my doc is so awesome -- sees me for free

• A ? for those in favor of national healthcare - sm
  • I believe him and I'm scared. - LRS
  • I think - Kaydie
    • too many people = higher premiums?! - mk
  • You could find out you have cancer and need - treatment now, but with National Health Care
    • But what if you didn't have any insurance...sm - blondie_1147
    • cancer and national health - mk
    • I have Blue Shield, and can hardly get them - to pay for anything, hence no doctor visits for me
    • What is the difference, all the doctors - are leaving or quitting and there will be
      • and once you do get an appt., you're lucky if they - spend even 8 minutes with you.
        • my doc is so awesome -- sees me for free - XanaX
          • I have an awesome deal right now too (sm) - Just the big bad
          • Maybe he has a crush on you. n/m - Stardust
          • Oh you are blessed...nm - blondie_1147
          • Doctor - woofer
  • Obama's plan is not based on - European models...sm
    • The long lines and months of waiting for tests - with HIS plan are still predicted.nm
      • What are you talking about? - Why would that happen?....sm
      • and where does this come from? Never heard that before now - nm - Amanda
  • healthcare - mk
    • Ditto. - nm
    • I'm with you MK....(sm) - Just the big bad

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people can take anything out of context and do with it what they want; it still doesn't make it a McCain/Palin issue.

Friday, November 25, 2005 - 12:00 AM

Permission to reprint or copy this article or photo, other than personal use, must be obtained from The Seattle Times. Call 206-464-3113 or e-mail resale@seattletimes.com with your request.

Rep. Norm Dicks voted in 2002 to back the war.

JIMI LOTT / THE SEATTLE TIMES, 2003

U.S. Rep. Norm Dicks, center, with military officers at ceremonies marking the opening of new facilities at Naval Station Bremerton in 2003.

By Alicia Mundy
Seattle Times Washington bureau

WASHINGTON — It was after 11 p.m. on Friday when Rep. Norm Dicks finally left the Capitol, fresh from the heated House debate on the Iraq war. He was demoralized and angry.

Sometime during the rancorous, seven-hour floor fight over whether to immediately withdraw U.S. troops, one Texas Republican compared those who question America's military strategy in Iraq to the hippies and peaceniks who protested the Vietnam War and did terrible things to troop morale.

The House was in a frenzy over comments by Rep. John Murtha, D-Pa., who had called for the troops to leave Iraq in six months. In response, the White House initially likened Murtha, a 37-year veteran of the Marines and an officer in Vietnam, to lefty moviemaker Michael Moore.

Then a new Republican representative from Ohio, Jean Schmidt, relayed a message to the House that she said she had received from a Marine colonel in her district: Cowards cut and run; Marines never do.

During much of the debate, Dicks, a Democrat from Bremerton, huddled in the Democrats' cloakroom with Murtha, a longtime friend. Both men are known for their strong support of the military over the years. Now, they felt, that record was being questioned.

There was a lot of anger back there, Dicks said in an interview this week. It was powerful. I can't remember anything quite as traumatic as this in my history here.

Near midnight, he drove to his D.C. home, poured a drink and wondered how defense hawks like he and Murtha had gotten lumped in with peaceniks by their colleagues and the administration.

And he thought about all that had happened over the past couple of years to change his mind about the war in Iraq.

Voted to back Bush

In October 2002, Dicks voted loudly and proudly to back President Bush in a future deployment of U.S. troops to Iraq — one of two Washington state Democratic House members to do so. Adam Smith, whose district includes Fort Lewis, was the other.

Dicks thought Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction and wouldn't hesitate to use them against the United States.

After visiting Iraq early in the war, Norm told me the Iraqis were going to be throwing petals at American troops, Murtha said in an interview this week.

Dicks now says it was all a mistake — his vote, the invasion, and the way the United States is waging the war.

While he disagrees with Murtha's conclusion that U.S. troops should be withdrawn within six months, Dicks said, He may well be right if this insurgency goes much further.

The insurgency has gotten worse and worse, he said. That's where Murtha's rationale is pretty strong — we're talking a lot of casualties with no success in sight. The American people obviously know that this war is a mistake.

Dicks, a member of the House Intelligence Committee, says he's particularly angry about the intelligence that supported going to war.

Without the threat of weapons of mass destruction (WMDs), he said, he would absolutely not have voted for the war.

The Bush administration has accused some members of Congress of rewriting history by claiming the president misled Americans about the reasons for going to war. Congress, the administration says, saw the same intelligence and agreed Iraq was a threat.

But Dicks says the intelligence was doctored. And he says the White House didn't plan for and deploy enough troops for the growing insurgency.

A lot of us relied on [former CIA director] George Tenet. We had many meetings with the White House and CIA, and they did not tell us there was a dispute between the CIA, Commerce or the Pentagon on the WMDs, he said.

He and Murtha tended to give the military, the CIA and the White House the benefit of the doubt, Dicks says. But he now says he and his colleagues should have pressed much harder for answers.

Norm ... has agonized

All of us have gone through a difficult period, but Norm really has agonized, Murtha said this week.

Murtha and Dicks were appointed to the House Defense Appropriations subcommittee in 1979, three years after Dicks first was elected to Congress. They rarely have disagreed, especially in their support of the military.

In October 2002, Dicks made an impassioned speech during the House debate over whether to authorize the president to send troops to Iraq without waiting for the United Nations to act.

Based on the briefings I have had, and based on the information provided by our intelligence agencies to members of Congress, I now believe there is credible evidence that Saddam Hussein has developed sophisticated chemical and biological weapons, and that he may be close to developing a nuclear weapon, Dicks said at the time.

By spring 2003, U.N. weapons inspectors said they hadn't found hard evidence of WMDs in Iraq. But Dicks remained convinced of Iraq's threat.

We're going to find things [Saddam] had not disclosed, he said shortly before the war began in March 2003. There is no doubt about that. Period. Underlined.

By June of that year, with no chemical, biological or nuclear weapons found, Dicks remained steadfast in his support for the war but called for a congressional inquiry into the intelligence agencies' work on Iraq. I think the American people deserve to know what happened and why it happened, he said at the time.

That same month, Dicks was upset when a good friend, Gen. Eric Shinseki, the Army chief of staff, was forced into retirement after telling Congress that the secretary of defense was not sending enough troops to win the peace.

Growing doubts

On July 6, 2003, Dicks awoke to read the now-famous New York Times opinion piece by former Ambassador Joseph Wilson, who had been sent on a CIA mission to investigate a report that Iraq had tried to buy nuclear materials in Africa.

Wilson wrote that he had found no evidence of such Iraqi intentions and criticized Bush for making the claim in his State of the Union address two months before the invasion.

That Joe Wilson article was very troubling, Dicks said.

Dicks grew somber about Iraq. Rep. Jim McDermott, who represents Seattle and had opposed the war from the start, talked with him about it.

Norm is a lot like Jack Murtha. These are guys with a somewhat different philosophy than me, McDermott said recently. This an extremely difficult time for them because they have to reassess what they were led to believe about prewar intelligence.

The White House maintains it did nothing to mischaracterize what it knew about Iraq and its weapons.

Dicks' private concerns became more public two months ago. At a breakfast fundraiser on Capitol Hill, Dicks surprised the guests with a tough talk against the war.

The White House last Friday called Dicks to gauge his support. House GOP leaders were pushing for a vote on a resolution they hoped would put Democrats on the spot by forcing them to either endorse an immediate troop withdrawal or stay the course in Iraq.

Dicks said he told the White House that their attack on Murtha was the most outrageous comment I've ever heard.

The resolution, denounced by Democrats, ultimately was defeated 403-3.

Dicks says the Pentagon should begin a phased withdrawal and leave some troops to help maintain order and train a new Iraq army. We've got to be very concerned that Iraq comes out of this whole, he said.

But he added, We can't take forever.

Some people say it takes eight to nine years to control an insurgency, Dicks said.

I don't think the American people will give eight to nine years, and I sure as heck won't.

Alicia Mundy: 202-662-7457 or amundy@seattletimes.com

Copyright © 2005 The Seattle Times Company

And from what I've read about him, it would be really hard to *Swiftboat* this guy (not that they'd let facts get in the way of their smear campaigns).  If the election were held today, he'd be my choice, as well. 

Yet another rambling session and yet....something is missing.  Oh, that's right.  What's missing is the fact that you can't back up the claim that was made.  The question was "what regulations."  Your answer thus far is seemingly...the ones that he might put in place...the onces that are in a supposed hidden agenda....the ones that only I can see....

In other words....the claim that small businesses are laying off people as a direct result of Obama legislation is nothing but BS spouted out by the likes of Limbaugh, Hannity and O'Reilly and regurgitated by the likes of you.  Thank you for proving my point.  You know, the thing that absolutely cracks me up about this board is that when people like you are asked a direct question, 9 times out of 10 you can't provide a valid answer.  Why is that...I wonder...LOL.

Strike 3...

I think he is a litte awkward on TV, but I think it's absolutely hilarious.  However, he is absolutely dead on with the issues.  

My husband is a firefighter so we have insurance through the city (BC/BS).  That's a relief all by itself!  However, the city has gone one step further for its employees.  They provide FOR FREE a clinic where you can go for the small stuff (cuts, colds, UTIs, etc).  They also provide city employees with FREE medicine so long as they carry it.  It has to be generic, but it's such a huge help.  What this service provides us:  For me:  lipid-lowering agent, happy pills, sleeping pills, and PPI.  For my husband:  Blood pressure medication and PPI.

They did this because it is actually cheaper for them in the long run to provide this service to their employees with health maintenance drugs, thereby reducing the added cost to the insurance from people not being able to afford this medication and ending up in the hospital which in the long run increases the cost of insurance.  I just hope they can continue to do this.

Actually, the list was more a list of individuals who made contributions towards passing prop 8.  Seems silly to boycott an entire organization because one guy or gal who happens to be employed there contributed to passing prop 8.  Just goes to show you that gay right's activitists lack a certain amount of intelligence.

* I don't know what *9/11 perps* you are talking about, but I don't think anyone has gone free.*

'Dr. Germ,' Others Released in Iraq

Monday, December 19, 2005

BAGHDAD, Iraq — About 24 top former officials in Saddam Hussein's regime, including a biological weapons expert known as Dr. Germ, have been released from jail, while a militant group released a video Monday of the purported killing of an American hostage.

The first results of Thursday's parliamentary election were released, with officials saying the Shiite religious bloc, the United Iraqi Alliance, got about 58 percent of the votes from 89 percent of ballot boxes counted in Baghdad province.

Across Iraq, meanwhile, demonstrations broke out to protest a government decision to raise the price of gasoline, heating and cooking fuel, and the oil minister threatened to resign over the development.

An Iraqi lawyer said the 24 or 25 officials from Saddam's government were released from jail without charges, and some have already left the country.

The release was an American-Iraqi decision and in line with an Iraqi government ruling made in December 2004, but hasn't been enforced until after the elections in an attempt to ease the political pressure in Iraq, said the lawyer, Badee Izzat Aref.

Among them were Rihab Taha, a British-educated biological weapons expert, who was known as Dr. Germ for her role in making bio-weapons in the 1980s, and Huda Salih Mahdi Ammash, known as Mrs. Anthrax, a former top Baath Party official and biotech researcher, Aref said.

Because of security reasons, some of them want to leave the country, he said. He declined to elaborate, but noted some have already left Iraq today.

Lt. Col. Barry Johnson, a U.S. military spokesman in Baghdad, would say only that eight individuals formerly designated as high-value detainees were released Saturday after a board process found they were no longer a security threat and no charges would be filed against them.

Neither the U.S. military or Iraqi officials would disclose any of the names, but a legal official in Baghdad said Taha and Ammash were among those released.

The official, who asked not to be identified because of the sensitivity of the issue, said those released also included Hossam Mohammed Amin, head of the weapons inspections directorate, and Aseel Tabra, an Iraqi Olympic Committee official under Odai Saddam Hussein, the former leader's son.

The video from the extremist group The Islamic Army of Iraq was posted on a Web site and showed a man purportedly being shot in the back of the head. Last week, the group had claimed it had killed civilian contractor Ronald Allen Schulz, a native of North Dakota.

The video did not show the victim's face, however, and it was impossible to identify him. The victim was kneeling with his back to the camera, with his hands tied behind his back and blindfolded with an Arab headdress when he was purportedly shot. The video also showed Schulz's identity card.

A separate video, shown on a split screen, showed images of Schulz alive. The group had aired that video when he was first taken hostage earlier this month.

Schulz has been identified by the extremist group as a security consultant for the Iraqi Housing Ministry, although family and neighbors from his current home in Alaska, say he is an industrial electrician who has worked on contracts around the world.

Schulz served in the Marine Corps from 1984 to 1991. He moved to Alaska six years ago, and friends and family say he is divorced.

The German government, meanwhile, said kidnappers had freed a German aid worker and archaeologist taken hostage with her driver in northern Iraq more than three weeks ago. Susanne Osthoff, 43, was reported in good condition at the German Embassy in Baghdad. It was unclear whether Osthoff's Iraqi driver had also been freed.

The military said a U.S. Marine was killed by small arms fire Sunday in the town of Ramadi, in central Iraq. The death brought to 2,156 the number of U.S. service members killed since the start of the war in 2003, according to an Associated Press count.

In other violence Monday, a suicide car bomb exploded outside a children's hospital in western Baghdad, killing at least two people and wounding 11, including seven police, officials said. Police believe the bomb had targeted a convoy carrying a police colonel, who was among the injured.

In western Baghdad, gunmen attacked the convoy of Deputy Baghdad Gov. Ziad Tariq, killing three civilians and wounding three of his bodyguards, police said. Tariq was not injured.

Iraqi soldiers on Monday began Operation Moonlight, which the U.S. military described as the first large-scale operation planned and executed by soldiers of the Iraqi 1st Brigade. The mission's aim is to disrupt insurgent activity along the Euphrates River near the border with Syria.

There are five Iraqi Army companies and one U.S. Marine company taking part in the operation, said Marine Capt. Jeffrey S. Pool.

With 89 percent of the ballot boxes counted in Baghdad province — Iraq's largest district — preliminary results showed the United Iraqi Alliance received 1,403,901 votes, or about 58 percent, while the Sunni Arab Iraqi Accordance party got 451,782 votes, and former Prime Minister Ayad Allawi's Iraqi National List with 327,174 votes, the electoral commission said.

The commission did not say how many people voted in Baghdad province or provide further details. Baghdad is Iraq's biggest electoral district with 2,161 candidates running for 59 of the 275 seats in Iraq's parliament.

Results from southern Basra province, also mixed but predominantly Shiite, saw the clergy-backed United Iraqi Alliance significantly ahead, winning 612,206 votes with 98 percent of ballot boxes counted. The list headed by Allawi, a secular Shiite, was in second with 87,134 votes, while the Sunni accordance party trailed with 36,997 votes.

Kurdish parties were overwhelmingly ahead in their three northern provinces.

In a speech Sunday, President Bush praised the vote and warned against a pullout of U.S. forces. He said the election would not end violence but means that America has an ally of growing strength in the fight against terror. He also warned that a U.S. troop pullout would signal to the world that America cannot be trusted to keep its word.

The fuel prices were raised Sunday — some as much as nine times — to curb a growing black market, Oil Ministry spokesman Assem Jihad said.

A gallon of imported and super gasoline in Iraq was raised to about 68 cents, but Iraqis were upset by the fivefold increase. The price of locally produced gas was raised to about 48 cents per gallon, a sevenfold increase.

In Amarah, 180 miles southeast of Baghdad, police fired into the air to disperse the hundreds of protesters who had gathered in front of the provincial government headquarters. The demonstrators, however, didn't leave, and scuffles broke out with police.

Drivers blocked roads and set tires on fire near fuel stations in the southern city of Basra, and hundreds demonstrated outside the governor's headquarters to protest the increases.

Oil Minister Ibrahim Bahr al-Uloum said when the Cabinet raised prices, it also decided that the extra money would be used to support more than 2 million low-income families. Some aid money was supposed to reach the families before the increases, but that didn't happen, he said.

Dr. Ibrahim will submit his resignation to the Iraqi government if the situation continues as is, he said, referring to himself. We should take in consideration the living conditions and the economic situation of the citizens.

Iraq's oil minister has previously said that cheap domestic fuel prices had encouraged smuggling to other countries. Iraq's government has continued Saddam's practice of heavily subsidizing fuel prices.

http://www.foxnews.com/printer_friendly_story/0,3566,179103,00.html

SLide show with music, worth watching.  The song is also one of my favorites.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article8199.htm

for a $500,000 contribution to the RNC.

Do you really think the government will give us worse insurance than the for-profit insurers are doing now?   Really???

I'm sick of paying something for nothing - after all the deductibles, out of pocket charges, copays and disallowed claims - that's pretty much what we get.  I'd rather take the money I pay in premiums to a greedy corporation who will refuse to pay a cent when the time comes I need them - and pay it in taxes for a free healtchare plan.  At least everybody would be in the same boat, with no nasty surprises.

healthcare for myself.  I want free or more affordable cost healthcare for American children.  My children are already covered.  My husband has worked for the same company for over 12 years, and he has decent insurance.  You are impossible to argue with because you refuse to admit that we can afford $333 MILLION PER DAY FOR A WAR IN IRAQ, AND WE CAN AFFORD $19 MILLION PER DAY FOR CHILDREN'S HEALTH CARE.  How are your taxes going to be raised to 70% of your income for the health care?  Have they been raised that high for the war?  NO, so your argument is not valid.