As we noted the other day, the next card in the Republican effort to scuttle health care reform is being played:
Senate Minority Whip Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.) on Tuesday defended critics of Democratic health care reform plans who claim the proposals would provide subsidized health care to illegal immigrants. Kyl said Democrats have long sought to block curbs on public services for people illegally in the country.
“It’s a logical question for people to ask,” Kyl said during a conference call with reporters, maintaining that during last year’s State Children’s Health Insurance Program debate and other legislative fights, Democrats blocked efforts by Republicans to include curbs on health care for illegal immigrants.
“In the last couple of bills … there were efforts to ensure that only eligible people would get the benefits … those efforts were defeated by Democrats,” Kyl argued, pointing out that hospitals currently are required to provide illegal aliens — as well as anyone else — with health care if they are in need.
You thought the teabaggers and patriots were insane at the town halls before- wait until the border folks start whipping up the hysteria. On the upside, this makes scheduling easier for Hardball, since Matthews has Tancredo on every week anyway.
Cat Lady
I’ll get Barney Frank on it.
Fwiffo
If Republicans had their way, any time somebody was brought into an emergency room with a sucking chest wound, they’d first need to pass the kerning on their birth certificate by the freepers before the doctors would be allowed to operate.
General Winfield Stuck
Good to see wingnuts doubling down on the Xenophobia.
Do you need some more nails for your electoral coffin Mr. Kyl?
dmsilev
Sheesh, this “debate” really is like a remix of the Greatest GOP Talking Points. How long until John Boehner or someone gets up and says that if we pass a public option, the terrorists will win?
-dms
Hunter Gathers
They can’t be this stupid, can they? This helps them how? They already have Whitey’s vote. Well, I guess ‘the dirty mexikins are gonna take yer jorb and yer healf care’ talking point was going to come around sooner or later.
Rey
@dmsilev
By this Friday?
Geez, here we go. Did the wise Latina justice not teach them anything.
JGabriel
Rollcall:
Translation: What kind of country will we become if we don’t let sick Hispanic kids die?
What kind of person opposes helping sick kids because of the country of their birth?
And the GOP wonders why the Hispanic vote is stampeding away from them in droves.
.
Jack T.
@ Hunter Gathers
I was just about to make the same point. But I guess they’ve written off the Hispanic vote for a little while. That, or they just can’t help themselves.
mcc
The dems should have tried to keep them on the “death panels” talking point as long as possible.
burnspbesq
New Zealand is looking better every day.
jenniebee
I can’t wait to see them mix this one with the “we have universal health care because emergency room care is freeeeee to everyone!” meme.
PeakVT
Of course, there’s a good chance it costs the same amount to give illegals basic health care as it does to treat the ones that end up in the emergency room due to lack of basic care.
Wouldn’t it be nice to talk about the facts?
Ash
Does Kyl know that he represents Arizona? Instead of say…Greenwich?
Will
My deeply cynical, evil side kind of wants the health care debate to drag on into the fall. A nice, massive pandemic running uncontrolled through the millions of uninsured, under-insured and illegal Americans – and consequently spreading even to those with “gold-plated” policies – might alter the terms of the debate a smidge.
My better angel knows that thousands – millions, if it gets to Spanish influenza levels – of deaths is a much worse thing than problems with health insurance. Plus, he knows that I could die, too.
Doesn’t make the daydream any less schadenfreundalicious.
Xecky Gilchrist
I thought they’d been beating this drum for a while. CNN last week had the ominous little corner-card saying “Health care reform: will it pay for care for illegal immigrants?”
So nothing new except that it’s being moved to the front burner.
Next up: requirements that presidents show their vault copy, long-form non-antichrist card before participating in policy discussions.
General Winfield Stuck
And I just want to take a moment to say thank you Senators Grassely and Kyl for finally making public the GOP’s real agenda of blanket opposition to any health care reform.
I’m sure the WH is thankful too, that they can now put your bi-partisan nonsense to bed, and get on with change we can believe in.
IndieTarheel
@Rey: You cannot teach the willfully ignorant.
Leelee for Obama
I haz a sad-Don Hewitt is gone. He ws 86, he had a good life, nothing to comlpain about, but I will miss him.
El Cid
Quick! Get some Democrats out there to respond by making sure that Real America knows that Democrats hate illegal immigrants too! Make sure to shoot as many of your own feet in the process of paying homage to the right’s propaganda! Urgent!
Leelee for Obama
There will be gnashing of teeth about this lack of bi-partisanship, and I, personally will play my teeny, tiny violin for them. Wonder if there will be rending of garments? All that sort of Biblical stuff.
frogspawn
Having an untreated population to incubate the pathogens is key for new and improved pandemics.
Brick Oven Bill
The plan, as I understand it, does not differentiate between US Citizens and illegal aliens. So the Democrats’ plan extends full health coverage not only to all Americans, but to all of the world that can manage to buy a plane ticket or jump a fence to put their feet on the ground here when they get sick.
This will bankrupt the system very quickly. Probably not a bad thing.
Ash Can
Is Kyl trying to say what I think he’s trying to say? That needed health care should be denied if the person in need can’t produce proper documentation first? Are the Republicans really going to go there?
Maybe at this point they’re just trying to see who else they can disgust and alienate, just for shits and giggles.
El Cid
@Brick Oven Bill: You do not understand it, nor do you care to. It doesn’t matter what is or is not in any bill, you’ll just make shit up and post 9,000 times about whatever large stone has rolled into your head at the moment.
jenniebee
@frogspawn: Say NO! to health care for Typhoid Mary!
Punchy
Lettuce recap:
1)They first went the “gubmint paying for abortionz!”
2)Then they went death panels and dead grandmamas
3) Now it’s “illegal aliens (read: dirty spics) get the bennys!”
/checks GOP handbook….
Uh, they’re done. They’ve used up their last boogeyman, unless they can somehow shoehorn gays in this somehow. Or maybe how gubmint health care evicerates the 2nd Amendy.
Perhaps the debate will swing in the Dems favor eventually.
El Cid
@Ash Can: OMG! JOHN KYL WANTS DEATH PANELS FOR ILLEGAL IMGRINTS!
Michael
Erickson is eating his own.
http://www.redstate.com/erick/2009/08/19/dear-senator-mike-enzi-and-heritage-foundation-shut-up/?preview=true
**************************
Dear Senator Mike Enzi and Heritage Foundation: Shut Up. [updated]
Posted by Erick Erickson (Profile)
Wednesday, August 19th at 10:40AM EDT
39 Comments
[updated]: As if on cue, Stuart Butler from the Heritage Foundation, has decided to take issue with Sarah Palin’s use of the phrase “death panels.” Butler is defending Ezekiel Emanuel, Rahm’s brother, who has written that we need not guarantee healthcare benefits to people with dementia because they cannot be full participants in the body politic.
Emanuel’s actual quote: “[S]ervices provided to individuals who are irreversibly prevented from being or becoming participating citizens [in the body politic] are not basic and should not be guaranteed. An obvious example is not guaranteeing health services to patients with dementia.”
Butler is defending Emanuel and attacking Palin at the precise moment the Democrats are in full scale retreat on the issue because of Palin’s offensive. Sigh. These guys have the political instincts of amoebas. They cannot afford to hide behind being policy guys. That policy plays hand in hand with politics and political instincts must be brought to bear in this fight. If they cannot or will not, Heritage must shut these guys up before they cause great damage in the fight.
**********************************
IndieTarheel
@Will:
Sorry, the Dick(ster) beat you to it. Of course, he’s dense enough to think it would be faked. What a retard.
Brick Oven Bill
El Cid;
Where in the legislation does it differentiate between levels of care for Citizens and levels of care for illegal aliens?
amk
More red meat for the base. Hope the Hispanics at least now realize which side their bread is buttered.
Sasha
@Brick Oven Bill:
The plan, as I understand it, does not differentiate between US Citizens and illegal aliens.
Then you don’t understand it.
GregB
Well, they were claiming that the plan would pay for gender reassignment.
Maybe they’ll top it off with freed federally covered gender reassignment for undocumented immigrants.
-G
Da Bomb
Typical anti-healthcare opponent:
“Who says that I want Messicans to takeover my healthcare. I don’t want the Chinese, the gay, or the shiftless welfare moms to take my healthcare(who could be illegal, but maybe not; but they don’t work so there!)
I don’t want illegal Muslim terrorists to take my healthcare away either.
Only old white americans like me deserve healthcare, and that black idiot in Arizona who had a gun, he deserves healthcare too.
He was defending my right to be a gimp, a blue hair carrying AARP member and carry a gun. But he can still sit on the back of the bus and his mom is probably on welfare. But that’s alright, because when the death panels come to get me, he and the LaRouchies will be there to shoot them on the spot, but hopefully he won’t try and touch me, because I fear that I will have his blackity blackness all over me. Also.”
Brick Oven Bill
OK then.
Sasha;
Where in the legislation does it differentiate between levels of care for Citizens and levels of care for illegal aliens?
Da Bomb
Typical anti-healthcare/anti-immigration opponent :
“Who says that I want Messicans to takeover my healthcare. I don’t want the Chinese, the gay, or the shiftless welfare moms to take my healthcare(who could be illegal, but maybe not; but they don’t work so there!)
I don’t want illegal Muslim terrorists to take my healthcare away either.
Only old white americans like me deserve healthcare, and that black idiot in Arizona who had a gun, he deserves healthcare too.
He was defending my right to be a gimp, a blue hair carrying AARP member and carry a gun. But he can still sit on the back of the bus and his mom is probably on welfare. But that’s alright, because when the death panels come to get me, he and the LaRouchies will be there to shoot them on the spot, but hopefully he won’t try and touch me, because I fear that I will have his blackity blackness all over me. Also.”
Just wait till the immigration reform debate comes around. You think it’s crazy now, whew, you haven’t seen crazy yet.
Hunter Gathers
Gibbs ‘walks back’ the go-it-alone strategy.
http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/2009/08/gibbs-denies-that-white-house-is-giving-up-on-bipartisanship.php?ref=fpb
Of course he’s going to ‘walk it back’, you media dunderheads. It’s Gibb’s job to spin. They have to keep the door open a smidge for the two ladies from Maine. And they know that the door will shut not long after they return from recess.
Something tells me that Snowe and Collins will not go along with the crazy, as long as Obama keeps a lifeline open.
AnotherBruce
It’s always been their argument, hasn’t it?
This country will be ruined because some minority that you hate will be helped by the same government program that’s helping you.
PeakVT
Public option whip count up to 46.
Brachiator
@Brick Oven Bill:
There’s your problem right there.
Your claim. Prove it or move along.
cleek
i can get behind a Whole Foods boycott, but i’m totally stumped about how to pull off a United Health Care boycott… though they deserve one.
The Grand Panjandrum
I read HR 3200 (one of three bills in the House) and it specifically proscribes those who are here illegally from receiving any Federal subisidies for health care. (Title 1, Subtitle C, Sec 246):
Damn facts keep getting in the way. The other two bills in the House have similar provisions. I leave it to the non-believers to do a bit of research to prove me wrong. (Which I am not.)
jenniebee
It’s not worth torpedoing the bill to insist on moving illegals from the expensive fake-name-in-the-emergency-room method of getting health care to the cheaper same-care-as-everyone-else standard, but it is no end of amusing to see BOB arguing for the expensive status quo as the fiscally responsible alternative.
Brick Oven Bill
You cannot prove a negative Brachinator. Duh. Where did you go to school?
Alan
Every time I see the figure 50 million uninsured some Rightwinger will obnoxiously ask, “how many of those are illegal aliens?” Yeah, this angle will resonate big time in a lot in their ranks.
And I read earlier that Frank Luntz is using the rhetoric, War on Medicare.
It’s going to get much worse. The Dems need to ignore the Right and just put together a good bill.
Xenos
Uh, they’re done. They’ve used up their last boogeyman, unless they can somehow shoehorn gays in this somehow. Or maybe how gubmint health care evicerates the 2nd Amendy.
The trolls on Politico are already complaining that a reformed health care system might lead to few AIDS deaths, which would be a shame since they are hoping for Barney Frank’s death. So expect that line to be emerging in the open in a few days.
As for the 2nd amendment, you getting people treated for gunshot wounds from the Militia attempted assassinations would definitely undermine the 2nd amendment, as far as they are concerned.
Crashman06
@Brick Oven Bill: I think The Grand Panjandrum just proved you wrong a few comments above.
Xenos
@cleek: It is not so easy to boycott UHC, but I certainly would not join one of their plans if I had any choice in the matter. As much as I can I try to work with mutual insurance companies only.
Roger Moore
@Fwiffo:
Fixt. Let’s be realistic, here. Everyone knows that people with the right skin color would never be asked to prove their citizenship status before receiving care. Only those dirty brown people would actually be checked.
Fwiffo
But that’s confusing legal speak. Why won’t they accept my amendment that just says “no health care for brown people”?
tamied
@Punchy: I believe the plan includes not only paying for, but encouraging sex-change operations. There will be sex-panels too.
Face
You do realize that this will cause Broder’s white wrinkley head will esspload after reading this, dont you?
Brick Oven Bill
The Grand Panjamdrum has provided a link demonstrating that the legislation, as introduced, does in fact differentiate between Citizens and illegal aliens.
I stand corrected, at least partially. The link does not limit public care for temporary workers, those here on visas, permanent residents, and the children of illegals.
Crashman06
@tamied: And forced abortion panels for evangelical mothers. Also.
Zifnab
@IndieTarheel:
I remember when the old “CIA gave AIDS to black people” conspiracy theory was a left wing thing. Now we’ve truly come full circle with crazy old white dudes claiming swine/bird flu is alternately completely tame and not to be worried about and totally a hoax perpetuated by the federal government (presumably as far back as the GOP / Bush Admin in ’02 and ’04) to steal our guns.
doctor tecate
when did “it’s a logical question to ask” become a way to introduce bullshit as fact?
KXB
“The plan, as I understand it, does not differentiate between US Citizens and illegal aliens. So the Democrats’ plan extends full health coverage not only to all Americans, but to all of the world that can manage to buy a plane ticket or jump a fence to put their feet on the ground here when they get sick.”
Funny – if expense is the concern, then why not ask cops, firemen, and EMS workers to check citizenship status before answering a call? How about closing a bunch of unnecessary military bases?
General Winfield Stuck
@Brick Oven Bill:
Well shit Bill. So your position is, if we have legal visitors here then we shouldn’t provide health care for them while their visiting. You might want to rethunk that. Ain’t a bit Christian of ya. Also.
bago
@Brick Oven Bill: I’m guessing that’s why the airlines fare so well on trips to canada and the UK, and why they are so heavily in debt to the Chinese running those trillion dollar deficits.
Punchy
@Crashman06: then where are the Wooden Panels for those peeps very stoic and unlikely to move?
Or Solar Panels for those beaming with radiance and warmth?
I could do this all day.
The Grand Panjandrum
@Brick Oven Bill: No you stand corrected because you wrote that there was no differentiation between American citizens and Illegal aliens. If you now want to change the terms of your argument I suggest you first state the obvious. You were wrong. Period. Those other categories you suggest are people who would then be paying taxes. If you were here legally you are a taxpayer. As the law currently stands any child born in the US is a citizen. If you think the law should be changed then that is your right. However, that is not the law.
So, please. Will you admit, without qualification, that you were wrong based on the argument you first presented?
Ash Can
My prediction: Lou Dobbs will have Jon Kyl on his program to discuss this matter (in 3…2…), which will spawn numerous YouTube hits and multiple contorted explanations by the usual suspects of how the Democrats were ultimately to blame for the Dobbs-Kyl spectacle.
General Winfield Stuck
John Podhortz thinks Obama is bluffing.
Nothing but flowers JohnPod. Nothing But Flowers. And cakewalks.
b-psycho
Wouldn’t checking the citizenship status of everyone who shows up at a hospital involve an expansion of government power?
Fwiffo
According to the constitution, children born in the United States (to whoever) are US citizens. All citizens must be given equal treatment under the law; also the plain language of the constitution. If you desire something different, it would require a constitutional amendment.
Sasha
@Brick Oven Bill:
OK then.
Sasha;
Where in the legislation does it differentiate between levels of care for Citizens and levels of care for illegal aliens?
IIRC, the public option would allow those who cannot afford private insurance to buy public health insurance from the government instead. Illegal aliens would not be allowed to purchase this public insurance under the proposed legislation (and I’m sure it wouldn’t be too hard to determine if someone is eligible or not).
There is a bit in the proposed bill about “nondiscrimination”, but the language in that bit does not change the fact that an illegal alien would not be able to buy public insurance.
In short, if you want to know what difference of the level of care is — a citizen who is eligible to buy public insurance can, and an illegal alien, who is not eligible, cannot (although, like now, if an illegal alien required serious medical attention, an emergency room would be obligated to treat him).
Roger Moore
@b-psycho:
Yes. That’s why in practice it would only involve checking the citizenship status of suspicious looking (i.e. brown) people. Because the government power would only be used against evil minorities and not Real Americans(R), it wouldn’t count.
Brick Oven Bill
Persons born under the jurisdiction of the government on US soil are Citizens. As people here illegally are not under the government’s jurisdiction, their children are not Citizens per the 14th Amendment. This intrepretation will come in good time.
You were right about illegal aliens The Grand Panjamdrum. I was wrong.
But above and beyond illegal aliens, in an era of limited budgets and rationing, Citizens should be given preference for public benefits. Non-Citizens should be made to pay for their own care, just like Americans have to pay for their own care when they are legally in Mexico.
Sasha
I stand corrected, at least partially. The link does not limit public care for temporary workers, those here on visas, permanent residents, and the children of illegals.
Actually, you stand completely corrected — you asked about citizens and illegal aliens and nothing else.
I have no problem with allowing temporary workers, those here on visas, permanent residents, and the children of illegals (who, if born in the States, are citizens) from purchasing public insurance.
El Cid
@Brick Oven Bill: HR3200 does not discriminate against “levels of care” between citizens and illegal immigrants because that would be contrary to the values of medicine and to the law and it would then be your “DEATH PANELS”.
For you to even phrase it that way is once again tedious and astoundingly stupid. What, are doctors in the emergency room supposed to have a list such that if they can’t prove it’s a citizen they let the cancer spread, or they allow the broken limb to go unset? Really?
The bill is not intended to be used as a substitute for immigration laws and enforcement. Then as now, if an ‘illegal immigrant’ is able to purchase health insurance, he or she may. Just like they buy TVs and cars and such and aren’t asked for their papers.
However, HR3200 does prevent Federal aid from being used to subsidize non-citizens, in sections 242
and 246 entitled SEC. 246. NO FEDERAL PAYMENT FOR UNDOCUMENTED ALIENS.
By the way, that text above is the entirety of Section 246. What, is a sentence now too long for the conservative opposition? Should a proper health care / insurance reform bill now be limited to 10 words or less so that the excessively dim and raving can feel comfortable with it? Maybe printed on the back of Bazooka Joe chewing gum?
Now, please instantly misunderstand this all, you propaganda spewing nitwit. And you’re welcome for doing the home work of READING THE BILL which you’re too lazy and stupid to do.
ThatLeftTurnInABQ
Can we call this the brownbaggers movement?
Brick Oven Bill
Hey El Cid;
Question: How to they treat poor people with cancer in Guatemala?
Answer: If you provide no health care for your own citizens, most do not die of cancer. The major causes of death:
“…were pneumonia and influenza (16.5%), perinatal conditions (13.8%), intestinal infectious diseases (8.9%), and nutritional deficiencies (5.7%). Malnutrition, alcoholism, and inadequate sanitation and housing also pose serious health problems.”
But you, El Cid, are all powerful, and can provide world-class health care TO THE WORLD!
El Cid
@Brick Oven Bill: Look, I had enough of your bullshit. You spewed absolute ignorance before, was an absolutely lazy schmuck, and you want to continue a dialogue? Screw you. Go away, lunatic.
Fwiffo
That’s even crazier than the Chewbacca defense. It’s crazy even by Brick Oven Bill standards. If illegal aliens were not under the jurisdiction of the US government when on US soil, then the US government wouldn’t be able to prosecute them for crimes or deport them. Any foreigner walking on the US soil would magically have some sort of super-duper, double-reacharound diplomatic immunity.
Beyond all that, it’s just fucking crazy beyond words to hold children responsible for the crimes of their parents.
Brachiator
@Brick Oven Bill:
Hmmm. You should change your handle to Brick Oven Non Sequitur.
But I see that once again, you make an uninformed claim and then wait for others to show how wrong you are. This is either excellent trolling, appalling ignorance, or some magical combination of both.
Crap! WordPress ate my post the first time out (using Windows and Chrome)
Brick Oven Bill
May the reproductive juices of Janet Reno drip down upon your head El Cid, causing a sheen. This will instruct you of the limits of your power.
THE LIMITS OF YOUR POWER!
Tony J
You thought the teabaggers and patriots were insane at the town halls before- wait until the border folks start whipping up the hysteria.
Yup. The frothing crazy being whipped up over Health Reform will be as nothing compared to the insanity the GOP Base will unleash when Immigration Reform starts rolling.
If you think the MSM has had to tie itself in knots covering for the Republicans over the last 8 months of Epic Fail, imagine how much harder they’re going to have to work pretending that the GOP is a credible party of government when the they go full-on ‘balls on the windshield’ with anti-immigrant rhetoric in 2011.
I predict a riot.
Leelee for Obama
{{Beyond all that, it’s just fucking crazy beyond words to hold children responsible for the crimes of their parents}}
While I completely agree with this statement, you need to understand the Protestant Ethic. It holds that if you are poor, it’s because you are not beloved of God. That God has turned from you, because, of course God and Baby Jesus are all about the bottom line. They also have a Bible position about the sins of the Father being visited on the Sons.
All ridiculous stuff, but there it it.
Laura W
@Brick Oven Bill: Look what I found on my trail hike this morning, Bill. I confess, I thought of you.
Fondly, of course:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/[email protected]/3836827977/
woot
Seems like a strong harbinger of peak wingnut to me…
ericblair
@Fwiffo: If illegal aliens were not under the jurisdiction of the US government when on US soil, then the US government wouldn’t be able to prosecute them for crimes or deport them. Any foreigner walking on the US soil would magically have some sort of super-duper, double-reacharound diplomatic immunity.
I remember this “theory” was part of the wingnut talking points when they were on a tear about immigration to try to prove that the Constitution didn’t apply to brown people. Wingnut constitutional scholarship is a very interesting discipline.
SrirachaHotSauce
@Brick Oven Bill:
Somebody is a little full of himself this morning.
John S.
We know, dining room table BOB, we know.
The Moar You Know
@Brick Oven Bill: Now THAT’S a curse. Albeit a tasteless one. Isn’t she dead?
Brick Oven Bill
That is a very nice troll LauraW, but I am more empathetic. No new pictures, so all I can offer is Larry the Lizard, as previously posted. One month later, Larry still hangs out in the house, and I feed him bugs. We get along well.
Larry is also against illegal immigration, as far as I can tell.
Leelee for Obama
{{Wingnut constitutional scholarship is a very interesting discipline.}}
I mentioned this the other day, but it bears repeating. Wingnuts refuse to accept that the Federalist Papers were op-eds in favor of ratifying the Constitution. They are NOT part of the Founding Documents. The Federalist Society, is akin to a Friedman Unit Society. Only the writers had more talent.
Much can be understood once this is understood.
Corner Stone
@Brick Oven Bill: I for one have repeatedly been dubious of the BoB character. With that said, I have to admit that this post is just sheer fucking brilliance.
henqiguai
@jenniebee (#11):
Too late. That one’s been trotted out any number of times that I’ve heard on the radio and TV in the past year.
Xenos
Persons born under the jurisdiction of the government on US soil are Citizens.
What does this sentence mean? Aside from being an incorrect statement of the law, are there people born on US soil (jus soli) who are not under the jurisdiction of ‘the government’? Which government ‘on US soil’ are you talking about? Or is this some sort of backhanded swipe at Native Americans born on reservations.
BOB – if you can’t talk clearly, using the correct terms within the correct categories, you can’t understand what you are talking about. It is just opaque verbiage, signifying nothing. A Palinesque word salad. Educate yourself or shut up. Or just admit that you became an engineering major just because you flunked English 101.
JGabriel
@Brick Oven Bill:
So, BOB, I guess that we can put you in class of people who would like to deny health to kids whose parents were born in the wrong country.
I really don’t have words to describe how much I despise people like that.
.
lawnorder
Chuck Norris went for “they are taking the children” saying Obamacare’s – optional – free well baby visits constitute an effort of the government to intrude on parents rights and indoctrinate your kids.
jenniebee
@Brick Oven Bill:
May the reproductive juices of Janet Reno drip down upon your head El Cid, causing a sheen. This will instruct you of the limits of your power.
THE LIMITS OF YOUR POWER!
I think that just replaced the “barfight with a lesbian” BOB comment as my new favorite BOBsense of all time.
Hint to BOB: spoofing where you tip your hand and let everyone in on the joke = teh awesome. Spoofing that cannot be differentiated from trolling, and/or trolling = cry for attention that makes us sorry about your tiny penis and your inability to get attention from Mom.
Dr.Woody
I don’t think most of us in the ‘educated’ classes realize just how deeply embedded in the psyches of the average Murkin lumpen-proles are jingoism, nativism and xenophobia. (I can only claim to have glimpsed the a small clue of the extent of it during the 30 years I spent teaching in Oklahomophia between 1994 and 2000, and it is astonishing!)
Dr.Woody
I don’t think most of us in the ‘educated’ classes realize just how deeply embedded in the psyches of the average Murkin lumpen-proles are jingoism, nativism and xenophobia. (I can only claim to have glimpsed the a small clue of the extent of it during the 30 years I spent teaching in Oklahomophia between 1994 and 2000, and it is astonishing!)
Calouste
@Xenos:
That’s to exclude children born to foreign diplomats. Diplomats are not under jurisdiction of the government of the foreign country they are based in. They can be expelled and declared persona non-grata, but they can’t really be prosecuted. Pretty much the same as that embassies are legally the territory of the embassy’s country, not of the host country.
ominira
Quote of the day, courtesy of Barney Frank:
“On what planet do you spend most of your time? Ma’am, trying to have a conversation with you would be like trying to argue with a dining room table. I have no interest in doing it.”
Response to a protestor who asked why Frank supports a Nazi healthcare policy and held a poster depicting Obama as Hitler.
jenniebee
@Calouste: in other words, for BOB’s “interpretation [to] come in time” as he puts it, we’d have to give all illegal aliens diplomatic immunity?
Now there’s a tradeoff for you, BOB. You’d finally be freed of the terrifying spectre of – gasp! – anchor babies, but you’d never be able to find a good parking space again.
henqiguai
@Brick Oven Bill (#53):
Brick Boy, you blithering idiot ! Those people, by definition, are either citizens or are here legally !
Roger Moore
@Xenos:
It was meant to include both Indians who were born under Indian territorial jurisdiction and the children of foreign diplomats. From Wikipedia:
drillfork
Greenwald depresses me so much, often when I read him, I either end up going back to bed or opening up some booze. But gawddammit, somebody needs to say this:
http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2009/08/19/obama/index.html
freelancer
Wow, via KETV
Overwhelming applause for Single Payer, VA, and Medicare at Sen. Ben Nelson’s Town Hall being held at my work, The Nebraska Med Center/University of NE Med Center. He immediately counters with not if favor of Single Payer.
http://www.ketv.com/video/20463843/index.html
catclub
Far, far too much troll feeding.
It only encourages it.
Brick Oven Bill
Re: Those people, by definition, are either citizens or are here legally !
With the exception of children of illegal aliens, I agree. But these visitors are here by choice, and they can pay for their own health care, just like all us schmucks who work, pay taxes, and take charge of our own medical responsibilities, without turning to the government.
When you work, you make this stuff called money. When you bring enough of this stuff called money to the doctor, he will provide you with a service in exchange for it. This is called paying for your own doctor’s visit. It would be cheaper to pay for your own doctor’s visit if national policy was not to compel doctors to give free service to anybody who shows up.
This means they have to charge their non-freeloading customers more. Everything makes sense, when you think about it.
ericblair
@Calouste: Pretty much the same as that embassies are legally the territory of the embassy’s country, not of the host country.
Not quite: they’re protected by statute and treaty, but aren’t extraterritorial like the UN or NATO headquarters.
freelancer
Next question was yet another Small Business owner pleading with him to adopt a public option as he can’t afford to provide Insurance to his employees.
This is really going well. No visible teabaggers, though it helps that they’re on a college campus.
Sasha
@Brick Oven Bill:
But these visitors are here by choice, and they can pay for their own health care, just like all us schmucks who work, pay taxes, and take charge of our own medical responsibilities, without turning to the government.
Um, if these visitors are paying for public insurance, doesn’t that mean they *are* paying for their own health care?
ericblair
@Brick Oven Bill: With the exception of children of illegal aliens, I agree. But these visitors are here by choice, and they can pay for their own health care, just like all us schmucks who work, pay taxes, and take charge of our own medical responsibilities, without turning to the government.
You know, legal immigrants pay all taxes that US citizens pay. The same rates, too. I’m not sure what you think happens when visa holders or permanent residents get paid. As far as paying for their own healthcare, they do that now exactly like citizens, and when we get some sort of sane healthcare system they’ll be able to use it in exactly the same way as citizens will.
As for choice, well, you don’t have to stay here either, you know.
Fwiffo
I always wonder what sort of anti-logical “ticking time bomb” thought experiments wingnuts are going to dream up next.
Imagine there were a pair of Siamese twins born right on the border, and one landed on US soil, and the other landed in Siam (obviously, it’s the US/Siamese border we’re talking about here). Lefty would be a US citizen and Righty would be a furriner – wait, that must be backwards. We’ll say mom is facing East at the time of birth so that Righty is the American and Lefty is the brown one… That’s the ticket…
Anyhow, as is often the case with conjoined twins, separation surgery is necessary to save their lives, so they go to the emergency room to get split up. Apparently Roy Blunt got hip replacement surgery in the emergency room, so I’m sure they can handle that sort of thing.
Naturally, they’d have to check each of the twin’s papers. We don’t want Lefty getting anything free accidentally. But then, can they only perform surgery on the American twin? That means they’d only get to cut on the American side and the brown one would get to go home with the bigger half when they deport him directly out of the ICU to Guatemala or whatever Arab country he’s from. What if there’s only enough organs for one to survive? It just won’t do if we can’t do surgery on Lefty to get the organs that are Righty’s birthright by birth.
I know! We’ll have one of our patriotic Republican congressmen propose an amendment so that it’s OK to do surgery on brown people to save the lives of real Americans. Being able to harvest organs from illegals will just be a bonus.
Ed Drone
In the early days of this country, fire insurance was private, and a fire company would not fight a fire in your house unless you had their company placard on the house. In that way, it’s a lot like how we treat health insurance now. The public option / single-payer is simply the creation of a public health utility. If we treated insurance companies like utilities, with rate commissions and real control (albeit now and then poorly-maintained control), then the public would be being served and a “public option” would be unneeded.
So the insurance companies need either true competition or tight control. And they’re doing their damnedest to avoid either, of couse.
And treating the uninsured in emergency rooms probably costs each US taxpayer about $1400 per year, I’ve read. So if the public option is cheaper than that, I’d vote for including all comers — legals, illegals, non-citizens, non-terrestrials, I don’t care.
I would vote for a health utility company, whomever runs it, if it’s well-controlled. It’s that simple.
Ed
Fwiffo
Invalid analogy. Sometimes fire can spread from building to building so the general public welfare is at stake. Obviously, disease is never like that.
Mike G
@B.O.B
May the reproductive juices of Janet Reno blahblahblah
You used this same insult on me last month with Helen Thomas’ name, loser. You’re not even creative.
You seem to have some kind of personal trauma involving older women, perhaps with your mother’s bodily functions. Stop wasting your time being an asshole on the internet and get some professional help.
ironranger
@Fwiffo:
Omygosh, that’s damn funny.
chopper
@Brick Oven Bill:
You cannot prove a negative Brachinator. Duh.
then it’s kinda stupid of you to assert a negative that can’t be proven and act like it carries any weight.
catclub
[email protected]
ha, ha
Brachiator
@Brick Oven Bill:
So now you are arguing against any form of insurance at all, and are in favor of a pure fee-for-service approach to health care.
Or do you not understand what you are saying?
Dog Is My Copilot
Excellent editorial in the Seattle Times today about “death panels.”
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/opinion/2009685301_harrop19.html
ericblair
@Fwiffo: Invalid analogy. Sometimes fire can spread from building to building so the general public welfare is at stake. Obviously, disease is never like that.
You’re going to have to use sarcasm tags, because in all seriousness it’s very difficult these days to figure out who’s joking and who’s taken up permanent residence in Cloud Cuckoo Land. Do they have to pay US taxes there, btw?
Fwiffo
Well, some just defy parody, and we all have to live with the consequences.
I was going to go with “Services performed by the fire and police departments are matters of life and death, as well as property. Health care is only a matter of life and death.”
ominira
@Brick Oven Bill:
Don’t worry, the aliens will be mostly Canadians looking for payback for all the US seniors going to buy cheaper drugs in Canada and the Americans who get fake Canadian IDs to receive free health care there.
Aspasia
To return to the OP. I live in Arizona, where I am “represented” in the Senate by Jon Kyl and John McCain, by a bunch of rabid repubs and blue dog dems in the house, and by a state legislature full of mean old white repubs who are so stubborn that they can’t even cut a budget deal with our governor after weeks of special sessions, and who is herself a republican. She replaced our dear departed Janet Napolitano, who didn’t put up with their shit for a second.
The sheriff of the largest county in the state is a literal thug, the infamous Joe Arpaio, who lately distinguished himself by raiding an office that is investigating him in order to break into their computers. The major newspaper is owned by relatives of Dan Quayle.
As far as I can tell, then, Kyl and McCain will “represent” Arizonans until they day they die, if they want to. Those with brains and a moral code need not apply for a political position in this state. The few who do attempt to run are either co-opted, driven out, or get the hell out of Dodge ASAP, like Napolitano.
RememberNovember
There must be a simple quiz that they take:
When confronted with reasonal rebuttal as to why you are against healthcare you:
A) Yell “Heil Hitler” and call Obama a Nazi in front of a Jewish Person
B) Blame ACORN
C) ignore the fact that GWB nearly bankrupted teh country in an endless two front war, learning nothing from WW2 or Napoleon and then handing it off to his successor and subsequently blame the guy who’s in office 6 months for trying to fix it.
D) All of the above. Sit at brunch in a Fellowship taxpayer paid-for Religious Cult building and pleasure each other to the dulcid tones of Rush Limbaugh.
IndieTarheel
@doctor tecate: It was either that, or Candy Crowley gets to preface the bullshit with “Some people say…”
Martian Buddy
Suddenly, it all makes sense–B.O.B. is Rorschach.