House Minority Whip Eric Cantor talked health care reform with Fox News’ Greta Van Sustren Wednesday night.

Just got this from the ofice of Senator Mitch McConnell:

WASHINGTON, D.C. – U.S. Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell made the following remarks on the Senate floor Thursday regarding the importance of getting it right on health care reform:

“Senators on both sides acknowledge that the health care bill we’re considering is among the most significant pieces of legislation any of us will ever consider.

“So it stands to reason that we’d devote significant time and attention to it.

“Indeed, some would argue that we should spend more time and attention on this bill than most — if not every — previous bill we’ve considered.

“The Majority disagrees.

“Why? Because this bill has become a political nightmare for them.

“They know Americans overwhelmingly oppose it, so they want to get it over with.

“Americans are already outraged at the fact that Democrat leaders took their eyes off the ball. Rushing the process on a partisan line makes the situation even worse.

“Americans were told the purpose of reform was to reduce the cost of health care.

“Instead, Democrat leaders produced a $2.5 trillion, 2,074-page monstrosity that vastly expands government, raises taxes, raises premiums, and wrecks Medicare.

“And they want to rush this bill through by Christmas — one of the most significant, far-reaching pieces of legislation in U.S. history. They want to rush it.

“And here’s the most outrageous part: at the end of this rush, they want us to vote on a bill that no one outside the Majority Leader’s conference room has even seen.

“That’s right. The final bill we’ll vote on isn’t even the one we’ve had on the floor. It’s the deal Democrat leaders have been trying to work out in private.

“That’s what they intend to bring to the floor and force a vote on before Christmas.

“So this entire process is essentially a charade.

“But let’s just compare the process so far with previous legislation for some perspective. Here’s a snapshot of what we’ve done and where we stand:

• The Majority Leader intends to bring this debate to a close as early as this weekend — four days from now, on this $2.5 trillion dollar mistake

• No American who hasn’t been invited into the Majority Leader’s conference room knows what will be in that bill

• This bill has been the pending business of the Senate since the last week of November — less than four weeks ago.

• We started the amendment process two weeks ago.

• We’ve had 21 amendments and motions — less than two a day.

“Now let’s look at how the Senate has dealt with previous legislation.

“No Child Left Behind (2001):

• 21 session days or 7 weeks.

• Roll Call votes: 44

• Number of Amendments offered: 157

“9/11 Commission/Homeland Security Act (2002):

• 19 session days over 7 weeks.

• Roll Call votes: 20

• Number of Amendments offered: 30

“Energy Bill (2002):

• 21 session days over 8 weeks

• Number of Roll Call votes: 36

• Number of Amendments offered: 158

“This isn’t an energy bill. This is an attempt by a majority to take over one sixth of the U.S. economy — to vastly expand the reach and the role of government into the health care decisions of every single American — and they want to be done after one substantive amendment. This is absolutely inexcusable.

“I think Senator Snowe put it best on Tuesday:

‘Given the enormity and complexity,’ she said, ‘I don’t see anything magical about the Christmas deadline if this bill is going to become law in 2014.’

“And I think Senator Snowe’s comments on a lack of bipartisanship at the outset of this debate are also right on point.

“Here’s what she said in late November:

‘I am truly disappointed we are commencing our historic debate on one of the most significant and pressing domestic issues of our time with a process that has forestalled our ability to arrive at broader agreement on some of the most crucial elements of health care reform. The bottom line is, the most consequential health care legislation in the history of our country and the reordering of $33 trillion in health care spending over the coming decade shouldn’t be determined by one vote-margin strategies – surely we can and must do better.’

“The only conceivable justification for rushing this bill is the overwhelming opposition of the American people. Democrats know that the longer Americans see this bill the less they like it. Here’s the latest from Pew. It came out just yesterday.

“A majority (58 percent) of those who have heard a lot about the bills oppose them while only 32 percent favor them.”

“There is no justification for this blind rush — except a political one, and that’s not good enough for the American people.

“And there’s no justification for forcing the Senate to vote on a bill none of us has seen.

“Americans already oppose this bill. The process is just as bad.

“It’s completely reckless, completely irresponsible.”

Annie sent this in:

16 top physicians assembled by patient advocate Dr. Betsy McCaughey speak out against the Democrats’ health care reform and explain why it endangers their most vulnerable patients.

Jim sent this in:

Last week, millions of Americans watched President Barack Obama continue to sell his national health care plan on news shows, talk shows and even the David Letterman Show.  Reporters during televised question and answer portions of Obama’s performances attempted to appear unbiased, but their tone and demeanor is a marked difference from the attack approach they use on conservative politicians. And not one reporter asked about the potential for fraud and corruption in such a huge financial endeavor as providing health care for Americans.

When President Obama stated that cutting Medicare and Medicaid fraud and waste would help to fund what’s become known as ObamaCare, that statement begged the questions: “Mr. President, why hasn’t the US government already cracked down on fraud and abuse in programs that are being looted by thieves and liars? Why wait, Mr. President?”

With the Obama Administration and Democrat leaders in both houses of the US Congress desperately pushing a major overhaul — many say government takeover — of US health care, a report obtained by the National Association of Chiefs of Police’s Fraud & White Collar Crime Committee sheds light on the fraud and corruption already existing in government medical programs. And one can only imagine the amount of corruption that will occur with total government control of the medicine,

On April 22, 2009, Government Accountability Office officials testified before an ad-hoc Congressional subcommittee at a hearing entitled, “Eliminating Waste and Fraud in Medicare and Medicaid.”

In a subsequent letter responding to a May 29, 2009 request for responses to questions for the record related to the April 22, 2009, testimony, the GAO responded to the following questions:  What do you see as the biggest challenge for Centers for Medicare/Medicaid Services (CMS) to provide an estimate for improper payments under Medicare Part D? Has GAO identified any problems with the current process for reviewing and paying Medicare claims that would make the program more vulnerable to fraudulent claims?  Is there any reason the US federal agency which administers Medicare, Medicaid, and the Children’s Health Insurance Program cannot include penalties in its Medicare Administrative Contractor contracts for paying improper or fraudulent claims that they are aware of?

With total outlays of about $46 billion in fiscal year 2008, Medicare Part D is the last significant part of Medicare for which the department has yet to develop an estimate of improper payments. In developing its estimate, it will be important for CMS to determine where the vulnerabilities and risks exist in the Medicare Part D structure and operations that could impact CMS’s ability to effectively detect, measure, and ultimately reduce improper payments.

In HHS’s fiscal year 2008 AFR, the department reported that it had calculated payment error rates for two components of Medicare Part D but also that its measurement was not fully implemented. Also, it will be important to consider Health and Human Services’ Office of Inspector General identified concerns about CMS’s implementation of internal controls to ensure payment accuracy as well as inadequate analysis of claims data.  

The GAO investigation identified several weaknesses with the current process for reviewing Medicare claims. Limitations in the number of medical reviews conducted leave the home health benefit — within the Medicare program — vulnerable to improper payments, including payments resulting from fraud and abuse.

In previous studies, the GAO reported in February 2009 that in fiscal year 2007, only 0.5 percent of the more than 8.7 million home health agency (HHA) claims processed were subjected to prepayment review by Medicare’s contractors.

The contractors focused primarily on claims submitted by HHAs whose billing patterns differed from their peers on measures such as cost per episode. Of those claims that were reviewed, over 40 percent were denied in whole or in part. There are also weaknesses with respect to selecting claims to review in Medicare Fee-for-Service.

In addition to the weaknesses with the current Medicare claims review process, analysts found that failure to effectively screen health providers before granting them billing privileges also increases the program’s vulnerability to fraudulent claims.

Consistent with the Social Security Act and applicable federal procurement regulations, CMS may include provisions in Medicare Administrative Contractor (MAC) contracts to:  prescribe the costs incurred by MACs in processing and paying Medicare claims that CMS may reimburse;  provide incentives or disincentives related to payment accuracy; and hold MACs and their employees liable for improper or fraudulent claims payments under limited circumstances.

Otherwise, neither the Social Security Act nor applicable federal procurement regulations expressly provides for CMS to reduce amounts owed to MACs under their contracts or to assess charges against MACs for improper or fraudulent claims payments.

Opponents of the plan currently considered by the US Congress — commonly known as ObamaCare — believe that if the US government succeeds in taking control of the health care industry, losses due to fraud and abuse will drastically increase.

Folks, I am here to tell you that the Democrats, as per usual, are up to their typical shenanigans as they are looking for ways to cram Obamacare down our throats. Let’s start with the most recent example.

Senators Chris Dodd and Max Baucus emerged from their secret, closed-door ObamaCare meetings with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and Obama Administration officials just long enough to brag about their openness and transparency.

No, it’s not a joke.  According to Jeffrey Young with The Hill:

“Two senators at the forefront of healthcare reform went to great lengths Tuesday to brag about how open and transparent the legislative process has been. Then, they resumed prepping for another closed-door meeting.”

Young added:

“Addressing the press Tuesday afternoon, Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus (D-Mont.) and Sen. Chris Dodd (D-Conn.) of the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee patted themselves and each other on the back for writing their healthcare reform bills in public view even as they remained tight-lipped about their private meetings with Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) and White House officials….”

Baucus would tell the assembled reporters:

“I have not been involved in such an open and transparent process as this. I’m very, very proud that we have done it… it’s so important to remind ourselves that no effort that I’ve been involved in and I don’t think anyone else in the Senate’s been involved with – certainly nothing with such significance and magnitude – has been so open and transparent as this. Totally open and transparent and I’m very proud of it.”

 

Dodd added this:

“Let me pick up on the point that Sen. Baucus was making. The suggestion somehow that this is being done otherwise is just blatantly false and a distraction from really we need to be talking about.”

 

And when Dodd and Baucus were finished, they resumed their secret ObamaCare meetings. Will you get to see the final version of ObamaCare before liberals try to ram it through Congress? 

 Will our elected officials even bother to read the Obamanation that comes out of these secret meetings before voting? If the past is any indication of what the immediate future holds, you already know the answer.

P.T. Barnum, the American businessman, politician and showman remembered most for his celebrated hoaxes, is widely credited with coining the phrase, “There’s a sucker born every minute.” Today, nearly 150 years later, the so-called leaders of the current Congress are seemingly taking Barnum’s words to heart. 

So much of what is happening in the ObamaCare closed-door and secret meetings is unknown. But another recent report from The Hill indicates that Reid and Dodd and Obama are about to play all of us for suckers. According to The Hill:

 “House Democrats are looking at re-branding the public health insurance option as Medicare, an established government healthcare program that is better known than the public option.”

 

The Hill calls it “Medicare Part E,” as in “Medicare for Everyone.” And Politico.com reported the following:

“Pelosi told her rank-and-file that she has more than 200 votes for a public option tethered to Medicare and that she wants to ’see if we can find the remaining votes,’ one member present said afterward.”

 

In other words, Congressional Democrats are scheming up a public relations hoax in an effort to sell ObamaCare to an unsuspecting American public that has thus far rejected it at every turn. 

And why not? People understand that “public option” means socialized medicine, rationing, and inferior care at a higher cost. But everyone loves Medicare… right? So… call ObamaCare, “Medicare for Everyone” and the suckers (that’s you) will fall for the scam… hook, line and sinker. Step right up folks. Welcome to the modern day version of “The Greatest Show on Earth” that is ObamaCare.

What has the head and lower body of a tyrannosaurus, the neck and forearms of an Iguanodon, and can crush towering skyscrapers with a swish of its crocodile tail? The answer is no longer Godzilla. It’s the Baucus version of ObamaCare… which turned out to be a 1,502 page monster… written in a foreign language that few can comprehend… Washingtonese. 

Few can understand more than two or three consecutive pages much less the entire bill.  But it doesn’t really matter. The Baucus bill – all 1,502 pages – was a sham anyway… a phony… a fake… a cruel and heartless joke. Democrats on the Senate Finance Committee passed it knowing that it would never see the light of day. In fact, they passed it before it was even drafted. 

Senate Democrats on the Senate Finance Committee only passed it so that Harry Reid, Max Baucus, Chris Dood and Barack Obama could “merge” it with an ObamaCare bill that had already passed through Dodd’s Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee. But they’re not really merging the bills… they’re cherry-picking… taking the parts of each bill they like… throwing out the parts they don’t. 

And, as you read this, that’s exactly what Harry Reid, Max Baucus, Chris Dodd and Obama surrogates are doing… they’re re-writing ObamaCare behind closed doors, in a smoke-filled room… under the cover of darkness. Expect them to try to ram it through Congress with lightning speed… as they did with the so-called “stimulus bill” … as they have done so many times in the past. 

You won’t be given time to read it. Our elected officials won’t have the time or the inclination to read it.  And when the sordid details become known, it will be too late. When everything is all said and done… your Congressman and your Senators will simply look at you innocently and say, “I didn’t know that was in the bill… we’ll have to do something about that.” But, of course, nothing will ever happen.

Even the liberal Washington Post admits that the public doesn’t support ObamaCare and that the President’s ratings are slipping because of his desire to sign a government takeover of health care:

“Obama’s approval ratings on health-care reform are slipping among his fellow Democrats… strong approval of his handling of the issue has dropped 15 percentage points since mid-September.”

 

That’s why they’re frantically rushing to pass ObamaCare… that’s why they’re meeting in secret… they are desperate to pass this Obamanation before you know what hit you. And if Obama can institute government-run health care, he will have won the war. Health care as you know it will be gone forever. Will bureaucrats in Washington usurp the doctor-patient relationship when it comes to making health care decisions for you and your family? Will waiting rooms begin to overflow and resemble the local Department of Motor Vehicles? 

Will private insurance carriers be strangled out of existence? Will health care will be rationed? 

Will you be told you can’t be scheduled for a crucial X-ray for a month… then nine months… then a year…? Will our cancer survival rates – presently the highest in the world -plummet? It’s not a scare-tactic. It could very well be reality. 

All these inhumane things inevitably happen when government practices medicine. They are characteristic of the socialist systems in Canada, Britain and Northern Europe. 

Obama promised change, but this Obamanation called “health care reform” is not what the American people signed up for. ObamaCare must be stopped. And it is easier than you think.

All it takes is either a simple email to your local representatives (both in the House and Senate), a telephone call or better yet, a visit to your local representative(s)’s office(s). Let them know in no uncertain terms that you do not want the federal government running your health care. Further state to them that they’re jobs will depend on this when the health care reform bill comes up for a vote very soon.

And do it now. Your future as well as future generations’ future depends on you. This folks, is the Republican Temple’s call to arms. Be proactive. Be loud. Be proud. And most importantly, be proactive. Take your country back today! 

Personally, I am glad. Glad that the United States of America did not get to host the 2016 Olympic Games. But then again, any time that the apologist-in-chief President Obama gets involved in the host city’s presentation, then you get the usual – and in this case deserved – result.

As those of you who know how the Olympic Committee operates, they – on occasion – have to make a decision on choosing a host city for future Olympic Games. In this instance, the decision was made in Copenhagen, Denmark; long story short, Chicago was eliminated in the first round of voting that took place.

To recap a bit, you already know that Obama and his linebacker wife jetted to Copenhagen to lobby for Chicago’s bid to host the 2016 Olympic Games. Despite the words and presentations by the Chicago thugs Olympic committee, it was all for naught as the Olympic higher-ups opted to select Rio De Janeiro as the host city.

Now, on to the words (begging in my humble opinion) from Barry and Michelle; first the president:

“If you do, if we walk this path together, then I promise you this: The city of Chicago and the United States of America will make the world proud.”

And here’s Michelle’s two cents (with change past due):

“I’m asking you to choose Chicago. I’m asking you to choose America.”

So there you have it. Even the president and First Lady couldn’t bring the Olympics to Chicago, which is just as well. One thing that hasn’t been brought up much is the fact that the citizens of Chicago, for the most part, didn’t want the Olympics in town in 2016 as a poll was commissioned in advance of the vote in Copenhagen.

Also bear in mind that if the Olympic Committee had decided to choose Chicago, several of Obama’s cronies and friends would have stood to financially benefit from the Olympics being hosted by the Windy City. Valerie Jarrett, close confident of Obama, had a vested interest in the vote last night as she is involved to some degree; in her case, real estate was the major player here as some of the Olympic venues happened to located on land that either she or her associates owned.

The bottom line folks? The Olympic Committee did all of us here in the U.S. a huge favor by not selecting Chicago as the host city in 2016. Considering that the president, instead of dealing with more important issues here in the U.S. such as health care reform, high unemployment and wars in both Iran and Afghanistan, he got exactly what he deserved.

Right now, unemployment is 9.8%. The president has had exactly one conversation with General Stanley McChrystal, the officer in charge of the theater where both wars are taking place. Pure and simple, Obama has no business being a president much less an Olympic cheerleader.

Mr. President, do all of us a favor: leave minor stuff like Olympic bidding and related business to people who actually know something about the process and do what the people elected you to do. Act and lead like a real U.S. president.