Say Anything Blog

                       
                     


Most thoughtful folks understand what this bill is all about, some just don’t care.

I care.

When I want to understand a legal document, where do I go? I look to experts.
For us laymen,
http://legalinsurrection.blogspot.com/2009/10/it-took-just-minutes-to-find-profound.html

This bill is a nightmare, all 1,990 pages. Its all there if you want to wade in.

I can hardly wait for government run health care.
God help us all!
From the pork report,

                       
                     

Pork Report October 27, 2009: Paying Dead People Edition.

U.S. Department of Agriculture distributed $1.1 billion in federal farm aid to the estates or companies of deceased farmers
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/07/22/AR2007072201128.html

Government at its best!
More if you care,
http://biggovernment.com/2009/10/27/pork-report-october-27-2009-paying-dead-people-edition/

The author of the 94 revolt chose to side with another rhino, only slightly to the right of her democrat opponent. He has now passed into irrelevancy too! Time for you to exit stage right Newt.


A paragraph from Doctor Zero sums it up this way,

The other story, playing out in the background, is the second act of one political saga beginning, even as another draws to a close. The rising star of Sarah Palin passes over the melancholy ruins of Newt Gingrich, who spent the last of his credibility endorsing Scozzafava. The Republican Party of Gingrich dies, unloved and irrelevant. Something else is replacing it. The new opposition party is not guaranteed of victory – such guarantees are issued to no one. Palin may never choose to campaign for an office beneath its banner, but she’s an integral part of its identity. She’ll certainly never be a governor, or anyone’s vice presidential candidate, again. For the Republicans, it will never be 1996 or 2006 again. There’s no more room for school-lunch debacles, government shutdown miscalculations, Trent Lott, George Allen, Mark Foley… or Newt Gingrich.


Make no mistake, the conservatives are taking back our party. I for one say, about damn time!
More from Doctor Zero
http://hotair.com/archives/2009/10/25/rogue-stars-rising/

Ooops, maybe not so obscene after all.
This one must have slipped by the editors, or the White House news czars took a day off.
From AP even,





FACT CHECK: Health insurer profits not so fat.

  By CALVIN WOODWARD, Associated Press Writer Calvin Woodward, Associated Press Writer   – 40 mins ago

WASHINGTON – Quick quiz: What do these enterprises have in common? Farm and construction machinery, Tupperware, the railroads, Hershey sweets, Yum food brands and Yahoo? Answer: They’re all more profitable than the health insurance industry. In the health care debate, Democrats and their allies have gone after insurance companies as rapacious profiteers making “immoral” and “obscene” returns while “the bodies pile up.”

More if you care,
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091025/ap_on_go_co/us_fact_check_health_insurance

Now they want control over any bank that is subject to federal regulation!




From the brilliant legal mind of William Jacobson @Legal Insurection,

According to the press release, the government proposes to monitor and, if need be, veto pay packages at any banking institution subject to federal regulation:
http://www.federalreserve.gov/newsevents/press/bcreg/20091022a.htm

  Flaws in incentive compensation practices were one of many factors contributing to the financial crisis. Inappropriate bonus or other compensation practices can incent senior executives or lower level employees, such as traders or mortgage officers, to take imprudent risks that significantly and adversely affect the firm. With that in mind, the Federal Reserve’s guidance and supervisory reviews cover all employees who have the ability to materially affect the risk profile of an organization, either individually, or as part of a group.

This is an earth-shattering development in the annals of government control, yet because the information was released on a Friday, it has received little press attention relative to its importance.

 

It is frightening to think what an out of control government can do.

Please read it all,
http://legalinsurrection.blogspot.com/2009/10/most-monumental-power-grab-you-never.html

Wonder what winter will be like?

Co2 use is up, temps keep falling.
WTH is going on?

                       
                     
The rest,
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/10/23/252_new_usa_lows/

ht TheAstuteBloggers

Any wonder why they spend so much time behind closed doors?

  -“Total national health expenditures under this bill would increase by an estimated 2.7 percent in 2019…”

    -“The additional demand for health services could be difficult to meet initially with existing health provider resources and could lead to price increases, cost-shifting, and/or changes in providers’ willingness to treat patients with low-reimbursement health coverage.”

  -More than half of the expansion in coverage (18 million out of 34 million) would be from increased Medicaid coverage.

  -12 million people would lose employer-sponsored coverage.

  -The productivity adjustments to Medicare are “unrealistic” and providers “might end their participation” because the cuts would make serving Medicare beneficiaries unprofitable.

  -Medicare Advantage enrollment would decrease by 64 percent (from a projected level of 13.2 million to 4.7 million under the proposal).

More if you care, and you damn well should.
http://biggovernment.com/author/capitolconfidential/

“Countrywide Kent” had an opportunity to get out in front of all this, but chose the “elitist” route. It will begin to unravel shortly!

                       
                     


Towns issues subpoenas for Countrywide,

Two days ago, Rep. Edolphus Towns (D-NY) changed the locks on the House Oversight Committee room’s door to keep Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA) from demanding that Towns authorize subpoenas to investigate Congressional ties to Countrywide Mortgage’s Friends of Angelo program.  Today, Towns has retreated after his publicity stunt backfired.  Politico reports that Towns has unexpectedly authorized wide-ranging subpoenas for information possibly linked to lawmakers who got sweetheart deals from Countrywide CEO Angelo Mozilo:

  House Oversight and Government Reform Chairman Ed Towns (D-N.Y.) said Friday he would issue a wide-ranging subpoena of Countrywide Financial, demanding the company hand over records that could show whether preferential loans were given to influential people in government.

  The subpoena letter, obtained by POLITICO, was sent to Countrywide Friday and gives the lender less than a month to hand over a slew of documents, including a detailed description of any program that provided “enhanced benefits” to people with regulatory or legislative power in federal or local government.

  Republicans, who have been pushing for weeks for such a subpoena, were caught off-guard by Towns’ move and met with committee Democrats late Friday to work out more details on the effort.


This is a significant climbdown, but one necessitated from the Democrats’ own strategy of class warfare.  They have consistently demonized Wall Street executives, and this week the White House Pay Czar slashed compensation plans at bailed-out firms.  With that kind of rhetoric and action being hailed by Democratic leadership, stonewalling on the collapsed Countrywide doesn’t sell for long.

Unfortunately for Towns, his strategy didn’t help, either.  He could easily have defeated a motion from Issa that would have kept Chris Dodd, Kent Conrad, and other prominent Democrats’ records from getting revealed by the Oversight Committee and published to the media — as long as he kept it in the committee.  Issa had been trying to get media attention to this issue for weeks, to little avail, until Towns locked Republicans out of the room.  That got the media interested, which meant that Democrats either had to retreat or explain why they spent the week demonizing Wall Street while covering up for Mozilo … and his friends on Capitol Hill.

How significant is this reversal?  The committee has asked for information from a number of companies involved in the housing bubble — but only Countrywide got a subpoena.  Stay tuned.

He owes North Dakotans more than what he has said so far.

http://hotair.com/archives/2009/10/23/towns-issues-subpoenas-for-countrywide/

from Ed Morrissey
ht Hot Air

Not only are the conservatives sending the beltway elites of the Republican party a message, Americans are sending the left a few also!


Republicans Best Dems In ALL 10 Key Electoral Issues.

For the first time in recent years Republicans lead Democrats in all 10 key electoral issues.

                       
                     

After democrats tripled the budget deficit and nearly doubled unemployment in less than one year, Republicans hold a 14 point lead over democrats on economic issues.
Rasmussen reported:
http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/mood_of_america/trust_on_issues

  For the first time in recent years, voters trust Republicans more than Democrats on all 10 key electoral issues regularly tracked by Rasmussen Reports. The GOP holds double-digit advantages on five of them.

  Republicans have nearly doubled their lead over Democrats on economic issues to 49% to 35%, after leading by eight points in September.

  The GOP also holds a 54% to 31% advantage on national security issues and a 50% to 31% lead on the handling of the war in Iraq.

  But voters are less sure which party they trust more to handle government ethics and corruption, an issue that passed the economy in voter importance last month. Thirty-three percent (33%) trust Republicans more while 29% have more confidence in Democrats. Another 38% are undecided. Last month, the parties were virtually tied on the issue.


The “ONE” is radioactive!!
America gave him a chance, now they want a refund.
In just 9 months!

ht GatewayPundit

This might work for them, there will only be one network to cover this, and it won’t be ABC, CBS, NBC, MSNBC, or CNN, and fewer and fewer read print so not many will notice.

Dems seek cover to boost debt limit.

                       



The Senate must soon increase the national debt limit to above $13 trillion — and Democrats are looking for political cover.

Knowing they will face unyielding GOP attacks for voting to increase the eye-popping debt, Democrats are considering attaching a debt increase provision to a must-pass bill, possibly the Defense Department spending bill, according to Democratic and Republican sources.

Adding it to the defense bill would allow Democrats to argue that they voted for the measure to help troops in harm’s way — and downplay that their vote also expanded the limit for how much money the country can borrow.

The strategy has not yet been finalized, aides and senators said. The House already approved a debt limit increase of $925 billion — above the $12.1 trillion ceiling Congress approved as part of the economic stimulus package last February — but Democrats may seek to increase the limit further so they don’t have to revisit the politically treacherous issue until after the 2010 midterm elections.
more if you care,
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1009/28586.html
                   
Yes the “ONE” inherited tremendous debt, but its obviously not a concern the way he and this congress spend. They just don’t want "US" to notice.

He just thinks government knows best. This guy has got to go. Regulate every thing.


* All 5 commissioners vote to seek public comment on rule

* Two Republican commissioners have some reservations

* Draft rule would allow for ‘reasonable’ net management

* Public comments accepted until Jan. 14

* Telecom firms worry rule would hamper network management (Adds vote by commissioners, quotes, background)

By John Poirier and Sinead Carew

WASHINGTON/CHICAGO, Oct 22 (Reuters) - U.S. communications regulators voted unanimously Thursday to support an open Internet rule that would prevent telecom network operators from barring or blocking content based on the revenue it generates.
More from “Julius”. Fitting name,
http://www.reuters.com/article/regulatoryNewsConsumerGoodsAndRetail/idUSN2237873320091022


“We commend the FCC for beginning the process,” said Senators Byron Dorgan, a North Dakota Democrat, and Olympia Snowe, a Maine Republican, in a joint statement. They proposed a net neutrality bill in the last session of Congress.

And they still call Snowe a Republican?

Liar in chief in action.

Does any one pay attention?

ABC, NBC, CBS, CNN, MSNBC,?

ht Astute Bloggers

Senator Conrad can’t keep hiding forever.

Countrywide Subpoena Moves Closer,

                       
                     

By JAMES FREEMAN

Will House oversight committee Chairman Edolphus Towns finally allow a vote to authorize a subpoena on Countrywide Financial’s VIP mortgage program? This afternoon, Mr. Towns met with GOP Rep. Darrell Issa, who has been pushing for a subpoena to get documents from Bank of America, which bought the failed subprime lender last year. An Issa spokesman, Kurt Bardella, described “positive, frank and prudent discussions” between the two men. Mr. Bardella pronounced Mr. Issa “optimistic” about Mr. Towns’ desire to allow the Countrywide investigation to proceed.
Does that mean that a subpoena is on the way? Mr. Issa’s office isn’t saying, but we’re told that a possible bi-partisan deal would generate a subpoena to gather documents on VIP loans to government officials, but not Members of Congress.

Earlier this week, Democratic staff for the House oversight committee informed their GOP counterparts that the majority had changed the locks on the committee’s hearing room. While Republicans previously enjoyed their own key to the room, they will now have to request access from Democrats. This followed a bitter partisan argument in which Republicans refused to take down a video from their website that contradicted Dem explanations about a closed-door meeting on the Countrywide scandal.

As we reported last week, the committee was scheduled to meet on Thursday to mark up several minor pieces of legislation. Days before the meeting, Mr. Issa notified Mr. Towns that Mr. Issa would call for a vote to subpoena Countrywide documents from Bank of America. Recall that, under the “Friends of Angelo” program, named for former Countrywide CEO Angelo Mozilo, Democratic Senators Chris Dodd and Kent Conrad received sweetheart deals on home mortgages. Mr. Issa wants to uncover the full story on Countrywide’s effort to influence Washington policy makers.

Mr. Towns, a New York Democrat who also received mortgages from the unit that processed the VIP loans but claims he received no favors, has opposed such a subpoena. But can he count on his Democratic colleagues to vote it down? Perhaps Mr. Towns would rather not find out. Mr. Issa showed up for the scheduled 2 p.m. markup on Thursday hoping that a few Democrats would vote his way and allow the investigation to proceed. Then a strange thing happened: As Mr. Issa and the GOP members of the committee sat waiting for the meeting to begin, Democrats huddled in a back room without explanation. Thirty-five minutes later, the committee announced that the meeting had been postponed indefinitely.

A committee press release later claimed the postponement was “due to conflicts” with a markup occurring at the same time in the financial services committee. But Mr. Issa’s staff videotaped several financial services members leaving the back-room gathering with Mr. Towns at the conclusion of the meeting. If members were there to confab with Chairman Towns, obviously they weren’t at any finance committee markup—suggesting the real “conflict” was between Democrats over whether to keep stonewalling the Countrywide matter.

More bad news for Mr. Towns: the Journal’s editorial page reported on Saturday that committee Democrat Mike Quigley is ready to vote for a Countrywide subpoena.


This will eventually all come out, if the good senator has nothing to hide, he could put all this to rest at any time. But he has something to hide and he knows it will hurt more than himself.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704224004574487760711670346.html?mod=loomia&loomia_si=t0:a16:g2:r1:c0.0821734:b28464287

They now just communicate live! This has Stalinism written all over it.

White House E-Mailing MSNBC During Shows.



It’s bad enough MSNBC is parroting their talking points, but now they’re actually providing content during the program.

But we’re not supposed to view Fox News credibly. Only the shows they’re "providing content" to.

  “The White House did just e-mail saying that interaction with Jake Tapper was not heated…”



This guy makes Nixon look squeaky clean, they better hope the dems hold the house, because the two years that follow are going to be damn tough on the “ONE”

ht JWF

The Last Shoe Drops

                       
                     

October 21, 2009 Posted by John at 10:00 PM

I think it’s the last shoe, anyway—the last stop on James O’Keefe’s and Hannah Giles’ tour of ACORN offices around the country. ACORN’s last line of defense was Philadelphia; the organization told reporters that its Philadelphia employees had kicked O’Keefe and Giles out of their office, and a number of newspapers reported that claim as fact.

It wasn’t true, of course. ACORN’s Philly office was as receptive to the undercover pair’s request for help in financing a brothel staffed by underage girls as the other ACORN outlets around the country. Andrew Breitbart’s Big Government finally released the Philadelphia video today. But they muted the ACORN employees’ words in response to ACORN’s lawsuit against them in Baltimore. Nevertheless, it’s obvious that the encounter bore no resemblance to the accounts that ACORN fed to the press. Here it is:

O’Keefe and Giles have challenged ACORN to permit them to play the audio of their employees’ statements.

Meanwhile, O’Keefe comments on the call that another ACORN employee made to the Philadelphia police, some time after O’Keefe and Giles had left the office, claiming that they had caused a “verbal disturbance.” As you can see from the video, that claim was false. Apparently someone at ACORN finally, after the fact, had the sense to realize that the organization could be in trouble for offering to aid and abet the fictitious crimes detailed by the two investigators.

As Andrew Breitbart writes, “ACORN has lied every step of the way.” And they’ve done it with your tax dollars.

The D.O.J can’t ignore this for much longer!

ht Power Line