Clipmarks | BobbyDelray's 'bush' clips

To Cut Medicare Growth, Bush Targets Hospitals

Thu, 31 Jan 2008 15:48:31 GMT

clipped by: BobbyDelray

Bush’s proposed Medicare budget would cut $15 billion over five years through a reduction of annual updates for inpatient care. It would also cut $25 billion from payments to hospitals serving large numbers of poor people, and $20 billion from payments for capital projects such as putting up new buildings and buying equipment, the New York Times reports.

The president would also cut $1.2 billion from Medicaid next year and nearly $14 billion over five years, according to the NYT. One cost Bush wouldn’t cut: Payments to private insurance companies who manage Medicare Advantage plans, which cost more than traditional Medicare plans.

Medicare and Medicaid accounted for $627 billion in federal spending last year, and the cost of the programs is projected to double in the coming decade, the Times said.

Tags: medicare, bush, budget

Bush Administration to Bailout Subprime Fools

Sun, 02 Dec 2007 01:20:49 GMT

clipped by: BobbyDelray
clipper's remarks: Would you like to receive a nice low government subsidized loan on your home? How about 2 percent?

Clip Source: blogs.wsj.com

The WSJ is reporting that the Bush administration and major financial institutions are close to agreeing on a plan that would temporarily freeze interest rates on certain troubled subprime home loans. The plan is being negotiated between regulators and a coalition of mortgage-related companies including Citigroup Inc., Wells Fargo & Co., Washington Mutual Inc., and Countrywide. Details are still being worked out but the plan might freeze teaser rates for as long as seven years.

“People made their own judgment to buy homes on their own. When people make profits off of their properties, they don’t share them with others. Why should rest of us pay for their mistakes?”

One counterargument is that some borrowers didn’t know what they were getting into. “The banks and mortgage lenders that pulled out all the stops to persuade them to the contrary were in a far better position to know,” wrote former Robert Reich on his blog last month. “After all, they had lots of experience at this game.”

Tags: subprime. loans, bailout, bush, administration

Americans getting 'heads blown off for the president's amusement'

Fri, 19 Oct 2007 16:05:10 GMT

clipped by: BobbyDelray

Clip Source: blogs.usatoday.com

Rep. Pete Stark, D-Calif., has added another item to our catalogue of the sort of discourse that now defines so much of American politics.

Stark took to the House floor yesterday to speak in favor of overriding President Bush's veto of legislation that would have expanded a children's health insurance program. He somehow veered into Iraq, saying that young Americans are getting their "heads blown off for the president's amusement."

"The truth is, Bush just likes to blow things up in Iraq, in the United States and in Congress," Stark says.

What do you think about what he said and how he said it?

Tags: president, bush, pete stark, children's health insurance program, iraq, war

95% of Troops in Iraq Americans

Wed, 10 Oct 2007 17:12:26 GMT

clipped by: BobbyDelray

Clip Source: blogs.usatoday.com

CNN's top story summarizes an essay about Burma by Laura Bush. MSNBC uses its front page to report on the "crumbling coalition" in Iraq, pointing readers to a report that says American forces will soon account for 95% of the troops on the front lines. Fox News sends a message to Fred Thompson, the former senator who participated in his first GOP presidential debate: "Welcome To the Show."

Tags: iraq, war, bush, troops

Bush Admin Leak Severed a Link to Al-Qaeda's Secrets

Wed, 10 Oct 2007 04:39:56 GMT

clipped by: BobbyDelray

Clip Source: www.washingtonpost.com

A small private intelligence company that monitors Islamic terrorist groups obtained a new Osama bin Laden video ahead of its official release last month, and around 10 a.m. on Sept. 7, it notified the Bush administration of its secret acquisition. It gave two senior officials access on the condition that the officials not reveal they had it until the al-Qaeda release.

Within 20 minutes, a range of intelligence agencies had begun downloading it from the company's Web site. By midafternoon that day, the video and a transcript of its audio track had been leaked from within the Bush administration to cable television news and broadcast worldwide.

The founder of the company, the SITE Intelligence Group, says this premature disclosure tipped al-Qaeda to a security breach and destroyed a years-long surveillance operation that the company has used to intercept and pass along secret messages, videos and advance warnings of suicide bombings from the terrorist group's communications network.

Tags: osama, bin, laden, bush, administration, site, intelligence, group, al-qaeda

Public splits with Bush on war spending, childrens' health insurance

Tue, 02 Oct 2007 18:51:28 GMT

clipped by: BobbyDelray

Clip Source: blogs.usatoday.com

A new Washington Post-ABC News poll suggests that most Americans oppose President Bush's proposal to spend $190 billion on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and a "sizable majority" support the changes to a health insurance program for children that Bush has pledged to veto.

This lack of consensus extends to the president' war-funding proposal. About 70% of respondents say they favor reductions in the war budget, with half saying they want the allocation "cut sharply or entirely."

A third of respondents say they approve of the president's performance.

"When the parties are pitted directly against each other, the public broadly favors Democrats on Iraq, health care, the federal budget and the economy. Only on the issue of terrorism are Republicans at parity with Democrats," the paper says.

Tags: war spending, kids health insurance, bush, public

Bush thinks Clinton will Win

Mon, 24 Sep 2007 15:56:02 GMT

clipped by: BobbyDelray
clipper's remarks: What do you think?

Clip Source: blogs.usatoday.com

The pundit-in-chief says Sen. Hillary Clinton will win the Democratic nomination but go on to lose the 2008 presidential election to the Republican candidate.

"She's got a national presence and this is becoming a national primary," President Bush is quoted as saying in a new book by Bill Sammon of The (Washington) Examiner. "And therefore the person with the national presence, who has got the ability to raise enough money to sustain an effort in a multiplicity of sites, has got a good chance to be nominated."

Sammon's new book, The Evangelical President, comes out today. There's an excerpt in this morning's edition of the Examiner.

"I think our candidate can beat her, but it's going to be a tough race," Bush tells the author. "I will work to see to it that a Republican wins and therefore don't accept the premise that a Democrat will win. I truly think the Republicans will hold the White House."

Tags: bush, clinton, democrat, nomination, the evangelical president

"TASER THIS [EXPLETIVE] BUSH"

Mon, 24 Sep 2007 15:52:39 GMT

clipped by: BobbyDelray
clipper's remarks: Comment?

Clip Source: blogs.usatoday.com

A four-word editorial that appeared Friday in the Rocky Mountain Collegian, a student newspaper at Colorado State University, is generating lots of buzz in the blogosphere.

We can't print the sentence in its entirety. Here's the sanitized version: "TASER THIS [EXPLETIVE] BUSH." (Click here or here for the unsanitized views of the paper's editorial board. Click here for footage of a Florida student being stunned by police.)

The paper acknowledges that the editorial was "immature, unnecessary and offensive," but says this piece "accomplished more than any other staff editorial we've written this year."

Pope refused to meet with Condi Rice

Wed, 19 Sep 2007 20:45:04 GMT

clipped by: BobbyDelray
clipper's remarks: Pope getting into politics? Good idea, bad idea?

Clip Source: blogs.usatoday.com

Pope Benedict XVI refused to meet with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice while she was on her way to the Middle East last month, according to reports from the Vatican.

Corriere della Sera says the Vatican rebuffed Rice, who "made it known to the Vatican that she absolutely had to meet the pope," because the Catholic leader was on vacation at his summer residence in Castel Gandolfo.

AFP says the reply "'illustrated the divergence of view' between the Vatican and the White House about the 'initiatives of the Bush administration in the Middle East.'"

BBC News, which appears to have confirmed the Italian paper's story, says: "Instead of meeting the Pope, Ms Rice had to make do with a telephone conversation with the Vatican's number two, Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, who was visiting the U.S. during August on other business."

Tags: condi, rice, bush, pope benedict xvi, vatican, secretary of state condoleezza rice, corriere della sera, middle east policy