Tuesday, July 31, 2012

Barker's Newsbites: Tuesday, July 31, 2012


Mornin', folks!

Let's see what the day brings!

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12 comments:

William R. Barker said...

http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/312573/britain-s-nhs-no-fun-and-games-john-fund

Sunday’s British papers report that a study by the research firm Lloyd’s TSB Premier Banking found that nearly two-thirds of Britons earning more than $78,700 a year have taken out private health insurance because they don’t trust the NHS.

* NHS = NATIONAL HEALTH SERVICE. (aka: SOCIALIZED MEDICINE)

Shaun Matisonn, the chief executive of PruHealth, says that “patients today are sophisticated consumers of health care. They research the treatments they want, but cannot always get them through the NHS.”

A survey by the British health-care organization Bupa found that two-thirds of its customers cited the risk of infection from superbugs as a top reason for buying private insurance.

Horror stories about the NHS abound. A 2007 survey of almost 1,000 physicians by Doctors’ Magazine found that two-thirds said they had been told by their local NHS trust not to prescribe certain drugs, and one in five doctors knew patients who had suffered as a result of treatment rationing.

The study cited one physician who characterized the NHS as “a lottery.”

A new study this year by GP magazine supports that conclusion. Through Freedom of Information Act records, it found that 90% of NHS trusts were rationing care.

Rick Dewsbury of the Daily Mail recounted the 2009 case of Kane Gorny, a 22-year-old NHS patient, who was admitted to the hospital for a hip replacement. A series of hospital employees refused his request for a glass of water and failed to give him diabetes medication. He went so far as to call the emergency operator for help. When the police arrived, nurses assured them that Gorny was confused and needed no outside help. A day later, he was dead of dehydration.

The official inquest into his death was published this month. It found that neglect by hospital staff — “a cascade of individual failures” — contributed to his death. Here’s hoping that not everyone is “treated the same” in Britain’s NHS hospitals.

In Britain, we have seen what could be our future, and it’s not a pretty sight.

July 31, 2012 at 8:30 AM
William R. Barker said...

http://washingtonexaminer.com/federal-court-finds-obama-appointees-interfered-with-new-black-panther-prosecution/article/2503500

A federal court in Washington, DC, held last week that political appointees appointed by President Obama did interfere with the Department of Justice’s prosecution of the New Black Panther Party.

The ruling came as part of a motion by the conservative legal watch dog group Judicial Watch, who had sued the DOJ in federal court to enforce a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request for documents pertaining to the New Black Panthers case.

United States District Court Judge Reggie Walton [cited] a “series of emails” between Obama political appointees and career Justice lawyers; Walton writes: "The documents reveal that political appointees within DOJ were conferring about the status and resolution of the New Black Panther Party case in the days preceding the DOJ’s dismissal of claims in that case, which would appear to contradict Assistant Attorney General Perez’s testimony that political leadership was not involved in that decision."

“The Court’s decision is another piece of evidence showing the Obama Justice Department is run by individuals who have a problem telling the truth,” Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton said. “The decision shows that we can’t trust the Obama Justice Department to fairly administer our nation’s voting and election laws.”

The New Black Panthers case stems from a Election Day 2008 incident where two members of the New Black Panther Party were filmed outside a polling place intimidating voters and poll watchers by brandishing a billy club. Justice Department lawyers investigated the case, filed charges, and when the Panthers failed to respond, a federal court in Philadelphia entered a “default” against all the Panthers defendants. But after Obama was sworn in, the Justice Department reversed course, dismissed charges against three of the defendants, and let the fourth off with a narrowly tailored restraining order.

July 31, 2012 at 8:41 AM
William R. Barker said...

http://washingtonexaminer.com/d.c.-students-being-paid-for-summer-school/article/2503405

The District of Columbia is paying 305 students with poor academic and behavioral records to attend summer school, The Washington Examiner has learned.

* ONE MORE TIME...

The District is paying 305 students with poor academic and behavioral records to attend summer school, The Washington Examiner has learned.

(*SIGH*)

The ninth-graders are earning $5.25 an hour to participate in the "Summer Bridge" program, which targets students identified by D.C. Public Schools as less likely than their peers to graduate high school within four years.

The 95 students who voluntarily signed up for the summer school program will receive half of an elective credit. But to fill the 400-student session with at-risk students, DCPS reached out to the Department of Employment Services. More than 300 students flagged by DCPS and who had signed up for the Summer Youth Employment Program were told that school would be their jobs this summer.

* UNFRIGGIN'BELIEVABLE... YEAH... BUT IT GETS WORSE! (READ ON!)

Melissa Salmanowitz, a spokeswoman for Chancellor Kaya Henderson, said DCPS officials are going to study this year's results, with the intention of expanding the program next summer.

* EXPANDING...?!?!

This summer isn't the first time the city has paid students to learn. The District allowed a Harvard University group to pay about 3,000 middle-school students up to $100 a month for good grades during the 2008-09 and 2009-10 school years. Grades overall didn't improve significantly.

* ONE MORE TIME...

Grades overall didn't improve significantly.

(*BANGING MY HEAD AGAINST THE WALL; PRAYING FOR DEATH*)

* OH! HERE'S THE BEST...! (READ ON!)

Students aren't making up failed coursework...

* NO... NO... OF COURSE NOT!

(*BLOOD PRESSURE SHOOTING THROUGH THE ROOF*)

[S]ome of their class-time is devoted to workplace simulations. In one scenario, students use math and literacy skills to solve problems while pretending to be executives at a sports television network.

* BUT... BUT... BUT... ISN'T THEIR LACK OF MATH AND LITERACY SKILLS THE REASON THEY'RE IN SUMMER SCHOOL...?!?! I HAVE NOTHING AGAINST SUCH "SCENARIOS," BUT DON'T THEY BELONG IN REGULAR CLASSES...??? WE SEEM TO BE JUMPING AHEAD HERE - PUTTING THE CART IN FRONT OF THE HORSE!

July 31, 2012 at 8:57 AM
William R. Barker said...

http://apnews.myway.com/article/20120730/DA0BDV2O2.html

The U.S. Postal Service is bracing for...

(*DRUM ROLL*)

...default on billions in payments due to the Treasury...

* O-BAM-A! O-BAM-A! O-BAM-A!

* NOPE. THE PROBLEMS PRE-DATE OBAMA. BUT HERE'S THE POINT: IF OBAMA COULDN'T SAVE THE FRIGGIN' POST OFFICE...

(*SHRUG*)

With cash running perilously low, two legally required payments for future postal retirees' health benefits - $5.5 billion due Wednesday, and another $5.6 billion due in September - will be left unpaid, the mail agency said Monday.

Postal officials said they also are studying whether they may need to delay other obligations.

(*SARCASTIC CLAP-CLAP-CLAP*)

The defaults won't stir any kind of catastrophe in day-to-day mail service. Post offices will stay open, mail trucks will run, employees will get paid, current retirees will get health benefits.

* WHICH TELLS YOU WHAT, FOLKS...?

(*SMIRK*)

First-class mail volume, which has fallen 25% since 2006, is projected to drop another 30% by 2016.

* CAN YOU SAY B*A*I*L*O*U*T...?!?!

The Postal Service, an independent agency of government, does not receive taxpayer money for operations but it is subject to congressional control. It estimates that it is now losing $25 million a day, which includes projected savings it had expected to be accruing by now if Congress this spring had approved its five-year profitability plan. That plan would cut Saturday delivery, reduce low-volume postal facilities and end its obligation to pay more than $5 billion each year for future retiree health payments.

* HOLD IT! LET'S HIGHLIGHT THAT LAST PART...

... and end its obligation to pay more than $5 billion each year for future retiree health payments.

* BUT... BUT... BUT... THEN WHO IS GONNA PAY FOR THE FUTURE RETIREE HEALTH BENEFITS...?!?! ONE MORE TIME: CAN YOU SAY B*A*I*L*O*U*T...?!?!

While the [Democrat-controlled] Senate passed a bill in April that provides an $11 billion cash infusion to help the mail agency avert a default...

* IN OTHER WORDS... A BAILOUT...

The House remains stalled over a measure that allows for the aggressive cuts the Postal Service prefers; that's unlikely to move forward this year, partly due to concerns among rural lawmakers over cutbacks in their communities.

(*JUST THROWING MY HANDS UP*)

The Postal Service, which releases third-quarter financial results next week, has projected a record $14.1 billion loss for the year. It expects to avoid bankruptcy in October only by defaulting on the two health prepayments, totaling $11.1 billion. It faces a cash crunch again next year.

July 31, 2012 at 9:12 AM
William R. Barker said...

http://www.nypost.com/p/news/opinion/opedcolumnists/inconvenient_truth_v0YgFJUTGIwWPibQYoF3LI#.UBeWaRBHxCc.facebook

While in Israel, Mitt Romney said something every sane person knows to be true: There is great cultural and political meaning in the fact that Israel has prospered while the Palestinians have festered.

“Culture,” Romney said, “makes all the difference . . . you notice a dramatic, stark difference in economic vitality.”

He didn’t specify what he meant by “culture,” but you can take your pick.

You want a political culture that works to create conditions under which an economy can thrive? Since signing the Oslo Accords with the Palestinians, Israel has spent two decades working to unshackle its economy from its socialist roots, with remarkable results.

The Palestinians? They’ve created what the House Foreign Affairs Committee has called a “chronic kleptocracy,” with foreign aid and investment shamelessly stolen and diverted to the bank accounts of the leaders of the Palestinian Authority and its gangsterish local strongmen.

According to Jim Zanotti of the Congressional Research Service, Uncle Sam has given the Palestinians $5 billion since 1994. We might as well have lit a match to most of it. It hasn’t gotten to the people who might’ve used it best; it’s simply served as personal financial lubricant for the folks in power.

You want a healthy social culture? The Middle East Media Research Institute has spent decades detailing the diseased messages emanating from Palestinian TV and textbooks, instructing children in the glories of suicide terrorism against innocent Israelis.

You want a culture where citizens are free to express themselves and so live in the openness necessary to the functioning of a successful economy? Israel has a free press, much of it openly hostile to the parties in power. The Palestinian Authority has arrested and tortured critical journalists, as well as conducted denial-of-service attacks against Web sites reporting on corruption.

(And this doesn’t even take into account Hamas, the radical terror group in charge of Gaza. It, too, has lived parasitically, sucking the life out of the Palestinian economy.)

So Romney said Israel has done better than the areas under Palestinian control because Israeli culture is healthier. That’s not only true, it’s a necessary thing to say — because the refusal to say it and accept it contributes to the continuing immiseration and unfreedom of the Palestinians themselves.

Of course, for saying this, Romney was called a “racist” by Saeb Erakat, the longtime slavering lackey of every Palestinian murderer and thief. Erakat blames “occupation” for Palestinian poverty. But the PA has dominion over almost all of the West Bank and Hamas has control over all of Gaza, so the word “occupation” is all but meaningless — except as shorthand for “Israel still holds Jerusalem.”

Erakat’s nonsense was to be expected. But what of how that repugnant lackey’s words were then shamefully echoed by slavering U.S. media lackeys (of the Obama re-election effort)? Dan Amira in New York magazine spoke for much of the press corps with an item titled “Mitt Romney Insults Whole New International Populace.” He wrote: “After he enraged the British by suggesting that their Olympics might not be as awesome as his Olympics, Romney moved on to Israel, where he appeared to blame Palestinian poverty in part on . . . the territory’s inferior culture.”

It does have an inferior political culture.

Romney spoke the truth.

And it wasn’t a gaffe — because anyone who publicizes his remark is helping Romney win the election. Even those who foolishly think they’re hurting him.

July 31, 2012 at 9:28 AM
William R. Barker said...

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10000872396390444405804577559442776203150.html?mod=WSJ_Opinion_AboveLEFTTop

Mitt Romney isn't famous for taking political risks, so it was notable and welcome on Monday when he came out against subsidies for wind power. (And if that doesn't sound like stop-the-presses news, remember that Republicans aren't really as implacably opposed to energy handouts as both Democrats and Republicans want the public to believe!)

So from the top: The wind industry more or less exists at the pleasure of politics, specifically because of a federal subsidy known as the production tax credit that provides developers with a 2.2-cent write-off for every kilowatt hour of electricity they produce. (In effect, the credit means that wind's energy competitors are taxed at a higher rate.) This annual $1.6 billion special advantage has hung around for a decade but lapses at the end of the year, and Washington is now debating an extension.

Holding fast on this deadline ought to be an easy call for Republicans, who say they want to make the tax code fairer and get the government out of picking energy winners and losers in particular. But a sizeable cheering section within the GOP wants to maintain the status quo.

* WE CALL THESE PEOPLE "SCUMBAGS." TO BE SPECIFIC, "RINO SCUMBAGS."

In a statement to the Des Moines Register on Monday, the Romney campaign was definitive: "He will allow the wind credit to expire, end the stimulus boondoggles, and create a level playing field on which all sources of energy can compete on their merits," a spokesman wrote. "Wind energy will thrive wherever it is economically competitive, and wherever private sector competitors with far more experience than the President believe the investment will produce results."

Just so.

And congratulations to Mr. Romney for bucking his own party's anti-free marketeers when the path of least resistance runs in the other direction.

July 31, 2012 at 10:56 AM
William R. Barker said...

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2012/jul/31/illegals-released-feds-19-murders-142-sex-crimes/

The Obama administration released illegal immigrants who went on to commit more crimes, including charges of 19 murders, 3 attempted murders and 142 sex crimes, the House Judiciary Committee said in a report Tuesday.

All told, the nearly 47,000 illegal immigrants the administration was notified of but declined to deport between 2008 and 2011 under its Secure Communities program had a recidivism rate of 16%, the committee said.

(*SARCASTIC CLAP-CLAP-CLAP*)

They were just part of the nearly 160,000 immigrants — most of them here legally — who were flagged by Secure Communities during the three year period but who were either not eligible to be deported or who the administration decided to release. Those immigrants went on to be charged in nearly 60,000 more crimes, according to the committee and the Congressional Research Service, which issued a report on the matter.

* WHAT'S A MEASLY 60,000 CRIMES BETWEEN FRIENDS, RIGHT? (*SMIRK*)

July 31, 2012 at 2:03 PM
William R. Barker said...

* TWO-PARTER... (Part 1 of 2)

http://www.creators.com/conservative/walter-williams.html

* BY WALTER E. WILLIAMS

Having been born in 1936 has allowed me to witness both societal progress and retrogression.

High on the list of things made better in our society are the great gains in civil liberties and economic opportunities, especially for racial minorities and women. People who are now deemed poor have a level of material wealth that would have been a pipe dream to yesteryear's poor. But despite the fact that today's Americans have achieved an unprecedented level of prosperity, we have become spiritually and morally impoverished compared with our ancestors.

Years ago, spending beyond one's means was considered a character defect. Today not only do people spend beyond their means but also there are companies that advertise on radio and TV to eliminate or reduce your credit card and mortgage debt. Students saddled with college loans have called for student loan forgiveness. Yesterday's Americans would have viewed it as morally corrupt and reprehensible to accumulate debt and then seek to avoid paying it. It's nothing less than theft. What's worse is there's little condemnation of it by the rest of us.

* I CONDEMN IT! I CONDEMN IT DAILY!

Earlier this year, as a result of a budget crunch, the Philadelphia School District had to lay off 91 school police officers. During the 1940s and '50s, I attended Philadelphia schools in poor neighborhoods. The only time we saw a policeman in school was during an assembly period when we had to listen to a boring lecture about safety. Because teacher assaults are tolerated — 4,000 over the past five years in Philadelphia — school police are needed. Prior to the '60s, few students would have thought of talking back to a teacher, and no one would have cursed, much less assaulted, a teacher.

I couldn't have been more than 8, 9 or 10 years old when one time, on the way home from school, my cousin and I were having a stone fight with some other youngsters. An elderly black lady walked up to my cousin and me and asked, "Does your mother know you're out here throwing stones?" We replied, "No, ma'am," praying that the matter rested there. Today an adult doing the same thing risks being cursed and possibly assaulted. Fearing retaliation, adults sit in silence as young people use vile language to one another on public conveyances, in school corridors and on the streets.

* NOT ME! I SPEAK UP!

* TO BE CONTINUED...

July 31, 2012 at 2:24 PM
William R. Barker said...

* CONCLUDING... (Part 2 of 2)

Yesteryear there was little tolerance for the kinds of crude behavior and language that are accepted today. To see a man sitting on a bus or trolley car while a woman is standing used to be unthinkable. Children didn't address adults by their first name. By the way, over the course of my nearly 45 years of teaching, on several occasions, students have addressed me by my first name. I have told them that I don't mind their addressing me by my first name but that my first name is Professor.

* OR "SIR!"

Much of what's accepted today would have been seen as bizarre and lowdown yesteryear. Out-of-wedlock childbirth was a disgrace and surely wouldn't have occasioned a baby shower. Popular TV shows such as "The Jerry Springer Show" and "Maury" feature guests who openly discuss despicable acts in their personal lives, often to the applause of the audience. Shame is going the way of the dinosaur.

I think that a society's first line of defense is not the law but customs, traditions and moral values. These behavioral norms — transmitted by example, word of mouth, religious teachings, rules of etiquette and manners — represent a body of wisdom distilled over the ages through experience and trial and error. They include important legal thou-shalt-nots — such as shalt not murder, steal, lie or cheat — but they also include all those civilities one might call ladylike or gentlemanly behavior.

Police officers and courts can never replace these social restraints on personal conduct.

At best, laws, police and the criminal justice system are a society's last desperate line of defense.

* AND, FOLKS... (*SIGH*)... THAT LAST LINE OF DEFENSE IS BEING BREACHED IN MORE AMERICAN CITIES AND TOWNS THAN WE'D LIKE TO BELIEVE.

July 31, 2012 at 2:24 PM
William R. Barker said...

* TWO-PARTER...(Part 1 of 2)

http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/la-pn-five-atf-officials-ruled-responsible-for-fast-and-furious-20120730,0,4364586.story

[C]ongressional investigators have concluded that five senior ATF officials - from the special agent-in-charge of the Phoenix field office to the top man in the bureau’s Washington headquarters - are collectively responsible for the failed Fast and Furious gun-tracking operation that was “marred by missteps, poor judgments and inherently reckless strategy.”

The investigators, in a final report likely to be released later this week, also unearthed new evidence that agents from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives in Phoenix initially sought to hide from the Mexican government the crucial information that two Fast and Furious firearms were recovered after the brother of a Mexican state attorney general was killed there.

According to a copy of the report obtained Monday by The Times, the investigators said their findings are “the best information available as of now” about the flawed gun operation that last month led to Atty. Gen. Eric H. Holder Jr. being found in contempt of Congress...

Two more final reports, they said, will deal with “the devastating failure of supervision and leadership” at the Department of Justice and an “unprecedented obstruction of the [congressional] investigation by the highest levels of the [Holder] Justice Department, including the attorney general himself.”

The first report did allege some Justice Department involvement, however, notably that Kenneth E. Melson, then acting ATF director, was made into a “scapegoat” for Fast and Furious after he told congressional Republicans his Justice Department supervisors “were doing more damage control than anything” else once Fast and Furious became public.

“My view is that the whole matter of the department’s response in this case was a disaster,” Melson told the investigators.

Fast and Furious, which allowed some 2,500 illegal gun sales in Arizona with the hope that agents would track the weapons to Mexican drug cartels, began in fall 2009 and was halted after U.S. Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry was killed in December 2010. By then, most of the weapons had been lost, and two were recovered at the scene of his slaying.

The five ATF managers, since moved to other positions, have either defended Fast and Furious in congressional testimony or refused to discuss it. They could not be reached for comment Monday. At the Justice Department, senior officials, including Holder, have steadfastly maintained that Fast and Furious was confined to the Arizona border region and that Washington was never aware of the flawed tactics.

The joint staff report, authored by Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA), chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, and Charles E. Grassley (R-IA), the top Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee, was highly critical of the ATF supervisors.

July 31, 2012 at 2:44 PM
William R. Barker said...

* CONCLUDING... (Part 2 of 2)

They found that William Newell, the special agent-in-charge in Phoenix, exhibited “repeatedly risky” management and “consistently pushed the envelope of permissible investigative techniques.” The report said “he had been reprimanded ... before for crossing the line, but under a new administration and a new attorney general he reverted back to the use of risky gun walking tactics.”

His boss, Deputy Assistant Director for Field Operations William McMahon, “rubber stamped critical documents that came across his desk without reading them,” the report alleged. “In McMahon’s view it was not his job to ask any questions about what was going on in the field.”

They added that McMahon gave “false testimony” to Congress about signing applications for wiretap intercepts in Fast and Furious.

His supervisor, Mark Chait, assistant director for field operations, “played a surprisingly passive role during the operation,” the report said. “He failed to provide oversight that his experience should have dictated and his position required.”

Above Chait was Deputy Director William Hoover, who the report said ordered an exit strategy to scuttle Fast and Furious but never followed through: “Hoover was derelict in his duty to ensure that public safety was not jeopardized.”

And they said Melson, a longtime career Justice official, “often stayed above the fray” instead of bringing Fast and Furious to an “end sooner.”

But, the investigators said, ATF agents said that they were hamstrung by federal prosecutors in Arizona from obtaining criminal charges for illegal gun sales, and that Melson “even offered to travel to Phoenix to write the indictments himself. Still, he never ordered it be shut down.”

In the November 2010 slaying in Mexico of Mario Gonzalez, the brother of Patricia Gonzalez, then attorney general for the state of Chihuahua, two of 16 weapons were traced back to Fast and Furious after they were recovered from a shootout with Mexican police.

But 10 days later, ATF Agent Tonya English urged Agent Hope MacAllister and their supervisor, David J. Voth, to keep it under wraps. “My thought is not to release any information,” she told them in an email.

When Patricia Gonzalez later learned that two of the guns had been illegally obtained under Fast and Furious, she was outraged. "The basic ineptitude of these officials [who ordered the Fast and Furious operation] caused the death of my brother and surely thousands more victims," she said.

The following month, Agent Terry was killed south of Tucson. Voth emailed back, “Ugh ... things will most likely get ugly.”

July 31, 2012 at 2:44 PM
William R. Barker said...

http://www.glennbeck.com/2012/07/31/epic-media-hypocrisy-ann-romney%E2%80%99s-990-shirt-bad-michelle-obama%E2%80%99s-6800-shirt-good/

The media has really outdone themselves with this one. They roundly thumped Ann Romney for wearing a $990 shirt – but when Michelle Obama wears something almost seven times as expensive, she’s lauded for saving a struggling economy. It doesn’t really make a whole lot of sense, does it?

The Washington Post had said: "Does Ann Romney wear her $990 designer shirt while driving one of her two Cadillacs? The very wealthy Mitt and Ann Romney have often been painted as out of touch with average Americans. Ann’s pricey shirt will not help her husband change those perceptions, no matter how many Laundromat photo-ops are on the campaign’s daily itinerary. On Tuesday Ann wore a colorful silk Tee-shirt with a large bird print by Reed Krakoff during an interview with her and her husband on CBS’s This Morning. Fashion blogs quickly tracked down the “The Reed Audubon Silk Shirt” and noted the whopping price tag."

* NEXT...

But now with Michelle Obama they are saying: "Michelle Obama has been criticized for not dressing up enough for Queen Elizabeth II, so she stepped up her game Friday night at an Olympics reception for heads of state at Buckingham Palace. The first lady wore a very fancy J. Mendel capsleeve jacket — white viscose techno crepe tailored jacket with overlapped side panels and silver embroidery” from the 2013 Resort collection, according to a press release from the company. It’s not in stores yet, but high-end retailer Moda Operandi listed the jacket at a princely $6,800. The White House declined to comment."

* A SEVEN THOUSAND DOLLAR SHIRT...?!?! ($6,800.00 TO BE PRECISE.) (DID SHE PAY TAX...???)

Where is the outrage? Where are the comments calling the Obama’s out of touch and out of step with the American people? Are they tone deaf? Or is it suddenly OK for them to do it since they are on the other side of the aisle?

[M]ake no mistake, this criticism isn’t about what Michelle Obama does with her own money. The issue is the stunning hypocrisy from the media who refuse to apply consistent standards to the Romney’s that they do to the Obama’s.

July 31, 2012 at 7:24 PM

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