The real problem with the healthcare system

If Congress is really interested in solving the healthcare crisis in this country they would stopped medical “scalping”. Recently on NBC Nightly News there was a report on third party companies that set themselves up as middlemen in the medical supplies game. They showed a cancer drug that the manufacturer charges $12.00 a vial for, that had been marked up by medical scalpers to over $900.00.

This is one of the many reasons that healthcare is so expensive in this country. There apparently are no regulations preventing this type of profiteering. Hospitals and other service providers routinely double-(or even triple)bill for services received. Or they charge for services that were not rendered. This is especially true in the cases of people who have insurance, Medicare or Medicaid. These service providers feel that if someone else is paying then no harm no foul. Most people with insurance don’t read the itemized bill to insure that they are being charged properly. They have insurance so the big companies will foot the bill. This of course drives up premiums for the rest of their customers.

When Congress passed Obamacare they did little if anything to stop these insane and immoral practices. Instead they simply tried to force everyone to drop their drawers and take it, spreading the same costs around. The problem with this mentality is that because it does nothing to address the underlying one of the causes of spiraling healthcare costs, medical scalping, it will only exacerbate the situation. Instead they passed a bill that will most likely be found unconstitutional. However we have laws against scalping and price gouging and they have NOT been found to be unconstitutional.

This lack of intelligence in lawmaking shows that the healthcare bill was really about vote buying and control of the American public. Both major parties receive campaign contributions from some of the companies and they certainly are not going to endanger their revenue streams by actually making good law.

We need a new Congress that’s smart enough and morally strong enough to say no, and yes when absolutely necessary.

The sorry state of the Union

I didn't watch the State of the Union address last night. That means one down, three to go. The thing about the SOU is that you really know what the president is going to say beforehand especially in this day and age of 24-hour news and the internet. And quite frankly President Obama has nothing to say that I want to hear. The only reason anybody wants to see it is to bask in the warm glow of the Dem chosen one.

Today I was watching CNBC and I saw Rep. Spencer Bacchus from my state, Alabama. He said something that is going to become a battle cry for Conservatives for the next four years.

"The government never solved anything by throwing more money at it."

We have known this for years. Look at the government school system. Every time we get a liberal president and congress we see the budget for government education explode. And every time it's like throwing money down a bottomless hole. It makes liberals think good about themselves and it placates some voters. But when everything is said and done it's just a useless waste of time. It always will be as long as teacher's unions are allowed to set policy.

Another example is the nation's infrastructure. When tax money goes to states and local communities, ostensibly to improve roads, bridges and levees, politicians, conservative and liberal alike, spend that money on pet projects. There was the instance in New Orleans where the local government spent infrastructure money meant for the levees on a fountain. A few years later Hurricane Katrina slammed into NO and the rest is history.

Just a few years ago there was the bridge collapse that was caused by stress fatigue and age. The money that should have been spent repairing that preexisting bridge was instead spent on building new structures just so politicians could get their names placed on them. And again people died.

In other words you have to change what you are doing to improve, not just throw money at it.

Economy vs. defense

Events over the last few days have shown that the worst of the financial crisis has already occurred: fifty-two percent of Americans elected Barack Obama president. It is a cliché that in tough economic times people vote for Democrats, but it is what it is. The opposite cliché is that when the issue is national security, the people usually vote for Republicans. In this year’s election, people only saw the economic trouble and not the threat from Islamic terrorists and rogue nations. After all, 9/11 was seven years ago. That kind of thing can’t happen again, right? Wrong.

As I am writing this, the Indian people are picking up the pieces from a major coordinated attack in the city of Mumbai. There are hostages and over one hundred people are dead and hundreds are injured. Of course, Islamic terrorists have claimed responsibility. Witnesses claim that some of the terrorists were demanding American and British tourists.

Closer to home intelligence officials claim that they have credible evidence that terrorists are targeting New York City subways for Thanksgiving. The believed goal is to close down Amtrak’s Northeast corridor. This would shut down holiday traffic, as well as Black Friday traffic between Boston and Washington, D.C.

As I said earlier the problem is that the Americans’ that voted for Obama were only concerned with the economy. They apparently forgot the harm that September 11 caused to our economy. And there are worse threats than airplanes slamming into buildings.

Many on the Left have argued that they are just as strong on national defense as Republicans. Yet Barney Frank (D-Mass.), the chairperson of the House Financial Services Committee wants to downsize the military. In addition, Vice President-elect Joe Biden told backers during the campaign that he believed that there would be a major terrorist attack within six months of Obama’s inauguration, “to test” the new president. He added that then-candidate Obama might do some things in response to such an attack that people might not understand. However, he pleaded with people to be patient with him. This statement has always raised the hackles on my neck. It’s not because I feel it confirms what Republicans said about Obama’s lack of experience. It’s because it sounds much more Orwellian than I care for.

We are about eight weeks from the inauguration of a man who has only three years of service on the national level. He did not sponsor any meaningful legislation during that time and mostly voted “present” during legislation. Somehow, he has become the “Chosen One” that will lead this country out of the wilderness that the Left have claimed for the last eight years that we have been wandering in. The Left claim that he has the practical understanding to appoint experienced people that can make up for any lack of experience in any given area. But in the end it will be Barack Obama that has to make the final decision. If the American people have any sense whatsoever they will remember that in 2012. Assuming that is, of course if some group hasn’t irradiated a major city or infected large numbers of people with some horrible plague. If this has happened then the only people that can be held ultimately responsible for such a tragedy will be Barack Obama and the people that voted for him.