HOUSE PASSES MEDICARE DRUG BILL

fox news ^ | Nov 23, 2003

[RobFromGa]

WASHINGTON

[Beck_isright]

Sheesh. Now I won't have to give my grandmother all those kethup packets I've been saving for her. I guess she'll have money for food now.

[Tribune7]

"The Republican-controlled House" . . .So, even Fox does it?

I imagine Fox is giving credit for a popular bill. We may not like it but I don't believe the average American understands the concept that there is no such thing as a free lunch.

The one silve lining is that the Dems hate it.

I don't like it either but when you get lemons you make lemonade.

[Wait4Truth]

The RATS never see the irony of their anger, do they? They are laughable. The bill is expected to pass the Senate more easily in the Senate than in the House, though - unless Kennedy, Clinton, Byrd and the rest of the liberals can threaten them into submission. The DUers have a campaign going right now to call and threaten their Senators to filibuster. I think they will fail. Daschle said he is completely opposed to the bill but will not call for a filibuster. We shall see. The vote will not take place until Monday, I heard.

[Ohioan]

Just what is your point?!

Reagan may not have been perfect, but we always knew where he stood: That in most areas of concern, Government was the problem not the solution.

The Reagan Administration, on the subject of Health Care and Federal policy, seriously considered closing down the Federal Department (then) of Health, Education & Welfare. Had our position been a little stronger in the Congress, they would have.

If you are suggesting that vastly expanding Medicare is not a complete reversal of what had been the Conservative Republican policy from FDR, through LBJ's ramming Medicare through Congress in 1965, up until the present Republican Administration, you will be denying a lot of political history. Why not just admit that you, as an individual, do not share the same values as those of us to whom this is an outrage. Why can't we at least have a frank exchange of opinions, and not mask that exchange by suggesting that those of us who believe the Constitution should be respected, who believe in economy not waste in Government, who believe in individual not collective responsibility for individual needs, are somehow being alamists, or hysterical.

If you want to honestly debate the issues, we will accommodate you, with courtesy and respect. If you insist on casting ad hominem slurs, by comparing us to unnamed alarmists, you will also get an appropriate response.

William Flax Return Of The Gods Web Site

[KDD]

I'll second that.

[dpwiener]

I am wondering how they could hold the vote open for 2 hours and 50 minutes until they got enough Republicans to change their vote?

Unfortunately that is done all the time by whichever party controls the House.

I went to bed a little after midnight (PST) when the vote was 194 Yes to 207 No. At that point none of the Democrats had voted for it, and about 25 Republicans had voted against it. It was hard to see how the Republican leadership would be able to overcome that margin. But they not only twisted some Republican arms, they also bought off some Democrats.

Hopefully enough Democratic Senators will filibuster this monstrosity in the Senate. I'm becoming very fearful of what will happen after 2004 if Republicans increase their margins in both houses of Congress.

Nowadays it seems one has to cheer on the Democrats, since political gridlock offers the only hope of preventing massive new Federal spending programs from being enacted into law.

[Spiff]

I think a new trend should start, 'work for prescription drugs'. I am a bonified old coot and believe me, over my working years I have paid a bundle into SS and its about time they give us a helping hand, look what they do for the medicade bunch.

People who collect Social Security and Medicare are leeches.

The money they "paid into" Social Security/Medicare was redistributed the very same year that you "contributed" it. They do not have an account that has accrued investment or interest. No, instead the money they are receiving and spending because they did not properly plan for their older years it forcefully collected from me and every other person who has a job today. It is taken directly from our paychecks - confiscated against our will - and redistributed to the leeches.

My family suffers because of this confiscation - it is OUR money, not ythe leeches. I work and earn that money for THEM, not for the leeches. As it is, all of the money that I work for and earn between January 1 and February 24 next year will be confiscated - stolen - by the leeches.

My children have to do without some things because 15% of my pay is confiscated before I ever see it. What, specifically, can I not afford for them? I can't afford to enroll them into private school and must homeschool them instead. And, no, I'm not going to send them to government schools where education welfare is distributed. I don't intend to take the handouts paid for by forceful confiscation from others.

And now the leeches actually applaud the largest expansion of government entitlements in...well, I think in the history of the United States. I hope those who are applauding this never even think of calling themselves conservatives. I'm sickened that it was the Republicans pushing through this socialist crap last night. I'd applaud the Democrat's opposition against it, but they only opposed it because it wasn't socialist enough for their tastes. If it was the Democrats who came up with this exact scheme during the Clinton years, every Republican would have been up in arms to defeat it. Instead, now they're applauding it. This proves that the current Republicans in Congress are Socialist Lite and the Democrats are Pure Socialists.

Last night was an ugly night for our nation. The repercussions that this vote will have on my children and grandchildren can only be guessed at by seeing the debacle that Social Security and Medicare has become over time. Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it and the Republicans just repeated it, ignoring the lessons of history and gleefully expanding the socialist state.

[Lancey Howard]

But House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi said

Heh, I keep forgetting about her and then every now and then her name pops up out of the blue.

[Lancey Howard]

From the New York Post:

November 19, 2003 -- DAN Aykroyd is no fan of the bureaucratic bungling and cut-rate care of socialized medicine. "One place you don't want to get sick is Quebec," the Canadian actor advised us after a screening of Denys Arcand's "The Barbarian Invasions." "It's all socialized. Believe me, you don't want to go to a hospital there.

[DLfromthedesert]

The redeeming quality is giving people the choice of participating in the Medicare program or a private insurance plan.

The current head of the AARP is the one who engineered the "Harry and Louise" commercials which derailed "Hillary"care.

The RATs see this is as the "nose in the tent" which eventually (don't we hope) will take apart the behomoth of government-run Medicare.

[Spiff]

The redeeming quality is giving people the choice of participating in the Medicare program or a private insurance plan.

A "private insurance plan" paid for by whom?

[Lancey Howard]

If you're under 45 get ready to empty your wallet.....

There's the key.

I don't care if the whore politicians give away the store as long as they do not raise taxes. Bush has already given working, traditional Americans a tax cut.

So, when this program eventually implodes (and every socialist government program eventually implodes) who will have the gall to raise taxes to keep it solvent? I mean besides legislators who represent the parasite nests (cities)?

[DLfromthedesert]

Don't you think there are seniors that have enough money to pay for their own, and WANT to ?

[Libertina]

For this, the weak-kneed Republicans were willing to fight. (Not the Intelligence-Memo letter leaked by the democrats...etc) Sigh... Big government lite.

[Badray]

"Nice to see that Specter-opponent Pat Toomey voted against this abomination."

That's the first one I checked on. My rep Mellisa Hart voted wrong. I guess I have to spank her some more and no Medicare Drug Bill covers her for that.

[OldFriend]

I need to know the details. I don't believe anything at all written in the newspapers or spoken on TV and that goes for FNC too.

If it's driving the DUmmies mad and they're screeching about AARP then I am happy.

Better the government spends my money on rx for greedy geezers than expanding other social programs.

[Hank Rearden]

As I have noted elsewhere, even the loyal Bushbots seem absent in the rationalizations on this monstrosity.

"But he's so dreeeeeamy!", the Bushbots will say, taking a few moments away from their daily picture-licking threads.

The Bushbot Picturelickers are all in favor of Big Stupid Republican Government, as long as Dreamboy Bush Jr. is the one screwing us with it.

[Badray]

"Perhaps the idea of Bushbots who blindly rubber-stamp any and everything the President says and does is just a myth perpetuated by those who hardly approve of anything the President does at all."

Are you a self confessed Bush Bot? Are you criticizing him now? Where are his rabid supporters on this. They may not be defending this, but they certainly aren't criticizing him, are they? Are they hiding?

It is OKAY to criticize him. He's just another man. C'mon, you can do it.

[OldFriend]

I'm less worried about the predictable six pubbies that vote with the dems than with the likes of Rush and Sean bashing the president thereby giving the filibuster crowd cover.

Whatever Rush says on his show, Sean does a me too!