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My right to basic bodily autonomy is not on the table. that’s the new deal.

If senate republicans had any shame, they’d die of it.

Human rights are not a matter of opinion!

Polls are now a reliable indicator of what corporate Republicans want us to think.

Prediction: the gop will rethink its strategy of boycotting future committees.

When I decide to be condescending, you won’t have to dream up a fantasy about it.

This must be what justice looks like, not vengeful, just peaceful exuberance.

This really is a full service blog.

Is it irresponsible to speculate? It is irresponsible not to.

If you thought you’d already seen people saying the stupidest things possible on the internet, prepare yourselves.

The poor and middle-class pay taxes, the rich pay accountants, the wealthy pay politicians.

Usually wrong but never in doubt

… riddled with inexplicable and elementary errors of law and fact

Baby steps, because the Republican Party is full of angry babies.

Disagreements are healthy; personal attacks are not.

This is dead girl, live boy, a goat, two wetsuits and a dildo territory.  oh, and pink furry handcuffs.

It’s a good piece. click on over. but then come back!!

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Lick the third rail, it tastes like chocolate!

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You are here: Home / Open Threads / Because of wow. / CNN Tea Party Audience Cheers at Idea of Letting Sick Uninsured Man Die

CNN Tea Party Audience Cheers at Idea of Letting Sick Uninsured Man Die

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Stays Klassy.

The CNN debate last night was wretched. It was everything that is wrong with this country — including feckless media and pundunces who should be ashamed for mainstreaming Teabilly bullshit — crammed into a studio so laden with patriotic lights, flags, and other Americana that even the creators of South Park and Team America were likely shocked and awed.

Then came the “cheering for Rick Perry’s high execution rate” moment: The Tea Party audience cheered — actually cheered at the notion of letting an uninsured man die if he didn’t decide for himself to buy Liberty Health Insurance from Liberty Health Associates, using his Liberty cell phone:

Blitzer: Let me ask you this hypothetical question. A healthy, 30-year-old man has a good job, makes a good living, but decides, “You know what, I’m not going to spend $200 or $300 a month for health insurance because I’m healthy, I don’t need it.” Something terrible happens, all of a sudden he needs it. Who’s going to pay if he goes into a coma, for example?

Paul: In a society that you accept welfare-ism and socialism, he expects the government to take care of it.

Blitzer: Well, what do you want?

Paul: He should do whatever he wants to do, and assume responsibility for himself. My advice to him would be have a major medical policy. But not forced—

Blitzer: But he doesn’t have that. And he needs intensive care for six months. Who pays?

Paul: That’s what freedom is all about. Taking your own risks. This whole idea that you have to prepare to take care of everybody.

Blitzer: But congressman, are you saying that society should just let him die?

Crowd: [Yeah! Yeah! Laughs.]

Karoli of Crooks and Liars nails it:

Wolf Blitzer did his best to pin Ron Paul down on a health care question where a 30-year old uninsured person had six months to live. After getting a bit of a runaround, Blitzer flatly asked Ron Paul whether that person should simply be left to die.

Before Paul could answer, the audience did, with cheers of “Yeah!” and applause. If anything comes of these debates, let it be this: Conservatives really believe people should be left to die with no intervention. Ron Paul answered the question after the audience cheered with an answer about churches taking care of their own.

(read the rest)

This morning on Twitter, the Paul enthusiasts1 were out in full force. You see, every time Ron Paul opens his mouth, the Paulites slinker out of the shadows to defend Paul against charges of racism and rampant assholery, and it’s hilarious to watch. This time, some Paulite tried to tell me that the audience was not cheering for death of the uninsured, but rather was cheering in support of Paul’s statements generally.

This is blatantly false, as a review of the video demonstrates:

The audience cheered immediately after Blitzer asked: “Are you saying that society should just let him die?” No amount of Twitter shenanigans can erase that fact.

The simple truth is this: The Tea Party is comprised, primarily, of savages. That’s the only word I can think of to use. They are the party of Die Early and Often. They are the party of “No Government except for in A Woman’s Vagina.” It’s so horrifying, that I am rendered nearly without power to snark about it.

Anyone who seriously contends that churches and good old-fashioned neighborliness could possibly cover the expenses of a serious illness, is not someone who can be taken seriously.

Accordingly, and notwithstanding his anti-war stance, Ron Paul is not someone who can be taken seriously.

‘Nuff said.

1 Please, stop using the term “Paultards.” Just stop it! It’s ableist and it’s offensive.

[via Crooks and Liars; image via News Corpse]

[cross-posted at ABLC]

Reader Interactions

69Comments

  2. 2.

    danimal

    The Tea Party is comprised, primarily, of savages. That’s the only word I can think of to use. They are the party of Die Early and Often. They are the party of “No Government except for in A Woman’s Vagina.” It’s so horrifying, that I am rendered nearly without power to snark about it.

    Well, to be fair, ABL, the conservatarians care about women’s uteruses as well.

  3. 3.

    Shade Tail

    Paul is an ass. He knows jack shit about the Constitution, believes in New World Order conspiracy theories, and thinks the US would be better off with policies that would cause a permanent depression and leave everyone at the mercy of vicious mega-corporations.

    And this is all in addition to the fact that men like David Duke endorse him in every election.

  5. 5.

    dan

    So churches will take care of the sick? The same churches that are filled with these Christians? Good luck.

  6. 6.

    Culture of Truth

    My advice to him would be have a major medical policy. But not forced—

    Distinction without a difference. Implied with both Paul’s answer and the cheering was the only people who deserve compassion are people who take responasibility and go out and buy health insurance. Seemed very much like an endorsement of the idea that people should be forced to buy insurance but not “forced” to “buy” “insurance.”

  8. 8.

    Litlebritdifrnt

    When my DH had his heart attack the total bill for his four day stay in hospital, his stent surgery and recovery came to a total of $68,000.00. That is a boat load of barbeque plates and bake sales. I don’t know any Church around here who could handle that. Luckily he had State Employees health insurance but it still left us with 20% deductibles and co-pays that we have no hope of ever paying off resulting in destroyed credit for the next seven years. That doesn’t even include all of the costs of follow up treatment (cardio rehab, follow ups with his surgeon ekgs etc.). Like Alan Grayson said today. These people are sadists.

  9. 9.

    lamh32

    Hmm, I guess the act stopped for a minute, cause Rick Perry was quoted saying this:

    rick-perry-on-health-insurance-question

    “I was a bit taken aback by that myself. We’re the party of life. We ought to be coming up with ways to save lives.”
    –Rick Perry’s reaction to whoops of assent from the audience at Monday night’s debate when one candidate was asked if a 30-year-old patient without health insurance should be allowed to die.

    I’m sure the mask in back on though and he’s back to secession & SS ponzi scheme talk.

  10. 10.

    Spaghetti Lee

    Anyone who seriously contends that churches and good old-fashioned neighborliness could possibly cover the expenses of a serious illness, is not someone who can be taken seriously.

    There was a recent post on Sadly No where someone said they collected all the spare change they found on the streets and saved it for four years. After four years, they had $38. They put in some of their own and gave it to a homeless person, who used it to spend a night in a cheap hotel. How far do you think $38 would get you in a hospital? That’s probably what they charge you just to walk in the door.

    This right-wing idea that anyone in severe financial straits can just get right back up again with the right combination of charity, intuition, and a little luck-it’s one of those things that can only be believed by someone who’s never tried it. It’s a glib, meaningless answer used to brush off serious problems with libertarianism. If you cut into government welfare spending the way the right wing wants to, you’re sentencing tens of thousands of people to death. There’s no way around it. And I guess in a way I’m glad it’s finally out there. When some smug, sneering little libertarian shit tells me that libertarians believe in charity and liberals believe in violence, I’ll just show him that clip.

  11. 11.

    JPL

    Former President Reagan (may he rest in hell) signed into law EMTALA so the question was stupid imo. Truth be known EMTALA has done more to raise health care costs than anything else.
    If you live in a Repub district write your congress person and ask if they support the mandate that EMTALA calls for. I didn’t watch the debate, so I’m curious if anyone brought this up.

    EDIT..Just so you know I support ACA even though I’d rather see a public option.

  12. 12.

    Spaghetti Lee

    And yes, Paul’s a crank. I don’t know how he got this kindly-old-man image because deep down he is one of the meanest, ugliest souls in all of congress, and boy is that some stiff competition. I hate it when left-libertarians tell me how different and special he is from other Republicans. Frankly, that almost makes him worse. I’d rather have just some average joe politician who may be corrupt but you can at least bargain with than some paleocon feudalist crank who demands everyone bow down to his insane ideas.

  13. 13.

    geg6

    They are who we thought they were. The mask has slipped and even the Village has to be taken aback by how savage humans, some humans, truly are.

  14. 14.

    John PM

    It is unfortunate that this response came while Blitzer was questioning Ron Paul, because Republicans can easily say that it was only Paul’s crazy supporters and not true Tea Party loving Americans who cheered for the death of the uninsured man. Now if he had been questioning Romney…

  15. 15.

    KG

    Is there some way we can just give them their own country, like in the south, but keep Miami and New Orleans?

  16. 16.

    Dee Loralei

    Apparently Santorum thinks we’re living too long, too. Can’t remember were I read it, though sorry.

  18. 18.

    Elie

    The “Tea Party” is so OVER.

    They are so far into their tantrum that they’ve busted up their own fists and arms punching the wall and Grand Old Party Moma.

    Its gonna be a hell of a morning for them when they wake up and figure out that they burned their house down and that their Grand Old Party is in the ER on life support.

  19. 19.

    rikyrah

    I’ll say it again:

    THIS IS WHO THEY ARE.

    THIS IS WHO THEY’VE ALWAYS BEEN.

    the only ones who didn’t know this were the ones stupid enough to vote for these mofos.

    this is who they are TO THE CORE.

  20. 20.

    rikyrah

    fuck Blitzer for his ‘ hypothetical’.

    there was an ACTUAL CASE just last week.

    24 year old UNEMPLOYED FATHER DIED BECAUSE OF A TOOTH PROBLEM.

    Fuck the hypothetical, Wolf.

    use the ACTUAL.

  24. 24.

    lamh32

    OT, but as a minority, female lawyer, I figured you appreciate this , but you probably already heard about this…lol. Still, a lil credit where credit is due:

    Females, minorities top Obama picks for judges

    President Barack Obama is moving at a historic pace to try to diversify the nation’s federal judiciary: Nearly three of every four people he has gotten confirmed to the federal bench are women or minorities. He is the first president who hasn’t selected a majority of white males for lifetime judgeships

    More than 70 percent of Obama’s confirmed judicial nominees during his first two years were “non-traditional,” or nominees who were not white males. That far exceeds the percentages in the two-term administrations of Bill Clinton (48.1 percent) and George W. Bush (32.9 percent), according to Sheldon Goldman, author of the authoritative book “Picking Federal Judges…”

  25. 25.

    Villago Delenda Est

    Please note that in 2008, Paulista jackasses were in the van of the brief John McCain is not eligible to be President because he was not born in the United States, and therefore is not a natural born citizen boomlet.

    Which evolved into the birther phenomenon in general when the near guy became sheriff.

  27. 27.

    stevie314

    I say call them “Paulings”.

    That way, when you meet one, you can say “hey, you’re a-pauling”.

  28. 28.

    FormerSwingVoter

    Once again:

    Conservatives want everyone they have deemed unworthy to die. This is not a figure of speech. They want everyone who isn’t them, and most of them who are them, to die. Literally die.

  29. 29.

    fuckwit

    @rikyrah: THIS.

    I guess he used the hypothetical so that people couldn’t drill down into the details of that particular case and try to “granite countertops” (or “swift boat”, or “ritually defame”) him to distract from the point.

  30. 30.

    fuckwit

    @Litlebritdifrnt: Or ivory-tower fools. The glibertarians like Paul are probably making an argument that, if there’s no government paying the bills, that’ll “bend the cost curve” and costs of medical care will come down. In other words, I’d wager that they’re arguing that having universal medical coverage inflates the costs, so that people CAN’T do it on their own.

    Which, of course, is a perfect ivory tower glibertarian argument. And, like most of them, has no basis in reality.
    c.f. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NcjMoihbIZc

  33. 33.

    Calouste

    Blitzer: Let me ask you this hypothetical question. A healthy, 30-year-old man has a good job, makes a good living, but decides, “You know what, I’m not going to spend $200 or $300 a month for health insurance because I’m healthy, I don’t need it.”

    I have good health insurance via my employer, but can you really get health insurance for $200 or $300 a month even if you are a healthy 30-year-old male? As in health insurance that won’t deny you coverage when you’re in a coma?

  34. 34.

    Odie Hugh Manatee

    Conservatives are a bloodthirsty lot, full stop. They applaud death, yell “YEAH!” to letting someone die who doesn’t have insurance and is in a coma, they want to jail, deport or kill anyone who isn’t white enough for them and so on and so on.

    Conservatives are joyful when someone they deem worthless dies or has something unfortunate happen to them, it literally makes their day.

    Great post ABL! Keep this crap in the spotlight and beat the right over the head with it.

    Daily.

    PS: I hope I wasn’t too effusive in my accolades to ABL about her post. After all, I wouldn’t want to upset the delicate fee-fees of sensitive people around here!

    ;)

  35. 35.

    sapient

    @Calouste: “I have good health insurance via my employer, but can you really get health insurance for $200 or $300 a month even if you are a healthy 30-year-old male? ”

    Calouste, don’t you know that if you’re a responsible, self-sufficient adult, you should have chosen to have a job, and chosen an employer that provided benefits? You must not be a real American if you’re asking that question!!

  36. 36.

    JITC

    Blitzer biffed the question. The healthy 30 year old male in his stupid scenario could have afforded insurance, but chose not to because he just “didn’t want” to pay the extra “$200-$300 per month.” In this scenario it IS easy to point the finger at the guy who took a dumb risk.

    The real problem, that continues to be ignored, is that there are millions of people who have jobs but still CAN’T afford insurance.

    The real problem is that $200-$300 per month this year becomes $400-$500 next year, and more the next, etc.

    The real problem is that despite paying that $200-$300 per month the insurance company might none-the-less deny coverage for the coma care.

    The real problem with tea baggers is that they honestly think that if you can’t afford insurance then you just don’t deserve it or health care.

    Health is a privilege to them, not a right. That’s why they compare health insurance to car insurance. Because we all can get by without a body if we can’t afford to own it, of course.

  37. 37.

    kay

    @JPL:

    signed into law EMTALA so the question was stupid imo.

    EMTLA doesn’t apply unless the hospital takes federal money, ie: Medicare, Medicaid, ect. Of course, all hospitals take federal money, so it always applies.

    If the Dr. Paul family (Ron ‘n Rand) were really principled people, they’d start a libertarian hospital chain that doesn’t take any federal money.

    They really don’t have to comply with the EMTLA mandate. They just can’t accept any federal cash. Constitutional problem solved!

  38. 38.

    Jonny Scrum-half

    This is BS. The “audience” didn’t “cheer” immediately after Blitzer’s question. 2, maybe 3, assholes yelled “yeah,” and there was audible laughter from other audience members. But the immediate reaction from the vast majority of the audience was silence, presumably to hear how Paul responded.

  40. 40.

    kay

    @JITC:

    The real problem is that $200-$300 per month this year becomes $400-$500 next year, and more the next, etc.

    At 400% of poverty level (around 43k for a single person) under the PPACA it really will cost this hypothetical person between 200 and 300 dollars a month for comprehensive health insurance. That’s with the government subsidy.

    Wolf Blitzer was right on the money, in terms of Obamacare. I have to give him credit for that. His number was right.

  41. 41.

    Odie Hugh Manatee

    The “audience” didn’t “cheer” immediately after Blitzer’s question. 2, maybe 3, assholes yelled “yeah,” and there was audible laughter from other audience members.

    Right, Republicans aren’t hateful assholes and never do anything wrong. It’s always one or two bad apples who make them look bad.

    Isn’t it a bit early to be sniffing glue?

  43. 43.

    gwangung

    This is BS. The “audience” didn’t “cheer” immediately after Blitzer’s question. 2, maybe 3, assholes yelled “yeah,” and there was audible laughter from other audience members.

    And you think your BS excuse makes it any better?

    Right.

  45. 45.

    Chris

    Before Paul could answer, the audience did, with cheers of “Yeah!” and applause. If anything comes of these debates, let it be this: Conservatives really believe people should be left to die with no intervention.

    Please note that those are the same turds who think it should be forbidden to pull the plug. Which one is it, assholes?

  47. 47.

    Jonny Scrum-half

    @Odie Hugh Manatee: Who said Republicans never do anything wrong? But a simple look at the video will show that it’s simply false to claim that the entire audience — or even more than 2 or 3 assholes — cheered after Blitzer’s question.

  48. 48.

    Jonny Scrum-half

    @gwangung: @Jonny Scrum-half: My excuse makes what “better”? The assholes who screamed “yeah” are assholes, and I’m not making any excuses for them. I’m not arguing in favor of the Republicans; I hope that the party dies in the near future. But let’s stick to facts, and not make up crap.

  50. 50.

    harlana

    Interesting when you consider that the republican/libertarian meme about health insurance reform has always been that we don’t have a health care problem in this country because anybody that needs medical care can go to the ER and get treated for free. I guess it’s just taking it one step further, letting them die in the ER and all.

    We should get to cheering for eugenics and shooting the old, infirm, and poor in time for the primary.

  51. 51.

    El Cid

    Not exactly a surprising result, given the circumstances, but apparently there were no Teabircher spectators to whoop it up.

    101-year-old Detroit woman evicted in foreclosure
    __
    DETROIT (AP) — A 101-year-old woman was evicted from the southwest Detroit home where she lived for nearly six decades after her 65-year-old son failed to pay the mortgage.
    __
    Texana Hollis was evicted Monday and her belongings were placed outside the home. Her son, Warren Hollis, said he didn’t pay the bill for several years and disregarded eviction notices.
    __
    “I kept it from her because I didn’t want to worry her,” Warren Hollis told WXYZ-TV for a report that aired Monday night. “I was just so sure it wasn’t going to happen.”
    __
    Wayne County Chief Deputy Treasurer David Szymanski told The Associated Press on Tuesday that the Hollises took out an adjustable-rate mortgage in 2002. A default and foreclosure notice was filed in November.
    __
    “They ended up owing $80,000 on the home,” Szymanski said. “Warren indicates he did not make the payments. He got the notices, but threw them away.”
    __
    County records show that property taxes were paid on the home through summer 2010. A winter tax bill of $55.95, including interest and fees, was unpaid, and a $778.44 summer tax bill was due this month.
    __
    A neighbor was letting Texana and Warren Hollis live in a rental house across the street from the home they shared, and Texana Hollis’ belongings were being moved there. Others, including a nonprofit organization, were working to get her back into her home.
    __
    On Monday night, she was taken to a hospital for evaluation after she became disoriented.
    __
    Szymanski said county officials were asking questions and looking into what they can do to help. He said the county has worked with 10,000 taxpayers to keep them from going into foreclosure.
    __
    “The teachable moment here is for people not to stick their head in the sand,” he said.

    If there had been more of an intention to it, though, it would seem a bit more like a housing rights direct action.

  53. 53.

    Delia

    @ABL:

    I think slinker is a Lord of the Rings reference. When Sam became suspicious that Gollum was debating with himself whether or not to kill him & Frodo, he (Sam) called the two halves of his personality Slinker and Stinker. Slinker was slightly less odious in Sam’s view, but since the two halves of Gollum compromised on leading the hobbits to the horrible giant spider rather than doing murder outright, neither one is a prize.

  54. 54.

    anthrosciguy

    Where is this guy getting health insurance for $200-300/month?

    If anyone wants to say “through his employer”, is there not a catastrophic insurance option he gets without an additional payment from the employee? Anyway, Wolfie is out of touch with reality; his question should’ve been the guy doesn’t want to pay $1,000/month for insurance, minimum. Given the average American’s salary (median income), that’s about 1/3 of his pre-tax pay, about half or more of his takehome pay.

  55. 55.

    Odie Hugh Manatee

    @Jonny Scrum-half:

    Not one voice in the audience indicated disapproval at what was happening around them. Not one single BOO of disapproval from them. Just yells of “YEAH!” and laughter to the question of letting someone die, that’s all they had.

    Nice people. Not. Just like their applause at the last debate about Perry proudly boasting about killing a shitload of people in the name of justice.

    Republicans are bloodthirsty assholes.

  56. 56.

    JGabriel

    Shorter Tea Party: If a woman gets pregnant, she can’t have an abortion. But, if, when leaving the hospital with the infant, they get hit by a car, and she’s uninsured, then the hospital should just let the baby die.

    Unless it’s an extremely brain-damaged woman on Medicare/Medicaid, who expressed her wish to be taken off machines in that situation, like Terri Schiavo. Then the gov’t should pay for her care indefinitely. But we should get rid of Medicare and Medicaid, because socia1ism.

    Seriously, these people make no fucking sense.

    .

  57. 57.

    Elie

    @harlana:

    In a very cynical (on my part) thought, I just KNOW there will not be wholesale “letting people die in ERs”… at least not before all the institutional providers make sure that they have enough services to get PAID

    Remember, (sadly and cynically), when people do not receive care at all, there is no payment going to a provider. Believe me, as much as they bitch about reimbursement, there are a LOT of providers and therefore a wholesale abandonmennt of treatment would mean that those folks would not get any dough. Period. And trust me, with health care at 17% of GNP, there are a lot of piglets looking for teats.

    Not to worry. Ignorant red neck whooping in the audience aside, aint NO provider gonna not get paid for doing something. Aint gonna happen. Rick Perry, his Moma and his hillbilly ancestors won’t do a thing cause they will be given a message. STFU – or else!

  58. 58.

    Odie Hugh Manatee

    @Odie Hugh Manatee:

    I just listened/watched the whole segment (again) on Maddow and I stand by my statement; Republicans are bloodthirsty assholes. If you (Jonny Scrum-half) want to excuse their behavior then go right ahead and do it.

    Join the assholes and defend the indefensible.

    @JGabriel:

    What’s worse is that what you stated makes sense to them. They actually believe that there is some intellectual consistency to those beliefs.

  59. 59.

    Elie

    @JGabriel:

    to follow on my previous comment to Harlana: aint no way they are going to let that baby die. That baby represents potentially hundreds of thousands of dollars revenue. For all the bitching, they will promptly have Mom (or her survivors), apply for Medicaid in that state (Medically needy), and then all the hospital billing will be taken care of. Without that, sure, the hospital and affiliated docs have not costs — but then they do not have any revenue either. A few of those and they are laying off folks and closing beds.

    You get the drift.

    And just sos you don’t think this is isolated issue. Hospitals are major employers in local economies. Talk about multiplier effects….

  60. 60.

    joeshabadoo

    Did we really need a third front pager to make a post about this?

    Sometimes it’s obvious that ABL is just copy-pasting from her own blog.

  61. 61.

    Keppler

    “‘If they would rather die,’ said Scrooge, ‘they had better do it, and decrease the surplus population.'”

    The GOP has become the Party of Scrooge.

  62. 62.

    El Cid

    I’m sick and tired of all these whiny, lazy good for nothin’s not getting jobs just because their cancerous tumors haven’t gotten life-threatening enough to qualify for medical aid.

    The BBC’s Newshour (on the BBC World Service) interviewed Sarah O’Brien (sp?) who works as a stagehand in Austin, TX, as part of their coverage of the new report on how absolutely no Americans live in poverty and it’s all their fault for not being job creators.

    [Our income has dropped] to the point where we are in a crisis. My family right now, we received our eviction notice yesterday.
    __
    And my fiancee is disabled, he has cancer, but because he was receiving treatment as a homeless person, he does not qualify for curative care, only stabilizing. And so right now, he can’t receive treatment because the tumor is not life-threatening yet, and so because of that he doesn’t qualify for any sort of assistance right now, and the disability supplemental Social Security income process takes months…
    __
    …[My income is not enough to pay the bills, and] the only reason I can feed my family healthy food sometimes if at all is because the food stamp program. I don’t want to receive charity. I don’t want, I want for my hard work to be worth as much as someone else’s hard work.
    __
    Our dream is to have a semi-self sufficient farmstead and teach other people how to do the same. We have a barn and we have chickens and we try to supplement our diet with our own food as much as we can, save money, and be easier on the environment.
    __
    We would love to be community active citizens, I would love to volunteer.
    __
    [The work] doesn’t pay enough for the most part, the work is pretty steady but it’s not a living wage especially for one person trying to support a household.
    __
    I have a daughter, and so we’re looking to downsize or looking to move into a smaller house if possible. We don’t want to live in excess, we don’t have luxuries. We do not have cable television, we don’t buy new phones.
    __
    [Where will you go?]
    __
    At this point I don’t know. [Pause.] We would probably stay with friends. My family lives on the other side of the country. My fiancee doesn’t have family, so, at that point we might qualify for some sort of assistance if we were homeless.
    __
    I didn’t want my daughter to experience that, but… if that’s what is going to happen, then I’m going to try and make it as positive and… not traumatic experience as possible.
    __
    But I’m working as hard as I possibly can, and it’s not enough.

    See? That’s the American spirit, one which isn’t all about the greedy parasites keeping their hands held out for gubmit largesse: making sure your daughter’s homelessness isn’t as traumatic as possible during your fiancee’s tumor’s metastasizing.

    Hearing something like this really shakes you, it really makes you feel what it’s like to suffer the sorts of pain and degradation that our bankers have when they receive trillions of dollars of government and Fed support yet Obama occasionally has suggested that they have been other than angelically perfect.

  63. 63.

    G

    Alan Grayson was shrill though.

    Rep. Alan Grayson (D-Fla.) warned Americans that “Republicans want you to die quickly” during an after-hours House floor speech Tuesday night.

    His remarks, which drew angry and immediate calls for an apology from Republicans, were highlighted by a sign reading “The Republican Health Care Plan: Die Quickly.”

    Veteran Tennessee Republican Jimmy Duncan abandoned customary reticence to chastise Grayson.

    “That is about the most mean-spirited partisan statement that I’ve ever heard made on this floor, and I, for one, don’t appreciate it,” Duncan said.

    “It’s fully appropriate that the gentleman return to the floor and apologize,” said Rep. Marsha Blackburn, another Tennessee Republican.

    But none was forthcoming from Grayson — a freshman Democrat from a competitive district — who said the first part of the GOP approach to health care is: Don’t get sick.

    “If you get sick, America, the Republican health care plan is this: Die quickly,” he said.

    http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0909/27726.html

  65. 65.

    AxelFoley

    @lamh32:

    Females, minorities top Obama picks for judges
    President Barack Obama is moving at a historic pace to try to diversify the nation’s federal judiciary: Nearly three of every four people he has gotten confirmed to the federal bench are women or minorities. He is the first president who hasn’t selected a majority of white males for lifetime judgeships
    More than 70 percent of Obama’s confirmed judicial nominees during his first two years were “non-traditional,” or nominees who were not white males. That far exceeds the percentages in the two-term administrations of Bill Clinton (48.1 percent) and George W. Bush (32.9 percent), according to Sheldon Goldman, author of the authoritative book “Picking Federal Judges…”

    But, but, but Obama ain’t do nothing for black peoples.

  66. 66.

    El Cid

    @G: Grayson’s comments were insulting and improper because I don’t think there was necessarily anything in the Republican and Teabircher view that someone should die quickly, just that if they need treatment and aren’t insured and can’t pay for it, they not receive treatment, and then if necessary, die, and reduce the surplus population.

    But nobody said they should do so quickly — just die without costing ‘the taxpayer’ anything.

    In fact, it might teach the lazy parasite and his parasite admirers a lesson if the dying were as drawn out and painful as possible.

  67. 67.

    28 Percent

    Where this really gets cute is that this fellow would have chosen not to buy insurance because he’s a rational actor who studies the actuarial tables and knows that, rationally speaking, it’s unlikely that he’ll come out ahead by buying life insurance in his 20’s (how the insurance industry remains profitable despite the fact that economies are populated entirely of rational actors who do not purchase health insurance until they’re statistically likely to get a net benefit from it is one of the great mysteries of the ages. Maybe a wizard did it.)

    Nevertheless, he’s rational not to purchase the insurance and that’s right and good because that’s how neoclassical economics works gosh darnit! Besides which, it’s proof that he’s a true Galtian who doesn’t waste his money by putting it in a pool with the sick and elderly because he’s not one of them. And then it’s right and good to let the rational actor die, not because he’s a Galtian schmuck and the world is probably better off without him, but because the same people who buy into all the rest of this crap also, too believe that by not buying insurance and contributing to the care of the poor and the weak and the stockholders (won’t somebody think of the stockholders!) that this young healthy person is behaving irresponsibly and should be punished. After all, if you don’t let him die how else will he learn?

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