T. Boone Pickens Scuttles Wind Farm Project

Texas oil billionaire T. Boone Pickens has called off plans to build the world's biggest wind farm in the Texas Panhandle, The Wall Street Journal said.

Pickens said the wind farm project was scuttled partly because of the lack of adequate transmission lines to carry the electricity from remote locations to cities, according to the paper.

The oil tycoon had hoped to build new transmission lines but could not secure financing, the paper said.

Pickens plans to find new homes for the turbines that he already agreed to buy, the paper said, citing a statement.

Pickens could not immediately be reached for comment by Reuters.

(Reporting by Ajay Kamalakaran in Bangalore; Editing by Greg Mahlich)

© 2009 Reuters

Source: NewsMax

Is there anyone out there other than me that is shaking their head in disbelief?? The government is pushing their global warming (ah climate change hoax) agenda down our throats and trying to convince the American People that they need to pass cap-and-trade, which in reality is cap-and-tax, the largest invasive power grab and tax increase in American/world history… and someone like T. Boone Pickens can’t get funding for his “green” project in this climate??? Hello???

And to confirm the lack of available financing, Donald Trump just said the same thing last week in an interview with Fox News’s Greta van Susteren:

When Greta asked Donald Trump what he’d do if he were President he said he would force the banks to loan the stimulus money that we, the taxpayers, have given them. He said no matter how wealthy you are, you cannot go out and get a loan. The banks are just sitting on that money, covering their bottom-line.

It is becoming ever more clear that the stimulus was a disaster, money is not flowing down, the Obama Financial Team either doesn’t know what they are doing (per V.P. Biden) or are purposely doing things to re-make or negatively impact our entire system and that we are being sold a bill of goods, including Cap-and-Trade, Nationalized Health, and the list goes on.

Related Resources:

• President Trump? What If?
• No More Green Guilt
• Scientist: Global Warming Claims a Lot of Hype
• Senator Inhofe Calls for Inquiry Into ‘Supressed’ Climate Change Report
• Energy Czar Has Not Read Climate Bill Either & Boehner Say Bill Is Pile of S__t!
• Congressman Requests Moment of Silence for Jobs Lot From Cap…
• Stifling Science To ‘Fight Warming
• Video: Obama: My Cap-and-Trade Plan Will Make Electricity Rates 'Skyrocket' | The FOX Nation"’
• Green Hell
• Red Hot Lies

Obama's Plan to Change U.S. Health Care System Will Cost Nearly Two TRILLON Dollars

Alice in Medical Care

Most political and media discussions of medical care have an air of unreality reminiscent of Alice in Wonderland. There is an abundance of catch-phrases but remarkably few coherent arguments.

Let's start at square one. Why is there alarm about American medical care? The most usual reason given is because its cost is high and rising.

That is certainly true. We were not spending nearly as much on high-tech medical procedures in the past because there were not nearly as many of them, and we were not spending anything at all on some of the new pharmaceutical drugs because they didn't exist.

This general pattern is not peculiar to medical care. Cars didn't cost nearly as much in the past, when they didn't have air-conditioning, power steering and high-tech safety features. Homes were cheaper when they were smaller, had fewer bathrooms and lacked such conveniences as built-in microwave ovens.

We would like to have all these things without the rising costs that come with them. But only with medical care is such wishful thinking taken seriously, with government regarded as a sort of fairy godmother who will give us the benefits without the costs.

A cynic is said to be someone who knows the price of everything and the value of nothing. If so, then it is political cynicism to point to other countries that spend less on medical care, including some countries where there is "universal health care" provided "free" by their governments.

Just as medical care, houses and cars were all cheaper when they lacked things that they have today, so medical care in other countries is cheaper when they lack many things that are more readily available in the United States.

There are more than four times as many Magnetic Resonance Imaging units (MRIs) per capita in the United States as in Britain or Canada, where there are government-run medical systems. There are more than twice as many CT scanners per capita in the United States as in Canada and more than four times as many per capita as in Britain.

Is it surprising that such things cost money?

The cost of developing a new pharmaceutical drug is now about a billion dollars. Neither political rhetoric nor government bureaucracies will make those costs go away.

We can, of course, refuse to pay these and other medical costs, just as we can refuse to buy air-conditioned homes with built-in microwave ovens. But that just means we pay attention only to prices and not to the value of what we get for those prices.

We can even refuse to pay for so many doctors. But that just means that we will have to wait longer to see a doctor-- as people do in countries with government-run medical systems.

In Canada, 27 percent of the people who have surgery wait four months or more. In Britain, 38 percent wait that long. But only 5 percent of Americans wait that long for surgery.

Surgery may well cost less in countries with government-run medical systems-- if you count only the money cost, and not the time the patients have to endure the ailments that require surgery, or the fact that some conditions become worse, or even fatal, while waiting.

A recent report from the Fraser Institute in Canada shows that patients there wait an average of ten weeks to get an MRI, just to find out what is wrong with them. A lot of bad things can happen in 10 weeks, ranging from suffering to death.

Politicians may talk about "bringing down the cost of medical care," but they seldom even attempt to bring down the costs. What they bring down is the price-- which is to say, they refuse to pay the costs.

Anybody can refuse to pay any cost. But don't be surprised if you get less when you pay less. None of this is rocket science. But it does require us to stop and think before jumping on a bandwagon.

The great haste with which the latest government expansion into medical care is being rushed through Congress suggests that the politicians don't want us to stop and think. That makes sense, from their point of view, but not from ours.

By Thomas Sowell - Copyright 2009, Creators Syndicate Inc.

Source: Real Clear Politics

Posted: Daily Thought Pad

Related Resources:

• Here Comes Health Care Rationing
• Catastrophe or Catastrophe CD
• Glenn Beck's Common Sense

President Obama Defends Right to Choose Best Care… For His Family

In ABC News Health Care Forum, President Answers Questions About Reform. President Obama struggled to explain today whether his health care reform proposals would force normal Americans to make sacrifices that wealthier, more powerful people -- like the president himself -- wouldn't face.

Obama Said He Won't Accept Health Care Limits for His Own Family… But Obviously Limits Will Be Good Enough For You and Your Family…. Hmmmm?!?

A special edition of "Nightline" from inside the White House followed the Prime Time infomercial.

The probing questions came from two skeptical neurologists during ABC News' special on health care reform, "Questions for the President: Prescription for America," anchored from the White House by Diane Sawyer and Charles Gibson.

Dr. Orrin Devinsky, a neurologist and researcher at the New York University Langone Medical Center, said that elites often propose health care solutions that limit options for the general public, secure in the knowledge that if they or their loves ones get sick, they will be able to afford the best care available, even if it's not provided by insurance.

Devinsky asked the president pointedly if he would be willing to promise that he wouldn't seek such extraordinary help for his wife or daughters if they became sick and the public plan he's proposing limited the tests or treatment they can get.

The president refused to make such a pledge, though he allowed that if "it's my family member, if it's my wife, if it's my children, if it's my grandmother, I always want them to get the very best care.

"There's a whole bunch of care that's being provided that every study, that every bit of evidence that we have indicates may not be making us healthier," he said.

Gibson interjected that often patients don't know what will work until they get every test they can.

"Oftentimes we know what makes sense and what doesn't," the president responded, making a push for evidence-based medicine.

By JAKE TAPPER and KAREN TRAVERS

Source: Fox Nation - Read The Full Article

Posted: Daily Thought Pad

Universal Health and Old People

Voice: The Glenn Beck program presents more truth behind America's march to socialism.

Glenn: Yesterday, I told how you how the socialized health system in the UK was letting the last survivor of the Titanic go bankrupt because they weren't covering her health costs. Mark my words, they're going to start selling us universal healthcare as a solution to our Social Security and Medicare costs, Medicaid, it's all going under. They're going to revamp it. This is really dangerous. Why is it dangerous?

Because look how it's happening and how it's working so wonderfully anywhere it's being tried. Hollywood, it kills me. Hollywood actually had step in. Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet bailed this 97 year old woman out to save her from healthcare despite endless examples of healthcare rationing in the healthcare system, Obama still full speed ahead on pursuing universal healthcare. He actually said that, you know, we all got to have the top flight medical care. It's not good enough that some people in our country have the best medical care. Excuse me?

How are you going to be able to afford everyone having top flight medical care?

You won't. You'll level the playing field which means we'll all have crappy healthcare. Don't worry, old people, though, it's going to be great. You're going to love it. When I say you're going to love it, I don't mean healthcare. I mean, heaven. You should see it especially this time of year. You can't get there fast enough. Let me tell you universal healthcare will help you do it. Why?

Because of the cost benefit analysis. At the Senate finance committee hearings on healthcare reform, Professor Stuart Altman of Brandeis University said that resources get wasted in the American healthcare system. Wasted. Well, what does that mean?

He means that it gets wasted specifically in one segment of the population. Old people, if you think I'm hyping it, his tonight to his words himself. Here's the audio record.

Voice: Remember, our population is aging and at the very, very elderly, the costs go down so that percentage should be falling and it's not. Second, the cost of care is growing by so much so at the same percentage it's worth a lot more. So let's go back to the issue of comparative effectiveness which we're supporting. That's where that can have a big impact. It's not the only place. But that's where the waste is. That's where people are using technologies that really either don't work at all or keep people alive for very limited and very high costs. Hospice is one option, but we do need to take account of the?? you know, I hate to say it, the cost benefit of some of the things we do and either we can do it directly or we can do it by bundling payments and let the delivery system deal with it. So it's a combination of the delivery system dealing with it or?? and/or you providing more information for people that make the right decisions, both for themselves and for their care.

Glenn: Do you understand what he just said?

What he said?? this should terrify people. He's saying you can either let the delivery system do it, in other words, the healthcare system can just say, yeah, you're not going to get that. You're too old. You're a drain on society. I'm sorry, no kidney dialysis for people over 70. What is it in the UK?

60. Some the things they cut off once you outlived your usefulness.

This is Nazi Germany stuff.

This is the kind of stuff that is progressive in its nature. It is eugenics. It is survival of the fittist. It is the reason why the abortion argument makes so much difference. You can't devalue life at either end because these people are waiting to swoop in and say it's just not worth doing these things. Don't waste the money on old people. They're not going to live long anyway. Spend it on someone who meets the requirements of our cost benefit analysis. So old people, thanks for all the contributions you made to society during your better years but now we're sorry to say it's time to send you to a better place, heaven.

By:  The Glenn Beck Program - May 13, 2009 - 12:07 ET

Related Resources:

Social Security and Medicare Finances Worsen

America's March to Socialism: Why we're one step closer to giant missile parades
is now available as an audio book...

American Progressivism