Monday - March 29, 2010

Obama’s Army

Hey, remember how candidate Obama used to rattle on about his civilian army, trained and equipped better than the real army? Went over like a lead balloon, and we haven’t heard a peep since.

Well, now Fox News is reporting that a thing similar to that exists in the health care bill that just got signed into law. A giant civilian medical corp, “trained along military lines”, under his orders to go where he wants when he wants and to do what he tells them to.

Emergency preparation? Or did he just co-opt the National Guard as well?

“Funny”, muses useful idiot Shepard Smith, “nobody has mentioned this at all yet. Not a word of debate on it, not a mention of it from any member of the House or the Senate.”

“That’s because nobody read the damn bill!” shoots back retired judge Andrew Napolitano, “2700 pages of legislation; there could be ANYTHING in there, and nobody would know it!”

Almost nobody, judge. It’s out at FREEP, but only from 4 days ago:

SEC. 430. ESTABLISHING A READY RESERVE CORPS.

Section 203 of the Public Health Service Act (42 U.S.C. 204) is amended to read as follows:

SEC. 203. COMMISSIONED CORPS AND READY RESERVE CORPS.

(a) ESTABLISHMENT.—

(1) IN GENERAL.—There shall be in the Service a commissioned Regular Corps and a Ready Reserve Corps for service in time of national emergency.

(2) REQUIREMENT.—All commissioned officers shall be citizens of the United States and shall be appointed without regard to the civil-service laws and compensated without regard to the Classification Act of 1923, as amended.

(3) APPOINTMENT.—Commissioned officers of the Ready Reserve Corps shall be appointed by the President and commissioned officers of the Regular Corps shall be appointed by the President with the advice and consent of the Senate.

(4) ACTIVE DUTY.—Commissioned officers of the Ready Reserve Corps shall at all times be subject to call to active duty by the Surgeon General, including active duty for the purpose of training.

(5) WARRANT OFFICERS.—Warrant officers may be appointed to the Service for the purpose of providing support to the health and delivery systems maintained by the Service and any warrant officer appointed to the Service shall be considered for purposes of this Act and title 37, United States Code, to be a commissioned officer within the Commissioned Corps of the Service.

(b) ASSIMILATING RESERVE CORP OFFICERS INTO THE REGULAR CORPS.—Effective on the date of enactment of the Affordable Health Choices Act, all individuals classified as officers in the Reserve Corps under this section (as such section existed on the day before the date of enactment of such Act) and serving on active duty shall be deemed to be commissioned officers of the Regular Corps.

(c) PURPOSE AND USE OF READY RESERVE.—

(1) PURPOSE.—The purpose of the Ready Reserve Corps is to fulfill the need to have additional Commissioned Corps personnel available on short notice (similar to the uniformed service’s reserve program) to assist regular Commissioned Corps personnel to meet both routine public health and emergency response missions.

(2) USES.—The Ready Reserve Corps shall—

(A) participate in routine training to meet the general and specific needs of the Commissioned Corps;

(B) be available and ready for involuntary calls to active duty during national emergencies and public health crises, similar to the uniformed service reserve personnel;

(C) be available for backfilling critical positions left vacant during deployment of active duty Commissioned Corps members, as well as for deployment to respond to public health emergencies, both foreign and domestic; and

(D) be available for service assignment in isolated, hardship, and medically underserved communities (as defined in section 399SS) to improve access to health services.

(d) FUNDING.—For the purpose of carrying out the duties and responsibilities of the Commissioned Corps under this section, there are authorized to be appropriated such sums as may be necessary to the Office of the Surgeon General for each of fiscal years 2010 through 2014. Funds appropriated under this subsection shall be used for recruitment and training of Commissioned Corps Officers.

So what this does is create the Health Police. It greatly expands the USPHS, which already exists, and is a uniformed, 6,000 member strong cadre of doctors and nurses. That’s right, UNIFORMED. With ranks, just like the Navy. Just like the braches of the military. And just like the military, Obama just created their Reserves with this bill. Which he can call up at any time. For health purposes only, right? You better hope so, because they just got a whole lot bigger. And pray that two of the ailments they aren’t tasked with curing is rebellion or dissent.

So, if this is nothing new, that the USPHS has been around for over 200 years, and the Reserve Corps itself has been around for more than 60, then why is this on the news this afternoon? Why is it even news? Could it be that Fox just follows the internet, and doesn’t bother to read things through? A made-up “news” story? Or is there a lot more to it than that?  “The way the passage is written is very vague”, says judge Napolitano, “it could mean anything.” Yeah, well does it actually mean nothing?

Advice to “journalists”: read the damn bill yourselves as well. Then do a little bit of investigation. Then see if your story is actually news. Or is it merely “olds”?

Posted by Drew458     on 03/29/2010 at 03:40 PM   
Filed Under: • Health-Medicine •  
• Comments (2) • Trackbacks(0)  Permalink •  

DISCLAIMER

THE SERVICES AND MATERIALS ON THIS WEBSITE ARE PROVIDED "AS IS" AND THE HOSTS OF THIS SITE EXPRESSLY DISCLAIMS ANY AND ALL WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, TO THE EXTENT PERMITTED BY LAW INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO WARRANTIES OF SATISFACTORY QUALITY, MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE, WITH RESPECT TO THE SERVICE OR ANY MATERIALS.

Not that very many people ever read this far down, but this blog was the creation of Allan Kelly and his friend Vilmar. Vilmar moved on to his own blog some time ago, and Allan ran this place alone until his sudden and unexpected death partway through 2006. We all miss him. A lot. Even though he is gone this site will always still be more than a little bit his. We who are left to carry on the BMEWS tradition owe him a great debt of gratitude, and we hope to be able to pay that back by following his last advice to us all:

1. Keep a firm grasp of Right and Wrong
2. Stay involved with government on every level and don't let those bastards get away with a thing
3. Use every legal means to defend yourself in the event of real internal trouble, and, most importantly:
4. Keep talking to each other, whether here or elsewhere

It's been a long strange trip without you Skipper, but thanks for pointing us in the right direction and giving us a swift kick in the behind to get us going. Keep lookin' down on us, will ya? Thanks.

THE INFORMATION AND OTHER CONTENTS OF THIS WEBSITE ARE DESIGNED TO COMPLY WITH THE LAWS OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. THIS WEBSITE SHALL BE GOVERNED BY AND CONSTRUED IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE LAWS OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA AND ALL PARTIES IRREVOCABLY SUBMIT TO THE JURISDICTION OF THE AMERICAN COURTS. IF ANYTHING ON THIS WEBSITE IS CONSTRUED AS BEING CONTRARY TO THE LAWS APPLICABLE IN ANY OTHER COUNTRY, THEN THIS WEBSITE IS NOT INTENDED TO BE ACCESSED BY PERSONS FROM THAT COUNTRY AND ANY PERSONS WHO ARE SUBJECT TO SUCH LAWS SHALL NOT BE ENTITLED TO USE OUR SERVICES UNLESS THEY CAN SATISFY US THAT SUCH USE WOULD BE LAWFUL.

Copyright © 2004-2015 Domain Owner