Right-wing Cato institute calls presidential hopeful Mitt Romney's health care plan identical to the plan just signed into Law

Right-wing think tank Cato Institute executive vice president David Boaz says that Republican presidential hopeful Mitt Romney is the guy who created the prototype for ObamaCare. 

Romney has been taking fire recently for criticizing President Barack Obama's health care plan despite having enacted a fundamentally identical bill as governor of Massachusetts in 2006.

During an April 15^th, 2010 Cato Institute discussion of the politics and policy of RomneyCare and Obamacare, Boaz asked, "How can he lead the charge against a health care plan that is modeled on his own?"  Michael Cannon, Cato's director of Health Policy Studies, commented, “When you run down this list of elements in the Obama plan and the Romney plan, they are all identical.".

Both plans comprise a series of insurance regulations, subsidies and mandates to extend coverage to the uninsured. Both create insurance exchanges that allow individuals and small businesses to pool risk, and neither includes a government-run option.

Watch the Cato Institute discussion here: http://www.cato.org/weekly/index.php?vid_id=156

Tea Bagger movement organized, funded and coordinated by Republican PR firm

The Tea Bagger rabble is nowhere near to a grass roots movement as its controllers and Fox News advertises it to be. About a year ago a Republican political consultant with the California Republican public relations firm Russo Marsh & Rogers, proposed that he said could “give a boost to our PAC and position his firm as a leading force as the 2010 elections by associating with the Tea-Bagger movement.

The proposal for a nationwide Tea Bagger party bus tour, called the Tea Party Express, has become the most identifiable brand of the Tea Bagger horde. Buses emblazoned with the Tea Party Express logo have brought speakers and entertainers, including former less than one–term Gov. Sarah Palin (R-AK), to rallies in dozens of cities and towns. These rallies have been funded, planned by campaign-style advance work, and managed by advisors closely associated Russo Marsh & Rogers. Advertising and promotion of these rallies has been handled by Russo Marsh & Rogers and integrated political action committees.  

Russo Marsh & Rogers founder Sal Russo has organized and coordinated prolific fundraising schemes for the ‘Tea Party Express’ coordinated campaign, and created the ‘Our Country Deserves Better –TeaPartyExpress.org’ PAC to fund and air hundreds of thousands of dollars in ads supporting Republican campaigns like Scott Brown’s successful special US Senate election in Massachusetts and blasting Democratic ones, such as Senate Majority Leader Reid’s reelection bid in Nevada.

The ‘Tea Party Express’s’ high profile has infuriated tea bagger rally attendants suspicious of huge payments to Russo Marsh & Rogers, who view the bus tours as distractions heading into the 2010 midterm elections. Many rally attendee’s say Republican ties to the California PR firm and PAC are wrong for a movement that claims its’ independence of any political establishment, even though national polls show more than 70% of tea baggers support Republicans. These baggers, who are not funded by Russo Marsh & Rogers, also angrily reject what looks to be a Republican effort to take the Tea Bagger movement over.

Former Gov. Palin's PAC spends less than 2.4% on candidates, and spends more than 96% on hotels, travel, and advisors

According to new filings made with the Federal Elections Commission former less than one-term Gov. Sarah Palin (R-AK) spent more money to de-ice her private jets than she did donating money to candidates during the first 3 months of 2010. 

The FEC filings from Palin's political action committee, Sarah PAC, also show it spent twice as much on hotels in New Orleans, New York City, and Richland, WA as it donated to individual candidates.

The first quarter report shows many of Palin’s advisors were paid $ 10,000 per month or more, for a total of $233,000 expended.

In stark contrast the former less than one-term Governor’s PAC gave just $7,500 to Republican candidates to help them win elections, and $1000 each to 2 PACs that support veterans running for Congress.

The $9,500 represents just 2.3% of the more than $413,000 Palin brought in from January through March of this year. The report shows Palin's PAC spent a total of $409,760 during those 3 months. With only $9,500 given to candidates and Pac’s, and $233,000 spent on advisors, what was the remaining $ 167,000 spent on?

There is no evidence that Palin has kept her promise to donate the $100,000 speaking fee to campaigns and candidates she collected from a February Tea-Bagger convention in Nashville, TN, as she scrambled to hold back the fury that erupted from many convention attendees upon hearing of the speaking fee.

Palin herself has not contributed to any federal candidate this quarter. It looks like she hypocritically won’t put her own money where her mouth is.

Read the FEC filing here: 

http://query.nictusa.com/pdf/899/10930494899/10930494899.pdf#navpanes=0

National Poll shows majority of Tea Baggers say the taxes they'll pay this year are fair, contradicting Fox News talking points

A new nationwide CBS News/ New York Times poll shows that 52 percent of Tea-Bagger Party supporters think the amount of income taxes they'll pay this year is fair, while 42 percent think the amount they’ll pay is unfair. 

6 percent of Tea-Baggers were not smart enough to answer the tax fairness question according to the poll. Less than 20 percent of Americans say they support the Tea Party movement.

Americans overall are more likely than the Tea-Baggers to describe the income taxes they'll pay this year as fair,  with 62 percent saying taxes are fair according to the same poll which was conducted April 5 - 12. A Majority of Americans across all income levels say their income taxes are fair, as do most Republicans and Democrats.

This poll was conducted among a random sample of 1,580 adults nationwide, interviewed by telephone April 5-12, 2010. Phone numbers were dialed from RDD samples of both standard land-lines and cell phones. The error due to sampling for results based on the entire sample could be plus or minus two percentage points. The error for subgroups is higher.

An oversample of people who describe themselves as supporters of the Tea Bagger movement were interviewed, for a total of 881 interviews. The results were then weighted in proportion to the adult population. The margin of error for the sample of Tea Party supporters is three points.

This poll release conforms to the Standards of Disclosure of the National Council on Public Polls.

Sen. Scott Brown (R-Mass.) jilts Sarah Palin and the Tea Baggers

Sen. Scott Brown (R-Mass.), who won an unexpected special US Senate election victory in January, has turned down an invitation to attend a Sarah Palin-headlined Tea Bagger rally in Boston this week according to a Boston Herald report.

Some suspect that Brown may be seeking to distance himself from the wing-nut and uncontrollable Tea Baggers, who claim they helped secure his Senate win.

Larry Sabato, a University of Virginia political scientist, said that Brown likely wants mainstream himself before the 1012 full term election. Brown's office, however, said that the Senator was busy in Washington and could not leave to attend the rally that is scheduled to take place on Boston Common in his home State on Wednesday.

Scott Brown's connection with Sarah Palin has been similarly tenuous. A few weeks after his election, Brown claimed that he'd "never met the less than one-term Governor from Alaska. “She's never contacted us and vice versa," in a statement that contradicted by earlier reports from Palin spokespeople that she'd spoken with Brown on the night of the election in January to congratulate him on his victory. Apparently, Scott Brown had forgotten about the call altogether.

It looks like Senator Brown is jilting his very date that brought him to the party, typical Republican.