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April 29, 2010

Obama's Politicized Justice Department

By Ed Lasky

Another new example surfaces today of how Obama's Justice Department, under the leadership of Attorney General Eric Holder, is being used as a political tool. The Department has already been used to advance Democratic partisan plans (the egregious efforts to channel votes to Democrat candidates in Kinston, North Carolina), as a tool that allows voter intimidation by the New Black Panther Party to get a pass, as long as such intimidation furthers Democratic goals; as a tool that shields groups such as ACORN -- a group notorious for , among other actions, encouraging voter fraud to benefit Democrats from federal racketeering charges.

Now the DOJ will be used to force health care providers to abide by the "guidelines" laid down by the Obama administration regarding their actions (pricing, providing of care, standards). Gangster government indeed. Or government by extortion: toe the line or the DOJ or Big Brother will start the legal harassment. This is more than a veiled threat to America's health care providers: it is a sign that this administration will use all its tool to force companies and people to do its bidding.

The Boston Globe reports:

The US Department of Justice has opened a civil investigation into possible anticompetitive behavior by Partners HealthCare System Inc., the region's most powerful hospital and physician network.

In a letter sent to Partners and the state's three largest health insurers on April 19, investigators from the Justice Department's antitrust division demanded documents relating to Partners' "contracting and other practices in health care markets in Eastern Massachusetts.''

The letter, obtained by the Globe, said the probe sought to determine whether the practices violated the Sherman Antitrust Act, which bars companies from using their market power to limit trade or artificially raise prices. The parties were told to respond by May 19.
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