JohnKWilson's blog

In a rare move at the end of the Supreme Court's June term, the justices ordered new arguments in the case rather than issuing a decision. Many experts believe that the re-argument may portend a Court willing to overturn many of the limits on campaign finance. The ACLU has come down on the side of prohibiting any limits on political speech. Floyd Abrams called limits on making such a movie a "constitutional desecration." Other progressive groups fear that a ruling by the Supreme Court may open up the floodgates to partisan groups using their money to influence elections with their own "documentaries" and advertising for them.

Third-party spending, such as Hillary the Movie, cannot be stopped without endangering freedom of political speech. Once you begin to say that "Hillary the Movie" cannot be advertised or shown on TV, there is a perilous and slippery slope down to a total ban. After all, if "Hillary the Movie" can be promoted online and shown in theaters and on DVD, it still amounts to a use of money on behalf or against a particular candidate. The exemption for "news media" cannot be sustained in a new internet environment where all of us can become part of the media by posting videos on YouTube and blogs online.

I take the "Hillary the Movie" case very personally. I wrote a book about Barack Obama that was published during the 2008 campaign. Part of my goal was to support Obama's candidacy and convince people to vote for Obama. Although I didn't give any money to Obama, arguably the resources provided by my publisher and myself far exceeding any campaign finance limits. I hope that I don't share the sheer stupidity and propensity for deceit found in "Hillary the Movie." But who would I trust to make the distinction, to say that my book is journalism and "Hillary the Movie" is pure politics? During the oral arguments this spring, the government's lawyer defended the campaign finance law by admitting that it said the government could restrict a book criticizing a candidate.

It's a troubling idea for any book lover, and it would be arrogant not to recognize the dangers of applying the concept to a movie. In 2004, conservatives sought to limit Michael Moore from promoting his movie Fahrenheit 9-11 on television and through personal appearances on college campuses. It was wrong to limit a leftist's speech, and it's equally wrong to limit a conservative's speech.

The danger posed by Hillary the Movie is small.  The republic will not fall because partisans, even well-funded partisans, choose to express their views. In an age of Fox News Channel, we already have a nation where entire news organizations are turned over to the service of one party against another.

Here is a case where the insights of the Founders can be educational. The early years of the United States were filled with the 18th Century equivalent of Hillary the Movie. Newspapers and pamphlets were viciously partisan and dishonest. Politicians may have regretted ever passing that First Amendment with its protections for freedom of the press. However, America prospered in spite of (and perhaps because of) this open environment for free speech.

The danger of big money in politics is real, and campaign finance reform alone cannot solve it. Hillary the Movie may lead the Supreme Court to overturn the ban on corporate and union funding of political advocacy. But we've seen how money funneled to right-wing think tanks and corporate media can influence our politics far more effectively.

Our current system is a failure. What should campaign finance reform look like? The 2008 campaign provides a valuable lesson. Barack Obama broke all records for fundraising. During the general election, Obama rejected public financing, preferring to continue his successful strategy of asking the American people to give money online. John McCain took public funding, which should have prevented him from doing any additional fundraising. But instead, McCain was aggressively raising money by helping the Republican Party seek funding for ads used in his campaign. Because the donation limits are much higher for the parties, McCain was seeking bigger sums of money from a much smaller group of donors than Obama. So the campaign finance system, subsidized by the public, actually encouraged corruption in 2008.

We need a new system for cleaning up campaigns. The first part should be an end to restrictions on movies such as "Hillary the Movie" and spending by outside groups. The second part should be limits on donations to candidates and parties and limits on coordination of state-based party donations. The third part should be a system of public matching funds for all candidates. By providing $50 in matching funds for every donation, we could have a system that rewards candidates for gaining support from the public rather than the wealthiest individuals.

With full disclosure and matching funds in all elections, we could help transform the political landscape. But ultimately, we need to participate actively in political debates in order to win them. Complaining about an unfair system that favors corporate interests and right-wing media won't change anything, and hoping that government regulation will favor a progressive point of view rather than suppressing it is a dangerous gamble.

The danger to our democracy doesn't come from documentaries or even corporate money, but from the failure to build a progressive movement that can persuade the public to embrace liberal policies and defeat the corporate interests trying to stop reforms.

Crossposted at DailyKos.

Considering that there aren't any regional health insurance cooperatives, how do we know they can't compete? There are plenty of good co-ops in America and around the world that do compete in a variety of businesses.

And why do progressives think that regional co-ops are the only option? One of the options Kent Conrad offered to his Senate colleagues was a national co-op.
Why aren't progressives pushing to make this a reality?

Jacob Hacker claims (pdf) that co-ops can't meet his standards for benchmark, backstop, and backup. Hacker's wrong on all three measures because he assumes co-ops would be "small and scattered." Why would they? Why can't we have a national cooperative that would do everything a public plan can do, and maybe more?

Large consumer co-ops are very rare because of a lack of capital, not because they can't compete. Banks are unlikely to hand over piles of money to an enterprise that's not devoted to making a big profit, and without private financing, no large consumer co-op has ever been established in America. However, the federal government has the funding to make these start-up costs feasible for a co-op.

The only real value I can see in a public plan (but it's unlikely to be allowed in any public plan that can get enough votes) over a co-op is to coordinate with Medicare for setting providers. However, Hacker argues that linking providers with Medicare is a bad idea for any plan, so this would seem to remove the only advantage of a public plan. (I'm not sure why a cooperative couldn't be allowed to link providers with Medicare anyway.) As for setting rates, a cooperative can set the same rates as Medicare +5% (as the House bill proposed). You don't need a public plan to do that; the Medicare rates aren't a secret.

A co-op is a PUBLIC option. It's not a government option, but it is owned by the public. In fact, because it's owned by its members, it may be a better public than the government. With a government-run plan, you will always have the influence of politicians. That means lobbyists from private health insurance companies will help shape legislation, and politicians will always be seeking to appease the elderly, more conservative voting bloc. With a co-op, the members (who would tend to be the young and the working poor) would choose the coverage.

It is a certainty that under a public plan illegal immigrants would not be covered; under a co-op, there's no reason why they would be banned. It is a certainty that some reproductive health care (especially abortion) would be banned under the public plan; under a co-op, that should be up to the member-owners and their elected representatives to decide. Considering the serious limits on democracy in our money-dominated political system, a co-op will be more democratic, more public in that sense, than a public plan.

There's nothing wrong with drawing a line in the sand. Progressive politicians should be standing up for our values against a conservative onslaught of lies. The problem is that the public option is the wrong line. Progressives should call for a public plan OR cooperatives, and demand that either choice meet progressive standards for competing with private insurers.

The cooperative plan is an approach that can get votes in the Senate, provide competition, and offer a non-profit alternative to the corporate model of health insurance.

So what exactly are the progressive arguments and evidence against a national cooperative?

I encourage you to respond, and also to listen to the show tonight.

Crossposted at DailyKos.

Limbaugh Lie #1: "this health care plan and the entire Obama agenda is frighteningly close to the National Socialism policies of Nazi Germany."(http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_081909/content/01125109.guest.html)
Obama's health care plan bears no resemblance to the policies of Nazi Germany, and their philosophy was fascism, not socialism.

Limbaugh Lie #2: "Look who is acting Nazi-like anyway? Who is it that's sending out thugs to beat people up at these meetings?...It's the Obama White House."(http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_081909/content/01125109.guest.html)
The Obama White House never sent out any "thugs to beat people up" at town hall meetings.

Limbaugh Lie #3: "assigning doctors regionally, assigning them geographically. It went so far in Hillary's health care bill as to assign what specialty they would learn. Doctors were going to be totally controlled. And it would be no different in this health care bill if Obama and Reid and Pelosi and Waxman get what they want."(http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_081409/content/01125111.guest.html)
There is absolutely nothing in any of the health care proposals about "totally controlled" doctors who would be told where they can work and "what specialty they would learn."

Limbaugh Lie #4: "No, there won't be a private doctor for you to go to."(http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_062409/content/01125110.guest.html)
Absolutely nothing in the legislation bans private doctors.

Limbaugh Lie #5: "this entire health care legislation is not even constitutional."(http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_081409/content/01125104.guest.html)
There is nothing even remotely unconstitutional about any of the health care reform proposals. Notably, Limbaugh doesn't even bother to say what specific legislation is unconstitutional, or what part of the Constitution is being violated; he simply believes that the government is not allowed to pass legislation dealing with health care, which is just insane.

Limbaugh Lie #6: Quoting Bernie Sanders, who said, "'Does Barack Obama want to kill off the old people or the disabled?' That is insane," Limbaugh responded, "It's not insane. It's going to happen! It's going to happen."(http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_081409/content/01125115.guest.html)
Obama is not going to kill off old people and the disabled.

Limbaugh Lie #7: "On page 16 of the House bill, it's right there, and you've heard people quote from it. I'm going to summarize it, page 16: private insurance will become illegal. Insurance companies cannot write new policies, people will lose their existing policy if they change jobs, if they change coverage, or if they change prices. Once any aspect of your private health insurance changes after this bill goes into effect, you can't renew it. You have to go public option."(http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_080409/content/01125111.guest.html)
Limbaugh Lie #8: Limbaugh again referred on August 7, 2009 to "the provision on Page 16 of the bill that would force you out of your private insurance plan."(August 7, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/...
Limbaugh Lie #9: Limbaugh added on August 10, 2009, "you will lose your private insurance and your doctor. It's on page 16 in the House plan."(August 10, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/...
None of this is true. Page 16 is an obscure clause for "grandfathered" health insurance plans that don't have to meet the new requirements (such as a ban on discrimination for preexisting conditions) because they're not enrolling new people or changing coverage. Private insurance will still be completely legal, contrary to Limbaugh's paranoid misreading of page 16.

Limbaugh Lie #10: Limbaugh said, "Page 22 mandates audits of all employers that self-insure."(August 10, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/...
No, it doesn't. Page 22 requires a "study" of how the health care reform will affect self-insuring employers. There is no audit forced on any business, and the word is never used.

Limbaugh Lie #11: Limbaugh claimed, "It admits on page 29 that your health care will be rationed."(August 10, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/...
No, in fact page 29 provides for payments of specified medical treatment "in accordance with generally accepted standards of medical or other appropriate clinical or professional practice" and "does not impose any annual or lifetime limit on the coverage of covered health care items and services." There is no rationing, and the ban on lifetime limits would end one current form of rationing by private health insurance.

Limbaugh Lie #12: Limbaugh said, "Page 30: A government will decide what treatments and benefits you get, and unlike an insurer, there is... Well, there's an appeals process that you don't even want to mess with that."(August 10, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/...
Limbaugh was wrong again. On page 30 there was the creation of a "Health Benefits Advisory Committee to recommend covered benefits and essential, enhanced, and premium plans." This is no different from an insurance company developing standards for what their insurance covers.

Limbaugh Lie #13: Limbaugh claimed, "On page 42, the health choices commissioner will decide health benefits for you. You will have no choice."(August 4, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/...
The commissioner's job is to establish "qualified health benefits plan standards" like any other insurance plan. People would be free to select any plan with the health benefits they desire.

Limabugh Lie #14: Limbaugh said, "Page 58:  Every person will be issued a national ID health card."(August 10, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/...
Page 58 says the proposal "may include utilization of a machine-readable health plan beneficiary identification card."(http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/getdoc.cgi?dbname=111_cong_bills&docid=f:h3200ih. txt.pdf) There would be no national ID health card because people would have different health insurance plans, and because everyone gets an insurance ID card, the only difference under this bill would be the option to include a bar code to speed up authorization of medical services.

Limbaugh Lie #15: Limbaugh asserted: "Page 59: The federal government will have direct real-time access to all individual bank accounts for electronic funds transfer."(August 10, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/...
In reality, the bill refers to a requirement to "enable electronic funds transfers, in order to allow automated reconciliation with the related health care payment and remittance advice."(http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/getdoc.cgi?dbname=111_cong_bills&docid=f:h3200i h.txt.pdf) Nowhere is the government given the power to steal money from individual bank accounts. This simply makes it easier for doctors to get paid more quickly for their work.

Limbaugh Lie #16: Limbaugh claimed that the Obama health reform would result in "direct deposit access to every individual's bank account."(August 6, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/... As a headline on Limbaugh's website put it, "Will Obamacare Access Your
Bank Account Via Direct Deposit?"
Limbaugh is a little unclear on the concept of direct deposit: it gives someone the power to deposit funds, not to withdraw them as Limbaugh alleged.

Limbaugh Lie #17: Limbaugh said, "Page 239: The bill will reduce physician services for Medicaid, meaning there will be Medicaid cuts. The president is out there saying that there won't be."(August 10, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/...
Page 239 says nothing about Medicaid cuts.(http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/getdoc.cgi?dbname=111_cong_bills&docid=f:h3200ih.t xt.pdf)

Limbaugh Lie #18: Limbaugh claimed, "Page 427: Government mandates program that orders end-of-life treatment.  Government dictates how your life ends."(August 10, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/...
Absolutely nothing on page 427 says that government will dictate how your life ends; in fact, it explicitly protects "enabling orders for life sustaining treatment." The provision allows for Medicare to pay for end-of-life counseling such as living wills. Nothing is compelled, and nothing is controversial about this provision.(http://mediamatters.org/research/200907310051)

Limbaugh Lie #19: "I will be damned if it's going to be become federally mandated law that the government hires a bunch of counselors that has these death care -- as you call it, death care -- discussions, 'end-of-life discussions.'"(July 30, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/...
Limbaugh Lie #20: Limbaugh asserted, "That's what the counselors are preparing these people for: end of care, 'cause they're getting old and it isn't going to be worth of investment. It's right in the House bill!  People to want try to deny all these things that are right there. People have read it. They're in the bill."(July 30, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/...
Once again, Limbaugh was lying. There is nothing about hiring counselors in the House bill. There is nothing about imposing "end of care" in the House bill. Limbaugh can claim, "They're in the bill," but it's interesting that he never quotes anything in the bill itself.

Limbaugh Lie #21: Limbaugh said, "Page 429:  Advanced care planning consult will be used to dictate treatment as patients' health deteriorates.  This can include an order for end-of-life plans. The order will be from the government."(August 10, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/...
Nothing on page 429 says that the government can order death. In fact, it requires that a doctor's order "effectively communicates the individual’s preferences regarding life sustaining treatment."(http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/getdoc.cgi?dbname=111_cong_bills&docid=f:h32 00ih.txt.pdf)

Limbaugh Lie #22: When a woman at a town hall meeting told Sen. Arlen Specter that the House bill would let a 74-year-old man with cancer die without treatment, Limbaugh agreed: "she's reading from the bill. She's got it there, and he says it's a 'malicious rumor,' and it's not."(http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_081109/content/01125108.guest.html)
Limbaugh knows that this little dystopian fantasy isn't anywhere in the bill, but he doesn't care about the truth.

Limbaugh Lie #23: On August 7, 2009, he falsely claimed that the power to "garnish your bank account" was found on page 435, and falsely asserted that "end-of-life" counseling was found on page 401.(August 7, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/...
Limbaugh didn't seem concerned about getting the page numbers wrong, and never corrected his error. It's doubtful that any of his listeners actually looked up any of his references. For Limbaugh, citing page numbers gives a false appearance of specificity, even when everything he says is inaccurate.

Limbaugh Lie #24: Limbaugh declared, "there are people who are actually fearful that if they are Republicans they will be discriminated against in terms of health care because this is such an ideologically political administration that does have a bunch of enemies."(http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_062409/content/01125110.guest.html)
The Obama Administration already directly provides health care to veterans, the elderly, the disabled, and the poor through various programs. And how many proven cases are there of anti-Republican discrimination in health care? None.

Limbaugh Lie #25: According to Limbaugh, "You are going to get treatment based on how much some government agency or bureaucratic thinks you're worth.  Who knows how that's going to be decided, the degree to which you have a sickness or an illness or a disease, your age, are you working or not, are you a drag on the system anyway?  Did you vote for Obama?"(http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_062409/content/01125110.guest.html)
The notion that only Obama voters will receive adequate medical care is among Limbaugh's craziest conspiracy theories.

Limbaugh Lie #26: According to Limbaugh, "The national coordinator of health information technology will monitor treatments that your doctor gives you to make sure your doctor is doing what the federal government deems appropriate and cost-effective."(Feb. 9, 2009)
Nothing like this was proposed at all. The bill would have improved electronic medical records "to help guide medical decisions at the time and place of care." Everything Limbaugh said about a national coordinator monitoring medical treatments and telling doctors what they can do was completely invented in Limbaugh’s twisted imagination.

Limbaugh Lie #27:  "this kind of fear that's arrived, invasion of privacy, they'll know everything about me.  They're going to know that when they get your medical records digitized, which is going to be part of national health care under the guise of facilitating your care.  But the purpose will actually be for them to know and to be able to blackmail you or use whatever information they have about you and your treatment."(June 18, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/...
The government already has the medical records of Medicare patients, soldiers, veterans, and many other Americans. There's never been a single case cited by Limbaugh of any government blackmail using these records.

Limbaugh Lie #28: "What aspect of your private life aren't they going to be into?  Well, I don't imagine they'll be in your bathroom. Not with cameras.  They might be, who knows."(June 18, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/...
Limbaugh manages to spin an amazing, alarming tale of government bureaucrats videotaping Americans in their own bathrooms.

Limbaugh Lie #29: Limbaugh declared, "national health care is the single biggest intervention in liberty this government could conceive. Because every aspect of your life can be regulated on the theory that it will control costs of health care."(June 8, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/...

Limbaugh Lie #30: According to Limbaugh, "If the Democrats get national health care, the concept of individual freedom and liberty will have been obliterated."(http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_060309/content/01125110.member.html, June 3, 2009)  

Limbaugh Lie #31: He told Sean Hannity, "if they get nationalized health care, they are going to be able to control every aspect of our lives because you get in a car the wrong way, it can impact health care costs. If you eat popcorn with coconut oil, it could impact health care costs. If they get that, then people have no idea the control over their lives the government will exert."("Rush Interviewed by Sean Hannity, Part Two," Fox News Channel, Recorded: June 3, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/...

Limbaugh Lie #32: Limbaugh added, "Think of virtually any activity you engage in with your kids that might put them at risk.  You take them outside and play.  You drive on a snowy road without chains.  You fly in an airplane.  Anything that could risk injury, which is practically everything you do, could be regulated or taxed because of the impact your behavior will have on the cost of health care.  After that takes place, the actual quality of health care we all get is going to hit the sewer."

Of course, no one has even remotely suggested a ban on eating popcorn or getting in a car the wrong way or letting kids play outside. It doesn’t make any sense: such bizarre rules, in addition to being incredibly unpopular and pointless, would be impossible to enforce.

Limbaugh Lie #33: Limbaugh declared that the survival of insurance companies would be based on politics: "It depends on how the insurance company voted.  If the insurance company voted for Obama, then they'll probably get some sort of a participatory role in administering the whole government-run health care plan."(June 10, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/...

It's absurd to imagine that an insurance company's status under Obama's health-care plan would depend on how much it supported Obama. After all, the government, not private insurance companies, administers the public option in health care. But there's a larger problem with Limbaugh's conspiracy theory: insurance companies don't vote. Individuals vote with a secret ballot. So there's no way an insurance company could have "voted for Obama," and no way of knowing how a company's employees voted.

Limbaugh Lie #34: Limbaugh claimed that concern about the swine flu was a conspiracy by the Obama Administration to conceal some unspoken evil deed: "What are they doing with the other hand when you're not watching?"(5/4/09)

Limbaugh Lie #35: Limbaugh even endorsed Sarah Palin's bizarre claim that "death panels" would decide whether to kill her son: "Sarah Palin has rocked 'em with that one because she's dead right. They are death panels."(http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_081309/content/01125107.guest.html)
Limbaugh Lie #36: Later, Limbaugh tried to backpedal from his lie: "I have not used the word 'death panels' except quoting Sarah Palin."(http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_081709/content/01125109.guest.html)
Of course, that wasn't true. Limbaugh agreed with Palin and said (without quoting her) that they were death panels, even though they didn't exist.

Limbaugh Lie #37: Limbaugh claimed that under Obama’s health care reform, the government will order people not to eat certain foods: "You have the public at large, mom and pop, Joe Six-Pack, Mary Botox, and they're out there living their lives and they're going to have all these restrictions on what they can eat, what they can't eat."(July 31, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/...
There are no restrictions on eating certain foods in the bill, and no mechanism for compelling it. No one has ever proposed restricting what people on health insurance can eat.

Limbaugh Lie #38: Limbaugh declared about the House bill, "the government will be able to dictate when you can and when you can't have children."(July 31, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/...
Limbaugh Lie #39: "the real reason they want to control family planning, you could throw in, yeah, they want to limit the number of potential Republicans born..."(July 31, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/...
Of course, there is no government control over having children.

Limbaugh Lie #40: "universal health care would lead to bans on swing sets and flat-screen TVs hanging on the wall"(5/13/09) because they might fall on people.
Limbaugh Lie #41: "they're gonna be able to regulate -- you know, they call you a risk based on, do you smoke, do you not smoke, how far do you drive to work, do you wear polyester -- it's more flammable -- I mean, it could get ridiculous."(July 28, 2009)
When the leading radio show host in the country claims that health care reform will lead to a ban on wearing polyester, it's already ridiculous.

Limbaugh Lie #42: "They have been talking a fat tax or some way of dealing with obesity. Suppose that you have lived a lifestyle they don't approve of that in their minds has increased your health risk and they don't want to pay for it or they want to charge you additional through the roof and so forth. This is the kind of thing they want. These are kind of statists that want to control every aspect of people's lives, and they want to certainly not have to spend money on people who have reached a certain age, just to put it bluntly, where it's not worth it in their mind."(August 7, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/...
Limbaugh Lie #43: "This health care bill, if it ever passes in this present form, gives them unlimited power to regulate lifestyles and behavior, in every way possible."(August 7, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/...
How can Limbaugh claim that a bill which gives the government zero power to regulate lifestyles and behavior actually provides "unlimited power"? Limbaugh, of course, never quotes from the actual bill whenever he makes these absurd assertions, perhaps because he knows that the words do not exist.

Limbaugh Lie #44: Limbaugh quoted from Obama's book, The Audacity of Hope: "'Not many Americans would feel comfortable with the government monitoring what we eat, no matter how many deaths and how much of our medical spending may be due to rising rates of obesity.' Yet he's doing it. Well, he doesn't say he's going to do it, he just knows we don't feel comfortable with it, but screw it. Our behavior must be constrained."(July 30, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/...
Only Limbaugh could take a quote from Obama opposing government regulation and use it to prove an absurd imaginary regulation that Limbaugh invented.

Limbaugh Lie #45: "so we're going to get some kind of fat tax, right? Some kind of fat tax. There's going to be a fat tax, an obesity tax, right?"(July 30, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/... Wrong. There is no fat tax. It was made up by Limbaugh. There are no politicians proposing a fat tax, and absolutely no chance of one passing, but Limbaugh wants to scare his fat audience into thinking that the government is going to get them and health care reform will come at their expense.

Limbaugh Lie #46: "we're going to get rid of your old clunker grandparents with Obama's health care.  Cash for clunkers. Death for clunkers."(July 31, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/...
Limbaugh Lie #47: Limbaugh also posited that it would be the Republican elderly who would particularly be in danger of murder by Obamacare: "I've heard that this fear from so many people who have called this program, that whatever the rules in this bill are, that if you're a Democrat it's going to be a little easier for you to be massaged through the system, you're going to be punished less, your wait list will be shorter if you're a Democrat.  A lot of people have this fear.  It tells me that people know who this guy is and what he's all about."(July 31, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/...
Limbaugh Lie #48: When a caller claimed the Obama plan was "generational genocide," Limbaugh declared, "you're damn right."(August 7, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/...
Limbaugh Lie #49: "there are provisions galore for factoring your death when you reach a certain seasoned citizen age. There are facts and proposals and pages galore of how health care is going to be rationed."(August 10, 2009, http://mediamatters.org/...
There are no provisions for murdering people who reach a certain age. There are no facts and no pages at all that say health care is going to be rationed. Limbaugh was simply making it all up. None of this existed, none of it was real.

Limbaugh Lie #50: Limbaugh endorsed a caller's fear that Republicans would be denied health care under Obama: "if you want to look at yourself as perhaps being discriminated against, it's that you're elderly first and then maybe Republican second..."(July 30, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/...

Limbaugh Lie #51: "they save money two ways when elderly people die. One, you don't get health care anymore, but also you are no longer on the Social Security rolls."(July 30, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/... It's rather sickening to claim that Obama is trying to kill the elderly to save money on health care and Social Security.

Limbaugh Lie #52: "what the Obamacare plan contains is end of life. Forget end-of-life counseling. It does have end of life. It's right there in the bill. He said it himself a number of times."(July 30, 2009)
Obama never said that. It's not in the bill.

Limbaugh Lie #53: When Obama held a press conference on health care, Limbaugh claimed it "was chock-full of some of the most blatant lies a president has told the country or the press corps, and he was not called on one of them."(July 23, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/... But Limbaugh didn't identify a single lie told by Obama; he simply assumed that his audience would believe him without evidence.

Limbaugh Lie #54: "he admitted he's going to wipe out private insurance."(July 23, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/...
No, he didn't.

Limbaugh Lie #55: under Obama’s health care plan, "27 million people would be thrown off insurance rolls and have to go public option. You would lose your choice of doctor."(June 16, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/... Limbaugh’s "27 million" figure is made up out of thin air, and his claim that a public option would ban doctor choice is false. In reality, the Obama plan to tax employers that fail to provide health care might cause more companies to offer health insurance.

Limbaugh Lie #56: Limbaugh invents all kinds of excuses for the poor global ratings of the US health care system: "about the World Health Organization rating French health care at the top and United States 34th. I did some digging on this, and let me tell you the two interesting factors that go into the World Health Organization's rating of health care. One thing they take into account is military people killed in action. (snorts) When you start comparing United States troop commitments around the world to those of France, you'll find that the frogs are in very few places getting shot at. And another thing that they take into account... No, seriously, they do that, folks."(http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_081309/content/01125112.guest.html)
In reality, the WHO rankings don't give any special bias to military deaths, although life expectancy is one factor. The last WHO rankings, where the US was rated 37th in health care performance, not 34th, came in 2000, at which time America had not lost a substantial number of troops in military operations for a quarter-century.(http://www.photius.com/rankings/healthranks.html) So Limbaugh's argument about the WHO ratings was entirely fictionalized, and used solely to insult the French troops, who have been American allies in the war in Afghanistan and more deeply involved in foreign peacekeeping operations than the United States.(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_of_France)

Limbaugh Lie #57: When a caller challenged Limbaugh's defense of the status quo on health care, accurately pointing out the high cost of insurance premiums, he was immediately cut off after referring to Rush’s drug addiction following failed back surgery. Limbaugh declared later on in the broadcast that "he was a fraud all the way around....His point was trying to discredit me.  He was probably calling from Rahm Emanuel's office, maybe from the Oval Office."(June 25, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/...

Limbaugh Lie #58: Limbaugh declared about health care in America, "There is no crisis.  The crisis in health care is in the UK. The crisis in health care is in Canada. The crisis in health care is in Cuba. The crisis in health care is with the ChiComs. The crisis in health care is with a lot of other places.  The crisis in health care here has been manufactured.  My point is, folks -- just ask yourself in your own circle of friends, your family, community, your neighborhood, whatever -- how many people do you know who are actually walking around daily in fear, constantly fear of an auto accident or a major disease is going to wipe 'em out?"(June 16, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/...
Of course, many Americans do fear that a medical emergency will wipe them out, and it happens to many more people who don’t understand the financial threat. If that fear is the definition of a health care crisis, then clearly the United States is facing a crisis and other countries with national health care do not.

Limbaugh Lie #59: Limbaugh said, "Most employee health care coverage comes from the employer. If the employer says, 'I'm outta here,' they have no choice but than to go government option."(August 10, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/... That's completely untrue. Anyone who loses their employer-based health insurance would be perfectly free to purchase any insurance on the private market. The only difference under the House bill is that they would have an additional public option.

Limbaugh Lie #60: "you have the President of the United States telling private citizens who want to be doctors where they can go and where they can't go."(http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_062509/content/01125107.guest.html) Absolutely nothing in any health care proposal would tell doctors where they can go and ban them from going elsewhere.

Limbaugh Lie #61: "after this bill becomes law, nobody in the insurance business can offer anybody and you can't buy private medical insurance."(July 16, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/... In reality, the provision does not ban private health insurance at all; it simply requires new health insurance plans to participate in the Health Insurance Exchange, which is a marketplace allowing consumers to comparison shop.(http://mediamatters.org/research/200907160040) If there actually were a ban on private health insurance, one would imagine that the private health insurers might speak out against it. The fact that they didn’t indicates that this is just another right-wing conspiracy theory spouted by Limbaugh without bothering to read Sec. 102 subsection (c) of the actual legislation.

Limbaugh Lie #62: "You can't stay in business if you’re competing against somebody that doesn't have to make a profit."(July 20, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/... That’s an odd sentiment from someone who successfully competes with noncommercial public radio stations on a daily basis.

Limbaugh Lie #63: Limbaugh promised "the utter destruction of the United States private sector as a result of President Obama's health care plan."(July 16, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/... Even if America went to a single-payer, government-run health care system, how could that possibly destroy the entire private sector?

Limbaugh Lie #64: Limbaugh claimed, "this health care plan is nothing more than the subprime mortgage debacle ready to happen all over again." (July 20, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/... The subprime mortgage crisis was the result of a bubble: too many people bought houses they couldn’t afford justified by speculation about rising prices. By contrast, health care will never cause a bubble; you can’t sell your own good health to another person. It’s not a transferable good. The money spent on health care is a necessity, but it’s not an investment. No one ever goes into a hospital expecting to come out richer, unlike real estate.

Limbaugh Lie #65: "Centralized, digitized health records won't be any more confidential than our military secrets leaked to the media."(July 28, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/... In reality, military secrets are almost never leaked to the media. And having electronic records doesn't make any difference in whether they're leaked to anyone. The fact is, the military already has a central record of health and other records about individual soldiers, and there's never been a case of these military health records being leaked to the media and published. So Limbaugh's paranoid fear-mongering about "centralized" health records has been proven false by the example of the military which he invokes.

Limbaugh Lie #66: "the United States Government and the state governments that have run this system into the ground and bankrupted it. They've made it unaffordable for you."(June 25, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/... The government hasn't caused higher private insurance rates.

Limbaugh Lie #67: "people are going to the doctor too much."(June 25, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/...
Limbaugh Lie #68: "it used to be that medicine was a pay-as-you-go thing....Now we have insurance for medicine. You know what it is. It's just totally out of control, and it's people like Hillary Clinton who have made it this way!"(October 17, 2007, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/... The notion that Hillary Clinton invented health insurance and HMOs is insane, especially since Limbaugh helped defeat Hillary’s health care reform. But Limbaugh, who likes to pay for his medical expenses out of his very fat wallet, imagines that government created every problem in the world.

Limbaugh Lie #69: "There's only one way to save money in our current health care system, and that's: Stop spending as much money on the sick, because we don't spend any money on the healthy."(http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_081309/content/01125109.guest.html) In fact, Limbaugh has it all wrong. One important way to save money on health care is to spend money on basic health care and prevention, rather than waiting until an illness progresses to the point where treatment is much more expensive.

Limbaugh Lie #70: Limbaugh claims (without offering any evidence), "It has been established that there is no cost-benefit to preventive care."(http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_081309/content/01125116.guest.html) The opposite is true. As Newt Gingrich twittered, "preventive care has largest benefits relative to cost for those most likely to suffer from specific medical problem."(August 12, 2009, http://twitter.com/...

Limbaugh Lie #71: Limbaugh said about Obama's health care plan, "Every poll shows the American people do not want what he's pushing."(July 27, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/... Actually, every poll showed the opposite. A Washington Post poll in July 2009 found 49-44 approval for Obama's handling of health care reform, but 54% approved of the legislation.(http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/07/19/AR2009071902176.html?hp id=topnews) When it comes to Obama's proposals, a June 2009 NBC/Wall Street Journal poll found that 76% of Americans wanted a public option in health care.(http://msnbcmedia.msn.com/i/msnbc/sections/news/090617_NBC-WSJ_poll_Full.pdf)

Limbaugh Lie #72: Citing a Gallup Poll that found 44% of Americans felt the Obama proposals would improve health care and 34% felt the proposals would worsen it, Limbaugh declared: "the bottom line is the people do not want this!"(http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_073009/content/01125106.guest.html)
People who know what's actually being proposed do want health care reform.

Limbaugh Lie #73: "He doesn't have the constitutional authority to ram health care down everybody's throat, but he's trying to do that."(http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_081909/content/01125112.guest.html)
Obama isn't ramming health care down everybody's throat by fiat. He's asking Congress to pass a health care reform law, which is completely Constitutional.

Limbaugh Lie #74: "You say there aren't any death panels here? Well, there certainly aren't any life panels! We're not hearing about improved medical care."(http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_081909/content/01125112.guest.html)
Obama's health care reform plan includes a demand "to improve the quality of care delivered" and provide medical care to the uninsured.(http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/fy2010_key_healthcare/)

Limbaugh Lie #75: Limbaugh claimed about health care, "The Obama army has to be bought and paid for."(http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_082609/content/01125116.guest.html)
There's no evidence that the vast numbers of people supporting health care reform are stooges being paid by Obama. The idea is itself laughable.

Limbaugh Lie #76: "At a certain stage in your life, Barack Obama and the executive branch are going to decide who gets paid, who gets covered, and who gets treated. And they're going to make the decision based on how sick are you and how old are you."(http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_082609/content/01125109.guest.html)
There's absolutely nothing in any legislation or any of Obama's plans to do this.

Limbaugh Lie #77: Limbaugh admitted that he has a living will, "but not because there's a federal panel that's making me do it.  Not because the government's requiring me to do it."(http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_082609/content/01125109.guest.html)
Nothing in the House bill or Obama's plan requires anyone to have a living will.

Limbaugh Lie #78: Limbaugh said  about a caller, "she's out there, 'Well, I'm working three part-time jobs and they're not giving me any health care.' Go buy it! Get rid of the cell phone; get rid of cable TV."(http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_082609/content/01125109.guest.html)
There's no way that a cell phone and cable TV bill would cover the cost of health insurance, particularly for the woman Limbaugh is talking about who has a preexisting condition.

Limbaugh Lie #79: "All you have to do is read H.R. 3200, and that's scary.  Nobody has written a bigger horror book than H.R. 3200.  It mandates end-of-life counseling."(http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_082609/content/01125109.guest.html)
It doesn't mandate end-of-life counseling, and end-of-life counseling isn't scary.

Limbaugh Lie #80: "The death panel phrase Sarah Palin came up with is precisely controversial because it was accurate."(http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_082609/content/01125109.guest.html)
There are no death panels, they do not exist.

Limbaugh Lie #81: "he's gotta make people believe that it's going to be the first government program in the history of government programs that reduced the cost of anything."(http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_082509/content/01125110.member.html)
Numerous government programs reduce costs (such as community colleges, which are vastly cheaper than private colleges). In fact Medicare provides health care for the elderly at lower payment rates than private insurance.

Limbaugh Lie #82: "we've got the best health care in the world already. And everybody who needs it gets it one way or another. They may not all have insurance, but anybody who needs health care in this country gets it."(http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_082509/content/01125111.member.html)
In America, people without insurance or substantial bank accounts are not able to get most health care beyond emergency services.

Limbaugh Lie #83: "I don't see a whole lot of people fleeing this country to go get health care.  In fact, I see just the opposite."(http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_082509/content/01125111.member.html)
The people who can't afford medical care in America also can't afford to fly to another country for medical treatment.

Limbaugh Lie #84: "day-to-day, there's no health care crisis in this country. You can get it. So, it isn't about health care, per se."[Premiere Radio Networks' The Rush Limbaugh Show, 6/18/09]
Obviously, Limbaugh doesn't understand how health care works (or doesn't work) in America. Anyone can go into an emergency room and get lifesaving treatment if they're bleeding to death, even if they can't pay for it. But the overwhelming majority of necessary health care doesn't come in the form of emergency care. It comes in the form of expensive operations and drug treatments, which do require insurance or vast sums of money.

Limbaugh Lie #85: "This is just about gaining control, taking money, and controlling people's lives, and wiping out Republicans." [Premiere Radio Networks' The Rush Limbaugh Show, 6/18/09]"
No one is wiping out Republicans or controlling people's lives or taking money. Health care reform is about saving lives and saving money.

Limbaugh Lie #86: "Look, it doesn't say 'death panels' in there, but he's going to set up a commission. He wants to take over the control which currently resides in Congress of deciding how much money is spent, Medicare and Medicaid, and on whom. That already exists! He wants to take it over from Congress, have it run out of the executive branch with a commission of people that he's already talked about setting up making these decisions."(August 20, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/...
Limbaugh Lie #87: "So it doesn't say 'death panels' in there but, look, common sense and common sense. You don't spend health care money on the healthy. You don't spend any money on the healthy. You spent it on the sick and they're going to cut back."(August 20, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/...
Limbaugh's fundamental error is assuming that spending money is the same as quality health care. If a hospital charges $20 for an aspirin to a Medicare patient, and the government negotiates the price down to $10,that doesn't reduce the quality of care.

Limbaugh Lie #88: "The death panel. The commission's going to 'let doctors know, your moms know, you know what, maybe this isn't going to help maybe you're better off not having the surgery,' we say to the 100-year-old mother, grandmother, 'maybe just take the pain pill.' What the hell? This is clear as a bell. That's lie one that he claims is being lied about, and we just refuted it."(August 20, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/...
Limbaugh didn't refute a lie, he repeated it. Nothing Obama said suggested that there would be death panels. Instead, he urged having a way to inform doctors about the effectiveness of different treatments, so that patients could be better informed about their options.

Limbaugh Lie #89: "The 47 uninsured figure includes about 12 to 14 million illegal aliens. If you take them out the 47 million drops proportionately and then there are young people who actively choose to not buy it. It's not that they can't get it. They just don't want it. So the number of truly uninsured people -- we've run the numbers on this -- uninsured people who want it but don't have it is 12 million. You can insure 12 million people for one year for $30 billion, and you could take it out of the unspent stimulus money."(August 20, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/...
The claim that there are 14 million uninsured illegal aliens is hard to believe, since there were only 11.2 million illlegal immigrants in the US in 2008, and certainly some of them have medical insurance from employers or private insurers.(http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/31/us/31immig.html?_r=1&partner=rssnyt)
Limbaugh has no evidence that 21-23 million Americans "don't want" any health insurance. Nor does he show how the remaining 12 million people, who often have preexisting conditions that prevent them from getting affordable health insurance, could receive it for $2,500 a year, about half the rate for a typical individual.(http://healthinsurance.about.com/b/2009/04/24/poll-shows-the-average-health-insurance-pr emium-out-of-reach-for-uninsured.htm)

Limbaugh Lie #90: "I mean not only is he saying that all persons and all women can access reproductive care. We already cover every other form of reproductive care: prenatal, postnatal, we cover all that. The only thing that can be talked about here is abortion, and when Planned Parenthood's involved, we know that they're asking here about abortion, and they're talking in code lingo. So, Mr. President, it is not a lie that federal tax dollars are going to be used to pay for abortions and not just in the public option."(August 20, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/...
It is a lie. Reproductive care doesn't just mean abortion, and it is common for birth control bills not to be covered by health insurance.(http://abcnews.go.com/US/story?id=91538) Obama was talking about his goals in 2007 for health insurance, not what the 2009 House bill and other plans would actually cover.

Limbaugh Lie #91: 'But he wants single payer. He wants it by the end of his first term and certainly in 15 or 20 years."(August 20, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/...
No, Obama declared that he wanted universal health care by the end of his first term, and said he could imagine that in 10 or 15 or 20 years, the American people would prefer a public system rather than employer-based insurance.

Limbaugh Lie #92:  "You're not going to have a choice in this, and Obama has said he's for single payer. He said it in 2003. He said it in 2007. He's for single payer. He knows it can't be done right off the bat. They have to ease into it. It might take 15 or 20 years, but that's the objective. So you might be able to keep your private plan for a period of time while they get this going."(August 20, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/...
No, Obama said he would prefer single payer if the US didn't already have employer-based insurance. But he never said that he wanted to adopt single payer, and nothing in the bill creates a plan for single payer health care.

Limbaugh Lie #93: "even if abortion and illegal coverage is not actually in the House bill, if it's not mentioned, the Supreme Court will see to it they get coverage. The Supreme Court's already ruled that illegal aliens have all citizen rights, and Obama knows this."(August 20, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/...
The Supreme Court has never ruled that illegal aliens have all the rights of citizens, and it has never declared that illegal aliens are entitled to government-provided health insurance.

Limbaugh Lie #94: "when it comes to illegals being covered under Obama's plan, the Supreme Court's already taken care of that."(August 20, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/...
No, they haven't. Limbaugh can't name a single Supreme Court case that would require offering them government health insurance.

Limbaugh Lie #95: "We now have the public government option exposed, the secret is out."(http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_082009/content/01125111.guest.html)
There was no "secret" public option; it was a fundamental part of Obama's health care proposal from the start. His 2007 fact sheet on health care noted, "the Obama plan will: (1) establish a new public insurance program."(http://www.barackobama.com/pdf/HealthPlanFull.pdf)

Limbaugh Lie #96: "CALLER: I just broke my wrist and it's costing me $6,000. I can't afford that.
RUSH: Well, you shouldn't have broken your wrist.....You know why it costs $6,000? Because you technically aren't paying for it. An insurance policy is paying for it backed up by some government insurance policy or what have you."(http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_082009/content/01125113.guest.html)
As Limbaugh's caller explained, his broken wrist is costing him $6,000, and since he's paying for it, it can't be the government causing it to be $6,000. It actually cost him $6,000. But Limbaugh always believes the government is to blame.

Limbaugh Lie #97: "The government says that life expectancy in the United States has risen to a new high, unexpectedly so. It stands at 78 years. How can this possibly be with our horrible health care system, I ask you? How can our life expectancy be up 78 years, unexpectedly so?"(http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_082009/content/01125104.guest.html)
Life expectancy of 78 years isn't "unexpectedly" high; America ranks number 50 in the world, which is a terrible result for the country which spends far more than any other country on health care.(https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/rankorder/2102rank.html) In Canada, with the socialized medicine and "rationing" decried by Limbaugh, life expectancy is 82 years, ranking it #8 in the world. The United States ranked #11 in life expectancy in 1984, and 42nd in 2004, according to US Census Bureau statistics.(http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,293008,00.html) So these life expectancy results show how flawed the American health care system is, the exact opposite of what Limbaugh claims.

Limbaugh Lie #98: "Is there any doubt that Obamacare will sooner or later fund abortions? There is no doubt."(http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_082009/content/01125107.guest.html)
Obama's health care plan doesn't fund abortions, and so there's plenty of doubt.

Limbaugh Lie #99: "He just explained here how his health care plan would provide abortion as basic care"(http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_081909/content/01125112.guest.html)
Obama said "reproductive health care," not abortion, and he was speaking in 2007 about his goals, not about the current health care reform plan.

Limbaugh Lie #100: "Is there any doubt that Obamacare sooner or later will have death panels? Whatever you call them, there's going to be a panel that's going to decide who gets health care and who doesn't and how much is going to be spent."(http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_082009/content/01125107.guest.html)
Obama's health care plan has no provisions for a panel to decide on every allocation of health care.

Limbaugh Lie #101: "If illegal immigrants are not going to get Obamacare how come all of these Hispanic groups are lobbying for it?"(http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_082109/content/01125106.guest.html)
Illegal immigrants aren't covered under Obama's plan, and Hispanic groups are lobbying for it because millions of Latino Americans lack adequate health insurance.

Limbaugh Lie #102: "Obama's out there just lying through his teeth saying that's what his health plan wants to be, wants to provide. 'Well, we just want to add more competition.'"(August 20, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/...
Obama isn't lying, and a public option does add more competition.

Limbaugh Lie #103: "if your premium goes up a dime, if you decide that you want to add to or subtract from the coverage that you have and pay for -- you lose it! It's in the bill."(August 20, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/...
No, it isn't. There is absolutely nothing in the House bill saying that people will lose their insurance if the coverage changes or the premium goes up.

Limbaugh Lie #104: "You say there aren't any death panels here? Well, there certainly aren't any life panels! We're not hearing about improved medical care."(http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_081909/content/01125112.guest.html)
Obama's health care reform plan includes a demand "to improve the quality of care delivered" and provide medical care to the uninsured.(http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/fy2010_key_healthcare/)

Limbaugh Lie #105: "Try this headline: 'Heart Attack Deaths Fall After Medicare Guidelines.' -- 'Clearer U.S. guidelines on how to treat elderly heart attack patients appear to have saved lives, with a marked reduction in heart attack deaths.' This has gotta be stopped! This has gotta be stopped, saving seasoned citizens' lives with health care tips? This is not in the plan."(http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_081909/content/01125104.guest.html)
To the contrary, clearer guidelines to improve health care is precisely what Obama has proposed: "the development of data on the effectiveness of medical interventions to improve the quality of care delivered."(http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/fy2010_key_healthcare/)

Limbaugh Lie #106: "Limiting medical treatment is cruel and unusual in a free country, it's unthinkable in America, as unthinkable as infanticide, which Obama actually once voted to withhold treatment from infants who survived abortions."(http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_081909/content/01125104.guest.html)
Medical treatment is already limited in America by insurance companies or lack of insurance, so it's far from unthinkable. It happens every day, and the Obama health care plan will reduce this "cruel" practice. And Obama never voted for infanticide.

Limbaugh Lie #107: "this is a willful, purposeful destruction of the capitalist US economy, and health care is the number one thing."(http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_081909/content/01125110.guest.html)
Obama is not destroying capitalism, and his health care plan is a capitalist, free-market plan which allows for private and public competition, just like what happens today in fields such radio, television, higher education, and yes, health care.

Limbaugh Lie #108: According to Limbaugh, "No, there won't be a private doctor for you to go to."(http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_062409/content/01125110.guest.html)
Absolutely nothing in the Obama's plan bans private doctors.

Limbaugh Lie #109: "He doesn't have the constitutional authority to ram health care down everybody's throat, but he's trying to do that."(http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_081909/content/01125112.guest.html)
Obama isn't ramming health care down everybody's throat by fiat. He's asking Congress to pass a health care reform law, which is completely Constitutional.

Limbaugh Lie #110: "this entire health care legislation is not even constitutional."(http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_081409/content/01125104.guest.html)
There is nothing even remotely unconstitutional about any of the health care reform proposals. Notably, Limbaugh doesn't even bother to say what specific legislation is unconstitutional, or what part of the Constitution is being violated; he simply believes that the government is not allowed to pass legislation dealing with health care, which is a stand the Supreme Court has never made.

Limbaugh Lie #111: Quoting Bernie Sanders, who said, "'Does Barack Obama want to kill off the old people or the disabled?' That is insane," Limbaugh responded, "It's not insane. It's going to happen! It's going to happen."(http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_081409/content/01125115.guest.html)
Obama is not going to kill off old people and the disabled, and it is insane for Limbaugh to assert this.

Limbaugh Lie #112: "The Bush administration pulled this Death Book. The Bush administration yanked it. It's the Obama administration that put it back on there."(August 24, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/...
There is no "death book"; a 1997 voluntary guide for veterans on end-of-life issues was recommended by the Veterans Administration throughout the Bush Administration and continued to be recommended by it during the Obama Administration while updated information is being prepared.(http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2009/8/23/771489/-Foxs-death-book-lie; http://mediamatters.org/...

Limbaugh Lie #113: When Social Security announced that there would be no cost-of-living increases due to low inflation, Limbaugh said: "this could also be a ploy designed to get seasoned citizens on board for health care, whatever health care the Obama administration wants."(August 24, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/...
This is no "ploy" to pass health care, and no rational reason why a lack of cost-of-living increases would affect support for health care. The decision is based on inflation, not influenced by the Obama Administration.

Limbaugh Lie #114: "they know it's going to take years and years and years to do it, but just as it was in Nazi Germany, the National Socialist party, health care was the building block foundation."(August 24, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/...
Health care was not the "buildiing block" of Nazism and nothing about the Obama health care plan will lead to fascism.

Limbaugh Lie #115: "there's going to be a public option....And with that, they then regulate what you can eat and what you can't eat and they might be able to regulate where you live down the line. They might be able to regulate every aspect of your life as it relates to health care and cost."(August 24, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/...
A public option does not allow the government to control what people eat or where they can live, let alone "every aspect of your life."

Limbaugh Lie #116: "We know Obama is lying about his intentions to destroy private health care.  He says he's not; we know he wants to. His detachment from reality on this is instructive in a lot of ways."(August 24, 2009, http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/...
Obama is not detached from reality; Limbaugh is. Obama does not intend to destroy private health care. He has always expressed some theoretical support for single payer insurance (which would not destroy private health care), but supported continuing the system of employer-based health insurance in the United States. Nothing in any of the health care plans would destroy private health insurance, and certainly not private health care.

Limbaugh Lie #117: Obama "wants us to have the same health care and plan that he had in Kenya."(August 24, 2009, http://mediamatters.org/...
Obama was not born in Kenya, contrary to Limbaugh's birther fantasy, and never had a health care plan during his short visits to Kenya as an adult. He has always had American health insurance, and his health care plan will improve the US system, not imitate anything in Kenya.

Limbaugh Lie #118: Limbaugh claimed, "the administration said that they were going to have mandatory circumcision in this country as one of the tools to fight HIV."(http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_082609/content/01125104.guest.html)
The Centers for Disease Control is considering urging circumcision of baby boys; there is no mandatory circumcision in any way being proposed. Rush, your penis is safe from Obama.

Limbaugh claimed, "I have not said one lie about what Obama's plan is."(http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_081709/content/01125109.guest.html)
For once, Limbaugh is correct. He hasn't said one lie, he's said (and repeated) more than one hundred lies.

It's time for Limbaugh's lies to be exposed and refuted. The media should be reporting on the fact that the leading conservative voice in America is lying about health care and Republican politicians should be confronted with Limbaugh's lies and asked, "Do you agree?"

Crossposted at DailyKos.

Why would a government-started health insurance cooperative work? For the same reason that lots of other big cooperatives work. Cooperatives are a good mechanism in a free market for competing against for-profit institutions. That's why so many small businesses use them. But consumer cooperatives typically lack the capital and market share to compete effectively: however, a government-sponsored cooperative with adequate start-up funds could change things dramatically.

Some on the left definitely do not agree. Jane Hamsher of Firedoglake calls the co-op idea a "faux 'public plan'" and claims, "There could only be one purpose served by such a plan: pull a bait-and-switch on a public plan." Howard Dean declared, "I do think there will be primaries as the result of all this, if the bill doesn't pass with a public option."

But Obama is right: there's a lot more to health care reform than just the public plan, and if the co-op can offer a viable alternative (and perhaps a better alternative), then we shouldn't shun it. It's true that no one knows exactly how a cooperative will work, or if it will be effective in competing against private insurance companies. But that's equally true of a public plan. We're all entering new territory here.

The first argument against a public plan is that it can't pass. According to Sen. Kent Conrad (D-ND), "there are not the votes in the United States Senate for the public option. There never have been. So to continue to chase that rabbit I think, uh, is just a wasted effort." The idea that we would be better off with no health care reform rather than a co-op is just plain crazy. If health care reform is defeated in 2009, the result will not be a public uprising in 2010 by the proletariat demanding a revolution. The result will be confirmation of the status quo belief in Washington that health care reform is impossible, the same thing that happened in 1993.

The second argument against a public plan is that it will be severely constrained in what it can do. Perhaps the progressive supporters of the public plan, who so far have been out-organized by a bunch of right-wing crackpots wielding Hitler posters, can finally press the Blue Dog Democrats to adopt a public plan. But even if a public plan managed to pass, at this point it seems likely that it would be hamstrung and compromised, limited in how aggressively it can push for lower prices and better quality. Even under a genuine progressive such as Barack Obama, a public plan is deeply compromised by the influence of corporate America. The pharmaceutical industry has agreed to no more than $8 billion a year in savings for the elderly, indicating the limits that a public plan would face. Although Obama has been pushing for a progressive approach and a public plan, he is limited by what conservative Democrats will accept.

The third argument against a public plan is the danger of what happens in the next Republican administration. Consider this hypothetical: What happens if a George W. Bush Republican becomes president at some point in the future? What happens if a President Sarah Palin in 2017 appoints the people in charge of the public plan? What happens if a "Heckuva Job" Brownie is running this public plan, with Karl Rove whispering in his ear, determined to prove that small government is best by mismanaging government agencies? Can you imagine what the public plan would be like with a Dick Cheney type of the insurance industry running it? If you think this is impossible, you obviously didn't learn anything during the years 2000-2008.

A cooperative, by contrast, is much better insulated from right-wing politics. Its board should be elected by the members of the health insurance cooperative. And we know that right now, the uninsured likely to buy into the cooperative tend to be the young and the working poor—two key demographic groups supporting Obama and progressive politics. We're better off trusting these people rather than the current corrupt political system that would run a public plan.

A co-op could be the best mechanism, better than a public plan, to provide a better, cheaper alternative to private insurance. It could also begin operating much earlier than the public plan, which is not scheduled to start until 2013 under the existing legislation. A co-op could easily start operating in 2011 and begin providing immediate competition to private companies. Imagine having millions of Americans voting online to select members of the Board for a health insurance cooperative, and the massive public attention given to health insurance issues.

The right-wing is scared of co-ops. Rush Limbaugh declared:

And these co-ops like we're too stupid to know what that's all about. Co-op? Why don't they just call them communes? Look, I know liberal lingo when I hear it. A co-op? Yeah, let's go to the farmers market. Let's go to the community garden! What, do they think we're idiots?....Co-ops. As long as they're going to create some government entity and as long as they're going to make private insurance unsustainable with limits and regulations and taxation, their objective is the same. Co-ops! Man, you people at the administration, if you're going to try to fool us by thinking you're dumping the public option well then come up with some name that doesn't reek of liberalism.

And he's absolutely right. The idea of a co-op reeks of liberalism. It's democratic, not-for-private-profit, and open.

Ben Shapiro noted on Townhall.com, "the 'co-op' myth will provide Obama the cover he seeks to utterly swamp the private system. When private insurer care drops in quality -- a drop necessitated by new regulations -- Obama will declare their care insufficient. More and more Americans will opt for the new 'co-ops.'" As Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-UT) observed, "You can call it a co-op, which is another way of saying a government plan."

The fact that the right-wing hates an idea is not necessarily proof of its progressive character. But it is a good indication that cooperatives aren't a Trojan horse designed to destroy health care reform. They're a powerful instrument for improving our system, and that's what the conservatives fear.

I appreciate the fact that progressives are finally speaking out and refusing to silence their demands for progressive policies. I just wish they had chosen a genuinely progressive position for the Left's Last Stand.

At least 60 House Democrats, enough to block passage of reform, have signed a letter declaring that "Any bill that does not provide, at a minimum, for a public option with reimbursement rates based on Medicare rates--not negotiated rates--is unacceptable." But it's doubtful that a public plan can get 60 votes in the Senate, and highly unlikely that it would require Medicare rates for everyone if it does manage to pass.

What's important is not to kill the health insurance cooperative and vainly try to save a flawed public plan, but to demand that the co-op proposal will be a good, progressive one.

First of all, it should aim to be a single national insurance co-op, rather than a bunch of small co-ops. Small co-ops don't have a great record of success. My Hyde Park Co-op went defunct after an ill-fated attempt to expand beyond a single store. But it was always precarious in a world where the big corporate chains have more buying power. A 2000 General Accounting Office report on health insurance cooperatives that noted, "None of the purchasing cooperatives we reviewed had a large enough market share to create bargaining leverage and therefore had a limited ability to significantly increase the percentage of small employers offering coverage in their state."

But the problems of small state-based cooperatives would not apply to a national cooperative. According to the Reuters, "Conrad said $6 billion would be needed -- in loans and grants to help doctors, hospitals, businesses and other groups form nonprofit cooperative networks." While various cooperative networks for doctors and hospitals should be encouraged in this legislation, the goal for insurance should be to have one cooperative capable of the size necessary to negotiate good prices in the open market. If we allow the reform plan to be split into a thousand different insurance co-ops, the result will be an improvement over the existing system, but a missed opportunity to make substantial change.

Second, the national co-op needs substantial initial funding to start, to help it build its structure and recruit members.

Third, the national co-op needs to be freed from government regulations designed to aid the insurance industry by limiting competition. This includes stopping corrupt state governments from preventing a national co-op through regulation. The co-op should be free to determine its own policies, not be micromanaged by politicians. It should start as soon as possible, rather than being limited to when the rest of the health care legislation goes into effect.

If a cooperative works well, it could be the first step in transforming America in a more progressive direction. People who buy their health insurance from a cooperative will be much more amenable to buying their groceries and books and much more from other cooperatives. We would no longer have to depend on an easily-corrupted government to compete with private industry.

Progressives have been given a tremendous opportunity here. The right-wing and the insurance industry has concentrated all of their opposition to health care reform against the idea of a government-run insurance plan. Utilizing a co-op undermines all of their efforts while achieving virtually the same (and perhaps even better) results as a public plan. The Blue Dog Democrats have only criticized a public plan, while largely embracing the idea of a co-op. This means that the exact details of a co-op plan can be moved in a progressive direction without compromising any votes. It will be almost impossible for any Blue Dog (and even some moderate Republicans) to vote against a solid, progressive co-op plan for health care reform. But right now, all of the political energy of progressives is aimed at stopping a co-op rather than making the only reform likely to pass into an excellent plan.

Drawing a line in the sand against a cooperative is the worst possible stand a progressive can make.

Crossposted at DailyKos.

The incompetence began when al-Marri was facing trial for fraud in 2003 in Peoria. There’s no doubt that he was guilty, and would have been found guilty. But the Bush Administration wanted al-Marri to reveal information about al-Qaeda. So they decided to name him an "enemy combatant" in order to have full control over him and perhaps use their "enhanced interrogation" techniques. In fact, the Bush Administration was so anxious to have al-Marri as an "enemy combatant" that they agreed to drop the fraud charges "with prejudice," meaning that he could never be charged with them again. Reports indicate that the Bush Administration never got any worthwhile information from al-Marri; the "enemy combatant" designation was an utter failure.

This was the first major error of the Bush Administration. If al-Marri had been convicted on fraud, the years he spent in prison for that would not be deducted from his 15-year sentence. In essence, by naming al-Marri an "enemy combatant," the Bush Administration ended up reducing his time in prison.

The second major mistake of the Bush Administration was the torture of Khalid Shaikh Mohammed. By torturing Mohammed rather than using normal interrogation techniques, the Bush Administration made all of the evidence he provided inadmissable in any court. If the more reliable and effective interrogation techniques that reject torture had been used, prosecutors would have been able to tie al-Marri directly to terrorism.

The problem for prosecutors today is that al-Marri had never been an operational terrorist, and although he was an al-Qaeda agent, he was sent as a sleeper agent to the US to coordinate al-Qaeda’s follow-up operatives arriving after 9-11, operatives who never arrived due to the global crackdown on al-Qaeda. Without Mohammed’s evidence and without the fraud evidence that the Bush Administration had tainted and dismissed with prejudice, prosecutors were in a very difficult position to prove that al-Marri had done anything illegal.

That’s why they felt forced to agree to a relatively short 15-year sentence, which may be further reduced by the time spent as an "enemy combatant." Once again, we’re all paying the price for the failures of the Bush Administration.

Below is an article I wrote last month for the Indy, the alternative newspaper in Normal, Illinois, about 50 miles from Peoria where the al-Marri trial was going to take place. It’s an update of an article I originally wrote in 2003.

The Terrorist from Central Illinois
By John K. Wilson

Ali Saleh Kahlah al-Marri has spent the last five years in indefinite executive detention in the U.S. Naval Consolidated brig in Charleston, South Carolina as an "enemy combatant." That’s a long way from Peoria, where al-Marri came with his wife and five children on Sept. 10, 2001 to enroll as a graduate student in computer science at Bradley University (which he had attended as an undergraduate two decades ago).

But al-Marri will soon be back in Peoria. Last week, a federal grand jury in Peoria indicted Al-Marri on terrorism charges. The Obama Administration, anxious to reverse the Bush Administration policies and avoid an almost certain defeat in the Supreme Court, has decided to try al-Marri in the regular court system.

Back in 2003, the Indy reported on al-Marri’s complicated story, and it is important to re-visit how we got to this point, and how badly the Bush Administration bungled the al-Marri case. While the government portrays al-Marri as a key al-Qaeda figure in America, he is also the center of a fight over whether civil liberties will be sacrificed to fight the "war on terrorism." On June 23, 2003, George W. Bush designated al-Marri as the third "enemy combatant" in America, depriving him of all legal rights.

While evidence of al-Marri’s involvement in illegal and perhaps terrorist activities has steadily accumulated, so too did the fact that the government is violating his constitutional rights with little justification. The Bush Administration’s efforts to deny al-Marri his rights have done nothing to protect America from terrorism, and its mishandling of the al-Marri case could eventually allow him to go free.

When the FBI first questioned al-Marri, at his apartment in West Peoria on Oct. 2, 2001, it was based on a police stop where al-Marri was found to have a briefcase full of cash (Al-Marri reportedly received over $13,000 in cash from Mustafa Ahmed al-Hawsawi, the financier who bankrolled the September 11th attacks).

A tip from a US Cellular salesman worried about al-Marri’s cell phone calls to the Middle East may also have led to a deeper investigation. Because his enrollment forms at Bradley had listed two different birthdates, the FBI paid a visit to al-Marri. FBI agents continued to investigate al-Marri, and on Dec. 11, 2001, visited his home again. They say al-Marri gave them permission to search his apartment and his laptop.
On al-Marri’s laptop, FBI computer experts found files with more than 1,750 credit card numbers, along with bookmarked websites about computer hacking, credit card fraud, buying hazardous chemicals, and making fake driver’s licenses. Al-Marri’s computer also included proxy software used to conceal identity on the internet, and hacker programs used to gather information about other people’s computers.

Al-Marri’s laptop also indicated his support of bin Laden, including an Arabic prayer that "Neither the U.S. nor anyone living in it will dream of security/safety before we live it in Palestine and before the infidel armies leave the land of Mohammed," and that God should "protect" and "guard" Usama bin Laden. The laptop also included audio files of lectures by bin Laden, lectures advising how to train in al-Qaeda camps in Afghanistan, photos of the 9-11 attacks and of prisoners held in Kabul, and a note in Arabic declaring: "Neither the U.S. nor anyone living in it will dream of security/safety before we live it in Palestine and before the infidel armies leave the land of Mohammed."

On Dec. 12, al-Marri returned to the FBI offices, but this time he asked for a lawyer, and refused to take a polygraph test. Agents confronted him with a list of 36 expired credit cards numbers on two sheets of paper in his laptop’s carrying case, a list that included the owners’ names and expiration dates. Al-Marri claimed that the handwriting on the sheets wasn’t his, and said he knew nothing about them. On orders from the New York City offices, federal agents arrested al-Marri that afternoon as a "material witness." After a few weeks in the Peoria County Jail, al-Marri was flown to New York and put in the Special Housing Unit at the Metropolitan Correctional Center.

On Dec. 14, 2001, FBI agents got a search warrant for al-Marri’s apartment, and found an almanac with business cards used to mark pages showing U.S. dams, reservoirs, waterways and railroads. They also found an Arabic prayer calling for the defeat of the "villainous" Christians and Jews in Palestine, Afghanistan, Kashmir and Chechnya.

The Credit Card Scheme

On Jan. 28, 2002, al-Marri was arrested and charged with unauthorized possession of "more than 15" access devices — the credit-card numbers — with the intent to defraud. He was indicted on the charge Feb. 6, 2002. After al-Marri and his attorneys decided that Manhattan was a bad place for a terrorism suspect to go on trial, they asked for the venue to be moved back to central Illinois, where the alleged crimes had taken place, so the government dropped the charges in New York and re-filed them in Peoria.

In the summer of 2000, al-Marri came to central Illinois and created a fake company, AAA Carpets, in room 209 at the Time Out Motel in Macomb, Il., using the name Abdullakareem A. Almuslam. Western Illinois University student Matt Stiles, who hooked up a high-speed internet connection for al-Marri, told the Chicago Tribune, "He said it was very important that he have fast Internet service." According to Stiles, "All I know is he sat around and was on the Internet all day."

Al-Marri used a false name and stolen Social Security number to open accounts at three banks in Macomb, and opened a credit card processing account. Using stolen credit card numbers, al-Marri processed fake transactions, and then moved the money out before the credit card companies and banks figured out the fraud.

Although al-Marri denied the allegations, the evidence against him seemed overwhelming. Six of the stolen credit card numbers used by "Almuslam" were later found on al-Marri’s laptop. A witness in Macomb picked al-Marri out of a photo line-up as the man calling himself "Almuslam." Fingerprints on the "Almuslam" bank documents in Macomb matched al-Marri. Airline records show that an Ali S. al-Marri took a flight from Saudi Arabia to Frankfurt and then O’Hare on May 25-26, 2000.

The summer "Almuslam" was in Macomb, he made a call to a travel agency, arranging for a flight by a man named Ali al-Marri, who took a flight from Peoria to Chicago and then New York on Aug. 18, 2000, and then returned the next day, missing the connection to Peoria. Al-Marri soon left the country, and flew from Frankfurt back to Saudi Arabia on Aug. 21, 2000.

But the Macomb evidence proves that al-Marri was a criminal, not
necessarily a terrorist. In January 2003, federal prosecutor Michael McGovern told a judge that al-Marri had used credit card fraud to provide "material support" to al-Qaeda, but no evidence of this has ever been publicly produced.

The Al-Qaeda Phone Number

In addition to the fraud charges, al-Marri was also charged with two counts of lying to federal agents. The government accused al-Marri of falsely denying that he called a phone in the United Arab Emirates, and of falsely claiming that he hadn’t been in the country in 2000 when the credit card fraud was perpetrated.

On four occasions in 2001, al-Marri tried (unsuccessfully) to call a number in United Arab Emirates using public pay phones in Illinois. On Sept. 23, a call was made from a store in Peoria near his apartment, using a phone card that was also used on al-Marri’s cell phone on Sept. 27 and his home phone on Oct. 24. On Oct. 14, the same number was called around 2am using the same phone card from a gas station in Springfield; around the same time, al-Marri’s cell phone was used near Springfield. On Nov. 4, the number was called twice from pay phones in Chicago, using a second phone card; that same phone card was used three days later from al-Marri’s home phone.

The FBI was suspicious of the phone number because it was used on Sept. 3, 2001 by Ramzi Bin Al-Shibh to transfer money to Zacarias Moussaoui, the "20th hijacker" for the 9-11 attacks. The phone number was also listed by al-Qaeda financier, Mustafa Ahmed al-Hawsawi (arrested in Pakistan on March 1, 2003 along with Khalid Shaikh Mohammed). Al-Hawsawi, who is accused of sending money to the 9-11 hijackers, listed the number on a withdrawal slip from a United Arab Emirates (UAE) bank.
The number was also called by 9-11 hijacker Mohamed Atta, who listed the phone number when he sent a Fed Ex package to the UAE on Sept. 4, 2001. The 9-11 hijackers returned leftover money to the account opened by al-Hawsawi shortly before the attacks. The phone number was also used in the transfer of money to Ramzi Muhammad Abdullah bin al-Shibh, whom American officials believe was intended to be another 9-11 hijacker. But when questioned by the FBI about it, al-Marri denied calling the phone number or knowing al-Hawsawi. On Dec. 23, 2002, al-Marri was charged with making false statements to the FBI denying that he called the number.

The Enemy Combatant

While al-Marri was awaiting his trial, the US got a lucky break in capturing Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, the global leader of al-Qaeda operations, on March 1, 2003. Under torture (including waterboarding), Mohammed revealed some information about the al-Qaeda network, and named al-Marri as "the point of contact for AQ operatives arriving in the US for September 11 follow-up operations." Newsweek claimed that Mohammed described al-Marri as "the perfect sleeper agent because he has studied in the United States, had no criminal record and had a family with whom he could travel."

But one Newsweek reporter admitted to a Peoria Journal-Star columnist there wasn’t evidence of contact with other al-Qaeda operatives. "That’s the mystery here," reporter Daniel Klaidman said. "If he was the main contact, we probably would’ve seen more evidence of him talking to others." Because some of the information linking al-Marri to terrorism was acquired using torture, it’s unreliable and cannot be allowed in a court of law.

According to the government, al-Marri trained at al-Qaeda’s al Farooq camp in Afghanistan, including training in chemical weapons, and pledged service to Osama bin Laden, offering himself for a "martyrdom" mission. Some detainees reportedly identified al-Marri as being at the al-Farooq camp, and said that he offered to die for al-Qaeda. With this additional information, the Bush Administration decided to name al-Marri an enemy combatant–even though he was arrested on American soil, and has never been accused of carrying out any acts of violence.

Bush’s June 23, 2003 order declared that "al-Marri engaged in conduct that constituted hostile and war-like acts, including conduct in preparation for acts of international terrorism," and he "represents a continuing, present and grave danger to the national security of the United States." The order claimed that the enemy combatant designation was "necessary to prevent him from aiding al-Qaeda in its efforts to attack the United States or its armed forces, other government personnel, or citizens."

The Defense Department said al-Marri’s status was changed ‘‘due to recent credible information provided by other detainees in the war on terrorism. Enemy combatant status may be used to describe an individual who, under the laws and customs of war, has become a member of or associated himself with hostile enemy forces, thereby attaining the status of a belligerent.’’

This doesn’t describe al-Marri at all, even if the worst accusations against him are true. First of all, there is no declared war with al-Qaeda, because al-Qaeda is a terrorist group, not an enemy nation. Second, al-Marri’s alleged membership in the group is tenuous at best. Third, al-Marri was never a belligerent of any kind. A statement from Human Rights Watch charged, "The United States cannot declare a criminal suspect, including a suspected member of al-Qaida, an enemy combatant, except where there has been direct participation in an international armed conflict."

Jan Paul Miller, federal prosecutor for central Illinois, filed to dismiss the criminal case without prejudice--meaning that the government could later reinstate the charges. And the judge seemed willing to support that ruling, but wanted to give defense attorneys time to prepare a response. However, the government was under orders to get al-Marri into military custody immediately, and rather than have a few hours delay for a response by al-Marri’s attorneys, they agreed to dismiss the charges with prejudice, which means al-Marri can never be prosecuted for his acts of credit card fraud and lying. This critical decision may come back to haunt the government now that al-Marri’s enemy combatant status is overturned.

The fact that al-Marri was already in jail awaiting trial on fraud charges made the sudden rush by the Bush Administration even more puzzling. Alice Fisher, deputy assistant attorney general, told the media, "We are confident we would have prevailed," but dropped the charges in order to help fight terrorism. Fisher has admitted that investigators do not believe that al-Marri was "specifically tasked" to plot a chemical or biological attack in the United States. Instead, Newsweek reports that government officials believe al-Marri was assigned to hack into the computer systems of U.S. banks. Al-Marri also frequently visited websites on the production of hydrogen cyanide, a lethal gas that al-Qaeda plotted to use in America. Given al-Marri’s suspected role, why was it necessary to shift the case to military tribunals, which cannot rule on the dismissed charges of fraud and lying?

According to an ABC News report, al-Marri was made an "enemy combatant" because "the government does not want senior al-Qaeda leaders testifying about classified information in open court." Yet this explanation is not plausible, since the fraud charges against al-Marri wouldn’t have required any classified information. Classified information might come out only if terrorism charges are filed against him, but it’s doubtful that evidence acquired more than five years ago would seriously undermine the war on terror.

Putting the Pressure on al-Marri

The real reason for "enemy combatant" status was revealed anonymously to journalists. United Press International reported that a Justice Department official said "that the actual reason for the change in status was to pressure him to cooperate." According to the anonymous official, "If the guy says ‘Even if you give me 30 years in jail, I’ll never help you.’ Then you can always threaten him with indefinite custody incommunicado from his family or attorneys." Attorney General John Ashcroft declared, "An individual with that kind of situation is an individual who might know a lot about what could happen, might know the names of individuals, information being so key to intelligence and prevention."

On May 7, 2003, federal prosecutor David Kelley, according to al-Marri’s attorney, threatened al-Marri that if he continued a plea of innocence, "the circumstances of his confinement, which were already severe, would be further aggravated." For years, al-Marri was kept in solitary confinement.

Even if al-Marri didn’t confess under this "pressure," the government hoped that making al-Marri an "enemy combatant" might give a lesson to al-Qaeda supporters who were reluctant to cooperate. CNN reported that "senior FBI official" said the al-Marri case had implications for other terrorism suspects: "If I were in their shoes, I’d take a message from this."

Frank Dunham, a defense attorney representing Zacarias Moussaoui and Yassir Hamdi, called this a significant admission: "In front of appeals courts, they have argued that enemy combatant status prevents the horror of having corporals and sergeants having to follow Miranda warnings and chain-evidence requirements. They have also argued for the national security implications of allowing it. But never a frank admission that it offers them more leverage in plea bargains and cooperation."

When Constitutional rights are abandoned solely for the sake of intimidating prisoners, it indicates a serious threat to civil liberties. As Emily Tynes of the ACLU observes, "The Department of Justice’s treatment of al-Marri reads like a case study in abuse of power." Tynes notes, "He will be held in a military brig indefinitely, without opportunity for trial, without the opportunity for counsel, without access to the outside world or even, necessarily, sunshine. He now has no rights. He now has no privileges. He is persona non grata."

Unfortunately, few people were concerned about the violations of civil liberties in the al-Marri case. Then-Congressman Ray LaHood (now a member of Obama’s cabinet) told WGLT about the al-Marri case at the time: "I guarantee you, if these folks get lawyers, they will have their day in court." LaHood claimed, "I don’t see too many crocodile tears being spread around this country for these people. I guarantee you, there’s enough civil liberties groups to look after their interests." LaHood may have been unaware of the fact that an "enemy combatant" is denied the constitutional right to a lawyer.

Former judge Andrew Napolitano, the senior judicial analyst at Fox News, noted in the Los Angeles Times about the al-Marri case, "We have tried the likes of Timothy McVeigh and Charles Manson, Al Capone and O.J. Simpson, Tokyo Rose and the Rosenbergs. So who is an enemy combatant? Not John Walker Lindh, who fought alongside the Taliban. Not Zacarias Moussaoui, who the government says helped plan the 9/11 attacks. Not Lyman Faris, who allegedly plotted to blow up the Brooklyn Bridge. The Constitution protected their rights. Who is an enemy combatant? Today, it can be anyone the president wants. And that is terrifying."

Hamdi v. Rumsfeld

Al-Marri’s case was the first time any president has ever stopped a judicial process by declaring someone an "enemy combatant." The fraud and lying charges against al-Marri could have carried penalties of five to 30 years in prison, with fines of up to $1 million on each count. Clearly, there was no immediate danger that al-Marri would be released to organize terrorist activities if not for the "enemy combatant" designation. To the contrary, al-Marri could have been kept in prison for years on fraud and lying charges, and by the time he was scheduled for release, terrorism charges could be filed without any danger to national security. Because the government did not file any terrorism charges against him, al-Marri would have no right to call any witnesses with potentially sensitive information. The public information already released in indictments was more than sufficient to convict al-Marri.

By refusing to respect civil liberties, the Bush Administration could have ended up allowing an al-Qaeda agent to get away with his crimes. Many experts felt that the Obama Administration might release al-Marri and send him back to his home country, Qatar. But with his skills in computer fraud, Al-Marri can pose a threat to America from anywhere in the world.

Most important of all, the Bush Administration has put the Bill of Rights at risk by treating it so cavalierly as an inconvenience to be dismissed whenever it suits the "war on terror." Ali al-Marri is not an innocent man. But until he is granted his rights and his day in court, we will all see our civil liberties reduced. The only way the terrorists can ultimately win is to lead us to reject the freedoms considered fundamental to our democracy.

Crossposted at DailyKos.