The American Spectator

Reid Disses David Broder

Posted by Philip Klein on 11.21.09 @ 10:20AM

In his opening floor remarks Saturday morning, Sen. Mitch McConnell cited this David Broder column from the Washington Post on Obamacare, headlined, "A budget buster in the making."

Reid responded with the familiar criticism that McConnell has no business talking about fiscal responsibility when McConnell supported President Bush's reckless spending on Iraq. Then Reid scoffed at Broder, who he dismissed as "a man who has been retired for many years, and writes a column once and awhile."

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What to Expect in the Senate Today

Posted by Philip Klein on 11.21.09 @ 10:08AM

The Senate has just open for business this Saturday morning to consider the motion to proceed that would require 60 votes to pass, and thus allow the 2,074-page health care bill to get to the floor. There will be 10 hours of debate, followed by a vote at 8 p.m. So far, we don't know what the outcome will be, becuase Democratic Sens. Blanche Lincoln and Mary Landrieu have not announced their intentions.

Here's the debating schedule that Harry Reid announced this morning:

10 am-6pm: Each party controling alternating hours, with Democrats controlling the first hour.

6-6:30 p.m. Democrats' time.

6:30-7:15 p.m. Republicans' time.

7:15-7:30 p.m. Democrats' time.

7:30-8 p.m. Time controlled by leaders Harry Reid and Mitch McConnell.

8 p.m. Roll call vote on the motion to proceed.

The proceedings are being broadcast on CSPAN-2. I'll be updating this blog with breaking news or other items I find interesting and amusing. If you want more blow-by-blow reaction, you can follow me on Twitter at: http://twitter.com/philipaklein .

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McCain is Not Scozzafava, and Palin Won't Be Branded a "Sell-Out"

Posted by Philip Klein on 11.21.09 @ 9:40AM

Daniel Larison, in response to Bill Kristol's suggestion that Palin campaign for McCain in the Arizona Senate primary, writes:

Were she to side openly with McCain in a primary against Hayworth, whose views match up a lot more closely with her supporters’ views, she would be seen as imitating McCain’s worst habits. She would be considered a worse sell-out than McCain. She would be doing exactly the opposite of what she did in NY-23. Her intervention may have failed to elect Hoffman, but rank-and-file conservatives generally loved her for it anyway. She would fritter all that away if she backed McCain. In exchange for the contempt and disaffection of the people who currently adore her, she would win the enduring affection of editors at The Weekly Standard. McCain seems to be satisfied with this, but I doubt it would be enough for Palin.

There is not much nuance to Larison's thinking here. It's completely absurd to compare the NY-23 Congressional race to the Arizona Senate primary, because beyond the broad outlines -- a race between an establishment candidate and a conservative insurgent -- there are few similarities. Scozzafava was not a moderate, she was a liberal who ultimately endorsed the Democrat anyway. It was not a matter of one issue -- she held liberal views on abortion, pledged to vote for "card check," and called the cops on a reporter who asked whether she would vote for a health care bill that raised taxes. McCain is pro-life. He has been firmly against "card check" to the point where he has actually blocked the nomination of Craig Becker to serve on the National Labor Relations Board (Becker is an SEIU lawyer who has written that "card check" could be implemented by the NLRB without Congressional action). He voted against the economic stimulus bill. And he has been adamantly against the health care bill. There's also the distinction between losing a single House seat and losing a Senate seat that could mean the difference between giving Obama a rubber stamp in the Senate or perhaps gaining a few seats next year to be able to effectively block anything major that Obama proposes. And while it was realistic to think that Hoffman could have a chance of winning, there's less reason to believe that J.D. Hayworth -- who couldn't win a Congressional race -- could win statewide. Now, I've had my share of issues with McCain over the years and am not going to argue that he's a perfect conservative. And for those who see immigration as such a crucial issue to them that they have to support Hayworth as a matter of conscience, I'm not going to tell them not to. But for Larison to sugeest that for Palin to keep in the good graces of her base, she has to back the more conservative candidate in every single race, no matter what other circumstances are in play, is totally ludicrous.

If there's one thing I've learned about Palin supporters -- especially when I've criticized her -- it's that they are generally very forgiving of her and willing to cut her a lot of slack. Ever since she burst onto the scene, I've been trying, to no avail, to argue that we shouldn't compare her to Ronald Reagan when he spent decades studying conservative philosophy and defending it and served two terms as governor of California, and she has a very slim governing record and it's unclear whether she's really a committed small government conservative. Even though I avoid the personal vitriol that has consumed much of the anti-Palin commentary and try to raise what I see as fair questions about her qualifications to be president, her acceptance of pork spending, her initial support for the "Bridge to Nowhere," etc., I'm brandished an elitist RINO who should shut up and go back to my brie and chablis. This is a long way of saying that it would take a lot more than backing McCain over Hayworth for Palin's supporters to view her as a "sell-out."

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Presto! Alarmist Emails Not Such a Big Deal

Posted by Paul Chesser on 11.21.09 @ 8:44AM

That's The Amazing Revkin for you -- the New York Times' DotEarth blogger/environmental reporter attempts some M*A*S*H-style meatball surgery this morning on the badly hemorrhaging climate alarmoscientists' scandal that has erupted in East Anglia, UK. First he acknowledges that some of the most prominent climate fictionalizers in the world said some very naughty things about global warming skeptics, but then he promptly cues the violins:

Some of the correspondence portrays the scientists as feeling under siege by the skeptics’ camp and worried that any stray comment or data glitch could be turned against them.

And then Revkin asserts that it's all pretty meaningless in the overall scheme:

The evidence pointing to a growing human contribution to global warming is so widely accepted that the hacked material is unlikely to erode the overall argument.

Revkin has authored two global warming books and so has a lot to lose himself from this controversy, as his reputation is just as much at stake as the scientists.' Therefore his defense mechanisms are fully engaged. In his blog post yesterday about the revelations, he states that repercussions "continue to unfold" and "there’s much more to explore," but do you really think he can be counted on for follow-up stories about it this week? We'll see, but this attitude doesn't give much hope:

The documents appear to have been acquired illegally and contain all manner of private information and statements that were never intended for the public eye, so they won’t be posted here. But a quick sift of skeptics’ Web sites will point anyone to plenty of sources.

And what a surprise: He offers no links to those skeptics' sites. Meanwhile, blogger Tom Nelson notes Revkin's past freedom-of-information heroics when it came to scrutinizing the Bush administration. So while Revkin and alarmists engage in crybabyism, the climate realists among us train our eyes on the substantive. For example, Czech physicist Lubos Motl identified a few juicy morsels from the emails, including one in which the University of East Anglia CRU's Phil Jones writes to U.S. atmospheric scientist (and realist) John Christy:

...If anything, I would like to see the climate change happen, so the science could be proved right, regardless of the consequences. This isn't being political, it is being selfish. Cheers, Phil

Indeed, selfishness appears to be at the heart of much of the alarmism movement. Motl discovers money transfer methods and tax evasion schemes, as well as Jones's well-funded endeavors over the years:

So far, the most interesting file I found...shows that since 1990, Phil Jones has collected staggering 13.7 million British pounds ($22.6 million) in grants.

There is oh-so-much. Like I said yesterday, it's like watching the ACORN-sting videos over and over again because you just can't believe what you're seeing.

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topics: Global Warming, Environmentalism, Climate Change

The Threat to Medical Innovation

Posted by Philip Klein on 11.20.09 @ 5:55PM

Earlier today, I attended a panel discussion at the Cato Institute about one of the most important aspects of health care that has gotten very little coverage during the current debate -- medical innovation.

Raymond Raad, a resident in psychiatry at New York Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell Medical Center and co-author of a new Cato study, presented evidence showing that the United States leads the world in the development of drugs, medical devices, and other advanced treatments. For instance, between 1969 and 2008, 57 of the 97 Nobel Prizes in medicine and physiology -- or nearly 60 percent -- were awarded to people who did their research in the U.S., and nine of the top 10 medical innovations between 1975 and 2000 were developed here. But these achievements aren't reflected in rankings of different health care systems that typically show the U.S. faring poorly and provide fodder to those pushing for government-run health care. This even though once these products are developed in the U.S., they become widely available and improve health care outcomes around the world.

Raad argued that one of the big dangers of health care legislation is that expanding the role of government and trying to impose price controls could change incentives to innovate. When the government is such a large consumer of health care, it has tremendous influence over whether some innovations succeed. As an example, Raad noted how government stunted the growth of specialty hospitals by not allowing Medicare money to spent at them. Specialty hospitals are smaller institutions formed by doctors to focus on one type of illness, such as heart disease. They can deliver better health outcomes and a more personalized experience for patients than giant factory hospitals that benefit from their tax-exempt non-profit status even as they rake in billions of dollars. Raad explained that some of the most common and important medical innovations --such as CT scans -- were quite controversial when first introduced, and thus putting more constraints on the market could prevent wider use of new products that may ultimately prove beneficial.

Gerard Anderson, director of the Center for Hospital Finance and Management at Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health, described himself as the liberal on the panel. He emphasized the importance of universal access to new medical innovations, and argued that it was "naive" to talk about where innovations originated, since they all tend to be developed on a multi-national basis in many stages. He also showed that the pace of medical innovation has slowed in recent years, in both the U.S. and Europe, and said that it's important to do something to change incentives that are currently in place. Currently, large drug companies spend just 12 percent to 15 percent of their outlays on researching and developing new drugs, and 30 percent on marketing them. 

John Calfee of the American Enterprise Institute suggested several reasons to worry about in the current health care bills. He said they would increase the costs to both the public and private sector well beyond what Congressional Budget Office is projecting. And he warned that it would be difficult for government to resist the temptation to impose price controls on products that were very expensive relative to their marginal costs. For instance, once drugs are developed, the cost to manufacture each additional pill is small relative to the price charged for the drug. But imposing such controls would reduce profits and thus the incentives of drug companies.

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Get That Hacker a Pimp Coat

Posted by Paul Chesser on 11.20.09 @ 5:29PM

What made the ACORN-exposing work of James O'Keefe and Hannah Giles so sensational was that they successfully infiltrated the habitats of the subjects they investigated, and observed their routine behaviors. They didn't have to coerce or pressure the ACORN office workers to say or do things they did not want to do. It wasn't "60 Minutes," but it reflected the new paradigm under cable TV news and Web rules. James and Hannah were like computer hackers walking in the front door and literally being given what they wanted.

So now an actual hacker -- or an insider -- has exposed something similar in the global warming activism realm: scientists at the University of East Anglia's Climate Research Unit (regarded as Britain's top authority) caught in behaviors they would never want the outside world to see. Marc Morano at Climate Depot is developing the link archive and Australian reporter Andrew Bolt is harvesting revelatory remarks from emails and documents, as he explains:

So the 1079 emails and 72 documents seem indeed evidence of a scandal involving most of the most prominent scientists pushing the man-made warming theory - a scandal that is one of the greatest in modern science. I’ve been adding some of the most astonishing in updates below - emails suggesting conspiracy, collusion in exaggerating warming data, possibly illegal destruction of embarrassing information, organised resistance to disclosure, manipulation of data, private admissions of flaws in their public claims and much more. If it is as it now seems, never again will “peer review” be used to shout down sceptics.

This is clearly not the work of some hacker, but of an insider who’s now blown the whistle.

The clogosphere (climate blogs) is awash in this story (again, see Climate Depot). Even if this isn't your issue, you ought to at least spend a little time this weekend (all us politico-infojunkies still get our fixes on Saturdays, right?) perusing what Bolt has unearthed. Amazing stuff which Chris Horner says could be alarmism's "blue dress moment." As Bolt notes, it's not just the East Anglians -- it's the foremost global warmer scientists from all over, caught. Wow.

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topics: Global Warming, Environmentalism, Climate Change

Justice Dep't Recusal List!

Posted by Quin Hillyer on 11.20.09 @ 3:03PM

To give credit where it is due, Byron York had a good piece on a brewing battle between Sen. Chuck Grassley and AG Eric Holder about how many times Justice officials have been forced to recuse themselves on suspected-terrorist detainee cases. Well, just within the past hour, we at the Wash Times advanced the story in a special early editorial. The answer for one official, departmental number 3 Tom Perelli: 39 times. This is a Wash Times opinion department exclusive.

The names of the detainees? Saad Al Qahtani. Mohammed Zahrani. Achraf Salim ("Sultan") Abdessalam. Abdul Rahman Abdul Abu Ghityh Sulayman. ......

Again, here's the link. Interesting stuff. Please read.

And it comes on the heels of my colleague Kerry Picket's great report yesterday that makes Chuck Schumer look a bit two-faced, about whether or not foreign terrorists captured abroad should be tried in criminal courts here.

All in all, this whole KSM trial continues to look worse and worse every day and every hour.

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Mac is Back on the Right as 2010 Approaches

Posted by Brian O'Connell on 11.20.09 @ 3:03PM

Politico reported last night that Senator McCain is expressing disapproval towards Lindsey Graham and Joe Lieberman's attempt to write a bipartisan climate bill. The piece suggests a position switch, pointing out that McCain has previously introduced climate legislation to the Senate multiple times. The article raises the question over whether the recession in Arizona, which has been especially hard-hitting, is playing a role in his current stance towards a cap and trade bill.

What also could be at play is McCain's 2010 race. Rasmussen polling reported this morning that McCain is only two points ahead of  former conservative Republican Congressman J.D. Hayworth for the primary. The last thing McCain needs right now politically is to be labeled as a "job killer" or even as a "Republican in name only."

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The Ben Nelson Shuffle

Posted by W. James Antle, III on 11.20.09 @ 3:01PM

The conservative constituents of red-state Democratic senators should see through what Ben Nelson is doing. Many Democrats in difficult states will vote to let the bill go forward and then switch on the second cloture vote or vote no on the Senate floor after cloture is invoked. But voting for the motion to proceed now makes it more likely that the bill will pass and much more difficult for it to be significantly reshaped.

In fact, an analysis by the Congressional Research Service performed at the request of Sen. Tom Coburn's (R-Okla.) office found that in 40 of 41 cases between the 106th and 110th Congress where there was a successful motion to proceed and a final Senate vote on a bill, the bill in question passed. That 97.6 percent figure doesn't apply to bills that ended up getting pulled before the final vote, meaning that there would still be a chance to defeat the bill. But Democrats who profess to be concerned about the Senate bill -- because of abortion or any other reason -- should not vote for the motion to proceed.

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Obama Gallup Rating Drops to Below 50%

Posted by Philip Klein on 11.20.09 @ 2:43PM

For the first time of his administration, President Obama's job approval rating has dropped to 49 percent in the Gallup poll. While it has been hovering in the low 50s for months now, the drop below 50 percent in the most well-known poll is an important symbolic moment that will add to the narrative that Obama is losing the support of the American people. The news comes just as Congress is hoping to enter the homestretch on health care, his top domestic priority. Click on the link for some historical context of other presidents.

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Nelson to Vote to Advance Health Care Bill

Posted by Philip Klein on 11.20.09 @ 2:18PM

Sen. Ben Nelson said that he would vote to allow the Senate health care bill to move to the floor for debate, even though he said yesterday that the abortion language in the bill is not acceptable to him.

His decision leaves Sens. Blanche Lincoln and Mary Landrieu as the remaining holdouts.

“Throughout my Senate career I have consistently rejected efforts to obstruct," Nelson said in a statement. "That's what the vote on the motion to proceed is all about."

He continuted:  

“It is not for or against the new Senate health care bill released Wednesday. 

“It is only to begin debate and an opportunity to make improvements. If you don't like a bill why block your own opportunity to amend it?

“As we have seen before, obstructionists are inviting a move toward reconciliation by opposing this first procedural vote. Let's be clear. That route shrinks debate and amendments, eliminates bipartisanship and needs only 50 votes to pass a bill.

“In the end, far more Washington-run health care policies win, but Nebraskans lose.

“In my first reading, I support parts of the bill and oppose others I will work to fix. If that's not possible, I will oppose the second cloture motion—needing 60 votes—to end debate, and oppose the final bill.

“But I won't slam the doors of the Senate in the face of Nebraskans now. They want the health care system fixed. The Senate owes them a full and open debate to try to do so.”

The problem, as his co-Senator from Nebraska Mike Johanns noted yesterday, is that once the bill gets to the floor, there will need to be 60 votes to change the abortion language. And there simply aren't that many pro-life votes in the Senate. So this really was a key test of his professed anti-abortion views.

Jim Antle wrote about the moment of truth facing pro-life Democrats on our main site.

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AHIP Opposes Senate Health Bill

Posted by Philip Klein on 11.20.09 @ 2:10PM

America's Health Insurance Plans, the industry trade group that has tried to remain in the good graces of the Obama administration and Democtrats in Congress on health care legislation, today issued a statement opposing the Senate bill. 

"The promise of health care reform is that it will provide all Americans coverage, allow them to keep their coverage if they like it, and bends the cost curve to put the system on a sustainable path," AHIP's president, Karen Ignagni, said. "These are the standards by which any reform bill should be judged, and the Senate bill falls short of meeting them."

Ignagni specifically attacks the $6.7 billion annual tax on health insurers and warns that the introduction of a government-plan will shift more costs to those who obtain insurance privately. She also criticizes the $117 billion in cuts to Medicare Advantage.

But AHIP is no fan of free markets, as it is pushing for an even stronger government mandate that would force individuals to purchase its product in exchange for agreeing to cover those with preexisting conditions.

The question is whether AHIP will actively begin to campaign against Democratic legislation, and even if so, whether it's too late for that to make a difference.

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England's Lost Decade Ahead

Posted by Joseph Lawler on 11.20.09 @ 12:37PM

In February, the Times explained the lessons the U.S. could take away from Japan's Lost Decade. But now it seems that those morals are better suited for the U.K., which, the Times is now claiming, is staring down the barrel of it's own Lost Decade:

Britain may be emerging from recession, but that is little solace for those who suggest that the economy here might follow in the steps of Japan's lost decade in the 1990s unless the twin threats of burgeoning national debt and ruined banks are adequately addressed.

The parallels are easy to see: Like Japan, Britain enjoyed a decade of booming growth, fueled by aggressive bank lending and real estate investments. Haunted by the comparison, policy makers have been extra aggressive in using fiscal and monetary levers to prevent the type of sustained period of stagnation and banking stasis that plagued Japan for so long.

One of the interesting notes in the February article on the Lost Decade is that the fiscal measures Japan enacted throughout the 90s were a mixed bag, at best:

Japan’s rural areas have been paved over and filled in with roads, dams and other big infrastructure projects, the legacy of trillions of dollars spent to lift the economy from a severe downturn caused by the bursting of a real estate bubble in the late 1980s. During those nearly two decades, Japan accumulated the largest public debt in the developed world — totaling 180 percent of its $5.5 trillion economy — while failing to generate a convincing recovery.

...

In the end, say economists, it was not public works but an expensive cleanup of the debt-ridden banking system, combined with growing exports to China and the United States, that brought a close to Japan's Lost Decade.

So before paving over its rural areas, the UK should probably first address its "ruined banks." Weird that the Bank of Englad should be worrying about these things now, a full year after Gordon Brown's government interventions saved not only the banks, but also the world.

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If WH Wants to Assauge Fears of Socialized Medicine

Posted by Philip Klein on 11.20.09 @ 11:35AM

Peter Orszag probably shouldn't be writing an op-ed in the Washington Post titled, "A leap forward to better care."

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Global Warming Fraud Exposed: The Bogus Scientific 'Consensus'

Posted by Robert Stacy McCain on 11.20.09 @ 11:02AM

That supposed scientific "consensus" about global warming may actually be a conspiracy. E-mails from a British climate-research organization -- obtained by an Australian magazine, Investigate -- disclose scientists discussing a statistical "trick" to "hide the decline" of global temperatures in their data.

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