By Kelly L. Goodridge and Oscar De  Los Santos

Pelosi’s Bill: More Sludge in the D.C. Swamp

Yesterday (Oct. 29), House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) praised Charles B. Rangel (D-N.Y.) and Maxine Waters (D-CA) for their help in determining the finances and taxes that will be levied in the new souped-up 1900-page health care bill.  This “Affordable Health Care for America Act” (or H.R .3962) bill has been debated for months. It is a perfect example of liberal lunacy and promises reneged.

Pelosi’s “gargantuan beast of a bill” contains 13 new tax hikes (“Comprehensive List of Taxes in the House Democrat Bill,” atr.org, October 30, 2009). Rep. Tom Price (R-GA) points out, “One thing is clear. Your concerns about a government takeover of health care have been totally ignored by Speaker Pelosi and her allies, who worked behind closed doors to write this bill” (“Government Still Trying to Take Over Health Care,” biggoverment.com, October 30, 2009). Price also notes that Pelosi’s House bill means government-run insurance, higher taxes, a job-killing employer mandate and “countless provisions that set Washington bureaucrats firmly between you and your doctor.”

Oh, and Sarah Palin was right – the provision for death panels or “End-of-Life-Planning” is included in Pelosi’s bill.

She’s Clogging up the Congressional Works – and Rangel Isn’t Helping Things

When she was crowned Queen of the House, Madame Pelosi vowed to drain the D.C. swamp of corruption.  So far, she’s just further clogging up the works. Pelosi also promised, “We Will Create the Most Open and Honest Government in History” in a January 18, 2006¨Press Release (Congresswoman Nancy Pelosi, California, 8th District, http://www.house.gov/pelosi/press/releases/Jan06/honest.html). Is that why Madame Speaker got Charlie Rangel, one of the most corrupt individuals in Washington D.C. to assist her with fact and figures as the new health care bill was drawn up?

The distinguished Chairman of the House Committee on Ways and Means, Rangel has been under investigation since the beginning of this year for multiple incidents involving tax evasion and failure to report income.  We’re not talking a few thousand bucks here (like Tim “Turbo Tax” Geithner).  Rangel is in deep you-know-what for hiding serious coin.  Peter Roff reports in U.S. News & World Report that “an ongoing investigation into Rangel’s finances reveals he has not been exactly candid with the IRS or, for the matter, his congressional colleagues about his real estate holding, sales of stock and his reportable income” (www.usnews.com/blogs/peter-roff/2009/09/08/for-the-democrats-sake-charles-rangel-must-go.html, May 12, 2009).

Back in May, further questions arose over the lord of the tax code’s conduct. Rangel’s “amended finance disclosure forms for the years 2002 through 2006, include his failure to report checking accounts at the Congressional Federal Credit Union and Merrill Lynch—each valued at between $250,000 and $500,000, tens of thousands of dollars in earning from stock dividends and mutual funds, and the proceeds from the sale of a townhouse back in his Manhattan-based congressional district” (Roff, www.usnews.com/blogs/peter-roff/2009/09/08/for-the-democrats-sake-charles-rangel-must-go.html, May 12, 2009). Yet this is the upstanding numbers man to whom Queen Pelosi turned in her hour of need.

Well, after all, Rangel is himself a big donor to the Democratic Party.

Maxine Waters – Another Inept Tax Plumber

As if Charlie Rangel weren’t enough, Pelosi also got Maxine Waters, a high-ranking member of the House Financial Services Committee, to help draft the new hernia-inducing health care monstrosity.  Waters has her own tax disclosure issues. Michelle Malkin “spotlighted” Waters back in March for she and her husband’s “smelly involvement with minority-owned bank called OneUnited” (michellemalkin.com, October 30, 2009). On Thursday (Oct. 29), the House Ethics Committee announced that it is investigating whether “Waters used her influence to help a bank in which her husband owned stock, and whether the couple benefited as a result” (michellemalkin.com, October 30, 2009). Waters’ husband also sits on the bank’s board. What’s more, OneUnited received $12 million dollars in Stimulus bill monies. Barney Frank (D-MA) helped the bank to secure the funds (Kelly Cunnigham, http://www.sddt.com/Commentary/article.cfm?Commentary_ID=192&SourceCode=20090211tzd, February 11, 2009).

Pelosi+Rangel+Waters = Bad Sewage!

The results of such masterminds concocting a new health care bill are messy.  In fact, even though Pelosi claims the new bill is more streamlined in dollars (if not bulk), it’s potentially more damaging to Americans from the get-go.  If it passes, Americans will start to be taxed immediately in order to pay for it.   Keep in mind that it doesn’t take effect until 2013 (after Obama & Co. have been re-elected – they hope – and there’s nothing to do but suffer the consequences).

Pelosi claims that the $894 Billion dollar bill will insure an additional 36 million Americans.  She also claims that the bill will “cut the deficit by $30 million over 10 years, which means it would meet President Obama's budget requirements. It would also extend coverage to 96 percent of the population. Top Democrats say the numbers are based on estimates from the Congressional Budget Office, which has yet to formally score the bill” (Jason Plautz, NationalJournal.com, http://healthtopic.nationaljournal.com/2009/10/house-plan-will-cost-894-billi.php, October 30, 2009).

We’re left scratching our heads. What kind of magical numbers-out-of-the hat is Pelosi trying to pull?  Probably the same kind good ol’ Charlie Rangel uses to balance his tax returns.

Need a Plumber? Don’t Call One Named Pelosi!

“Poor Nancy, every time she tries to drain the swamp, she either catches a reflection of herself or she uncovers one of her friends. Drain a little, there's Charley Rangel wallowing in the mud” (chuckthings.blogspot.com, 5/12/09).

It’s all too obvious that Nancy Pelosi meant she was going to strip Republicans – corrupt and otherwise – of power when she boasted she would drain the D.C. swamp.  Liberals need not worry and are encouraged to continue contributing to the muck.

Madame Speaker has proven herself to be a poor sump pump. OK hopes to see major plumbing work – and House cleaning – done in 2010.

Fear of communism permeated American culture in the 1950s.  Neighbors turned in neighbors for suspicious activities.  Libraries turned in book checkout lists to the government.  Everyone was in each other’s business. 

Leftist historians like to demonize Joseph McCarthy and there’s a certain degree of good reason for that.  He took his communist searches to extremes and made mistakes – but he was also right more often than liberal history books would have us believe.  There were officials in power with communist/socialist links.

Imagine what McCarthy would think of Washington now.  At least in the past, one had to dig deeply to trace the connections.  So many people in government today have virtually transparent past affiliations with socialist groups. 

In fact, in many respects, the commie with-hunt 1950s are back – except that this time, the hunted are the hunters. 

The Obama camp has set up a website for watchdog citizens to turn in what they perceive to be misinformation about the healthcare plan.  Ostensibly, they want to know who’s misleading the American public and – um, correct – these poor misinformed souls. 

But anyone can see that this is a 21^st century spy-on-your-neighbor operation designed to silence all Obama dissenters. 

This comes from the same administration that regarded phone surveillance against suspected terrorists as a gross violation of human rights; from the same administration that wants to go after Bush 43 administration members who saw fit to waterboard three terrorists in order to glean information from them and prevent future attacks on American soil. 

So now the Obama camp resorts to intimidation tactics that are themselves a form of aggression.  It shouldn’t surprise us.  Camp Obama has never hesitated to resort to threats.  Note his violent rhetoric during the presidential campaign.  At a stopoff in Elko, Nevada, Obama implored his supporters to help him turn uncertain and Republican voters:  “I want you to get in their face and argue with them” (Kathleen Hennessy, “Obama mocks McCain in Nevada stops,” San Francisco Chronicle, September 17, 2008, http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2008/09/17/politics/p185733D40.DTL&type=politics).

Picture that kind of belligerent suggestion coming from Senator John McCain – or President George W. Bush or VP Cheney.  The lamestream media would have roasted them up one side and down the other.

Yet it’s even more disturbing:  At a June ’08 Democratic fundraiser, Obama promised to outdo the Republicans in any way possible:  “If they bring a knife to the fight, we bring a gun.  Because from what I understand, folks in Philly like a good brawl” (Ben Smith, “Obama brings a gun to a knife fight,” June 14, 2008, http://www.politico.com/blogs/bensmith/0608/Obama_brings_a_gun_to_a_knife_fight.html). 

But now the battle goes stealth, to be fought in subterranean depths. Turn-in-thy-neighbhor is clearly designed to stoke fear in all Obama dissenters and silence those who dare oppose the current administration’s actions. 

So we shouldn’t protest another loan to Fannie Mae. We shouldn’t oppose the 40-plus Obama-czars.  The birthers – wacky or not – shouldn’t have a voice to protest a president they see as a usurper.  And we damn well better stop questioning Obamacare and just let it sail through. 

In fact, Americans shouldn’t dare voice a whisper – let alone a cry – against any action undertaken by our government. 

Take a good look and assess how radically the American tables have turned in just a little over half a year.  And how 1950s paranoia has been resurrected by those in power. 

Yet what irony.  The watched have become the watchers.

By Oscar De Los Santos and Kelly L. Goodridge