SNOOKERED!

Rememeber the last two of years when Dick Army’s Tea Party engineered massive astroturf rallies against the Obama Administration by scaring seniors into believing that the President was going to implement large funding cuts to Medicare? The nation saw scenes of seniors on electric scooters attending anti-government TEA party rallies terrified by the prospect that the Obama administration was threatening their access to a Socialist, government run health insurance program.

The juxtaposition was incongruous, to be sure. But nonetheless, there they were with their government supplied scooters and their signs, proving that in politics it is far more effective to scare people with lies than try to convince them of the superiority of your actual policy positions by explaining the intricacies and nuances of your plan.

Well, now that they finally have control of the House, GOP leaders are not only threatening Medicare with cuts of their own (you mean the party that has derided Medicare as Socialism for 60 years didn’t really mean to strengthen and protect the system?) they are floating a plan to do far worse: they want to privatize the system, effectively ending Medicare altogether.
Interestingly, it appears that the GOP is now a subsidiary of the radical, far-right TEA Party, and cannot even impose the discipline necessary to quiet the radicals until after the 2012 election when they might actually have the political power to start putting some of these ideas into effect.

I have a feeling that the Obama administration is salivating at the prospect of running in 2012 against the party that wants to not only give health insurers the right to discriminate against people with pre-existing medical conditions, cap lifetime medical benefits, and raise rates on a whim, but is also the party that wants to end the Medicare system altogether, replacing it with fixed payments that seniors must use to buy a policy from these same insurance companies they want to empower to screw their customers seven ways to Sunday.

The only question that remains is whether Democrats will take the opportunity that’s been handed to them and hammer this message 24/7 over the next two years, or whether they’ll shrug their shoulders and continue to “play nice,” virtually assuring that Barack Obama will be a one-term president.

Serolf Divad
9:00 am • Friday • January 28, 2011
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7 Comments

ManchuCandidate

9:24 am • Friday • January 28, 2011

What I’ve learned from dipping my toe into political waters:

When a Right Winger (usually wingnut) screams about their opponent, it is usually what they’re going to do.

Part of me (evil side) laughs at the white olds who feared a black man (who was trying to moderately alter US America healthcare for the better) more than the rich white fuckers who are going to unplug the Rascals and rip out the oxygen tanks from their old feeble racist hands.

Capt Howdy

10:05 am • Friday • January 28, 2011

The only question that remains is whether Democrtas will take the opportunity that’s been handed to them and hammer this message 24/7 over the next two years

and if your grandmother had wheels she would be a wagon

Nabisco

9:37 pm • Friday • January 28, 2011

Myth: Marines protect Americans overseas.

Fact: Marines protect American documents overseas.

Carry on.

SanFranLefty

9:54 pm • Friday • January 28, 2011

@Nabisco: And King Tut’s mask and remains?

10:05 pm • Friday • January 28, 2011

@SanFranLefty: Only if they contain something Julian Assuange is after. Well, anything not human, that is. Their job is to protect confidential information; the embassy is just a vessel. “American compounds” are largely a myth, as well, outside of those two countries we’ve invaded in the last two years and a handful of other hotspots.

I, for example, have Barney Fife from Wackenhut outside my apt building – and most of the time he’s drinking chai.

JNOV

10:28 pm • Friday • January 28, 2011

Hypothetically speaking, if the US contracts with a sketchy foreign nation that has sketchy internal security to provide something like air conditioner construction, installation and maintenance, and then the US hypothetically subcontracts to a company like Honeywell, those civilian workers and their families are protected by the military, even ≈30 years ago. Hypothetically speaking, of course.

10:29 pm • Friday • January 28, 2011

@SanFranLefty: Remember the pillage of the Iraq museums? We just stood by and watched.

SNOOKERED!

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