GOP
to the uninsured: Drop dead
“The
House is voting (again) to repeal the Affordable Care Act on
Wednesday.
“Meanwhile, six Republican governors (so far) say they
won’t go along with the law’s planned Medicaid expansion for 4 million
uninsured people in their states, even though the feds would pick up nearly all
the tab…
This is the shameful reality behind
the GOP’s rhetoric on health care. Republicans don’t want to spend a penny to
insure the uninsured.
We
know this because back during the original debate over Obamacare, the “boldest”
GOP alternative would have extended coverage to 3 million of the 50 million
uninsured, versus Obama’s 30 million (which still leaves us 20 million short of
behaving like every other civilized nation, mind you).
It was not always
thus. It’s striking to recall that back in 1992, George
H.W. Bush put out a serious plan to cover 30 million of the then 35 million
uninsured. (Democrats at the time rejected it, figuring they’d do the job on
their own terms once Bill Clinton won. We know how that turned out.) So the
erosion of Republican seriousness over two decades can be tracked with unusual
precision. As the ranks of the uninsured have soared, the size of Republican
compassion has shriveled.
Why?
Daniel Patrick
Moynihan gave me the most convincing explanation not long before he died in
2003. “Those folks never vote for us,” he told me, summing up the Republican
mind on the issue, “and we have our priorities for the money.”
Like trillions
more in tax cuts for the best-off Americans over the next decade.
Cassi
Creek:
Yesterday, the occluded front that
drapes along the TN/KY border dropped a line of mid-morning thunderstorms over north
east TN. There was no hike with
Mike. Walking on wet pavement and
carrying an aluminum trekking pole during frequent and close lightning is not
conducive to longevity.
This morning offered what appeared to
be a 30-45 minute window between lines of rain, and there was no apparent
lightning as Loki and I walked down to Mike’s place. The light drizzle became apparent within 0.1
mile. Actual visible rain remained in
abeyance until we were 0.2 mile from Mike’s on the return leg. Then, the volume and intensity of the rain
increased with every step up the valley.
When we returned to Mike’s, where we normally stop and talk about
nothing for a bit, Loki and I pushed on.
By arrival chez nous there was a full-fledged shower underway. My decision to wear Gore-Tex this morning was
justified.
The morning news is generally
depressing. One act of legislative
retrogression follows another as the GOP/teavangelists race toward attempting
to return the nation to the 19th century. They are lined up this morning in yet another
act of stupidity, the “symbolic repeal of the affordable health care act. I’ve
heard a string of Congresspersons and Senators stand before television cameras
and lie about the “European socialist nature of the act when it is actually
gift to the insurance industry, adding another 30 million customers to their
roles with next to no oversight. There’s
no socialism in that outcome. The reform
we needed, and still need, is a universal single payer, national health plan
that encompasses all citizens. The GOP
loved the Romney model until it became the Obama model for delivery of health
care. Now they can’t spread enough lies
about it.
The teavangelists have proven their overall
stupidity by allowing the theocrats further political power in their effort to
overturn the prescription and use of all forms of contraception. The collective teavangelist base is pushing
the schools and other social functions further and further from any
intellectual awareness. They’ve been
encouraged to wave their anti-intellectual banner as if it were something to be
proud of rather than something to cause us to shake our heads in stunned
disbelief. No nation that celebrates ignorance has any future other than
providing under-paid hourly stoop-laborers.
The path they have opened is clearly one to national ignorance. It is so tragic that there is not even
amusement in hearing the various demagogues and hate mongers promise to move to
Canada or other nations with national health care since the SCOTUS decision on
health care.
Moynihan’s
statement above is the point of the spear of truth. Those people who don’t vote
for the religious, reactionary, right, have no place in the nation that the
GOP/teavangelists envision. If you can
think, can read and write, you have no role in their return to company stores
and company towns. They won’t insure
you, won’t provide health care, education, or any other social safety net. Please be sure to die of something
communicable so that you can pass it on to others who don’t vote correctly
either.
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