Topic: Scratchpad
Happy Saint Patrick's Day!
Posted by tmg110
at 7:52 AM EDT
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Happy Saint Patrick's Day!
While most people's attention has been focused on health care "reform," a serious crisis in the relationship between Israel and the United States has has flared up. Writing for NRO, Joel C. Rosenberg provides details.
It's quite clear that the Obama Administration has seized on this incident as a pretext for pressuring Israel into making unilateral concessions ahead of pending "indirect" peace talks with the Palestinians. It's equally clear that such a one-sided policy won't work. All the Obama Administration will accomplish with its "hysterical and heavy-handed measures to berate Israel" (Rosenberg's words) will be to further alienate the Israeli government and Israeli public opinion, both of which already view the Administration with profound distrust.
In the pursuit of peace, Obama and his foreign policy team are laying the foundations for another Mideast war. Some messiah!
The contemporary US Catholic Church is big on the concept of "social justice," i.e. fairness in such things as wages, working conditions, health care availability, etc. It all sounds fine in theory but, if I may so put it, the devil is in the details. That's why the US Catholic bishops, which for decades has supported the concept of health care "reform," now find themselves opposing ObamaCare.
The sticking point is abortion. If, as may happen, the current bill becomes law, government funding of abortion will be the law of the land. Additionally, there will be no legal protection for Catholics and others working in health care who, as a matter of conscience, refuse to perform or participate in abortions.
The odd thing about this development is that it was entirely predictable. Given that (a) health care "reform" is the Holy Grail of progressivism and the (b) abortion is the central sacrament of progressivism, therefore (c) health care "reform" leads inevitably to government-funded abortion. I find it astonishing that the US Catholic bishops, fully aware as they are of the position of the Democratic Party on abortion, ever expected Catholic teaching on abortion to be incorporated into ObamaCare.
And this shows the flaw in Catholic teaching on "social justice." Inevitably, social justice advocacy boils down to demands for government action. But as the Church ought to have known all along, it takes a long spoon to sup with the devil.
OK, now the Ides of March are gone…
Incidentally, in the ancient Roman calendar, the ides fell on the 15th day of March, May, July and October, and on the 13th day of other months. Just thought you'd like to know.
But not gone…
Our post-partisan president, who as a candidate pledged to bind up the nation's political wounds, reach across the aisle, work with all sides, etc., etc. is sitting in the Oval Office today contemplating the latest Gallup poll, which shows that 45% of Americans approve of the job he's doing, while 45% disapprove. Way to bring us together, Barack!
To hear President Obama tell it (and tell it, and tell it, and…) all the problems of the US health care system can be laid at the door of those evil, greedy insurance companies. That's a provocative claim. Is it true?
Not really, as Jonah Goldberg notes in this article for National Review. Supposedly the major problem with US health care is that it costs too much. Well, insurance companies account for a paltry 5% of total health care spending—hardly a budget-busting percentage. Hospitals, for example, account for a far higher percentage of health care costs—31% according to the AEI. And for all their greed, they're not particularly profitable. In a study by the American Enterprise Institute, they ranked 84th in profitability among US companies. So all those savings that Obama keeps promising can hardly come out of the profits of the insurance companies.
The truth is that Obama thinks he needs to demonize someone or something in order to sell his plan to a skeptical public. So he's picking on the insurance companies—even though the plan he's pushing would force people to buy health insurance from those very same companies, thus providing them with a federally guaranteed market for their products.
But the President's clever little stratagem has fallen flat. Though people may not much like the insurance companies, it seems that increased government control of the health care system is a prospect that they like even less.
It's how he (OK, OK, or she) steps up to the responsibilities of office. Take Barack Obama. One of the biggest challenges he's facing as president is the uncontrollable and unsustainable growth of federal government spending, deficits and debt. His response? Establish a blue-ribbon commission to recommend solutions. That's what's known as kicking the can down the road—and whatever else you might care to call it, leadership it ain't.
Yesterday someone asked me to name the worst movie I've ever seen! A challenging question! Tinsel town is always developing new and creative ways of blowing megabucks on absolute crap. I could not, therefore, confine myself to a single citation—it would have to be a list. So let me think about it, but for now I do want to mention one of the greatest and most obnoxious stinkers of all time: The Magus (1968), based on the almost-as-bad novel of the same name by John Fowles. Don't be fooled by the fact that it stars Michael Caine and Anthony Quinn, plus a young and beauteous Candice Bergen. By turns tedious and unintentionally funny, The Magus is cinematic junk. Well, why wouldn't it be? This movie is a near perfect expression of the Zeitgeist of the late, unlamented Sixties.
Stand by for the full list, coming soon to a blog near you.
Incidentally, my own congressman, Democrat Joe Donnelly of Indiana's 2nd Congressional District, announced yesterday that he will vote no if the Senate health care "reform" plan comes up for consideration in the House. He voted in favor of the House version of ObamaCare. Donnelly said that the abortion language in the Senate bill is unacceptable to him. I have no doubt, however, that he was also swayed by the constituent protests against ObamaCare (including a couple from me) that have deluged his office in recent days.
