The Obama administration is proposing the creation of a new office within the Treasury Department to coordinate policy in the state-regulated insurance sector, according to a near-final draft of the plan.
The office would be charged with gathering information about the insurance sector and negotiating international agreements, according to the draft. It would also be empowered to consult with the Federal Reserve and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. on insurance matters if a failing insurer needs to be resolved by the government. Legislative action would be required to establish the new office.
The proposed insurance office is a far cry from the federal regulation of the industry that some insurers had been seeking. Large property and casualty firms and life insurers have pushed for years to have an optional federal charter but have been met with stiff opposition from smaller firms and insurance agents.
Or this…
Senate lawmakers from both parties raised questions on Thursday about one of the main elements of President Obama’s proposal to restructure the financial system: granting more power to the Federal Reserve.
Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner defended the proposal and the Fed’s role as a “systemic risk regulator” at a Senate Banking Committee hearing.
But committee Chairman Chris Dodd (D-Conn.) continues to have questions about granting the central bank authority to oversee “systemic risk.” Meanwhile, Sen. Richard Shelby (R-Ala.) took aim at the Fed for failing to regulate lending practices among large firms at the center of the financial crisis. Shelby questioned the administration’s plan to vest more power in an agency that traditionally has tried to maintain its independence in setting monetary policy.
Or this…
Progressives must keep demanding a single-payer health care system to ensure that the reform package Congress eventually votes upon at least has a robust public option, Rep. Barbara Lee told local health care and community leaders Monday.
About 250 people attended the national heath care plan discussion that Lee, D-Oakland, hosted in the Evergreen Missionary Baptist Church on West MacArthur Blvd. Joining Lee on the dais were several Bay Area health policy experts, most of whom extolled a single-payer plan — in which one source of money, most likely the government, pays all health care providers — but acknowledged that’s essentially a political impossibility.
But they said pushing for a single-payer plan will build support for the proposal unveiled last week by the Democratic chairman of the Education and Labor, Energy and Commerce and Ways and Means committees, which at least includes a public alternative to private insurance.
“At no point can we be silent,” Lee told the crowd, adding President Barack Obama wants “a democratic movement of people” to push for the best possible plan under the political circumstances. “Health care should not be driven by a profit motive. I don’t believe it should be an industry — I believe it’s a human right.”
Where does the Constitution grant Congress the right to take action in these areas?
Where does the Constitution grant Congress to overrule our inalienable rights AGAINST government interference?
There are 18 specific, enumerated powers given to Congress and two clauses to allow action on these powers- the interstate commerce clause and the general welfare clause.
Where does President Obama claim to draw his power from? Where does he claim legitimacy for his actions? We need to only look at a key line from his Inauguration:
What the cynics fail to understand is that the ground has shifted beneath them - that the stale political arguments that have consumed us for so long no longer apply. The question we ask today is not whether our government is too big or too small, but whether it works - whether it helps families find jobs at a decent wage, care they can afford, a retirement that is dignified. Where the answer is yes, we intend to move forward. Where the answer is no, programs will end. And those of us who manage the public’s dollars will be held to account - to spend wisely, reform bad habits, and do our business in the light of day - because only then can we restore the vital trust between a people and their government.
Nor is the question before us whether the market is a force for good or ill. Its power to generate wealth and expand freedom is unmatched, but this crisis has reminded us that without a watchful eye, the market can spin out of control - and that a nation cannot prosper long when it favors only the prosperous. The success of our economy has always depended not just on the size of our Gross Domestic Product, but on the reach of our prosperity; on our ability to extend opportunity to every willing heart - not out of charity, but because it is the surest route to our common good.
As for our common defense, we reject as false the choice between our safety and our ideals. Our Founding Fathers, faced with perils we can scarcely imagine, drafted a charter to assure the rule of law and the rights of man, a charter expanded by the blood of generations. Those ideals still light the world, and we will not give them up for expedience’s sake. And so to all other peoples and governments who are watching today, from the grandest capitals to the small village where my father was born: know that America is a friend of each nation and every man, woman, and child who seeks a future of peace and dignity, and that we are ready to lead once more.
Translation: ”expedience’s sake” seems to be whatever fits Obama’s socialist agenda.