Honestly, I have to stop drinking coffee when reading political pieces in the Houston Chronicle in the morning. I've unintentionally spewed coffee from my mouth and nostrils more than once when I've read something by or about Texas Republican politicians.
But before I venture into a story about Texas Republican shills for corporate lobbyists in big business and insurance, let me share some breaking news about how 73% of U.S. physicians are totally on board with a public option in health care reform.
From the New England Journal of Medicine, and, according to NPR:
When polled, "nearly three-quarters of physicians supported some form of a public option, either alone or in combination with private insurance options," says Dr. Salomeh Keyhani. She and Dr. Alex Federman, both internists and researchers at Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York, conducted a random survey, by mail and by phone, of 2,130 doctors. They surveyed them from June right up to early September.
Most doctors - 63 percent - say they favor giving patients a choice that would include both public and private insurance. That's the position of President Obama and of many congressional Democrats. In addition, another 10 percent of doctors say they favor a public option only; they'd like to see a single-payer health care system. Together, the two groups add up to 73 percent.
Predictable GOP response from the psycho wacko right: The doctors are a bunch of witch doctors from Africa. All are undocumented workers who were not born here. All are nazis, communists, fascists, Hitler, Stalin, Lenin, socialists and blah, blah, blah.
Moving along as to why I could not hold my morning coffee. Hint: it has something to do with plastering lipstick on rather large and really dirty pigs.
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Yesterday the coffee blew out of my mouth due to Peggy Fikac's article on Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison and her new adviser, Karen Hughes and informal adviser, Karl Rove.
The very notion of "compassion" when linked to two of most uncompassionate, divisive and right wing ideological hatchet folks in the U.S. is laughable at best.
It's a blast back to the lovely days of 2000 and 2004 folks. Fortunately for we Democrats, this time the battle will be the right wing vs. the right wing. The only difference? One candidate will smile while the other scowls. Get your popcorn ready, folks. This movie is going to be long and quite adventurous. The drama queens and kings on the right and the right may even have serious car chases and gun slinging shootouts in order to entertain us.
There's an echo of George W. Bush's "uniter not divider" mantra as his chief loyalist, Karen Hughes, boosts U.S. Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison's bid to unseat Gov. Rick Perry.
Hughes, who worked with Bush from Texas to Washington, joined Hutchison on her announcement tour last month to pronounce the race a choice between "someone who divides and someone who delivers."
"It's important for our state and our party that we have a different tone in our leadership, and particularly in the governor's office," Hughes said recently, touting Hutchison as a consensus-builder.
As Perry casts himself as the true conservative, Hughes offered a twist on the word, just as Bush did when he called himself a "compassionate conservative."
"It's important for the Republican Party that we're conservatives with a smile rather than conservatives with a scowl," Hughes said. "We're a welcoming party."
It is nice to know that Republican shills are attempting to paint themselves as smiling compassionates again. The meme brings back memories of the McCain campaign's attempts to mask Sarah Palin's true nature with 150K in designer clothes, gallons upon gallons of makeup and $400.00 hair reworks.
As we know, there is no such thing as a compassionate conservative. The notion does not exist. And if it should from time to time, it is only when a conservative or one of their loved ones is hit with adversity or suffering. In other words a conservative feels compassion only when hardship affects them personally.
The whole idea of a smiling compassionate conservative politician is a joke. It is merely a catch phrase, a jingle, a meme, or whatever.
Let's take a look at the last eight years of serious compassion free conservatism.
We know that the smiling compassion free conservatives brought about a global economic melt down because of their hard line belief in unregulated financial instruments. We know about the smiling conservatives' compassionless and unnecessary war of choice called Iraq. We know that the compassionless conservatives put Iraq on the credit card while giving trillions in tax cuts to the most wealthy in this country.
We also know that the middle class shouldered the lion's share of the tax burden. This enormous transfer of wealth did not create more jobs. It did not increase the vast majority of wages. It did not provide us with affordable health care. It did not upgrade or improve our school's abysmal national ranking. It did not change the fact that Texas boasts the highest number of uninsured Americans, and no, not all are undocumented workers. The uninsured in this state are mostly folks who lost their jobs, and their insurance, or they have a job and cannot afford the ridiculous premiums.
While serving in the Senate during the Bush years, Kay Bailey Hutchison voted with the President 90% of the time. She rubber stamped his war in Iraq, tax cuts for the wealthy and the Senator had no problem with putting all of the above on the national credit card. During the Obama Administration the Senator voted against federal stimulus money meant to shore up the decimated economy and to extend unemployment benefits for out-of work Americans. The Senator from the great state of Texas also voted against the first Hispanic female justice to serve in the Supreme Court.
Her voting record in the Senate reveals what we already know. Kay Bailey is no moderate. She is a right wing conservative with strong libertarian leanings. She is also dead set against health care reform and for throwing any economic life line to struggling, hard working, everyday folks. As always Kay Bailey sides with the interests of big business over the needs of her constituents. Kay Bailey is also dishonest when she refers to a public option in health care reform as a "government takeover." Andrea Mitchell of MSNBC called out the Senator for the bald face lie on national TV.
Why would Hutchison govern Texas any differently than she serves in the Senate?
Governor Perry is cut from the very same right wing conservative cloth as Kay Bailey Hutchison. His efforts as the governor have hurt hard working, middle and working class Americans. His attitude toward the impoverished and their children has been heartless. In fact, Perry has been on a crusade to keep the poor in a perpetual state of poverty.
Texas, with its glorious free market regime and deeply incentive-creating 25 percent rate of health uninsurance, has a per capita income of $37,187; nanny-state New Jersey, with its oppressive taxes and regulation of everything (what it takes to get permission to cut down a dying tree ... ), has a per capita income of $49,194.
Perry's refusal to accept federal stimulus funds to extend unemployment benefits demonstrates his cruel contempt for out-of-work Texans. The state's slow response in delivering food stamps, that are 100% federally funded, to hungry Texans is unconscionable at best.
Perry brings shame and embarrassment to the state with his ridiculous threats to secede. No wonder Texas serves as the butt of jokes and derision by cable TV political anchors and late night comedy hosts.
The story that Texas has the power to leave the U.S. if it decides to do so is a common one in the state, but, according to the Associated Press, which checked with the Texas State Library and Archives Commission, it's not true.
We are sick and tired of the Rick Perry and Texas GOP clown shows.
Texans have been as poorly served by Governor Rick Perry as they have by U.S. Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison. Both are a lose lose for the people of Texas.
