Friday, July 31, 2009

"Cash for Clunkers"

The government has come up with another successful program doing what they do best - giving away money! All you have to do is take in any old car and if you buy a new car with better gas mileage, you get a free check from the government from between $3500-4500 dollars, and of course you improve the environment at the same time by reducing all those nasty gas guzzling cars that Americans seem to love.

In just one week, the "Cash for Clunkers" program blew through its billion dollar budget and was on the verge of being canceled. But our benevolent government quickly came to the rescue. In a matter of hours the House of Representatives found another $2 billion laying around and the program is back on again. A few billion here, a few billion there, I love the way our politicians enjoy spending our money - money we don't have.

This program has been so successful, I understand that as part of the new Health Care Reform Bill the Democrats are considering a "Cash for Senior Clunkers" program, so that when us old folks reach a point where the government decides it is no longer cost effective to give us health care, our kids can turn us in to the local government-run euthanasia facility and get a cash rebate. It's comforting to know that someday my kids will at least get back a small portion of the taxes I have paid all these years.

Tuesday, July 28, 2009

"Health Care for Everyone"

Of course we want health care for everyone, but the way this plan is being presented the Democrats fail to mention that 80-90% of Americans are satisfied with our present health care system. This leaves about 30 million people without health care in the USA, plus an estimated 12 million illegal aliens, which is where the "42 million" number comes from.

Why not concentrate on the 30 million uninsured instead of the majority that are satisfied with the best health care system in the world? I won't go into all the arguments in this blog; if you have followed the news you know what they are; if you haven't, this blog will mean nothing to you. All I know is that I want to keep my doctors, I trust them, and I want any medical decisions made between just me, my doctors, and my family.

Representative John Conyers said yesterday; " How can you expect us to read a document that is more than 1000 pages long when you would need days and a few lawyers to understand it". He is one of the key democrats trying to push this bill through Congress and he admits that they did not read the bill before voting on it - unbelievable. Our political system is broken - politicians are voting on ideology not what they think is best for the American people.

Here is a draft of of the bill - 1018 pages - pretend you are a Congressman or Senator and read it:
http://docs.house.gov/edlabor/AAHCA-BillText-071409.pdf

If you want "free" health care, you should read this, because if this bill is passed it will affect the rest of your life. But you won't read it, just like our politicians won't read it...it would take weeks if not months to truly understand it. Yet Obama says we need to vote on it NOW. Why? Because the Democrats know that if the public has time to see what is in this bill they will reject it, so "cramming" it through is their only hope of getting it passed.

One "minor" portion of this proposed bill is the requirement to give "end of life counseling" every five years to all seniors over the age of 65. Being almost 70 I will move to the top of that list. Can you imagine the day that a young civil servant with a bachelors degree in psychology comes and knocks on my door to give me "end of life counseling"? He will wish that he had picked engineering as a profession - if he survives the visit.