Last Call For The Cruz Revolution

You really do have to wonder about the wisdom of a politician calling on his supporters to rise up against America over affordable health care, but Ted Cruz will play this con game for as long as he can.

Sen. Ted Cruz on Saturday continued his call for cutting off funding for President Barack Obama's health care law and told conservative Christians that congressional lawmakers can't be counted on to do it.

The Texas Republican, a tea-party favorite and a possible presidential candidate in 2016, drew a standing ovation at the Family Leadership Summit with his denouncement of the health care initiative labeled "Obamacare" by its critics.

"That reaction right there shows how we win this fight," Cruz said. "If I was sitting in the Senate cloakroom, the reaction would be fundamentally different. If we have to depend on Washington, it will never be done."

As he has in remarks to other conservatives, Cruz asserted that a grassroots effort would be needed. "The only way we win this fight is if the American people rise up and hold our elected officials accountable," he said.

So here's Cruz, saying "We need to shut down the government over Obamacare" and admitting that will never happen, but they are cheering him on anyway.  Of course, if you're wondering why the logical disconnect, remember these are "Christians" whose idea of "Christianity" is "making people suffer on purpose".

They just want those people to be hurt, that's all.  Cruz will be able to ride that train for the rest of his career, and he'll never have to deliver.

Another Honey Badger Moment

Winger blogs are screaming this morning that Sen. Harry Reid has "finally given us the truth about fascist Obamacare" or something.  The news?  Reid mentioned in a panel discussion Fiday on a Las Vegas PBS show that Obamacare is a step towards single payer health care.

Reid said he thinks the country has to “work our way past” insurance-based health care during a Friday night appearance on Vegas PBS’ program “Nevada Week in Review.”

“What we’ve done with Obamacare is have a step in the right direction, but we’re far from having something that’s going to work forever,” Reid said.

When then asked by panelist Steve Sebelius whether he meant ultimately the country would have to have a health care system that abandoned insurance as the means of accessing it, Reid said: “Yes, yes. Absolutely, yes.”

The idea of introducing a single-payer national health care system to the United States, or even just a public option, sent lawmakers into a tizzy back in 2009, when Reid was negotiating the health care bill.

“We had a real good run at the public option … don’t think we didn’t have a tremendous number of people who wanted a single-payer system,” Reid said on the PBS program, recalling how then-Sen. Joe Lieberman’s opposition to the idea of a public option made them abandon the notion and start from scratch.

Eventually, Reid decided the public option was unworkable.

“We had to get a majority of votes,” Reid said. “In fact, we had to get a little extra in the Senate, we have to get 60.”

Reid cited the post-WWII auto industry labor negotiations that made employer-backed health insurance the norm, remarking that “we’ve never been able to work our way out of that” before predicting that Congress would someday end the insurance-based health care system.

Only if you haven't paid any attention whatsoever to the debate over Obamacare on the left is this actually news in the sense that it is a new development.  Again, the public option and single payer debate came up in 2009 and early 2010.  Oh, but look who we're talking about suffering from epistemic closure?

And yes, these idiots are calling it fascism.  How horrible to have health care coverage from your government.

Republican Muscleheads

Since conservatives have gotten rid of voter suppression for us and we no longer need the Voting Rights Act, and that everyone gets health care in America so we don't need to expand Medicaid, it's also comforting to know that they've gotten rid of poor people and hunger in America, so we don't need SNAP benefits and food programs.

At a town hall in Welch, OK on Thursday, Rep. Markwayne Mullin (R-OK) called for the outright elimination of aid programs for low-income Americans, claiming that he has witnessed food stamp fraud firsthand. Mullin said he would like to “do away with a lot of these programs” because they allow people to slack off.

“The food programs are designed to take care of people who can’t work, not won’t work. And we all know those people that won’t work, right?” he asked the audience. “They’re abusing the program, and we’ve got to get them off of it.”

Of course, 618,000 Oklahomans are on SNAP which comes out to one in six, and due to the expiration of the SNAP boost from the 2009 Recovery Act, SNAP benefits are already due for a substantial cut across the board in November.  But of course, none of the people in that town hall meeting could possibly be one of those people.  (PS, Welch, OK is in Craig County, where about 20% of residents are on SNAP benefits as of 2011.  I'm sure those numbers are higher now.  But they're all frauds, right?)

"So I’m in Crystal City and I’m buying my groceries…and I noticed everybody was giving that card. They had these huge baskets, and I realized it was the first of the month. But then I’m looking over, and there’s a couple beside me. This guy was built like a brick house. I mean he had muscles all over him. He was in a little tank top and pair of shorts and really nice Nike shoes. And she was standing there, and she was all in shape and she looked like she had just come from a fitness program. She was in the spandex, and you know, they were both physically fit. And they go up in front of me and they pay with that card. Fraud. Absolute 100% all it is is fraud…it’s all over the place. And there you go, to the fact that we shouldn’t be supporting those who won’t work. They’re spending their money someplace."

So there you go, America.  Republicans have already established as "fact" that people who are fat can't possibly need food stamps, and now we know people who are fit can't possibly need food stamps, so really nobody needs them.

Here's the truth:

Meanwhile, many of those who receive SNAP benefits (from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or food stamps) work: More than 40 percent of recipients live in a household with earnings. Those who don’t work are likely to be under 18 or over 60. In fact, strict eligibility requirements for the Supplementary Nutrition Assistance Program have disqualified one in four food insecure households for being too high-income, and are allowing at least 50 million people to go hungry. Regardless, House Republicans are gunning for more cuts that would kick millions more families off the vital program.

And Republicans like Rep. Mullin here want to trash the program completely.  Because our real problem is we spend too much money on poor people. Starve them all, let God and religious charites decide who's worthy, right?

You know, not those people.