Approximately 15 to 20% of the deaths attributed to the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombs resulted from radiation sickness. See http://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/AAF/USSBS/AtomicEffects/AtomicEffects-2.html. This is approximately 20 to 40 thousand people. In addition, there were numerous illnesses in the population which showed up years later. This is documented fact. With regard to Chernobyl there have been thousands of cases of thyroid cancer attributed to the accident. Fortunately, this disease is very much treatable. At this point, Dr. Coulter is correct, when she states there have been 31 deaths up to this point that can be directly linked to the nuclear accident. However, I certainly would not be happy sending my 3 year old...

What is actually unparalleled during the Obama Presidency is the bogus reporting (such as the one above) that claims he is governing in a partisan way. For example, let's take the claim that Republicans were "shut out" of the legislative process in the Senate Health Care bill. Here is a link which highlights the contributions of Republicans to the Bill which passed the Senate: http://cloudfront.mediamatters.org/static/pdf/ahca.pdf

Note that over 160 amendments in the Bill came from Republicans.

What should be reported is the partisan blocking of votes by Republicans in the Senate on appointments and legislation. There have more filibusters by the Republicans in the Senate in the last year than has ever occurred in the...

The author argument is so flawed and ridiculous one wonders whether this gentlemen knows anything about the proposed healthcare legislation. He states that "So if it’s not ... how did you get 100% of the votes of those who publicly support government run health care." Very simply they would rather have something than nothing. Voting for insurance reform (elimination of pre-existing conditions, no rescinding of existing policies, remove the monopoly exemption for health insurance co., etc) makes good sense (many of these were once supported by Republicans). Secondly, a defeat of this legislation would be a serious political blow for the President and the Democrats in Congress. The reason the blue dog Democrats are less likely to...

One measure of the quality of a country's healthcare system is the infant mortality rate. Based on statistics in 2009 (source CIA), Cuba has a slight lower rate than the US (5.82 vs. 6.22).

https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook /rankorder/2091rank.html

France, often spoke of by those in favor or a "nationalized health system" has a rate of 3.33. (As opposed to Cuba which is rarely pointed to as a "model" system, outside of the film Sicko).

Here is a list of all the countries and regions with a lower infant mortality rate than the US. We might learn something about healthcare...

The "Deem and Pass" rule was used 90 times by the House under the leadership of Newt Gingrich. It was used over 100 times by Congress under leadership of Dennis "Denny" Hastert.

See for example http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2010_ 03/022879.php

Based on the screaming from the right I guess all the 300+ laws enacted by this approach by Republicans are "illegal" and according to Michelle Bachmand do not have to be followed or obeyed.

The rethoric coming from Republicans and the right is not only hypocritical but in the case of Rep. Bachmann is tantamount to grounds for arrest under the laws...

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/02/05/shelbys-blanket-ho ld-puts_n_450934.html

Here is a link to a transcript and video of the meeting in Baltimore:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/01/29/transcript-of-pres ident-o_n_442423.html

Apparently the link I provided to the report by the California Nurses Association is broken> Here are some key findings from the report released On Spet. 2, 2009. Look it up.

"Claims denial rates by leading California insurers, first six months of 2009:

* PacifiCare -- 39.6 percent
* Cigna -- 32.7 percent
* HealthNet -- 30 percent
* Kaiser Permanente -- 28.3 percent
* Blue Cross -- 27.9 percent
* Aetna -- 6.4 percent"

I should also revise my statement above at the denial rate from Aetna is only 6.4% not 20. Note that PacifiCare has a deinal rate of nearly 40% as I stated. I guess this kind of "rationing" is ok with the vast majority of those who post on Townhall.

I have noticed that nearly every time I post on Townhall several of my words are either changed or removed. In my last post it changed my spelling of Bachmann to Bachmand (one time). Note that the letter "d" is on the other side of the keyboard from the letter "n". There is no way I mistakenly typed a "d". I also see one of my words was dropped from a sentence. I will continue to post on Townhall but wonder why this continues to occur. Have others noticed this happening to their posts?

First of all there are several House and Senate plans that have been put forward with numerous proposed amendments. So to say that President Obama has proposed a healthcare plan that will go into effect in 2013 is simply not accurate. If one looks only at the provisions of House Bill 3600, the statement by Mr. Sowell (that the Bill does not go into effect until 2013) can very easily be shown to be false. For example, one of the proposed statutes in this bill states that in 2010 a law would go into effect where 'Insurance companies are barred from engaging in "rescissions" — the cancellation of existing policies' see for example http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/32013032

HR3600 proposes staged changes to occur in the system in 2010,...