My participation in “Carbon Nation” came about quite fortuitously.  After I retired from the Army, I was working as a government analyst, looking at the tactical implications of energy security. I was leaving that position to try to encourage commercial interest to get involved with the Department of Defense to help solve what had been a strategic dilemma since the ‘70s: oil dependance.   A friend asked me to speak to a documentary film maker about my concerns.  I met Pete Byck outside the U.S. Capital building on a bright spring day and tried to tell the story of DOD’s efforts to solve a national security issue. 

Having received a post graduate degree in National Security and Strategic Planning from the U.S. Naval War College, I put those tools to work to understand the larger implications of our addiction to fossil fuels.   What I concluded was that climate change was a concern, the economic drain was unfortunate and that the national security implications were terrifying.  …

—–

“Carbon Nation” tells a story that must be heard.  There are people throughout the world who are taking action, but leadership at the national and international level is lacking.  We have “islands of excellence” in the quest for solutions, but we lack vision.  To paraphrase a good book I read, without vision, the people perish.  At no time has this had greater meaning.  It is my sincere hope that “Carbon Nation” supplies the impetus to change, to find our vision and to plot a new course into the future.

Read the full piece at Big Government…

Regardless, this might help explain the post below (and Saturday’s “Restore Sanity” rally), why Stewart found Republican victories so much more high-larious than the Dems losses…

Satirist, Economist

Per Bloomberg, here’s more evidence of just how co-opted Jon Stewart is and pathetic the Obama administration’s become — off-the-record meetings with our nation’s Treasury Secretary “to discuss the economy“:

In the midst of debates on financial regulation and China’s currency in April, Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner sat down to discuss the U.S. economy — with comedian Jon Stewart.

Geithner and Stewart, host of Comedy Central’s “The Daily Show,” held an off-the-record meeting at Stewart’s office in New York on April 2, according to Geithner’s appointments calendar, updated through August on Treasury’s website.

Geithner didn’t stay for a television interview with Stewart although other administration officials — most notably President Barack Obama last week — have turned up for on-camera chats.

“Jon Stewart is influential in America, so we took the opportunity for the two to meet and to discuss the economy,” Treasury spokesman Steve Adamske said in an e-mail yesterday. Stewart’s program has poked fun at Geithner, including a segment last year about the Treasury secretary’s trouble selling his New York home.

Like his anti-Beck rally Saturday, we’re sure Stewart just thought he was helping all of America, not just Obama and the Left.

He’s a moderate satirist, you know.

Yep, instead of joining the work force, grads are turning their Ipods up, and flip flops homeward, to sponge off mom and dad, because, according to the Times, “the work offered doesn’t match their self-assessed market value.”

Meaning, they’re special, so their jobs must be special. I mean, you can’t have a precious one-of-a-kind snowflake working in the mailroom! Snowflakes can’t open packages! Snowflakes can’t make coffee! Snowflakes are there to be appreciated, as snowflakes!

And so the job becomes another spoke in the wheel of self-fulfillment, something to accentuate the belly button ring and Asian lettered tattoo on your pelvis (which reads “stupid white person”).

You could say this is the ultimate consequence of self-love buoyed by a safety net. It’s not the kid who’s doing this, but the parents who indulge them. Kick ‘em out, they’ll find work.

But to me, by not accepting work, they’re missing out on a key part of life: having a job you hate. A rotten first job teaches you to love the better jobs that come later. Plus, they can be fun! A rotten job means you can invent new ways to pass time, i.e. drinking rum in the bathroom. And the best part: you won’t care, because the job doesn’t matter. You won’t have sleepless nights – just boring afternoons. In a real sense, taking the job you don’t want creates a freedom other people envy.

And also, it’ll get you out of the house. Which you owe your parents.

And if you disagree with me, you’re worse than Helen Thomas.

Tonight, we have John Gibson, the lovely Brooke Goldstein, the hilarious Joe Devito.

And Sharlto Copley (the star of “District 9,” and the new “A-Team”!)

Not long ago people like Al Gore were jetting around the globe taking in vast speaking fees, winning awards, telling everyone that they must give up the things they enjoy to save the planet. These doomsayers all told us we were stupid if we doubted them. They knew better, you see. These people claimed all “real” scientists agreed that mankind was destroying the planet with global warming. That we humans were at fault and the only way to save ourselves is bow down to a world government, pay lots of taxes and give up our cars, our electricity, air travel, light bulbs, blah blah blah.

There was a vast left wing conspiracy in other words. One designed to scare people into giving more power and wealth to statist bureaucrats who were employing the oldest trick in the book. Using fear and guilt to manufacture consent.

They began by locking down major institutions like NASA and Britain’s Climate Research Unit (CRU). Then they got the media on board, the science magazines, the cable networks. They started churning out articles and documentaries supporting the global warming meme. Millions were spent selling the idea, because many of these groups knew that fear, like sex, sells. There are two main motivations that human beings have. The desire to have something and the fear of losing something. They used both to pitch the notion that we could create a “green utopia” by changing the way we did things, and in doing so we would prevent the end of the world. Who doesn’t want to be a hero? Who doesn’t love the environment? How can you argue with that?

But two things happened last year that shot an arrow in the heart of the beast; one of the worst winters on record and Climategate. And the hits keep on coming. Now it turns out that NASA, who claimed for years that their data proves Global Warming is real, was actually just using CRU data all along. And the CRU couldn’t back up any of its data. In fact, they “lost the records” when they were forced to produce them. Oops!

So now these news channels who’ve been trumpeting the story as fact, all those cable networks who spent millions on documentaries hyping it, all those TV shows hawking green as the in color; they all look like fools. Or worse, they look like they were in on what will go down as one of the biggest scams in human history.

What would you do if you were in their position? It’s not hard to understand why they’re carrying on like Climategate never happened. They have a president in the White House as clueless as they are, pushing the Cap and Trade agenda as if those darn glaciers are just about melted. We have to do something fast! Not a moment too soon, kiddies.

The climate scam is worth trillions of dollars and who knows how many millions, if not billions have been spent to win over the public. Too bad the public is losing interest fast. People are increasingly saying it’s all made up or at best, exaggerated. You can’t put toothpaste back in the tube. The proverbial genie is out of the bottle, The cat has left the bag. There’s no going back to the lies and spin. But our friends in the media are still living a lie. It’s like they threw a party and only their mom and a few friends showed up. What was once a hip thing to be a part of, like smoking, is fast becoming a loser tattoo on their foreheads.

The public’s trust is evaporating and it’s not helping that many in the media are circling the wagons. As their ratings drop and their Nielsens tank, as the suits upstairs start laying off staff, they’re going to have to deal with reality. Something they’ve tried to deny all these years. Yes, folks. The warm-mongers are in fact the deniers.

The economy is in a down-spiral. Telling people they need to cut back is like rubbing salt in their wounds. Promising them “green jobs” is like telling a 40 year old Santa Claus is coming to town.

The climate skeptics started a snowball years ago that has been gaining size and momentum as it rolled downhill. It’s getting larger all the time. And now it’s headed straight at the media that tried to deny it. They want to pretend it will go away if they think happy thoughts (or gloomy ones as the case may be). But it’s coming at them like an unstoppable freight train and it’s almost here.

Its name is karma.

My questions were prompted after a “letter from Michael Moore” popped into my inbox.  It was promoting the DVD launch of his documentary Capitalism – A Love Story.

Mr. Moore acknowledges that some may not have watched it in the movie theater because they were working too hard but then blames poor ticket sales on the behaviour of the very workers he pretends to defend in his documentaries.

He seems to detest working people and how he thinks they behave in the movie theater.

But for those of you who didn’t get to the theater, what’s your excuse? Didn’t want to sit through 20 minutes of TV ads up on the screen before the movie started? Don’t like sitting next to people who have 6 important cell calls to make during the film? Feet get stuck to the floor after two hours of people spilling their 164 oz. sodas, thus preventing you from getting up when the film’s over?

So in Mooreland the workers of the world are boorish, inconsiderate slobs who eat and drink to excess and mess up their theaters.

It is clear Michael Moore despises his audience, but perhaps even more tellingly, he does not even seem to know how they live or even what the inside of a movie theater looks like these days.

For one, I travel a lot across America and in the movie theaters I go to most people seem to enjoy the trailers.

Honestly, when was the last time people made a phone call, never mind six, in the theater beside you? It simply doesn’t happen anymore (if it ever really did).

And feet stuck to the floor?  In most movie theaters nowadays you could eat your dinner of the floor.  Michael Moore likes to portray workers in some kind of Dickensian nightmare struggling against uncaring bosses who will work them to death in hellish conditions. In Mooreland there are no air conditioned offices and factories or on-the-job trainings and promotions.

And in Mooreland, the movie theaters are thirty-year-old caricatures that were inaccurate even then.

So I beg the question: Does Michael Moore actually know any working people and how they behave? Or does he just despise them and their habits from so far away that he doesn’t even know what their habits are?  And given his strange assumptions about the interior of movie theaters, it seems fair to ask, does Michael Moore even go to the movies any more?

Last Call!

Now, this would be hilarious, if it wasn’t for the fact that quadrillions of dollars are at stake. (And just so you know: quadrillions can buy a lot of unicorn porn.) I’m not going to use this latest revelation to hammer these “experts,” even though they’d do that to a “skeptic” like me, if they had the chance. I just want to nail two key points:

*this news shows exactly why climate change researchers must release data and reveal methods. If they have nothing to hide, then their work’s credibility will only increase. The fact that they’re trying to avoid that makes me think they’re basing their data on articles from Cosmo. FYI: global warming can and does make it harder to find your g-spot, says Darla, age 23, data analyst.

*There are few real experts on climate change – only pawns used to justify policies that will inevitably sodomize our economy. By the way, I include myself as a non-expert. I was an English major, who spent the last twenty years drunk, shirtless and weeping. But this is a good thing: whether you think humans cause global warming or not, we’re all in this boat of ignorance together, and therefore should be more tolerant of opposing views. If so-called experts are culling mountain ice data from Penthouse Letters (apparently melting glaciers totally cause chicks to remove their tops faster, says Vic, 25, a pizza deliveryman), then we are all so-called experts.

That should make you happy.

And if it doesn’t, then you’re probably a planet-hating racist homophobe who eats polar bears for breakfast.

Tonight, the yummerific S.E. Cupp! 

the yowzawoza Jim Norton!

the yuckywucky Dr. Michael Baden! 

and someone else!

**************

Scene 14: Christmas Eve, inside Bedford Falls Town Hall. Senator George Bailey confronts an angry mob of constituents protesting his vote on the new health care bill.
MAN #1
Come on Bailey, you can’t hide forever! Let us in!

WOMAN #1
Yeah, what is this mandatory insurance nonsense? Stop cowering behind that podium George! We want answers!

crowd erupts into shouting

GEORGE BAILEY
Now now now, everybody calm down, see? If you’ll, well, see, just let me explain…

MAN #2
You should’ve explained these death panels before we elected you! Let’s get ‘em!

WOMAN #2 (shaking pitchfork)
Yeah!

MAN #3
Hey, pipe down youse mugs, let the man talk. It’ll be 15 minutes before the tar is hot enough to pour. Out with it Bailey!

GEORGE BAILEY
Well well, thank you for that Pete. Now folks, see, you just gotta understand how Washington works. Remember how you, you sent me there to bring back free things to Bedford Falls, like free heath care and jobs and that new George S. Bailey retractable midnight basketball court for the high school gym?

MAN #4
Hey Bailey, do know how many kids drowned at the prom last year from that stupid thing?

GEORGE BAILEY
Well, now now now, Clem, sure a few kids drowned. But look at all the jobs it created down at the Potter Retractable Basketball Floor factory. And that’s my point. Now, see, down in Washington there’s a whole Senate full of regular guys like you and you, and me, and we represent thousands of places just like Bedford Falls. And all of those places want their own jobs and healthcare and retractable basketball courts. And it turns out all of this costs money, so we have to get, well, revenues…

WOMAN #3
You mean taxes?

GEORGE BAILEY
Well, yeah, Helen, if that’s how you want to put it. See, we put all those revenues in a, a, a, big pile there in Washington, and then we start making deals and such, to make sure we can all bring some home. Sometimes we run out, and have to make up for it with other fees…

MAN #2
You mean taxes? Why don’t you get it from Old Man Potter?

WOMAN #2
Yeah! Get it from Potter!

GEORGE BAILEY
Now, now, I hate old man Potter just as much as the rest of you. Maybe more. He lives in that cold old mansion up there on Beacon Hill, while you’re getting laid off and trying to make ends meet. It just isn’t right, and that’s why I organized the big ACORN march against him last year. But I’m telling you, even if we confiscated every penny he has, we couldn’t pay for your free universal health care. That’s why we have to charge you for some of it, and make sure you don’t use too much. But don’t worry, I sent my top trade representative Uncle Billy over to China to get a payday loan for the rest.

WOMAN #5
But won’t we have to pay them back?

GEORGE BAILEY
Well, Marge, yeah, technically, but only until you’re all dead. After that it’ll just be your kids.

MAN #4
Stop your malarkey, Bailey! Keep your ridiculous health care bill. We want our money back!

CROWD
Yeah! Give it back!

GEORGE BAILEY
Now now now, Clem, let’s take it easy there. Sure it’s your money. And yours, Violet. And yours too, Reverend Larson. It’s everybody’s money, and belongs to everybody. Especially me because I’m a Senator. We need that money to make the deals to make the legislation to make sure you get the things you want. Now if you’ll all be patient, I’m sure that Uncle Billy will be getting back from Peking any time now…

MAN #1
I’ve heard enough of this! Let’s get ‘em!

CROWD
Yeah!

MAN #2
Tar’s ready!

GEORGE BAILEY
Gulp!

George runs flailing through the snowy streets of Bedford Falls, the torch-weilding mob in hot pursuit
*************
Scene 15: A bridge outside Bedford Falls. George, breathless, peers dead-eyed into the icy river 100 feet below.

GEORGE BAILEY
I… I wish I was never elected!

George swings his leg over the side of the bridge, but he is tackled by a kindly old stranger

CLARENCE
Phew, that was a close one, George. I thought for sure you were a goner!

GEORGE BAILEY
Who… who are you? How did you know my name?

CLARENCE
Well that’s a mighty interesting question, Senator Bailey. I guess you could say… well, let’s say I’m sort of your protector. Clarence is the name. Clarence Odbody.

GEORGE BAILEY
You mean some kind of guardian angel? From heaven?

CLARENCE
Yessir, straight from lobbyist row on K Street. But I’m not an official angel as yet. Before I can earn my wings I have to stop you from this fool idea of yours. Honestly, George — political suicide? It’s just plain sinful.

GEORGE BAILEY
Did you see that crowd? Have you seen my approval ratings? This town would have been better off if I had never been elected.

CLARENCE
Stop saying such a thing! Do you really feel that way George?

GEORGE BAILEY
I, I, I, I… yeah! Well, see, yeah! See.

CLARENCE
Alright George, I’ll grant you your wish. But you may not like what you see.

swirling screen, blaring staccato strings

GEORGE BAILEY
Where, uh, where are we Clarence?

CLARENCE
Don’t you recognize it, George? It’s Bedford Falls.

GEORGE BAILEY
But but, now see, it doesn’t look anything like Bedford Falls…

CLARENCE
Of course not George. Don’t you remember I granted your wish? This is Bedford Falls… except you’ve never been elected. Let’s see what’s happening over at the High School.

George and Clarence try to enter the gymnasium.

GEORGE BAILEY
Hey, it’s locked!

CLARENCE
That’s right George. Because you weren’t around to pass your midnight basketball bill, all the kids are down at the malt shop and the library.

GEORGE BAILEY
But what about the retractable floor?

CLARENCE
It isn’t there George. Because you weren’t there to insert that earmark. And that means more than 20 men from the Retractable Basketball Floor Workers Union couldn’t contribute to your re-election fund.

GEORGE BAILEY
You’re lying!

CLARENCE
I’m afraid not George. Let’s walk downtown.

George and Clarence walk down the snowy sidewalks of Bedford Falls

GEORGE BAILEY
There’s something strange Clarence… where are all the potholes?

CLARENCE
Potholes? Without your Stimulus Bill, Bedford Falls ended up hiring their own non-union pavement contractor.

GEORGE BAILEY
I think I need a drink.

CLARENCE
Whatever you say, George. Let’s pop into Joe’s Tavern.

GEORGE BAILEY
Hey, what happened to my Smoke Free Tavern Act? Why… why.. It’s Ed! Ed Flenderson! President of the Retractable Basketball Floor Workers Union! Ed, it’s me, George! Senator George Bailey! Don’t you know me Ed? Can I count on your support for the next campaign contribution cycle?

ED FLENDERSON
Get away from me you, crazy wino! The Potter Basketball Floor Plant closed down years ago.

GEORGE BAILEY
But Ed, that means you’re out of a job…

ED FLENDERSON
What are you, nuts? After I left that dead-end job I started my own business. FlenderCo, the third biggest snow removal company in Bedford Falls. I’m my own boss, make more money, and no more splinters.

JOE THE BARTENDER
Hey, scram, you crazy hobo! Stop bothering my customers!

George and Clarence cross the street to the Malt Shoppe. George peers through the foggy glass to see teenagers reveling.

GEORGE BAILEY
There’s something familiar about that soda jerk… yeah… why that’s Tommy O’Reilly! But he was… he was…

CLARENCE
…decapitated by the retractable basketball court at prom? I’m afraid not, George. Tommy and those eight other casualties are in there right now, Lindy Hopping.

GEORGE BAILEY
But what about that big class action suit?

CLARENCE
It never happened, George. And your friends at the Bedford Falls Trial Lawyers Association never got their contingency fees.

GEORGE BAILEY
And I never got their contribution bundle?

CLARENCE
No George. Why would you? After all, you’re not a Senator.

GEORGE BAILEY
I… I… I…

CLARENCE
It’s time to move on George. Let’s go over to the Bedford Falls Police Station.

At the booking desk

GEORGE BAILEY
What are we doing here Clarence?

CLARENCE
Just wait George. You’ll see.

Two cops roll in an old man in a wheelchair, wearing a dress

MR. POTTER
Let me go! I know my rights!

COP #1
Caught him red handed, Sarge. He was trying to book a flight to Rio at the Bedford Falls Municipal Airport.

DESK SERGEANT
Good job boys! Well, well, well. if it isn’t Mr. Potter. 31 counts of illegal mortgage lending, 8 counts of embezzelment, and 28 counts of investment fraud in that retractable basketball court Ponzi scheme. Looks like you’ll be spending the holidays upstate at the Big House.

GEORGE BAILEY
Mr. Potter! Mr. Potter!

CLARENCE
Save it George. He doesn’t know you. You were never Senator, remember? You never got to use Mr. Potter as a villain in your campaign ads, he never bought you that secret vacation condo in St. Martins, and you never passed that $12 billion emergency stimulus supplement to bail him out.

MR. POTTER
Do I know you, young man?

GEORGE BAILEY
Well, yes… I, I mean no…

MR. POTTER
Say, do you think you could lend an old man $300 for bail? It is Christmas after all.

GEORGE BAILEY (rummaging through pocket)
Well, sure Mr. Potter, you’ve always helped me when I got in a jam. Let me see what I have in my emergency legal defense fund… what the heck?! Noooo!

DESK SERGEANT
Hey pal, get the heck out of here before I bust you for loitering. G’wan, beat it!

George and Clarence walk by empty welfare centers and boarded-up ACORN offices

CLARENCE
You see George, Bedford Falls is a mighty different place without you in Washington.

GEORGE BAILEY
I guess what they say is right – one man can make a difference. Clarence, but what about the heath care bill? The health care bill, Clarence!

CLARENCE
You weren’t there to vote for cloture, George. It died in committee. America never got its healthcare bill, and Bedford Falls never got that Federal Snow Museum.

GEORGE BAILEY
Take me to Doc Bradford’s medical clinic Clarence! I wanna see what happened!

CLARENCE
But George, I don’t think you’ll want to see it, it’s just…

GEORGE BAILEY
Take me there Clarence! Take me, darn it! I wanna see it, see?

CLARENCE
Sigh. Alright, as you wish.

Inside Doc Bradford’s clinic

DOC BRADFORD
That was quite a nasty spill you took on the ice, Mrs. Foster. I’m scheduling you for an artificial hip replacement Tuesday. In the meantime, stay off your feet and fill this prescription for pain relievers.

GEORGE BAILEY
Just like that? What about getting approval from the hip procedure rationing board?

CLARENCE
There is no rationing board, George. It’s completely up to Doc and Mrs. Foster.

MRS. FOSTER
Oh, bother. How much is this going to cost me?

DOC BRADFORD
Medicare will pick up most of it, but looks like you’ll have a $200 deductible.

MRS. FOSTER
Well I guess I always can skip my AARP dues.

GEORGE BAILEY
Noooooo! Hey… now, now, now, who who’s that woman over there? Why that’s… that’s…

CLARENCE
Yes, George. It’s Mary. Your Mary.

DOC BRADFORD
Mary? Mary Hatch? Your prescription is ready.

GEORGE BAILEY
Mary ‘Hatch’? Why, why, that’s Mary’s maiden name! You mean she never…

CLARENCE
No, George, she never married. Because you never became Senator, you never met her through that escort service. Mary remained here in Bedford Falls working as a simple call girl, and now she has to pay for her chlamydia drugs from her own pocket.

DOC BRADFORD
Alright Mary, I’ll renew this one more time. But I’m warning you, this is the strongest antibiotic I can find.

MARY
Can you break a $100 bill?

GEORGE BAILEY
Mary! Mary! It’s me, George! Oh, Mary, don’t you know me? Speak to me Mary!

MARY
Hey, get your hands off me you creep! I charge a sawbuck for that kind of weirdo stuff.

CLARENCE
Come on George, it’s time to leave. We have to get back to the bridge by midnight.

GEORGE BAILEY
But.. but.. I I don’t want to do it, Clarence! I want to live! I want to live, in Washington! I want to legislate! I want to chair committees and live sweet precious life wherever it takes me!

CLARENCE
Are you sure George? But what about your approval ratings?

GEORGE BAILEY
It’ll all work out, I just know it! I’ll hire the best media consultants in DC. The voters will forget all about it by November, just you see!

CLARENCE
But what if you lose?

GEORGE BAILEY
Then I’ll set up my own lobbying firm on K Street! Ten times more money and I still get to write bills! Anything to avoid coming back to this shitty one horse town!

CLARENCE
Splendid, my boy. Absolutely splendid! That’s the true Christmas spirit of the Beltway! Oh George, I think you just may have earned me wings.

swirling screen, blaring staccato strings

**********************
Scene 16: George comes to on the icy bridge.

GEORGE BAILEY
Clarence? Clarence? Where am I? I think I better pinch myself… well how about that! I I I’m alive! I’m a Senator, I tell you! United States Senator from Bedford Falls George S. Bailey! You did it Clarence! You did it, you old lobbyist! Woo hoo!

George runs back into town, giddily skipping up the steps of the town hall, where he is spotted by the angry torch waving mob.

MAN #1
There he is! Let’s get him!

MAN #2
Hurry, the tar is getting cold!

Inside Bedford Fall Town Hall

MAN #3
Alright Bailey, say your prayers.

GEORGE BAILEY
Now, now Pete, put down that pitchfork. Let me tell you about the new agriculture appropriations bill I’m co-sponsoring.

MARY (entering the hall with their 3 children)
George? Are you alright? I’ve been worried sick about you.

BAILEY KIDS
Daddy!

GEORGE BAILEY
Oh Mary! You know me! You know me!

MARY
Well, of course I do, George. You’re my husband, and I’m your trophy wife.

GEORGE BAILEY
And your chlamydia is mostly cleared up!

MAN #3
Very touching Bailey. Now hand back our money nice and slow, or we start the tarring.

GEORGE BAILEY
Now now now now, just wait there, see. You need to be patient…

WESTERN UNION BOY
Telegram! Telegram for Senator George Bailey from Uncle Billy!

MARY
Well what is it? What does it say? Hush, everyone!

WESTERN UNION BOY
I have made success, stop. Pawned Hawaii to Chinese $1 trillion, stop. Rest of money can be printed at US Mint, stop. Health care is saved, stop. Merry Christmas Uncle Billy.

GEORGE BAILEY
Did you hear that folks? We’re saved! Free healthcare for everybody! Merry Christmas!

CROWD
Hooray! Should auld acquaintance be forgot, and ne’er brought to mind…

GEORGE BAILEY
Re-elect Bailey in ‘48!

LITTLE ZUZU BAILEY
Do you hear that Daddy? It’s bells ringing.

GEORGE BAILEY
By golly you’re right, sweetie. It is bells.

LITTLE ZUZU BAILEY
Teacher says that everytime a bell rings, a Washington angel gets his wings.

GEORGE BAILEY
That’s right, that’s right.

LITTLE ZUZU BAILEY
And everytime a Washington angel gets his wings, the national debt goes up one kazillion dollars.

GEORGE BAILEY
Attaboy Clarence.

CROWD
…should auld acquaintance be forgot, in days of auld lang syne…

Fade out, credits

So, Obama asks and Congress obeys!  Here we have another 1,000 plus page bill winding its way through the House of which I am sure almost no member of Congress has read.  Just get it done before anyone knows what’s going on.  Make it happen fast!  That appears to be the logic behind the President’s legislative agenda.  If you get the ball rolling, pass it and sign it before anyone reads it.

We all know how much good the February stimulus bill did; none.  If anyone had a chance to analyze it and the pork associated with it, it would have never passed.  It looks like “Cap and Trade” may be dead in the Senate.  People must have read it and told their Senators to make sure it dies.  I guess things did not move fast enough.

Now, let us look at the health care bill.  The rich are in for it again per the Democrats.  The Democrats are proposing that the top income earners will see their income taxes increase in order to pay the approximate one trillion dollars that this bill will cost our future generations.  The top tax rate would go up by 5.4%.  This would be on couples earning more than one million dollars.  The smallest increase would be on couples earning more than $350,000.  They would get an additional tax bill of one percent of their income.

If you analyze those tax raises carefully, you will see that President Obama is now breaking one of his most vocal campaign promises.  If you remember way back to last November, he preached to his loyal followers that “no one making less than $250,000 would get a tax increase.”  Well if you do the math, an individual earning $175,000 will get a tax increase of one percent.  You may ask how I came to this figure.  Well, if couples earning $350,000 are getting taxed at a higher rate, an individual (single person) would be taxed at $175,000.  That unfortunately is the way the tax code works.

The bill additionally states that any individual without medical insurance would be forced to pay a penalty of 2.5 percent of his/her income up to a cap of the cost of medical insurance.  In Southern California medical insurance for an individual runs approximately $6,000 per year.  So, someone making $250,000 per year would be paying $6,750 per year more in taxes.  How did I get to this figure?  Let’s not forget that one percent tax increase.

However, there is another break of the ultimate campaign promise here.  The middle class wage earner making $50,000 per year would be penalized $1,250.  You can call it a penalty or anything you want, but it is a tax.  So, now the anointed one is proposing to raise taxes on the real middle class.  This is not someone making $250,000 per year.  It is not even close.  To someone making $50,000 per year, $1,250 per year in additional taxes is a real blow.  And, on top of it, the poor soul still would not have health insurance.

But, that not the real shot below the belt which is the penalty on employers for not providing health insurance.  This proposed penalty is 8% of a worker’s wages.  That means every company that does not provide health insurance will pay a penalty to the US Government in the amount of $8,000 per $100,000 of payroll.

Talk about messing with the middle class and the employment rates.  Again, Obama and his economic geniuses are killing employment in this country.  Do you think any business is going to absorb this cost?

If the company chooses to give health insurance, they will be forced to pay approximately $6,000 per employee in Southern California.  This $6,000 would come from only a few places; one, the employee’s pocket, two, the consumer’s pocket, or, three from employees losing their jobs to pay for this mess.  Companies are working at small enough margins as it is now with the economy in the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression.  They are not going to absorb this kind of loss.  Of course, the proponents of the bill are saying that there will be a small business exception to the requirements and penalties.  How that will be defined in the final bill is anybody’s guess?

So, who will benefit from this plan?  You may say the poor and uninsured.  The poor already have access to health care.  They just show up at emergency rooms and get treated or they qualify for Medicaid.  So, it’s not them.  It’s not the middle class.  We already looked at that.  It’s not the rich, since they are paying for it.  It’s not the business owners since they are getting burned again.  Who?  NO ONE. 

Yes, a large portion of people who are not insured will be under this plan.  That is true.  But, they will be paying for it either in the form of higher taxes or lower wages.  Some people making less than $250,000 per year cannot afford that.  In fact, as I said above, the poor soul making $50,000 per year cannot afford to lose $1,250.

To put it simply, this plan is a joke and should be killed this time before it even gets to the Senate.  So, get your pens out and start writing your Congressmen again.  If enough people complain about this crap going on in Congress, it might actually stop.

As an aside, I had lunch today with a fellow entertainment industry Republican, Michael Mandaville, and he had an interesting analysis of this health care bill.  In the movie industry, people are hired usually for short periods of time during the course of a production of a film.  On a union picture, most people have insurance, but not all.  On a non-union film, almost no one has health insurance.

Under this proposed health care plan, a catastrophe will happen to the entertainment industry.  Let’s say for arguments sake that 30 crew members on a film have no insurance.  These 30 people will work an average of approximately three months on a film.  If you figure that the average cost of health insurance is $500 per month, the budget of the film will go up $15,000 per month to cover these employees.  Over the course of three months, that is an additional $45,000 added to the cost of making the movie.  Say goodbye to film making in the United States.  Whatever is still here, will be gone.  (And, this whole analysis is based upon low budget movies.  On a high budget movie, you could be talking an additional cost in the hundreds of thousands of dollars).

Well, that’s about if for now.  Until next week . . .