Your Daily Dose of Health Care Reform Stupidity

So, so true.

So much stoopid.... lessee, we have Michael Steele's inane new anti-reform ad, which scaremongers on Medicare. That's rich, coming from the party that's tried to destroy Medicare for decades. Indeed, "for Republicans to say that you should trust us on Medicare is like Colonel Sanders guarding the chicken coop." Here's a few friendly reminders for folks who might be stupid enough to believe the Cons' claims about being valiant defenders of Medicare.

I'd also like to point out to a few folks who are undoubtedly stupid enough to believe what Cons claim that the U.S.S. Constitution is a ship, not a founding document you can wave around in a ridiculous attempt to prove that health care reform is unconstitutional. I suppose I should illustrate for the terminally hard-of-thinking.

U.S.S. Constitution:
United States Constitution:

Hope that helps.

Continuing our survey of the terminally hard-of-thinking, CNBC's Maria Bartiromo asks 44 year-old Rep. Anthony Weiner why he's not on Medicare if it's so great, and then doesn't understand the answer. Apparently, she thinks there's a waiver for those under 65 if they really like Medicare and want to jump in early.

Eric Cantor keeps using the word "mainstream." It doesn't mean what he thinks it means.

Michele Bachmann's apparently confused over how one does a blood-brother ritual. Hint: it doesn't include slitting wrists, although if the right-wing activists you were exhorting try it like that, it may lead to a fantastic first-hand experience of the joys of our byzantine health care system that will illustrate in a personal way the need for reform. Oh, and Michele? Stop cribbing the "shall not pass" lines from Gandalf. It's an insult to LOTR.

Turning back now to flaming hypocrisy news, Sen. Judd Greg, champion of the reconciliation option for drilling in our pristine national wildernesses, has now decided that reconciliation is beyond the pale and a majority vote isn't enough. I'm sure none of us saw that coming.

Sen. Chuck Grassley continues to show his commitment to health care reform by stating that “There’s a feeling that the only way to get a bipartisan agreement is to defeat a Democratic proposal in the first hand and then the Democrats will come to Republican leadership. And then at that point, they’ll know the only way they’re going to get health care reform is bipartisan." The only reason he's working with the Gang o' Six is because he's worried that little fantasy might not work. Ya think? Amazing how these assclowns can't seem to understand that they lost the fucking election in a landslide.

Cons (and Blue Dogs) actually should start thinking long and hard (but very fast) about what their opposition might do. Because here's what happens if health care reform has to be done via budget reconciliation:

As Senate leaders begin work on a Democrat-only health care bill, they're finding themselves confronted with an unexpected irony: Though the caucus has reached an uneasy consensus around a public option that's modeled in many ways after a private insurer, it may be necessary to make the public option more liberal, and thus, more politically radioactive, if it's to overcome a number of unique procedural hurdles.

[snip]

"A very robust public option that scores significant savings would presumably be easy to justify doing through reconciliation," says a Senate Democratic aide. "But it is still being studied whether other, more moderate versions of a public option could pass parliamentary muster."

According to Martin Paone, a legislative expert who's helping Democrats map out legislative strategy, a more robust public option--one that sets low prices, and provides cheap, subsidized insurance to low- and middle-class consumers--would have an easier time surviving the procedural demands of the so-called reconciliation process.

Can we say "backfire," boys and girls?