Reading is for Snobs has the story of an editor at RedState, who had a serious illness, was uninsured (since it is a tradition for Erick and all his sons not to provide insurance for their employees), and had his medical bills paid by a charity campaign funded in part by Daily Kos readers. Let’s just say the story has irony to burn.
Of course, now that he’s better, the question is whether he’s changed his mind on Obamacare. You guess the answer.
PaulW
Well that’s what the Daily Kos’ers get for being charitable. Now the Red Stater is convinced that he doesn’t need insurance, he just needs sympathizing suckers.
negative 1
The system still works! Rethugs fuck it up, Dems come in and fix it, rethugs learn nothing and continue to bray like jackasses. Works every time
Nicole
I guess he figures the next time he gets into a health jam, people should step in and give him money again. Thanks to the ACA, though, he’s never going to have to be exposed to the law of diminishing returns, so he can hang on to his delusions.
magurakurin
DKOS Frogs…meet RedState Scorpion
MattF
Yeah, well. Sad, but not surprising.
George Orwell wrote a famous essay on why Tolstoy hated Shakespeare. Orwell noted that Tolstoy had a basic misunderstanding of Jesus’ injunction to turn the other cheek– in fact, one should do so only with the expectation of being hit again, harder.
Kay
If the health care law does nothing else, I hope it reduces or eliminates the homemade coin donation cans with a picture of a gravely ill person on them that I see here at convenience stores.
“please help! Travis needs chemo!”
Here’s my 43 cents towards your 3 million dollar medical bill. Good luck!
JPL
The Red Stater will sign up for health care but not share that fact with anyone. His livelihood depends on lies. His healthcare needs depend on “ACA”.
Amir Khalid
It takes a man of principle not to be turned by financial inducements, I guess. But can his employers simply persist in refusing to provide healthcare insurance to staff? As I understand your Obamacare, aren’t they obliged to do so, or else pay a fine to cover the cost?
C.V. Danes
@PaulW:
My thoughts exactly. As long as there are suckers out there willing to step in and help these people through their ideologically-slanted bad choices, they will never learn.
Nor do they have any shame.
dpm (dread pirate mistermix)
@Amir Khalid: He’s probably a part-time independent contractor, the way Jesus intended.
El Tiburon
Link won’t open on my Obamaphone, but I’m dying to know the answer: did he change his mind on Obamacare?
SatanicPanic
The Republican plan is, don’t get sick. If you do, die quickly… or rely on the charity of liberal bloggers.
Botsplainer
Speaking of charity:
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2013/12/30/home-depot-founder-worries-pope-francis-neither-loves-or-understands-rich-americans/?onswipe_redirect=no#comments
On The book of Faces, I said this:
1. The 1% would be easier to take if they weren’t such spoiled, whiny brats, expecting to be coddled and praised as if they were endangered giant pandas in the path of a Chinese Foxconn plant expansion whenever the subject of productivity inequality comes up.
2. Vanity donations given to impress others about your status (cancer wings, university chairs, buildings) which happen to be tax deductible aren’t really charity. Also, when your church is your social club from which you perform a whole bunch of business and social activities in a tax deductible setting, it doesn’t impress me when you do big, chunky donations and I don’t see that as charity.
3. John Calvin was a jackass. So was Girolamo Savonarola. Ditto for Ayn Rand. They may not know it, but the large subset of American religious conservatives of Evangelical/Fundamentalist, Roman Catholic and Glibertarian persuasions who are following those great thinkers into Galt’s Gulch/The Holy City and have the expectation of the adoration of the masses are hastening the demise of their ideologies by focusing the scorn outward, thereby alienating their own offspring and new followers. I would normally welcome this development, however, their societal antagonism does a great deal of damage.
4. Langone may be disappointed to find out that the Pope isn’t nearly as amenable to pressure through an underling as a conservative Congressman or Senator. He tried through Dolan, but methinks that Francis may not be listening.
I meant every fucking word. Cue the weeping, wailing, gnashing of teeth, followed up by whines from that asshole Franklin Graham.
I used to occasionally watch video of Frank Schaeffer trying to fuck up Eastern Orthodoxy, but in the end, the one who wound up changed was him – the Sons of Calvin have tried to move in, but left mainly destruction in their wake.
Bill E Pilgrim
I think the logic runs along the lines of:
Obamcare? Why? After all, those people from DKOS probably all have ACA policies, and what good did it do them? They still had to pay extra to bail me out.
gogol's wife
@Kay:
That one always gets me too.
Poopyman
@C.V. Danes: Well, had I been part of the DKos community that donated (I wasn’t), it would have been more as an experiment to see exactly what would have happened without any expectation of a different outcome than we have seen. That and the fact that political persuasions don’t really get in the way of my charity.
Amir Khalid
@dpm (dread pirate mistermix):
So even an editor is but casual labour to Erick bin Erick al-Erick? It figures.
Tyro
@C.V. Danes: As long as there are suckers out there willing to step in and help these people through their ideologically-slanted bad choices, they will never learn.
The point was to pay for a sick person’s health care, not get an ideological conversion as a quid pro quo.
I never give money in the hopes that some greater good will come of it– that’s a formula for frustration.
I think that’s what conservatives don’t understand– private charity never changes anything. Never has, never will. It *can* help an individual. But the systemic problem still remains, and there’s not enough charity to go around.
SatanicPanic
@Botsplainer:
Also, the kind of thing Jesus told people not to do.
Bill E Pilgrim
@Amir Khalid: “Even” an editor? :)
Let me tell you about the writing and editing business, my son….
Just kidding but yes, being an independent contractor is at least as common there as in tech work, maybe more so.
I actually prefer working as a contractor, but I’m kind of a daredevil.
zoot
Can’t we have the republican healthcare plan available to republicans? In this case the hospital would have refused to admit him because he didn’t have insurance and we’d have one less disgusting wingnut to hear about.
Carol M
It infuriates me that this guy has access to a website that reaches a large number of people and a (right-wing) celebrity willing to ask for donations on his behalf. Joe Blow, who is also uninsured and sick but doesn’t have that large pool of people from whom to ask for help, is SOL.
Patricia Kayden
Why should those on the left give $$$ to help out those on the right who have no compassion for their fellow citizens? I assume the Red Stater who was helped still believes that the ACA is worst than the Holocaust, Rwandan Genocide and slavery combined.
Daily Kos readers should save their charity for those who will be grateful. Let Red Staters and their rightwing ilk fend for themselves like true Ayn Randians.
Botsplainer
@SatanicPanic:
I’ve occasionally enjoyed bringing up the Pharisee thing about loud and noisy public prayers at public events like football games down South.
Good times…
Judge Crater
@Botsplainer: Langone, like Caleb Howe, worships at the church of Capitalism. Criticism of Capitalism, even by the Pope, is apostasy. The “free market” believers find in its tenets and principles the same unassailable truths as believers find in their various religions. Like saints and sinners, there are makers and takers, moochers and looters. If you question the distribution of wealth or income, it is like questioning fact of the Resurrection or the existence of god.
The Tragically Flip
It was still well done on the part of the Kossacks. It will affect people, even if the main beneficiary remains stuck in his ways. Maybe his kids will be more compassionate than their dad’s politics.
Amir Khalid
@Bill E Pilgrim:
Well, I spent my two decades as a journo at a newspaper and at my country’s news agency. At both places, editors were/are not only staff, but pretty senior staff; the most senior at the paper rank below only the corporate bosses.
Gin & Tonic
@Patricia Kayden: save their charity for those who will be grateful
That’s not the point of charity.
Roger Moore
@SatanicPanic:
Somebody’s next penance needs to include reading Matthew 6 until he understands it.
The Tragically Flip
Sadly it won’t occur to Howe that he was still saved by his privileged position as a front page writer at a major website with tens of thousands of readers and well linked by other major sites. Makes for a great donor pool to draw from.
Your typical uninsured sick person would have a facebook page or a tumblr read by maybe a couple dozen people at best. Chances are those people will be relatives and friends of similar lower economic means. Plenty of affluent people read RedState.
Charity works if you can get your sob story in front of enough people with money to spare. But that’s still a matter of luck & privilege.
Botsplainer
@Judge Crater:
The current faith of Free Marketeerism really does look like the bastard offspring of a threesome between Rand, Calvin and Savonarola, and any misery caused to innocents or excesses are excused within one or more of the theological doctrines of each.
slippytoad
That bears repeating about a billion times at ten billion decibels. I am sick and fucking tired of our social goals being dictated by people with the emotional maturity of fucking five year olds.
beth
Has there been any kind of thank you from Howe for the help he received? Has he even acknowledged it? Could he be that big of a dick?
The Tragically Flip
@The Tragically Flip:
I should add to this that my own experience as a political convert from conservative to liberal was a process that proceeded in stages, not a “road to Damascus” moment of clarity (though there were distinct moments I can recall where my thinking shifted notable amounts).
Maybe some conservatives became that way because they were “liberals” who got mugged, but I don’t find you get to be liberal by any such, well, reactionary thinking.
Kay
@gogol’s wife:
It isn’t just that it’s sad, it’s that it’s nearly futile.
“Oh, this isn’t a good plan at all” is what I’m thinking.
I helped a friend of a friend try to make some sense out of 3 million in medical bills once (we were really putting them in piles under the larger category of ‘not paying any of these’) and she would get punchy and silly while we’re doing this because it’s ridiculous. She didn’t have anywhere near enough to even make a small dent in them.
Roger Moore
@Judge Crater:
“No man can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon.” These people have chosen Mammon, and they’re upset that anyone is willing to point it out.
Bill E Pilgrim
@Amir Khalid: Noted. I should have added “In the US”. Also perhaps “these days”, since some of the more traditional newspapers still work the way yours did, at least the big ones, but for much of the rest that’s gone. For the kind of editor this guy is, it’s not unusual at all for it to be a freelance gig.
When I worked outside of the US, for many years, I found that the whole freelance/contractor idea was still fairly foreign. Everyone assumes you must be angling for a “real” position. Never was, myself.
El Caganer
I’m not at all convinced that helping people who are allegedly your ideological enemies qualifies as charity. Maybe that’s because I’m not a very charitable person, though.
Davis X. Machina
Just because you have a First Amendment doesn’t mean you don’t have a state religion.
Oh, and Savonarola doesn’t really belong in there. Conspicuous consumption conspicuously on display is the liturgy — Rand and Calvin provide the doctrine.
SFAW
@Tyro:
Then why give at all? Or did you mean to say “expectation”?
In other words, if you are not at least hopeful that it will do some good – somehow, somewhere – then I would suggest that you’re just doing it to soothe your conscience (or whatever).
On the other hand, expecting that it will lead to some greater good may not be unreasonable, but might be a little naive. (“Might” used without sarcasm.)
IowaOldLady
It’ll be interesting to see how calls for donations are received now that the law requires everyone to have health insurance. Will givers be less sympathetic to those who chose not to?
Linda Featheringill
@Amir Khalid:
Erick bin Erick al-Erick
Oooh! I like that name!
Roger Moore
@El Caganer:
Jesus would disagree. He said that even bad people are willing to help their friends, and it’s only the truly good ones who are willing to help enemies.
brendancalling
@beth: I had the same question. Did the smarmy douchenozzle even say “thank you”?
The Tragically Flip
If he had died, RS would have found some way to blame Obamacare anyway. “Oh it drove up his costs, it scared off the good doctors with all the socialism, if only he could have shopped for insurance over state lines…”
schrodinger's cat
@IowaOldLady: On BBC World News I saw this young guy in Mississippi who had no insurance and didn’t want to get any and worked at Walmart.
Roger Moore
@SFAW:
Because you’re interested in the direct good it does. IOW, you give to somebody who’s sick because they need to pay for medical care, not because you’re hoping that they’ll somehow learn the value of charity and/or healthcare for all and become better people.
kc
@Tyro:
What you say is true; however, I personally would have been more inclined to donate to someone who wasn’t a wingnut douchebag.
catclub
@slippytoad: “billion times at ten billion decibels”
I wonder if the pressure of ten billion decibels is high enough to induce fusion.
elmo
@Botsplainer:
I’m an atheist, but my license plate says “Mathew 6” on it. It’s my very favorite Bible verse.
kc
@beth:
Apparently he (Caleb Howe) has been busy tweeting dick jokes.
catclub
@Roger Moore: I agree. Plus, my brilliant realization was that there is really no such thing as ‘the deserving poor’. Also note [email protected] 48.
The many, if not most, people who will get charity will do something stupid, or objectionable.
That is only a bar to donating if the donor makes it one.
gene108
@Amir Khalid:
It depends on the size of the employer. Truly small employer, well under 50 employees do not need to provide insurance. Their employees will be eligible to purchase insurance on the Exchanges.
I think the actual number of employees Red State pays is pretty small, so they more than likely would be exempt.
Feebog
For the true believers there is no turning back on the ACA. This is a perfect example of the mindset of the modern conservative. Facts don’t matter, even a devastating life experience doesn’t matter. Kudos to those Daily Kos readers who donated, they are expressing the true meaning of charity.
Hal
@The Tragically Flip:
I just had an argument with my mother the other day after she blamed Obama for her Medicare secondary insurance premium going up even though it does every year. She even admitted as much but still; thanks Obama.
Higgs Boson's Mate
Over at the linked article someone in comments was whining that their health insurance costs nearly doubled. The commenter then asked “Why should someone as middle class as me be forced to subsidize others healthcare?” That is a common whine from the right on many threads regarding the ACA.
A possible answer occurred to me; “Because someone even less middle class than you paid to subsidize your public school education, the roads you drive on, the airports you fly from, the water you drink,,,”
They never seem to get the fact that we are all in this together. George Harrison even wrote a song about them:
All through the day, I me mine, I me mine, I me mine,
All through the night, I me mine I me mine, I me mine…
Roger Moore
@catclub:
The decibel scale is logarithmic, so an increase of 10 decibels means the noise is 10 times louder. You get to energies big enough to destroy planets somewhere in the hundreds of decibels, and IIRC, the Big Bang was something like 1100 dB.
Higgs Boson's Mate
@gene108:
I think the actual number of employees Red State pays is Erick Erickson.
CaseyL
@kc: This! I have limited funds, and am picky about where I donate them. I can think of much worthier causes than “anyone at Red State.”
elmo
@Roger Moore:
I missed your post – see mine at #50. My version of proselytizing.
Villago Delenda Est
@beth:
Is a bear Argentinian? Does the Pope shit in the woods?
slippytoad
@Higgs Boson’s Mate:
These are people who whine non-stop, because they are unhappy and want to drag the rest of us down with them into their morass of stupid.
No apparent awareness that they are already subsidizing a ton of healthcare with their taxes and this is an effort to make that less of a burden to all of us. No, these freeloading whiners couldn’t possibly grab a rope and pull, because bitch bitch bitch bitch bitch.
catclub
@elmo: Matthew 6 is a chapter. Verse 1?
Matthew 25:31-46, for example, is a more complete pointer.
El Caganer
@Roger Moore: I’m sure he would. Good for him.
catclub
@Roger Moore: Thanks!
Aji
@Roger Moore: THIS.
At the GOS, there’s a long tradition of helping folks in need, whether it’s saving a home, fixing a car, getting desperately needed surgery, or even helping to save a beloved pet. Folks have helped us, and we’ve turned around and helped a lot of folks there. Money’s something that’s pretty much always in short supply for us, but we can nearly always eke out ten or twenty to help someone in more desperate straits than we are, just by juggling a bit and/or forgoing something for a week. And once we give $$, we LET. IT. GO. If they do something with our share of the monies donated that, well, maybe we wouldn’t, well, that’s life. People disagree about all sorts of things, including how best to allocate funds. And if we’ve been had, well, we gave for the right reasons, and trust that some good came out of it somewhere, even if only in helping to contribute to the come-to-Jesus moment of some lurking Scrooge.
As it turns out, we didn’t donate to this guy. IIRC, I was preoccupied with other things when the diary initially posted and didn’t see it until much later, and I don’t think we could’ve afforded it right then anyway. But I still think the folks who gave did something commendable. That the recipient has proven an ingrate – well, frogs, scorpions, etc. But the givers did it for the right reasons.
The Pale Scot
The fella has a “failing liver” which I believe, is mostly caused by lifestyle choices.
The bro either fucked, drank or shot up something he shouldn’t have.
aimai
@Tyro: I want to differ with you on one point–they absolutely understand that private charity changes nothing. In fact, if you argue with them about it they will cite Jesus in his decompensating phase when he says “The poor you will have always with you, but me you will not have with you.” The poor serve a dual function in a right wing imaginary–they are a cautionary tale about how bad works equals bad outcome, and they serve as a place where one can perform “good works” and hope for a good outcome for oneself. If the poor suffer in silence and don’t change the status quo they are good examples of pure faith and a lack of materialism. If they demand succor they are an example of materialistic and anti religious thinking and rebellion that must be put down.
Actually ending poverty, which we could do with a wave of our hands in this country, is not the goal of rich person’s charitable actions. As the Kos article points out the reason that rich french and english people don’t need to donate hospital wings is that the state pays for people’s medical care. Which would a sick person rather have? A gorgeous hospital wing in a city too far away, with medical costs too high for them to pay, or a local, accessible, federally funded clinic with medicaid or medicare for their needs? Utility doesn’t enter into any of these calculations about charity.
rikyrah
See, when you’re this stuck on stupid….
I have no sympathy for folks like this.
Should have given the money to an uninsured person who actually would appreciate it. Shoulda let the muthafucka die for his beliefs.
Harsh, I know…but I’m at that point with these idiots.
Kay
@Botsplainer:
That’s the best thing about the hippie pope, as far as I’m concerned. I knew they were going to whine. Knew it.
It’s hilarious because they want it both ways. They want, literally, to be “exclusive” as far as address and belongings and all the rest but they ALSO want us to pretend they’re like everyone else.
We can’t do both! It’s impossible! We can’t fill their need to belong AND view them as inherently superior!
Villago Delenda Est
@aimai:
Actually fixing problems is not their goal. Fluffing their egos is. They still need the poor around in order to enjoy their good fortune…they need the contrast. Someone has to be starving for them to enjoy their grand meals.
Higgs Boson's Mate
@rikyrah:
I understand your point though I struggle not to adopt it. The struggle becomes more difficult every day.
Villago Delenda Est
@rikyrah:
I’m with you. Let them, for once, suffer the consequences for their action or inaction.
Aji
@The Pale Scot: Nope. Meds can do it easily. I’m off virtually all of the ones I was taking for my autoimmune conditions precisely because of that issue. Hell, some poor folks get one accidental OD of Tylenol and their liver’s destroyed. It’s not the sort of thing you can just attribute to bad choices.
beth
@kc: To answer my own question, he can be an enormous dick. Go to the end of the comments section of the DKOS link where someone has posted his tweets about Roger Ebert before he died. What a horrible excuse for a human being. I have to give the readers there a lot of credit for donating to him; I’m not sure I could be that charitable.
aimai
@Aji: This. Very well written. I saw the discussion on Kos at the time and a lot of people gave from the bottom of their hearts with no expectation of anything in return. As it should be. And some gave in an experimental way, curiously. Thats ok too.
I’d like to point out that we just had an experiment in just behaving humanely–according to TPM when Jim Inhofe’s son died in a tragic accident he was shocked to discover that it was the Democrats, his imagined enemies, who stepped forward with condolences and comfort. Sometimes people just need to do the right thing. It may have a good effect on the person you are reaching out to, it may not. You don’t always know. But you do what you do because the root of humanitarian is human and humane. And thats the kind of person one aspires to be.
Kay
@rikyrah:
I don’t know why he didn’t just go to the emergency room. Both Mitt Romney and George W Bush said that’s the health care option for uninsured people.
Like either Mitt Romney or George W Bush has ever, ever had to “just go to an emergency room” for medical care. The son of a governor and the son of a president will now lecture us on health care options. Why these clowns weren’t laughed out of the room when they tossed off this advice is beyond me.
The Pale Scot
@Aji: I guess, but it’s more fun to think the guy was sneaking out at night snorting meth off a male hooker’s buttocks.
schrodinger's cat
@Kay: The biggest problem in our polity right now is the media, even more so than the Republicans. If the media did its job and did not give cover to Republican mendacity we would be far better off. The problem is that many people who are not plugged into politics like we are, take MSM at face value.
Roger Moore
@Villago Delenda Est:
I think your first point is wrong and your second point is correct. They are interested in solving problems; it’s just that they are only interested in problems that affect them personally. They see poverty as a feature rather than a bug. Without poor people, who will they hire at starvation wages? Without poor people, who will they look down on? They need poverty, so eliminating it would create a problem for them rather than solving one.
Gin & Tonic
@rikyrah: Should have given the money to an uninsured person who actually would appreciate it.
You’ve convinced me. In the future I will make charitable donations only to those who will give me a handwritten note of thanks (good penmanship, please), and a bottle of good Champagne (none of that cheap crap.)
Amir Khalid
Off topic:
It’s just past midnight, and the firework display over the park outside the Petronas Towers is beginning. To everyone, Selamat Tahun Baru.
danielx
@Villago Delenda Est:
Yup. Kind of like evangelical Christians that way. After all, how are good Christians supposed to enjoy heaven if they can’t enjoy – er, hear – the screams of those in hell? If you can’t occasionally look at poor scum who don’t deserve to live, except for those menials who do your landscaping and pick up your garbage, how are you supposed to enjoy being rich?
Villago Delenda Est
@Roger Moore:
Sociopaths gotta be sociopaths.
Villago Delenda Est
@Amir Khalid:
And to you, posting from 2014!
schrodinger's cat
@Amir Khalid: Saal Mubarak!
Villago Delenda Est
@The Pale Scot:
Well, it would reinforce the notion of hypocritical depravity that seems to be the hallmark of contemporary “conservatism”.
Mudge
He cannot acknowledge the usefulness of Obamacare and keep his job. This was noted above. But Republicans, and RedState folks, are notoriously duplicitous and mendacious. He could easily sign up for health insurance and lie about it and continue his anti-Obamacare screeds. That way he’d keep his job and protect his health.
gelfling545
@PaulW: Well, that’s the thing about real acts of charity. It can’t matter whether the person deserves it, only that s/he needs it.
Elizabelle
@Kay:
One of the best comments of the thread.
And we might still see those donation cans at restaurants, for families trying to meet the deductible, which can be pricy.
But we will know that Travis DID get his chemo. That’s huge.
Elizabelle
@schrodinger’s cat:
Agree, kinda. The Republicans/plutocrats and their insane, cruel, greedy ideology are the problem.
But they couldn’t do as much damage without the media’s complicity. So you’re right there.
The average American, who may not care that much for politics and is crazy busy trying to work and raise a family, probably figures a pox on both of their houses.
That should not be so easy to assume.
cmorenc
In Caleb’s honor, next time I’m in a rural convenience store where they’ve got a large glass jar with a slot in the lid set up on the counter next to the cash register with a photo of someone’s cute but gravely ill 7 year old daughter whose family is crushingly unable to afford her medical bills, I’ll be sure to drop in a quarter. Because that worked for Caleb, and so it’s good enough for that little girl, amirite?
SatanicPanic
@Mudge:
ah, the working man’s version of Cash-and-Trash
Aji
@The Pale Scot: Well, don’t think I suffer from any surfeit of sympathy for the scorpion in this story. My guess, were I forced to give it, would be too much alcohol. My comment was more aimed at recognizing the folks who try to do everything right and still get nailed with something abominable like liver failure.
Davis X. Machina
@Elizabelle: But Travis not getting his chemo brings single-payer, or an NHS/USA, just a little bit closer, though. And isn’t that the real goal?
No revolution without martyrs.
Keith G
Who cares.
ACA is here to stay. Hopefully the perception damage created by the administration’s stupid handling of the rollout will diminish quickly as things get better. Ntl, by the time the GOP regains the raw legislative and administrative power to do anything they want, they will more than likely not have the political will to pay the price of dismantling the ACA.
Augie
@Tyro: If you say “I never give money in the hopes that some greater good will come of it”, I really hope you take a long hard look at how you are spending your charitable dollars and start re-considering your priorities.
elmo
@catclub:
Thanks, but Matthew 25:31-46 won’t fit on a license plate. :)
schrodinger's cat
@Elizabelle:
You are right of course. I just find the media more contemptible because they pretend to be neutral and have no agenda, when that is clearly not true.
cmorenc
@The Tragically Flip:
My road, exactly. As a 19 year old college sophomore, my political outlook (adjusted for the issues of the day back in 1968) would have been very much in tune with Eric the Red and Red State; it was shortly after that time that the combination of enlightenment-by-experience and maturation began evolving me out of my sophomoric glibertarian fantasies and toward an eventual progressive outlook, although that took a decade for the change to fully evolve. One perverse residual benefit for those of us who have “been there” over in winger-land at an earlier point is possession of a discomforting familiarity with the mindset from the POV of an insider. Unfortunately, what does not come along with this residual understanding is any special insight in how to effectively reach and convert those still stuck in this winger mindset. IMHO although the conversion process out of it toward a more progressive viewpoint doesn’t require any singular “Road to Damascus” moments, nevertheless it DOES very much require at least a series of impressionable personal experiences that cumulatively open the person’s eyes to wavelengths of human light they were unable to see before. As Caleb’s example shows, unfortunately it’s extremely difficult to predict for any given person what sort of experience and when will effectively work toward prying their mind open, and which their mind will stay resistantly shut to, even though to us it seems it should be potent enough to crack a mountain open.
Eric U.
@Mudge: I sure hope he did sign up for insurance. I think even a wingnut will realize that the system is actually free-market-compatible once they get past having to sign up via healthcare.gov. And he probably qualifies for subsidies. I didn’t end up donating to him, but the thing about the story that bothered me is that he has kids. Kids are better off with a dad, even a reprehensible asshole like this guy.
Ruckus
@Higgs Boson’s Mate:
@Villago Delenda Est:
Dad always taught me I could do anything. But there was always a price. Conservatives are not paying a price for their bullshit. Oh they think they are, that they are being put upon for not getting their own selfish ways. But that isn’t a price. I agree with both of you, that @rikyrah: is correct. He wants to spout that the poor shouldn’t have health care? Then when he is poor he shouldn’t get it. Is that charitable? Who cares? Wasn’t there a passage, something about according to one’s needs somewhere in that book?
Ruckus
@Kay:
I had to go to the emergency room once. When they asked who to send the bill to I answered George W. Bush. It was his answer that I should go so it should be him that pays. They didn’t think it was funny. I told them I didn’t think it was funny either.
Aji
@aimai: Thanks.
And you nailed it. I’d like to think that if I were, say, in a car accident, heaven forbid, people wouldn’t stop to try to find out my politics before deciding whether to stop and try to help.
A friend and I both have a running . . . well, not joke, exactly. We both use the expression, “I wouldn’t cross the street to piss on him if he was on fire.” And we both invariably follow it up immediately with, “Well, I would, but you know what I mean.’ Because even if it was our own worst enemy, well, you can’t just leave someone to suffer like that. It’s about who WE are, not who THEY are.
Ruckus
@Aji:
In an even close to just world bad stuff still happens to people. And you help them when they need it and can’t help themselves. As in an accident. But this guy is the one trying to run people over with his car and hits everyone he attempts to. You can only do so much, do you help the people he hits or him? His expressed expectation is that you help him and fuck everyone else. I don’t accept his side.
The Pale Scot
Well lookie here
Worse for wear? – Caleb Howe – Red State’s alcohol-inspired attack-dog blogger
Concise: Delong, Brad has a small collection of Cal’s passionate twitters. Huh.
Aji
@Ruckus: I don’t accept his side, either. But I also don’t begrudge the people who tried to help him for all the right reasons. Sometimes, it does cause a change in consciousness. other times, it doesn’t – but who knows? Maybe a few other folks got the message and are changing their views. I just refuse to pile on the folks who tried to help, and I’m not going to feel bad about any efforts I might make along the same lines. [I didn’t in this case, but I’m sure there have been others where the recipient turned out to be somehow objectionable, if not with the same size megaphone as this selfish twit.]
Anonne
@schrodinger’s cat: The majority of mass media outlets is ultimately owned by what, 4 corporations? I think we fail to realize that the media is just the propaganda arm of the corporate machine.
C.V. Danes
@Poopyman: @Tyro:
Points taken. But there’s enough people out there who actually try to good who need a helping hand than to waste money on someone who’s looking for a handout so that they can just keep us rolling in an eternal shit pile.
SiubhanDuinne
@Amir Khalid: A very happy new year to you and yours, Amir!
Ruckus
@Aji:
Maybe we are talking past each other. I don’t think the people that did help him are suckers or wrong. They made a choice to be the better angel. Good for them. I’m not that good a person. I know it’s me that doesn’t see things their charitable way. But this guy didn’t get into an accident, he’s trying to cause one, for everyone else. I’m not willing to help him do that.
Pogonip
@Kay: Aren’t those horrible? Especially when it’s a toddler. Whenever I see one of those I wonder why we the people tolerate it.
James E Powell
@Anonne:
I am always saying this, but I don’t think that the great mass of Americans get it or get the implications.
pseudonymous in nc
@The Tragically Flip:
And it reinforces medical Calvinism, because the people who receive donations from exposure can end up thinking that they were somehow more deserving of charity than someone else. That’s the biggest reason why it sucks. Charity is as capricious as the weather: fuck bake sales.
Alex Milstein
Why does the Catholic church need million dollar donors to remodel one of their showcase cathedrals in NYC? Do they not have enough tax exempt money in their coffers already?
Alex Milstein
Why does the Catholic church need million dollar donors to remodel one of their showcase cathedrals in NYC? Do they not have enough tax exempt money in their coffers already?
wenchacha
@Botsplainer: Shorter Home Depot CEO thug: “That’s a nice church you got there, Pope. Wouldn’t want nothin’ to happen to it.”
All those Catholics of the last 30-40 years who so willingly followed every Pope who chipped away at Vatican II have suddenly begun to question a pope’s infallibility. And all this time I thought they were just fastidiously faithful believers. Jokes on me.
Dangerfield
@JPL:
And thanks to the ACA he doesnt have to worry about bieng denied because of pre-existing conditions.
Jebediah, RBG
@schrodinger’s cat:
Isn’t he Hosni’s cousin?
Patricia Kayden
@CaseyL: AMEN! Hopefully the next time the Daily Kos readers decide to do good, they’ll pick worthier targets. Sorry but I don’t believe in giving money away to ungrateful people who would never consider giving a dime to anyone else in need.
Monala
@Gin & Tonic: I remember when the DK drive began. There were some good comments about why some weren’t going to contribute to this fund: there are many more people in need they could give to, not because those people were more likely to be grateful, but because they wouldn’t turn around and advocate against providing health care for others.
Schlemizel
Fuck that bastard. It was kind-hearted and humane to raise money for him but totally stupid and pointless. He would piss on Kos if the situation were reversed, fuck him & fuck the idea that any of those assholes could ever be brought into the light. They live in darkness because they enjoy it, it is their hate that feeds them and gives them life. He knows he is alive because he deserves to be & you do not, you can’t take that sort of hate away with kindness. I would not rejoice at his death but I would not expect anything but the sting from a scorpion.
JoyfulA
@Bill E Pilgrim: Even more common in writing and editing, I’m sure, and increasingly so as time passess.
I used to be a contractor with various publishers. Now I’m a subcontractor because the jobs of all the people I used to deal with have been contracted out.
Tyro
@Augie: I really hope you take a long hard look at how you are spending your charitable dollars and start re-considering your priorities.
My charitable donations go to the aid of an immediate good. I don’t think they’re going to change the world or change the overall structure of things. That’s just not how these things work. Donating to that guy wasn’t to create a sea change in the way the recipient viewed health care and liberalism. It was to help him get treated without going bankrupt. There is very, very limited good that charity can do beyond immediate help.
DavidTC
@JPL:
The Red Stater will sign up for health care but not share that fact with anyone. His livelihood depends on lies. His healthcare needs depend on “ACA”.
You know what I’d like to see. I’d like the left to find anti-ACA writers on the right who, in the past, didn’t have health insurance. Enough of those bozos have written about health insurance that such people would be easy to find.
And we have then have concern trolls keep repeatedly asking if they have insurance now.
Not to find one that does, but to pretend it is actually a _scandal_ if people currently have health insurance if they weren’t able to get insurance before the ACA.
And don’t just let it go if they signed up for private insurance directly, not via the exchange…let’s ask if they had any sort of pre-existing conditions that would have rendered them unable to get insurance beforehand. (And if they didn’t, why _didn’t_ they have insurance before?) If they did have such a condition, than they actually _are_ ‘using’ Obamacare.
Seriously, these idiots are running around trying to make people go without insurance. Let’s keep asking if _they’re_ going without insurance. Yes, they’ll lie…but the fun thing about lies is, they eventually come out.
(And lucky for us, I rather suspect none of these right-wing publications have employee health insurance, which is apparently the only sort of health insurance that is allowed now. Or something. If they do have such insurance, ask if it covers contraceptives.)
Oh, and let’s not forget to ask the same thing of Republican Congressmen. They’ll assert they had to sign up on the exchanges, but they’re lying…they could go without insurance.
Get out there, demand to know if each and every right-wing writer is planning to make use of the ACA, and make it a _scandal_ if they are.