And so it continues. I mentioned the craziness that the anti-healthcare reformers are using to stifle debate on the issue a few days ago. And it doesn’t show any signs of letting up.
The bullshit continues, and escalates.
Rep. Brad Miller (D-NC) will not be hosting any town hall events this August — instead, he’s making himself available to constituents for one-on-one meetings about health care reform — and at least part of the reason is this: His offices have received threatening phone calls, including at least one direct threat against his life.
Death threats and fistfights? This is a complex issue; it’s not black or white. There isn’t an obvious right or wrong answer. It’s something that needs to be discussed, and that’s not happening because of these people. One town hall attendee stated: “They think they’re exercising their right to free speech, but they’re only exercising their right to disrupt civil discourse.”
And finally, from another raucous town hall meeting comes this very sad tidbit:
During the town hall, one conservative activist turns to his fellow attendees and asks them to raise their hands if they “oppose any form of socialized or government-run health care.” Almost all the hands shot up. Rep Green quickly turned the question on the audience and asked, “How many of you have Medicare?” Nearly half the attendees raised their hands, failing to note the irony.
What do I think about Obama’s health care reforms? I don’t know, really. I haven’t had a chance to properly study the matter. I think that a public health insurance option–and getting uninsured people on insurance–is ultimately a good thing, but I can’t speak to the specific details of the Obama plan.
What I can speak to is the “impromptu” mobs that are cropping up at town hall meetings and similar settings around the country. As it turns out, these impromptu mobs aren’t impromptu, but are rallied by national conservative and industry groups.
It wouldn’t be as big of a deal if they were just sending people to contribute to the discussions and speak their piece. But they are encouraging people to be loud and disruptive. This prevents any real discussion from taking place. It’s OK to disagree. It’s not OK to stifle debate with pseudo-grassroots brute force.
Screaming constituents, protesters dragged out by the cops, congressmen fearful for their safety — welcome to the new town-hall-style meeting, the once-staid forum that is rapidly turning into a house of horrors for members of Congress.
The tactics are repugnant. At one rally a congressman was hung in effigy.
All this to try to give the impression that ordinary Americans are mad as hell, and not gonna take it anymore. This editorial claims it’s good that Rep. Tim Bishop was barely able to get a word in at his town hall meeting–and then goes on to lambaste single payer health insurance.
This irresponsible behavior is not only preventing useful discussion on the health care issue, but it may also prevent constituents from being heard on other issues as well:
In at least one case, a congressman has stopped holding town hall events because the situation has spiraled so far out of control.
“I had felt they would be pointless,” Rep. Tim Bishop (D-N.Y.) told POLITICO, referring to his recent decision to temporarily suspend the events in his Long Island district. “There is no point in meeting with my constituents and [to] listen to them and have them listen to you if what is basically an unruly mob prevents you from having an intelligent conversation.”
This after police were called in to escort him safely to his car after a town hall meeting ran amok.
After walking in the rain to get home, I got on my PC and saw that I still had weather.com open from this morning. This is what it showed for the 36 hour outlook:
First, I would describe the weather for much of the afternoon as partly cloudy at best, mostly cloudy at worst. Second, you may have caught that I walked home in the rain. And may I direct you to the chance of precipitation in the above image? Ten percent is almost as close as they get (I’ve seen 0% but it’s pretty rare) to saying “It’s not gonna rain.” Fortunately I had my umbrella with me for other nefarious reasons, so I stayed fairly dry.
So really, when it comes to predicting the weather it’s just a guessing game. I’ve lost count of how many times the day’s forecast in the morning has been wrong. I rarely bother to look at long term forecasts since I could do just as well with a deck of weather tarot cards.
“We’ve done everything here. We’re leading the way with our inspector general, office of compliance, all the things we’ve done,” Daley said. “We’re more transparent than any other government. Look at it.”
“We’re doing a tremendous job here, we lead by example,” he said.
In a story last week, the Tribune documented how the Daley administration routinely cites exemptions in the state’s public records law to avoid releasing information and frequently drags out for weeks or even months efforts to get records.
Federal prosecutors convicted several top Daley aides for running an illegal hiring scheme, and a federal monitor has complained the city still is not complying with court requirements to keep politics out of hiring.
No, this isn’t a post about underwear… I’m too lazy to write full-blown blog entries, so I’m just posting some brief snippets of things that I find interesting right now.
Tomorrow is Friday the 13th, the second one in a row.
The day after is Pi Day! I plan to celebrate by eating pie. Maybe I’ll even calculate the circumference and area of the pie before I eat it! What are your plans?
I haven’t really seen Peanut Butter Twix–which was one of my favorites–in a long time. Apparently they were discontinued for awhile, but were brought back briefly and then were discontinued again. Anyway, I was excited to see a commercial for Twix PB. This candy is like Peanut Butter Twix, but with a chocolate cookie part instead of the vanilla cookie in the original. It appears that Twix PB was introduced in 2007, yet I don’t remember ever seeing one. What’s up with that? Of course this “new” candy is gettingmixedreviews, so I’ll have to try to find one to taste it for myself.
The Sears Tower is going to be renamed. The fuck? Hell no, we won’t go (along with that bullshit)! OK so Sears hasn’t had any offices in the building for a long time, and lost naming rights a few years ago. I don’t care. I don’t even associate the Tower with the stupid stores. The Sears Tower is an icon. You don’t rename a mother-fucking icon (nor paint it silver)! I will not call it by its new name, Willis Tower. The name was given away to a British insurance company who will be occupying a relatively small amount of space in the building (though it will be the largest new tenant since 2001). I guess management really is desperate for tenants.
I just got back from Portland (OR, not ME) last night. More about that in later posts, but first a rant. . .
My flight from PDX to ORD was scheduled to leave at 2:08pm. Guess what time it left? If you said “It didn’t” you win a prize! It was canceled. But it’s the reason for the cancellation that really boggles the mind.
The aircraft had two non-functioning lavatories. Why? Because someone on the previous flight put baby diapers into two of the toilets. Diapers. Into an airplane toilet. What the fuck? How stupid do you have to be? For one thing, there are signs in words and universal pictogram in all the lavs explaining that nothing but TP should go in those delicate toilets. For another thing, you wouldn’t do that at home, what on (or above) Earth would make you think it’s OK to do it on a freakin’ plane?
The maintenance crew was not able to get the mess unclogged in a timely fashion, so the flight was canceled and 100+ people had to be rebooked and most likely got to their destinations several hours late (for me, it was about 5 hours, flying to ORD through SFO). I’d like to find the shit-for-brains that did that and shove their face into one of those dirty diapers. And I bet I could find 100 or so people to line up behind me for their turn to do the same.
It seems to happen more and more. I’m on the Internet, minding my own business. I’m on weather.com, or some random programming site trying to figure out how the fuck to do something in Java (I hate Java), or reading about google’s latest foray into collecting as much information on us as possible (I think google could become SkyNet some day). And then…
BAM
WTF?!
There are these weigh loss ads, showing a fat belly and a skinny belly–before and after pictures. They might be alternating in animation form, or adjacent to each other but there they are. And one is a big, saggy gut chosen specifically for it’s undesirable appearance.
I don’t want to see that! I could easily have found examples to post here, but I don’t want to do that to my readers. I’m too nice. Plus, I’m sure you know what I’m talking about already.
What do I think about Obama’s health care reforms? I don’t know, really. I haven’t had a chance to properly study the matter. I think that a public health insurance option–and getting uninsured people on insurance–is ultimately a good thing, but I can’t speak to the specific details of the Obama plan.
