South Of Heaven

How the GOP is eliminating rape

You thought that the big victories for the GOP would put them into gear cutting the deficit and ending all those illegals who are sapping the blood out of our country.

No, they are eliminating rape. By changing the definition.

Is forcing people to buy health insurance constitutional?

More court news:

A judge in Florida has ruled that the individual mandate in the healthcare reform act; often referred to as "Obamacare," is unconstitutional.

Judge Roger Vinson released the ruling mid-day Monday. In it, Vinson says Congress does not have the authority to require citizens to engage in economic activity. Simply put, Congress cannot tell all citizens that they have to buy something or face fines. Vinson went on to rule that since the mandate is central to the bill and therefore "inseverable" from the rest of the law, the entire 2200+ page law is void. Vinson did not grant an injunction barring the enforcement of the law which would have prevented the government from enforcing it during the appeals process. 26 states attorney generals, including Colorado's are a party to this suit.

Vinson's ruling joins three others already decided by courts across the country. Two in Pennsylvania and Michigan ruled the law constitutional. Two in Florida and Virginia ruled it unconstitutional. All of these cases are almost certain to be appealed.

Back in 2009 I wrote that the healthcare bill smelled unconstitutional to me. Here.

Most Americans think healthcare reform didn't go far enough

Most Americans think that healthcare reform didn't go far enough. And most Americans are opposed to the Republican position on healthcare.

President Barack Obama's health care overhaul has divided the nation, and Republicans believe their call for repeal will help them win elections in November. But the picture's not that clear cut.

A new AP poll finds that Americans who think the law should have done more outnumber those who think the government should stay out of health care by 2-to-1.

"I was disappointed that it didn't provide universal coverage," said Bronwyn Bleakley, 35, a biology professor from Easton, Mass.

More than 30 million people would gain coverage in 2019 when the law is fully phased in, but another 20 million or so would remain uninsured. Bleakley, who was uninsured early in her career, views the overhaul as a work in progress.

The poll found that about four in 10 adults think the new law did not go far enough to change the health care system, regardless of whether they support the law, oppose it or remain neutral. On the other side, about one in five say they oppose the law because they think the federal government should not be involved in health care at all.

So how can a Republican get elected this fall? Because people aren't informed on the issues. Considering that Republicans want to privatize Social Security and Medicare, it's laughable what teabaggers think.

Why we need mental institutions

Some people are crazy dangerous.

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The sister of the woman accused of stabbing four people at a West Hollywood Target storesaid Tuesday that the family had repeatedly sought --  but was unable to get -- mental-health help for Layla Rosetta Trawick.

The Antioch woman was arrested on suspicion of attempted murder Monday after Los Angeles County sheriff's investigators said she used knives from the kitchen department  of Target to  stab random shoppers.   An off-duty Los Angeles County sheriff's deputy who had been shopping for paper towels halted Trawick and detained her.

Her sister Stephanie, who asked that her last name not be used because she feared harassment, told The Times the family was worried that Trawick could act out violently after she began experiencing severe emotional problems in her 30s.

"They categorized her with different things. Her mood would change from day to day; one she would be  normal and the next day, she's not," the sister said.

Family members said Trawick was in and out of the hospital with mental health issues. Her family  "begged them [medical authorities] not to release her and send her to treatment," Stephanie said. "They did nothing. It was really frustrating."

Court records show that Trawick had numerous charges for mostly minor crimes, including public drunkenness, petty theft and vandalism. She also was arrested for misdemeanor assault, though details of that case were not immediately available.

Her sister acknowledged that Trawick had been troubled but attributed her problems to her mental illness, which manifested itself in violent thoughts but not violent actions, she said. And she never had received consistent treatment.

I worked with a bi-polar person. If she went over to your house during her episodes the first thing she did was loot your medicine cabinet for drugs that could get her high. I was told she was wild in bed or wild anywhere you'd have sex with her, but she was scary wild.

There used to be mental hospitals but they were mostly closed down, partly because of the abuse of warehoused patients and partly because it was the first place they began saving money on government services. This may not be the right time to ask the government to rethink this, considering how short states are with money. But then again, you could be shopping in Target.

Family members said Trawick was in and out of the hospital with mental health issues. Her family  "begged them [medical authorities] not to release her and send her to treatment," Stephanie said. "They did nothing. It was really frustrating."

Court records show that Trawick had numerous charges for mostly minor crimes, including public drunkenness, petty theft and vandalism. She also was arrested for misdemeanor assault, though details of that case were not immediately available.

Her sister acknowledged that Trawick had been troubled but attributed her problems to her mental illness, which manifested itself in violent thoughts but not violent actions, she said. And she never had received consistent treatment.

I worked with a bi-polar person. If she went over to your house during her episodes the first thing she did was loot your medicine cabinet for drugs that could get her high. I was told she was wild in bed or wild anywhere you'd have sex with her, but she was scary wild.

There used to be mental hospitals but they were mostly closed down, partly because of the abuse of warehoused patients and partly because it was the first place they began saving money on government services. This may not be the right time to ask the government to rethink this, considering how short states are with money. But then again, you could be shopping in Target.

Healthcare wins, sorta

I haven't commented much on the battle over healthcare in Congress lately because during the sausage-making it's become more of an institutionalization of insurance companies than a corrective for the major problems America really faces with healthcare.

Tom Walker has a pretty good summary of the problems with the legislation that passed overnight.

The latest healthcare debate shows the problem with politics in the U.S. now. It's either death panels or fantasyland. People who recognize problems with the current system and also see that the teabagger crap is just that have nowhere to go if they have legitimate criticism of what has passed.

Screw Parkinson's victims

What can you say?

The passion against health care reform has elevated to such a level that protesters on Tuesday mocked an apparent Parkinson's Disease victim, scorning him as a "communist" who is looking for "handouts."

Protesters on both ends of the health care debate squared off in competing rallies outside the Columbus, Ohio office of district Rep. Mary Jo Kilroy (D-OH), who says she is undecided on her vote for the bill.

A wrinkled, kneeling man holding a stick crawled up to a group opposing the effort with a sign saying he has "got Parkinson's" and needs help.

"If you're looking for a handout you're in the wrong end of town," one man yelled at him. "Nothing for free over here, you have to work for everything you get."

Parkinson's is an incurable and degenerative brain disorder that impairs the victim's speech, motor skills and various other functions.

Why politicians on TV show are better than politicians in real life.

Here.

Why Kucinich and Moore oppose this health care bill

And I pretty much agree.

...Moore explains "If I drove up an old AMC Pacer here tonight and said 'here, Larry, I'm giving you a free car,' I don't think you'd say 'get the hell, get that out of here.' I think you'd say 'well, that's nice, Mike' and maybe you've got a sixteen-year-old you'd give it to."

"So that's what this bill is," Moore continues. "It's the AMC Pacer. It runs. But it really doesn't take care of the main problem which is the profit motive will still dictate everything. The insurance companies will still be in charge. Even after they, if you have insurance with them, and this is really what I had covered in this film, it was really about the people who have insurance, who, once they have it, then can't get the bill paid. Because they run you around, they're going to look for loopholes."

Interesting stats

From here.

"In an election between Scott Brown and the public option, the public option would have won."

– Charles Chamberlain, political director of Democracy for America

HEALTH CARE BILL OPPONENTS THINK IT "DOESN'T GO FAR ENOUGH"

• by 3 to 2 among Obama voters who voted for Brown
• by 6 to 1 among Obama voters who stayed home

(18% of Obama supporters who voted supported Brown.)

VOTERS OVERWHELMINGLY SUPPORT THE PUBLIC OPTION

• 82% of Obama voters who voted for Brown
• 86% of Obama voters who stayed home

OBAMA VOTERS WANT DEMOCRATS TO BE BOLDER

• 57% of Brown voters say Obama "not delivering enough" on change he promised
• 49% to 37% among voters who stayed home

PLUS: Obama voters overwhelming want bold economic populism from Democrats in 2010.

This suggests that when you have people like Lanny Davis (former lawyer for Bill Clinton, now fronting for the Honduran coup leaders) reading the entrails, you know that you're not getting anything real. You're getting what the corporations want you to hear.

Wednesday morning political hangover

Out here on the West Coast the barometric pressure is so low that the Pacific Ocean is rising up and spilling all over the land. It's been raining since Saturday with increasingly more powerful storms rumbling in off the ocean. Today's going to be the worst. It appears that Northern California will get a winter's worth of rain this week.

This morning there is a lot of Republican chest-beating over the Senate win in Massachusetts yesterday. And on the other side the Democrats have formed a circular firing squad in the attempt to blame someone within the Democratic Party for this failure.

First, let's suggest what Scott Brown's victory wasn't. It wasn't the sudden realization by the people of Massachusetts that Obama has really created death panels to kill the elderly or that Obama was born in Kenya or any of the other ridiculous doodoo that the teabaggers have flung over the last year. Massachusetts has its own health insurance plan and that's pretty popular with the citizenry. So it's not that Massachusetts is against health care reform. But they may, like the rest of America, not particularly like the current health care reform being offered by the Senate.

The saying that all politics is local is not an absolute but should not be discounted. Scott Brown is a good-looking and personable guy. He speaks well extemporaneously. He's an excellent candidate. Martha Coakley, on the other hand, is a middle-aged woman, a little wrinkly, not sexy, not exciting, not a very good campaigner. Not only that, she, her campaign, the state's Democratic Party, mailed this election in. Coakley pretty much took a vacation from campaigning the day after she won the primary until someone noticed that her fifteen-point lead had become a five-point deficit. As politicians she and the Democrats deserved to lose the election.

Having said that, Brown's positions are very much out of sync with what the people of Massachusetts believe. I bet some people who felt good sticking it to the state Democratic Party last night are waking up with a political hangover this morning. By the spring thaw reality will have set in and everyone will have realized that they should never have gotten into bed with Brown. If he's anything like other politicians of his depth Scotty may manage to squeeze an affair into his brief stay in D.C. Then he'll lose and be sent to a think tank as a consolation prize.

+++

Brown's election is being offered up in the context of what it will do to healthcare reform. I know it's unpopular in many Democratic circles to even acknowledge her, but I think that Jane Hamsher has pretty much sussed out the lay of the land. If the current Senate healthcare reform had anything to do with the race, it was that the mess it has become is unpopular as opposed to more liberal healthcare proposals. In a sense, it was Joe Lieberman's blocking of the public option that has created this mess.

A new

FDL/SurveyUSA poll of NY-01 shows how Lieberman’s bill is affecting the race in that district, one of many that the Democrats are at risk of losing in the next election. Incumbent Tim Bishop would have a narrow lead over GOP challenger Randy Altschuler if the race were held today in a contest that was rated “lean Democratic” by Cook’s Political Report.

People were pretty evenly split when asked if they supported a bill with a mandate to buy private insurance, with 50% saying it’s a good idea and 44% saying it’s a bad idea. Support fell dramatically when they were told that they would be fined up to 2% of their income for failure to comply, with 40% saying it’s a good idea and 57% saying it’s a bad idea. But when the option to buy into a government-run Medicare program was added, 63% of likely voters (66% of independents) supported it and 33% opposed even with the fine. Even support among Republicans shot up 23%.

Polling done for HCAN last September

found similar results nationally, indicating that likely 2010 voters “oppose a mandate to purchase private insurance by 64% to 34% but support a mandate with a choice of private or public insurance by 60% to 37%.”

Joe Lieberman was personally responsible for killing the public option/Medicare expansion in the Senate bill.

So maybe if Democrats want to win in November the first thing to do is to kick Lieberman out of their caucus, and the second thing to do is to begin doing what the people want. The problem is that too many Democrats are as beholden to insurance companies as the Republicans are.