Obama Goons Get First Casualty, Valerie Jarrett’s Fingerprints Are All Over This One

[H/T The Blacksphere]: It didn’t take long for Obama’s “goons” to make it clear that they won’t abide turncoats…though the disloyal outcast’s position is a shocker!

Despite the lie Obama told, don’t think he plans to let ObamaCare go down easily. Those who aid and abet the enemy–free market insurance–will get their walking papers. And that’s just what happened in DC, according to Fox News:

The District of Columbia’s insurance commissioner says he was fired after questioning President Obama’s plan to fix ObamaCare and saying the city might not follow his suggestions.

Commissioner William White told The Washington Post on Saturday that he was called into Mayor Vincent Gray’s office the prior day and told the Democratic mayor “wants to go in a different direction.”

In what could be considered “black on black crime,” the link to former DC Insurance Commissioner William P. White on the DC website has been redirected to his successor, Chester McPherson.

You can tell how fast all of this occurred, as there is only one small graphic of McPherson that I could find on all of the internet, and it’s a 100×100 thumbnail.

This is the Obama “machine” in full view, and you can bet Valerie Jarrett’s fingerprints are all over this one.

BENGHAZI UPDATE: Staffers Told: ‘You Are On Your Own,’ Lawmaker Puts Blame Squarely on Hillary Clinton

[H/T WND]: A congressman has revealed a new detail about the 2012 Benghazi attack, disclosing that staff members at the besieged U.S. special mission were told in a directive, “You are on your own.”

In an interview with CNN yesterday, Rep. Lynn Westmoreland, R-Ga., chairman of the House Intelligence Subcommittee, charged the State Department, then run by Hillary Clinton, was culpable in the attack and ensuing cover-up.

While CNN.com focused on a different aspect of Westmoreland’s interview, running the headline “GOP Rep: Benghazi Not A ‘Complete Cover-Up,’” other statements made in the nine-minute sit-down may be more significant.

Westmoreland’s committee recently questioned CIA agents and contractors who were on the ground during the attack.

The lawmaker told CNN his committee learned a directive was issued Aug. 11 – one month before the attack – telling Benghazi staff they were on their own.

“And so we are looking into that directive to find out exactly who put that out,” he stated.

Asked whether he thought the government did its job to protect the facility, Westmoreland replied, “Absolutely not.”

He pointed specifically to the State Department.

“I think this will come back to the State Department,” he said.

Later in the interview, he again pointed to Clinton’s State Department for making what he said were claims contradicted by the intelligence community.

“You had the State Department trying to tell one story, and you had the security – the intelligence community – that may have been trying to sell another story,” he said.

Westmoreland said the Benghazi compound “itself is not set up for protection.”

He stated that when his committee interviewed the people who were on the ground, “they said they were really surprised that the lack of security at the mission facility.”

“They also testified that the people at the facility had been wanting help, requesting help, requesting additional security,” he said.

Westmoreland said “they just couldn’t believe that those guys were over there as unprepared and unequipped as they were.”

With research by Joshua Klein.

SEAL Team 6: Bin Laden Shooter Says Suspect Did Not Look Like Bin Laden – Must See Video

[H/T Red Flag News]: During a 60 Minutes interview, a SEAL Team 6 member who fired at a subject alleged to be Osama Bin Laden, said that he did not recognize the subject as being Bin Laden.

Earlier this year, in response to an open records request, the Pentagon told the Associated Press it could not locate any photographs or video taken during the raid or showing Bin Laden’s body. It also said it could not find any images of Bin Laden’s body on the Navy aircraft carrier where the al-Qaida leader’s body was taken. The Pentagon also said it could not find any death certificate, autopsy report or results of DNA identification tests for Bin Laden.

So Hideous, You Need to Read it Yourself, Politico Reporter: ‘So, 4000 Rubes are Dead, Cry Me the Tigris’

I normally pay no heed to this vile garbage; illegitimate human beings, but this one really hit me as extraordinarily vile, even for the left.  This one needed to be called out.  Written by Politico Magazine reporter Ian Murphy during the Iraq War, his deploring written words will astonish you.

[H/T Breitbart]: “So, 4000 rubes are dead. Cry me the Tigris. Another 30,000 have been seriously wounded. Boo fucking hoo. They got what they asked for–and cool robotic limbs too.”

Thus begins a virulent anti-American soldier screed titled “Fuck the Troops,” written by Politico Magazine reporter Ian Murphy during the Iraq War. His current offering for Politico, “How I Punked Scott Walker,”appeared yesterday as the number two profiled story in the website’s new magazine. It describes Murphy’s failed attempt to upend the Wisconsin Governor’s historic battle against public service union collective bargaining rights.

Murphy’s May 2008 column appeared as the intense combat of “the surge” was winding down. As Murphy said “…our soldiers are lauded by all as saints. Why? They volunteered to partake in this savage idiocy, and for this they deserve our utmost repsect. I think not… stop sucking off the troops. They get enough action raping female soldiers and sodomizing Iraqi detainees.”

Murphy goes on to question young Americans’ service in defense of their country:

As a society we need to discard our blind deference to military service. There’s nothing admirable about voluteering to murder people… but what kind of world would we rather live in: one where fools are admired for being fooled and murderers are extolled for murdering, or one where we have the capacity to step back and say, “I don’t care who told you to do what and why; you’re still an asshole!”

Murphy admits that he is not certain about particular basic facts surrounding the authorization for the use of combat troops in the Iraq War because “I was doing a lot of heavy narcotics back in ’03.”

Using Murphy as a columnist for their magazine seems an odd and risky choice, as Politico has a national defense “Morning Tip Sheet,” a “Politico Pro” Defense policy offering, and a print edition that is a stocked with ads from major defense contractors.

Politico did not respond to a request for comment.

Allen West: ‘Our Enemies are Watching Us Slowly Dismantle Military Capability,’ Realignment of Military Budget Must Have Enemies Cheering

Realignment of military budget must have enemies cheering.  We are no longer safe fellow patriots.

[H/T Allen West]: According to the New York Times, Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel is pondering “realignment” of the military budget, which means a shift in strategic posture. That’s the sort of news which should cause grave concern about our military readiness – unless, of course, you’re one of our enemies.

According to Secretary Hagel, “The Army was the principal institution fighting those two wars (Iraq and Afghanistan), as the armies normally are in land wars,” Mr. Hagel said. “So as those requirements have come down, there’s going to be an adjustment.” That view is driving a new look at the Pentagon’s traditional, even distribution of funds. Hagel further states, “I don’t think you can just make easy, simple assertions based on simple formulas — a third, a third, a third,” he said. “That might turn out to be just about right, but it may not.”

Obamacare Official Admits Something So Incredible You’ll Wonder Why You’re Just Now Hearing About It

[H/T The Blaze]: A large portion of the error-riddled, multimillion dollar federal health insurance exchange system has not even been built yet, according to a senior official involved in the construction of the website.

Deputy chief information officer of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services Henry Chao (Getty Images)

The revelation came Tuesday during a House Energy and Commerce Committee hearing on the possible security risks surrounding healthcare.gov.

“The committee’s been reviewing materials that indicate that some parts of healthcare.gov were not completed before the launch, as we’ve discussed here,” Rep. Cory Gardner (R-Colo.) said. “What portion of the website remained to be created when you launched on October 1st?”

“I don’t have an exact percentage,” said Henry Chao, deputy chief information officer of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. “I look at it in terms of overall marketplace systems.”

“I think it was a set of priority functions that needed to be in place,” Chao added.

“Well, how much do we have to build today?” Gardner pressed.

“Just an approximation, we’re probably sitting somewhere between 60 and 70 percent,” Chao said.

“Sixty to 70 percent that needs to be built still?” Gardner said.

“We still have to build the payment systems to make payments to issuers in January,” the Obamacare official said before adding, “the online application, verification, determination, plan compare, getting enrolled, generating enrollment transaction – that’s 100 percent there.”

“But the entire system is 60 to 70 percent away from being complete,” Gardner said.

“There’s the back office systems, the accounting systems, the payment systems … they still need to be done,” Chao said.

Chao, not disputing the figure, said the 60 to 70 percent that has yet to be built would be tested “in the exact same manner we tested everything else.”

But here’s something: Later in the hearing, Chao referred to the remaining 30 to 40 percent of the system that has yet to be built.

Perhaps he flipped the percentages in his head? This would seem strange considering Gardner repeatedly pressed him on the 70 percent figure.

“(R)egardless of the exact number, Chao’s response is utterly devastating,” Townhall’s Guy Benson wrote. “Somewhere between 30 and 70 percent of Obamacare’s online system has not yet been constructed or tested. They’ve had over three years.”

 

Obamacare: After Shifting Blame to Insurers, Obama May Give Them Subsidies

[H/T Washington Times]: President Obama has decided to attack the insurers again. But maybe he’s decided to subsidize them even more. Or both.

In waiving the part of Obamacare that outlaws many insurance plans, Obama tried to shift blame for any cancellations to the insurers. But on Friday, he met with representatives from these same companies, sparking speculation that he had plans to offer them subsidies to help smooth Obamacare’s rocky rollout.

This seeming schizophrenia is standard fare in the love-hate relationship between Obama and the insurers.

Obama raised $1.34 million from the “Health Services/HMOs” industry in 2008, according to the Center for Responsive Politics. That is the most any candidate has ever raised from this industry in history, and more than twice what John McCain raised that year.

Right after Obama’s election, America’s Health Insurance Plans (AHIP) – the top lobby for the industry – announced a reform proposal that ended up forming the heart of Obamacare: an individual mandate, plus a requirement that insurers cover all comers and all pre-existing conditions.

The second law Obama signed was the Children’s Health Insurance Program Reauthorization Act, which expanded a program to subsidize poor children’s insurance so that it would also subsidize the insurance of middle-class young adults. AHIP had championed this legislation.

As Congress began crafting Obamacare, the insurance industry pledged a million dollars in ad buys promoting “reform.” Obama dropped the insurers’ most hated proposal: a government-run insurer, or “public option.” Obama soon also adopted the industry’s Holy Grail: the individual mandate. Of course, insurance subsidies were always part of the proposal.

Soon, though, things soured. The health industries that spent more on lobbying – drugmakers, hospitals, and doctors – soon elbowed the insurers out of the way. In a deft move, the drugmakers pledged money to help Democratic senators endangered by voting for the bill.

Most importantly, probably, the White House got polling data in the summer of 2009 showing that it was politically popular to campaign against health insurance companies. That’s when the White House rhetoric shifted from talking about “health care reform” to promising “health insurance reform.”

Insurers soured on the bill. Rules limiting insurer profits (known as “Medical Loss Ratio” regulations) could be used to kill private insurers. AHIP complained the law didn’t do enough to limit health care spending. The law also included a tax levied only on insurers.

By the end of 2009, insurers were funneling money to outside groups trying to kill the bill, and Obama was mercilessly flogging the industry for its intransigence. Still, things were complicated.

Lobbyists for AHIP, Blue Cross and the other major insurers went to the mat to try and elect Martha Coakley in the January 2010 special election. The election was clearly a referendum on Obamacare, and Coakley was supposed to be the 60th vote for the law. Coakley lost to Scott Brown, despite the health lobbyists’ best efforts.

A few months after the law passed, Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius sternly warned the industry against talking about its effects. “It has come to my attention that several health insurer carriers are sending letters to their enrollees falsely blaming premium increases for 2011 on the patient protections in the Affordable Care Act,” Sebelius wrote AHIP head Karen Ignagni, darkly warning “there will be zero tolerance for this type of misinformation…”

Still, the insurers soon started loving Obamacare again. In the 2012 election, Obama led Romney in money raised from the insurance industry.

When conservatives challenged Obamacare’s constitutionality, Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts filed a brief with the court, siding with the administration.

Sebelius soon started hitting up the insurers for contributions to Enroll America – the nonprofit organization tasked with recruiting customers for the exchanges.

In 50 states, the insurers lobbied lawmakers to implement Obamacare by expanding Medicaid and creating state-level exchanges. For instance, the Missouri Association of Health Plans was a leading member of the state’s Medicaid Expansion Coalition. In Idaho, a state senator who was also an insurance agent argued “Idaho’s insurance industry would lose out under a federal exchange, which likely would focus on national companies rather than Idaho insurers.”

Now, Obama is shifting blame to insurers, and threatening to weaken the insurance pool by allowing low-risk customers to keep low-premium plans. Simultaneously, he may be offering insurers some sort of bailout.

If you’re confused by this relationship, you’ve been paying attention.

OBAMA: Removes ‘under God’ from Gettysburg Address

[H/T Breitbart]: Washington DC talk show host Chris Plante reported today that Barack Obama omitted the words “under God” from the Gettysburg Address when reciting the great speech for a Ken Burns documentary.

Burns had filmed all living presidents as well as various Hollywood personalities and luminaries to pay homage to the speech which was delivered by Abraham Lincoln 150 years ago, today.

Plante broke the story on Washington DC talk radio station WMAL on his mid-morning program, “The Chris Plante Show.”

WMAL reports:

Curiously enough, in his version of the speech, President Barack Obama’s delivery contained an omission – in a line that every other celebrity delivered as “that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom,” the President left out the words “under God.”

The video of Obama’s rendition of the speech can be seen below. It is unlisted (for now) on the Ken Burns YouTube page.