Guantanamo, Republican fear campaign, how to deal with detainees. We must shut it down, the issue is how many prisoners will go back to their homeland, and if they are dangerous, will they be incarcerated. Charges? Where will they go? Health care will get more coverage, the finance committee headed by Max Baucus and the Health, Education, Labor and Pension committed headed by Kennedy, which he is on. Kennedy's committee is more progressive. Single payer is not going to happen. He introduced a bill for it, they are looking for the next best.
People should be paying a lot of attention to the health care debate, beware of the power of medical, pharmaceutical, medical equipment companies. Did Bernie voting against the Guantanamo bill give the right wing their talking points? You cannot nuance your vote. For example, the IMF amendment yesterday to cut funding, Bernie supports foreign aid, but Bernie voted with the extreme right wing because he is not happy with the IMF. Bernie's reason for voting as he did was very different than theirs. Fannie and Freddie restriction preventing people from buying. FCC failure to take action.
The president signed 2 days ago legislation which will create an investigatory commission to look at the causes of the financial crisis. Its membership is not yet known, they will need to be tough. CEO salaries, advertisement costs, the public option would subsidize the private?. The function of private health care companies is not to provide health care, the more cases they deny, the more they profit. It will draw people away from private to public. Cheney admitted there had been an anthrax attack, which undermines his arguments that there has been no attack since 9/11 because they used torture, and also nobody was tortured when there was the ticking time bomb of possible further anthrax attacks. Did they know who did the anthrax? Medical Device Safety Act. Somebody flatlined four times because of a faulty pacemaker, it cost $300,000 to replace it.
Soldiers are failing drug tests yet still being kept in the military, yet mission critical people are being tossed out because of the 'don't ask don't tell' policy. We are moving toward the day when we judge people based on what they do and who they are. Accounting of the Federal Reserve, companion bill to Ron Paul. Book: "Meltdown", Thomas Woods. Bernie likes Ron Paul, although usually they differ. The Federal Reserve lent a lot of money out, separate to the bailout. Amendment passed in the budget. What can people whose credit card limit has been reduced and their rate increased to the point they can no longer afford necessities do until the credit card bill takes effect? Get on the phone to them and protest. They have months position themselves before the bill takes effect.
The potential for health insurance companies to take advantage of the private program. The companies send out a huge amount of marketing material. Bernie wants the plan to be simple, affordable, in competition with private, he sees it as an antidote. Health care should be a right, comprehensive health insurance, do better primary healthcare, disease prevention. The reasons why the system is so expensive. We need to get rid of waste, profiteering. T.R. Reid did a PBS documentary on health care, every country that has both public and private health care forbids the for-profit companies from doing primary health care. T.R. Reid will be Bernie's guest in Vermont on June 1 in Burlington. A moose just walked by the studio window. As Bernie said, 'the moose is on the loose!'
Last year, former Washington Post reporter T.R. Reid made a great documentary for the PBS show Frontline titled Sick Around the World.
Reid traveled to five countries that deliver health care for all – UK, Japan, Switzerland, Germany, Taiwan – to learn about how they do it.
Reid found that the one thing these five countries had in common – none allowed for-profit health insurance companies to sell basic medical coverage.
Frontline then said to Reid – okay, we want you to go around the United States and make a companion documentary titled Sick Around the America.
So, Reid traveled around America, interviewing patients, doctors, and health insurance executives.
The documentary that resulted – Sick Around America – aired Monday night on PBS.
But even though Reid did the reporting for the film, he was cut out of the film when it aired this week.
And the film didn’t present Reid’s bottom line for health care reform – don’t let health insurance companies profit from selling basic health insurance.
They can sell for-profit insurance for extras – breast enlargements, botox, hair transplants.
But not for the basic health needs of the American people.
Instead, the film that aired Monday pushed the view that Americans be required to purchase health insurance from for-profit companies.
And the film had a deceptive segment that totally got wrong the lesson of Reid’s previous documentary – Sick Around the World.
"It's a bloodthirsty religion that's practiced over there by a bunch of throwbacks, and we're to kill 'em." Michael Savage.
Elizabeth de la Vega saying there should be no special prosecutor. She did not factor in the statue of limitations, but otherwise he agrees. Judge passed information to Congress about Watergate. Congress is not usually good at investigations. Special investigations can get limited, like The Scooter Libby probe not going after Cheney. Maybe foreign prosecutors will take action. The Spanish Attorney General may be against, others do not agree, and other countries are looking, international statutes are longer, would be a major embarrassment for the US. It would be better to do the right things ourselves. Consolidation to one committee, or several better? Cheney with Iran Contra got a joint hearing, those don't work - inner conflicts, too big. It is better to have a select committee.
If there is a statue of limitations on war crimes, how come we are still prosecuting Germans? Each country has its own limits, and in nearly all it is unlimited for murder. Torture without death is generally 8 years, assaults and conspiracies 5 years. What happened to sodium pentathol? It is against the law and not much better than torture. How to give Democrats a spine? Embarrass them, make them blow up the Senate. It is a collegiate body operating by consent. Trent Lott. Mike Mansfield created a two track system for filibusters.
People died during torture, Taxi to the Dark Side was homicide, would an extension of the statute of limitations go all the way up? It would be problematic connecting the death to the memos. Conspiracy is 5 years. Watergate used conspiring to do things they were not supposed to be doing, like torture rather than legal opinions. International law, common plan. Could we use international law? Yes, we should under treaties, we don't necessarily have to go to the Hague. It is unusual to operate on international law in federal court, it might have to go to an international court.
Today's story of a soldier killing an Iraqi girl, a Texan being tried in Kentucky near Fort Campbell. He is being tried as a civilian, why did the military not try him? He will look at the article. Philosophically, does this come down to as a society is America ultimately driven by reason and civility or corporate? is there a process that would serve us after limit? truth and reconciliation. history of civility - Obama trying to bring us back to more civility.
Bob Altemeyer's "The Authoritarians" is the source of the 25 year study on authoritarian personality he mentioned. Appoint Janis Karpinski as special prosecutor? Conservatives appointed people loyal to them not the constitution. Broken government.
"OK, what’s this book about? It’s about what happened to the American government after "conservatives" gained control of Congress in the 1990s and the White House in 2000. It’s about the disastrous decisions that government made, which have created the enormous problems we face now. It’s about the corruption that rotted the Congress. It’s about how traditional conservatism has nearly been destroyed by authoritarianism. It’s about how the “Religious Right” teamed up with amoral authoritarian leaders to push its un-democratic agenda onto the country."
Blue Dog Democrats have red fleas… that’s the problem.
