"Cut the deficit, cut my taxes, but don't spend less."

It now appears the Obama health care proposal is being watered down even as you and I sit in front of our computers. It appears Congress will exempt about 83% of small businesses from compliance with the new law. I’m sure those 83% of small businesses will, in the spirit of true altruism, offer health coverage to their employees anyway, aren’t you?

In the end, the new law may not offer much reform....but maybe that's what Americans think they want right now. It seems government can't get our attention until disaster strikes us and then government has 15 minutes to straighten out the problem or we dump 'em.

Is this a great country or what!

The NYTimes/CBS poll soon to be released, perhaps today, will say:

"Most Americans continue to want the federal government to focus on reducing the budget deficit rather than spending money to stimulate the national economy... Yet at the same time, most oppose some proposed solution for decreasing it."

"Fifty-six percent of respondents said that they were not willing to pay more in taxes in order to reduce the deficit, and nearly as many said they were not willing for the government to provide fewer services in areas such as health care, education and defense spending."

Think about our recent history on health care reform. When the Clinton team proposed it, all the stakeholders opposed it and it went down in quick defeat. If the Obama effort at true reform goes down with a watered down version of virtually no changes, that will be another setback. And the Republicans want nothing but the status quo because the “free market will solve everything.”

In the meantime, the American people are seeing their health insurance premiums increase in double digits every year while inflation is an anemic 1.5% to 3%. What sort of civic mindedness thinks that’s a better state of affairs than we would get with the Obama plan?

I don’t know about you but I would gladly pay more in taxes if it would result in bringing my insurance increases down to ….oh, say….8-9% annually (which is itself outrageous).

I fear we are reaching a state of national mindset that will not allow anyone or any institution to govern effectively. It was a great republic at one time. Now it's just overweight and selfish...and demanding more and more for less and less.

Health Care Reform is a Complex Issue

Opponents of the current health care reform legislation are attempting to boil it down to language that will support their efforts to enlist others in working to defeat the bill. And they don't care if they exaggerate or get it totally wrong; they’ve got to kill this thing. Right now, the bill in question is HR 3200. It is 1,018 pages, not the 1,800 pages frequently claimed in e-mails circulating on the Internet. And most critics will be quick to claim members of Congress have not read the bill. A comment on that in a moment.

BTW, HR 3200 is not the only bill working its way through Congress. There are three bills being considered by House committees and at least two in the Senate. The Senate is not as far along as the House but we are a long way from setting language in concrete. You wouldn’t know that from the scaremongers who are using the draft to claim every evil known to man is about to be visited upon us.

The e-mail I received listed 31 so-called “egregious acts of government intervention in our lives” if health care reform passes. Here’s the first one:

Pg 22 of the HC Bill MANDATES the Govt will audit books of ALL EMPLOYERS THAT SELF-INSURE!!

Not true. It actually says “The Commissioner…shall conduct a study of the large group insured and self-insured employer health care markets.” [Underline added by Ben]

Several criteria are listed for the study but the one that troubles most opponents is the one:

(C) The financial solvency and capital reserve levels of employers that self-insure by employer size.

In other words, the new Commissioner will be required to conduct a study of the solvency of self-insured employers and provide recommendations to Congress on how to make the program work better.

Because the study will take a look at the "solvency and capital reserve levels" of employers, the author of the scare e-mail interprets that to mean the government will audit your books. That's not what the language says...but, wait a minute, isn't it true that government already has the authority to audits the tax returns of businesses, and individuals?

The next item in the e-mail says:

Pg 30 Sec 123 of HC bill - THERE WILL

BE A GOVT COMMITTEE that decides what treatments/benefits you get

Not true. Language in the bill actually says there will be a public/private advisory committee established to recommend covered benefits.

The proposal says there will be 26 members appointed by the President and Congress to serve on this advisory panel…and more than government will be represented on it. Here is the actual language of the bill:

(1) PARTICIPATION- The membership of the Health Benefits Advisory Committee shall at least reflect providers, consumer representatives, employers, labor, health insurance issuers, experts in health care financing and delivery, experts in racial and ethnic disparities, experts in care for those with disabilities, representatives of relevant governmental agencies. and at least one practicing physician or other health professional and an expert on children’s health and shall represent a balance among various sectors of the health care system so that no single sector unduly influences the recommendations of such Committee.

Does that sound like "a Government Committee will decide your benefits?" Hardly. The advisory committee even includes "consumer representatives" and -- note the last line -- "so that no single sector unduly influences the recommendations of such Committee." That doesn’t sound very malevolent to me.

The person who wrote the e-mail I received attempted to cite 29 additional provisions of the new proposal that convinced him there should be no law passed to address health care reform. His exaggerations undermine his argument for as soon as they are exposed for the exaggerations they are, and in some cases, outright falsehoods, his argument is dismissed. But his hard-line ultra right wing view is shared by many members of Congress who think it best that America not address health care reform.

Finally, don't let anyone get away with telling you Members of Congress don't read the bills they pass into law. When it comes to important landmark legislation such as health care reform, every member will read every word. Most of them will read and re-read the most important sections of the bill many times.

Those who don't want health care reform to pass claim members have not read the bill because THEY DO NOT WANT YOU TO READ THE BILL. They want you to think the task is too daunting and you should be happy they are reading and interpreting it for you.

At some point, we must stop listening to those who only want to scare us, and start listening to those who want to genuinely lead us.

Change is coming. The status quo of our health care delivery system is untenable. Of course, there are those who don't want any change. I say to them, take a look around you.

Collection boxes for US Mail are going away. They will soon be relics of our past because Americans have adopted new forms of communication.

Cars will soon be run on energy other than fossil fuels because the supply of fossil fuels is finite and will soon disappear altogether. And our cars will be made of material that doesn't break in a crash, only bends.

In our lifetimes, most of our electricity will be generated by means other than fossil fuels.

Change is part of who we are. Change is not something we should be afraid of.

We have 47 million (or more) Americans who don't have any health care coverage. It is costing us an arm and a leg to take care of them in Emergency Rooms across this nation. We can't continue to do so. Our hospitals and other aspects of our healthcare delivery system are suffering.

In addition, you and I and others who have health insurance, have seen our premiums soar annually in double digits for the past 25 years (that's my own experience) and even the rates we pay, exorbitant as they are, are unrelated to the true cost of health care. That true cost, which most of us never see, impacts us all and robs our nation of precious resources that could be used to help us achieve higher productivity.

President Obama is trying to do something very difficult. He needs the help of a lot of people. Mostly he needs citizens to have a little faith in him, and believe he has our nation's best interest at heart...because he does.

Questions from Readers

Why don’t we have more willing bipartisanship in the Congress?

I think it goes back to redistricting. State legislatures have done such a "good" job of carving out districts that support one party or the other that those elected are not allowed – or cannot afford, politically – to be bipartisan in their thinking or their voting.

Voters of their "solid" districts won't give them the freedom to look at the other side, to consider the merits of another point of view. That is a sad development for America, and truly undermines our representative form of government. Both parties are guilty of carving out districts where there is little chance of successfully contesting the status quo. By the way, our founders wanted nothing to do with the status quo if you recall history. I don't know why today's "leaders" are afraid of addressing it.

Why is President Obama in such a rush to pass health care reform?

In my view, nothing is being rushed. All the issues have been simmering on the stove for years. Most legislative leaders on Capitol Hill are thoroughly familiar with them…BUT no one has had the courage to take them off the hot stove. All have been content to wait for a real cook to come along brave enough to pick up the pot, hot to the touch with all the sensitive issues brewing inside, and serve it up to everyone at the table. Obama, it turns out, is that cook and he is not afraid of the heat.

Sen. Demint (R-SC) speaks for a large number of Republicans who see health care as "Obama's Waterloo.” As Demint said, “We can use it to break him." They have no intention of serving the public interest. None at all. Their only goal is to defeat Obama. The public interest be damned. Regrettably, that is the essence of the Republican Party these days. Why not be seen coming to the table to say, "We like this, we don't like that, we can compromise on these two." Everyone in America knows the health care system is broken. Costs are out of control. So, let's do something about it. No, the Republicans don't want to do anything if it means Obama might actually succeed. They just can't stomach that possibility.

Why can’t the vote wait until later this year or even next year?

Look, every member of Congress understands very well why the vote must take place soon. If we don't get a bill out of committee before the August recess, two things will happen: (1) the crush of the legislative calendar will cut short the days when the bill may be considered in both chambers, and (2) opposition to any reform of health care will use the time to distort the bill in the hope of preventing any change. Time and the inclination to say "no" to anything new will be working against meaningful change this year. The largest lobbying operation the world has ever known is working against it. If Obama succeeds, his middle name ought to be changed to Hercules.

As the schedule slips and votes are put off, passage of meaningful legislation becomes less assured. Only one thing is 99% certain: if health care reform doesn’t pass this year, it is probably dead for the foreseeable future. Rush Limbaugh and New Gingrich will have won again and 225 million Americans will have lost…again. Won't that be special?!

What about this “birther movement,” (challenging the validity of Obama’s birth as a natural born American)?

Every American ought to be disgusted with this development and denounce it at every opportunity. The "birther movement," make no mistake about it, is blatant racism by those who cannot stand to see a black man succeed....and particularly not this one. We have come a long way as a nation but ... we have not traveled far.

Walter Cronkite

Now they are all gone.

Eric Sevareid, Charles Collingwood, Robert Trout, Howard K. Smith, Richard C. Hottelet, Edward R. Murrow .... and now Walter Cronkite. These were the best and brightest of print and broadcast journalists. All came from a newspaper and/or wire service background. They understood the news; they understood their role in reporting it; they trusted the listener to hear and understand the import of what they were saying.

They came to be known first to America through their reporting of unfolding events in Europe during WWII. After the war most of them joined CBS, though I recall Howard K. Smith went to ABC.

What we miss now is the intellectual and moral honesty they brought to their craft. My wife knows how much I miss that in today's news reporting because I complain about it to her all the time.

Today's news reporting is more about speculation, fear, conspiracy, distrust, and of course, the performance of the reporter.

No one alive at the time of President Kennedy's assassination will ever forget the moment Walter Cronkite reported the official death, exact time and place, and nothing more. Can you imagine the same report by one of today's reporters. It would probably go something like this:

Reporter Jane Doe: "President Kennedy was brutally murdered today in Dallas, Texas. We don't know but there may have been more more than one killer. Some have said the Russians may have been involved. Our armed forces are attempting to secure the borders and the Pentagon may be preparing for war. No one knows for sure because the reports we are getting from official sources are inconsistent at best. ... Now to John Smith in the weather center."

Reporter John Smith: "Weather in a moment, Jane, but first viewers need to know at least four Category Five hurricanes are expected to reach landfall along the Atlantic and Gulf Coasts this season. Viewers should prepare today for the worst to come. Today, however, the high will be 75 and pleasant...a good day to visit the hardware store and stock up for the rough weather ahead."

See what I mean.

What are they teaching in Journalism schools today? Is this genie so far out of the bottle that it can't be put back?

I'm trying to think of someone in the media even close to the Cronkite mold....and I am coming up empty. If you can think of even one, let me know.

Cheney is no patriot.

As most Americans know by now, Dick Cheney, former member of Congress and former Vice President of the United States of America is no patriot. At the very least, he is a disgrace to our system of government.

This afternoon, the New York Times reported the latest and certainly the most serious violation of his duty to uphold the US Constitution. Details will follow no doubt but here is the NYT report:

"The Central Intelligence Agency withheld information about a
secret counter terrorism program from Congress for eight years
on direct orders from former Vice President Dick Cheney, the
agency's director, Leon E. Panetta, has told the Senate and
House intelligence committees, two people with direct
knowledge of the matter said Saturday.

"The report that Mr. Cheney was behind the decision to conceal
the still-unidentified program from Congress deepened the
mystery surrounding it, suggesting that the Bush
administration had put a high priority on the program and its
secrecy.

"Mr. Panetta, who ended the program when he first learned of
its existence from subordinates on June 23, briefed the two
intelligence committees about it in separate closed sessions
the next day."

It is my hope that every news organization, every blog, and every legitimate news organ in America will print/report this story.  When you hear the details of this Cheney authorized plan that only he had the right to oversee, you will be as disgusted as I am.

It is time for all of us -- Republicans as well as Democrats -- to denounce this individual for what he is.

Just thinking about highways…”electric” highways, that is.

There are some people in the electric utility industry who just don’t get it. One CEO actually wrote in a leading utility publication, “We already have a smart grid.” The one we built 50 years ago, he says, with its upgrades, is doing just fine, thank you. He doesn’t get it. Yes, today’s transmission and distribution systems allow better monitoring of use, leading to great efficiencies and conservation of electricity.

But that is not enough by a long shot. We have to do more.

Just as President Eisenhower saw the need to build an interstate highway system and superimpose it on the existing hodge-podge of two-lane highways choking our cities and slowing down economic expansion, so President Obama has in mind a network of electric transmission superhighways crisscrossing the continent. And the electricity they carry will be a result of new technologies – some that we know about and some we don’t know very much about – that will, for example, convert AC current to DC at a series of substations across the land before converting the DC back to AC at the point of distribution to final customer.

Wow, that’s new.

No, it’s not.

It’s definitely not a new idea. They’re already doing it in Quebec and China and working on it other developed countries. Another idea is to kick up the voltage to an extra high 765 kilovolts, almost twice as much as is typically carried on those heavy duty high voltage lines now. The advantage, engineers say, is that utilities could minimize the need for converting back and forth between AC and DC.

As they say in the movies, “We have people working on these ideas right now.”

Look, I don’t know if this is where we are going. I’m not an engineer. I just know that we have to do something in order to keep up with demand, in order to provide electricity at cost effective rates, in order to reduce our dependency on fossil fuels (this new superhighway would enable renewable energy – wind and solar – to be carried great distances, from places where it is easily generated to places where it is needed most), and we should all be in favor of that.

It will be a true paradigm shift, yes, in the way we think about electricity, the way it is generated, transmitted and distributed to customers. It will definitely not be business as usual.

To claim that we don’t need to spend the money on a new way of generating, transporting and delivering electricity is naïve at best and irresponsible at worst.

Utilities would do the country – and especially their customers – a service if they would begin to open the window on what the future will make possible, and explain it clearly. For it is through such major innovations that the nation will begin to realize exponential growth in all areas of the economy which, in turn, will lead to the productivity growth we must have to generate the revenues required to service the national debt more easily while continuing to provide the services people have come to expect from their government.

"Politics as Usual"

Friends have asked, "So, what do you make of Sarah Palin's resignation?"

Well, I want to take her at her word so I will use what I call the "Larry Craig test of political truthiness." You remember when Larry Craig first walked to the microphones to defend himself on the charge that he had solicited sex in an airport men's room, he said very clearly in the middle of his defense, "I am not gay. I never have been gay. I have never engaged in gay activity." Now, right there, you knew he was gay.

Trust me, I have studied political non-speech for 38 years and I am sharing with you the benefit of that carefully cultivated insight.

What does this have to do with Sarah Palin? In her rambling resignation speech, she said she did not believe in politics as usual. Not three times, but five times she referenced this closely held conviction:

1. "...I promised no more politics as usual."
2. "...Trust me with this decision and know that it is no more politics as usual."
3. "...It's no more politics as usual..."
4. "...No more conventional politics as usual."
5. "...I'm not wired to operate under the same old politics as usual."

Make no mistake about it: Sarah Palin's decision was strictly politics as usual. Her ambition rules her every move. It is too bad that somewhere along the way she didn't let her brain learn some of the substance that her ambition could use today.

She will soon be free to raise the money she needs, to pick up the favors she needs, to assemble the organization she needs to make a run for President in 2012. And the voters will exercise their good judgment at the polls in 2012....and that is the best part of "politics as usual."

Every Day is Independence Day

Every Fourth of July, I hear someone say, “I wish America could return to the days of our founding fathers,” a wish no doubt for a time when everything important in life was known, certain, and not likely to change.

The only problem is that does not describe our founders’ ambitions. The men who put their signatures on the Declaration of Independence had something else in mind: They were uncomfortable with their present status and wanted to change it.

They wanted nothing of religious constriction, governmental tyranny, or suffocating conventional wisdom in the exploration of science, theology, art and politics. They were focused like today’s laser beam on the future, and were enthralled with the potential that exists in the human mind.

The world was ripe for the embracing of radical change in the era of Jefferson, Adams and Franklin. Our founders wanted anything but the status quo. Tomorrow was always likely to be a better day for the improvements it would bring in previously “accepted” thought.

What would they say about the so-called “improvements” of our time?

Well, the Internet has certainly changed our political process by making it possible for a veritable unknown candidate from Illinois to demonstrate to a majority of the electorate that he can be trusted with the government. Indeed, the Internet has changed our entire world through a diffusion of knowledge that has touched and stimulated people on every square foot of this planet.

Surely that diffusion of knowledge is something the founders would applaud, though certainly not every use of the Internet would be approved.

As for tomorrow, what secrets will be revealed through continued DNA research? What products and technologies will be made possible by the exploitation of nanotechnology? What new fuels will be developed that power our cars while cleaning the air we breathe? And what of the atom smashing capabilities of the super collider recently built but untested in Europe. What a marvelous world awaits our children and grandchildren!

You may laugh at my speculation, but I have long ago ceased to laugh at the seemingly impossible. Too many of those “impossible” ideas are in my house today.

When the colonists decided they didn’t want to be told to send their tax money to England, King George III must have longed for the comfort of “the good old days.” And surely there were citizens in colonial America who would have been more comfortable with seeking an accommodation with the Crown – but of course, it was not to be.

To find comfort for their lives was not the goal of our forefathers. They envisioned a never quite satisfied electorate always “looking forward, not backwards, for improvement” in their government.

The founders believed America could be improved if each succeeding generation could find the mettle to be worthy stewards of the government they bequeathed to us.

We celebrate our Independence from England on one specific day of the year, but we renew our founders’ independent spirit each day we devote to improving this republic.

Dawn of New Era

With so much media attention focused last week on coverage of Michael Jackson’s death, it is not surprising that most Americans are not aware the entire country has entered a new era. Maybe you felt the earth move just a bit last Friday when the vote came in on the so-called “climate change” bill in the House. By passing the comprehensive energy bill by a vote of 219 to 212, the House crossed a threshold never achieved before – one that sets out to change American energy policy.

It's not law yet...but it's moving!

I have been an observer of the many attempts by Congress to address this issue in a substantive way since 1973, and I’ve seen many serious attempts to reform energy policy get sucked into the powerful quicksand of the status quo. Nothing happens to change things. All efforts to do so disappear before your eyes.

But not this time.

Under the bill, greenhouse gases must be trimmed by 17 percent from 2005 levels and all by 2020. Utilities must also generate 15 percent of electricity from renewable energy sources by 2020. Energy efficiency gains of 8 percent are required by the same time. The overall goal is to cut carbon dioxide emissions by 80 percent by 2050.

This bill is a game changer. America’s utilities know it. Some generators of electricity fear the impact on their bottom line and on the economy in general. But they are also aware that if it is accompanied by initiatives to facilitate the development of new technologies in the market, it could work without slowing down economic growth. The growth – real growth – that results from this massive and complex effort could be the beginning of the paradigm shift that awaits this country in its new world leadership role on energy.

Now – on to the US Senate.