24 September, 2009

Your Daily Dose of Health Care Reform Stupidity

The stupid, it is strong today.

There is no hypocrisy too hypocritical for Cons to engage in. The same fuckwits who loved the idea of individual mandates in June hate individual mandates now that Democrats have included them in the reform mix. Some even go so far as to declare them unconstitutional. As Steve Benen says, "Congressional Republicans could probably save themselves a lot of trouble by simply saying, 'Whatever Democrats are for, we're against,' in response to every question."

Sen. Jim DeMint, who apparently feels he hasn't been enough of a nutcase lately, wants us all to know that Obama's putting the troops in harm's way by focusing on health care reform, and blathers on about socialism, freedom, and dead soldiers. This is hackery at its hackiest.

Meanwhile, Sen. Jim Bunning can't be bothered to stay awake during the Senate Finance Committee's mark-up of the Baucus Bullshit. Way to express your interest in helping the process along, there, Bunnie.

And as Cons howl against the public option, it might be a good idea to remember that they love public insurance options - for property, not people.

Sen. Olympia Snowe's pushing her trigger idea hard. The problem: her plan ensures the trigger would never, ever get pulled. If Democrats start to get weak-kneed, be sure to remind your reps and senators that her idea is completely fucking unacceptable.

Sen. Pat Roberts is busy looking out for health industry lobbyists' interests. Regular Americans need not concern him.

Other Cons are busy defending insurance companies' freedom of speech - even though "Humana accepted lobbying and marketing limits when it started collecting tax dollars." And this is the wonderful bunch they're rising in defense of:

In the meantime, Democrats on the Hill were quick to note the background of the company Republicans were desperate to defend: "Humana was recently featured in a HuffPost story for denying health care due to lack of an enema. In 2005, it settled a racketeering suit for $40 million. It settled a fraud lawsuit in 2000 for $14.5 million. Since 2000, its profits have soared from $90 million to $834 million."

Republicans often pick the wrong friends, don't they?

Indeed they do.

Speaking of insurance companies, Aetna's paying for a "town hall" featuring - what else? - "lobbyists from the health insurance industry and opponents of reform." What a shocker that is.

Meanwhile, Wellpoint's CEO goes on CNBC, attempts to lie, and gets roundly spanked by a surprisingly frisky duo of CNBC hosts. Perhaps they're starting to take Jon Stewart's criticisms to heart. It's nice to see some actual journalism, facts included, happening on our teevees. More, please.

Just how friendly is Baucus' Bullshit bill to the very same insurance companies now lying and defrauding and generally acting like robber barons? Very. As in, "Here's a firehose, there's the Treasury, drink as much as you can hold!" I know the bill's starting to drift left in mark-up, but it's got a very long way to go before it's tolerable.

There are a few Blue Dog Dems who really need to reassess their party affiliation. Democrats don't typically call Medicare, Medicaid and the insurance industry "Soviet-style" health care - but Rep. Jim Marshall did.

But he's small potatoes compared to Blue Dog Mike Ross, who took a page from the Con playbook and attacked ProPublica as a bunch of dirty leftists for exposing his little backscratching deal with USA Drug. Lessee, we have corruption and a Con insult - could it be that Mike Ross has the wrong letter after his name?

It gets better. Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington is requesting the Justice Department investigate his deal.

And Ross's recent antics in backing away from the deal he and his cohorts negotiated with the House Energy and Commerce Committee has led Nancy Pelosi to say, in effect, "Fine. You want to renege on the deal? Great! We'll scrap the deal. Yoo-hoo, liberals, what was that you said about tying the public option to Medicare reimbursement rates? Sounds wonderful to me!"

I love it when a fucktard gets exactly what he deserves.

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