Truth, Lies and Distortions

Is that Robert Gibbs, the porcupine, lurking in the grass, ready to throw his quills at protesters?

• Because it is so vital to know the truth, and I am finding that none of my friends where I live seem to have taken an interest in actually finding the truth, I am sharing an email from the Republican National Committee:
  
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• Rhetoric: President Obama Promises Americans Can Keep Their Current Health Care Coverage. "You know, the interesting thing is we've actually been very clear on what we want. I've said I want to make sure if you have health care you are going to keep it..." (PBS's "The Newshour With Jim Lehrer," 7/20/09)

• FACT: Analysis Shows Over 88 Million People To Lose Current Insurance Under Government Health Care Takeover. "Under current law, there will be about 158.1 million people who are covered under an employer plan as workers, dependents or early retirees in 2011. If the act were fully implemented in that year, about 88.1 million workers would shift from private employer insurance to the public plan." (John Shelis, Vice President, Lewin Group, "Analysis Of The July 15 Draft Of The American Affordable Health Choices Act Of 2009," 7/17/09)

• Rhetoric: President Obama Pledges Americans Can Keep Their Doctor. "If you like your plan and you like your doctor, you won't have to do a thing. You keep your plan. You keep your doctor...We're not going to mess with it." (President Barack Obama, Remarks At White House Press Conference, The White House, 6/23/09)

• FACT: Mayo Clinic Says Government-Run Health Care Will Force Doctors To Drop Patients. '[L]awmakers are on track to approve across-the-board federal payment reductions of $155 billion over 10 years for hospitals ... Mayo and similar health systems object to the sweeping cuts. 'Across-the-board cuts will be harmful to everyone and we think it is particularly bad to penalize the high-value organizations,' said Jeff Korsmo, executive director of the Mayo Clinic Health Policy Center. 'We will have to violate our values in order to stay in business and reduce our access to government patients.'" (Phil Galewitz, "'Model' Health Systems Press Case For Medicare Fix In Reform," Kaiser Health News, 7/20/09)
• [I, Karen, will reiterate here that when one loses his job and must get new insurance, he MUST take the government plan once the government plan has begun.]
  

• Rhetoric: President Obama Promises No Additional Taxes On Middle Class. "What I've said is, and I have stuck to this point, I don't want to see additional tax burdens on people making $250,000 a year or less." (NBC's "Today Show," 7/21/09)

• FACT: Democrats' Plan Imposes 2.5% Tax On Uninsured Individuals. "The penalty assessed on people who would be subject to the mandate but did not obtain insurance would equal 2.5 percent of the difference between their adjusted gross income (modified to include tax-exempt interest and certain other sources of income) and the tax filing threshold ..." (Douglas W. Elmendorf, "Preliminary Analysis Of The Insurance Coverage Specifications Provided By The House Tri-Committee Group," Letter To Chairman Rangel, 7/17/09)
• [Here, I will add that the bill states that the taxes necessary to fund this plan will NOT be called a tax. Huh?]
  

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Fox News contributor Major Garrett, an a Robert Gibbs press conference, asked Gibbs to explain why he is learning that some Americans are getting emails from the White House without EVER having written to the White House. He asked if the White House also seeks other information to identify those to whom they send their emails without ever having received an email from them or visited the web site. Ending the exchange, Gibbs said, "Let me go someplace else that might be constructive."

[Next time, Garrett - don't ask such a difficult question!]

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Researchers who have examined the effects of preventive care generally find that the added costs of widespread use of preventive services tend to exceed the savings from averted illness

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AmericanSeniors.org. ASA’s Four Pillars: (Time to cancel AARP and go with this group? - I have)

• Social Security Reform
• Medicare Reform
• Tax Reform (Fair Tax)
• Keeping Citizen Benefits
out of the hands of illegal
aliens
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