I am glad that the vast overhaul of the Health care system has been slowed to a crawl. Sadly it does keep moving forward but has gotten bogged down in procedure and language that have a chance of killing it off. The last thing this country needs is another giant welfare program that is funded by higher taxes, bigger government and a vast expansion in spending. Many thousands of hours have gone into debates from Washington to Main Street. Imagine if Congress and the government devoted the same time and energy wasted on Health care to actually solving the deficit spending and massive borrowing. They didn't though.

Spending continues on both sides of the isle at breakneck speed. Just this week, there was a request to increase Education spending by $1 billion, $500 million for 'emergency' agriculture spending, $10 billion to extend jobless benefits (plus a pile of pork projects and 'critical' infrastructure needs), An unspecified amount for relief in Haiti and Chile. All of those items sailed through both houses of congress with broad support and very little opposition. Problem is, we have no money to be spending. Fully 34% of the 2010 budget is deficit (borrowed) spending. As if that isn't bad enough, now we have added more to it. Within a few weeks, congress will work through a $70 billion 'jobs' bill. It contains all the same kind of spending as the year old stimulus package but it looks nearly certain to pass. Never mind that 45% of the original monies for the stimulus have not yet been spent. Never mind that banks and Insurance companies have paid billions back to "the fed" and all that money is just sitting there (not being repaid to the treasury). Never mind that we are over $14 trillion in debt (a bit over $45,000 for every man woman and child in the United States). The average family of four now owes over $180,000 in debt that the government has spent on their behalf. The interest payments alone this year are around $100 billion!!

We HAVE to stop. This means broad cuts in Social Security, government pensions, Medicare, Medicaid, Education, NASA, foreign aid, the military and everywhere else money is spent. I realize that many individuals paid into the 'system' for many years and now they are dependent on it. That hurts - hurts bad. That is definitely not fair. But we as a nation just have to face the fact that we have all been lied to. The system was poorly designed and not sustainable. For many year's we have been warned that the system is out of balance and approaching failure. We just cannot afford to make those payments anymore. Not without massive new taxes. We are already one of the most taxed (per capita) nations on the planet. A nearly 50% increase in federal taxes is just not the answer.

I am sure my statements above are already making some of you squirm. I know because the thought of it makes me squirm. The collective groan of the beneficiaries of many programs will be loud and painful across the board. Still, its got to be done. We are broke.

I really don't know how many folks read this but I'm going to plead that anybody reading this takes a few minutes to call or email Ben Nelson and strongly urge him to represent the feelings of Nebraskans and vote "NO" on cloture for the Health Care Reform Bill. This seems to be the most likely way to slow the bill down or stop it altogether. There is no need to hurry this thing to passage. Urge Senator Nelson to force the Senate to take a deep breath and include more public comment before snowballing this over the American people just to meet an arbitrary deadline. So please call AND email - keep the pressure up and pray that he does the right thing. Please - even if you have never done such a thing before. http://bennelson.senate.gov/contact-me.cfm

Well it is December now and the National Health care debate is still in full swing. Democrats have sent off a 2,100 page bill off for analysis without showing it to anybody but promising that it holds a compromise solution to everything. We already know it is significantly different then the House version passed a few months ago. The same promise of cutting $500 billion in wasteful Medicare fraud is still there. Only now, we are going to expand Medicare for more people while cutting the funding to it. Makes real good sense - doesn't it?? I have no doubt whatsoever that the goal is to craft a highly watered down bill to sucker in a few Republican Senators and all the Liberal moderates. Then, during the reconciliation process, a small group of lawmakers will toss in all the bad (highly liberal left wing) parts and throw out all the lightweight vague promises to moderates and Republicans. I hope not but that seems to be the way of this congress.

Worse yet is the forthcoming EPA "administration" of carbon emissions. If you haven't already heard, the president is disappointed in congress for not taking swift action on CO2 reductions. So he ordered the EPA to craft some rules to regulate CO2 under the thin guise of a public health emergency. I expect our heating bills, electric bills and gasoline to double over the next 2 years if this ill crafted plan takes shape. It is simply unrealistic to meet the goals outlined by the fringe groups promoting this junk science. The only real goal here is to fill government coffers with all the new fines and taxes for falling short. Much of those monies will then be distributed around the world to "apologize" for American use of CO2 and our wealth and prosperity. At every chance on the international stage, Obama has already apologized for every action America has ever taken. The crippling effects of this on our economy will be staggering.

Not to worry though - Obama has plans to "spend us out of this recession". Over the past few months a few banks have repaid the TARP loans and others sold off loans and assets to the Federal Reserve to raise cash for repayments. Obama plans to try and spend those monies on more inane government projects and give-aways to help create all the jobs that never materialized from the original Stimulus monies. However, loan repayment that were filtered through banks via the Reserve is  just pulling money out of the left pocket and putting it in the right.  Actually it is more like copying off all the bills in your left pocket and then putting the copies in your right pocket and saying you have more money to spend. Smoke and mirrors. At the same time, he has the unmitigated gall to blame the deficit spending on the Bush administration AND he calls for fiscal restraint. No seriously - all in the same speech!!

Scary times my friends - scary times indeed.

Keep up the pressure on your local congressmen and senators to start overturing these outrageous new programs. Even if it seems they are not listening. Keep up the pressure. Emails, letters, showing up at their offices, phone calls. Marches in Washington. Use any and all legal means to get the message across.

Much of the cost for the proposed sweeping Health Care Bill now in committee in the Senate is supposed to be paid for by saving money elsewhere. Obama has said it, many democrats have stated it. We are led to believe that there is currently as much as $500 billion in savings over ten years by eliminating fraud and wasteful spending in Medicare. Just one of several programs that will see saviings according to proponents of the bill. Leaves me with one important question. Why don't we just eliminate that fraud and waste and use the extra money to pay for the "soaring" government cost of health care? Why not use it to help supplment those 12 million souls who have no access to insurance?? Why, if it really exists, have we not already eliminated it? The same folks that can't seem to properly administrate the current government medicare program now want to be in charge of all of our Health Care?? Now thats a truely scary thought.......

Here we go again, more federal dollars on the way. Seems to be no end to the money flowing out of Washington DC for little Bridgeport's water system. The 52% of us that pay any federal income tax are again paying for an aspect of the needed water system. Nevermind that Bridgeport had artificially low water rates for decades and that the city failed at performing even basic maintenance on the existing system. No accountability, no consequnces - just more money to fix things up. Way too much dependancy on the federal government to take care of a local issue. Not much more to say on this one - here is the article: http://www.kneb.com/news/index/36ab64f3-30df-4898-92c3-d6133322005b.

The administration and some leaders in the house are currently in an all out push to get passage of the proposed Health Care reforms before August. Remember the Stimulus bill?? These same folks kept telling us that it needed to be passed quickly. So quickly that most of the nation's law makers did not have a chance to read the details contained in the 1000+ page bill. We (the people) were told that the money was critical or unemployment might rise above 9%. We needed swift action to save or create four million jobs this year alone. Now, 6 months later - unemployment is well over 9%, the CBO (congressional Budget Office) estimates no more than 100,000 jobs have come from the stimulus and all economic indicators continue lower. Now some in congress and the administration admit that they did not fully understand the economic situation, others plead for more time to see results of the stimulus. In other words, the stimulus isn't working as expected. But recall how we were told over and over again how quickly it was needed. Then it was the car companies. Swift action was needed to "save" them from filing bankruptcy. The government now owns them. And don't forget we started the current mess by rushing to send money to banks and insurance companies. Now the government owns that too. Its July, now its Government run Health Care. We are told it is "urgent". A pressing need. Obama told us on the radio that quick passage was necessary to "pull in control of government spending". The stimulus bill cost taxpayers almost 800 billion dollars. The Health Care Bill has an estimated price tag of 1.4 trillion. Does anybody in their right mind actually believe that government run and controlled health Care will actually "save" money? Lead to greater innovations? stimulate the economy?

Urge the congress to slow way down for once. Really take time to read the bill. Understand it. Let the public hear details and make decisions. Take time to hear feedback from the home folks. After all what we have isn't really broken. It just needs some tweaks. Take a deep breath - Our nation will survive if this actually gets debated well into the fall. Or maybe - just maybe the actual goal is something else - after all - why the hurry??