One of the Media Research Center's dearest friends and supporters, Mark Levin, has a new book out called “Ameritopia.”

On Tuesday, the esteemed author and radio host spoke to NewsBusters by phone about the book's contents and how the media are assisting powerful utopian forces in America to undermine our Constitutional republic (video follows with complete transcript, don't miss spectacular book signing video at article's conclusion):

NEWSBUSTERS: Mark Levin is a lawyer, author, and host of one of the nation’s most popular syndicated radio programs. His book “Liberty and Tyranny” was on the New York Times bestseller list for eight months, three at number one, and was Amazon’s second bestseller in 2009. An expert in Constitutional law, Levin is a loyal supporter and dear friend of the Media Research Center. His new book “Ameritopia” takes readers through the various utopian concepts proffered by Plato, Thomas More, Thomas Hobbes, and Karl Marx demonstrating that despite their notorious failings, America has been moving in this direction for almost a century and is dangerously close to never coming back. We are very pleased to have Mark with us at NewsBusters to discuss his compelling new book. Welcome, Mark.

MARK LEVIN: Noel, a great pleasure. I appreciate all the work you do, my friend.

NEWSBUSTERS: Thank you, sir. You as well. My first question is a bit tongue-in-cheek. I think you’ll find it a tad humorous. Despite your last book “Liberty and Tyranny” spending many months on the New York Times bestseller list, they never reviewed it. You think they’ll review this one?

LEVIN: Well, you know, if they do I'm sure it won't be very favorable. Whether they review it or not is almost irrelevant because I barely read the New York Times anymore, let alone that particular section of the New York Times. So, my goal is to address my audience, reach beyond where we can to people who are somewhat open-minded or aren't sure what they believe, and my guess is most of the people who read the New York Times are people who are in that utopian camp. Whether it's reviewed or not is no matter to me.

NEWSBUSTERS: Why do you think they don't typically review conservative authors?

LEVIN: Because they are exactly what we've said they are for years. They are mouthpieces for the Left, and for the most part when they do review conservative authors, they trash them, or they nitpick them and cherry-pick aspects of their books. So I don't care if they review my book or not. It is totally irrelevant.

NEWSBUSTERS: I don't imagine you're expecting "Good Morning America," the "Today" show or the "Early Show" to give you a call and let you speak about your book.

LEVIN: They've not contacted us and we're not contacting them, and that's pretty much the way it worked with “Liberty and Tyranny.” They never contacted us and we pretty much didn't contact them. If they want to go out of their way to contact me and invite me on and have a little debate, that's perfectly fine, but I don't need them, and obviously they don't need me.

NEWSBUSTERS: There you go. Well, in your introduction, you wrote, “Utopianism has long promoted the idea of a paradisiacal existence and advanced concepts of pseudo ‘ideal’ societies in which a heroic despot, a benevolent sovereign, or an enlightened oligarchy claims the ability and authority to provide all the needs and fulfill all the wants of the individual – in exchange for his abject servitude.” Does this describe Barack Obama and all of his followers including in the media?

LEVIN: Well, it absolutely does, and in his State of the Union speech it will be clear as with his past State of the Union speeches, with most of his past speeches. Obama holds himself up as a mastermind. He's not one, but he holds himself up as one, and only because he has power and he has an ideology. And even though his ideology is generally understood and can be generally defined, it's not well thought out by him.

So, like most masterminds, he has a general idea where he wants to drag this country, although he's a little short on specifics from time to time, and his target is to reshape, to mold the individual, in fact to destroy the nature of the individual so that he can build in essence an army of followers – the masses as they like to call them – in pursuit of a fantasy. And the fantasy is this notion of a so-called paradise which requires individuals to surrender their liberty and surrender their private property rights, basically to surrender their free will in order to accommodate this abstraction that Obama and others have. And there's no end to it, because once you're unmoored from the Constitution, as we are in so many ways today, then we are moored to this abstraction that a mastermind has and is promoting.

In Obama's case, he borrows a little bit from Plato's “Republic,” a little bit from Thomas More's “Utopia,” and Thomas Hobbes' “Leviathan,” and Karl Marx and Engels' “Communist Manifesto.” Now, he may not do it wittingly, and he may do it unwittingly, but in either event it is extremely destructive. You cannot have these notions of utopianism dressed up as a humane type of ideal society and constitutionalism. You cannot have 310 million individuals who are mostly free to pursue their own interests and live their own lives and at the same time have a centralized government with increasingly concentrated power which is telling people what to do in matters big and small.

NEWSBUSTERS: Staying with that theme, do you see the desire for a utopia stemming from laziness and cowardice? Aren’t people who strive for such a system just wanting less work and personal responsibility?

LEVIN: It's a number of things depending on the people and the groups of people we're talking about. For instance, there are a number of malcontents in this country who blame the existing society and system quote-unquote for their own personal failures. And so they are largely disconnected from the existing society. There are also those who benefit greatly from the policies of the masterminds and their utopian endeavors such as crony capitalists among others. So they favor utopianism greatly because they benefit personally from it.

There are those who unfortunately are more in the Pollyanna or blissfully ignorant school who really aren't paying attention, aren't engaged, haven't been roused by what's going on, and they do not necessarily see this much as a threat because it is sold to them in a rather mild way – not as a trespass on their liberties or their private property rights. So it's a combination of all these things, and I thought it was very important to dig into this because it can be a very alluring philosophy for so many millions of people while it's destroying their nature. And that is the nature of utopianism.

NEWSBUSTERS: Interesting. Early on, you also quoted Eric Hoffer who wrote, “For men to plunge headlong into an undertaking of vast change, they must be intensely discontented yet not destitute, and they must have the feeling that by the possession of some potent doctrine, infallible leader or some new technique they have access to a source of irresistible power.” How well does this describe the nation after the financial crisis of 2008, and how important was that to Obama’s victory?

LEVIN: Well, I think it describes the hard-left utopians period, and always has. Look, the financial crisis, we always have some crisis in this country whether it's a real crisis or a manufactured crisis. The government likes to sabotage various industries, and it sabotaged the financial industry with the Community Reinvestment Act, which is a long story I wrote about in “Liberty and Tyranny” and don't need to get into right now. But, the fact is where you find most economic dislocation or failure you find the heavy hand of the federal government.

So, to answer your question, the crises that are used are either made by the federal government or they happen naturally and the mastermind seizes on them to further centralize government and seize power. The problem is that when that ends it ends in an increasingly tyrannical society because the problems that are created by government are further exacerbated because the people who are trying to deal with the problems in government do not have the knowledge and not necessarily the best interests of the population generally in what they're trying to achieve.

What is it exactly, for instance, Barack Obama brings to the table about healthcare? He's not an expert, he doesn't have great knowledge on the subject. He brings ideology. He brings a conceit. He brings his own self-interest. Milton Friedman once said, and I paraphrase, “Why is it nobler for politicians to make political decisions than for individuals to make economic decisions?” It's a great statement that applies certainly to this circumstance.

NEWSBUSTERS: Well, you know of course Obama promised to unite the nation, but as you wrote, utopianism “assigns [individuals] a group identity based on race, ethnicity, age, gender, income, etc., to highlight differences within the masses. It then exacerbates old rivalries and disputes or it incites new ones.” So, despite the claims of unity, in reality that's not what utopians are after at all is it?

LEVIN: No it's not, and you can hear it today. Again, in the State of the Union speech, Obama will talk about fairness, fairness, and fairness again while he's trashing successful, independent and industrious people who produce all kinds of wealth for our society and all kinds of services for our society that the people want. He's going to trash those people, and he has to because those people demonstrate that society can in fact function properly, that there are people who do succeed in this society. But when you have an individual such as Obama who seeks to fundamentally transform this society – meaning he rejects it, meaning he doesn't like it, meaning his conduct is going to be un-Constitutional because he doesn't have the power as president under the Constitution to fundamentally transform our nation – you're going to see more and more of that kind of behavior and that kind of propaganda.

So of course he's not interested in uniting. This is the other thing about the utopian push for this endless statism. It's the perversion of language. So while they pretend to speak for the quote-unquote middle class which we can't even find, while they pretend to stand for the little guy, while they pretend to stand for hard work and individual values and so forth, they stand for none of that. They stand for in fact a top down authoritarian system where a relative handful of people have this ideal society in mind which always involves the destruction of man's nature, to mold man to accommodate their abstraction.

And so that is what's going on today, that is what has gone on since the beginning of mankind. And that is why what we did in this country, what the Founders did in this country is so unique, so marvelous, such a blessing that it is my hope that in this book “Ameritopia” when I define and explain the philosophies that underlay our view of individual sovereignty and constitutionalism and consent of the governed and the nature of man versus their view, these phony ideal societies that even Plato couldn't create, the idea of uniformity and conformity, and the idea of class warfare or an all-powerful sovereign where we're subjects will be exposed for what it is and people will fear it.

NEWSBUSTERS: Speaking of the Founders, you quoted Jefferson, and I love this quote: “All the powers of government, legislative, executive, and judiciary, result to the legislative body. The concentrating of these in the same hands is precisely the definition of despotic government. It will be no alleviation that these powers will be exercised by a plurality of hands, and not by a single one. 173 despots would surely be as oppressive as one…An elective despotism was not the government we fought for.”

LEVIN: Yep. And later on, about a half century later, Alexis de Tocqueville said exactly the same thing. And before both of those men, others said exactly the same thing including Charles de Montesquieu. The point being that the fact that you vote doesn't mean you don't have despotism. The fact that you have a legislature and an assembly of some kind again doesn't mean you don't have despotism. You can vote for your despots. And the point is that at some point unfortunately in democracies the power structure is such that when you vote, so much of what you vote about has nothing to do with what happens.

I'll give you an example. We've this massive fourth branch of government, this administrative state, massive bureaucracy, untold numbers of people doing untold numbers of things in untold numbers of agencies who are issuing regulations that have the force of law that have financial penalties and criminal penalties where people can go to prison with strict liability. We don't know who they are, we don't know what they're up to, we don't know how they come to their conclusions.

And the point is that we've elected a congress, we've elected the president, and yet here we have this big monument to despotism in effect which has incredible power on our daily lives. And so there's a huge disconnect between us voting and what happens in this society and how we're governed. And this is why I came up with the title of the book “Ameritopia” because you and I and others, we are fighting to get back to the America that is based on the Constitution and the concepts of individual sovereignty and so forth.

This country cannot be called today strictly a constitutional republic, a representative republic or a federal republic because it's been turned upside-down. The states have very little authority vis-a-vis the federal government. The individual is getting smothered in this massive leviathan, and those things that Jefferson feared, the Founders feared, Alexis de Tocqueville after him feared, and the great enlightened philosophers feared are coming to pass.

NEWSBUSTERS: Isn’t it also interesting that although all of the utopias you wrote about provide universal healthcare for their people, they also all encourage the sick or infirm to commit suicide or just die off? So despite what the media said, Sarah Palin was right about death panels?

LEVIN: Isn't that interesting? In Plato's “Republic,” in Thomas More's “Utopia,” in supposedly humanistic, compassionate societies, and so forth, yes, national government-run healthcare is key to all of these societies because they want complete control over the individual body and soul. And, yes, they encourage people to end their own lives, or at least not seek medical care if they have these terrible diseases or illnesses and cannot be contributors to the society as a whole, because remember now, under the utopian notion, it is society as a whole, it is government as a whole, it is an ideology that is paramount to everything else. The individual is inconsequential. The individual has no worth in and of himself. Self-interest is to be denounced as it is in our society in many respects.

NEWSBUSTERS: The other interesting hypocrisy to me is a common theme in all these utopias: men can’t be trusted to govern themselves. But if this is true, how can a president, ruler, or legislature of men be trusted?

LEVIN: Well, I kind of get to that in the book. Men cannot be trusted to govern themselves, but they are trusted to vote for their guardians. Yet they're not wise enough to pick their own light bulbs. And this is what it's become. And of course man is so bad, so imperfect, so evil, except of course for the few who manage to get power and rule over the rest of his fellow men. So, the whole notion is a notion of totalitarianism, and that's the point. It's totalitarianism in form and substance, and the question is what degree of totalitarianism are people willing to tolerate.

NEWSBUSTERS: Another interesting aspect, you quoted de Tocqueville: “In America the aristocratic element has always been feeble from its birth; and if at the present day it is not actually destroyed, it is at any rate so completely disabled that we can scarcely assign to it any degree of influence on the course of affairs.” With the current Occupy movement and the media’s incessant contention that the wealthy have undue influence in America today especially in light of the Citizens’ United decision, would de Tocqueville make this same observation if he were here today?

LEVIN: Oh, absolutely. In fact, he'd be appalled as would the Founders by what's happened to this great country. The aristocracy in this country today, I would argue, are the politicians and the bureaucrats who have the power of law to do lawless things, and the robber barons of this country today aren't individual industrialists. They are the individuals in Congress and in the Administration who have access to enormous amounts of wealth, not necessarily to enhance their own status financially, but in order to remake society, in order to coerce people, in order to sabotage various private sector entities and so forth. So they're actually even worse than the old robber barons in that they not only have enormous wealth that doesn't belong to them, they have the power of the law to do as they see fit with that enormous wealth.

NEWSBUSTERS: You also wrote, “For the utopian, it is better that all be poor than some be wealthy.”

LEVIN: Right.

NEWSBUSTERS: Does this describe the feeling of today’s Left as well as the Occupy movement and the media?

LEVIN: It absolutely does. It is this mindless, destructive pursuit of radical egalitarianism. You see it in Thomas More's “Utopia,” you see it in the “Communist Manifesto,” and you see it in the modern Democrat Party. You see, we can never be truly equal. There will never be equal incomes period. Mankind has demonstrated that through experience. There will never be free healthcare for everybody of the same exact quality no matter what. It's simply not going to happen. And these plans that they come up with are not only impracticable, but they're impossible. And yet they're put out there as these promises, these future promises where these masterminds say they're going to deliver these things, and of course they can't and they won't. They deliver the opposite: destitution, misery, and poverty.

But all that said, I think that today we're in an extremely perilous situation because if I had to guess, I'd guess 40 percent or more of the American people have surrendered to this ideology, or they've been conquered by it, bought off by it through entitlements and so forth, or through coercion, administrative coercion through bureaucracies. And the issue to me is whether there is time to save the republic or whether the mindset, the psychology of the American people has been so trounced and so altered that politically it will be impossible to reverse course.

NEWSBUSTERS: Well, that's why I would ask you if there are any real anti-utopians left in America? 80 years after the New Deal, aren’t we all utopians to some degree? Look at the Tea Party signs that we saw, “Keep Your Hands Off of My Medicare,” “Keep Your Hands Off of My Social Security.” Aren’t we all now on a utopian slippery slope that can’t be stopped given the number of citizens – even conservatives – now dependent upon the existing utopian legislation?

LEVIN: Those signs were the exception at the Tea Party rallies. I went to several of them. The Tea Party rallies were not about Medicare, were not about entitlements. They were about the opposite. They were about constitutionalism.

I can't answer your question whether or not we will survive as a nation. All I can tell you is that those of us aware of what's going on need to fight like hell to try and preserve it because it's worth preserving, and if we cannot preserve it, then I don't know what mankind's going to look like in the future. I cannot believe as I say in “Ameritopia” that as inheritors of such a magnificent society that we are prepared to send our children and grandchildren and all future generations into infinite darkness. I just cannot believe it. And so we shall see.

I cannot predict the future, but I am very hopeful that “Ameritopia” will help get the message out to at least some people so they understand the philosophical roots of individual sovereignty, of constitutionalism of this great society, and will also understand the philosophical roots of the tyranny that seeks to devour it. And I am of the opinion that more and more people who get to those roots beyond the superficial, who go beyond the Founders, who go beyond Obama, and who really look deeply into what's gone on in the history of mankind and then apply it to what's going on today, I think we have a chance.

NEWSBUSTERS: You argue in “Ameritopia's" concluding chapter that if the Supreme Court doesn’t strike down the individual mandate in ObamaCare, “the contours of utopian society and the mastermind’s authority would seem unconfined. Thereafter, the individual’s free will ceases to be free or his will?” Please elaborate.

LEVIN: Well, that's correct because at this point we would have all three branches of government – the legislative, executive and the judicial – conspiring openly against the individual, against “we the people,” against the citizen. And what I mean by this is the utopians who push this statist agenda, this top down authoritarianism if not totalitarianism and dress it up as a democracy movement, or dress it up as some kind of a compassionate program, they won't have to dress anything up anymore because if the Supreme Court gives itself and the rest of the federal government the power to push around and bully and order the individual to do things that the individual does not want to do, then it no longer has to use the carrot. It can use the stick. That's the point.

NEWSBUSTERS: Indeed. And you mentioned that the Tea Party certainly is the positive force. The utopian force right now would you agree is pretty much embodied not just in the media but in the Occupy movement, and this is where the battle for America's future, the Americans versus the Ameritopians is being waged?

LEVIN: The Occupy movement is a very tiny movement that is just a reflection of what's been going on in this country. The Tea Party movement is really a great perhaps last stand for constitutionalism, which is why the utopians hate it so much and disparage it endlessly. And yet it gives people like me hope.

We are in an Ameritopia right now. We're not transitioning into an Ameritopia, we are here. The question is how far down this course are we going to go? And I don't think it is virtuous or noble to pretend otherwise. I don't think it is helpful if some conservatives or some Libertarians pretend otherwise.

This is an extremely perilous period in our history, and the utopian notions have taken a firm hold. And the question is, as I said earlier, can we reacquaint ourselves with the original mindset of the American people or whether we've been so thoroughly duped that there's no hope? I believe that we still have an opportunity, but the hour is very late.

NEWSBUSTERS: And why do you think America's media are so on board with the utopians and always have been?

LEVIN: Because they are one and the same. The fact that they're in the media not in the government is irrelevant. When you look at Thomas Friedman, three-time Pulitzer Prize winner writing in the New York Times, he's constantly flirting with totalitarianism and rejecting the checks and balances that are built into our Constitutional system. The utopians are in a hurry. They're in a hurry to go somewhere they can't detail exactly where they want to take us, but they think they want to take us in that direction regardless. The Constitution – they condemn it all the time. During ObamaCare, people were asked about the Constitutional basis for ObamaCare. Members of Congress basically laughed. So, that's how I would answer your question.

NEWSBUSTERS: Anything else you want to tell our readers before I let you go?

LEVIN: I would tell them what I tell my radio audience – and I'm sure there's a lot of overlap in that regard – that is you have to view yourselves as the Paul and Paulette Reveres of this nation. The media's not going to do it. Certain politicians aren't going to do it. One election's not going to do it. We have to save ourselves from this utopian tyranny. The more we understand it, the more we inform ourselves, the more we can spread the word to our family members, our friends, our co-workers, our neighbors. If this society is going to survive, and if we are going to survive as a free people, it's up to us and nobody else.

NEWSBUSTERS: Well, Mark, speaking for everybody at the Media Research Center and all of our readers, we sincerely thank you for your hard work toward saving our nation, and thank you very, very much for your time today.

LEVIN: Noel, thank you for all you do, and the great Media Research Center, my buddy Brent Bozell and everybody else there. G-d bless you, my friend.

The following is a marvelous video from an “Ameritopia” book signing at a bookstore on Long Island last weekend:

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In the guise of a status report on ObamaCare, Katie Couric on Thursday night derided Republican efforts to repeal it just as it’s “starting to kick in.” She pleaded for viewers to give it a chance as she rationalized “the law is vulnerable because of the complex way it tries to fold 30 million uninsured people into the system,” fretting “damage could be inflicted by choking off funding for programs that support the law, but a greater threat is the legal storm that's brewing.”

Her only expert, Dr. Atul Gawande, touted ObamaCare as “a toolbox.” Couric disingenuously described Gawande as merely “a surgeon at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston and an influential voice on health care policy.” In fact, Gawande, who toiled on Gary Hart’s 1984 presidential bid and then for Al Gore’s quest in 1988 before working in Bill Clinton’s 1992 effort, oversaw a team of 75 toiling on the Clinton administration’s health care task force in 1993-94.

Last year, he penned a piece for The New Yorker, “Watching the Health-Care Vote,” on how he brought his “fourteen-year-old son to see the vote on health reform” since it meant “hope has arrived.”

Gawande revealed: “I realized I was — for just this one day — jealous of the politicians swirling in and out of the chambers,” because:

[T]hey were going to take a final up or down vote on whether to embrace the principle in our country that if you are in medical need, you should be able to get quality health care without bankrupting yourself. And I was jealous of those who got to step onto the House floor, slide their identification cards into the electronic voting boxes, and, either way the tally went, make history.

The bill was not remotely the kind of socialist, government take over of medicine its opponents accused it of being…

The CBS Evening News story ended with Gawande’s assurance of ObamaCare’s potential if not ruined by opponents: “I have no question that we will discover ways that can control costs, improve quality of care for people. Whether we're going to take those lessons depends entirely on politics, and that's scary. That's the reality.”

(The CBSNews.com online version also failed to identify Gawande’s political work and belief in ObamaCare.)

Couric began by deriding the GOP/Tea Party agenda: “A move by House Republicans to repeal the law is going nowhere. Even so, they passed a resolution today directing House committees to get to work on new health reform legislation.”

After one reporter expressed despair at how many supposedly can’t afford health care, another CBS reporter benignly explained how HHS is now formulating a huge regulatory regime: “The job of implementing health care reform belongs to HHS, the Department of Health and Human Services, and they have an entire new division now to do that.”

Citing a poll, Couric relayed how “just 13 percent say they have seen any benefit, even though,” Couric stressed, “the most vulnerable are now protected.” But, she told viewers in pleading for them to give the law time, “it will take six more years to phase in all 91 of the law's major components.”

Couric soon worried “the law is vulnerable because of the complex way it tries to fold 30 million uninsured people into the system while getting a handle on costs. By 2019,” she seriously asserted, “the law is expected to save the economy $143 billion.”

Reporter Nancy Cordes described the GOP strategy: “One congressional expert that I spoke to put it this way: He said, ‘They're not going to be able to kill this bill. The best they can do right now is a series of flesh wounds.’”

To which, Couric flailed: “That damage could be inflicted by choking off funding for programs that support the law, but a greater threat is the legal storm that's brewing.”

“Threat,” not “opportunity.”

From the Thursday, January 20 CBS Evening News, transcript provided by the MRC’s Brad Wilmouth:

KATIE COURIC: And about the hot issue in Congress this week, 40 percent of Americans say the health care reform law should be repealed. That's down from 45 percent in November. A move by House Republicans to repeal the law is going nowhere. Even so, they passed a resolution today directing House committees to get to work on new health reform legislation. The vote was 253-175, with 14 Democrats joining the majority. In the meantime, the reform plan the President signed into law last year is starting to kick in. Where do things stand? Tonight we put that "In Focus."

---

   
BILL WHITAKER: We went to the Los Angeles Forum. We got there very early in the morning, around 2:30, 3:00, and already, there was a line of people. The point of the event was to provide free medical care to people in need.
       
COURIC: In all, more than 5,000. Ten months after the Affordable Care Act became law, many Americans still rely on charity like this. Implementing reform is just beginning.

WHITAKER: It was shocking. It was shocking to see that many people needing that level of care.

DR. ATUL GAWANDE, HARVARD SCHOOL OF PUBLIC HEALTH: I think the best way to understand the health reform package is that it is not a recipe for everything that's to be done but is, in fact, a toolbox.

COURIC: Atul Gawande is a surgeon at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston and an influential voice on health care policy.

GAWANDE: This is a rollout that doesn't even begin to produce insurance for people for three years.

COURIC: The key date is 2014. That's when every American not covered by employers must buy health insurance or pay a fine. This larger pool of insured Americans is essential to pay for the most ill and expensive patients. For the next three years, 17 of every 100 Americans will remain uninsured. That number should drop to nine in 2014.

GAWANDE: This is a long process.

COURIC: A process that requires turning a 900-page law that few people have actually read into a better health care system.

WYATT ANDREWS: The job of implementing health care reform belongs to HHS, the Department of Health and Human Services, and they have an entire new division now to do that.

COURIC: The concrete building on Independence Avenue is where the new coverage rules are being defined.

ANDREWS: There is a special interest lobbying frenzy going on right now over the definition of one word: essential. Is obesity treatment, is that essential? Infertility treatment?

COURIC: As the government sorts out those questions, Americans are still trying to figure out what the law means to them. In our latest poll, 56 percent say the law has not been explained well. Just 13 percent say they have seen any benefit, even though the most vulnerable are now protected.

JON LAPOOK, CBS NEWS MEDICAL COORESPONDENT: Children cannot be denied insurance because of a preexisting condition. At no age can insurance company cancel your insurance because you get sick. And children can be covered under their parents' policies up until the age of 26.

COURIC: A gap in Medicare coverage for drug costs is being closed, and experimental programs to reward doctors for better efficiency and outcomes are under way. But it will take six more years to phase in all 91 of the law's major components.

CHIP REID: And that's why the White House has its entire war room operation up and going again. They understand that part one was getting it passed. Part two is protecting it.

COURIC: The law is vulnerable because of the complex way it tries to fold 30 million uninsured people into the system while getting a handle on costs. By 2019, the law is expected to save the economy $143 billion. But the country's health care tab at that point will still reach $4.6 trillion, or 20 percent of the economy. That's compared to 17 percent now.

ANTHONY MASON: This law does more to address coverage than it does to address cost. And business's argument for years has been the problem is cost and that's what's killing our economy.

WHITAKER: Recently, the largest insurer in California, Blue Shield, announced that it was raising its premiums once again.

COURIC: Californians are not the only ones still being battered with jaw-dropping hikes.

WHITAKER: Many, many people thought that health care reform was going to stop these kinds of increases.

COURIC: Republican leaders are making sure that doesn't go unnoticed.

REP. MICHELE BACHMANN (R-MN): We will continue this fight until ObamaCare is no longer the law of the land.

NANCY CORDES: One congressional expert that I spoke to put it this way: He said, "They're not going to be able to kill this bill. The best they can do right now is a series of flesh wounds."

COURIC: That damage could be inflicted by choking off funding for programs that support the law, but a greater threat is the legal storm that's brewing.

JAN CRAWFORD: The future of health care reform could well hinge on legal issues, not political ones.

COURIC: More than 20 states are now suing the federal government over the rule that makes insurance coverage mandatory.

CRAWFORD: They say Congress simply exceeded its authority when it passed this wide-ranging law because it requires residents of all these states to actually buy insurance or face a tax.

COURIC: Court rulings in favor of the states may cripple reform.

CRAWFORD: So that storm is going to get stronger and build and build. It's going to get to the appeals courts, and eventually with, I think, the full force of a hurricane, it's going to hit the United States Supreme Court.

GAWANDE: I have no question that we will discover ways that can control costs, improve quality of care for people. Whether we're going to take those lessons depends entirely on politics, and that's scary. That's the reality.

COURIC: And for more on what's in the health care reform law and when the various changes take effect, you can go to cbsnews.com.

— Brent Baker is Vice President for Research and Publications at the Media Research Center. Click here to follow him on Twitter.

Monday's "Morning Joe" panel on MSNBC mocked the House Republicans' plan to vote to repeal President Obama's health care legislation in full. "Waste of time" and "meaningless legislative exercise" were some of the phrases used to describe the first announced GOP priority.

"It's going to take them fifteen minutes, they're going to vote to repeal it, and the Senate's not going to do it," explained co-host Joe Scarborough. "It is a meaningless legislative exercise, but you know what? The base will like it."

"Republicans in Washington are planning to waste some time. Is anyone surprised by that?" co-host Mika Brzezinski tersely introduced the segment in the 7 a.m. EDT news hour.

Both Scarborough and Brzezinski sarcastically mocked the plan. "Good for them. Thank you," Brzezinski spat. "You are big men," she derided the House Republicans. "You so tough," Scarborough chimed in, followed by Brzezinski making strange growling noises.
 

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Former New York City mayor Rudy Giuliani took on the ladies of "The View" along with their highly-partisan audience Wednesday in a post-election discussion about Sarah Palin, Barack Obama, and healthcare reform.

So strongly did most of those in attendance disagree with Giuliani that he ended saying "You don't get it" when they booed him for criticizing the President (video follows with partial transcript and commentary):

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For more thoughts on both videos make sure you check out this post on the Eyeblast Blog.

Todd, however, couldn’t avoid reporting that “the change that voters want” includes 54 percent who “hope that this Tea Party enthusiasm in the Republican Party makes them a fiscally conservative party” and “54 percent want to see the repeal of health care.” Plus, “42 percent tell us” the Tea Party movement has “been a good thing” – more than twice as many as see it as a “bad thing.”

Unmentioned by Todd or Williams: Those pro-Tea Party/anti-ObamaCare numbers came from a polling sample dominated by MSM television news consumers. Question 36, in the PDF rundown of the survey, asked from which “television news sources do you get MOST of your information about politics and current events?” From the list offered, 35 percent said “broadcast network news, such as NBC, ABC, or CBS,” 16 percent named “the cable channel CNN” and 8 percent affirmed they rely on “the cable channel MSNBC.” That adds up to 59 percent, compared to 24 percent who cited “the cable channel Fox News.”

Todd also couldn’t resist touting Bill Clinton’s popularity:

The most popular politician we tested in this survey – we tested the President, Sarah Palin, Newt Gingrich, you name it, Nancy Pelosi. Bill Clinton has his best ratings we’ve seen since he left office. Sort of nostalgia for the good old days may be helping the President.

From the top of the Tuesday, September 28 NBC Nightly News, transcript provided by the MRC’s Brad Wilmouth:

BRIAN WILLIAMS: Good evening. There is important news in what we’re about to show you because it may be evidence of a trend afoot right now. We are at this hour debuting a new NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll, and, while there is some good news here for the Democrats who may be worried about a bloodbath – sweeping losses at the upcoming midterm elections has been predicted – there is really bad news if you’re an incumbent officeholder of either party. The voters increasingly don’t want to hear it. They want something, someone else, and something new. Our NBC News political director, chief White House correspondent, Chuck Todd, here with us in New York to start us off tonight.

CHUCK TODD: Well, good evening, Brian. Look, we’re going to start with, of course, the number that everybody asks about five weeks before the election, and that is, this generic ballot question. Who’s up? Who’s down? Who do you prefer? Last month, it was a nine-point advantage for the Republicans – 49 percent to 40 percent. Now, among likely voters, that lead has shrunk down to six [actually three, 46 to 43]. The mood of the electorate hasn’t changed. They still want change. They don’t like the direction of the country. Democrats are starting to engage African-Americans and Hispanics. As Peter Hart – our Democratic pollster – put it, Democrats can’t change the landscape; they can change the turnout.

But one of the questions we wanted to ask here is: What is the change that voters want? What is this change that they want? Listen to this: 75 percent say that the result they’d like to see is reduced special interest influence; 70 percent tell us they want to elect political outsiders, even if they are inexperienced – whether we’re talking about Christine O’Donnell from Delaware or other folks like that – 54 percent hope that this Tea Party enthusiasm in the Republican Party makes them a fiscally conservative party; 54 percent want to see the repeal of health care. But what’s interesting here, they care about these things more than which party controls Congress. They want Washington to change the way they do business, not necessarily just change the color of the jerseys.

By the way, speaking of the Tea Party, it is the engine inside this Republican enthusiasm gap, 42 percent tell us it’s been a good thing. Even if they don’t agree with the Tea Party movement, they believe it’s been a good thing. Only 18 percent say it’s a bad thing.

By the way, speaking of big-name politicians, the most popular politician we tested in this survey – we tested the President, Sarah Palin, Newt Gingrich, you name it, Nancy Pelosi. Bill Clinton has his best ratings we’ve seen since he left office. Sort of nostalgia for the good old days may be helping the President.

WILLIAMS: Interesting results in this group of data.

By contrast, on Sunday Morning, CBS anchor Charles Osgood briefly recounted numbers from the AP poll which suggested that ObamaCare is unpopular. Osgood: "A poll commissioned by the Associated Press finds just 30 percent of Americans in favor of the new health care law, 30 percent are neutral, and 40 percent oppose it. Four out of 10 respondents say the new law doesn’t do enough to change the health care system."

Returning to NBC, Gregory did not comment directly on whether he believed the poll’s accuracy, as he argued that the Republican message may indeed be successful, and went on to raise the theory from the left that ObamaCare will become more popular as people benefit from it:

If the message is government’s out of control, they passed this huge entitlement, it’s going to cost a lot of money and have you felt the effects of it yet, I think that has the shot to be a winning political message. But the more people start to feel health care reform, so the argument goes, it will become more popular. But that has not exactly been the case across the board yet with health care reform, and that’s why the President has to keep hammering away at it.

Below is a transcript of the relevant portion of the Sunday, September 26, Sunday Morning on CBS, followed by the same day’s Today show on NBC:

#From the September 26 Sunday Morning on CBS:

CHARLES OSGOOD: A poll commissioned by the Associated Press finds just 30 percent of Americans in favor of the new health care law, 30 percent are neutral, and 40 percent oppose it. Four out of 10 respondents say the new law doesn’t do enough to change the health care system.

#From the September 26 Today show on NBC:

LESTER HOLT: The President in his weekly radio address, he talked about the Pledge for America, it’s the Republican pledge that they have released. One of the things they talked about was going after the health care, repealing the health care bill. But new polling out suggests that most people not only do they not want to, don’t want it repealed they want more added to it. Do Republicans have to refine this message and take a better look at it?

DAVID GREGORY: Well, I think that, from a political point of view, if the message is government’s out of control, they passed this huge entitlement, it’s going to cost a lot of money and have you felt the effects of it yet, I think that has the shot to be a winning political message. But the more people start to feel health care reform, so the argument goes, it will become more popular. But that has not exactly been the case across the board yet with health care reform, and that’s why the President has to keep hammering away at it.

HOLT: This Pledge for America, of course, many compare it to the contract from 1994. How does it differ?

GREGORY: Well, I mean, it is, it’s very similar. It lacks some specifics that the ‘94 contract had. But one thing that’s similar is that what’s more important than the Pledge to America, what’s more important than the Contract with America is the political climate in which they’re operating. The truth is it’s the unpopularity of President Obama and his policies right now that’s hurting democrats more than faith in the Republicans which, by the way, is an argument that the Presidents trying to exploit and say, look, the alternative is not the way to go here.

Andrew Breitbart on Friday exposed Bill Maher for not being the Libertarian he claims to be, but a socialist instead.

When push came to shove, a seemingly embarrassed Maher didn’t protest.

In the middle of a heated discussion on HBO’s "Real Time" about healthcare reform legislation passed earlier this year, Maher vehemently defended the program.

This led Breitbart to smartly observe, "So you’re officially not a Libertarian anymore, right? I mean, this position has run so far from the Libertarian position. Is this, so you admit that you have more of a, you know, European socialist leaning perspective on this issue?"

When the audience laughter subsided, a clearly stunned Maher acknowledged, "I’m not afraid to say European socialism works" (video follows with transcript and commentary): 

AMY HOLMES, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: In point of fact, Democrats did talk about healthcare endlessly. President Obama went out on the stump talking about, "Pass this bill, pass this bill." Bill Clinton said once it was passed it would become popular. Bill Clinton now, he confesses that he made a mistake, that it has not become more popular.

BILL MAHER, HOST: It’s been kicked in for two days…

HOLMES: It’s become less popular, and here’s why.

MAHER: …and most of it doesn’t kick in till 2014. Could we wait till people see it before we can judge whether it’s popular?

HOLMES: You’re asking why…

(AUDIENCE APPLAUSE)

MAHER: Please, sorry.

HOLMES: But you’re asking why Democrats are not campaigning on this. Because in the next 40 days with a bill that is hugely unpopular, it’s not good for their re-election process.

MAHER: It would be popular if they would talk about it. They could have, if they could stand up for what they believe they could have passed Medicare for all. That’s what they should have done. What they should have said is insurance companies have a million other things to insure. They insure your car and your house and if it rains and there’s a flood and an earthquake and Betty Grable’s legs and a million other things. They don’t need to also insure life. Life should be off the table.

HOLMES: They talked endlessly about it and their agenda was rejected by the American people, that’s a simple fact.

MAHER: Because they’re stupid.

And here’s where it got good. Readers are strongly advised to watch the video to see Maher’s expression when Breitbart nails him: 

ANDREW BREITBART: So you’re, you’re officially not a Libertarian anymore, right? I mean, this position…

MAHER: Well..

BREITBART: …has run so far from the Libertarian position. Is this, so you admit that you have more of a, you know, European socialist leaning perspective on this issue?

(AUDIENCE LAUGHTER)

BREITBART: Why is that funny?

The look on Maher’s face at this moment said it all: 

MAHER: I’m, I’m not afraid, it’s not, I’m not afraid to say European socialism works.

Exactly. Quite a strange position for a man that claims to be a Libertarian. 

In the end, Bill Maher has been hiding behind a Libertarian veil for years, but the reality is he’s liberal through and through.

No self-respecting Libertarian would support the government expansion Maher does. Far from it.

And on September 24, 2010, Andrew Breitbart exposed Maher for what he really is. 

Nicely done, Andrew. Bravo! 

Correspondent Sharyl Attkisson recounted the story of a man who has had trouble purchasing insurance for his daughter because of a preexisting condition, and then informed viewers of the disappointing news that she still will likely not be able to obtain insurance. After noting President Barack Obama’s promise to ban discrimination against children with preexisting health problem, Attkisson continued:

Now reality has set in. Insurers may be barred from refusing kids like Maria with preexisting conditions, but some have found a way around that – stop offering certain policies in the first place, the ones that cover a child instead of the whole family. Aetna, Anthem Blue Cross and Cigna are among the companies announcing that as early as tomorrow they’ll stop selling child-only policies in many states.

A soundbite of Robert Zirkelbach of America’s Health Insurance Plans later explained: "They’re going to have very, very high health care costs that are going to have to be borne out by everybody else who has health insurance. And that’s a system that’s simply not sustainable."

The September 21 Washington Post article "Some Insurers to Halt New Child-Only Policies," by N.C. Aizenman, further quoted Zirkelbach as arguing that selling to those with preexisting conditions "provides a very powerful incentive for a parent to wait until their child becomes very sick before purchasing coverage."

Aizenman further explained that "the pool of children insured by child-only plans would rapidly skew toward those with expensive medical bills, either bankrupting the plans or forcing insurers to make up their losses by substantially increasing premiums for all customers."

Below is a complete transcript of the report filed by Attkisson from the Wednesday, September 22, CBS Evening News:

KATIE COURIC: And it didn’t take long. The insurance industry has already found a way around that preexisting condition provision for children’s policies: Don’t sell any. And that could affect a half a million Americans under the age of 18. Sharyl Attkisson has that story.

SHARYL ATTKISSON: Auto technician Toby Serrano hoped health care reform would cure his family’s insurance ills. Daughter Maria has a history of brain procedures as a young child, a preexisting condition that’s keeping her from getting affordable health insurance. But the family was filled with hope by this unqualified promise:

PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA: Starting in September, some of the worst abuses will be banned forever. No more discriminating against children with preexisting conditions. Those days are over.

TOBY SERRANO, FATHER: When health reform passed, you know, it definitely saw a light at the end of the tunnel.

ATTKISSON: Now reality has set in. Insurers may be barred from refusing kids like Maria with preexisting conditions, but some have found a way around that – stop offering certain policies in the first place, the ones that cover a child instead of the whole family. Aetna, Anthem Blue Cross and Cigna are among the companies announcing that as early as tomorrow they’ll stop selling child-only policies in many states. That’s the very type of policy the Serranos were hoping to buy for Maria.

MARIA SERRANO: I feel bad for myself, but then I also think about everyone else.

ATTKISSON: It doesn’t affect anyone who now has insurance, but it does impact the families of an estimated half million children who might have wanted child-only policies. Now nonprofits like this one in the Serranos’ home state of Colorado worry they’ll have to pick up the slack.

DR. JOE CRAIG, THE ROCKY MOUNTAIN YOUTH CLINICS: A new stress, I guess, from the, you know, more demand out there for those that are uninsured. We could find ourselves in trouble.

ATTKISSON: Some insurers say they’d rather lose the small market of child-only policies altogether than be forced to cover kids with preexisting conditions.

ROBERT ZIRKELBACH, AMERICA’S HEALTH INSURANCE PLANS: They’re going to have very, very high health care costs that are going to have to be borne out by everybody else who has health insurance. And that’s a system that’s simply not sustainable.

ATTKISSON: We asked the insurance lobby to provide their numbers and projections as to just how expensive it can be to cover children with preexisting conditions, but they declined to provide any figures. Sharyl Attkisson, CBS News, Washington.

That’s how Newsweek’s Stuart Taylor Jr. today all but argued that, political ideology of the Supreme Court’s majority aside, a Supreme Court decision declaring unconstitutional the "individual mandate" of ObamaCare is quite unlikely.

But while Taylor may be right  that no signature presidential initiative post-New Deal has been declared unconstitutional by the Court on the grounds that it violated the interstate commerce clause, he neglected to mention there are two key cases in the past 15 years where the Supreme Court did set outer limits to Congress’s exploitation of the commerce clause as a fountain of federal power.

In 1995, a 5-justice majority in U.S. v. Lopez struck down a provision of the Gun Free School Zones Act of 1990 that made it a federal crime to possess a firearm in a school zone.

Chief Justice Rehnquist wrote for the Court that "the possession of a gun in a local school zone is in no sense an economic activity that might, through repetition elsewhere, have such a substantial effect on interstate commerce….  Nor is it an essential part of a larger regulation of economic activity, in which the regulatory scheme could be undercut unless the intrastate activity were regulated."

What’s more, Rehnquist noted (emphasis mine), "To uphold the Government’s contention that 922(q) is justified because firearms possession in a local school zone does indeed substantially affect interstate commerce would require this Court to pile inference upon inference in a manner that would bid fair to convert congressional Commerce Clause authority to a general police power of the sort held only by the States."

In other words, if the Court had accepted the government’s rationale in Lopez, it would paved the way to destroy what is supposed to be an enumerated, limited federal power into a broader "police power" that is reserved for the several states of the Union. 

Similar arguments regarding ObamaCare are certain to be made before the Supreme Court should the case get that far.

Five years later in United States v. Morrison, the Rehnquist Court drew on the precedent in Lopez to strike down a portion of the federal Violence Against Women Act — legislation championed by current Vice President and then-Delaware Senator Joe Biden — on the grounds that it was an improper application of the interstate commerce clause.

Wrote Rehnquist for the Court (emphasis mine):

The Constitution requires a distinction between what is truly national and what is truly local, and there is no better example of the police power, which the Founders undeniably left reposed in the States and denied the central government, than the suppression of violent crime and vindication of its victims. Congress therefore may not regulate noneconomic, violent criminal conduct based solely on the conduct’s aggregate effect on interstate commerce.

Both Lopez and Morrison were 5-to-4 cases, but they are relevant case law for the question of whether the ObamaCare individual mandate violates the interstate commerce clause by jury-rigging it into a police power-granting clause for Congress.