And that's the way it is Today ............

I was yet to come to this country but, even so, this interview made the BBC evening news however the aftermath didn’t.

Responding to Cronkite's reporting from Vietnam four decades ago that the only way to end the war was by negotiating with the North Vietnamese, President Lyndon Johnson was reported (though never confirmed) to have said, "If I've lost Cronkite, I've lost Middle America."

Obama may have experienced his Walter Cronkite moment over the economy.

Now Obama appears to have "lost" New York Times liberal economic columnist Paul Krugman. Krugman, who enthusiastically supported the president's redistributionist and stimulus plans, has bowed to the reality that they are not working.

In a recent column titled "This is Not a Recovery," Krugman took issue with the president and Vice President Joe Biden that we have experienced a summer of economic recovery. "Unfortunately, that's not true," he wrote. "This isn't a recovery, in any sense that matters. And policymakers should be doing everything they can to change that fact."

Krugman asked an essential question: "Why are people who know better sugarcoating economic reality? The answer, I'm sorry to say, is that it's all about evading responsibility."

It is that, and more. The administration is so locked into its left-wing, "tax, borrow and spend" ideology that it has become like someone trapped in a cult: unable to escape and endlessly repeating the same mantra.

In a speech last week to central bankers and economists in Jackson Hole, Wyoming., Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke acknowledged that the economy is fragile, especially in light of the government's latest report, which showed the weakest quarterly growth in a year. He added that high unemployment poses a serious threat.

Still, Bernanke tried to sound optimistic by forecasting some pickup in growth in 2011 and beyond.

Optimism not based on reality is false hope based on wishful thinking. One might as well ask a high-performance engine to run at peak level after several of its cylinders have been disabled. It is impossible, no matter how shiny the paint job.

An economy burdened down with debt because of too much government spending, a health care law that will add new and unknown burdens, expiring tax cuts that will take more money from the private sector for government to waste and abuse, and a stock market unsure and thus unable to fuel the economic engine to propel us out of this recession, is not a "summer of recovery," but a winter of discontent.

The solution is not a "Star Trek" approach in which we must go where no one has gone before. We know what works and what must be done.

Social Security and Medicare must be reformed; government programs that have failed, or are obsolete, should be scrapped; military spending designed to enhance re-election prospects for some members of Congress, while doing nothing to improve the military, must be ended, and people should be asked to return to the attitude of previous generations that all of us, including government, must live within our means.

Writing in U.S. News & World Report, publisher Mort Zuckerman takes the Krugman view a step further by calling the administration he once supported "The Most Fiscally Irresponsible Government in U.S. History."

Zuckerman writes: "People see the stimulus, fashioned and passed by Congress in such a hurry, as a metaphor for wasted money. They are highly critical about the lack of discipline among our political leaders. The question that naturally arises is how to forestall a long-term economic decline."

The answer is for the Republicans, so eager and so likely to regain power in the House and possibly the Senate in the coming election, to expose the administration's sugarcoating of reality and get out the bad-tasting medicine. The good news is that by swallowing fiscal responsibility, we will all be better off in the end.

But can Republicans withstand and prevail over the Democratic demagoguery that will predictably be heaped on them? They'd better, or they don't deserve to lead.

As Walter Cronkite used to say, "That's the way it is."

T'was the Night after Christmas ...

In just 4 months, on January 1, 2011, the largest tax hikes in the history of America will take effect. And they will hit families and small businesses in three great waves.

On January 1, 2011, here's what happens...

First Wave:

In 2001 and 2003, the GOP Congress enacted several tax cuts for investors, small business owners, and families. These will all expire on January 1, 2011.

Personal income tax rates will rise. The top income tax rate will rise from 35 to 39.6 percent (this is also the rate at which two-thirds of small business profits are taxed). The lowest rate will rise from 10 to 15 percent. All the rates in between will also rise and the full list of marginal rate hikes is below:

• The 10% bracket rises to an expanded 15%
• The 25% bracket rises to 28%
• The 28% bracket rises to 31%
• The 33% bracket rises to 36%
• The 35% bracket rises to 39.6%

The "marriage penalty" (narrower tax brackets for married couples) will return from the first dollar of income. The child tax credit will be cut in half from $1000 to $500 per child. The standard deduction will no longer be doubled for married couples relative to the single level. The dependent care and adoption tax credits will be cut.

Then there’s the return of the Death Tax. This year only, there is no death tax. (It's a quirk!) For those dying on or after January 1, 2011, there is a 55 percent top death tax rate on estates over $1 million. A person leaving behind two homes, a business and a retirement account could easily pass along a death tax bill to their loved ones.

Think of the farmers who don't make much money, but their land, which they purchased years ago with after-tax dollars, is now worth a lot of money. Their children will have to sell the farm, which may be their livelihood, just to pay the estate tax if they don't have the cash sitting around to pay the tax.

Think about your own family's assets. Maybe your family owns real estate, or a business that doesn't make much money, but the building and equipment are worth $1 million. Upon their death, you can inherit the $1 million business tax free, but if they own a home, stock, cash worth $500K on top of the $1 million business, then you will owe the government $275,000 cash! That's 55% of the value of the assets over $1 million! Do you have that kind of cash sitting around waiting to pay the estate tax?

Higher tax rates on savers and investors will come into effect as the Capital Gains tax will rise from 15 percent this year to 20 percent in 2011. The dividends tax will rise from 15 percent this year to 39.6 percent in 2011. These rates will rise another 3.8 percent in 2013.

Second Wave:

There are over twenty new or higher taxes in Obamacare. Several will first go into effect on January 1, 2011. They include:

The "Medicine Cabinet Tax" as thanks to Obamacare, Americans will no longer be able to use health savings account (HSA), flexible spending account (FSA), or health reimbursement (HRA) pre-tax dollars to purchase non-prescription, over-the-counter medicines (except insulin).

Then there is the "Special Needs Kids Tax". This provision of Obamacare imposes a cap on flexible spending accounts (FSAs) of $2500 (Currently, there is no federal government limit). There is one group of FSA owners for whom this new cap will be particularly cruel and onerous: parents of special needs children.

There are thousands of families with special needs children in the United States , and many of them use FSAs to pay for special needs education.

Tuition rates at one leading school that teaches special needs children in Washington, D.C. ( National Child Research Center ) can easily exceed $14,000 per year.

Under tax rules, FSA dollars cannot be used to pay for this type of special needs education.

The HSA (Health Savings Account) Withdrawal Tax hike increases the additional tax on non-medical early withdrawals from an HSA from 10 to 20 percent, disadvantaging them relative to IRAs and other tax-advantaged accounts, which remain at 10 percent.

Third Wave:

The Alternative Minimum Tax (AMT) and Employer Tax hikes will bring some nasty surprises when Americans prepare to file their tax returns in January of 2011, -the AMT won't be held harmless, and many tax relief provisions will have expired.

According to the left-leaning Tax Policy Center, Congress' failure to index the AMT will lead to an explosion of AMT taxpaying families-rising from 4 million last year to 28.5 million. These families will have to calculate their tax burdens twice, and pay taxes at the higher level. The AMT was created in 1969 to ensnare a handful of taxpayers.

Small businesses can normally expense (rather than slowly-deduct, or "depreciate") equipment purchases up to $250,000. This will be cut all the way down to $25,000. Larger businesses can currently expense half of their purchases of equipment. In January of 2011, all of it will have to be "depreciated."

There are literally scores of tax hikes on business that will take place. The biggest is the loss of the "research and experimentation tax credit," but there are many, many others. Combining high marginal tax rates with the loss of this tax relief will cost jobs.

Tax credits for education will be limited and the deduction for tuition and fees will not be available. Teachers will no longer be able to deduct classroom expenses. Coverdell Education Savings Accounts will be cut. Employer-provided educational assistance is curtailed and the student loan interest deduction will be disallowed for hundreds of thousands of families.

Under current law, a retired person with an IRA can contribute up to $100,000 per year directly to a charity from their IRA. This contribution also counts toward an annual "required minimum distribution." This ability will no longer be there.

And Obama and Congress are not through yet. One of the surprises we'll find come next year, is what follows - - a little "surprise" that 99% of us had no idea was included in the "new and improved" healthcare legislation . . . the dupes, er, dopes, who backed this administration will be astonished!

Starting in 2011, (next year folks), your W-2 tax form sent by your employer will be increased to show the value of whatever health insurance you are given by the company. It does not matter if that's a private concern or governmental body of some sort.

If you're retired? So what... your gross will go up by the amount of insurance you get.

You will be required to pay taxes on a large sum of money that you have never seen. Take the tax form you filed last April and see what $15,000 or $20,000 additional gross does to your tax debt. That's what you'll pay next year.

For many, it also puts you into a new higher bracket so it's even worse.

This is how the government is going to buy insurance for the15% that don't have it and it's only part of the tax increases.

Not believing this??? Here is a research of the summaries.....

On page 25 of 29: TITLE IX REVENUE PROVISIONS- SUBTITLE A: REVENUE OFFSET PROVISIONS-(sec. 9001, as modified by sec. 10901) Sec.9002 "requires employers to include in the W-2 form of each employee the aggregate cost of applicable employer sponsored group health coverage that is excludable from the employees gross income."

Now researching this last point on the Web reveals as many confirmatory references as it does denials but we'll soon see.

Note that all this stuff won't hit the fan until after the mid-term elections which I'm sure was mere serendipity. And it's as far away from the 2012 presidential battle as possible but, as I said, I'm sure that's purely coincidental.

Happy New Year!!

Mostly Stupid Network Broadcasters or MSNBC for short ..

Let me confess, MSNBC bugs me. That's simple enough on the surface ........

But the "why" is more complicated. Perhaps it's because it is the "little engine that couldn't" never has and never will. But it still huffs and puffs via little Chrissy and Olberman et al and pretends to be a valid voice whereas the reality is that it is far behind in the ratings and even trails CNN.

Little radio station KFYI in the Phoenix market gets a bigger audience but on Monday last, MSNBC outdid itself in pomposity.

One segment was dedicated to denouncing Sen. Mitch McConnell's response to a question about whether Obama is a Muslim. McConnell said: "We all have to rely on the word of (Barack Obama) -- something about as reliable as a credit default swap.

"No, I'm sorry, that's what The Atlantic's Andrew Sullivan said about whether Trig Palin was really Sarah Palin's child.

McConnell responded by demanding that Obama be fired -- or at least have his security clearance suspended.

No, no -- wrong again: That was Sen. John Kerry and Sen. Chuck Schumer, respectively, not taking Karl Rove at his word when he said he had not released Valerie Plame's name to the press. (It turned out Rove was telling the truth; it was Richard Armitage, and it wasn't a crime.)

What McConnell actually said in response to the Muslim question was: "The president says he's a Christian. I take him at his word. I don't think that's in dispute."

Over at MSNBC, that's Republican code for: "He's a Muslim!"

North Korean TV's Ed Schultz hysterically babbled: "McConnell gave cover. That's what he did. He gave cover to all those low information voters out there who still believe this garbage about President Obama being a Muslim. ... The Republican leadership just loves to feed the fire."

Chris Matthews was so impressed with Schultz's nonsensical argument that he spent the entire hour on NKTV's "Hardball" making the same one: McConnell had expressed insufficient fervor when he said he believed Obama was a Christian! (Perhaps if McConnell had added something about a thrill running up his leg ...)

The statement "I take him at his word," Matthews said, was a "pitch-perfect dog whistle to the haters." He continued: "Yes, sure, whatever he says. Right. This is not about belief. It's an accusation that President Obama is not one of us. The right wing's attempt to de-Americanize the president."What else is there besides Obama's word? If Obama suddenly announced that he was a Muslim -- or a Buddhist -- what evidence would Matthews cite to prove him wrong?

Meanwhile, liberals absolutely refuse to take Republicans at their word when they identify their own children. Or deny leaking a low-level CIA functionary's name to the press. Or when they deny they are racists. Indeed, Matthews' guest, Howard Fineman of Newsweek, accused the entire state of Kentucky of bigotry to explain McConnell's "crafted" words.

Kentucky, Fineman said, is "a state where the nativist appeal outside of Louisville really works big-time." The Republicans, he said, are "going to use whatever fear message they can. It's aimed at Kentucky, for sure."I believe the Bluegrass state has just been called "nativist" without any evidence at all!

Was Kentucky's father a nativist? Was it educated in a nativist madrassa as a child? Did Kentucky just endorse the idea of a nativist cultural center at Ground Zero?

On the following night's "Hardball," Tuesday, Matthews and his guest, The Chicago Tribune's Clarence Page, refused to take Glenn Beck at his word when he said that he picked the day for his Lincoln Memorial rally without realizing it was the 47th anniversary of Martin Luther King's "I Have a Dream" speech. (Everybody knows the 47th anniversary is the big one!)

Accusations of racism apparently do not require the ironclad proof demanded for accusations that someone is a Muslim. And there's a lot more evidence that Obama's a Muslim than Republicans are racists. Let's compare: Evidence for the Proposition That Obama's a Muslim: His father was a Muslim; his mother, an atheist, married two Muslims; he attended a Muslim school in Indonesia from age 6 to 10; and, during the campaign, he proudly posted on his webpage his statement that America is "no longer" a Christian nation, a statement he has repeated as president, while announcing on French TV that America is "one of the largest Muslim countries in the world."

Evidence for the Proposition That Republicans Are Racist: (Nothing so far.)

Evidence for the Proposition That Liberals Lie About Republicans Being Racist: Try this. Video of a supporter of Rand Paul's opponent pretending to be a racist Paul supporter; Oregon public school teacher Jason Levin caught operating a website asking liberals to show up at Tea Parties pretending to be right-wing racists; The New York Times' Maureen Dowd claiming she heard Rep. Joe Wilson shout, "You lie, boy!" when he shouted "You lie!" during Obama's speech to a joint session of Congress; and the mainstream media lying about civil rights hero John Lewis being called the N-word 15 times at an anti-ObamaCare protest, with no one ever being able to produce a videotape, despite a $100,000 reward.

If Republicans played by liberal rules, they'd just call Obama a racist, who leaked Valerie Plame's name to the press, is not Sasha's father, and smokes Newports, not Kools.
　

Health, Death and Taxes

Yesterday marked the end for most of the primary elections across the country and now the surviving combatants can finally get around to savaging their opponents for office instead of just knifing their own party rivals. And they have just over 2 months to do it.

Whether Obama likes it or not, and he won’t, this General Election will not be just about the makeup of the House and Senate. It will be a referendum on him and his policies and his performance. Apart from spending trillions of dollars we don’t have and apart from appointing a whole raft of inexperienced and incompetent people to one office or another, he really has only one thing upon which to hang his hat.

And that one thing is ObamaCare which his congressional lackeys rammed through unread and which is seen by most thinking Americans as a disaster waiting in the wings. Now the GOP aren’t that stupid that they don’t read the tea leaves on this subject and so it is inevitable the issue will play a major role in the run-up to November 2.

Equally, the liberal strategists are not dumb either when it comes to clinging onto power. No, they reserve their stupidity in order to apply it in full to their policies when they do gain power.

And now we know how they plan to fight the inevitable. The message being drummed into liberal candidates around the country is “Improve’ health care, don’t talk cost” , but that is not wholly what is going on. What is going on is a recognition from the Democrats that after a year of trying to sell Obamacare as a panacea of right thinking and improvement, the voters headed to the polls in November disagree and are angry.

Consequently, the Democrats are abandoning all pretenses of selling Obamacare to the public and have cut and run back to “If you don’t replace us with the Republicans, we promise we will improve it.”

This strategy can only suggest that Democrats are acknowledging the failure of their predictions that the health care legislation would grow more popular after its passage, as its benefits became clear and rhetoric cooled. Instead, it is designed to win over a skeptical public, and to defend the legislation — and in particular the individual mandate — from a push for repeal.

The presentation provided to liberal candidates nationwide concedes that groups typically supportive of Democratic causes — people under 40, non-college-educated women and Hispanic voters — have not been won over by the plan. Indeed, it stresses repeatedly that many are unaware that the legislation has passed, an astonishing shortcoming in the White House’s all-out communications effort.

Note just how bad it must be for the Democrats and their messaging if “many are unaware that Obamacare has passed.” This is consistent willful naivety by the Democrats. The public that will most likely vote does know Obamacare passed and they are mad as all get out because of it.

And the kicker — the revised talking points counsel that Democrats should avoid making the claim that Obamacare will reduce costs and cut the deficit.

In other words, the two main selling points are being tossed out the window.

And now it's time to start tossing out the perpetrators starting in just 69 days.

In Arizona it's Primary Day. For Democrats it's Taps

It was a good run for the Democrats, but all things must come to an end some day. I know, I know: it’s downright horrible for the American people to start expecting the political party that’s held Congress since 2006 and the White House since 2008 to actually take personal responsibility for the bad things happening to the economy.

But the Democrats will have to live with it, as the American people have started to assign more responsibility to Obama for the current economy than to Bush - at least, the Republican and Independent sections of the American people have, which is really the important thing these days.

And now I can see November 2 quite clearly despite that which Howard Dean thinks, and we all know how reliable are his political predictions, but it’s just 70 days away.

A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that 48% of Likely U.S. Voters now think Obama’s policies are to blame for the continuing bad economy, up three points from last month. Forty-seven percent (47%) say the recession that began under Bush is at fault.

There are, of course, many hidden victims here of this betrayal of the Democratic party by the people of the United States. No, really. I mean, think of all of those soon-to-be Democratic former Congressmen who have to hope that the lobbying industry can handle the sudden influx of new glad-handlers, parasites, and influence-peddlers that comes from a Congressional readjustment!

For that matter, think of those poor, poor staffers who next January will be facing the specter of having no job and no prospect of getting one - and in one of the more expensive metropolitan areas, to boot. Some of them may even have to move back in with their parents.

The horror.

In truth, I am somewhat surprised that things ended this quickly. But I couldn’t be happier but I will be on November 3.

Up to now, the standard operating procedure for the Democrats is that the last Republican President acts as their designated voodoo doll until such time as the next Republican President takes office.

That’s why Ronald Reagan went from a diabolical idiot savant in 1988 to the revered elder statesman of fond memory that Obama looked up to in 2008 campaign commercials, and how George Bush the Elder went from That Guy Who Lied Us Into A War With Iraq For Oil in 1993 to the wise elder statesman who knew better than his son.

And then there was that Guy Who Lied Us Into A War With Iraq For Oil in 2003.

It’s in the best interests of the Democrats to not have things go so south for their current ruling majority, so quickly. So what happened?

Oh, right, the President’s a purblind incompetent when it comes to actual politics.

I forgot.

A Smoking Gun? Or just smoldering?

The red text is merely there to highlight that which may be hard to read otherwise.

Well this story is getting more legs than I ever thought it would.

Frankly, I don’t care if Obama is Muslim, Christian, or a Bush Baptist and that does not refer to the ex-president. What I do care about is honesty and truth. So is he lying?

Well, he’s a politician. He’s a lawyer. He’s from Chicago. Three strikes count for something I'm told.

But from a story in today’s Washington Post headlined Poll shows more Americans think Obama is a Muslim:

The number of Americans who believe that President Obama is a Muslim has increased significantly since his inauguration and now accounts for 25 percent of the nation’s population.

Those results, from a new Pew Research Center survey, were drawn from interviews done before the president’s comments about the construction of an Islamic cultural center near Ground Zero, and they suggest that there could be serious political danger for the White House as the debate continues. We can but hope.

The president’s religion, like his place of birth, has been the subject of Internet-spread rumors since before he began his presidential campaign, and the poll indicates that those rumors have gained currency since Obama took office. The number of people who now identify Obama as a Christian has dropped to 34 percent, down from nearly half when he took office.

Wonder why that is?

What is illustrative about this story is that roughly the same number of people believe Obama is a muslim and was born outside the United States as believe a mosque should be built on Ground Zero and the US Government was behind 9/11 — too bad we can’t do a Venn Diagram here.

If the Post is puzzled as to why this should be the case, it need look no further than the flaccid, sycophantic coverage it has given Obama the Senator, Obama the Candidate, and Obama the President.

Lack of experience: ignored.

The sale of Obama’s senate seat: ignored.

Failure of Senator Obama’s subcommittee to hold hearings on Afghanistan: ignored.

Obama’s relationship with Bill Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn: ignored.

Obama’s relationship with Jeremiah Wright: ignored.

Obama’s appointment of a pedophile as safe schools czar: ignored.

Obama’s appointment of an avowed commie and 9/11 Troofer as “green jobs czar”: ignored.

Obama's birth certificate: ignored.

I lump these all together for a reason because they are all stories the legacy media should have covered had they been as invested in doing their job as they were in promoting Obama’s candidacy. For those who pooh-pooh the idea that Obama’s birth origins warranted investigation I can only point out that the legacy media did cover the idea that John McCain’s birth in the US Canal Zone — to a US Naval officer and his American citizen wife — might exclude him from the Presidency.

If you’re saying that being crazy per se disqualifies an idea as worthy of investigation I present Exhibit A which proves conclusively that no idea is too crazy to be investigated: the aptly named Gary Sick’s October Surprise allegation.


Whenever an area of controversy has arisen concerning Obama it has been ignored by the press and anyone bringing up the subject demonized. This has had two effects. First, a lot of the nuttiness on this administration has been exposed by nontraditional media. Second, the refusal of the legacy media to investigate gives an aura of plausibility to just about any story circulating about the administration.

So while this lickspittle relationship the media has with Obama did enable him to win the presidency and it has enabled his egregious policies to escape public scrutiny, it has also created a climate where the media have sacrificed all credibility when it comes to dealing with negative stories about Obama.

I don’t know what Obama’s religion is and, as I said, I don’t much care. Obama’s quarter century in a front row seat in the Reverend Jeremiah Wright’s house of hate isn’t any more dispositive of his Christianity than W attending Matt Hale’s Church of the Creator but that doesn’t make him a muslim. If you’re predisposed to believe he is muslim, you will always fall back on the claim that he’s practicing taqiyya.

Personally, I think Obama believes in one thing and one thing only: that he should get what he wants. He sat through Wright’s racemongering Sabbath after Sabbath because it brought him influence. If he thought becoming a Buddhist would guarantee his election in 2012, we’d see him boarding Air Force One with a shaved head and wearing a saffron robe. He is his own monotheistic religion.

The illustration at the top of this story, though, indicates why this mysterious belief that Obama is a muslim not only persists, but is growing. It is a claim that warrants investigation if the Post sees fit to run a story decrying as a calumny that one in five Americans believe this to be the case. It is a view that isn’t going to go away simply because the media feel uncomfortable examining Obama’s religion.

Candidates from at least Jimmy Carter onwards have had their religious beliefs scrutinized by theological imbeciles in the media, why does Obama get a pass? He shouldn’t.
It wasn’t fair to the country that this and other allegations were ignored. And now, belatedly, the media are discovering that it wasn’t fair to either Obama or themselves.

With this particular president, the debate is over. Any story, no matter how ridiculous, will gain a substantial following because the media have sacrificed their credibility. Maybe in 2012, if we’re lucky, or 2016, if we’re not, the media will return to doing the job it claims it wants to do, to play a constructive role in our political process. They can do that by treating the candidates they like the same way they treat those they don't believe.

How much is a life worth?

Somewhere in Europe in 1450, a midwife slapped the bottom of a little boy who grew up to be known as Hieronymus Bosch.

He became an artist and some of his paintings were of scenes idyllic but some were of scenes of souls in torment which Christians call Hell.

The Church in Rome loved those because they provided visual “proof” that the threats being sprayed from the pulpits were real which improved obeisance and tithes and indulgences.

It has always been thus; When in doubt follow the money.

Well I saw Hell yesterday in a view of the future should Obamacare come to pass.

I drove a friend of a friend for an appointment at the local Veteran’s Medical facility. He went to get blood drawn and to see a doctor to review his medication dosages.

From start to finish, the elapsed time was more than 3 hours. Now that was par for the course according to my passenger and would have been longer if he’d had to wait for prescription fulfillment.

It so reminded me of my experiences of the National Health Service in England and so it should as this was governmental healthcare at work.

Another friend was on a cruise recently and she spoke to quite a few Brits who were quite happy with their NHS. I pointed out that so was I until I came here and saw a different way, a better way.

In the last few days some entities have dared to bring up the issues of “medical rationing” in our future if Obamacare comes to pass. The whole subject was, of course, vehemently denied in the run-up to the bill’s passage. Well here is a case in point.

Now, if you’ve missed the Avastin controversy, here’s a quick summary of it: Avastin is a general anti-cancer drug that got fast-tracked by the FDA a few years ago and is now prescribed to under 18 thousand women a year in the United States who suffer from the last stages of breast cancer. It doesn’t cure the cancer; it has side effects; and its beneficial effects are disputed… but the drug has its defenders as well as its detractors.

However, now the FDA is contemplating reversing its approval of Avastin, which would probably mean the end of both its coverage by Medicare, and a subsidy program for low-income women.

Why?

Because then it won’t be covered by Medicare and the government can end the subsidy program for low-income women, of course. The difficulty here for Obamacare supporters is that Avastin can cost up to $100K a year - the aforementioned subsidy program only covers about 40% of that, by the way - and under Obamacare the government would have to be the one to make the awkward and politically fraught call on whether or not to spend a lot of money making available a drug that doesn’t magically destroy cancer on the spot.

It’s another ‘take a pill' kind of situation, in other words: or to be even more inflammatory (but perfectly accurate), it’s another ‘death panel’ kind of situation.

There’s no good answer for an Obamacare enthusiast: if the drug’s available and you subsidize it, that’s up to a couple of billion dollars right there per year that the government will have to pay for a treatment of disputed efficacy (and demand for the drug will assuredly go up, if it’s subsidized).

If the drug’s available and you don’t subsidize it, you’re denying care under your system that was available previously (which is precisely what has been promised as not going to happen). But if you can get the FDA to remove the approval, well… problem solved, right?

Assuming that you don’t have advanced breast cancer, of course.

For now, I’m ignoring the mosque at Ground Zero but I’m not going to ignore the premature death of thousands of low income women.

Two years ago it was all about Hope and Change. Now with the midterms on the near horizon, Obama’s speech writers decided to update it and they came up with, "Reach for Hope”.

I suggest that on November 2 we “Reach for Change”.

And this time, mean it.