Year: 2013
For Tea Partyists Who Still Don’t Believe Obamacare Is a Republican Invention, Here Is Ultimate Proof
Transcript:
MITT ROMNEY: When [the uninsured] show up at the hospital, they get care. They get free care, paid for by you and me. If that’s not a form of socialism, I don’t know what is. So my plan [Romneycare] did something quite different. It said, you know what?, if people can afford to buy insurance, if they can afford to buy insurance, or if they can pay their own way, then they either buy that insurance or pay their own way, but they no longer look to government to hand out free care. And that, in my opinion, is the ultimate conservatism.
That’s why the Heritage Foundation worked with us and was at the celebration of the signing — the Heritage Foundation, as you know, a quintessentially conservative group, recognized that the principles of free enterprise and personal responsibility were at work. You know, I’m proud to talk about what we did. We did not need to raise taxes. We did not need to have the government take over healthcare. Instead we rely on private market dynamics to get people in our state insured and for individuals to finally take responsibility for some portion of their healthcare rather than expecting government to give ’em a free ride.
From a report by Michael Issikoff, NBC News, on Oct. 11, 2011:
To the Rest of the World, the U.S, Government Looks Insane and Weak
To the rest of the world, the United States looks insane right now. They’re dealing with real problems that their political systems are struggling to solve. The United States’ political system is creating fake problems that it may choose to leave unsolved…At best, the United States is slowing its recovery — and that of the rest of the world. At worst, it’s going to trigger another global crisis.
— Ezra Klein, in The Washington Post.
Americans Signed Up in State Insurance Exchanges Exceeds 100k
35,000 and 100,000
The numbers of people who have signed up and completed applications for health plans in state insurance exchanges, respectively.
GOP-Controlled North Carolina Becomes First State to Suspend Welfare Payments Because of Republican Shutdown
The North Carolina Republican Party’s war on the state’s poor people got a boost from the congressional GOP’s shutdown of the federal government on Monday. The shutdown gave the tea partyists who run North Carolina an excuse for suspending welfare payments in November:
North Carolina on Monday suspended its Work First program, formerly known as welfare, because of the federal shutdown in Washington.
County social service agencies stopped processing new applications for Temporary Assistance for Needy Families because federal monies are expected to dry up by November unless Congress can reach a deal for funding the federal government.
The Department of Health and Human Services sent out a letter Thursday to county social service directors telling them to stop processing new applications as well as re-certifications for November.
Lindsey Graham Pleads with Dems to Show Mercy on Republicans
We won’t be the last political party to overplay our hand. It might happen one day on the Democratic side. And if it did, would Republicans, for the good of the country, kinda give a little? We really did go too far. We screwed up. But their response is making things worse, not better.
– Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., begging Democrats to go easy on Republicans, who are in trouble with voters because they shut down the government and are threatening to default on the national debt.
News Anchor Asks Tea Party Rep: ‘Do You Hate Obamacare More Than You Love Your Country?’
Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy
A member of the Fourth Estate finally asked a tea party Republican a question that cuts to the heart of their latest manufactured crisis. The exchange occurred today when MSBNC’s Thomas Roberts interviewed the eternally unctuous Tennessee Rep. Marsha Blackburn:
GOP No Longer the ‘Daddy’ Party
If Republicans were once the daddy party, now they’re the abusive ex-husband with a substance abuse problem party.
— Josh Barrow, writing in BusinessInsider.
Three-Quarters of Americans Disapprove of GOP’s Handling of Budget Crisis
74%
Of Americans disapprove of the way the Republicans in Congress are handling Washington’s budget crisis, up significantly in the past two weeks and far exceeding disapproval of both President Obama and congressional Democrats on the issue,a new ABC News-Washington Post poll finds.
I’m Not Part of the New American Center, and I’m OK with That
Esquire magazine has a new study out that claims that the American electorate is actually not divided into liberal and conservative extremes, but instead has a big, fat middle: A new Esquire-NBC News survey “shows us that everything we are told about politics in America today — that there is no middle ground between left and right, blue and red, us and them — is wrong… there is a large group of American voters — even a majority — who make up a New American Center that is passionate, persuadable, and very real. They are merely waiting for Washington to find them.”
They even provide an online survey to enable you to see where you fall on the continuum. I took it and — no surprise here — ended up in the progressive camp. Where are you on the political playing field?
