Obamacare Website $93 Mil. Phony Crony Pay-Off

Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, CMS, officials are Toni Townes-Whitleytight-lipped about why CGI was chosen or how it happened. They also refuse to say if other firms competed with CGI, or if there was ever a public solicitation for building Healthcare.gov, the backbone of Obamacare’s problem-plagued web portal. In awarding the Healthcare.gov contract, CMS relied on a little-known federal contracting system called ID/IQ, which is government jargon for “Indefinite Delivery and Indefinite Quantity.”

Michelle Obama

One huge fact is glaringly obvious, First Lady Michelle Obama’s Princeton classmate is a top executive at this company that earned the no-bid contract to build the failed Obamacare website.

• CGI Federal executives were large campaign bundlers for Obama. They helped him shut off all the security features on Obama's campaign donation website in 2008 and 2012 in order to take multi-millions in foreign donations.

• CGI Federal distributes $1.7 billion in federal Superstorm Sandy relief money. They won a multi-million dollar contract from the Obama administration in May, 2013.
  

• CGI Federal won the 'No-bid' $93 Million contract to build the failed Obamacare website. CMS officials are tight-lipped about why CGI was chosen or how it happened. They also refuse to say if other firms competed with CGI, or if there was ever a public solicitation for building Healthcare.gov, the backbone of Obamacare’s problem-plagued web portal. Between 2009 and 2013, CMS officials awarded 185 separate task orders to CGI totaling $678 million for work of all kinds, according to USAspending.gov, a federal spending database.The Obamacare website design contract was for $93 million.

• Toni Townes-Whitley, Princeton class of ’85, is senior vice president at CGI Federal, which earned the no-bid contract to build the $93 million Obamacare enrollment website at Healthcare.gov. CGI Federal is the U.S. arm of a Canadian company.

• Toni Townes-Whitley and Michelle Obama, her Princeton classmate, are both active members of the Association of Black Princeton Alumni.
  

• CGI in Canada also suffered embarrassment in 2011 when it failed to deliver on time for Ontario province's flagship project a new online medical registry for diabetes patients and treatment providers. Ontario government officials cancelled the $46.2 million contract after 14 months of delay in September 2012. Ontario officials currently refuse to pay any fees to CGI for the failed IT project.
  

Obama: Caught Up In His Own Tangled Web

1941 'The Maltese Falcon' - Humphrey Bogart & Sidney Greenstreet CLICK ON PHOTO TO VIEW VIDEO FILM CLIP - Time: 04:13"What is at issue here is not some sacred moral value, such as "In God We Trust." Domestic politics or the affairs of nations are not an avocation for angels. But the coin of this imperfect realm is credibility."

"Sydney Greenstreet's Kasper Gutman explained the terms of trade in the 1941 film, 'The Maltese Falcon': "I must tell you what I know, but you won't tell me what you know. That is hardly equitable, sir. I don't think we can do business along those lines." Bogie was rebuked and so he angrily stormed out of the room. So then how do two sides conduct a one-sided negotiation amicably? They don't, just like in the movie. But in Obama's case, he is the world leader on the world stage acting like a two-bit actor that's all show, no go and no real act.

"Bluntly, Mr. Obama's partners are concluding that they cannot do business with him. They don't trust him. Whether it's the Saudis, the Syrian rebels, the French, the Iraqis, the unpivoted Asians or the congressional Republicans, they've all had their fill of coming up on the short end with so mercurial a U.S. president. And when that happens, the world's important business doesn't get done. It sits in a dangerous and volatile vacuum."

The Maltese FalconObama has foolishly squandered his own moral capital. Despite appearances, politicians and governments care deeply about people's moral judgments, for these provide the moral capital they depend on for survival and effective functioning. Obama stupidly burned all of his bridges as he never learned an important axiom: “An honest man's word is as good as his bond.” - from 'Don Quixote de la Mancha' by Miguel de Cervantes. Obama has deservedly earned the distinction that he cannot be trusted to give or keep his word, period - how many times is too many to finally cross the 'red line'?

"The next major political event in Washington is the negotiation over spending, entitlements and taxes between House budget chairman Paul Ryan and his Senate partner, Patty Murray. The bad air over this effort is the same as that Marco Rubio says is choking immigration reform: the fear that Mr. Obama will urge the process forward in public and then blow up any Ryan-Murray agreement at the 11th hour with deal-killing demands for greater tax revenue." 

"Then there is Mr. Obama's bond with the American people, which is diminishing with the failed rollout of the Affordable Care Act. ObamaCare is the central processing unit of the Obama presidency's belief system. Now the believers are wondering why the administration suppressed knowledge of the huge program's problems when hundreds of tech workers for the project had to know this mess would happen Oct. 1."

It is apropos to say, "Oh what a tangled web we weave when first we practice to deceive." - by Sir Walter Scott, 1808.  It certainly describes not only Obama but his untrustworthy partners' motives both inside and outside government circles.  He has consistently demonstrated his contempt for our Constitutional governance, our capitalist country and our people--witness Obama's burdensome socialist programs and prolific Federal government spending projected to shoot over $20 Trillion at the end of his term. And, our government has still not cut spending or set up any budget--isn't it about time now?

Medical News On 'Clostridium difficile' - What?

More than two million people in the U.S. develop infections every year that are resistant to antibiotics, and at least 23,000 of them die as a result, according to a CDC report that called for aggressive steps to counter worsening public health problems.

The Center for Disease Control, CDC, released a blistering report on September 16, 2013. It bluntly stated, "Up to half of antibiotic use in humans and much of antibiotic use in animals is unnecessary and inappropriate and makes everyone less safe." Bacteria evolve quickly to evade antibiotics meant to kill them, so greater use of antibiotics will lead to more drug-resistant germs. "Giving antibiotics to food-producing animals to promote their growth should be 'phased out'," it said too.

The CDC ranked 18 drug-resistant bacteria and fungi by threat level. Three are ranked 'urgent,' meaning they have few treatment options and the potential is widespread. The clostridium difficile or 'C. difficile', a life-threatening infection that occurs mostly in patients who have recently been given antibiotics and undergone medical care. The number of deaths has risen more than five times between 2000 and 2007.

Many hospitals have 'antibiotic stewardship' programs that oversee how drugs are prescribed.  But more needs to be done, according to Edward Septimus, a professor of internal medicine of Texas A&M University Health Science Center, and a member of the Infectious Diseases Society of America's antimicrobial resistance committee.

News Update - October 17, 2013 - 'Clostridium difficile'

A potential new victory in the war against antibiotic-resistant "superbugs" lies in the discovery of specific viruses that eat bacteria - called bacteriophages. Researchers in the UK have isolated certain phages, which have been shown to target the infectious hospital bug Clostridium difficile.  

Yellin' Yellen's Yin-Yang

Ben Bernanke's Helicopter QE Money PolicyYin-Yang. In Eastern thought, two complementary forces make up all aspects and phenomena of life. Yin is present in even numbers. Yang is present in odd numbers. Their interplay on one another (as one increases the other decreases) being a description of the actual process of the universe and all that is in it.

The overall economic philosophy contrasting Yellen to Bernanke is their policy making. Ben acted upon market pressures of the moment instead of Yellen believing in the government wisdom to guide the economy constantly throughout - ever heard of socialism, communism? 

So, who is 'Yin' or 'Yang' here?

Ben is a 'Milton Friedman,' 'free-market laissez-faire' economist, but with some of his own 'momentus intervention' such as 'quantitative easing', QE, aka 'printing money and buying back our bonds' to buoy up U.S. currency while creating inflation - contrary to Milton Friedman's basic precepts.

Janet is a 'Maynard Keyes,' 'government centrist' economist, but with a 'James Tobin' twist, as a 'reconstructionist' about unemployment as the central focus over maintaining price stabilities to control inflation. She embraces the 'Phillips Curve' and 'NAIRU', non-accelerating inflation rate of employment, the trade-off between inflation and unemployment which means always doing the fine-tuning and meddling micro-management.

In the 'new Keynesian' theories, it assumes recessions are caused by some economy-wide market failure. So, Keynesian economics provides a rationale for government intervention into the entire economy, such as countercyclical monetary or fiscal policy. That means people are not circulating enough money and the Central Government needs to get more cash out into circulation with lower interest rates on bank loans and to increase numbers of recipients for Federal benefits to put into their open hands more money to spend.

This alternating sequence of expansion and contraction in economic activity is imperfect to say the least, unpredictable to say more which leans toward outright clairvoyance riddled with glitches in deciding future events. It does take from months to years to affect different sectors of the U.S. economy; i.e., finance and banking are immediate as monies flow directly from the Federal Bank, businesses and industries are cyclical due to seasonal changes, business cycles, or technological advances can take up to years while sporadically infusing funds. So, instead of letting the 'marketplace' dictate QE timing, the 'new-Keynesian' economists forecast with their crystal balls the 'marketplace' timing of QE - just like a coach that flips a coin on whether to put a player in the game.

So, Janet says, "Let's start up the printing presses, it's QE 'funny-money' time!"  Bring out large wheelbarrows too. You'll need a bunch more bills to buy bread at $6/loaf, milk at $8/gallon and gasoline at $12/gallon.

It's again like the German Weimar Republic (1919-1933) In 1919, one loaf of bread cost 1 mark; by 1923, the same loaf of bread cost 100 billion marks.

Obama & Putin: Masks vs. Bras, Panties & Slips

On August 27, 2013 during the removal of paintings from the exhibition titled 'Leaders', Police seized a painting of Russia's president and prime minister in women's underwear from a gallery, "Museum of Power", in St Petersburg. Russia does have a law against insulting authorities - an offense that carries a maximum one-year prison term.

The painting showed President Vladimir Putin wearing a tight-fitting slip and brushing the hair of Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev, who is wearing knickers and a bra.  St Petersburg was one of the first Russian cities to introduce a law banning the spread of "gay propaganda" too.

St Petersburg deputy Vitaly Mironov, whose face was combined with the gay rights movement's rainbow flag in one of the paintings, told Reuters the images were inappropriate and "of a distinctly pornographic character".

The Russian parliament has also adopted similar legislation, prompting protests from abroad and calls for a boycott of the Winter Olympics which Russia will host in the Black Sea resort of Sochi in February, 2014.

Were you equally upset when the RODEO CLOWN was banned for life in Missouri for wearing a Obama mask?

September 4, 2013

Read more here: http://www.kansascity.com/2013/08/11/4404230/clowns-obama-stunt-at-missouri.html#storylink=cpy

The Missouri State Fair imposed a lifetime ban on the rodeo clown wearing an Obama mask whose depiction of Obama getting charged by a bull was widely criticized by Democratic and Republican officials alike - a Democrat Governor and a Republican Lt. Governor of Missouri. [But, it was not reported by the crowd who laughed with no complaints.]

The rodeo clown won't be allowed [for life] to participate or perform at the fair again. Fair officials say they're also reviewing whether to take any action against the Missouri Rodeo Cowboy Association, the contractor responsible for Saturday's event.

This current rodeo event and political fallout certainly does not follow others over the past fifty years in the history of rodeo clowns' buffoonery while wearing masks of Presidents Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon, Reagan, Clinton, Bush and now Obama; nor do any of these masks even remotely approach the acrimony of editorial cartoons and posters depicting far worst imagery and acts over our U.S. history for the past two hundred and thirty years.

Here in the United States our respect for the President as our leader transends any petty laws or groups that don't allow our leaders to be depicted as they are seen - like the good witch on the "down-low", the quirky and bubbly Glinda in the Wizard of Oz? 

 "Ha, ha, ha! Rubbish! You have no power here. Now begone — before someone drops a house on you, too!"