The depths of Demcare demagoguery
My column today looks at the Democrats’ rhetorical morass on health care.
I spotlight the targeting of Chamber of Commerce CEO Tom Donohue by a nutroots website with the gall to call itself “Velvet Revolution” after the citizen-led democracy movements in eastern Europe. The group is on a thuggish fishing expedition akin to the Goon Squad tactics of Team Obama and its supporters during the campaign. Investor’s Business Daily hits the nail on the head in diagnosing the Alinksy tactics of these “thugs in velvet:” “…the biggest problem seems to be the malevolent tone the bounty sets, something that in the current political climate is only growing worse as the Obama administration does nothing to rein it in.”
I also feature the health care horror fables of NYTimes columnist Nick Kristof and President Barack Obama. Propaganda recyclers continue to parrot the John Brodniak plight despite its debunking and crumbling under scrutiny. Guy Benson follows up on the Oregon health plan here.
While they chain us in debt, they accuse us of standing with slavemasters. While they accuse us of inciting violence, they put bounties on the heads of business leaders. While they accuse us fear-mongering, they spread bogus health-care horror stories. Brace yourselves: It’s only going to get worse.
If you are in the Washington DC area on December 15, there’s a Code Red Rally protest on the Capitol against the Demcare beast. Laura Ingraham has details here. Don’t let up.
***
The depths of Demcare demagoguery
by Michelle Malkin
Creators Syndicate
Copyright 2009
How low can they go? The desperate Democrat peddlers of a government health care takeover have proclaimed an insurance “Holocaust in America” (Fla. Democrat Rep. Alan Grayson), lambasted conservative health care town hall protesters as “political terrorists” (Indiana Democrat Rep. Baron Hill), sent SEIU thugs to demonstrate outside Democrat Sen. Joe Lieberman’s private residence, and derided senior citizens questioning President Obama’s fuzzy math savings claims (California Democrat Rep. Pete Stark: “I wouldn’t dignify you by peeing on your leg. It wouldn’t be worth wasting the urine.”) Now, Harry Reid is leading them deeper into demagogic mire.
This week, the Senate Majority Leader pummeled opponents with the overworn race card. Following in the mucky footsteps of former President Jimmy Carter (who blamed GOP Rep. Joe Wilson’s objections to Obama’s policy deceptions on a “racism inclination”) and Jesse Jackson (“You can’t vote against healthcare and call yourself a black man”), Reid likened Republicans who object to socialized medicine to slavemasters, enemies of women’s suffrage, and Bull Connor.
Reid’s rhetorical aim was worse than the unhinged Minnesota protester who threw tomatoes at Sarah Palin during a book signing and hit a police officer instead. Splat.
Mustering up as much indignation as his grimly taut face could exhibit, Reid lectured those standing in the way of Demcare: “When this country belatedly recognized the wrongs of slavery, there were those who dug in their heels and said ‘slow down, it’s too early, things aren’t bad enough. When women spoke up for the right to speak up, they wanted to vote, some insisted they simply, slow down, there will be a better day to do that, today isn’t quite right. When this body was on the verge of guaranteeing equal civil rights to everyone regardless of the color of their skin, some senators resorted to the same filibuster threats that we hear today.”
It was the GOP that fought slavery and the Democrat Party that battled to preserve it. It was then-Democrat Strom Thurmond who led the civil rights filibuster that Reid tried to lay on Republicans. And it’s the Democrat Party, not the GOP, that boasts ex-Klansman Sen. Robert Byrd among its senior leaders. But don’t confuse Harry Reid with history while he’s chasing Republicans around with his “RAAAACISM!” stamp.
The more the American public learns about the choice-limiting, debt-exploding, bureaucracy-multiplying health care takeover, the more opposition increases. And the more unhinged the Democrat majority and its supporters get. There is now a $200,000 “bounty” on the head of U.S Chamber of Commerce CEO Tom Donohue. Left-wing activist website “Velvet Revolution” published a want ad with Donohue’s picture on it this week, which solicits information leading to “the arrest and conviction” of the business leader for “opposing progressive initiatives.” The witch hunt is targeting Donohue for his outspoken criticism of the costs and impact of Dems’ health care legislation on small businesses across the country.
Such reckless propaganda accusing opponents of “criminality” isn’t limited to nutroots publications. In the august pages of the New York Times last week, Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist Nicholas Kristof titled his universal care manifesto, “Are We Going to Let John Die?” Kristof elevated unemployed Oregon sawmill worker John Brodniak, 23, as the Demcare poster child. Reportedly diagnosed with cavernous hemangioma, a neurological condition, Kristof bemoaned: “Without insurance, John has been unable to get surgery or even help managing the pain.”
An emergency room turned Brodniak away, Kristof claims (a practice which is prohibited by federal law). No doctor would treat him, Kristof reported (get your grain of salt ready). Isn’t it “monstrous,” Kristof concludes (hanky alert), “for politicians to avert their eyes, make excuses and deny coverage to innumerable Americans just like John?”
Ready for the punchline? Brodniak not only has coverage through Oregon’s Medicaid program, but has also been a patient at the prestigious Oregon Health and Science University in Portland (a safety-net institution which accepts all Medicaid patients) for the past three weeks – a fact Kristof either deliberately ignored and suppressed from readers or didn’t bother to find out before publishing his screed.
In other words, Brodniak was already being treated and cared for by a top-notch neurologist under our existing health care system when Kristof came along to scream at Congress for letting him die.
Kristof’s fable follows on the heels of at least two dubious horror stories disseminated by President Obama himself. In September, Obama told of Illinois cancer patient Otto Raddatz, who supposedly died after he was dropped from his insurance plan when his insurer discovered an unreported gallstone the patient hadn’t known about. The truth? He got the treatment he needed in 2005 and died just this year. In another case, Obama claimed, a woman with breast cancer lost her insurance “she forgot to declare a case of acne.” In fact, she failed to disclose a previous heart condition and did not list her weight accurately, but had her insurance restored anyway after intense public lobbying.
But why bother with troublesome facts? In the insatiable pursuit of government control, truth and rationality are the first casualties.
See what others have said
Note from Michelle: This section is for comments from michellemalkin.com's community of registered readers. Please don't assume that I agree with or endorse any particular comment just because I let it stand. A reminder: Anyone who fails to comply with my terms of use may lose his or her posting privilege.
Comments
You must be logged in to post a comment.
 |
Catholic lawsuit against Obamacare mandate cites 1993 legislation written by Ted Kennedy and Chuck Schumer
May 22, 2012 04:35 PM by Doug Powers
48 Comments
Illinois Republicans flirting with cigarette tax hike for Obamacare — and a reminder about Orrin Hatch
May 21, 2012 11:03 AM by Michelle Malkin
32 CommentsHigh school fined $15,000 for… selling soda pop during lunch
May 19, 2012 01:29 PM by Doug Powers
101 Comments
Destroying private health insurance was always the goal
May 16, 2012 09:40 AM by Michelle Malkin
43 CommentsObamacare cronyism: The First Lady’s patient-dumping, privacy-meddling scheme
May 16, 2012 08:56 AM by Michelle Malkin
102 CommentsInsurers issuing new round of rebates must credit Obamacare
May 14, 2012 11:26 AM by Doug Powers
66 CommentsWhite House to SCOTUS: ‘Extraordinary disruptions’ to Medicare if Obamacare struck down
May 4, 2012 02:03 PM by Doug Powers
86 Comments
Biden predicts Supreme Court will uphold Obamacare
April 1, 2012 12:49 PM by Doug Powers
63 Comments
Categories: Health care
Nice Deb
» The Organized Left Now Stalking RomneyNewsBusters.org
» Very Annoyed Matthews Rips ‘Horse’s Ass Right-Wingers’ Who Cite ‘Thrill Up My Leg,’ Calls C-SPAN Host a ‘Jackass’Nice Deb
» Uncovered Ad Shows Obama Appeared At 1996 Event Hosted By Democratic Socialists of AmericaNice Deb
» Uncovered Ad Shows Obama Appeared At 1996 Event Hosted By Democratic Socialists of AmericaNewsBusters.org
» Reuters's Freeland: 'Anorexic' Americans Think Tax Bite Too Heavy When In Fact It's Dangerously Thin
good piece and a good overview of all the ridiculous claims by our ‘fearless leaders’.
They will say anything to get you to let them spend all of your money and the money of your grandkids.
Because Donohue has repeatedly and unapologetically acted as a pro-amnesty mouthpiece for the Open Border Lobby, there’s no way I can support him for anything… not even local county animal control officer.
As I have said before, our Country is being run by the Chicago mafia, and their goon squad is everywhere. Just stay in line, accept what they say, and no one will get hurt. Step out of line however…well, it won’t be pretty. Stay brave everyone, we are the targets.
I wonder if Donahue can go after this group for sladerous claims. They are presuming he is guilty of something without a shred of evidence.
I also wonder if someone on the left may take this “bounty” thing to serious and actual try to harm him. If this happens will the MSM decry it and the tactics being employed by this group or will they just ignore it as usual? Hopefully we will never discover the answer to those questions.
The sad thing is that all insurance agents around the country have to be licensed in every state that they conduct business. You have to go through training courses, and recurrent training every year.
NONE of the senators would be eligible to even DISCUSS BENEFITS with anyone without violating the law. None of them are licensed, yet they are the ones making new laws.
I’ve been saving people money on health care for all of my professional life. I know the issues and the problems because I DEAL WITH THEM DAILY. Nobody asked me what I thought.
They are only interested in spending as much money as they can. They don’t care about solutions. . . they just want to spend money. They figure interest rates are cheap now so they need to borrow the money now.
If this agenda passes, our children will hate us in 30 years.
Gee Harry, read a history book once in a while. Many of the founding fathers were opposed to slavery which is why some states never had it from the beginning.
What a jerk.
As for Mr. Donahue, what they are doing is trying to intimidate people by saying, if you have any skeletons in your closet you better STFU or we will expose you.
I wish this would get more exposure than the limited viewing of conservative blogs and coverage on talk radio. Americans are fair minded people, they will reject this if they know about it.
Obama and his thugs are doing more damage to the USA than any terrorist or enemy nation ever has done.
They must be stopped.
The Washington Post did a hit piece on Joe Lieberman for opposing “the public option”. The two reporters who wrote the hit piece are well known lefties even by Washington Post standards. These two reporters used sources who are well known for their involvement with liberal Democrat Senate staffs.
What? No inane and silly remarks by the resident “thoughtful” Leftists?
It’s now illegal to oppose “progressive causes?”
This country is turning into a South American thugocracy.
As they say, “never let the facts get in the way of a good scare tactic”.
FIFY.
“Scratch a ‘liberal,’ and you’ll find a totalitarian underneath.”
This is reminiscent of an account from an Austrian Jew whose epiphany came when he opened a window and saw someone standing on the sidewalk in front of his home, whistling the Horst Wessel Lied.
You know what they’re thinking, you know what they’re planning… and the only choice they’re going to leave you with is to fight for your life or get the hell outta Dodge while you can.
The Austrian Jew fled to the USA. Where can we run to…? I guess that means we’re going to have to fight.
This is most certainly not the last of this sort of crap that we will run into. If this attempt is at all successful in any manner, it will only invigorate the left into doing it more.
If the right did this, it would be called vigilantism.
Fight fire with fire.
More and more I have to agree Regulus. I’m just surprised at the amount of sheer stupidty thats coming out on the left now. They think as Obama won they are in charge and now its there way or no way.
Ironic they preached to the roof tops when Bush said that about the war on Terror.
BHO has no idea how capitalism works. He has no idea how jobs are created. Poor people don’t create jobs. Unions don’t create jobs. Government mandates don’t create jobs. Taxes don’t create jobs. No amount of bullying, threatening or bribing will create jobs. And if BHO continues to take money from us, he will not get the economy going.
Apparently, Obama said this a.m. that the tax cuts put through by the last administration were passed without any way of paying for them. He seriously said that! Say what??? As if you didn’t need any more proof he is clueless about capitalism! Tax cuts stimulate jobs and the economy…you don’t have to pay for them, doofus! Is he really that stupid, or does he think he is fooling so many people that he just keeps spouting this crap in hopes no one will notice?
Saddly Happy I’ld wager on what you said, even sadder I’ll wager a good percentage of Beltway folks will by it among others.
buy* ah well reguardless he keeps selling more debt to the Chinese, wonder when they’ll cash in. One heck of a weapon to be given, more might lays with it than thousands of nukes.
I also just heard on Rush that millions of stimulus dollars went to Hillary Clinton’s personal pollster. First of all, I didn’t realize these people had “personal pollsters”. After all, Robert Gibbs just said yesterday that polls are stupid and childish. Anyway, the money to Hillary’s pollster apparently was to save three jobs. Folks, all this spending is just a giant ponzi-scheme fraud foisted on the American people. We are all paying for Obama and his cronies to pay back their backers for getting them into office. SEIU, ACORN, lawyers, etc. This is so corrupt it is staggering! And yet, the MSM remains silent. There will be a reckoning…mark my words! The pot is boiling over.
an old adage taught to every freshman law student, when you have the facts, pound the facts, when you don’t have the facts, pound the table and bluster. bluster is legaleze for lie.
I guess this is a bit OT, But the swirling lies are beginning to confuse me. I may have to quit Milk and go back to Whiskey.
So, let me get this right, Obama through his intermediaries or should that be minions, has used TARP money to pay off almost 6 Million dollars of Hillary’s campaign debt. That’s almost as if the TARP funds are really just a Slush Fund.
No, no, no, Uplander. You are looking at this in the wrong way. Obama is helping reduce the exposure of financial institutions holing bad loans. If he hadn’t given the money to the Clinton campaign some poor bank would have a toxic asset on their hands. This is just redeeming one of those toxic assets the plan was designed for…
uplander, my understanding is that not the tarp money, but the stimuluspalooza money was used to pay off hilly’s campaign debt. remember hilly would support barry at the convention is he paid off her campaign debts. VOILA. but i do find it interesting that barry congratulates the tarp money from pulling us back from financial collapse but then says it created this debt problem. 1 tarp was a bush era deal, and a bunch of it wasn’t spent and a bunch of it has been paid back. how much, only god knows since gubmint gets to account on the wing and a prayer method. the 787 billion stimulus palooza bill was all barry, and it was spent (given) to pet projects like hilly’s debts, and state gubmints to keep the states afloat. now barry wants to take the tarp funds remaining and flush them down the same hole the previous 787B went. yes he really did recieve a harvard education.
Actually, cheapseat, only a small amount of the 787 billion of the porkulus has been spent at this point.
And about 200 to 250 billion of the TARP funds have not been spent either.
Of course, Obama will spend it all before he is done…
Democrats the party that defined racism..with slavery..with internment camps..with segregation..with civil rights boycotts..with taxpayer moneyed subjugation of the poor..with global warming discrimination of third world countries.
I need to get something straight in my mind. The health reform bill includes massive cuts to Medicare…right? And Medicare is already in financial trouble…right? And the baby boomers are going to hit the age of receiving Medicare within a matter of one or two years…right?? Now, one of the new plans they just added to the bill is to allow 55 and up to get Medicare. Say What??? Tell me where in the name of anything sane this passes the stink test. What are these people smoking? I realize that a lot of them are from the 1960′s drug culture. Maybe some of that dope really did fry their brains.
I may be wrong but – spending any money other than wat was defined in TARP is against the law?
To PhredE, comment #854577
I agree completely. I have no sympathy for an open borders guy.
11B: Thanks, duly noted and back at ya.
Good Day
“All history is one long story to this effect: men have struggled for power over their fellow men in order that they might win the joys of earth at the expense of others, might shift the burdens of life from their own shoulders upon those of others.” –American professor William Graham Sumner (1840-1910)
They’re above the law.
But, wait I must be confused aren’t the liberals the tolerant bunch????
Thanx WarEagle,
Ma Mind is right now.
Not content to run the health care industry, I see they now want to run the college football playoffs now. I guess there is nothing that can be left alone. Next, I guess, a bill controlling the Sprint Cup chase with automatic inclusion of their favorites, to combat global warming, of course. Come November, will we be allowed to vote, or will it be suspended due to possible CO2 emissions from the polling sites, or, health care problems due to standing in line and embolisms?
My response to a donation request from Da One to help sell our healthcare system down the river:
I’m giving long odds on someone responding to my reply.
ECS