2011 A time for Sanity

We're now in 2011 and I thought I would reflect on what I think needs to
happen this year. As the title imlies I hope it is a time for sanity rather
than insanity. The last two years have really been a time of insanity, what
with the passage of the health care legislation, the administration's
failure to charge wiki leaks with anything and more.

The way the Republicans are talking, this year will be different. Well, I
certainly hope so. Rep. Darrell Isa is going after the administration,
particularly Atty Gen. Eric Holder for failure to prosecute a number of
organizations. Two of these I would venture to say have likely ties to
Obama and the third one there is no excuse for. The President has a past
history with ACORN so that one is understandable but not justified. The one
involving the New Black Panterhs party is not justified. Voter intimidation
is voter intimidation no matter who is committing it.

As for the third one, Wiki Leaks, that one is a travesty. We have espionage
laws and Atty. Gen. Holder needs to use them to prosecute Wiki Leaks founder
Assange or resign from office. This is about what Isa is saying and I
agree. Otherwise we look like a paper tiger and will only be laughed at and
that's not what I want from this country. Also those who enable Wiki Leaks
need to be gone after under the espionage laws. Holder had a chance last
spring but failed to take action after the leak of the papers involving
Afghanistan and Iraq. It should never have gotten as far as the diplomatic
cables. While the Army has one person under investigation,there are clearly
more people involved. They also need to be investigated an dprosecuted.

As for health care reform, there is a constitutional challenge on this one
and I hope it succeeds as Obama care is bad legislation. Short of the
constitutional battle, I hope there is success in outright repeal or
defunding. I8t is my opinion that there will be a battle royale over the
budget with health care right in the thick of it. If we can at leat get
this thing defunded, that would lower the deficit. Then let's get it
repealed. It's interesting to me that many of the major provisions don't
take affect until 2014. Why is that? IMO it's because this is bad
legislation and its authors know that and don't want to take the political
hit for it. The adage that the more the people see about this legislation
the more they don't like it holds true on this one. Let's hope ewe can get
some sensible health care reform, starting with tort reform which would
limit malpractice suits and stop judge shopping in these cases. This type
of sensible reform would bring down costs as there would be less of a need
for defensive medicine.

I also hope there's sanity on the foreign policy front as well but that will
be difficult given that two rogue nations, North Korea and Iran, appear to
be working together. This is dangerous and needs to be dealt with. I'm not
even going to go into what needs to be done here as I'm not sure of that
one. Looking weak though is not an option in my opinion.

These are just a few things that I hope will happen in order to bring real
sanity in 2011. Let's see how much gets accomplished prior to the
Presidential campaign starting in the fall.