Looks like some Republicans are getting a little pushback for their support of the “very serious” Ryan wealth redistribution plan:
Rep. Dan Benishek’s (R-MI) embrace of the Republican Party’s platform ran into stiff opposition at a town hall meeting in Saulte Sainte Marie, Michigan when at least a dozen constituents, many of them senior citizens, pushed back against Benishek’s claims on Medicare, Social Security, oil subsides and health care reform.
***Benishek also displayed a shocking lack of self-awareness about his level of knowledge of some key facts. “There are no government subsidies for oil,” he told one woman who suggested ending the very real subsidies given to oil corporations to help defray the cost of Medicare. Watch a portion of the town hall:
At one point, the discussion turned to health care reform. Benishek, who served as a medical doctor before he was elected to Congress in 2010, was thrust onto the national stage after his predecessor Bart Stupak cast the deciding vote in favor of the Affordable Care Act in 2010. He told the audience that the United States has the best health care system in the world, before he was literally laughed at by several attendees.
“We have the highest life spans in the world,” argued Benishek. Several women in the audience quickly pointed out that in fact, many countries with universal health care place higher than the United States in terms of life expectancy, including Canada, Sweden, Norway and the Netherlands. The United States ranks 50th, just behind South Korea and Bosnia and Herzegovina.
“I don’t believe that’s true,” said Benishek. “How can you not know that, you’re a medical doctor?” one woman replied.
He has no idea what he is talking about, and I was loving watching the granny-brigade call him a liar and laugh at him. He’s just wrong about everything. We don’t have the highest life expectancy, we most certainly have subsidies for oil and gas (and, in fact, Republicans in the Senate just voted down ending them), and my favorite was the claim that oil companies pay 40% of their income to taxes:
Exxon Mobil, the most profitable of the big five oil companies, made $41.1 billion in profits last year. Although Exxon made 35 percent more profits since 2010, its estimated effective tax rate actually dropped. Citizens for Tax Justice reported Exxon paid only 17.6 percent taxes in 2010, lower than the average American, and a Reuters analysis using the same criteria estimates that Exxon will pay only 13 percent in effective taxes for 2011. Exxon paid zero taxes to the federal government in 2009.
Republicans really are embracing the idea of creating their own reality. It’s truly a bizarre spectacle, when the citizenry is so much more informed than their elected officials.
And because my mind works in strange ways, all I could think about during that video clip was the following:
I have issues.
redshirt
Karl Rove:
danimal
I’ve wondered whether the GOP congresscritters are willfully stupid or evil. This seems to confirm my bias: Both.
I expect Rep. Benishek to do the only sensible thing in response to his granny grilling, cease participating in unscripted public appearances.
pragmatism
but but will wilkinson in the ECONOMIST says paul ryan’s quite the looker. how could an attractive person steer us wrong?
Cargo
Where are all these senior citizens when elections come around? “oh, dearie me, I couldn’t possibly vote for that colored fellow, he’s a muslim don’t cha know, and that democrat congressman of ours is so RUDE, and probably pals around with terrorists.” *pulls the lever for the republican*
*a year later when the republican they voted for wants to cut everything and give the money to his billionair golf pals* “This is terrible! How could this happen!?”
BGinCHI
@redshirt: Right now I’m studying how they are fucking destroying their party and trying to take the whole country with them.
The Village Idiots will be the last to realize this, but they’ll come around as soon as their livelihoods are in any way threatened.
Citizen Alan
If the Teabaggers start eating their own, I may laugh myself to death.
ThatLeftTurnInABQ
__
Shorter Benishek: our healthcare system cannot fail, it can only be failed.
__
__
What do you mean We, paleface?
Jesse
That’s fantastic. (“Marvellous”) You have to be just brass balls to the walls ignorant to think that the status quo for health care in the US is just awesome and worth going to the mat for.
I’m pleased that this jagoff is getting some pushback. I doubt it will make any difference, though. He’ll just go back to Washington and ask a staffer to download something the AEI website showing conclusively that, contrary to mathematical reality, the US heath care system as a whole is not just number 1, it’s even better.
bobbo
@pragmatism: There needs to be a “quite the looker” meme/tag.
butler
First termer? Hmmm, lemme guess:
Has little to no political experience. Swept in by angry, confused tea-partiers in a Republican wave election. Just now finding out that governing is actually, like, hard work and stuff and that constituents will actually demand that he at least pretend like he’s doing his job.
And a quick check of wikipedia reveals I’m correct! Not that it was such a hard prediction.
Boots Day
It really is kind of chilling to see that our elected representatives are so much more ignorant of what our government is doing than the ordinary citizenry. Running the government is their job!
Chris
Hey, it worked for the Soviets for about seventy years.
Well, okay, no, it didn’t work for the Soviets, if by “Soviets” we mean “the regular people who lived all over that country.” But making it work for the regular people was never the point there, and it isn’t here either.
jl
Hey, you dang BJ kids, you want to get some life expectancy stats and confront your Congrescritter?
Click on the link below.
http://www.oecd.org/document/30/0,3746,en_2649_33929_12968734_1_1_1_1,00.html
You need MS excel to download files and start looking at the numbers right away, but I think everyone has that spreadsheet program now.
The data include maternal, perinatal infant and child mortality rates as well. (Edit: but do not overinterpret sudden jumps in rates over a few years, since reporting methods have changed for some countries, including recently the US)
Over 20 high income advanced economy OECD countries, many with continuous data back to 1960 for cool comparisons across countries and time.
The frequently requested data file is easiest to use.
I think the whole data set is available for free now, but for some statistics you have to use the rather clunky OECD data interface, but there is tutorial for sing it. Hey, I could figure out how to use, so anyone can, since I am easily befuddled by data base stuff.
Edit: wholesome edutainment fun for the whole family!
butler
@pragmatism: Actually, I believe he technically said he’s “a bit of a looker”.
Which isn’t a very good compliment. I wonder how much granny-starving he would get away with if he was actually “quite” the looker.
currants
Love your “issues,” JC.
Mark S.
I eagerly await Politifact rating this as mostly true.
Shinobi
It’s nice to see some people pushing back on clearly false facts. So often these pols seem to get away with saying whatever they want, I wish our journalists were half as confident in correcting their interviewees.
gaz
go grandma go!
Satanicpanic
I highly doubt that any of these people were teabaggers or voted Republican. They know actual facts.
redshirt
I love that Karl Rove quote because 1. It’s how they really think – the smart ones. The dumb ones just accept whatever the party line is that day and repeat it, but also 2. It was uttered at the height of their delusional power. You can smell the Imperial arrogance reeking from it. 2003/2004. My gads, what a horrible time that was, and thank FSM we got through it – so far.
pragmatism
@butler: oh that’s technically true but collectively nonsense. ;)
but i stand corrected. fucking glibertarians can’t even properly fawn when they’re pimping logical fallacies.
Violet
@Satanicpanic:
Did they stay home in 2010 because Obama was such a disappointment? Is that how this guy got elected?
ThatLeftTurnInABQ
@Chris:
__
Somebody else here on BJ once said it better than I can: today’s GOP is the last truly Leninist party (of any consequence) left standing.
Spaghetti Lee
@Cargo:
You know, plenty of old people out there vote Democrat.
Joseph Nobles
@redshirt: Do we know that was Karl? I always had Cheney pegged for that one.
Zifnab
@Boots Day:
Didn’t you read 1984? The higher you are in the chain of command, the more kool-aid they make you drink. Benishek wouldn’t have been allowed through the GOP primary if he hadn’t already proven himself a true believer.
kindness
I miss Monty Python. I bought the dvd package but don’t watch it. My bad.
catclub
@Mark S.: “I eagerly await Politifact rating this as mostly true.”
About 78 out of 83 % true.
Amir Khalid
Per Thinkprogress:
So a Congressman’s open meeting with constituents is private and confidential, and not for public consumption? Interesting.
jl
@jl:
Below are data series in the ‘frequently requested data’ excel file that are most useful for overall comparison of population health outomes.
Life expectancy at birth, female population
Life expectancy at birth, male population
Life expectancy at birth, total population
Life expectancy at 65 years old, female population
Life expectancy at 65 years old, male population
Infant mortality rate, deaths per 1 000 live births
Potential years of life lost (PYLL), all causes, female population
Potential years of life lost (PYLL), all causes, male population
I am pretty sure this part of the OECD health data is free to download by anyone, but not 100 percent sure.
Potential years of life lost is a good series to use in addition to life expectancies at birth and age 65.
Horrendo Slapp (formerly Jimperson Zibb, Duncan Dönitz, Otto Graf von Pfmidtnöchtler-Pízsmőgy, Mumphrey, et al.)
Yeah, well, the only issue that matters here is that “Hell’s Grannies” if funny.
Elizabelle
Interesting that the GOP has 18 physicians serving in Congress; the Democrats have 2 (one of them is the delegate from the Virgin Islands).
Four of the Republicans are OB/Gyns.
And now this dude, Rep. Banishek aka Dr. Clueless.
He’s proof of that disturbing trend where well-educated GOP can be even tougher to reason with. He believes his misinformed views; apparently saw no reason to look further.
So much for a scientifically-inclined inquiring mind.
The Other Chuck
I’d find it deliciously apropos to see Rep Benishek assaulted at his next meeting by a marauding gang of keep left signs.
catclub
@Spaghetti Lee: Indeed, if 40% of old people vote Democrat that is a lot of people.
Likewise, if even 30% of people are batshit insane and go to rallies with tri-corner hats that is a lot of people.
Actual numbers at rallies, or at Benishek’s town meeting are probably closer to 0.5%, so it just takes a few to look like a lot.
General Stuck
Republicans have always lied about policy, to basically make up for votes potentially lost to this or that group of faction. Usually, to stir up enough dust to hide their knobbery of the 1 percent, at the cost of the rest of us. But those lies have been measured and always with outlets for plausible deniability, if word got out what they are up to. Not anymore, they are letting their fiction freek flags fly in whatever direction that suits what they perceive as the threat to power on any given day. It is truly stunning, this disconnect with reality we are seeing, as was spoken of by conservadem John Yarmuth Rep. Ky., concerning the blathering lies coming from the mouth of his states minority leader in the US senate. Sending him a letting made public, concerning Mitch’s untethered bullshit on the ACA in a recent Courier Journal Op Ed by McConnell.
pdf full letter
For a Kentucky congressman to send such a formal complaint to a Kentucky senator, is kind of far out, especially when the letter accuses Mitch of, in effect, lying through his teeth .
It is everywhere you look, the unbound fiction coming out of the GOP, with seeming nary a concern about going too far, or any kind of backlash. Maybe they will get away with it and win the election, and confirm for eternity that this country doesn’t deserve to survive.
Chris
@ThatLeftTurnInABQ:
Aye, tis true.
And that Dmitry Orlov “Closing the Collapse Gap” article is looking more spot on every day.
(“many of the problems that sunk the Soviet Union are now endangering the United States as well. Such as a huge, well-equipped, very expensive military, with no clear mission, bogged down in fighting Muslim insurgents. Such as energy shortfalls linked to peaking oil production. Such as a persistently unfavorable trade balance, resulting in runaway foreign debt. Add to that a delusional self-image, an inflexible ideology, and an unresponsive political system.”)
Yutsano
@pragmatism: It only counts if he got starbursts. Otherwise it’s just words on a page…
David Koch
psssssst. psssssssst. Don’t tell the corporate media.
PPP: Obama up 53-40 in Colorado and up 49-44 in North Carolina.
And Obama hasn’t even begun to campaign.
Last night ABC news pathetically and laughably attempted to debunk their very own poll showing Obama up by 7 pts, insisting it’s really a toss-up.
redshirt
@Joseph Nobles: I’ve always seen it sourced to Rove, but it would work coming out of Darth Cheney’s mouth just as well.
MikeJ
@efgoldman:
It’s the UP, so there may not be.
scav
Speaking of OT blast from the past reality pushbacks, looky they finally released the pepper spray report and the whole thing wasn’t warranted on multiple axes, including (1) ignoring actual police advice and (b) the ever popular wasn’t standing his ground against an angry mob one! Even the size of the spray bottle comes under review, “larger than the one campus police officers are authorized and trained to use” Guardian .
Gee
@redshirt:
Redshirt,
When and where is that quote from? Just curious.
pragmatism
@Yutsano: i refuse to believe that the randian superhero who never ever ever took death benefits doesn’t give every glibertarian at least a raging semi. the piercing blue eyes and herman munsteresque qualities are the toppers.
hw3
What do you call a doctor who graduated at the bottom of his class?
Doctor.
Calouste
@scav:
Use of weaponry not issued by the department should be a firing offense for any police officer.
bemused
Is there more video of that town hall? That short clip of seniors pushing back was great. I’d love to see more.
What an amazing difference from the summer of town halls filled with screaming tea party maniacs. Senior citizens who know their facts.
quannlace
Don’t you know? In the Republican party, belief trumps facts/reality every time.
Spaghetti Lee
@MikeJ:
The district is only R +3, very blue collar. There was this woman named Saltonstall who was supposed to be a Democratic threat to keep the district in ’10, but she declined, I believe.
Churchlady320
@Cargo: Don’t be such a Bagger in your analysis of senior voters. The people who sat it out in 2010 were largely YOUNGER people who believed Ed Schultz in “show the Dems, don’t vote” so they did not.
Seniors are not all conservative or even in the majority. They get it when it’s clear. Some Baggers are indeed older like that idiot woman who said “Keep the government out of my Medicare” but the movement as a whole was small.
Remember in 2008 the “Great Schlep”? Younger people went to visit their folks and grandparents in Florida? It worked. Communication is imperative, and trust me on this – older people are no more racist than younger ones. They get who’s got the real skinny WHEN that story is heard. Sault Ste. Marie is not a hotbed of liberals, and these folks GET IT. Now get out there and start talking with them!
jl
@Churchlady320:
As I mentioned in a comment some weeks ago, the implications of the GOP plans for Social Security, and especially Medicare sunk into the original teabagger in my family. He is disgusted, and not sure what to do, and he is old enough to be on both programs.
The younger teabaggers who believe the BS that Social Security will go completely broke before they retire, and deny the eyewitness accounts of the oldsters aabout the problems with churning corporate shell games with Medicare Advantage are the problems.
The Other Chuck
@Churchlady320:
Is that a fact? Because the numbers I read showed that the teabaggers came out in higher numbers where the turnout on the left was perfectly average for mid-term elections.
The “Great Shlep” was a comedy bit. I suspect you’ll find that participation in it was not exactly a vast pilgrimage.
ThatLeftTurnInABQ
@Gee:
__
Ron Suskind, NYT Magazine, Oct 17, 2004, quoting an unnamed Bush admin official.
Humanities Grad
@ Gee,
That quote appeared in an article by Ron Suskind (he was the journalist to whom the anonymous Bush staffer gave that quote).
I _think_ the article’s title was something like “The Education of George W. Bush.” It’s one of the most singularly frightening things I’ve ever read, and came out just shortly before the ’04 presidential election.
The identity of the individual who gave the quote has never been conclusively confirmed, so far as I know, but Karl Rove is seen as the most likely candidate. While it’s not out of place with Cheney’s ideology, Cheney was notoriously cagey about giving interviews–he didn’t like leaving things on paper that could get tracked back to him.
Rove, on the other hand, is one of those people who can’t resist dropping hints about just how clever he is (see “I’ve got _the_ math”). IMHO, he’s much more likely to have been the source of the quote than Cheney.
Edit: ThatLeftTurninABQ beat me to it.
Rekster
This is the problem when one elects a Physician to be a member of Congress.
I am a retired emergency nurse with 38 years of experience. Way back when the Clinton health plan was all the rage I was working in a large Community Hospital ER in Texas (a Frist family Hospital). One late evening a General Surgeon was going on and on about how is the Clinton plan passed he was going to quit practicing medicine.
I asked him what he planned on doing? He had no marketable skills, couldn’t answer the phone or make a call, couldn’t do anything for himself other than cut patients open and do that particular skill. Where did he think he would be able to find a job and actually work for a living?
He didn’t have a plan for that.
Guess he could be a Member of Congress.
Chris
@Humanities Grad:
::channeling Professor Farnsworth:: Good news, everyone! I found what appears to be the Ron Suskind article here:
Faith, Certainty, and the Presidency of George W. Bush.
Beginning to read now…
ETA: Warning for those tempted to read: Holy ASS, this is a long article.
Jay in Oregon
@Mark S.:
I eagerly await Politifact rating this as mostly true.
Well, the following is true:
* We have life spans
* We are in the world
So call it 66% true? 75%?
Elizabelle
@Rekster:
Comment of the day, Rekster.
Amen.
Randy P
@efgoldman:
I hang out with a lot of Quakers. Suffice it to say there aren’t too many Bill O’Reilly or Limbaugh fans in that crowd either. If you read about an 80-year-old being arrested at a protest, it’s probably a Quaker.
Ruckus
@Mark S.:
We have the highest life spans in the world
It only feels like forever
Chris
@Humanities Grad:
Okay, done. You were right, it’s a scary article (for those who want the CliffNotes, it’s fairly straightforward – the entire Bush way of governance followed a “gut”-based faith in himself as guided by God). But the part that struck me the most was in the first paragraph:
From the hindsight of where we are, eight years later, that comes off as incredibly naive. Bush won, his ideology won, and there’s been no “civil war,” not even metaphorically, in the Republican Party. A trivial number of intellectuals, like Bartlett, left the party, but the vast, overwhelming majority of its supporters have happily stuck behind the “fundamentalists” and “true believers” even as they charge off to extremes even greater than Bush’s.
I guess Bartlett really wanted to believe that there was a meaningful part of the GOP that was guided by something other than delusional, tribal bloody-mindedness. It must suck nowadays to realize how wrong he was.
Mike G
Because like all Repukes, he is well-paid to ignore inconvenient facts; and to pretend to believe in happy flag-waving lies the party finds it convenient to push.
Ignorance is lucrative bliss.
FlipYrWhig
It amazes me that people whose job involves knowing things so rarely know those fucking things. Dana Milbank on the Lawrence O’Donnell show was like that. Talking about Paul Ryan as a potential VP pick, O’D asked him about the last time a House member was tapped for VP. He said something about Gerald Ford. Ford, of course, never ran for VP. Jack Kemp, OTOH, did, in 1996. You don’t have to know these things, certainly, except WHEN IT’S YOUR FUCKING JOB AND WHAT YOU SPEND EVERY WAKING MOMENT THINKING ABOUT. Jesus H. Keerist.
gelfling545
When I was a nice young girl I thought than one had to be exceptionally smart and talented to be elected to Congress. Now it seems like it’s a place to house well-to-do idiots. “You say Moneybags, Jr. has no aptitude for any profession whatsoever and the intellectual curiosity of a formica table top? Well, shoot, send him to Congress.”
Desert Rat
@butler:
Well said. There’s a reason why so many wave election first-term congressmen/women wind up only serving one term. Stunts like this, for example.
redshirt
@Humanities Grad: I agree. It’s terrifying. We’re lucky to have survived that period. For now!
patroclus
@FlipYrWhig:
Also, Geraldine Ferraro in 1988 and William Miller in 1964.
patroclus
er, Ferraro in 1984.
ral
@gelfling545
Mark Twain: “Suppose you were an idiot, and suppose you were a member of Congress; but I repeat myself.”
Nothing new under the sun.
Cacti
@gelfling545:
It’s the modern equivalent of what the priesthood was in medieval times.
RalfW
I’m fine with Republicans creating their own reality. I strongly suggest they do it in Texas. Go ahead an let Rick “Oops” Perry go ahead with the secession and frog-march all the alternate reality bozos like Benishek down there.
It’d be a shame about loosing Austin. Maybe we can have airlifts, like for Berlin. But other than that, really, it can just ESAD. And I lived there for 14 years!!
It’s Republican hell-hole perfect. the remaining 49 can give amnesty to people who can show us that they voted in a Democratic primary in the past, let ’em move out of the Great State of Texas, and make more room for the 27%-ers.
someofparts
Oh, I dunno. I’m an old lady approaching retirement. Now you’ve made me want to move to the UK and join the Hells Grannies.