In July 1991, Clarence Thomas, a relatively unknown D.C. Circuit judge, was nominated by President George H.W. Bush to replace Thurgood Marshall on the United States Supreme Court. Thomas soon found out that the only thing more perilous than replacing a historical icon on the Court is replacing a liberal with a conservative. Thomas would become an icon in his own right for conservatives: an unyielding defender of textualism and conservative jurisprudence. Yet, liberals seem more preoccupied by his race than his rigidity. This week, a leading Democrat, Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison unleashed another openly racist attack on Thomas and neither the media nor the political establishment condemned the remarks.
Ellison condemned Thomas as a house slave working for white people, analogizing him to the vile character “Stephen,” played by Samuel L. Jackson in the film “Django Unchained.” (Jackson himself called Thomas “Uncle Clarence” after the Dobbs decision overturning Roe v. Wade). Ellison added that, because he disagreed with Thomas’ conservative opinions, the justice is “illegitimate” and “needs to be impeached.”
That is, of course, nonsensical from a constitutional standpoint. However, what was most striking is the response to statements. The racist attack from the top lawyer in the state of Minnesota was not condemned by a single democrat.
Not Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, who previously falsely declared that hate speech is not constitutionally protected under the First Amendment and declared himself a champion against bigotry and racist rhetoric.
Not from senior Senator Amy Klubuchar, who has repeatedly denounced racist tropes and rhetoric of Republicans.
Not from Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, who rightfully condemned the comments of Republican Sen. Tommy Tuberville on white nationalism but made no comment on a racist attack of Thomas in the same week.
Not from President Joe Biden, who has repeatedly denounced racial rhetoric and “codes” by Republicans.
Indeed, the day that Ellison’s comments were being aired nationally, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre went to the press room to denounce Robert F. Kennedy Jr. at length for his statements suggesting that Covid-19 may have been engineered to spare Jewish and Chinese people. Jean-Pierre declared that “it is important that we essentially speak out” when such racist or anti-Semitic comments are made, but then made no mention of the racist attack on Thomas as nothing more than a house slave.
Thomas knew that being a conservative black jurist would not be easy when he was nominated for the bench. Thomas replaced Robert Bork on the D.C. Circuit. Bork was also savagely attacked when he was nominated for the Court. Indeed, “borked” is now a term of art for destroying nominees in the confirmation process.
Thomas’ confirmation became a battle royale after Anita Hill accused him of of sexual harassment. What followed was famously described by Thomas as “a high tech lynching for uppity blacks who in any way deign to think for themselves, to do for themselves, to have different ideas.”
The attacks on Thomas would never end. His very presence on the Court seemed to disgust liberals who made continual reference to his race. One Democratic legislator on the Georgia Senate floor called him an “Uncle Tom” who “sold his soul to the slave master.”
The Smithsonian’s African American museum even skipped over Thomas in its selection of great African Americans at its opening despite being the second African-American appointed to the highest court. (His Senate confirmation-hearing accuser, Anita Hill, did make the cut.) It was only after a public outcry that the Smithsonian relented to include Thomas.
The media has been unrelenting in its hostile and one-sided coverage of Thomas. While running gushing pieces heralding the backgrounds of liberal justices, there has been a virtual news blackout on Thomas’ amazing life story, one of the truly most inspirational accounts of overcoming every possible obstacle in life.
Thomas was born on the Georgia coast in Pin Point, Georgia and grew up speaking Gullah, the creole dialect. He was raised in a one-room shack with dirt floors, no plumbing, and no Dad. When he was eventually sent to a Catholic school, he had to learn to read and write in English. He overcame segregation and prejudice to eventually go to Holy Cross and then was offered admission to Yale, Harvard, and the University of Pennsylvania law schools. He would become the chairman of the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission in 1982, a federal appellate judge, and the second African American to join the Court.
Few of these critics could have walked the path of this man from Pin Point to Capitol Hill. He did so by being his own man — relying on his faith and his intellect to face seemingly insurmountable barriers before him.
Some 32 years ago, Thomas objected to the treatment of an “uppity black” jurist who thinks for himself. Others have made the case for him. For years, commentators have singled out Thomas for his race among the conservative majority. Now, in the face of yet another raw and racist attacks, the political and media establishment is again silent.
Ironically, the thing that made Stephen hate Django in the movie was that he would not yield to the demands of the white owners. Django defiantly admitted that he was “that one [black man] in ten thousand.” For the liberal establishment, Thomas was a threat because others might emulate him. That is why other black leaders like Sen. Tim Scott from South Carolina have faced continual racist tropes from the left, including a Maryland Delegate Gabriel Acevero stating that “Tim Scott isn’t naive, he’s cooning” to please white people.
The bitter irony is that Thomas is the antithesis of the Stephen character. He has always refused to yield to the demands of others on how he should think as a jurist due to his race.
The attacks are meant to chill others from even considering conservative or libertarian views. Ellison has long valued intimidation as a political weapon. He previously praised the ultra-violent group Antifa as useful to “strike fear in the heart” of Trump and Republicans.
Of course, Django is all about righteous rage as a license for the most extreme actions.
That is why Ellison may have had the right movie, but the wrong character. Call it the Django syndrome. When you are “one in ten thousand” who refuses to yield, you become not simply an annoyance but an obsession.
Fabulous debate on Twitter: Kennedy rams through amendment condemning racist attacks on Clarence Thomas about an amendment for censoring
It is worth listening to just to learn how to control a debate.
https://twitter.com/SenJohnKennedy/status/1682115141712609285?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1682115141712609285%7Ctwgr%5E4e58f4ab3e8368c70b1c4d40b0a36fc92617fead%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fjustthenews.com%2Fpolitics-policy%2Fkennedy-rams-through-amendment-condemning-racist-attacks-clarence-thomas
When all else fails, they call you names and attack your character. The fact even after 32 years Clarence Thomas refuses to rise and take the bait should exemplify his character. I can only wish more politicians would follow his example of dignity.
IT’S THE SAME HATEFUL RACISM AGAINST CLARENCE THOMAS. HE ISN’T SUPPOSED TO BE A CONSERVATIVE BECAUSE IT’S THE SANE WAY TO THINK AND THOSE WHO ARE UNHINGED CAN’T ALLOW THAT!!!!
Democrat politicians have always treated people differently based on the color of their skin. In prior years, Democrat politicians supported race-based slavery, race-based voter eligibility, race-based hiring, race-based career advancement, race-based neighborhoods, race-based hotels, race-based restaurants, and race based-public transportation. In 2023, Democrat politicians support race-based hiring, race-based career advancement, race-based congressional districts, race-based government contracts, and race-based college admissions.
Blacks are reliably Dim voters and that’s why the Dims pander to them. It’s also why they’re taken for granted and their plight never really addressed by their patrons. Sort of sad way to treat people who support you but why would the Dims give up a constituency?
“Mr. Faux Djangos”
by the Nitty Gritty Dirty Politics Band
Leftist blacks (the true Uncle Toms) and Democrats now have a second minority member to skewer, hate, fling invectives and denounce as only the Left can do: pure, unadulterated xenophobia. MSNBC Joy(less) Reid should be asked by Fox News to repeat her anti gay comments now that the 2nd whistleblower has been identified as a gay married Democrat: IRS Special Agent Joe Ziegler
😂
I’m no more credible than this man sitting next to me due to my sexual orientation or my political beliefs,” Ziegler plans to say. “I was raised and have always strived to do what is right.
“I have heard from some that I am a traitor to the Democratic Party and that I am causing more division in our society. I implore you, that if you were put in my position with the facts as I have stated them, that you would be doing the exact same thing — regardless of your political party affiliation.”
Ziegler will say he hopes he serves as an example to the LGBT community “who are questioning doing the right thing at a potential cost to themselves and others.”
https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/justice/joe-ziegler-whistleblower-x-revealed-hunter-biden-investigation
Democrats will kill this guy ala Democrat Charles Schumer “you have released the whirlwind, and you will pay the price….You won’t know what hit you if you go forward with these awful decisions.”
Estovir,
This is a man (Ziegler) who has great courage, integrity and moral character.
He knows what is right vs what is bipartisanship. I hope his courage inspires others to come forward.
I will stand by and wait and see how MSM and the Democrat party goes to what lengths to slander him.
To him and his partner I wish them well. If there is a fund to support them, I may contribute.
The Democrats have overfilled their depends, on this one. A few have tried to challenge these two, and are forced to retreat. So, most of the dems just spend 5 minutes banging their personal grievance hobby horse. Never getting close to the topic.
What does being a defender of conservative jurisprudence mean? That you allow yourself to disregard jurisprudence if it is not conservative?
Estovir,
If Zeigler hasn’t yet, I would recommend he and his spouse publicly state immediately that they are in excellent health, living the American dream and have not now or ever contemplated committing suicide.
I think your field is accounting or something along those lines. I earned an MBA Degree after my stint in Big Pharma because I sensed that physicians needed to learn how to survive and thrive in the business landscape of medicine. Consequently I keep one hand on scientific research in my field and the other on business in medicine. I am shocked at the 2022 revenue numbers on the insurance industry. Worse of all is that every American health consumer knows that our health system is broken. This is to say that for decades Members of Congress and US Presidents could have prevented our broken and highly unjust health care system. Instead they have focused on their own agendas and vendettas. From Obama’s politicization of race and Federal agencies, Democrats “getting” Trump, and now Republicans responding in kind, Americans get screwed on a visceral level. There are many problems facing our nation, several of which started decades ago. Now that our nation is hemorrhaging on many levels, our politicians tend to what matters to them instead of what matters to Americans.
To reply to UpstateFarmer, I hope Joseph Ziegler and his husband thought ahead of what Ziegler has done. They are dead meat ala SCOTUS Catholic Justices with the likes of Merrick Garland drawing bullseyes on the heads of Americans
BIG INSURANCE 2022: Revenues reached $1.25 trillion thanks to sucking billions out of the pharmacy supply chain – and taxpayers’ pockets
Analysis of the 2022 financial statements of UnitedHealth Group, CVS/Aetna, Cigna, Elevance, Humana, Centene, and Molina
https://wendellpotter.substack.com/p/big-insurance-2022-revenues-reached
In many respects, we are over-insured, and that causes a lot of wasted money. Too much money is chasing services and products. Government involvement created this problem during WW2 and made it permanent after the war..
Estovir,
You are correct. It is very difficult for providers to navigate this tangled web we call modern American medicine. It is out of control or as they would say in the South, “It is a hot mess!”
I can’t for the life of me figure out what this segue to health insurance has to do with the topic but the facts presented by Wendell Potter are total horse manure. Potter is a former sales person for private Medigap limited indemnity insurance policies which – back in the day – many people on Original Medicare bought because Original Medicare absolutely is the worst financial protection ever imagined (that’s what happens when you let Congressional Committees design things). After Potter stopped selling his Medigap crap (or got fired because its market share went from 40% to 10% of the people on Original Medicare), he started pumping out all these lies about the other three Medicare options and health insurance in general
I’m not defending the American health care system or its health insurance system (those are two different things) although the health care is demonstrably the best in the world (compare any cohort of second or third generation fill-in-the-blank-ethnicity Americans to the cohort of those of same age still living in wherever that ethnicity came from). But you better find a better source than that washed up salesperson Potter to make your points about them
In particular the Potter article misinformation and outright lies include
1. Those companies’ health insurance revenues increased in the 10 years mentioned because of Obamacare (a few of the companies mentioned were created specifically because of Obamacare) and because of the overwhelming increased acceptance of public Part C Medicare-*, the most popular optional Federal program ever announced. The comparison conveniently leaves out the numbers of the companies that left the health insurance market, inflating the growth rate
2. Most public Medicare Part C plans (commonly called Medicare Advantage although not all Part C plans are Advantage plans and most people on Advantage plans never see those words) are sponsored by non profits. To claim that the for-profit insurers control the market, you have to put the huge non profit AARP – the market leader – in the for-profit column because it uses UnitedHealth to administer its plans (but that’s just like the Trustees contract out all Original Medicare administration to five for profit insurers). And for those that have something against for profit companies and/or something against AARP, there are still dozens of non profit sponsors to choose from. Most of such sponsors are your doctor, which eliminates the dreaded insurance middleman altogether. Often the middleman is your union
3. The same for profit insurers who make up a minority of the Medicare Advantage revenue stream (after you put AARP in the correct bucket) also sell the increasingly unpopular very expensive Medigap limited indemnity insurance policies that Potter is shilling as well as run the increasingly fewer group employer retiree plans. So they make out either way… whichever option the person on Medicare chooses. But as for Trust Fund dollars-**, the people on Medicare Advantage plans cost the Trusts less than the people on “gap” and retiree insurance while getting much better benefits (the tradeoff is that you have to be happy with networked health care, which 80% of the people not yet aged into Medicare all use anyways)
4. Everything in the Potter article about the pharmacy supply chain is total nonsense. Pharmaceuticals only account for about 10% of health spending and PBMs only take about 5% of that 11% (so a half a percent of all healthcare spending) to administer the drug plans they control under contract for large employers, the government and Medicare/Medicaid plan sponsors. Even if you want to argue that their negotiating skills are totally useless (obviously the thousands of Fortune/Forbes companies that use PBMs do not), there is some value in the administrative end of their supply chain activity and only a small percent of the revenue that flows through them is profit
___________
*Ironically Medicare Part C ballooned even though Obama intended to kill it in Obamacare because Pelosi told the Democrats to vote for it before they read it. If they had read it, they would have known that the per capita payment for Part C members is directly tied to the inefficiency of Original Medicare… the more the Trust Funds spend inefficiently on people on Fee for Service Medicare the more benefits we people on public Part C get spent on us… all of which has to be spent on benefits for us… it can’t go to the sponsors
**This is usually called “taxpayer dollars” by leftists. Leftists always leave out the fact that it is the people on Medicare who put the dollars in the Trust Funds in the first place via payroll (Part A) and income (Part B) taxes respectively
For-profits and not-for-profits differ primarily due to their tax designation. The rest of the stuff has many workarounds. I would not get hung up over not-for-profit status v. for-profit.
“ Pharmaceuticals only account for about 10% of health spending and PBMs only take about 5% of that 11%”
It depends on the view. Healthy or minimally ill patients spend little on medication, but that 10% burdens sick patients buying expensive drugs such as Eliquis and Entresto.
Your reply does not seem to be addressed to me but in case you think it is, S Meyer, your first point about for profit vs non profit is the same as mine. There are plenty of options of both if people get hung about such things. However, the charity I deal with for my health insurance does not do it for any tax advantage or designation. It is a true charity. However it pays all relevant sales, property, etc. taxes that apply to its assets. Of course, it has no profits so it pays no income taxes. Some years it takes in more in premiums than it pays out in claims; when that happens, premiums decrease the next year under the supervision of the charity czar in my state (I recall one year in the last 25 when I actually got a check back). Some years the opposite happens.
I simply don’t understand the comment about drugs. I think you are saying the 80/20 rule applies and I agree. However much of that spending on expensive brandname drugs is not a burden on the Medicare patient. Perhaps you do not mean to be Medicare specific but on Medicare, 25% of the beneficiaries basically get their drugs and drug plans for free and another 50% are eligible for state/city/county assist so only the wealthiest people on Medicare who are also sadly chronically ill pay a lot for drugs
Most not-for-profits function in the same manner as for-profit companies. The non-profit lacks taxable revenues, but for the most part, that is irrelevant.
“the charity I deal with for my health insurance does not do it for any tax advantage or designation. It is a true charity.”
It is possibly a charity, but I doubt it. (There is possibly one in Pennsylvania, though I am unsure.) In general, money goes into the pockets of many people and other companies, so one has to look carefully to see what they are doing.
“I simply don’t understand the comment about drugs. I think you are saying the 80/20 rule applies”
I don’t know which 80/20 rule you refer to. What I was referring to is that when looking at costs, benefits, and all sorts of things involving patients, one can not look at the average costs or benefits. One needs to look at the costs and benefits for the sick population. Healthcare is to treat the sick, so when you look at the significant numbers, you have to specifically and separately observe the sick group.
There are many costs for Part D users. There is the doughnut hole, copay, and multiple tiers. There is also often the loss of the better drug because the insurer declines to provide it without a physician’s explanation, and even then, the costs can be significantly higher.
The system is rotten. Those that accept Medicare Advantage get their drugs included, but that is generally associated with HMO-type care, which is problematic. The unknown details of the health insurance industry are disgusting, and all start with government action. WW2 was the beginning of the government taking control over healthcare, but it didn’t become so bad until Medicare. Medicare looked good at the onset to those that do not understand the marketplace, but almost everything bad that has happened, including the astronomical cost of healthcare, arises from Medicare and other government controls.
PBMs are evil as they operate today. They make Big Pharma look good. They redirect revenues to their owners while sticking it to patients Rx out of pocket costs and/or forcing their physicians to prescribe secondary or tertiary drugs because the PBM does not cover the primary drug per drug plan. Naturally the owners of PBMs win big. Look at who owns the PBMs.
The majority of pharmacy benefit management market share is currently occupied by only a few major players, namely CVS Health (32%), Cigna (24%), UnitedHealth Group’s OptumRx (21%), and Humana Pharmacy Solutions (8%).
CVS Health owns Caremark and Aetna!
Cigna owns Express Scripts
UnitedHealth Group owns OptumRx
The above 3 processed about 77% of all equivalent prescription claims.
see: https://www.drugchannels.net/2021/04/the-top-pharmacy-benefit-managers-pbms.html
It is a scam of epic proportions. Sadly neither physicians nor patients understand these things which allows PBMs and their owners to make bank, none of which is the blame of Big Pharma, as explained in the following WSJ article is dated, 2016. It covers some of these issues in their infancy. They are far worse today.
Drugmakers Point Finger at Middlemen for Rising Drug Prices
Wall Street Journal
This is a super complex conversation because the medical industry accounts for nearly 20% of US GDP. Consequently the players will not walk away from the table because they know there is money to be made. It is crushing patients finances, physician content with their profession and quality of care for everyone.
I think the PBMs and middlemen are the worst. They drive up prices and do not permit transparency in pricing. They force us into specific brands.
I remember Hillary Clinton’s speech about this poor woman who had to pay $10,000 for her meds. She listed what the woman needed and quoted the costs for the most expensive brand names used to treat those conditions. I went through the list and found others, previously gold-standard drugs able to treat the problem. The total cost was in the hundreds, not in the thousands.
Today we are pushed into over-kill destroying antibiotics and using expensive drugs in places of less expensive ones. Many insurance profits are based on a percentage of cost, so when that is the metric, the more paid, the higher the profit.
Permit Americans to buy their drugs from anywhere in the world. Prevent the middlemen from pushing specific drugs, which sometimes don’t work as well. The incentives existing in IMO are socially unacceptable and sometimes criminal.
Dennis Byron says: July 20, 2023 at 7:27 AM: I can’t for the life of me figure out what this segue to health insurance has to do with the topic…
When one engages in public discourse it is assumed one has 2 functioning neurons, preferably in the cerebral cortex, before proving their irrelevance
Estovir says: July 19, 2023 at 6:59 PM: This is to say that for decades Members of Congress and US Presidents could have prevented our broken and highly unjust health care system. Instead they have focused on their own agendas and vendettas
i.e. Democrats pursuing Justice Clarence Thomas, President Trump, et al are politicians focused on their own political agendas while ignoring far more pressing matters that affect Americans daily like their health care
Potter is a former sales person for private Medigap limited indemnity insurance policies which – back in the day ….
He is a former Senior VP for Cigna, and now a turncoat executive serving as a whistleblower for his former industry.
Leftists always leave out the fact that it is the people on Medicare who put the dollars in the Trust Funds in the first place via payroll (Part A) and income (Part B) taxes respectively
Medicare beneficiaries exhaust their “fair share” of contributions after 2 hospital admissions.
And for those that have something against for profit companies and/or something against AARP, there are still dozens of non profit sponsors to choose from. Most of such sponsors are your doctor, which eliminates the dreaded insurance middleman altogether
🤣
You obviously have no clue what doctors do today
You’re the reason why instructions are provided on the envelopes of Pop Tarts
Well this post is as totally absurd as the original comment by this commenter. As to the Medicare portions of this reply
1. “Medicare beneficiaries exhaust their “fair share” of contributions after 2 hospital admissions.” That sentence is totally out of context with the sentence prior to it in the reply but also totally out of context with all previous comments. “Fair share” is in quotes but I cannot find any other place where those words appear. If the comment means to reflect the fact that all insurance covers events that only happen to a few percent of the insured, yeah sure. Brilliant observation
2. As for the scattered emoji, it is a fact that most Medicare Advantage plans are sponsored by non profit organizations and most of those organizations are controlled by your doctors (and by companies that the doctors split off for state legal reasons)
3. My separate comment about Potter’s lies say all you need to know about Potter
I am shocked at the 2022 revenue numbers on the insurance industry.
Estovir, I’m betting that you’re not shocked, but rather appalled. Shocked would indicate you didn’t see it coming. Of course our healthcare system is broken. And since it is a system that touches every demographic, it is not in the best interest of our government to fix it. First of all, there’s too much lobbying money chasing the politicians and secondly, a broken system gives the politicians power to control an increasingly dependent electorate. Can you name one industry that the government hasn’t made worse? Is there one industry that has a bipartisan approach that would make it better for all Americans? I would have thought we could at least be unified on fighting against child sex trafficking. But when that “industry” is exposed by The Sound of Freedom, not even that can unite us. When every industry is broken to some degree, and never to the benefit of the all the people, then look no further for the root problem than the overlords in government.
Obviously the medical issue is very personal to me given my patients are largely poor, uneducated and minorities with bare minimal health insurance plans offered by sketchy employers. You are right. Im not shocked but appalled, better choice of words. Just when I thought greed could not possibly get worse in the business landscape of medicine, the 2022 numbers for health plans bowled me over. Hospital systems like HCA are not too far behind, and pharmacies, PBMs, etc
I often have to beg patients to come to clinic, lean on them to go to pharmacies to get their meds where their scripts were sent, get them refilled given the refill orders exist, to get their blood work done, etc. Many are financially strapped. One patient, an older Hispanic who works 6 days/ week a menial job, had a local HCA hospital send him a “last notice bill” and threat of collections. He paid it, then could not pay his rent and groceries. I was furious and told him next time to ignore such a bill, considering it was an HCA Hospital
I see patients at their worst points in life, and often have discussions with pharmacists who are helpless to work around PBMs and insurance plans for rejecting drugs as prescribed. Really frustrating.
I have yet to see the The Sound of Freedom movie because I know immigrants who went through slave and sex trafficking just to get to America. That the Left have written the movie off as a QAnon story is predictable considering they caused it in large part. I hold Biden responsible for these slave and sex trafficking tragedies given his open borders advertisement
This is what happens when God was removed from the public square and postmodernism became our metric for everything.
For the sake of personal health, spending time in prayer and meditation are crucial. Not sure where I would be without them
Oremus!
Brother, I’m certainly not trying to trivialize your experience. On the contrary, the problems you cite affect every demographic in this country. Well perhaps not the wealthy that can afford other options. The fact that the healthcare industry, including insurance, is getting worse and not better for the American people, is sadly just one of many problems we face.
I’m curious to know what the good professor thinks of his blog today. When you read his bio, most of the recognition this blog has received where he includes the years come from a time before as you say postmodernism became our metric for everything. JT hasn’t changed over the years, but the comments section has. It’s morphed from legal theory as it relates to current events, to an MMA cage match between those living in reality and those demoralized beyond repair. The amazing thing is while reality pummels the demoralized day in and day out, the demoralized keep toeing the line. I don’t know if JT is only concerned about his numbers, but he could return this to a legal blog. All he would have to do is scrub comments that have no connection to a legal point.
Anyway, Oremus!
” it is not in the best interest of our government to fix it.”
Olly, when government does, it makes things worse. Many people were gung-ho over Medicare Part D. When first brought to our attention, I called it what I believed it was, The Merck Welfare Bill. Merck had little in the pipeline as their drugs were going generic and me-too drugs were competing. Part D came in not to place a ceiling on pharmaceutical prices, but to put a floor on them. At the time, Merck, Pfizer, and a few others provided their brand-name drugs for free or $15 delivered to a poor person’s home. After Part D passed, the pharmaceutical companies and middlemen made a lot more.
ObamaCare, despite what many think, is a disaster. It raised the cost of healthcare, transferred costs ineffectively from one group of people to another, and led to physician churning and other practices that are not good, along with a whole host of other things. It wasn’t even a complete bill leaving many important things up to the ‘secretary’.
Get the government out of healthcare, and without affecting overall quality and access, we could save at least one-third of present-day expenditures (probably a lot more).
Thank you for the details. You and Estovir get it.
Get the government out of… EVERYTHING that can and should be done at the state or local level. And that includes what can be done by the people themselves without government.
After Getting $1B in Fed Cash, Hospital Let Schumer’s Wife Go Ahead of Sicker Patients
https://www.frontpagemag.com/after-getting-1b-in-fed-cash-hospital-let-schumers-wife-go-ahead-of-sicker-patients/
Estovir, the politicians serve us with their ideas but they don’t live under them.
I see you like Daniel Greenfield. He is one of those orthodox Jews you talked about awhile back. He’s great.
Olly wrote: It’s morphed from legal theory as it relates to current events, to an MMA cage match
Good analogy. I joined this forum precisely because of its scholastic, academic bent with discussion led by attorneys like Mespo. It has succumbed to such a bottom dwelling level that I find the forum distasteful. Too many people just ranting, venting their spleen, and the numerous mindless copy/paste of content from extraneous websites that have nothing to do with Professor Turley’s otherwise legal acumen. Im scrolling these days more and more
S. Meyer wrote Many people were gung-ho over Medicare Part D……ObamaCare, despite what many think, is a disaster. It raised the cost of healthcare,
My original comment was on the collapsing of the US Health Care while politicians busied themselves with political jihads against their “enemies”. Then, sadly, Dennis Byron commandeered the thread to make it about his priority, Medicare, which is only a fraction of the health care pie. Making things worse, he ranted about x, y and z, reminding me why I never discuss these things with people who have no idea about the overall industry.
It needs to be blown up. Obamacare was a trojan horse that promised everything, and delivered nothing that has benefited patients nor providers, but it has made private, for-profit players, salivate for the loop holes. There will always be loop holes! EMR has been such a colossal failure, that communication between physicians and patients is almost nonexistent. The administrative burden on all of us in medicine is breaking our spirits. Ask any pharmacist for starters.
Politicians could have done much 2 decades ago to prevent our present situation. Now, no one in the business basket wants to give up their piece of the pie, including patients, so its all going down. Its a damn shame. I dont even recognize our US Health Care anymore. Most physicians want out or have checked out mentally: its just a job. Thank the Feds for that. Only until Members of Congress have to deal with third party payers like average Americans do will they see how bad things are. Now, like Chuck Schumer recently waving his political ties as he entered a hospital in NYC for his wife’s COVID-like symptoms, he was treated like royalty. Politicians are too detached from Americans every day concerns, which brings me back to my original comment: they pursue Justice Clarence Thomas because they couldnt give a frack about the concerns Americans face like health care
fin
I joined this forum precisely because of its scholastic, academic bent with discussion led by attorneys like Mespo. It has succumbed to such a bottom dwelling level that I find the forum distasteful.
Estovir, I too joined JT’s blog for the sole purpose of learning the legal arguments being made by all sides as they relate to many current events. I recall many heated discussions related to Obamacare when Chief Justice Roberts ruled it constitutional by amending it (legislating) from the bench. An attorney, Mike Appleton, was a common fixture on this blog at the time defending this act. While he was obviously a very left-leaning Democrat, I read his arguments and followed the debates against his legal opinions from Mespo and others, with great interest. This was a time when the legal opinions of facts and evidence were argued from liberal and conservative perspectives. While the opinions varied, neither side of the debate ignored the veracity of the facts and evidence.
That blog does not exist any longer. We now have one side offering legal opinions of facts and evidence and on the other side the legal opinions require ignoring facts and evidence. It’s difficult to pinpoint when this mind-altering take on reality began to infect this blog, but my guess is it was following the Benghazi attack. Then, when the Clinton private server and email controversy exploded leading up to the 2016 election, this blog completely transformed into an ideological debate over reality. My learning curve shifted from trying to understand legal theory, to trying to understand the psychology motivating those clearly observing a different reality. This is when I first learned about the Yuri Bezmenov explanation in his 1984 interview regarding “active measures.” Then most recently, when I read Mattias Desmet’s piece (and book) regarding “mass formation psychosis”, I finally understood the mind of the cancerous trolls that have consumed the time and talents of many fine contributors on this blog.
I’ve often thought this cancer was fed by those willing to engage them in debate. But the problem is far greater than that. This cancer is merely a symptom of the rot in our culture, the media, big tech, our government institutions, the Democratic party and so many others. And no, the Republican party is not innocent in this cancer that has metastasized in every corner of this country. I believe this country is in the end stages of our great experiment and in January 2025 we will begin to restore or put an end to this great republic
” Most physicians want out or have checked out mentally: its just a job.”
That is a problem, and the physician is what we need to be concerned about. Hospitals are nothing more than structures built of brick and mortar. Insurance companies are merely one way of paying the bill. All of these things depend on the physician who has been destroyed by those who say, “I’m from the government and here to help.”
Solutions are needed, but they cannot be imposed. The federal government cannot steal from one pocket to give to another. Physicians as a group cannot be forced to do slave labor, but today are incentivized to such an extent that the difference between “slavery” and freedom comes close to not existing.
What do we do? The first thing is to disentangle healthcare from the federal government. Will people permit that?
[For Enigma, I am not using the term slavery as the ownership of another individual.]
The first thing is to disentangle healthcare from the federal government. Will people permit that?
That’s an excellent comment and question, SM. It will require the people to understand why their federal government exists in the first place. There exists this co-dependency weighted in favor of a master-slave relationship between the federal bureaucracy and the people respectively. My opinion is (to borrower from Bezmenov) the people will continue to permit this right up to the point they feel (and understand) that it’s the federal government that has the boot on theirneck.
Olly, we have a tremendous agreement. First, we need to understand why the states created a federal government. They did so for protection and paid for it with a loss of some rights and the need to pay for administrating that federal bureaucracy.
Then people need to understand the idea behind federalism and why the Constitution needs to act as a fixed anchor.
Healthcare’s destruction started after WW2 when the government made temporary IRS deductions for healthcare permanent. That provided a government entrance into that sector and started the gamesmanship in healthcare that wastes 30-50+% of every dollar.
As an accountant, you know what happens when a deduction is available. Paying for the treatment needed for a myocardial infarction leads to therapy. That ensuing therapy leads to all sorts of questions regarding tax deductibility. If they are unobtainable, corporations incorporate some of the services into their healthcare insurance.
Once the government is involved, it sees an opportunity to enter the field with Medicare and Medicaid. Soon the government finds the costs excessive, so it infringes on medical care at the bedside.
The government watching its costs rise calls for socialized medicine. This desire is tricky because former allies will support socialized medicine, and a split evolves.
Socialized medicine means central control, which long term, always provides less at a more sizeable cost.
The first answer has existed almost forever, charity, which government squeezes out. The second is the minimum possible interference with the marketplace. That is where the discussion about healthcare should take place.
The first answer has existed almost forever, charity, which government squeezes out. The second is the minimum possible interference with the marketplace. That is where the discussion about healthcare should take place.
I agree completely. The forces working against any meaningful reform of the healthcare industry and for that matter every industry, are so deeply entrenched, that only a complete collapse has to occur to get the attention of the people. And this administration is doing everything imaginable to get the dominoes lining up in that direction.
it is always surprising when the MSM identifies suspected criminals, murderers and the like (aka Democrats) as black.
Surveillance video released of home invasion robbery in Rockville
https://www.fox5dc.com/news/surveillance-video-released-of-home-invasion-robbery-in-rockville
MONTGOMERY COUNTY, Md. – Police have released surveillance video of six suspects committing a home invasion robbery in Montgomery County.
An adult male victim parked his vehicle in the parking garage of his apartment complex, when six suspects approached him and displayed handguns while announcing the robbery. Police say the suspects then stabbed and assaulted the victim, and tied his hands behind his back with zip ties. The victim was forced into the suspects’ vehicle and later gave the suspects access to his apartment, where they took a safe containing an undisclosed amount of cash and jewelry before fleeing the scene. Other family members were present inside the apartment during the robbery, they were unharmed. The victim was transported to an area hospital with serious but non-life-threatening injuries.
One of the suspects is described as a Black male, in his twenties, with curly hair, medium build, and armed with a handgun. The suspect was wearing a black ski mask and black clothing during the incident. Police say the other five suspects are described as Black males, in their twenties, and armed with handguns. They were all were wearing black clothing.
Detectives are asking anyone with information regarding this crime or the suspects involved to call Crime Solvers of Montgomery County. A reward of up to $10,000 is being offered for any information that leads to the arrest of the involved suspects.
#WhiteNationalismTerrorists
Jonathan: Now I think I know why you want to talk about Clarence Thomas and why you think he is unfairly being attacked for what you think are “racist tropes”. It’s distraction and diversion. You don’t want to discuss all the bad things that are happening to Donald Trump–all the civil and criminal cases he faces. I know it’s overwhelming but as a seasoned criminal attorney we would expect you would want to address, at least, some of them. I guess not because your boss, Rupert Murdock, doesn’t want you to go on Fox and have to admit DJT is in serious legal jeopardy. So I guess it’s up to some of us on your blog to keep everyone updated on DJT’s legal difficulties. So here goes.
For starters. SC Jack Smith is not the only one who is going to drop the hammer on DJT for Jan. 6 and his attempt to illegally appoint fake electors in the 2020 election. In Michigan, the state AG just filed criminal charges yesterday against 16 Republican fake electors–including forgery and conspiracy. Any of these charges carry a max penalty of 14 years in prison. DJT also used the same fake elector scheme in other states like Arizona, New Mexico, Nevada, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Georgia. In Fulton County, Georgia DA Fani Willis is about to file conspiracy charges against DJT and others for the fake elector scheme there. It looks like some of the battleground states are finally trying to uphold the integrity of our voting system to ensure what DJT attempted never happens again.
In the E. Jean Carroll second defamation case brought against DJT he was found civilly liable and Carroll was awarded $5 million in damages, including punitive damages. DJT’s lawyers appealed to Judge Kaplan to reduce the damages to only $1 million. Judge Kaplan just refused that request. DJT will appeal the jury verdict but now has to post a $5.5 bond because Judge Kaplan ruled DJT’s appeal was “frivolous”. Don’t look for a reversal on appeal. Of course, DJT faces another defamation lawsuit over his continued defamatory statements about Carroll. There the attorneys for Carroll will be asking for $10 million in damages. DJT’s sink hole gets deeper and deeper.
Finally, the Israeli government is trying to get back some valuable antiquities loaned to the Trump WH for a ceremony in 2019. They disappeared when DJT left the WH and the Israeli government has good reason to believe they are at Mar-a-Lago. Israel Hassan, head of Israel’s Antiquities Authority, approved the loan on condition the items be returned immediately after the ceremony. DJT has ignored Israel’s request to return the antiquities. That’s because DJT is a kleptocrat who took everything that wasn’t nailed down! Israel will probably have to sue DJT to recover the items but expect him to ask for a finder’s fee to return them!
Dennis – it is ironic that you say the defense of Clarence Thomas’s character is unimportant when not long ago you were pushing the line that Thomas was corrupt. You helped put the character of Justice Thomas into the limelight. And it is also rather unpleasant to see someone squeal with delight at the sight of prospective indictments of a former and possibly future President. You would love to live in a banana republic.
edwardmahl: You’re wrong again. Clarence Thomas’ “character”, nor his race, is the issue. It’s his behavior–accepting lavish gifts from a billionaire and hiding them from public scrutiny. And it’s his refusal to recuse himself in cases where he has a direct conflict of interest. No other federal judge could get away with the kinds corruption Thomas has engaged in during the last 20 years he has been on the Court. I didn’t put all this in the limelight. It was the hard work of investigative reporters.
And I wouldn’t “live in a banana republic”. I lived in one for about a year and it was not a pleasant experience. From the trash collector, local cop on the beat, the building inspector when you wanted a permit to do some remodeling–you name it everyone had their hands out. It is called a “mordida” or “soborno” in Spanish. Even judges were known to have their hands out when you wanted wanted a favorable ruling. No, the guy who would feel quite comfortable in a banana republic is Clarence Thomas.
“It should surprise no one that Democrats want their opponents to be political prisoners and their allies to be immunized for any and all crimes. This is true of Marxists and Statists everywhere and it is now our reality in America. Democrats laugh at your cries for equal justice.”
Stephen Miller
@StephenM
“[T]he Israeli government is trying to get back . . .”
I wonder if the communist Chinese government is “trying to get back” the some $10 million it gave to the Biden crime family. Or maybe Joe Biden already paid it off.
Sorry. Conservatives don’t get to dictate how black people talk about and respond to one another within our community. If white progressives or liberals actually say something racist about a black conservative, I’d condemn that. When a black person says they don’t feel that another black person cares about the black community or its interests, even using insults, that is not racist. I believe its nonsensical to say that a black person or is being racist towards their own race by criticizing someone as not being in step with the majority of the community. That would be like black liberals crying about conservative whites being mean to progressive whites. We don’t do that.
Potato potato
You have uncovered the worthlessness of the term “racist.” An insult is an insult, deal with it. A “racist” insult is simply a lazy term used for the insult.
You have uncovered the worthlessness of the term “racist.
Amen to that.
You have uncovered the worthlessness of the term “racist.”
And by doing so, he’s identified the absolute value of enigmainblack’s existence on this blog.
Your TDS is showing.
Black woman, Georgia State Rep Mesha Manor, flooded with racist hate mail after announcing she would leave the Democrat Plantation, I mean Party.
https://www.dailywire.com/news/mesha-mainor-left-the-democratic-party-and-the-hate-mail-just-keeps-coming
Again, this is not confined to random trolls. It’s the standard Democrat reaction.
Black Americans, why do you belong to a party that is guaranteed to attack you with racist slurs if you don’t vote as you’re told? Why associate yourself with the party that’s normalized blatantly racist slurs against blacks? This isn’t a question of a disparity not necessarily being indicative of racism. It’s open racism.
It’s okay because they can attack Whites with impunity and they attack each other with racial slurs all the time.
When you’re the only party that can speak freely why leave it ?
You’re also guaranteed unfair advantages while you whine everyone not on your hate filled attack side is keeping you down, thus making certain you get that special hand up privilege, no matter how many times you are an open racist or hate filled anti-American louse.
You can even break the law with impunity in public.
Anyone and everyone who criticizes you is the worst thing in the world and the media and DC will back you up on it 100%.
Why would any of them not associate themselves with the corrupt movement ? IT RULES.
You are correct, up until that time when the government is no longer able to send checks to their voters and chaos has destroyed any semblance of a society. Then it will be too late to switch parties as we ill be in ruins.
whimsicalmama,
I agree with your assessment.
We get to that point, which the Democrat party seems to be pushing for, then the only things that will be of value is real gold or silver, chickens, and ammo.
I hope we never see that.
But there is the Biden admin and the Democrat party . . .
The black majority has an absolute right to criticize `black conservatives for their minority viewpoints.
Correct.
But using racist language is still racism. Something the former KKK Democrat party does not seem to grasp.
Or, should we say the current KKK Democrat party? They both use the same language.
The most racist part, surpassing even the racism of George Wallace and his crowd, are the blacks of the prog/left (formerly known as the democrat) party. It is astounding how irony and hypocrisy are unfathomable those concepts are to the programmed minds of the prog/left.
The black majority has an absolute right to criticize `black conservatives,
That’s called free speech. Something the left is working overtime to limit.
Of course anyone has the right criticize anyone, for any reason. And the Sun has the right to rise in the East.