Maybe I'm just tired, but watching this here at my desk just now made me start to cry:
Emotional Question From Audience Member On Health Care
To see what people were saying on the subject, I blogsearched the guy's name (Steve Skvara) and found this from an outfit called the MRC:
Evidently, the media coverage of this moment was full of rampant liberal bias:
Couric asserted that "45 million Americans have no coverage. That includes more than 13 million between the ages of 19 and 29. Many of them don't get coverage from their jobs, and cannot afford to buy it on their own." Of course, many can afford it and in that age range feel comfortable without insurance. In fact, 17 million of the uninsured earn more than $50,000. Removing those, plus people who are not U.S. citizens, leaves fewer than ten million chronically uninsured.
And then the author moves on. I don't feel like checking, so let's say all those numbers are right, the illegals don't really count, and every single one of the 17 million uninsured people making over $50K doesn't want your lousy health insurance anyway. Okay, then, there are only ten million chronically underinsured Americans making under $50K. One of them is poor, pitiful Steve Skvara, and he's the person we should feel bad for.
Except we shouldn't feel bad for Steve, he brought this on himself:
Skvara complained that when the steel company he had worked for went bankrupt he lost his promised lifetime health insurance. Not surprisingly, neither Miller nor Matthews raised Skvara's lack of personal responsibility in planning ahead for his own future when he worked in a declining industry, burdened by high health care costs, that many predicted long ago would go out of business. Nor did they look into the responsibility of the union to which he paid dues for decades. On Hardball, Skvara did acknowledge that he's on Medicare and his wife, who is several years younger, will qualify for Medicare in a few years. [emphases mine]
It's Steve's fault for working for a declining industry? Maybe so! Yeah, what a dumbass! He (and every other steel worker in the U.S.) should have walked off the job when these trends first became clear (or at least saved up a big chunk of change for future unplanned health emergencies). What did they think, that "promised lifetime health insurance" meant "promised lifetime health insurance?" Fools! And it's only going to be "a few years" until his wife qualifies for Medicare--what could possibly go wrong in a few years??
So at this point, I'm sure I must be reading some crackpot publication. I toodle around the site to confirm my suspicion, and read:
Newt Gingrich, former Speaker of the House
"I would say that the MRC, and Brent Bozell, are remarkably important. There are days when their reports are a breath of fresh air. You almost think that you are losing your own sense of what's going on because the biases around you and then when you have Brent reporting on just how bad the bias is, it sort of reassures you, you just keep doing what's right for America and not allow the media to get you off stride or to get you off focus."
Rich Lowry
Editor, National Review
"Perhaps no conservative organization does work as important as the MRC does. It's an indefatigable watchdog, exposing the crudities, omissions, and inequities of our corrupt Fourth Estate."
Robert D. Novak, CNN Crossfire Co-Host and Nationally Syndicated Columnist
"The MRC is the indispensable counter-punch to liberal reporting, providing timely, accurate, and balanced analyses of the most egregious examples of media bias."
Fred Barnes, Executive Editor, The Weekly Standard
"Nobody exposes inaccuracy, sensationalism, and liberal bias in the mainstream press like Brent Bozell and his media sleuths at the Media Research Center. Their work is heroic. It's not only indispensable to understanding the media, it's critical to preserving a free and independent press."
John Fund, Wall Street Journal Editorial Board Member
"Brent Bozell is an American patriot. I don't normally go out of my way to endorse groups, but I think his Media Research Center is one of the seminal institutions in American life today...
Dr. William J. Bennett, Co-Director, Empower America
"The MRC is one of the most important organizations in the country. In the battle for our culture, the facts are on our side.
Rush Limbaugh
"Brent Bozell and the MRC provide a most precious commodity - a quest for the truth. I can't possibly expose every example of bias and error that emanates from the national mainstream media, but Bozell and his group come as close as anyone can. MRC is a vital national interest."
Boy, I see those people on my tv every day. They must be right. I guess Steve Skvara brought all this on himself. Serves his wife right for marrying such an irresponsible man.