The government paid more than $47 billion in questionable Medicare claims including medical treatment showing little relation to a patient's condition, wasting taxpayer dollars at a rate nearly three times the previous year. That's $1 billion per state. Per year. How would your state like to have that kind of money put into their coffers? And I'm pretty sure it's worse than that.
Excerpts of a new federal report, obtained by The Associated Press, show a dramatic increase in improper payments in the $440 billion Medicare program that has been cited by government auditors as a high risk for fraud and waste for 20 years.
#1
The 'providers' are driving up the baseline from which Obamacare is going to the measured from. Specifically, the point from which the government is going to dictate 'savings' cuts. If you set your margins high enough, you'll find yourself back at the pre-program level rather than below the standard you had been working prior. They're padding the books.
KEVIN Rudd will apologise today to thousands of Australians shipped from Britain as children with the promise of a better life, only to face abuse and neglect. The Prime Minister will also say sorry to many more thousands of "forgotten Australians" who suffered in orphanages, foster homes and care between the 1930s and 1970s.
Britain sent more than 130,000 poor children to Australia and other former colonies in the last century, many wiithout the knowledge or consent of their parents, according to the charity Child Migrants Trust.
Specialist agencies sent them abroad to populate British colonies with "good white British stock", the charity said, but most ended up in state institutions or farm schools.
Hundreds of former child migrants are expected in Canberra today to hear Mr Rudd's apology. It will cover 500,000 minors placed in care over the 40-year period, including some 7000 sent from Britain and still living in Australia.
British Prime Minister Gordon Brown is to make his own apology, probably early next year.
"The apology is symbolically very important," Britain's Children's Secretary Ed Balls told Sky News.
It was a "matter of shame" that the "terrible policy" had continued for so long, he added.
"It would never happen today. But I think it is right that as a society when we look back and see things which we now know were morally wrong, that we are willing to say we're sorry."
Compensation battle
Former child migrant Harold Haig will witness the Rudd speech today. "We were told we were orphans and we found out in our '40s, '50s and '60s that was all a lie," he said. "We see the national apology as the first step, but our struggle for compensation will not end."
Compensation schemes exist in Queensland, Western Australia and Tasmania and cases are before the courts in Victoria and NSW. Federal governments allocated more than $1 million to Child Migrant Trust branches in Melbourne and Perth but contributions have now ceased.
Julie Pearson, one of the children who lived in orphanages and institutions, will also be at Parliament House in Canberra to hear Mr Rudd's words, which she hopes will mark the beginning of the healing process.
"It's going to be hard for all of us, but we are finally going to get the apology we deserve - and it means so much to me," Ms Pearson, who was placed in a home during the 1970s, said.
#2
From the comments: "My nan searched her whole adult life for the 2 sisters and brother that were stolen from her family and were 2 shipped off to canada and 1 to America as servants (nice way to say slave) to well to do families."
Ok, when the heck did the Brits send orphans to the US!?
Didn't we have enough orphans of our own by the 20th century - did we really need to import British children? I know there were British evacuees during WWII - but IIRC, they were sent with the consent of their families, and they (the families) really had to pull strings to get their children sent to what was perceived as safety in the US.
This comment struck me as really ... curious. Did Brit social/church services in the late 19th and 20th centuries have a policy of shipping children to the US to be servants!?
#3
Next up, Rudd will apologize to all those who were NOT taken from their abusive and neglectful parents.
Crimony. The comments are full of tales of beatings and servitude. This was the way of the world at that time, and many children who grew up with their biological parents experienced the same thing.
#4
Probably meant Canada, Sgt. Mom. I can't imagine we'd have taken distressed children in to be servants when we had plenty of our own in orphanages who'd have been happy to have the jobs.
#1
And the consequence, a bursting of the bubble in stock and property markets worldwide due to the carry trade, which will make the meltdown in the financial markets in '08 look like a hiccup.
Major Hasans computer indicated that he had logged on to Web sites that celebrated radical Islamic ideologies and that he had exchanged e-mail messages with Imam Al-Awlaki.
Intelligence agencies intercepted communications last year and this year between the two. But federal authorities dropped an inquiry into the matter after deciding that the messages warranted no further action because which they said gave no indication that he was likely to engage in violence.
Imam Al-Awlaki is a high ranking member of Al-Qaeda prior to the event and his communications were intercepted by the NSA who was keeping an eye on him. NSA turned the information over to the FBI which was afraid to act on it not because there were no outright threats of violence but because Hasan was Muslim and they would be accused of discrimination, not investigation.
The strategy of the terrorist support lobby in America had worked. The FBI was afraid of a lawsuit from CAIR a group of filthy traitorous scum determined to security strip America as part of a hidden Islamist agenda. CAIR works closely with the ACLU. The two organizations had worked together to cripple the NSA.
If not for this litigious group with unlimited resources there would have been action taken against Major Hasan. The emails dealt with questions regarding Islam and indicated that Hasan was about to make a big decision and sought counseling or a fatwa. But even if they concerned Halal recipes for lamb the fact that an American officer was in touch with someone like Al-Awlaki, who had a hand in 9/11, must have set of alarm bells at the Bureau but CAIR had them stalemated.
CAIR continues to raise funds to sue any individual or branch of government that discriminates against Muslims. CAIR was what the FBI and military were afraid of because they have a long history of litigiousness.
For example CAIR represented a veteran of the American military and a doctor in trying to force the USG to grant them citizenship. Had Hasan been fired just for his radical beliefs combined with the fact he was Muslim CAIR would have sued the US Army. They succeeded in tying the hands of intelligence agencies via the justice system and their goal of killing Americans was achieved.
CAIR had to put out a page dispelling all the rumors about it. CAIR ALSO PULLED THAT TRIGGER AND MUST BE DESTROYED LEGALLY.
Posted by: AJ Weberman ||
11/15/2009 11:10 ||
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America's long campaign to defeat Al Qaeda took a largely untested turn on Friday with a decision by US Attorney General Eric Holder to put the key 9/11 suspects on trial in a civilian court just blocks from where the World Trade Center once stood.
If he's right, Mr. Holder's choice to treat Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and four other Guantánamo Bay detainees as normal criminals and to put America's rule of law on display for all terrorists to see will likely keep Americans safer from another Al Qaeda-inspired attack.
President Bush, of course, prevented another 9/11-style attack during his time in office. But he treated terror suspects as outside civilian law, subject to only military trials or no trials at all.
Barack Obama's election a year ago promised a new tactic, one that claims that a stricter adherence to the ideals of the Constitution will better defeat an unconventional enemy whose methods challenge many legal precedents.
His new approach faces its first reality check if this trial begins in a few months.
Here are the key tests:
1. Will New York City be made safe and the jury protected from any retaliatory attacks by Al Qaeda? (Holder cites the successful trials of other terrorists, such as Ramzi Yousef for the 1993 World Trade center bombing, as evidence that this trial can be held safely.)
2. Will the trial provide a rallying point for jihadists to promote their propaganda and recruit more terrorists? (Holder contends the world will see American justice at work, and that will rally more people against Al Qaeda's terrorist ways.)
3. Will the government's antiterrorist techniques be exposed during the trial, helping to aid Al Qaeda? (The attorney general claims a judge will allow secret sessions during the trial to prevent such exposure.)
4. Will "enhanced" interrogation techniques such as waterboarding, which were used against some suspects, result in a mistrial being declared? (Holder claims he has now-secret evidence that will ensure a conviction no matter what.)
5. In seeking the death penalty for the suspects, will the United States make them martyrs for their cause to those radical Muslims who see such death as justifying their acts? (No comment yet from the attorney general on that question.)
6. While being held in prison, will the defendants indoctrinate other prisoners? (Judges don't look kindly on solitary confinement without just cause. No comment from Holder.)
7. Even if this trial goes well and results in convictions, will not President Obama's decision to hold other suspects indefinitely without a trial simply defeat the purpose of such civilian trials. (Again, no comment.) Most of these folks were detained years ago, and the methods and sources are no longer valid. OK, try them. But now that Noobama has decided to try these folks, he will have to try the next batch much sooner, and the sources and methods involved will be much fresher. So I guess Noobama will end up having to hold onto those guys and drag his feet until they are no longer useful. A distinction without a difference.
Obama asserts that America need not sacrifice its ideals to ensure security against terrorism. That assertion will also be on trial in this momentous case. He was elected to test it. Now it's begun.
#1
" Will the government's antiterrorist techniques be exposed during the trial, helping to aid Al Qaeda? (The attorney general claims a judge will allow secret sessions during the trial to prevent such exposure.)"
Will the defense lawyer's be banned from these "secret sessions"?
The New York Times told readers Saturday that Attorney General Eric Holder's decision to try five Guantanamo Bay terrorist detainees in New York City was "a bold and principled step...toward repairing the damage wrought by former President George W. Bush."
Not surprisingly, while the Times editorial board cheered Friday's decision to try Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and others with suspected ties to the 9/11 attacks near where the World Trade Center used to stand, they also took the opportunity to bash Bush:
From that entirely unnecessary policy (the United States had the tools to detain, charge and bring terrorists to justice) flowed a terrible legacy of torture and open-ended incarceration. It left President Obama with yet another mess to clean up on an urgent basis.
The editorial continued:
It was an enormous victory for the rule of law, a major milestone in Mr. Obama's efforts to close the detention camp at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and an important departure from Mr. Bush's disregard for American courts and their proven ability to competently handle high-profile terror cases. If he and Vice President Dick Cheney had shown more faith in the laws and the Constitution, the alleged mass murderers would have faced justice much earlier.
The piece concluded with one final swipe at the Bush White House:
Still, this much is clear: the Obama administration has yet to completely figure out how to rectify the disgraceful Bush detention policies, but it is getting there.
Posted by: Fred ||
11/15/2009 00:00 ||
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#1
If New York becomes a shooting gallery or a bomb site, just what does the NY Times propose to repair that damage?
Posted by: Rambler in Virginia ||
11/15/2009 1:09 Comments ||
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#3
"a bold and principled step...toward insuring that ONLY Bush is ever blamed for this mess repairing the damage wrought by former President George W. Bush."
There. FTFY.
Mike
Posted by: Mike Kozlowski ||
11/15/2009 5:48 Comments ||
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#4
This trial will be the congressional hearings on Bush and Cheney Obama knew would be a majority killer. The OJ trial will look like the Lincoln Douglas debates in comparison. I wonder if Judge Ito is still available.
#5
Any and all sh1t will hit the Obama admin and Dem Party fans. They own this "trials for genocidal islamic terrorists" shtick.
Posted by: ed ||
11/15/2009 8:50 Comments ||
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#6
I feel for the 9/11 families who I know don't want this, but it's gonna be a lose lose for the Obama Regime, so that's about the only silver lining in this.
#7
I'm not sure it will be a lose-lose for this administration. It appears that their intent is to discredit the WOT and this is a prime venue for doing just that.
#9
Think back to the swagger of the Libyan airline bomber released by the Scots.
Now: imagine KSM let off because of 'torture' by the US, but not until after day after day of rants about how the US is responsible for oppressing Muslims around the world. What better soapbox could Holder give him?
Imagine how it will empower the Islamicists around the world when KSM is freed and then rallies jihadis all over again.
#10
If I were a defence lawyer, I'd be salivating.
First of all, since waterboarding is not an approved police procedure, any statement made by KSM after that might (will) be ruled inadmisable. That would include anything he said about the other 4 defendants.
Also, did anybody read these defendents their Miranda rights? If so when? Anything they say before then might (will) be excluded from evidence. This will include any physical evidence gathered as a result of their excluded statement (this is called "fruit of the poisoned tree").
Were there warrants issued before all of the searches and seizures of evidence? If not, motion to dismiss.
Has O'Bambi thought of the problems of maintaining an uncontaminated crime scene in a combat zone? or maintaining chain of custody?
Has O'Bambi thought of what will happen if KSM and his buddies walk because of a technicality?
Al
Posted by: Frozen Al ||
11/15/2009 13:35 Comments ||
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#11
KSM is a tool. The people in the administration could care less about KSM. They're out to destroy our government and [like the hijackers using the aircraft was a weapon] are using the government's own institutions to destroy it. The two remaining bulwarks of trust in the national government are the judiciary and the military. This provides them the opportunity to destroy that trust in the institutions of the law. It's been made possible by the legal caste itself.
Justice Kennedy et al wanted to impose their power and control over matters that have for all previous conflicts have been the purview of a separate judicial system, military tribunals. There were rational reasons why these were separate, but the legal caste just can't help itself in sticking their fingers into every aspect of the nation. Now they have what they've wanted. However, now they have to play by their own rituals, procedures and precedents which are ill equipped to do the work. Now the principle of forcing your enemy to live up to their own standards comes to play. If they hold true to their process, KSM will not be convicted on technicalities. When that happens in the large public stage, that trust in the institution may well be fundamentally destroyed, which is the true objective of this kabuki theater. KSM is just the tool to make it happen.
The legal caste is so wrapped up with itself and its rituals it won't be able to help itself. The one out they really have is at the start of the proceedings, the sitting justice rebukes DoJ and directs the process back to the tribunals. Isn't going to happen.
This summer, I theorized that Attorney General Eric Holder -- and his boss -- had a hidden agenda in ordering a re-investigation of the CIA for six-year-old alleged interrogation excesses that had already been scrutinized by non-partisan DOJ prosecutors who had found no basis for prosecution. The continuing investigations of Bush-era counterterrorism policies (i.e., the policies that kept us safe from more domestic terror attacks), coupled with the Holder Justice Department's obsession to disclose classified national-defense information from that period, enable Holder to give the hard Left the "reckoning" that he and Obama promised during the 2008 campaign. It would be too politically explosive for Obama/Holder to do the dirty work of charging Bush administration officials; but as new revelations from investigations and declassifications are churned out, Leftist lawyers use them to urge European and international tribunals to bring "torture" and "war crimes" indictments. Thus, administration cooperation gives Obama's base the reckoning it demands but Obama gets to deny responsibility for any actual prosecutions.
Today's announcement that KSM and other top al-Qaeda terrorists will be transferred to Manhattan federal court for civilian trials neatly fits this hidden agenda. Nothing results in more disclosures of government intelligence than civilian trials. They are a banquet of information, not just at the discovery stage but in the trial process itself, where witnesses -- intelligence sources -- must expose themselves and their secrets.
Let's take stock of where we are at this point. KSM and his confederates wanted to plead guilty and have their martyrs' execution last December, when they were being handled by military commission. As I said at the time, we could and should have accommodated them. The Obama administration could still accommodate them. After all, the president has not pulled the plug on all military commissions: Holder is going to announce at least one commission trial (for Nashiri, the Cole bomber) today.
Moreover, KSM has no defense. He was under American indictment for terrorism for years before there ever was a 9/11, and he can't help himself but brag about the atrocities he and his fellow barbarians have carried out.
So: We are now going to have a trial that never had to happen for defendants who have no defense. And when defendants have no defense for their own actions, there is only one thing for their lawyers to do: put the government on trial in hopes of getting the jury (and the media) spun up over government errors, abuses and incompetence. That is what is going to happen in the trial of KSM et al. It will be a soapbox for al-Qaeda's case against America. Since that will be their "defense," the defendants will demand every bit of information they can get about interrogations, renditions, secret prisons, undercover operations targeting Muslims and mosques, etc., and -- depending on what judge catches the case -- they are likely to be given a lot of it. The administration will be able to claim that the judge, not the administration, is responsible for the exposure of our defense secrets. And the circus will be played out for all to see -- in the middle of the war.
Posted by: Fred ||
11/15/2009 00:00 ||
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#1
This man is sick in the mind. He does not deserve a law degree
#2
1) How will the jury pool be decided and where will they go to get members to allow the cowards to be judged by "their peers". I guess they will have to seek out the 10% radical mosques to find a jury pool. 2) The Blind Sheikh's of the Al Gamaat Islamiyya (Islamic Group) was tried in New York for the first World Trade Center bombing in 2/93 and later his group went on to conduct terrorist operations including the terrorist attack at Luxor, Egypt almost 11 years ago to the day. There they killed 58 Western tourists including three generations of one British family (including a 5 year girl who was wearing a Mickey Mouse backpack). And by the way, while in prison the Blind Sheikh secreted messages to the Islamic Group via his attorney Lynne Stewart (who was convicted for her deeds) who passed on the green light to his adherents to conduct attacks in Egypt. Thus, there are many security risks to trying the 9/11 murders in Federal court.
#1
The world is noticing.
DNA India: Obama kowtows to China Likewise, Obama took an exceedingly conciliatory tone with China that amounted to a ritualistic kowtow from the head of an economically enfeebled US to its 'banker'. He held out the assurance that the US "does not seek to contain" China; he praised its contributions in promoting "security and stability in Afghanistan and Pakistan"; and he certified China as being "committed to the global nuclear non-proliferation regime" -- a sentiment that's at dissonance with the most recent Washington Post revelations about China's clandestine transfer of enriched uranium to Pakistan.
APEC summit press photo:
Putin is off frame just to the left with a broom handle.
Posted by: ed ||
11/15/2009 8:17 Comments ||
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#2
America was the last free range wolfpack in the world. Watch how the world elites eagerly anticipate our caging and gelding. Our actions set a bad example for their own populations watching us through the wires.
#3
...WhiteCollar Redneck speaks wisdom, sadly. Even if we do regain our freedoms an election or two down the road, there will be a significant proportion of the world lined up to insure we don't go back to the old ways.
Mike
Posted by: Mike Kozlowski ||
11/15/2009 11:16 Comments ||
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#4
O-Bow-Ma: "First, the Saudi King. Now, the Japanese Emperor. Whats he going to do with Russian President Medvedev on Sunday the downward-facing dog yoga pose?"
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
KEVIN Rudd will apologise today to thousands of Australians shipped from Britain as children with the promise of a better life, only to face abuse and neglect. The Prime Minister will also say sorry to many more thousands of "forgotten Australians" who suffered in orphanages, foster homes and care between the 1930s and 1970s.
