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HH: But why is the Obama administration doing this?

JK That is hard to fathom, although there was a report today that the decision was actually made by the president in May of this year, and communicated to Governor Paterson in New York. So perhaps the decision was made a long time ago. But if you think about what could go wrong, and although both the president and the attorney general have said in no uncertain terms, nothing will go wrong, he will be convicted and he will be executed, first of all, that’s probably a violation of prosecutorial ethics. You can taint a jury pool by that kind of language. But nonetheless, they’re so doggone certain of that, when you ask them the next question yes, but what if by some fluke one juror decides no, they don’t have an answer for that. And that…if that should happen, I think it could make this president a one-term president.

HH: Do you believe, Senator Kyl, that it is possible that one of the motivations here is to turn this into a trial not of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and his confederates, but of the Bush administration interrogation tactics?

JK: I don’t want to question the motives of the president or the attorney general, but when you say what conceivable motive could there be, the only other motive that I can think of is well, we want to show off our jury system to the rest of the world. Now think about that for a minute. If that’s what we’re doing here, and we’re declaring in advance that we know for a certainty that he’s going to be convicted and executed, what kind of a system is it?

HH: And how long do you think it’s going to take?

JK: Well, it depends upon whatever agreement is reached between the majority and minority leaders. They’re negotiating that right now. Just because your audience is pretty steeped in this, what we could do is continue debating things that have nothing to do with health care, as we are right now, and then this vote occurs at 8:00 on Saturday night, and then we debate health care for thirty hours. That doesn’t make a lot of sense, and I think one suggestion the two leaders are thinking about is how about if we start the debate on health care tonight, basically, and have that debate through Saturday at 8:00, then have this vote, and then go home and start talking to our constituents about it, and come back ready to start the amendment process the Monday after Thanksgiving.

HH: How long will that amendment process go, if in fact they get to take up the bill?

JK: Assuming they take up the bill, if you compare it to other bills of this kind, it’s, you can easily justify a six or seven week process. So I’m assuming it will be into early next year.

HH: And how important will the public’s reaction…I mean, there’s things in here like the Botox tax we just found out about. I mean, that’s going to devastate a bunch of businesses that do cosmetic surgery.

JK: The answer is that this bill will pass or fail depending upon the degree of energy by which the American people express their opposition. They’re essentially in opposition by a 60-40 vote. That’s probably not going to change a lot. And so the question is, will the majority, the substantial majority who oppose this legislation be heard by their representatives? If they are, then it will be defeated, and we’ll go back and try to do it in a more responsible step by step way. If these representatives or these Senators hear the voices but choose to ignore them, they’ll probably be defeated in the next election, but we may have some very bad policy in the meantime.

Desperately seeking money to pay for the legislation, Mr. Reid came up with a new source of financing: a 5 percent tax on elective cosmetic medical procedures. The tax would be paid by patients, but collected by doctors and clinics and forwarded to the government.

The tax would be calculated as 5 percent of the amount paid for an elective cosmetic procedure, whether by the patient, insurance or other sources. The tax would not apply to cosmetic surgery for people with congenital abnormalities, disfiguring diseases or traumatic injuries.

The New York Times admits that Reid has loaded up his version of the bill with gimmicks like delaying the start of the most expensive provisions until 2014 in order to hide the cost of the massive expansion of government.

But even the bill's incredible bulk cannot hide the enormous cuts to Medicare on which the bill's "deficit neutrality" is premised.  The bill is an open declaration of war on senior citizens and the costs they impose on the medical system. 

It can be beaten, but it will require an enormous outpouring of opposition from every corner.  The energy of the Tea Party participants, the passion of the Townhall attendees, the willingness to act and to spend their own time and money of the 9/12 demonstrators --all this and more will be required to stop the last desperate lurch towards the finish line by the Obama-Pelosi-Reid Democrats.

As I write in my new Townhall.com column this morning, funds have to pour in to the ReverseTheVote.org account dedicated to defeating the 24 House Democrats from red or purple districts who voted for Obamacare on November 7.  If Democrats in both the House and the Senate see the proof that passing Obamacare means involuntary retirement, they won't pass it, no matter how much the president and the Speaker and the Majority Leader push.  These aren't people with great career paths waiting for them on the other side of their public lives.  Many are backbenchers in their first or second terms.  They won't be asked on to corporate boards or given chairs in think tanks.  The president and the speaker are treating them as expendable.  Do they agree?

Even Democratic staffers used to the majority's perks after three years have got to be wondering about the electoral avalanche being triggered by this assault on seniors, doctors, and the employed-with-insurance-they-like.  So too do the consultants and lobbyists and permanent Democratic Party apparatus.  The president wants a win, but at what cost will his party go along?

So please give generously to ReverseTheVote.org.  And participate this weekend in the Docs4PatientCare.org rallies if you are in one of the cities where they are being held.  Finally, use the 202-224-3121 number to call Senators Blanche Lincoln of Arkansas, Ben Nelson of Nebraska and Mary Landrieu of Louisiana and urge a no vote on cloture. Raising the stakes on every vote is the only way to stop Obamacare.

• Around the world the fundamental vehicle for organizing global affairs, the national state, is undergoing massive changes.
• In Europe it is on decline as countries subordinate themselves to the European Union. The EU is no substitute for the nation state.In the Middle East countries that pass for nation states are disintegrating, coming apart under the challenge of a universalist ideology that rejects their legitimacy.
• In Asia new states are emerging as global players, creating new global challenges.
• On its own the U.S. cannot create a new order from this changing environment.
• Not only is the U.S.-U.K. special relationship still valid but essential in the emerging environment.
• Regarding the major global security decision before the two countries today, Kissinger said that troop levels in Afghanistan needed to reflect the conditions on the ground and what is at stake.
• We must act before we are confronted with far greater challenges.
• We must not allow Pakistan to become a failed state.
• If Pakistan should become a failed state, the crisis will quickly spread to India, with its large Muslim population and history of conflicts among groups.
• As prime minister, Kissinger added, Margaret Thatcher knew our countries should stand together.
  

• People often compare, he said, China today and Germany before the First World War.
• World War One was brought on by a quarter century of clumsy, tactless German diplomacy.
• He seemed to believe that Chinese diplomacy was more tempered and skillful than that of late 19th,early 20th century Germany.
• Still, he noted, in the China-U.S. relationship, the diplomatic DNA of the two sides could lead to conflict, China with its desire to create an Asian block, the U.S. with its often intemperate sense of missionary purpose.
• In the 19th Century, the Congress of Vienna created a balance among the major powers that lasted nearly a century.
• But Europe’s 19th century peace – broken only by the relatively limited Crimean War and the Franco-Prussian War – covered a comparatively small geographic area.
• It is essential for the U.S. and Europe to work together in this emerging world.
• Implicit was that the task of producing a stable global order in the decades ahead could prove more challenging than the task the diplomats who met in post-Napoleonic Vienna faced.
  

• A Tory takeover following the next election is regarded as a certainty within the political class in London.
• One American journalist told me a hung Parliament was possible, as did a prominent think tank analyst.  But among those actively preparing for the next election, there was no dissent. The Conservatives are all but in.
• All felt they would be assuming governance of a country in more serious financial straits than the U.S. – higher taxes, deeper debt compared to their GDP, more profligate spending.
• In global affairs, the time our president has been taking to decide on Afghanistan was widely seen as a sign of indecision and lack of stomach for the fight.