Court upholds Affordable Care Act
Chief Justice Roberts casts the deciding vote. The individual mandate is constitutional because it is a tax, but without compulsion to pay. Virtually the entire act is upheld, except for certain provisions regarding Medicaid.
From ScotusBlog:
The Affordable Care Act, including its individual mandate that virtually all Americans buy health insurance, is constitutional. There were not five votes to uphold it on the ground that Congress could use its power to regulate commerce between the states to require everyone to buy health insurance. However, five Justices agreed that the penalty that someone must pay if he refuses to buy insurance is a kind of tax that Congress can impose using its taxing power. That is all that matters. Because the mandate survives, the Court did not need to decide what other parts of the statute were constitutional, except for a provision that required states to comply with new eligibility requirements for Medicaid or risk losing their funding. On that question, the Court held that the provision is constitutional as long as states would only lose new funds if they didn’t comply with the new requirements, rather than all of their funding.
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Chief Justice Roberts demonstrated great statesmanship in guiding the Court to this decision. He avoided the messy arguments surrounding the use of the Commerce Clause to justify the individual mandate and arrived at a solution that makes the health care system all-inclusive by imposing a tax on non-payers. The two most recent important cases decided by the Court reinforce the notion that you can’t judge the outcome of a case by oral argument. In the Arizona immigration case, various justices questioned why states couldn’t have a shared role in immigration policy with the federal government. But the decision made it clear that the Constitution gives the federal government full authority over immigration and naturalization. In the matter of the Affordable Care Act (I guess that the phrase “Obamacare” will gradually disappear from the political lexicon), the savants who commented on the oral argument agreed that the solicitor general did a terrible job in defending the administration’s point of view, but the result was in favor of the administration.
While this is obviously a victory for the president, it is also a victory for the many Americans who have health care problems. The current system, as the president has said many times, is unsustainable. It is hard to argue with that. The huge number of uninsured Americans, the spiraling cost of health care, and the cumbersome process of going through insurance companies to get coverage have made for a very creaky system. The Affordable Care Act addressed many of the issues that afflict the health care system. Yes, it is a huge and costly government intervention of the sort that many Americans–Republicans and Democrats alike–will decry. But it has the promise of actually solving a major problem in American society, something our political system has not done very well lately. I suspect that Chief Justice Roberts took these aspects of the case into account in arriving at a wise and far-reaching decision.
longleaf says:
Roberts is very clever. He just handed the White House to Rmoney. I’m sure that is one of the principal reasons for his sudden outbreak of “lib’rulism” here. He just fired up the base, something Mitt can’t do.
Nothing is ever what it seems on the surface.
Here’s another reason this is not surprising. Roberts is also a corporate “lady of the evening” and this is a HUGE insurance cartel victory in terms of a new forced customer base of 30 million Americans. Who the hell cares who has to pay for this base? All the insurance companies can hear is “ka-ching!”
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Just tired.... Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 11:05 am
And that is exactly why we need to move to a single-payer system.
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Whoa Nellie! Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 11:57 am
Completely agree.
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Jerry Only Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 12:06 pm
it also seems that the way he worded it, it blows a massive hole in the commerce clause and opens the possibility of laws based on that to be overturned in the future.
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Blue Dogs Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 12:23 pm
Longleaf, I know Romney says he plans on repealing Obamacare if he’s elected President and you maybe RIGHT about this one.
The Supreme Court judges must be SMOKING on something stupid because by striking down 3 out of the 4 provisions of the AZ Law (which I support) and keeping Obamacare, it’s pretty obvious the Republicans are going to be super energized and ready to vote in massive droves come November 6th.
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Prismatic Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 2:07 pm
Romney might win, but the U.S. Senate will still need 60 Republicans if the Affordable Care Act is to be repealed. So do y’all really think Roberts made this decision just so Romney will get re-elected? He’s hedging on 13 Senate seats going R?
Cut it out with the conspiracy bulls*it. Roberts made this decision based on his belief that it’s the responsibility of the SC to interpret laws in such a manner as to be constitutional before unconstitutional. It’s the duty of his office and he carried it out with admirable respect for this country’s institutions of government.
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Spiro Eagleton Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 3:45 pm
Its actually just 51 votes to defund it. Tim Carney has a column about that on the DC Examiner.
allmaya Reply:
June 29th, 2012 at 1:04 am
Graveyard, whistling past.
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Just tired.... says:
My favorite part of this entire fiasco was Fox and CNN reporting that the individual mandate had been struck down. Don’t any of these idiots READ THE BLOODY DECISION before telling us what it said.
Morons.
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Robert Morrow Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 6:38 pm
They (the MSM) have only been misreporting the JFK Assassination for FIFTY YEARS. So blowing SCOTUS for a few minutes on Obamacare is no biggie.
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Jerry Only Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 7:43 pm
give it up.
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Anonymous Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 8:07 pm
49
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Just tired.... Reply:
June 29th, 2012 at 9:38 am
STFU
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cyrus says:
The notion that this ruling somehow brings MORE conservatives out in November is laughable. What Republican is newly motivated to vote against the POTUS that wasn’t motivated yesterday? Of course Romney will get a short fundraising bump out of this as anger seems to open up wallets these days. Obama will reap from this as well. It’s pretty much a wash since it appears Romney will have to spend 5x what Obama spends per swing state vote.
I agree the insurance cartel needs to be brought to heel, though. A public option would have gone a long way toward that.
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JBR Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 3:34 pm
The whack jobs are always motivated to waste time on things like challenging solid law.
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WUSRPH says:
I personally think it is great that the Supreme Court has finally fulfilled Teddy Roosevelt’s dream of a national health insurance system while, at the same time, vindicating Mitt Romney’s idea of the individual mandate. It is nice to see the ideas of such prominent REPUBLICANS have finally become the law of the land.
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cyrus Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 11:59 am
*Like ^
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Kenneth D. Franks Reply:
June 29th, 2012 at 6:07 am
Thanks to Romney for such a good idea for the country.
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Just tired.... Reply:
June 29th, 2012 at 9:39 am
…and could those “prominent republicans” be elected in their own party today?
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WUSRPH Reply:
July 5th, 2012 at 5:13 pm
Would someone stop using my ID to enter their thoughts…I kind of agree with what they said, but it would have been nice if I have actualy said it….
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Robert Morrow says:
“The notion that this ruling somehow brings MORE conservatives out in November is laughable.”
Agreed!Fire of the GOP to vote for WHO?? Mitt Romney is the INVENTOR of Obamacare and all his current phony protestions aside, he is perfectly happy with this.
When will self respecting convervatives finally dump the Republican party and let it rot and burn on the ash heap where it belongs?
Not that I am “conservative” – it has become a cuss word to me. As “conservative” Chief “Just Us” Roberts has proven again that “conservatives” just conserve and even expand big government. That is why I am a libertarian.
“Conservative” Bush appointed this joker and a bunch of “conservatives” in the Senate confirmed him.
Robomneycare is the result.
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The Mustache That Dare Not Speak Its Name says:
I called it! On this blog, March 31, 2012. A tax that dare not speak its name. Always listen to the Mustache.
http://www.texasmonthly.com/blogs/burkablog/?p=13183
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Jerry Only Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 12:09 pm
youve earned a special trip the the salon.
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Bodhisattva Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 5:13 pm
Mustache, thanks for taking us down Memory Lane re your prediction. Actually, I got a kick out of Paul’s opening salvo:
“The outcome of the battle over healthcare before the Supreme Court was preordained. The majority was going to rule against Obama because he called them out in an earlier State of the Union Address over the Citizens United decision.”
As Our Only Governor would say, “Oops!”
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Spiro Eagleton says:
This is a great day for all of us that wish to one day have a socialized medicine system like Great Britain’s. Everyone knows that the NHS is a HUGE success with absolutely no problems, and certainly no wait lists. The Brits have proved that more government and more regulation help to solve the problem every time despite what the troglodyte conservatives say.
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Whoa Nellie! says:
On the other hand, a lot of people on all sides of the political spectrum really dislike this program. The people that dislike it the most vociferously, the Tea Partiers and conservatives, will be galvanized by this decision, and in an election year, this is only throwing gasoline on the anti-Obama voters or disenchanted Obama voters from 2008. If this impells the republicans to sweeping victories in the fall, look for the Affordable care Act to be revoked by a Republican-controlled Washington before it ever has a chance to launch.
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cyrus says:
Point is that they have been “galvanized” by ACA for 3 years. How does this add to their numbers? They decry Obamacare in Every. Single. Email. – and have since the summer of ’09.
Where is the polling to indicate that indy voters will be swung to the right by how the SCOTUS rules on the ACA? That makes zero sense. There’s been no shortage of awareness about the issue for quite some time now.
I can see it now: “Well, I was willing to vote for Obama (or just not vote) if the SCOTUS had overturned Obamacare, but now that they upheld it, I gotta vote against him.”
Honestly now.
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cyrus says:
The big sort has already occurred. The GOP wore out these bloody shirts in 2010. It’s about indies now, and this decision is not going to move the needle much, and not for very long.
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Robert Morrow Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 2:10 pm
Correct, Cyrus. This ruling will not move the needle an inch for independents. This pretty much has no impact in the general, except maybe to help Obama who can use it to fire up his base.
Romney absolutely has no credibility with his base.
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Anonymous Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 2:58 pm
Will have no impact with independents? Says who? For those paying attention, the earlier Citizen’s United ruling had indies riled, their striking down the 1912 Wyoming law taking away their rights as a state to limit corporate contributions pumped things up a bit more, many didn’t agree with the immigration ruling, and now the ruling giving healthcare providers everything they want. Independents are not libertarians, Mr. Morrow. Not even close. Where do you come up with this stuff?
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Robert Morrow Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 3:14 pm
Independents don’t give a flying flip about Citizens United. Citizens United was a delicious ruling.
Totalitarians in Congress tried to stamp out free speech and it blew up in their faces. Billionaires have free speech rights, too.
It is the “Coffee Party” that is obsessing about Citizens United and the “need” to crush political speech. And the Coffee Party is a pure joke.
JBR Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 3:38 pm
I’ll describe myself as a slightly right/moderate independent. I see all the posturing and inabilitly to offer alternatives and the unwillingness to do anything but bloviate and bitch a reason to vote D. I’ve seen nothing but “no” and malarkey from the R’s of late.
Anonymous Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 4:10 pm
Horseshit, Morrow. Where do you come up with this stuff? Name one thing you have been right on since this blog started.
Fiftycal Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 5:01 pm
HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA The “indies” will vote for SELF INTEREST! I just found out that my TAX on my $44K salary will be $4200! Over and above the TAX I already pay. Wait til this little tidbit gets tossed around and the SHEEP learn that THEY are going to get FLEECED in this booddoggle.
Anonymous Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 5:18 pm
OK, fifty cal. Where did you come up with this? Inquiring minds what to know.
Blue Dogs says:
Cyrus, I’m going to predict the Indys will move to Romney as a reulst of this.
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cyrus Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 2:26 pm
How and/or why? Are you imagining an independent voter who might have voted Obama if the SCOTUS had overturned ACA but will vote against Obama now that they’ve upheld it? Where’s the logic in that choice? It’s not like this issue has just now reared it’s head.
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anony Reply:
June 29th, 2012 at 2:13 pm
50 cal and his $20/hr job will not see any increase in health care costs. Wahsington Post has a neat calculator he can use.
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FLPD says:
Greg Abbott now says Chief Justice John Roberts “may have engaged in judicial activism…”. Judicial activism is defined as any act by any justice appointed by any president and confirmed by any senate that is in disagreement in any aspect with the official position of the Republican party.
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JBR Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 3:39 pm
More BS from the right. They are attacking their own….did Abbott say anything about Scalia and Thomas and Citizens United?
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JohnBernardBooks says:
President Obama has now passed the “largest tax increase” in history while telling the nation “I will not raise your taxes one red cent.”
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FLPD Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 1:08 pm
So, JBB, a portion of the 16% or so of people who do not have health insurance now will be required to pay something…a tax. The rest of us who are insured have been paying for them directly or indirectl–through taxes that support public hospitals, through higher insurance premiums, and also through tax write-offs for private hospitals providing uncompensated care. Largest tax increase in history? More hyperbole.
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Anon Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 2:04 pm
So the supremes give the right their new language: He raised Taxes! Hilarious. Did you see where Abbott sent out the wrong press release? Hilarious.
The GOP gets funnier and funnier.
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FLPD Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 2:20 pm
No, I didn’t see it but would love to. Where can I find it?
JohnBernardBooks Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 2:49 pm
many will be exempt from paying. ie now 47% of eligible tax payers pay no fed taxes. Those do do will be footing the bill or as president Obama so fondly says “sharing their wealth”.
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WUSRPH Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 3:05 pm
As usual, you are wrong…Even if the number 47% is correct it applies ONLY TO PERSONS PAYING INCOME TAXES. The vast majority who do not pay that tax DO PAY OTHER FEDERAL TAXES. The number for those who pay no federal taxes is in the teens—virutally all of whom are elderly or children.
JohnBernardBooks Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 3:33 pm
Try not to be stupid. Taxes taken from workers are called a federal WH tax, FICA and Medicare taxes. Where does it say income tax?
47% pay no fed WH tax or fed tax.
Fiftycal Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 5:03 pm
And don’t forget the 30% TAX on “cadillac” insurance plans. If you have decent coverage, that could cost you an EXTRA $200 a month.
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Anonymous Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 5:15 pm
Where’s your retort, wusrph? Let’s see what you know.
Bay Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 9:00 pm
The oft-cited figure involves only federal personal income taxes, which are generally withheld from paychecks (rich folks with unearned income have to pay quarterly estimates) but come back to low-income workers. Social Security (FICA) and Medicare taxes come out of every dollar of earnings (except when your wages go past $110,000 or so) so are paid by ALL workers. Plus there are federal taxes on gasoline, cigarettes, alcohol, and telecommunications – most people drive, smoke, drink, or have a phone.
Mike says:
I have two observations. First, Roberts likely preserved the legitimacy and credibility of the court as an independent institution. Second, the Commerce Clause ruling is huge news. You won’t read about it, but its huge news. It brings back the Lochner-esque distinction of activity versus inactivity, which was incredibly expensive and time-consuming for interstate businesses of the era.
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JohnBernardBooks Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 3:36 pm
very true Roberts gutted the commerce clause, the democrats have been abusing it since FDR.
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Rooster Cogburn Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 3:42 pm
Keep on going JBB! You are the main reason most of us on this blog want to become conservatives! We want to think like you!We are trying hard not to be stupid so we can be like you!
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JohnBernardBooks Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 7:53 pm
actually you can, maybe.
Anon Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 4:05 pm
FLPD: Abbott sent our press releses to the media, the firts one praising the SCOTUS: “This is an historic victory…blah, blah” then realized it was the wrong one. Minutes later a new one: “While rebuking an overreaching government….”
Hoot! Just like CNN and Fox, our boy jumped the gun a bit.
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Blue Dogs Reply:
June 29th, 2012 at 11:55 am
Abbott has AGED, I can tell 10 years as State AG can do that to a person.
Anonymous Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 5:11 pm
Saaay whaaatt?
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donuthin says:
And this is an excellent demonstration of the importance of the separation of powers. The question before the court was whether or not it was constitutional, not if it was right or wrong. They did good. I can’t imagine that Robert’s was politically motivated with his decision.
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Jerry Only Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 1:18 pm
i can. he knows that if the court had ruled against the law, the admin would have been able to question the legitimacy of the court as an impartial body.
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Willie James Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 2:05 pm
It was pretty much in the bag that Thomas and Scalia were political and activist….I had thought that of Roberts. On the fence on that now.
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John Johnson says:
Amen, JBB.
1. The uninsured get insurance, the insurance companies write more policies, the hospitals, physicians, device maufacturers, and pharm companies all get richer, and who pays for it all?
Are any of the healthcare providers dropping prices in return for increased number of policy holders or increased number of people untilizing their services? This was not mandated because it was the lobbyists representing all these groups that wrote Obamacare. Duh!
2. 60+% of U.S. voters think Obamacare is totally bogus or partially so. Think that 60% is pleased today with the courts decision? Pleased with the Roberts and the “other” liberal justices over this decision, the Arizona decision, and, the one I thought most damaging, the Wyoming decision? If I were Romney, I would start campaigning right now on the fact that the U.S. cannot afford to let Obama serve another four years with Supreme Court appointments likely to be in play during the next term.
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Jerry Only Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 1:21 pm
a large # of that 60% have no idea whats in the law too, they still believe in scary boogeyman things like “death panels”. if most people knew what was actually in the law, theres a strong likelyhood theyd say “youre not taking that away from me!”.
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Fiftycal Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 5:07 pm
Don’t “believe” in death panels? Here, let me EDUCATE you. Google this for more TRUTH if you can stand it.
“Repeal of the Independent Payment Advisory Board (IPAB) is critical to prevent the rationing of life-saving medical treatment,” said Burke Balch, J.D., director of National Right to Life’s Robert Powell Center for Medical Ethics. “The IPAB would recommend drastic limits for the Department of Health and Human Services to impose on what Americans are allowed to spend out of their own funds to save their own lives and the lives of their families.”
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Jerry Only Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 7:46 pm
good. i want to sit on one and decide who gets ground up into dog food. where do i sign up?
Willie James Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 2:06 pm
Uh, oh. Roberts is now a liberal.
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WUSRPH Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 3:07 pm
Actually, it is all George Bush’s fault! He picked Roberts didn’t he. Boy it is nice to be able to blame Bush for something again!
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John Johnson says:
Really, Jerry. I would not dispute the part about people not knowing what is in the bill, since the legislators who backed it don’t either. I would, however, disagree on how people will feel after they find out. Would you like to enlighten me on some of these serendipities that will one day come to light?
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Jerry Only Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 2:45 pm
cant turn down coverage on the basis of preexisting conditions, parents keeping children on their insurance until the age of 26, consumer protections, preventative services free for those on medicare to name a few.
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Anonymous Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 3:09 pm
And these attributes can’t be brought back in a modified package?
Any fair program would have mandated savings for the consumer built in. What physicians and hospitals are charging today for simple, standard procedures is criminal. A lithotripsy has gone up over 1000% since they first came up with the equipment to preform them, and they are still using the same equipment. Where’s the sanity?
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FLPD Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 3:19 pm
And why didn’t tort reform in Texas cure this 1,000% increase? Is it the free market that caused the increase? Is it greed? How do you fix it?
Mr. Munshun Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 4:08 pm
Not from Republicans. They wouldn’t introduce those provisions. Who among the Republican leadership ever said they would since ACA passed? I haven’t. “Repeal” is their only plan.
Congressional Republicans would never reintroduce anything in ACA because the insurance lobby would forbid them from doing it. And God knows that if big business doesn’t want it, neither do their shills in Congress.
Anonymous Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 4:39 pm
FLPD….costs spiral higher and higher because there is no competition, and because Texas physicians and hospitals are still doing redundant testing and performing unneeded procedures. No one is monitoring them. They can do whatever they want and charge whatever they want. A recent X-ray in hospital was almost $400. The same one at radiological lab across the street was $60. Same type X-ray. Same machine. Our doctor doesn’t send us to the one across the street. They send us to the one in the hospital where they are on staff. They don ‘t tell us we have options. If you are paying cash for having your tonsils out they can’t quote you a price for the entire procedure. Look at how many bills you get from the hospital, surgeon, anesthesiologist, radiology, and pathology. Does anyone get quotes from all these before hitting the operating room? They can charge what they want and the insurance companies let them. They just jack our premiums up. See how it works. This is not going to change with Obamacare, except they will all have more patients, which means even more windfall profits for these greedy bastards.
cyrus Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 5:41 pm
THose charges are insane because they don’t reflect cost for individual treatment or exams. They represent the cost PLUS the extra $$ they must recoup from uncovered services and insurance under-coverage. That’s how costs keep blowing up for the insured – we’ve been covering the uninsured for decades now.
Anonymous Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 6:56 pm
That is flatout wrong. I will bet you everything I own that costs will not go down under Obamacare. It will be just like the tort reform promises. The only ones with smiles on their faces will be those who couldn’t afford coverage; the ones with pre-existing conditions, college students, illegals, doctors, hospitals, and drug companies. Premiums for the rest of us will continue to skyrocket, routine procedures will continue to cost more, fees will be assested on things we never dreamed about, and sales taxes put in place that will want to make you puke. Hide and watch.
GROW UP says:
NEWSFLASH: If Romney is elected, he WILL NOT REPEAL HRC. Like it or not, there are too many provisions in the bill ( parents of twenty-somethings, twenty-somethings, diabetics, etc.) who benefit from the bill.
If you think the Republicans are going to touch it, you’re probably the same group of intermittently politically-involved Republicans who believe Rick Perry will do something about illegal immigration.
GROW UP. You’re being lied to..and frankly, I would feel sorry for you, but your friends won’t shut the HELL UP long to garner any sympathy.
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Anonymous Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 1:59 pm
Hey, Mr. Compassionate One – are you some sort of soothsayer or something? Couldn’t he repeal and replace with some of the good aspects of Obamacare?
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GROW UP Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 2:15 pm
No one wants to open it up. They would have done it years ago if it were that simple.
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Anonymous Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 2:33 pm
If you don’t know what’s in it, and I don’t know what’s in it, and the guys who voted on it don’t know what’s in it, how can you possibly say that there are provisions in there that are going to really turn us on?
Anonymous Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 2:19 pm
Republicans have been harping on “repeal and replace” for almost 3 years now and have not come up with a single idea for improving access to healt care other than the nebulous “tort reform”. And we know how well that works.
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Anonymous Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 2:25 pm
Not to mention medical tort reform already in place in the major states including California..
Anonymous Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 2:35 pm
Dick Weekley should come out tell every Texan what happened with the “It’s going to lower healthcare costs in Texas” spiel. What a crock!
Robert Morrow says:
Remember when Congress passed legislation to make houses more affordable? …
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Anonymous Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 2:19 pm
Hey Robert, stop using that stolen water in Lake Travis yet?
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Robert Morrow Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 3:16 pm
That “Water plan” and and water bill is all about stealing water from its rightful owner – the landowner and giving it to someone else.
Just like Obamacare.
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Anonymous Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 3:20 pm
So you’re taking away health insurance from it’s rightful owner and giving it to someone else..? I’ve seen pennies that make more sense than you.
Anonymous Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 3:10 pm
An @ 2:33pm, No one knew what was in the Patriot Act and they voted for it. Further, what a sickeningly weak argument. As I recall, there were townhalls across the nation that contained dozens of high school and college dropouts claiming they had not only read the bill but had read the Constitution. If you don’t know what you’re talking about, don’t post.
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Anonymous Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 4:46 pm
You twit. I just watched a congressman a Dem congressman admit that he didn’t have a clue what all was buried in there. How about the rumor that we’re having a sales tax added to sale of our homes to help pay for all this. Heard that one? Is it true? What other surprises await us? Do you know?
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Anonymous Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 5:22 pm
Sigh. Try reading: http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/newsdesk/2012/06/why-romney-wont-repeal-obamacare.html
Anonymous Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 6:48 pm
Now I know you are goofy. You think the New Yorker is some sort of bible? The author some sort of award winning prognosticator. The obstacles for repeal are real, and Romney would face an uphill battle, but the senate numbers could change and the $300B number is debated.
Sigh…you didn’t answer my questions.
Anonymous Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 9:43 pm
Sighing Anny @ 5:22pm, according to the AG of VA, it only takes 51 votes in the Senate since we are talking about a tax issue as defined by Justice Roberts.
Anonymous says:
Robert, do you remember when Congress repealed Glass-Steagel? I think one of the biggest proponents, Phil Gramm, received one of the biggest bail-outs. Or was that Dick Armey?
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John Otto says:
So the same President and Congressional backers that swore the ACA was not a “tax” argued successfully before the Supreme Court that the mandate is constitutional because it is a “tax”. The President and those that voted for this bill should either stand up and take full credit for passing one of the largest tax increases ever on the middle class or admit that they lied to us when passing the bill. Either way this just became a BIG election issue for President as well as Congress.
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Mr. Munshun Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 3:39 pm
Weak.
But I suppose when you legislate raising “fees”, it’s totally different, right? Because you don’t call it a “tax” by name. It serves the same purpose, but it’s not a tax.
Did you hear that Tea Partyers? It’s not a tax, it’s a fee. So it’s okay.
I look forward to reading all your tax-free, fee-free bills next session.
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John Johnson Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 4:50 pm
We Texans should understand how this “fee” deal works. We are “fee’d” to death because they don’t want to call it a tax.
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Dan C says:
This decision can only help Obama in November. I don’t think there is a single “base” GOP voter who would have stayed home and said “I don’t need to vote for Romney” if the decision had gone the other way. It is June. By November, this will only be a big deal to people who were going to vote against Obama anyway. The vitriol that will spew from the hard right will alienate many people who are still undecided. The GOP’s “alternative” is non-existent or worse. Bring back exclusions for pre-existing conditions? Kick 24 year olds off their parents’ policies? Those are losing arguments. The charge against “Obamacare” is going to led by the guy who, as Justice Ginsburg noted, passed it in the first place? What a joke. A very good day for the Dems in terms of what happens in November.
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José Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 8:41 pm
The bigger benefit to President Obama is perception. This is his signature piece of domestic policy, a centerpiece of his campaign in 2008. He won by getting the PPACA passed in the first place and then he won again today. Actually, the big thing is that he dodged a bullet because he didn’t lose. Imagine how different Obama would look in November if the Supremes yanked away his one big legislative accomplishment.
“Americans love a winner and will not tolerate a loser.”
Now it’s time for Romney and Boehner to look like whiny kids.
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JohnBernardBooks says:
As previously stated President Obama who pledged to not raise taxes one red cent has now passed the largest tax hike in history. Obamacare is a tax as SCOTUS ruled. Its a great day for dems.
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Anonymous Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 3:35 pm
Really?? President Obama signed Grover Norquist’s tax pledge? This would be more bullshit would it jbb?
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Anonymous Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 3:42 pm
Lies are the new truth.
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JohnBernardBooks Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 3:43 pm
Wha….?
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Rooster Cogburn Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 4:00 pm
GOP playbook.
Anonymous Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 5:01 pm
Like the Hope and Change lies, Rooster?
A2Z Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 11:14 pm
Ever wonder what would happen if every single person who signed Grover Norquist’s tax pledge reneged and said, “This is bullshit. I’m not participating in this insanity any more?” Would it change the game in Washington at all?
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Dan C Reply:
June 29th, 2012 at 9:18 am
Roberts is the only justice who said it was a tax. Eight said it was not. Even if it is one, it is a tax that is designed to be avoided – buy insurance and you don’t pay it. If you think this is a winning argument in November – go for it.
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Cow Droppings Reply:
July 1st, 2012 at 7:25 am
yeah right.
You are not mandated to buy insurance, but you are taxed if you don’t.
Yeah, they won’t sell in Peoria (sigh…)
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Anonymous says:
Base votes are not going to decide this election. It is the 42%’ers who will decide it. Every Republican will vote for Romney. Not all Dem’s will vote for Obama. How will the independents vote? The Libertarians?
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Republican Insider says:
My party is toast. They gambled the farm and got cow droppings. Obamacare is modeled after Romneycare. Thus, Romney has no credibility on the issue.
Today was a bad day for Republicans thank to a very conservative Republican, Chief Justice Roberts.
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Robert Morrow Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 3:21 pm
“Your” party is toast in the general. I serious am beginning to wonder if Laura Ingraham and Rush Limbaugh are sniffing paint spray cans again. Today they where telling me that because of of the Supreme Court ruling I am supposed to vote for Republicans (Romney – inventor of Obamacare along with Newt Gingrich and Heritage Foundation, John Roberts, appointed as POTUS by mr. Compassionate Conservative himself GWB).
I would vote for Obama over Romney anyday. It is better than getting stabbed in the back by the statists and “compassionate” conservatives of the GOP.
As it is I will be for Libertarian Gary Johnson.
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Anonymous says:
Burka, do you think this decision helps or hurts Dewhurst? Doesn’t matter? What’s your take?
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Spiro Eagleton Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 3:48 pm
It hurts the Dew. He’s going to lose.
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Anonymous Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 4:03 pm
Interesting. Thought so.
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SCOTUS says:
SCOTUS upholds RomneyCare!
Now being female isn’t a pre-existing condition.
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Mr. Munshun says:
Republicans using the line about ‘Obama said it’s not a tax’ but the solicitor general and SCOTUS says ‘it is tax’, is essentially Republicans whining and saying “He didn’t play fair!”
That’s laughable coming out of Republican mouths.
Remember these Republican classics?
“Saddam is aiming WMDs right at our faces, so we gotta go kick his ass!” or
“Voter ID is about protecting the integrity of the process, not disenfranchising legal non-Republican voters?”
At least if our current President uses overly nuanced language it’s to stop a health crisis within our own country, not to go to war or undermine the most basic right of US citizens.
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Willie James says:
Well, since it woudl take 60 inthe sentate to get rid of this, we have a law and millions will benefit and millions will pay a bit more and millions will pay a bit less and insurance companies will make more. Bottom line is that lots of folks willhave coverage and be safer and their is a price for that. But listening to the gasbags is about to wear me out.
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Anonymous Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 4:58 pm
You don’t know anything about what the total cost will be, nitwit. No one does. We do know that insurance and healthcare providers will be making more.
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Anonymous Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 5:24 pm
Good. Let’s start bashing health care providers and insurance companies rather than lawyers for a change.
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Dan C says:
Stop wasting your time watching the blowhards. I might watch Hannity for a little while tonight just to see if his head explodes, but then. . . no Fox News, no AM radio, no MSNBC all summer. Life is too short.
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Robert Morrow says:
Almost NO competitive House seats in Texas in 2012:
http://www.centerforpolitics.org/crystalball/articles/the-houses-15-closest-contests/
Here is the only one:
– Texas 23 (Rep. Francisco “Quico” Canseco running for reelection; 2008 Obama 50, McCain 49) — This race could feature yet another rematch, but that won’t be the case if Democrats get their way. Freshman Canseco defeated ex-Rep. Ciro Rodriguez in 2010, and while Rodriguez wants another shot at getting his job back, national Democrats favor a different candidate, popular state Rep. Pete Gallego, for the nomination. Rodriguez finished ahead of Gallego in the May 29 primary, but they will square off again in the July 31 runoff. Amazingly, of 36 House seats in Texas, this is the only one we list among the nation’s competitive races.
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JohnBernardBooks says:
This hilarious….Let’s go back a few short years ago when the Chosen One said “I will not raise taxes one single dime.”
Today Americans became the proud owners of the largest tax increase in history.
how’s zat hopey changey stuff going libs?
Whoops upsidedahaid a tax increase!
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FLPD Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 9:00 pm
How’s your man Perry stack up on his pledge,JBB? Billions in new fees and billions in new business taxes under his administration. “Fee” “Tax” both three-letter words. And might I add billions in new debt–a four-letter word.
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FLPD Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 9:17 pm
You’ve got me on a roll, JBB. I would like to ask how you like the Bush/Perry involuntary tax added to people’s electric bills in deregulated areas of Texas which is now being used to balance the state budget instead of its statutory purpose. Talk about held hostage. If you want to have electricity in your home, you have to pay the tax. If that’s okay with you, how about the doubling last year of the involuntary tax added to our automobile insurance policies for auto-theft prevention because the Republicans in charge stole all the money from the first $1 to balance the state budget.
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John Johnson Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 10:10 pm
Come on FLPD…you know you’re not supposed to be broadcasting that stuff. Cool your roll…don’t want you carrying this any further. You might go crazy and mention designated funds paid by Texans for themed license plates who want to make a $ contribution to financially support the entity of their choice…like Texas Parks & Wildlife. Rangers drive 20 year old Suburbans, park restrooms are condemned while our legislature uses mega millions out of this account to pay bills. Can’t cut spending; won’t raise taxes; let’s just fraudulently collect it and then steal it from TP&W. Don’t go nuts and bring this up.
FLPD Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 10:28 pm
I’m happy to oblige and not bring up TP&WD reduced to begging for $5 million in public donations while the agency’s dedicated accounts are used for balancing the budget. I’m also not going to go mention the diversion of those taxes you pay every month on every one of your phone bill(s) that are supposed to be used for 9-1-1 services. That’s it. I’m not going to go nuts and bring up any more examples from the $5 billion in dedicated state taxes/fees that are being used to “balance” the state budget.
John Johnson Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 11:32 pm
Thank you. You had me worried for a minute. I would also beg you not to mention the lame excuses the gov and legislative perps use when some crazy reporter actually ask them about these thefts….like Sen. Ogden who used the lamest of excuses…”I had to” and “I’m not the first one. We’ve been doing this for years”. Give him a break. I think he knows now that he could have leveled with the citizens of Texas by calling a press conference, using his bully pulpit, and outlining the stinky things that gutless legislatures will do to keep from telling trusting constituents the truth.
allmaya Reply:
June 29th, 2012 at 1:16 am
Come on FLPD.
You know JBB NEVER responds to substantive arguments.
Julie Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 9:45 pm
Obama did change his mind, as you pointed out, but so has the GOP. President George HW Bush proposed a health insurance mandate and Republicans supported it, but they dropped it after the Democrats would not. Now the parties have changed sides on the health care issue.
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Tom says:
For all you “conservatives” who want to go back to the good old days, when indigents showed up at the emergency room with significant health problems that could have been easily treated with an early diagnosis, today’s ruling saves considerable tax dollars.
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Jerry Only Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 8:45 pm
exactly, we’re already paying for everyone else’s healthcare. this is an attempt to do it in a more efficient way.
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Anonymous Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 8:48 pm
Hey Tom..,,I’ve got some dried out lake front property you might be interested in. Based in your comment, it sounds like you know a good deal when you see one
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Anonymous Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 9:48 pm
The indigents will still be showing up along with not so indigent people. This because you either pay or get taxed, even at some lower income levels. This is my understanding.
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I'm Pavlov. Ring a Bell? says:
Nothing about this govt. is “efficient.” See the national debt. Obamacare is only going to accelerate that
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Anonymous says:
At least be transparent and rename it ……..
“Unaffordable Care Tax”
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allmaya Reply:
June 29th, 2012 at 1:11 am
I guess what we have now is “affordable” where we spend far far more per capita for health care than anywhere else on the planet.
Oh, and we are #37 in the overall health of our citizens.
Why do wingers want to pay new Lexus prices for a used Dodge? Are they psychologically invested (cognitive dissonance???) in being chumps?
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Anonymous Reply:
June 29th, 2012 at 6:31 am
The costs will do nothing put go up.
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rw says:
So I guess we need a tax to save us considerable tax dollars?
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rw says:
Scalia’s dissent – ‘…is to make mere breathing in and out the basis for federal prescription and to extend federal power to virtually all human activity’
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Robert Morrow says:
Here is an important article in Slate:
“Obama Wins the Battle, Roberts Wins the War”
“The chief justice’s canny move to uphold the Affordable Care Act while gutting the Commerce Clause.”
I think Just Us Roberts was making a trade. Losing on Obamacare, but winning on the broader issue of federal government intrusion.
http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/scocca/2012/06/roberts_health_care_opinion_commerce_clause_the_real_reason_the_chief_justice_upheld_obamacare_.html?fb_action_ids=4150216002038&fb_action_types=og.likes&fb_source=aggregation&fb_aggregation_id=288381481237582
“Roberts was smarter than that. By ruling that the individual mandate was permissible as a tax, he joined the Democratic appointees to uphold the law—while joining the Republican wing to gut the Commerce Clause (and push back against the necessary-and-proper clause as well)” …
“business about “new and potentially vast” authority is a fig leaf. This is a substantial rollback of Congress’ regulatory powers, and the chief justice knows it. It is what Roberts has been pursuing ever since he signed up with the Federalist Society. In 2005, Sen. Barack Obama spoke in opposition to Roberts’ nomination, saying he did not trust his political philosophy on tough questions such as “whether the Commerce Clause empowers Congress to speak on those issues of broad national concern that may be only tangentially related to what is easily defined as interstate commerce.” Today, Roberts did what Obama predicted he would do.”
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allmaya says:
Couldn’t agree with you more Robert.
This is why it is critical that Obama be re-elected and be able to make Supreme Court appointments.
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Anonymous Reply:
June 29th, 2012 at 6:33 am
Allmaya, I don’t think you understand.
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allmaya Reply:
June 29th, 2012 at 10:01 pm
Oh yes I do. I want jurists appointed to the Supreme Court who will not take a cramped view of the Commerce Clause.
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Anonymous Reply:
June 30th, 2012 at 10:06 am
yes, because you don’t want your big government schemes actually constrained by the Constitution.
While most people observing this are playing checkers, Robert is playing chess
JohnBernardBooks says:
President Ameteur’s legacy.
“I will not raise your taxes one thin dime,” while slipping the biggest tax increase in History in.
This is bigger than “Ah did not have sex ….”
What is it about democrats that makes them hero worship a liar?
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Anonymous Reply:
June 29th, 2012 at 9:00 am
The first President Bush also promised no new taxes and then broke his promise. Presidents change their minds.
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Julie Reply:
June 29th, 2012 at 9:01 am
The first President Bush also promised no new taxes and then broke his promise. Presidents change their minds.
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donuthin Reply:
July 2nd, 2012 at 2:00 pm
and in retrospect, probably one of his best decisions, though president Clinton was the one who got the benefit
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Anonymous Reply:
June 29th, 2012 at 9:18 am
Hey JBB, can you please provide a source link for the “I will not raise your taxes one thin dime,” Obama quote because otherwise it sounds like bullshit instead of the “valid arguments” that JJ just loves from you. Also, can you provide us some documentation that proves your biggest tax increase in History statement? Because it seems to me that you wingnuts think every tax increase is OMG, THE BIGGEST ONE IN HISTORY!!! Once again, without documentation it sounds like your typical bullshit.
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Anonymous Reply:
June 29th, 2012 at 11:24 am
Well , Anny, it has been all over the news casts since early this morning starting with A video interview with Obama conducted by Stefanopolis on Morning Joe. Obama reiterated twice that he was not raising taxes. Seemed put out by the question.
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JohnBernardBooks Reply:
June 29th, 2012 at 11:43 am
“Hey JBB, can you please provide a source link for the “I will not raise your taxes one thin dime,” Obama quote”
can I yes, will I? no
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Karen says:
Info on AHC. http://www.reddit.com/tb/vbkfm
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John Johnson Reply:
June 29th, 2012 at 9:30 am
Karen, thanks for posting this link. It is informative, but it is written by someone who obviously thinks ACA in its entirity is a good thing.
I will just ask you one quesiton. Most all of the cost savings are supposed to come from some sort of oversight by the feds. For instance, doctors and hosptials will be reimbursed by how well they perform. Surgeons who get in and out of the operating room quickly and who can show that post op infection rates in their patients are low will receive extra compensation. Please tell me how well fed oversight is currently working? How about oversight on GSA spending? How about oversight on Medicare and Medicade fraud? Social Security fraud? Get my point? Why would you believe that the feds will make this work with this horrible track record to judge them by?
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Spiro Eagleton says:
More proof that even the Dew’s people are worried that he’s going to lose.
http://www.rollcall.com/issues/57_160/Late-Date-Summer-Heat-to-Affect-Texas-Race-215813-1.html?pos=hln
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JohnBernardBooks says:
Huge day for dems
1. Largest tax increase in history
2. Atty Gen Holder held in comtempt of Congress
3. Dems fled the chambers to avoid doing their sworn duties.
makes you proud to be a democrat
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Reality bites Reply:
June 29th, 2012 at 10:35 am
So on Feb 14 2008 republicans fled the chambers to avoid doing their sworn duties. Makes you proud to be a republican eh???
The House voted Thursday to hold White House Chief of Staff Josh Bolten and former White House lawyer Harriet Miers in contempt in its probe of the 2006 firings of U.S. attorneys.
The House voted 223-23 to hold the two Bush aides in contempt of Congress.
White House spokeswoman Dana Perino called the move “a partisan, futile act” that would not be enforced by the Justice Department.
And the chamber’s Republican minority staged a walkout before the vote, demanding that Democratic leaders vote instead on a revision of federal surveillance laws.
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anon says:
Huge day for repugs:
1. Healthcare affirmed over weak arguements
2. Repugnant politicking expose them as weak.
3. So vile fellow legislators leave chambers.
Makes you wonder why the GOP is laughable.
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Anonymous says:
Obama and the Dems have stifled businesses, jobs, and prices. Any business with 50 or more employees will be required to provide insurance or pay a fine.
Translated to…
1. Do not expand over 49 employees …stifles growth
2. Lay off employees to afford the added “tax”…loss of jobs
3. Pay the “tax”….increase prices to consumer.
This is not progress!
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business owner Reply:
July 2nd, 2012 at 1:17 pm
the health insurance companies raise rates 30% per year for businesses and Obamacare will rein them in, forcing them to have better coverage, and by expanding the pool with younger healthier people paying into the system. Supply and demand determines the number of employees, nothing else.
Obamacare hopefully will give people the freedom to freelance and hold their own insurance
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anita says:
Yes, the ACA makes me proud to be a Democrat. It’s a positive step forward for our country and her people. It took serious leadership on the part of the President to make this happen.
Sad to see petulant fools like Rep. Louie Gohmert lose their minds over a victory for our country. Texans deserve better representation — he’s an embarrassment.
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retrocon Reply:
June 29th, 2012 at 9:38 am
Think back to the way the ACA was passed. Can that be classified as LEADERSHIP on the part of the President?
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Anonymous says:
It is not an Act….it is a TAX!
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anita Reply:
June 29th, 2012 at 10:57 am
If a requirement to have health insurance or pay a penalty is considered to be a tax (for political purposes), then what is a requirement to have auto insurance or pay a penalty? Riddle me that, Gov. Perry?
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Anonymous Reply:
June 29th, 2012 at 11:04 am
Oh, Anita, you must have listened to this roll off of Chuck Todd’s tongue this morning. There is no good answer. Both dems and repubs are scratching their heads. You’ll have to ask Roberts. For the time being, there is a difference. It is written into law.
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Anonymous Reply:
June 29th, 2012 at 11:17 am
Anita……the SCOTUS ruled it was a TAX! You liberals can’t handle the truth !
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anita Reply:
June 29th, 2012 at 11:52 am
No, they ruled it was constitutional under the taxing powers of the federal government, as opposed to the powers under the Commerce Clause. It’s extremely simplistic to conclude that everything derived under the taxing powers is a “tax”.
It’s fun to watch you guys contort everything into an anti-Obama rant. Like a school of fish, you all blindly follow one another, twisting and turning. First it’s “blatantly unconstitutional” — we heard this for years — until your hand-picked Chief Justice debunked that. Now it’s “the largest tax increase in the history of mankind” — C’mon!
And what do you propose to address what is clearly a need for action on health care? Zero. Just the mantra of “repeal”. Zero of substance. Republicans stand for nothing but being against anything and everything Obama. What’s your positive agenda?
Anonymous Reply:
June 29th, 2012 at 1:11 pm
Anita, Obama said repeatedly ACA was not a tax yet attys filed case with supreme court using tax as their third argument. Now that Roberts has given democrats their wish can’t the rest of us just use the same term that the justices of the supreme court are now using? That being “tax”?
anita Reply:
June 29th, 2012 at 1:44 pm
When you don’t pay your taxes on time, you pay a penalty. Is the penalty a tax? No. But the ability to assess the penalty is derived under the taxing powers of the federal government.
Under ACA, if you don’t have health insurance, you pay a penalty. Is the penalty a tax? No. But the ability to assess the penalty is derived under the taxing powers of the federal government.
anita Reply:
June 30th, 2012 at 8:46 am
You all should read the decision you are now citing — the first issue they rule on is whether the penalty is a tax, and they conclude that it is not a tax, therefore allowing the case to move forward, not barred by the Anti-Injunction Act.
Later, a majority concludes that the penalty is valid as an exercise of the taxing clause.
Ironically (or perhaps not), Rep. Gohmert ranted about this yesterday on the House floor, to the point that he confused himself and everyone listening about how he thought it was a tax before he thought it wasn’t a tax and now thinks it is a tax before concluding it was’t a tax.
Of course, those who wanted to get the case before the Court in hopes of striking it down, to avoid the bar of the Anti-Injunction Act, argued strenuously that it wasn’t a tax — and prevailed. Now they don’t like the outcome, and want to argue it is a tax. Which one is it?
Cow Droppings Reply:
June 30th, 2012 at 10:11 am
oh Anita, you forget one very important distinction: no one is compelled to drive. I you choose to drive many states force you to buy insurance, not the federal government.
Under liberal logic, healthcare is a universal right. Everyone is entitled to it. Obama went one step further saying everyone is entitled to insurance, and must purchase it.
Your analogy crumbles when one digs below the surface.
John Johnson Reply:
June 30th, 2012 at 10:33 am
Good retort, CD. Big points scored.
Pat Reply:
June 30th, 2012 at 9:26 pm
CD, if you don’t force everybody to buy insurance, taxpayers end up footing the bill for the freeloaders who don’t buy insurance and then need life-saving treatment. Not just any taxpayers–Big City taxpayers are disproportionately burdened as their hospitals exclusively harbor uniquely regional life-saving medical units (BICU, NICO, CICU, etc.).
In Texas, we pay it in property taxes. Have you ever seen the Parkland budget? Dallas County subsidizes freeloaders by hundreds of millions every year.
John Johnson says:
Please, Anita. Your post sounds like past Pravda press releases…although I will agree with you on Gohmert. He comes across as a DeLay mini-me.
No doubt that there are good things in the law, but, as usual with Dems, the method of payment is skewed and means of reducing heathcare charges murky. It is not going to work as is because it depends on fed oversight to make it work. Fed ovesight does not work…has never worked.
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FLPD Reply:
June 29th, 2012 at 12:34 pm
Johnson, Gohmert is disgraceful. No, he’s contemptible. He has proven himself unfit for public office.
You criticize Democrats’ methods as skewed and murky. I suppose you prefer the methods of Texas Republicans you talk about so often on this blog–divert and deceive. Now, that’s the honorable way.
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John Johnson Reply:
June 29th, 2012 at 12:59 pm
Back up FLPD…take a deep breath. 1. I stated Gohmert is DeLay like. DeLay is one of the main reasons I am no longer a Trunk to Tail’er. I am no fan of Louie. 2. I said the Feds cannot manage and oversee anything properly. I did not say Democrats; I did not say Repubs; I said the federal government. Got it?
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FLPD Reply:
June 29th, 2012 at 1:30 pm
Perhaps you should re-read my post. I said you said Democrats’ methods are skewed and murky. Check your post at 9:41 a.m. I did not say anything about your comments about the feds not being able to manage or oversee anything properly. Check my post at 12:34 p.m. I think you should back up and take the deep breath. No apologies required.
Anonymous Reply:
June 29th, 2012 at 12:45 pm
TAX TAX TAX!
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allmaya Reply:
June 29th, 2012 at 10:06 pm
If government succeeds, Republican ideology fails.
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Dan C says:
If anyone wants to read what an intelligent conservative (you have to go outside the Texas GOP to find one) thinks should be done to actually offer an alternative to the ACA – read the post by David Frum on “the Daily Beast” referenced below. It is titled “After Waterloo”. He persuasively argues “ . . . conservative intransigence on healthcare in 2010 will look ever more reckless with the passing years. Republicans need to move rapidly to a more constructive approach.” Neanderthals like Perry and Cruz, and toadies like Abbott and Cornyn don’t get it. They just throw tantrums when they don’t get their way. By November, people are going to be so tired of them.
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2012/06/28/conservative-health-reform.html
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I'm Pavlov. Ring a Bell? says:
You piqued my interest with “intellgient conservative,” but then you lost me with “Daily Best” and “David Frum.” If that’s what passes for intelligent conservative in your book, then you need a new book.
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Incetardis Reply:
June 29th, 2012 at 11:40 am
David Frum worked in the White House writing speeches for President Bush. He’s also paid well to write and speak about his thoughts and opinions on current political events. He’s an accomplished author and has a J.D. from Harvard.
Whereas, you “Pavlov” post snarky comments on someone else’s blog.
Frum is light years ahead of you on any subject you care to mention, intelligent conservatism included.
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JohnBernardBooks says:
Two quick points liberals
I’m not here to argue with you. No one has ever changed a liberals mind with facts.
2nd I am here to make fun of you.
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John Johnson Reply:
June 29th, 2012 at 12:52 pm
Ha Ha Ha! Priceless. I’m giving you high marks for this post
Your turn Mustache, Col Mike, Anny, whoever. I’ll grade your retort from an unbiased position. I’ll tell ya though…this one will be hard to beat.
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Reality bites Reply:
June 29th, 2012 at 1:22 pm
That you think this is “priceless” is really sad. You’re like two 8 year olds laughing about having chocolate milk run out your nose. Let me know when you want to join us at the adult table.
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John Johnson Reply:
June 29th, 2012 at 2:17 pm
Come on, sour puss, it was funny. It is funny. The words have a clean, sharp edge to them. Nothing superfluous. Shockingly on point. Like a dagger.
Reality bites Reply:
June 29th, 2012 at 2:56 pm
Funny? Shockingly on point? I don’t know who you are but please release JJ. It’s obvious you are holding him captive and posting inane drivel in his name.
The Mustache That Dare Not Speak Its Name Reply:
June 29th, 2012 at 1:57 pm
Well, I’ll respond since I was asked to, though there’s really nothing to JBB’s comment worth noting other than that he has just admitted to being an internet troll. But I see you’re quite impressed, JJ, which, as Ross Perot might say, is just sad.
And in any case, I’ll point out what I mentioned upthread, namely that I called this decision months ago on the tax vs. Commerce Clause issue. Once again, always listen to the Mustache.
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anon Reply:
June 29th, 2012 at 2:03 pm
Make fun of what, JBB? You have not made a lick of sense yet. Your posts are more fun for the rest of us than they are for you to write. No one for one minute believes that you are being truthful, ther is not anyone in history that damned ignorant of facts.
John Johnson Reply:
June 29th, 2012 at 2:38 pm
Omar, your are no longer low man on the totem pole . Mustache’s retort scored a big zero. He does get credit, however, for giving Mr. Burka credit.
The Mustache That Dare Not Speak Its Name Reply:
June 29th, 2012 at 3:08 pm
And John continues to display his lack of reading comprehension skills and why the word “sad” has been used so often to describe him.
Omar Little Reply:
June 29th, 2012 at 1:09 pm
And I’m here to make fun of you.
Since you do “criminal profiling for the Gvmt” have you helped catch any criminals that we would’ve read about in the news?
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Anonymous Reply:
June 29th, 2012 at 1:13 pm
Sorry, Omar….low score. Real low. Anyone else?
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Omar Little Reply:
June 29th, 2012 at 3:21 pm
Cool! Thanks for the new ranking above, JJ.
A win by default is still a win.
Anonymous says:
Anita….
How many people have you PERSONALLY employed?
How many jobs have you PERSONALLY created?
How many businesses have you PERSONALLY started?
How many people have you PERSONALLY paid insurance not including your immediate family?
How many do you PERSONALLY support, not including immediate family?
How much employer taxes and benefits have you PERSONALLY paid to others?
The Unaffordable Care Tax is yet another burden on employers and citizens. Whatever benefits there may be to some, far far far outweigh the costs.
But you liberals and Obamaites believe the emperor really is clothed.
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Jim says:
David Frum is neither conservative nor intelligent. Read some of the garbage he has put out for at least the last 8 years and you will see he is an utter fool with a wannabe-Cassandra complex. Start with his columns relating to the Iraq war- those were pure gold.
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BCinBCS says:
In 1981, I was sitting in a philosophy class full of medical students. On that first day, the professor walked into the classroom, introduced himself and asked: “How many of you think that health care is a right and how many think that it is a privilege?” To my utter surprise, about one-fourth of those future doctors indicated that health care was a privilege. The show of hands to that question began a debate with myself that lasted twenty years about whether health care was a right or a privilege. I can now answer, without a doubt, that it is a right.
If health care is a right then how can it be provided to everyone and how can universal medical care be made affordable? For the next five years or so, I worked on this problem and developed a solution that provides universal health insurance, does not involve federal, state or local government control, removes insurance from being provided by the employer, uses the free market system, is totally portable, has a mechanism for funding and, best of all, reduces – or at least arrests – the rising cost of medical care. It is a plan that appeals to both liberals and conservatives.
I had hoped to introduce my plan after the Supreme Court found the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) unconstitutional because it violated the Commerce Clause. Of course, we know how that turned out!
If you would like to learn how a relatively simple solution can provide universal health care and lower the cost of medical care or if the article by David Frum introduced by Dan C on 6/29/12 @ 9:53am piqued your interest, I invite you to read my paper. Unfortunately, I do not have a web page so if you want to read it, send me an e-mail and I will send the paper as a reply.
This is not a scam and is not a method of collecting e-mail addresses. I will not sell, give away or in any other method distribute your e-mail address. If you are still uneasy sending me an e-mail, spend five minutes and set up a “throw away” e-mail address using Google Mail (GMail), Yahoo Mail or any of the other free e-mail services. And, I am most certainly not trying to sell anything. If universal health care and medical cost reduction interest you, this is worth your time and effort. My e-mail address is: bruceomniwin@gmail.com Please put “UHC” in the subject line.
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Spiro Eagleton says:
Dan Goeb, I mean Patrick, is all in for the Dew. This makes me want to vote for Cruz all the more!
Check out this story -
http://www.texastribune.org/texas-politics/2012-congressional-election/cruz-and-patrick-angrily-debate-dewhurst-record/
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Anonymous says:
Look out the window, people. The earth didn’t stop spinning on its axis (for those against science, the gnomes in the center of the earth didn’t stop running on the magical gnome habitrail wheel). And neither will it if it gets repealed next year. Did you see that Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes split today? Now thats news!
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FLPD says:
Wall Street Journal reports that…”Texas regulators voted Thursday to allow electricity generators to charge up to 50% more for wholesale power in the state, an action that critics worried would lead to sharply higher costs for residents and businesses in a hot summer that already is seeing usage records. Concerned about adequate electricity supplies, the Texas Public Utility Commission raised a price cap for wholesale electricity sales, already the highest in the nation, to $4,500 a megawatt hour from $3,000.” Wow. Highest in the nation.
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Anonymous says:
FLPD, please, thats just socialist talk. In Texas, everything is bigger, including my electric bill. And thats the way I like it. I’d rather pay an extra thousand dollars to some job creating corparation than spend twenty bucks in taxes.
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John Johnson says:
How’s deregulation working? This should tell you. Reason for moving to dereg was to move to free market system. Let supply and demand dictate price. It is not working.
KKR (Future Energy Holdings)paid $45 billion for TXU thinking that natural gas prices would keep moving upward. They could then sell all the electricity they produced using coal and nuclear fission for triple or quadruple what it cost to produce. With all the new dry gas plays the price per cubic foot hit bottom and KKR’s plans went south. They can make a profit even with today’s low prices, but they cannot service debt. They paid way too much. How do they save themselves? Find a way to get prices raised even with production costs at an alltime low. Tell the PUC that you won’t build any new plants unless the cap is raised. Since they and Reliant are by far and away the two largest producers in the state with each having interests in nuclear plants they have divided up and control the market. None of the little guys are going to cross them. They can drop wholesale prices in non-peak times and sink the little guys. The Airlines and insurance companies have done this. We now have four major carriers in the entire U.S. who have divided up the pie and have their own fiefdoms.
This is what Future Energy Holdings and Reliant have in mind. In essence, they already have it. They just need our PUC’s help in helping out FEH so they can service debt. Reliant won’t mind accepting their part of the windfall profits. If this summer’s heat is close to last, it will cost consumers a reported $4.7B more than it would have without the cap increase. That should go a long way toward taking the pressure off FEH.
We should name our Public Utility Commission the Utilities’ Utility Commission.
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FLPD Reply:
June 29th, 2012 at 5:14 pm
Exactly. This is the kind of factual information I count on you to provide, Johnson. Since we agree on this, how do we fix it? Maybe the oath of office for Texas’ elected (and appointed) officials should include a portion of the oath for U.S. Supreme Court justices:”…and do equal right to the poor and to the rich…”.
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allmaya Reply:
June 29th, 2012 at 10:19 pm
Thanks JJ. I was unaware of this backstory.
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John Johnson says:
Alas, my dear FLPD, better men have tried, and better men have died. It’s next to impossible.
FDR broke up electric holding companies once upon a time for doing the exact same thing that is going on right now in Texas with electricty…and insurance companies, oil and gas companies, hospitals, drug manufacturers, etc. are doing the same thing nationwide. Buy out or run off the small companies, divide up the pie and collude to control supply and demand, and pricing.
This cannot be reversed as long as the supreme court allows corporations to buy votes. KKR and Reliant spent a reported $13M back during the 2007 legislative session and employed over 100 lobbyists to cover Austin from stem to stern with handfuls of throw around money. They got everything the wanted from both Repubs and Dems alike. There were powerful Dem and Repub campaign givers who invested huge sums in the KKR deal.
I get great pleasure knowing that right now they are taking a bath on that deal, but they haven’t given up. Don’t think that powerful players weren’t involved behind the scenes with the PUC ruling yesterday.
TM should sic a bulldog reporter on this story. It has all the makings for a good book.
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John Johnson Reply:
June 30th, 2012 at 10:59 am
And if you will allow me (I know many could give a hoot about electricity prices, I want to make one more point. We need to go back to regulated elecricity.
What corporate head if promised a steady profit margin when fuel supplies fluctuate up and down, and knowing that additional funds were collected on each bill that went into escrow for additional generating plants when demand called of it would turn this deal down? I will tell you who, people like DeLay at Enron who proposed going to a deregulated market in the first place, and those guys running private equity companies like KKR, who gamble on natural gas prices skyrocketing and what to make a killing.
We would get rid of all the confusing “price to beat” retail providers who are nothing more than unneeded middlemen and just make our electricity more expensive. They don’t generate electricity, they don’t erect and maintain powerlines, they just buy and resell power and bill us for it. They are the proverbial tits on a boar hog.
Natural gas prices are going to go up bigtime when the Gulf coast export terminals are completed, and when Pickens finally convinces the feds to push freight hauling trucks to use NG. Our electricity rates could easily double – more if coal is removed from the equation as a fuel source. Then the KKR’s are really going to be happy. We are really going to be sad…..No, make that mad.
I would suggest that our PUC initiate a study to see what going back to regulation would entail and the results of doing so with the consumer in mind…not the Big’s.
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JohnBernardBooks says:
Dems have an afliction its called taxNspend, they are so ashamed they won’t acknowledge its a tax.
cumon dems manup
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John Johnson's Doppelgänger Reply:
June 29th, 2012 at 5:43 pm
Ha Ha Ha! Priceless. I’m giving you high marks for this post
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John Johnson Reply:
June 29th, 2012 at 6:16 pm
Thanks…and for those of you wondering why I voted for Wendy Davis against Kim Brimer. It was because Brimer was one of the most active waterboys for KKR back in 2007. I watched Wendy fight for the most lowly of her constituent base whe she was on the FW city council knocking heads with Moncrief, the democratic mayor who has always been chummy with the Big’s. He was, in fact, backing the the Repub Brimer over her. I added “Republicans voting for” across the top of one of Wendy’s 4×4 yard signs. She has not disappointed us. Don’t agree with her on some social points, but know that she is going to represent Texans’ best interest, not those of holding companies and big corporations. The rest of you Repubs, Dems and Indies need to find you a Wendy.
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Tom says:
All the wingers cry like babies, but still can’t answer why they want to go back to the good old days of emergency rooms filled with patients that can’t pay. And the rest of us picking up the tab.
You honestly prefer that to ObamaCare? You can’t be serious.
Too much irony here. ObamaCare patterned on Mitt Romney’s baby and John Roberts telling conservatives he’s joining the liberal elites.
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Anonymous says:
Tommy, me boy. WHo’s going to pay for it. What guarantees that cost will drop? Federal oversight. Has that ever worked?
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Kraege Polan says:
I will use my real name and not hide some made up name.I read many blogs daily.I have never run across a responder that is more ignorant about what is happening in the real world than Johnbennardbrooks. HE MUST NOT WORK AT A FAST FOOD JOINT AS i PEG HIM AS AN ORDERLY AT A MENTAL INSTUTION THAT HAS STOLEN A PATIENT”S MEDS.RSTAURANT eMPLOYEES HAVE SENSE.
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allmaya says:
Kraege, the usage of allcaps is like screaming in a crowded elevator. It should be reserved for the most extreme circumstances.
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Simon Reply:
July 1st, 2012 at 8:38 am
Yes and do not taunt JBB. You have to remember that old west Texas saying: Never wrestle with a pig…you get dirty and the pig likes it.
Allmaya: OTOH, JBB is rather extreme .
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John Johnson says:
BCinBCS posted@ 1:40 today that he had an alternative plan for a universal healthcare plan and offered to share this plan with whoever might be interested. I asked him to send it to me and found it to be very informative and thought provoking. I encourage all of you to take a look.
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Anonymous says:
Enrique Marquez says Dewhurst is the one that has been leading the fight against Obamacare in Texas. Are all Dewhurst staffers this full of shit?
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anita says:
You all should read the decision you are now citing — the first issue they rule on is whether the penalty is a tax, and they conclude that it is not a tax, therefore allowing the case to move forward, not barred by the Anti-Injunction Act.
Later, a majority concludes that the penalty is valid as an exercise of the taxing clause.
Ironically (or perhaps not), Rep. Gohmert ranted about this yesterday on the House floor, to the point that he confused himself and everyone listening about how he thought it was a tax before he thought it wasn’t a tax and now thinks it is a tax before concluding it was’t a tax.
Of course, those who wanted to get the case before the Court in hopes of striking it down, to avoid the bar of the Anti-Injunction Act, argued strenuously that it wasn’t a tax — and prevailed. Now they don’t like the outcome, and want to argue it is a tax. Which one is it?
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John Johnson says:
Go ask Obama, Anita. He all but screamed it wasn’t a tax but Dem lawyers submitted argument stating that it was. Which is it? It is now a tax per SCOTUS.
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FLPD Reply:
June 30th, 2012 at 10:41 am
Several million people are expected to pay the penalty for not having insurance by 2016, I believe. As I understand it, the only authority the federal government had to enforce the penalty was to withhold tax refunds. They couldn’t (and we wouldn’t want them to) take their houses or something. So, in my view, withholding a tax refund is a smart & fair way to collect the penalty and to get some Americans who are paying nothing for health care to at least pay a little.
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JohnBernardBooks Reply:
June 30th, 2012 at 10:50 am
ex-Speaker Pelosi said if you didn’t pay up you should go to jail.
No rational person would make this statement or many of the others ex-Speaker Pelosi has made, ie “we have to pass this bill before we can find out whats in it.
What was in it was the hiring of 17,000 additional IRS agents to collect this tax which democrats say isn’t a tax.
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donuthin Reply:
June 30th, 2012 at 12:05 pm
Much like the fees in Texas; it is a tax.
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John Johnson says:
The Rebpub’s have their Gohmert’s; the Dem’s their Pelosi’s. Gohmert is a poor man; Pelosi and her husband have made millions off insider deals since she has been in office. I’ll take the Gohmert’s anyday.
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FLPD Reply:
June 30th, 2012 at 11:14 am
It was interesting exchanging views with you, Johnson.
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John Johnson Reply:
June 30th, 2012 at 1:13 pm
Likewise. Glad you brought it up.
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anita Reply:
June 30th, 2012 at 1:58 pm
Gohmert is a lawyer, he’s far from being a poor man.
Just for laughs, you should really watch his video from the House floor yesterday. It’s almost as good as his debacle with Anderson Cooper claiming anchor babies were going to blow up Houston.
It’s dolts like this that make the world cringe when they think of Texas. We are the new Mississippi.
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longleaf Reply:
June 30th, 2012 at 5:23 pm
http://www.texastribune.org/texas-representatives-in-congress/us-congress/poorest-texas-congressmen-tout-house-diversity/
It is a fact. Gohmert really is not well … off.
He is a good representative for his district, though, in terms of his relative poverty. He has a lot of people in trailer parks voting for him along with the doctors in south Tyler.
To me, this is the biggest political miracle people like Rove pulled off in Texas beginning about 40 years ago. They convinced people “without a pot to pee in” to vote for the GOPers religiously (literally so, as the First Baptist Church pastors of Anytown, Texas, tell them in sermons it is their sacred duty to vote for “God’s Own Party”).
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John Johnson Reply:
June 30th, 2012 at 5:28 pm
Grew up Episcopalian. Wife was Bsptist. I’m now Baptist. In my 20 + years in Baptist churches I have never heard on pastor say vote Republican or vote for so and so.
John Johnson Reply:
June 30th, 2012 at 5:31 pm
Anita, do you just assume that all attorneys are wealthy? We’re overloaded with. More per capita than any country in the world. Many are not doing well.
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anita Reply:
June 30th, 2012 at 8:10 pm
No, I don’t. But I believe they (we) have the ability to use our professional degree to earn a living that is beyond the average per capita in our state.
In the article Longleaf cited, one of Gohmert’s fellow GOP members, in explaining the wealth of himself and other members, stated “success breeds success”. Perhaps the corollary is true for Gohmert.
longleaf Reply:
July 1st, 2012 at 5:30 am
JJ, the Southern Baptists and others of their ilk hand out issues-oriented “voter guides” from the “Moral Majority”-style political groups during election years. It is all very carefully orchestrated so as to avoid stepping over the bright lines of the IRS.
You are bound to know this already. So you’re right and I was exaggerating for effect. The pastors who step across the line in sermons are the careless ones, but I’ve heard them do so in my rural area.
Anonymous Reply:
June 30th, 2012 at 5:35 pm
Don’t cringe any more than I do when Shiela Jackson Lee makes some outlandish comment.
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FLPD says:
I move that we reassign a few thousand of those agents to look into Americans with Swiss bank accounts. I think that will have a higher yield. And by the way, former Governor Romney answered a reporter’s question back in the day about the Mass health care tax by saying it wasn’t a tax, it was just a fee or assessment or whatever.
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JohnBernardBooks Reply:
June 30th, 2012 at 1:03 pm
Democrats knew they couldn’t pass the Obamatax care law under the commerce clause so THEY argued before SCOTUS that it was a tax. They won by calling it a tax but now want to deny that they called it a tax because they know people like Anita, Julie and Willie will believe them.
LBJ was right if you tell a lie enough democrats will believe you.
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Anonymous says:
Anita….Still waiting on a answer ….
How many people have you PERSONALLY employed?
How many jobs have you PERSONALLY created?
How many businesses have you PERSONALLY started?
How many people have you PERSONALLY paid insurance not including your immediate family?
How many do you PERSONALLY support, not including immediate family?
How much employer taxes and benefits have you PERSONALLY paid to others?
The Unaffordable Care Tax is yet another burden on employers and citizens. Whatever benefits there may be to some, far far far outweigh the costs.
But you liberals and Obamaites believe the emperor really is clothed.
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donuthin Reply:
June 30th, 2012 at 8:04 pm
You are outta line.
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Anonymous Reply:
June 30th, 2012 at 8:06 pm
huh? It’s easy to support something when you aren’t paying
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Anon Reply:
June 30th, 2012 at 8:10 pm
Fair questions…only asking numbers. Don’t see anything wrong with that. But then libs don’t like to answer questions ….
allmaya Reply:
June 30th, 2012 at 11:11 pm
So, by your logic Anon, only people who have served in the military are entitled to have an opinion on whether we should invade a country.
buy a clue says:
and you know this how??
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Anonymous Reply:
June 30th, 2012 at 8:03 pm
Buy a Clue…….GET A CLUE. It is apparent who are the givers and who are the receivers on this blog.
Ask any business owner how this will financially affect them and therefore some will have to lay off workers, not expand, and/or pass on the costs of this TAX to the consumers.
And I know this how? I AM THAT BUSINESS OWNER!!!
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buy a clue Reply:
July 1st, 2012 at 1:37 pm
more scare quotes from faux news. Since JJ is screaming that no one in the world knows exactly what is in this bill and can tell people how they will be affected why don’t you enlighten everyone on this board on exactly what the specific monetary costs of this bill are. Tell us the costs to business with 50 employees or more that don’t currently provide health insurance, businesses that employ 50 or more that do provide health insurance and businesses that employ less than 50. I await your thoughtful and fact filled response.
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100 Year Decision Reply:
July 2nd, 2012 at 9:02 am
I own a small business with just under 100 employees. We recognize that providing some sort of coverage is necessary to have a decent workforce. This bill will have very little effect on our business as we can MANAGE it, without laying off people. Seems to me we have a lot of piss-poor managers out there that can’t handle a work around, or can read the new law.
anita says:
I am too. I employ about 150 in my Austin office. Hard to say how many jobs I’ve “created” — this is more of a term that politicians like to use. I can’t say that I’ve personally started a business — I’ve had partners, we’ve shared risk and we’ve been successful. I don’t know the answers to the rest of your questions — I’ve obviously paid a significant amount in taxes and benefits.
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Anon says:
Anita, glad to know you are gainfully employed. If you were a business owner you would know the answers to those questions because you would be paying it. As it is you are fortunate to have “partners” and therefore “share” the costs. Some business people carry the burden alone. It is difficult and becoming even more so to realize the Anerican dream. The current President has not helped any.
This isn’t about Rep and Dem. it is about sound economics and job creation and personal choice.. I am a conservative by nature, but I liked Clinton’s economic policies and did quite well, not so well under Bush, and have had to close offices and lay off workers under Obama. This new TAX will only make things worse
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anita Reply:
July 1st, 2012 at 9:54 am
I can certainly find out the answers that I’ve not answered to your satisfaction — my profession involves providing professional services, and I have a management team.
The line of questioning disturbs me, though. We are Americans, and long ago we decided that we would form a government that, in theory, gave all an equal say in it’s outcomes. The employer should have an equal say as the employee. The CEO the same say as the janitor. The landowner the same say as the tenant farmer.
I’m happy to play your little game, but the American Dream means different things to different people. I imagine there are many who feel that their ability to pursue the American Dream will be assisted when the burden of healthcare is addressed — it is the largest driver in Americans having to declare personal bankruptcy. And it impacts Texas disproportionately — we have the largest amount of uninsured in America.
I’ve said it before and will repeat — ACA is not perfect, but it’s an improvement, and the status quo is unsustainable.
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JohnBernardBooks says:
Anita still believes OJ is innocent because he was found not guilty.
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donuthin says:
LOL, you anon’s aren’t able to give intelligent responses so you attack. Don’t often align with Anita’s views but respect them as she is far better at articulating them than those of you who question her credentials.
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Sam Reply:
June 30th, 2012 at 9:32 pm
I don’t see any “attacks”. Only questions. It’s the libs that attack.
And formthe record, ….credentials are declarations of qualification capabilities and competences issued to an individual by a third party with a relevant or de facto authority or assumed competence to do so.
Her “credentials” we’re not being questioned.
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donuthin says:
cre·den·tial /krɪˈdɛnʃəl/ noun
plural cre·den·tials
[count] 1 : a quality, skill, or experience that makes a person suited to do a job
▪ My experience as a manager is my strongest credential. — usually plural. Webster definition.
your definition is way too narrow. But if you prefer, her qualifications were being questioned. They would be relevant questions if you were interviewing her for a job but rude for a blog.
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Charlie Adaway says:
I support President Obama and the ACA and I am a small business owner.
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Cow Droppings Reply:
July 1st, 2012 at 7:32 am
hope you don’t have 50 employees or more…or you are about to get much smaller. Because big brother is about to hit you with a massive tax in the name of social engineering.
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John Johnson Reply:
July 1st, 2012 at 8:29 am
CD’s having to point this facet of Obamacare out to Charlie and the rest of us, is indicative of the major problem with the program. No one knows what all is about to come down on us. Ask your congressman, be they Dem or Repub. They won’t be able to answer specific questions. They will just be able to repeat party talking points. The devil is in the details has never been so appropriate a statement. It fits perfectly here.
I predict that the indigents will be happy. The insurance companies, doctors, hosptials and drug companies will be happy. The rest of us from the lower middle class on up will be howling.
I further predict that Obama’s legacy will not be an enviable one. He allowed the lobbyists he was going to all but run out of Washington, to write the healthcare law for him. He surrounded himself with advisors that cut their teeth working for politicians in Chicago…the most corrupt in the country. He’s is nothing more than an excellent public speaker and good father. I do not see one other enviable attribute. If you do, you have poor vision.
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anita Reply:
July 1st, 2012 at 10:07 am
You decry party talking points, then give us a heaping dose of them.
You see what you want to see. I admire this president. He’s achieved some fairly significant things while dealing with an obstinate opposition party. And the vitriol hurled at him has been excessive, to say the least. It is beyond policy, it’s clearly personal. It makes me sad, as an American, to see.
John Johnson Reply:
July 1st, 2012 at 11:11 am
Did he promise to cut ties w/ lobbyists? Did they write most of the healthcare law? Can anyone tell us what is in the law and exactly how it will affect us? What did I say that was not true?
anita Reply:
July 1st, 2012 at 4:25 pm
You said you’ve not seen any enviable traits in this president.
I believe he’s deftly steered us through a financial crisis (that began during the term of and due to the policies of his predecessor), he showed the leadership to save the domestic automobile industry, he showed the resolve to take out Osama Bin Laden, he showed the courage to end the childish ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ policy, he showed the guts to end the deportation of the children of illegals — who had no say in how or why they arrived here, he showed principle in opposing an unconstitutional Arizona statute that made any person with brown pigment subject to harassment, he’s steadfastly defended the voting rights of American citizens, and he’s tackled, at tremendous political risk, one of the issues that has been a “third rail” of American politics for too long — an unsustainable, broken health care system.
You may not like the results, but I think you have to acknowledge the effectiveness of this president in pursuit of objectives.
John Johnson Reply:
July 1st, 2012 at 6:01 pm
I will certainly acknowledge his pursuit of objectives. No argument about that whatsoever.
It is such a pity that he prioritized these objectives in such a skewed order.
The country is in a financial meltdown, brought about by felonious actions in the residential mortgage sector…beginning when Dodd and Frank started calling the shots at Sallie Mae/Freddie Mac. Senator Obama took large contributions from them. Dood got a brother-in-law deal through them, and the Bush administation warned Dodd/Frank’s committee a reported 17 times that a crisis was looming.
Bush is responsible…but not entirely, but I will agree that he was responsible. It happened on his watch.
So now Obama takes over and the auto industry is “saved”. I could debate, but I will not. Let’s mark this up as an Obama positive. That’s all I’m giving you.
From there, when the economy is tanking, and after promising to save jobs,get the immigration issue resolved, run lobbyists off,and reform Wall Street, he decides instead to reform our healthcare system. Right in the middle of an economic meltdown, he keeps giving money away to green energy phonies who are bundling money for his poltical machine’s bank account. Billions are flushed down the drain; a large part of it goes to foreign companies supplying parts to these born to fail companies. In the interim, he files suit on AZ for attempting to curb illegal immigration after repeated pleas for the feds to do their job has fallen on deaf ears.
The economy continues to teeter. His idea of immigration reform is to dangle a carrot to the Hispanic population of the U.S. just prior to elections, and he simply gave his OK to make an attempt on Obama after U.S. intelligence found him. How much credit can you give him for that? I suggest about as much as you would Caesar after one gladiator had another on the ground, and he either flipped his thumb up or down?
Admit it, Anita, you are eaten up with anythng Dem. You cannot look at anything objectively. You are a Hatfield fighting the McCoy’s. Loyal to a fault. There are too many like you on both sides of the equation. Thus the reason for the shape we are in. Nothing gets done. Bring back Clinton and Newt. Bring back Ronald and Tip. Bring back sanity. It is going to be up to the 42%’ers in the middle to get ‘ur done.
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anita Reply:
July 1st, 2012 at 9:17 pm
Perhaps you’re correct — I’m smitten with Obama. But let’s take a quick moment to review something that you are dismissive of — his taking out of OBL.
Bush had at least two opportunities to do this, but it never happened. Perhaps he was spooked by having to take too hard a line against his ally in the region, Pakistan. Perhaps he was distracted by the search for WMD that never existed. Perhaps he was distracted by the neocons on his staff who pushed him into unnecessary skirmishes to settle old scores. Whatever it was, Bush never could make it happen.
Obama stuck with it. They performed a surgical operation in another country — and even when a helicopter was lost, the president said push on. Knowing how the loss of helicopters can cripple a mission (a la Carter in 1979), it took some balls to press on. Obama and his team made it happen, and they restored America’s pride in so doing. He enabled our best soldiers and military personnel to do what they do best — perform. This is not something to be so easily dismissed.
buy a clue Reply:
July 1st, 2012 at 9:38 pm
Bring back Newt, bring back sanity??? Are you kidding me. What does Newtie boy have to do with sanity? Like all republicans, he’s a first class grifter. Fleecing the rubes just like you.
John Johnson Reply:
July 1st, 2012 at 10:19 pm
Bush, Bush, Bush, Bush, Bush! I’m not judging him against Bush, or Clinton, for that matter. I am judging Obama on who he is and what he has done. Please don’t embellish his role in Bin Laden’s death. We think we have found him. Want to go? Yes or no?
With regards to making a monumental go/no go decision after the mishap, it didn’t happen. When chopper went down, SEALs got their bearings and proceeded with mission without any input from Obama. The only decision Obama made after OK’ing the mission was to add a couple of SEAL laden backup Choppers in case they had to fight their way out of Pakistan. He was Caesar; he simply gave the gladiator SEALs a thumbs up to proceed.
John Johnson Reply:
July 1st, 2012 at 10:25 pm
Buy a clue….how old are you? Think what you will about SpeakerNewt but he worked with President Clinton to get positive things done instead of entering into an impasse like we have today. Know anything about it?
FLPD Reply:
July 1st, 2012 at 11:44 pm
Johnson @10:19, you state the President was presented with “We think we have found him. Want to go? Yes or no?…He was Caesar; he simply gave the gladiator SEALS a thumbs up to proceed.” I guess you might have some insider’s intel that I don’t have, but I’ve tried to read some credible accounts of the events. The President’s options were: bomb the compound with less risk but less assurance Osama could be positively identified; wait and monitor the site a little longer to be absolutely sure it’s him; send in the Seals immediately. The President’s advisors were divided. You don’t have to like or respect President Obama to give him credit for his persistence and, quite frankly, for having a spine.
John Johnson Reply:
July 2nd, 2012 at 6:08 am
Caesar, I have my opponent on the ground. My foot is on his neck. I can dispatch him with a gladius, a fascina, or a sica, or you can spare him. If you choose to spare him you will greatly anger those who have so eagerly been awaiting my opponents demise. Up or down?
I give Obama credit for making the right decision. The bulk of the praise goes to our intelligence community and SEALS.
I don’t even give him as much credit for this “victory” as I would Mac Brown for winning a national championship. Not only does Mac call the plays, he is personally responsible for developing a gameplan, and he trains the team on how to get it done. Obama is Deloss Dodds.
buy a clue Reply:
July 2nd, 2012 at 7:09 am
HA, the same Newt who threw a hissy fit because he had to sit on the back of Air Force One?? The same one who shut down the government?? He is he father of the republican morons running the House now. Stop looking at the past through your wingnut colored glasses.
John Johnson Reply:
July 2nd, 2012 at 8:50 am
buy a clue, please go join Anita in the “I am a total biased”, “can’t see things objectively” line. Newt definitely likes himself, makes rash statements, and has a proclivity for pissing people off, but he DID work with Clinton to keep the government going forward and the two of them got things done. You can deny this fact if you want to. Clinton has grudgingly acknowledged his respect for Newt, but not you. Go figure.
buy a clue Reply:
July 2nd, 2012 at 9:52 am
Love your logic. “If you don’t agree with me 100% you’re totally biased.” Here’s a thought grandpa, look in the mirror. You like to pretend you’re the sage voice of reason, but you’re just as wingnutty as your hero, jbb.
Anon Reply:
July 2nd, 2012 at 8:59 am
I have 135, and it will have little effect on myu business. Wonder whay so many right wingers have so much trouble running theirs?
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John Johnson Reply:
July 2nd, 2012 at 3:00 pm
buy a clue, you don’t have to agree with me 100%. If you’ve followed this blog for very long, you would know that I think both you people pressing the wall on the far left, and your counterparts doing the same on the opposite side, are a waste and should just be ignored as much as possible. You will never be part of any solution.
I lean a bit to the right, but I dislike the Republican party just about as much as I do the Dem one. I am a 42%’er, although I bet this number has grown.
JBB is a far right guy. He pushes his agenda by making fun of the rest of you. I disagree with him on a regular basis, but he gives me a break because he knows that I am not one of you. I know that he is sharp. I know that he pokes and prods you to see how many foul names you can come up with and to see what childish remarks will be in your responses. He plays you like like a fiddle.
buy a clue Reply:
July 2nd, 2012 at 3:22 pm
“You will never be part of any solution.”
and your evidence to come to this conclusion is that we don’t agree with you 100% of the time. But it’s not evidence that YOU are part of the problem. Why?? because you’re special.
You don’t even know what “far left” means. It’s just something that you say by rote, like reciting the lord’s prayer. Spare me your analysis. Stop kidding yourself, you and jbb are cut from the same cloth.
John Johnson Reply:
July 2nd, 2012 at 6:57 pm
You make my point so well for me, newbe. You don’t mind if I call you that do you, buy a clue?
You, and your ilk, never agree with anyone else 1% of the time.
buy a clue Reply:
July 2nd, 2012 at 11:03 pm
As I stated before, your evidence of this is that we don’t agree with you 100% of the time therefore you jump to the absurd conclusion that we don’t agree with anyone 1% of the time. You keep proving my point that you and jbb are more alike than you can stand to admit.
Bob the Builder says:
Anons and Sam…….
Never argue with a fool. They will bring you down to their level and beat you with experience
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JohnBernardBooks Reply:
July 1st, 2012 at 9:42 am
exactly, in 2006 Rep Pelosi said on Meet the Press “if we can drag republicans down to our level we can win in Nov. If the help of the MSM, democrats were able to falsely accuse republicans of every thing democrats were doing. The gullible bought it hook line and sinker giving us Speaker Nancy dingbat Pelosi leading to President Amateur and a $15 trillion deficit.
Now the democrats who passed the largest tax bill in history are telling the gullible “its not a tax”…wink wink
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longleaf Reply:
July 2nd, 2012 at 6:41 am
I can’t let that about Mack Brown calling the plays for Texas go uncorrected. I don’t know if he has EVER called the plays in his years there, but FOR SURE he doesn’t know and hasn’t in many years. This is the reason Greg Davis was fired before last season. He was thrown under the bus for his play-calling. It appears to me that now, more than ever, Mack Brown is the delegator-in-chief. He can be compared to Ronald Reagan in the last few years of his White House tenure, although I don’t think there’s any evidence Brown is actually losing his mind yet.
Meet Bryan Harsin:
“He’s not only installing a new offense and CALLING THE PLAYS (emphasis added), but he’s also replacing Davis, a coach who groomed the top two quarterbacks in school history (Vince Young and Colt McCoy) and who produced the top nine scoring seasons in school history during his 13-year tenure.
http://texas.247sports.com/Article/Inside-Bryan-Harsin-16200
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John Johnson Reply:
July 2nd, 2012 at 7:02 am
Metaphorically speaking, longleaf. He decides which offense will be utilized…what plays are in the play book.
Anon Reply:
July 2nd, 2012 at 8:58 am
incorrect, JBB. Pelosi never said that.
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JohnBernardBooks Reply:
July 2nd, 2012 at 9:40 am
prove it
Pudding Reply:
July 2nd, 2012 at 11:23 am
Transcript of Pelosi’s only 2006 MTP appearance:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/12612211/ns/meet_the_press/t/transcript-may/#.T_HIirWe5V4
buy a clue Reply:
July 2nd, 2012 at 11:47 am
Wow, jbb proven to be full of shit once again. Hold the presses for that dog bites man story.
Anonymous Reply:
July 2nd, 2012 at 1:51 pm
JBB is one of the most outrageous liars ever to post. And he’ll never respond when caught in one of his many, many lies.
buy a clue Reply:
July 2nd, 2012 at 2:14 pm
One man’s lies are another man’s “compelling arguments”. /sarcasm
Tom says:
The wingers are having problems getting their facts straight.
“But Republicans are now saying it’s the ‘biggest tax increase in history’ – either of America or the universe of whatever. But this is demonstrably false.
The Congressional Budget Office says the mandate penalty will raise $27 billion between 2012 and 2021. $27 billion over a decade. Anybody who cares to can do the math. But if you want to call it a ‘tax increase’ – which is debatable – it’s clearly one of tiniest ones in history.”
And for those wingers who claim this is a giant overreach of Washington power, not even close. Some of us were drafted during the Vietnam War. You have no idea of the power of the federal government until it comes into your home, takes you away, and gives you no say on your short term future.
So yes, some of us are feeling very fortunate that Mitt Romney pioneered the individual mandate and John Roberts agreed the liberal elites got it right.
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Anonymous Reply:
July 1st, 2012 at 8:38 pm
Thank you for serving in our armed forces. The service of you that were drafted, along with those who volunteered, in WW1, WWII, the Korean War and the war in Vietnam is the principal reason you can vote for who you want and openly criticize at will. That being said, I have that right as well. You are a misguided nitwit.
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FLPD Reply:
July 1st, 2012 at 9:23 pm
I would be embarrassed to sign my name to that post, also, anonymous. Ridicule, derision, insults, sarcasm. There really is no excuse to call a veteran of any of this nation’s wars a misguided nitwit. You must not have watched the nightly news during the Vietnam War. If you had you would have stopped at “Thank you for serving in our armed forces.”
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anita Reply:
July 1st, 2012 at 9:32 pm
Classless is what it is. Jeez.
anony Reply:
July 2nd, 2012 at 8:56 am
The principal reason we can vote is the constiution says we can.
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JohnBernardBooks says:
“But if you want to call it a ‘tax increase’ – which is debatable”
“However, five Justices agreed that the penalty that someone must pay if he refuses to buy insurance is a kind of tax that Congress can impose using its taxing power.”
Dems never met a tax they didn’t love want everyone to believe this law isn’t a tax. How silly.
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baybear says:
It is debatable. And the part about Democrats loving taxes is foolish.
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JohnBernardBooks Reply:
July 2nd, 2012 at 9:41 am
“And the part about Democrats loving taxes is foolish”
no that statement was foolish.
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Anonymous Reply:
July 2nd, 2012 at 9:49 am
Wow, more compelling arguments from jbb. I’m sure big bro JJ will be along any minute now to pat you on the head and give you a cookie.
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John Johnson Reply:
July 2nd, 2012 at 3:01 pm
See above.
BAYBEAR says:
Sorta new to thsi blog, I’m assuming JBB is the clown prince?
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JohnBernardBooks says:
JJB is the grownup in room, many do not like this
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buy a clue Reply:
July 2nd, 2012 at 2:54 pm
Who is this JJB of which you speak?
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BAYBEAR says:
Got it
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Anonymous says:
More flip-flops from Romney:
“It was a penalty, and the governor had all the authority he needed under our state constitution to put in the reforms that he did put in place,” Romney adviser Eric Fehrnstrom said this morning on MSNBC. “The governor has consistently described the mandate in Massachusetts as a penalty.”
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anita says:
I’m interested in another political aspect of the ACA; clearly there are some moral issues in play here. In my mind, it’s hard to be pro-life and believe the suffering that comes with our current health care system is acceptable. Poverty should not be the determining factor in hastening the end of a person’s natural life.
So does the moralist wing of the Republican party succumb to the ‘free market’ economics wing of the Party on this? How does that work?
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allmaya says:
Anita, for too many conservatives, methinks there is a direct relationship between how much melanin a person has and how acceptable it is for that person to suffer.
This is precisely why we are so late adopt a national system of health care. It is much easier to fund a system where almost everybody looks like you.
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JohnBernardBooks says:
first SCOTUS ruled Obamacare was tax they did not rule Romneycare was a tax.
second a state has the right to implode like Mass or Michigan if they choose. The federal guv didn’t have the right to mandate your behavior before last thursday.
SCOTUS ruled the fed gvmt could tax you to make you change your behavior.a new low for America.
Wow!
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anita Reply:
July 2nd, 2012 at 7:56 pm
JBB, I typically pass on responding to you, but this is just too easy.
There are tens of thousands of persons cooling their heels in federal prisons who would love for your statement that the federal government can’t compel behavior to be true.
You funny …
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Anonymous Reply:
July 2nd, 2012 at 8:07 pm
How far can you twist and contort any given statement ?
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JohnBernardBooks Reply:
July 2nd, 2012 at 9:10 pm
Like OJ?
would that have changed OJ’s behavior if Anita and dems could have made them pay a tax?
now thats funny I don’t care who you are.
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anita says:
Statement from the Romney Campaign, issued today:
“The governor disagreed with the ruling of the court, he agreed with the dissent that was written by Justice Scalia, that very clearly said that the mandate was not a tax,” Eric Fehrnstrom said on MSNBC. “The governor believes what we put in place in Massachusetts was a penalty and he disagrees with the Court’s ruling that the mandate was a tax.”
So there you have it, from the Republican nominee for president.
Case closed.
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BCinBCS Reply:
July 2nd, 2012 at 7:54 pm
Anita,
Would you contact me personally at:
bruceomniwin@gmail.com
I have a small favor/opinion to ask of you.
Reply »
JohnBernardBooks says:
I’ll repeat it as obviously anita didn’t get it.
first SCOTUS ruled Obamacare was tax they did not rule Romneycare was a tax.
second states can choose if they want to impode like Calif, Mass and Michigan etc.
As of thursday thanks to SCOTUS the fed gvmt can TAX any behavior they decide they want to force you to change.
wow!
Reply »
BCinBCS Reply:
July 2nd, 2012 at 9:33 pm
JJB, the government has always been able to levy taxes to change behavior. Examples of this include cigarette taxes, alcohol taxes, marijuana taxes, etc.
SCOTUS did not grant the government the power to do this, it merely confirmed that it always had the right to do it.
I don’t like to attack people for their beliefs but when you take one grain of sand’s worth of truth and try to build an entire beach of falsehood with it, you make it very hard to resist.
Reply »
JohnBernardBooks Reply:
July 3rd, 2012 at 7:00 am
another uninformed democrat
“One of the central questions in the Obamacare ruling is whether Congress has the power to tax inactivity or tax the failure to purchase something. This is the most obvious retort to the cigarettes analogy. Granted, Congress has the power to tax the purchase of a cigarette, but does Congress possess the power to tax you for not purchasing a cigarette?”
see how hard was that?
Reply »
Omar Little Reply:
July 3rd, 2012 at 8:54 am
I would think someone who’s a professional criminal profiler would understand the different societal outcomes between cigarettes and health insurance.
Choosing to smoke = Bad for one and all.
Buying health insurance = Good for one and all.
Instead of being involved in public policy and politics, maybe you should stick to finding elusive criminals through your vast knowledge of the human psyche and protecting the good people of Fort Bend County.
BCinBCS Reply:
July 3rd, 2012 at 5:56 pm
JBB,
Do you live on another planet? Do you not understand English?
I get taxed constantly for roads that were built with my dollars that I don’t and never will use, I am taxed for airports that I will never fly into, I am taxed for schools that I will never have children attend as well as a multitude of other government programs.
Now I realize that you will try to change the subject yet again (your original post complained about the government having the authority to tax to change behavior. When clearly demonstrated that they do, you now say that they can’t tax inactivity vs taxing when one purchases something), so let me ask you a hypothetical: If you do not pay your income taxes, does the government have the authority to fine you – after all, that would be a “tax” for not doing something? There are many other examples such as this but I doubt that they will change your closed mind.
Robert Morrow says:
Healthcare is boring. But John Kennedy’s unhinged sex life was not. Evelyn Lincoln, JFK’s secretary for 12 years, said that LBJ and Sam Rayburn used Hoover’s dossier on JFK as a form of sexual blackmail at the 1960 Demo convention as a way to force JFK to put the despised LBJ on the ticket as VP.
Commentary from C.W. Porter:
•JFK did Lee Radziwill, Jackie’s sister when Jackie was in hospital with Caroline [?].
•JFK did Audrey Hepburn [?]
•JFK did Jayne Mansfield for 3 years [?]
•He also did Gene Tierney [X] [Reeves, p. 83] and Marlene Dietrich [Dietrich was allegedly bisexual and preferred women, but supposedly claimed to have slept with 3 of the 4 Kennedys: the Old Man, Jack and Bobby. Oh, well, if the price is right. Dietrich was also married for about 50 years although she did not live with her husband all that time. So who knows? - C.P.]
•Other actresses tied to JFK in the press were Kim Novak, Janet Leigh and Rhonda Fleming [they were present at the inaugural party and ball. That's all I can tell so far. - C.P.].
•Angie Dickinson [X] [Reeves, pp. 235-36] commenting on JFK’s brutal lovemaking style called it “the best 20 seconds of my life.” [?]
•Jackie said JFK was a flop as a lover. She told a friend he “just goes too fast and falls asleep” as reported in the book GRACE AND POWER by Sally Smith [Many other women said the same thing. In other words, he was as egotistical sexually as he was politically. - C.P.]
•During WWII JFK was a security risk at the Pentagon for his well-known affair with Nazi spy Ingrid Arvad. [I question whether she was really a spy but she had some National Socialist connections. Kennedy had no secrets to betray at the time, but it could have been an embarassment. - C.P.]
•In 1951 Kennedy had to pay off Alicia Purdom wife of a British actor half a million dollars after making her pregnant and then reneging on his promise to marry her [X].
•In 1956 Kennedy did Joan Lundberg [X] who says he loved threesomes and was a voyeur. He paid for her abortion and slept with her in Jackie’s marriage bed [Judith Campbell Exner said and did the same things but refused the threesome. - C.P.]
•90 minutes before the first televised debate with Nixon, JFK was with a call-girl. (Reeves p 202) [X] [This is also true of the other debates. - C.P.] He also had a call-girl inauguration night [X] [Not a whore, actually, just another idiot female at one of about 50 inaugural parties, held at Joseph Alsop's house, while Jacqueline was home at the White House. - CP.] [Reeves, p. 236]. The night before the inauguration, he cheated on his wife in their Georgetown house [X].
•JFK kept an apartment at the Carroll Arms in Washington where he met young women [X]. After a year of marriage a friend said of Jackie, “Jackie was wandering around looking like a survivor of an airplane crash.” (Reeves p 116) [X]
•JFK did Mary Pinchot Meyer in about thirty White House visits from Jan ’62 to Nov ’63 [X] [Reeves, pp. 8, 75, 240-41, 321; Talbot, pp. 195-6; 198-204; 219; 225; 391]. She was mysteriously murdered in 1964 [X] and her diary of their affair ended up at the CIA [X]. Mary and JFK did drugs together.
•JFK did David Niven’s wife [X]. [He accomplished this in about ten minutes. - C.P.] [Reeves, p. 242]
•JFK did Pamela Turnure, 23, a Jackie look-a-like, hired as Jackie’s press secretary, in an affair that went on three years in the White House [X]. [Reeves, p. 242; Talbot, p. 333]
•JFK did Fiddle and Faddle, Secret Service code names for 21 and 23 year old staff members hired mostly for sex. [X] [Reeves, 7, 242]. JFK tested dangerous drugs on them without their knowledge by putting drugs [amyl nitrate] in their drinks [X]. [Peter Lawford warned JFK not to take the stuff himself, because it was too dangerous. So they gave it to one of the girls! She appeared to be hyperventilating, but what did they care? What's the life of just another idiot female to a Kennedy? In short, JFK was just like Teddy -- no different. JFK could have had his very own "Chappaquiddick" at any time. - C.P.]
["At one point Peter Lawford brought along some amyl nitrate to the White House. Knowing that the drug, called 'Poppers', was supposed to increase the sexual experience, Jack wanted to try some. Lawford refused, citing the extreme danger involved and warning the president not to take the risk. So Jack gave the drug to Fiddle or Faddle, and both men watched with interest as the young woman fell under the drug's powerful influence, appearing for a time to be hyperventilating. Neither Kennedy nor Lawford worried about the health of the recipient; the experiment satisfied their curiosity." - Reeves, p. 242]
•White House intern Marion “Mimi” Beardsley whose married name is Fahnestock was 19 when JFK raped her (statutory rape – the age of consent was 21 in DC at the time) [X]. A powerful older man preying on vulnerable young women is what sexual harassment is all about [X]. [Source: Internet reprints of newspaper articles. Mrs. Fahnestock today works as an auditor for a Manhatten church and is a Christian. -C.P]
•JFK got shots of speed from Dr. Max Jacobson, a.k.a. Dr. Feelgood [X]. [Jacobson was not a member of the American Medical Association and was later barred from the practice of medicine [Hersch, p. 234]. His specialty was injecting large doses of amphetamines and steroids [Reeves, p. 295]. JFK’s photographer Mark Shaw died at 47 from the effects of these same drugs, administered by this same quack “doctor” [Reeves, p. 297]. Charles Spalding was high on the same drugs about half the time [Hersch, p. 236]. In other words, the people making the decisions during the Cuban Missile Crisis were all “speed freaks”. [Reeves, p. 296] – C.P.]
•JFK had a penchant for swimming nude with his female guests at wild pool parties [One of the reasons he died was because he pulled a groin muscle romping around with a load of women (and his romping activities were always in the nude), and had to wear a back brace that held him upright, much stiffer than the brace he usually wore. Ordinarily, the first shot that hit him would have knocked him flat and the next shot would have missed. Instead, the next shot blew the top of his head off. - C.P.] [Hersch, p. 439]
•JFK & a British female tennis star had a lengthy relationship [X].
•BIGAMIST – JFK married socialite Durie Malcolm in Palm Springs in early 1947 and then a few days later had his friend Charles Spalding steal the marriage certificate from the Court House [unproven but accepted as truth by many people close to the Kennedys. Spalding claims it is true, and that he did it. [Hersch, pp. 2-3, 326-40, 344, 405]. Durie Malcolm denies she ever married JFK, saying she “didn’t care for those Irish Micks. And Old Joe was a terrible man” [Hersch, p. 329]. To me, this sounds like she knows more than she is saying. But if the documents have been destroyed, what else can she do? Admit she was a fool, and be ridiculed and vilified (and perhaps killed) by all the forces the Kennedy family could bring to bear? Almost anyone would deny it. If true, it means that Kennedy was a bigamist and the Kennedy children were all illegitimate. – C.P.].
•JFK reportedly had an illegitimate child in the late 50s by prostitute Alicia Darr Clark who later tried to blackmail him [X] [Reeves, p. 218, 456, footnote; Hersh, pp. 111-120]
•JFK did Judith Campbell Exner, mob moll [Talbot, p. 140], who had some twenty visits starting in May 1961. Exner carried cash bribes to JFK from California defense contractors. [X] When she called JFK and told him that he had made her pregnant, he asked, “What are you going to do about it?” She had an abortion at a Chicago hospital in January 1963. She was never invited back to the White House. Her lover, mob boss Sam Giancana, bragged that he had ‘placed’ her with the President. Interestingly, both Giancana and another of her mob lovers, Roselli, were given the C.I.A. contract to kill Castro [X].
•JFK did Ellen Rometsch, an East German spy [X]. When the Profumo affair (a sex scandal with a German spy) was blowing apart the British government, the Kennedys paid her off and had her deported. They abused both the FBI and Congress (by threatening Congressmen with information from their FBI files) to keep this liaison out of the press and the timing strongly suggests that the assassination of South Vietnam’s Diem was used to divert press attention from JFK’s connection to Rometsch. Kennedy also had had sex both in London and New York with prostitute Suzy Chang [X] who was at the heart of the Profumo affair. Bobby had a hard time covering this up [X].
•When the Secret Service was asked by local officials in Seattle if Kennedy always had prostitutes brought to him, they answered, “We travel during the day, so this only happens at night.” Truckloads of prostitutes were brought to the Whitehouse and admitted without security checks. [X] When JFK inspected military bases, he expected to be supplied with women.
•JFK used Peter Lawford’s home in Santa Monica for meeting women [X].
•JFK kept a large collection of photos of himself with naked women [X]. [Hersch, p. 11]
•When President, Kennedy blackmailed starlets into servicing him or have their careers destroyed [X].
["'I saw [JFK personal aide] Dave Powers bring in two starlets who were easily recognizable. He had one [of the women] put a scarf over her heard. They had a White House car go out and pick her up at the airport, and Powers met her at the car and walked her up to the second floor’. It was Powers who arranged for the ambitious Hollywood starlets to fly into Washington to service the President. ‘It might be their career if they told their [theatrical] agent in Hollywood they didn’t want to play” [Secret Service agent Larry] Newman said. “A lot of agents felt sorry for a lot of the girls (…), that they were used this way. There wasn’t a thank-you — not like an affair. It was just being used. (….). Afterwards, while driving the women back to the airport, [JFK personal aide Dave] Powers would ‘counsel’ the women, essentially warning them, Newman said, ‘that if this ever gets out in any way, your career is through’” – Hersch, pp. 229-230].
JFK’s father did the same thing when he was a movie producer and made no secret of it, even from the family. Where”Personality Cults” are concerned, Stalin was an amateur, because personality and money were all JFK had. – C.P.]
•JFK suffered from permanent venereal disease because he had been re-infected so often. He infected his partners with a disease so serious that it causes 35 percent of all infertility in US women [JFK suffered from chronic non-gonorrheal eurethritis and chlamydia from about 1940 until the day he died. [Hersch, p. 231, 232, footnote; 233; Reeves, xxii, pp. 342, 349]. He suffered from Addison’s Disease, which interferes with the immune system. One of the side-effects of the drugs he was taking was an enormous increase in sex drive [Hersch, p. 232, footnote]. Plus he came from a randy family anyway. His father was a rapist [Reeves, p. 29, Hamilton, p. 65], a swindler, libertine, and semi-maniacal family tyrant. His mother was frigid and looked the other way while his father brought chorus girls and starlets to the family home. He also tried to seduce his sons’ girl friends. A foine old Oirish Ketholic family. – C.P.] .
•Marilyn Monroe told a columnist that JFK would not indulge in foreplay because he lacked the time [X] [Reeves, pp. 10, 319-20, 322-27, 473 footnote]. They had a one-year affair. Bobby Kennedy also did her and she even aborted his baby which, if she told, would have destroyed his career. The day Monroe died, neighbors saw Robert F. Kennedy and “a man with a doctor’s bag” together enter her house. Within four hours she was found dead. Monroe was killed with a barbiturate suppository, but a bottle of oral pills was left at the scene to make it look like a possible suicide. U.S. Attorney General Kennedy was never questioned about his role and his cousin actor Peter Lawford who “cleaned up” the murder scene never explained what happened to Marilyn’s incriminating diary. The Kennedys were banned from the funeral [X] [This much is a fact. Joe DiMaggio blamed the Kennedys for her death. - C.P.]
The best source for Marilyn’s murder is The Life and Curious Death of Marilyn Monroe, NY:Pinnacle House 1974, by her former husband Robert F. Slatzer.
JFK is quoted by Traphes Bryant as saying to a friend, “I’m not through with a girl till I’ve had her three ways.” (Reeves p 241) [X] [Presumably this means three times a day, before meals, shake well. Or is he referring to something else? - C.P]
During a 1961 meeting in Bermuda with British Prime Minister Harold McMillan Kennedy said, “I wonder how it is with you, Harold? If I don’t have a woman for three days, I get terrible headaches.” There is a much more vulgar Kennedy quote along the same line in Hersh page 389. [The quote is: "[Bobby] Baker told of one meeting early in the presidency when he was invited to the Oval Office to meet with Kennedy. ‘He really didn’t want to talk about the Senate… He just said, “You know, I get a migraine headache if I don’t get a strange piece of ass every day’”. – C.P.]
JFK’s PUBLIC RECORD
•JFK graduated 64th in his high school class of 112 [X].
•As a student his mind was undisciplined and according to his college tutorial record “will probably never be very original.” [X] [Reeves, p. 48]
•The book Why England Slept attributed to JFK was written by Blair Clark and Arthur Krock [They certainly rewrote it, the question is whether they wrote it in the first place. It was ungrammatical and full of incomplete and otherwise defective sentences, based almost entirely on magazine and newspaper articles pasted together. The family hired at least 3 or 4 professional writers to turn it into something publishable, including the addition of new material. -C.P. ] [Reeves, 49-51; for more on JFK's literary fakery, see Hersch pp. 17, 88, 116, footnote; Reeves, pp. 9, 49-51, 117-18, 127-128, 157]. Harold Laski said of it “it is very immature, it has no structure, and dwells almost entirely on the surface of things.” [X] [Reeves, 50].
•As a WWII commander of a patrol boat PT-109 off Western Australia, he managed through simply unbelievable incompetence to get it run over by a Japanese destroyer [The question is whether the incompetence was Kennedy's or that of the Navy generally, in the fine old tradition of "snafu". - C.P.] He then fabricated a story. His men called him “Shafty” and complained he spent more time chasing women than Japanese [This seems rather unfair to me. To me, the circumstances of the incident are not quite clear. The nickname was intended to ridicule his pronunciation [Lasky, p. 112]. – C.P.]
•1946 House of Representatives race, his father spent $300,000 on his campaign in violation of law. JFK reported to the Massachusetts Secretary of State that there were no campaign contributions or expenditures [He also violated the law by registering late, although the law permitted no exceptions. The Kennedys were widely referred to as "carpetbaggers" in most of their electoral efforts [Lasky, pp. 87, 122]. – C.P.] .
•1952 Senate seat was won by skullduggery (Reeves p 106) [So were all his other elections. - C.P.] .
•Johnson on JFK, “He never said a word of importance in the Senate and never did a thing.” [X] [He was absent most of the time and hardly voted. The only thing the Kennedys ever worked on was their own popularity. He spent 14 years [!] in the House of Representatives and Senate, and had one of the worst absentee records in both. He even said, “What’s the point in hanging around Washington at the beginning of the season when I could be in Florida?” [Lasky, p. 144]- C.P.] JFK promised Senator Stuart Symington that he was the 1960 VP choice, but then had a mysterious meeting with LBJ and Sam Rayburn at which Johnson blackmailed him with dirt given him by FBI Director Hoover [X].
•Profiles in Courage was written by Sorenson [raised as a Unitarian but son of a Russian Jewish feminist named Anna Chaiken [Talbot, p. 40] , i.e., Sorensen would have been eligible for citizenship in Israel . – C.P.] and Davids. JFK “served principally as an overseer or, more charitably, as a sponsor and editor, one whose final approval was as important for its publication as its birth.” (Reeves p 127) [X] JFK claimed unequivocally to be its author and its authorship was always a sore point with him. Joe Kennedy bought up copies to make it a best seller. Although this book was not nominated for a Pulitzer Prize, Joe Kennedy bought the prize for the book. (Reeves p 142) [X]
•1956 after the stillbirth of his child, JFK was with a boatload of females [including a particularly dumb blonde who referred to herself in the third person as "Pooh" - C.P.] in the Mediterranean [X] and said “Why should I go back? What good would it do?” [?] [Oh, well, Jackie only married him mainly for his money and knew what he was to start with. The whole marriage was a fake. It is rumoured (but not proven) that Old Man Joe offered her a million dollars not to divorce him. Jackie had almost no money of her own when she married and revenged herself by spending up to 40,000 dollars a month, enraging JFK, who was notoriously tight-fisted. Like all the Kennedys, JFK never carried money. Whenever he went out for drinks or a meal, he cadged money from his companions and/or hangers-on. If they wanted to be repaid, they had to "invoice" the Old Man, as a "business expense". This is perhaps the best example of the manner in which the Kennedys treated ordinary people. In short, they were rich scum, who treated everybody around them like dirt, all their lives, and we're supposed to believe they cared about the blacks? - C.P.]
HERE IS MORE OF THE LIFE OF SEX FREAK JOHN KENNEDY:
[" 'The first thing he did', recalled one of Jack's earliest helpers in his campaign, 'was to get one of Dowd's staff pregnant' (John Dowd had been hired by Jack's father as a publicity agent and was giving secretarial help to Jack). 'I went in one day -- I was taking a law degree after leaving the navy -- and I found him humping this girl on one of the desks in his office. I said, 'Sorry', and left! Later, the girl told my wife she had missed her period, then learned she was expecting. I told Jack.
'Oh shit!' was all he he said! He didn't care a damn about the girl -- it was just the inconvenience that bothered him! In that sense, he was a pretty selfish guy.' "
- Hamilton, p. 737] .
Or:
[" 'What they saw', [according to Secret Service agent Larry Newman], ‘was [JFK personal aide] Powers banging a girl on the edge of the pool. The president is sitting across the pool, having a drink and talking to some broads. Everybody was buckass naked.’ ”
- Hersch, p. 245]
The Secret Service are trained to observe everything and be prepared to sacrifice their lives for the President, if necessary. But as soon as they went to work for JFK they were told to ignore everything they saw, forget everything, and keep their mouths shut [Hersch, p. 240]. Everywhere JFK went, local party hacks showed up at JFK’s hotel with carloads of prostitutes who had to be admitted to his private quarters without any I.D. check, no search of their person, their purses, nothing. They could have been carrrying drugs, poison, weapons, syringes, spy equipment, anything
["We didn't know if these women were carrying listening devices, if they had syringes that carried some type of poison or if they had Pentax cameras that would photograph the president for blackmail" - Hersch, p. 229].
And when they left, the Secret Service weren’t even allowed to enter the President’s suite to see if he was still alive! To find out whether he was still alive, they had to wait until he came out next morning [Hersch, p. 226-230], perhaps many hours later. The assassin could have been in Cuba, Israel or anywhere else by then.
[" 'The women would be brought out of the president's suite after three or four hours. 'This became a matter of great concern (...), because we didn't know who these people were or what they had on their person (...) We were just told not to interfere with it. We didn't know if the president that next morning would be dead or alive (...).' " - Hersch, p. 228]
Plus, JFK injected himself with massive doses of painkillers, and was constantly asking his friends and associates to inject him in the buttocks [Hersch, p. 235]. What happens if an assassin switches the medications for an overdose, or another drug, or poison? He could also have been forcefully injected, since he was incapacitated about half the time.
One of his Secret Service agents is on record as saying the same thing: not one more year.
["In [Secret Service agent William T.] McIntyre’s opinion, a public scandal about Kennedy’s incessant womanizing was inevitable. ‘It would have had to come out in the next year or so. In the [1964 presidential ] election campaign, maybe.’ “- Hersch, p 248]
["Secret Service agent Larry Newman said:] ‘You were on the most elite assignment in the Secret Service, and you were there watching an elevator or a door because the president was inside with two hookers. Your neighbours and everybody thought you were risking your life, and actually you were out there to see that he’s not disturbed in the shower with two gals from Twelfth Avenue…Other times when we were in hotels around the country and Powers would bring these girls that we didn’t know, we often said we would draw the black bean to see who got to testify before the House subcommittee (…) if the president received harm or was killed in the room by these two women. This was the President of the United States, and you felt impotent and you couldn’t do your job. It was frustrating.’ ” – Hersch, p.230]
["Secret Service agent Tony Sherman said:] ‘I got mad (…) I got angry at any president who doesn’t treat the White House like I think he should (…) The possibility of blackmail and things like that are astounding. I never knew the name of the outsiders, where they came from, where they were, or anything. I opened the door and said good evening and they said good evening. And in they went and the door shut. And when I reported for my shift the next day, the president was still alive.’ ” – Hersch, p. 243].
["(...) 'You're going to see a lot of shit around here. Stuff with the president. Just forget about it. Keep it to yourself. Don't even talk to your wife.' Over the next few days, McIntyre said, he saw 'girls coming in -- hookers.' (...) McIntyre recalled with a laugh, 'How the hell do you know what's going on? He could be hurt in there. What if one bites him' in a sensitive area? Despite such fears, McIntyre said, 'we would never stop them from going in if [JFK personal aide] Powers or [JFK personal aide] O’Donnell was with them. We wouldn’t check them over.’ ” – Hersch, p. 246]
["According to Secret Service agent Tony Sherman:] ‘It was just not once every six months, not every New Year’s Eve, but was a regular thing (…) I’m serious in my job. I didn’t want a part of it. It’s difficult to talk morally about other people, but we aren’t talking about other people. We’re talking about the President of the United States. We’re talking about my country. And we’re talking about people my age with wives and children who were willing to give their lives.’ ” – Hersch, p. 241]
["'Each agent is, after all, a sworn law enforcement officer', [McIntyre said], ‘When you see some type of criminal offense, whether it’s a misdemeanor or a felony, occurring in your presence, blatantly, that makes you feel a bit used’ — especially if it’s done by the president. ‘And if you have procurers with prostitutes paraded in front of you, then as a sworn law enforcement officer you’re asking yourself, ‘Well, what do they think of us?’ (…) McIntyre said he eventually realized that he had compromised his law enforcement beliefs to the point where he wondered whether it was ‘time to get out of there. I was disappointed by what I saw.’ ” – Hersch, p. 241], etc. etc. etc.
Marion MiMi Fahnestock had an affair with JFK in 1962 when she was age 19
http://www.thefreelibrary.com/JFK%3A+The+President+who+made+Clinton+look+like+a+choirboy.-a0101900316
JFK: The President who made Clinton look like a choirboy.
Byline: BARBARA DAVIES
IT’S hard to believe now that the 60-year-old grandmother sitting quietly in Manhattan’s Presbyterian Church was once the secret lover of the world’s most powerful man.
This week, after nearly 40 years, Marion Fahnestock stepped out of the shadows to admit that she was Mimi, the mysterious and beautiful young White House intern who once shared a bed with John F Kennedy.
When the affair – from June 1962 when she was 19 until November 1963 – was uncovered in a new biography of the assassinated President, Marion reluctantly stepped briefly back into the limelight.
She might have remained hidden for ever – Mimi, the 19-year college girl was merely one woman in the cast of thousands bedded by Kennedy.
Jack Kennedy was insatiable, the greatest womaniser ever to occupy the Oval office.
While Bill Clinton’s presidency was nearly destroyed by his sexual liaison with that other White House intern, Monica Lewinsky, JFK never experienced the humiliation of public exposure – and never needed to lie about his sordid private life – because no one ever openly talked about it.
The existence of Mimi – in her own words “a very young, very naive, very innocent young girl” – is yet another reminder of Kennedy’s out-of-control appetite for sex and his penchant for risk-taking.
He is remembered for many things: for the genius of his “Ich bin ein Berliner” speech, for his cool-headed aversion of nuclear war during the Cuban Missile Crisis, and more than anything else, for his violent assassination in Dallas in 1963.
BUT the thousand days of his ill-fated presidency were interspersed with a thousand nights of illicit sex.
In his time he bedded a stream of beautiful women.
Some of them were famous – actresses such as Janet Leigh, Zsa Zsa
Gabor, Kim Novak, Jayne Mansfield, Angie Dickinson and, most famously, Marilyn Monroe – but he was just as happy to have sex with secretaries, prostitutes, strippers and even close friends of his wife.
Kennedy was addicted to sex and lacked any self-restraint.
Just a few hours after uttering the words that galvanised a nation at his inaugural address: “Ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country”, he was partying in a Georgetown house asking: “Where are the broads?”
Kennedy’s overwhelming sexual appetite emerged early in adulthood.
Long before the White House beckoned, he lost a job in naval intelligence after the FBI taped him having sex with a Danish beauty queen.
She was also a Nazi sympathiser – and had once been Hitler’s lover.
But despite this early brush with the secret services – who later dubbed him “the Lancer” – Kennedy was prepared to gamble even his golden political career to satisfy his orgiastic tastes.
His marriage to New York socialite Jacqueline Lee Bouvier
on September 12, 1953, did nothing to dampen his lust.
In 1959, when he was still a mere Senator, he was threatened with exposure by middle-aged housewife Florence Kater, who had rented an apartment to one of his lovers.
The tenant in the Georgetown home was Pamela Turnure, an attractive receptionist in Kennedy’s Senate office and Kennedy was a regular visitor, arriving late at night and emerging early the following day.
Kater photographed him leaving the apartment at 3am holding a handkerchief across his face and sent it to 50 prominent figures in New York and Washington
When attempts by a Justice Department attorney – retained by Kennedy’s father Joe – failed to silence Kater, the family bluffed their way through the scandal, claiming the picture was a fake.
Once he was President, Kennedy’s appetite flourished. He is said to have swum naked every afternoon with White House secretaries.
His choice of women was varied. Judith Exner was a young raven-haired beauty and the sometime companion of Mafia big shots.
Mary Meyer was a 41-year-old painter from a respected Pennsylvanian Republican family while actress Angie Dickinson became a famous TV cop.
Exner, who was introduced to Kennedy by Frank Sinatra at a party in Las Vegas in 1960, later claimed that she aborted his child. Dickinson described her hurried liaison with the president as “the greatest 30 seconds of my life”.
His most explosive relationship was with Marilyn Monroe, whom he began seeing regularly not long after winning the Democratic nomination. On a tape made at the suggestion of her psychiatrist, Marilyn described herself as “a soldier whose commander-in-chief is the greatest and most powerful man in the world.
“The first duty of a soldier is to obey. He says, ‘Do this’, and you do it.”
But she later revealed to Hollywood reporter James Bacon that his bedroom performances were less than average.
“She complained because it was over too quickly,” said Bacon. “It was slam, bam, thank you, Ma’am.”
ACTRESS Jayne Mansfield claimed to have carried on a three-year intermittent affair with Kennedy.
But Kennedy was never satisfied with the same woman for long.
He is known to frequently have had sex with prostitutes both in the White House and while travelling.
He paid London call girl Suzy Chang for several sex sessions during 1960 and 1961. Their affair was nearly exposed by the New York Journal-American until his brother Bobby Kennedy, then US Attorney General, threatened the paper with a lawsuit. Another London prostitute, Marie Novotny, met Kennedy at a party in New York after being hired by his brother-in-law Peter Lawford.
She was asked to arrange something “a bit more interesting for the President”.
She took him to a rented apartment where they were joined by two other girls, dressed up as nurses for a game of doctor.
Stripper Tempest Storm grabbed his eye during a show at the Casino Royale Theatre in Washington.
“He was almost insatiable in bed,” she said later.
He bedded another stripper, Blaze Starr, during a trip to New Orleans in 1960 – and had sex with her in a wardrobe.
Even on the eve of the Cuban Missile Crisis, the most crucial moment of his Presidency, his eyes fell on a pretty secretary who wandered into the cabinet office. The President would later need some R&R…
“Get me her name and number,” he said to an aide. “We may avert war tonight.”
Throughout their marriage, Kennedy’s long-suffering wife Jackie turned a blind eye to his affairs.
But according to a former electrician and kennel keeper at the White House, she sometimes found it impossible.
Traphes Bryant claims the housekeeping staff engaged in a “conspiracy of silence” to keep his trysts a secret.
BUT in his book, Dog Days At The White House, he recalls the day Jackie discovered a woman’s undergarment tucked into a pillow slip.
She is alleged to have calmly told her husband: “Would you please shop around and see who these belong to? They’re not my size.”
But while Jackie tolerated his affairs, he was less tolerant of what he believed was her own infidelity.
He suspected she cheated on him with Aristotle Onassis to spite him for his unfaithfulness.
“She’s getting back at me,” he allegedly told a friend. “I resent it – he’s an ugly Greek.” Nearly 40 years after his death, Kennedy’s legendary philandering still fascinates.
One woman who moved in his circle claimed that “if all the women who claimed privately that they had slept with Jack had really done so, he wouldn’t have had the strength to lift a cup of tea.”
But if there was smoke, there was also fire and coming at the end of a long history of tales about Kennedy’s notorious womanising, details of Mimi Fahnestock’s affair no longer shocks, but serves only to give a further insight into the workings of his astonishing life.
According to historian Robert Dallek, who revealed the existence of Mimi in An Unfinished Life: John F Kennedy, 1917-1963, published in the US this week, the young Mimi could not even type but was invited to White House pool parties, flown on Air Force jets to secret liaisons with Kennedy at resorts and summit meetings.
“Her only skill was to provide sexual release for JFK on trips and maybe in the White House,” he says.
Kennedy’s ability to keep his notorious sexploits under wraps was partly due to the protection offered by the White House machine and partly to a pre-Watergate newspaper culture which avoided asking too many questions about the private lives of public figures.
If only life had been so simple for Bill Clinton.
CAPTION(S):
SECRET: Mimi the intern in 1963; REVEALED: ‘Mimi’ 40 years on; MAGNETIC: Wherever he went Kennedy oozed sex appeal. Even a swim on a local beach turned into a riot as hysterical women mobbed him; TOLERANT: Jackie turned a blind eye; All the President’s women; Janet Leigh; Kim Novak; Jayne Mansfield and Marilyn Monroe; Zsa Zsa Gabor; Angie Dickinson; Tempest Storm and Blaze Starr; Marie Novotny; Judith Exner
JFK Quote:
“Despite all the stories I’ve heard about other past Presidents, I doubt we will ever have another one like Kennedy. I even heard him say to one of his buddies, “I’m not through with a girl till I’ve had her three ways.”
There was something else interesting about Kennedy’s pre-White House escapades. When he and a congressional buddy used to get a hotel room in another city, they would get two girls and trade around. Nowadays he would be called a “swinger.” Then he was just called plain wild.”
[Traphes Bryant, Dog Days at the White House: The outrageous Memoirs of the presidential kennel keeper, p. 38] Book was published in 1975.
JFK and his naked pool parties in the White House
“A lot of celebrities are chased by beautiful people,” Baker said and Jack Kennedy “loved it.” Baker told of one meeting early in the presidency when he was invited to the Oval Office to meet with Kennedy. “He really didn’t want to talk about the Senate,” Baker told me. “He just said, ‘You know, I get a migraine if I don’t get a strange piece of ass every day.’”
Over the next few months, Ellen Rometsch helped Kennedy ward off headaches. And she gossiped to Baker about it. She described pool parties in the White House, Baker told me, where “everbody’s running around there naked.” There was one occasion, Baker told me without naming his source, “when Jackie came home and Bill Thompson had all these people “ in the pool….On May 18th, 1963, we [Baker and Rometsch] were talking because we were seatmates,” Baker told me, “and she [Rometsch] had gone to the White House two nights before for a naked party in the swimming pool. I think there was like five guys and twelve girls in the White House indoor pool.” In all, Baker estimated, Rometsch visited Kennedy at least ten times in the spring and summer.”
[Hersh, The Dark Side of Camelot, p. 390]
That JFK naked pool party/orgy would be on Thursday, May 16, 1963.
Reply »
Robert Morrow says:
And beyond that, on p. 11 of the Dark Side of Camelot – a spectacular book that I HIGHLY recommend – Hersh interviewed Sidney Mickelson, owner of the high end Mickelson Gallery. Mickelson said that President John Kennedy used to send over photos of sexual exploits to be framed by Mickelson as momentos for the folks involved!
Mickelson said, “over a number of years we framed a number of photographs of people – naked and often lying on beds – in the Lincoln Room. The women were always beautiful.” In some cases the photographs included the president with, as Mickelson carefully described it, “a group of people with masks on.” Another memorable photograph, Mickelson added, involved the president and two women, all wearing masks. “The Secret Service agent said it was Kennedy,” Mickelson told me, “and I have no reason to doubt it.” The photographs were always of high quality, Mickelson added, similar to those taken by official White House photographers.” [Seymour Hersh, the Dark Side of Camlelot, p. 11]
Kinky. Sex Freak. The Prez … but not for long courtesy of LBJ and military intelligence.
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Blue Dogs Reply:
July 3rd, 2012 at 2:46 pm
Let’s be honest. JFK was a sex addict and couldn’t overcome his addiction to hot women. His brother was a sex addict too and likely slept with Jackie.
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Robert Morrow Reply:
July 3rd, 2012 at 3:59 pm
JFK, LBJ, Ted Kennedy and Bill Clinton were all unhinged sex addicts who would sleep with literally anything. One of JFK’s good friends was George Smathers who he would go “girl hunting” with.
Lyndon Johnson has been described as a “sexual gorilla;” he was an exhibitionist who was ready to show “Jumbo” to just about anyone and LBJ would often brag about how “endowed” he was. JFK and LBJ both like to skinny dip in the White House swimming pool; JFK with the women so he could have orgies with them (Fiddle and Faddle, others); LBJ with other men so he contrast/compare and humiliate them.
Robert Kennedy likely had an affair with Marilyn Monroe and he was carrying on an outrageous affair with Jackie Kennedy post JFK assassination, despite the fact RFK had a wife and 10 kids (an 11th Rory came after his death).
“Bobby and Jackie: A Love Story:”
http://www.amazon.com/Bobby-Jackie-A-Love-Story/dp/B004KAB5OQ/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1341348819&sr=8-2&keywords=bobby+and+jackie#_
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JohnBernardBooks says:
for the uninformed:
“Article 1 section 8 gives the power to levy taxes, but the taxes must be uniform”
Democrats are now using taxes as a punishment, punishing some while rewarding others. what can be more uniform than that?
Taxes the democrats answer to everything.
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anita Reply:
July 3rd, 2012 at 1:25 pm
That’s in the Texas Constitution — not the federal, so it has zero to do with the ACA.
You know the difference between state and federal, correct?
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JohnBernardBooks Reply:
July 3rd, 2012 at 6:43 pm
anita sweetie you’re messing with JBB do you remember the last time you did that?
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JohnBernardBooks says:
so are you dems still predicting a $20 Billion budget shortfall?
“Boatload” of new revenues against last session’s spending cuts look to produce big cash balance
Through the third quarter the state continues collecting a boatload of tax revenues – perhaps as much as $8 billion net for the biennium.
Tax revenues are increasing at double digit rates, 3.6 times greater than expected from the current revenue estimate. The sales tax growth rate is more than double that of the revenue estimate, while the growth in the taxes, oil production and natural gas production, that contribute to the rainy day fund (RDF) have experienced growth in revenue rivaling the Spindletop gusher of 1901. Severance tax receipts are 50 percent or more greater than in FY11.”
Making fun of dems is so easy.
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BAYBEAR says:
I’m not sure who makes the most sense here, Morrow or JohnBernardBooks…..but I am glad I found this blog, hilarious!
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Anonymous Reply:
July 3rd, 2012 at 9:02 am
C) None of the above
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Anonymous Reply:
July 3rd, 2012 at 11:03 am
You will grow tired of it, Baybear. Morrow seems to think that he is some sort of history professor delving into rumor and hearsay, who uses this site as his chalk board. Burka needs to either charge him for the space or run him off – preferably the latter. No one wants to read this crap. Many who used to post here have fled the scene.
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JohnBernardBooks Reply:
July 3rd, 2012 at 1:17 pm
dems haven’t gotten the word this is now officially the Burka/Morrow blog
Robert carry on your comments are always on topic, succinct and on point.
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Robert Morrow says:
Information on Malcolm Wallace, a former University of Texas SGA president in the mid 1940′s who later became Lyndon Johnson’s personal hit man.
LBJ used his lawyer John Cofer and some serious string pulling to get Wallace basically OFF a first degree murder that he committed in October, 1951. Wallace was convicted of first degree murder of Doug Kinser and given a 5 year suspended sentence (!!!!)
That is just one example of the dark power of Lyndon Johnson. I have many more examples of that. Btw, Robert Caro knows exactly who Mac Wallace is and he left him out of his 4 volumes on LBJ.
Here is a good summary of Malcolm Wallace, LBJ’s personal hitman who also murdered Henry Marshall in June, 1961, when LBJ was VP and engaged in a sub rosa war with the Kennedys.
http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/JFKwallaceM.htm
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Dan C Reply:
July 3rd, 2012 at 11:07 am
You and JBB really do waste everybody’s time with your non-sense. Even if what you say is true – What does any of this have to do with the S Ct’s ruling on the ACA?
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Spiro Eagleton says:
Hey Burka! There are now over 300 comments on this post. How about a new post to at least establish a new comments thread? Good grief! If you didn’t know better you’d think this might be a good site for a blog. Ha.
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JohnBernardBooks Reply:
July 3rd, 2012 at 1:18 pm
Burka runs this blog as a free service for bored state employee to keep busy during their hours on the job.
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BAYBEAR Reply:
July 3rd, 2012 at 1:27 pm
And I see you comment more than anyone else, Mr. Books! You are a funny guy!
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Robert Morrow Reply:
July 3rd, 2012 at 1:52 pm
There is probably a lot of truth in that one, JBB.
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Anonymous Reply:
July 3rd, 2012 at 1:23 pm
I can hear the invectives, see the spit fly and the faces turn red. Knock it off, JBB, you’re going to cause someone to stroke out.
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Blue Dogs says:
When the Supreme Court comes back for the fall, I expect affirmative action and key parts of the 1965 Voting Rights Act to be STRUCK DOWN pissing off the liberals.
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anita says:
I think that’s correct. But I doubt that ‘liberals’ will be the only folks upset by this. Americans have a good sense of fundamental fairness.
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JohnBernardBooks says:
anita sweetie where is the fairness clause you dems love so much in the US Constitution?
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BAYBEAR Reply:
July 5th, 2012 at 8:17 am
Mr. Books! A constitiutional scholar as well!I would think most Amricans like the concept of fairness
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Robert Morrow says:
In 1992, was Ross Perot out to torpedo the campaign of GHW Bush? Yes, absolutely. In fact, according the Arkansas state trooper Larry Patterson, Perot and Clinton would talk almost daily towards the end of the 1992 campaign. See Patterson’s cassette tapes “More than Sex” about his times with Clinton.
There was a lot of bad blood between Ross Perot and GHW Bush and I think a lot of it had to do with 1980′s CIA drug smuggling that Perot was so incensed about.
Here is journalist Robert Novak and his experiences of the 1992 campaign.
Robert Novak on Ross Perot and his Antipathy Towards GHW Bush in the 1992 campaign:
“I could not vote for Clinton, but this time there was a genuine third party alternative: Texas billionaire Ross Perot. When I flew to Dallas on May 6, 1992, to interview Perot, I thought I actually might vote for him. Perot had become the first independent candidate ever to pass the Republican and Democratic candidates in presidential polls…
I found it hard to fall in love with any presidential candidate (even John F. Kennedy and Ronald Reagan, both of whom I liked personally) because, as a reporter, I observed them at close range. The May 6 interview with Perot served that purpose and incidentally guaranteed my eventual, reluctant vote for Bush. I began the Evans & Novak column based on that meeting:
After concluding a 90-minute interview in his modest 17th-floor North Dallas office, Ross Perot stopped us at the door to confide his dream: a one-on-one debate with President Bush, with no questions from journalists and nobody else interfering.
But what about the third man in the presidential race, Bill Clinton? Perot sloughed off our question. The putative Democratic nominee just isn’t on the mind of the Texas billionaire as he prepares his independent candidacy. He sees the election of Ross Perot vs. George Bush ….
[H]e makes clear he does not consider Bush much of a president … Perot told us he believes he is hurting Bush more than Clinton, basing that opinion on polls showing him ahead in three big Sunbelt states dear to Republican hearts: California, Texas and Florida.
By the same token, Perot traces hostile probing by the news media to inspiration from the Bush camp, not Clinton. Bush “started the character assassination as soon as I got ahead of him in Texas,” he told us….
Perot later got back into the race, without Rollins and without any promises to spend his own money. But the glitter was gone, and his clear purpose now was not to elect himself but to beat George Bush. That was what he always had in mind.
[Robert Novak, "The Prince of Darkness: 50 Years of Reporting in Washington," p. 497-499]
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eyeswideopen says:
Since Robert insists on turning the subject of any given thread into sordid, rumor from the past, I have taken the liberty of giving you something else to ponder that you might find a bit more pertinent.
SOMETHING TO THINK ABOUT
Not only did you contribute to Social Security but your employer did too. It totaled 15% of your income before taxes. If you averaged only $30K over your working life, that’s close to $220,500.
If you calculate the future value of $4,500 per year (yours & your employer’s contribution) at a simple 5%, after 49 years of working you’d have $892,919.98.
If you took out only 3% per year, you’d receive $26,787.60 per year and it would last better than 30 years (until you’re 95 if you retire at age 65) and that’s with no interest paid on that final amount on deposit! If you bought an annuity and it paid 4% per year, you’d have a lifetime income of $2,976.40 per month.
The folks in Washington have pulled off a bigger Ponzi scheme than Bernie Madhoff ever had.
Entitlement my ass, I paid cash for my social security insurance!!!! Just because they borrowed the money, doesn’t make my benefits some kind of charity or handout!!
Congressional benefits —- free healthcare, outrageous retirement packages, 67 paid holidays, three weeks paid vacation, unlimited paid sick days, now that’s welfare, and they have the nerve to call my social security retirement an “entitlement”?
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Sybil Reply:
July 4th, 2012 at 12:22 pm
Not to put too fine a point on it, but an “entitlement” is exactly what Social Security is – NOT a handout or charity, but something you have earned with your own labor and are legallly ENTITLED to. The right have demonized this word and relentlessly used it as a pejorative until the actual meaning of the term is unrecognizable to the American public.
Subsidies to oil companies are welfare – Social Security and Medicare are NOT.
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BAYBEAR Reply:
July 5th, 2012 at 3:16 pm
Hmmm. Does that make military pensions and farm subsidies welfare? Since the rest of us pay for it? I think so…
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Robert Morrow Reply:
July 4th, 2012 at 5:50 pm
Why don’t you point out that Lyndon Johnson was the one who originally raided the “lock box” of Social Security, putting in a bunch of worthless IOUs to pay for his “guns and butter” of FUBAR Vietnam and “Great Society?”
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John Johnson Reply:
July 5th, 2012 at 9:47 am
Morrow is obviously disputing the numbers. Care to enlighten us on this, Robert? Are they wrong? Shouldn’t we receive some sort of ROI? If invested, wouldn’t we expect the fund to do at least as well as CD’s or the average mutual fund over a 40+ year period?
There is no doubt that the SS fund was raided. It should never have happened, but it did. Should we look at it as a bad investment (which it wasn’t since we had no choice in the matter)or do you think it was a flat out case of theft?
Sybil, how about you? You just questioning he use of the word “entitlement”?
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Tom Barry says:
Spot-on,Sybil!
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100 Year Decision Reply:
July 5th, 2012 at 3:17 pm
Dead Solid Perfect, Sybil and Baybear.
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Robert Morrow says:
“Subsidies to oil companies are welfare – Social Security and Medicare are NOT.”
Bullshit. They are de facto entitlements now because the government a) raided the SS trust fund a long, long time ago b) beneficiaries get far more benefits than they ever paid in.
Entitlements.
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Sybil Reply:
July 4th, 2012 at 11:53 pm
Oooh, both Anglo Saxon profanity and Latin phrases all in one post. Erudite AND bilingual, impressive.
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Willie James says:
While this one has been one of the most amusing ever, Burka, it is time for a new subject. Maybe wait a day while the teapublicans get new gaskets?
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Tom says:
Willard’s friends are turning on him:
“The Wall Street Journal, whose opinion pages are a highly regarded barometer of conservative thought, published an editorial Thursday that excoriated the Romney campaign for its “unforced error” on the tax issue and concluded that “the campaign looks confused in addition to being politically dumb.”
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anON says:
The WSJ is Fox News in print and not well regarded ourside of right wing conservatives and big business.
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bnrtn says:
I stop by every now & then to see what the latest buzz-words / buzz-arguments are from both (all?) sides, but most every time I come away with: “Meanwhile, Rome burns!”
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anita says:
So when this post began, the Court had ruled and Romney was in a bit of a pickle because the individual mandate he had included in the MA health care reforms, that he had dubbed a “penalty” or “fee”, was referred to as a tax in the decision.
Fast forward to Monday, when his campaign offered their health care advisor to assert that Romney sided with the dissent — the penalty or fee was not a tax . . .
Hold on — on Wednesday, he asserts in an interview that he still sides with the dissent, but believes the majority was correct in calling the penalty or fee a tax.
So in the course of one week, Mitt Romney has reversed himself on the Constitutionality of the individual mandate, and in his description of the method to compel such a mandate. What for years he has described and embraced as a penalty or fee, affirmed by his own campaign just 2 days ago, morphed into a tax sometime between Monday evening and Wednesday morning.
Lesson learned: if you don’t like what Willard Romney has to say today, just wait until tomorrow . . .
Flip. Flop. Flip. Flop. Flip. Flop. Flip . . .
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JohnBernardBooks Reply:
July 6th, 2012 at 6:54 am
“I will not raise your taxes one single dime”
Preasident Barak Obama, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012,
SCOTUS June 2012 yep its a tax.
Folks thats not a flip flop thats a blatant lie.
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I'm Pavlov. Ring a Bell? says:
Oh please Anita. Sometimes I think you work for the TDP with all the clearly partisan stuff you spout.
With regard to flip-flopping, let’s also not forget that President Obama said he wasn’t going to raise taxes on anyone making $250,00 or less–but guess what, he passed Obamacare, one of the largest tax increases in the history of the country. Then after selling it to the American public as not-a-tax-increase, he went to SCOTUS and had his lawyers argue that it was a tax to try and get it dismissed under the AIA. And guess what happened after that failed and the ruling came out…are you ready? He said, with a straight face mind you, the exact opposite of what his lawyers had just argued before the Supreme Court.
Bottom line: At least when Mitt flip flops, 1/7 of the economy doesn’t hang in the balance along with my right to be left alone.
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Anonymous Reply:
July 5th, 2012 at 6:46 pm
Thank you, Pavlov, for the opposing view. However, You waste your breath on Anita. She is brainwashed. She’s gone. Black is white, and white is black to her. She can’t help it.
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anita Reply:
July 5th, 2012 at 8:59 pm
“after selling it to the American public as not-a-tax-increase, he went to SCOTUS and had his lawyers argue that it was a tax to try and get it dismissed under the AIA. And guess what happened after that failed and the ruling came out…are you ready? He said, with a straight face mind you, the exact opposite of what his lawyers had just argued before the Supreme Court.”
You really think the President “had his lawyers” make a specific argument before the Court?
A lawyer charged with defending an act of Congress has an ethical obligation to zealously advocate toward that end, making every possible procedural and substantive argument. If you really think these lawyers are camped out the door of the Oval Office, waiting to brief the President on every possible nuance of their case and iteration of their pleadings, you may be a bit naive.
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anita says:
Seriously, with all due respect, there’s no comparison between the President’s use of nomenclature compared with the parlance of the Court in describing constitutional powers, and that of Mitt Romney throwing aside a long-held personal position, one reasserted just 48 hours earlier by his own campaign.
Conviction seems to elude Mr. Romney. I’m glad he wasn’t at the Alamo in 1836 — he’d start each day reassessing the line in the sand and whether he really crossed it, and what it meant.
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Anonymous Reply:
July 5th, 2012 at 10:03 pm
Ouch!
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John Johnson Reply:
July 5th, 2012 at 10:40 pm
She is the epitome of biased. She’s never changed a mind. This is because if an R does it, it is the most dastardly of deeds; if a D does the same exact thing it is suddenly acceptable. This type of inconsistency is obvious to all. Sad. Too many on each side suffer from the same disease.
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Just tired.... Reply:
July 6th, 2012 at 12:19 pm
Yea, but that’s a hell of a good line about Romney!
JohnBernardBooks Reply:
July 6th, 2012 at 6:56 am
anita sweetie is a democrat they are expected to lie.
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Robert Morrow says:
In 2004 I gave $1,000 to the Bush for President campaign and I campaigned ardently for GWB, despite the fact I knew what a snake his father was. I just did not like Clinton, Gore, Kerry, or Demos.
In 2004 the Republican volunteers would often make comments about John Kerry, his sexuality; the NRA handed out cards comparing Kerry to a French poodle in a pink sweater. Basically gigalo Kerry was made out to be a flip flopping sissy. “Fairy Kerry” the saying often went. In 2004 the GOP used its gay executive director Ken Mehlmann to run its field game – much of which consisted of piggybacking on anti-gay marriage propositions on many state ballots. “Anti-gay” is one big reason Bush won 20% of the black vote in Ohio and won the state.
Then in 2005 I started researching the Clintons and by accident the Bushes. I came across “Leola McConnell Lustful Utterances.” Leola was a Las Vegas dominitrix/prostitute and she was the dominitrix for one William Bennett. Bennett that is the Republican values guy who writes books on the “Book of Virtues” while at the same time losing millions playing the $100-$500 slots in Vegas and I guess, doing whatever Leola told him to do on any given day. Bennett was convinced he wwas “winning” at the slots.
Well, Leola had some adventures with on George W. Bush and his old gay roommate from Yale, Victor Ashe. Just start googling those names and you will get the full, hilarious, disturbing story.
Leola also knew Roy Cohn and said he and GWB were noted for their bad behavior. Google “Bush’s Secret Life in 84″ Especially google “Leola McConnell George Bush.”
Thank God for Alex Jones and Infowars – they will tell you things few others will. Google
“Bush Homosexual Allegations Resurface In New Book
Leola McConnell releases tell-all memoirs”
or try this link:
http://www.prisonplanet.com/articles/september2007/240907_homosexual_allegations.htm
Here is Leola on one George W. Bush, later governor of Texas and 2 term US president who ran on an “anti-gay” agenda a la Rick Perry.
Leola:
“In 1984 I watched George W. Bush enthusiastically and expertly perform a homosexual act on another man, one Victor Ashe,” said McConnell.
“Ashe is the current U.S. ambassador to Poland; and he too should come out, like former New Jersey Gov. James McGreevy, and admit to being a gay American.”
“Other homo-erotic acts were also performed by then-private citizen George W. Bush. I know this because I performed one of them on him myself.”
Let’s just it this way, I am convinced there are some things one George W. Bush can do a lot better than say, Hillary Clinton. Ha ha.
I have not even gotten into the Jeff Gannon, Jeff Guckert story. Gannon was the fake reporter and gay male prostitute who was running around the Bush White House with the access of a house cat.
Google “Bush kissing Jeff Gannon” and you will see GWB kissing the bald head of gay prostitute Jeff Gannon who used to ask all the creampuff questions at the press conferences. In fact, that is why he aroused such suspicion. Other reporters were saying just who the hell is this guy asking all the softball/beach ball questions??
There is also a photo of Bush rubbing the bald head of Gannon/Guckert.
I just want to wish everyone a Happy Fourth of July plus one!
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John Johnson says:
Paul, how in the hell can you allow this sort of stuff from robert morrow to continue? It should not be allowed here. There has not been one scintilla of proof accompanying any of the sick, sordid things he has posted since you started this blog. What are your rules governing posted comments of this nature? Are there any?
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Robert Morrow Reply:
July 6th, 2012 at 1:18 am
There is one thing that is absolutely true. President George W. Bush was kissing the bald head of a homosexual prostitute Jeff Gannon, aka James Guckert, who posed as a phony reporter and who had a free roam of the White House.
I never saw GWB kiss Candy Crowley on the head.
It is also a fact that the 2004 Bush re-elect campaign made heavy usuage of anti-gay marriage propositions on the ballots of many states as a method of ensuring Christian conservative turnout.
It is also a fact that Ken Mehlmann, the head of the RNC and the de facto head of the Bush field operation was/is as queer as a 3 dollar bill.
Those are all facts. It is also a fact that William Bennett, Mr. “Book of Virtues” had a severe gambling addiction.
Be a big boy, John Johnson, examine the material and make your own determinations as to its credibility.
https://www.google.com/#hl=en&sclient=psy-ab&q=jeff+gannon+gay+escort&oq=jeff+gannon+gay+&gs_l=serp.1.1.0i30l2j0i8i30l2.10701.11320.0.13944.5.5.0.0.0.0.174.501.3j2.5.0…0.0.Ms8wpVZDVdI&pbx=1&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.r_cp.r_qf.,cf.osb&fp=fdaf61c5db998dc7&biw=1280&bih=945
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Robert Morrow Reply:
July 6th, 2012 at 1:20 am
Also, John Johnson, I have found that people don’t like it when you lie about them. But what they really *hate* it when you tell the truth about them.
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John Johnson says:
You don’t seem to understand the word “proof”. You take any shocking, sordid rumor put to paper by self published authors , that just beg for any and all participants or eye witnesses to come forward and collaborate, and call it fact. Nary a one has materialized.
You can’t see it. You are eaten up with it. You seem to get a rise out of it. You have a problem. You highjack a popular blog site because no one would ever visit one of your own over once.
I have enjoyed the time interacting with people on this site. It has been a part of my daily routine for several years now. No more. I think your rants are sickening and have no place here. Obviously, the only way to protest is to no longer participate.
I have also found that moderate commentary is more difficult to find here. Those people have gone. I have grown more cynical and my comments more pointed and personal. The only ones left are all by far and away fully entrenched party diehards and loons. I’ve been called both. They may be right.
You can have my space, Robert. I’m just going to read more. It won’t be the trash that you are addicted to.
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Robert Morrow Reply:
July 6th, 2012 at 12:12 pm
John Johnson, it is true that people like Rick Perry and George W. Bush have used the “anti-gay” agenda is as critical cogs in their election strategies. Bush- 2004 with all the anti-gay marriage stuff and Rick Perry with all his presidential prayer rallies and pandering to gay hating preachers. It is also true Rick Perry has had a book written about his hilarious adventures called “Head Figure Head.”
It is also true that when he ran for president in 2000, George W. Bush said that favorite philosopher is Jesus Christ. Bush was saying that about the same time he was saying he had NO IDEA who the head of Pakistan Pervez Musharraf was.
And it is true, President George W. Bush took the time to plant a sweet, soft kiss on the bald head of Jeff Gannon, aka James Guckert, a homosexual prostitute posing as a fake reporter at the White House and who asked all the cotton candy questions. Jeff Gannon “worked” for Talon News, which was owned by Texas GOP activist Bobby Eberle
As for Leola McConnell, I give her 99% chance of being true in her allegations. Bush at least in the 1980′s had some well known behavioral issues. I would not be surprised if they continued on later.
Here is a good link to read on GWB:
http://calltodecision.com/whb1.htm
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Steve says:
Robert’s is a Coward for voting to approve this and forcing people to pay higher taxes!!! Yes, mark my word, taxes are going up. Going to sell your house? How about 3.8%tax on the equity you get from the sale of your home? How about the fact that Robert’s and the other liberals giving Congress and Obama the go ahead to come up with any new tax they want? How can anyone think this is a good thing? People, you need to wake up! How about the fact that your good buddy Obama lied, AGAIN? No new taxes on people making less than 250,000! Hello, welcome to your new taxes! Ugh, some people are so clueless, I’m really concerned about our Republic making it through all of this. God Bless Us and let those of us with a mind, pray that we do survive, so we can take care of the clueless!
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Vernon Reply:
July 6th, 2012 at 10:40 am
How is a 3.8% tax on income from home equity sales going to jeopardize the future of our republic?
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Anonymous Reply:
July 6th, 2012 at 1:00 pm
Steve,
Grab a paper bag and breath deeply, buddy. Now listen up for a minute. You and your mouth breathers have relied on Santa Claus and the Amazing Kreskin to be foundational strategists for government operations for too long. If you want something, you have to pay for it. If you don’t, get ready for all those 70+ senior citizens that are voting straight R this cycle to look around and wonder where their free health care is. Either give it to them and pay for it, or figure out how to replace them in the voting booth. You make the call.
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Anonymous says:
Roberts is now a liberal? Man, wtf is wrong with you people?? You realize congress already has the ability to lay taxes, right? This isn’t a new power granted by the Supreme Court in the ACA decision. I’m concerned about our Republic because the segment of the population that listens to Fox news and Rush Limbaugh are functionally brain dead.
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I'm Pavlov. Ring a Bell? says:
Taxing inactivity is a power never before granted to Congress.
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Anonymous Reply:
July 6th, 2012 at 11:15 am
It’s not “inactivity” because everyone uses health care at some point. You are making the freeloaders pony up for the services they use. Paying for a service, surely conservatives can’t find fault with that?
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anita Reply:
July 6th, 2012 at 3:14 pm
Apparently, “conservatives” think we should continue overpaying for healthcare via property taxes when folks show up at the emergency room.
It’s like refusing to put oil in your car, on the theory that you’ll just buy a new engine when it freezes up.
Makes perfect sense.
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anita Reply:
July 6th, 2012 at 11:31 am
And what’s your cite for this nugget of nonsense — Glenn Beck?
If I don’t pay my taxes on time (“inactivity”), I have to pay a penalty and an additional tax. Just one example.
You should think before repeating something someone made up.
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Robert Morrow says:
I just love seeing Mitt Romney, the inventor of Obamacare, on TV this week saying Robamacare in Massachusetts was most definitely NOT a tax, but that Robamnycare passed by Congress was most definitely a tax because the Supreme Court says it was.
And how opposed to Robamnycare, the inventor of Obamacare says he is.
Mitt Romney is so toast this fall. Just because the election is “close” doesn’t mean he has a chance of winning.
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Just tired.... says:
Welcome to the morrowblog.
Paul….it’s downright irresponsible for you to allow something with your name on it to be hijacked as this has been.
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MAC says:
One week of the same post and Morrow’s si-fi. Where’s Paul to lead us out of the promise, not a promise, is too, is not, is too, is not, etc. land!!
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Just tired.... says:
Do TBTP at TM know this crap is going on here?
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I'm Pavlov. Ring a Bell? says:
“nugget of nonsense”? Ha! I actually laughed out loud at that one Anita. Well done.
As for your penalty on a tax hypothetical, wouldn’t you first have to engage in some type of activity (be it earning wages, property transactions, etc.) in order to be levied with the tax, only to then be fined for non-payment? Before Obamacare, it used to be that you had to do something more than exist before the govt. could come along and tax you, and then fine you in addition to that in your example.
And the whole “everybody uses it at some point” argument is nonsensical. Now we’re crafting tax policy based on the possiblity of some future happenstance? Only a liberal…
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Anonymous Reply:
July 6th, 2012 at 12:54 pm
If everybody has to use healthcare then it’s not happenstance now, is it? Do wingnuts own dictionaries???
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Vernon Reply:
July 6th, 2012 at 2:00 pm
Pavlov,
Everyone needing healthcare in their lives isn’t hypothetical.
Were you born somewhere other than a hospital?
Have you never once visited a doctor or hospital due to illness or an accident?
You and most everyone else will likely die while in the care of a health professional.
We will all use the health system at some point. It’s not hypothetical.
(Okay it’s not hypothetical if…your mother never visited a doctor while you were in utero, are the result of a totally natural home birth, are miraculously blessed with perfect health, never encounter any accidental bodily harm, never visit a doctor while you or your spouse is pregnant, never allow your children to visit a doctor, go through the end stages of your life without consulting a healthcare professional and die while ensuring your corpse isn’t touched by a doctor. But that seems rather unlikely, doesn’t it?)
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anita Reply:
July 6th, 2012 at 3:03 pm
Pavlov has obviously never filed an income tax return.
Try not doing so and see how long it takes before you hear from the IRS about your “inactivity”.
Better yet, ask Willie Nelson.
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BCinBCS Reply:
July 6th, 2012 at 8:51 pm
“Now we’re crafting tax policy based on the possiblity of some future happenstance?”
Possibility? Possibility? If it was only a possibility we would not need universal health care.
There are four health care cost choices: (i) those that can’t pay are not allowed to have medical care; (ii) everyone who has health insurance or pays for their medical costs out-of-pocket can subsidize those who don’t or can’t; (iii) some sort of charity system can be instituted; or (iv) there must be some universal way to pay for medical costs (usually done with insurance).
For the most part, choice (i) is not something that this country is willing to do, choice (ii) is what we are doing now (and how’s that working out – did you know that, if you have health insurance, about $1,000.00 of your yearly insurance premium goes to pay for those who did not pay their medical bill (so do nothing, pay an insurance “tax”)), choice (iii) doesn’t work and choice (iv) is all that is left and makes the most sense.
The thing that really rips my drawers is the constant blathering by people about how they are taxed too much (despite the actual fact that we have one of the lowest tax rates among industrialized nations) while they – not once – refuse to accept the services that they need and that the government provides them.
My question to you Pavlov is what is your plan to solve the health care problem and how are you going to pay for it??
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Tom Barry says:
From several analyses I’ve read about the provision for enforcing the tax, it was designed to fail. The IRS can’t put a lein on your property, can’t confiscate, can’t pursue you as a criminal. Best I can figure, the most the IRS can do if you refuse to buy insurance is to take the money out of any income-tax refund you might be due. Just Google “What happens if I refuse to buy insurance under the “Obamacare” act.”
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anita Reply:
July 6th, 2012 at 2:53 pm
That’s exactly right — it can only be held from withholding. You can’t affirmatively be compelled to pay it. Of course, that gets lost in the histrionics of “it’s the end of the world as we know it.”
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I'm Pavlov. Ring a Bell? says:
Not everybody “has” to have healthcare. Not everybody does now. If they did, doctors and hospitals would be so overloaded you’d have lines out the door. Healthcare is a privilege, not a right, or do you left-wing “wingnuts” not understand that?
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Vernon Reply:
July 6th, 2012 at 2:08 pm
Not everyone has to have healthcare at the same time. Otherwise, yes, there would be lines out the door.
Healthcare isn’t like when Apple has a release date for their “iPhone 12 SGS” or whatever. It’s not like when a new Harry Potter book or Star Wars movie comes out. Everyone (who’s cool) must have it that day. It’s not like that at all.
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anita Reply:
July 6th, 2012 at 2:59 pm
Right, the poor have leeches and herbal remedies. If things get real bad, they can light candles. They don’t need anything else. That’s the way we aspire to do things in the most prosperous country on the face of the Earth.
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Vernon Reply:
July 6th, 2012 at 3:33 pm
That’s the “Jeremiah Johnson” argument. It’s where someone decries the ACA because it unfairly taxes the inactivity of someone like, oh say, Jeremiah Johnson who doesn’t now nor would ever use the healthcare system. (I came up with that just now!) And thus poor Jeremiah’s freedoms being stolen away.
But when we apply logical reasoning to that analogy, doesn’t the fact that Jeremiah finds a badass .50 caliber rifle and gets a free Indian wife make up for getting fined a single beaver pelt (adjusted for inflation, of course) for not having health insurance? I think it does.
BCinBCS Reply:
July 6th, 2012 at 8:56 pm
“Healthcare is a privilege, not a right, or do you left-wing “wingnuts” not understand that?”-Pavlov
You are dead wrong Pavlov and even a superficial reading of the U.S. Constitution demonstrates that it is a RIGHT. Oh, BTW, I’m not left-wing, either.
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100 Year Decision Reply:
July 9th, 2012 at 1:51 pm
Owning a gun is a right, but getting healthcare is not….hmmm. Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness be damned, eh, Wingers?
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Anonymous says:
Healthcare as a privilege and not a right. Spoken like a true christian.
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Robert Morrow Reply:
July 8th, 2012 at 2:14 pm
Correct. Healthcare is not a right. Neither is food or shelter. Nor is anything else except the right to free speech and the right to *pursue* but not achieve your happiness.
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Anonymous Reply:
July 8th, 2012 at 3:51 pm
Still using that stolen water the gubment provides you Morrow??? Is it your “right” to use stolen water?
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100 Year Decision Reply:
July 9th, 2012 at 1:52 pm
But having a gun is.
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Spiro Eagleton says:
More proof that Dewworst is going to lose! I got this from the Cruz campaign and I believe it based on the friends, neighbors, and co-workers I’ve been talking to.
Start of email —–
I wanted to give you a heads up about a recent internal poll conducted for the Cruz for Senate campaign that shows Ted leading Dewhurst 49-40.
This is remarkable. It indicates that all the momentum in the runoff is in our favor because conservative Texans are sick and tired of an out-of-control government and know another career politician won’t cut it.
Ted is leading Dewhurst among nearly every sub-group. Importantly, Ted is dominating self-identified “Tea Party” and “Very Conservative” voters.
Among the 50% of likely runoff voters who are Tea Party aligned, Ted leads 72-22. Among the 60% who are very conservative, Ted leads 58-33.
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Robert Morrow Reply:
July 6th, 2012 at 3:18 pm
I am voting for Ted Cruz, but have no idea how he will do. I do know Dewhurst’s name got boo’ed at the Texas State GOP convention.
I think it is Dewhurst’s money vs. Cruz’ grassroots momentum. I do know this: David Dewhurst could not inspire a fat person to eat a doughnut much less vote for him.
The lobby loves him, though.
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anita says:
I’m hopeful that we’ll make it to 400 comments on this entry.
So what’s up with the new mayor of Galveston refusing to allow any federally-subsidized affordable housing to be rebuilt on the Island, thus threatening HUD funding across the state?
What’s up with the nutty Houston City Council member who forged her employees time cards to keep them from qualifying for benefits?
What’s up with the national report that
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anita says:
Premature post …
What’s up with the national report of health care in the states, and Texas coming in dead last? Not even Mississippi or Alabama as bad.
What’s up?
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Anonymous Reply:
July 6th, 2012 at 3:57 pm
Thank god we passed tort reform.
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Anonymous says:
way to go jbb, keep up the goo work
A well-respected judge who was appointed to the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals by President Ronald Reagan says that he has become less conservative because of “crackpots” and “lunatics” in the Republican Party.
In an interview with NPR on Thursday Judge Richard Posner said that “right-wingers” were making a serious mistake by attacking Chief Justice John Roberts for siding with liberals and upholding President Barack Obama’s health care reform law.
“Because if you put [yourself] in his position, what’s he supposed to think?” Posner wondered. “That he finds his allies to be a bunch of crackpots? Does that help the conservative movement? I mean, what would you do if you were Roberts? All the sudden you find out that the people you thought were your friends have turned against you, they despise you, they mistreat you, they leak to the press.”
“What do you do? Do you become more conservative? Or do you say, ‘What am I doing with this crowd of lunatics?’ Right? Maybe you have to re-examine your position.”
He added: “I’ve become less conservative since the Republican Party started becoming goofy.”
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Anonymous Reply:
July 6th, 2012 at 4:08 pm
That should read: good work
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anita says:
Yea, it’s really paying off for us. And I’m so glad I’m seeing that hefty reduction in premiums, as promised. It’s really been a Godsend.
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John Johnson Reply:
July 7th, 2012 at 6:24 am
No way your premiums have gone down unless you raised your deductible or turned 65. Which is it?
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institutionalized Reply:
July 7th, 2012 at 8:47 am
I thought you stormed off and abandoned this blog in protest.
almost made it 24 hours
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anita Reply:
July 9th, 2012 at 2:28 am
JJ, I was being sarcastic. Premiums have not gone down, as promised.
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Canadian Border Patrol says:
Yup thank god for ObamaCare, since my Mother’s Medicare supplemental premiums have skyrocketed. Oh wait! Obama and the Democrats took $500 billion out of medicare to pay for this albatross.
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Anonymous Reply:
July 6th, 2012 at 6:19 pm
Nice try. smarter monkey’s please. Or at least monkey’s that don’t watch fox.
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JohnBernardBooks says:
Democrats haven’t won a statewide election since 1994 and I know the reason why.
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Robert Morrow says:
Rick Perry and his bloated security entourage costing Texas almost $4 million for the 2011 Humiliation Tour.
http://www.kxan.com/dpp/news/texas/perrys-failed-run-costs-texans-37m
“Not included in either the security travel expenses or overtime tabs are the 126 days Perry spent outside Texas while running for president, which forced the state to pay the lieutenant governor or Senate pro tem $32,466 to fill in as acting governor.”
“The latest round of additional travel expenses pushes the total security expenditures to more than $3.7 million, but additional bills — such as holdover travel expenses or overtime filings that could appear in the department’s future reports — could raise the cost to taxpayers even more.”
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Tom says:
In order to get to #400, let me ask, why do conservatives hate John Roberts.
And don’t we all agree ObamaCare is merely the stepchild of RomneyCare.
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longleaf says:
Why do we not hear the usual “free market” solution when it comes to the medical-industrial complex? In an economics textbook, this industry would be decried for its barriers to entry. Why isn’t the U.S. market being flooded with foreign-made pharmaceuticals and millions of health care professionals from MDs on down to drive down costs?
If this business model works for Walmart etc., why can’t it be applied to this cartel as a solution to the persistent inflation of health care costs?
The answer the cartel spokesperson (as his face turned red from his blood pressure spiking) would probably give me: “TORT REFORM!” However, that’s long been in place in Texas and my premiums are still rising.
The administrative overhead of the insurance cartel is also an obvious cost-driver. I have to give these cartels credit. They seem to have as much political power as the banksters on Wall Street. There is no way to vote any of them out. They always own everything and everybody behind the scenes once the Potemkin elections are over every two years.
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JohnBernardBooks says:
Democrats haven’t won a statewide office since 1994, I’m going to go out on a limb and predict they won’t again in Nov.
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Tom Barry Reply:
July 8th, 2012 at 12:50 pm
That’s as bold a prediction as betting the sun will rise tomorrow. But it has nothing to do with the subject at hand.
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Anonymous says:
Huge salary increases at TxDot? Kitzman not attending insurance meeting in Corpus Christi? Where are you, Paul?
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Sybil says:
Do we know what has happened to Burka? Is he ok? Being held hostage by Morrow? Please, Paul, send a raven.
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Robert Morrow says:
Would you like to learn more about the JFK assassination, aka the 1963 Coup d’Etat?
Here is my interview with Robert Wenzel of Economic Policy Journal:
http://www.economicpolicyjournal.com/2012/07/on-robert-wenzel-show-who-killed-jfk.html
“On this week’s Robert Wenzel Show. JFK assassination expert Robert Morrow is the guest.
You will learn:
Who was the next door neighbor of J. Edgar Hoover, for years.
Where George H.W. Bush said he was at the time of the assassination.
Why Lyndon Johnson was really picked as Kennedy’s running mate.
Who were the two most evil men in Washington D.C. at the time of the assassination.
What Richard Nixon said about the assassination.
Who Lee Harvey Oswald really was.
and much, much more.”
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RobertMorrowsMother Reply:
July 8th, 2012 at 3:58 pm
Tune into this blog for the latest unsolicited rants from self proclaimed, misguided, imbecilic “expert” Robert “I’ll-cram-it-down-your-throat” Morrow. Those of you wishing to comment on something rather than his posts are warned to keep it short as he needs the space. Those of you who don’t heed this dictate will be banished from this site like he’s he’s done to Paul.
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Robert Morrow says:
I think my posts pertaining to Texas politics, history and politicians are interesting and highly informative.
I am a political researcher, political activist and amateur historian. I have probably a 1,000 books relating to history and politics (no, I am not read them all – but I have read parts of all of them).
Have you seem my blog on the Clintons? It has some of the most cutting edge stuff on the internet.
http://1984arkansasmotheroftheyear.blogspot.com/search?updated-min=2012-01-01T00:00:00-08:00&updated-max=2013-01-01T00:00:00-08:00&max-results=50
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Anonymous Reply:
July 8th, 2012 at 5:19 pm
“I think”. We don’t.
” I am …”. So what.
“Have you seen…”? No. Not interested.
Did I use too much space ? Enough for you to get the message?
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Anonymous Reply:
July 9th, 2012 at 2:32 pm
Of course you do honey, bless your heart.
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Robert Morrow says:
Re: Anonymous
“‘I think.’ We don’t.”
Exactly.
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Spiro Eagleton says:
I love it when Burka goes on one of his months-long summer sabbaticals and turns over his blog to those of us crazy enough to read and post on here. After reading so many of Morrow’s in-depth post on the JKF killing I’m almost starting to believe that LBJ really did do it! Ha.
Oh, and I’m increasingly inclined to believe that Cruz is going to win this race. I even saw a new sign up over the weekend for Cruz that read, “On to the run-off!” I’ve seen nothing of the sort from Dewhurst, probably because he has no supporters that would put up any signs for him, let allow block-walk or make calls.
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Robert Morrow Reply:
July 9th, 2012 at 11:10 am
Lyndon Johnson was like a Hitler or a Stalin and, no, I am not exaggerating. His mentality was like that, even if his kill totals did not reach those levels unless you count Vietnam.
McGeorge Bundy compare LBJ to Stalin as he was leaving as national security advisor.
“Mutual Contempt: Lyndon Johnson, Robert Kennedy, and the Feud that Defined a Decade”
http://www.amazon.com/Mutual-Contempt-Johnson-Kennedy-Defined/dp/0393318559/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1341849914&sr=8-1&keywords=mutual+contempt+RFK
As for Ted Cruz, we he certainly has a decent chance unless bucketfuls of Dewhurst negative ads sway the day. I only have seen ONE Dewhurst yard sign and it was at the end of one of the priciest streets in the exclusive Rob Roy neighborhood.
Dewhurst could not inspire a fat person to eat a doughnut much less millions to vote for him.
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Spiro Eagleton says:
Let alone.
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Anonymous says:
This site has turned into a gathering spot for loons. Someone please tell me where the moderate voices of sanity and reasoning that used to post here on occasion have gone.
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Burka's Bellhop says:
Mr. Burka is enjoying a restful stay at the Four Seasons Resort in Jackson, WY and has had a mani/pedi along with a full mustache cleaning and brushing. He shall return to the heathens in Texas once the right-wing troglodytes have finished defeating LtGov Dewhurst in their hate-filled primary run-off election. Until that time Mr. Burka shall continue to tip me with back issues of Texas Monthly and unsolicited political advise. Occasionally he is in a more generous mood and will slip me some of his left-over room service meals.
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Robert Morrow says:
Lyndon Johnson signed Freedom of Information act on July 4, 1966 “kicking and screaming.”
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/news/20120704/
Washington, DC, July 4, 2012 – Marking the 46th anniversary of President Johnson’s signing the Freedom of Information Act, the National Security Archive today posted a compilation of 46 news headlines from the past year made possible by active and creative use of the FOIA. This representative sample, drawn from hundreds of FOIA stories reported by newspapers, blogs, broadcasters, and researchers, describe FOIA requests that revealed the theft of Jack Daniels whiskey by airport security screeners, the keywords used by homeland security officials to monitor social networking sites, the soil contamination endangering Marines and their families at Camp Lejeune, pre-9/11 attempts to whack Osama bin Laden, and $1.2 trillion of secret Federal Reserve loans to banks, among dozens of other topics that the public has a right and a need to know.
“These freedom of information stories show the paradox of FOIA,” remarked Tom Blanton, director of the Archive, which has made tens of thousands of successful FOIA requests since its founding in 1985. “We requesters always complain about the constant delays, the bureaucratic obstacles, the processing fee harassment, and the excessive government secrecy; yet the FOIA actually produces front-page results every year that make a real difference to citizens and to better government.”
“Agencies are still dragging their heels on fulfilling President Obama’s transparency promises,” said Nate Jones, the Archive’s Freedom of Information Coordinator, citing the Archive’s government-wide audits of FOIA performance. “But persistence and focus and pressure pay off, as these headlines show; and the core principle of FOIA – that government information belongs to the people – is worth fighting for.”
The Archive’s detailed 122-page guide, “Effective FOIA Requesting for Everyone,” is available online at the Archive’s FOIA page, here.
The Archive’s previous postings of documentation from the Johnson, Nixon and Ford presidential libraries show that President Johnson grudgingly signed the FOIA into law 46 years ago today, at the last possible minute, only after pressure from newspaper editors and his own press secretary Bill Moyers, who later said LBJ was “dragged kicking and screaming” into signing the bill. Moyers credited the persistence of longtime California congressman John Moss, lead author of the FOIA bill, for making the law happen.
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Alex Jones 4 President says:
I USED TO READ INFORWARS.COM FOR ALL OF THE TRUTH, BUT NOW I COME HERE TO READ MORROWS GREAT WRITTINGS. HES A GENIUS AND I LOVE IT! THANK YOU TO PAUL BIRKA FOR THIS AWESOME BLOG! NOW WE NEED TO TALK ABOUT 9 11 BEING AN INSIDE JOB BY THE BILDERBURGER ILLUMINATI. LET THE DEBATE BEGAN!
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Robert Morrow Reply:
July 9th, 2012 at 6:20 pm
The Bilderbergers never invited Rick Perry back. And the voters of Iowa and New Hampshire did not like him either.
I guess Perry just was not up to snuff to be the face of the New World Odor.
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Alex says:
The Greatest Threat To Mankind
The ultimate sin of the technocrats
Paul Joseph Watson
Infowars.com
Monday, July 9, 2012
The self-destructive, self-loathing, nihilistic drivel that poses as popular culture and modern society is like a ball and chain to humanity’s innate desire to realize its true potential.
In the video above, Alex Jones explains how the people in control of our planet are wantonly hurting the course of human development and sacrificing the very legacy of our species in order to satisfy their own meaningless, myopic lust for transitory power.
A small group of inbred, unhappy, twisted and wicked people have committed to dominating and enslaving the population of the planet instead of serving humanity as pioneers in leading our species on to its destiny of greatness.
Humanity can only dream of the potential it possesses in reaching out for the stars while we are being held back and turned away from our destiny by globalists.
While the human race is being demonized as a virus or a cancer upon the planet, in reality it is our controllers who are the true cancer because they are creating the environment for mankind’s destruction.
The ultimate sin committed by the technocrats against the world population is their attempt to shutter our doors of perception and put a halt to the charge of human progress, freedom, and spiritual enlightenment.
If we are to survive and thrive as a species we must untangle our minds from the trap that has been laid for us by the technocrats and come to the understanding that they are the biggest threat mankind faces as a species.
*********************
Paul Joseph Watson is the editor and writer for Prison Planet.com. He is the author of Order Out Of Chaos. Watson is also a regular fill-in host for The Alex Jones Show and Infowars Nightly News.
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The Mustache That Dare Not Speak Its Name says:
While I, like others here, would like for this blog’s sabbatical to end, I have not been wasting my time. I have received the finest of brushings and shampooings, partially in recognition of my fine prognostication of the Obamacare case (see above, June 28 at 11:45am). Ginseng bubbles and sandlewood brushes. Heavenly!
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Sigmund Jakucki says:
Did I hear someone in the Texas Chili Parlor today say that Burka quit TM and is now writing a novel based on the TX Lege?
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hooboy! says:
I don’t know, did you?
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hooboy! says:
No Sigmund, you didn’t hear that. If that had happened they’d have his name off the front page so fast your head would have spun.
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Robert Morrow says:
Remember back in the 1992 Demo primary when the Globe ran the story of Bill Clinton and his *supposed* affair with Bobbie Ann Williams?
This was in February after the Gennifer Flower affair had come public, which of course the Clintons lied about (and all the other 26 “bimbos” – God knows hundreds – that Betsy Wright was worried about coming public).
The story was that Bill Clinton not only had affairs with Bobbie Ann but also had a son Danny Williams which Bill never took responsibility for.
That story was true. NewsMax and Carl Limbacher investigated it. One of Clinton’s biographers wrote about it and confirmed. Arkansas state trooper Larry Patterson said Bill used to send some of Chelsea’s extra Xmas gifts to Bobbie Ann’s house every Xmas.
Chelsea is of course the biological daughter of Webb Hubbell, not wild Bill. But that is a story for another day. Google “Chelsea Clinton Webb Hubbell” for that one.
Bill met Bobbie Ann one day when he went out for a job. The “projects” in Little Rock are about 5 blocks away from the Arkansas Governor’s mansion.
Here is what Bobbie Ann said:
“I was still working the street into the fourth month I was carrying Bill’s baby. And Bill got a special kick out of having sex with pregnant women. He said that pregnancy makes gals hotter.
When I told him that he was the father of my baby, he just laughed. He rubbed my big belly and said, ‘Girl, that can’t be my baby.’
But I knew it was. I just had this kind of woman’s feeling that this was his child.” – Bobbie Ann Williams
[Clinton Confidential, p. 179, originally in the Globe (2/17/92)]
Bobbie Ann Williams says Bill sired her son Danny or “Danno,” born in 1985 – which deadbeat dad Bill has never claimed or supported. Lucille Bolton, Danny’s aunt, says the now young man, age 21, is definitely Bill’s rejected son “There’s no buts, there’s no ifs, there’s no supposes about it.”
The Clintons made a deal with black activist Say McIntosh that if he would just shut up about Bobbie Ann Williams for the rest of the 1992, then they would pardon his son Tommy Williams.
That is exactly what happened. McIntosh shut up for 1992 and then his son Tommy McIntosh gets a pardon in January, 1993 by the Lt. Gov. when President elect Bill is out of town.
Aren’t you folks tired of BOTH the Bushes and the Clintons?
More on Bobbie Ann Williams/wild Bill here:
http://1984arkansasmotheroftheyear.blogspot.com/2012/02/hillary-and-bill-clinton-reject-danny.html
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Robert Morrow Reply:
July 9th, 2012 at 6:36 pm
Note: Tommy McIntosh had been in jail on drug charges and was not eligible for parole until 2010; he gets his pardon in January, 1993.
Roger Clinton went to jail in the 1980′s for dealing huge amounts of cocaine and got 2 years…
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texun says:
And I am the only bona fide descendant of Karl der Grosse, Louis XII, and Greta Garbo. So, no more talk about Clinton, George I and the like. I will hand down a definitive opinion as soon as I am ready and I am off meds long enough to type it.
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Jim Bob Der Grosse says:
Now that there just ain’t true.
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Mofus says:
Jezzz…….
Same boring caca from the same boring net-trolls……
come back soon Paul
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