Whorish Congress - Wheels, Deals and Spins The Truth!

Sen. Nelson and others bring home the 'wampum.' (See 1 below.)

Reid's subtle insert targets insurers with the intent of driving them out of business but is it Constitutional? But then, Liberals never particularly cared about that old piece of musty yellowing parchment. (See 2 and 2a below.)
Sent to me by a friend and fellow memo reader who is hallucinating if she believes any of this would even be considered by our 'whorish' legislators - either aisle. (See 3 below.)

Have the Japanese learned industrial production deception from us or are they reverting back to their old ways? Either way not an encouraging sign for Toyota owners or buyers.(See 4 below.)

Logic from a conservative friend and fellow memo reader? He might be right on abortion but I am not sure about his education claim. Neighborhood schools are a traditional feature of American life. Liberals certainly support teacher unions which has under served educating the nation's school children. (See 5 below.)

An explanation why Wendi is angry! There are an increasing number of Wendi's out there. (See 6 below.)

Hamas appears to have accepted Netanyahu's deportation terms for a prisoner swap. (See 7 below.)

As some Democrats here are thinking about converting several Kadima PM's are getting ready to leave Livni's party. (See 8 below.)


Dick


1)The Price of 'History': Harry Reid delivers a bundle of special-interest favors
.
Blanche Lincoln and Evan Bayh must feel like saps. The Arkansas and Indiana Democrats spent months caterwauling about this or that provision in the Senate health-care bill, then at 1 a.m. Monday they voted to speed its passage without getting so much as a lousy T-shirt.

In Harry Reid's Senate, this qualifies as dereliction of duty, as the Majority Leader said himself on Monday in defense of his frantic deal-making to get 60 votes. "I don't know if there is a Senator that doesn't have something in this bill that was important to them," Mr. Reid said at a press conference that offered an unintentional commentary on modern democracy. "And if they don't have something in it important to them, then it doesn't speak well of them."

James Madison, phone home.

Truth be told, even Tom DeLay must be jealous of Mr. Reid's handiwork. We summarize some of his most notorious political payoffs nearby, including the legendary $300 million "Louisiana Purchase" for Mary Landrieu, and $100 million for Chris Dodd's favorite Connecticut hospital.

.But special attention should go to Senator Ben Nelson, who played hard-to-get the longest and in return for being the 60th vote won an exemption for Nebraska from paying any of the additional costs for the bill's Medicaid expansion, which is worth $100 million. He also won millions of dollars of exemptions from the $6.7 billion in health insurance fees for Nebraska-based companies like Mutual of Omaha.

This is the same Senator who declared a few weeks ago that "my vote is not for sale." Well, he never said: at any price.

At first, Mr. Nelson defended his Medicaid buy-off as a service to his constituents, two-thirds of whom tell pollsters they oppose the overall bill. But the lucre was denounced by Nebraska Governor Dave Heineman and Republican Senator Mike Johanns.

"Nebraskans don't want a special deal," said Mr. Johanns. "The special deal for Nevada was wrong, the carve-outs for Louisiana, Vermont, and Massachusetts are wrong, and the same applies to the backroom deal for Nebraska. All of the special deals should be removed. If the bill cannot pass without carve-outs, what further evidence is needed that it is bad policy?"

But Iowa Democrat Tom Harkin replied that Mr. Nelson's Cornhusker kickback was merely an example all 50 states will soon follow. "Every Governor in the country is going to say, why doesn't our state" get that Medicaid deal, Mr. Harkin said, and the Nelson connivance is "going to be the impetus for" the federal government to pay 100% of the extra Medicaid costs for all the states.

And, sure enough, Mr. Nelson admitted yesterday amid a defensive near-meltdown on the Senate floor that "Three Senators came up to me just now on the [Senate] floor and said, 'Now we understand what you did. We'll be seeking this funding too.'" Mr. Nelson now says "it's not a special deal for Nebraska. It is in fact an opportunity to get rid of an unfunded federal mandate."

You have to admire his political dexterity. But if having the feds pay for these Medicaid expansions is such a great idea, then why wasn't that part of the original bill? Answer: The $30 billion cost would be too high for all 50 states and would make the bill look even more expensive than it is, but as a bribe to buy off one or two Senators, it's acceptable. The other states will have to get theirs later, after the Reid bill has been passed under the fantastical ruse that it is "deficit-neutral." Taxpayers nationwide will pay sooner or later.

Meanwhile, the Reid bill's fine print also solves the mystery of Florida Senator Bill Nelson, who is no relation to Ben but is just as crafty. How could a Florida Democrat, who has built his career denouncing Medicare "cuts," vote for a bill that pays for a new entitlement for younger Americans by taking more than $400 billion from health-care for seniors?

His brilliant solution: Include a grandfather clause that exempts Florida seniors who currently have Medicare Advantage benefits from losing them. This little beauty is worth $3 billion to $5 billion. (Presumably Arizona, also the home to many retirees, didn't qualify because its two Senators are Republicans.)

This does mean, of course, that if you turn 65 next year and move to Florida and want Medicare Advantage, you don't qualify for the Nelson Advantage. So some seniors will be more equal than others. But at least Mr. Nelson was able to minimize the chance of a major senior revolt against his support for Medicare cuts.

Thus does your United States Senate, the world's greatest nondeliberative deliverer of special-interest favors, practice political medicine. Get used to it. As President Obama likes to say, it's "history" in the making.

Printed in The Wall Street Journal, page A20


2)Harry Reid Turns Insurance Into a Public Utility: The health bill creates a massive cash crunch and then bankruptcies for many insurers
By RICHARD A. EPSTEIN

As Harry Reid's 2,000 page health-care bill is being rammed through the Senate, most of the public debate has been focused on its expanded coverage, its now defunct public option, and its high taxes. Lost in the shuffle has been its intensely coercive requirements on health insurance issuers, especially in the individual and small group markets. Taken together, these restrictions are likely to drive them out of business and run afoul of the constitutional guarantee that all regulated industries have to a reasonable, risk-adjusted, rate of return on their invested capital.

The perils of the Reid bill are made evident in a recent Congressional Budget Office (CBO) report that focused on the bill's rebate program, which holds that once an insurance company spends more than 10% of its revenues on administrative expenses, its customers are entitled to an indefinite statutory rebate determined by state regulatory authorities subject to oversight by the Secretary of Health and Human Services. Defining these administrative costs is a royal headache, but everyone agrees that they are heaviest in the small group and individual markets, where they typically range between 25% and 30%, without the new regulatory hassles.

The CBO concluded that this one restriction turned the Reid bill into "an essentially governmental program." In other words, the targeted health insurers would become de facto public utilities whose profits are gutted when the huge compliance costs under the Reid bill are piled on top of the hefty costs inherent in running a labor intensive health-care insurance business.

Worse still, the statutory rebate is only the tip of a larger regulatory iceberg that permeates the bill. Normally, insurers have the power to underwrite—to choose their line of business, to select and to price risks, and to decline unattractive risks. Not under the Reid bill. In its frantic effort to expand coverage to the uninsured, the bill will create state health-care exchanges supported by generous federal subsidies to unspecified millions of needy and low-income individuals. Any health insurance carrier that steers clear of these exchanges cannot keep its customers. Any insurance carrier that enters Mr. Reid's inferno will lose its financial shirt.

Here are some reasons why. Initially, all insurers have to take all comers and to renew all policies except for nonpayment of premiums. Insurers are not allowed to take into account differential risks based on pre-existing conditions. And the premium differentials based on such matters as age and tobacco use are smaller than the market spreads. If too many customers demand coverage from a given insurer to insure efficiently, it's the government that will decide how many they have to keep and who they are.

Next, it's the government that requires extensive coverage including "ambulatory patient services, emergency services, hospitalization, maternity and newborn care, mental health and substance abuse disorder services, prescription drugs, rehabilitative and habilitative [sic!] services and devices, laboratory services, preventive and wellness services and chronic disease management, pediatric services, including oral and vision care." The price squeeze gets even tighter because in every required area of care a collection of government standards will help set the minimum level of required services.

Ostensibly, the Reid bill does not impose any direct price controls on what health insurers can charge for this veritable cornucopia of services. But the bill's complex, cooperative federalism scheme authorizes state regulators, after recommendations from the federal government, to exclude insurers from the exchanges if their prices are too high, which would again be a competitive death knell. Exile from the exchange does not, however, restore traditional underwriting controls, as the Reid bill and other federal and state regulation continue to apply to these firms.

One common talking point of proponents of the Reid bill is that competitive markets don't really do a very good job of reining in costs. Indeed, the most common justification for the public option was to supply real competition to the private sector. Now that the option has vanished, the alternative regulatory technique is brute regulatory force. The argument seems to be that price controls alone can force out the waste and inefficiency that are posited to be the hallmark of private markets.

By this twisted logic, rent control is the perfect path to efficient competitive markets. Unfortunately, here no insurer can simply cut back on services provided given the minimum standards. And if it raises rates, the rebates cut ever more deeply during the next period. So essentially, there is no viable option for these firms either on the state exchange or off it.

The economic chaos that is likely to follow the disruption of private insurance health-care markets draws no attention from its Democratic supporters. Oddly enough, it has also been overlooked by the opponents of the bill who are so appalled by this hydra-headed monster that they don't have the patience to parse its mind-numbing provision.

Perhaps that indifference will end if the Supreme Court takes a hard look at this new adventure into rate regulation. Traditional public utility regulation applies to such services as gas, electric and water, which were supplied by natural monopolists. Left unregulated, they could charge excessive or discriminatory prices. The constitutional art of rate regulation sought to keep monopolists at competitive rates of return.

To control against the risk of confiscatory rates, the Supreme Court also required the state regulator to allow each firm to obtain a market rate of return on its invested capital, taking into account the inherent riskiness of the venture. The orthodox legal approach was summed up in Justice William Rehnquist's unanimous 1989 decision in Duquesne Light v. Barasch. Duquesne Light allowed the state regulators a wide choice of methods so long as the "bottom line" secured the appropriate rate of return. There's no need to discuss the fine points here, because not one syllable in the Reid bill is dedicated to securing that constitutionally guaranteed minimum rate of return.

Duquesne Light carries extra weight here because health-insurance industries are far from natural monopolies, so that regulating their rates calls for an extra dollop of judicial scrutiny. At this point, the Reid bill is on a collision course with the Constitution. I take it for granted that, constitutionally, the federal government could not just require all private health insurers to liquidate tomorrow, without compensation.

What's done here is a close second. The inexorable squeeze between the constricted revenue sources allowable that insurers get under the Reid bill and the extensive and uncertain new legal obligations it imposes is likely to result in a massive cash-flow crunch that will drive the firms in the individual and small-group health insurance markets into speedy bankruptcy. The Supreme Court should apply the constitutional brakes to this foolhardy scheme if Congress doesn't come to its senses first.

Mr. Epstein is a professor of law at the University of Chicago and a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution. This article is based on a longer study released by the Manhattan Institute at www.medicalprogresstoday.com.

2a)Give Me Liberty, or Give Me Obamacare
By Jeffrey H. Anderson


Remember back in June, in President Obama’s major address to the AMA, when he said the following? “No matter how we reform health care, we will keep this promise. . . . If you like your health-care plan, you will be able to keep your health care plan. Period. No one will take it away. No matter what.” In the six months since, there seems to have been a change.



Obamacare would require Americans to buy government-approved health insurance. It would make it illegal to offer choices in insurance plans beyond the handful of very similar ones that the government would allow. It would become illegal to offer new and innovative plans. Under any of the government-approved plans, it would become illegal to pay your doctor directly for more than a certain percentage of your care. Higher deductible, consumer-driven plans would be severely altered or eliminated. By law, a greater percentage of money would have to be paid in insurance premiums, rather than directly for care. Competition and choice would diminish tremendously. One-size-fits-all conformity would rule the day.



At its core, what Obamacare really means is a loss of freedom.



Obamacare would significantly diminish Americans' freedom to control the fruits of their own labors and to spend them as they choose and as they think best. The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) reports that American taxpayers would be on the hook for approximately $2.5 trillion for Obamacare in its real first ten years in operation (2014 to 2023) — about triple the false number of $871 billion that the Democrats are spreading. As the CBO conveys, $871 billion only covers the cost of insurance coverage expansions, which is only a portion of the bill. Furthermore, less than 2 percent of the costs for what the Democrats are calling the bill's "first-ten-year costs" would hit prior to the fifth year of that period. So the Democrats are really giving the six-year costs — for insurance coverage expansions alone — and calling them the ten-year costs for the whole bill. Either the Democrats know this and are being deliberately deceitful, or else they don't understand their own bill and are in over their heads even more than it appears.



In exchange for our significantly reduced freedom to contract with others in the manner of our own choosing, and our significantly reduced freedom to control the fruits of our own labor, one would hope that we would at least enjoy a corresponding drop in health-care costs. Instead, the Office of the Chief Actuary at the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) says that health-care costs under Obamacare would rise in relation to current law, becoming 21 percent of the gross domestic product (GDP) by the end of 2019 in comparison to 17 percent today. Remember when President Obama said that we couldn't continue spending 17 percent of our GDP on health care? For that matter, remember when President Obama talked about the crucial need to bend the health-care cost-curve down, vowing flatly that he wouldn't sign a bill that did otherwise? The CMS Chief Actuary confirms that both the House and Senate versions of Obamacare would bend the cost-curve up.



The CBO also reports that, in its real first twelve years in operation (2014 to 2025), Obamacare would transfer $1.0 trillion from American taxpayers to private insurance companies. Ever wonder why insurers back Obamacare — even though they would no longer be free to control their own product-line? The answer is plain: Obamacare would mandate that Americans buy insurers' product. And to make that mandate more feasible, it would transfer a trillion dollars of Americans' earnings to insurers over a dozen years. That trillion dollars would be funneled through the government and used to help individual people comply with the mandate, but the money would be required to be spent on insurance, and it would therefore end up in the hands of insurers.



The Democrats are not only making disingenuous claims about the costs of their proposal, they are making similarly disingenuous claims about its effects on the deficit. Democrats claim that this massive expansion of government would somehow reduce the deficit. But the CBO says otherwise. The CBO says that unless Democrats follow through and cut doctors' pay under Medicare by 21 percent next year and never raise it back up, the bill would increase the deficit by over $200 billion in its real first decade. How many people think that the Democrats would really cut doctors' payments by a fifth? Certainly the Democrats know that they won't, and yet they are shameless enough to pitch Obamacare as deficit-neutral, despite the CBO’s plain findings to the contrary.



And yet this is just the beginning of the increased deficits. According to the CBO, the Democrats would siphon over $1 trillion out of Medicare and related federal programs in the real first decade of their health-care overhaul. Simply put, they would siphon $1 trillion out of Medicare and spend it on Obamacare. Across the last year, the White House's own budget director, Peter Orszag, has repeatedly and rightly emphasized that Medicare and Medicaid (the latter of which would be expanded dramatically under Obamacare) are already barely-solvent, that their effects on future budget deficits will "swamp" the effects of all other federal programs combined, and that the key to being able to afford them in the future is to bend the health-care cost-curve down. Now the administration is pulling out all stops to try to pass a health bill that would bend the cost-curve up, and is planning to pay for it, in large part, by looting $1 trillion out of a Medicare program that its own Budget Director has made clear is the last place that we should be looking for money to spend elsewhere. Not surprisingly, the CBO openly mentions the possibility that Obamacare could “reduce access to care or diminish the quality of care” for Medicare beneficiaries.



When a "health-care reform" bill would deplete Medicare funds, drive up health costs, and dramatically reduce choice, competition, and personal freedom in health care — while funneling $1 trillion from American taxpayers to insurers (who would now be almost entirely under government control) — one starts to suspect that the motivation is something other than health-care reform. It is. The motivation is to replace millions of private choices with a command-and-control model in which health-care decisions and health-care resources are centrally administered and allocated by the federal government — under the ultimate command, at least initially, of Barack Obama. The motivation is simple and can be reduced to one word: power. And it doubtless has the American Founders, who dedicated their lives to securing liberty, spinning in their graves.



— Jeffrey H. Anderson, the director of the Benjamin Rush Society, was the senior speechwriter for Secretary Mike Leavitt at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.






3)Congressional Reform Act of 2009


1. Term Limits: 12 years only, one of the possible options below.

A. Two Six-year Senate terms
B. Six Two-year House terms
C. One Six-year Senate term and three Two-Year House terms


Serving in Congress is an honor, not a career. The Founding Fathers envisioned citizen legislators, serve your term(s), then go home and back to work.


2. No Tenure / No Pension:
A congressman collects a salary while in office and receives no pay when they are out of office.

Serving in Congress is an honor, not a career. The Founding Fathers envisioned citizen legislators, serve your term(s), then go home and back to work.


3. Congress (past, present & future) participates in Social Security:

All funds in the Congressional retirement fund moves to the Social Security system immediately. All future funds flow into the Social Security system, Congress participates with the American people.

Serving in Congress is an honor, not a career. The Founding Fathers envisioned citizen legislators, server your term(s), then go home and back to work.

4. Congress can purchase their own retirement plan just as all Americans..

Serving in Congress is an honor, not a career. The Founding Fathers envisioned citizen legislators, serve your term(s), then go home and back to work.


5. Congress will no longer vote themselves a pay raise. Congressional pay will rise by the lower of CPI or 3%.


Serving in Congress is an honor, not a career. The Founding Fathers envisioned citizen legislators, serve your term(s), then go home and back to work.


6. Congress loses their current health care system and participates in the same health care system as the American people.


Serving in Congress is an honor, not a career... The Founding Fathers envisioned citizen legislators, serve your term(s), then go home and back to work.


7. Congress must equally abide in all laws they impose on the American people..


Serving in Congress is an honor, not a career. The Founding Fathers envisioned citizen legislators, serve your term(s), then go home and back to work.


8. All contracts with past and present congressmen are void effective 1/1/10.

The American people did not make this contract with congressmen, congressmen made all these contracts for themselves.


Serving in Congress is an honor, not a career. The Founding Fathers envisioned citizen legislators, serve your term(s), then go home and back to work.


4)By Ken Bensinger
Dec. 23, 2009

During a routine test on its Sienna minivan in April 2003, Toyota Motor Corp. engineers discovered that a plastic panel could come loose and cause the gas pedal to stick, potentially making the vehicle accelerate out of control.

The automaker redesigned the part and by that June every 2004 model year Sienna off the assembly line came with the new panel. Toyota did not notify tens of thousands of people who had already bought vans with the old panel, however.

It wasn't until U.S. safety officials opened an investigation last year that Toyota acknowledged in a letter to regulators that the part could come loose and "lead to unwanted or sudden acceleration."

In January, nearly six years after discovering the potential hazard, the automaker recalled 26,501 vans made with the old panel.

In a statement to The Times, Toyota said that there was no defect in the Sienna and that "a safety recall was not deemed necessary" when it discovered the problem in 2003. The company called the replacement part "an additional safety measure."

A peerless reputation for quality and safety has helped Toyota become the world's largest automaker. But even as its sales have soared, the company has delayed recalls, kept a tight lid on disclosure of potential problems and attempted to blame human error in cases where owners claimed vehicle defects.

The automaker's handling of safety issues has come under scrutiny in recent months because of incidents of sudden acceleration in Toyota and Lexus vehicles, which The Times has reported were involved in accidents causing 19 fatalities since 2001, more deaths from that problem than all other automakers combined.

After Toyota this fall announced its biggest recall to address the sudden-acceleration problem, it insisted publicly that no defect existed. That drew a rare public rebuke from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, which chastised the automaker for making "inaccurate and misleading statements."

In the wake of Toyota's announcement of the massive recall, The Times examined some of the ways the automaker has dealt with safety problems in recent years and found that:

* The automaker knew of a dangerous steering defect in vehicles including the 4Runner sport utility vehicle for years before issuing a recall in Japan in 2004. But it told regulators no recall was necessary in the U.S., despite having received dozens of complaints from drivers. Toyota said a subsequent investigation led it to order a U.S. recall in 2005.

* Toyota has paid cash settlements to people who say their vehicles have raced out of control, sometimes causing serious accidents, according to consumers and their attorneys. Other motorists who complained of acceleration problems with their vehicles have received buybacks under lemon laws.

* Although the sudden acceleration issue erupted publicly only in recent months, it has been festering for nearly a decade. A computerized search of NHTSA records by The Times has found Toyota issued eight previous recalls related to unintended acceleration since 2000, more than any other automaker.

* A former Toyota lawyer who handled safety litigation has sued the automaker, accusing it of engaging in a "calculated conspiracy to prevent the disclosure of damaging evidence" as part of a scheme to "prevent evidence of its vehicles' structural shortcomings from becoming known" to plaintiffs lawyers, courts, NHTSA and the public.

As a result, plaintiffs attorneys are considering reopening dozens of product-liability suits against the automaker.

Toyota has called the allegations of the attorney, Dimitrios Biller, "both misleading and inaccurate" and noted that he is also suing another former employer. The company said it had "acted appropriately in product liability cases and in all reporting to federal safety regulators."

In a written statement to The Times, Toyota said that it strove to keep government officials and consumers informed about potential safety problems with its vehicles, which it says are tested to meet or exceed federal standards.

"Toyota has absolutely not minimized public awareness of any defect or issue with respect to its vehicles," the company said.

Currently, Toyota is a defendant in at least 10 lawsuits alleging unintended acceleration that caused five fatalities and four injuries. Two of those suits are seeking class-action status.

But few, if any, sudden-acceleration cases ever make it to trial, according to attorneys who handle such cases.

After a 2007 crash of a Camry that accelerated out of control for 20 miles before killing the driver of another car in San Jose, Toyota was sued by members of the victim's family. Their attorney, Louis Franecke, said the automaker "didn't want to go to trial," and paid them a seven-figure sum in exchange for dropping the case and signing a non-disclosure form.

In an interview, Guadalupe Gomez, the driver of the runaway Camry, said he also signed a confidentiality agreement and received a settlement from Toyota. He was initially arrested on suspicion of manslaughter for causing the crash, but charges were never filed.

By settling, Toyota has managed to keep potentially damaging information out of the public eye, said Raymond Paul Johnson, a Los Angeles attorney who said he had settled four sudden-acceleration cases with the automaker.

"It's just a matter of risk control for them," Johnson said.

Toyota said that although it does not comment on individual cases, it "has resolved and will continue to resolve matters with litigants through confidential settlement when it is in both parties' interests to do so."

The majority of unintended acceleration incidents don't end up in accidents. But even after minor incidents, some consumers have obtained deals under which their cars were repurchased on favorable terms.

Tim Marks, a small businessman in Camden, Ark., parked his daughter's 2006 Lexus IS 250 in front of the dealership last year and said his family would never drive it again after experiencing four sudden-acceleration events.

"They told my daughter she was texting while driving and wasn't paying attention," Marks recalled. "She is a 95-pound, little itty-bitty thing, but she was fixing to twist off on that man."

The vehicle was bought back and the title branded as a lemon, according to vehicle registration records. It was later registered in Florida, suggesting that the dealer resold it.

Much the same thing happened to Joan Marschall, a Visalia resident whose 2003 Camry accelerated on its own three times before she complained.

"I took it to the dealer and said I wouldn't drive it again," Marschall recalled. "I said I don't care if you tell me the computer says nothing happened. I know it did."

Marschall received a lemon buyback too. Registration records show the car was transferred to a new owner in Southern California.

Toyota said it had no policy to repurchase vehicles from customers complaining about sudden acceleration, though its dealers may act on their own to "preserve goodwill."

Some motorists who have confronted safety issues said the automaker has hidden information from them.

In January, Jeffrey Pepski, a financial consultant in suburban Minneapolis, took his 2007 Lexus ES 350 to the dealer after it accelerated out of control on a Twin Cities freeway, reaching 80 miles per hour.

Toyota sent an expert to examine the car Feb. 3 and download electronic data stored on the vehicle's computers. When Pepski asked for a copy of the data, he was refused.

"They said it was proprietary," Pepski recalled.

He filed a defect petition with NHTSA, and the dealer allowed Pepski to trade in the sedan for a sport utility vehicle. The Lexus ES was not branded a lemon and was resold in Minnesota, records show.

How Toyota handles requests like Pepski's has frustrated investigators and vehicle owners who want to get information contained on computers in their vehicles.

Nearly all new cars today contain an event data recorder, often called a black box, that can record several seconds of key information when accidents occur or in other circumstances.

According to Toyota, its black boxes can capture vehicle speed, engine speed, brake pedal application, accelerator pedal position and seat belt usage, among other things. That data, experts say, could be crucial to investigating causes of sudden acceleration.

Unlike manufacturers such as General Motors Co. and Ford Motor Co., Toyota's data recorders are extremely difficult for non-Toyota personnel to read, said W.R. "Rusty" Haight, a black-box expert who owns a San Diego collision investigation company.

Toyota says it has only one device in the U.S. that can read the data. An operating manual for the device, a copy of which was reviewed by The Times, indicates that it takes two passwords to operate.

On its website, Toyota says that it "will not honor EDR readout requests from private individuals or their attorneys," because its device is a prototype.

On some safety issues, Toyota has little choice but to go public.

Sudden acceleration didn't become a national issue for the automaker until this fall, when it announced its largest recall shortly after a 2009 Lexus ES accelerated out of control and crashed in San Diego County, killing an off-duty California Highway Patrol officer along with his wife, daughter and brother-in-law.

In a 5:30 a.m. conference call the day before Thanksgiving, Toyota detailed remedies to prevent acceleration problems it has blamed on gas pedals trapped by floor mats. Toyota will replace or modify pedals, replace floor mats, modify floor well padding and add new safety software to seven models, representing 4.26 million cars and trucks.

The campaign follows eight recalls in the U.S. over the last decade to fix problems that in the automaker's own words could cause sudden acceleration or faulty throttle system operation, Times research shows.

Two years ago, a NHTSA investigation found that the gas pedal in Camry and Lexus ES sedans could be trapped by rubber all-weather floor mats -- the same problem being addressed in the current recall. Toyota responded by recalling 55,000 of the vehicles, but only enlarged a warning label on the underside of the mat and on its packaging.

In 2005, Toyota recalled 3,567 Lexus IS 250 sedans because the gas pedal had a propensity to stick on a floor pad. In 2006, it recalled 367,594 Highlander and Lexus RX SUVs after receiving complaints that an interior cover could interfere with the accelerator pedal, keeping it depressed.

All those followed a 2003 recall in Canada of 408 Celicas, also for floor mat interference with the accelerator pedal.

In the ongoing Sienna recall, Toyota is replacing a hard-plastic trim panel over the center console. In its statement to The Times, the automaker said that pedal entrapment could only be caused in the event of a missing attachment clip, which might not be replaced after service work.

Toyota said it issued the recall voluntarily after a single complaint to NHTSA prompted an investigation by the agency. "In response to Toyota's voluntary campaign, regulators closed the investigation," the company said.

NHTSA officials did not respond to a written question about the recall and the agency's oversight of the matter.

The Sienna incident wasn't the only time that Toyota issued a recall long after discovering a problem.

In 1994, NHTSA slapped Toyota with a $250,000 fine, at the time the agency's second-largest, for providing misleading information about a fuel leak in Land Cruisers and waiting two years to undertake a recall to fix the problem. Toyota acknowledged that it failed to conduct a timely recall but denied withholding information from the agency.

A decade later, Toyota recalled about 330,000 vehicles in Japan after a 2004 crash there -- caused by a broken steering linkage -- seriously injured five people. The vehicle in the accident, a Hilux Surf, was sold in the U.S. as the 4Runner. Other truck models sold here, including the Toyota 4x4 and T100 pickups, also used the same linkage, a steering relay rod.

Despite that, the company told NHTSA in an October 2004 letter that it would not conduct a U.S. recall because it had not received information here indicating a problem with the part.

Documents entered in four lawsuits filed in Los Angeles this year, however, show that Toyota had received numerous consumer complaints dating from 2000 and had replaced dozens of the parts under warranty. The documents also show that Japanese police, in an investigation of the defect, said that Toyota employees had known about the problem since 1992 and should have initiated a recall immediately.

In September 2005, Toyota recalled nearly 1 million vehicles in the U.S. to replace the part, its second-largest campaign.

It came too late for Zackary Audulewicz of Ila, Ga., relatives said. The 20-year-old was driving his Toyota 4x4 to work in August 2003 when the pickup lost control. A witness said she heard a pop and saw a spark just before the pickup careened off the road, flipped into the air and rolled on its roof. Audulewicz was killed instantly.

"I feel like they knew about the problem long before the recall," said Don Audulewicz, Zackary's father and one of the plaintiffs in the suits. "I can't understand why whoever was making decisions at Toyota would do that."

Toyota declined to discuss the case, citing its policy not to comment on pending litigation. In a written statement, Toyota explained that its own investigation of the defective steering component part led it to broaden the recall to include the T100 truck.

On several occasions in the last decade, Toyota has been admonished by judges for failing to provide evidence. In 2000, for example, a Missouri state judge sanctioned it for failing to disclose results of five rear-impact tests of Corollas "despite numerous discovery requests." He ordered a new trial.

In 2007, California's Court of Appeal found that "Toyota had intentionally violated two orders compelling discovery" of stability test results in a case involving a Toyota-made forklift that tipped over and killed a worker. The court slapped Toyota with a $138,984.33 sanction and ordered a new trial. Toyota, which denied wrongdoing, ultimately settled the case.

E. Todd Tracy, a Texas attorney with 22 years of experience litigating against automakers, believes that Toyota's issues with legal discovery run far deeper than a few sanctions.

Over the last three months, he has moved to reopen 17 lawsuits against the automaker related to vehicle rollovers because he now believes Toyota routinely hid information in those cases.

His argument rests on four boxes of documents submitted by Biller, the former Toyota attorney. The contents have not yet been revealed, but Tracy believes they prove that Toyota hid crucial information about rollovers in those lawsuits.

"This is clearly information that Toyota does not want the public to see," Tracy said. "For years, they were the gold standard, but right now they have more problems than they know what to do with."

5)Isn't it strange how the Left opposes choice vis-a-vis health care, but
fight with all their might for choice when it comes to abortion or
selecting a neighborhood school?.................W.

6)Why the 'Angry Mob' Is Angry
By Wendi Lynn G

I, like many, have had those heart-pounding dreams where I'm battling evil. When trying to cry out, I cannot utter a sound. I try to get away, but my legs won't move. At the height of fear, I wake up, relieved that it was only a dream. I wake up every day realizing that the America in which I am currently living is this nightmare, and I wish it were only a bad dream. Instead, the real-life heart-pounding is leading me to post-traumatic stress syndrome. I pray to get to the "post" part already because my heart cannot endure the present part of living in ObamAmerica much longer. I'm not alone, as a recent Rasmussen poll revealed that 71% of Americans are angry with our government and 61% oppose ObamaCare.


Yes, yes, call us names like "astroturfer," "teabagger," and "angry mob." Such is the motif of our accusers in government who seem to think that we're angry because "our party" isn't in power, all the while neglecting the log within their own eyes that blocks their view of the truth. This hypocrisy and ignorance exemplify the reality behind why we're angry. Using the Saul Alinsky tactic of badgering serves only to pour gasoline upon the very fires of anger that they ignited. And this fire has only begun to burn. The Santa Ana winds are not far off over the mountains.


Our anger comes not simply because we are poor sports. We are not racists who abhor the idea of "a black man in the White House," because in truth, we have wanted to see that bridge crossed for years. We are not "just angry people" -- quite the contrary, which underscores the point. Conservatives are not usually angry, nor are we protesters. That we show up to a protest at all is a huge statement itself and expressive enough of our anger. When we do protest, we don't vandalize local merchants, topple cars and set them on fire, or require the police to control us or cart us off to jail. We're not violent people -- but we are human, and we do get angry. We're just regular folks who prefer to not protest or make a stink about anything. We just want to live our lives in peace. What lights our fire is any threat to that peace and the freedom that provides it.


In September 2008, before the financial crisis came to the fore, I fought on two fronts: I didn't want then-Senator Obama to win the election, and I didn't want the TARP bill to pass. For the first time in my life, I called my local elected officials and the McCain Campaign Headquarters. I begged, through tears of frustration, for Senator McCain not to support the TARP legislation. If ever I needed the "Maverick" to show up, it was then, for both the bill and the election. I was hugely disappointed on both counts. My frustration escalated to shouting matches at my TV set every time I heard the lies, spin, and audacious deception that, for the first time in our history, elected someone radically far left into the White House. On election night, I grieved from knowing, knowing what was to come: something utterly unlike the America in which I grew up with such hope and patriotic pride. I wasn't alone in this, but at the time, I didn't know it.


From day one of Obama's presidency, the dismantling commenced. We have continued to call and write to our elected officials. "We don't want the bailouts, spending, cap-and-trade, ObamaCare," etc. On April 15, 2009, I joined thousands across the country in attending our first protest. We wanted to be heard by our representatives. We believed that in addition to reading letters and fielding calls -- if they even did that -- perhaps our visibility would finally capture their attention. Then, at a town hall, the president un-presidentially and mockingly dismissed us, saying we were "waving tea bags around" like we're just a joke! As our disapproval and disagreement with the Obama agenda has grown ever louder, we have essentially asked, "can you hear us now?!" And the answer has been further dismissal, lack of acknowledgment, and blatant media attacks utilizing the aforementioned Saul Alinksy skill set.


We're trying in every way legally and officially possible to make clear that we don't want the radical meal we're being forced to eat. We fervently do not want to "fundamentally transform" America. But there is such a huge disconnect from our world to our representatives'. It's as if we are ghosts whom they can't see or hear! When someone refuses to listen, going so far as to ignore you, don't you shout louder? Doesn't it anger you? When you're attacked and belittled because you have to shout to be heard and you're still ignored, doesn't that infuriate you? These people miss that we passionately don't want what they want. The more they refuse to hear us, the more we try to make them. We are not going away.


We're justly and increasingly angry because our reps not only refuse to hear us, but they also chastise us for wanting to be heard. How else would they expect us to react when we feel so helpless and hopeless? No matter what we want, say, or do, our government is going to force us to eat a meal we never ordered. In addition, we keep saying, "no, we don't want this," but they keep putting affirmations in our mouths and proceeding with their radical agenda anyway. We are not enjoying the governmental rape of our country. We said "no," and "no" means "no" in every language. Why doesn't this matter? Every poll reflects the president's rapidly declining approval rating -- for good reason. And still, Robert Gibbs flippantly dismisses it. How are "we the people" supposed to feel? Certainly we do not feel happy, or even just mildly upset, about being disregarded. Far-left ideologues who supposedly espouse "compassionate" causes have no compassion for how we feel, nor do they have a clue that we are an angry mob of their own creation.


We take comfort in knowing (if only for ourselves, because clearly, they have forgotten) that "we the people" hold the power of our votes. Our elected officials will hear us in 2010 and 2012. Even so, if we do not stop this train wreck now; we may never be able to undo the damage being forced upon us.


Yes, my heart is pounding, and I feel like I'm living the nightmare in fighting to be heard. I want more than anything to finally wake up and say, "Oh, thank God...it was only a dream." I want to return to a life where I'm not concerned about the uncertainty of a future where I can still pursue dreams. Once at the "post" part of PTSS, I can return to being part of the regular folk, peacefully living life. But as long as I live in this nightmare, this "angry mobstress" will continue to fight against the radical "remaking" of America so that we can remain America, with liberty and justice for all. As one of the "regular folks," I really wish I had another choice.


Wendi is a writer and blogger residing in the San Francisco Bay Area. She is currently working on her first book. Her blog can be found at rightmakesmight4all.blogspot.com

7)Report: Hamas agrees to deport 123 prisoners in Shalit deal
By Roee Nahmias


Hamas yet to formally respond to Israeli swap offer, but Lebanese daily quotes Palestinian sources as saying prominent prisoners have given their consent to Jerusalem's demand to deport 97 of them to Gaza, 20 to Qatar and the rest to Europe


As part of the negotiations on a prisoner exchange with Israel, Hamas has agreed to the deportation of 123 Palestinian prisoners from the West Bank to a number of destinations, Lebanese daily Al-Mustaqbal quoted Palestinian sources as saying Wednesday.



According to the report, the Palestinian prisoners slated for deportation have given their consent to the lsraeli demand.



If carried out, the deal would see hundreds of Palestinian prisoners released by Israel in exchange for IDF soldier Gilad Shalit, who was kidnapped into Gaza on June 25, 2006.




The Palestinian sources said Israel is demanding to deport 97 of the prisoners to the Gaza Strip, more than 20 others to Qatar and the rest to a number of European countries that have expressed a willingness to receive them.




The sources said Israel's refusal to release nine prominent Palestinian prisoners, including former Fatah Secretary-General in the West Bank Marwan Barghouti and Popular Front Secretary-General Ahmad Saadat, remains an obstacle to the deal's completion.





Last week the London-based al-Sharq al-Awsat newspaper quoted a Palestinian source as saying, "The prominentHamas prisoners jailed in Israel, with Abbas al-Sayyad, Ibrahim Hamed, Abdel Nasser Issa, and Abdallah Barghouti figuring most notably amongst them, believe that this deal is their only hope for release and that leaving their names out will devalue it."



A delegation of senior Hamas figures in Gaza is expected to travel to Damascus on Thursday for meetings with the Islamist group's exiled leadership, during which the group will apparently formulate a final response to the Israeli offer.

8)MKs sign deal to leave Kadima as split in party looms
By Gil Hoffman

At least six Kadima MKs signed forms with Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu's adviser Yitzhak Molho last week committing themselves to leave the party, sources close to Netanyahu confirmed on Wednesday night.

MKs Eli Aflalo, Ronit Tirosh, Shai Hermesh, Otniel Schneller, Aryeh Bibi and Yulia Shamalov Berkovich reportedly signed the forms while MK Ze'ev Boim and other Kadima legislators were expected to join the move soon.

Netanyahu and his associates have negotiated with 15 Kadima MKs about leaving Kadima over the past three months, but just seven are needed in order to legally split the party.

Netanyahu's associates said they had not decided yet when to turn the forms over to the Knesset House Committee to proceed with the split and a lot depended on the final decisions of the remaining MKs and the progress in negotiations to bring home kidnapped IDF soldier Gilad Schalit.

Aflalo already told Kadima leader Tzipi Livni on Tuesday that he intended to leave the party on his own, because he was angry at her for not helping him get re-elected to the Knesset after he was instrumental in helping her win the Kadima leadership against MK Shaul Mofaz.

"You betrayed me and I don't believe in you anymore," Aflalo told Livni in the heated conversation.

Each of the MKs who leave Kadima will become a minister, deputy minister or Knesset committee chairman. Aflalo is expected to be named Negev and Galilee development minister, Tirosh will be a minister in the Foreign Ministry, Boim could be minister of Jerusalem and pensioners affairs, Shamalov Berkovich deputy communications minister, Bibi deputy internal security minister, Hermesh deputy agriculture minister, and Schneller chairman of the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee.

Kadima MK Yoel Hason wrote Attorney-general Menahem Mazuz on Wednesday asking him whether such promises were legally considered bribery. Netanyahu's associates said they were not concerned. They accused Livni of hypocrisy for condemning Netanyahu's moves at the same time that she was trying to woo the Labor rebels to her party.

"Livni's problem is not Netanyahu but her own lack of leadership," a source close to Netanyahu said. "She should not complain about the prime minister if she is unable to lead her own party."

Livni's associates responded that she never offered any position to anyone from Labor, which was splitting without any connection to Kadima. They expressed hope that the extensive coverage of efforts to split the party would persuade MKs to stay.

"Netanyahu's people offered me a gentleman's agreement to leave but I told them it wasn't what I was looking for at this time," a Kadima MK told Livni on Wednesday. "I stayed in Kadima because I believe in its opinions, not because I believe in you."

Mofaz tried over the last few days to persuade Kadima MKs allied with him to remain in the party. He intends to blast Livni if the split takes place.

Meanwhile, former Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's sons, Gilad and Omri, reportedly called Kadima MKs and tried to persuade them to return to the Likud and leave the party that their father founded four years ago.

The MKs that leave Kadima are expected to form a new faction before most of them join Likud. An MK or two might join Israel Beiteinu or Labor instead. Hermesh wants to return to Labor, the party he started in.

Kadima MK Marina Solodkin fiercely criticized MKs who intended to leave, saying that "the Russian street spits on traitors."

Kadima council chairman Haim Ramon accused Netanyahu and Labor chairman Ehud Barak of conspiring to split Kadima in what he said was an act of chauvinism against Livni.

Labor director-general Weizmann Shiri responded that Ramon, as a convicted sex offender who helped split the Likud, had no right to preach about chauvinism or efforts to split Kadima.