Help is on the way for uninsured Texans with pre-existing conditions.
According to new federal regulations, Rick Perry and the health insurance companies in Texas have 90 days to deliver a plan that will cover uninsured Texans.
Texas, we finally have a solution to the health care insurance debacle here.
Federal law now dictates that the majority of uninsured Texans will have access to affordable health care insurance.
On Friday, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius sent letters to governors and state insurers, laying out the requirements for these pools and asking states to decide whether they'll participate.
In my district in Houston (TX-7-Culberson) we will:
Improve coverage for 537,000 residents with health insurance.
Give tax credits and other assistance to up to 140,000 families and 14,600 small businesses to help them afford coverage.
Improve Medicare for 80,000 beneficiaries, including closing the donut hole.
Extend coverage to 75,500 uninsured residents.
Guarantee that 15,000 residents with pre-existing conditions can obtain coverage.
Protect 500 families from bankruptcy due to unaffordable health care costs.
Allow 60,000 young adults to obtain coverage on their parents' insurance plans.
Provide millions of dollars in new funding for 5 community health centers.
Reduce the cost of uncompensated care for hospitals and other health care providers by $146
million annually.
Since we Democrats, especially progressive Democrats, are, according to the far right, supposed to be a bunch of pinko commie socialist Stalinist, Marxist and Hitlerite fascists and hippie freaks who are on a mission to ram socialism down the throats of the American people, how's that score for demonstrating a little fiscal responsibility?
Comprehensive health care reform will cost the federal government $940 billion over a ten-year period, but will increase revenue and cut other costs by a greater amount, leading to a reduction of $138 billion in the federal deficit over the same period, according to an analysis by the Congressional Budget Office, a Democratic source tells HuffPost. It will cut the deficit by $1.2 trillion over the second ten year period.
There they go again. The GOP clown shows complete with its outrageous signs are out in full force this week. Health care reform has Republicans and its teabagger wing in a state of hysteria.
Too bad most do not understand that they will actually benefit from health care reform legislation. But oh well, I've given up on expecting rational thought and reason to prevail among a bunch of misled and manipulated extremists.
Glenn Beck must have spiked U.S. Rep. Gohmert's iced tea. Or maybe the weather has been so cold in Washington that most of Gohmert's brain cells have frozen. Or perhaps the fact that over 30 million uninsured Americans will now be able to afford health coverage and the insurance companies will no longer be able to hand out death sentences to patients is simply too much for Gohmert to bear.
Speaking shortly after he riled up a crowd at Tuesday's Tea Party protest, Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-Tex.) declared that "demons" - yes, demons - have invaded the capital (and likely the souls of Democrats), forcing lawmakers to mislead the public about the content of the health care bill.
Governor, lately you've been pitching, twitching and puffing a lot of hot air about secession.
Texas is a real unique place all right and the Governor is a major contributor to its uniqueness.
Come on Governor, put your money where your mouth is. Just do it. Leave already. You can take all of your worshipers, i.e. secessionists, teabaggers, Birchers, birthers, racists and xenophobes with you.
Hit the road dude.
Leave, dude. Voters are the meanest old women you will have ever seen. You won't be packing any of our money with you when you leave, either.
But you can, Sir, help yourself to all of the creationism, witchcraft and voodoo science text books that you and your supporters put in our schools in yet another endless crusade of right wing conservative efforts to dumb down the children of Texas.
I'm sure you all will find a cozy place to establish a new Republic, Governor. Hell, Sir, you could name your new territory the New Republic of Teabagistan, Secessistan or Birchistan in honor of your strongest supporters. Below is a little reminder to help you sort out the guiding principles of your new Republic.
This would be a perfect time for you to leave Governor. After all, Bill White, Houston's former and very popular mayor raised $2.2 million last month. So far he has over $9 mil in his war chest.
On Sunday Texas had the honor to be graced by the frequent flashing of pearly whites, volumes of hair, razzle, dazzle, sizzle and sazzle at a Perry campaign pep rally near Houston. Aside from memorized talking point attacks, a boatload of flash and glittering glamor, lots of hair all around and awesome wardrobes, Rick and Sarah had little of substance to offer their crowd.
All hats, all hair, no cattle.
Rick Perry and Sarah Palin fired up their base with the usual right wing rhetoric and campaign jingles. Approximately 1100 hard right conservatives comprised mostly of teabaggers, (including the group's neo-Nazis and white supremists)secessionists, racists, bigots and xenophobes cheered Mr. Good Hair and the Quitter on Twitter's pep rally.
Rick and Sarah spent much of their time attacking, attacking and well, more attacking. I guess neither have a plan to bring new jobs to Texas, nor are they interested in investing in alternative green sources of energy. The Quitter on Twitter remains locked in a 20th century energy framework, reciting her old drill baby drill campaign pledge. Perry offered no plan to bring down the drop out rate in Texas schools. Nor did he talk about the fatal flaws of the Texas criminal justice system. He failed to mention the transportation challenges that plague our state given the broken roads, the lack of viable public transportation and our state's crumbling infrastructure.
Out of touch do nothing government believers, like Rick and Sarah, who rely on fat cats to deliver the goods, don't get what happens when their sugar daddy fat cats fail to, thanks to greed, deliver the goods to the people.
Both Perry and Palin ignored state wide issues and both targeted their guns away from their own failures as governors while pointing at a convenient and predictable target.
Blame Washington DC for everything.
Meanwhile, back at the Perry farm in Texas and in the snow laden outpost called Wasilla, Alaska, federal funding has been greeted with both great sighs of relief and cheers.
But narcissists like Rick and Sarah don't care much about the people of Texas or Alaska, for it is all about them. For both, their main concern is:
What works best for me?
Kay Bailey Hutchison is no better. She said it is time to leave the Senate and yet she is still there. Her husband and children live in Texas and she is here every Thursday through Tuesday. Senator Hutchison is earning a tax payer funded six figure salary with health insurance benefits, while working two and a half days on behalf of Texas.
It seems that the teabaggers, racists and right wing extremists have taken over the Republican Party. Of those polled as self-identified Republicans, 39% believe President Obama should be impeached. 63% think he is a socialist. 42% do not believe the President was born in the United States. 31% believe President Obama hates white people. 23% want their state to secede from the U.S..
To all of you who have written emails and comments, I really wish I could respond to every one of you. I truly appreciate your taking the time to write, even if we may be on different sides of the political fence. If there is one thing that my politically mixed San Francisco/Idaho background has taught me, it is benefit of continuing a discussion even if you don't agree. Too often these days, the Left and the Right immediately shut down if you are deemed to be from the opposing camp. Here's to good discussion even if we don't agree.
Of course there is not a civil war brewing in the Republican Party. Someone just made it up. But a leading conservative has recently called the non-civil non-war an impending bloodbath.
After the havoc the Republican Party and its newly formed teabagger faction have wreaked on this country from Ronald Reagan to George H.W. Bush and culminating with the horror of George W. Bush and his neocon policies, a bloodbath sounds just fine by me. Indeed, one is long overdue.
According to yesterday's Houston Chronicle, the teabaggers in Texas are fed up and want to throw all of the bums out. In Texas, the bums happen to be Republicans.
Even Rick Perry is a target of this group because he apparently is not conservative enough.
While it's too early to determine if the Tea Party movement will prove to be a durable political force, its candidates could prove a costly and unwanted distraction for establishment Republicans who would rather be aiming their fire at Democrats. Case in point: the GOP race for governor, where Tea Party ally Debra Medina of Wharton has announced her candidacy for the Republican nomination against incumbent Gov. Rick Perry and Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, whom she dismisses derisively as "get-along-style politicians."
The Huffinton Post reveals that Senate GOP intends to send out misleading mailers from a so-called non-partisan and vague task force called:
U.S.Senate Health Care Task Force
The mailer is actually commissioned by the National Republican Senatorial Committee and it is by no means non-partisan. The letter is signed by yours truly John Cornyn.
All of these descriptions are either intentionally misleading or deeply contested interpretations of the health care provisions put forth by Democrats. And while the name and NRSC title -- "Chairman" -- of Senator John Cornyn, (R-Texas) is listed in the header, there is no mention of the fact that he's a Republican. Only in the sixth paragraph is it revealed that "Republican leadership of the United States Senate" commissioned the survey.
This is yet another pathetic attempt for pimped out Republicans to kill health care reform.
The mailer uses the usual GOP fear mongering tactics by insisting that a lottery system will be set up that will determine who does and does not get care. The system will be based on age, race and gender.
