GOP Bill on Obamacare ID Theft Irks White House

John Semmens: Semi-News — A Satirical Look at Recent NewsA Republican bill that would require the Department of Health and Human Services to inform persons whose identities may have been stolen via the Obamacare website was roundly criticized as “defamatory” by Press Secretary Jay Carney on Thursday.Carney insisted that “whether the risk is real is not the point. By raising fears that people's identities might be stolen if they access the health care website the GOP is undermining people's confidence in the government. The ripple effect of this is that fewer people will sign up for health insurance.”House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va) countered, saying that “millions of people are being victimized by a shoddily constructed website. It's bad enough that the government has concocted its own man-made disaster in the effort to coerce everyone into a 'Procrustean' health insurance plan designed by idiots. Yet, despite widespread evidence of the noxious effects of the Affordable Care Act, Democrats refuse to offer any respite. Requiring HHS officials to warn potential ID theft victims is the least we can do.” The press secretary characterized Cantor's criticisms as “unpatriotic. As a member of Congress, Mr. Cantor has an obligation to stand up for the government. He should not be promulgating initiatives that sully the image and dilute the people's respect for the government. In the grander scheme of things, the hassles that a few private individuals might suffer as a result of having their identities stolen is of far less consequence than the damage this proposed legislation has already done to the people's faith in the President and his Administration.”In related news, Senator Mark Udall (D-Colo) complained that the Colorado Division of Insurance's accurate reports on the number of health insurance policies canceled in the state (nearly 250,000) were “destroying people's confidence in their Government and in me as a representative of their interests. How can we get people to comply with the law's mandate that everyone buy quality health insurance when they find out that many of those who already had insurance lost their insurance through no fault of their own? I'm not saying that the CDI should falsify the data. All I'm saying is that they could've just kept quiet about it.” Cold Weather Feeds Global Warming HysteriaRecent cold weather that has hit large swaths of the country with arctic temperatures has got the proponents of man made global warming scrambling for a plausible narrative.President Obama warned Americans “whose pipes are frozen, whose cars won't start, and whose faces get frost bitten on a five minute trip outside in sub-zero temperatures should not be fooled by your own experiences of extreme cold weather over the past week into disbelieving what I've been telling you about the dangers of global warming. Every scientist I've been listening to assures me that the threat of global warming is dire and that it is imperative that Government take a leading role in suppressing it.”Representative Peter DeFazio (D-Ore) urged “even more extreme measures be undertaken to combat this very real threat to our existence. Climate change deniers are blathering idiots who would crassly use freezing weather to derail all our efforts to deal with this problem.”De Fazio also insists that “we shouldn't smugly assume that compelling anti-global warming behavior in America will be sufficient. After all, it is global warming that's the problem. We need a global solution.” The representative suggested that “we should use our considerable military might to force other countries to take the anti-warming steps we have determined are needed.”DOJ Says Schools Unfairly Punish MinoritiesAttorney General Eric Holder slammed schools' disciplinary standards that result in a “disproportionate number of minorities being penalized. These school administrators may feel that they're being fair because the same rules apply to all students. But I'm saying this kind of simplistic notion is not good enough.”Holder suggested that “differences in the subcultures of students from different racial, social, and economic backgrounds must be considered. Minorities who have been subjected to generations of oppression have a right to strike back against this oppression. An action that might justifiably be regarded as unwarranted if committed by a member of the privileged class of our society should be recognized as warranted rebellion against their oppressors if committed by a member of a minority.”The attorney general also cautioned that “there might be some spillover effect when rage against white oppression does collateral damage against other minorities. A student vandalizing a school, bullying a classmate or stabbing a teacher shouldn't face some knee-jerk reaction from school administrators. There needs to be a balanced consideration for all the factors that might have influenced the behavior.”“Ideally, the ratio of persons punished by the schools should roughly reflect the ratios of each racial, ethnic, income and gender group within the school population,” Holder concluded. “Some will lampoon this as a quota system. But I call it affirmative disciplinary action.”NJ Governor Says He's Stunned by Thuggery of StaffTouted GOP presidential frontrunner for 2016, New Jersey Governor Chris Christie professed himself “stunned” and “humiliated” that members of his hand-picked staff maliciously inflicted traffic congestion on Fort Lee by unnecessarily closing entrance ramps to the George Washington Bridge last year. The move cause havoc with emergency vehicle response times and may have contributed to an elderly woman's death.Whether Christie's effort to salvage his political future will be successful remains to be seen. His assertions that he was “completely in the dark about this until I read about it in the paper” and “I am not a bully” were unimpressive despite his attempts to put them into context.“The expectations we've laid at the feet of government exceed the capabilities of any person to manage it,” Christie declared. “A chief executive can't help but be ignorant about a wide range of activities that go on in his administration. Look what happened to President Obama. His Department of Justice gun-running operation ended up arming Mexican drug lords. Underlings at his IRS abused authority to the disadvantage of his political opponents. Incompetence at his State Department got four people killed in Benghazi. Only right-wing extremists blame him for these mishaps. Why should I, a simple governor of one state, be held to a higher standard?”In a bid to distinguish himself from President Obama, who has never fired anyone for the series blunders that have characterized his term in office, Christie fired his deputy chief of staff, Bridget Anne Kelly and vowed “she will never work in this state again as long as I'm governor.”Congresswoman Argues for End to “Welfare” as We Know ItRepresentative Sheila Jackson Lee (D-Texas) urged that we stop using the term “welfare” to describe the handouts government gives to support a distressingly large portion of the population.“Welfare conjures up an image of some lazy person sitting around watching TV while taxpayers have to foot her bills,” Jackson said. “We need to change this image.”The change Jackson is pushing is to rename the program. “If we were to call it the transitional living fund we'd completely change people perception of what is going on,” she bragged. “'Transitional' gives a sense of movement to replace the sense of stagnation that welfare implies. 'Fund' implies that it is an investment. And 'living' sounds so alive and uplifting.”Representative John Conyers (D-Mich) praised Jackson's intent, but urged caution. “There's no question we need to upgrade the terminology,” Conyers agreed. “However, I'm not sure we should jettison the term welfare. The word 'welfare' is in the Constitution. 'Transitional living fund' is not. Since the 'good and plenty' clause of the Constitution authorizes Congress to provide welfare I don't know if it would be safe to abandon it.”EPA Voids 1905 Law, Cedes Town to TribeThe Environmental Protection Agency voided a law passed by Congress in 1905 and awarded the town of Riverton, Wyoming to the Wind River Indian Reservation.Wyoming Governor Matt Mead (R) questioned the legitimacy of the move asking “since when can a federal agency override an Act of Congress? I mean, if the EPA has objections to an existing law shouldn't they be asking Congress to revise it? I see nothing in the Constitution granting the EPA the authority they've assumed.”EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson brushed aside Mead's concerns as “excessively formalistic. The president has stressed that we take a broader view of the concept of environmental justice in our actions. When adherence to an out-of-date statute conflicts with this it is right that we put it aside. Voters elected the President to transform America. That takes precedence over complying with laws passed by white males who are long since dead.”Jackson says that “the transfer of Riverton to tribal jurisdiction is expected to improve air quality and reduce global warming, as the normal, depressed economic conditions prevalent on Indian reservations are usually associated with fewer vehicle emissions. When more of a town's businesses shut down and workers are laid off there's less need to drive. Remember, driving is a major cause of society's ills.”A  Satirical Look at Recent NewsJohn Semmens is a retired economist who has written a weekly political satire column for The Arizona Conservative since 2005. He says working on his satires is one of the ways he tries to honor the liberties that our nation’s Founding Fathers tried to protect. Please do us a favor. If you use material created by The Arizona Conservative, give us credit, and DO NOT change the context. Thank you.