Showing posts with label Healthcare. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Healthcare. Show all posts

Sunday, August 16, 2009

Public Option Dropped, Lefty Blog Hilarity Ensues!


The scuttlebutt around the Beltway says that the White House is willing to drop health reform's 'public option' as Democrats, home on August recess, cower in fear. A midterm election looms, less than 15 months away, and an enraged, energized electorate is giving their representatives hell, ignoring the astroturf and union thugs bused in to put them down.

In many districts, Democrats are avoiding constituents altogether, resulting in a new characterization: "Milk Carton Dems".

The President's approval ratings are in the toilet along with Congress, the conservative wing of the GOP is as energized as it's ever been, and taxpayers who've never been moved to political involvement are readying torches and pitchforks.

So, in this difficult time for Democrats, a visit to the left side of the blogosphere was warranted. Equipping myself with a Haz-Mat suit (suitable for Biosafety Level 4 Hot Zones) and a laptop, I've returned from that mission horrified and shocked at what I've seen.

Consider the denizens of the ill-named "AmericaBlog" -- ill-named because its supporters so obviously hate the founders, the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution:

I don't understand why Democrats are always so willing and desperate to compromise with themselves. The GOPers don't want any reform bill. Their base, comprised of the teabaggers, birthers and deathers, won't let them negotiate. So, Democrats compromise with themselves, again -- and sell out their principles, again. Just like they did on the stimulus package - they gave the GOP nearly 40% of the package in tax cuts, and how many votes did it get them in the entire Congress? Three.

The overwhelming public mistrust of socialized medicine be damned! We've got socialist principles to install, so get the hell out of the way!

• jimfromthefoothills firmly states, "Remember, we are going to rebuild every school, bridge and road in the country. We will fix healthcare. We will restore the constitution, end illegal wars [and] reduce emissions of greenhouse gasses." ......... And then luscious chocolate-chip cookies will drop from the sky, multi-colored unicorns will everyone give free rides to work and school, and Karl Rove will get frogmarched out of Fox News in primetime. As an aside, Jim is still living in the foothills and apparently ate some bad possum before posting.

sandra adroitly observes, "Obama has succeeded in showing us that the corrupt corporations hold the power, the crazy screamers have succeeded, and democracy has failed us, big time." ......... If by "corrupt corporations", you mean the companies that pay billions in taxes and employ millions of American taxpayers... and by "crazy screamers", you mean "pissed-off taxpayers"... and by democracy failing "us", you mean ACORN, the SEIU and other paid agitators are outnumbered by the taxpayers... well, yes, you're spot on.

mtiffany threatens David "Svengali" Axelrod and Rahm "Al Capone" Emanuel, stating that if "there is a public mandate to buy insurance without a public option, I'm NEVER voting for the Democrats EVER again." ......... Well, Tiffany, I'm sure all of the capitalization scared them back into line.

Gridlock is madder than a Democrat forced to comply with the Constitution, "...so the inmates in the nuthouse have won, now they'll be screaming about this forever (at least until they get sick and die without the healthcare they succeeded in killing) and Failbama failed miserably at the first big task in front of him... Nice job. 0 for 0, Barry... Enjoy the rest of your hamstrung term, you f***wit." ......... No snide comments are necessary on my part, because the Secret Service is currently chasing Gridlock down the street, flip-flops, shopping cart and all.

Bostonian_Queer_in_Dallas is thoughtful and introspective. "I sit here today on the 40th anniversary of Woodstock and now realize that we were the most spoiled brat generation ever in this nation because ultimately our liberalism of 1969 was to save our own asses from going to Nam, it had nothing to do with making the nation better or helping the downtrodden because we all went out and cut our hair and became part of the machine to make money by f***ing everyone. It was all about basic cowardice and selfishness and getting stoned. F*** us. The Boomers have sold out and don't give a s*** about anyone but themselves. It is very depressing. I did not sell out. I did good in the world by going into teaching. So now I'm just poor and unhappy. I was a total fool. I shoulda sold out like everyone else did. I was really f***ing stupid to hold onto ideals. You made your f***ing bed now lie in it Boomers." ......... I really need to know what school district this guy teaches in --- my kids need that type of edumacation.

Dateline_Molly lets it all hang out. "This is probably enough to get me thrown off a conservative blog like this one, but I'll say it anyway: The underlying cause of the problems is CAPITALISM. Nobody seems to want to address this even though it is the elephant in the room... And we are seeing the same kind of irrationality in this health care debate. It is irrational strictly on an economic level not to have at least single payer, if not nationalized health care. Every study proves that it would save us money... I don't know how you disentangle from this corrupt web without dismantling American capitalism." ......... Like Cuba and the Soviet Union! The CCCP worked out so well for all involved (if you ignore the 100 million killed by Communism -- but who's counting?).

Jersey has an excellent idea: "Can we convince Howard Dean to run against Obama in 2012?" ......... Please, God, please... from Jerry's lips to your ears.

jimfromthefoothills returned to his dialup connection after mixing up a delicious crawdad-and-roadkill stew, to add: "Barry sold us a paradigm shift. Remember... turn the page? Write a new chapter in American History? He sold us revolution and he delivered Choco-Bush." ......... Choco-Bush? But I thought it was the evil right-wingers who were the racists?

elRey just called the movers: "No words. How can they be so weak? I don't understand. Norway, here I come." ......... I'll alert the King.

jimfromthefoothills has some more Democrat tickets to suggest, "Dean\Krugman, Reich\Waters, ANYBODY BUT OBAMA" ......... Oh, goodness. Tummy. Hurts. Must. Stop. Reading. Hard to breathe.

Best progressive idea yet: responding to a suggestion that the party primary Obama in '12, SCLiberal responds, "I still think MoveOn should put forth a true liberal candidate."

Can't type... can't... must... stop. Laughing too hard... about to pass out... Must stop reading.


Update: Ruh roh. Michelle Malkin says that the plan to drop a public option may be a trial balloon and not a white flag. Stay vigilant, folks.

Linked by: Michelle Malkin, Gateway Pundit, Jawa Report and Celestial Junk. Thanks!

Thirty Degrees Below Zero


For more than five weeks during the brutally cold winter of 1997, tenants suffered without any heat in a government-subsidized apartment building. The 31-unit building in Chicago's Englewood neighborhood had been "rehabbed" just four years prior at taxpayer expense, no less.

How cold was it? Temperatures routinely dipped around ten below zero. With wind-chills factored in, the effective temperatures approached 30 below.

And the residents of the building had no heat for more than a month.

The building's owner -- Rezmar Corporation -- didn't bother to turn on the heat for weeks. In fact, it didn't do so until it was sued.

And the Englewood building wasn't the only one of Rezmar's properties that had scores of code violations. At least a dozen times, Rezmar had to be sued in order to simply turn on the heat in its properties.

Rezmar's properties turned out to be catastrophic failures: 17 buildings ended up in foreclosure, 6 are boarded up, hundreds of apartments are vacant and require repair... and taxpayers were stuck with millions in unpaid loans.

All of these buildings were in -- or just blocks away from -- a single state senator's district. A district belonging to a young, up-and-coming politician named Barack Obama.

In fact, during the brutal winter of 1997, even while Rezmar refused to heat its Englewood apartments, it was donating $1,000 to state senator Obama's campaign fund.

During the winter or the scores of subsequent code violations, did state senator Obama ever lift a finger to protect his constituents from "predatory slumlords" like Rezmar?

The answer appears to be a resounding "No". In 2007, Obama's own campaign staff stated, "Senator Obama does not remember having conversations... about properties that [Rezmar] owned.."

The shivering tenants in in and around the district were left defenseless for weeks at a time. Assailed on one side by predatory slumlords like Rezmar, they were -- for all intents and purposes -- left out in the cold by their state senator, Barack Obama.

There's a simple reason Obama didn't lift a finger to protest these horrific violations. His political patron, Tony Rezko, was the driving force behind Rezmar. And Rezko helped raise a quarter of a million dollars for Obama's various campaigns.

And after stating he'd "never done any favors for" Rezko, the Chicago Sun-Times discovered letters Obama wrote to city and state officials supporting Rezko's bid for $14 million in taxpayers' money for an elder-care facility.

While Obama didn't expend an ounce of energy to protest Rezko's outrageous violations, he did take time to write letters on behalf of Rezko in his efforts to secure an additional $14 million in taxpayer funds.

State senator Obama couldn't effectively represent his abused constituents... perhaps because he was otherwise occupied helping his slumlord patrons advance their own agendas.

And as a so-called "community organizer" and then a state senator, Obama -- and close friend and confidante Valerie Jarrett, who was responsible for property management -- couldn't even keep huge, federally subsidized housing complexes like Grove Parc habitable. And 'habitable' is kind of a low bar, I would think.

State Senator Barack Obama did a really lousy job representing his constituents in a tiny district in Chicago's south side, appearing to side more often with corporate interests than his own, downtrodden citizens.

And his cronies -- like Valerie Jarrett -- were linked to dozens of failed projects that burned through millions in taxpayer funds.

And these failed, small-time bureaucrats want us to trust them to control 20% of the entire U.S. economy -- the whole American health care system?

It'll be a cold day in hell before that sounds like a good idea to the American taxpayer. Say, thirty degrees below zero cold.


Linked by: Michelle Malkin and Cold Fury. Thanks!

Saturday, August 15, 2009

One Chart to Rule Them All


I spotted this chart (courtesy Larwyn, of course) at The Jacksonian Party. It explains a great deal about our current situation; one in which the people find themselves pitted against their elected officials.

Prior to 1902, Congress had never reached a 70% reelection rate.


Jacksonian argues that when the Senate became a directly elected body and no longer represented Statehouses, taxation and other federal usurpations of Constitutional bounds became rife. In other words, the federal government could and did use its power to begin punishing the states, regulating local affairs and interfering in every sort of arcane transaction.

That change triggered an ever-increasing federal budget that went far beyond national defense. Budget-busting initiatives, politically motivated in nature, purported to help retirees, the sick, the elderly and so on, while concentrating ever more power in Washington.

The federal government now consists of a body of lifetime bureaucrats, many of whom couldn't power a flashlight with all of their brainpower combined, who are reelected automatically through their use of federal tax funds. They reward, they punish, they anoint.


And they continue to aggregate more power at the federal level -- and to build their own personal wealth -- ignoring and flouting the law. Dodd, Rangel, Feinstein, Frank, Reid, Waters, Conyers, Mollohan, Murtha -- to name but a few -- have repeatedly thumbed their noses at financial disclosures, ethics violations, criminal complaints, FOIA requests, and the like.

If government worked as Obama and the National Socialist Democrats say it will, then why would we care about separation of powers? Why would we care about different levels of government?

Why would we care about the Constitution?

Why was this nation founded in the first place?

If government is so beneficent, so effective, so humane and compassionate, how is it that throughout all of human history, the great philosophers and thinkers were so fearful of it?

Aristotle, Cicero, Locke, Montesquieu, Edmund Burke, Adam Smith, Benjamin Franklin, George Washington, James Madison, Thomas Jefferson, John Adams and so many more.

Were they all wrong about government and Obama right?

Were they all wrong about limiting, balancing, placing checks on government? Were they all wrong about liberty?

Is human history all wrong and Obama right?

Is human history all wrong and Nancy Pelosi right?

Is human history all wrong and Harry Reid right?

Do you really think Obama, Pelosi and Reid hold a candle to the greatest thinkers civilization has ever seen?

Because for Obama to be right; and for his party, now in the hands of the radical left, to be right; the Founders had to be wrong.

For Obama to be right, the Declaration of Independence has to be wrong.

For Obama to be right, the Constitution has to be wrong.

For Obama to be right, Aristotle, Cicero, Locke, Montesquieu, Burke, Smith and the founding fathers all had to be wrong.

And so it is clear how all of this will end.

Government-run health care will be used as a tool by government officials. As these programs always are. It will be used to punish political enemies, to reward friends, to entice supporters and -- always -- to aggregate more power.

It must be defeated.


Hat tips: The Jacksonian Party, Thirty Thousand and Mark Levin (8/14/2009, 44:30 - MP3). Linked by: Stacy McCain. Thanks!

Friday, August 14, 2009

Citizen Obama


In an alternative universe, Barack Obama is just a normal citizen. A normal taxpaying schmoe like you and me. These are his adventures.

Mr. Obama, I'm sorry to say that your wife's mother is suffering from some serious ailments.

We'll need to do an extensive battery of tests. Her white blood cell count is elevated, which could mean a variety of things. Also, she may need a hip replacement.

Doctor, thank you. Even though this is family, I don't want you to go to extraordinary lengths.

You know what? We should cut costs.

It pains me to say this, but don't do any tests.

Don't give her that expensive drug. It treats a rare disease and is very expensive. The last thing I'd want to do is run up costs for other Americans.

No, we're not going to go to the Cleveland Clinic, Johns Hopkins or some other top-notch facility.

Who am I to demand cutting-edge treatment? Those extra tests? Cutting-edge drugs? No, we don't want any of those.

And look. She's 79, for heaven's sake. Forget about the hip replacement.

She can handle it, she's tougher than nails.

Look, bottom line: just give her some painkillers. It's the Democrat thing to do.



SEIU-linked Familes USA issues health care "study" pushing single-payer, MSM gratefully reprints nationwide


Families USA, a group that supports socialist causes, is working with public sector unions to fund $12 million in television ads supporting single-payer, government-run health care.


And when Families USA issued another of its curiously biased press release "studies" today, the mainstream media hungrily threw the stories into their content management systems, eager to reprint the press release in support of a big government takeover of health care.

A sampling of headlines, customized by region:

• Florida: Study: Fla. health insurance costs grow at triple the rate of income
• Maine: Health Insurance Premiums in Maine Skyrocketing, Study Indicates
• Connecticut: Study: Health care costs grow 7x faster than pay
• New Hampshire: NE health costs rise faster than pay
• Nevada: Report: Health care costs rising faster than wages
• Pennsylvania: Report: Health care costs rising faster than wages

There are certainly ones I missed. Put simply, the MSM just donated hundreds of thousands of dollars in free advertising in order to help market the leftist agenda.


Note that this is the second time the decripit, dying mainstream media has conspired with Families USA to push socialized medicine on a resistant American public.

How come these groups never complain about government costs growing? After all, at least private insurers have to compete with one another. Who does the federal government compete with?

Oh, that's right. These groups despise America's laws, our traditions, our Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, which strictly forbid the federal government's interference in these affairs.

No matter, the progressives say that the Constitution is "living and breathing" (unlike the mainstream media), so they can morph it into any illegal direction they prefer.

The death of old media can't come quick enough.


Thursday, August 13, 2009

Crony Capitalism: Obama and Big Pharma's Deal Revealed


Capitalism, no matter what progressives say, isn't evil. The free market is the most empowering of all economic systems. It knows no race, creed, religion or color.

The restaurant owner does not know the skin color of the farmer who grew his produce. The truck driver does not know the religion of those who manufactured his cargo. The steelworker can safely ignore the genealogy of those who designed his lunchbox.

Yet the Statist can not tolerate the free market, for it defies his control.

It resists his abilities to regulate, dictate and oversee. Thus is born "crony capitalism".

In this instance, elements of the pharmaceutical industry, who are crawling into bed with the Obama administration, enrich themselves at the expense of the American taxpayer.

A memo obtained by the Huffington Post confirms that the White House and the pharmaceutical lobby secretly agreed to precisely the sort of wide-ranging deal that both parties have been denying over the past week.

The memo, which according to a knowledgeable health care lobbyist was prepared by a person directly involved in the negotiations, lists exactly what the White House gave up, and what it got in return.


It says the White House agreed to oppose any congressional efforts to use the government's leverage to bargain for lower drug prices or import drugs from Canada -- and also agreed not to pursue Medicare rebates or shift some drugs from Medicare Part B to Medicare Part D, which would cost Big Pharma billions in reduced reimbursements.

In exchange, the Pharmaceutical Researchers and Manufacturers Association (PhRMA) agreed to cut $80 billion in projected costs to taxpayers and senior citizens over ten years. Or, as the memo says: "Commitment of up to $80 billion, but not more than $80 billion."

Representatives from both the White House and PhRMA, shown the outline, adamantly denied that it reflected reality. PhRMA senior vice president Ken Johnson said that the outline "is simply not accurate." "This memo isn't accurate and does not reflect the agreement with the drug companies," said White House spokesman Reid Cherlin.

The pharmaceutical industry has pledged $150 million in television advertising money to pimp socialized medicine.

That, my friends, is crony capitalism at its finest.

Crony capitalism is antithetical to the free market -- it is the Democrat Party distorting, twisting, perverting industries to advance its Statist agenda. Like Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and the "War on Poverty", the Democrat agenda is always control.

As if you needed more proof.

Somewhere, a skull is burning.


Hat tip: Larwyn.

Wednesday, August 12, 2009

Top Ten Lies About My Health Care Plan, by President Barack H. Obama


10   According to the Congressional Budget Office, under the House bill, in the year 2015 about 8 million uninsured Americans would remain uninsured and pay higher taxes. This would violate my pledge not to raise taxes on anyone earning less than $250,000 per year. Conclusion: The CBO is lying.

9   The CBO says that the House bill would increase the budget deficit by $239 B over the next ten years. This conflicts with my goal of not increasing short-term deficits. Conclusion: The CBO is lying.

8   The CBO also says that under the House bill, about 3 million people who now have employer-sponsored health insurance would lose that coverage because their employer drops it, violating my bold promise that no one will lose the health plan they have now. Conclusion: The CBO is lying.

7   I have repeatedly assured the public that under the proposed health care reforms there will be no "rationing," and that everyone will continue to receive the best available treatment options. Yet my previous statements and some of my top health care policy advisers have questioned the "sustainability" of expensive major medical procedures for the elderly or the terminally ill. Conclusion: My old self and my advisers were lying.

6   The CBO states that the House bill would increase long-term budget deficits by ever-increasing amounts, making our long-term debt problem even worse than it is today. This of course conflicts with my contention that “health care reform is entitlement reform,” and that health care reform is the lynchpin of spending within our means. Conclusion: The CBO is lying.

5   I recently stated that it is “outlandish” to suggest that I favor providing government-run healthcare for the tens of millions of illegal immigrants currently in the US. However, I also said I want healthcare reform done this year, and a pathway to citizenship for illegal immigrants passed in 2010. Conclusion: I'm lying, but I forget which time it was.

4   The office of Senator Robert Menendez and La Raza have asserted that illegal immigrants care more about health care reform than 'amnesty'; that "the useless barriers of citizenship would not be in this bill"; and that "If the American people find out that this bill is about giving health care to non-citizens, they will rise up against it." Conclusion: Menendez' office and La Raza are both lying.

3   The President’s Medicare Commission proposal would probably save about $2 billion over ten years, and a significant concern that it would save no money at all. Conclusion: The CBO is lying.

2   In my 10 August 2009 "town hall" meeting, I flatly stated that, "I have not said that I am a supporter of a single-payer system."

However, an uncut, unedited AFL-CIO video clip from 2003 shows me saying, "I happen to be a proponent of single-payer universal healthcare plan... A single-payer universal healthcare plan - that's what I'd like to see. But as all of you know, we may not get there immediately. Because first we got to take back the White House, and we got to take back the Senate, and we got to take back the House." Conclusion: I was misquoted, taken out of context and redacted, but am telling the truth now.

1   During the campaign, I promised a series of open and honest health care reform debates to be broadcast on CSPAN. I committed that health care reform debates would never be held behind closed doors; that the details would be openly discussed; and that public access to the debate process would ensure that special interests could not influence reform bills. At that time, I believed the American people deserved to know exactly what was to be included in any health care reform legislation voted on by Congress. Conclusion: I was lying then, but I promise that I am telling the truth now.

I demand that anyone responsible for these lies be held to account!


Based upon: "Correcting misinformation about ObamaCare". Linked by: I Own the World., Cold Fury, Double Plus Undead, The Astute Bloggers. Thanks!

Tuesday, August 11, 2009

"The President is Lying"


Congratulations are due to the White House for keeping its health care disinformation "snitch line" -- which some critics assert is blatantly illegal -- going for an entire week.

"The White House is in bit of a conundrum because of this privacy statute that prohibits the White House from collecting data and storing it on people who disagree with it... [t]here's also a statute that requires the White House to retain all communications that it receives. It can't try to rewrite history by pretending it didn't receive anything... If the White House deletes anything, it violates one statute. If the White House collects data on the free speech, it violates another statute."

[Judge] Napolitano [is] referring to the Privacy Act of 1974, which was passed after the Nixon administration used federal agencies to illegally investigate individuals for political purposes.

Perhaps some enterprising blogger could file a Freedom of Information Act request to ensure that all such reports are made public (as an aside, since more than a dozen administration officials are former members of the mainstream media, it's pointless to assume that professional "journalists" will do so).

Linda Douglass, White House Communications Director, is playing the role of Josef Goebbels (or, in more politically correct terms, the Minister of Propaganda), repeating the "Big Lie" over and over again, to anyone who will listen.

KURTZ: Naked Emperor News is not exactly a well-known Web site, but when posted a video featuring some of Barack Obama's past comments on health care, it was trumpeted by "The Drudge Report," which, in classic faction, boosted it into the mainstream media. But the administration, rather than ignoring the thing, decided to take on Drudge. Linda Douglass, the former journalist who now works for the White House, weighed into this YouTube war with her own video.

We're going to show you part of the attack video and then the White House response.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

OBAMA: And my commitment is to make sure that we've got universal health care. I would hope that we set up a system that allows those who can't go through their employer to access a federal system or a state pool of some sort.

There's going to be potentially some transition process. I can envision a decade out or 15 years out or 20 years out.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DOUGLASS: Hi, I'm Linda Douglass. I'm the communications director for the White House Office of Health Reform. And one of my jobs is to keep track of all the disinformation that's out there about health insurance reform. And there are a lot of very deceiving headlines out there right now such as this one. Take a look at this one.

This one says, " Uncovered Video: Obama Explains How His Health Care Plan Will Eliminate Private Insurance."

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KURTZ: And joining us now to talk about the White House media strategy is Linda Douglass.

Welcome.

Why did you decide to take on Matt Drudge and put up that video, which, of course, calls more attention to the original attack video?

DOUGLASS: Well, you know, one of the things we learned during the campaign was that if you give people all the facts, they become better informed. You know, there were all kinds of myths and smears that were used against then-Senator Obama during the campaign.

And what we discovered is, if we encountered them with the real facts, people really paid attention. They understand what the truth is when they seek it. And in this case, this was a bunch of clips that were taken out of context with a headline that said the president wants to eliminate private insurance. Well, that is the absolute opposite of what he's talking about doing.

KURTZ: Well, hold on. When you say taken out of context, that video featured clips of Barack Obama before he was president. The dates were given. He was talking about health care. It's his own words.

How is that illegitimate?

DOUGLASS: Well, as you know, you can take a sound bite here and a sound bite there. They took pieces of sound bites from different periods of time, they put a chyron -- that's the words on a screen -- that says "wants to eliminate private insurance" to go along with these sound bites that they cobbled together.

And our point is that he is saying exactly the opposite. The health insurance reform that we're talking about is built upon the current private insurance system. That's what it is.

(CROSSTALK)

KURTZ: Right. That is not his current plan. So, you can say well, it misrepresented or perhaps suggested that this is his position now.

DOUGLASS: His current plan...

KURTZ: But apparently he did have a different position when he was senator, and that's legitimate to throw out there.

DOUGLASS: He didn't have a different position when he was a senator. But the point is...

KURTZ: What do you mean he didn't have a different position? He talked about -- first he talked about single payers, supporting that. It was years ago. And then he talked about making a transition over 10 or 15 years to fully government insurance.

DOUGLASS: What he talked about early on was, look, if we could start over all again, maybe it would be fine to have a single payer system. But we're not going to start all over again.

There's legislation that is being written in Congress that will become the law that he signs. That is legislation that is built upon the private insurance system. If you like the coverage you have at work, you can absolutely keep it. It doesn't change except you're protected from onerous insurance regulations. So, that's the legislation that's going through Congress, and that's what he's promoting as president.

KURTZ: The woman behind this Naked Emperor Web site is Pam Kish. She's a 42-year-old California mother and a children's book illustrator who has this very anti-Obama side. She's not affiliated with any large or political group.

Doesn't she have the right to speak out?

DOUGLASS: Of course she does. And we have the right to correct the information.

You know, one of the things we're going to be doing this week is making available a Web site where people can go to get the facts about health insurance reform. There's a lot of misinformation, and there is, as I said in the video, a lot of disinformation. That's information that's meant to mislead you.

So, we're going to have a new site where people can go, they can get the facts, they can share it with family and friends. They can look at some videos. We're going to have some fact sheets and we're going to make it possible for people to get the answers to the questions that they're seeking.

KURTZ: OK. Well, I'm still skeptical on whether using someone's actual words is disinformation, but another thing that the White House did in recent days that has drawn some flak, particularly on the right, is to ask people in this effort by you to collect what you had called disinformation to send in e-mails of those who perhaps are not representing adequately the president's health care plan. That was talked about on a number of programs, including "The O'Reilly Factor."

Here is Bernie Goldberg and Bill O'Reilly talking about this effort.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BERNARD GOLDBERG, FOX NEWS CONTRIBUTOR: I'm really glad you used the word "hypocrisy," because that what runs through all of this.

Yesterday, somebody in the Obama administration, Linda Douglass, who I know and I think you know, said that if you have any fishy -- her word, fishy information, misleading information about Obama's health care plan, send it to us at the White House.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KURTZ: He went on to say that if the Bush administration had tried this, it would be a page one scandal story in "The New York Times."

DOUGLASS: Well, as I said before, there's a tremendous amount of misinformation, disinformation, myths, rumors that are being circulated all over the place for people who are trying to scare -- this happens every time you try to do something with the health care system. There's tons of special interests who have a vested interest in keeping things the way they are. So, there's a lot of effort to scare people, and what we've asked people do is, if they're worried about something they've heard, send in the information.

We don't have a list. We're not keeping any of the sources of information. I mean, those are all crazy charges.

KURTZ: Well, you're not keeping it, so why is it crazy? Republican Senator John Cornyn has asked the White House to stop this, and he says this could raise the specter of a data collection program.

DOUGLASS: Well, we're not -- there's no list being compiled. The information is not being retained. The sources are not being tracked.

But if there's a rumor going around, as there have been many rumors going around, we say let's take a look at the rumor and see what the truth is. And so, the information is all around and examined and looked at. And we provide the truth for people on a Web site that I think they're going to find very helpful as they try to get the truth about health insurance reform.

In today's town hall meeting, President Obama flatly stated that, "I have not said that I am a supporter of a single-payer system."

CNN omitted a far more damaging video clip from 2003, in which Obama states, "I happen to be a proponent of single-payer universal healthcare plan... A single-payer universal healthcare plan - that's what I'd like to see. But as all of you know, we may not get there immediately. Because first we got to take back the White House, and we got to take back the Senate, and we got to take back the House."

Everyone knows the truth and Douglass is lying. Democrats have been pushing for single-payer for decades as part of their effort to expand the scope and control of government over the people. To continue to build the welfare state and to make voters even more dependent on their largesse.

Barack Obama's said as much. Barney Frank's said it. Jan Schakowsky's said it. Union bosses have said it. Democrat health care experts have said it.

A "public option" is a thinly-disguised mechanism to destroy private insurers. After all, if the government writes the rule book for the insurers -- and competes with them -- it's pretty clear how that competition will turn out.

As Mark Levin said last week, "The President is lying".

And everyone knows it.

Linda Douglass is truly the Minister of Propaganda.