The Labor Day weekend is upon us. My lovely sister Elaine had her 30th birthday (again) two days ago (love you Lainey!) and I — regrettably — found myself back in the work force. Not so regrettable actually. It’s a simple job that will fund the simple pleasures and necessary requirements one needs in this complicated, free market economy we call home. You can bet I’m going to the beach at least once!
The August Recess for Congress will be over as of Tuesday, September 8 and the president will give his big bi-cameral address to the combined Congress the following day — coincidentally my first day of work.
But on Tuesday the real controversy occurs. The president is going to speak to school children, via C-Span, to encourage them to stay in school, do their homework and not skip out of classes. And there are Republicans who think that will be subversive. These idiots insist the president will try to indoctrinate the kids into a Socialist ideology and make them … what? Little Communists? You gotta be shittin’ me!
No, these imbeciles are not shitting us.
One of the board members of the Grossmont School District here in San Diego insists the president is trying to indoctrinate kids. “You know we try to protect kids from outside speakers coming in to politicize the classroom and anyone else would not have been allowed to do that.”
What a moron … and he’s a member of a school board? It just so happens that President George H.W. Bush (41) gave a similar speech to students 18 years ago. No one objected then, certainly no one on the right. And let’s not forget then First Lady Nancy Reagan going on TV to encourage children to “Just say no!” in her anti-drug campaign. She received some ridicule for such a simplistic message (it takes a little more than just saying “no”), but no one tried to stop the First Lady from speaking to kids.
For the idiots opposed to the president giving his speech to the kids, it’s all about the lesson plan suggested by the Department of Education, a lesson plan that has already been pulled from the Internet. It suggested ideas teachers could use to incorporate what the president said into what they were teaching their kids about the value of education.
When pressed on their opposition to the president giving a positive speech to kids on education, the idiots accuse the journalists questioning them of being “in the tank” for Barack Obama. It was a tactic used by Mike Leahy of the National Tea Party Coalition when he was being questioned by David Shuster of MSNBC.
The only reasons these idiots oppose President Obama speaking to school kids are simple enough: A) he is a Democrat so therefore he must be a Socialist too, and B) He’s Back. Of course they deny the second point. Parents who keep their kids from seeing the president ought to be investigated for child endangerment because they certainly don’t have their children’s welfare in mind, just their political views.
On the other hand, conservatives have a long history of being opposed to education.
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Here’s an interesting bit of hypocrisy: the Republicans are not only against universal health care, they are against a public plan, modeled after the one federal employees get to choose from that is largely funded by the government. That plan doesn’t exclude the insurance carriers. On the contrary, it allows federal employees to choose a plan from many different health insurance companies.
And this is the same plan the members of Congress get to use — and boy do they use it! And unlike their fellow federal employees, members of Congress don’t pay a penny for any of it. You think that’s a sweet deal? Well, here’s where the Republicans get really hypocritical. Members of Congress can also used the medical facilities provided by the military, like Bethesda Naval Hospital.
Senators Mitch McConnell and John McCain had major surgery at Bethesda, one of the best — if the not the best — medical facilities in the nation. As did Missouri Congressman Roy Blunt.
Now, it is true military retirees can use military medical facilities. I have a lot of friends here in San Diego who retired from the military and they use Balboa Naval Hospital for their health care. John McCain is a military retiree so he would have access to Bethesda Naval Hospital, but Roy Blunt served only two years in the Army and Mitch McConnell, well, like President Clinton, who Republicans are fond of calling a draft dodger, and former Vice President Dick Cheney, Senator McConnell used every available deferment to avoid serving in the military during Vietnam. So, neither one of them would have access to military medical facilities if they weren’t members of Congress.
The next time any Republican, but especially these three, say they are against the “public option,” ask them of they are willing to give up their public option plan and all the perks that go with it, like the free cost and the choice to have surgery performed at Bethesda Naval Hospital. My guess is they would dodge the question, as any good hypocrite would do.
And if they are truly against single-payer, government health care, ask them if they are ready and willing to put forth bills to end Medicare, the policy first started by President Harry S. Truman in 1948 and finally signed into law by President Lyndon B. Johnson in 1965. Like any good hypocrite, they will dodge that one too, which they’ve been doing since the health care issue came to the fore with President Obama.
Ask them why we as U.S. citizens can’t have the same health care advantages they enjoy with their sweet deal. That’s the question I want asked and answered, Wish one of the newsies would ask them.
TheForkesReport