In a not terribly surprising development, I've been getting a bunch of health care-related alerts in my inbox lately. I'll share two: one from Unionvoice and the other from Public Citizen. The former alert argues for a public option, while the latter alert argues for a single-payer system, so of course I prefer the latter. I include the former alert mainly because I haven't gotten around to mentioning taxation of employee-provided health benefits somehow being "on the table." That's the second-dumbest solution to the health care mess I've heard (Mr. McCain's anti-health insurance Health Savings Accounts plan being the dumbest). Your Reps and Senators need to hear from you -- over the phone, preferably -- that taxing health insurance benefits is a non-starter with the American people, no matter what Republicans think of it.
The Servicemembers Legal Defense Network has had trouble pressuring Mr. Obama to change don't-ask-don't-tell -- even though, you know, Mr. Obama could just order the Armed Forces to accept openly gay soldiers, just as Harry Truman ordered the Armed Forces to desegregate. So now they're targeting Nancy Pelosi, who could make action on the Military Readiness Enhancement Act (H.R. 1283) a priority if she so chooses. Thus SLDN provides a petition demanding action on H.R. 1283. Apparently over 120,000 folks have signed it already. Maybe it'll move the legislation, maybe it won't. But at least we'll be on record as having said something about it. That's more important than it seems sometimes. Karl Rove was right about one thing -- politics is a ground game. And we need to think of ourselves as John Riggins.
Meanwhile, in another not terribly surprising development, Fox News let Stephen Moore say this about Mr. Obama's plans to fix the economy: "The one thing this administration won't do is cut taxes." Except that, like, it already has. And I don't even mean the annual Alternative Minimum Tax patch that somehow got thrown into the stimulus bill; I mean an actual tax cut, targeted to lower-income earners for once. I also remember Mr. Obama wanting it to be much larger, but Congress balking because it was, you know, fiscally irresponsible or something. I also remember that none of Mr. Bush's tax cuts worked, and that Mr. Reagan's 1981 tax cuts didn't do nearly as much for the economy as his 1984 tax hikes did. Sigh. Stephen Moore is kinda like the late Jack Kemp, just without the heart or the brain. Probably without the throwing arm, too.
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