For instance, take the appointment of Dr. Don Berwick to head the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS). Dr. Berwick was nominated for the post just a few months ago, back in April. Yesterday, the President decided to bypass the Senate entirely and just give him the job through a recess appointment. Why? Well, the White House Communications Director made the President’s position quite clear:

Many Republicans in Congress have made it clear in recent weeks that they were going to stall the nomination as long as they could, solely to score political points.

Yes, it was all the fault of those evil and nasty Senate Republicans, the source of all evil in this country. Now, that may very well be true. Most Senate Republicans are rather spineless, greedy, and craven. But, as the Senate Republican Policy Committee pointed out, they never even got a chance to stall, prevaricate, or vacillate.

In this context, it’s worth pointing out that Democrats never called a hearing on Dr. Berwick’s nomination. Republicans have no ability to “stall the nomination” in committee – and nothing prevented the majority from calling a hearing, or voting to report the nomination out of committee. They chose to do neither.

In fact, they were quite eager to have a conversation about the importance of the post and the merits of the nominee.

Second, CMS is one of the largest agencies in the federal government. This fiscal year, it will disburse $803 billion in benefits – making CMS larger than all but 15 of the world’s economies. And of course, its responsibilities will only grow under the health care law, as the CMS Administrator will be responsible for implementing more than $500 billion in savings from the Medicare program, and an unprecedented expansion of Medicaid as well. Yet both Republicans and Democrats will be denied any opportunity to question Dr. Berwick about how he plans to implement the law, and manage CMS, because the President decided to make a recess appointment before the confirmation process began in earnest.

This recess appointment is more about our President’s moral cowardice than it is about the Republican’s moral cowardice. Dr. Berwick, together with the President, is a proponent of some ideas that a majority of Americans don’t like.

Dr. Donald Berwick has been awaiting a nomination hearing in Congress since Mr. Obama tapped him for the post in April. Since then, Republicans have attacked the Harvard professor and health policy expert for making favorable statements about Britain’s government-run health system and for endorsing certain health spending cuts.

Democrats have been concerned that Dr. Berwick’s confirmation hearing would be a bruising battle. Republicans indicated they would use the hearing to revive their arguments that the health-overhaul law will lead to a government takeover of the health system.

ABC reported that Republicans were rather looking forward to this nominating hearing.

But Republicans were not delaying or stalling Berwick’s nomination.

Indeed, they were eager for his hearing, hoping to assail Berwick’s past statements about health care rationing and his praise for the British health care system.

“The nomination hasn’t been held up by Republicans in Congress and to say otherwise is misleading,” said Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, the ranking Republican on the Senate Finance Committee, which would have held Berwick’s hearing.

Grassley said that he “requested that a hearing take place two weeks ago, before this recess.”

Berwick’s nomination was sent to the Senate in April, and his hearing had not been scheduled because he was participating in the “standard vetting process,” a Democratic aide on the Senate Finance Committee told ABC News.

But speaking not for attribution, Democratic officials say that neither Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., nor Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., the chair of the Senate Finance Committee, were eager for an ugly confirmation fight four months before the midterm elections.

Even the New York Times managed to notice that something wasn’t quite right.

The recess appointment was somewhat unusual because the Senate is in recess for less than two weeks and senators were still waiting for Dr. Berwick to submit responses to some of their requests for information. No confirmation hearing has been held or scheduled.

The holding and scheduling of confirmation hearings is at the discreation of the Senate majority. Democrats have a 59-41 advantage in the Senate. If they truly wanted to, they would have no problem scheduling a hearing, voting the nominee out of committee and then approving the nominee with a full Senate vote. Senate Republicans would have had little real opportunity to stop the process.

Instead, the President and Senate leadership ignored their Constitutional duties out of fear of the American public. They were afraid of political fallout from letting the American public watch the hearings and see what their nominee really believed — what the President really believes. This isn’t a mark of a great leader. It’s the mark of a political coward. And it’s just one of the many reasons why I don’t like President Obama.

I almost wish I lived in New Jersey. (Almost.) I’d like to vote for this guy.

It’s been a pretty big surprise to me that one of the few magazines out there still interested in shedding some real light on how things work today in Washington D.C. is RollingStone. I mean, yeah, they were cool enough to print stuff from P.J. O’Rourke, but those were basically humor columns. Yet take a look to the right of Taylor Lautner’s drenched abs on the above cover, for instance, and you’ll note a small yellow caption reading “Obama’s Wall Street Sellout, by Matt Taibbi”. It’s an understated advertisement for the latest gold from the rag’s very skilled and utterly furious staff writer on politics.

His latest (June issue) story is entitled “Wall Street War”. I’m ordering you to read it for free here on RollingStone‘s website, because it’s as well-researched and well-written an article as I can imagine on the issue of financial reform and how our so-called representatives have turned betraying their constituents into an outright art form. This is really the sort of hard-hitting, truth-to-power stuff all major journalists should at least try to write.

The only criticism I have of the piece is its lackluster concluding paragraph. What Taibbi wrote to summarize “Wall Street War” doesn’t hold a candle to the flourished finish he wrote for “The Great American Bubble Machine”, his stellar article on the history of Goldman-Sachs.

It’s not always easy to accept the reality of what we now routinely allow these people to get away with; there’s a kind of collective denial that kicks in when a country goes through what America has gone through lately, when a people lose as much prestige and status as we have in the past few years. You can’t really register the fact that you’re no longer a citizen of a thriving first-world democracy, that you’re no longer above getting robbed in broad daylight, because like an amputee, you can still sort of feel things that are no longer there.

But this is it. This is the world we live in now. And in this world, some of us have to play by the rules, while others get a note from the principal excusing them from homework till the end of time, plus 10 billion free dollars in a paper bag to buy lunch. It’s a gangster state, running on gangster economics, and even prices can’t be trusted anymore; there are hidden taxes in every buck you pay. And maybe we can’t stop it, but we should at least know where it’s all going.

I won’t lie to you: to read words like these in a major magazine with a high circulation among my generation does my soul a world of good. In retrospect, maybe I should have realized that any magazine for adults willing to make the Jonas Bros. their monthly feature has be fearless, and now I’m wondering what I’ve been missing. Crazy as it seems, I’m also looking forward to what RollingStone‘s got next.

FURTHER READING: Matt Taibbi’s smashing discussion of health care reform and American government, “Sick and Wrong: How Washington is screwing up health care reform — and why it may take a revolt to fix it.”

In a major blow to Democrats, House Appropriations Committee Chairman David Obey has told close associates that he will not seek re-election and an announcement of his plans is expected as early as Wednesday.

The Wisconsin Democrat faces tough poll numbers at home but until Tuesday night his staff had insisted he was running aggressively and had hired campaign staff. But a person close to him confirmed the decision to POLITICO Wednesday and said Obey was preparing to make a statement.

via Obey Won’t Seek Re-election – Daniel Foster – The Corner on National Review Online.

Seeing as how I think the House Appropriations Committee is full of the most arrogant, big spending collection of corruptocrats in the entire Congress and seeing as how Congressman Obey was their Chairman — you might say that I’m elated at this news.

Florida Gov. Charlie Crist formally launched his bid for a U.S. Senate seat as an independent candidate Thursday evening, abandoning the Republican primary and casting himself as the outsider in a “broken” political system.

Apparently, the political system is “broken” because the political system no longer wants Charlie Crist. Good to know.

Last March, after the University of Maryland men’s basketball team beat Duke, students spilled out into College Park to celebrate. That brought out the riot police. In footage captured by several students with their iPhones, Maryland student Jack McKenna dances down the street with dozens of other students, then stops when he sees two cops on horseback. Unprovoked by McKenna, three riot cops then enter the picture, throw McKenna up against a wall, and begin beating him with their batons. According to attorney Christopher Griffiths—who is representing McKenna and another student, Benjamin Donat—both suffered concussions, contusions, and cuts from the beatings.

McKenna was charged with disorderly conduct, a charge that as of last week was still pending but now seems certain to be dropped. Prince George’s County has since suspended four police officers, the three captured on tape beating McKenna and the sergeant who supervised them. But were it not for those iPhone videos, it would have been McKenna’s word (and possibly those of whatever celebrating student witnesses he could round up) against the word of three of Maryland’s finest. Or at least three. It seems likely that a number of other cops would have come forward to lie on behalf of those who beat McKenna.

If that sounds harsh, consider this: After the iPhone video of McKenna’s beating emerged, investigators subpoenaed 60 hours of surveillance video from the College Park campus police. The only video police couldn’t manage to locate was the one from the camera aimed squarely at the area where McKenna was beaten. Funny how that works. Campus police claimed that a “technical error” with that particular camera caused it to record over the footage of the beating. As public pressure mounted, police later found what they claimed was a recording of the lost video. But two minutes of that video were missing. Coincidentally, those two minutes happened to depict key portions of McKenna’s beating. The kicker? The head of the campus video surveillance system, Lt. Joanne Ardovini, is married to one of the cops named in McKenna’s complaint. (Washington D.C.’s ABC News affiliate, WJLA, a station with a history of deferring to police spokesmen without bothering to verify the accuracy of their statements, quaintly referred to this as “a bizarre coincidence.”)

In another instance, Maryland police raided an individual’s home for video tapes after he committed the non-crime of video taping a police officer, on a public highway. The judge who authorized the illegal raid?

According to Graber, the name of the judge who signed off on the raid of his parents’ home doesn’t appear on the warrant. As Graber told Miller, “They told me they don’t want you to know who the judge is because of privacy.” If true, that statement is so absurd it’s mind numbing. A judge issued an illegal warrant for police to invade the private residence and rummage through the private belongings of a man who broke no laws, and we aren’t permitted to know the judge’s name in order to protect the judge’s privacy?

Here’s the bottom line: government officials, acting in their official capacity, have no right to privacy. You work for us. You have no more privacy rights, in the performance of your job, than any private sector employee in the performance of his job. And you’re not above the law either. Wearing a uniform isn’t an authorization to go out and beat people — or otherwise break the law — with impunity. Period. And, no, having a stressful job isn’t a good justification for mistreating American citizens.

My wife and I enjoy our Flex Spending Account. We put in enough money each year to cover the various drugs we’ll need to buy (both prescription and non-prescription), a new pair of glasses, and money to cover any other medical expenses we anticipate. Next year, I’m planning on putting in an extra $4000 for corrective laser eye surgery, so that I can finally stop wearing glasses. We like the plan we have.

Well, under the Senate healthcare bill, we’ll no longer have that plan.

Both the House and Senate bills include a change in the definition of a “qualified medical expense” that impacts reimbursements and withdrawals under all types of health care accounts (i.e., FSAs, HRAs, HSAs, and Archer MSAs). As of 2011, expenses incurred for over-the-counter (OTC) medications and products will no longer be eligible for payment or reimbursement from any of the health care accounts. The House bill definition appears to apply to all OTC medications. However, the Senate bill would still allow OTC medicines obtained with a prescription and insulin to be reimbursed or paid tax-free from the health care accounts.

The most significant change likely to be enacted is an annual limit on contributions made by employees to flexible spending arrangements (FSAs) for health care. Both the House and Senate versions of health reform legislation would limit contributions to no more than $2,500 annually. The limit would be indexed to inflation for future years. Under the House bill, these changes would not take effect until 2013. In the Senate bill, these changes would take effect in 2011.

If the current “reform” bills, I wouldn’t be able to buy OTC drugs — Sudafed, Mucinex, ibuprofen, Tylenol — tax free. If the “reform” bills pass, I wouldn’t be able to save tax free for corrective eye surgery. I would no longer have the plan I like.

It’s just one more broken promise from a president that’s building quite a pile of them. Apparently, “yes we can” act just like any other politician.

I just finished Richard Friedman’s Who Wrote the Bible? It’s a classic popularization of the Documentary Hypothesis, which claims that the Pentateuch (the first five books of the Bible) is actually a medley of four earlier sources called J (the Yahwist), E (the Elohist), D (the Deuteronomist), and P (the Priestly source). Friedman’s survey of two centuries of Biblical detective work is quite fascinating. What truly shocked me, however, was learning that a bunch of liberal theologians converged on a vulgar Public Choice theory of the evolution of their most sacred book.

Friedman begins by explaining that J and E are the earliest sources. The most obvious difference between the two is that J always calls God “Yahweh,” while E initially calls him “Elohim.” But it’s the non-obvious differences that are telling. He presents strong evidence that the author of J came from Judah, the southern Jewish kingdom, while the author of E came from Israel, the northern Jewish kingdom. J elevates Aaron and slights Moses; E does the opposite.

What’s going on? Friedman explains that these two countries had conflicting religious establishments. Those in the north – or at least a major faction – were Mushite (claiming descent from Moses); those in the south were Aaronite (claiming descent from Aaron). Through this lens, J and E turn out to be thinly-veiled bids for money and power. Here’s one example of how E tries to push Mushite interests:

Recall that the [Mushite] priests of Shiloh suffered the loss of their place in the priestly hierarchy under King Solomon. Their chief… was expelled from Jerusalem. The other chief priest… who was regarded as a descendant of Aaron, meanwhile remained in power… The Shiloh prophet Ahijah instigated the northern tribes’ secession, and he designated Jeroboam as the northern king. The Shiloh priests’ hopes for the new kingdom, however, were frustrated when Jeroboam established the golden calf religious centers at Dan and Beth-El, and he did not appoint them as priests there. For this old family of priests, what should have been a time of liberation had been turned into a religious betrayal. The symbol of their exclusion in Israel was the golden calves. The symbol of their exclusion in Judah was Aaron. Someone from that family, the author of E, wrote a story that said that soon after the Israelites’ liberation from slavery, they committed heresy. What was the heresy? They worshipped a golden calf! Who made the golden calf? Aaron! [emphasis original]

—The Public Choice of the Ancient Hebrews, Bryan Caplan

You may want to click through to EconLog to read the rest of Bryan’s summarization. It’s all fascinating.

For the first time since Mayor Richard M. Daley appointed him to the City Council seven years ago, Alderman Thomas Tunney (44th Ward) voted against the mayor’s $6.1 billion budget proposal.

Alderman Thomas Allen (38th), below, a Council member since 1993, also voted against Mr. Daley’s budget for the first time.

For my money, President Obama is at least as vapid as Sarah Palin has been portrayed to be. But given a choice between the pol who voted against her patron the first time and a pol who comes out of the Chicago tradition — I’ll take Palin.

(Which, of course, says nothing about whom I’d vote for if my choices included more than just President Obama and Sarah Palin.)

That’s why this op-ed caught my interest: Palin in Wasilla: Resistance to insider assimilation.

Early in the second chapter of “Going Rogue,” a chapter titled “Kitchen-Table Politics,” you learn everything you need to know to understand why [Palin is so hated].

… Recruited to run for the council in 1992 by local power broker Nick Carney, Palin was seen as an attractive face who would support the usual way of doing business in Wasilla. She wasn’t.

In one of the first tests of her independence, Palin opposed a proposal touted by Carney, her political patron, to force residents to pay for neighborhood trash pickup rather than hauling their garbage to the dump themselves, as most did, and as Palin says she still does.

Why was this so important to Carney? Because he owned the local garbage truck company. If you’ve never had much exposure to local politics — and this is largely true anywhere you go — it’s a pretty big deal for a young, inexperienced politician (especially a woman) to so blatantly go against the person who recruited you into politics and supported you in your first campaign. You come under tremendous pressure to fall into line. Most cave, right then and there, long before they ever sniff politics at a higher level.

Palin didn’t.

During her terms on the council, she consistently opposed heavy-handed community planning initiatives and burdensome taxes.

… Among Palin-haters, one of the most popular canards is that she is an airhead, and clearly not capable of dealing with the intricacies of government. As this chapter demonstrates, nothing could be further from the truth.

Palin not only has a keen grasp of the details of governing and budgeting, she also understands the political difficulties inherent in making government responsive. Many of her antagonists at the national level scoffed at the notion that her experience in Wasilla was of any value. Quite the contrary, local government is where a public official’s decisions have the most direct impact on the electorate. It’s where you really have to understand the ins and outs of what you’re doing.

Interesting, no? And, yes, I am planning on reading Going Rogue. I’ll pick it up sometime after the Kindle edition comes out.