‘Puter’s been doing some thinking here, which is always dangerous. ‘Puter’s noted a disturbing connection between the Department of Justice’s witch hunt at the CIA and ObamaCare’s failure to address tort reform. Bear with ‘Puter for a minute.

Attorney General Eric Holder has launched an investigation to second-guess the conduct of CIA interrogators of terrorists during the early days of the War on Terror. Attorney General Holder claims that even if interrogators acted in accordance with orders from above, taking actions blessed by legal counsel, interrogators may still be personally and criminally liable.

On the ObamaCare front, President Obama and the Democrat Congress propose to mandate rationing of health care, leaving doctors no choice but to forgo tests and procedures doctors and patients may think beneficial. Yet ObamaCare does not require the rationing entity (government) to take legal responsibility for the government’s mandate to doctors to refuse certain treatments to patients. That is, even though doctors cannot legally provide the treatment, doctors remain liable in tort for failure to provide the impermissible treatment if the patient is harmed by the refusal.

In both instances, the government is leaving individuals open to liability (criminal and civil) for taking actions mandated by government at the time they were taken. How wacky is this? Well, here’s an cruddy illustrative analogy for you. ‘Puter likes to use union workers in his analogies because as we all know, all unions are in it for the children (who are our future).

Hank works on the GM truck line in the mythical failed state of Michiganistan. Hank’s been putting bumpers on GMC 1500s for 25 years, and is a few years short of retirement. Hank’s been an exemplary employee, attaching bumpers exactly in accordance with his superiors’ instructions. Hank’s never deviated even minutely form the designers’ specifications. One day, Hank learns that the bumpers he’s been installing are claimed to be substandard, and may or may not have contributed to injuries in auto accidents. GM redesigns the bumpers to be installed, and Hank keeps working for three more years. One day, the Michigan State Police show up at Hank’s house and arrest him for installing the allegedly defective bumpers. The next day, Hank is served with a civil lawsuit, attempting to hold him liable for injuries to thousands of people allegedly caused by the bumpers Hank’s installed.

“Crazy!”, you say. “Not really.”, replies ‘Puter.

Hank’s the CIA interrogator who did exactly as instructed, with legal imprimatur, who now is the subject of a liberal second guessing of War on Terror tactics. Hank’s also the doctor who can’t prescribe a treatment who is hung out to dry by the very government that prevents him from doing his job. (‘Puter knows the doctor/Hank analogy is weak because Hank is in trouble for his actions, while the doctor is in trouble for his inaction, but suspend your danged overly-literal mind for a minute here). President Obama’s chosen course pushes liability down onto people who are not culpable. This is not a formula for success in either national defense or health care reform.

The foreseeable consequences of the Obama Administration’s interrogation and health care policies are thus: (1) we will be less safe because our protectors will fear prosecution for doing their jobs, so the job will remain undone; and (2) we will be less healthy because there will be fewer doctors willing to risk their livelihoods for following the government’s arbitrary rationing rules.

Welcome to our brave, new world, Obama style.

'Puter

Always right, unless he isn’t, the infallible Ghettoputer F. X. Gormogons claims to be an in-law of the Volgi, although no one really believes this.

’Puter carefully follows economic and financial trends, legal affairs, and serves as the Gormogons’ financial and legal advisor. He successfully defended us against a lawsuit from a liquor distributor worth hundreds of thousands of dollars in unpaid deliveries of bootleg shandies.

The Geep has an IQ so high it is untestable and attempts to measure it have resulted in dangerously unstable results as well as injuries to researchers. Coincidentally, he publishes intelligence tests as a side gig.

His sarcasm is so highly developed it borders on the psychic, and he is often able to insult a person even before meeting them. ’Puter enjoys hunting small game with 000 slugs and punt guns, correcting homilies in real time at Mass, and undermining unions. ’Puter likes to wear a hockey mask and carry an axe into public campgrounds, where he bursts into people’s tents and screams. As you might expect, he has been shot several times but remains completely undeterred.

He assures us that his obsessive fawning over news stories involving women teachers sleeping with young students is not Freudian in any way, although he admits something similar once happened to him. Uniquely, ’Puter is unable to speak, read, or write Russian, but he is able to sing it fluently.

Geep joined the order in the mid-1980s. He arrived at the Castle door with dozens of steamer trunks and an inarticulate hissing creature of astonishingly low intelligence he calls “Sleestak.” Ghettoputer appears to make his wishes known to Sleestak, although no one is sure whether this is the result of complex sign language, expert body posture reading, or simply beating Sleestak with a rubber mallet.

‘Puter suggests the Czar suck it.