now, tracy, i don't know you, so i won't judge you. on the contrary, i want to help you. you see, we rational's (that's what i am. liberal, yes, but i base my views on rationality, not my political bent) do. we help people trapped in the poltical spectrum ease their minds about things they don't agree with, admittedly to limited success. and exactly what body WOULD you like controlling your freedoms, hmmm? Amana? Blue Cross? Metlife? ya see, or maybe you don't see, this is where this particular argument falls apart. it's the illusion of socialism and communism that has been created by right wing talking heads that has people spooked, not health care reform. it's sad, really, because alot of very intelligent people have been conned into opposing the first initiative since civil rights that will actually improve the quality of life of the american citizen. and that's what it is: a mass con perpetrated by your republican representatives and the conservative media. they conned you all by framing the debate in imaginary fantasy nightmare monsters like death panels, nazis, socialists, and black men with power. they dreamt up scary numbers with suffixes like "trillion" to sway you. they organized and gave themselves edgy names like "tea bagger" and "sarah palin".
i could go into the time not a decade ago when a president and his administration actually DID infringe upon our constitutional freedoms, but let's stick to the subject at hand.
alright, so you're frightened right now. i understand. change is scary, for sure, but so is surgery, and that can save your life. so let's ease your mind right now. this new law is not a socialist plot. there are no death wagons coming for grandma. there aren't any black suits monitoring your doctor visits. there are no government checkpoints that you have to carry papers for. now answer me this: at what point in this bill is a government run health care system proposed? i'll wait... oh, that's right, it isn't proposed in this bill! this is an INSURANCE reform bill, not a "government takeover of the health care system". all it does is tell Amana, and BCBS, and Metlife what they can't do to us, and what they must do for us.
you cannot do things without paying for them. it's funny, and i'm just observing here, how so few people from a certain side of the political spectrum were critical of the reckless way the previous administration spent money. it's even a bit shocking that nobody from a certain side of the political spectrum, and again this is just an observation, seemed to be outraged with the anti-regulatory policies enacted by the previous administration that led to the mess that the current regime had to clean up. you can't blame the current owner for the way the previous owner left the house. had the country not been bleeding money over the past decade due to poor balance of trade's, bubble economics, and a seeming aversion to creating new revenue streams, maybe we wouldn't have felt the need to pass that ghastly bailout. if the past decade hadn't been spent in a collection of wars that proved to be money pit's, not to mention where victory is an improbability, perhaps our deficit wouldn't be in the trillions.
Tracy, my dear, change is scary for all of us. i must admit that even I am not 100% sold on what has passed, but i know one thing for sure: i'd rather have an imperfect reform bill than a for profit health baron deciding my fate. give it time, my dear, give it time.
Showing posts with label health care. Show all posts
Showing posts with label health care. Show all posts
Tuesday, March 23, 2010
Friday, August 21, 2009
game changers
so apparently america's pissy little children of politics, the republican party, can't get it through their fuckin heads that they had their turn and its time to share. apparently according to many republican senators, and confirmed by rachel maddow, the democrats need to get 75 or 80 votes to pass health care. so i decided to inquire into which orifice these people (and i use that term loosely) unceremoniously yanked this 80% requirement. considering the us constitution requires a mere majority (51 votes or fifty and Joe Biden) hell, dems even conceded to the republicans the filibuster which requires a 60 vote majority to overturn, then proceded to put baby in a corner by winning 60 senate seats (yay al franken!). okay so where in the blue crossed/blue shielded hell did they come up with a 75-80% majority... as a launching point? so i checked the constitution and nowhere does it require more than majority. checked the ammendments: no 75% senate vote for bill ratification ammendment (though the 20th changed the dates of terms). checked case law precedent: found results about indonesian vendors, corporate business contracts, and senator vivian davis figures but no 75 vote majority in the senate. i was perplexed, and a little dejected. would a political party really have no precedent for such an outrageous figure?
then it dawned on me like dish detergent on a greasy pan: they don't want this bill to pass at all!! it's always bugged me that this rebel party would always seem to undermine the best interest of the people they claim to serve if it would increase their power, or, worse, just to stick it to the dems. they're like that kid who got told to sit out, so they kicked the ball into the neighbors yard. this is party that would rATHER HURT EVERYBODY THAn let the other guys win. you know those movies where the bad guy gets his ass kicked, and rather than just accept that his ass is kicked, he hits the self destruct button and takes everybody down with him? that's the republican party right now, and that's exactly what will happen if health care is defeated. but the pussy dems look lie they're going to sit back and let this affront on american politics slide! well i wont. those who are responsible for concocting this cockamamie scheme, this albatross, this unicorn of 75 senate votes as a requirement to pass health care must be set straight. they have to be forced to accept that they can't cheat us out of our necessities. besides the system is set up so that changes can take place, we oughta use it. so here's my proposal: every republican calling for a fillibuster on health care, or for a ridiculous majority, or for some bs bipartisan bill must write "universal health care is not a socialist conspiracy" over 1000 pages. and anyone who falls for any of the bs surrounding this issue (death panels and what not) must eat their words before the can become a real people like you and me, dear reader. after all, anything that tastes so gnarly must be good for you. and god knows they need to eat right, i mean, it's not like they have health care.
ps, check this out
then it dawned on me like dish detergent on a greasy pan: they don't want this bill to pass at all!! it's always bugged me that this rebel party would always seem to undermine the best interest of the people they claim to serve if it would increase their power, or, worse, just to stick it to the dems. they're like that kid who got told to sit out, so they kicked the ball into the neighbors yard. this is party that would rATHER HURT EVERYBODY THAn let the other guys win. you know those movies where the bad guy gets his ass kicked, and rather than just accept that his ass is kicked, he hits the self destruct button and takes everybody down with him? that's the republican party right now, and that's exactly what will happen if health care is defeated. but the pussy dems look lie they're going to sit back and let this affront on american politics slide! well i wont. those who are responsible for concocting this cockamamie scheme, this albatross, this unicorn of 75 senate votes as a requirement to pass health care must be set straight. they have to be forced to accept that they can't cheat us out of our necessities. besides the system is set up so that changes can take place, we oughta use it. so here's my proposal: every republican calling for a fillibuster on health care, or for a ridiculous majority, or for some bs bipartisan bill must write "universal health care is not a socialist conspiracy" over 1000 pages. and anyone who falls for any of the bs surrounding this issue (death panels and what not) must eat their words before the can become a real people like you and me, dear reader. after all, anything that tastes so gnarly must be good for you. and god knows they need to eat right, i mean, it's not like they have health care.
ps, check this out
Wednesday, August 12, 2009
i cannot remain silent
"...And what country can preserve its liberties, if its rulers are not warned from time to time, that this people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take arms. The remedy is to set them right as to the facts, pardon and pacify them. What signify a few lives lost in a century or two? The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time, with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is its natural manure."
those words are from our favorite slave-owning, slave-screwing founding father thomas jefferson. they are in reference to the necessity of waging war against the british if the colonies wanted their independence ("colonies" is a minor misnomer, but that's for another blog). what they were not in reference to was the citizenry protesting necessary reform. of course that means someone out there is going to interpret them that way. i think we can forget the fuck-up of the week awards for the rest of 2009 and just give it to this guy William Kostric. for those who dont know, kostric is the chump who carried a sidearm to an obama health care "town hall" along with a sign reading "it's time to water the liberty tree" hmm... sound familiar? it's a reference to the jeffersonian "the tree of liberty must be refreshed with the blood of tyrants and patriots" bit. now lets put two and two together. a man wearing a pistol with a sign that calls for the blood of tyrants (three guesses who that is) at an obama rally. raise any eyebrows 'round yer way? if it dosen't perhaps this interview will:
now if a man with a gun at a presidential event carrying a sign that calls for blood that sounds as blah about it as this dickwad doesn't raise your tim mcvey/david rudolph meter to at least 8 (mines at 11, but im a nervous nellie) you're effn whacked. by the way, Cenk Uygur, Host of The Young Turks, compared this guy to mcvey in his huffington post blog. he also raised an interesting quandary: what if two, ten of these assholes show up at the next obama function? will people think its so harmless then?
speaking of harmless, one media outlet had the audacity to defend kostric's actions because they were legal. cbs.com blogger Declan McCullagh wrote a blog that had the gall to chastise the news media for condemning the action. his blog
"Gun-Toting Man Draws Scrutiny Outside Obama Town Hall" defends kostric's actions saying:
"New Hampshire state law is pretty clear about protecting its citizens' rights to carry firearms in public. Carrying a pistol or revolver openly is permitted without a license; carrying a concealed weapon requires a license from the state or local police.
William Kostric took advantage of that law on Tuesday to show up outside President Obama's Portsmouth, N.H. town hall meeting and hold a sign saying "It Is Time To Water The Tree Of Liberty." That invokes a phrase from a letter written by Thomas Jefferson: "The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants."
note a few things about that opening: he mentions a new hampshire state law allowing people to carry guns openly, which kostric was. only he NEVER MENTIONS THAT KOSTRIC HAD A GUN! in fact i looked up new hampshire's gun laws.
Carry
It is unlawful to carry a loaded handgun in any vehicle or concealed about one's person without a license.
Exceptions to the above prohibition are:
* Carrying in one's dwelling, house or place of business.
* Law enforcement and military personnel when on duty.
* Organizations authorized by law to purchase or receive firearms.
A person may carry a handgun openly upon his person or unloaded and exposed or locked up in a vehicle without a license to carry.
looking at the law, it allows for a person to carry a hand gun openly, no arguments the bastard didn't break any laws. i never am one to advocate against our constitutional rights.
but this isn't about rights. this is about the meaning of the message and the possible affects of it. when you brandish symbols that advocate the murder of people, in this case the tyrant, grand-lord emir obama, and brandish a weapon you go beyond the realm of public discourse and into other territory. true, it's not as flashy as a burning cross or as auspicious as a hanging effigy, or even as blunt as a swastika painted on david scott's office door but the message is clear. you want to kill this tyrant.
and that, my dear mccullagh, is what these pundits that you take such joy in chastising are bitching about. which brings me to this quote:
"you'd hope that television commentators would take the time to learn at least a little before calling for measures such as court injunctions and disarming by police"
well, i'm sure chris matthews does his homework, but he ain't debunking the law. he's talking about the message that this incident sends. speaking of the law, here's mccullagh's final argument:
"... a lawsuit filed last week in Washington, D.C. seeks to establish a broad Second Amendment right to carry firearms in public -- which, if successful, could mean that William Kostric's exercise in public handgun ownership will become much more commonplace. "
let's dissect mr. mccullagh's statement. for one thousands of lawsuits are filed daily. using a filed lawsuit to expand a law as evidence to support the actions of this man is tantamount to defending charles manson because he never actually committed those murders. legal or not, these actions SHOULD raise red flags in the eyes of any reasonable person. you don't bring a firearm to a political rally, ESPECIALLY if that politician is the first balck president, period, notwithstanding if you're holding a sign that calls for blood. given our nations history with race relations, in which the two biggest black civil rights leaders and the president that heard their call to action were assassinated, you gotta wonder how this guy thought his display would be taken.
next, its a little presumptuous to assume that a successful case WILL prompt people to carry firearms to all manner of public forums again (i can't wait to see guns in school and .22 totin' preachers). lets face it: court decisions, even highly publicized ones, take time to catch on. hell, after the Brown v. board of education decision was publicized, 9 of the millions of black students in the country integrated a school. it took years (and the national guard, and a few additional court rulings)for integration to complete itself. and this is one of the biggest court decisions ever. so fie on your logic mccullagh!
those words are from our favorite slave-owning, slave-screwing founding father thomas jefferson. they are in reference to the necessity of waging war against the british if the colonies wanted their independence ("colonies" is a minor misnomer, but that's for another blog). what they were not in reference to was the citizenry protesting necessary reform. of course that means someone out there is going to interpret them that way. i think we can forget the fuck-up of the week awards for the rest of 2009 and just give it to this guy William Kostric. for those who dont know, kostric is the chump who carried a sidearm to an obama health care "town hall" along with a sign reading "it's time to water the liberty tree" hmm... sound familiar? it's a reference to the jeffersonian "the tree of liberty must be refreshed with the blood of tyrants and patriots" bit. now lets put two and two together. a man wearing a pistol with a sign that calls for the blood of tyrants (three guesses who that is) at an obama rally. raise any eyebrows 'round yer way? if it dosen't perhaps this interview will:
now if a man with a gun at a presidential event carrying a sign that calls for blood that sounds as blah about it as this dickwad doesn't raise your tim mcvey/david rudolph meter to at least 8 (mines at 11, but im a nervous nellie) you're effn whacked. by the way, Cenk Uygur, Host of The Young Turks, compared this guy to mcvey in his huffington post blog. he also raised an interesting quandary: what if two, ten of these assholes show up at the next obama function? will people think its so harmless then?
speaking of harmless, one media outlet had the audacity to defend kostric's actions because they were legal. cbs.com blogger Declan McCullagh wrote a blog that had the gall to chastise the news media for condemning the action. his blog
"Gun-Toting Man Draws Scrutiny Outside Obama Town Hall" defends kostric's actions saying:
"New Hampshire state law is pretty clear about protecting its citizens' rights to carry firearms in public. Carrying a pistol or revolver openly is permitted without a license; carrying a concealed weapon requires a license from the state or local police.
William Kostric took advantage of that law on Tuesday to show up outside President Obama's Portsmouth, N.H. town hall meeting and hold a sign saying "It Is Time To Water The Tree Of Liberty." That invokes a phrase from a letter written by Thomas Jefferson: "The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants."
note a few things about that opening: he mentions a new hampshire state law allowing people to carry guns openly, which kostric was. only he NEVER MENTIONS THAT KOSTRIC HAD A GUN! in fact i looked up new hampshire's gun laws.
Carry
It is unlawful to carry a loaded handgun in any vehicle or concealed about one's person without a license.
Exceptions to the above prohibition are:
* Carrying in one's dwelling, house or place of business.
* Law enforcement and military personnel when on duty.
* Organizations authorized by law to purchase or receive firearms.
A person may carry a handgun openly upon his person or unloaded and exposed or locked up in a vehicle without a license to carry.
looking at the law, it allows for a person to carry a hand gun openly, no arguments the bastard didn't break any laws. i never am one to advocate against our constitutional rights.
but this isn't about rights. this is about the meaning of the message and the possible affects of it. when you brandish symbols that advocate the murder of people, in this case the tyrant, grand-lord emir obama, and brandish a weapon you go beyond the realm of public discourse and into other territory. true, it's not as flashy as a burning cross or as auspicious as a hanging effigy, or even as blunt as a swastika painted on david scott's office door but the message is clear. you want to kill this tyrant.
and that, my dear mccullagh, is what these pundits that you take such joy in chastising are bitching about. which brings me to this quote:
"you'd hope that television commentators would take the time to learn at least a little before calling for measures such as court injunctions and disarming by police"
well, i'm sure chris matthews does his homework, but he ain't debunking the law. he's talking about the message that this incident sends. speaking of the law, here's mccullagh's final argument:
"... a lawsuit filed last week in Washington, D.C. seeks to establish a broad Second Amendment right to carry firearms in public -- which, if successful, could mean that William Kostric's exercise in public handgun ownership will become much more commonplace. "
let's dissect mr. mccullagh's statement. for one thousands of lawsuits are filed daily. using a filed lawsuit to expand a law as evidence to support the actions of this man is tantamount to defending charles manson because he never actually committed those murders. legal or not, these actions SHOULD raise red flags in the eyes of any reasonable person. you don't bring a firearm to a political rally, ESPECIALLY if that politician is the first balck president, period, notwithstanding if you're holding a sign that calls for blood. given our nations history with race relations, in which the two biggest black civil rights leaders and the president that heard their call to action were assassinated, you gotta wonder how this guy thought his display would be taken.
next, its a little presumptuous to assume that a successful case WILL prompt people to carry firearms to all manner of public forums again (i can't wait to see guns in school and .22 totin' preachers). lets face it: court decisions, even highly publicized ones, take time to catch on. hell, after the Brown v. board of education decision was publicized, 9 of the millions of black students in the country integrated a school. it took years (and the national guard, and a few additional court rulings)for integration to complete itself. and this is one of the biggest court decisions ever. so fie on your logic mccullagh!
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