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THE FOUNDATION

"Fear is the foundation of most governments." --John Adams

EDITORIAL EXEGESIS

"President Obama is pushing Congress to pass health care legislation that could nationalize as much as 10 percent of the economy. Most members of Congress will vote on this bill with no idea what's in it. Rep. John Conyers Jr., Michigan Democrat, disparaged lawmakers for even pretending to read the laws they pass. 'I love these members, they get up and say, "Read the bill,"' he said last week at the National Press Club. 'What good is reading the bill if it's a thousand pages and you don't have two days and two lawyers to find out what it means after you've read the bill?' Mr. Conyers might think it's an antiquated notion that congressmen actually read legislation, but it is the most fundamental responsibility of elected representatives to know and understand laws and how they will affect the lives of their constituents. That is especially the case with such a gargantuan bill. The House version creates 53 new federal bureaucracies with everything from a Health Choices Administration to a Health Insurance Exchange Trust Fund to a Health Benefits Advisory Committee. Thirty-three entitlement programs are created or expanded. The notion is put to rest that government might cooperate with doctors and patients to work out what is best for providing care. The health care bill uses the assertive word 'shall' 1,683 times. These passages are government mandates that force doctors, consumers and others in the health care profession to do what Congress orders. The word 'penalty' is used 156 times for those who don't follow orders. 'Tax' is referred to 172 times. Mr. Conyers is right about one thing: A legal education would come in handy when reading through this legislation. The bill is 1,018 pages long, very complicated and surely will cause legal disputes about its meaning for years to come." --The Washington Times

THE DEMO-GOGUES

Summer reading: "What good is reading the [health care] bill if it's a thousand pages and you don't have two days and two lawyers to find out what it means after you read the bill?" --Rep. John Conyers (D-MI)

What's in the bill: "We also want to start rewarding doctors for quality, not just the quantity of care that they provide. Instead of rewarding them for how many procedures they perform or how many tests they order, we'll bundle payments so providers aren't paid for every treatment they offer when they chronic -- to a patient with a chronic condition like diabetes, but instead are paid for how are they managing that disease overall." --Barack Obama in a townhall meeting **Exactly how is BO or any of his elite minions authorized or qualified to decide the quality of a doctor's care?

Again, pay no attention to the man behind the curtain: "My interest is not in getting between you and your doctor." --Barack Obama during the same bogus Town hall meeting as the prior statement

The BIG Lie continues: "Here's a guarantee that I'd make. If you have insurance that you like, then you will be able to keep that insurance. If you have a doctor that you like, you will be able to keep your doctor." --Barack Obama **Not if the House has anything to do with the actual legislation.

Regulatory Commissars: "I've had people come to us and complain, 'Well, if you do that, I can't make any money.' The answer is that's not my job. We're not here to help you make money. We are here to help have a system in which you will make money as an incident of your providing funds to those who will use it productively." --Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA) on regulating the financial industry

On Afghanistan: "I'm always worried about using the word victory, because, you know, it invokes this notion of Emperor Hirohito coming down and signing a surrender to MacArthur." --commander in chief Barack Obama on winning (or not) in Afghanistan **Maybe Obama should Give Victory a Chance

Let them eat cake: "No, I don't care. ... I don't know about 'trust' -- I think I'm trusted. I certainly want to be trusted. I'm not particularly concerned if I'm liked." --House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) on being extremely unpopular

Stuck on stupid: "If I was trying to jigger -- well, I guess this is my house now. So it probably wouldn't happen. But let's say my old house in Chicago. Here I'd get shot." --Barack Obama on the flap over Henry Louis Gates' arrest

Thug: "I'm from Chicago. I don't break." --Barack Obama

INSIGHT

"To be ignorant of one's ignorance is the malady of the ignorant." --American teacher, writer and philosopher Bronson Alcott (1799-1888)

"Nothing is more terrible than ignorance in action." --German writer Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1834)

"Back in the thirties we were told we must collectivize the nation because the people were so poor. Now we are told we must collectivize the nation because the people are so rich." --American author and commentator William F. Buckley Jr. (1925-2008)

UPRIGHT

"Health care cannot be a right, because rights cannot come from government. At best, they can be protected by government. The founders understood this, which is why our Bill of Rights is really a list of restrictions on the government in Washington." --National Review editor Jonah Goldberg

"Mr. Obama and the Democrats object to the rationing plan being called a rationing plan, so the only way to get a scheme like this past the public, which doesn't always pay close attention early on, is to do it quickly before a lot of people notice." --Washington Times editor emeritus Wesley Pruden

"Every doctor knows, as I did when I practiced years ago, how much unnecessary medical cost is incurred with an eye not on medicine but on the law. Tort reform would yield tens of billions in savings. Yet you cannot find it in the Democratic bills. And Obama breathed not a word about it in the full hour of his health-care news conference. Why? No mystery. The Democrats are parasitically dependent on huge donations from trial lawyers." --columnist Charles Krauthammer

"We hear a lot of talk about eliminating waste and having more preventative health care. But the most powerful health care initiative we could get is the last thing they will propose: Traditional family values. The same values undermined by the liberal abortion regime and moral relativism they promote." --columnist Star Parker

"Be wary of accepting government largesse. It doesn't come free, and often accepting it takes away everything that is free. Melting into Washington's powerful, caretaking arms will just suck incentive to work hard and chart our own course right out of us -- and that not only contributes to an unstable economy and dizzying national debt, but it does make us less free." --former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin

"Those of us who want to see racism on its way out need to realize that others benefit greatly from crying racism. They benefit politically, financially, and socially. Barack Obama has been allied with such people for decades." --economist Thomas Sowell

"The president's response to Gatesgate actually sheds a lot of light on his approach to health care and other issues, for this reason: Obama adopts his positions before knowing what he is talking about." --columnist Mona Charen

DEZINFORMATSIA

Clear as mud: "It's clear, listening to the president ... that he knows his stuff. He knows health care policy." --ABC's George Stephanopoulos

Rooting for Obama: "You're so confident, Mr. President, and so focused. Is your confidence ever shaken? Do you ever wake up and say, 'D***, this is hard. D***, I'm not going to get the things done I want to get done, and it's just too politicized to really get accomplished the big things I want to accomplish'? ... Are you concerned at all that if health care reform fails it will be a huge and devastating setback to your presidency?" --CBS's Katie Couric

Blame the GOP: "People are saying that you are playing pure politics with this issue.... Are you rallying conservatives to the cause of health care reform? Or are you rallying conservatives to the cause of breaking a president?" --NBC's Matt Lauer to Republican Senator Jim DeMint

"You're always honest about both political parties. Governor, do you believe that the Republicans are playing politics here, at the risk of people's health care? ... Is it upstaging the need to help people right now? Is this getting to be a little bit of a reckless situation?" --ABC's Chris Cuomo to Arnold Schwarzenegger

Taxation of carbonation: "Health officials seem to like the idea of a federal soda tax. They say we consume about 250 more calories a day than we did just 20 years ago and most of those calories are from the soda can. Adding a tax of three cents a can to high-calorie sodas could generate $24 billion over the next four years. Opponents argue Americans won't tolerate another tax. Still, supporters say it could cut health care costs and America's ever- expanding bottom line, all at once." --ABC's Sharon Alfonsi

From the Theo-lib files: "I ... took the opportunity ... to ask Mr. Obama about how the presidency is affecting and shaping his spiritual life, and he said ... that before he was elected, he had a habit of praying every night, but that now he prays all the time." --ABC's Terry Moran **Does he stand in front of a mirror to do it or does he just talk to himself on the sofa?

Sue!: "[Henry Louis] Gates should enjoy a cool one and then file suit, assuming he has legal grounds to do so. We Americans are often mocked for being overly litigious, but we are not nearly litigious enough. In the right circumstances, filing suit can be a way to pursue social justice, and that makes it thoroughly ethical." --New York Times Magazine "ethics" columnist Randy Cohen on Gates and the Cambridge police

Newspulper Headlines:

No One Said Getting Old Was Easy: "House Dems Clear One Health Obstacle, Others Loom" --Associated Press

Help Wanted: "Democrats Search for Villains on Health Care" --Politico

Breaking News From 1973, 1978, 1988, 1993, 1994, 1998, 2000, 2003, 2007...: "US in Diplomatic Push for Mideast Peace" --Agence France-Presse

Breaking News From 2007: "Clinton Hopes for Female President in Her Lifetime" --Reuters

We Blame Global Warming: "School Officials: Climate Not Right for School Construction Referenda" --Times (Munster, IN)

How Many More Does He Want?: "Newark Mayor Says 10 Shootings Unacceptable" --Associated Press

Everything Seemingly Is Spinning Out of Control: "'Imbeciles': Hundreds Evacuated From Their Homes as Brushfire Caused by French Military Threatens Marseille" --Daily Mail (London)

Bottom Stories of the Day: "Obama Blames GOP for Stalled Health Bills" --The Hill

(Thanks to The Wall Street Journal's James Taranto)

VILLAGE IDIOTS

Nothing to fear: "We're going to pay big time if we don't get this [Obama's health care plan]. I don't think we're going to be a great world power." --NBC medical correspondent Dr. Nancy Snyderman

Class act: "As conservatives get to call universal health care 'socialized medicine,' I get to call private for-profit healthcare 'soulless vampire bastards making money off human pain.' The more people who get sick and stay sick, the higher their profit margins, which is why they're always pushing the Jell-O." --HBO's Bill Maher

Race bait: "The president wants to have constructive dialogue with people that clearly want to have constructive dialogue on issues that are as important as race. Uh, whether or not Rush Limbaugh wants to be part of, uh, a constructive dialogue or whether he wants to get ratings to sell commercials, uh, on a radio show, I'll let him answer that question. ... I think what's important is obviously these are important issues, they have been over the lifetime and the history of our country, and the president takes them seriously and wants to deal with them seriously." --White House press secretary Robert Gibbs blaming Rush for Obama making an issue of Henry Gates' arrest

"This issue of Dr. Gates being a victim of excessive force and bad judgment is a much bigger subject. ... This one case could open up the issue of the pervasiveness of race profiling. ... And so, there is -- this is a teachable moment if we, in fact, now address the issue of -- race profiling is deadly, it's costly and it's expensive, and really is bad for your health." --the "Reverend" Jesse Jackson weighing in

SHORT CUTS

"President Obama invited the Cambridge cop and the black professor to the White House to settle things over a beer. Both parties still insist they're in the right. Whenever neither side is willing to back down, the best thing to do is to add alcohol." --comedian Argus Hamilton

"A lot of the Obama presidency is a contest between his intelligence and his arrogance [and he thought] he can say anything on race and is so smart that he will be untouchable." --columnist Charles Krauthammer

"I am willing to accept the notion that the Surgeon General can be the poster-woman for a national effort to lose weight. That would be swell. But, if we accept that theory, then Obama should appoint: -- a junkie as Drug Czar, -- a person whose license has been suspended as Secretary of Transportation, -- a deserter as Secretary of Defense, -- a slum lord heading HUD and, -- Bernie Madoff as chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission. I was going to add 'tax cheats in the U.S. Treasury' but Obama has already done that." --political analyst Rich Galen

"I mean, a joke's a joke, but how could Obama and [Henry] Waxman believe for a second that people like Barney Frank, Barbara Boxer, Charles Rangel, John Murtha, Nancy Pelosi and the idiots on the Black Congressional Caucus could make a better living outside of politics? Half of these people would be trolls living under bridges if they ever lost an election. Who on earth would hire them? There are, after all, only so many circuses in America, and only so many elephants in those circuses, and only so many brooms to go around." --columnist Burt Prelutsky

"ObamaCare isn't an easy-to-fill prescription for the half-price-but-just-as-good blue pill. The real product under the safety cap is snake oil." --columnist Debra Saunders

*****

Veritas vos Liberabit -- Semper Vigilo, Fortis, Paratus, et Fidelis! Mark Alexander, Publisher, for The Patriot's editors and staff.

(Please pray for our Armed Forces standing in harm's way around the world, and for their families -- especially families of those fallen Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen, Marines and Coast Guardsmen, who granted their lives in defense of American liberty.)