Month: February 2010

Monsters Under The Bed

~ susie ~ 1 Comment

I can’t say it’s a surprise that congressional Republicans think it would be great to start over with healthcare, or that they’re in favor of “incremental” changes. (I’d love to see them get Tom Toles’ “incremental” health surgery.)

And I can’t say it’s a surprise that they had virtually nothing useful to offer.

What I realized, though (and maybe this is the driving force behind Obama’s maddening compromises) is that to many Republicans, their illogical fantasies are akin to a child’s night terrors. We know there aren’t any monsters under the bed, but your child doesn’t. So you go through the motions of shooing the monsters away so your child can sleep.

We know that tort reform has such small influence on malpractice premiums that it’s virtually meaningless. Any rational person who looks at the research knows this. What you have are a lot of people making what they claim are factual assertions that are nothing more than an intellectual construct to support their already-faulty conclusion.

We know that selling insurance across state lines doesn’t solve the health care crisis, either.

We know that the fastest increases in costly diseases are being driven by environmental pollutants and contaminants, so eating right and exercising doesn’t solve the health care crisis, either.

But we’re left with a Congress where roughly half of them believe their fairy tales. And since the ideological wars are driven by true believers, we simply don’t have the time to convert each of them, one by one, to the realities we face.

Which is simply my long-winded way of saying that Harry Reid needs to shove good healthcare legislation through using reconciliation, right now. No more waiting.

People are dying, every single day. President Obama, we don’t need any more to die while you patiently explain to the Republicans about the monsters under the bed.

Get. It. Done. NOW.

Deep Thought

~ susie ~ 7 Comments

The same Senate millionaires who love the free market and hate the thought of public health insurance are very happy to have a public option when it comes to federal flood insurance for their vacation properties.

Public Option

~ susie ~ 2 Comments

I wonder if he’s right:

The Senate has the 50 votes necessary to pass a public health insurance option using the budget reconciliation process, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) said Thursday.

Sanders, a self-described “democratic socialist” who supports the government-run plan, urged President Barack Obama to push for the public option even though the possibility of passing it appeared to die this week.

“I think we do have 50 votes in the Senate for a public option and frankly I don’t know why the president has not put it in and I hope that we can inject it,” Sanders said on MSNBC. “I think it’s a very important part of healthcare reform.”

It’s not clear if Sanders’s remarks will encourage leaders to take up the public option, but they will surely give hope to his liberal supporters who have put pressure on Congress to pass a public plan.

The White House and Democratic leaders on Tuesday threw cold water on the possibility of pushing the proposal through, saying that there is not enough support in Congress to do so.

Weather Report

~ susie ~ 1 Comment

Now they’ve lowered the forecast to 6-10 inches, and it won’t really snow until late tonight. We’ve had flurries all day and the snow’s not even sticking yet, though all the schools were closed today. But the wind is really starting to kick up.

Here’s a picture of my street now, almost completely clear of snow (the patch of snow left on my front lawn was three feet high a few days ago). Tomorrow? Who knows!

Oy

~ susie ~ 5 Comments

So my sister has pneumonia, my oldest brother’s in the hospital after a perforated appendix and my aunt’s in the hospital with heart problems.

What a week!

Union for the Unemployed

~ susie ~ 6 Comments

This is a really good idea and I hope people sign on: (h/t Matt & John)

It’s been only a month that a union for the unemployed has come into existence through an ingenious grassroots organizing campaign. In case you haven’t heard about it, the union’s name is “UR Union of the Unemployed” or its nickname, “UCubed,” because of its unique method of organizing.

UCubed is the brain-child of the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers (IAM), whose leaders feel that the millions of unemployed workers need a union of their own to join in the struggle for massive jobs programs.

The idea is that if millions of jobless join together and act as an organization, they are more likely to get Congress and the White House to provide the jobs that are urgently needed. They can also apply pressure for health insurance coverage, unemployment insurance and COBRA benefits and food stamps. An unemployed worker is virtually helpless if he or she has to act alone.

Joining a Cube is as simple as it is important. (Please check the union web site.). Six people who live in the same zip code address can form a Ucube. Nine such UCubes make a neighborhood. Three neighborhood UCubes form a power block that cntains 162 activists. Politicians cannot easily ignore a multitude of power blocks, nor can merchants avoid them.