In a bit of serendipity, the day after the big Internet protest against SOPA and PIPA the FBI acts on the powers already granted under the law to shut down a massive file sharing site (NY Times) In what the federal authorities on Thursday called one of the largest criminal copyright cases ever brought, the
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FBI Shuts Down File Sharing Site Megaupload – We Need SOPA And PIPA Why?
**Written by Doug Powers In 2008, Joe Biden said that paying higher taxes is an act of patriotism, and thanks to the “Patriotic Millionaires” that sentiment is still going strong. The PM group was formed a while back, and they continue to try like the dickens to convince the government to take more of their money so they can participate in what made America great: High taxes paid to irresponsible spenders. I don’t begrudge anybody his or her success, but there’s no better way to suggest that your success might have been due to sheer luck more than brains if you’re unable to understand that the problem is that the government spends way too much, not that people don’t pay enough in taxes. Some members of the group have made a new video. It’s not very well produced, but they didn’t want to spend lots of money on a quality production house in order to save up for those high taxes they always wanted (h/t Real Clear Politics via Hot Air ) : The video could also be entitled, “Fools and their money beg to be parted.” In spite of all that rhetoric, why am I guessing that their tax forms contain very few unused loopholes? To the repentant wealthy, I’ve said this before and I’ll say it again. You can give the government more money by using Pay.gov. Click here and clear your conscience — it’s like going to confession for rich people with feelings of guilt. Some of the “Patriotic Millionaires” have that base covered though: A reporter had asked the millionaires why, if they want the government to take more of their money, don’t they just hand it over voluntarily? “We have a system of compulsory taxation and everybody gets treated the same under the law,” Mehiel said. “We disagree with what the law is right now. We think its outcomes are unfair.” Paul Egerman, founder of a medical transcription company called eScription, also scoffed at the suggestion millionaires who advocate for higher taxes should take it upon themselves to send money to the government. “Running any government is a shared responsibility of its citizens,” Egerman said. “Government is not a charity, and you can’t imagine a situation where the Department of Defense runs a bake sale to build an aircraft carrier.” That guy wants to pay higher taxes so the government can build an aircraft carrier? And just when I thought we’d finally found a way to make the hard left like millionaires. Update: Kevin McCullough responds to the PMs . **Written by Doug Powers Twitter @ThePowersThatBe
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‘Patriotic Millionaires’ Still Begging Government to Take Their Money
-By Warner Todd Huston A few weeks ago AFL-CIO president Richard Trumka used the Civil Rights movement as a comparison for his union work. He wanted his audience to imagine that unionism is somehow just like the struggles for equality under the law that African Americans sought in the middle of the last century. This is
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Union Chief Tries to Steal Civil Rights Movement
The next big issue for the federal health law as it moves toward implementation is how regulators will define so-called essential benefits—the basic medical services that health plans must cover under the law.
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Defining ‘Essential’ Care
**Written by Doug Powers A recent poll found that the general public knows more about the Constitution than elected officials, and one Congressman is on a mission to validate the poll’s findings : Rep. John Lewis (D-GA) believes the Constitution justifies Obamacare’s mandate that people must buy health insurance. According to him, the Constitution’s reference to the “pursuit of happiness” specifically justifies that mandate. There’s just one problem, the pursuit of happiness isn’t in the Constitution. “Well, when you start off with the Preamble of the Constitution, you talk about the pursuit of happiness,” Lewis told CNS News regarding the mandate’s justification. ”You go to the 14th Amendment–it’s equal protection under the law and we have not repealed the 14th Amendment. People have a right to have health care. It’s not a privilege but a right.” The “pursuit of happiness” is of course from the Declaration. If Lewis would have first checked with his colleagues he would have known that the Preamble of the Constitution is the one that starts with “My country tis of thee…” **Written by Doug Powers Twitter @ThePowersThatBe
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Another Day, Another Congressional Constitutional Scholar
**Written by Doug Powers Nancy Pelosi said it : “We need to pass health care reform so we can find out what’s in it.” Some people were actually excited by that prospect, like contestants on Let’s Make a Deal being asked to trade the pittance in their hand for the promise of what’s behind door #1: AARP, either in blind faith or full complicity, bet on door #1 and their employees (not to mention almost everybody else) get to pay the price : WASHINGTON – AARP’s endorsement helped secure passage of President Barack Obama’s health care overhaul. Now the seniors’ lobby is telling its employees their insurance costs will rise partly as a result of the law. In an e-mail to employees, AARP says health care premiums will increase by 8 percent to 13 percent next year because of rapidly rising medical costs. And AARP adds that it’s changing copayments and deductibles to avoid a 40 percent tax on high-cost health plans that takes effect in 2018 under the law. Aerospace giant Boeing also has cited the tax in asking its workers to pay more. Shifting costs to employees lowers the value of a health care plan and acts like an escape hatch from the tax. Prepare for AARP to now lobby the Obama administration for a waiver from the glorious health care law they helped shove down America’s throat. Here’s a related flashback. In August of last year an AARP representative was in Dallas trying to convince dues-paying members why they should support the Democrats’ health care plan. It didn’t go well, and the skeptics were correct: The woman conducting the seminar will now be paying more for health insurance, so there’s a bit of schadenfreude here — self-inflicted in her case. **Written by Doug Powers Twitter @ThePowersThatBe
Hey, remember back in March when the Democrats’ chief inquisitor on Capitol Hill, Henry Waxman, announced plans to haul up corporate executives who dared to speak the truth about the dire cost consequences of the federal Obamacare mandate? Flashback March 3,1 2010: Now, Waxman is targeting the heads of Deere, Caterpillar, Verizon and AT&T with “invitations” they can’t refuse to testify at an April 21 hearing on their public statements regarding Demcare-caused writedowns. Waxman’s fishing expedition letters sent out last week “asked” the company heads to produce copious documentation. Business execs are damned if they do disclose how the costs of the new federal health care taxes will hit their bottom line and damned if they don’t. If they stay silent, they’ll be violating Securities and Exchange Commission disclosure requirements passed by Congress after the Enron scandal. If they talk, they’ll be paraded in front of the camera like those poor tobacco heads Waxman waxed more than 15 years ago. Who’s next? On Monday, Prudential said it would take a $100 million charge in the first quarter thanks to Demcare. In Colorado, the Steamboat Ski and Resort Corp. said the health care law will cost $2 million a year starting in 2014. AK Steel Corp., 3M and Valero Energy have all announced similar writedowns. At this rate, if Waxman insists on hauling up every last truth-teller in the marketplace, he’ll be holding an inquisition-a-thon a day. And that would suit the Witch Hunter of Capitol Hill just fine. If he isn’t meddling, he isn’t working. And if he isn’t using his powers to bully, bulldoze or bankrupt his enemies, he is failing the gods of progressivism. Waxman backed off, but as I warned, it was only a temporary reprieve. The truth about Obamacare’s all-too-predictable, real-world consequences keeps coming out and it won’t be long before desperate Dems try to squelch the Obamacare revolt again. Go ahead, Henry. Double-dog dare you. Via the WSJ : Health insurers say they plan to raise premiums for some Americans as a direct result of the health overhaul in coming weeks, complicating Democrats’ efforts to trumpet their signature achievement before the midterm elections. Insurers say they plan to raise premiums on some Americans due to the health overhaul, complicating Democrats’ efforts to trumpet their signature achievement before elections. Janet Adamy and Evan Newmark discuss. Also, Justin Lahart discusses the two-track economy for American business, with global players getting boosts from fast-growing foreign markets, while companies focused on the U.S. market are hamstrung by recession-scarred consumers. Aetna Inc., some BlueCross BlueShield plans and other smaller carriers have asked for premium increases of between 1% and 9% to pay for extra benefits required under the law, according to filings with state regulators. These and other insurers say Congress’s landmark refashioning of U.S. health coverage, which passed in March after a brutal fight, is causing them to pass on more costs to consumers than Democrats predicted. The rate increases largely apply to policies for individuals and small businesses and don’t include people covered by a big employer or Medicare. About 9% of Americans buy coverage through the individual market, according to the Census Bureau, and roughly one-fifth of people who get coverage through their employer work at companies with 50 or fewer employees, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation. People in both groups are likely to feel the effects of the proposed increases, even as they see new benefits under the law, such as the elimination of lifetime and certain annual coverage caps. Many carriers also are seeking additional rate increases that they say they need to cover rising medical costs. As a result, some consumers could face total premium increases of more than 20%. Flare your nostrils. Wave your gavel. Try to bully them into silence, Chairman Waxman. Dissent must be silenced!
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Go ahead, Henry Waxman: Launch another Obamacare witch hunt
-By Warner Todd Huston There are several precepts that American jurisprudence is supposed to be based upon. “Equal under the law,” “justice is blind,” “no man is either above or below the law,” in the U.S. these basic ideas undergird the premise that we are all the same under our American law. But apparently someone forgot
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Amer. Bar Assoc. Peddling Race Instead of Law With New ‘Hispanic Law’ Study
