Cultural Equivalency

        
“Deluded, you blindly followed the call of a false doctrine.” (Milton Meyer)

I have never seen an entire nation so eager to give away and destroy their country and their American exceptionalism in exchange for the progressives’ cultural Marxism promoted in American textbooks and taught by academia’s promise of equality. It is all right for the masses to be equally poor and miserable in the failed communist societal model, so long as the elites are exempted from this equality nonsense.

“If you’ve got a business, you didn’t build that. Somebody else made that happen…,” said our president to a fawning crowd in Virginia.

I was listening dumbfounded that the President of the most successful country on the planet, built by American entrepreneurship, by Americans who took huge financial risks, mortgaged their homes, worked 18 hour days, spent their lives’ savings to build their American dream, could say such a preposterous lie, belittling the business acumen and accomplishments of millions of hard-working Americans, without being challenged by the adoring audience and the lapdog main stream media. Instead of being laughed out of the room, he was applauded!

America has helped billions in the world with its generosity of food, shelter, money, medical care, construction, advice, exploration, and financial aid without the expectation of repayment in times of trouble, war, occupation, emergency, natural disasters, and pandemic disease.

Our exceptional military has been the “policeman of the world” and got to a troubled zone in no time at all. “The Americans are coming” was music to the ears of those in need of help because they knew salvation was close.

Search which country in the world has most patents, discoveries, technological developments, medical procedures breakthroughs that save millions of lives, and Nobel Prizes, and you will find the United States of America. You will also find that Marxism has killed more people in the world than any armed conflict.

According to educators and writers of Nebraska social studies standards, all “cultures are equivalent.” Has anybody seen lately women being stoned to death in this country if found or suspected of committing adultery? They do in Muslim countries. Do we practice genital mutilation in women? Are seventh century cultures equal to our twenty-first century culture? Do we live by seventh century rules of conduct? Of course, cultures are not equal! Just because liberals are brainwashing our children with ridiculous lies in textbooks, does not make it a fact. Unfortunately, children look up to these “educators” and believe their teachers’ constant misinformation and alteration of our history and introduction of events and discoveries from cultures dear to progressives’ hearts that never took place.

As Joe Dejka reported, “America's Founding Fathers, as well as other historical figures and dates will be restored in proposed new Nebraska social studies standards.” Their absence from an earlier draft, which focused instead on broad concepts and themes, drew criticism from the public and some members of the Nebraska Board of Education when released in April.” (World-Herald News Service, Lincoln, Nebraska, July 11, 2012)

Why would the public even allow that the Founding Fathers and historical figures be taken out of the textbooks in the first place? Because there is no accountability in education, the agenda of the few progressives and the National Education Association trumps the truth and the wishes of parents. The writing is done behind closed doors in a few large states such as Texas and California. The historical truth falls victim to the cultural Marxists’ agenda.

Educators and teachers are people who have never set foot in a communist country and have not experienced firsthand the horrors of living under such a dictatorship. They believed the revolution drivel and romanticized version of Marxism told or taught by their college professors who were also insulated from any experience with totalitarian regimes. They just thought Castro, Che Guevara, Stalin, Mao and other dictators were “cool,” promising equality for all and everything for nothing. They forgot to mention the millions of innocents who were slaughtered because they did not go along with the program and despised the communist ideology.

The draft standards included manmade global warming as a fact, not theory; it advocated for global government, the linchpin of the environmentalists’ UN Agenda 21; the draft standards failed to emphasize American exceptionalism, and diminished the role of the U.S. Constitution and of our Founding Fathers.

These liberal/progressive standards were re-written by 45 Nebraska educators for teachers of history, economics, civics, and geography in 250 school districts in the state. “The draft also encouraged students to “engage in appropriate civic activities” such as advocating for personal rights, the rights of others and influencing government action.”(Joe Dejka)

Board member John Sieler of Omaha complained that the draft standards suggested, “All cultures are equivalent.” He used a news article about an Afghani woman accused of adultery, who was shot to death before a crowd of men, as an example that such deed is not a “cultural equivalent to American beliefs.” He continued, “Standards should talk of capitalism and free enterprise as positive forces.” (World-Herald News Services)

I hope that the new draft will be written with public input instead of behind closed doors. Then again, our own lawmakers have set a precedent for murkiness and lack of transparency, in spite of empty promises of openness to the public - they have written and discussed Obamacare, the 2,700 page healthcare law, behind closed doors.

In spite of obvious massive failures of leadership, high unemployment, transparency, and a disastrous economy, the Obama campaign is not giving up its “hope and change” motto. His supporters are marching over the cliff to communism. We will keep our “hope” for a prosperous capitalist America, while liberals can take their phony “change” and spend it in Cuba.

Choose Your Poison, Communism or Other Dictatorship?

I live under the dreaded Home Owner Association rules. The person in charge of checking yard compliance is the worst offender – his back yard looks like it was overtaken by the nearby forest weeds five years ago and he has given up. Since he lives next door to me, I wish I could rent a goat and let it loose on his property until she eats all the knee-high weeds.

He takes his job very seriously - he walks around the neighborhood early in the evening with a tablet in hand, diligently writing down minor offenses that will then appear in threatening letters to the respective homeowners. He reminds me of the neighborhood informant under communism who, for a small fee, a few extra crumbs of food, and access to the communist hospitals, would keep a daily log of everybody’s comings and goings and record information on their own relatives and then report it to the security police.

I do not know who snitched on my neighbors across the small pond. They had a beautiful vegetable garden within the perimeter of their well-tended yard. A painted fence surrounds the property in order to keep the deer and other forest critters at bay. They toiled in this garden every morning and every evening and it was a beauty: green and bell peppers, okra, tomatoes, cucumbers, cabbage, and squash. The garden was not visible from the street and it certainly did not violate the 300-page HOA rulebook that each homeowner was handed upon signing the agreement to move into the neighborhood.

Two days ago, two men with smirks of satisfaction on their faces were busy pulling out every plant by the roots in this beautiful garden and throwing it over the fence, while the lady of the house was crying, wringing her hands helplessly nearby and wiping away silent tears. It was heart breaking to see such injustice. Do we still live in free America? I have seen this woman work so hard tending to her plants since early March. It was a labor of love to provide her family with fresh vegetables, especially since everything is so expensive in grocery stores thanks to our disastrously run economy.

We import a lot of fruit and vegetables from Mexico and Chile. Congresswomen Boxer, Feinstein, and Pelosi from California and this administration made sure that as much as possible of our fruit and vegetable production in the San Joaquin valley in California would be destroyed by denying farmers water – God forbid the Delta smelt, a tiny fish, might be hurt.

I moved away 8,000 miles to escape communism and now, this communist organization, the HOA, composed of die-hard Obama fans, was telling me that I could not move into the house my husband and I have built from our hard work until we signed such a contract. We paid the fee every month for the “privilege” of having our trash picked up twice a week, a swimming pool that we never used, and snow removal that seldom happened.

I thought we had choices in a free country but I was wrong. We moved as far away from the metro area as possible to escape HOA. We could have bought a parcel of land in the woods somewhere, but I am sure, EPA regulations would have made it impossible since everything is close to marshland. In Maryland, you can no longer build in an area without an established sewer system. Governor O’Malley, through executive order, has forbidden septic tanks. Houses can only be built along an approved corridor, thanks to UN Agenda 21’s Smart Growth, which requires that a very large portion of our lands be given back to the wilderness. We must move into high rises, five minutes’ walk or bike from work, school, and play

We no longer live in a free country; we just have an illusion of freedom.

When I first came to the United States, I recoiled in fear every time I saw a cop. My heart rate would go up tremendously, to the point of tachycardia. I had been conditioned, after 20 years of communism, that the security police, the economic police, the secret police, the military police, were there to harass citizens, arrest them, beat them, torture them, rape them, steal their possessions, their wealth, and confiscate any property. Their job was not to protect and defend us. It took me a good three years to get over the fear of police, the sheriff, and the highway patrol.

I was not alone in this. When my mom came to visit, she jumped every time there was a knock on the door. She experienced the same feelings because we had been conditioned to be submissive and to fear police, whether we did something wrong or not. They could always find something wrong if they wanted to in order to throw us in jail.

I see America moving in that direction. The emergence of TSA with their intrusive pat-downs and molestations at airports, random checks at metros, at train and bus stations, did not see many citizens protesting, they are being submissive, and they are giving up their rights, their freedom of speech, of being free Americans. We are transforming into a police state.

The most recent viral YouTube video shows a man, stopped three times at roadblocks in California within 90 minutes ride, asked to prove that he is American. He protested, had a camera ready, and refused to show his papers since he did nothing wrong,

The police was surprised that he said no, everybody else was compliant collectively, like sheep going over a cliff, “Is this not America anymore, is it Nazi Germany,” he asked. The rest of the drivers submitted, gave up their Constitutional rights, and yielded to the intrusion by police. Whatever happened to the requirements of probable cause and a search warrant?

We are just a few steps from ratifying the UN Small Arms Treaty. Once ratified, we must surrender our personal guns for protection and hunting. We will be defenseless against home intruders, thieves, and drug gangs. Criminals can always procure guns in spite of bans.

Fear is growing inside my heart. I see police everywhere, most are in unmarked cars, different types of vehicle, and hard to detect. If they are here to serve us and receive taxpayer dollars, if I do not know who they are, how will I be able to ask for help in case of an emergency? They are here to harass, catch and ticket speeders, control us, stop us, and cameras are everywhere. It is so scary, I do not like the America as it is transforming, and I fear for the future of everybody’s children and grandchildren. We are turning into a banana republic dictatorship with many similarities to fascistic elements and to communist China.

The question remains, which poison will we be forced to take, will we be like communist China, or some other type of dictatorship? We do have the 257 Chinese FTZ (Free Trade Zones) all over the United States, which seems bizarre, but, in context with all the money we owe them, it makes sense.

We are in a period of economic abundance and welfare dependency; Americans have not suffered economically since the end of World War II. Under this administration, food stamp recipients are at an all time high, yet the government is advertising the giving of more food stamps, renamed to take away the stigma of being a perennial bum, waiting on handouts. Economic abundance had lead to complacency, laziness, apathy, and dependence on government as a nanny state. Who needs a family, mommy and daddy, when we have the government? Such dependency is going to lead to cowardice and a morass of spiritual, moral, and physical bondage.

Friday the 13th Blogtalk Radio with Silvio Canto

Friday, July 13, 2012 Radio Chat with Silvio Canto Jr. of Dallas.
The economy, corn crop, EU, new executive order, HHS welfare modification without Congress' consent, and other current topics.
http://www.blogtalkradio.com/cantotalk/2012/07/13/our-friday-chat-with-dr-ileana-johnson-paugh

I do not like THIS Uncle Sam - I do not like the GO GREEN Scam

Newt Gingrich tweeted about the recent 60 mph straight-line winds in our nation’s capital, suburbs and neighboring states. “Friend and coauthor Bill Forstchen notes Washington-Baltimore blackout mild taste of what an EMP (electro-magnetic pulse) attack would do. Forstchen’s novel, One Second After, is an amazingly vivid story of small town’s struggles after all electricity has been destroyed by EMP.” (Daniel Halper, the weekly Standard, July 2, 2012)

Since utilities in Ohio, Virginia, and Maryland described damage to their power grids as catastrophic, it was painfully evident that nobody was or is prepared for a potential disaster from a powerful storm, much less a solar flare, cyber-attack, or an electro-magnetic pulse (EMP).

To handle the demand, utilities brought crews from out of state to work on the power grid. A quite common occurrence, straight-line winds brought down trees and the nation’s capital to its knees. The D.C. “Department of Transportation reported that 69 trees had fallen on public space, although not in roadways.” Sen. Barbara A. Mikulski, Maryland Democrat, said, “In terms of federal assistance, this is unprecedented. We will have to look at how to do that.”(The Washington Times, July 1, 2012)

If Mother Nature created such havoc with straight-line winds that unprecedented federal assistance was necessary, what would happen if a hurricane hit or a Trojan virus attacked the Smart Grid?

Stephen Moore of the Wall Street Journal said in his column, “sweltering in the dark is a glimpse into America’s future if the greens have their way. Electrical power is the central nervous system of our modern economy. Yet every initiative by green groups is focused on reducing our access to electrical power.” (When the Moore Family Lost Power, WSJ, July 4, 2012)

Clean and renewable energy like wind and solar only provide 3 % of our electricity, far short of powering the largest economy on earth. After billions of dollars of subsidies in solar and wind energy, companies are still going bankrupt, long after Solyndra’s demise.

Abound Solar Inc. of Loveland, Colorado, suspended operations and sought bankruptcy in Wilmington, Delaware, after receiving $400 million in Department of Energy loan guarantees.

Chuck Neubauer said that Nevada Geothermal Power, with a $98.5 million loan guarantee from the Obama administration, had financial problems (substantial debt and not enough cash generated from its operations) and the auditors were wondering whether it could stay in business.

What most people avoid discussing is the fact that the power grid is very vulnerable to disruptions and “catastrophic failure,” particularly the Smart Grid. Currently, not everyone is attached to the Smart Grid because the Smart Meters installation has not been completed.

Some citizens who know what Smart Meters are and do, reject them on the basis of intrusion into their lives without a search warrant, health issues from constant radiation, and loss of control to the power company to shut off electricity during peaks of consumption, usually very hot and very cold days.

The federal government has given utilities billions of dollars to install Smart Meters. Utilities loved the idea because it saved them money and headaches to store electricity and to build new and expensive facilities to store excess capacity in case of high demand.

The touted Smart Grid was supposed to avoid devastating effects from 60 mph straight-line winds. We have heard arguments that the old, patchwork system must be replaced in order to re-route electricity in case of localized failure and downed power lines. The reality is that areas heavily attached to Smart Meters suffered the worst. Power lines and telephone lines run on the same pole. If a pole is knocked down, power goes out but phone landlines are still operational.

According to Mike Adams, NatureNews editor, without electricity, acquiring food and water becomes a real problem in a major city. People are not prepared and expect to depend on 911 (it failed for 48 hours in Virginia), fragile cell phone technology, and the Internet. A national grid-down scenario would leave everyone destitute since there will be no neighbors to come to anybody’s rescue. Experts predict that repairs would take years to complete or would not be possible at all in an EMP event.

Backup generators run on fuel that must be delivered from refineries, not on solar power or wind generation. Evacuation would overwhelm delivery of any life sustaining elements of a large city. Without the maligned fossil fuels, coal, Diesel, and gasoline there is not much electricity, deliveries of needed supplies, fuel, there is no water, medicines, food, or anything liberals take for granted. Where would they re-charge their fabulously green electric cars? How would they power the Smart Cars without fuel? If there is a choice between eating corn and turning it into biofuel, the need for survival will win every time.

Harvard Research Fellow Leonardo Maugeri said that U.S. huge oil and gas shale reserves are “the most important revolution in the oil sector in decades.” The Sierra Club, a left-wing environmentalist group, after touting natural gas as a cleaner alternative to coal and oil for years, has “undertaken a massive campaign against the extraction of natural gas from shale.” (Lachlan Markay, The Energy Revolution and Its Discontents, July 3, 2012)

The EPA targets companies that use hydraulic fracturing (fracking), accusing them of environmental contamination of soil and water. Scant evidence is provided of such contamination. Region 6 administrator Al Armendariz compared the EPA’s history of enforcement philosophy against oil and gas drillers to Roman crucifixions. Al Armendariz is now working for the Sierra Club. (Lachlan Markay)

Repairing the damage to the Smart Grid or the remaining traditional patchwork grid from 60 mph straight-line winds is the least of our worries. Although criticism of the Smart Grid is coming from many directions, energy companies and the government continue to fast-track Smart Grid and Smart Meter installations across the country. Complaints against Smart Meters include electricity cost increases, health risks, privacy risks, grid vulnerability, and the lack of a democratic process since many states are not allowed to opt-out of Smart Meters. States like California, Nevada, Maine, Vermont, Louisiana, Michigan, and Connecticut announced opt-out measures from smart meter installation. Santa Cruz and Marin have instituted moratoriums. Quebec, the Netherlands, and the U.K. are implementing opt-outs.

According to David Chalk, hacking expert, “there is a 100 % certainty of total catastrophic failure of the entire power infrastructure within 3 years. This could actually be worse than a nuclear war, because it would happen everywhere. How governments and utilities are blindly merging the power grid with the Internet, and effectively without any protection, is insanity at its finest.” (Urgent Call, Vancouver, British Columbia)

Doug Powell, manager of SMI Security, Privacy and Safety for Canadian utility BC Hydro said, “Every endpoint (Smart Meter) is a new potential threat vector.”

Former CIA Director James Woolsey criticized the energy policy makers who received multi-billion dollars in the Economic Stimulus Act of 2008. “The so-called ‘Smart Grid’ that is as vulnerable as what we’ve got now is not smart at all. It’s a really, really stupid grid.” (interview with energynow.com) 

Current CIA Director David Petraeus confirmed, “Governments will use wireless smart appliances to spy on citizens. Items of interest will be located, identified, monitored, and remotely controlled through technologies such as radio-frequency identification, sensor networks, tiny embedded servers, and energy harvesters. This will rethink our notions of identity and secrecy.” (meeting of In-Q-Tel, CIA venture capital firm, as quoted by www.thepowerfilm.org, “Take Back Your Power,” and Business Wire, Vancouver, British Columbia)

Dick Morris wrote in “Screwed” that China has hacked our electric power grid in 2009 and created secret openings so that an attacker could get back in with ease. “Hackers left behind software that could be used to cause disruptions or even shut down the system.”  Richard Clarke wrote in the Wall Street Journal that “there is no money to steal on the electrical grid, nor is there any intelligence value that would justify cyber espionage. The only point to penetrating the grid’s controls is to counter American military superiority by threatening to damage the underpinnings of the U.S. economy.” Entering the grid is much more efficient than exploding a bomb that would trigger an EMP. (Dick Morris, China Has Hacked Our Electric Power Grid, May 10, 2012)

Two separate reports by the Congressional Research Service, dated June 15, 2011 and February 3, 2012 warned about Smart Grid and cyber security and Smart Meter data privacy and cyber security. The Government Accountability Office (GAO) described in the February 28, 2012 report the challenges in securing the modernized electricity grid.

An HVAC contractor warned us of the required programmable thermostats that must be installed on all “systems where city officials have inspection authority created by city councils,” with coaching from UN Agenda 21 visioning committee representatives. “The thermostat can be overridden by the Smart Meter so that they can control your home’s temperature. Remember RFID tracking tags are going to be placed gradually in all items purchased.” In the future, resale shops will be outlawed because they will have for sale items that the system cannot track. Best advice, buy and store items of old that you will need.

Brain washing our children to go green to save the planet, installing smart meters, reducing the carbon footprint, re-setting our lifestyles to pre-industrial age, driving dangerous tin cans, expensive electric cars that “brick themselves” like Tesla, living a miserable life while the elites continue polluting shamelessly is just a con. Humans are not responsible for climate change, nobody can definitively say and scientifically prove that it is so. Climate changes everywhere as part of the earth’s cycle, in response to solar flares, and volcanic eruptions on land and in water, to name just a few variables.

I do not like THIS Uncle Sam

I do not like the GO GREEN scam.

Suggested websites for more information:

www.smartmeterdangers.org
www.electrosmogprevention.org
www.emfsafetynetwork.org
www.stopsmartmeters.org
www.refusesmartmeters.org

My Doctor Is Now the IRS

The Congressional Research Service Report for Congress, “A Brief Overview of the Law, Implementation, and Legal Challenges,” gives a new definition to Nancy Pelosi’s statement that we had “to pass Obamacare to find out what’s in it.” Not only did Congressmen not read the 2,700 page law before they voted and passed it by twisting arms and briberies, but they now have to be informed of the disaster they have created. (C. Stephen Redhead, Hinda Chaikind, Bernadette Fernandez, Jennifer Staman, July 3, 2012)

The unfortunately named Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) of 2010, passed by 111^th Congress, touted the following:

-          increased access to health insurance coverage (not necessarily access to health care)

-         expansion of federal private health insurance market requirements

-         creation of health insurance exchanges to provide individuals and small employers with access to insurance

-         expansion of Medicaid coverage

The federal government pledged to cover the cost of the most massive bureaucratic expansion of our health care system by an increase in tax revenues and reduction in spending on Medicare and other federal health programs.

According to the Congressional Budget Office estimates, Obamacare will add at least $1 trillion dollars to spending over the next ten years. Since we are already broke, do we really need more spending we cannot afford?

As soon as Obamacare became law, the legal challenges began. Individuals, states, and other groups sued on constitutional grounds - the forced mandate for individuals to purchase health insurance being beyond Congress’s enumerated powers. The states sued because the expansion of Medicaid infringed on states’ rights, forcing them to accept “onerous conditions in exchange for federal funds.”

The Supreme Court issued on June 28, 2012 its decision on National Federation of Independent Business v. Sebelius. The findings were as follows:

-         “the individual mandate is a constitutional exercise of Congress’s authority to levy taxes”

-         “the individual mandate is not a valid exercise of Congress’s power under the Commerce Clause or the Necessary and Proper Clause”

-         “In regards to the Medicaid expansion, the federal government cannot terminate current Medicaid program federal matching funds if a state refuses to expand its Medicaid program”

-         “If a state accepts the new Obamacare Medicaid expansion funds, it must abide by the new expansion coverage rules”

-         A state can refuse to participate in the expansion without losing any of its current federal Medicaid matching funds”

-         “All other provisions of Obamacare remain intact” (ACA: Summary, July 3, 2012)

The Supreme Court, using semantics in its decision, changed the law written and passed by Congress, making the individual mandate a “tax.” Justice Roberts used the opportunity to make his mark in “judicial activism from the bench” history, by siding with the liberals.

“While most of the major provisions of the law do not take effect until 2014, some provisions are already in place, with others to be phased in over the next few years,” more specifically, 2018. (CRS Report for Congress, July 3, 2012)

Temporary programs were created for “targeted groups.” These programs were responsible for the premium escalation of everybody’s health insurance since 2010. The targeted groups were:

-         High-risk uninsured individuals with preexisting conditions

-         Reinsurance program to reimburse employers for a portion of the health insurance claims costs for 55-64 year old retirees (unions must be protected)

-         Small business tax credits for businesses with less than 25 full-time “equivalents” (FTEs), average wages below $50,000 who choose to offer health insurance.(suddenly, employees have become “equivalents” in federal jargon)

-         Prior to 2014, “states may choose voluntarily to expand their Medicaid programs”

Private health insurance changes have taken effect and are responsible for such increase in premiums that eventually everybody will be forced into the federal health exchanges, including “children” under the age of 26.

-         Children under 19 cannot be denied insurance and benefits based on preexisting conditions

-         Major medical plans cannot impose any lifetime dollar limits on essential health benefits and are prohibited from doing so beginning in 2014 (Does anyone believe that these companies will stay in business after 2014?)

-         Preventive care with no cost sharing must be provided

-         Coverage cannot be rescinded except in case of fraud

-         Insurers must have an appeals process for coverage and claims (I thought that existed already, are they trying to reinvent the wheel?)

-         Insurers have to limit the ratio of premiums spent on administrative costs v. medical costs – called the medical loss ratio, MLRs.

I predict that most private insurers will be pushed out of business. Americans will be forced into a government health insurance exchange, a privilege for which they will have to pay a tax determined by the omnipotent government. A 15-member bureaucratic death panel will deny as much medical care as possible based on age and utility of a “unit” (person) in order to save money.

Obamacare is so great that the ruling elites and Congress have exempted themselves from it. We will have a two tier healthcare system, just like under communism, the elites will have their private hospitals and polyclinics while the proletariat will become part of the exchanges where shortages, rationing, and denial of care will dominate.  

Health care will be financed, organized, and delivered according to the rules of the IRS and HHS. Poor families will receive subsidies to purchase coverage through health exchanges. Excise taxes will be imposed on those who can afford Cadillac plans. The tax code, Medicare, Medicaid, CHIP, and other federal programs will be modified in order to reduce benefits for rationing purposes and to tax those able to pay more.

As enacted, Obamacare “requires state Medicaid programs to expand coverage to all eligible non-pregnant legal residents with incomes up to 133% of the federal poverty level, or risk losing their federal Medicaid matching funds.” The Supreme Court, however, found that the Medicaid expansion violated the Constitution. (CRS, p. 6)

Obamacare will make the doctor shortage worse. It has already caused the cancellation of many doctor-owned hospitals. Thousands of new bureaucrats will take over our health care system while the federal government will replace American trained physicians, who might leave the profession, with third world doctors. Plans to admit students to medical school based on racial and ethnic quotas and not merit, involving shorter training, will exacerbate the problem and deliver substandard care.

Doctors will be paid the same regardless of specialty and the government will set all doctors’ fees. (ACA, p. 241, p. 253)

Based on the Massachusetts model of Romneycare, the average wait to see a doctor will expand similarly from 33 days to over 55 days. Patients will have to pay for life-saving drugs but life-ending drugs will be free. If health care for everyone is important, shouldn’t life-saving drugs be free instead of life-ending drugs?

The government will specify which doctors will write an end-of-life order. (p. 429) Patients on social security will be required to attend end-of-life planning seminars every five years, a sort of death counseling, and a mandated advanced-care planning consultation. (p. 425)

Oncology hospitals will ration cancer care according to the patient’s age. (p. 272, section 1145)

IRS will control the enforcing of Obamacare, have direct and mandated access to our bank accounts, will levy 20 new taxes, will control costs,  promote efficiency, and, in the process, will reduce our life expectancy by denying needed care - that will kill many Americans before their time.

IRS will have real-time access to an individual’s bank account and will have the authority to make electronic fund transfers from those accounts. (ACA, pp. 58-59)

The Congressional Budget Office and the Joint Committee on Taxation cost projections for Obamcare do not include the Supreme Court’s decision, which precludes HHS Secretary Sebelius from penalizing states that choose not to participate in the Medicaid expansion. (CRS Report, July 3, 2012, p. 5)

If a state decides not to implement the Medicaid expansion, “low-income adults below the poverty line who were not covered by, or eligible for, the state’s existing Medicaid program would in general be ineligible for the exchange subsidies.” (CRS Report, p. 8)

Low-income Americans would have to pay for the health exchange out of their own pockets. The very people President Obama vowed to help with his mandate are now being taxed by his regime because they merely exist and the government knows what is best for them.

If the medical profession is allowed to unionize and thus strike, a new Pandora’s Box will be opened. Recently in the UK, unionized doctors and nurses went on strike, leaving patients without care, while scheduled surgeries were postponed.

David Martin, Executive President of the Media Research Center, said, “the media played a role in deceiving Americans about the impact of this horrific law, regurgitating verbatim every lie told by the Obama Administration. Every promise the media and the Obama Administration made about Obamacare – that it would make healthcare cheaper without increasing taxes or deficits, that you can keep your doctor, the businesses would not be hit with crippling regulations and taxes – has been broken.” (June 28, 2012)

Political pundits, liberals and RINOs, have attempted miserably to spin the Supreme Court’s decision in perplexing ways such as, Justice Roberts tricked the liberals by siding and voting with them, but he is such a brilliant and clever conservative.

Interestingly, Senator Obama voted in 2005 against the man who saved his health care law. “The bottom line is this: I will be voting against John Roberts’ nomination.” Senator Obama continued, “I hope that his jurisprudence is one that stands up to the bullies of all ideological types.” Justice Robert’s “jurisprudence and outstanding legal thinking” did not stand up to liberal bullying and he voted against the productive Americans in our society.

Americans are not giving up. Orly Taitz filed a class action suit on behalf of Christian and Jewish U.S citizens.

“Healthcare Obama Tax is illegal as it violates Equal Protection Clause, Due Process Clause, Establishment Clause, and Free Exercise of Religion Clause of the U.S. Constitution by exempting Muslim citizens, and places a heavy tax burden on Christian and Jewish U.S. Citizens to pay a de facto Judeo-Christian Obama Tax not only for themselves, but also for Muslim citizens, who are exempt.” (July 5, 2012, 113 page complaint, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California)

The stark truth in Realityville is that Obamacare is the biggest victory for President Obama, the biggest loss of personal freedom in America, the downgrading of medical care quality to levels of third world nations, the highest tax hike in the history of our country, and the biggest usurpation of our Constitution.

Columnist Note: Credit due to Honorable David Kithil of Marble Falls, Texas for providing specific page numbers from HB3200

Santa Maria di Negrar

The narrow winding road from Santa Maria di Negrar to Verona was flanked by lush green vineyards and well-tended gardens overflowing with vegetables. The river Adige with its beautiful Roman bridge, Ponte Pietra, built in 100 BC, dominated the Verona landscape. Higher on the banks was Castel San Pietro, built on ruins that dated back to 1389. The city walls, erected between the bridges Ponte di Pietra and Ponte Postumio alongside the river Adige as protection against 12 ft. floods, could be seen in a panoramic view from the castle’s terrace.

The ruins of a Roman amphitheater built in the 1st century BC are still extant today. It was a difficult hike to the top of the hill. Sitting on the peaceful stone steps, surrounded by balsam trees and so much history of the western world, I was daydreaming about my Roman ancestors and their daily lives, so close to a river that frequently overflowed its banks. The cobblestone road crossing the Adige, archeological evidence of the magnificent quality of thousands of miles of roads that crisscrossed the Roman Empire, held deep grooves worn into stone by chariot wheels passing through “Verona Romana.”

The province of Veneto is a spectacular canvass of green terraced orchards, balsam trees, vineyards, and olive groves, interspersed with dangerous and dimly lit roads. I closed my eyes, white-knuckled, every time Dave took sharp curves too close to the center, unable to see oncoming traffic.

The beat up Nissan we purchased for a song chugged along, picking up speed, never failing us, cranking up every time. When the GMC Jimmy was totaled, the Nissan seemed like a Godsend. Exiting our favorite pizzeria, La Tonda, one night, Dave was hit on top of the blind hill by a speeding car. The sturdy and heavy SUV saved his life.

 

Italians love to speed, take their side in the middle of the road, park where they please, especially on the sidewalk, drive as if their lives do not matter, and act like children when they feel cut off in traffic. Getting on the “autostrada” past the toll roads is like a gladiatorial game of kill or be killed. I have never witnessed anyone being ticketed for speeding but saw plenty of cars smashed beyond recognition on the sky is the speed limit “autostrada.”

I have seen Italian men and women stop in the middle of a busy intersection, get out of their cars with fists pumping in each other’s faces, yelling obscenities and hurling personal insults to total strangers, blocking traffic in both directions in order to get verbal revenge. Pedestrians stop to watch such comical and entertaining display of road rage while drivers honk impatiently in a cacophony of noise. Many get out of their cars to witness the spectacle, further exacerbating the traffic jam.

Riding a Pullman bus to the airport one foggy morning, the driver got out to confront a drunken “motorini” owner who hit the bus. The image running through my mind was the Italian Don Quixote fighting the giant windmills. Instead of waiting for the police that never came, the two drivers started fighting. The bus was intact, we eventually left on our way, but the little scooter was left behind with a twisted wheel. The “motorini” bully was not hurt; we were going way too slow.

There are no traffic rules for Italians, just suggestions. Following the law would be too simple. Why wear seat belts when you can wear a t-shirt with a black line across the chest, mimicking a seat belt, in an attempt to fool “polizia stradale?”

Our Spartan but expensive apartment in Santa Maria di Negrar was overlooking a rolling vineyard with an irrigation ditch that cascaded into a serene waterfall below our balcony. Few had a backyard – the land was too precious to waste on frivolous pleasure – it was used to raise food instead. The owners tended to the grapevines meticulously like a mother caring for her baby. We were delighted to leave our large windows open all the time, shutters and all, overlooking the green hills in the distance, and did not have to worry about flies or mosquitoes – the vineyard was well sprayed for parasites and disease. I wanted to meet the owners but I was afraid to enter their property – below the imposing archway was a huge “no trespassing” sign. A German shepherd and a hunting rifle accompanied the owner on his daily inspections of the grounds. I watched him from afar. We were the only Americans in the small village on the outskirts of Verona. Americans were not very welcome and we stood out like a sore thumb - we are both tall. German tourists, who loved the Lake Garda area, would often ask us for directions, thinking that we were German. We must have looked like giants to the petite Italians.

I loved the cool marble tiled floor and the large skylight on the second floor. I took many dangerous tumbles from the second floor on the moist and slippery marble. We could watch the stars in the absence of streetlights and outdoor ambient light. When the sun went down, we were plunged into an inky blackness, perfect for stargazing.

It was strange that we had to purchase light fixtures, sinks, and other amenities that American apartments offer. Italians rent apartments or homes for most of their lives and are expected to provide chandeliers, kitchen cabinets, sinks, and air conditioning. When they move, they take all these amenities with them, leaving the apartment stripped bare with electrical wires exposed everywhere. Because we were so far north, nights were cool. It was really hot during the day without air conditioning but nights were pleasant.

We never had enough power to run a microwave, a washer, and dryer at the same time. I shorted out the entire apartment complex several times by trying to run the dryer and make a cup of tea in the microwave at the same time. The washer was tiny by design; I could only run very small loads, a couple of shirts and two pairs of jeans at a time. The cycle would take at least 90 minutes to wash and dry a load and it was very expensive. I started using the clothesline on the balcony – the drycleaners were fantastically expensive. Our neighbors saved on their water and electric bills by wearing the same outfits to work all week. It seemed like a European tradition to bathe once a week, on Saturdays, and use bidets the rest of the week. One American home filled its bidet with potpourri to discourage its use by Italian visitors. We were told repeatedly that Americans are too wasteful because we shower every day and change our clothes.

The bank of smart meters would cut off power whenever we least expect it. There was never a schedule but we knew it would be on the hottest or coldest days/nights and it lasted for hours every time. We got used to the pitch-blackness - we were sent back in time, keeping the farming schedule of long time ago before electricity freed us from an agrarian lifestyle.

The underground parking cubicle allotted for each resident was barely enough space for an SUV, with inches to squeeze by sideways on the way out. We unloaded groceries in the driveway and then parked the car in our concrete-walled garage. I will never understand how Dave drove in and out of the garage without scraping the car on both sides of the wall.

The security system was always armed, with speakerphones and cameras for each apartment. No visitor was buzzed in unless recognized by the apartment dwellers. We never saw or knew the property owner - the government docked our required bank account for rent.

To address pollution, the government passed a novel ordinance to discourage driving – cars with even license plates numbers could drive one week and cars with odd license plates numbers could drive another week. Violators caught on the road in the wrong week were fined heavily.

Northern Italians were so glued to their cell phones, they would have had to be surgically removed from their “cellulare.” No matter how remote a place, the familiar “pronto” was everywhere. Service was very good but expensive. Landlines were not dependable and worked intermittently. It was hard to get service in towns built on mountains where lines were difficult to bury a few feet under layers of cobblestone and rock. Roman roads, which were religiously preserved, made it more challenging to bury fiber optic cables, power, or phone lines. Unions had to be consulted before any projects were undertaken and a myriad of notarized forms had to be filled and approved by the arcane bureaucracy.

Italy is a developed country but life there is not as easy as life in the United States. Just paying the phone bill took a good part of the day, following the strange bureaucratic schedules at the mercy and whims of clerks who did not care about serving customers, especially when time came for their mandated afternoon nap. Everything closed down for 2-3 hours.

We loved to eat in “trattorias” and truck stops where a three-course meal cost 5 Euros, was fresh, homemade, and delicious. “Ristorante” was expensive and frequented by rich Italians and tourists. The locals would eye us with suspicion. When speaking Italian, they accepted our presence graciously, but eyed my husband warily since he did not know a word of Italian other than “grazie,” thank you.

And then, there were the Auto Grills, the familiar sight on every Italian “autostrada,” with an array of freshly prepared pastas, sandwiches, coffee bars with café lungo, espresso, café Americano, café macchiato, cappuccino, freshly squeezed blood orange juice, and stinky pay toilets. For some reason, Italians have not mastered the art of providing clean public restrooms for everyone, easily accessible as we do in America. I found that bizarre since the Romans had flushable commodes in their cities and knew the importance of military port-o-potties in preventing disease. In towns, unless you found a pay bathroom, you were in trouble, as businesses allowed the use of their facilities only if you purchased what they sold.

When the Nissan needed new brakes and tires, it took two weeks! We rented a Volvo S60, which I promptly ground to a halt by filling it with gasoline instead of Diesel. The tow-truck came to rescue me. An American would have laughed off my stupidity but this petite and gruff Italian was all business, gesturing “mamma mias” to heaven, calling the dumb American interesting epithets, not realizing that I spoke Italian. It cost 300 Euros in towing fees. I rented a new car with a traditional engine because Diesel was too expensive. I laughed off the offensive disdain for my mistake and my predicament.

Italy is a picturesque country of uncommon landscapes, a jewel of art, history, cuisine, and gelato, with colorful and hospitable people full of charm, but life is very complicated and unnecessarily hard.

Friday Radio Chat with Silvio Canto Jr. of Dallas

One hour chat with Silvio on economy, Obamacare, Euro zone situation, France, eastern Europe, education updates, new taxes
http://www.blogtalkradio.com/cantotalk/2012/07/06/our-friday-chat-with-dr-ileana-johnson-paugh