The trouble is mounting on something already too twisted and cold to grasp without gloves. Much like yanking thick ivy off a wrought iron fence on a cold morning, finding any trace of actual public service under the hack and filth of the new health care bill will be a job no American will want to take. Truth is, even before the votes are all in it’ll be just as heavy. Chances are, of course, that it won’t fall on you, and you’ll be able to safely ignore the damn thing without looking odd and out of place like a sexless jack rabbit in spring. Soon enough the congress will round up to vote on the health care bill they’ve been talking incessantly about and we’ll answer once again that old question: if a politician votes no on a necessary piece of legislation and no one from his state has been paying attention, will the affair make any noise at all?
Despite the activists, despite the motions, the small contributing calls to action here and there that might have been producing some sort of momentum, when the vote comes down we will hear very little about it, and not because of the mainstream media’s usual complicit tactics with the men on the hill. No, we won’t hear about it because it will no longer be news; there will no longer be any story worth telling as we’ve all known for some time now that this is and has always been the same story we’ve heard before, just with a different illustrator. And in the world of 24-hour news, grief is a very expensive line item.
Of course, it’s not really a vote for or against anything we wanted in the first place, which is the right to not worry about how we, as human beings, will pay for our health. What they’ll be voting on won’t even bother trying to offer single-payer health care. It will feign to be reform in the sense that it will offer a weak and unenforceable version of a mandate that everyone be insured, but all this will really do is provide many new unwitting clients to an industry rolling with the fat of peoples’ suffering.
It will not regulate the prices those fat cats can charge, allowing insurance companies to inflate them as much as they can get away with. And when you’re lying on an operating table with a lump the size of a golf ball in your breast, or a grown man’s finger up your rectum saying, “uh-oh, mister Johnson, it looks like things are about to get uncomfortable for you,” you’ll consider just about any price they start throwing in your direction.
Assuming they’re willing to pay for it at all. Shit, in the light of this mess it’s come out that insurance companies won’t even promise to cover their own emlployees…what chance do you think YOU have?
Instead, the new plan might offer the states the Right to offer a state-level option for health care as a token of show, a shiny hood ornament, or something just as functional. It will be ravaged by the insurance company executives and lobbyists in the much weaker state legislatures which — conveniently — is where the whole process will become easier to ignore, because who the hell is paying attention to state legislatures? Not to mention creating the potential for fifty different health care organizations, all doing more or less the same thing and doubling up on all of the same administrative tasks, wasting more money than necessary and dooming the projects to the critics years before it’s even time to bury the thing.
And when the impotent thing passes — which it will…no politician today can afford the political capital of not passing SOMETHING — we will hear all kinds of applause for a few days before the whole thing vanishes under cloaks of appeals and unsexy subcommittee talks. Nothing for the national press, I’m afraid. Unless I’m much mistaken — and I’ve never wished so badly that I was — we will hear President Obama laud it as his success at bipartisan health reform, just like Clinton did for his own inadequate failure. Democrats will pat each other’s backs and shuffle out the door to discuss “Don’t ask don’t tell”, while Republicans grumble behind the camera and shout on the radio about repealing what the democrats shove through.
And who cares? They’re not going to repeal anything any more than you’d notice if they did. Health care as a topic will fizzle, probably until the next time a “hope and change” candidate runs and we’ll go through the whole futile exercise again. Maybe we’ll still have journalists like Maddow and Olbermann, and we’ll still have lunatics, pimps and jackasses like Sean Hannity, Bill O’Reilly, and Glenn Beck. And we’ll fuck that up too, and move on to the next juicy topic, be it Afghanistan, or gays in the military, or Rush Limbaugh’s failed attempt at buying the St. Louis Rams. Whatever. It’s all been done before.
And in 2010, with Obama’s new Nobel Peace Prize for…something, and the Democrats’ most epic failure since George McGovern’s loss in ‘72, Republicans will slowly gain more and more seats again, until finally, when they’ve found a voice sober enough to silence idiots like Sara Palin and Bobby Jindal, someone with more temporal coherence than Michael Steele to stay on point and lead their party in some kind of direction, the vicious cycle will return us to a Republican President again.
Don’t mistake my anger for pessimism. It’s just that…well, I hope to be halfway to Mars by then.
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I guess I’d had a bad feeling about the whole thing from the moment I’d seen the teletext on the airport flatscreen back in that September air: “Pelosi — we have a deal.” Jesus. That’s horrible to even think about in today’s climate.
Looking back on that scene is like looking at a crowd of idle jesters with a Metor careening over the skyline overhead. If you’d listened to the report CNN put out that day you would’ve thought that the vote itself was a mere glorious formality, and that our capitalism was all but fixed and saved. Then I read the thing.
Yeah, I read it. It had a dank stink to it that I couldn’t describe. There were no specifics, and there was no substance; a thing totally open to interpretation; an animal of no instinct or nature. Just cold politics with a hot breath on the public, a fine mist that hung over their eyes just long enough to let the creeps get away. An old joke on the people it was about to rape.
Fuck, I thought. The end is near.
Now, who-knows-how-many-billion dollars into the affair and so many other mad accusations thrown into this mess that I’ve had to buy two full-length books to wrap my mind around it and I’m still sorting through all the names. By the way, please note that in order to cover my expenses for these extra efforts, I will have to charge a small fee of $5, that can be payable by PayPal, even if you don’t have an account. The fee can be payed right after you finish reading the article…
What? No, sorry. That was a scam I ran into on craigslist the other day, but we won’t have any of that here. Those evil bastards could probably give the DOJ a run for their money, eh?
Anyway, the same senseless monsters that managed to get the economy from trillions in surplus to a full one-eighty in the red in just two administrations are now driving some of the efforts at opposing Obama’s massive relief efforts, spending projects, federal budget…whatever label you want to put on it. And all the crazy talk has dropped us off here, where the rubber meets the asphault, and the crazy meets the news. In a half-mad fury of head-turning craziness, Chris Matthews, of all the spinning, talking faces, refused to let that god-damned waterhead, Tom DeLay, get away with smooth talking nonsense about “fighting like a Texan”.
“You can’t seCEED from the UNion,” Matthews said, talking right over DeLay’s crap. “That’s the kind of talk we heard in 1861. Why are you talking like this, Tom?” He dropped his tone a bit, seemed disappointed. “Mr. DeLay, you know this isn’t a real conversation. This is not serious business.”
Which begs the question: what the hell happened to Chris Matthews that he suddenly decided to quit the machete game to become a journalist, eh? Did he just like Obama that much? Did he stop yelling long enough to discard the talking points from the White House and stand now where he belongs — between the executive and the legislative branches, shielding the people?
Well, once again, we’re back to that basic question, aren’t we? What side are you on?
Ain’t nothing rhetorical about it, kids. Get yourselves an answer.
Posted in Politics, Rants | 1 Comment…
Yes.
Indeed.
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Why are house republicans REALLY against any kind of deal whatsoever?
Welcome to Washington D.C., the sign says. Hunter Thompson wrote about coming to Washington when he covered the campaign trail in ‘72 and it wasn’t a pretty town then, either. The roads leading into the district were just as foul and littered with vermin and swine and new lawyers. There was probably more acid then and a little more tact, but it stank to holy shits back then too. According to Hunter.
But now it’s worse. Every since John McCain swooped down over Washington and it’s hordes of frantic legislators in the midst of reaching a middle ground where this financial bailout package is concerned, something has really started to stink.
Actually, it started to smell bad earlier than that. John McCain was due to be on David Letterman’s show in New York last week and canceled at the last minute, saying that he had to “suspend his campaign activities” to “immediately return to Washington”.
By “immediately”, of course, McCain meant that he was going to
- go straight to Katie Couric’s show, also on CBS
- get his makeup done (I’m not making this up)
- give her and interview at the same time he would’ve given Letterman his
- go to dinner
- RETURN TO HIS HOTEL for the night
- sleep
- have a nice breakfast AT ANOTHER HOTEL
…and then catch a flight to Washington.
And why? Because he couldn’t “phone this one in”? Not only has he not phoned ANYTHING in since April 8th but while he was physically in Washington he didn’t go to the hill, where the discussions were being had. Mostly he stayed in his campaign headquarters, except when he went to the White House photo op or when he went out to dinner with Joe Leiberman. Did he not think we’d find out about this?
Of course he knew; he’s an obscene and gross little maggot but he’s not unconscious or stupid. Something else was up.
We don’t, at this point know what that was, and it’s starting to look like we never will. The debate went as well as McCain could’ve hoped for, with Barack Obama merely spanking him rather than full on embarrassing the aging senator. And now we have Chuck Schumer questioning Alberto Gonzalez about who sent him to the hospital to strong arm then sick Attorney General, John Ashcroft, into cooperating with the Bush Administration’s illegal wiretapping initiative. Wouldn’t you know it? The little runt wants to talk! He wants to answer questions and say that he “was there on behalf of the President of the United States”!
You’d think this was a great way to get attention off of the financial situation but the American people are too focused, too myopic for that. Remember, illegal wiretapping is sooo last year. The American public doesn’t have time for remembering the things their government broke last year and haven’t fixed yet. They’re too focused on what their government is breaking THIS year, and this kind of distraction won’t get them very far.
Well, it’ll get Alberto Gonzales pretty far. From employment, that is. Nobody with a soul or a concept of hygiene has been able to stomach hiring the man since he “resigned”. And after this weaseling and finger pointing that resembles retired generals, Scott McLellan and many others who after leaving the Bush Administration decide they’ve seen the light and want to tell the truth again as if they’ve been under the Imperius Curse or something, well, let’s just say that a woman in white gloves wouldn’t GIVE him her ketchup popsicle.
But. I’ve strayed from John McCain, and how much he stinks, which is, I guess what they wanted me to do. Those of you still with me here, well, you’re winning.
More on topic: it stinks. House Republicans have been urging no bailout, no bailout as if someone was listening. But they know, just like everyone else seems to, that something like this, in some form or other, is necessary. To refuse it outright would be foolish. To do nothing would be even worse, though I’m not sure anyone is seriously proposing that.
(Any interesting quotes you’d like to contribute, representative Bachman?)
So why would they oppose it? Let’s see…
They could genuinely feel that it’s unconstitutional to give someone this much power over funds and not stand for that…but they’re house republicans and everyone who’s been around knows that they always end up getting some of the pie so let’s not kid ourselves here.
It’s really a politics thing.
Going along with this would mean that if it works, Democrats get credit for working bipartisanly…if it doesn’t work, your name is attached to something that failed…again.
Going against it means that if it works, you can claim that they got lucky and you didn’t want to take that kind of irresponsible risk (which is superficially, at least, similar to Obama’s position on the surge in Iraq though I think he’s not nearly vocal enough of the fact that the surge won’t have “worked” until they define what “working” means - just because violence is down doesn’t mean you’ve removed any part of the problem…it could be any number of things like, say, 30K extra troops suppressing the problem, which is hardly a solution.)
Whew. I almost strayed again on that one. But I’m back.
So there’s no political reason for the House Republicans to back up this deal. The democrats, if they want to be responsible and pass something they think is necessary, might have to go into it without them, and take some ownership of the solution. Imagine that. Balls.
But remember: doing SOMETHING is not the goal here. Doing nothing can’t realistically happen but they must do the right thing. And any democrat who votes for a bill with the wrong provisions (see the previous article) will not receive my vote again. It’s as simple as that.
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People, people, people…
PEOPLE!
There are some truths that we must recognize and stop talking about so that we can move on to the good stuff. Luckily, you’re all primed to hear about them because they have to do with THE ISSUES - which you love - and that’s what this election in November is going to be about.
Right? Right.
Abortion
It’s pretty obvious to anyone paying attention at this point that Roe v. Wade will not be repealed without some kind of voodoo on the Supreme Court. It would be a travesty to the American Way of life, but not because it goes against our values, necessarily. Roe v. Wade has become like Fenway, like Thanksgiving, like Drive Thru’s, like Labor Day Sales, like hot dogs and watermelons and like frivolous lawsuits. It’s an American Institution. You can’t get rid of Roe v. Wade. What the hell would we bicker about pointlessly in presidential races?
So, seriously, shut up about abortion. It’s legal, and besides, the President of the United States is just about the least powerful peg on the totem pole when it comes to changing the constitution. Even Franklin, Adams and Hamilton agreed on that. Hell, even Ahnold has more sway with that document than does the Prez. The best chance the chief executive has is to stack the deck, and that’s only if you get lucky like W. and have 2 freaking seats give way to you. In a matter of months. Weird.
National Security
It’s pretty obvious to anyone counting the ciphers at the NSA that National Security has been mostly an efficient way to make my tax dollars go from one magical place to another magical place as inefficiently as possible. We could’ve been more efficient in wasting so much money as what we spend on the TSA: we could’ve put it all in a pile in the middle of the desert and taken a match to it.
Furthermore, the disaster of national security, aside from the poor planning, poor execution and poor response, is really the fact that the mentality of people has now changed to one that more closely resembles frightened hamsters than Americans in pursuit of their life, liberty and/or happiness. Seriously. You can cause panic, fear and a total disruption of commerce simply by putting an empty briefcase at a street corner. Or you can hang a circuit board with wires hanging from it on electrical wires around a city. Or you can leave a note in the seat back pocket of an aircraft saying that there’s a bomb in the airport.
Watch how people react. It’s insane. Frightened rats make more sense in their flee tactics and threat assertions. We suck at that kind of thing.
Health Care
It’s pretty obvious to anyone that has lived abroad or been injured abroad while traveling that American health care is the shite of the civilized world. Embarrassingly complicated, impossibly expensive and totally overrun by insurance companies and staff infections, and god help you if you use Kaiser Permanente. I mean, you may as well just amputate your own head.
Ideas float rampantly in political campaigns, but if you pay attention, no one has ever really got hold of one of these “ideas”; not really. Promises are made like it was an algebra problem, but it always falls short on explaining anything. It’s not impossible, I’m sure. But with 300 million people, nothing’s really easy. Obama’s new plan is no different, though the man can sure tell a good story, eh?
I feel like buying some health care already.
Foreign Policy
It’s pretty obvious to anyone looking out instead of just looking in that the world is a big place, and that America doesn’t fill up anywhere near enough of it to behave the way it does. Being abroad has shown me that if there’s such as thing as “stark contrast” it’s what you see when you put the “typical” American image that the world has come to have next to the image of an American who has traveled. The world seems to think (mostly rightfully so) of bumbling idiots that are as loud as they are rude, unrefined and totally despicable animals of no taste or class. But American’s who travel, who have a chance to look back as they leave borders behind are almost unanimously disgusted by their brethren. They think very much like Europeans, that America is doomed and there’s nothing the world can do about it. Which is too bad, I should say, because the place had so much potential.
Economy
It’s pretty obvious to anyone paying a mortgage or taxes or dividends or just about anything that the economy has tanked. And I don’t mean like, a cycle, where if you just sit tight this thing will get figured out in 5-6 years and we can all go back to day trading while at work, shopping on amazon while driving down the road and checking out the nicer rims on the other Explorers who all pay the same $1.40 for gas.
No, no. This was a bad time for the US to fall flat on its face and drag the civilized world with it and the consequences will be more than just the sum of its parts. We have finally gotten past the Chinese Olympics (which everyone has already forgotten by now) in which China came out of the economic underground flashing the ownership title of all of our debt in its left hand and a fisted up can of whup-ass in the other. And everyone knows China is right handed.
While we distract ourselves and spread what little worth our economy has throughout the middle east in pointless ventures that haven’t had a hope of success in 5 years, China, India and Russia are being smart and silent. Europe can’t protect America because it’s got its own problems. Last week in Edinburgh I saw a comedian from the Isle of Mann poke fun of the housing market and those in it. How much more “rising of the proletariat” can you get? I mean, the Isle of Mann! Who’s ever heard of that place and they’re taking the piss out of the entire rest of the continent for getting swept up in this mess.
By the time this is done, not only will America be paying at least what it is now at the pump, but we won’t even have gallons anymore. Ever heard of the metric system? I suggest everyone take a steep course in Mandarin and look up the word “meter”. We’ll all be seeing it a lot more very soon with the learning curve that is around the corner.
Iraq
It’s pretty obvious to anyone paying attention at this point that Iraq will not have a pretty ending. Or even a clear one. And won’t somebody stop this shit about it being about supporting the troops? Wars aren’t about supporting the men and women you send to die. War is about something else. What do we do to mitigate a war? Do we provide equipment and healthcare for the fighters? Do we provide proper funding to the cause? Sure. If this were actually a war and not a terribly mis-guided joy ride on the taxpayer’s grandchildren.
How about supporting them by saving their lives and bringing them home, not by saving the egos of their leaders. Do I REALLY have to be the one to say that?
Global Warming
It’s pretty obvious to anyone paying attention at this point that we will not reverse this carbon problem. We should’ve been doing something about it in 1993. And only now are we even having discussions about it, and they’re not even productive. It’s still a talking point. That’s it, man. We’re fucked. The republican’s refuse to even use the term, “global warming” and the democrats are too incompetent to make the issue visible beyond some powerpoint slides and and green posters. Polar bears are melting (because, you know, they’re made of ice. I bet you Michelle Bachman would buy that) and we have people who think that unrestricting industry is more important than maintaining a sustainable growth. And no action.
You can have the congress set out resolutions upon resolutions about 50% of cars produced in the US must have 20% fewer emissions by the year 2156 or whatever, but that’s not action: it’s theater. You know and I know that nothing will happen except that there will be more hybrid commercials. And don’t even get me started on those damn things.
The End
It’s pretty obvious to anyone paying attention at this point that the options are limited, like always. John McCain is either a habitual liar or else that he has his memory systematically erased by Karl Rove every night before bed. Unofficially, of course. The corollary to that is that everyone in the mainstream media seems to have no capacity for short term memory. Don’t you people record the shit he says and then contradicts less than 24 hours later? Weren’t you there both times he said diametrically opposing things?
Yes, yes you were. So why don’t you stop him and point out his contradiction on the spot? Why don’t you get him on track when you ask him about his 7 houses and he replies with a POW story that sounds more like Abe Simpson drolling on about an incoherent and unrelated story? And why stop just because he gets visibly angry? Why don’t you just warn him before the interview that if he tries anything funny that we’ll put a stink bomb under his kitchen table, but that we won’t tell him which one it’s under?
What Else
It’s pretty obvious to anyone paying attention at this point that…
Oh, what the hell? Screw this shit - let’s have the hope. Sure. Have it. Fill your mouth with it like whipped cream or Velveeta from the bottle. Roll around in it like bushels of hay and make all the love you want, or don’t want. John McCain is either an idiot or a lying bastard and we’ve had enough of both for too long. Obama is not perfect, and he’s fucked up big on at least one occasion that I can think of off the top of my head (I’m looking at you, FISA Bill). And Biden… he ain’t perfect either with his big mouth and politician’s smile that I’ve so learned to distrust. But an Obama-Biden ticket… that’s some sweet sugar we’ve been so long without. We’ve been putting up with the bitter taste of Zombies and Frankensteins and recoiling in the sour shower of corruption and lies and outright thievery that we’ve forgotten the taste of real honey.
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