So, Shepard Smith goes postal on a Republican Senator, saying that, “Every vote against the public option is a vote for the insurance companies.”
And Mr. Smith works for Fox News….OK, things are getting weird here…..End of the world weird here.
*Dr. Peter Venkman, Ghostbusters.
Alan Grayson is talking with the supidest motherf%$#er on CNN, among others, and he is not backing down one step.
He actually used the phrase, “nattering nabobs of negativism.”
I’d say that he called Blitzer a cocks*cker, but that would be an insult to cocks*ckers.
I want him to be President.
H/t AMERICAblog
I know that something is wrong, and in this case it is how accurately the Senate minority leader nails the attitude of Barack Obama and His Stupid Minions™: “
Senator McConnell dismissed the President’s substantive involvement in the debate, dryly noting the president “would sign anything the Congress sent him, provided it had ‘Health Care Reform’ written at the top of the page.
It’s not just McConnel who is saying this. We also have Robert Reich, who has always been an extremely big booster of the Obama campaign and later the Obama Administration, so when he says this:
Big Pharma and big insurance hate the public insurance option even more than they hate big Medicare discounts. And although the President has sounded as if he would welcome it, political operatives in the White House have quietly reassured the industries that it won’t be included in the final bill. At most, the bill would allow the formation of non-profit ‘cooperatives’ that wouldn’t have the scale or authority to squeeze the profits of private industry, or a ‘trigger’ that would allow states to form public insurance options eventually if certain goals for cost savings and coverage weren’t met.
Which is a clear statement against his own political interest.
He cannot bring himself to voice it explicitly, is that Barack Obama and his people do not care about healthcare reform, but that they are looking for phony reform for 2012.
The results of White House “Axis of Weasel” on this is plain to see, with , as Rockefeller’s public option amendment being voted down, as well as Schumer’s weaker tea public option.
It gets worse, of course, with Baucus proposing that nationwide standards on insurance be written by the insurance industry in his bill.
He is suggesting that the National Assn. of Insurance Commissioners write binding regulations on insurance company behavior, it has issued advisory regulations for some years, with , “States would be permitted to deviate from the standards only by appealing to the Department of Health and Human Services.”
What’s more because the NAIC is a private organization, there would be no requirement for public meetings or public access to records.
It’s mice to know that there are a few bright spots, but, as with the case of Sen. Byron Dorgan (!)
offering an amendment allowing for drug reimportation, but you know that Rahmbo , with the President’s full approval, will go all out to kill this, because the White House has already cut a deal with health insurers and pharma to boost their already obscene profits by requiring people to buy health insurance.
When you have cancer, beg for charity, quoth Eric Cantor.
The thing is, that Eric Cantor knows how Medicaid works, when he says “apply for Medicaid,” what he’s really saying, as Yobie Benjamin notes, is, “Sell or auction all your belongings. After you reach a certain poverty threshold, apply for Medicaid, the federal medical insurance for the very poor. If that’s not enough apply for indigent services.”
That’s what his language about “indigency” in the long version means.
Short vid
Full event, exchange starts at about 59:05, and runs for about 7 minutes.
This man is a shanda before the Goyim.
I’m thinking about finding a way to convince him to become a Christian, because I really don’t want to share a synagogue, much a religion with him.
I am referring to Representative Mike Ross, Democrat (hah!) of Arkansas’s 4th Congressional district.
We have always known that Mike Ross is a bit blue dog, and in the pocket of the health insurers the pharmaceutical industry, and now, thanks to ProPublica, we know why.
It turns out that he and his wife sold their pharmacy and related property to pharmacy chain USA Drug in 2007, and paid between $1 million and $1.67 million for the it, which is kind of surprising, when the county tax assessment listed it at $263,000, and an independent assessor retained by ProPublica valued it at $198,000.
This means that he was overpaid for his property, and for “the pharmacy’s assets”, and for a “non-compete” agreement from his wife, Holly Ross, something on the order of $1 million.
What’s more the owner of the pharmacy chain, Stephen L. LaFrance Sr., who has been quoted as saying that, “Universal health care will ruin our health care in America,” maxed out on his campaign contributions to Ross in 2007, the year of the sale.
It’s depressing. Mike Ross is bought and paid for by the medical industry, his biggest donor, and he routinely gets more than 70% in the general, and there is no one challenging him in the primary.
Please, someone run. I’ll through in a few bucks, and list the person on my Act blue page.
[On edit]
Ross issued a non denial denial.
Who is thinking of the poor insurance company executives?
David Axelrod, on healthcare:
“David’s in there — Axelrod — saying we’ve got to try to get ‘something.’ So, the new benchmark is, ‘Well, if we can do something, if we can do anything, then we can say we did healthcare reform,’” [West Virginia Senator David] Rockefeller said.
I know that a lot of Obama fans will be saying that this is just Axelrod, but that sounds a lot like the phrase, “If only the Czar knew.”
Obama will own healthcare, and he owns what his advisors say.
Really, I’m serious about this, because Roland Burris knows that he will not get another term, and he knows that his value as a Washington lobbyist is nil, he does not have to kowtow to the insurance lobby, so he has announced that he will not vote for a healthcare bill without a public option.
In creating the lamest of lame ducks, Burris won’t be able to work in DC at all once he is out of office, Blago has created a man who can do the right thing, because he has nothing to lose.
First we have her robot videos:
Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy
And then we have her talking with the health reform bill. No seriously. She is talking with the animated bill from schoolhouse rock, you know, this guy:
Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy
You know, If I hadn’t already found Sharon,* and she did not “bat for the other team,” I’d be sending her some seriously steamy fan mail.
*Love of my life, light of the cosmos, she who must be obeyed, my wife.
If you haven’t followed Ezra Klein, he got hired as a blogger by the Washington Post, and since then, he’s done his level best to show that he’s one of the Beltway Kule Kidz, repeatedly posting about how it’s only those DFH’s* who care about the public option.†
Well, after all this time, Mr. Klein finally looks at the product of his best bud Max Baucus, and even he sees that it is completely inadequate:
What’s more, for all of his show of bipartisanship, he has failed to secure the support of a single Republican.
Can we run a primary against him, please?
*Dirty F%$#ing Hippies
†FWIW, they aren’t DFH’s, I am. I don’t just want a public option, or single payer, I want a National Health Service (NHS), because I think that the system is too broken to allow for any potential point of entry for the health insurers.
International healthcare ratings.
Don’t worry though, Barack Obama is determined to get us to a tie for number 36.
Stay classy you inbred Christo-Fascist nativist punks.
Health insurers are denying coverage to victims of domestic violence on the basis of it being a pre-existing condition. (H/t Pandagon)
SEIU report here.
These folks make Goldman Sachs and Dick Cheney look like complete pikers in the evil department.
Rob Miller has now raised $803,306 on act blue.
I think that Olbermann is wearing out the batteries on the special comments.
They are not so special any more. Rep. Wilson is a small venal asshole, now move on.
Special comments should be about saying that the emperor has no clothes, and Joe can’t even carry off being the village idiot.
8:05 pm Watching MSNBC, talking heads going on and on.
8:12 pm Elvis has entered the building…..He is in the doorway.
Now He is walking in, shaking hands, smiling….Mitch McConnel looks like he has just eaten a lemon.
8:16 He’s started talking.
8:18 Talks about recovery and creating jobs….He’s claiming victory, in “pulling the economy back from the brink” (rolling my eyes)
8:22 States obvious: Only modern nation without coverage, etc.
8:23 Talks about how insurance companies sucked, cutting off coverage, etc. Also mentions how it inhibits entrepreneurial activity and business competitiveness.
8:26 Takes a shot at the left about how “disruptive” single payer is. I guess it’s the audacity of nope.
8:28 Accusing people of politics, without naming who is playing the politics….Wimp.
8:29 Claims that his plan will save cost, expand coverage, etc.:
8:39 Calling some lies as lies: No “death panels” no coverage for illegal aliens, and he just sold abortion rights down the river. Go Cheney your self.
8:40 Comes out for public option, mentions that there are monopolies in most states, but is there a veto threat for no public option?
8:40 Says that only 5% of of people would take public option, a convenient lie, and says that there would be no tax dollars spent on the system. He minimizes its impact.
8:44 Calls the public option is only a means to an end. Translation: He is willing to throw public option under the bus. Says that he won’t back down on a “choice,” but mentions alternate plans, like the wimpy co-ops as possibilities.
8:46 Promises not to sign a plan that adds “one dime” to the deficit. Wants a “Paygo” provision in the health plan. Thinks that most of cost can be covered by elimination of waste in the system.
8:48 Time to pander to the AARP. Just eliminate waste, and reduce prescription drug payments at the same time.
8:52 Will tax “Cadillac” insurance plans…..Camel’s nose is under the door, it will work its way down.
8:53 Sells plaintiff’s lawyers down the river. “Malpractice reform” is bullshit, just look at the most plaintiff unfriendly state, Texas, and McKinney (IIRC) which is among the most expensive area in the nation.
8:55 What’s with the sour looking dude holding the paper in the air?
8:56 Says that he will call out liars…..I’ll believe it when I see it.
8:57 Invokes Ted Kennedy.
8:58 Invokes America’s “rugged individualism”….I take the Dilbert view, “rugged induhvidualism”.
9:02 “We did not come to fear the future, we came to shape it.” Very nice turn of phrase.
Final assesment: Well delivered, well written, but he’s clearly willing to sell a public option down the road, but wants to be a deficit hawk.
He gives good speech, but the content is lacking.
This is a very good encapsulation of the two sides of the debate.
Less than a week after Jon Stewart showed Betsy McCaughey to be a complete liar who knows nothing about the healthcare bill, and next to nothing about healthcare, she gets a Wall Street Journal editorial.
You don’t have to be a stupid pathological liar to get an OP/Ed in the WSJ, but it helps, a lot.
