From the GREAT STATE OF MAINE…
The New Scarlet Letter
Every morning when I wake up and get dressed, I can’t help but notice the seven-inch pale red scar running from my sternum to just below my belly button. I have another scar---two inches horizontal---on my upper chest. They’re a daily reminder of the emergency surgery I had last March that revealed a thriving cancer colony in my gut (happily removed), and the “mediport” that was my hookup for three months of chemo.
They are also a daily reminder that I am now a walking pre-existing condition.
Under the Affordable Care Act, I can look at those scars and feel grateful and relieved. Not just because I’m now cancer-free, but because when it returns (I have no doubt it will---before they were rooted out, those cancer cells were sending postcards to all their friends gushing about what sweet retirement property my insides have to offer) I know I won’t be price-gouged by the insurance vultures or denied coverage outright. Because it’s against the law. Thanks, Obama. Seriously---thanks, Obama!
But. If this new Graham-Cassidy-Trumpcare bill Republicans are trying to ram through Congress passes next week, that could all change. My scars will instead become a daily reminder that these perfumed-hanky-sniffing grifters have put a guillotine blade above my, and your, and everybody else’s necks. Under Trumpcare, any state will have the blessing of the federal government to green-light the insurance vultures to let you suffer and die because you once had the unmitigated gall to seek medical attention at some point in the past.
This is just one part of Trumpcare 4.0---yes, Lord Dampnut owns this just as much as Congress---that is unconscionably heartless. We know this because we have pre-existing memories of things like this and this.
What Republicans will try to foist on our country next week smacks of domestic terrorism to me. Few people will be able to wake up every morning knowing for certain that their health insurance will do what they expect it to do if they need it. There’s no doubt that people will die because of the cruelty that’s been hastily stuffed in this bill. And for what? Purely political reasons. Tax cuts for the rich. A Koch brothers rim job. A chance to erase the signature achievement of the previous Democratic president who was a thousand times smarter and more compassionate than these stooges will ever be. A cheap check mark in the win column they can wave in front of the faces of the base they’re about to screw.
The Affordable Care Act is working. If Republicans weren’t sabotaging it, it would be working even better. If they would huddle up with Democrats to work on improvements (like they were until Mitch McConnell forced them to disband this week), it could hum like a well-oiled machine. But no. Billionaires come first and fuck the rest of you.
If Trumpcare 4.0 passes, our scars and our medical histories will once again become the modern-day scarlet letter---a flashing red light to Big Insurance that yours is an account that may be cut loose in the name of profits; a feature, not a bug, in Sens. Lindsey Graham’s and Bill Cassidy’s sick minds. (Cassidy should have his medical license revoked for stomping all over the Hippocratic oath. Ditto Tom Price.)
These hacks don’t deserve this victory. America doesn’t deserve this deep dive back into the dark ages. Call your senators (202-224-3121 in DC, or their local office), especially if they have an “R” after their name, and give ‘em firm but polite hell. The only thing necessary for evil to prevail is for good people to do nothing. And this sack of shit, created by two old white male lying sacks of shit, is evil personified.
Cheers and Jeers starts below the fold...
Cheers and Jeers for Thursday, September 21, 2017
Note: Sometimes due to deadline pressures we can only allocate a few seconds to writing our daily note, and the lack of editing time means it might not always make fish. We regret the plunger. ---Mgt.
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By the Numbers:
Days 'til the first Indigenous Peoples Day in Portland Maine, which will replace official Columbus Day observances thanks to a Monday city council vote: 18
Days 'til the Lisle Ale Fest in Illinois: 9
Size of Tuesday’s Mexican earthquake that has killed at least 237: 7.1
Percent of individual insurance plans that excluded maternity coverage before the ACA made it a requirement, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation: 75%
Percent that excluded substance-abuse treatment: 45%
Minimum number of lawyers working with Robert Mueller on his Trump-Russia investigation: 16
Number of east coast businesses and commercial fishing families, respectively, supporting an alliance to prevent drilling along the Atlantic coast: 41,000 / 500,000
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Your Thursday Molly Ivins Moment:
Bet you if I had a nickel for every time someone has started an article or a speech in past five years by saying, "The nation's health care system is facing a crisis," or, "Our health care system is falling apart," I would be a rich woman today.
I suppose I could come up with some dramatic metaphor for the crumbling, tottering, greed-rotted structure, but hey, why don't you check out your health insurance premiums and see how you're doing? Up by 12 percent, 22 percent, 40 percent?
Larger premiums, higher deductibles, increased payments for prescription drugs? Employer dropping your coverage? Are we having fun yet?
---January 2003
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Puppy Pic of the Day: Gooooooooal!!!!!
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JEERS to Nature’s swirlies. Yup, this is how earth reminds us it’s in control---by sticking our head in its commode and flushing. To get the full effect, watch this with your face close to the ground so when your jaw drops it’ll literally hit the floor:
Hurricane Maria left massive damage in its wake, including a total blackout in our 51st should-be-a-state Puerto Rico. (Great job praying it away, evangelical grifters!) Now it’s eyeing (pardon the pun) the mid- to upper east coast. Looks like I picked the wrong week to invest in New England Porcine Straw Domiciles, Inc. Damn you and your suave sales pitch, pig.
CHEERS to Year 5778. Happy New Year! Rosh Hashanah rolled in last night, and C&J wishes all of our Jewish readers "Shana Tova!" minus the Times Square ball drop:
The only similarity between the Jewish New Year and the secular one is:
Many people use the New Year as a time to make "resolutions." Likewise, the Jewish New Year is a time to begin looking back at the mistakes of the past year and planning the changes to be made in the new year. …
Rosh Hashana begins a 10 day period, known as Aseret Ymay Tshuva, (Ten Days of Repentance) or Yomim Nora'im (High Holy days). These ten days that end with Yom Kippur, are a time for Tshuva (repentance), Tefilla (prayer) and Tzedaka (charity).
Even though the C&J household is just a run-'o-the-mill lapsed-Episcopalian/lapsed-Catholic domicile, we still took a moment to blow a ram's horn outside our neighbor's bedroom window at 3am. We figured, why break with our normal routine just because it's Rosh Hashanah?
JEERS to throwing gasoline on the fire. Hey, kids, what say we hop in Billy’s little yellow school bus with the Yosemite Sam mudflaps and take a little trip to the offices of Equifax, the credit-reporting agency that got hacked and allowed all your personal information to be surgically extracted by hackers, and see how competently they’re dealing with the situation:
The credit agency's Twitter account tweeted links on Wednesday to a fake site pretending to be Equifax,further bungling the company's response to a massive hack that affected 143 million customers.
Equifax, like many companies, handles customer service and complaints through its Twitter account. But in tweets replying to people asking for help and more information, it occasionally directed them to"securityequifax2017.com." The domain, designed to look like a phishing site, was set up to criticize how the company handled the situation.
The official account tweeted links to the same site multiple times since September 9, two days after the breach was first announced. The links have been deleted, but screenshots show it was not a one-time flub. […] "Their response to this incident leaves millions vulnerable to phishing attacks on copycat sites," the fake website states.
According to CNN, Equifax executives “did not respond to a request for comment.” But several fake Equifax “executives” said everything would be fine, but not before thanking the real Equifax for its generosity with all those wonderful credit card numbers.
CHEERS to America's favorite literary boogeyman. 70 skulls go on the cake of most-famous-Mainer Stephen King, born September 21, 1947 in Portland, just steps from where I live. (Okay, several thousand steps, but still) King is an unabashed Democrat who isn't afraid to speak his mind, which he occasionally does by blowing up twitter:
» From the Book of Republicans: "Lo, we have many assholes running for President. Let us consider, and pick the biggest. And so it was done."
» Trump thinks hitting a woman with a golf ball and knocking her down is funny. Myself, I think it indicates a severely fucked-up mind.
» Breaking News: Reliable sources reveal that Donald Trump is actually Cthulu. The absurd hairdo isn't absurd at all. It hides the tentacles.
» Donald Trump and Kim Jong Un, currently in a battle to see who is the craziest man on the planet.
» Our governor, Paul LePage, is a bigot, a homophobe, and a racist. I think that about covers it.
» Trump promises to veto single payer health care, should it get to his desk. No surprise. His rich friends wouldn't like that at all.
» Bill O'Reilly wants you to know that the slaves who built the White House were well-fed. Thanks for sharing, Bill.
» Gee, looks like NOBODY killed Freddie Gray. Guess he just died of being black. Funny how that happens in this country.
» Little by little, Trump is isolating himself. Soon he'll be Oz the Great and Terrible: little man, big voice, hiding behind a curtain.
Today's special in the C&J watering hole, as always: half-off Redrum and Cokes.
JEERS to unsolved mysteries. This is getting ridiculous. The Guinness Book’s oldest person in the world keeps dying. The latest is Violet Moss-Brown of Jamaica, who holds the distinction of being the last living subject of Queen Victoria. She was 117 and---Poof!---gone, just five months after previous record holder Emma Morano was found, shall we say, unresponsive. I’m not sure who Violet’s replacement is (the Guinness folks are still in verification mode), but I hope he or she is taking plenty of vitamins. And hiring a bodyguard who knows how to disarm a hooded ghoul of his scythe with judo chop hai!!!
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Ten years ago in C&J: September 21, 2007
JEERS to Stephen Colbert: Environment Killer. Yesterday we received our WRISTSTRONG wristband in the mail. It came in a cardboard box that was 11 inches long, 10 inches wide and 4 inches deep,stuffed with wads of brown paper and sealed in a yellow envelope. Um,Stephen...you do know that you're just playing an Earth-pillaging conservative on TV, right?
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And just one more…
CHEERS to "The Way Life Should Be." Twenty-four years ago today---September 21, 1993---my partner Michael ("Common Sense Mainer" here on Planet Orange) and I arrived in the liberal paradise known as Portland, Maine, having escaped the rust-belt hamlet of Saginaw, Michigan (motto: "No Smiling: It Scares The Children"). We had no jobs, only a smidgeon of savings, and an apartment that gave us barely any heat but did give us a January heating bill of $318.
Twenty-four years later we're still here and we still have nothing but kind words for our home (if you don't include the unprintable ones we have for our lunatic governor). Portland is constantly making “Best of” lists for awesomeness: most livable city, best place to retire, great place for dogs, the arts, food, working, playing, drinking, vacationing and yadda yadda yadda. And this year we’re joining the handful of other cities that ditched Columbus Day observances in favor of Indigenous Peoples Day.
So, yeah---we love our little corner of the world, and we hope you feel the same way about yours. Coming up tonight: our annual good luck tradition of releasing our genetically-engineered Maine lobster into the wild. She’s 60 feet tall and weighs five tons. We call her Fluffy. The mayor calls her “code red!!!”
Have a nice Thursday. Call your senators. Floor's open...What are you cheering and jeering about today?
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Today's Shameless C&J Testimonial:
More than 700 Kossacks from Cheers and Jeers gathered in the kiddie pool on Saturday to confirm their support for a planned independence referendum that Markos Moulitsas has declared illegal.
---Reuters
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