Penny Press 5, 2018 · Pre-ObamaCare high-deductible plans and their out-of-pocket costs were...

Penny PressNevada, USA Volume 15 Number 44 JULY 5, 2018

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THE PENNY PRESS,JULY 5, 2018 PAGE 2

By MARILYN SINGLETON, MDSpecial to the Penny Press

Kudos to the folks in D.C. who are advancing alternatives to the Affordable Care Act’s over-regulated and expensive health

insurance policies. Small business association health plans and expanding health savings accounts (HSAs) are among several tools to increase health care choices. However, one element in the medical care cost analysis that is rarely addressed is personal responsibility for one’s health. Politicians are reluctant to “blame the victim” (patients) so they

criticize the health care “system.” That misses the point: It is not the government’s job to keep us healthy.

Estimates of 2016 U.S. health care spending averages $10,345-per-person. Purchasing insurance makes up the bulk of the spending: $3,852 annual insurance premium, $4,358 to meet the deductible, for a total of $8,210. But most of the actual spending on medical care is for 5 percent of the population, mainly for chronic conditions. Eighty-six percent of the nation’s $2.7 trillion annual health care expenditures (2010) were for people with chronic and mental health conditions.

It takes more than good luck to maintain good health. Up to 40 percent of lost years of life from each of five leading U.S.

causes (heart disease, cancer, chronic lower respiratory diseases, stroke, and unintentional injuries) are preventable according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Sadly, opiate use disorder jumped from 52nd on the list in 1990 to 15th in 2016.

Research suggests that behaviors, such as smoking, poor diet and over-eating, and lack of exercise are the most important determinants of premature death. Over the last 25 years the percentage of Americans with healthy lifestyles (exercise, good diet, “normal” body fat, non-smoking) has dropped from 6.8 percent to 3 percent. More than two-thirds of all adults and nearly one-third of all children and youth in the United States are either overweight or obese. The CDC reports that 9.3 percent of Americans

have diabetes. Will this problem be solved by expanding government “healthcare” programs? No. In 1965 when Medicare and Medicaid were established, 1.2 percent of Americans had diabetes. This number had doubled by 1975, even with more sources for medical care, and continued to rise at the same rate despite the implementation of the ACA.

The American Diabetes Association estimates that in 2017, diabetes and its related complications accounted for $237 billion in direct medical costs — a 26 percent increase from 2012. The price of poor lifestyle choices is staggering. For the years 2009–2012, the costs for direct medical care due to smoking was at least $170 billion. Medical costs linked

Penny PressNEVADA USA 16 PAGES VOLUME 15 NUMBER 44 JULY 5, 2018

Penny WisdomIt’s almost like they (the Left) are having an Outrage Olympics. —Charlie Kirk

The Conservative Weekly Voice Of NevadaInside:Trump's Judges AGift To The Country

See Editorial Page 6

RON KNECHT PAGE 5FRED WEINBERG PAGE 6ROBERT RINGER PAGE 7DOUG FRENCH PAGE 9G. RICHARD OLDS PAGE 10ROBERT ROMANO PAGE 11CHUCK MUTH PAGE 14

Biggest Health Cost Is Insurance and Deductable

Commentary

Continued on page4


to obesity were estimated to be from $147 billion to nearly $210 billion per year.

Let’s face it. Many Americans have been duped into ignoring responsibility for their own health. With the drug companies’ relentless ads, prescription drugs have become the equivalent of “As Seen on TV” products. These ads send the unstated message that the latest diabetes or lung disease medication will take care of you so you do not have to take care of yourself and possibly avoid these diseases in the first place. It’s no surprise that 70 percent of Americans take at least one prescription medication.

And the same government geniuses that permit food stamps to be used at fast food outlets mandates over-priced insurance products that include “free” preventive care. But, of course the high-priced cholesterol medication will cancel that out, right?

No sane person would wish a chronic condition on anyone, or deny treatment for such patients. But preventive health begins at home. Changing behaviors requires someone who connects with patients, will take time to listen and help identify personal motivators for change. This

requires a physician who will spend time with you—not a storefront doc-in-the-box. Direct pay practices (DPC) offer quality time, service, and chronic disease management. These physicians are not constrained by insurance companies’ and the government’s paint-by-the-numbers treatments.

Health insurance is necessary for big ticket items like hospitalizations. But there is no need to pay thousands for services that will never be used. Pre-ObamaCare high-deductible plans and their out-of-pocket costs were generally offset by lower premiums and employer contributions to health savings accounts.

Shifting all our personal responsibilities to the government has not improved our nation’s health. Imagine if the $1,000 spent on designer coffee or manicures were spent on foods and a non-sedentary activities that improved health.

Dr. Singleton is a board-certified anesthesiologist. She is also a Board-of-Directors member and President-elect of the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons (AAPS).

Costs Go Down When You Take ResponsibilityContinued from page 3

Progressive Equals Socialist in the Modern Democrat Party

In a major upset last week, a leading old Democrat warhorse lost his primary election for his New York congressional seat. Joe Crowley, a ten-term incumbent, had been touted as a replacement for minority leader Nancy Pelosi as speaker if the Democrats regain control of the House. But he was beaten by Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a 28-year old political newcomer.

Some folks are comparing this upset to the defeat of Republican

minority leader Eric Cantor in 2014 by Dave Brat in Virginia. There have been few other upsets that are a good comparison. Even Brat was not outspent 18 to 1 by his opponent, as Ocasio-Cortez was.

Ocasio-Cortez is a member of the Democrat Socialists of America, a far left group inside the Democrat party that champions the policies of Vermont Independent Senator Bernie Sanders. For anyone who thinks socialism is not fundamental to the modern Democrat party, consider this primary result and the continuing successful insurgence of the Sanders wing. Others may call them progressives, but they are socialists and proud of it! And she with a capital “S” at that.

Ocasio-Cortez will almost certainly be going to Congress from this heavily Democrat district in Queens; Republicans have no

chance. So, Democrats as a party have suffered no setback with her election, despite the loss of one old warhorse. Her election also suggests Pelosi will return to the speaker’s podium if the Democrats can wrestle control from Republicans.

From an image perspective, the modern Democrat party should be quick to embrace her. She provides a youthful counterpoint to a decrepit party dominated by the likes of Pelosi, Maxine Waters, Hillary Rodham Clinton, Joe Biden and Sanders. So, the Democrats should put this socialist right out front.

And she’s already attuned to the drift – dare we say evolution? – of Democrat policy positions anyway. Big time.

Today’s Democrats embrace “free” college tuition, “free” healthcare, open borders and hatred of President Donald Trump. All of these are embodied in the fresh new face of Ocasio-Cortez, coupled with Old Man Sanders in the Senate. In fact, she as much as anyone has pioneered their effort to abolish the federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency.

Pelosi, Sanders, and Waters all want the same things the Democrat Socialists of America want. They’re just afraid of embracing the “socialist” title.

But the modern Democrat party looks old and tired when two of their leading candidates for president are pushing 80, those being Biden and Sanders. Sure, Trump is over 70, but running someone who is older than Trump in 2020 is likely to yield the same result as in 2016.

Republicans and others should understand that saying one is progressive is just slapping lipstick on a pig; it really means socialist.

Socialist plus a few other things. The roots of socialism go far back and mean coercive collectivism, whether the harsh brutality of Karl Marx or the misguided good (but still coercive) intentions of those from a religious bent. Progressivism is less than 150 years old, and means socialism plus at least the conceit that progressives are our enlightened betters who should rule us peons.

Of course, as Hillary Rodham Clinton said, “At this point, what difference does it make?”

As a practical matter, Democrats should own it all now with this fresh new face as a party leader. We’re sure Ms. Ocasio-Cortez will perform admirably. They believe she has the message they need to gather and hold the youth of this country.

So what if she alienates older Democrats who are just hanging on hoping their team starts eventually to tack back toward the center. It’s not going to happen, so Dems might as well finish kicking them out the door. Eventually, Dems think, those folks will all be replaced by the younger generation that’s been heavily indoctrinated by the education system to socialism, and they’ll soon prevail anyway.

And in ten to 20 years, they’ll be winning elections by landslides.

Unless people start looking up from their smartphones long enough to realize we’re losing the precious constitutional republic, rights, freedoms, prosperity and hope previous generations left us. For our children, for our future, we need to turn things around. That’s what we’re about.


The Penny Press Tips Its Cap To:The Democrat Party which just dumped a 56-year-old Congressman in the leadership for a 28-year-old Hispanic woman with two last names who also happens to be a socialist. That may play in New York’s inner city but how will that play on a national basis on national issues. About as well as Maxine Waters?

Las Vegas artist Robert Davidson who was awarded nearly $3.6 million last week by a federal court that ruled the U.S. Postal Service infringed his copyright when it mistakenly used an image of his statue at New York New York on a stamp. The government agency began issuing the stamp that depicted a close-up of the Las Vegas-based Lady Liberty in December 2010. They deliver for you…

The Penny Press Sends A Bronx Cheer And A Bouquet of Weeds To:Thom Reilly, chancellor of the Nevada System of Higher Education who told the Las Vegas Review Journal that they would NOT honor the Trump admin-istration’s rescission of guidance which says that race may be used as a factor in college admissions. “We’re proud of our diversity. It reflects our state. It’s incredibly important, and we’re committed to that at all levels.” A great decision for Asian taxpayers who study too hard.


Tips Of Our Capand

Bronx Cheers

RON KNECHT and JAMES SMACK

Commentary: Ron Knecht & James Smack

In his own back-handed way, Chuck Todd at NBC gave President Trump the biggest complement he has ever had from the leftist media.

“The announced retirement of Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy this week helped make one political reality clear — despite his overall unpopularity, President Trump is winning, and the Democrats right now are reeling,” said the man we think of as the Ryan Seacrest of politics on last week’s Meet the Press.

I’m not certain if, when he refers to “overall unpopularity” he was talking about the folks at the table, the leftist media, the swamp inside the Beltway or himself, but Todd has a strange way of measuring things so as to come to a conclusion he has predetermined. Maybe he was talking about the Democrat party.

But the fact is that if Trump were to run today, he might win by Reagan numbers. The reason he is so hated by the left, is that he is actually KEEPING his campaign promises, starting with the one where he said he would appoint Federal Judges in the mold of the late Associate Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia.

Even NPR reported that in his first year in office, Trump “welcomed a new, young and conservative lawyer, Neil Gorsuch, onto the Supreme Court. And he won confirmation of 12 federal appeals court judges — a record”.

Since Federal Judges get a lifetime appointment, many of these people could serve 40 years.

No wonder the Democrat Party has a group in Congress who wants to impeach him.

No wonder the Democrat Party has a new battle cry—that somehow Trump cannot make a judicial nomination during any election year—not just the election year replacing a lame duck President.

No wonder the Democrat Party has a new alternate battle cry—that Trump is looking for a jurist who would lead the Court to somehow overturn Roe v. Wade.

To quote Barack Obama, “elections have consequences”.

One of those consequences is that the winner of a Presidential election—which Donald Trump absolutely is—has the absolute right to nominate a judge to the Supreme Court, subject to confirmation by the Senate. That’s absolute. Not subject to some made up asterisk by some Senator, Congressman or legal “expert” on CNN or the New York Times.

If Trump keeps no other promise he has made—and that train has also already left the station—this is the one which promises to reshape the country.

For one thing, much of the Court has become increasingly concerned with activist District Judges issuing nationwide injunctions which are clearly political in nature—similar to the ones swept aside by the Court, 5-4, upholding the President’s so-called travel ban in US v. Hawaii. Since the Associate Justice who is retiring happened to be on the 5 voting to uphold the 1952 law which gave the President that authority, a moderate judge might change that vote.

Trump needs to hold firm and ignore the Chuckie Schumers and the Nancy Pelosis of the world. He’ll have plenty of backing from just regular people.

Also, his previous vetting of his judicial appointments has been sound and reasonable. That, even from the legal left. The lefties of the legal persuasion may not like the results, but they cannot argue with the process, so far.

But, again, as Barack Obama was fond of saying, “elections have consequences”.

The beauty of the timing of Trump’s election is that he may have as many as four picks on the Supreme Court. And many more at the Appellate and District levels.

That means his work will be felt in this country for many years to come, no matter the next three of four Presidents’ political persuasions.

Thank God.

FRED WEINBERG


OPINIONFrom The Publisher...

Reshaping The Courts: Trump's Gift To The Country


The Civil War Is at HandEven though Fox News gave him the boot, George Will’s signature trait

— pretentiousness — is alive and well. In a recent column in the Washington Posttitled “Vote against the GOP this November,” Will outdid himself with a whole new level of pretentiousness. One gets the distinct impression that his greatest thrill in life is coming up with words that most people have never heard of.

True, his pretentiousness is phony and obnoxious. True, he has become a caricature of the infantile whiners who failed to get their way in the last election. True, his irrelevance has reduced him to a pathetic figure. But before dismissing Will’s childish behavior out of hand, I think it’s worth examining what his downfall and subsequent bitterness means in the grand scheme of things.

Will is an icon of the establishment that ruled Washington for decades, prior to the Trump Revolution — perhaps, one might argue, since the very inception of the nation. Those in the establishment have had their way for so long they cannot bring themselves to believe they are no longer in control of things.

To them, the Trump-inspired political earthquake is nothing more than a sociological hiccup — an accident of history that occurs every 50 years or so. Just bide one’s time, keep calm, hold the fort, and it will all melt away when people finally come to their senses.

The late, great Charles Krauthammer, one of George Will’s closest friends, was somewhat caught up in the same normalcy-bias trap, though he had a much better grasp of reality than Will. When I interviewed Krauthammer back in 2009, I found him to be reasonable and thoughtful with his words, and, in an uneffusive and odd sort of way, rather pleasant.

However, when Krauthammer and I appeared on a panel discussion together for the second time the following year, he was rather unhappy with my grouping Barack Obama in with some of the more infamous dictators of our time. Obama is, after all, a nice guy. Just ask Gentleman Mitt.

I mention my brief interactions with Charles Krauthammer only to make the point that even though he was unquestionably a brilliant, insightful, fair-minded man — not to mention an incredibly brave one — he could not seem to comprehend the fact that the political landscape was being paved over by a sea of fed-up, truth-telling populists.

I thought about all this in 2016 when Krauthammer said, “This is the strongest field of Republican candidates in 35 years. You could pick a dozen of them at random and you have the strongest cabinet America’s had in our lifetime.” I wholeheartedly disagreed with his assessment but respected his opinion.

He then went on to say, “Instead, all of our time is spent discussing this rodeo clown (Donald Trump).” Still, no big deal, just his opinion. But when he went one step further and complained that “No previous president has ever talked like that,” it was a telltale moment for me because it showed that Charles Krauthammer, a man who made it a habit to carefully measure his words, simply was not able to grasp what was happening in America.

Clearly, it had not sunk in with him that it was because Donald Trump “talks like that” that he was elected president — even though Horrible Hillary and the Dirty Dems, the FBI, the DOJ, and Never-Trump Republicans illegally conspired against him.

More broadly, I don’t believe Charles Krauthammer, notwithstanding his brilliance, could fathom that because no one has had the courage to reign in the hateful rhetoric and threats coming from the Radical Left, the door has been opened for them to take the next step and resort to the kind of violence that could lead to a second civil war.

The violence of the Radical Left was on vivid display last week when Sarah Sanders, Kirstjen Nielson, and Stephen Miller were confronted and harassed in restaurants and Pam Bondi got the same treatment when trying to enter a movie theater. The message was clear: Whatever it takes, “Nazis” must be forcibly prevented from infecting the public landscape.

All this reminds me of why I strayed from hard-line libertarian doctrine some years ago. It was a result of my finally accepting the reality that there are both evil and ignorant people in the world who delight in causing pain and suffering

to those with whom they disagree. When I use the word evil, it’s not necessarily in a biblical context but, rather, a figurative way of referring to people who enjoy seeing others suffer.

As to ignorance, it can often lead to the same results as evil. The empirical evidence makes it clear that a person who is ignorant but well-intentioned can do as much harm to others as the person who is knowledgeable but ill-intentioned.

Low-information (i.e., ignorant) people provide the manpower for evil leaders whose objective is to silence their perceived enemies. They are the useful idiots that Vladimir Lenin spoke about so contemptuously in the early part of the 20thcentury, those lost souls who provide crusaders with the true believers they need to carry out their crusades.

They are generally the kind of self-loathing zombies who became Hitler’s brown shirts and Mao’s Red Guard. Today they fill the ranks of hate groups like Occupy Wall Street, Antifa, and, yes, the Southern Poverty Law Center.

In other words, history has taught us not to dismiss rank-and-file true believers as harmless fools. No matter how ignorant they may seem, they are extremely dangerous if for no other reason than they are guided by emotion rather than intellect.

Which brings me to the Boy Scout Republicans — unprincipled toadys like Paul Ryan, Jeff Flake, and Marco Rubio. These are the mental dwarfs who bray on endlessly about “reaching across the aisle,” as though they believe their good-faith efforts will make the Dirty Dems respond in kind. What they do not understand is that reaching across the aisle does not work when those on the other side of the aisle want to destroy you and everything you believe in.

As the Radical Left ramps up its moral-superiority crusade to take out Trump and his supporters, it will become ever more clear that their antics can end only in one of two ways: capitulation by those on the right who disagree with them (as has usually been the case in the past) or all-out civil war. Which one is worse is subject to debate.

The only thing we know for certain is that the Radical Left will never, ever back down. Their hatred is too deep, their anger too raw, their ignorance too great. And, make no mistake about it, the Radical Left now includes most of the Democratic Party.

Also, never forget that lurking in the background is the only president in history who vowed to fundamentally change America, the only president in history to hang around Washington after his presidency ended and actively try to undermine and destroy his successor; the only president in history to offer such violence-dripped gems as:

“We’re gonna punish our enemies and we’re gonna reward our friends,”“I want you to argue with them and get in their face.”“If they bring a knife to the fight, we bring a gun.” (Maybe this is the best

reason of all to cherish the Second Amendment.)I guess this is what the oh-so-sweet and charming Mrs. Obama means when

she says, with a straight face, “When they go low, we go high.” Wink, wink.It’s time to face up to it: The Radical Left is at war with the rule of law,

at war with the Constitution, at war with civility, at war with normal, everyday Americans. The only question that remains is: What will take the Radical Left’s hatred and insanity to a new level and cause them to fire that first shot at Fort Sumter?

Could it be Donald Trump’s upcoming, ultra-conservative Supreme Court pick? We shall soon find out. ROBERT RINGERRobert Ringer (© 2018)is a New York Times #1 bestselling author who has appeared on numerous national radio and television shows, including The Tonight Show, Today, The Dennis Miller Show, Good Morning America, ABC Nightline, The Charlie Rose Show, as well as Fox News and Fox Business. To sign up for a free subscription to his mind-expanding daily insights, visit www.robertringer.com.


Commentary: Robert Ringer

Merger MalinvestmentThe June 29th edition of Grant’s Interest Rate Observer led with,

“Time Warner, Inc. was put on this earth not to produce Game of Thrones but to punctuate the cycles of investment enthusiasm.” Grant’s reminds the forgetful that a few bubbles ago Time Warner and AOL merged and that “announcement in 2000 rang down the curtain on the dot-com era.”

The Time Warner - American Online (AOL) merger was a colossal $111 billion deal. A blink in time later, May 2009, the CEO of Time Warner, Jeff Bewkes, announced the two companies were separating, the merger was but a brief hookup instead of a marriage.

Now Time-Warner is making merger with AT&T, and Grant’s wonders if the deal “may epitomize the post-2008 corporate-credit boom.”

“The new AT&T is a kind of triptych,” writes Grant’s, “one-third wireless, one-third wireline and one-third entertainment.”

Of course, anything can work on paper if the guys and gals in the corner office want it to. In a 2011 piece for mises.org, I wrote,

“A former director of Coopers & Lybrand told author Mark Sirower, “Lotus is the culprit in failed acquisitions. It is too easy to assume anything you want in perpetuity without any understanding of the economics of an industry, and package it in a beautiful report.”

In his book The Synergy Trap, Sirower says valuation models turn on three things: free-cash-flow forecasts, residual value, and a discount rate.

The cost of capital is integral to making these assumptions. The lower the assumed interest rate or cost of capital, the higher the price for the acquisition that the models will justify.

And if anyone is assuming today’s Fed-induced microscopic interests rates will last forever, well, now would be the time to be selling instead of buying. Once interest rates go up, these valuation models will be blown up along with the government-employee pension-plan assumptions.

It’s hard to make something work out economically if you overpay in the first place. And that is most often what happens. Companies overpay for the firms they acquire.

It’s the rare business combination that works out. I mentioned,according to Max Landsberg and Dr. Thomas Kell at the consulting

firm Heidrick & Struggles, 74 percent of mergers fail. “Two-thirds of the newly formed companies perform well below the industry average,” according to the Harvard Management Update. Although “up to 70 percent [of mergers] failed to create value, it seems clear that the end is not yet in sight,” claims Financial Executive. And the Journal of Property Management says “60 percent to 80 percent of all business combinations undergo a slow, painful demise.”

In the AT&T/Time Warner merger there is the additional problem of the debt load. “If pro forma AT&T were a country,” Craig Moffett tells Grant’s, “it would place 32nd on the list of highest total debt burdens, between Indonesia (at $335 billion) and the UAB ($220 billion). Pro forma leverage, on an adjusted basis, will now be 3.9 times EBITDA,”

“M&A is now--arguably, always has been--a leap in the dark,” Grant’s writes. The primary problem is size itself. Ludwig von Mises explained that socialism doesn’t work because there was no market to determine

prices and thus calculate how resources should be used. Behemoth companies are no more immune than government bureaucracies.

Murray Rothbard explained,“Economic calculation becomes ever more important as the market

economy develops and progresses, as the stages and the complexities of type and variety of capital goods increase. Ever more important for the maintenance of an advanced economy, then, is the preservation of markets for all the capital and other producers’ goods.”

Professor Peter Klein furthers the point in his book The Capitalist and the Entrepreneur,

“as soon as the firm expands to the point where at least one external market has disappeared, however, the calculation problem exists. The difficulties become worse and worse as more and more external markets disappear, as [quoting Rothbard] “islands of non calculable chaos swell to the proportions of masses and continents. As the area of incalculability increases, the degrees of irrationality, misallocation, loss, impoverishment, etc, become greater.”

Grant’s closed the AT&T analysis with, “There is nothing certain about the new Time Warner corporate marriage, only the time-honored tendencies of governments to inflate, investment bankers to promote, corporate CEOs to deal--and ground-hugging interest rates to addle the brain.”

In the end, this latest corporate knot-tying will crumble and destroy capital. DOUG FRENCH


Commentary: Doug French



How to Address the Coming Shortfall of Primary Care Doctors

About 20,000 students recently graduated from U.S. medical schools. Now, they’re beginning the next chapter of their training, as residents.

Yet less than 7,000 will be pursuing careers in primary care. America will be short up to 43,100 primary care physicians by 2030, according to the Association of American Medical Colleges.

Medical schools have a responsibility to help fix this shortfall. They can do so by making primary care more alluring to students.

Primary care physicians are our healthcare system’s first line of defense. They diagnose illnesses, help manage chronic conditions, and refer patients to specialists. Without them, patients would get lost in today’s byzantine health system.

The shortage of primary care doctors is partially due to concerns over money and status. Specialists are better paid and often involved in prestigious new research.

Between April 2016 and March 2017, physician recruitment firm Merritt Hawkins conducted nearly 3,300 searches for its clients. The average offered to recruit an orthopedic surgeon was $579,000. The average to recruit a family practitioner was less than half that.

The shortage also occurs because U.S. medical school’s faculty are mainly specialists. Surgery departments in U.S. medical schools boast over 15,000 faculty members. Family practice departments have just 5,700 members.

Professors serve as role models to students, many of whom seek to follow in the footsteps of these mentors. Overwhelmingly, that means pursuing a career as a specialist.

Aspiring doctors also train in settings that push them toward specialties, not primary care. Medical students generally train in large

teaching hospitals that serve patients who have been referred from primary and secondary care providers. Few students train in small clinics and local doctor’s offices.

But most health care — and almost all primary care — is delivered outside of the hospital. Americans make 923 million trips to physician offices every year — and only 130 million to emergency departments. More than half of office visits are to primary care physicians.

So medical students rarely gain enough experience in primary care settings to decide if it’s the right career path for them.

These barriers are significant but not insurmountable. To start, schools could promote primary care as a career. In 2015,

the medical school at the University of California, Riverside, partnered with the Desert Regional Medical Center and Desert Healthcare District to launch a new primary care residency program in Palm Springs. UC Riverside also partners with Loma Linda University to offer the Pediatric Primary Care Residency Training Program, which prepares residents for careers in pediatrics and family medicine.

Second, schools could ensure students gain hands-on primary care experience by encouraging them to serve at community clinics. At the University of California, Davis, School of Medicine, for example, nearly nine in ten students volunteer in clinics in underserved communities. As a result, half of UC Davis students picked a primary care residency in 2015.

Third, schools could subsidize tuition for students who commit to primary care careers. At St. George’s University, on the Caribbean island of Grenada, our CityDoctors Scholarship program provides grants to students from New York City who agree to return to practice in the city’s public hospital system after they graduate. This year, eight students received CityDoctors scholarships worth a total of $1.1 million.

Medical schools must make careers in primary care exciting and affordable for a new generation of physicians. Dr. G. RICHARD OLDSG. Richard Olds, M.D., is President of St. George’s University. He was founding dean of UC Riverside’s medical school.

Commentary: Dr. G. Richard Olds

Trump-Putin Summit Shows Why President is Ahead of the Curve

President Donald Trump will be meeting Russian President Vladimir Putin in Helsinki, Finland on July 16. There the two will discuss nuclear weapons and U.S.-Russian relations.

This is not only the right time to cool tensions between the two foremost nuclear powers — who have clashed over Syria, Ukraine and other potential hotspots — but also the right time politically for Trump to take to the international stage.

Coming off a successful summit in Singapore with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, achieving an agreement in principle to denuclearize the Korean peninsula, President Trump’s popularity is soaring. He has the political capital to meet with Putin.

Trump’s surge, simultaneously stunning and perplexing to D.C. elites — but not to his supporters — comes as he does not appear to be hampered even in the slightest by the ongoing Russia investigation by Special Counsel Robert Mueller. Probably because there was no collusion.

But not only does Trump have the political capital to meet with Putin from a position of strength, it is politically smart for him to do it.

Peace is popular.Not only is this what Trump ran on in 2016 — achieving a better

relationship with American adversaries like Russia — there is a long history of presidents who have benefitted greatly through the politics of summits.

Richard Nixon went to China, famously, in 1972. He also got the first Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty (SALT I) and the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty that year with the Soviet Union.

He also happened to be running for reelection that year. It was one of the greatest landslides in modern electoral history, as Nixon carried 49 states.

Fast forward a decade or so, and Ronald Reagan was in his second term. He pursued the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (which eventually got signed in 1991), had his summits with Mikhail Gorbachev starting in 1985, culminating in the signing of the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty which was signed in 1987. That was the first ever reduction of nuclear arms.

Peace with the Soviet Union proved a political boon for the President’s party in 1988, as George H. W. Bush went on to carry 40 states.

So, while the short-term political wisdom is that Trump is crazy, he cannot meet with Putin because of the Russia investigation, Trump is meeting with Putin in spite of the Russia investigation.

Which is what presidents are supposed to do. Trump has so far been quite successful in these foreign policy events. His trip to Asia last year was well-received. The Arab summit was a masterstroke — raising the possibility of peace between Israel and her Arab neighbors.

The substance of the Trump-Putin summit itself should make it worthwhile. Cooling tensions in Syria and Ukraine, while addressing the new nuclear arms race, is not only in U.S. interests, but everyone’s

interests. Nobody wants to see war between U.S. and Russia, and these are issues that can be settled as there has been a great history of doing so in the past to draw upon.

To the extent they have made war between the nuclear powers less likely, they have made the world a safer place to live.

Ultimately, this is one of the reasons why Trump won in 2016. By promising to bring peace and not the sword — but on America’s terms. Trump’s opponents still do not get him — they still cannot even fathom that he won let alone how. They should sit back and take notes. Class is in session. ROBERT ROMANORobert Romano is the Vice President of Public Policy at Americans for Limited Government.


Commentary: Robert Romano



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They Don’t Call Him “Shady Steve” for Nothing

Nevada Democrat gubernatorial candidates Steve Sisolak and Chris Giunchigliani faced off in a televised debate in Las Vegas on May 21, 2018. And according to the Las Vegas Review-Journal report on the to-and-fro…

“Sisolak…criticized Giunchigliani for taking money from strip clubs and brothels.”

And yet just one week later Sisolak’s campaign took a maximum $5,000 donation from brothel owner Lance Gilman, who also is now hosting a ritzy fundraiser at the Pennington Mansion in Reno for “Shady Steve” in August.

That’s chutzpah!Speaking of Brothel Hypocrites…Guess who else raked in campaign dough from a ritzy fundraising

reception at the Pennington Mansion hosted by brothel owner Lance Gilman?

Assembly Minority Leader Jim Wheeler!Wheeler-Dealer’s also pocketed a $1,000 donation from Mr. Gillman.

And yet he’s now refusing to support the duly-elected Republican nominee for Assembly District 36, Dennis Hof (disclaimer; one of my clients) because Hof is a brothel owner.

That’s chutzpah!Heller’s Favorite Pimp Pays Big Bucks for Services Rendered

When it comes to how things work in the swamp – both in DC and Carson City - a story out of the Washington Post last week really rips the Band-Aid off the scab.

It seems that Storey County – home to brothel owner Lance Gilman’s Mustang Ranch – did not qualify for a new “Opportunity Zone” designation by the federal government, which was designed “to help distressed areas attract money.”

Let the swamp games begin!“Working behind the scenes to help the effort was a Storey County

brothel owner and real estate investor, Lance Gilman, who told local officials that the designation could lead to a surge of investments within the next few years. Gilman is also a major GOP donor and made a $5,000 campaign contribution to Heller in the midst of the process, the biggest contribution he had ever given to a candidate for federal office.”

And lo and behold, the rules were changed! Instead of neighboring Dayton, Nevada getting the slot for the

assistance program, the small rural town was given the shaft and Gilman-land was moved into its place. But we’re sure the $5,000 payment to Heller was just a coincidence, right?

Political prostitution is still prostitution. At least Heller isn’t cheap.Oh, and by the way: While Mr. Heller is more than happy to pocket

Pimp Gilman’s campaign cash, he’s also one of the high-and-mighty political moralists who refuses to support Republican Assembly District 36 nomineeDennis Hof in November’s general election.

That’s chutzpah!Those Who Almost Cost Us the Supreme Court

Patrick Morrisey is the Republican candidate running against Democrat

Joe Manchin for the U.S. Senate in West Virginia. And after Justice Anthony Kennedy announced his retirement from the Supreme Court this week, Mr. Morrisey tweeted…

“Today’s Supreme Court news underscores why it was so important to support @realDonaldTrump in 2016. Don’t forget, if Joe Manchin had his way, Hillary Clinton would be on her way to appointing her second radical Supreme Court Justice.”

Frightening beyond imagination. However, let’s not forget that if Nevada U.S. Sen. Dean Heller – a

#Never Trumper in 2016 – had HIS way, Hillary Clinton would be on her way to appointing her second radical Supreme Court Justice.

Heller’s refusal to support Trump helped Hillary carry Nevada – and almost win the presidency. Are we supposed to now forgive and forget what he almost did to this country?

Stealing a line from Heller himself, “I’m not there yet.” And not sure I’ll ever be. I’m just not buying DC Dean’s “born again” Trump conversion. I think Heller will go right back to undermining the President, McCain-style, the minute he’s re-elected.

Do we really want another six years of THAT?About that Upcoming Clark County Special Election

Many of you have written asking me about the special election betweenThomas Fougere and Aaron Manfredi being held next month for Public Administrator after some election worker snafus that occurred during the June 12 GOP primary.

Alas, I really knew nothing about either candidate either. So I went and did some research for y’all.

First, here are the bona fides Mr. Fougere provided when asked why he’s the best candidate in the RJ’s voter guide…

“I hold a Master’s Degree in Public Administration (M.P.A.) from San Francisco State University. I have 13 years’ experience as a Nevada licensed Real Estate Broker Salesperson, during which time I have seen many probate listings. My expertise in determining property valuation is demonstrated in Broker Price Opinions (BPOs) that I have prepared for use in properties requiring court approval. I have over 30 years’ experience in international trade businesses, during which I managed logistical operations for several leading multi-billion dollar publicly-listed corporations.”

Now, I have no idea what any of that means, but it sounds impressive as hell!

For Mr. Manfredi’s part, I was immediately put off by his campaign video announcing right out of the gate that, “I am not a politician.”

Um, yes you are, dude. By virtue of running for political office you are, by definition, a politician.

But this is just a pet peeve of mine as a campaign consultant. So let’s take a look at why politician Manfredi says he’s the best politician for the job…

“What makes me the best candidate is what makes anybody the best they can be, and that is the humbling experience of dedicating myself to what I believe in.”

Barf. Check, please!This one turns out to be a no-brainer. Thomas Fougere is by FAR the

better qualified and more experienced.

CHUCK MUTH


Commentary: Chuck Muth


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