From the AJC's Editorial Board this morning:

"Why didn't the administration consider the possibility of this 'nightmare scenario' before it led us into war? Why did it blithely ignore pre-war cautions from experts and analysts, some from within the U.S. government, that things would be far more difficult than claimed? Why didn't the president pay attention, for example, to the U.S. Army War College, which before the invasion issued a report that is now chilling in its foresight, warning that we would be stuck in Iraq for years, that U.S. forces would become a target for terrorists, that preserving the Iraqi army after the war was essential? 'Without an overwhelming effort to prepare for occupation,' the War College report warned, 'the United States could find itself in a radically different world over the next few years, a world in which the threat of Saddam Hussein seems like a pale shadow of new problems of America's own making.' Which is exactly where we find ourselves today.

"All were ignored. Instead, we were reassured that we were making enormous progress, that the insurgency was in its last throes, that the 'liberal media' were painting a falsely dire picture. 'Stay the course' was the message, from people too giddy with their own sense of power and God-sanctioned mission to see things clearly. Now . . . we have gone from a policy dirven by hubris to a policy driven by panic." Read it all here.

We must find a way to take war powers from this administration. It is out of control and has lost its way. Other plans have been offered and ignored. It is not clear who is making decisions about war. The authors of disaster should be identified and it is time to remove them. If the preznut himself intends to remain in place, he at the very least needs a panel of new advisors. I wish this was as simple as the democratic congress against the president. Rather it is the secret cabal of the executive branch versus a loosely knit band of representatives of the people. The people must hold sway.

The Pentagon released the names of 47 American servicemen and women who were killed in Iraq this week.

Did you feel that the preznut's new health-care plan went by pretty fast in the State of the Union Address last week? All I really got was that I would have to pay income and social security taxes on our health benefits now since the cost exceeds the proposed 15K dollar cap for a family. He proposed higher taxes for those people with "gold-plated" plans who are abusing health care and driving the costs up in order to give tax breaks to the uninsured and provide universal health care. The 40 million without health care are going to be able to rush out and get covered with their new tax break. Well no. Did it even occur to you that a leopard can't change his spots? This was a proposal to do away with employer sponsored health care. A break for business. Surprise, surprise, surprise.

The New York Times' Robert Pear has prepared a comprehensive look at the proposal. I wish it could be reduced to a sound byte, but it is complicated. If you can't bring yourself to read this much material, just read the bold-face, which I added.

January 28, 2007

Experts See Peril in Bush Health Proposal

By ROBERT PEAR

WASHINGTON, Jan. 27 — With his proposal to uproot a tax break that has been in place for more than 60 years, President Bush has touched off an impassioned debate over the future of the employer-based system that provides health insurance to more than half of all Americans.

“Changing the tax code is a vital and necessary step to making health care affordable for more Americans,” Mr. Bush said in his State of the Union address this week.

Mr. Bush said his proposal would eliminate a bias in the tax code that strongly favored insurance provided by employers over coverage bought by individuals and families outside the workplace.

Paul Fronstin, director of health research at the Employee Benefit Research Institute, a nonpartisan organization, said: “The president’s proposal would mean the end of employer-based benefits as we know them. It gives employers a way out of providing the benefits because their employees could get the same tax break on their own.”

Tony Fratto, a White House spokesman, denied that the president wanted to move people away from the employer-based system and toward the individual insurance market. “We are seriously agnostic on that,” he said.

It might take years for changes to occur. “Large corporate employers could not immediately terminate their health benefits because there is, at present, no reliable place where employees can get coverage they can afford outside the workplace,” said Frank B. McArdle, a health policy expert at Hewitt Associates, a benefits consulting firm.

The economic rationale for Mr. Bush’s proposal is that too many people have “gold-plated, deluxe” health insurance, which encourages them to use excessive amounts of health care, driving up costs for everyone.

Many economists agree. But they doubt that Mr. Bush’s proposal would do much to hold down costs or cover more people.

“The president’s proposal addresses inequities in the tax code that provide an open-ended subsidy for premiums paid by employers,” said Robert D. Reischauer, a former director of the Congressional Budget Office. “If your employer does not provide health insurance and you have to buy it on your own, you get no tax benefit at all. The president’s plan would eliminate that distinction.”

But Mr. Reischauer said, “A glaring problem with the president’s plan is that he did not call for any stronger regulation of the individual insurance market.” In that market as it now exists in most states, insurers can deny coverage or charge higher rates to sick people.

In their desire to achieve universal coverage, some Democrats have also begun to raise questions about the employer-based system. “We have to ask ourselves if the employer-based system of health care is still the best way for providing insurance to all Americans,” said Senator Barack Obama, Democrat of Illinois, noting that workers frequently changed jobs.

The Service Employees International Union negotiates with employers to secure health benefits for its members, but the president of the union, Andrew L. Stern, said, “The current employer-based health care system is not the foundation for 21st-century health care reform.”

Mr. Bush’s proposal differs radically from President Bill Clinton’s plan for universal coverage, but experts on health benefits said they were similar in one respect: In an effort to help the uninsured — about one-sixth of the population — they would upend the system that covers most Americans.

The Clinton plan would have provided comprehensive health benefits to 39 million uninsured Americans, with more than $400 billion in new federal spending over 10 years. The White House says the tax changes proposed by Mr. Bush would provide coverage for 3 million to 5 million people at no cost to the government over 10 years.

Since Mr. Bush took office in 2001, the number of people without insurance has increased by more than 5 million, to 46.6 million, according to the Census Bureau. Administration officials said they hoped to reverse that trend by helping states that offered basic private insurance policies to their residents. To pay for such help, the administration would take federal money from hospitals that serve large numbers of poor people.

Under Mr. Bush’s proposal, employee health benefits would, for the first time, be treated as income and would be subject to income and payroll taxes, just like wages. At the same time, Mr. Bush would create a tax deduction for health insurance of $15,000 for families and $7,500 for individuals. The same deduction would be available to everyone with coverage, regardless of the source or value of the policy.

A family with coverage worth $18,000 would have to pay taxes on the amount exceeding the $15,000 standard deduction — $3,000, in this example.

Katherine Baicker, a member of the president’s Council of Economic Advisers, said the proposal would increase taxes for 30 million people with the most generous employer-provided health benefits, unless they “change their behavior” and choose less costly coverage. Ms. Baicker said the proposal would cut taxes for more than 100 million people who bought insurance on their own or had employee health benefits worth less than the standard deduction.

Treasury officials said that under the Bush proposal, an uninsured family of four with an annual income of $60,000 would save $4,545 if it bought coverage in the individual market. By contrast, they said, a family that earns $80,000 and has employer-provided coverage worth $20,000 could see a tax increase of about $1,500.

Joel D. Kaplan, deputy chief of staff at the White House, acknowledged that the proposal could accelerate the trend of employers’ dropping health benefits for employees. But he said more people “would be able to buy insurance in the individual market,” so there would be “a net increase in the number of insured.”

Politicians and health care providers are skeptical.

Representative John D. Dingell, the Michigan Democrat who is the chairman of the Committee on Energy and Commerce, said, “The president’s proposal would do little to help the uninsured, but would undermine the employer-based system through which 160 million people get coverage.”

Richard J. Umbdenstock, president of the American Hospital Association, agreed. “The tax proposal would have the effect of driving people to the small-group insurance market — a market that has proved unstable,” Mr. Umbdenstock said. “For many people, even with a tax break, coverage would remain unaffordable.”

Historically, employers have used benefits as a tool to recruit workers and keep them healthy and productive.

R. Bruce Josten, executive vice president of the United States Chamber of Commerce, praised the general direction of the president’s proposal but said his members had serious concerns.

First, Mr. Josten said, the $15,000 cap on tax-free insurance takes no account of wide geographic variation in the cost of health care and insurance. The same package of benefits typically costs more in Boston than in Minneapolis, for example.

Moreover, Mr. Josten said, a health plan may be expensive because it covers older workers with major medical problems, not because it is “gold-plated.” A single mother, working as a low-paid secretary at a law firm, could be pushed into a higher tax bracket because she participates in an $18,000 health plan covering older men who have had heart attacks and expensive surgery, Mr. Josten said.

Treasury officials acknowledged that some people with costly, comprehensive benefits had modest incomes.

But deluxe health plans are vanishing fast. In recent years, many workers have found themselves paying more for less comprehensive benefits. From 2000 to 2006, premiums for employer-sponsored coverage rose 87 percent, about four times as fast as workers’ earnings, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation.

If the Iraq war is the most significant issue of our time, as the preznut assures us it is, why don't we go all out instead of sending over 20,000 troops? Why don't we double out presense there? You might say we don't have the troops, but we actually do have the troops, they are just all over the globe. If Iraq is so important, shouldn't we be making some sacrifices at home to support the war? Rationing and conservation for the war effort? Maybe Iraq isn't that important. We lost 59K troops in Viet Nam and have only lost 3K in Iraq. Maybe we just aren't risking enough to get the job done. Maybe instead of a surge we need a flood. Or maybe that's what was neede 4 years ago. Or maybe. . .we shouldn't be there at all.

Did the line about doubling the strategic oil reserve make you think that the preznut was getting serious about weaning us off foreign oil? It made me think he was going to stock up before starting to wage war against Iran and destroying their oil refining capacity, throwing the world into chaos. It also conveniently propped up falling oil prices. The Saudis have been saying that no emergency meeting was needed by OPEC. Hmmm. Did they already know what was coming? No worry. Their preznut will drive the prices back up.

Libby says Rove did it and he is supposed to take the fall. He's not happy. Rove is.

I often have thoughts that I want to put on the blog but they seem too insignificant to make an essay out of and they never get written down. Here are bits and pieces of them.

If you don't have a pillowtop mattress. . . you must not fail to get one the next time you get a mattress. We definitely waited too long to get ours and even though we've been sleeping on it for two years, I still think it is sooo wonderful as I lie in it in the mornings.

While I wonder if the kings and lords of old ever got as pleasant a night's sleep as I do, I am reminded that the real proof of my own royalty is . . . the shower. Isn't it just marvelous to stand in a good steamy shower with seemingly endless hot water pouring on your head. Henry the VIII could not have matched that I'm certain.

There are lots of little lights in our house at night. I can't figure out how many, but there are lots. The chargers have lights, the CD player, amp, Tivo, phones, the space heater in the bedroom, the piano even has lights, the computers, and the back-up hard drive blinks a lovely blue. The alarm pad has a variety of colors and lights depending on its setting. The digital clocks all glow and so does the stove and the refrigerator has a blue and red light. I discovered that the blue light brightens up other stuff, but the red light while seeming to be as bright, does not shed it's light on anything. Or at least I can't see it.

A new community choir has come into being and I have been asked to conduct. It will be so much fun since I already know the singers so well. First rehearsal is next Thursday evening. It makes me smile.

"President Bush has admitted that he made mistakes in Iraq and says he has learned from them and promises not to make the same mistakes in Iran."

David Letterman

You have to admire the honesty of these comments written by a science teacher in Washington. These comments are from her blog for January 17, which I will quote below, wholesale. Much of her comments are coming from the Wall Street Journal, but I wasn't sure what was her own thought and what was quoted. Nevertheless, this is dead on. Boldface is mine.


Intelligence in the Classroom

The opinion page from the Wall Street Journal has a headline that, at first, made me chuckle: Half of All Children Are Below Average. Hey, there's some real news. Half are below average? Gosh, I bet half of them are below the median, too. But reading further gave me pause to think a bit more about the unfortunately titled article.

Some say that the public schools are so awful that there is huge room for improvement in academic performance just by improving education. There are two problems with that position. The first is that the numbers used to indict the public schools are missing a crucial component. For example, in the 2005 round of the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), 36% of all fourth-graders were below the NAEP's "basic achievement" score in reading. It sounds like a terrible record. But we know from the mathematics of the normal distribution that 36% of fourth-graders also have IQs lower than 95.

What IQ is necessary to give a child a reasonable chance to meet the NAEP's basic achievement score? Remarkably, it appears that no one has tried to answer that question.

We only know for sure that if the bar for basic achievement is meaningfully defined, some substantial proportion of students will be unable to meet it no matter how well they are taught. As it happens, the NAEP's definition of basic achievement is said to be on the tough side. That substantial proportion of fourth-graders who cannot reasonably be expected to meet it could well be close to 36%.

The second problem with the argument that education can be vastly improved is the false assumption that educators already know how to educate everyone and that they just need to try harder--the assumption that prompted No Child Left Behind. We have never known how to educate everyone. The widely held image of a golden age of American education when teachers brooked no nonsense and all the children learned their three Rs is a myth. If we confine the discussion to children in the lower half of the intelligence distribution (education of the gifted is another story), the overall trend of the 20th century was one of slow, hard-won improvement.

This is not to say that American public schools cannot be improved. Many of them, especially in large cities, are dreadful. But even the best schools under the best conditions cannot repeal the limits on achievement set by limits on intelligence . . .

To say that even a perfect education system is not going to make much difference in the performance of children in the lower half of the distribution understandably grates. But the easy retorts do not work. It's no use coming up with the example of a child who was getting Ds in school, met an inspiring teacher, and went on to become an astrophysicist. That is an underachievement story, not the story of someone at the 49th percentile of intelligence.

That says nothing about the quality of the lives that should be open to everyone across the range of ability. I am among the most emphatic of those who think that the importance of IQ in living a good life is vastly overrated. My point is just this: It is true that many social and economic problems are disproportionately found among people with little education, but the culprit for their educational deficit is often low intelligence. Refusing to come to grips with that reality has produced policies that have been ineffectual at best and damaging at worst.

Certainly gives some pause for thought, doesn't it?

The thing we have refused to do is say to the parent of low intelligence children. "Your daughter, your son has below average intelligence and we should point her/him in directions that will allow a wonderful life that is not based on academic prowess." Everything we know says that no child left behind is bogus. I was left behind when we all went out for a sprint at recess. Others were left behind when we balanced equations in chemistry, others when we sang a song. It's okay. We need alternative education for many in the bottom of the bell curve.

A Perfect Mess: The Hidden Benefits of Disorder--How Crammed Closets, Cluttered Offices, and On-the-Fly Planning Make the World a Better Place (Hardcover)
by Eric Abrahamson, David H. Freedman

A messy desk allows you to keep everything at your fingertips.

A clean desk person has to file every time something hits their desk.

People with messy desks get 36% more work done!

Yeah! I have been telling people so for years!

I've long said that the Repubs were advocating a totalitarian government. I don't use the term facsism but Reality based educator does and he backs it up. He points out the administrations tendency to fire federal prosecutors that are not friendly to the administration and make temporary appointments without senate confirmation under the homeland security act (as though there was some emergency). Don't agree with the top? You are out and constitutional process will be circumvented.

I heard an interesting phrase this morning from Madeline Albright on C-span. What we need is a SURGE in diplomacy. Can you see that diplomacy is not being used? Could other Arab states help with the mess? Could Europe? Russia? Well I think so. Is any work being done in that area? Any appeals made? No we are still being tough guys. A surge in diplomacy. I'm for that.

The attack on the Iranian consulate by American forces in Iraq is disturbing to say the least. Clearly a provocation to Iran and a violation of international law. Even more disturbing is Pat Buchanan's take on it. He believes that the Bush-Cheny doctrine is to attack Iran and destroy their nuclear bomb making capacity and that they intend to do it soon. The prezut said he was moving an air craft carrier into the gulf and also putting Patriot missles into Iraq. Patriot missles are defensive. Who does he think is going to shoot at us? The insurgency? And why would we need air power? Of course it is to attack Iran and defend against their response.

reality based educator has the details.

I've been amused this week by what happened after the preznut's speechification on Wednesday. Same ole thing, everyone got out to sell the plan to the people. Condi going here and there, Cheny too. Bushie himself selling it to soldiers, an increasingly difficult audience. The question is . . . Why? I mean he's the CIC so if he orders it, it is so. The congress can't really cut him off. So why the sales job? He's not running for office. He can do whatever he wants to do.

Another oddity has come to my attention. Even with the surge, which Condi calls and augmentation now, we won't have as many soldiers in Iraq as we did roughly a year ago. If the problem has been that there aren't enough troops and now there are still fewer than last year, what kind of surge is that? Why no surge at all by me. If we were surging wouldn't we be going to record high levels? Not so.

At the same time as the surge announcement, the British announced that 3000 of their folks are withdrawing. Really a coordinated effort by the allies, huh?

Face it. Iraq is lost in the administrations judgement. All efforts are to prop things up until he is out of office so he can blame it on someone else. I can just hear him now, "That would have never happened when me 'n Dick was running things." I'm really tired of hearing about how potentially bad this could be for America. Think about how bad it is for Iraqis.

A failure of democracy.

The problem with war in Iraq, surge or no surge, is that no one seems to know when we can say we "won." Winning is important to cowboys. And cowboys won when all the Indians were dead. No matter how many times I examine the question of winning, I can't figure out what it would mean to win.

It is clear that the preznut equates any withdrawal of troops as failure. And failure "would be a disaster for the U.S." according to him. So winning will not be a disaster. 500 billion, oh lets go ahead and say it, half a trillion dollars, blown up. More than 3000 dead American soldiers, 30,000 severely wounded, and 600,000 dead Iraqis. That is NOT a disaster already according to the preznut?

Do you know what I like the best about what he is saying now? It's the disaster senarios. U.S. withdrawal will result in all these horrible things: Saudi Arabia will intervene for the Sunnis, Iran will swoop in to support the Shia, terrorists will have free reign to recruit and train and will begin attacking America, Turky will declare war on the Kurds in Northern Iraq. Since the administration also predicted 1. weapons of mass destruction, 2. greeted as liberators, 3. Iraq is a secular state, 4. the Iraqis can finance their own rebuilding, 5. the war will cost about 8 billion, 6. there is no insurgency, 7. the insurgency is in its last throes, 8. there will not be a civil war, 9. yada yada yada X 100. Does anyone remember the justification for the Viet Nam war? If South Viet Nam falls to communism, all southeast Asia will fall to communism.

When we left Viet Nam, those people took care of themselves. We lost face, not for leaving, but for ever having gone. The preznut was recently back there visiting, making nice and wearing funny clothes. The loss for America will not be withdrawing, which is inevitable sooner or later. The loss is that we ever allowed it to happen. It is a failure of democracy.

Meanwhile Osama has his feet up and is still smiling in Afghanistan.

Buried on page A/8 in today's AJC is a tiny article that relates that Fred Fielding has replaced Harriet Miers as Whitehouse chief counsel. Harriet took one for the team and hung around after the debacle of her supreme court nomination and subsequent defeat at the hands of outraged conservatives.

Who is Fred Fielding? I don't recall the name, but wait! He was deputy White House counsel from 1972 until 1974 (associate counsel from 70 to 72). So he was a chief legal advisor to the Nixon Whitehouse. That is what he brings to the oval office. He is a Repub war counsel lawyer.

FYI. Since all the Repubs have been instructed to denigrate the Democratic party by leaving off the last syllable of the Democratic party's name, calling it the "Democrat" party, from the Preznut on down, I have decided to do them one better and leave off two syllables of their name and will be calling them the Repubs from now on. Perhaps the Pub party would be an even better designation, but I'm taking it easy on them.

Paul Krugman of the New York Times has a good article today on the delusional preznut.

If you get the opportunity to go hear the Bulgarian National Opera on tour . . . Don't! Don't allow anyone you know to go either!

I as astonished that they are getting away with charging people for their disasterous rendition of The Marriage of Figaro. My seats were $65. I'll list some of the amazing deficiencies so you can get an idea, but I can't really do it justice. Figaro, Susanna, the Count and Countess, all sang okay. There were glaring errors at times for them all, like Figaro's inability to sing an E natural. Susanna couldn't sing above the upper passagio without thinning out terribly. The Countess often made a throaty sound, a major technic flaw which will ruin her if she doesn't get help soon and so she sang almost everything flat. The Count was covered to the point of being muffled and unheard with the too loud orchestra. Of the secondary players only Cherubino was okay. She was also covered and heavy for her role but she was young and strong and bulled her way through. Every other character was horrible! Shrieking, gargling, coughing, and rattling their way through their parts, with basically no vocal technique. One could only assume they were the stage crew in costume and thrust wide-eyed onto the stage. The chorus was worse. Both the secondary characters and the chorus were lost at times, stumbling through the music, not singing together or leaving things out. The chorus was lost for an entire section. Incredibly embarrassing. Some sang against one another, about two beats apart, while others simply stood there and listened dumbfoundedly, not knowing what to do. The orchestra was horrible beyond description. Thankfully they left many notes out for they played none in tune. Entrances by the winds were ghastly, often in differing tonalities, and the strings were only slightly better. Imagine a bad high school orchestra. These guys were worse than that at times. The leads could hardly find a tonality to sing in during some sections. The scenery! Oh my how tacky. The set was about twenty feet tall and about twenty feet wide. The stairs were unfinished and so worn from being carted around on tour that the splintered treads tugged at the ladies dresses all evening, throwing them off stride. The costumes were cheap and ill fitting. Figaro's showed off his big beer belly. The wigs were ragged and falling apart. Movement on the stage and acting were profoundly lacking. Sections that featured the secondary characters, like the gardener, the doctor, etc., were so weak that I wondered if they would get through them.

The players did not know the meaning of the words they were singing, to comic effect, as when Figaro sang about his right arm while holding out his left. I could go on for another hour. I have seen college productions at this level in some regards, but overall, this was the worst production I've seen of anything ever.

Well maybe some of the local kid productions are worse. But hey, they are kids.

At least they are getting to tour the United States.

The new way forward is . . . more of the same. More troops. More death. More billions for Haliburton. That will do it. Go prez.

Since it appears that twice as many Iraqis have died violently since Saddam left power and died violently under his dictatorship, do we wonder why they hate us. We were told they hated Saddam, so they should hate us double, right?

The preznut appears to be ignoring the reccomendations of the bipartisan committee. He said he was listening to commanders in the field. When those commanders didn't say what he wanted to hear, he has relieved them from duty this week and replaced them with yes sir generals. It is now clear that the preznut's plan is keep the conflict going for two more years to ensure that the next preznut has to manage the withdrawal. Then of course the Bushies will chant that victory was lost because the cowards "cut and ran."

I have been so proud of the Democrats plans for the first 100 hours of the 110th congress. So much significant legislation is passing. Will the president veto it all? New ethics regulations for congress, negotiation with drug companies for lower drug prices, asking oil companies to pay for those leasing fees they have been ignoring and the end of oil company subsidies. An increasing minimum wage. A woman is speaker of the house and third in line to the presidency. Makes one think it is about time for a woman to be president.

Ever notice how fox news reflects the Daily Show? Hannity's Hot Seat. Where did he get that idea? At least the Daily show is where it belongs, on Comedy Central, not masquerading as news.

I'll bet you missed the Republicans calling a press conference to complain about the house rules not allowing them to make endless amendments and have endless debates and have endless sub committee and committee meetings to delay all legislation at the beginning of this congress. They actually said they resented being treated the way they had treated the democratic opposition when the Republicans were in power. The press asked "Are you guys for real?" Their answer. The people voted for change so we should operate under different rules now.
hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha

You must admit that a state funeral for a president brings together a lot of forces. I guess someone is in charge of the protocol. Imagine deciding who sits where for this gathering how they are all going to arrive and depart. I was glad that President Ford had the major hand in planning the event, asking people to participate a year or so ago and I was pleased with how many hymns that were included in the service. The King of Love My Shepherd Is. For All the Saints. Funny how we all agree that music should play a major role in such an event. The musicians and pallbearers seemed to be from all five branches of the service. I found it significant that the Cathedral Choir had a portion of the music and it was not all left to the military. I thought the treble voices of that choir, children's voices, stole the show. Years from now people will say "You sang for the funeral of a president?" The priests and bishop were not to be outdone in finery by the generals and admirals either. Wasn't it significant that Gerald Ford picked Tom Brokaw to speak. A member of the liberal media. And didn't his eloquence stand out as remarkable. I saw Walter Cronkite on TV yesterday recorded at the New Year's Day celebration of the Vienna Philharmonic with Zubin Mehta. I thought Mehta was vigorous and sharp at 70, and then I realized that Cronkite was 90. Brokaw has become the trusted voice to America that Cronkite once was, in my opinion.

A mixture of Democrats and Republicans, politicians and people, military bands and church choirs, church and state. I wonder how it was viewed by the British, by the French, by the Arabs? What do they think when they see the dignity and strength of such a gathering. I doubt if they realized the significance of the camera catching the Latin phrase e pluribus unum on a flag that carried the great seal of the United States. Out of many, one.

"It's Alice in Wonderland. I'm absolutely opposed to sending any more troops to Iraq. It is folly." -- Chuck Hagel, second-ranking Republican on the Foreign Relations Committee.