The Wall Street Journal’s James Taranto:

“An old friend who has been active in politics for more than 30 years tells me he’s giving up,” claims Robert Reich in a Puffington Host post: ” ‘I can’t stomach what’s going on in Washington anymore,’ he says. ‘The hell with all of them. I have better things to do with my life.’ ”

Reich is a proven fabulist, so one has to assume any story he tells is a tall tale. But we’re interested in the supposed moral of the parable of Reich’s Disgusted Imaginary Friend: “My friend is falling exactly into the trap that the extreme right wants all of us to fall into–such disgust and cynicism that we all give up on politics.” The “Tea Bag Republicans,” as the homophobic Reich calls them, “want to sow even greater cynicism about the capacity of government to do much of anything.”

In reality, nobody is more disgusted or cynical about government than Tea Party activists themselves–and they have much to be cynical about. The Washington Examiner reports that TeaParty.net “has finally received its tax-exempt status after a three-year delay” caused by the repurposing of the Internal Revenue Service into a political operation aimed at suppressing opposition to Barack Obama’s re-election campaign. …

Cynicism is often, as we’ve noted, a product of disappointed idealism–of naiveté being crushed by reality. If Obama’s supporters have been turning cynical, it is because the falseness of his promises is finally becoming undeniable. Take ObamaCare. He promised to accomplish the impossible: to guarantee health care to everyone, offering both higher quality and lower cost than under the (admittedly far from optimal) status quo ante.

The San Jose Mercury News reports on the reality:

Cindy Vinson and Tom Waschura are big believers in the Affordable Care Act. They vote independent and are proud to say they helped elect and re-elect President Barack Obama.

Yet, like many other Bay Area residents who pay for their own medical insurance, they were floored last week when they opened their bills: Their policies were being replaced with pricier plans that conform to all the requirements of the new health care law.

Vinson, of San Jose, will pay $1,800 more a year for an individual policy, while Waschura, of Portola Valley, will cough up almost $10,000 more for insurance for his family of four. . . .

“I was laughing at Boehner–until the mail came today,” Waschura said, referring to House Speaker John Boehner, who is leading the Republican charge to defund Obamacare.

“I really don’t like the Republican tactics, but at least now I can understand why they are so pissed about this. When you take $10,000 out of my family’s pocket each year, that’s otherwise disposable income or retirement savings that will not be going into our local economy.” . . .

“Of course, I want people to have health care,” Vinson said. “I just didn’t realize I would be the one who was going to pay for it personally.”

Reich acknowledges that ObamaCare “is hardly perfect,” but he insists “the president cannot re-negotiate the Affordable Care Act” because that would mean giving in to the Republicans: “If you give in to bullies, their bullying only escalates.” America is stuck with this monstrous law because the alternative would be too costly to Obama’s pride. Disgust and cynicism seems an entirely appropriate reaction.

Then we have the government shutdown, which the Obama administration has been working to make as painful as possible. FoxNews.com has a list of “7 Things the Government Shut Down That Saved Practically Nothing,” including websites (whose content not only isn’t being updated but has been taken off-line altogether); public parks (such as the normally unattended World War II memorial, which has been fenced off and patrolled by rangers to keep citizens away); and even privately run parks that happen to be situated on public land.

Obama explained his shutdown tactics at a White House press conference yesterday:

Q: Mr. President, while you’re waiting for the shutdown to end, why is it that you can’t go along with any of the bills the House is passing funding the FDA and FEMA, where you were yesterday, and veterans benefits and Head Start? You’ve got to be tempted to sign those bills and get funding to those programs that you support.

Obama: Of course I’m tempted, because you’d like to think that you could solve at least some of the problem if you couldn’t solve all of it.

But here’s the problem. What you’ve seen are bills that come up where wherever Republicans are feeling political pressure, they put a bill forward. And if there’s no political heat, if there’s no television story on it, then nothing happens. And if we do some sort of shotgun approach like that, then you’ll have some programs that are highly visible get funded and reopened, like national monuments, but things that don’t get a lot of attention, like those SBA loans, not being funded.

By the president’s own admission, it’s all about jockeying for political advantage. Arguably it’s working: The Associated Press reports its new poll suggests the Republicans are “taking the biggest hit in public opinion from the shutdown”: “Overall, 62 percent mainly blamed Republicans for the shutdown. About half said Obama or the Democrats in Congress bear much responsibility.” Congress’s approval rating is at a laughable 5%, though Obama’s is 37%, almost as bad by presidential standards.

But again, cynicism and disgust seem entirely appropriate responses. Ronald Reagan was the last president who had a basic skepticism of Big Government, but Barack Obama may end up having done more than any of his predecessors to promote that feeling among the public.

Another example of the fraud that is Barack Obama comes from a comparison of Obama’s comments at a January 2011 event after the shooting of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D–Arizona) and his news conference Tuesday, as recorded by Rush Limbaugh:

2011: “At a time when our discourse has become so sharply polarized …”

Tuesday: “Extortion, insane, catastrophic, chaos.”

2011: “We are far too eager to lay the blame for all that ails the world at the feet of those who think differently.”

Tuesday: “You have some ideological extremist, extreme Republicans.”

2011: “It’s important for us to pause for a moment.”

Tuesday: “We’re not going to pay a ransom, you don’t pay a ransom, demand a ransom.”

2011: “And make sure that we are talking with each other in a way that heals.”

Tuesday: “You do not hold people hostage.”

2011: “Not in a way that wounds.”

Tuesday: “Ransom-taking or hostage-taking.”

2011: “Usher in more civility in our public discourse.”

Tuesday: “Burn down the plant or your office.”

2011: “Only a more civil and honest public discourse can help us face the challenges of our nation.”

Tuesday: “I’m going to burn down your house.”

2011: “Not on the usual plane of politics and point scoring and pettiness.”

Tiuesday: “Tea Party Republicans flirted with the idea of default, a nuclear bomb.”

2011: “We should do everything we can do to make sure this country lives up to our children’s expectations.”

Tuesday: “You’re just a deadbeat.”

Nile Gardiner of London’s Telegraph observes:

I’ve just watched Barack Obama’s press conference at the White House, where the president has been talking about the government shutdown and the possibility of a US default over the debt ceiling. It wasn’t a pretty sight. The most powerful man on earth, the leader of the free world,lashed out at conservatives in Congress (whom he labeled as “extremists”), accusing them of “ransom” and “extortion,” even comparing them to a “deadbeat” who doesn’t pay the mortgage.

This was a childish, as well as unpleasant, display of petulance by Mr. Obama, who treats elected officials as though they were puppets who should dance to his tune. It was followed by an embarrassing set of hand-picked questions from a largely subservient liberal-dominated media, none of which seriously challenged the president’s policies or his handling of the shutdown. In the UK, a British prime minister would never get away with this kind of performance without a barrage of relentlessly tough questioning.

Barack Obama’s approach today was imperial in style, both arrogant and condescending, and deeply partisan in outlook. There was not a hint of humility on show from the president, against a backdrop of declining poll numbers and mounting disillusionment with his presidency. The United States is facing the prospect of a default overwhelmingly because of Obama’s big spending, big government programmes, which have added a staggering $6 trillion to the national debt. The shutdown has been prompted by the imposition of a hugely unpopular health care reform, forced on the American people despite the fact that the Democrats no longer control the House of Representatives. This is a president who is incapable of taking responsibility for his own actions, who refuses to listen to any criticism of his policies, and is more willing to negotiate with a state sponsor of terrorism in Tehran than sit down with Republicans in Congress.

The Wall Street Journal’s James Taranto compares U.S. Sen. Barack Obama (D–Illinois) …

The fact that we are here today to debate raising America’s debt limit is a sign of leadership failure. It is a sign that the U.S. government can’t pay its own bills. It is a sign that we now depend on ongoing financial assistance from foreign countries to finance our Government’s reckless fiscal policies. . . . Increasing America’s debt weakens us domestically and internationally. Leadership means that “the buck stops here.” Instead, Washington is shifting the burden of bad choices today onto the backs of our children and grandchildren. America has a debt problem and a failure of leadership. Americans deserve better.

… with the petulant brat at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave.:

If the borrowing limit isn’t raised, “the whole world will have problems, which is why, generally, nobody’s ever thought to actually threaten not to pay our bills,” said Mr. Obama in an address at a construction company in Rockville, Md., on Thursday.

Taranto adds:

So which is it? Is a threat not to increase the debt ceiling a threat “not to pay our bills,” or is it “a sign that the U.S. government can’t pay its own bills”? It’s difficult to see how these two statements are anything other than a direct contradiction.

When you have trillion-dollar deficits, well, you can’t pay your bills.

Meanwhile, for those who claim the federal government cannot possibly cut anything in federal spending, Nick Gillespie of Reason provides them with a list of things to cut:

Much of what the feds spend money on is either unnecessary or ineffective … or both. The sequestration and the shutdown force voters and politicians to engage in serious and hopefully consequential cost-benefit analyses.

Start small, with something like arts funding, which comes to $1.8 billion annually for “the whole suite of federal arts-related agencies,” according to The Arts Index. That total is dwarfed by the $13 billion that Americans donate to cultural nonprofits and the $150 billion that we spend on art, music, movies and the like. …

Whole agencies are demonstrably ineffective. The Department of Education was created in 1979, and its annual budget for K-12 education comes in just shy of $40 billion. Test scores for high-school seniors on the National Assessment of Educational Progress – called the Nation’s Report Card – are either flat or slightly below where they were before the department existed.

Then there’s Defense, which is one of the single-biggest items in the federal budget. The U.S. accounts for 40 percent of global expenditures on military might and, in real dollars, our defense spending rose nearly 80 percent between 2001 and 2012. As the shutdown entered its second week, The Dayton Daily News reported that the Pentagon is sending half a billion dollars’ worth of “nearly new” cargo planes to a storage facility in Arizona, where they will join $35 billion worth of other unnecessary aircraft and vehicles.

When leaders like Representative Nancy Pelosi claim “there’s no more cuts to make,” I have to wonder whether they are tripping on powerful hallucinogens – whose availability undercuts another unnecessary, ineffective and costly federal program: the war on drugs.

Gillespie doesn’t put a price tag on the war on drugs, but his short list totals $77.3 billion, which surely is a good start.

People who have watched politics for a while know that crises usually fail to create good policy. The twin “crises” of the government “shutdown” (which as you know is actually a “slowdown” since three-fourths of the government continues to operate) and the looming debt limit have each happened numerous times in the past decades. (Government shutdowns began in 1980 after Attorney General Benjamin Civiletti ignored nearly two centuries of precedent in claiming that government funding could not continue at previous levels once the fiscal year ended Sept. 30. It is the fault of every attorney general since Civiletti and every Congress since then that previous-fiscal-year funding wasn’t restored, which proves the political value of that particular “crisis.”)

The debt crisis apparently has an actual date, Oct. 17. The government “shutdown” doesn’t have a deadline date, though more and more activities apparently won’t get funded as the “shutdown” continues.

Pundits may well be correct in reporting polls apparently blaming House Republicans for the “shutdown.” (Given that all appropriations are required by the U.S. Constitution to originate in the House, to use an IT phrase, that’s a feature, not a bug.) Pundits are incorrect in claiming that the longest “shutdown,” the Newt Gingrich-led event of late 1995 and early 1996, hurt Republicans. The GOP controlled the House from the 1994 elections until the 2006 elections, and with the exception of the brief departure of Sen. James Jeffords from the GOP that threw the Senate into Democratic hands, the GOP controlled the Senate that long too. The shutdown may have hurt Gingrich’s presidential aspirations, and it may have helped Bill Clinton get reelected, but it’s doubtful welfare reform and the investor-friendly tax cut of the late 1990s would have happened without the GOP’s flexing its political muscle.

The current political crises will end when it is politically advantageous to all sides concerned for them to end. In the case of the debt ceiling, that’s probably around Oct. 17. In the case of the “shutdown,” that date isn’t apparent, but it will be when Barack Obama, Senate Democrats and House Republicans figure out how to do something that will politically benefit all of them. Politics is about getting elected and reelected, after all.

Facebook Friend Mike Smith talks about a relative of his who complains about the cost of Lipitor:

Relative: “The cost of Lipitor is killing me and my friends.”
Me: “You are kidding, right?”
Relative: (shocked) “What do you mean? Lipitor is very expensive!”
Me: Compared to what? A heart attack might kill you. And, even if it doesn’t, it costs far, far more than Lipitor.”
Relative: “Well, Lipitor is just too expensive!”

Did a little research. Omitting the possibility of death, a major heart attack costs $1,000,000 and a minor heart attack $760,000. Generic Lipitor in the 10mg size, without insurance, has a national average cost of about $425/year when purchased 90 days at a time. Yes, it cost more when it was under patent but even then it was much less than 1% of the cost of a heart attack.

The conversation was what I call “magical thinking*.” While emotions are understandable when comes to health care, we often have things backward. Instead of heralding the invention of statins, their lifesaving properties, and the money they save (compared to heart attacks), we denigrate both the drugs (“too expensive”) and their creators (“greedy!”). We single out medical companies for extra taxes. So, we get layoffs and less innovation when we need more innovation and more jobs. http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/02/business/merck-plans-to-lay-off-8500-workers.html

Instead of insuring against big hazards (cancer, heart attack, etc.), we want 100% of our fees and medicine covered every time we have an allergy or cold.

This is nonsenseand we have to stop thinking this way. Yes, healthcare is emotional. But, I fear, without a change in thinking, someone could create a $10 pill that cured all cancer and people would be picketing with signs complaining about “profiting from peoples’ misery.” Even in nations with single-payer (government) insurance, everyone has to pay something. There is no free lunch.

With smartphones, internet, and technology there is a real chance that we can improve healthcare and make it affordable. We need to be encouraging, not taxing, innovation!

So, before I offer any other suggestions, I must exhort everyone to stop with the magical thinking. Quality health care is not, and will never be, free. …

The entire theory of “insurance” is for many to pay a (relatively) small amount so that a (relatively) rare catastrophic loss will not bankrupt a person or family. Health insurance works nothing like this, so it is not “insurance.” It is very possible my home will never have a fire or tornado. It is impossible I could live a normal lifespan without ever seeing a physician.

So, why do we think it is a good idea to have “insurance” pay for a visit to a physician or a common cold or allergy for which little can be done anyway (colds and allergies cannot be cured) other than treating symptoms? This is nuts. We have to rethink this. Life has expenses. In my world, getting an annual allergy shot should not be part of “insurance.” And, an (relatively) inexpensive physician assistant would handle this to keep costs down. Fixing this would seem relatively simple, at least in concept. But, emotions get in the way.

Many liberals accurately point out that the U.S. is the only first-world nation without some type of national health program. They see it as unjust because they believe everyone has a right to be cared for when seriously ill. …

Conservatives, who have been unfairly and illegally attacked by the IRS, will never accept it as OC enforcer since the Administration has not prosecuted a single one of the wrongdoers. This breach of civic trust makes, for C’s, Obamacare a non-starter. Yesterday’s new Christian Science Monitor poll showed 57% against Obamacare, so neither political party would pay a price for the delay. Besides, President Obama has (without authorization of Congress) waived the start of the business mandate, so the precedent exists.

We should adopt the plan of a Democrat, Bill Bradley, from when he ran for President. Every U.S. citizen and permanent legal resident should be able to purchase either an individual or family policy from the same set of policies available to federal employees and their families. There are something like 20 plans with lots of choice and lots of tailoring options.

For those who are poor, there should be a means-tested voucher (no cash value) that can only be used to purchase a policy. It would be administered by existing state welfare agencies. No new giant bureaucracy. Low cost. The voucher pays for a policy that insures against major illnesses not every time someone has a cold unless someone wants to voluntarily pay more.

Repeal Obamacare but ONLY when we can simultaneously replace it with a plan of along the lines of the above. It should be named, in the best sense of the term, The Democratic Party Health Plan. It was proposed by a D, they deserve the credit. The R’s have done a lousy job in this area of governance.

The plan will have the same restrictions (i.e., other than in an open enrollment period) as the federal employees’ plan: you can’t buy a policy the day after being diagnosed with cancer as the federal employees have. Fraud is a criminal offense. Any connection between the IRS and health care MUST be severed. …

The tax on medical devices will be repealed. We need more innovation, not less. The U.S. Department of Defense has DARPA, which offers prizes to innovation they deem useful. Perhaps we do the same in healthcare for innovations that improve care for the same or lower cost or provide the same level of care for less cost.

Yes, there is the issue of people refusing to buy a policy. Fine, if they have refused a policy, let them go bankrupt if they have major medical they cannot afford. It is time we get back to a concept of individual responsibility. It is time for “tough love.” President Reagan was right: If we subsidize irresponsible (not buying a policy) behavior we will get more of it.

Smith, who is not a political blogger, nonetheless has a few more political things to say: