How to become President in four months

Barack Obama on Sarah Palin:

"...At least one savvy politician—Barack Obama—believed Palin would never have time to get up to speed. He told his aides that it had taken him four months to learn how to be a national candidate, and added, “I don’t care how talented she is, this is really a leap.”

From http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/features/2009/08/sarah-palin200908

I look at the way the liberal media HATES her and George W. Bush - It is scary how open they are with their hate.

Judge Sotomayer...

...should be confirmed. Although I am probably as much on the conservative side of the political spectrum as Judge Sotomayer is on the liberal side, I believe that the President should have his judicial picks confirmed, as long as they are qualified, as Judge Sotomayer clearly is.

No President should have to do what President Bush had to do, which is to first nominate someone clearly unqualified so that when the replacement candidate is named, the energy has already been expended opposing the original pick and the replacement pick can be confirmed.

Reforming Health Care Jbirdme's way

Here is my proposal for reforming health care in the USA:

Catastrophic coverage run through private insurance with a upper limit (8% of income) with Medicaid to expand to cover those who cannot afford the upper limit . This coverage would kick in when someone, in a calender year, has spent over $5,000 or $7,500 on any healthcare related expense. It would cover hospitalization, visits with physicians (incl. nurse practitioners and physician assistants), medications and "durable medical equipment". To reach the $5,000 or $7,500 limit, any healthcare expense that is covered by a Section 125 plan would be included, even though many of these expenses would not be covered by the catastropic insurance itself.

Expansion of the Federally Qualified Health Centers (FQHC)/Rural Health Clinics (RHC) to allow communities and providers to offer affordable healthcare with strings attached. FQHC's, otherwise known as community health centers, offer comprehensive healthcare to low income communities, with the Governement subsidizing through grants and cost-based reimbursement. RHC's allow private physicians in rural, underserved areas to obtain cost-based reimbursement for Medicare. I would expand/reform these programs beyond rural and low income areas to provide cost-based reimbursement for all patients based on the patients being charged according to a sliding scale based on income. If a person has insurance, the sliding scale would apply to the copay, deductible, etc. In both the FQHCs and RHCs, the cost-based reimbursement would have an upper limit per visit, as they do now.

Reform of the malpractice system. Yesterday, I read an article that says that overuse and unnecessary use of the healthcare system is driven by physicians paid for treating illness, not maintaining health. I think these costs are driven by fears of malpractice. Someone who wants to sue his physician should have two choices: 1) a healthcare court which gives awards based on the injury, not on the supposed 'neglegence'; and 2) use a regular court, but the plantiff must prove the 'negligence' according to a very high standard, and if the physician successfully argues that his care was based on the correct use of a national guideline or other evidence-based practice, the plaintiff loses.

Expansion of HSAs. A person should be able to save $ tax free for any healthcare cost that would be covered by a section 125 plan.

Creativity The most important outcome of this would be to open up the healthcare system to true market forces and allow the "vendors" to package healthcare services in ways that are currently not covered by health insurance. This is where I think the American version of national health care can be better than France's, Germany's, Australia's and anyone elses healthcare system.

State Security Secrets - Bush and Obama

The NY Times, in an editorial today, critisized the Obama administration for going to court and using the same arguments that the Bush administration used in asking that certain terrorism-related cases not be tried in open court. The NY Times is very disapointed in Obama, basically calling him out for lying on the campaign trail.

Did it ever occur to the Times that now that President Obama has access to the same information that President Bush had, he realizes that the actions that President Bush undertook were in fact justified and necessary, and that the security of the United States depends on his continuing the policies of his predecessor?