Struttin' around, like peacocks in heat--these damn Republicans.
Nothing but struttin' and bragging about compassion, Christian family values, crying crocodile tears over the deficit--all a crock of horse crap, as they line up, once again in 2007, against the dire needs of the American people.
Bring it on, Mr. Bush, Mr. Boehner, let the American people see you in full contempt mode as they head to the polls in 2008.
So get ready, I suspect--fear--that 2007 will shape up to be remembered as the year of the Compassionate Conservative Veto.
2007 Realities:
The intellectually and spiritually defective president who lied the nation into a depraved invasion of a soverign nation, will now, just as casually, shrug off the suffering inflicted on the American people by the criminal larceny and malfeasance of his government.
Watch him exercise his presidental perogatives by vetoing, what I would generously call, timid emergency healthcare legislation which will come from the Democratic Congress.
I think all you should expect in the way of healthcare reform in 2007 is some improvement--tinkering at the margins. But any relief after these six years of Republican larceny will be welcome by increasingly desperate American citizens.
How far this country has plunged. But perhaps the American people will finally recognize, elections have consequences.
For what it's worth, this morning the Washington Post laid out how things might play out.
Shift in Congress Puts Health Care Back on the Table
Health care is set to return to the national political stage in 2007, setting up partisan clashes in Congress that could end with rare vetoes from President Bush and help to define the 2008 presidential campaigns.
After years in which Iraq and national security dominated the debate -- and memories of the 1994 Clinton health plan debacle made major health-care changes politically radioactive -- the return of Democratic control in the House and Senate and the ramping up of the presidential campaigns are expected to bring health policy back into the legislative mix.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/...
Keep in mind as you read this, that Mr. Bush has only seen fit to veto one piece of legislation during the six years of his regime. Do you remember what it was? Let me help you--stem cell research.
WASHINGTON, July 19 — President Bush on Wednesday rejected legislation to expand federally supported embryonic stem cell research, exercising his first veto while putting himself at odds with many members of his own party and what polls say is a majority of the public.
By defying the Republican-controlled Congress, which had sent him legislation that would have overturned research restrictions he imposed five years ago, Mr. Bush re-inserted himself forcefully into a moral, scientific and political debate in which Republicans are increasingly finding common ground with Democrats.
http://www.nytimes.com/...
So Mr. Bush, a man of privilege who has destroyed everything he has ever been given, will now likely see fit to destroy through the power of the veto, some modest healthcare legislation which will come from the Democratic Congress.
The healthcare initiatives we hope Democrats will move to the front of the legislative agenda, are very modest indeed. Certainly there is no sweeping plan to insure healthcare as a basic human right--other than the Wyden giveaway to the for-profit insurance industry.
Key lawmakers and their aides in both parties say other health-policy initiatives likely to surface include renewing funding for the state-federal health-insurance program for children of the working poor, expanding access to health insurance generally, and beefing up drug-safety efforts at the Food and Drug Administration. Also in the works are efforts to promote electronic medical records, ease restrictions on the importation of low-cost prescription drugs from Canada, devise a better way of paying doctors under Medicare and improve the subsidized drug coverage for low-income Medicare beneficiaries.
Nothing radical, just common sense help--which is the purpose of government. But as we know, if there is not enough in it for the for-profit insurance industry, then Mr. Bush (and sadly, even some Democrats, can anyone spell P-R-I-M-A-R-Y?)will line up in opposition to the American people.
Still, even measures that do not win approval can be recycled into political grist for the 2008 presidential campaign, in which health care is expected to be a major issue. When Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) said this month that he would introduce legislation in the next Congress to create a centrally financed system of private health insurance for every American, his goal seemed as much to influence the presidential debate as to win passage of a bill that many analysts consider a long shot.
"Medical costs are hitting every part of this nation like a wrecking ball," Wyden said. "The last time America tried to fix health care was in 1993 and 1994. . . . Getting this on the presidential agenda so that candidates of both political parties have got to get beyond position papers is an especially important point."
Mr. Wyden, the wrecking ball you so aptly identify is coming from the system you seek to perpetuate.
In 2007 and 2008, let us hope that we will have hit a tipping point.
The American people will finally demand that we have a discussion about this tragic state of affairs and hold those responsible for all this needless suffering accountable.