Through the Megaphone-

Hey Progressives, weren't you listening?
As President Obama's decision about America's continued involvement in Afghanistan became increasingly imminent, I have heard many angry and angst-filled progressives complaining  on the radio and on television about the prospect of the president sending more troops to Afghanistan. Even Keith Olberman sternly pontificated.  As anticipation of the decision increased, many of these people act as if a decision to increase troops would be a betrayal of their vote. I find this attitude interesting because throughout his campaign, President Obama consistently stated that he would increase the troops in Afghanistan. On August 1, 2007,in Washington, D.C., then-Senator Obama made the following remarks:

"And so, a little more than a year after that bright September day, I was in the streets of Chicago again, this time speaking at a rally in opposition to war in Iraq. I did not oppose all wars, I said. I was a strong supporter of the war in Afghanistan. But I said I could not support "a dumb war, a rash war" in Iraq."

"It is time to turn the page. When I am President, we will wage the war that has to be won, with a comprehensive strategy with five elements: getting out of Iraq and on to the right battlefield in Afghanistan and Pakistan; developing the capabilities and partnerships we need to take out the terrorists and the world's most deadly weapons; engaging the world to dry up support for terror and extremism; restoring our values; and securing a more resilient homeland."

"The first step must be getting off the wrong battlefield in Iraq, and taking the fight to the terrorists in Afghanistan and Pakistan."

"As President, I would deploy at least two additional brigades to Afghanistan to re-enforce our counter-terrorism operations and support NATO's efforts against the Taliban. As we step up our commitment, our European friends must do the same, and without the burdensome restrictions that have hampered NATO's efforts. We must also put more of an Afghan face on security by improving the training and equipping of the Afghan Army and Police, and including Afghan soldiers in U.S. and NATO operations."

Obama made similar remarks on September 12, 2007 in Clinton, Iowa:

"Osama bin Ladin and his top lieutenants have rebuilt a new base in Pakistan where they freely train recruits, plot new attacks, and disseminate propaganda. The Taliban is resurgent in Afghanistan."

"When we end this war in Iraq, we can finally finish the fight in Afghanistan. That is why I propose stepping up our commitment there, with at least two additional combat brigades and a comprehensive program of aid and support to help Afghans help themselves."

On August 19, 2008, Obama said the following in a speech at the VFW National Convention in Orlando, Florida:

"Ending the war will allow us to invest in America, to strengthen our military, and to finish the fight against al Qaeda and the Taliban in Afghanistan and the border region of Pakistan. We must also recognize that we cannot succeed in Afghanistan or secure America as long as there is a terrorist safe-haven in northwest Pakistan. A year ago, I said that we must take action against bin Laden and his lieutenants if we have them in our sights and Pakistan cannot or will not act.


"Six years ago, I stood up at a time when it was politically difficult to oppose going to war in Iraq, and argued that our first priority had to be finishing the fight against Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda in Afghanistan."


"Ending the war will allow us to invest in America, to strengthen our military, and to finish the fight against al Qaeda and the Taliban in Afghanistan and the border region of Pakistan.  And as Commander-in-Chief, I will have no greater priority than taking out these terrorists who threaten America, and finishing the job against the Taliban."

Not only was President Obama on the record as being in support of sending more troops to Afghanistan for several years before his election, he campaigned on it. If he announces that he is going to send additional troops as is widely speculated, he is doing exactly what the he told us he would do. So, I don't understand this feeling of surprise and betrayal in the progressive community. Did they not listen to his speeches? Did they misunderstand? Did they purposely ignore it? Did they think that he did not mean what he said?

OMG! Do these people actually vote?!

This would be amusing if it was not so sad and scary.  This is clear and convincing evidence that we have a block of people (voters? I hope not!) who are uninformed, but pick up catch phrases from conservative talk shows and throw them around without knowing what they mean.  This is also an indictment of our educational system because they did not teach these people how to pick up a newspaper and read it, or how to find news on the Internet.  Most important, they did not teach critical thinking. 

The Time Is Now

We must press on!

I have not heard of any corporations lining up in support of the proposed health care reform legislation. In fact, they have been spending millions of dollars paying off republicans and "blue dog" democrats to do their bidding for them, financing commercials and staging demonstrations at town hall meetings and elsewhere to spread their lies in an effort to defeat the legislation. Unless the government takes action with a strong public option, there will be no competition for the insurance companies and they will continue to strangle us all. Without a public option in place, their will be no motivation for the industry to bring down costs. If we don't do this now, there may never be another chance in our lifetimes. Every day we wait, more people die because they do not have health insurance coverage. Every day that we waste battling, the chances that we will ever have effective change get smaller and people continue to die. Rolling back the Bush tax cuts will go a long way toward paying for the changes.

***The Presiding Pundit is back after several weeks of absence due to illness.  Thanks to Brooklyn Beagle for making sure the blog did not die from lack of entries during  this time.

Still sizzling

Here is a recent e-mail exchange that took place among Presiding Pundit's relatives. I changed the names to protect the innocent . . . and the guilty.

----- Original Message -----
From: Dash
Sent:  Saturday, November 21, 2009 9:54 PM
Subject: healthcare
As much as I would like to support Obama on healthcare reform, this bill is 2074 pages of misguided crap.  It disingenuously claims not to raise the deficit, but does so through accounting trickery:
1. it accounts for two years of increased revenue via hiked taxes before subsidies kicks in.  If you adjust the revenue and spending to start at the same time, it is not revenue neutral.
2. In order to get doctors to support it, it prevents scheduled cuts in Medicare payments, but does so by moving the $274 billion in costs into a different bill to hide the issue.
Mainly, it focuses on expanding coverage to the poor yet does nothing to control the ridiculous costs of the existing system. Rather, Obama should focus on cutting costs of the system first. Instead, we are now adding millions of people onto a taxpayer supported system with artificially high costs that benefits lawyers, doctors, insurance and pharmaceuticals. The system sucked long before Obama came to office, but he needs to not add more people onto a broken system. These are real reasons why the democratic bill is crap.  Most of the reasons put forth by the republicans on why the bill is bad (supposed lost jobs, gov't run healthcare, etc) are also disingenuous and false.
Here's the -- http://democrats.senate.gov/reform/patient-protection-affordable-care-act.pdf
 
From: Kit
Sent: Sun, November 22, 2009 7:59:33 AM
Subject: Re: healthcare
You obviously have not been reading the Wilsonville Pundit.  Presiding Pundit and Brooklyn Beagle have espoused the health care reform bill with great wisdom - basically, it doesn't matter how much it costs, do it.

From: Dash
Sent: Sun, Nov 22, 2009 10:23 AM
Subject: Re: healthcare
Yep, I can understand the desire for healthcare reform and to fix the terrible existing system.  It's a good idea. The problem is that the order in which reform happens is important. They need to bring costs under control before adding 30-40 million more people to the system. We can't bring the wasted money on the Iraq war into this.  It's irrelevant, as the old saying goes, two wrongs don't make a right!

From: Presiding Pundit
Sent: Mon, November 23, 2009 6:48:41 AM
Subject: Re: healthcare
I have not had a chance to read the entire bill, but the Congressional Budget Office did they actually gave it a good rating.  Here is their report: http://www.cbo.gov/ftpdocs/107xx/doc10731/Reid_letter_11_18_09.pdf

We have a very small window of time in which to get this done.  If we don't do it now, the republicans and health insurance companies will make sure it will never get done.  I don't care how much it costs, it is necessary.  It is the moral thing to do.  We should be ashamed as a country that we have not done this until now.  All of the other western countries have universal health care.  Due to greed, we are the lone holdout.  I don't think that one can ignore the money spent on the Iraq war, all of the money that went into the pockets of Dick Cheney and his friends and how we almost lost our freedoms because of their assault on our constitutional rights.  The people who supported and voted for Bush/Cheney TWICE are the same people who rant, rave and lie (or are eager to believe the lies) about Barak Obama and the Democrats' efforts to provide good quality health care to all Americans.  According to Harvard Medical School researchers, 45,000 people per year (that's one person every 12 minutes) die due to lack of adequate health care because they do not have insurance.  No matter what the cost, we do not have the moral right to refuse to change a system that sees fit to let people die due to lack of health insurance. 

From: George
Sent: Mon. November 23, 2009 9:01 AM
Subject: Re: healthcare
I intend to organize and track local, state and federal officials that vote "yes" or "present" to any part of this stupid idiotic spending spree and, accordingly, oppose in any and every way possible their continuation in public office.  These people have to be stopped.  We can't community organize and spend our way out of this mess.  Stop the spending; send the special interest groups, unions, bleeding heart AH insurance companies and, especially, the ever loving litigating Washington lawyers to hell.  I am serious.  I hate them all.  I do not trust anyone right now. Not even Sarah and particularly anyone that claims they are a democrat or republican.

From: Dash
Sent: Mon, November 23, 2009 9:45:08 AM
Subject: Re: healthcare
By adding on tens of millions to the existing system, it will only make service worse and pump more money into the doctors, insurance and legal industries. This makes them more powerful and means that it will be even harder to control costs in the future.  Why else would the corporations be lining up behind this bill?  It funnels taxpayer money, which we will have to borrow at high rates, to these industry groups by way of 30-40 million people who otherwise couldn't afford it. Instead, wouldn't it be better to get the skyrocketing costs down first, and then afterward move to implement broad coverage?  To me they have this backwards. It's akin to guaranteeing everyone the right to subsidized gasoline when prices are $5 a gallon.

What's all the screaming about ?!

$1.1 Trillion over 10 years for a national health care plan that covers everyone – WHAT IS EVERYONE SCREAMING ABOUT? We've already spent $1 Trillion on the Iraq and Afghan wars and plan to spend $2-3 Trillion before they're over, if they're ever over. Brooklyn Beagle thinks that anyone who wants to spend more on Iraq and Afghanistan than on the health and well-being of this country's citizens should be voted out of office. We need to spend so much on health care in this country that we CANNOT AFFORD to fuel a war in another part of the world.

Howling,
Brooklyn Beagle