© Walt Handelsman

It has often been said that making laws is like making sausage: You’ll be much happier if you don’t see it happen. But the current health care bill has been exposed to unprecedented scrutiny from both sides and from the media. As Ezra Klein notes in the Washington Post:

So far in the health-care debate, Republicans have attacked the legitimacy of private negotiations, parochial dealmaking, the budget reconciliation process, self-executing rules, the Congressional Budget Office’s analyses, and even the constitutionality of the legislation. It’s a good theory: Make people hate Washington and mistrust the legislative process and you’ll make people hate and mistrust what emerges from that process.

But it’s also dangerous. As Republicans well know, private negotiations between lawmakers, deals that advantage a state or a district, and a base level of respect for the CBO’s scores have long been central to the lawmaking progress. As the parties have polarized, reconciliation and self-executing rules (like deem and pass) have become more common — and the GOP’s own record, which includes dozens of reconciliation bills and self-executing rules, proves it.

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But if you look at the tax returns of the organization that puts on the concerts, less than 4% (yes, four percent) of the money collected actually went to scholarships or veterans. In order to be considered a reputable charity, over 75% of money collected is supposed to go to the intended recipients, and in fact Hannity himself promised in fundraising letters that 100% of the money donated would go directly to scholarships and wounded soldiers.

So where did the rest of the $48 million go? Hannity himself demands — and gets — a private Gulfstream jet to fly him, his family, and his entourage to the concerts, plus a fleet of Cadillac or Lincoln SUVs, and multiple suites at expensive hotels — all paid for out of the donations. Even more is spent on “consultants” and “expenses”. In other words, these events are big ego parties for Hannity, his family and friends, spending millions of dollars on who knows what, with a few scraps tossed to actual veterans. It is repulsive.

On his radio program last May, Hannity told his listeners “Our new sponsor, Boca Java, just pledged $30,000 to the Freedom Concerts. That will provide a full one-year college scholarship for a kid of a fallen soldier.” But in reality, the charity has never given a full scholarship to anyone. The most it has given out to any student is less than $6,000, and is typically much less. Even Boca Java stopped being a sponsor after last year.

Why does anyone believe these people?

UPDATE: The charity responds.

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As usual, today the Dems announced a new procedural tactic to get health care reform passed. The GOP immediately attacked it as unconstitutional, unprecedented, unclean, unholy, and the end of civilization as we know it, while ignoring that they used the same or worse tactics when they were in power.

And the Tea Party threw a protest. Organizers estimated the crowd at 5000, while everyone else estimated it at 300. Meanwhile, Republicans had a larger turnout for a fundraiser with insurance company lobbyists.

Yet another person who thought they had bought and paid for a health insurance policy that would, you know, actually pay for their medical bills had their policy canceled for no particular reason other than to make more money for the insurance company. But in an ironic twist, the victim of this all-too-commmon scam managed to stay alive long enough to sue the company and win a judgement against them.

Fox News again shows why Obama doesn’t like to appear on their shows. Obama is interviewed on Fox by Bret Baier, who mostly just repeats Republican talking points and interrupts Obama repeatedly, talks over the president, and even interrupts him to apologize for interrupting him. Watch the video:

I can safely predict that we could fast-forward to 2012 and the debate will still be running along the same lines, probably something like this:

© Tom Toles

I just want to remind people that any time the Republican Party comes out with an argument against the current health care reform bill, a perfectly good response is to remind them about Medicare Part D, which was crammed down the throat of Congress through outright bribery, was entirely funded through deficit spending, included “death panels”, expanded entitlements and big government, and was a huge giveaway to the drug companies.

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© Lee Judge

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You kind of expect misinformation like that from politicians, but how do you explain that the US Conference of Catholic Bishops came out against health care reform, stating that the bill’s prohibition against federal funding for abortion is a “legal fiction”.

Well, in a new twist, a group of religious orders representing 59,000 Catholic nuns has sent out a letter basically saying the Bishops are wrong. The letter says that “despire false claims to the contrary, the Senate bill will not provide taxpayer funding for elective abortions.” They also point out that health care reform will save many lives, and is “the real pro-life stance”.

Personally, I don’t see how anyone can read the health care bill and think it will fund abortions in any way, shape, or form. I applaud the Nuns for standing up to the Bishops.

Not surprisingly, Representative Stupak dismissed the letter from the nuns, saying “When I’m drafting right to life language, I don’t call up the nuns.” I guess he believes that “nun” would support him.

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“He admits to groping, fondling, and tickling. And I’m thinking, well, why isn’t this guy governor of New York?” – David Letterman

“Massa goes on the Glenn Beck show and he says that he was having a birthday party tickling his staff. And he said one guy couldn’t breathe, he was tickling him so hard. And then Dick Cheney said, ‘Well, we should have done that at Gitmo.’” – David Letterman

“Massa just keeps getting into more and more trouble. One of Massa’s former shipmates in the Navy says that he used to give his subordinates massages. And he called them ‘Massa massages’, which is why the Navy’s policy toward Massa was ‘don’t ask because it’s pretty obvious, isn’t it?’” – Jimmy Fallon

“So now this Congressman Eric Massa is claiming that he was bullied in a gym by Rahm Emanuel. The President’s guy is bullying him in a gym, naked. And I know you are thinking to yourselves, ‘Well gee, thanks a lot, Dave, for searing that image into our brains because that’s something we’ll carry for a long time right there.’” – David Letterman

“It turns out Eric Massa was living in a house in D.C. with a bunch of young single male staffers. Massa described the house as ‘just a bunch of guys doing guy stuff’, while the male staffers described it as a ‘den of awkwardness.’” – Jimmy Fallon

“He admits to groping, fondling, and tickling. And I’m thinking, well, why isn’t this guy governor of New York?” – David Letterman

“The big rumor is Tiger Woods is getting ready to return to golf. Tiger has hired Ari Fleischer, George Bush’s former press secretary, to handle the press for him. I guess Ari Fleischer figures after years of trying to explain George W. Bush, this should be a piece of cake.” – Jay Leno

“Tiger Woods is reportedly ready to return to golf, possibly in two weeks in Orlando. According to The New York Post, Tiger’s hired former President Bush’s press secretary, Ari Fleischer to help with his PR campaign. Is that the guy you want in charge of your approval rating? I’d hire Clinton’s guy. That’s the one with some experience in that particular area.” – Jimmy Kimmel

“Former President Bush, George W. Bush, is now writing a book about his eight years in the White House. And it’s green. It’s entirely made out of old Al Gore ballots. So that will be a keepsake for you there.” – David Letterman

“A lot of anticipation about the new book that George Bush is writing. But don’t worry, it’ll also be available in English.” – David Letterman

“Karl Rove’s memoir, ‘Courage and Consequence’, is the best-selling book on Amazon.com. The book costs $19.99, and comes with free shipping and mishandling.” – Jimmy Fallon

“Barbie’s birthday. Did you know that? And if you don’t know Barbie let me just tell you. She is the pretty, plastic doll who didn’t run with John McCain.” – David Letterman

“A new poll out today shows that 22 percent of voters strongly approve of the job President Obama is doing, 43 percent strongly disapprove of the job he’s doing, and the other 35 percent are holding off judgment until he actually does something.” – Jay Leno

“I’m sure you heard the First Lady talk about this. Childhood obesity at an all-time high here in America. Give you an idea how bad it is, when children are filling out a form now, next to hometown, 83 percent of the kids write ‘buffet.’” – Jay Leno

“Yesterday, Michelle Obama and Hillary Clinton were at an event and Michelle said that she almost referred to Hillary as ‘President Clinton’ by mistake. And then Hillary was like, ‘Ha-ha-ha. Seriously, though, would you?’” – Jimmy Fallon

“According to USA Today, corruption among government officials in China is running rampant. Yet another idea they stole from us.” – Jay Leno

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Even though you might think that the pilot of a drone would suffer from less stress, since they are flying the aircraft much like one would play a video game, and are not personally in any danger. But ironically, the reverse is true. Drone operators are reporting higher levels of combat stress, increased fatigue, emotional exhaustion and burnout than actual troops in a combat area.

In fact, the very thing that makes drones safer might be causing the extra stress. As one drone pilot explained it “You’re going to war for one hour, and then you get in the car and drive home, and within two minutes you’re sitting at the dinner table talking about your kids’ homework.” This kind of casual, switch-on / switch-off warfare is deeply disturbing on many levels.

In real war, you are in the company of other soldiers, sharing the bad experiences as a “band of brothers”. But drone pilots don’t have that support. They are alone. Even worse, soldiers in a war area are in a situation where they can justify their actions as “kill or be killed”. But the drone pilot is not in any immediate danger.

In the end, making war “safer” might have the opposite effect.

The article also talks about “war porn” — where surveillance drones allow you to watch war taking place without actually taking part in it. You can even see videos from drones on YouTube. Like other kinds of porn, it allows us to see more while experiencing less.

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© Tom Toles

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