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Steve King is out of his "freedom-loving" mind. In what world do all Americans have health care coverage? Oh yeah, the emergency rooms. That's the GOP's idea of health care coverage and "freedom".
Last week over at StarkReports.com, I began asking Republican opponents of health care reform if they could tell me how many of their constituents are uninsured. I asked Joe Wilson, Steve King, Jim DeMint, Darryl Issa and Virginia Foxx. None of them could answer the question.
Today, after months of debate, the House vote is upon us. Steve King decided to rally the tea-baggers on the Capitol lawn one more time. About 15-25 other Republicans joined him on the stage at various times. I caught several of them as they made their way between their offices, the chamber and the rally. Once again, not a single republican I spoke with knew how many of their constituents are uninsured. The lonely guy in the middle of the video that did know? That's Dan Boren, a Blue Dog Democrat from Oklahoma...
Next up… Rep. Louie Gohmert (also in the first video) tells me my private insurance will be taken from me by this bill:
Finally, and I wish I could say the last video is shocking, but, alas, this is where we find ourselves today ... Representative Steven King, the leader of today’s anti-reform rally, tells a crowd that the Democratic bill requires the government to encourage suicide and/or assisted suicide. Not making it up; he’s explicit ... he uses those very words:
Schaeffer has a new book now, Patience with God: Faith for People Who Don’t Like Religion (or Atheism), and in it he takes on both the “incipient fascism” of the religious right and what he called “proselytizing” atheism of Richard Dawkins and others. He joins Laura on GRITtv for a fascinating interview about his own journey, and how people, religious or irreligious, are all looking for answers to the same questions.
Here it is, the somewhat anticlimactic morning after the historic vote on health care reform in the House of Representatives. I thought it would be nice to have a reminder of why we are fighting and why the fight continues.
This version of health care reform was never going to be the final product. Certainly, the inclusion of the Stupak amendment makes its current version unpalatable to me and others. But we must remember Lisa and Cathy and her son and stake out this new ground and then push for more and more, until we have truly universal health coverage and we catch up with the rest of the industrialized world.
Health care will be topic one with the bobbleheads. Joe Lieberman gets the attention he so whorishly craves, with an appearance on Fox News Sunday. The rest of the shows seem to take pains to offer up matched sets: DNC chair Tim Kaine with RNC chair Michael Steele on This Week, Governors Ed Rendell (D-PA) and Haley Barbour (R-MS) on Meet the Press. Astroturf King Dick Armey will be on Face the Nation, (note the description isn't his current gig with FreedomWorks, but as a former House leader...sneaky). New Virginia Governor Bob McDonnell gets dual exposure on Fox News Sunday and State of the Union. Think they'll mention his rather retro-notions on gender roles? Nah, I don't think so either. My favorite round table guest, Rachel Maddow, is back on Meet the Press. Let's see her show David Gregory for the chump he is.
ABC's "This Week" - Democratic National Chairman Tim Kaine and Republican National Chairman Michael Steele; Army chief of staff Gen. George Casey.
CBS' "Face the Nation" -Sen. Robert Menendez, D-N.J.; former House Majority Leader Dick Armey, R-Texas; Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, D-Fla.
NBC's "Meet the Press" - Govs. Haley Barbour, R-Miss., and Ed Rendell, D-Pa.
NBC's "The Chris Matthew Show" - Panel: Kathleen Parker, Andrew Sullivan, John Heilemann, Savannah Guthrie. Topics: Election Fallout: How Will Democrats Both Stick with Obama and Move to the Center? The GOP's Strange Bedfellows: Do the Wingnuts Run the Show? Meter Questions: Will Tuesday's vote scare moderates on health care? YES: 1 NO: 11; Will Afghanistan define President Obama's legacy more than health care? YES: 6 No: 6.
CNN's "State of the Union" - Army chief of staff Casey; Virginia Gov.-elect Bob McDonnell.
CNN's "Fareed Zakaria GPS" - A star-studded panel of historians discusses Obama's first year in office and the political climate in America. Plus, as Hamid Karzai gets another term as President of Afghanistan, we get the view from across the border: Pakistan's former President Pervez Musharraf on Karzai, corruption, and the prospects for peace in Afghanistan.
CNN's "Amanpour" - Christiane talks to Iranian mastermind of 1979 US Embassy takeover, plus a hostage, and Pres. Carter's Iran point man.
"Fox News Sunday" - McDonnell; Sen. Joe Lieberman, Connecticut independent; Reps. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md., and Mike Pence, R-Ind.
I had the pleasure of catching Brian Setzer and the Stray Cats opening for Stevie Ray Vaughn shortly before Stevie's untimely death in 1990. Stevie Ray stole the show, but Brian was every bit his equal that night. The Cats put on one hell of a show and Setzer wailed like a man on fire.
This live version of 'Switch Blade 327' isn't the greatest quality, but the music and vibe comes through loud and clear.
More music tonight at our sister site Newstalgia: The Cribs with Johnny Marr live at The Limelight in Belfast, 2004.
Everything, they say, is bigger in the Texas. So it is with the failure of the health care system. Leading the nation with a jaw-dropping 25% of its residents uninsured, Texas ranked 46th in the Commonwealth Fund's 2009 scorecard of state health care performance. All of which makes Friday's op-ed by Newt Gingrich and Governor Rick Perry touting the mess in Texas all the more puzzling.
Just two days after the CBO dismissed a House Republican plan that would barely dent the rolls of the uninsured, Perry and Gingrich blasted Democratic health care reform in a Washington Post screed titled, "Let States Lead the Way." Besides dredging up Newt's worn out 1990's vintage talking points on unfunded mandates, the duo insist it is the Lone Star State which should be at the front of that vanguard:
Texas, for example, has adopted approaches to controlling health-care costs while improving choice, advancing quality of care and expanding coverage. Consider the successful 2003 tort reform. Fewer frivolous lawsuits have attracted record numbers of doctors to the state as medical malpractice insurance premiums dropped by half. Christus Health, a large Catholic nonprofit system with a significant presence in Texas, spent about $100 million on liability defense payments in 2003. Last year, Christus spent $2.3 million on such payments. Much of that savings has gone into expanding health-care services in low-income neighborhoods.
As the Post's Erza Klein asks, "how's that working out?"
The answer, of course, is quite poorly. While from 2007 to 2009 Texas nudged its way from a horrific 48th to a merely miserable 46th in the Commonwealth Fund rankings, the health care system there remains an ongoing calamity for its residents. Among the poster children for the failure of red state health care, Perry's state brought up the rear across the five indicators measured. When it comes to health care access and equity, Texas is dead last. (See table above.)
While it is predictable that Republicans Gingrich and Perry cite Texas' draconian tort reform law as an example for the nation, the data is far from clear as to its benefits in actually reducing malpractice premiums, lowering costs and attracting physicians to the underserved state.
Via Raw Story. Actor/comedian Andy Cobb once did ads for Blue Cross in Florida. And now CIGNA's Wendell Potter has someone to talk to:
Teaming with the liberal Brave New Films, a former Blue Cross pitchman is now pitching against Blue Cross.
Andy Cobb, who once tried to sell Floridians on a Blue Cross health insurance plan, says he's fed up with the industry.
"I was a spokesman for BlueCross and Blueshield of Florida," Cobb says. "Call me a spokesjerk. People who make money for buying things you don't need. And we're telling you lies."
"They, by which I mean I, make money by standing in the way of reform," Cobb says in the ad, which appears as a spoof of something like a freecreditreport.com ad. "It's time for change."
"That's why I'm calling on leaders from the spokesjerk industry," Cobb continues. "The freecreditreport.com guy. The Shamwow dude. And Senator Bill Nelson, recipient of big money from insurance companies -- to lead us. To walk away from their cash cows and tell American people the truth.
"And us spokesjerks, we'll be fine," Cobb adds. "There's plenty of room in entertainment for people who tried to sell you the worst product in American history. Private health insurance."
Yes, John Shadegg actually used an innocent infant as a prop, spoke baby talk, and provided us with nothing more than what was most likely in Maddy's diaper at the time. And for this, he got applause.
Henry Waxman made a joke and said: “That was a remarkable child,” “and a great ventriloquist.”
How could a father let his child be used as a prop like that? What would have happened if he hurt her in any way? The entire Republican Party is made up of fools, and I mean the staffers as well. And then there are the people who applauded this stunt ...
Woot! I love it when we get some plain-spoken truth on the House Floor. Such a refreshing change from the Republican lies and fear-mongering.
The Republican record defies their rhetoric. Remember their so-called Prescription Drug Benefit for Seniors passed in the dark of the night? No one read the bill, didn’t know what was in it. Cost 700 billion dollars ‘cause that was subsidizing the pharmaceutical and insurance industry. But now, they’re worried about costs. It gave the seniors a donut hole.
Now their concern is not about what they’re stating. It’s about their patrons in the insurance industry. Because this bill has real reforms of the worst abuses of the insurance industry. It takes away their unfair anti-trust immunity, so they can no longer collude to drive up premium prices or restrict coverages. The Republicans would continue the anti-trust exemption. This bill outlaws the unfair pre-existing condition restriction. Republicans would continue that for the insurance industry. This bill would not allow the industry to cancel your policy even though you’ve been paying your premiums when you get sick. It’s called recission. The Republicans allowed that abuse to continue. This bill, on our side, outlaws the small print that limits your lifetime coverage, which bankrupts families every day in America. The Republicans allow it to continue.
And that’s not enough. They’ve opened up a new loophole, their so-called national plan: a company would only be regulated by the laws of the state in which it was based when it sold you a policy. If you live in Oregon, but you bought a policy that was written--and oh, by the way, they expand the definition of state to include the territories in the Mariana Islands—so if you’ve got a problem, call the Mariana Islands Insurance Commissioner. That’s the Republican plan and profits to the insurance industry!
We've got great news to report about our campaign shaming Sen. Richard Burr (R-NC) for taking $700,000 from the defense industry and Chamber of Commerce and then siding with them against rape victims and his constituents. Thousands of people have signed our national expression of outrage and told their friends to sign -- and the national and local media are reporting on our campaign!
Reform group Change Congress launched a campaign yesterday to shame Sen. Richard Burr, R-N.C., for voting against legislation that would help ensure victims of rape have the right to bring their case to court. The government reform group hit cyberspace with an email asking people to sign a 'national expression of outrage.' Citing $700,000 in campaign contributions from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the defense industry, Change Congress accused Burr of putting special interests before rape victims.
The more signatures we get, the more the media will report on his campaign. We need to keep publicly shaming these politicians one by one until Congress realizes it's time to replace special-interest-funded elections with citizen-funded elections.
Until they do, Americans will continue to ask: Did you vote that way because it made good sense, or because it raised special-interest campaign dollars?
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Darcy Burner, the leader of the Progressive Caucus Policy Foundation says that if the Stupak amendment passes, progressives should vote down the health care bill in the House.
Burner: It means that women who find they have cancer while they are pregnant won't get the choice of how to proceed, but those choices will instead be made by politicians in Washington, DC whose lives aren't the ones who are being destroyed. The idea that we would throw women under the bus in the process of doing health care reform is completely unacceptable.
Now the word I'm hearing is that the Senate is more progressive than the House on this issue and the belief is that it will come back from the conference committee without the Stupak amendment included.
If the bill that comes back from conference does have the Stupak amendment, then organizing will be huge.
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Keith and Eugene Robinson had the same reaction I did to watching members of Congress out there calling for something close to the overthrow of our government. I agree completely with Eugene Robinson—it was frankly appalling.
OLBERMANN: Good evening from New York.
An elected Republican official today is leading a protest on the west steps of the Capitol that compared health care reform to Nazi death camps and encouraged mindless harassment of and possibly violence against the government. Not tea baggers anymore, not demagogic commentators, an actual congresswoman inciting a hateful rebellion against the rule of law and order. Her name is Michele Bachmann.
Our fifth story on the COUNTDOWN: As if that were not bad enough, Ms. Bachmann today joined by the House minority leader as well as countless other GOP representatives. This orgy of veiled threat and not so veiled racism of white power minority rule now fully the province of the Republican Party. Welcome to the coup!
Congressman Bachmann staging what she tried to claim was a spontaneous meet-up of opponents to health care reform, in 25 buses paid for by the AstroTurf group Americans for Prosperity, could be considered spontaneous. An estimated 4,000 people today answering Ms. Bachmann‘s call, bringing with them on those buses, not just their misunderstanding of health care reform but also their hatred of President Obama, as well as pure hatred, period.
Lee Fang of ThinkProgress.org taking these photographs of a sign that reads “National Socialist Health Care, Dachau, Germany, 1945,” superimposed over the horrific images of the corpses from Dachau. Other signs are slightly less shameful but many in no way related to health care.
Congresswoman Bachmann urging these people to rebel.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BACHMANN: It was Thomas Jefferson who said—a revolution every now and then is a good thing. What do you think?
(CHEERING)
BACHMANN: You feel so good right now, and we, the members of Congress that are gathered on these steps for this press conference, are so honored that you are here.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
OLBERMANN: Press conference? The geniuses at the Republican study committee trying to rebrand today‘s event not as a protest, nor a rally, but as a press conference. Urging House staffers in an e-mail last night to please make sure your boss does not turn this event a rally.
Does any of this sound like press conference to you?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. PAUL BROUN, GEORGIA: Who will kill this bill? You will! You will! And we must. The Constitution of the United States starts with three very powerful words: “We, the people.” And we the people are speaking. Nancy Pelosi, listen.
Fellow patriots, go tell your congressman you‘re not going to eat this rotten stinking fish that is Pelosi health care! We are going to put a stop sign in front of her steamroller of socialism. Go to it, Patriots!
