Some People Are Never Happy

A devoted follower of former Alaska governor Sarah Palin paid $63, 500 on an online charity to share dinner with her. A quite a steep price for a meal but the proceeds go to a charity that benefits wounded veterans.

From the article:

Cathy Maples of Huntsville, Alabama, on Friday won the dinner in an Internet
auction, which was a benefit for a charity that aids wounded veterans.

Palin offered the dinner as part of the charity auction on eBay for the Ride
2 Recovery program, which supports wounded veterans through cycling
programs.

Yet, despite this, some are not pleased.

From a Yahoo comments board:

Like they say "A fool and his money...."
POSTED BY: Cleo

Had Mrs. Palin been like Al Gore, his boss, Bill Clinton or rabid capitalist, Michael Moore, and collected a HUGE sum of cash for a speaking tour, then maybe that would have been more acceptable. I guess charities have run their course.

Firstly, there is far too much USA news on this site. Its supposed to be a
Canadian news site. Secondly, Canadians are sick & tired of hearing about
this stupid btch. -Ensign

Gee, some people like wearing trailer trash on their sleeves. I know I can't speak for Ensign- nor would I want to- but Sarah Palin would be a welcome change from the lame-duck fellow who sold out the Poles not too long ago.

Wow, corruption and backroom deals.

No, charity. Read the article. It even says so.


I suppose some people can never catch a break.

When the World Starts Caring

Can one name a film about the Holocaust? Yes. There are several- Schindler's List, The Boy in Striped Pyjamas, The Pianist, Playing for Time (starring the controversial Vanessa Redgrave), Haven (starring the now deceased Natasha Richardson, daughter of Vanessa Redgrave), Escape from Sobibor and several documentaries (most notably Frontline's "Memories of the Camps" narrated with grave aplomb by Trevor Howard). All of these features- and rightly so- portray the horrors of the Holocaust in shocking and unflinching detail.



Now, can one name a film about the killing fields of Cambodia? To my knowledge, there is only one feature film about that subject, The Killing Fields, about the late Dith Pran and starring the late Dr. Haing S. Ngor, both of whom survived a genocide that claimed nearly two million lives. That such an intense subject has not made the adequate rounds of celluloid (or digital) dabbling presents a disparity in an arena bent on taking stands.



However, Hollywood is not alone in its silent shunning about discussions and depictions of communism and its utter failure to be a practical and humane form of government. The National Capital Commission in Ottawa is afraid that its planned monument to remember the millions imprisoned and killed by communists everywhere will offend. Granted that anything one says or does these days is likely to offend, this particular monument should not be avoided for that reason. White-washing it to make palatable for some who cannot digest history and its ugliness itself is an offense to be avoided. Should one avoid the Holocaust or Guantanamo so as not to offend? Elitists would never dream of it. So why avoid mentioning how communists murdered so many millions? How can we learn from history if the pages have been streaked with black marker?



From the article:

...."Memorial to the Victims of Totalitarian Communism"....

Communism is totalitarian. It's kind of superfluous, really.

"I was unsettled by this name, and other members of the committee agreed
with me," Hélène Grand-Maître, one commission member, said at the public
approval hearing. "We should make sure that we are politically correct in this
designation.... I feel this name should be changed."

Perhaps Miss Grand-Maitre should list the sycophants who are offended. And the fact that she comes right and uses the term "politically correct" just shows how far we have to dig ourselves out.



Further:

Board member Adel Ayad noted that people who identify as communists might "not like" the memorial. "It's not communism itself that we should be fighting here.
It is rather totalitarianism we are against in any form."

Could anything more childish and dripping with denial? Why is Ayad afraid of specificity? Nazism was totalitarian and fascism, too. Islamist states are totalitarian but we cannot mention that without incurring some fire-bomb throwing ire. If communism is mentioned specifically then it would be hard to ignore the stares and the difficult questions it would undoubtedly face like: "Why did you send an entire family to a gulag?" and "Was it necessary to starve Ukrainians to death?" Yes, sin loves company or- better yet- to be forgotten at all costs.



Even further:

One commissioner questioned whether Canadians could even legitimately point
fingers at the brutality of Stalin or Pol Pot, given that our own federal
government had put Japanese-Canadians in internment camps during the Second
World War.

Completely dishonest intellectually and morally. Yes, our government sent Canadians of Japanese descent into internment camps- something they admitted to, apologised for and made reparations for. How any of that is even remotely comparable to the killing fields or Holodmor is beyond me. This kind of deflection and denial works well with Putin but not so in a country that rehashes "white guilt" on an almost daily basis. Efforts have been made to ignore Babi Yar, Katyn, the Chinese famine under Mao and North Korea. Surely, intellectually if not morally, we've hit a wall and realised we cannot ignore these events and atrocities any longer.



Please contact the National Capital Commission or the ombudsman.



info@ncc-ccn.ca



National Capital Commission

202–40 Elgin Street

Ottawa ON

K1P 1C7

Access Denied

Remember when Sarah Palin referred to "death panels" and she was laughed at? Remember when Obama made some obscure claim that Americans were going bankrupt because health-care in the US was too expensive?



A report from the Canadian Cancer Society has found that cancer patients have limited or no access to life-saving drugs.



From the report:



The report, released Monday, says patients in some provinces will have cancer drugs covered under comprehensive insurance plans, while those in other jurisdictions must pay some or all of the cost from their own pockets.



And with most newer cancer drugs carrying price tags that can run into thousands of dollars, the burden of paying for life-saving treatments can mean financial disaster for some Canadians, the society says.



Although cancer medications given in hospital are paid for by the health-care system, that isn't the case once a patient is discharged, said Demers. "If they're administered at home, the individual is responsible for paying for them."
The coverage varies widely from province to province.



From the Canadian Cancer Society website:





According to the Canada Health Act, only drugs provided during a hospital stay are provided free of charge.


45% of cancer drugs were administered outside of hospitals in 2006 and often the patient is responsible for paying for their treatment.


One-fifth of Canadians are not insured for routine drug costs.


Spending on drugs is the fastest growing expenditure of the health care system and is expected to grow faster (8.3%) than spending on hospitals (5.8 %) or physicians (6.2 %).


The working poor, middle-class and self-employed who have paid into the health system all of their lives are the most vulnerable, and many are unaware of the situation until they face a cancer diagnosis.
Significant disparities exist between drug plans as to what drugs are covered and/or how they can be used. These discrepancies are based largely on individual provinces’ cost-containment goals the priority of cancer within a province’s healthcare system
how appropriate utilization of drugs is defined the drug plan’s interpretation of what constitutes acceptable value for money.



Who would have thought?

A Poor Player That Struts His Hour Upon the Stage

...it is a tale told by an idiot.

Michael Ignatieff, Liberal Party bigwig and American extraordinaire, declares his party would restore Canada on the world stage.

Mr. Ignatieff has been away too long.

We are on the world stage.

Spot On

From the comments:

Not at all surprising that El Presidente Maximo "el Uno" doesn't know what he's talking about.

His remark about tonsillectomies and amputations has shown him to be a man out of sync with the times.The last time that tonsillectomies are performed similar to what he claimed was back in the 60's. Back then, if the tonsils are thought to harbor organisms that cause frequent sore throats, they will be taken out. Nowadays, there are those who will carry strep in their tonsils as carriers without symptoms. They are about 15% of the pediatric population, as per the Atlanta ENT's web page on strep/tonsillectomy.

If el Presidente's advisers can't find this information, which took me all of 6 minutes (bathroom break, including hand washing), how can we trust him and his advisers to get "healthcare reform" right?

It says it all.

Thanks, DI.

Thursday Wrap-Up

President Obama's desperate pitch for validation- I mean- to save his audacious health-care plan is filled with gilded promises and has staved off (for now) a sudden defeat.

From his speech:

"Instead of honest debate, we have seen scare tactics ... And out of this
blizzard of charges and counter-charges, confusion has reigned."

Indeed. Has Mr. Obama examined how socialised medicine works, including all its short-comings? He has no further to look than Canada where one could wait weeks to months for a knee replacement or MRI. The government can also cap the number of medical personnel entering the workforce and the salary of a general practitioner.

Further:

But he said "the time for bickering" over details of the legislation is past
and insisted the consequences of defeat - measured in lives lost, bankrupted
families and cost to the U.S. Treasury - are too high for him to accept.

It is the details that confuse or anger the opponents of his plan. For example, Mr. Obama promised that illegal immigrants would not be covered under this plan. Unless something suddenly drastic occurred, that is not what the plan states:

CRS Report for Congress - Aug. 25, 2009- Prepared for Members and Committees of Congress-
"H.R. 3200 does not contain any restrictions on noncitizens participating in the Exchange - whether the noncitizens are legally or illegally present, or in the United States temporarily or permanently." (emphasis mine)

A detail that cannot be bickered over are the numbers of uninsured. Byron York of the Washington Examiner pointed out the fluid numbers of people who are not or cannot be insured (that itself is an important distinction):

Remember all those statements from Democrats, including Barack Obama
himself, that 47 million Americans are without health insurance? That's no
longer the operative number. "There are now more than thirty million American
citizens who cannot get coverage," the president said in tonight's speech.... So
why did Obama make the change? The first possibility is the difference between
people who "don't have any health insurance" and people who "cannot get
coverage." Millions of Americans who can afford health insurance choose not to
have it, many of them because they are young, healthy and unlikely to need it.
The second difference in Obama's phrasing is between "people without health
insurance," in his old phrasing, and "American citizens" without coverage, as he
said in last night's speech.

I think what needs to be scrutinised is Obama's intention. There is no doubt that insurance reform is needed in the US. If Obama is as "centrist" as he claimed, then he would have gathered various experts and held a round-table discussion in order to explore efficient and fair possibilities for reform. That is not what he did. He tried to adopt the "universal health-care" approach which would have proven unwieldy, expensive and ultimately discriminatory to patients who would have their health-care rationed by bureaucrats.

Sidebar: the preceding statement is made deliberately and from someone who lives with socialised medicine. Imagine being told you have to wait for treatment for a brain tumor, or having a cancer exam botched. Now imagine there is no one to appeal to.

Emerging from self-imposed exile is former Alaska governor Sarah Palin whose "death panels" remark caused quite a stir. Despite unproven claims of intellectual dwarfism, Mrs. Palin's opinion piece in the Wall Street Journal makes a fair bit of sense for a skeptic:

Writing in the New York Times last month, President Barack Obama asked
that Americans "talk with one another, and not over one another" as our
health-care debate moves forward.

I couldn't agree more. Let's engage the other side's arguments, and
let's allow Americans to decide for themselves whether the Democrats'
health-care proposals should become governing law.

Some 45 years ago Ronald Reagan said that "no one in this country
should be denied medical care because of a lack of funds." Each of us knows that
we have an obligation to care for the old, the young and the sick. We stand
strongest when we stand with the weakest among us.
We also know that our current health-care system too often burdens individuals and businesses—particularly small businesses—with crippling expenses. And we know that allowing government health-care spending to continue at current rates will only add to our ever-expanding deficit.

How can we ensure that those who need medical care receive it while
also reducing health-care costs? The answers offered by Democrats in Washington all rest on one principle: that increased government involvement can solve the
problem. I fundamentally disagree.

Mrs. Palin outlines the deficits of the current system and the merits of free choice in the first five paragraphs of her opinion piece. How has she erred here? She is right to point out that there are deficiencies in the system. She is also correct in pointing out how taking on the vast responsibility of health-care could fail not only the government but the very people the system is meant to care for. She calls for reform- a patient-oriented reform- not government interference. Sounds sensible to me.

When Jon Voight points out "Hanoi" Jane Fonda's baffling yet not-too-unexpected hypocrisy regarding Israel, it's like a breath of fresh air. If there could be demerit points for every time a Hollywood buffoon said or did something stupid, I would feel hope for the universe.

Now, for your daily shock. Watch as ACORN (Obama's ACORN) not bats an eyelid when an undercover pimp and prostitute ask how they can illegally smuggle children across the border. Sick just doesn't encompass the lot.

09.09.09

On the day of this chronological curiosity, we mark the following events:

Mary Stuart is crowned Queen of Scots in 1543.

Étienne Brulé discovers Toronto in 1615. Toronto is an Iroquois word meaning "a good place to do business". It also means "there is nowhere to park your car".

The United States is officially called the United States in 1776 by the Continental Congress.

Lev Tolstoy is born in 1828. (notice how short that sentence is)

Cliff Robertson (Uncle Ben in the "Spider-Man" movies) is born in 1923.

Otis Redding is born in 1941.

The Republic of North Korea is declared in 1948. It hasn't gone anywhere (unfortunately).

Goran Visnjic was born in 1972. There is a noticeable ice melt on the polar caps.

Who thought there was nothing fascinating about his day? Not me!

A Comment About the Poll

The rather overlooked poll concerning Stalin has proven at least one thing: the person who thought Stalin was a leader hasn't read a book.

For one's edification: Stalin: The First In-depth Biography Based on Explosive New Documents from Russia's Secret Archives

The Whisperers (awesome book, by the way)

Stalin The Court Of The Red Tsar

Koba the Dread (another good book)

Falling Flat On One's Face

Making speeches about staying in school might seem innocuous but coming from someone who pats himself on the back ALL THE TIME and has never really worked hard it just seems so flat. It just reeks of "cult of personality" aided by adoring masses who care more about their benefits than if their students have the requisite knowledge to make their way in the world.

A Question

Um, why are we selling our natural assets to China?

Why not refuse the sale, cripple China and let restive ethnic groups finish off the toxic-laden slave labour population? I mean- we could have ended China's nightmarish existence under the dictator Mao but we kept it alive, traded with them and gave them the Olympics. Now, we're giving them OUR oil sands.

It's okay to ruin a totalitarian state. It's even more okay to fend for ourselves.

Just saying.

What's Wrong With This Picture?

Efforts to canonise the former Soviet Union's greatest butcher appear strangely reminiscent of the popular press' glowing praise of Mary-Jo Kopechne's killer.

In a country where deflection and denial are the norm when speaking about communism's grand failures, this form of Holocaust denial truly takes the cake.

Alas, we live in an era where this kind of talk is accepted at face-value. Soon, there will be no such things as human rights abuses or genocides. It will all be a matter of perspective. The devil will have succeeded in hiding his existence from the world.

Saint Monica

It was that whenever she could she acted as a peacemaker between any differing and discordant spirits, and when she heard very bitter things on either side of a controversy--the kind of bloated and undigested discord which often belches forth bitter words, when crude malice is breathed out by sharp tongues to a present friend against an absent enemy--she would disclose nothing about the one to the other except what might serve toward their reconciliation.

(The Confessions of Saint Augustine, Ch. 9, 21)

In Case We Forgot....

Ted Kennedy, of the massively wealthy, privileged and corrupt Kennedys, killed Mary-Jo Kopechne, told jokes about it, supported the IRA, pushed for extremely anti-life policies and ruined Robert Bork.

Let's remember that when the hearse carrying his bloated corpse makes the rounds to adoring and idiotic masses who believed he was a good man and any moron who would use his demise to push forward a crummy health-care plan.

Things You Should Never Do

Release a convicted terrorist, for example. A Scottish court's decision to release convicted terrorist Abdel Basset al-Megrahi on "compassionate grounds" fuels the Islamofascist desire to rejoice not only in flaunting the law but over the victims' families who have had to suffer through this tragedy since 1988. Even letting Libya weasel their way out of moral culpability by paying "compensation" was beyond the pale. Now, al-Megrahi has gotten his hero's welcome and terrorists everywhere are emboldened by the moral weakness of the West.

In case we need to be reminded of the enormity of the tragedy and why al-Megrahi should have remained in prison, remember this:

Forensic pathologist Dr. William G. Eckert, who examined the autopsy
evidence, told Scottish police he believed the pilot and 147 other passengers
survived the bomb blast and may have been alive on impact. None of these
passengers showed signs of injury from the explosion itself, he said. Although
the victims would have lost consciousness because of the lack of oxygen at
31,000 feet (9.4 km), forensic examiners believe they may have regained
consciousness as they fell toward the oxygen-rich lower altitudes.

Similarly, South Korea should continue to raise the pressure against North Korea, despite Bill Clinton's slick deal to release two American journalists weeks ago. Kim Jong-Il hasn't apologised for Korean Air Flight 858, has he? One can set a watch to the next round of treachery and appeasement in the Korean Peninsula.

Monday Evening Nod

Yep.

Here's a little film about making an icon.

New and Bizarre Ways

An update on the US health-care debate.

One article writer decries accusing Sarah Palin of intellectual dwarfism as lies borne of snobbery and the other has no ruddy idea what he's talking about.

I don't know if this blog about North Korea is a joke or not. Just see it for yourself and make the call.

Outrage 2.0

The community of Iqaluit is "outraged" that two boys were (photographed) sleeping on a sidewalk.

I, too, am outraged. Where were the parents?

From the article:

The territorial social services department hasn't released details of why
the boys were out in the streets, but the area suffers from some of Canada's
highest rates of family violence and alcohol abuse.

Oh. That's where they were.

I am not making light of neglect or abuse as these are not trifles to be laughed at but serious problems that need addressing. I would like to see the parents held accountable, not more tax dollars thrown in any direction. The boys need a proper home, not "white man's guilt" or "taxpayers' remorse".

Lies, Lies and Damned Lies

Been away from my desk for far too long.

A woman who identified herself as a pediatric physician at U.S. Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee's townhouse meeting on health-care reform was revealed not to be a physician at all but a rabid Obama supporter. I suppose that qualifies for credibility these days.

Former Alaska governor Sarah Palin has received much haranguing from the popular press over her "death panels" remark.

What the Bill says:

1) IN GENERAL.—The Administration headed by a Health Choices
Commissioner division referred to as the ‘‘Commissioner’’) shall be appointed
by the President, advice and consent of the Senate. (pg. 40)

With regards to commissions set up to discuss and/or allocate care, funds and research:

‘‘(A) be designed, as appropriate, to take into account the potential
for differences in the effectiveness of health care items and services
used with various subpopulations such as racial and ethnic minorities,
women, different age groups (including children, adolescents, adults,
and seniors), and individuals with different comorbidities; (pg. 520)

To the end of life:

‘‘(3) PHYSICIAN’S QUALITY REPORTING INITIATIVE.—
7 ‘‘(A) IN GENERAL.—For
purposes of reporting data on quality measures for covered
professional services furnished during 2011 and any subsequent year, to
the extent that measures are available, the Secretary shall include
quality measures on end of life care and advanced care planning that
have been adopted or endorsed by a consensus-based organization, if
appropriate. Such measures shall measure both the creation of and
adherence to orders for life sustaining treatment. (pg. 432)

What Sarah Palin said (after reading the bill the president apparently did not):

Section 1233 authorizes advanced care planning consultations for senior
citizens on Medicare every five years, and more often “if there is a significant
change in the health condition of the individual ... or upon admission to a
skilled nursing facility, a long-term care facility... or a hospice program."
[3] During those consultations, practitioners must explain “the continuum of
end-of-life services and supports available, including palliative care and
hospice,” and the government benefits available to pay for such services. [4]Now
put this in context. These consultations are authorized whenever a Medicare
recipient’s health changes significantly or when they enter a nursing home, and
they are part of a bill whose stated purpose is “to reduce the growth in health
care spending.” [5] Is it any wonder that senior citizens might view such
consultations as attempts to convince them to help reduce health care costs by
accepting minimal end-of-life care? As Charles Lane notes in the Washington
Post, Section 1233 “addresses compassionate goals in disconcerting proximity to
fiscal ones.... If it’s all about obviating suffering, emotional or physical,
what’s it doing in a measure to “bend the curve” on health-care costs?”
[6]

What (the brother of White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel) Dr. Ezekiel Emanuel wrote regarding the criteria of saving lives:

Maximizing benefits is a utilitarian value....

What the president said:

“Let me just be specific about some things that I’ve been hearing
lately that we just need to dispose of here. The rumor that’s been circulating a
lot lately is this idea that somehow the House of Representatives voted for
death panels that will basically pull the plug on grandma because we’ve decided
that we don’t, it’s too expensive to let her live anymore....It turns out that I
guess this arose out of a provision in one of the House bills that allowed
Medicare to reimburse people for consultations about end-of-life care, setting
up living wills, the availability of hospice, etc. So the intention of the
members of Congress was to give people more information so that they could
handle issues of end-of-life care when they’re ready on their own terms. It
wasn’t forcing anybody to do anything.” [1]

So- who is lying? Who is mistaken? Why the need for rationing what is purported to be a compassionate service to all?

Basically because public health-care isn't. The public pays for a system controlled by one body, a body not accountable to anyone. As populations get older and sicker and fewer taxpayers are born to prop up this system, rationing health-care is a very cost-effective measure for those who weigh human lives in terms of what they give us. One could make the argument for any number of gender-studies graduates who foment hatred and discord but that would just be evil.

Oh- and the health-care bill will cover elective abortions. I guess as long as it is cost-effective and not going to children under the age of ten or anything.

It gets better. The White House has a deal with a pharmaceutical company.

Bill Clinton's monumental task of freeing two journalists who worked for Al Gore from a North Korean prison isn't just fishy; it's wrong. One cannot simply walk up to Kim Jong-Il and ask for the safe return of one's compatriots. What did Bill Clinton promise North Korea? More to come.

When John Bolton talks about North Korea or objects to Mary Robinson being given the Presidential Medal of Freedom, I listen. After all, the medal shouldn't sink to the depth of the Order of Canada.

Some good news.

Anger Management

Calm down!

Don't turn into this little fellow!

Race-Gate? What Race-Gate?

I've been late posting about this but now is as good a time as any.

Obama's attempt to smooth over HIS mistake with cheap American beer has to be one of the most transparent acts of ingratiation I've seen in the longest time.

Let's get things clear: Professor Henry Gates, whose tenure is due to his race and whose topic of interest is race, has the gall but the prerogative (given his lesson plans) to accuse a distinguished police officer of racism when he would not co-operate during a routine investigation. I don't know what people expect a police officer to do when he receives a call of a possible break-in but whatever.

Obama, desperate to get the American public's mind off his extremely expensive and unrealistic health-care plan, accuses the aforementioned police officer of racism and it has since blown up in his presidential face. So what does he do? He invites the parties concerned for a beer because that's what the little people do (ask a man who has never even smelled a ghetto but sure knows how to organise communities).

Man of the people.

Not really.