Tag: Trump 2020

Lieutenant Colonel Alexander Vindman

I have one thing to say about the smart mouthed, arrogant, third party hear-say, so called witness, Trump hater Lieutenant Colonel Alexander Vindman. The Lieutenant serves under our Commander and Chief, President Trump and is subject to reassignment by his superior, that same Commander.

I suggest that President Trump reassign Lt.Vindman where he could serve his country better. Like the Bering Straits or Aleutian Islands to protect us from Russian invasion, or maybe Antarctica for security of the research facility there! Then maybe he could gain something that obviously his military service has not taught him, respect for the chain of command, and humility. 

Medicare For ALL

Medicare for all sounds great, except for at least one very expensive consideration: When a Medicare claim is processed the billing structure is totally different for Medicare than that from any doctor to a private insurer. Anyone who is on Medicare, and once had private insurance should know this for a fact. The bill for any procedure can be anywhere from 20% to 525% higher for Medicare in comparison to that of a private insurer. 

 Rather than give carte blanche to the healthcare industry to overbill all Americans in the form of taxation, wouldn’t it be better to reform or reign in the insurance billing standards?

 These standards are excessive because of Medicare, because The Federal Government has allowed it! After all, it’s not The Government’s money it’s spending, it’s ours! For example, let’s just say a Hernia procedure bill from the doctor is twenty thousand dollars. That bill is what the acceptable set standard is by the private insurance industry, however, the bill to Medicare; I can assure you is much higher form the doctor, because that standard is not applicable for Medicare billing.

 Not only that, but The Federal Government has the poorest track record of any entity, business, or industry, of accountability for anything. What makes anyone think that this would be any different? Unless and until The Federal Government can set the standard pricing for every doctors office visit, and every medical procedure, eliminate the private health insurance industry, and enforce those billing standards, it is a complete impossibility to tell the American people what it would cost.

Medicare and Social Security are insolvent now. Let’s try adding sixty plus percent of Americans to the broken system and see what happens. 

So the problem with “paying for it” can’t be accurately measured. These so called estimates are just propaganda. These illusionists are simply adding the estimated sixty to seventy percent to the existing costs. Heck, what’s to stop a doctor from billing Medicare for a heart transplant procedure, when he actually performed a tonsillectomy?  Like all the other Socialist programs that are already written into law, they are all unsustainable because there is no accountability for spending when there is  one payer and that one payer is the government.

Eventually, those that pay for it all, get tired of paying for those that refuse to and the walls come tumbling down, as all socialist governments eventually do.

Rule Changed?

Someone in The Intelligence Agency had to authorize the rule change that allowed this whistleblower complaint to move forward. There must be a paper trail with one or more signatures; otherwise the rule change essentially is not a rule change.

 This person or persons should immediately have their security clearance revoked, with disciplinary action to follow. A serious crime has been committed. This is a planned attempt to try to have the President impeached, in other words, treason. Whoever is responsible for this “set up” should appropriately be charged with treason or espionage. I know, the government has an extremely poor track record of policing itself, but this shouldn’t be that hard to nail down, even for them.

The so called “whistleblower” should also be charged with similar charges if found to be involved in the scheme. If those involved are found not guilty, then so be it. Since this obviously was a set up, then all the evidence gathered, including the phone call transcript, should be held for use at the trial or trials of those implicated in the crimes. All the accusations that are related to the impeachment in The Congressional hearings should then be postponed, on that basis, until the initial charges of the individuals is resolved. 

The trial outcomes then become the evidence for or against impeachment, rather than the speculation of the intent of a phone call, based on the interpretation of the transcript of that call. If the individuals involved are found not guilty, then there may be more solid grounds for an impeachment. This is the appropriate process, not the trial by public opinion, as Adam Schiff, Jerry Nadler, and all the other angry Democrats would prefer.

We have a system of laws and procedures, and they don’t include public circus acts in politically bias theatre, such as these Congressional Committees that are run by the afore-mentioned angry Democrats. Let’s not forget, The Congressional Committees can’t charge anyone with a crime, arrest anyone, or try or convict anyone for anything. They can only make recommendations to The Inspector General.

Crazy Democrat Conversation

I thought that the crazy Democrats were just on television. Then I actually had a conversation with one. The conversation started innocently enough. I am selling a classic car, and have the car listed on the local sales internet site. The ad reads, “for sale or trade”. A guy calls and asks if I would trade for a vehicle he has. As he describes the vehicle he mentions that he is a Chevy or G.M. guy. I tell him that I am also. He goes on to say he’s a retired auto worker from the Detroit area, and a Vietnam Vet. I thank him for his service,of course, and he talks about different vehicles he’s owned, and some health issues, and that he is 73 years old.

Then he starts talking about how he is in favor of a “single payer” health care system. As a conservative Republican, I naturally respond by telling him that system would only create a rationing of health care, place a burden on those who have to work to support it, and create a government debacle of insurance fraud and waste. I said that I didn’t like the idea of government-run healthcare. I told him I thought that government has a poor track record of managing anything. This apparently struck a nerve. The guy said he’s a staunch Democrat supporter, and began his tirade.

What I found so hard to believe, is that a person at his age could be so ignorant of the facts of things, and believe so strongly in his misgivings. He said he hated President Trump, because he’s in league with Vladimir Putin. Then I responded by saying that at least he seemed to be the better choice, given the allegations about Hillary Clinton’s activities. I went on to say that I thought Trump was doing a good job with the economy. This guy became even more absurd, stating that President Obama was responsible for the great economy, and that Trump was only riding Obama’s coattails, and that Obama saved us from the financial crisis that president Bush created by sending troops into Iraq and Afghanistan.

I tried to explain to the guy that President Obama simply threw tons of taxpayer money at the problem, and doubled the deficit in the process, along with other unnecessary expenditures. The guy really came unglued at the seams, when I told him about how Barney Frank and Chris Dodd introduced legislation, passed in a Democratic controlled Congress, during Bush’s second term, aimed at anti-discrimination, not troop deployment, that was responsible. This forced banks to give mortgage loans without secured funding. Huge numbers of low-income people flocked to the banks to secure loans to buy houses. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac issued billions in unsecured loans, the mortgage-backed securities created from the loans were then traded on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange.

These financial instruments are commonly traded, and treated just like cash, even better, because they can be leveraged for their intrinsic value over the life of the loans that back them. As huge numbers of delinquencies started pouring in, these leveraged securities became not only worthless, but as leveraged trades at huge multiples of negative or value, their marks when called, were unable to be met financially by the institutions that were trading them. Ergo the financial collapse. First Lehman Bros, Then Bank of America Merrill Lynch, G.M.A.C., Citibank, and so on, like dominoes.

 Unfortunately for the guy I was speaking to, he never got to hear the whole truth about the financial crisis, because he became too enraged when I told him about the Dodd Frank legislation, that he hung up the phone.

I feel kind of sorry for the guy going through life believing only what the talking heads on M.S.N.B.C. or C.N.N. tell him and not investigating the real facts about things. Heck, some of these people have just a two-year degree in journalism and little real world experience in anything. I may be conservative, but that doesn’t mean I believe everything on Fox News or the internet. It’s a shame to see a person so entrenched in political belief that they close their mind completely to intelligent dialog.