Big Frick Dot Com

There is a lot to be said for Hope.

I think it’s pretty obvious that I never bought into the whole Hope and Change thing pushed by Barack Obama and his Chicago political team.  Some would say that I’m too cynical; I prefer to think I am too realistic.

For me things need to make sense.  The numbers need to add up.  I enjoy a good magic trick, but I never wonder if the magician is truly blessed with some secret mystic power that allows him to make things disappear and reappear.  I appreciate the show for what it is and wonder how long it took him to work out the logistics and the mechanics of the trick.  Because I know it’s a trick and it will never be anything but a trick.  A great magician is a master of misdirection and timing.  It is entertaining to watch but I don’t leave the show a changed man, filled with hope, because I’ve just witnessed feats that defy explanation and inspire a sense of awe.

I feel pretty much the same way when I watch what is currently transpiring in Washington DC with the eminent passage of the ObamaCare healthcare debacle.  The Democrats currently leading both Houses of Congress are certainly masters of misdirection and timing.  They read the polls being reported that show a wide majority of Americans oppose this disaster to medical care and personal choice and know that if they don’t get a bill passed quickly they will lose the fragile voting bloc they have cobbled together with hundreds of millions of dollars in cash payments and corrupt earmark agreements.

The plan is clear.  Democrats hope to get this misguided, budget busting nationalization of health care pushed through the Senate and back to the House.  House members will bitch and moan just enough to get some additional graft payments for themselves before they finally roll over and accept this two trillion dollar mistake, allowing Barack Obama to close the year deceiving the American public by claiming he has been successful at fulfilling his promise of healthcare reform.  In fact, nothing could be farther from the truth.  This legislation does not provide coverage for all the uninsured in the country but rather mandates that everyone get coverage, which they will be forced to pay for or risk getting hit with a $750 fine.  It does not include any public option nor does it extend Medicare coverage to those 55 years old like the House bill.  In order to get the AMA on board it does not include the 20% cut in Medicare benefits to doctors nor does it tax put a tax on cosmetic surgery for the wealthy but instead puts a tax on tanning salons.  The intentional misdirection of this piece of legislation being touted by the president is so profound that it actually inspires hope.  At least in me.

You see the only selling point left in this bill is the Congressional Budget Office’s audit which shows this package will actually reduce the national deficit in the first ten years.  The CBO is a nonpartisan accounting office that is mandated to produce budgetary conclusions based on the information it is given.  Guess who gave the CBO the data to be extrapolated.  Why the Democrats, of course.  It also only has the ability to extend that information for a ten year window of review.  Because the tax portion of this bill will start in 2010 and the benefits portion doesn’t kick in until 2014 the overall outlook for the first ten years can be assumed to be positive.  But if you take the numbers and work them for the years that the benefits exist it is a far different story.  Dollars in versus dollars out shows a whopping $2 trillion deficit over ten years.  Plus the CBO data was required to show no increase in Medicare expenses over the ten year period it reviewed.  Of course that is not possible but the CBO cannot draw its own conclusions but can only use the data it is provided.

Why would something like this inspire hope in an old conservative heart like mine?  Because no matter how the Dem’s try to spin this, the news media is already beginning to lose faith.  The real numbers are beginning to surface and by the time we get to the 2010 midterm elections the voting public will be armed with all the information they need to make some serious changes in who controls the nation’s checkbook.

Once this plan is fully instituted it will be like AOL software and corrupt the system to the point of meltdown.  But as most of the 176 new commissions and none of the insurance or healthcare practices will be in place by the 2010 election, voters will have a chance to end this nightmare and rescind Barack Obama’s blank check legislation.

I am hopeful that ObamaCare is this community activist president’s Waterloo.  I am hopeful that ObamaCare will strip the gavel from Nancy Pelosi’s hand.  I am hopeful that ObamaCare will remove Harry “Mr. Peepers” Reed from the Senate leader position and may even remove him from the Senate entirely.  This ObamaCare package is so corrupt and so unworkable that its passage may turn out to be the Christmas gift conservatives have been waiting for.

2010 is coming and I do have Hope for a Change.