An Open Letter to President Obama

July 30, 2009 by 14 Comments

Dear Mr. President,

I am reading the Health Reform bill and I do not like it at all. I do not think this is the direction in which our government should be going– specifically, that is, competing with private business and issuing mandates to employers about insuring employees and mandates to American citizens (and also to non-citizens!!!) about our bodies and our minds and even opening the door to monitoring how we raise our children.

I am not one who thinks highly of modern Western medicine with all its drugs and advanced technology. Instead, I tend to have confidence in the ability of the body and mind to heal themselves. I suspect that except for what doctors and hospitals accomplish in the case of trauma (i.e. mechanical repair and temporary life support,) a remarkable amount of “health” care in the U.S. is unnecessary, ineffective, and at times actually harmful. If amusement parks had the same accident record as some hospitals, they would undoubtedly be shut down.

I believe that food is the best medicine. Add an active lifestyle and a sound spiritual foundation and for the most part an individual can achieve health without the constant presence of doctors and certainly without government management.

Which brings me to the fact –by the way– that under your watch government is getting way too big way too fast in an enormous number of areas. This was unfortunately also the direction of the Bush administration. But by means of the stimulus horribilis bill you signed into law, the far- reaching arms of the government have been transformed. Now they are more like tentacles that would only grow longer if this Health Reform bill passes.

I am also concerned that you don’t seem to be following through on quite a number of your campaign promises. One particularly bothersome omission is that you promised (I thought) to bring bi-partisanship to Washington. I know this is a difficult task but some of your comments and your obvious feelings of irritation haven’t been helpful. The same goes for your supposed post-racial philosophy.

You promised transparency in your administration and you simply have not achieved that nor apparently have you made any efforts to do so. As far as I am concerned, your thinly disguised love of power and secrecy creates a frightening and dangerous combination.

Our nation and her people will be lucky to survive another three years of your administration. Another seven is totally out of the question

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Open Letter To Senator Grassley

July 30, 2009 by 17 Comments

An Open Letter to Senator Charles Grassley

By Representative Kent Sorenson

 

Senator Grassley,

Few Iowans, especially those of us who like you are in politics, command the respect and dignity you have over the course of your long and distinguished career.  On the other hand, I am merely a freshman state legislator who has yet to complete his first term, so I recognize the miles of difference between us in both achievement and experience.

However, as I watch you carry out your duties in the United States Senate as of late, I must confess that not only am I puzzled by some of your recent decisions, but so are thousands of your constituents across the state of Iowa as well.

Senator, I challenged an incumbent Democrat last year in my district in a year that strongly favored Democrats.  A young, popular, and charismatic colleague of yours in the U.S. Senate was at the top of the ballot as well, coasting to victory in Iowa’s presidential election.  I was underfunded.  I was practically ignored by the state Republican Party apparatus, who assumed I had little chance of victory – and given the facts on the ground I don’t blame them for that – and therefore offered only token assistance to my campaign.

I was even told by a Republican statehouse leader not to campaign on social issues, lest I risk being defined by the media as a member of what he described as “the God squad.”

Yet, despite all of these obstacles, and the fact that I went house-to-house in a Democratic district clearly and plainly defining where I stand on every issue in our party’s platform, my campaign defied conventional wisdom and emerged victorious on Election Day.

Not only that, but my race was one of only two in the 2008 election that took a seat away from the Democrats and gave it to the Republicans.

Because of that accomplishment, which is a rare feat as of late, I had hoped my campaign would be a model for our party across the board.  Ours is a party that should stand for the strong convictions in its platform, because it is supported by a grassroots that consists of people who share those strong convictions.  I know this firsthand, because I came out of those same grassroots that have supported your campaigns for several decades now.

That’s why many of us back home here in Iowa are troubled with some of your decisions as of late.  As the current statewide standard bearer for our party, at least until we defeat Governor Culver next year, the decisions and statements you make in Washington have a huge impact on the grassroots here at home.  Both my constituents and the people I talk to across the state are puzzled by the following:

  • Your vote for the so-called TARP program last fall.  That Bush bailout not only violated our party’s convictions, but it also violated our nation’s Constitution.  You expressed remorse that you were asking hard-working Iowans to bailout Wall Street, but you voted with Tom Harkin anyway.
  • Your vote to confirm Eric Holder as Attorney General of the United States.  According to a November 21, 2008 article at NewsMax, Holder was a “strong supporter of restrictive gun control” as President Clinton’s deputy attorney general.
  • The fact you told The Des Moines Register back in April you needed “30 days to think about” whether or not you support an amendment to the State Constitution defining marriage as one man and one woman.
  • The fact you said on Iowa Press back in April that county recorders needed to “follow the law” and issue marriage licenses to homosexuals.  The last time I read our State Constitution, I was working in the only prescribed body for the making of laws, and lawmakers didn’t vote to legalize homosexual marriages on any day of the session I attended, and I attended them all.
  • The fact that you have failed to flatly refuse to support President Obama’s attempted takeover of our healthcare system, and thus one-seventh of the U.S. economy.  It’s ironic that as more and more Americans are realizing the scope of what Obama is proposing, and coincidentally more and more Democrats are realizing the political backlash they will face at the polls next year if they vote for it, you at the very least are being portrayed as someone attempting to keep this empty hope and change alive with bi-partisan support. From its government mandates to rationing of healthcare, we need this bill completely defeated, not just negotiated down to a more manageable monstrosity.

Senator Grassley, I applaud you for your vote against confirming Sonia Sotomayor to the Supreme Court.  However, I would also like to encourage you to not stop there.

Ours is a state that is hemorrhaging young families like mine.  We are getting older and poorer.  I witnessed Democratic budget tactics in my first legislative session that in this nation’s past history would’ve seen them tarred and feathered by the very public they were attempting to fleece.

You have been in the U.S. Senate for a long time, but I’m guessing our country has never needed principled and bold leadership from its leaders more during your tenure than it does right now.

We are facing a war for our very way of life, both at home and abroad.  Senator Grassley, we need you to set an example of that principled and bold leadership that will inspire us both here in Iowa and across the country.

Iowans cannot afford any more of Obama-Culver-Gronstal government.  However, I fear that unless our party shows them something more righteous than “the lesser of two evils” as a comparison, that’s exactly what we’ll get.

Senator Grassley, Iowans need the bold convictions of our party platform like never before.  I wish to partner with you in advancing that platform if you’re interested in offering the principled and bold leadership Iowans need.

God bless,

Kent Sorenson

(Kent Sorenson is a Republican representing House District 74 in Warren County.)

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Culvers bright Idea for future is to take Iowa back to train travel?

July 30, 2009 by 6 Comments

Once upon a time in America you traveled by foot, then horse, then stage coach, then train and finally plane. Each  faster than the other. It would take days to travel from west coast to east coast by train and this remained the mode of travel til airplanes came along and cut the days down to hours. Now our not so  bright governor instead of promoting more daily airline flights to Chicago  from Des Moines or Cedar Rapids is taking us back to the past. Now if the airline industry can’t hardly  get enough  passengers every day to maintain daily flights to  Chicago from Des Moines or Cedar Rapids just how is Amtrak going to get enough passengers every day?  Amtrak is a lot faster than the old steam engines i did find some speed records of over 100 miles per hour in 1930s from steam engines but in this day and age of speed and super fast internet and cell phones we want to get there as quick as possible.  I could fly from Des Moines to Chicago go to a Cubs game and fly back home before the train would even get there.

I looked up Grey Hound it would get there about as fast as Amtrak would. It costs $162 dollars for a round trip from Ottumwa to Chicago and Amtrak is losing money. But Gov. Culver is working with Amtrak officials “to make Chicago-to-Iowa possible,” at a price ranging from $40 to $50 for a roundtrip ticket. That would take 3 times the passengers to equal the cost of the Ottumwa Amtrak trip.  So you can tell right away that this will lose money from the get go not to mention the $50+ million for track upgrade. They are planning on calling it the Chicago Flyer it ought to be named Rip Off Express!  Amtrak officials are expecting 120,000 to 190,000 passengers a year for this line i would like to know where they will get all these passengers to appear to ride something thats a by gone era of transportation. I guess everyone in Des Moines better least plan on one train trip a year! Well when were paying for it why not put it through?  Taxpayers provide over $100 for every 1000 miles traveled by each Amtrak passenger. This is turning out to be more of a political payback than necessity. I just can’t envision a multitude of Iowan’s  this day and age who would want to take so long to get there and back we want to get there faster and quicker not back to 1930s or 40s time. Because if that was the case more people would be driving to Ottumwa and riding Amtrak now.

In years past, Culver said, “Passenger rail really connected people in the Midwest. I think people miss that. … People are rather nostalgic about what this used to mean to their town.”   I’m sure the average Iowan or American wants to spend 10 hours on a train and think they are doing it for nostalgic reasons. I don’t know why even Culver is so thrilled with the passenger train idea since he was only 4 when Des Moines last had a regularly scheduled passenger train service that ended on  May 31, 1970, when the Rock Island Lines’ Chicago-Council Bluffs Cornbelt Rocket ceased operations. So please Governor tell us of your train rides back in the good ole days i would be thrilled to death to hear you tell some tall tales. Maybe you was on the train with Babe Ruth!?  Not considering he died in 1948 and you wasn’t born til 1966. I don’t think being nostalgic is worth this cost. I should run for governor i think the old west was pretty wild so i will bring back a stage coach line to Chicago and have bandits shoot at passengers.  Boy that sounds nostalgic doesn’t it !?

Amtrak has never turned a profit and your telling me  in these times when we need to carefully spend money that this is a good idea. I don’t think we need to be spending money on a  upgrade of a blast from the past. I think  he’s got some money invested in this hoping to reap big rewards from the government.  I got news for Culver were BROKE and printing money faster than Parker Brothers for Monopoly. Its a matter of time before it devaluates and becomes worthless.  I’m 43 and have had no interest in going to Chicago or reason to go there in my lifetime. I would rather see the money spent creating jobs in Iowa not making another Amtrak non profit line.

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Democrats Care About People (Unless You are an Old Person or a Baby)

July 27, 2009 by 3 Comments

The other day I saw a bumper sticker on a car that said I vote Democrat because they care about people.  I just had to laugh at the irony of it all.  Care about people?  Really?

The recent poster child for “caring about people” is the aide to Democrat Representative Paul Tonko of New York who admitted while talking about the health care legislation that she gets paid to read the bill for Tonko.  I guess caring about people means that you spend a trillion dollars of your constituents’ money on something you didn’t even read.

The aide then goes on to admit that “probably the best part of the bill is the increase in Hospice care which will solve the prolonging of life issue.”    It looks like Democrats care about people so much that they got both ends of the life spectrum covered.  They dole out money to snuff out life in the beginning stages and now they fund ending life sooner in the later stages.  I guess they only care about you if you meet their criteria of quality of human life.

It all makes sense.  In order for ObamaCare to even remotely work there has to be a fixed amount of people that it can cover.  How do you achieve that?  Promote abortions (which taxpayers will be footing the bill for) and dying with dignity.  To heck with you if it costs too much to keep you alive.  Remember, Democrats care about people.  Hope and Change.

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Christopher Dodd struggling with Independent voters

July 23, 2009 by Leave a Comment

Voters are paying attention to what is happening in Washington, D.C. As noted in this recent poll Christopher Dodd has a 52 % disapproval rating and is struggling with Independent voters.

Here is a portion of the article:

“Dodd’s most glaring weakness continues to be that a majority of voters say he is not honest and trustworthy. This is not something that will be easy for Dodd to reverse,” adds Schwartz.
The poll indicates Dodd trails former Congressman Rob Simmons, a likely Republican challenger, 48 to 39 percent in a hypothetical matchup in next year’s senate race.

“not honest and trustworthy”…

I can only hope that other liberal Democrats and RINO’s are concerned about their fate in the next election cycle. Iowans will need to look at the decisions and votes that Harkin and Grassley have made. If Connecticut voters are having second thoughts there is hope that Iowa voters will seriously consider a change for Iowa.

Almost every day I am told by family, friends, and coworkers that they are considering becoming Independent voters. Democrats and Republicans need to be on notice that the grass roots are restless and paying attention to what is happening in America.

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Inequities of government-run health insurance programs

July 22, 2009 by 4 Comments

Following is an opinion piece written by Paul R. Zietlow, CLU, ChFC, RHU, NAIFA IOWA and shared with his permission.

The “public option” is a term being used for a government- run health insurance program. While change is needed, a government run plan would soon put private plans out of business due to inequities of the plan. The government:
•    Would not have to pay state premium tax like private plans. Private plans currently pay $40 million to the State of Iowa every year.
•    Would not have to set aside reserve funds to pay future losses like private plans are required to do.
•    Would not have to cover Medicare’s “lower payments” that are shifted to private insurance plans by providers to cover their cost of operation.
•    Would use the IRS to collect premiums and not count it as health care administration cost.
•    Would replace several thousand jobs in Iowa with jobs in other states.
•    Would eventually determine eligible procedures and set the prices (rationed care).
•    Would not follow individual state mandates like private insurance are required.
•    Could operate at a loss and still remain in business. They would raise other fees and taxes to make up the difference.
•    By lowering prices would force small rural hospitals and physician clinics out of business. “Older” physicians may simply “retire” rather than work for less income creating an even greater shortage of doctors and longer waiting lines.

We have a great healthcare system in Iowa. To make it better and lower the cost, we need to:
•    Require healthcare providers to publish their fees for consumers to see before the service is provided.
•    Allow consumers to make the choice for their own healthcare and (like Lasik eye surgery) pay for those choices.
•    Guarantee to insure everyone (government can subsidize high risk consumers).
•    Require consumers to pay the basic cost of healthcare (deductible) and insure the catastrophic loss (pay 100% of everything about the deductible).
•    Utilize Health Savings Accounts to pay for basic healthcare (deductible) and incorporate wellness expenses

When consumers have options and pay for services, they find better solutions than the government’s perceived “free” care. Government monopolies have not been more efficient than private industry in the past, so why do we think that that the “government option” would be any better?

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Universal Health Care not the right medicine now.

July 22, 2009 by 6 Comments

From way i have been looking at this is. Sure we would have universal health care but when someone gets to determine if your treatement is going to cost to much you are going turned away.  Also if your to old your basically told to go home and prepare to die or they send you to a hospice to pass your final days in. Is this the type of care we want? Do you want a board of strangers saying if your loved one gets to live or have treatment or leave them to die? I sure would not want this. How many premature babies would be left to die? Hmm to many heart angioplasty’s are being done they say. When you have already had a heart attack and your artery is 95% clogged or more is jogging gonna help it ? Yeah might get you to a quicker grave so then the procedure won’t be needed.

A typical Canadian seeking surgical or other therapeutic treatment had to wait 18.3 weeks in 2007, an all-time high, according to new research published Monday by independent research organization the Fraser Institute. Read on down in that article it will show how  long it takes in other parts of Canada and in Newfoundland and Labrador residents waited longest (20.0 weeks) for a MRI. Imagine your son or daughter messing up their ACL or MCL knee ligaments and having to wait 20 weeks just to have a MRI thats just 6 weeks short of being half a year. Then how long before the surgery can be preformed on the knee after hard to tell but i bet its going to be around a year before you get the surgery and then another 6-8 weeks wait to get in for physical therapy.  

So we will have a huge wait times we will see rises in cancer deaths and brain tumors that could have been removed and a life saved  just for a few. A brain tumor can’t be delayed.We will be put on lists or not at all and these won’t be Canadians we don’t know. It will be your family members  and friends, cousins, aunts, uncles, grandparents. How many of you would be so willing to want this health care if it turns your own child away or parents ? Because they are getting to old or its gonna cost to much.

 In England from January 2009  no-one should wait more than 18 weeks from the time they are referred to the start of treatment, unless it is clinically appropriate or they choose to wait longer. We have better heatlh care than that now. 18 week wait or longer if they choose to wait. Right  i don’t think you would  want to wait longer if your  having chest pains.

 Knowing from history of last 7 months we should not  be rushing bills through. The stimulus sure hasn’t helped stimulate the economy as Obama claimed if we didn’t pass it unemployment is still climbing. Meanwhile Obama holds the gun to congress’s head demanding a bill on his desk by August. Mr Hope and Change is quickly turning into Mr. Hope and let it all ride. Please anyone do not tell him what the next monitary dollar amount is beyond Trillion i’m sure he would try to spend it.I just wonder how long it will take to get to one quadrillion? Which is 1000 trillion we’re well on our way to 100 trillion with Social Security IOU’s to the Baby boomer generation and the National Debt throw in the Cost of Universal Health Care and maybe Cap and Trade that should pretty well take care of 100 trillion dollars.  I bet the printing presses are cranking out the money. By end of this year they will burn through 4 Trillion dollars thats about 11 billion a day. We didn’t have this amount of money to begin with and we didn’t borrow. They have  borrowed it from our kids and grand kids and kids yet to be born for along time to come. So we must have printed it. How long will it be before we are packing around some monopoly money ? Our forefathers must be rolling over in their graves at the massive government thats ruining this country.

Why is Obama trying to get this pushed through so fast??  Here will be another bill that most of congress and most likely the president won’t even read nor care.Why isn’t anyone  asking Obama  if it will cover people who are not a legal citizen?    If this is gonna be so important and big then slow down take the time to go over it throughly and come up with more ideas to cut costs and limit lawsuits amounts and do this right ! I don’t think there would be many of you out there willing to pay over 50% of your income in to pay for this. If you had great job and made a million a year you would be paying in over $500,000 . I think they take out enough already.  

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Clarke County land grab: Where is the Farm Bureau?

July 22, 2009 by Leave a Comment

In a sharp and pointed Letter to the Editor that appears in the Osceola Sentinel – Tribune, Michael Patterson asks “Why haven’t we heard from Farm Bureau?”

Patterson states that it is time for the Farm Bureau to step up to the plate and honor their rhetoric and obligations to those who have supported their organization for many years.

With 1,100 acres that are designated as being prime agricultural land and permanent loss of over 15 percent of farmland in Washington County at risk of being taken up for the recreational lake, I can see why Mr. Patterson is calling on Farm Bureau as well as local banks to speak out for their customers. He speaks of “treasured customers”. What a great term. “Treasured customers”, valued citizens, hard working Americans, and people who are being terrorized and bullied. What a concept to rally around community people!

Way to go, Mr. Patterson! I hope you get your answer soon. Nothing like organizations being responsible to the customers and standing up for the underdog!

In closing I quote from Mr. Patterson’s letter:

Will someone please alert the World Health Organization and the Center for Disease Control that we are experiencing a pandemic of laryngitis and public apathy here in Clarke County?

From a distance I say thank you, Mr. Patterson, for finding YOUR voice about the land grab/eminent domain issue in Clarke County. You are a great American and Iowa Citizen. I salute your efforts on behalf of all landowners.

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Guest Commentary: Shaw Issues a Challenge

July 21, 2009 by 3 Comments

tom-shaw-1I most strongly propose an amendment to Iowa’s Constitution which would provide an absolute guarantee of the individual right for Iowans to “Keep and Bear Arms.”   I believe that the following language, adopted from Idaho’s state constitution, would ensure against state infringement on this most important right:

 

“The people have the right to keep and bear arms, which right shall not be abridged; but this provision shall not prevent the passage of laws to govern the carrying of weapons concealed on the person nor prevent passage of legislation providing minimum sentences for crimes committed while in possession of a firearm, nor prevent the passage of legislation providing penalties for the possession of firearms by a convicted felon, nor prevent the passage of any legislation punishing the use of a firearm. No law shall impose licensure, registration or special taxation on the ownership or possession of firearms or ammunition. Nor shall any law permit the confiscation of firearms, except those actually used in the commission of a felony.

 

Iowa is one of only six states that does not provide a constitutional guarantee to its citizens.  This leaves Iowans vulnerable to gun control groups to advocate for restrictions on the ownership of firearms and ammunition.  The gun control groups could use the same tactics used by homosexual activist groups in legalizing gay marriage.

 

The Second Amendment to the United States Constitution provides the basis for individual citizens to keep and bear arms.  This individual right was recently affirmed by the U.S. Supreme Court in its decision of District of Columbia v. Heller.  In reaching its conclusion, the Court considered many factors, one of which was that several of the original states included Second Amendment language in their own constitutions.  It drove home the point that that armed citizens are essential to the defense and security of individuals, states, and the nation.

 

Iowa’s constitution (Art. I, § 1) states: “All men are, by nature, free and equal, and have certain inalienable rights—among which are those of enjoying and defending life and liberty, acquiring, possessing and protecting property, and pursuing and obtaining safety and happiness.”  What is missing is the guarantee of the individual right to keep and bear arms in order to defend life, liberty, and property.

 

It is important at this time to affirm Iowans’ right to keep and bear arms as failure to do so may result in restrictions which do not outright ban firearms ownership, but rather make ownership difficult or unduly expensive.  Consider this from the (Iowa) Legislative Services Agency (Legal Services Division for the General Assembly):  “The Supreme Court’s decision interprets the Second Amendment’s “right of the people to keep and bear arms” and is limited in application to the District of Columbia’s total ban on handgun possession in a private District of Columbia residence.  The case involved only federal law, so the Court’s decision does not apply directly to the states.  Although the Court did caution that the Second Amendment right is not unlimited as possession by felons and mentally ill persons may be prohibited, for example, the Court did not specify or give guidance on what such limitations are or should be in regard to State or local gun laws.  The exact scope of permissible firearm regulations by the states is thus left unsettled.” (emphasis added) 

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Jeaneane Garafalo opens mouth and inserts foot Again !

July 21, 2009 by Leave a Comment

Once again Jeaneane has showed us just how much brains some of the Hollywood elite really have. She spoke out about the tea parties and called us red neck tea baggers. Teabagger is a slang term from the homosexual world. That we have no right to complain about how our tax money is being spent.She recently spoke to the BBC radio this past weekend and once again showed us that she doesn’t have the brains God gave a ant.  And shows me just how stupid and blind and self absorbed these people really are. GAROFALO said to a BBC reporter: “The, mostly the media in the States is much more to the right. I mean there is almost no liberal outlet for news commentary or editorializing. And also, they have an unfortunate need to make it combative where they have people that wind up devolving into a shouting match of sorts”.She has spoke out that anyone was racist that didn’t support Obama. Why do these narcissistic people spew out what they do? She is so far from reality its not funny and with this comment i wonder what planet she is even on ?  I have to say shes so full of it i bet she has brown eyes. Oh yeah Obama sure has difficulty getting out there and getting his agenda across. He has ABC in his pocket they came to the White House to put him on promoting his Obama care with no rebuttal from Republicans nor any experts that could have  come on and say we cannot afford this. He has most of the media on his side.There are plenty of liberal news and talk shows she can get her point across. Liberals don’t even like to be questioned its a threat to thier intelligence or lack there of . And once you corner one with facts they are known to lash out and refuse to listen to the facts. It is quite funny when you have the facts and let them have it. They come apart at the seams. I like to least hear both sides before i make my decision.  For her to say this i wonder if shes so full of herself that  she doesn’t realize the world and news is so much smaller and faster with internet. Maybe she thought she could buffalo a BBC reporter with the crap she spewed. Or she thought since this is England it won’t get back to the US.  I wasn’t going to write about this but the more times i heard it played the madder i got at her. She must think she is the smartest person on the planet and were all dumbies. I just wish she would keep her mouth shut and don’t go away angry just go away Ms. Garafalo.

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