We are told, daily, about the “exploitative” profits being made by the large health insurance companies in the form of premiums. The “huge” amount of dollars collected should be grounds for the massive take over of health care by the government, we are often told by the media. Politicians discuss these companies like preachers from the pulpit, using terms such as “immoral” and “disgusting” as measures of the amounts they make. According to the Associated Press, the real numbers show a different story.

Health insurance profit margins run around 6 percent, give or take a point or two. That is very small compared to other forms of insurance and below the standard 7 percent most of us learned in economic classes as the corporate average for profits.

Here are some of the points from the AP article:

I personally do not care how much a business makes as long as its profits are legal and they face competition. The Obama Administration likes to complain about the health insurance industry “monopoly” on health care, as if we were all dealing with a single company. In light of the fact health insurance companies are making considerably less than other industries, it is clear that these companies do not enjoy anything like a monopoly. We will not, however, be able to say the same about Obama’s public option.

Recently at a town hall meeting, Congressman Barney Frank (D-Mass) was in rare form.  He normally is snide and arrogant, but that day he was downright abusive.  He will no doubt say he was being reactionary, cashing in on the convenient excuse that apparently every town hall grouping is full of nothing but angry mobs carrying torches and pitchforks.  He asked someone what planet they were from when they asked him questions about the health care bill.  He was not only condescending, he was utterly full of contempt for the audience.  I saw the video clips, and I think he truly believed himself above the ‘little people.’

Congressman Frank and others of his ilk do not live here on planet earth with the rest of us.  He is an extreme liberal, a group that is the smallest of all general political labels (Republicans, Democrats, Independents, Conservatives and Liberals).  They do not know what it is to be out in ‘normal’ America.  They are almost always guaranteed re-election, and never have to really put up much of a fight in their extremely liberal states and/or districts.  Barney Frank is from one of the most liberal districts in one of the most liberal states in the country.  Other Democrats in this category would be Congressman Charlie Rangel (NY), Ted Kennedy (Mass), Dianne Feinstein (Cali), Nancy Pelosi (Cali), and California Senator Barbara Boxer, who actually for the first time finds herself in dangerous polling territory against her 2010 assumed-to-be rivals Carly Fiorina and Chuck DeVore.

These people are calling the protesters Nazis, thugs and ignorant hicks.  They are complaining at the audacity that these people have to stand up and voice their objections.  They don’t like the fact that anyone would have any objections.  People like Rep. Eric Massa (D-NY) said he would vote against his constituency’s wishes and vote for H.R. 3200 (The Democrat-written health care bill) even if they all told him not to. He said he didn’t care.  He spoke with arrogance, as if the ‘little people’ did not know what is best for them, and needed to be told.  They all seem to bristle with that arrogance, as if they cannot be bothered with the serfs who do not seem to know what is best for them.

They do not know what a general election looks like.  They never have to fight and they have never had to deal with people who think other than what they think, until they started screwing with their health care.  They woke people up to how they truly view people.  They view people as something that can be pushed around and controlled, and they seem to have woken up the sleeping giant.

Speaking of H.R. 3200, I have downloaded it from the congressional website where it is available, and I am making my way through it.  My next few blogs will feature my findings and review of this monstrosity of a bill.   I’ve read 250 pages so far it and it is a complete train wreck, kind of like Obama’s sales pitch these past few weeks!

Stay tuned!

Why not? Because Mahmoud Ahmadinejad stole an election, and has had his political and moral opposition murdered. If he shows his mug anywhere, there’s a healthy chance that he could get killed. Iran is crossing its Rubicon. Only time will tell if things get better for her beleaguered people.

Read Amir Taheri’s article for the New York Post here.

Cross-posted at RudyCarrera.com.

Pakistan’s army, maybe, has finally gotten the idea. This arrest of Iranian Revolutionary Guards working in Pakistan is a big coup on their part. The BBC has more on the incident here.

Cross-posted at RudyCarrera.com.

The last two days have been hell for our military in Afghanistan. Yet the President dithers. What’s worse, blame is pinned on former Vice President Dick Cheney for “taking his eye off the ball” in Afghanistan. Funny to hear things like that from John Kerry, a traitor to his country and a man who was outed for fraud in garnering undeserved Purple Heart medals.

There is no time to waste on sending troops, Mr. President. American men are dying because of your lack of spine. Send in troops or send them home. Now.

The BBC reports on the latest casualties here.

Cross-posted at RudyCarrera.com.

Lots of excellent reading from the goings-on in Afghanistan (you know, the “good” war):

Blood for nothing – Ralph Peters, once a fervent supporter of American soldiers’ work in Iraq, doesn’t see the point in continuing in Afghanistan, as it seems this administration isn’t serious about combating the Taliban or Al Qaeda. It’s a shame, as Peters is considered a warrior’s warrior. If he feels it’s over for American troops in Afghanistan because the terrorists will simply pack up and leave, that’s a worrying trend. It will be incumbent on the next president to send overwhelming force and crush them later, as non-intervention won’t be an option.

Next, the cowards at the UN try to interject themselves in the war. First, the following article claims that drone strikes may break “international laws” against summary executions. In other words, they want no accountability from the terrorists, but plenty from NATO troops.

Claudia Rosett continues the meme brilliantly by reporting that the UN also wants to repeal Counter-Terrorism Laws and replace them with gender-equality laws. Yeah, the UN is serious about that. Idiots.

Finally, though I’m not much of a fan anymore of Hamid Kharzai, and certainly not of his brother, it seems a bit disingenuous for the New York Times to attack Kharzai’s brother for “being on the payroll of the CIA” and a “Pablo Escobar of the Afghan drug trade.” It smacks of “Let’s keep blaming Bush.” The brothers respond vigorously to these claims at The Daily Beast.

Cross-posted at RudyCarrera.com.

Never trust a sibling. That seems to be the lesson of this article by the BBC. Still, thank God for Juanita snooping on her thug of a brother, though.

Cross-posted at RudyCarrera.com.

A group of Democrats in the House have threatened to block passage of healthcare reform unless their amendment is passed – and it’s not the blue-dogs – it’s the pro-lifers.   Whether these 40 “anti-pro-choice” Democrats have the guts to follow through with their threat, and whether their amendment, blocking the use of federal monies for abortions would pass and work as intended, is suspect.  But for now, social conservatives can at least cling to the hope that these 40 souls will stick to their principles.

The proposed amendment injects the Hyde Amendment, prohibiting the federal funding of abortions with taxpayer dollars, into the final healthcare proposal.  Shockingly, Speaker Pelosi has refused to allow a vote on the amendment.   She is what I refer to as “pro-abort” - someone who not only supports a legal right for a woman to abort the child in the womb at any time for any reason, but is also a proponent of this horrendous practice worldwide.  As a Catholic, I can state that for many of us, Pelosi is a heretic; claiming to be a “Conservative Catholic,” while being a strong advocate for legal and expansive abortion rights, despite the tenets of Catholicism teaching that abortion is intrinsically evil.  Instead of protecting the most weak and innocent members of our society, Pelosi solicits and gleefully accepts campaign donations from large pro-abort groups, such as Planned Parenthood and Emily’s List.  What’s worse is that the Speaker of the House expects tax payers – regardless of political or religious convictions – to pay for this abhorrent service through a government run healthcare plan.  Can anyone say quid pro quo?

Pelosi knows – as do the 40 Democrats taking this politically dangerous stand – that all of the current iterations of the healthcare reform bill will permit Federal funds to be used for abortions.  She knows this, the President knows it, and so do the 40 pro-life Democrats who are taking this politically tenuous stand.  The Supreme Court has found that any public entitlement program offered to some, must be offered to all.  As abortion is legal and considered to be “healthcare” (although I personally see the taking of a human life as antithetical to healthcare), an argument exists that women are entitled to “free” abortions as long as the government is giving away “free” hip replacements, “free” MRIs,  and so on.  Further, although seemingly a separate issue, this same logic will result in illegal immigrants receiving “free” healthcare.  Legally, the government cannot offer “free” services without giving it to all – we see this already with illegal immigrants receiving access to our taxpayer funded public school system.

Douglas Johnson of National Right to Life, who has reviewed the House version of the healthcare bill, states that the language contained in the measure, “explicitly requires that the federal official who runs the program must calculate the total cost of abortions and increase the premium for all enrollees enough to pay for the aggregate cost of the abortions.”  This seems pretty clear to me.  Further, Johnson asserts that “the abortion premium is not optional: If you want to enroll in the government’s public health plan, you would be required to pay the abortion surcharge. If you did not want to pay for abortions, you would not be allowed to take advantage of the government program at all.” Crystal clear.

Over on the Senate side, Reid’s concise 2,500 page bill, mentions abortion in the affirmative over twenty times.  Of course, no one really knows what Reid and a handful of officials are conjuring up because they refuse to speak with specificity and are holding discussions of a final bill behind closed doors.  Remember it was Pelosi who claimed under her and Reid’s leadership, the current Congress would be the most transparent Congress of all.  How’s all that Hope and Change working out for you?

The truth is that the President and Pelosi are playing a game of semantics largely because if the public was allowed to understand what this measure will certainly do, and is intended to do to their personal medical care, they would unanimously reject it.  They are also masking the provisions and/or loopholes being purposely embedded in the bill that will permit hard earned tax payer money to fund abortions regardless of the fact that many of us – Republicans and Democrats – agree it to be wrong and immoral.

Purveyors of Truth and Transparency?  You be the judge.

By Guest Blogger Raquel Okyay