This Republican ad, featuring Michael Steele, is stunning in both its stupidity and its arrogant cynicism.
I'll turn the podium over to Steve Benen of Washington Monthly. (But take the liberty of adding red highlight.)
Anyone who can watch the whole thing without pounding your head against a hard surface is a stronger person than I am. An ad like this is so breathtakingly stupid, and is so shameless in its cynical assumptions about the gullibility of the nation, it's literally painful.
The strategy is straightforward enough: Steele thinks he can kill the reform the nation needs by scaring the hell out of seniors with ridiculous lies. If Steele were a sane, responsible person, he'd choose a different path. After all, just last week, Steele said -- within a 24-hour timeframe -- that Medicare is a) a great government program that Democrats are trying to undermine and the GOP is trying to protect; and b) a terrible program that doesn't work and should probably be privatized. And this only came after Steele ran one of the all-time dumbest op-eds to ever run on health care policy.
Media Matters deconstructs the ad point by nauseating point.
In case you have the stomach for more, here is Steele's Washington Post op-ed where he delivers the same message in print.
DeLong weighs in on how dumb and inconsistent Republicans are on health care.
The stupid -- it burns.
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5 comments:
oh yeah, he's stupid. And corrupt. But does he outrate Nancy Pelosi on the corruptometer? Not sure. I wager even ChairDame Nancy has some chats with Mr. Steele.
Either way, Medicare should not be mistaken for a successful health care program, though many nannycrats suggest as much. For that matter, Steele, however f-ed up, does correctly note that many in GOP and Corporate-land want a Medicare-like program. No longer required to pay premiums, execs will save millions of shekels.
An expanded VA-like system would work--but have American corporations pay for it, with like a rollover of premiums. Neither nannycrats or the repugs want something cost efficient and ethical however: they work for the insurance people and medical industry, and they all want to make money. At least the repugs however corrupt admit it.
(hey jzb: did one of the Ministers of Kultur at EotAW object to my comments, or say something about J.? The EotAW gals don't care for anyone interferring with their Schlesinger schtick).
Medicare not successful?
Got any data on that?
Unfortunately, both parties are owned by big business - oil, pharma, insurance, Wall St. I have no idea who is the most corrupt.
(Nobody at EOTAW communicates with me on any topic. Feeling a little paranoid?
Is this You? Didn't strike me as either your style of choice of content - but what do I know?)
Cheers!
Re Medicare: mostly anecdotal, but even Leahy recently suggested as much when arguing for his plan--which does however allow for public option. There's stuff online, though some is Foxnews bozo-speak.
Re EOTAW. That's not J, as in I. One reg--Rauschway I believe--put me on permanent moderation list (ie to be ignored) a few months ago, after I alluded to the fraud and graft of Tammany (for EotAW, the Demo party has always been True Blue--Tweed, Schmeed). They upgraded that to Banned after I reminded 'em that even that hack Karl Popper considered 90% of academic history superfluous, non-verifiable ideology (whether marxist or...nazi-ist).
Historians don't care for the V-word--or perhaps we call it E-word (for Evidentialism).
I'll bite - what's the V word?
Anyway, a message is a small part what is said, and a large part how it's said. I don't know how you came across there, but you can be both abrasive and hard to follow.
I was ready to ban you - if I'd known how - after your first post here. Hence my "Leave your comment" comment, above.
But we're getting along fine, now.
Cheers!
V-word as in Verification.
I wasn't particularly rude--Emerson's far more abrasive (though with some nannycrat sentimentality). Actually I think you appeared on one thread that I did with my w-p name "HoratioX":
http://edgeofthewest.wordpress.com/2009/06/16/tied-up-with-a-silver-bow/
Regardless of "tone", I was correct. On occasion I'll post on EotAW, but only once in great while does it appear, so I bagged it. Other sites to work with (yr pal Berube started banning people too, both left and right. Then so did CT, and most of the supposed "liberal" sites). Bukharin.com has arrived.
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