Is this country literally too stupid to live? Will Public Option be defeated by those who need it most?
August 17, 2009

 
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During Sunday’s political talkshows, the consensus appeared to be that “the Public Option is dead.” If so, I can guarantee you the healthcare lobbyists and special interests are dancing in their offices this morning, smelling victory in the air as a $173 million dollar effort to defeat healthcare reform pays off. Through a well-concerted effort of fear, demagoguery, and preying on the self-interests of politicians more worried about being re-elected than doing what’s right for the country, combined for a perfect storm to protect the outrageous profits of the heathcare industry. After all, we ARE talking about a $300 Billion dollar industry. When there’s that much money at stake, even the Federal Government can’t compete… which is ironic because one of their chief arguments against “the public option” is that the “poor widdle insurance companies would never be able to compete with the big bad government.”

President Obama’s HHS (“Health & Human Services”) Secretary, Kathleen Sebelius appeared on both ABC’s “This Week” and CNN to declare the Public Option is “not essential” to healthcare reform, suggesting the “co-op” compromise may be the closest we get to passing healthcare reform. (“Co-ops” are basically “non-profit” groups made up of individuals that pool their money together to pay for healthcare.) Problem is, no non-profit pool can possibly be big enough to control spiraling healthcare costs. The only way to do that is to give them government backing, which Richard Shelby (R-AL) said on Fox News Sunday was something he absolutely would not support. Republicans are opposed to ANY government involvement at all.

So just who is the “co-op compromise” meant to appease? The Blue Dogs. A small group off 11 (iirc) Conservative Democrats that were selected by the DNC to run against Republicans in long-held Republican strongholds in order to reach that much ballyhooed “60 vote Super Majority” (update: Blue Dog reform leader Kent Conrad admits a “co-op” would do almost nothing to bring down costs). But when you’ve got 11 Democrats that vote like Republicans on healthcare, you don’t have a super majority. In fact, you don’t have a “majority” at all. Suddenly, it’s 51 to 49 (Conservatives to Liberals/Progressives). Scratch Ted Kennedy and Richard Byrd (update: Sen. Chris Dodd who is being treated for cancer) who are out with health issues, and you don’t even have that. Meanwhile, Republicans like to “remind” everyone that “Democrats have a Super Majority, so Republicans should be seen as blameless” for whatever bad happens since Bush left office (Bush handed Obama several timebombs set to go off after Bush left office: The Recession and his unsustainable tax cuts, two wars, and the unfunded mandate of “Medicare Part-D”.)

Many healthcare reform opponents are being whipped into a frenzy by Special Interests harnessing the racism, paranoia, and just plain stupidity of Conservative voters to unwittingly work against their own interests. Meet Exhibit-A, Diane Campbell, 50, of Kingston, New Hampshire:
 

Hitler did to
(special mention for misspelling “too” and having to add the missing “O” by overwriting one of the exclamation points.)


Beside her is her daughter, Janet Dillon of Massachusetts, who tells reporters how proud she is of her mother for staying up all night to draw the “Obama as a Nazi Stormtrooper” image on their posters despite her mother’s poor health.
 

Obama as a Nazi Stormtrooper

 

You might be surprised (I doubt it) to learn that many of Ms. Campbell’s family owes their life to government healthcare:

Campbell suffers from hereditary autoimmune disease that is treated with expensive transfusions of gamma globulin, paid for by Medicare. Her sister, Louise, was born with no arms and one leg, and is also covered by Medicare, the government-run, health-insurance program for the elderly and disabled.

Imagine where these morons would be without dreaded “socialized medicine”?

“Adolf Hitler was for exterminating the weak, not just the Jews and stuff, and socialism — that’s what’s going to happen”, says Ms.  Campbell.

Ironically, “stupid” is both hereditary and incurable as well, neither of which can be fixed via any healthcare system known to man.
 

We learned recently that some of the loudest anti-reform critics are (wait for it) monster freakin’ hypocrites (bet’cha didn’t see that coming!) I know, it’s hard to believe, but it’s true. Sarah Palin, who started a fury on her Twitter feed, describing the “funding for end-of-life counseling” provision in the House healthcare bills as “Obama’s Death Panel”, supported “funding for end-of-life counseling” in April of last year when she proclaimed April 16th, “Healthcare Decisions Day”. No, I’m not making this up.

In 2003, when Republicans passed the totally unfunded “Medicare Part-D” provision to fulfill Candidate Bush’s 2000 campaign promise of adding “Prescription Drug coverage to Medicare” that actually made “negotiating lower prices” illegal, they included an “end-of-life counseling” provision to the bill. Senator Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), who is actually on the committee to reform healthcare, and repeated the claim that “voters have every right to fear” government involvement in “end-of-life counseling”, was one of the sponsors of the 2003 EoL provision. as was fellow Senator Orrin Hatch, who was asked about his support for EoL Counseling during his appearance on ABC’s “This Week”. (And you already know by now the inclusion of the provision was inserted into the Senate’s bill by Republican Sen. Johnny Isakson (R-GA) as a way to keep the government OUT of making EoL decisions for Americans, as it did in the Terri Schivo case a few years back.) Hatch then went on a screed about how “the public option” would put the insurance companies out of business (demonstrating where his true loyalties lie.)

Both Keith Olberman and Rachel Maddow (with some help from The Daily Show), caught some absolutely stunning hypocrisy… stunning if it weren’t par for the course for Wingnuts.

During last Friday’s Countdown, Keith spotlighted Newt Gingrich, who supported EoL Counseling just six months ago in a speech before the AEI, while Rush Limbaugh endorsed EoL Counseling on his radioshow (citing how much money it would save consumers), and perhaps most egregiously, Glenn Beck, who has been denouncing “Obama Care” for months as seeking to “destroy the best healthcare system in the world”, was singing a MUCH different tune in January of last year when he whimpered from his sick-bed that the hospital he went to… “the same hospital the President of GE goes to”… provided him with such poor care that he felt they “didn’t care” about “schlubs” like him. He deemed the entire experience “a real eye-opener”. I seriously believe Beck is on the verge of a mental breakdown. On display for tens of thousands of viewers each night, Beck exhibits wild mood swings, temper-tantrums, and acting out of murder fantasies, like some gawky teenager trying desperately to be liked by “the cool kids”. Viewers have a front-row seat to the slow-motion train wreck that is Glenn Beck.

Guest panelist Rachel Maddow on “Meet the Press” pointed out the fact that leading healthcare reform opponent, former Representative turned Healthcare Lobbyist, Dick Armey (R-TX), “considers Medicare to be tyranny” and opposes ALL government health programs, including Social Security. These are the people behind the opposition to healthcare reform. They’re behind the tea-baggers, the “birther” movement, and now the “Town Hall riots”.They’re the lunatic fringe…. and yet, they are steering the healthcare debate.
 

A frequent target of healthcare reform opponents is Great Brittan, who cite England’s NHS (“National Health Service”) as a prime example of “how bad Socialized Medicine is”. Several English women, critics of the NHS, were used in Republican anti-reform TV ads to support their contention. Problem is, the women in the ad DON’T want to kill the NHS, only “fix it”. I posted the following eye-opening BBC News clip over the weekend:
 

“I was duped” – Brits furious over GOP healthcare claims

 

The British, who are very proud of their healthcare system, are taking great offense at the constant disparaging remarks made by Republicans in the U.S. about their system, to the point where even Prime Minister Gordon Brown has started a campaign to defend the NHS from Republican attacks.

I truly believe that one of the reasons healthcare reform is so unpopular even among people who support “Social Security” and “Medicare” is because they fear that “Obama Care” will “destroy” those systems. They don’t understand that government has been providing healthcare for some 44 years now (the Medicare Act of 1965).
 

I started an online petition to “use Medicare as a platform for healthcare reform”. The infrastructure is already there. Simply expand it to provide general healthcare services, allow anyone of any age to “buy in” (helping to explain how it will be paid for) like any other insurance policy. And call it “MedicarePLUS so people know it’s based upon a system they are familiar with (and allay the fears of seniors worried about “losing their Medicare”.) Then let’s see how many Conservatives come out “against Medicare”.

Please visit the link above, sign my petition and forward the link to all your friends.
 

Conservatives are acting like rebellious teenagers (even that is generous. More like toddlers in their “terrible twos”). They bitch & moan, and threaten to hold their breath until they get their way. But NOTHING will appease them. Sometimes, you have to force a child to take their medicine because they refuse to do what’s good for them. And like any child, they’ll eat pizza and hamburgers for every meal, party all night and have “Cheerios with beer” for breakfast the next morning. Sometimes you have to force the medicine down their throat. They may fight you and throw a temper tantrum, but you do it because it’s for their own good. President Obama needs to stop trying to “work with” these rowdy teenagers and start laying down some tough-love.
 

ADDENDUM: About a month ago, I reported on here that “Global Warming would result in fewer mid-Summer hurricanes” because they “don’t like extreme heat”. The news is reporting how amazingly calm this hurricane season has been “up until now”. Suddenly, just as the peak of Summer (the first week in August) passes and temperatures start to fall rather than climb towards 100’+, not one but THREE tropical storms all appear in the Atlantic literally within hours of each other. And trust me, there’s plenty more where they came from. Sometimes you’ve just gotta say, “I told ya so!”
 


 

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August 17, 2009 · Admin Mugsy · 2 Comments - Add
Posted in: Healthcare, Politics, Rants

2 Responses

  1. fastfeat - August 17, 2009

    Good post. To answer the questions simply– Yes, and Yes. It’s over, I’m afraid. The MSM has played the stoopid of this country like a fiddle, no, like a banjo. Sadly, the lowest common denominator still determines our greatness.

    If only the woman who spent an entire night drawing the Hitler caricature had spent that time getting her tubes tied instead…

  2. fastfeat - August 17, 2009

    BTW, signed your petition and forwarded it to others. Maybe too late, but I agree that framing the issue has been done very poorly from the beginning. Rather surprising given how well the presidential campaign was run, but…

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