Sounds Familiar...

...but only because I've said much the same thing for years.

A Three-Way Fix For Health Reform That Saves Money

Before President Barack Obama and Congress overhaul the U.S. health care system at great expense - and, as things look now, without a cost-control mechanism - they ought to consider an alternative conceptual framework.

It comes from Tom Cigarran, founder of Healthways Inc., the nation's largest disease-management company, who says that - despite politicians' denials - some sort of health care rationing is inevitable and needs to be done rationally and fairly.

Worth your time, though light on critical analysis. But the key points about rationing are there.

Monica? Is That You?

White House Corrects Conference Call Number After Directing Reporters to Sex Line

Journalists seeking to talk a little foreign policy with high-profile Obama administration officials live from the G20 meetings in London this week were solicited for phone sex instead after ringing up the toll-free number given by the White House.

Wonder how the wrong number got in there...maybe someone was writing personal notes in the margins of briefing papers or something?

In a press release, the White House accidentally listed a sex line number for journalists seeking an "on-the-record briefing call with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and National Security Advisor Jim Jones to discuss the NATO summit."

Ah, so that's it! Hillary's been leaving things lying around the house again! We knew there was probably a Clinton involved.

Nutshell VI

Schedule leaves Obama a media no-show

Unlike President Bush's White House communications team, which usually timed press conferences abroad to coincide with the U.S. morning programs, the Obama operation kicked off the president's first day in Britain while most Americans were still asleep. What's more, the president banned most reporters from nearly every event he held on a day busy with bilateral talks with foreign leaders, and even held cameras at bay for his visit to Buckingham Palace to meet the queen.

Just gotta love that that most transparent White House in history, eh? Even the NYT is starting to notice...

My America

In Fargo, goodwill runs as deep as the Red River

One family offered their home to anyone left homeless by flooding, even sharing their security entry code. When another couple lost their house, total strangers showed up at their hotel with chicken dinners, brownies and quilts. In the neighborly spirit synonymous with North Dakota, some people have given out their phone numbers on radio talk shows, offering shelter to any listeners in need. The generosity is so common that even as thousands of people are driven out of their homes by the overflowing Red River, most storm shelters are virtually empty.

That's my America, the one I grew up in, and the one I live in, and the one I work to preserve. Do your part.

Nutshell V

'New York Times' Spiked Obama Donor Story:
Congressional Testimony: ‘Game-Changer’ Article Would Have Connected Campaign With ACORN

A lawyer involved with legal action against Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN) told a House Judiciary subcommittee on March 19 The New York Times had killed a story in October that would have shown a close link between ACORN, Project Vote and the Obama campaign because it would have been a “a game changer.”

Hey, and it took less than two weeks for someone to notice! Ah, media-driven tranparency!

Cannibal Watch

Democrats vs. Democrats

As Boehner accused Blue Dog Democrats of being “lap dogs” for Obama, MoveOn.org and Americans United for Change, the labor-backed organization that serves as the White House’s chief third-party operation, began airing ads Wednesday urging moderate Democrats in both the House and the Senate to get on board with the president’s budget.

Among the targets of Americans United for Change is Sen. Mark Pryor (D-Ark.), who declared the ads “not very helpful.”

“The liberal groups need to understand that we are not elected to represent the president,” Pryor said. “We’re elected to represent our states, and we are trying to reflect the attitudes and values of the people who sent us to Washington.”

You can always spot a winger--they insist on trying to eat their own.

Some Animals Are More Equal Than Others

DHS Signals Policy Changes Ahead for Immigration Raids

Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano has delayed a series of proposed immigration raids and other enforcement actions at U.S. workplaces in recent weeks, asking agents in her department to apply more scrutiny to the selection and investigation of targets as well as the timing of raids, federal officials said.

A senior department official said the delays signal a pending change in whom agents at U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement choose to prosecute -- increasing the focus on businesses and executives instead of ordinary workers.

"ICE is now scrutinizing these cases more thoroughly to ensure that [targets] are being taken down when they should be taken down, and that the employer is being targeted and the surveillance and the investigation is being done how it should be done," said the official, discussing Napolitano's views about sensitive law enforcement matters on the condition of anonymity.

Being rather familiar with bureaucratic double-speak, my mind immediately interprets this "change of policy" and "increasing the focus" as "We can nail almost anyone if we want to, and we're going to target those who make our enemies list. So play ball, or else."

Maybe that's just sheer cynicism talking. But similar things have been known to happen.

For a somewhat different take on Napolitano and the Obama admin's new "focus" on illegal immigration, see here.

Nutshell IV

Obama Town Hall Questioners Were Campaign Backers

But while the online question portion of the White House town hall was open to any member of the public with an Internet connection, the five fully identified questioners called on randomly* by the president in the East Room were anything but a diverse lot. They included: a member of the pro-Obama Service Employees International Union, a member of the Democratic National Committee who campaigned for Obama among Hispanics during the primary; a former Democratic candidate for Virginia state delegate who endorsed Obama last fall in an op-ed in the Fredericksburg Free Lance-Star; and a Virginia businessman who was a donor to Obama's campaign in 2008.

HopeChange®!

[*--emphasis mine. If this were truly a "random" selection, the results indicate a pre-stacked crowd, any one of whom could be safely called on. If they were not random selections, well, that also speaks to the Potemkinist nature of "Town Hall" meetings at the most transparent White House in history, doesn't it?]

Someone Else's Nutshell

Obama's Press Conference in a Nutshell

Capitalism is a systemic virus that we cannot hope to kill, and as distasteful as that thought is to my Administration, it is something that we can hope to control if you give us unprecedented power.

We need to institute cap-and-trade so that we move from real, but pollution-causing energy sources to environmentally-friendly solutions that presently, err, do not exist.

And sure, my budget will most likely bankrupt the United States if we're off even a little bit, but if we don't spend hundreds of billions to institute a bunch of vague, wide-ranging, and ideologically-driven policy prescriptions, then we might end up broke anyway because of impossible—hey look, a bunny!

Pretty much on target.

Nutshell III

Yep yep, the most transparent White House in history. How could I ever have doubted?

WH preserves secrecy option for tax panel

I think I have a better idea now why the White House was so sensitive about my story Monday questioning the legality and wisdom of secret meetings held by subcommittees of President Obama’s economic advisory panel.

It was because officials planned to announce within days that Obama intended to use just such a subcommittee to prepare his tax simplification and enforcement initiative. And it looks like they’re laying the groundwork to allow the new tax panel to do its work behind closed doors.

HopeChange®!