Op-Eds and Blogs

A son lays out the grim truth about his mother’s cancer medicine in the Obamacare era in Monday morning’s Wall Street Journal (hat tip to Right Wisconsin). Stephen Blackwood writes that his mother has been fighting off a terminal carcinoid cancer since she was 49 in 2005. What kept her alive was a semimonthly shot of Sandostatin, which slows the growth of tumors. “Then in November, along with millions of other Americans, she lost her health insurance. She'd had a Blue Cross/Blue Shield plan for nearly 20 years. It was expensive, but given that it covered her very expensive treatment, it was a terrific plan. It gave her access to any specialist or surgeon, and to the Sandostatin and other medications that were keeping her alive. “And then, because our lawmakers and president thought they could do better, she had nothing. Her old plan, now considered illegal under the new health law, had been canceled.”

<b> Originally printed in Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, February 21st, 2014 </b> Based on how much we spend, every child in America should be getting a world-class education, which would include connecting our classrooms to digital opportunities. To get there, the federal government doesn't need to spend more money — the Federal Communications Commission already runs a program called E-Rate that distributes over $2 billion to schools and libraries to purchase communications services each year. What we <em>do</em> need is real reform in Washington and an end to the waste, fraud and abuse inherent in the current program.

While everyone in Wisconsin is right to be concerned about violent crime, I find that some people believe there’s a magic-wand solution. They feel that if only we passed yet one more law, we could end the tragedies that result from people choosing to ignore the law and shoot others. This came up when I was talking to people in Appleton this past week. A woman asked whether I had voted for some particular gun-control law that she favored. My answer was simple: No. It wasn’t a good law. I voted for a better solution to the problem of “straw buyers,” a bill offered by Sen. Grassley of Iowa. It would have cracked down on attempts by felons to illegally purchase firearms, increased penalties for gun trafficking, required the Department of Justice to explain its failure to prosecute gun cases, and improved the existing Criminal Background Check System. No magic wand – just better enforcement of the law we have.

Workers at a Volkswagen plant in Chattanooga, Tenn., voted over the weekend not to unionize with the United Auto Workers. The Wall Street Journal says it’s “the best news so far this year for the American economy.” It’s important news for taxpayers outside the auto industry. The Journal explains why: “The failure reflects how well the plant's workers are doing without a union, to the tune of $27 an hour including benefits. The defeat also speaks to the harm the UAW has done to itself by driving GM and Chrysler to bankruptcy and pushing companies like Caterpillar to move new production from union plants.”