The Messiah Versus Captain Obvious
Hey, Captain Obvious!!!! Thanks, but no thanks!!!!
Republican Representative Joe Wilson from South Carolina made a fool of himself and degraded his position by shouting “You Lie” at the President during his speech on ObamaCare to the joint Houses of Congress.
Unless the Congressman has turrets, it was a completely unacceptable outburst. It did nothing to bolster the Republicans opposition of this nationalization of healthcare and only served as fodder for all the liberals desperately seeking something to be offended by. Poor Nancy Pelosi even had a flashback to just about every George Bush speech delivered to Congress where Democrats hissed and booed like poltergeist snakes.
But the Democrats past boorish behavior is still no excuse for denigrating the office of the President by publicly shouting what most of those watching already knew.
Of course Obama was lying. He lied throughout most of the speech. He lied about healthcare coverage for illegal aliens (the point that made Wilson lose his mind and dignity), he lied about the cost, he lied about not having a penny go toward the already catastrophic national debt, he lied about cutting over $560 billion from Medicare without reducing service, he lied about Republicans not having any alternative plans and he lied about not wanting this to be a partisan healthcare package.
The purpose of this speech was not to make nice with Republicans. Obama made that clear in his threat to call out and expose any Republican that supposedly lies about what ObamaCare covers. He used the “death panels” as an example of what he called a “lie, plain and simple”. But in the ever changing sphere of Obama-speak it’s tough to tell if he was saying that there would absolutely not be anything like a death panel or if he was saying they would not necessarily be called by that name.
Obama made this speech for one reason and one reason only. Not to increase bipartisan participation but to rally his Democrats and put them back on the offensive. But while the speech was a rallying cry for the left wing of the Party I can’t see how it did much to bolster support from the few centrist Democrats left serving.
Obama said the plan he is considering would now only cost $900 billion over ten years versus the original plan of $1 trillion. Quite frankly at this level of spending cutting it back to $900 billion is like the grocery store charging $1.99 instead of 2 bucks.
For the first time Obama tried to garner support from doctors by claiming he is open to removing malpractice lawsuits from the courts and instituting panels that would resolve disputes. The obvious problem with that is who installs the members of the panel and that if they do not have any mandated direction as to settlements they will be no more likely to reduce costs then the existing system.
In what was initially reported as a step away from organized labor Obama is now willing to look at instituting a tax on higher end insurance plans. The AFL-CIO was quick to voice concern that this tax might harm the premium insurance plans their members now enjoyed.
But the truth is that this obstacle could be easily overcome with a separate law outside the healthcare bill forcing employers to absorb the additional cost. The report also doesn’t take into account the great number of new union healthcare workers ObamaCare mandates.
Oh, did Barack Obama fail to mention the union stipulations in his program? Imagine that.
The Senate version implements the same forced unionization plans endorsed by now dethroned Governor Rod Blagojevich. It reclassifies home healthcare workers as government employees thereby forcing them to join the very powerful and very political Service Employees Union International or SEUI. Perhaps you’ve heard of the SEUI but can’t remember where. It was in all the news stories about SEIU union thugs beating and harassing vocal opponents of ObamaCare at town hall meetings. Make sense now?
The House version (HR3200) goes even further requiring compulsory union dues for most healthcare workers including doctors. This requirement would immediately increase union dues paying members by the hundreds of thousands.
Congressman Wilson was wrong for what he did. But of course Barack Obama was lying.
His lips were moving.
