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Health Care, like the Debate about Abortion, attracts the Lowest Common Denominator

By Steve Lombardi

My wife and I were talking about this health care debate and how it is attracting society's fringe protesters, who to me simply hate this President and nothing more. Their side of the debate offers speculation for arguments and little more. Listening to them say the word death-squad is meant to conjure up Nazi death camps. The volume of their rhetoric is intended more to drown out anyone who wants to honestly debate the subject of health-care reform. Shouting out death camps or liar has more to do with fear mongering than to really add any content to the subject. Yelling about death-panels seems to be more of a ploy to scare the elderly than anything else and indicates to me who is really behind financing this fringe element.

Health care reform advocates pitch program over protests, Des Moines Register

Carpet baggers like South Carolina's Congressman Joe Wilson shouting out 'You lie!' during President Obama's address to the nation and to congress clearly demonstrates what this is all about. For Wilson it's about votes back home and solidifying his position with voters. Like most political debate Wilson's isn't about truth and consequences but appearances and trying to get votes by appealing to the lowest common denominator in society – through fear and not intelligent consideration.

Heckling Of President Rare In US History, AP and KCCI-TV Iowa

It's shameful really and it applies to both parties and that is where Barbara and I differ. She blames it on Republicans, of which I'm one. I say it has nothing to do with party labels and to do so, does nothing to advance the discussion.

Party labels aren't working for us any more. Think back to the Bush Administration lying about the reasons we needed to go into Iraq. There were clearly no weapons of mass destruction; only made-up and exaggerated intelligence data. Where was Wilson then? Why weren't he and the other Republicans shouting out 'Liar!'? And where were the Democrats who voted for the war with Iraq? Why weren't they shouting out in opposition for more concrete data about the reasons for the war? Why weren't they shouting out, "You lie!"?

How dumb are we Parrot Heads?

I've written previously about the use of labels and how using labels does nothing to advance the debate. It's a technique that money grubbers like Ann Coulter, Hannity and Limbaugh have perfected. It's about raw nerves that turn the brain off, rather than on towards more productive analysis. There are as many Republican voters who are sick and tired of Congressional lies for the sake of special interest campaign contributions and increasing profits as there are Democrats. And there are as many Democratic voters who are in favor of profitable businesses and lower taxes as there are Republicans. Starting out any debate with reference to either Republicans or Democrats or conservatives or liberals is simply a way of polarizing the discussion without regard to content. It derails the discussion and that's exactly what the special interests hope to do; derail the health care reform discussion to protect special profit interests. Fear is their weapon of choice and it's the W.M.D. for health-care-reform. It's a lie and even Republicans who would want health-care reforms can see it is.

The Republican Party does not endear itself to intelligent Republican voters by aligning itself with the fringe in health care reform any more than they did with Palin and her ilk. Their arguments meant to avoid discussing the underlying facts are just as pathetic as arguing, I can see Russia from my kitchen window in Alaska so I must be qualified on all issues of foreign policy.

Get real. Stop dumbing down the discussion with using fear and labels intended to polarize the discussion. It was pathetic then and it is pathetic now. Remember being a voter in a two-party system in which I call myself a Republican doesn't make me an idiot. Now that the Cold War has cooled they are pitting us against each other rather than the Russians, but with a new angle to selling fear. Smarten up America it's the same game just a different approach. They are still wasting your tax dollars, but instead of using fear to sell unnecessary implements of war, the new war is on health care cost containment. This is nothing more than one more distraction; we take our eye off the ball and they steal our tax dollars by wasting them bailing out their Wall Street cronies or in not fixing the spending problems. And in the end the doctors get screwed by taking less for reimbursements and wanting more from the injured patients. It's a fight that patients, doctors, tax payers or personal injury lawyers need or can afford. We need solutions.

And where is the serious discussion; still wasting away in Margaritaville.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6cbX4DUACYU

And still we don't have the cheeseburger in paradise. And why?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oq69l32DCKs

Thank you Jimmy Buffet and Alan Jackson.

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Originally posted at InjuryBoard by Steve Lombardi

Full post as published by Des Moines Personal Injury Lawyer on September 16, 2009 (boomark / email).