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February 9, 2012
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Kimberly Palmer: How to actually enjoy -- relaxing, financially -- your vacation
February 8, 2012
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Menachem Wecker: Though Controversial, LL.M.'s Can Lead to Specialized Legal Jobs
The Kosher Gourmet byDana Velden: Going to the bother of making soup? You know it better be good. This CREAM OF TOMATO SOUP certainly is! And it's a cinch to make, too (Includes techinques and serving secrets)
February 7, 2012
Frank J. Gaffney, Jr.: Caught off-guard? President's Super Bowl interview with Matt Lauer gives those who need a reason not to vote for him, a darn good one
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Jonathan Tobin: Iran Threatens Israel With Destruction, But the New York Times Doesn't Hear It
Jeffrey Fleishman: In newly democratic Egypt, tens of democracy activists jailed, to stand trial; their groups are 'threatening the stability of the homeland'
Julie Deardorff : Researchers say antioxidants may not be that effective and could do more harm than good
Mark Clayton: How did Anonymous hackers eavesdrop on FBI and Scotland Yard?
February 3, 2012
Edmund Sanders : Israeli official says Iran is creating missile that could reach East Coast of US
Victoria Kim: Immigrant-smuggling ring used black drivers to avoid racial profiling
February 2, 2012
Jim Carney: Wrong number call may have saved her life
Reza Kahlili : Ex-CIA spy in Iran's Revolutionary Guard: What Obama doesn't grasp about striking deals with Tehran
Tina Susman: For woodchuck rescuer, every day is Groundhog Day
February 1, 2012
Brian Bennett: US officials see increasing threat of domestic attack from Iran
Emily Brandon: How to Take Advantage of New 401(k) Fee Disclosures
January 31, 2012
January 30, 2012
Paul Richter and Ramin Mostaghim: Misreading Teheran's limits -- deadly and economically devastating as they may be -- is a risk administration, Europe seem willing to take
Suzanne Bohan: Warning: Nap-deprived tots missing more than sleep, study finds
Meg Handley: Banks Revamping Rewards Programs to Woo Customers
January 27, 2012
Caroline B. Glick: Obama: Of course I intend to prevent a nuclear holocaust . . . in a few months
Yochonon Donn: In liberal New York City, fervently-Orthodox Jews may soon be getting a district to call their own
Jeannine Stein: An inflated ego and thinking you're 'all that' doesn't just make others sick of you, it can make you ill
Katy Hopkins: New budget rules may affect how much money you get for college
January 26, 2012
Ed Koch: To the New York Times, calling for the murder of Jews by those capable of having their incitement taken seriously isn't news
Jeannine Stein: Mental illness struck one in five U.S. adults in 2010: Report
January 25, 2012
Richard Simon: House passes two bills endorsing the use of religious symbols at military memorials
Fred Weir: Putin: Multiethnic Russia cannot survive as a US-style 'melting pot'; must find its own way
Susan Johnston: 5 Sneaky Coupon Strategies Consumers Should Watch Out For
January 24, 2012
Carol Clark: The price of your soul: How your brain decides whether to 'sell out'
Caroline B. Glick: America lost most in 'Arab Spring'. Sadly, many voters still don't grasp the extent
Warren Richey: Drug criminal scores win in GPS ruling from conservative-leaning high court
Erika Bolstad: Black conservatives gather to talk about gaining strength
January 23, 2012
Melissa Dribben: Jewish voters to play a key role in Florida's Republican primary
Jordan Rau: In quest to grow, Catholic hospital system will announce this morning its break from church
Ali Safi: U.S. envoy gives Taliban terms for peace talks
January 19, 2012
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January 17, 2012
Frank J. Gaffney Jr.: No-kidding red lines: U.S. response to an Iranian nuke may be bluster, but Israel's won't be
David G. Savage: They sued their principals after slandering them online --- now the cases are headed to the Supreme Court
David Francis: Where to Invest in 2012: With stocks expected to rebound, opportunity abounds for investors
January 13, 2012
Ben Lynfield: Israeli lawmakers move to annex Jewish Judea, one museum at a time
Alexia Elejalde-Ruiz: Thriving through touch: Gentle massage helps older people with low mobility improve in mind and body
January 12, 2012
Warren Richey: Landmark Supreme Court ruling a 'resounding win' for religious groups
Warren Richey: Supreme Court says no to new rule on eyewitness testimony
John Fauber : Statins found to raise diabetes risk in postmenopausal women
Katy Hopkins : Consider This Before You Pay for an Online Degree
The Kosher Gourmet by Joseph Erdos: This mushroom and barley soup has an intense -- almost nutty -- flavor that mixes robust with Middle East. It has creaminess without cream
January 11, 2012
Shari Roan: Millions of atrial fibrillation sufferers at risk for devastating, but preventable, stroke
Tom Hussain: Pakistan -- recipient of more than $21 billion in civilian and military aid -- speeds pursuit of Iranian pipeline, defying US
David G. Savage: High court signals it won't be loosening TV's 'indecency' rules
Stephen Ceasar: Oklahoma's Islamic law amendment can't go into effect, court rules
January 10, 2012
Reza Kahlili: From an ex-CIA spy: US must exploit new split in Iran's Revolutionary Guard
Karen Kaplan: Study: Nicotine replacement products ineffective when used in real-life situations
January 9, 2012
Michael Doyle: Put through legal hell over dream home, couple fought back hard --- all the way to Supreme Court
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Jewish World Review
August 26, 2009
/ 6 Elul 5769
The second American Revolution
By
Nat Hentoff
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http://www.JewishWorldReview.com |
Startlingly and wholly involuntarily President Obama is teaching us that, as Thomas Jefferson often said, "the people are the ultimate guardians of their own liberty." The growing resistance to the president's goal of state-controlled health care is moving more of us to act on our constitutional power to protect our quintessential individual liberty to decide for ourselves how long we are going to stay on this Earth.
The reverberating town-hall meetings are a legacy of the 1765 meeting in Boston where Samuel Adams and the Sons of Liberty organized against King George III and, not having access to the Internet, later started the Committees of Correspondence that alerted all the colonists to insistent royal threats to their personal liberties. During a secret meeting in Virginia, Jefferson helped organize such a committee in his state.
Here and now, as the president decrees that health-care costs must be cut severely, Medicare officials before there is a final bill from Congress have been planning to slash payments to many specialists.
"Cardiologists would be especially hard hit," reported The New York Times on Aug. 21., "with cuts of more than 20 percent in payments for electrocardiograms and 12 percent for heart stent procedures."
Said Dr. John C. Lewin, chief executive of the American College of Cardiology: "Cuts of this magnitude could cripple cardiology practices and threaten access to services for millions of patients."
It is because of the life-saving work of cardiologists, over the years, that I am alive and able to write this and applaud the 150 cardiologists and more than 1,500 patients who organized a health-care rally in downtown Orlando, Fla., on Aug. 21 to protest these Medicare cuts scheduled to take effect Jan. 1. The cuts involve (NYT, Aug. 21) "a variety of standard heart procedures, in some cases by more than one-third" in addition to the two I cited.
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Three days before, at a town-hall meeting organized by the wives of two Louisville physicians to directly protest the portents of Obamacare, the invited keynote speaker, Wesley Smith, an internationally known advocate for human rights in health care, expected to talk to maybe 100 people. At least 1,000 Kentucky citizens were there for an event conceived only two weeks before.
According to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, those citizens must have been among the "evil-mongers" drowning out national debate with "lies, innuendo and rumor." But Smith tells me that no organization put together the Louisville protest. "People showed up because they are very engaged as citizens about one of the most important domestic policy initiatives in recent times."
To many of us, including doctors, it is THE most important issue. Marc K. Siegel, a practicing internist and an associate professor of Medicine at New York's BYU Langone Medical Center with which my doctors are associated writes (New York Post, Aug. 18):
"For generations, we doctors have promised our patients that medical advances will allow us all to live longer, more comfortable lives. Now that these results are finally arriving, 'health-care reform' or 'insurance reform' (as our would-be health czar now calls it) could snatch the rug out from under us."
If the president succeeds in having Congress enact into law a national federal council to decide the most cost-effective medical care, those national standards will necessarily override which specific care can be most effective for each individual patient. Is expressing that concern, even loudly about being lost in the abstract whole what House Speaker Nancy Pelosi calls "un-American" as she scorns these citizen eruptions by latter-day sons and daughters of liberty?
Obviously, there is great need to make health care more equitable, but what Obama's Democratic loyalists are leading us toward has been clearly and ominously described by Michael Gerson ("When Planners Decide Life," Washington Post, Aug. 21).
To counter inefficient, costly medical decisions, Gerson writes, by imposing a national structure "gives government extraordinary power. And the approach taken by planners is, by necessity, utilitarian considering the greatest good for the greatest number. (Such) decisions cannot be made on a human scale."
We are all individuals!
Siegel adds on a very human level: "Anyone who's been saved from cancer by the latest targeted chemotherapy treatment, had a lung or breast cancer diagnosed early by a CT scan or MRI or returned from the brink of a heart-related death thanks to the newest drug-treated stent understands that some expensive care is well worth the price."
Siegel then presents this question to the Democratic majority: "Which recent advances would have been aborted if we'd adopted "reform" years ago? Anti-inflammatory treatments such as Enbrel for corrosive arthritis? Major surgeries made far less invasive through use of a 'scope? More precise and powerful lasers to treat the skin and eyes?"
Throughout our history, we've been tested by Jefferson's question: "Who will govern the governors?" As we face Obamacare, this constitutional question on an acutely individual basis has never been more urgent. Jefferson called Samuel Adams "truly the Man of the Revolution." He was a rowdy fellow, that Adams!
Remember his Tea Party?
Every weekday JewishWorldReview.com publishes what many in the media and Washington consider "must-reading". Sign up for the daily JWR update. It's free. Just click here.
Nat Hentoff is a nationally renowned authority on the First Amendment and the Bill of Rights and author of several books, including his current work, "The War on the Bill of Rights and the Gathering Resistance". Comment by clicking here.
Nat Hentoff Archives
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