in this country of African Americans and Latinos being stopped by police disproportionately"

Really? First, if you locked yourself out of your house and had to break in, wouldn't your first thought be "I hope no one sees me and thinks I'm breaking in." I think most people would be grateful if not understanding that a neighbor and the police were so quick to respond to a situation like that. Wouldn't most people tell the police officer "yeah, ya know...funny story...here's my ID." That's not what Gates did. He immediately assumed he was being questioned because he was black and initially refused to show the officer his ID.

Obama's assertion that the police acted stupidly is reckless and ignorant. To make that statement without knowing the facts, to undermine a police officer doing his job, and to ignore the childish and disrespectful behavior of Gates is astounding coming from a president and will only perpetuate the claim that this was a racially motivated incident. In his remarks Obama stated that Gates was a friend of his so he was probably biased. Fine. Then, maybe you're not in the best position to offer your opinion to the country.

And, unfortunately blacks and Latinos are stopped by police disproportionally because they cause commit a disproportionate amount of violent crimes. That's not opinion. It's just a simple fact. Pretending that isn't the case is absurd and only further damages race relations. Instead of pretending, isn't it more productive to examine why it's disproportionate and work on solving that problem.

Now, Obama "is surprised by the controversy surrounding my statement. because I think it was a pretty straightforward comment that you probably don't need to handcuff a guy, a middle-aged man who uses a cane, who's in his own home." If that's true and everything is that simple, let's apply that logic to airports as well. I would like Obama to explain to me the reason why my old Jewish grandmother in a wheelchair has to go through hours of security at an airport while they examine her walker and the corns on her feet. Oye vey - what a shanda.