What about ME??!

The Democrats are the party of  "we."
The Republicans, however, are the party of  "me. me. me. me. me. me. I don't care that these unemployed people have steadily worked hard all their lives, can't find jobs, have gone through their savings and are losing their homes to foreclosure.  I don't care that children don't have health care.   Who cares about these old people on Social Security?  What about me?!  Me, me, me??!  Screw everybody else, I want MY tax break!"

Thank you Harry Reid!

I have been very critical of Senate Majority  Leader Harry Reid's lack of backbone due to his failure to stand up to the Republicans and or to use his pulpit to push through legislation. Well, this week, Senate Democrats led by Harry Reid stood up to Republicans in a big way. After weeks of Republicans blocking the Wall Street reform bill, Majority Leader Reid called their bluff by threatening to require votes throughout the night so the filibustering senators could not go home. He also called them on their obstructionism and exposed them for siding with the big banks by making statements to the press such as: 

• "The games of stalling are over";
• "All the talk by Republicans about wanting to do something about this bill before it gets on the floor is really anti-Senate, anti-American.  It appears they're more concerned about taking care of the fat cats on Wall Street"; 
• When asked about the finance bill and the moderate Republicans, he replied, "There aren't any.."  

and he won!  MoveOn.org is circulating a thank you card.  As they said, it would have been easy to give in, cut a deal and weaken reform. But this time, Senator Reid and the Democrats did the right thing, and we should thank them. I signed this 'Thank You' card.  Please take a minute, click on the link below and sign the card!
http://pol.moveon.org/thanksreiddems/?r_by=20102-4265401-T2eVwVx&rc=paste

A Slip of the Republican Tongue

The Republicans on the Senate Finance Committee argued for additional time to read the Baucus health care bill before voting on it.  Although they asked for 72 hours, the work and procedures arising out of that time could add up to three weeks to the process, according to press accounts.  I note that none of the Republicans cared to read George Bush's Patriot Act and they ignored similar requests by Democrats for more time to review.  In fact,  the Republican leadership forced it through to a floor vote in the House in just one day. 

In support of the Republicans' request to delay the health care bill, Sen. Pat Roberts (R-Kansas), revealed that the  Republicans did not ask for the time so that the senators and/or their staff members could read the bill, but so the insurance lobbyists  could read the bill and have time to come up with additional roadblocks.  Mike Madden at Salon.com reports that Roberts stated the following:

All the Senator from Kentucky is asking is for 72 hours to determine the cost. Senator Snowe has spoken eloquently about sunshine, and the openness, and the fact that the American people would support this 90 percent, 95 percent. But the thing that I’m trying to point out is we would have at least 72 hours for the people that the providers have hired to keep up with all of the legislation that we pass around here, and the regulations that we pass around here, to say “hey, wait a minute. Have you considered this?” 

oops.

Terrorism-

Legitimized?? 

We are in crazy-town folks!  That is where we must be living if a U.S. congressman can get away with publicly endorsing a constituent's pronouncement that he (the constituent) is a terrorist! 

Remember when there were cries from the right to arrest anti-war protesters for terrorism and jail them for up to 25 years  because they were disrupting traffic?  (See Oregon Senate Bill 742, which was considered but not passed in 2003. It defined a terrorist as a person who "plans or participates in an act that is intended, by at least one of its participants, to disrupt" business, transportation, schools, government, or free assembly.)   Republicans have conveniently forgotten that they are against terrorism.

In case you missed it, Rep. Wally Herger (R-CA) held a town hall meeting last week during which Bert Stead,  a tea-partier and birther (read lun-a-tic) declared himself to be a "proud right-wing terrorist."  Herger then looked around the room, smiled and nodded his head in approval.  Following the confessed terrorist's ant-Obama and  anti-government remarks, Herger said, "Amen. God bless you.  There's a great American!"  In response to criticism in the media, Herger's office released the following statement: "Congressman Herger stands by his statement in support of his constituent.  Mr. Bert Stead is a taxpayer and veteran, who, like so many others, is rightfully fed up with being called 'un-American', or 'extremist' or a 'political terrorist' by liberals in Washington, for simply exercising his First Amendment rights. Mr. Stead served his country and therefore he is a great American. The Congressman doesn't at all regret commending him for standing up, exercising his free speech rights, and expressing his strong concerns with the direction liberals in Washington are taking our country."

Didn't Stead call himself a "proud right wing terrorist?"  If he calls himself a terrorist, why is he fed up with other people calling him a terrorist?  And, substitute left wing for right wing, switch Herger with Barney Frank, and the Republicans would be screaming for the Democrats to condemn the congressman, for the congressman's resignation and for a full investigation of him for aiding and abetting terrorism!  Did we hear any such demands from the Rs on this one?  Nope.  Not a peep.

Obsessed

It must seem that I am obsessed about health care reform and the public option. At this time, I may be. But, the sleazy manipulation of the public by the Republicans and the health care industry, the curiously naive handling of the issue by the Obama administration and the grave necessity for serious health care reform with a public option have captured and monopolized my attention.

I do not understand how or why the Obama Administration has allowed the process to get so out of control. I knew that the Republicans would never agree to a public option or effective and meaningful health care reform. (See my July 29 and July 31 blog entries.) It was so clear that any such efforts would be futile and that the Republicans were being manipulative. If I could see that so clearly, why didn't President Obama see it? (By the way, I am dropping off my resume for the position of resident pundit at the White House this afternoon.) And, after all that has transpired since the last days of July, why is he still talking about a bipartisan agreement? Why is he still acting as if Grassley is negotiating in good faith? It really makes the president appear naive and weak. Then, there is spineless Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid. Well, he just needs to be replaced. Frankly, I think that Reid and the White House should take a page out of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's book. She is the only one who seems to have control of her troops.

As Gomer Pyle once said, "SURPRISE, SURPRISE, SURPRISE!"

FOX News surprises with accurate report on the history of GOP support of and disingenuous GOP opposition to end-of-life-counseling

I was pleased as punch to stumble across this article (well, maybe I actually found myself on the ground after reading it, having been knocked off my rocker). I found it on the FOX News site, of all places. Granted, it is an AP wire piece by Ben Evans, but who'dah thunk it would be published on the web site of the "crazy and unbalanced" network? Here it is:

GOP Backs Away From Promoting End-of-Life Counseling

Republicans who eagerly backed the idea of end-of-life counseling in government health care programs like Medicare are distancing themselves from it or lying low in the face of a backlash from the right.

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Until last week, Republican Sen. Johnny Isakson was among the most enthusiastic backers of end-of-life counseling in government health care programs like Medicare. That was before conservatives called it a step toward euthanasia and former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin likened the idea to a bureaucratic "death panel" that would decide whether sick people get to live. And even though those claims have been widely discredited, the issue remains a political weapon in the increasingly bitter health care debate.

Now, Isakson and other Republicans who eagerly backed the idea are distancing themselves from it or lying low in the face of a backlash from the right. "Until last week this was basically a nonpartisan issue," said John Rother, executive vice president for policy at AARP, the seniors lobbying group. "People across the political spectrum recognize that far too often people's wishes aren't respected at the end of life and there is a lot of unnecessary suffering." The idea for government-backed end-of-life counseling - while delicate given the subject matter - has garnered significant consensus on Capitol Hill, fueled in part by cases such as that of Terri Schiavo, whose divided family fought for years over whether she would want to be kept alive in a vegetative state. Just a year ago, Congress overwhelmingly approved legislation requiring doctors to discuss issues like living wills and advance directives with new Medicare enrollees. And the government already requires hospitals and nursing homes to help patients with those legal documents if they want support, under a 1992 law passed under Republican President George H.W. Bush.

Supporters say the current House proposal just goes one step further by paying for the counseling, with the idea that doctors and patients would spend more time on it instead of just having a cursory discussion in an initial Medicare visit. The counseling is voluntary. Isakson and other Republicans such as Sens. Richard Lugar of Indiana and Susan Collins of Maine have co-sponsored legislation in recent years promoting the counseling, including in initial Medicare visits and through a proposed government-run insurance program for long-term care. In the House, Republican Reps. Charles Boustany of Louisiana, Geoff Davis of Kentucky and Patrick Tiberi of Ohio co-sponsored legislation from Rep. Earl Blumenauer, D-Ore., that would authorize Medicare to pay for the counseling. That measure served as a model for the current House language.

Earlier this summer, Isakson sponsored an arguably more far-reaching measure that would have required that new Medicare patients have a living will or other advance directive. But the Georgia conservative found himself in a storm of criticism when President Barack Obama said at a town hall meeting this week that Isakson was a chief architect of the House approach. Isakson quickly issued a statement repudiating the proposal. "The House provision is merely another ill-advised attempt at more government mandates, more government intrusion and more government involvement in what should be an individual choice," he said. Pressed later to explain his opposition, Isakson and his spokeswoman, Joan Kirchner, said he doesn't like the fact that the House bill would expand Medicare costs by paying for the consultations and giving doctors an incentive to conduct them. He also said the House bill is too specific in detailing what must be discussed in the sessions. "There are similarities ... but there are substantial difference," Isakson said. "I'm not running away from anything but I'm not going to accept the president of the United States telling people I wrote something that I didn't." Isakson, who initially called Palin's "death panel" characterization "nuts" in an interview Monday, declined later in the week to criticize Palin's statement, in which she said the measure would force people like her baby Trig, who has Down syndrome, "to stand in front of Obama's 'death panel' so his bureaucrats can decide ... whether they are worthy of health care." "The best I can read she's applying the House bill and using her child with Down syndrome as an example," Isakson said. "I would never question anyone's defense of their child."

Spokesmen for Lugar and Collins-two other longtime proponents of end-of-life planning-declined to comment on the House bill. Sen. Charles Grassley, an Iowa Republican and a lead negotiator on health care legislation, told constituents at a community meeting last week that they have good reason to fear the proposal. "I don't have any problem with things like living wills, but they ought to be done within the family," he said. "We should not have a government program that determines you're going to pull the plug on grandma." Grassley said Thursday that lawmakers negotiating on the Senate version of the health care bill had dropped the provision from consideration, citing how it could be misinterpreted.

Comments like Grassley's puzzle Rother, who said "it's been a little disappointing" that more Republicans haven't stepped forward to defend the legislation. He and Jon Keyserling, a vice president at the National Hospice and Palliative Care Organization, say there is little difference between the current proposal and past legislation that Republicans have supported. The current bill specifies that the counseling would be covered only every five years to prevent people from overusing it, and describes what the consultations must include. Keyserling said many people wrongly assume that end-of-life counseling is about terminating treatment. But it really is about making sure a patient's wishes are known, he said, including if that means continuing life-sustaining treatment in all circumstances. He said he's been surprised at the backlash, particularly given the close attention that Congress paid to Schiavo's case, which he said clearly highlighted the need for better end-of-life planning. Schiavo was removed from life support in 2005, though the Republican-led Congress and President George W. Bush had intervened in the family dispute in an effort to continue her care. "I think the House bill is about as innocuous and helpful as possible," Keyserling said. "It's about making sure people are prepared and informed to make decisions."

Associated Press

Dupes for the health care industry

Adele M. Stan, has a well-researched, informative piece on Alternet which exposes the identities and relationships among the town hall wingnuts, Republicans and the health care industry lobby: Inside Story on Town Hall Riots: Right-Wing Shock Troops Do Corporate America's Dirty Work ( How the health-care industry, the GOP and one media mogul made common cause with the anti-government fringe.) From the introductory paragraphs:

The recent spate of town hall dustups may look like an overnight sensation, but they've been years, even decades, in the making.

Since the days in the late 1970s, when the New Right began its takeover of the Republican Party, it has cultivated a militia of white people armed with a grudge against those who brought forth the social changes of the '60s.

These malcontents have been promised their day of retribution, a day for which they are more than ready. Few seem to understand that they are merely dupes for a corporate agenda that will only worsen the conditions in which they live.

Why, you may ask, would men of power and fame shake the rough, unmanicured hands of gun enthusiasts, conspiracy theorists, gay-haters, misogynists and racists?

Read the post and find the answer! It is good reading!