Monthly Archives: October 2013

Live-blogging Kathleen Sebelius’ testimony

Featured image Good morning. Chairman Upton of the House Energy and Commerce Committee has just commenced today’s hearing in which Secretary Sebelius will testify. Here is my account of the proceedings: 9:04: Upton wastes no time in blasting Sebelius. “Malfunctions have become the norm,” he says, as he zeroes in the website glitches. He also mentions the problems of loss of insurance and sticker shock on the policies available on the exchanges. »

Lies of Obamacare: House GOP Conference edition

Featured image “If you like your health care plan, you can keep your health care” is one of the foundational lies of Obamacre. In the typology of lies, this one is of the bald variety. How many times did Obama make this false statement in the course of retailing his mess of pottage? That is a research assignment requiring prompt attention. I trust someone is working on it. In the meantime, we »

Lies of Obamacare: Senate Dems edition

Featured image John McCormack and Michael Warren joined forces to gauge the reaction of Senate Democrats to one of the foundational lies of Obamacare. They caught up with our own Amy Klobuchar. Where was Al Franken? There is no evidence that they were able to attempt contact Al Franken, without whom Obamacare would not be Obamacare. As it happens, Franken is up for reelection next year. You can be sure that Minnesota’s »

Woeful testimony about Obamacare’s woes

Featured image I didn’t watch the testimony today of Marilyn Tavenner, administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, before the House Ways and Means Committee. But according to this report from Politico’s David Nather, it did not go well for the Obama administration: [Tavenner] apologized right away for the technological missteps that are preventing millions of Americans from using the federal enrollment website. That drew a vivid contrast with the »

Our Deeply Confused Electorate

Featured image These days, many are saying that Americans are profoundly divided, in a way that we haven’t seen in a long time. That might be true. But it seems to me that our electorate is as much confused as divided. Some of the current data at Rasmussen Reports illustrate the point. It is useful, I think, to look at multiple data points from the same source, so that differing results are »

Live-blogging Sebelius’s testimony

Featured image This is a reminder that I will live-blog the testimony of HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius before the House Energy and Commerce Committee (assuming, as I do, that C-SPAN broadcasts it). Her testimony is scheduled to begin at 9:00 a.m. I’ll stick with it for a couple of hours or until I become bored or tired, whichever occurs later. »

Judge Posner’s mea culpa was a recantation

Featured image I wrote here about Judge Richard Posner’s “weak and inappropriate mea culpa,” wherein he declared that he made a mistake in upholding Indiana’s voter-ID law. But now, Judge Posner denies that he is recanting that opinion. In a post on the New Republic’s website called “I Did Not ‘Recant’ on Voter ID laws,” he asserts: I did not say [in Reflections on Judging] that my decision, and the Supreme Court’s »

Why Does Obamacare Make Health Insurance So Expensive?

Featured image For a succinct explanation of why Obamacare is making health insurance more expensive for millions of Americans, check out this short interview with Aetna CEO Mark Bertolini. Bertolini identifies three main factors: 1) Obamacare imposes a requirement that, on an actuarial basis, insurance cover at least 60% of health care costs. Currently, more than half of Americans who buy individual coverage are below 50%. 2) Obamacare imposes 4% to 5% »

For Prudence, Supplemental

Featured image Scott shouldn’t have all the fun–or the mixed reader reaction.  It is a remarkable fact of the Obama era that we have come to the point of serious division and rancor amongst ourselves.  I don’t think there was this degree of disagreement over whether and how to oppose Bill Clinton in the 1990s.  I have lots of thoughts on this state of affairs, including the possibility that this internal debate »

When she’s moving her lips again

Featured image This week House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi recalled her deprived Baltimore childhood in (fictitious) thralldom to the Washington Redkskins. Today an observant reader reminds us of her minor loyalty conflict in this year’s Super Bowl as a result of her deep but previously forgotten childhood ties to the Baltimore Colts (whole thing here): Q: Madam Leader, also on another subject quickly, could you discuss your possible divided loyalties, having been »

Our Churchill

Featured image Dorothy Rabinowitz delivers the good news in today’s Wall Street Journal: In January of 1941, Winston Churchill dined at a Glasgow hotel with his physician, Sir Charles Wilson (later Lord Moran ), and his secretary of state for Scotland, Tom Johnston. The other member of the party was Harry Hopkins, Franklin Roosevelt’s redoubtable unofficial ambassador and the American president’s most trusted adviser. Hopkins had been sent to investigate and report »

The spying on Europeans farce

Featured image I love this headline on the front page of today’s Washington Post (print edition): “Officials: Obama unaware U.S. spied on allied leaders.” The locution is, I think, the Post’s way of signaling that it doesn’t really believe what the “officials” are saying. Nor should we. As John Yoo argues, spying on European leaders is something the U.S. has long done and should do, and this is common knowledge: Of course »

“Washington Bravehearts”? Not if Snyder changes the name

Featured image I hadn’t planned to write about the latest iteration of the dispute over the Washington Redskins name. Even after President Obama, Nancy Pelosi, Bob Costas, and (most importantly) Charles Krauthammer weighed in — all on the side of name-change — I didn’t feel the need to comment. But word that Redskins owner Dan Snyder may be contemplating changing the team name to Bravehearts (good thing Albert Haynesworth isn’t on the »

For prudence

Featured image Looking back at the shutdown showdown and the intraparty rift it exposed among Republicans, Rich Lowry and Ramesh Ponnuru make the case for political prudence. They call their essay “Against despair.” In taking issue with Senators Cruz and Lee on the shutdown showdown, Lowry and Ponnuru take the high road. I think that the essay makes some elementary and obvious points well. The essay is worth reading and I commend »

The wages of Obama’s foreign policy indifference

Featured image Last month, relying mainly on the work of Jessica Lewis of the Institute for the Study of War, I wrote about the resurgence of al Qaeda in Iraq. Today, the Washington Post, in a front page story that quotes Lewis extensively, describes the same phenomenon: Nearly two years after the U.S. troop withdrawal, Iraq is in the midst of a deepening security crisis as an al-Qaeda affiliate wages a relentless »

Coming Soon: Miss Universe!

Featured image We have been off the pageant beat for a while, since I boycotted Miss World this year after pageant authorities canceled the swimsuit competition in a pre-emptive surrender to Islamic radicals. But that is about to change: the Miss Universe competition is in full swing. Contestants have gathered in Moscow, and the Miss Universe site finally has some good photography. The preliminary round will be held on November 5 and »

Lies of Obamacare

Featured image And they just keep coming (click to enlarge). »