What’s interesting in the news today?
1. This is progress? It’s the same mentality that allows them to ignore laws they disagree with. Pretend it doesn’t exist and say problem solved. Talk about dereliction of duty.
From TheWashingtonExaminer “Thousands of orders for diagnostic medical tests have been purged en masse by the Department of Veterans Affairs to make it appear its decade-long backlog is being eliminated, according to documents obtained by the Washington Examiner.
About 40,000 appointments were “administratively closed” in Los Angeles, and another 13,000 were cancelled in Dallas in 2012.
That means the patients did not receive the tests or treatment that had been ordered, but rather the orders for the follow-up procedures were simply deleted from the agency’s records.
It is not known how widespread the practice is, or how many veterans hospitals have mass-purged appointment orders to clear their backlogs.”
2. This one goes along with the story above. Yet another example of this tactic of clearing backlogs instead of providing care.
From WISTV “Three Wm. Jennings Bryan Dorn VA Medical Center executives left their jobs after six deaths occurred that could’ve been prevented.
Dr. Robert Petzel, under secretary for health for the VA, admitted to Congressional representatives that there was a criminal investigation completed by the Inspector General’s Office at Dorn VA concerning the backlog of gastrointestinal cases from 2012. No criminal intent was found.
“There’s no way to hold them accountable when people die because of their failures,” said U.S. Rep. Tim Huelskamp, R-Kansas.” Petzel explained that the responsible individuals left their jobs before disciplinary action could be taken.”
Others are apparently purging their records in order to avoid being held accountable. No one is held accountable in this administration. The buck stops nowhere.
________________________________________
3. Here’s that mentality at work again. Just pretend you can do whatever you’d like.
From TheWashingtonTimes “The Obama administration regularly cuts a break for businesses that hire illegal immigrants, reducing their fines by an average of 40 percent from what they should be, according to an audit released Tuesday that suggests the government could be doing more to go after unscrupulous employers.
According to the audit, conducted by the Homeland Security Department’s inspector general, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement cut one business’s fine from $4.9 million to slightly more than $1 million — a 78 percent drop.
Investigators said the reduction is legal, but it may be undercutting the administration’s goal of getting tough on businesses that hire illegal immigrants.
“The knowledge that fines can be significantly reduced may diminish the effectiveness of fines as a deterrent to hiring unauthorized workers,” the inspector general said.”
That is their intent.
_________________________________________
4. Yet another example, and another ObamaCare lie exposed.
From TheLATimes “A new report shows that as many as 125,000 young California immigrants may qualify for an expansion of Medi-Cal, the state’s Medicaid program.
The Affordable Care Act bars insurance subsidies and enrollment in the Medicaid expansion for undocumented immigrants, but a wrinkle in California rules does offer coverage for those with “deferred action status.”
The Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program was created by President Obama in 2012 to grant immigrants who came to the country illegally as children — sometimes called Dreamers — legal status and work authorization for two-year periods.
Laurel Lucia, a policy analyst at the UC Berkeley Labor Center and author of the report released Tuesday, said California is one of the few states that lets youth with deferred action status enroll in Medicaid. “But the word still hasn’t been spread,” she said.”
Oh but it will. Quickly.
________________________________________
5. And yet another ObamaCare lie. Remember, we were all supposed to see an average savings of $2500.00 per family, as promised by the President. About another 11 million people are about to find out that promise had an expiration date. Hey, somebody’s gotta pay for the folks in the story above. Looks like middle class workers drew the short straw. Again.
From FoxNews “Republicans renewed their fight against ObamaCare on Monday in response to a new report in which the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services concludes that 11 million small business employees may see their premiums rise under the law.
The report, released Friday, says the higher rates are partly due to the health law’s requirement that premiums can no longer be based on a person’s age. That has sent premiums higher for younger workers, and lower for older ones.
The report found that 65 percent of small businesses would see a spike in insurance premiums and about 35 percent of small businesses would see lower rates for plans covering six million people, The Wall Street Journal reported.
The estimate is far from certain, partly because many small businesses renewed their policies in 2013. Renewing before the end of the year allowed them to avoid higher premiums that went into effect Jan. 1, when coverage was required to conform to the law.”
Just wait until the sticker shock from this happens. They illegally delayed it until after the elections, but it’s coming.
________________________________________
6. Here’s a good start point for reigning in this administration.
From CNSNews “During a press conference on Tuesday in Washington, D.C., to announce a signature campaign to impeach U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder, Rev. Bill Owens said President Barack Obama has “hurt the American people.”
“We’re on a downward road,” Owens, who is founder and president of the Coalition of African American Pastors (CAAP), said at the event at the National Press Club. “And this president has done more to hurt the American people than any president, as I see it, in my lifetime and in history.”
“Owens cited Holder’s “repeated lawlessness” of disregarding state laws and the Constitution. “What we have in Attorney General Holder is a man so political in his zeal to redefine marriage that he is willing to run roughshod over the rulings of the Supreme Court, binging federal law, and the United States Constitution along with the constitutions of a majority of states,” Owens said in a statement distributed at the press conference.”
________________________________________
7. Before reading this one remember, as always, that vote fraud is a myth. 🙄
From NationalReview “Vice President Biden claimed voter ID laws were evidence of “hatred” and “zealotry” during a Black History Month event yesterday in Washington.
Ignoring the fact that voter ID laws were declared constitutional in a 2006 Supreme Court decision written by John Paul Stevens, the Court’s then most liberal justice, Biden is continuing the fact-free assault on anti-voter fraud measures.
When such laws aren’t “hateful” they are “unnecessary.” The Brennan Center for Justice says “voter fraud is essentially irrational” so it almost never happens. Voter fraud is so rare “you’re more likely to get hit by lightning than find a case of prosecutorial voter fraud,” insists Judith Browne-Dianis, co-director of the liberal Advancement Project.
Well, the Iowa Division of Criminal Investigation disagrees. Not a state known for its hateful politics, Iowa’s DCI wrapped up its investigation this month and has referred more than 80 cases of voter fraud to county attorneys for possible prosecution. Since the investigation was initiated by GOP Secretary of State Matt Schultz a year and a half ago, five people have pleaded guilty to voter fraud and 15 others are facing charges.”
________________________________________
8. Polly wanna cracker?
A little comedy for the last one. This is why he has like 26 viewers. It’s not news, it’s parroting the same talking points.
🙂
________________________________________
Wandering Views 
From the AP, via Drudge:
PHOENIX (AP) — Republican Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer slapped down the right wing of her own party, vetoing a bill pushed by social conservatives that would have allowed people with sincerely held religious beliefs to refuse to serve gays.
Does this mean that a Muslim cabbie at the Phoenix airport can’t refuse to take a client who has a bottle or even smells of whiskey as they do at DCA?
I’ll betcha it doesn’t.
This will be tested. Stay tuned.
LikeLike
Arrgh. The story Chas quotes (like so many others) completely misstates the law’s point. It is NOT to refuse to “serve gays.” It was to provide an “opt out” via religious conscience for those who felt they could not participate in a gay wedding by way of providing goods and services for such an event.
Not the same thing.
At all.
Surprised at AP, they are usually better than that.
That said, I don’t know if the law would have accomplished its intent — or merely caused more problems. Not questioning the veto per se as I hadn’t read the complete text of the law in its entirety (and there was some debate over how it would have played out). But its intent has been misreported consistently.
The intent was about providing a defense against lawsuits, it was about government overreach in the area of religious freedom. Its intent, at any rate, was — in my view — akin in spirit to the conscientious objector provisions in this country.
LikeLike
My rant was aimed at AP, not Chas, by the way. 😉 I’d never rant at Chas.
LikeLike
When Muslim taxi drivers refused to drive passengers with seeing eye dogs or who carried bottles of alcohol, there was an uproar. But now Obama Inc. is using to claim that Muslim discrimination is a civil right thatemployers must accommodate.
Star Transport, Inc., a trucking company based in Morton, Ill., violated federal law by failing to accommodate two employees because of their religion, Islam, and discharging them, the U.S. Equal Employment OpportunityCommission (EEOC) charged in a lawsuit filed today.
http://www.frontpagemag.com/2013/dgreenfield/obama-inc-sues-trucking-company-for-firing-muslim-drivers-who-refused-to-deliver-alcohol/
Does this answer the question?
Muslims have religious freedom.
Christians don’t
LikeLike
You’re right, donna j. That law (and its intention as tested elsewhere) has got to be THE most misrepresented and/or misunderstood concept on the planet. Just absurd it’s even an issue. I mean, comparing it to Jim Crow laws? That’s nothing less than idiotic.
LikeLike
My apologies if anyone has already posted this:
http://themattwalshblog.com/2014/02/25/yes-of-course-a-business-owner-should-have-the-right-to-refuse-service-to-gay-people/
Walsh’s assumptions appear to be that govt should be religiously neutral. I don’t agree with that notion, but even on that basis of govt neutrality, opponents of the law are just totally out to lunch.
LikeLike
This is from one of our ministerial staffers (law school grad), so I’m stealing it from fb, but I think outlines the arguments well:
“Forcing a person to perform services that they consider to be immoral is a real problem; to perform services that contribute to inherently immoral actions is not entirely different. When a person thinks that a homosexual relationship is harmful to the person’s relationship with God, with their personal well being, and with their relationships with other people of course they will have a conscientious objection to participation. It’s not obvious that participation in a marriage ceremony is inherently different from providing food at a restaurant but it’s understandable with a little thoughtful reflection. When people in the south denied services, or demanded separate services on the basis of race, it was not a matter of conscience; it might have been a lot of things but it was never argued to be a matter of conscience, religious or otherwise. Here, people are forced (laws threatening punishment for non-compliance are always “force”) to exercise artistic and creative talents toward the celebration and affirmation of something inconsistent with their interpretation of self and understanding of love for their fellow human beings, and to force someone to do that kind of thing sets a dangerous precedent for a free society.”
LikeLike
If our national government were suddenly run by a cross-section of Muslims:
1. Would the killing of the unborn increase or decrease?
2. Would the US Constitution be given less or more consideration?
3. Would our energy policy be more or less rational?
4. Would the government be more or less hostile to Christianity?
5. Would promotion of perversion by the public schools, colleges and the popular media increase or decrease?
6. Would more or fewer Christians be forced to take actions inconsistent with their faith?
I don’t want to be governed by Muslims. Right now, they are not an imminent threat to overrun the US. I also do not want to be governed by the perverted, socialist atheists who now dominate Washington and the Democratic Party. We are being overrun by that crew on a daily basis
LikeLike
I heard on the radio this morning that the main reason for the veto and no push-back against it is because the Super Bowl is scheduled to be in Phoenix next year and no one wanted anything to jeopardize that.
LikeLike
From my legally logical fb friend again:
“If we define the expression of religious freedom as discrimination then it will always be discriminatory, and thus immoral and/or illegal but that will always be defining a truth into existence. The reason we use the military as the analogy is that military service and fighting wars is much more complex that simple commerce. Freedom of contract is a very important right; still in relation to civil rights the weight of the import outweighed the right of that freedom. A person may not discriminate on the basis of race, color, nation of origin, religion, gender, age, etc. But the reason all of this works is that it requires no involvement in the other person’s race, color, nation of origin, religion, gender or age to perform a service for them. The marriage of two men is itself the immoral activity that is religiously prohibitive. Therefore one cannot participate without a violation of conscience.”
LikeLike
They keep phrasing this as a license to discriminate against certain people. It’s not. I’m sure that if a gay person ordered a birthday cake they would get it. It about not wanting to offer a certain service violates a person’s conscience. Could a black person be forced to make a cake for a KKK rally?
LikeLike
It has nothing to do with discrimination.
The purpose is to push the Overton Window another notch toward the bottom.
LikeLike
Good questions/points IRT a Muslim-run govt, RickyW.
And good points by your fb friend, Donna J. He makes a good distinction between those things a business owner is not involved in (race, gender, etc., of the customer) and those things he would be involved in (participating in some way in a religiously objectionable ceremony by making a cake). But…
As useful as that distinction is, I do believe violation of conscience is just as arbitrary a reason to refuse service as any of those other things (like race, gender, etc.). All those things can simply be put in the group of “things a person may not like.” Whether one’s religion or conscience is what determines one’s view of those things shouldn’t be relevant (so long as we’re assuming, as most Americans do, that the govt should be religiously neutral). In other words, the only two non-arbitrary means I can think of for allowing a business to refuse service would be 1) if the government were allowed to let religion inform laws, or 2) if businesses were allowed to refuse service to anyone for any reason whatsoever.
LikeLike
“There’s nothing government can do that can’t make something worse.”
I’m not sure what all it means, but it sounds like a profound observation by Dana Parinoi in “The Five” on Fox News.
::-)
LikeLike
Again, this is not a matter of refusing service to a person, but the right to decide what services you provide.
LikeLike
What if a straight person came in and tried to buy a wedding cake for their gay friends. Could I refuse him?
LikeLike
http://www.foxnews.com/story/2008/12/17/little-adolf-hitler-denied-birthday-cake-at-new-jersey-grocery-store/
Do these people have the same case as the gay couple?
LikeLike
Opponents of the AZ law (and of the rights of businesses) misrepresent everything about this stuff, but it is true that the law would allow the right to refuse service to a person. The fact that the law parses out *which* services based on *what* principles doesn’t negate that persons *could* legally be refused certain services.
I’m not so much concerned about what the law *is* (or would be, as proposed), but what *should* be. If we’re going to assume govt should be religiously neutral (if we’re throwing in the towel on that aspect), then I see no reason why a business should not be allowed to refuse service to a straight person, or gay, or Christian, or whoever, for whatever reason or no reason at all.
Referring to the hypothetical that a black baker could be forced to bake a cake for a KKK rally, in the recent case of the baker in Colorado, that possibility was brought up and dismissed out of hand by the court, which simply said that a KKK rally would be so offensive to such a large number of the population, that the business owner would be within his right *to refuse* the service. These bozos can’t keep from mangling up their own logic to save their lives.
LikeLike
How large a number of the people have to be offended? If you add all evangelicals, Catholics and Muslims together you have a pretty large number.
LikeLike
KBells, But we are not the right people.
The perverts have carefully choreographed the last few stories to make heroes of homosexual black athletes. I believe this was done to weaken resistance to perversion in the black community.
Solar P, I agree with you that the best option is to let all businesses refuse service to anyone for any reason or no reason. Hopefully, that will be the law in our new Texas Republic.
LikeLike
More from my earlier source:
“After all, isn’t forcing Christians to violate their consciences a form of religious discrimination? Usually we think of discrimination as the denial of something, and in this case it’s the denial to the right of conscience.”
I understand the trickiness of applying this on a retail business level. The military, after all, applies CO status after a pretty rigorous examination. Trying to determine the connection with a gay wedding might be more trouble than it’s worth.
Either way, as someone on FB cracked, it sure seems like there’s a very high demand for cakes in the gay community lately. 😉
LikeLike
It will be interesting to see how this plays out with lawsuits, etc. Now that gay marriage is (apparently) destined to quickly become the law of the land, how will the aftermath of what will be a clash of individual rights be handled?
LikeLike
That last quote in 8:56 wasn’t from the same earlier source, that was from someone else on fb.
LikeLike
Yeah, the lawsuits are a’comin’. As RickyW intimated above, we Christians aren’t the right *kind* of people, and the wrong *kinds* of people are the ones who will be adjudicating perverted law based not on sound principle, but faddish social trends.
LikeLike
Among the issues coming, too — questions over renting out church facilities. You know there will be intentional challenges to push the envelope.
LikeLike