As the senate and house prepare for the August recess, it’s easy to forget the country is in between rounds in the critical fight waged against misguided health care reform by clear-headed patriots. As we regroup, so will they. It is folly to believe the fight is over. The takeover of the private health section is alive and well as demonstrated by the current bill’s attempt to gut ERISA and allow employees to sue employers over health care, causing a mass exodus by employers from private insurance to the public plan. There are many nefarious and deceitful ways liberals can destroy private insurance, and you can bet the bill nobody has read yet has plenty of them. They only need to sneak in one and the game is over.

Now is certainly not the time to rest. The schedule of those serving in the federal legislature, even on recess, is often full with fundraisers and other political pastimes such as town hall meetings. Keep up the pressure; email and phone your representative and senator. To find out who your representative is and write them check here. To contact your representative by phone go here. For senators, this page is useful. Often representatives and senators will have local numbers in your area. Use Google to find this contact information and location.

I know by nature many of you are not protesters and picketers. However the recent tea party protests emphasizes an important fact – when necessary we do what must be done. Now is the time for more tea parties, picketing outside political venues, making phone calls, and emailing.

America scored a major victory this week thanks to the efforts of talk show hosts, conservative pundits, bloggers, and people like you who care about the future of this country. John McCain recently said elections have consequences – and they do. However, who can forget his statement that we have nothing to fear from an Obama presidency during the campaign? If elections have consequences, the senator from Arizona acted to the contrary.

There is a long road ahead and a litany of issues to address. There are a lot of hills and mountains to climb, and our eyes have been fixated on the one marked socialized health care. Now our attention must diversify and take in the entire landscape of issues. Let’s not forget the additional stimulus plan under consideration, or the fact that cap-and-tax passed in the House thanks to these eight GOP sell-outs:

Our very way of life is under attack. Deficits are soaring and even if victorious against cap-and-tax and government controlled health care, our deficits, now monumental, threaten to saddle future generations and impact the American dream so many fought and died for. Government now has a stake in banks and car companies. There is a lot of damage Obama has done and is still capable of doing. Our only recourse is to put the pressure on. Even if you feel your representative or senator is beyond hope, know there are many who, like you, don’t like the change Obama is offering.

Hope and change? Despair and change is more like it. So regardless of where you live, it is your civic and moral duty to let your voice be heard.

The road is long and treacherous, but just remember this: After the dark days of Jimmy Carter came the bright shining city on the hill of Ronald Reagan. I am optimistic, and my optimism fuels my resistance. From the greatest challenges come the greatest opportunities. Just think of what we can accomplish given the challenge of Obama, the liberals, and their radical agenda.

Next stop on the road to Waterloo? 2010.

Keep up the fight.

Read Michelle Malkin’s Ghoulish science + Obamacare = health hazard.

Glenn Reynolds: The Press Has Met Their Waterloo and It’s Obama

Can we get ABBA to record that?

CNN Political Ticker: Experts debate proposed ‘big brother’ medical council

Another piece from Michelle: Barbara Boxer: My jerkish behavior is great for fund-raising! Apparently, even some Dems are getting concerned about her odd behavior.

This is in another post, but I felt like this topic deserved its own spot:

From The Hill: Dems at odds on how to turn tide on health. It looks like more than Blue Dogs are getting a bit skittish. Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) said that if consensus can’t be reached, he expects to send legislators home on schedule. Majority Whip James Clyburn (D-S.C.) on Tuesday said the House should stay in until it finishes the bill.

They can’t even agree on whether to take a vacation. I suggest a robust debate concerning the vacation!

Nanny State Nancy chimes in saying Congress should work through recess on health bill.

“I think 70 percent of the American people would want that,” Pelosi said. “I want a bill.”

Which would be fine if it were not for those pesky things called polls. Glenn Reynold’s – RASMUSSEN: 53% Now Oppose Congressional Health Care Reform. You don’t say. That math sure must be challenging Nancy. Kind of like “save or create jobs”, or “deficit neutral” – it just doesn’t add up. Last time I checked 53% was just a wee bit smaller than 70%.

Here is a doozy for you. Michelle Malkin reports Exposed: A trial lawyers’ pay-off in Obamacare

From the Washington Post: Senate Panel Takes Careful Approach to Crafting Health Bill. The important part is near the bottom in discussing the Senate Finance committee’s approach (emphasis mine):

Finance members said the committee was leaning against requiring employers to provide health coverage, although it would impose a fee on individuals who do not purchase insurance. They also said the panel had rejected the government health plan that Obama wants to create and would instead adopt a cooperative model, similar to rural electricity providers.

Would that it were true. While premature to raise a glass to the end of government takeover of health care, this development looks promising.

From My Way: White House putting off release of budget update (emphasis mine):

The White House is being forced to acknowledge the wide gap between its once-upbeat predictions about the economy and today’s bleak landscape.

The administration’s annual midsummer budget update is sure to show higher deficits and unemployment and slower growth than projected in President Barack Obama’s budget in February and update in May, and that could complicate his efforts to get his signature health care and global-warming proposals through Congress.

The release of the update – usually scheduled for mid-July – has been put off until the middle of next month, giving rise to speculation the White House is delaying the bad news at least until Congress leaves town on its August 7 summer recess.

The administration is pressing for votes before then on its $1 trillion health care initiative, which lawmakers are arguing over how to finance.

The White House budget director, Peter Orszag, said on Sunday that the administration believes the “chances are high” of getting a health care bill by then. But new analyses showing runaway costs are jeopardizing Senate passage.

“Instead of a dream, this routine report could be a nightmare,” Tony Fratto, a former Treasury Department official and White House spokesman under President George W. Bush, said of the delayed budget update. “There are some things that can’t be escaped.”

Trouble in paradise?

Any member of either Congressional chamber voting in favor of health care reform prior to the release of the White House budget data abdicates responsibility and common sense, and the negligence involved profound to the point of defying any form of logic. The correct recourse to such behavior, bordering in this author’s opinion on criminal, is the removal of the offending thief.

The Hill reports that Healthcare marathon may hit wall this week:

If President Obama’s analogy — that reforming healthcare is a long race — holds true, this week might just be Heartbreak Hill.

Beginning on Monday, Obama will find out if congressional Democrats have the wherewithal to push ahead with their — and his — ambitious goal of crossing the healthcare finish line before August, or whether they have to stop and stretch before limping across at a later date.

It’ll be close.

In the House, Democratic leaders are still grappling with severe cramps caused by two different groups: their vulnerable freshman members and the conservative Blue Dog Democrats.

Twenty freshman Democrats, led by Rep. Jared Polis (Colo.), have threatened a revolt against the $544 billion worth of tax increases spelled out in the House bill — one of the two revenue pillars holding up the Democrats’ promise of producing a “deficit-neutral” healthcare bill that is expected to cost more than $1 trillion.

The Ways and Means Committee completed its markup of the tax portion of the bill last week, meaning that if the freshmen aren’t satisfied with the result, close to two dozen votes could be at risk.

So far, all indications point to House leaders sticking with their plan to pay for half of their bill through a sliding surtax on the income of Americans in the top tax brackets — a plan the White House has blessed but for which the Senate has not indicated an appetite.

Beyond that, the biggest threat to the August goal — if not successful passage of the bill altogether — is coming from fiscally conservative Blue Dog Democrats, who have banded together in opposition to everything from Medicare reimbursement rates to an automatic public plan, and have hinted at bolting on the idea of taxes of any kind.

The will of these Democrats, and the power of their leaders to cut deals with them, will be on full display starting on Monday, when the critical Energy and Commerce Committee continues its markup of major portions of the House bill.

Committee Chairman Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) has vowed to finish his markup by midweek as promised. But the Blue Dogs have said they have enough votes to kill the bill in committee if changes aren’t realized. And on issues where the committee lacks jurisdiction, such as the tax portion, Blue Dogs have warned that there are enough votes to kill the bill on the floor as well.

Light up the phone lines and send those emails to your Representative and Senator.

And they better pay attention. As the Washington post reports: Poll Shows Obama Slipping on Key Issues, Approval Rating on Health Care Falls Below 50 Percent

Heading into a critical period in the debate over health-care reform, public approval of President Obama’s stewardship on the issue has dropped below the 50 percent threshold for the first time, according to a new Washington Post-ABC News poll.

Obama’s approval ratings on other front-burner issues, such as the economy and the federal budget deficit, have also slipped over the summer, as rising concern about spending and continuing worries about the economy combine to challenge his administration. Barely more than half approve of the way he is handling unemployment, which now tops 10 percent in 15 states and the District.

The president’s overall approval rating remains higher than his marks on particular domestic issues, with 59 percent giving him positive reviews and 37 percent disapproving. But this is the first time in his presidency that Obama has fallen under 60 percent in Post-ABC polling, and the rating is six percentage points lower than it was a month ago.

Obama has taken on a series of major problems during his young presidency, but he faces a particularly difficult fight over his effort to encourage Congress to pass an overhaul of the nation’s health-care system.

Wondering why liberals are rushing through health care reform? Time is the enemy of liberalism. The more of it we have, the less chance they have of passing destructive, socialized, deficit growing legislation. Only conservative democrats capable of level-headed thinking can save us from the disaster of Obamacare. The longer this bill is debated, the worse it begins to look and the odds of getting real health care reform increases.

Michelle Malkin on Obama’s slipping poll numbers.

Also, check out Michelle’s Democrats reverse Obama on auto dealerships. Looks like not all Democrats are a rubber stamp for Obama and his policies. Poll numbers do count. Go figure.

The truth is out: Glimpse of Obamacare future: 83 million would lose private coverage. Like I said, the smell gets worse as time passes.

Right Pundits: Dude, Where’s My Budget?

More: Even The NYT Won’t Avoid The Truth – Socialized Healthcare Stinks

Glenn Reynold’s warns via Advertising Age:

ANOTHER REASON FOR THE RUSH: Advertising Age: Obama Wants to Avoid Health-Care-Reform Ad War. “If supporters of health-care legislation seem like they’re in a hurry to get a bill passed, it might be because they’re hoping to avoid a costly ad war they would stand a good chance of losing. . . . If a health-care bill isn’t passed before the August recess, that opens the door for opponents to appeal to the public.”

Like the filthy and uneducated masses should have anything to say about what is best for us. Sounds like the elites disrespect for us unedumakated gun tottin’, bible clutching nitwits uncloaks itself.

The Wall Street Journal on how the AMA betrays doctors by backing ObamaCare (emphasis mine):

What’s Up, Docs? The AMA signs its members up to be civil servants.

Everyone supports “health reform” as an abstract goal, but that mile-wide consensus is an inch deep when it comes to substance. Increasingly, however, most of the major health industry lobbies seem prepared to concede the mile — as long they get their inch.

The latest example is the American Medical Association’s unqualified endorsement Thursday of the health bill patched together by House Democrats. In a letter to Ways and Means Chairman Charlie Rangel, the doctors group lays on its “appreciation and support” pretty thick, and pledges to “work with the House committees and leadership to build support.” The so-called tri-committee plan is also the most left-leaning out there, funding its new coverage for the uninsured in part by cutting payments to doctors and hospitals in Medicare and Medicaid.

But lobbyists don’t lobby for less revenue for their members, and Democrats seem to have procured the AMA’s bouquet with what the AMA letter says is the promise of “fundamental Medicare reforms, including repeal of the sustainable growth rate,” or SGR. The SGR is a formula that Congress created in 1997 as a form of fiscal triage, mandating automatic cuts in physician payments if entitlement spending rises too steeply. Next year, they’re scheduled to drop by 21.5%.

President Barack Obama speaks about health care on Friday in the Diplomatic Room of the White House.

Doctors despise the SGR, and understandably so. Medicare’s administered prices are already 20% to 30% lower than those of private insurers, and then Congress threatens to arbitrarily pay even less for the medical goods and services it wants to buy. However, Washington always swoops in with an 11th-hour reprieve that defers the pain to another year, given that even deeper cuts would cause many doctors to stop treating Medicare patients. But this only makes the distortions worse, creating an uncertain business climate and forcing some doctors to compensate by shifting costs onto their private patients or making up in volume what they lose on margin in Medicare.

Yes, ending this incoherent farce is a great idea. But the AMA is essentially saying that if doctors get paid more, all else is negotiable. Other industry lobbies such as the insurers and drug makers have made the same calculation, putting their short-term self-interest — usually ensuring that government programs remain generous (enough) — ahead of the long-run threats. It can’t last.

I guess in politics you also reap what you sow. From The Hill:

Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) is paying a price on healthcare reform for the arm-twisting she did on the climate change bill last month.

Democratic House members were rankled by how the climate bill passed — and stunned by the criticism they got at home.

Those memories are fueling a revolt among conservative Blue Dogs and a drive among freshman lawmakers to drop plans for a surtax on the wealthy in healthcare reform.

An aide to one conservative Democratic lawmaker said the climate bill was “really rammed down our throats.”

And there’s a general sense of unease among others members of the caucus.

“I think the well’s a bit poisoned,” said Rep. Peter DeFazio (D-Ore.). “A lot of people went home and got beaten up on climate. Now they want to make sure they understand it before they vote on it. People still want to do it. It’s just going to be a little bit harder.”

Many centrist Democrats pushed Pelosi and the Democratic leadership to put off the climate change debate and pass a healthcare overhaul first, giving members more time to work through the issues and get comfortable with the complex issue.

And what still rubs many members raw is that if the climate bill ever comes back from the Senate, it’s likely to be significantly weaker. So they voted for tough and expensive regulations that will likely never become law.

The fresh memory of the difficult vote has hit the Democrats’ plan to pass a healthcare bill before August like a Mack truck.

It also looks like other sections of the Democratic Congress are just a little concerned:

Despite a massive listening campaign organized by Pelosi and other leaders, the objections to the healthcare bill are coming from diverse parts of the caucus.

Freshmen are circulating a letter calling for the surtax to be eliminated because they believe it will unfairly hit small businesses.

“Republicans called the last one a tax increase and it wasn’t. But this one really is,” said an aide to one Democratic freshman lawmaker.

Blue Dogs have a host of complaints, starting with irritation that the bill doesn’t wring enough cost savings out of the healthcare system and leaves Medicare reimbursement unfairly low in their rural districts. They launched a formal protest last week that delayed the rollout of the House bill.

But after Pelosi introduced it with great fanfare Tuesday, Blue Dogs complained that few, if any, of their concerns were fixed.

The conservative Blue Dog’s have a strategy:

So the Blue Dogs on the House Energy and Commerce Committee have banded together to change the bill. They’ve warned they have the votes to stop the bill in at least one committee if those changes aren’t made

This tactic is designed to weaken the divide-and-conquer strategy used in the climate bill. However, leadership aides note their own parties opposition members are not so much against a bill; the previous climate bill arm twisting and subsequent backlash in their own backyards gives angry Blue Dogs a chance to flex their muscles and demand changes necessary to alter the bill to one they can support. The elephant in the room is whether these markups avoid dooming America to sub-standard health care and unsustainable debt. The only way to avoid disaster is to do away with the public option in any form.

Even a public option that is allowed to compete with private insurance on an exchange (as the current bill is written), would push out private insurers and drive them out of business. Nobody can compete with a non-profit government capable of printing money when deemed necessary. The current bill is implicitly designed to destroy private insurance. I’m from Canada – trust me, you don’t want that system.

The Blue Dogs have the fate of the country in their hands. On their death beds will they remember their lives with fondness, pride, and a swelling sense of dignity, or know they have sold out the souls of countless millions and doomed them to an inkling of an existence? Will they uphold the spirit of our forefathers and preserve liberty and dignity? History, the cruelest judge of all, remembers. If they are principled enough to change the course of disaster set by Obama and avoid the destruction of the greatest of countries, they will be remembered as heroes; men and women of honest disposition, worthy of great praise. As for the other option – sellouts, crooks, pirates of liberty, spineless and unprincipled hacks – these words will describe the men and women who vote against principles of common sense, even though each and every one of these labels provides for a loftier descriptive for such lowly scoundrels.

Further Reading: Even The NYT Won’t Avoid The Truth – Socialized Healthcare Stinks

In related news and opinion:

Michelle Malkin: Inside the monstrous Obamacare bureaucracy. Also check out, Putting a face on the casualties of Obamacare.

Sister Toldjah: CBO pours cold water on Obama admin’s claims about “savings” from ObamaCare. Heh.

Stop the ACLU: Snowe Dampens Dems Healthcare Ardor and Polls Begin to Turn

From Prime Buzz: Moore signs Blue Dog letter demanding “deficit neutral” health care reform. Emphasis mine.

Rep. Dennis Moore — joining more than three dozen other Democrats — signed a letter to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi objecting to some parts of the health care reform package now circulating in Washington.

Read the letter here.

Among the concerns: Health care reform must be “deficit neutral”, and the a “Medicare-like” public option will unfairly impact providers.

And — in a key paragraph — the signers want “time to review” any health care reform package. The White House has asked for a bill by the August recess, which now seems almost impossible.

Moore’s signature is interesting because of the heat he’s taking on his vote for the cap-and-trade energy legislation, as well as his votes for the stimulus bills.

Interesting? Not really, as the pressure is building against the public option from – you guessed it – the public.

Still Democratic leaders in both chambers commit to an August deadline. Should be very interesting to watch. Fire up those phone lines.

In other news and opinion:

Michelle Malkin: Spawn of the Spendulus. Here that flushing sound? That’s your money.

Sister Toldjah on the Quote of the Day – from Carol Browner, climate-czar. Via Mark Tapscott:

Carol Browner, former Clinton administration EPA head and current Obama White House climate czar, instructed auto industry execs “to put nothing in writing, ever” regarding secret negotiations she orchestrated regarding a deal to increase federal Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) standards.

Rep. James Sensenbrenner, R-WI, is demanding a congressional investigation of Browner’s conduct in the CAFE talks, saying in a letter to Rep. Henry Waxman, D-CA, that Browner “intended to leave little or no documentation of the deliberations that lead to stringent new CAFE standards.”

Talk about transparency.