The Obama Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) recently announced an arbitrary September 2011 cutoff for waiver applications, but right up to this deadline these exemptions continue to proliferate. According to The Hill, 106 new waivers were granted in July, bringing the total to 1,472 unions and companies that have been granted exemptions from Obamacare. And yet, the Obama administration continues to be super secretive regarding just how these waiver applications are evaluated.

But here’s one thing we do know. Approximately 50% of the waivers granted cover employees of unions even though union workers represent about 12% of the total workforce according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics!

Why are unions seemingly getting a disproportionate number of waivers? That’s just one of many questions at the center of a Judicial Watch investigation.

Recently, for example, we obtained 3,497 pages of Obamacare documents from the Obama HHS pursuant to a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit filed on January 4, 2011.

The records include internal HHS email correspondence and strategic documents, as well as email communications with Medicare and Medicaid, and with unions and companies applying for waivers. The records also include preliminary drafts and multiple versions of the health care plan itself, along with comments from the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) and other agencies with concerns and suggestions for revising the plan.

The majority of the email communications relate to the waivers granted by HHS exempting companies and unions from the minimum annual cap on the amount payable to an individual in benefits. (Many companies argue these caps will force them to either drop coverage or raise premiums.) The Obamacare waivers enable these companies and unions to keep their existing plans in place until January 1, 2014, when covered expenses will no longer be limited by a cap. (Just wait and see the chaos that occurs should Obamacare somehow withstand judicial scrutiny and become the law of the land.)

In a general sense, Judicial Watch simply wants to know the criteria by which a company or union is granted one of these waivers. We want to know who got them and who didn’t. We want to know what conditions mandate approval and which mandate rejection. But HHS is mum on these questions. This first batch of 3,500 pages is, believe it or not, just the tip of the iceberg of the thousands of other documents the “transparent” Obama administration continues to withhold from us in contemptuous violation of the Freedom of Information Act.

Which is an especially troubling problem considering the fact that Big Labor seems to be getting big favors from HHS in the form of these waivers.

You may recall Judicial Watch previously obtained documents from HHS regarding closed-door health care meetings between Big Labor and Vice President Joe Biden, HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, and then-Obamacare Czar Nancy-Ann Min DeParle.

The documents include a list of all of the labor union leaders who attended a meeting with President Obama, along with brief biographical information on each participant. The list included: Richard Trumka, President of the AFL-CIO; Andy Stern, President of the Service Employees International Union; and Jim Hoffa, President of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, among other Big Labor leaders.

What assurances did the Obama administration give to labor leaders in exchange for their support of the plan? The documents we previously uncovered suggest that the key provisions of the Obamacare law were written solely to address the concerns of union interests. (And now we see Big Labor getting 50% of the waiver haul.)

Speaking over Labor Day Weekend, at a rally for organized labor attended by Barack Obama, Hoffa attacked the Tea Party and urged attendees to get out the vote for Democrats: “President Obama, this is your army…Everybody here has got to vote. If we go back and we keep the eye on the prize, let’s take these sons of bitches out and give America back to America where we belong.”

So the unions appear to be getting what they want, a reprieve from Obamacare. And the Obama campaign is getting what it wants, union cash and support. And where does this leave the rest of America? In the dark. The Obama administration continues to push forward with Obamacare under a veil of secrecy, especially the details of these Obamacare waivers.

Waiving the law for 3.4 million Americans is unfair and an affront to the rule of law. And it seems corrupt when political supporters in Big Labor are getting a disproportionate number of waivers from Obamacare. Unions helped write Obamacare and then get exempted from it! And now Big Labor is paying back these waiver favors with campaign support for Barack Obama. Judicial Watch is committed to bringing as much transparency as possible to the thoroughly corrupt Obamacare, especially this ongoing abuse of the “waiver” process.

Those were my thoughts when I heard that Harry Reid appointed Senators Kerry, Murray, and Baucus to the “super committee” created by the debt limit bill.

And then I was similarly stunned when Nancy Pelosi picked Representatives Clyburn, Becerra, and Van Hollen.

If you wanted to select the six most doctrinaire statists in Congress, you’d be hard pressed to come up with a different list. To understand just how left wing they are, here’s a chart showing their 2010 ratings from the National Taxpayers Union. They all had the same grade – a big fat F. And that is rather remarkable since NTU grades on a big curve. A score of 19 is all it takes to get a D.

For purposes of comparison, I’ve also added a line indicating Senator Ted Kennedy’s lifetime rating. He got an F, of course, but his average rating was higher than every single one of the big-government clowns named by Reid and Pelosi.

As I said earlier, wow.

I hope the too-eager-to-please GOPers realize that this super committee is nothing other than a tax increase trap.

Fortunately, there is a sure-fire winning strategy for the super committee, which I’ll write about next week.

As reported in the Washington Times:

“Republicans offered to let the vote happen Friday night, just minutes after the chamber voted to halt a House Republican bill. All sides expect Democrats’ bill will fail too, and the GOP said senators might as well kill both at the same time so that negotiations could move on to a compromise.

“‘We would be happy to have that vote tonight,’ Sen. Mitch McConnell, Republicans’ leader, offered.

“But Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid objected, even though the vote would occur on his own bill. He instead said the chamber would have to run out the full procedural clock, which means a vote in the early hours Sunday morning.

“He said he would be willing to move up the vote if Republicans didn’t insist on a 60-vote threshold, which has become traditional for big, controversial items to pass the Senate. But the GOP held firm on that demand, so Mr. Reid said he would insist on the full process, which he said would show the country that Republicans were being obstructionist.”

At a time when the American people are screaming – nay, demanding – that those elected to office in Washington stop with the political positioning and gamesmanship, Progressive Democrat Harry Reid, a man whose approval rating is just 27 percent, whose negatives stand at 53 percent, a man whose last election was handed to him not by the people of Nevada but by the union members of Las Vegas, represents the quintessential example of exactly the kind of behavior Americans detest.

For years, both when Mr. Reid was a minority leader and as majority leader, he would rail against Republican leadership for not allowing “up or down” votes on issues such as judicial nominees and presidential appointments, calling the legitimate blocking of ideologues to positions of incredible influence “obstructionist. Yet, Mr. Reid would go so far as to maintain sessions over holiday breaks, even on Christmas, so as to block any chance of President Bush utilizing his power of recess appointment, a power that President Obama has used several times to appoint people possessing Progressive, Socialist and even Communist ideological leanings to sensitive positions.

Now, as we face a possible downgrade to the nation’s credit rating, a downgrade directly related to not the debt ceiling but to grotesque overspending and mismanagement of national revenues, we witness Harry Reid, partisan operative and Progressive ideologue, accusing the entire opposing political party of doing exactly what he is doing, right in front of an entire nation: obstructing a path toward solution.

If partisanship in Washington, DC, is the thing that the American people most loathe about the political class in our country – and poll after poll after poll after poll reveals, without doubt and across all political declarations, that this is the case – then Mr. Reid has proven himself the best candidate for “poster boy” to that malady. That is saying quite a bit when you consider Nancy Pelosi must come in second place.

The obvious and transparent political maneuvering that is “tabling,” or killing, honestly constructed and legislated solutions in an effort to demonize, through the use of Goebbels-esque propaganda tactics, the opposing political party, especially at the expense of the nation, is beyond reprehensible. Senator Reid’s actions are inexcusable and the full weight of his party’s leadership should condemn his embrace of politically opportunistic partisanship at a time when our nation needs honest leaders.

Sadly, with what passes for leadership in the Progressive Movement and the Democrat Party today, the American people are more likely to see the 10 percent of the population that is Progressive celebrating Mr. Reid’s “fiddling,” even as the nation burns.

Many on the Left side of the aisle have been caught rationalizing the need to raise the debt ceiling by noting it has been raised 78 times since 1960 – 49 times under Republican presidents, and 29 times under Democrat presidents, an irrelevant attribution due to the fact that Congress holds the power of the purse, not the Executive Branch. In fact, if one wants to split hairs about which party has presided over the majority of debt ceiling raises, and, consequently, which party has presided over the most deficit spending, it would be more accurate to point out that Democrats, from 1960 to 2010, have held the majorities in the Senate for 36 years and the House for 41 years. Ergo, Democrats and Progressives are far more to blame than Republicans for bringing the nation to the precipice of financial ruin.

Truth be told, both sides of the aisle are to blame for spending beyond their means, the honest man – or woman – recognizes and acknowledges that Congress has been spending more than it takes in for generations, whether under Republican leadership or Democrat leadership. That said, our nation would be infinitely better served if the news media and the elected class abandoned the blame game and political gimmicks – something that Progressives and especially Pres. Obama are not wont to do, to focus on the urgent need for them to commit to balancing the budget.
Recognizing that the real disease afflicting our federal government is an addiction to overspending; an addiction to using the disingenuous tool of promise, balanced on the back of the taxpayers, to buy votes from the narcissistic, the argument over raising the debt ceiling becomes a false one, because the debt ceiling itself is an illusion. If the debt ceiling were something that was binding, it would be different, but the fact that it has been raised 78 times in 50 years suggests that it is a “feel good” declaration that literally holds no weight. If a restriction doesn’t restrict, is it really a restriction?

Keeping that thought in mind, let’s pretend that a balanced budget amendment were passed out of Congress and each and every State signed on to it, making it law of the land backed by the US Constitution. So what? The Congressional Budget Act of 1974 mandates that Congress must complete its annual budget resolution by April 15th – the same day Americans must pay taxes. If Congress fails to pass a budget resolution, legislation that affects budgetary matters cannot be considered. Yet our federal government has been without a budget for two Congresses running. And what can we do about it? Nothing. It takes an act of Congress to punish Congress and those elected to Congress – at least until the TEA Party came to town – are too gutless to do the right thing. So, you will excuse me if I am not as excited about a balanced budget amendment as everyone seems to be.

To that extent, what I see an necessary to rectify the spendthrift ways of our federal government would make Nancy Pelosi’s face crack off at the stitch-line and Harry Reid actually prove that he is awake.

First, legislation needs to be passed that defines the prioritization of spending for the federal government. One would have thought that the Constitution was pretty clear on that but when an elected class believes that the Commerce Clause paves the way for penalizing people for not buying a product…well…that presents as proof positive that the opportunistic political class cannot be trusted to make honest financial decisions from Congress to Congress.

Second, legislation needs to be passed that reforms the tax code to provide for either a flat tax – for both personal and corporate taxes, no deductions but for those who have disabilities or exist below the poverty level – or a complete transition to a consumption tax. Personally, I prefer the latter as it allows those here illegally and those who are transient to pay into the system. All other forms of taxation would be abolished but for taxes on foreign entities with regard to trade and sales. Both reforms force the elected class to limit their reach into the taxpayers’ pocket.

Third, and this is the one that will prove most controversial and objectionable, legislation must be passed that makes it a crime, punishable by incredibly high fines, mandatory incarceration and a 10-year exile from US markets, for any financial institution and their enabling officers – both domestic and international, and for any foreign entity, be it sovereign government or corporation, who enter into financial arrangements with the United States federal government resulting in the accrual of national debt, exempt to wartime and/or in the event of a national disaster.

Drastic? You bet. But with a professional elected class that has proven beyond doubt that it cannot be trusted to be fiscally responsible, “drastic” is called for.

Of course, all this could be avoided if the American people would only execute their constitutional duty to governmental oversight. If we were calling our elected officials out on spending taxpayer monies for private sector programs (i.e. Planned Parenthood, ACORN splinter groups, etc.), rejecting their use of taxpayer monies as political payola bribes for special interest groups (i.e. eco-zealots and unions) and demanding that we close the global pocketbook that is the “be my friend” money tossed about the globe by the State Department, no drastic measures would be necessary. That said, until the American people stop believing that government “owes” them something, the need for drastic measures will remain.

Back to the drastic measures noted above. None of the measures needed to put our nation back to good can be achieved if the fiscally responsible don’t run for office and are not elected to office. 2010 was a great start. The TEA Party did a good job. But now is not the time to rest on our laurels. Now is the time to hit it even harder than we did before the 2010 elections. Conservatives and TEA Party Americans – and let’s remember that the TEA Party encompasses Republicans, Conservatives, Independents, Democrats and Libertarians – must make dramatic gains in Congress while retaking the White House in 2012. Short of that…well…our country is doomed to Democratic Socialism.

Even as President Obama and Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner take to the airwaves (as it were) to trumpet that the economic sky will fall if Congress does not reach a deal to raise the debt ceiling; to give the federal government the ability to amass more foreign debt, both Mr. Obama and Mr. Geithner – and their dispatches – have been reassuring the financial sector that they have no intention of allowing the United States government to “default” on its debt, regardless of whether Congress raises the debt ceiling or not.

A senior banking official admitted to receiving “guidance” from the Obama Administration insisting that “default is off the table.” This should be the catalyst for a great deal of anger; anger emanating from those who receive Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid payments, not to mention anyone whose investments have been held in limbo for all the uncertainty surrounding the debt ceiling issue.

FOX Business reports:

“In a series of phone calls, administration officials have told bankers that the administration will not allow a default to happen even if the debt cap isn’t raised by the August 2 date Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner says the government will run out of money to pay all its bills, including obligations to bond holders…

“A senior banking official told FOX Business that administration officials have provided guidance to them that even though a default is off the table, a downgrade ‘is a real possibility for no other reason than S&P and Moody’s have to cover (themselves) since they’ve been speaking out on the debt cap so much.

“This guidance is a big reason why Wall Street has largely dismissed the possibility of default, and though the markets have been jittery amid the talk of default, they haven’t imploded as would be the case, many economists fear, if the nation missed a payment on its debt.”

(As an aside, every American should be questioning the validity of S&P and Moody’s rating declarations, if only for the undisputable fact that they were complicit in the mortgage meltdown that triggered the economic crisis in that they gave AAA ratings to sub-prime mortgage bundlers who imploded when the “ACORN mortgage payments” came due. But I digress…)

This lends credence to each and every member of Congress and every informed citizen who has pointed out the indisputable fact that there is no possible way the United States can “default” on its debt interest payments, not to mention Social Security, Medicare, Medicare and Veteran’s Affairs payments due, as well as federal employee paychecks, including military. Those who have demonized the truth-tellers owe them a heartfelt apology.

Further, even as the TEA Party contingent among our elected officials takes on the full brunt of the Obama Machine’s demagoguery, they are readying a bill – The Full Faith & Credit Act – to the House floor. This bill would direct the president to prioritize federal payments to the nation’s creditors, Social Security recipients and soldiers serving in Afghanistan and Iraq. They do this as the Progressive Left attacks them for…oh, the gall of it all…demanding that the federal government spend within its means.

So, we have President Obama, using one of his Janus faces to take to the public airwaves to declare that should Congress not act in providing for an increase in the federal government’s ability to accrue debt, Social Security checks “may not be sent out,” and that the United States federal government would be harmed – irreparably. While out of his other Janus face he tells potential campaign contributors (read: Obama Doing Well with Wall Street Donors) not to worry about a US government default because he won’t allow it to happen.

These actions serve as proof positive that Mr. Obama, David Plouffe, Valerie Jarrett and the rest of the Hyde Park, Chicago, Progressive Leftist contingent are simply – at their core beings – slimy Chicago politicians employing the “say anything to win” strategy of instituting crisis while employing fear-tactics that target our nation’s seniors and the most vulnerable among us. It is despicable and our nation deserves better.

Cowboys know a lot about life. For instance they know that as soon as you think you know everything about horses and you can control them, you get hurt. The same is true of power and President Obama has been intoxicated with ego and power from the time he entered the White House, dictating his demands to a Democratic Party that was stunned into subservience by a victory that could not be explained. Most important is that the President believed in his own invulnerability. Only recently have the facts emerged. David Border writing for the Post in an August 9, 2010 article entitled “Senate as Civil as Ever, We’re Told” that Senate Minority Leader Mitch Mc Connell was first invited for a one on one with the President one year and seven months after Obama took office.

In recent weeks Time Magazine stated that the White House didn’t have Boehner’s phone number which was later confirmed by Stephanopoulos on ABC News that a top aid to the President didn’t know Boehner the Minority Leader of the House of Representatives. These are truly amazing revelations when you think back on the relationships that Presidents have had with members of their opposing parties. Reagan with Tip O’ Neil and Rostenkowski. Clinton with Newt Gingrich. While these Presidents fought with leaders of the opposite party, sometimes publically, they respected and knew one another well.

Harvard Professor V.O. Key, Jr. stated in his seminal work, “The Responsible Electorate”: “This narcissistic approach assumes it’s most repulsive form among election winners who have championed intolerance, who have stirred the passions and hatreds of people, or who have advocated causes known by decent men to be outrageous or dangerous in their long run circumstances.” This intolerance fueled the formation of the Tea Party and now has removed him from the favor of his own party.

It is now becoming clear that Senator Reid has had enough and has decided that he will work with Mc Connell to fashion a solution that will work for both parties and the Country. It is also clear that Boehner is willing to work with both parties to do the same. What is Obama doing? Yesterday he dispatched his Chief of Staff and Treasury Secretary to make the argument that the White House is relevant and he is a victim of an economic situation that he inherited.

Through the complexity of the debt limit and budget issue the President has revealed very little understanding or competence appearing to only be interested in getting the matter behind him so he can have a second term. He has simply shown an inability to comprehend the details and a lack of ability to participate in the philosophical debate. Interestingly this debate has been fashioned by the President through the focus he generated by his Health Reform and Stimulus Package that the Country has questioned weather there was any return for those investments. In reality this is a healthy moment in our country to have this debate and Congress is reasserting itself, a shining testament about our Democracy.

The danger is that as this Administration becomes more marginalized it will take more desperate measures to try to prove its status, value and relevance as demonstrated by the scare tactics they are currently resorting to. Don’t be surprised if the Administration delays checks being sent out to get the public upset, after all it was Rahm Emanuel who said “never fail to take advantage of a good crisis.”

The fact of the matter is that House Speaker John Boehner, and a majority of the House and Senate Republican contingents, have compromised, and have done so on a major issue: raising the debt ceiling.

Looking back on the 2010 Mid-Term Election, those concerned about the fiscal irresponsibility executed by our elected class stated loud and clear, in the only poll that matters – the poll at the ballot box, that we wanted the federal government to employ fiscal restraint. In many cases, those whose names were on the ballot, indicated that they finally – finally – got the message. Even Harry Reid (D-NV), ran on a platform that included support for a balanced budget amendment. They said time and time again, at rallies and fundraisers that they understood that the American people were demanding dramatically reduced spending, an honest effort to reduce debt and an abdication of status quo partisan politics, at least until the country’s fiscal health was on the mend.

Fast-Forward to today.

The elected class on the Left side of the aisle, but for a very few, have once again exhibited the status quo Janus face of political skullduggery.

They have abandoned the stance of fiscal responsibility only to embrace their neo-traditional role of Progressive partisan. They feign an advocacy for reducing expenditures when in fact they are actually advancing increased expenditures in a reduced manner from what they would prefer. Over a dozen Democrats who actually ran on a platform supporting a balanced budget amendment – including Senate Majority Leader Reid – abandoned their promises to their constituents in voting down ‘Cut, Cap and Balance,’ a bill Mr. Reid called, “the stupidest constitutional amendment I’ve ever seen.”

Conversely – and most importantly as we move forward – Republicans who ran on fiscal responsibility, who insisted that they heard the American voter in the 2010 election, have taken their seats at the negotiating table in good faith, in contrast to their counterparts. In the spirit of ingenuous compromise, Republicans acquiesced to raising the debt ceiling, an action their constituents firmly stated, via the ballot box, they did not want them to do; Republicans compromised on their principles by entertaining the notion of raising the debt ceiling. What they asked for in return – what they wanted in compromise from Democrats, Progressives and Mr. Obama – was a commitment to honor the fiscal responsibility mandated by the American people: reduced spending with caps, entitlement reforms and a mechanism to make sure the federal government, both of the present and in the future, follows through on these promises: a balanced budget amendment that could be debated at the State level.

As we stand at the precipice of a historical moment in time, we have one party – the Republican Party – that has advanced no less than four debt ceiling/budget reduction plans and offered a true compromise in allowing for a raise in the federal debt limit, and another party – the Progressive Democrat Party and Barack Obama – who have proven unconditional in their insistence of reserving the right to spend and amass debt; who execute an audacity that brands compromising Republicans as “intransigent” even as they execute that very short-coming.

When the facts are examined, it is, in fact, Democrats, Progressives and, especially, President Obama, who have proved to be stubbornly intransigent, not Republicans. Republicans compromised on raising the debt ceiling. Democrats and Mr. Obama have compromised on nothing.