Arizona: Giffords

by David Safier

This is from an email reply Giffords sent after I called her office supporting the public option.

I support reform that creates competition through a strong public option that lowers everyone's costs and competes with private insurers.  I also support malpractice tort reform, and I will not vote for a bill that is not deficit neutral.  You may be pleased to know that H.R. 3200 is 100 percent paid for through a combination of cost saving measures within the health sector and a new surcharge on the very wealthiest Americans.  Finally, I do not support a "government take-over" of health care or "socialized medicine." 

I can accept that, even though I'm not sure I'd agree on every detail.

You can call Giffords' Tucson office: 881-3588. Call even if you called before. It only takes a minute.

by David Safier

My last post about Giffords and health care reform was very positive. She came out clearly for a strong public option and held firm in front of a hostile crowd at the town hall I attended.

The rubber is about to meet the road on health care legislation, and I hope she'll stay true to her convictions. These are the times that try legislators' souls. They're also the times that test their mettle.

by David Safier

Grijalva continues his heavy lifting on health care reform with a long op ed in The Hill: Public option — accept nothing less. 

Some highlights.

Sen. Max Baucus (D-Mont.) recently released his version of healthcare reform. 

However, his bill fails to meet the most basic principles of healthcare reform. The legislation presented is nothing more than a giveaway to the insurance companies. It is telling that even with the concessions made to the bill, no member of the Senate, including the “Gang of Six,” stood with him in support.

The Baucus bill is all about the insurance industry’s bottom line: no teeth in enforcements and regulations, endless patent hoarding for the pharmaceutical industry and laws that rein in citizens to pay these industries the largest transfer of wealth in history.

by David Safier
If it wasn't clear before, there's no doubt now that the right wing scream machine has turned its volume up to a continual roar. I felt it on a visceral level as I sat through Giffords' town hall on Tuesday, and I hear it on every media outlet, about every possible issue having to do with Obama and any other Democrat the right thinks is important enough to be attacked.

The Bush administration, Republican politicians and the right wing media screamed in outrage at everything the Democrats said or did when Bush was in power, until Dem members of Congress acted like victims of battered wife syndrome.