Bonnie Erbe is convinced that Barack Obama hates women. This is mainly because despite all the women he’s hired, he’s actually Jesse Helms:
President Obama could invite Chamique Holdsclaw to the private White House basketball court and Billie Jean King to play tennis with him. I still wouldn’t believe he’s any more comfortable dealing with women or concerned about “women’s” issues than the dearly departed former Sen. Jesse Helms. President Obama talks the talk a lot better and a lot louder than Helms. But Jesse Helms was so rooted in his atavist traditions, he chose to remain true to his misogyny rather than pose for cameras with faux female golfing partners. President Obama must hide the side of his personality that is clearly uncomfortable with women because he needs their votes much more than Helms ever did.
Whether it was his treatment of Hillary Clinton on the campaign trail (as in his condescending remark that she was “likeable enough”) or his clearly career-oriented mate who has been toned down and remorphed into a Stepford Wife, I just don’t get the impression this man is comfortable with women. Nor do I believe he cares about them beyond needing women’s votes. It’s an act and a thoroughly see-through, amateur one at that.
I’d sort of hoped we were past the residual PUMA bullshit, but apparently not. Besides getting into the bizarre culture of workplace sports and gender dynamics which are far bigger than President Obama, it behooves us to point out that Bonnie Erbe is a giant, disingenuous asshole. How patronizingly sexist is it to say that Michelle Obama, who I’m pretty sure has kicked Barack’s figurative ass more than once over the course of their relationship, was cowed into being a mewling housewife by this terrible sexist beast? How little must she think of the numerous women Obama has appointed in his administration who apparently sold out their feminist and progressive ideals to go work for the black Jesse Helms?
The problem isn’t just the asinine criticism of Obama. It’s the implicit criticism of the dozens of women he trusts that they’ve sold out for their thirty pieces of phallic-shaped silver. Obama listened to (and acted on) the criticism. He got flack over the summer, repeatedly, for appointing Sotomayor “just because she was a woman”. Commentators worried ad nauseum if he’d be able to deal with Hillary Clinton, who eats mens’ souls as appetizers, in her role as Secretary of State. He signed the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act into law. There’s substance to his support of women, but it is apparently all for naught (as are all the women who’ve been working in and with the Obama administration) because it’s obvious that this fucker hates women as much as he also hates Christians, white people and the hardworking employees of Fox News.
For an added bonus, read the comments, which oh-so-unpredictably morph into comments about how black Muslims hate women.
As I’ve mentioned many times before on this blog, I sit in a position as a triple minority commenting on these often dicey political issues. I have to take potshots from some in the LGBT community, who take issue with either the number of pieces I do about race or the content of the posts, and from some in the black community who feel that I’m not black enough or have sold out to The Homosexual Agenda.
Here’s a prime example of denigrating not what I say, but what I am in terms of identity, from a black woman in the comments of Americablog who is incensed about my criticism of the administration’s handling of LGBT issues. She calls racism.
Wow. The racism is flowing here. I am a daily reader of this blog but the way that you guys have attacked our first black President is unfortunate. My god he has been in office for 10 months. Is marriage more important than having a job? Health care?
I am getting quite tired of the white gays and
half breeded gays
slamming Obama after he has only been in office for MONTHS. Go check out the black blogs and you will see that there is a true divide in who supports Obama and who doesn’t.
You see, I can’t possibly be black and hold the views that I do. My “cultural” blackness is erased in her mind by my gayness, plus she’s keeping score by shade of skin, aka colorism. Nice.
Of course I had to laugh at “half breed” on a couple of levels. 1) I’m not biracial, I’m the product of two parents who are black (and neither of them were/are biracial), something that people seem to have a hard time grasping is possible these days. In the end, I’m not particularly peeved about the name calling of “half breed.” I tolerate that garbage all the time. It’s the injection of race into the discussion that wasn’t there before the commenter lobbed the irrelevant but potent bomb in there to derail the criticism of the admin. That is a tiresome and well-worn tactic to shut it down because people are fearful of the third rail of race.
It’s only been in the last decade or so that people have even raised the question about me, so I attribute it to more biracial people asserting their status than anything else; and 2) If you’re of a certain age, who can forget Cher on top of a horse singing this in 1973:
But note that commenter doesn’t question the President’s blackness, she claims it even though he is a true “half-breed”. This is the level of racial discourse going on out there; it’s polluted by racism from without and within, which shows you why honest, reality-based discussions about race are hard to come by. This faux “half-breed” homo will continue trying to have those discussions.
In an NBC report less than 24 hours after the President declared his unwavering support for the LGBT community, the White House has decided to sh*t on citizen journalists on the left who are simply advocating for our civil rights. This is a real shot across the bow. Via Americablog:
NBC News’ John Harwood just reported that an Obama administration staffer advisor today called the gay community part of “the Internet left fringe,” and therefore the White House is not concerned about the gay community’s, and other Democrats’, concerns that the president isn’t keeping his promises. As part of its report on today’s gay march, NBC’s Harwood said the following:
Barack Obama is doing well with 90% or more of Democrats so the White House views this opposition as really part of the Internet left fringe.
Harwood then went on to say that the White House thinks that:
For a sign of how seriously the White House does or doesn’t take this opposition, one adviser told me those bloggers need to take off the pajamas, get dressed, and realize that governing a closely divided country is complicated and difficult.
Wow. Nice to know that asking to pass federal legislation (ENDA) so my fellow North Carolinian LGBTs don’t get canned for being who they are is a “fringe” activity. I must remind the White House that North Carolina delivered for him in 2008, and LGBT support was key, and was leaned on for support in a big way.
Nice to know that asking to pass federal legislation related to national security (repeal of DADT) when our military forces are strained and the Obama administration is mulling an increase in troops in Afghanistan is a “fringe” activity.
I guess asking for any of the long list of issues to be addressed before 2012 (since re-election isn’t a given in the reality-based universe) is a “fringe” activity.
I guess all of that “support” he doled out last night at the HRC dinner and the fact Candidate Obama said to hold him accountable was conditional if you’re LGBT. Or maybe civil rights matters are don’t qualify for the “keep up the pressure” policy.
It doesn’t matter why this behavior is occurring, really. What one has to take away from this message, naturally not attributed to anyone at the WH—cowards—is that bloggers are messing up their playbooks. And the answer is to diminish what influence we have—it’s limited at best. You have to ask why is this paranoid, juvenile message getting tossed out there. All those big brains in the White House and the best they can do is to bring up the hoary pajama game?
Here is the transcript via FDL:
LESTER HOLT: John what we saw in that protest today, was it simply frustration or does it represent a serious problem the President is having with an important part of his base?
JOHN HARWOOD: As a practical matter Lester I don’t think it’s a serious problem. we’ve seen and certainly Bill Clinton learned that they Democratic President can get punished by the mainstream of the electorate for being too aggressive on social issues so for now I think the administration feels that if they take care of the big issues — health care, energy, the economy — he’s going to be just fine with this group.
HOLT: But in general when yo look at the left as a whole, have there been conversations about some things they thought would have been done but haven’t?
HARWOOD: Sure but If you look at the polling, Barack Obama is doing well with 90% or more of Democrats so the White House views this opposition as really part of the “internet left fringe” Lester. And for a sign of how seriously the White House does or doesn’t take this opposition one adviser told me today those bloggers need to take off their pajamas get dressed and realize that governing a closely divided country is complicated and difficult.
So which Barack Obama is it—the one who said to challenge him, or a fragile flower that panders to LGBTs then has a coward source backstab? To me the WH has just declared war on us after a wine and dine with the right kind of LGBTs that don’t make trouble for them. Someone has to answer to this.
Or do I just need to fold my hands in my pajama-clad, Cheetos-stained lap like a good homo?
UPDATE: You wouldn’t believe some of the excuses flying around on FB and Twitter saying “oh, you shouldn’t pay attention to anon sources” or “the WH wouldn’t say that” or that this statement somehow is NBC reporter John Harwood making the sh*t up, or that “he didn’t say LGBT bloggers” (ok, that one is just lame—I said in the headline “part of pajama-clad ‘Internet fringe’” - AND the reporter’s filing a report about NEM, for god’s sake, lolol).
Well, sitting in this chair, SOMEONE needs to take responsibility for the statement because it is someone’s POV, one believed to be widely held by insiders about progressive bloggers, but never articulated so boldly.
The remarks are an insult to people like me (and readers), who know how complicated governing and legislating are, and many of us do this from a perspective of 1) being in a state where waiting DOES matter and, in my case 2) I blog and work a full time job, at the expense of my own health, not to be a muckraker, but to make a difference. If someone has a different perspective and dismisses me outright, I do have a right to be angry and demand someone own their statement. When I say something it’s straight up, you mean to tell me no one has the stones to own their opinions up there? That’s pathetic. Anonymous or not, the statement’s out there now for all to see.
The bottom line is that it’s one of three things—1) Harwood is lying or 2) The White House is playing two-faced; or 3) they’ve got a lunatic loose high level advisor who is off message.
I was live on-the-air for SiriusOutQ’s coverage of the HRC Dinner featuring the President’s historic keynote address Saturday night, and I have to tell you, the low expectations I had regarding LGBT policy were unfortunately met on that account. If you’re an activist or citizen looking for timelines, actions, use of the bully pulpit, ANYTHING that would indicate to the community that our President was serious about moving on the laundry list of LGBT issues any time soon, you would call it a fail.
However, I have to agree with Sean Bugg, my fellow commentator during the coverage, who made a great point that if you aren’t a wonk or activist clued in to the messy politics going on behind the scenes, this speech is a huge home run of support from the President of the United States to a kid out in the sticks who watches it can now feel he is part of the American fabric. In our cynical view of the political system, jaded by the hypocrisy and spinning we see each day, as well as outright lying by pols and advocates, you have to remember how this speech can resonate with non-political LGBTs and straight America. The President actually engaged with a segment of our community in his first term to affirm support for the LGBT community. I doubt you’ll see him endure sane, rational criticism from the right on this other than the usual whines from the fringes who already think he’s Satan/Hitler/Muslim terrorist, etc. That’s progress on its own and it should not be minimized.
So that’s my praise. As far as criticism, I don’t even know where to begin. But I’ll first share the news that HRC is happy with the speech.
“Tonight, President Obama told LGBT Americans that his commitment to ending discrimination in the military, in the workplace and for loving couples and their families is ‘unwavering.’ He made it crystal clear that he is our strongest ally in this fight, that he understands and, in fact, encourages our activism and our voice even when we’re impatient with the pace of change. But these remarks weren’t just for us, they were directed to all Americans who share his dream and ours of a country where “no one is denied their basic rights, in which all of us are free to live and love as we see fit.”
“And we heard unequivocally about the repeal of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell: ‘I am working with the Pentagon, its leadership and members of the House and Senate to end this policy. I will end Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell. That is my commitment to you.’
“Finally, we heard something quite remarkable from the President: ‘You will see a time in which we as a nation finally recognize relationships between two men or two women as just as real and admirable as relationships between a man and a woman.’
“This was a historic night when we felt the full embrace and commitment of the President of the United States. It’s simply unprecedented.”
OK. What he said about DADT is no different than the message we’ve heard every time the admin is asked about this. Robert Gibbs winds the key in his back and belches that out regularly during press briefings. No news. DADT repeal is the big “gimme” that he could most easily accomplish—all the polling support is there, there’s bipartisan support on the Hill, and the face of the opposition is Elaine Donnelly, for god’s sake? Many service members are already serving openly with their COs looking the other way. How many homophobic retired generals need to go to the hereafter before Nancy, Harry and Barry open the locked chest to find their dusty spines? I wasn’t surprised that the response of Aubrey Sarvis, executive director, Servicemembers Legal Defense Network was diplomaticly muted.
“We were heartened to hear the President say, ‘I will end don’t ask, don’t tell.’ But an opportunity was missed tonight. SLDN was disappointed the President did not lay out a timeline and specifics for repeal.The 65,000 gay and lesbian service members—who put their lives on the line and who remain impatient with the pace of progress—deserve to know when their commander in chief and Congress plan on getting rid of this law.”
The President mentioned our relationships, but gave no timeline other than “You will see a time.” Well crap, I can say that and be as precise as the President. Honestly marriage equality won’t happen any time soon and isn’t a priority - what about ENDA, which would free LGBTs from the shackles of silence of fear of losing employment. Does the President say he will use the bully pulpit to pressure Congress to act with deliberate speed. Nope.
This was a well-crafted, oddly familiar address if you’re a political junkie, because it felt like a stump speech, a post-election speech and a WH LGBT photo op address patched together. I understand his support for equality; what I didn’t hear is that civil rights of human beings are any more important than any other political issue he faces. That correcting a grievous wrong affecting the lives of American taxpayers he wants support from on other issues is ok to shuffle down in the pile of issues. Honestly, it’s good to know where you stand—statements of support without any timelines at this stage in the game is frustrating
and
very informative. But it doesn’t mean we won’t continue to press for them, no matter what Barney says.
And, did you notice the “T” invisibility in this address? No shock there either; I think this may be another education issue. I have to say the money quote from the speech that made me laugh out loud was the President running down a string of accomplishments and one he referred to was how he invited the homos to the Easter Egg Roll. Yep I can take that to the bank here in NC and do something with that bit of equality. BTW, the Bushes had gay families participate in those festivities as well, the first time they just didn’t want them photographed with Laura. The second time seemed to be pretty irrelevant. Oy. Funny and sad, but it’s progress, right.
Ironically, I give President Obama points for having the cojones to state that we are impatient—and should be. He’s man enough to say to continue the pressure, whereas the messages delivered by Joe Solmonese and Barney Frank in the past few days have been protective of the President and scolding of the grassroots and the LGBT Netroots. It’s quite a stark disconnect that says more about our professional advocates than it does about the President.
An aside—I think the major schism between our orgs and the grassroots and Netroots has reached a perfect storm with this weekend. The juxtaposition of this dinner, where we see a different view of progress, as ovation after ovation for the President suggested full support of the Patience Agenda, versus the people attending the march. Many of those marching on Sunday don’t have the access to power or fat wallets to be considered for courtship by the Obama’s 2012 team and the Dem party.
Michael F. Cannon and Ramesh Ponnuru write an article called “You Mislead!”, which is apparently the NRO method of sympathizing with Joe Wilson, two weeks late and with a lot more lying.
You see, they’re going to “fact check” Obama’s healthcare speech, which is so full of terrible, glaring missteps that even reports cited misleadingly and out of context disprove every point he tried to make. That is how bad it is, my friends. Let’s look at their first couple of points (the italicized portions are Obama quotes):
1. “Buying insurance on your own costs you three times as much as the coverage you get from your employer.” The Congressional Budget Office writes, “Premiums for policies purchased in the individual insurance market are, on average, much lower — about one-third lower for single coverage and one-half lower for family policies.” It is true that individual insurance policies are generally 30 percent less comprehensive than employer-provided insurance, and comparable individual policies are about twice as expensive. But much of the extra cost is a function of the tax penalty on purchasing such insurance and the stunted market that penalty has yielded.
Actually, the authors leave out the next part of the CBO’s argument, which I’ve reproduced in full:
Premiums for policies purchased in the individual insurance market are much lower—about one-third lower for single cover- age and half that level for family policies. In large
part, those differences reflect the fact that policies purchased in the individual market cover a lower share of enrollees’ health care costs, on average, which also encourages enrollees to use somewhat fewer services. At the same time, average administrative costs are higher for individually purchased policies. The remainder of the difference in premiums probably arises because people
who purchase individual coverage have lower expected costs for health care to begin with.
There’s no support for the tax penalty contention from the CBO. Whatsoever. More importantly, the major reasons that individual policies cost any less is because they’re generally worse insurance for younger and healthier people. In other words, Obama was completely right about the drastically increased expense for purchasing comprehensive health insurance individually…but it doesn’t count because of something something ACORN.
2. “There are now more than 30 million American citizens who cannot get coverage.”An outright falsehood, whether you use the president’s noncitizen-free estimate or the standard, questionable estimate of 46 million uninsured residents.
A study prepared for the federal government estimates that 9 million people counted as “uninsured” in the standard estimate are in fact enrolled in Medicaid. The left-leaning Urban Institute estimates that 12 million are eligible but not enrolled, meaning they could get coverage at any time. Health economists Mark Pauly of the University of Pennsylvania and Kate Bundorf of Stanford estimate that one quarter to three quarters of the uninsured can afford to purchase coverage, but choose not to do so.
I really wish we were in the middle of a game of Mortal Kombat right now so that a distorted, bass-driven voice could yell out, “DEVASTATING” right now. And then I wish the arcade operator would come over and reset the machine, because it’s malfunctioning rather terribly.
Is saying there are 30 million uninsured, particularly based on the sources cited, an “outright falsehood”? Well, technically, yes, because the sources cited all say there are more uninsured than that, even with the exclusions. For instance, the government report:
For CY 2003, correcting for an undercount of 17 million persons lowers the full year uninsured estimate by just over 9 million persons. For CY 2003, with this adjustment, the almost 36 million uninsured (as compared to an unadjusted 45.0 million) is more consistent with the full year uninsured count reported by MEPS of 31.7 million (although for an earlier year).
In 2003, years before the economy took its current tumble, there were somewhere between 32 and 36 million uninsured. And Barack Obama said 30 million in 2009, which is basically akin to saying the Holocaust didn’t happen, except with a greater chance of killing your grandmother.
Now, the Urban Institute piece, which is actually from the Kaiser Foundation, but whatever, because Bill Ayers runs the whole thing. Its first page shows the following graph:
44.6 million uninsured, 25% of which (11.15 million, but what’s an extra million between people who are ideologically opposed to each other?) are eligible for public assistance, leaving 33.45 million who are uninsured and ineligible for public assistance. And that was in 2007. (Also remember that, from their initial contention, the authors preferably wanted you to subtract the covered-but-not-insured from the 30 million number, assuming that the only difference between the higher number and the lower number was illegal immigrants.)
There are two explanations for why Cannon and Ponnuru are unfailingly dishonest in “correcting” Obama. The first is that they’re hoping that a gullible yet uninformed audience buys into everything they say and harasses your libtard face with it every chance it gets. The second is that Cannon and Ponnuru took the affirmative action-bake sale route through undergrad and never went to class enough to learn that you can’t prove your point just by yelling at minorities and liberals with made up numbers.
It’s simply idiotic to presume that death threats against Bush weren’t being investigated. A reality-based explanation would be that there are four times as many death threats against Obama as there were against Bush, meaning that there would be a lot more arrests (and, ergo, more arrests of protesters), but that’s probably something I made up along with 9/11 being an inside job and the Underground Railroad.
Incidentally, I appreciate the argument that the reason that there are more protest-related arrests of people threatening Obama’s life is that the media effectively didn’t cover liberal protests, which would seem to actually contradict the liberalism that’s driving the media to not report on the conservative protests that they’re actually reporting on and therefore using to point out death threats. Or something.
“slow rot”
“corrupt and servile”
“sickening”
“violently ill”
When it comes to disdaining artists—-particularly when they don’t paint realistic seascapes with Jesus doing something Jesus-y in the foreground or an eagle crying with a flag waving somewhere—-there’s really no limit on the adjective abuse from conservatives. (Via Michael, which makes me wonder if conservative accused WPA mural artists of being in league with Satan.) Let’s face it. Conservatives are in a full blown depression over losing an election they thought was a sure win—-because they assumed that most of America shared their how-dare-you-call-it-racism beliefs—-and we all know what depression leads people to do: seek comfort in familiar things. A bowl of chicken soup while curled up in front of some cheesy 80s movie does it for the non-nutty, but wingnuts have different comforts. It’s time to take out some old hates, dust them off, and try to make them seem new again. Hate and resentment soothe like mother’s milk. Lashing out at people who don’t suck as bad as you is a useful distraction from dwelling on your own nastiness. Hating the National Endowment for the Arts was fruitful in the 90s, so of course they’re going back to see if that well has more water.
It probably does, of course. Hating on artists is the gift that keeps on giving when you’re trying to pump up the base. Let’s face it. If you’re a wingnut, you’re probably not the sharpest tool in the box. You don’t get modern art. And all these people who do get it, who go to museums and plays and arty films and seem to understand what someone’s talking about when they say “mise en scène”, make you feel stupid. Sure, you could look that term up, do some reading, and if you actually tried to understand this stuff, it would make more sense. But that’s work. And here’s this demagogue saying that all those yapping smarty-pants liberals who like this art shit don’t really, but are just pretending to so they can lord it over you.
(Sadly, this kind of thinking has extended beyond the circles of Nixonian resentment. Witness this video, which shames you for being a “hipster” for liking Sonic Youth and Wilco. They’re not even trying.)
Demagoguing about artists getting paid to make art by the government is about the cheapest, easiest form of demagoguery. It taps multiple resentments at once: The jealousy of artists for making a living doing something they love while you’re stuck with your boring job, the feeling of being left out by modern art that you don’t understand, and the ever-changing nature of art that brings up the fear of change. Of course, stereotypes of what it’s like to be a writer or an artist feed into this. The image, particularly the over-simplified one that filters out to the more sheltered types that make up the wingnut ranks, is of the artist as the bohemian. To be fair, there’s more than a sliver of truth to the idea that creative people are more likely to be open to sexual experimentation, and more likely to fill their time with parties and interesting friends. They’re creative! They think outside of the box, and that means they’ve got more practice bucking stifling social norms. But a lot of artistic types have boring old mom-pop-and-kids home lives, you know. And even people who live a little out of that box rarely have lives as exciting as the fever dreams of conservatives would have you imagine. And, at the end of the day, writing or making art is hard, often boring work, like any other work. And it’s scary, competitive work. And artists who succeed deserve to get paid. And the government should invest in it, because having more art is good for us all. Yes, even the people who resent it. Once it’s decades or even centuries out of date, they often come around to liking it and getting something out of it.
(UPDATE: I just want to note that the the talking heads on the left as well as the right are trying to minimize the amount of racism being tossed out there; as if it’s only a handful of people doing this. James Carville was on CNN just this AM trying to downplay the bigotry. I think not. Take a look at my long list—a sampling—of what has transpired not just in the South but all over the country. It’s not just teabaggers, it’s DC insiders and pols spewing racist garbage on the air as fact. )
Carter’s observations may seem obvious to many of us here at Pandagon. We’ve seen this racist, code-laden garbage surface during the 2008 campaign only to revive with a bigoted bang right after the inauguration. But it’s significant that the former President, a man of the South (as is Joe “You Lie!” Wilson) during a time when there was enormous social race-based upheaval calls it out so bluntly. He knows most of this crap is simply dancing around calling the current President of the United States a n*gger—and you know Wilson knows it too.
Honestly, I’m surprised these fringe birthers, teabaggers and junior-league Klan member wannabes haven’t thrown down that card yet. It’s on the tips of their forked tongues. (Huff Post):
“I think it’s based on racism. There is an inherent feeling among many in this country that an African-American should not be president.”
The Georgia Democrat said the outburst was a part of a disturbing trend directed at the president that has included demonstrators equating Obama to Nazi leaders.
“Those kind of things are not just casual outcomes of a sincere debate on whether we should have a national program on health care,” he said. “It’s deeper than that.”
“I think an overwhelming portion of the intensely demonstrated animosity toward President Barack Obama is based on the fact that he is a black man, that he’s African American,” Carter told NBC in an interview. “I live in the South, and I’ve seen the South come a long way, and I’ve seen the rest of the country that shared the South’s attitude toward minority groups at that time, particularly African Americans”
Continued Carter: “And that racism inclination still exists… It’s an abominable circumstance, and it grieves me and concerns me very deeply.”
This low-clash trashy behavior of Rep. Joe Wilson (R-SC) during tonight's address is outlandish. While the President was dispelling the lies by the right regarding whether undocumented people in this country would be covered under health reform (they are not), Wilson took it upon himself to scream out:
"YOU LIE"
...at the President of the United States. You can let your feelings be known about Wilson's behavior by doing this:
petition @CongJoeWilson to apologize for yelling "LIAR" during Obama speech, and lying about #hcr http://act.ly/iq RT to sign #p2
You should check out the Wikipedia entry for Wilson before it is edited again:
The other Bush-league behavior seen in the chambers was by Eric Cantor, who texted while sitting in the front row in full view of cameras for the entire speech. One has to wonder why he couldn't for one damn hour, put the thing away. I was wondering if he was fervently texting about adulterous spanking, dripping, sex.
UPDATE: John McCain on CNN called for Wilson to “apologize immediately.” So what does the rest of the GOP leadership have to say?
10:43 PM ET: here comes the THE APOLOGY, from CNN’s Politicker: GOP Rep. Joe Wilson of South Carolina issued a statement Wednesday night apologizing for his outburst during President Obama’s speech to Congress:
“This evening I let my emotions get the best of me when listening to the President’s remarks regarding the coverage of illegal immigrants in the health care bill. While I disagree with the President’s statement, my comments were inappropriate and regrettable. I extend sincere apologies to the President for this lack of civility.”
I’ve stood by our radical black socialist magician President through thick and thin. I was with him when he threatened to kill Granny with bureaucracy, I was with him when the stimulus bill reserved $212 million to promote teenage pregnancy, I was even with him when he appointed Alger Hiss’ ghost to oversee Cash for Clunkers. And you know why I was with him? Everything he did was to advance the greater good.
However, when Barack Obama dares to tread upon the sacred American ground of September 11th by proposing a National Day of Service, that goes too fucking far. There is perhaps nothing more offensive than the idea of people gathering together in their communities in an organized fashion to help others - in fact, it may be precisely what the terrorists wanted, given bin Laden’s stated intention to plant trees and donate canned food in the wake of the 9/11 attacks.
Atlas Shrugs is worried that this will be the launch of Obama’s private civilian army, because it makes sense that the man in charge of the most advanced military force on the planet would build up a subsidiary army of college students and stay-at-home parents whose main training will be in phonebanking and pamphlet-stuffing.
Robert Stacy McCain pimps the 2,996 Project, because Americans are dumb and cannot both help people and remember why they’re helping them. Personally, I was helping an old lady across the street yesterday and halfway across left her there because I forgot I wasn’t supposed to get paid for it.
Michelle Malkin smartly points out that Obama believes that 9/11 happened because of “a fundamental absence of empathy” on the part of the attackers, which is a ridiculous statement, because I suppose they actually cared about the people they brutally murdered? Anyway, volunteering is for jobless libtards, so there.
This is my break with the statist authoritarian ideology of Barack Obama. By asking Americans to voluntarily pay tribute to the people whose lives were lost in the terrorist attacks of September 11th, 2001 through aiding their communities and making the country we all love a better place, he is effectively Joseph Stalin. Also, Cash for Clunkers is over, and Ghost Alger Hiss is currently haunting my refrigerator. Thanks, Barry.
TPM has caught the conservative movement with its racist pants down again. Actually, we saw so much racist garbage during the campaign from the low-information Base that it was no surprise to find out the Teabagger movement and is apesh*t not just about taxes, but the fact that we have a black president.
On Sunday night, Dr. David McKalip forwarded to fellow members of a Google listserv affiliated with the Tea Party movement the image below. Above it, he wrote: "Funny stuff."
Asked about the email in a brief phone interview with TPMmuckraker, McKalip said he believes that by depicting the president as an African witch doctor, the "artist" who created the image "was expressing concerns that the health-care proposals [made by President Obama] would make the quality of medical care worse in our country." McKalip said he didn't know who created it.
After being busted for this bottom-of-the-barrel trash behavior, the Florida Medical Association condemned McKalip's bigoted email and called for an apology. McKalip had his nuts in a vise, so I'm sure it pained him to type this one out:
"I genuinely regret the decision I made in passing this e-mail message along. Directly to President Obama, I sincerely apologize for offending him. This was, in no way whatsoever, my intention. The image has nothing to do with my feelings or thoughts on any race or culture. I recognize that this image is offensive and hope that the nation refocuses on assuring all Americans have access to high-quality, affordable health care with no party interfering in the patient-physician relationship. My intention is to focus directly on the issue at hand, which is putting financial and decision-making power into the hands of patients and taking it from government and insurance companies," said McKalip.
Yes, we are to believe that the first image that comes to mind when you think of the current president is that he runs around a bone through his nose dressed as a a loincloth-clad witch doctor as he discusses health care reform.
I'd like to say that this was the end of it, but we're talking about conservatives, right? Specifically the kind of conservatives who talk a big game about personal responsibility except when it comes to themselves. Case in point —McKalip's not sorry for what he did, he's mad at the humorless Left for finding out about his jocularity and ruining a perfectly good joke. Besides, he can't be racist, because, well, he helped out them pickaninnies once:
In an interview yesterday with the St. Petersburg Times, which picked up the story, he declared: "I am not a racist. I am simply a person speaking up to make sure patients don't get hurt by the government and by insurance companies.''
As a defense against the racism charge, he noted, in the paper's words, that he had "helped organize a career counseling day several years ago for African-American Boy Scouts." And he blamed liberal activists for touting the email, which he called a "satire."
Perhaps someone should buy him a membership to The Valley Club.
UPDATE: People have pointed me to this DKos diary, where it appears Holmes was not diagnosed with a brain tumor, but a cyst, and she has repeatedly appeared on TV claiming the tumor story. While that’s not particularly surprising, that even underscores the bottom line is her story proves we need reform because she had to put a second mortgage on her home, borrow from friends and her husband took a second job to be able to afford the $100k U.S. surgery.
Q of the day: do you have a health care horror story to share? Was it denial of service or meds by your insurance, or hospital bureaucracy, or something even more onerous, like poor quality care?
***
I have to agree with this assertion over at Eschaton—“The reality is if you get real sick, no matter if you’re insured or not, you’re probably financially fucked.” The partisan bickering over how much it is going to cost is ludicrous—the cost is just one part of the problem, the fact that we have so many people uninsured and worse, under-insured, is the reality of too many Americans and to get everyone adequate care will likely cost trillions.
Those of us who do have decent insurance, are rightfully concerned that government mucking around in the system and playing politics with something that should be a right—equal access to GOOD medical care for all—is going to end up a big mess.
I’m not going to debate the merits of one plan or another here; I’m just looking at health care as a “frequent flyer” consumer with pre-existing conditions who sees doctors and specialists several times a year, and has adequate insurance that still has left me with long waits to see a specialist (3 months is not unheard of), and dealt with substandard care.
In our current system nearly everyone has horror stories about waiting for insurance to approve the most basic common sense things—like one extra day in the hospital after a c-section, or trying to get a medication not yet in generic form that you and your doctor know works and the insurance company insists on a different generic substitute or you pay outright. The number and type of what I call “drive-by” surgeries, where they kick you to the curb a couple of hours after you’ve been opened up on the table is astonishing— they wanted to do that for my gall bladder surgery and I begged to stay overnight because I’ve had complications after ambulatory surgery before that landed me back in the ER the next day. Thankfully it was approved, because I was right—I developed a fever and had serious difficulties that I wouldn’t have been able to manage at home.
But what if the insurance company had said no. That happens all the time. It happened to me several years ago, I wasn’t able to stay overnight and went into the drive-through surgery; I developed a serious staph infection. It required a
second surgery
a couple of weeks later. Oh, and I had to pay a lot out of pocket for that second surgery even though I wasn’t responsible for the need for it, even with insurance. A little time and attention would have saved everyone a lot of grief.
And prescription insurance—well big pharma makes us all pay for the price controls in other countries. I totaled up medications I take each month to see what they would cost if I didn’t have insurance—over $900/month! That’s insane. John’s story is no better, and again, he
I didn’t know what my good plan covered until I got asthma as a result of my allergies. Now I know that my asthma drugs cost a whopping $471 a month. That’s $5,652 a year. After Blue Cross’ paltry share, that leaves me with $4,152 a year in asthma drugs (not counting any other prescriptions I may have to take for other unrelated problems that may arise). My insurance costs me nearly $420 a month. That’s another $5,040 a year. And the premium goes up around 25% a year. Imagine how much it’s going to be in ten years when I’m 55. And the joke, Blue Cross will still only give me $1500 in prescription drug coverage ten years from now - that’s the way their policy works. I got $1500 when I started 12 years ago with them, and I’ll have $1500 in ten years.
The problem here—and I’m calling out all of the elected officials on the Hill—is that while they are bickering about numbers (it will be huge no matter what we end up with I want all of them to answer one question: do they believe every person in the country is entitled to the same health care choices and offerings as Congress? If not, why not?
“It’s too expensive” is not a legitimate answer.
That answer is loaded with the difficult truth underlying the debate—a lot of people determining the fate of our health care system believe there should be a tiered level of care—that some people are deserving of A+ quality care with all the options available, and some are not, and should be satisfied with something less, or fewer options because they poor or underinsured. If this is the case, state it now.
If Congress is satisfied with their current care, why not price out that model to cover everyone, and work the numbers. Obviously Dear Leader didn’t put a price tag on his war adventures and we’re still running up an endless tab that produced death and destruction that Congress keeps funding.
The high cost of health care is also due to doctors and hospitals covering their butts with extra unnecessary tests to avoid lawsuits, emergency rooms flooded with people who have no insurance and cannot pay, so the cost is passed on to those who can. Big pharma counts on us to boost the profits they cannot extract from countries with price controls; doctors have to carry high liability insurance because we’re such a litigious society…the list goes on and on.
Employer group policy deductibles keep rising each year, or services are reduced because the employer cannot afford to underwrite the costs to hold the line on premiums. No one should have their health care plan tied to their employment. It has to be portable and stable. COBRA, intended to provide portability of a policy for those who leave a job, is often too expensive.
And remember, if your plan is tied to your employment and you’re have pre-existing conditions, you better find a large company with a big group policy and never leave that job, since small businesses are more likely to have crappier policies or heinously high premiums—or offer no insurance at all.
The whole system is broken—except when it’s not and works just fine for a good number of people.
Why is it so difficult to put that level of priority setting on health care? Maybe I’m missing something.
President Obama has nominatedDr. Regina Benjamin, a family physician from Bayou La Batre, Alabama, a rural community, to be the next Surgeon General.
The surgeon general is the people’s health advocate, a bully pulpit position that can be tremendously effective with a forceful personality.
Benjamin has that reputation.
A decade ago, the New York Times called her ‘‘angel in a white coat,’’ a country doctor who made house calls along the impoverished Gulf Coast, paid whatever her patients could scrounge.
From those early days she has emerged as a national leader in the call to improve health disparities, pushed by the need in her own fishing community of Bayou La Batre, Ala., and its diverse patient mix—where immigrants from Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos make up a growing part of the population.
This is a post that requires Senate confirmation, so expect the religious right to scrutinize Dr. Benjamin’s record on sex-ed advocacy and position on reproductive freedom. Here’s a snippet of her NIH bio:
Regina Benjamin practices as a country doctor in rural Alabama. As founder and CEO of the Bayou La Batre Rural Health Clinic, Dr. Regina Benjamin is making a difference to the underserved poor in a small fishing village on the Gulf Coast of Alabama. It is a town of about 2500 people, about 80 percent of her patients live below the poverty level, and Dr. Benjamin is their only physician.
...Dr. Benjamin earned an M.B.A. degree in 1991. The same year she was selected for the American Medical Association’s “Unsung Hero Campaign”. In 1995 she was named a “Person of the Week” on ABC World News Tonight with Peter Jennings, and in 1997 she received the Kaiser Family Foundation’s Nelson Mandela Award for Health and Human Rights. She was interviewed by People magazine in the article “Always On Call,” in May, 2002 and was the subject of an “Everyday Heroes” feature in the January 2003 issue of Reader’s Digest.
When her clinic was reduced to rubble by Hurricane Georges in 1998, Dr. Benjamin rolled up her sleeves and helped rebuild it, and continued to serve her patients by making house calls in her 1988 Ford pickup. As she explains her motivation, “I hope I make a difference one person at a time. By making a patient feel better, by being able to tell a mother that her baby is going to be okay. Whether her baby is four or forty-four the look on the mother’s face is the same. I also hope that I am making a difference in my community by providing a clinic where patients can come and receive health care with dignity.”
I have been involved in community activities since high school, and organized medicine such as the American Medical Association and the State medical associations, since medical school. By being involved, working hard and trying to do a good job, I have been elected to positions of leadership. I have remained involved to help improve healthcare in our community. Career-wise I still have a lot to do. We still have a lot of problems with our health care system, the high number of uninsured and underinsured, the need for improved access to healthcare services as well as a need for improved personal responsibility of our own health, good education, clean air, clean water and good work place environments.
Dr. Benjamin is also the first black woman to become president of the state medical society of Alabama. There isn’t anything controversial in her bio, so I’m sure the right will be digging away.
UPDATE: The White House has now released a statement from the President:
President Obama said, “Health care reform is about every family’s health and the health of our economy. And if there’s anyone who understands the urgency of meeting this challenge in a personal and powerful way, it’s the woman who will become our nation’s next Surgeon General, Doctor Regina Benjamin. I look forward working with her in the months and years ahead.”
While the VIP LGBTs were waiting for the President to meet and greet them yesterday, White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs was taking a pummeling today at the daily presser about the inaction of the administration regarding several LGBT issues on the back burner. Clearly it’s more than just the “whining homos” wondering why the President talks a good game but seems quite passive about doing anything concrete. Gibbs does his usual song and dance saying the Pentagon and Congress have to be involved, but that the President hasn’t met with the people in the Pentagon or Congress. Sounds like a circular reference to me.
Q Robert, I have a question on today’s event in the East Room. On “don’t ask, don’t tell,” how much is the President personally involved? I mean, I know you’ve said that he sort of turned that policy change over to the Pentagon and you’re letting them and Congress work on that.
MR. GIBBS: I’ve said that—I mean, the President hasn’t, himself, been involved in meetings with the Pentagon. A solution has to include working with the Pentagon. But it’s something that the President has been involved in since coming to this administration.
Q How much of a priority is this for him?
MR. GIBBS: Well, it’s something that—
Q I mean, is there a timeline or—
MR. GIBBS: When we can get it done. The President has talked about this—and I’ve talked about the fact that to have an enduring solution this had to be done legislatively. That, I think most people recognize, is going to take some time to do, working with both Congress and the Pentagon. I think the President will address this in remarks at the event a little bit later today.
Q Change in policy?
MR. GIBBS: Pardon me?
Q A change?
MR. GIBBS: No. But, again, in order to have that enduring solution, this is going to have to be done legislatively.
As in no administrative changes will be worked out with the Pentagon in terms of implementation of DADT, and there will be no executive order. And then he was directly asked about the foot-dragging with Congress.
Q Robert, today the President is going to celebrate Gay Pride at the White House for the first time. Even so, the gay community is somewhat divided over whether or not the President has done enough, the pace of change is enough. What does the President intend to say today, and can you talk a little bit about his thinking about how much he has to mollify a community that’s been very supportive during the campaign?
MR. GIBBS: I appreciate the opportunity to comment on mollifying a community, but that’s not the way the President looks at important issues. I think if you go back and look at the campaign—either his campaign for the Senate or his campaign for the presidency—he takes stands that he believes are consistent with his values.
We didn’t play a lot of interest group-based politics in the presidential race, I think that was denoted by the fact that we didn’t get a lot of endorsements in the presidential race.
The President makes those decisions, again, based on his values. I won’t get ahead of what he’s going to say later today, but he will, I think, address a number of issues and reaffirm the commitments that he’s made.
Yes, ma’am.
Q Following on that, the President has talked about repealing “don’t ask, don’t tell,” and also the Defense of Marriage Act. So I’m wondering if you can tell me what specific steps has he taken to do this? What is his timeline for doing it? And also—
MR. GIBBS: I think we got a fairly similar question a minute ago, but I’ll try to—
Q —there’s legislation apparently moving through House to repeal “don’t ask, don’t tell,” I think it’s H.R. 1283, and he hasn’t endorsed it. Why not?
MR. GIBBS: I can certainly talk to legislative affairs about what that piece of legislation would do. As I said earlier, the President has been involved in, personally, meetings on this topic with stakeholders, including those at the Pentagon.
Q What about members of Congress?
MR. GIBBS: I don’t know if he’s met specifically with members of Congress on that. I know that—I can try to get a list, I know that staff has worked here on the issue. It’s a commitment that he intends to keep.
Q Can you talk a little bit more about the meetings that he’s had, what—
MR. GIBBS: No.
Q —and how recent has he been in these meetings?
MR. GIBBS: Since January 20.
So which is it—has the President been in meetings with the Pentagon or not? Anyway, compare this presser to the Obama Speech at yesterday’s reception. A key section is below the fold.
Following Amanda’s post on the right-wing paranoia machine and the 2010 Census, this should give them agita. Pass the Pepto to the fringe…
Every government measure that quantifies the US citizenry must permit LGBT individuals to self-identify and be counted in every way citizens are counted. —From Call to Action # 6 of The Dallas Principles
There has been tremendous pressure on the White House to do more than crumb-throwing to the LGBT community since its DOMA brief debacle. It has resulted in this development in the WSJ:
White House Looks to Include Same-Sex Unions in Census Count
The White House said Thursday it was seeking ways to include same-sex marriages, unions and partnerships in 2010 Census data, the second time in a week the administration has signaled a policy change of interest to the gay community.
The administration has directed the Census Bureau to determine changes needed in tabulation software to allow for same-sex marriage data to be released early in 2011 with other detailed demographic information from the decennial count. The bureau historically hasn’t released same-sex marriage data.
This is potentially huge (and politically contentious), as we don’t officially “exist” if we aren’t counted. If gay and lesbian couples are counted, that pulls the curtain back, for good or ill—how many are going to come out of the closet and be counted? That’s where the rubber hits the road in terms of our own accountability in effecting change. We have also have to deal with problems of nailing down what is “married” due to the patchwork of marriage/civil unions/domestic partnerships—and legal marriages performed outside of this country.
An accurate statistical snapshot of legally married same-sex couples may be elusive. Before the White House’s plan emerged, Howard Hogan, associate director for demographic programs at the Census Bureau, said data from its 2007 American Community Survey showed more than 340,000 same-sex couples as being in marriages. But according to data from Massachusetts, the only state that permitted gay marriages in 2007, about 11,000 marriage licenses were issued for same-sex couples.
...The original plan for handling these marriages in the 2010 Census was controversial among some statisticians and gay activists. Following procedures employed in 2000, the bureau had planned to use a computer program that recategorized spouses in same-sex marriages as unmarried partners. For the 1990 count, the bureau simply altered the gender designation of one partner.
But realistically, notice the phrase “seeking ways.” Unfortunately, this WSJ article doesn’t indicate there is an effort to officially count and report transfolk in this proposal. Will it? Even with this potential bone, it’s not a done deal and thus may remain a promise unfulfilled. Yet again DOMA, which this administration is defending, stands in the way.
The Census Bureau has long collected data on same-sex marriages when people chose to report it. White House officials said the previous administration interpreted the federal Defense of Marriage Act as prohibiting the release of the data. The Obama administration has abandoned that interpretation.
How can it at once abandon the interpretation yet still support DOMA. I’m not talking legal technicalities here, I’m talking intellectually? This seems like a giant mess of declaring one-man, one-woman marriage “real” and alternately saying same-sex marriages exist and should be recognized by the U.S. government. It can’t be both so I’m sure the big brains out there can clue us in on how the Department of Commerce, which handles the Census, can square that.
As I’ve mentioned many times before on this blog, I sit in a position as a triple minority commenting on these often dicey political issues. I have to take potshots from some in the LGBT community, who take issue with either the number of pieces I do about race or the content of the posts, and from some in the black community who feel that I’m not black enough or have sold out to The Homosexual Agenda.
I was live on-the-air for SiriusOutQ’s coverage of the HRC Dinner featuring the President’s historic keynote address Saturday night, and I have to tell you, the low expectations I had regarding LGBT policy were unfortunately met on that account. If you’re an activist or citizen looking for timelines, actions, use of the bully pulpit, ANYTHING that would indicate to the community that our President was serious about moving on the laundry list of LGBT issues any time soon, you would call it a fail.
“slow rot”
Related:
I’ve stood by our radical black socialist magician President through thick and thin. I was with him when he threatened to kill Granny with bureaucracy, I was with him when the stimulus bill reserved $212 million to promote teenage pregnancy, I was even with him when he appointed Alger Hiss’ ghost to oversee Cash for Clunkers. And you know why I was with him? Everything he did was to advance the greater good. 
President Obama 
Q Robert, I have a question on today’s event in the East Room. On “don’t ask, don’t tell,” how much is the President personally involved? I mean, I know you’ve said that he sort of turned that policy change over to the Pentagon and you’re letting them and Congress work on that.
Q Robert, today the President is going to celebrate Gay Pride at the White House for the first time. Even so, the gay community is somewhat divided over whether or not the President has done enough, the pace of change is enough. What does the President intend to say today, and can you talk a little bit about his thinking about how much he has to mollify a community that’s been very supportive during the campaign?