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The link I found to this article claimed that it was the single most important thing you could read about the health care debate.

“Good thing our leaders weren’t so cowardly in 1964, or we would never have passed a civil rights bill — because of complaints over the provisions in it that would enslave whites.”

I don’t think it’s too bold to say that. Read this article.

(Via In America, Crazy Is a Preexisting Condition.)

This is from the Washington Post:

“The recent attacks by Republican leaders and their ideological fellow-travelers on the effort to reform the health-care system have been so misleading, so disingenuous, that they could only spring from a cynical effort to gain partisan political advantage. By poisoning the political well, they’ve given up any pretense of being the loyal opposition. They’ve become political terrorists, willing to say or do anything to prevent the country from reaching a consensus on one of its most serious domestic problems. “

and this quote is especially spot-on:

Health reform is a test of whether this country can function once again as a civil society — whether we can trust ourselves to embrace the big, important changes that require everyone to give up something in order to make everyone better off. Republican leaders are eager to see us fail that test. We need to show them that no matter how many lies they tell or how many scare tactics they concoct, Americans will come together and get this done.

(Via Republicans Propagating Falsehoods in Attacks on Health-Care Reform.)

At this point it seems that all of these tea-baggers are digging themselves into a hole… and asking for more shovels.

“Go ahead, shoot me. I like the status quo on health care in the United States. I’ve got health insurance and I don’t give a damn about the 47 million suckers who don’t. Obama and Congress must be stopped. No bill! I’m better off the way things are.

I’m with that woman who wrote the president complaining about ‘socialized medicine’ and added: ‘Now keep your hands off my Medicare.’ That’s the spirit!”

(Via Newsweek.)

Perfect!

Both cases are distressingly telling examples of the authoritarian mentality so often found in right-wing politics — force and mob action to shut down actual discussion. It two sides of the same coin — the right in power versus the right out of power.

Par for the course.

(Via Authoritarian Mindset -Talking Points Memo: by Joshua Micah Marshall.)

If you haven’t heard, right-wing groups are organizing “regular citizens” to show up at these town halls, and essentially heckle, boo, and disrupt the discussion.

Sounds like the party of ideas to me .

if you’re interested in reading more on the subject, including comparisons to other health systems around the world, here’s a good article…

In his new book The Healing of America, the journalist T.R. Reid employs a clever device for surveying the world’s health systems: He takes an old shoulder injury to doctors in various countries.

Health, American-style

Remember back to July of 2001, if you can. Do remember the massive $1.5 trillion dollar tax cut that President Bush signed into law?

Lines up pretty nicely with the $1 trillion dollar health care plan, doesn’t it…

It’s all about choices. More over at TPM — Let the Record Show

I love how he has identified the fundamental hypocrisy of “judicial activism”. (Emphasis mine)

I agree with Senator Feingold and Senator Whitehouse that we hear a lot about judicial activism when politicians talk about what kind of judge they want in the Supreme Court. But it seems that their definition of an activist judge is one who votes differently than they would like. Because during the Rehnquist Court, Justice Clarence Thomas voted to overturn federal laws more than Justices Stevens and Breyer combined.“

(Via TPM.)