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Michelle Malkin: Who's Behind the Internet Snitch Brigade? (ObamaCare and flag@whitehouse.gov)
Townhall ^ | August 7, 2009 | Michelle Malkin

Posted on 08/06/2009 9:44:40 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet

Czardom has its privileges. This week, President Obama's health care overlord, Nancy DeParle, launched a taxpayer-funded initiative to recruit an Internet Snitch Brigade that will combat "disinformation about health insurance reform." As the White House explained in a special online bulletin:

"These rumors often travel just below the surface via chain e-mails or through casual conversation. Since we can't keep track of all of them here at the White House, we're asking for your help. If you get an e-mail or see something on the web about health insurance reform that seems fishy, send it to flag@whitehouse.gov."

What will health care czar DeParle do with this information? Where will it be stored? Who has oversight of the czar's powers, budget and personnel? Concerned citizens, alas, will have a hard time tracking down the "Office of Health Care Reform" created by executive order in April. There is no central website for the office, no direct channel for transparency and no congressional accountability.

At least one member of Congress has started asking questions. Texas GOP Sen. John Cornyn sent a letter to Obama demanding that he disband the Internet Snitch Brigade immediately: "By requesting citizens send 'fishy' e-mails to the White House, it is inevitable that the names, e-mail addresses, IP addresses and private speech of U.S. citizens will be reported to the White House," Cornyn wrote. "You should not be surprised that these actions taken by your White House staff raise the specter of a data collection program."

Taxpayers have the right to know what government agencies and third parties the health care czar may share that data with -- and why. Take note: The White House Office of Health Care Reform is working in close quarters with an entirely separate Office of Health Reform created under the Department of Health and Human Services. That office is staffed with several Obama campaign operatives and former employees of the Center for American Progress, including special assistant Michael Halle and HHS Office of Health Reform Director Jeanne Lambrew, a former senior fellow at the Center for American Progress who worked on health policy in the Clinton administration.

CAP is a lead organization in the Health Care for America Now coalition, the "grassroots" lobbying group for Obama's health care takeover legislation run out of 1825 K Street in Washington, D.C., with a $40 million budget. CAP is also the parent group of Think Progress, the far-left website leading the smear campaign against fiscally conservative activists protesting at congressional town halls.

Lawmakers must also dig far beyond the health care czar's flagging operation. Last month, a Washington, D.C., citizen watchdog group filed suit to force the White House to disclose which health care lobbyists and executives it had met with this year to discuss the government health care takeover legislation. White House counsel Greg Craig refused to disclose which administration officials attended the meetings. But at least two of the industry visitors have ties to DeParle.

William C. Weldon is chairman of Johnson & Johnson, which paid DeParle $7,500 for a recent speech. Wayne Smith is chief executive of Community Health Systems, which merged with Triad Hospitals -- where DeParle served on the board of directors. DeParle's options were converted to cash payments worth $1.05 million.

Despite Obama's lip service to transparency, the public is in the dark about which assets DeParle has divested; how many times, if any, DeParle has recused herself from policy matters and meetings; and the exact nature of her conversations with health care executives. While White House press secretary Robert Gibbs lambastes the corporate health care ties of Republican opponents, he has shrugged off the corporate ties of the woman leading the Obamacare charge.

Alert the Internet Snitch Brigade: The fishiest odor is emanating from 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.


TOPICS: Constitution/Conservatism; Crime/Corruption; Front Page News; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: agenda; bho44; bhofascism; bhohealthcare; congress; deparle; fuhrerobama; healthcare; liberalfascism; malkin; michellemalkin; obama; obamacare; obamajugend; snitches; socializedmedicine
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Isn't that illegal?
1 posted on 08/06/2009 9:44:40 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
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To: 2ndDivisionVet
MY LETTER TO THE WHITEHOUSE AND OBAMA ABOUT FREE SPEECH
2 posted on 08/06/2009 9:45:22 PM PDT by Jeff Head (Freedom is not free...never has been, never will be. (www.dragonsfuryseries.com))
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Every stage magician uses misdirection to work seeming miracles. In this case, pinning the blame for a hare brained health (s)care plan on its opponents.


3 posted on 08/06/2009 9:47:39 PM PDT by HiTech RedNeck (The Democrat Party: a criminal organization masquerading as a political party)
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To: TigersEye

Read this.


4 posted on 08/06/2009 9:48:32 PM PDT by pandoraou812 (elected officials should be required to pass drug, alcohol & dementia testing)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet
Isn't that illegal?

Do they care if it is or not? I think not. Pepto Bismol is my friend lately. Rage against the machine is not stomach friendly. Flag me, I hate Obama's lies and Alinsky tactics.

5 posted on 08/06/2009 9:49:01 PM PDT by mplsconservative
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To: Jeff Head

I believe you mean a “dangerous tack” not a “dangerous tact.”


6 posted on 08/06/2009 9:49:08 PM PDT by HiTech RedNeck (The Democrat Party: a criminal organization masquerading as a political party)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet
"Isn't that illegal? "

Slightly. He's done worse, actually.

7 posted on 08/06/2009 9:49:54 PM PDT by YHAOS
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To: mplsconservative

No they don’t care, the mantra is to get away with as much as they can.


8 posted on 08/06/2009 9:50:09 PM PDT by HiTech RedNeck (The Democrat Party: a criminal organization masquerading as a political party)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

How long before blue eagle stickers are mandated for businesses that want a government contract? Where the government boycotts and “encourages” citizens to boycott businesses that do not show the sticker? How long before that happens now?

FDR did it for the National Recovery Act


9 posted on 08/06/2009 9:53:01 PM PDT by GeronL (Guilty of the crime of deviationism.)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

WHERE’S THAT VIDEO OF HILLARY SAYING “WE DON’T HAVE TIME FOR ‘ON THE JOB TRAINING’........

This president is so inexperienced..... he is getting swept along by the Chicago thugs who are running full tilt now to get their programs in place before the People wake up........(I’m TRYING to be kind to the pompous narcissistic Socialist)......


10 posted on 08/06/2009 9:53:12 PM PDT by bitt (wHERE'S)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet
Isn't that illegal?

These people are now the law of the land and any who oppose them are illegal.

11 posted on 08/06/2009 9:53:29 PM PDT by Just mythoughts (Bama and Company are reenacting the Pharaoh as told by Moses in Genesis!!!!!)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

It’s spooky as hell, if you ask me.

No doubt this information will be of great use when the Civilian National Security Force is up and running. A ready made list of public enemies to keep an eye on.


12 posted on 08/06/2009 9:53:46 PM PDT by Ronin (Nemo me impune lacesset)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet
Dang it.
Rules....


13 posted on 08/06/2009 9:54:44 PM PDT by 50cal Smokepole (Effective gun control involves effective recoil management)
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To: HiTech RedNeck

Yes indeed. This month is crucial to these Stalinists. I hope it all backfires on them. With the media in lockstep, I’m more than a little worried, to say the least.


14 posted on 08/06/2009 9:55:35 PM PDT by mplsconservative
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To: GeronL

>>How long before blue eagle stickers are mandated for businesses that want a government contract? Where the government boycotts and “encourages” citizens to boycott businesses that do not show the sticker? How long before that happens now?<<

Only this time the whites will be discriminated against.
All other minorities, get the sticker.


15 posted on 08/06/2009 9:56:05 PM PDT by netmilsmom (Psalm 109:8 - Let his days be few; and let another take his office)
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To: Ronin

If it’s any consolation, I believe the flaggots are being spammed to the point of burial. Why can’t a bunch of plausible looking but completely bogus “reports” be placed with them too? Even better to bog them down.


16 posted on 08/06/2009 9:56:30 PM PDT by HiTech RedNeck (The Democrat Party: a criminal organization masquerading as a political party)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

The pressure points are Community Health Services and J&J. Hit them hard and in a continuing effort and things will begin to change.


17 posted on 08/06/2009 10:00:53 PM PDT by Rembrandt
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To: Jeff Head

Right on, Jeff!


18 posted on 08/06/2009 10:04:29 PM PDT by FrdmLvr
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Nancy DeParle

She served as the director of the Health Care Financing Administration (HCFA) from 1997 to 2000, administering the Medicare program for the Clinton administration, and before then worked at the Office of Management and Budget. On March 2, 2009, she was named by President Obama to serve as "health reform Czar", or director of the new White House Office of Health Reform

Earlier in her career, DeParle served in the Cabinet of Tennessee Governor Ned McWherter as Commissioner of Human Services. She has also worked as a lawyer in private practice.

As the child of Chinese immigrants in Tennessee, she ended up attending the University of Tennesse, winning a Rhodes Scholarship, giving her a degree from Oxford to go along with the one she'd get from Harvard Law School.

A public plan is something that’s sponsored by the government, and therefore has very low or almost nonexistent administrative costs (RIGHT!), compared to others. It doesn’t have the need to have brokers out selling; it wouldn’t have the need to have a lot of costs and profits, the way private plans would. So it has that advantage. It could operate by the same rules that all the other plans do; it could have payments rates that are very similar. Or it could have payment rates that are the same as Medicare — that’s one idea that’s been used. So there are various ways of looking at it.

******

An attorney running our health care system?!

19 posted on 08/06/2009 10:07:22 PM PDT by kcvl
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To: mplsconservative

That’s the maddening part, what do you do about people who have no principles, no conscience, no morals, no ethics, and no fear of the law? If it did come to armed confrontation, they would also have no qualms about using overwhelming force to put down “insurrection”, while leaving citizens no other option to express their rights and be represented. They don’t care if you know they’re lying-they don’t care about anything, as long as it can’t stop them. What do you do with monsters like that?


20 posted on 08/06/2009 10:09:30 PM PDT by mrsmel (Put the Gitmo terrorists near Capitol Hill.)
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