One Brick Short

It’s a simple, three-letter word and it’s spelled h-u-h with a question mark.

Huh?

Today’s Huh? includes tonight’s speech by President Obama in which he will damn the trillion-dollar deficit he inherited from the Bush Administration prior to creating one of his own with a $787 billion stimulus plan.

Huh?

According to the Associated Press, Obama will make it clear that the deficit is the one that President George W. Bush and the previous Congress left for him and which forced him to spend more money.  It seems you spend more money because you are in debt and dig the country out its economic big hole by way of the Center of the Earth.

Huh?

On the other hand, the economy sounds like a wheezing Hoover, so all bets are off. Maybe he knows what he’s doing. Of course, I said the same thing about Bush and Iraq.

But, wait, there’s more: Nadya Suleman, the woman who gave birth to octuplets, is unemployed, on welfare and has 14 children.

Huh?

Now the public that once loved her hates her. Scores of Web sites, according to the Associated Press, are denouncing the woman, making fun of her and even threatening her life and those of her publicists.

Huh?

Why does the public care? Leave the woman alone or help her out. Freakin’ get off your high horses and walk on the ground for awhile, quit tearing people down because they have issues—and lord knows the woman has issues— and deal with your own. You’ve got them, too, you know.

Geez.

And finally, the AP reports that Michael Cowen, the head of Active Solutions of Worthington, Ohio, duped customers into buying $8,000, 200-pound wheelchairs instead of lightweight Rascal-like scooters. He pleaded guilty Monday to conspiracy and health care fraud.

The government said Cowen’s company used television commercials between 2002 and 2005 to dupe people into buying the $8,000 motorized wheelchairs, when they thought they were buying 3-wheeled “freedom scooters.“

Huh?

How hard is it to tell the difference from a two-wheeled (OK, four) motorized wheelchair and a three-wheel Rascal? Apparently, very.

The company used the purchases to file Medicaid and Medicare claims worth nearly $26 million. His company sold several thousand wheelchairs in nine states, including Virginia, West Virginia and Ohio.

The man could be sentenced to up to 15 years. In a plea agreement, Cowen will forfeit $2.5 million and six vehicles.

Huh.