A False Sense Of Patriotism

The Healthcare issue has brought our country to a new era in reform. Unfortunately, some very ignorant people have taken Patriotism beyond what our civilized democracy is all about. The Tea baggers, as well as, the Republican Party itself, has instigated and incited a frenzy that is misled and extremely misguided.

In the 1700’s, when our nation was fighting for its freedom, society was much different as was the situation. The problem today is, that time period is being misused and misrepresented, in regard to, today’s events. The following is a quick synopsis of the situation then; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Revolutionary_War
The war was the culmination of the political American Revolution, whereby many of the colonists rejected the legitimacy of the Parliament of Great Britain to govern them without representation, claiming that this violated the Rights of Englishmen. The First Continental Congress met in 1774 to coordinate relations with Great Britain and the thirteen now self-governing and individual provinces, petitioning George III for intervention with Parliament, organizing a boycott of British goods, while affirming loyalty to the British Crown. Their pleas ignored, and with British combat troops billeted in Boston, Massachusetts, by 1775 the Provincial Congresses formed the Second Continental Congress and authorized a Continental Army. Additional petitions to the king to intervene with Parliament resulted in the following year with Congress being declared traitors and the states to be in rebellion. The Americans responded in 1776 by formally declaring their independence as one new nation — the United States of America — claiming their own sovereignty and rejecting any allegiance to the British monarchy.

The following is an article from Yahoo.com reporting events today; http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100325/ap_on_re_us/us_health_care_threats
Dems deal with threats over health care support
By EMILY WAGSTER PETTUS, Associated Press Writer Emily Wagster Pettus, Associated Press Writer – Thu Mar 25, 6:35 am ET
Democratic Congress members are getting lessons from the FBI on how to handle threats such as several directed at their colleagues, including bricks hurled through windows and menacing obscenity-laced phone messages left for those who supported sweeping federal health care legislation.
Windows were shattered at four Democratic offices in New York, Arizona and Kansas and at least 10 members of Congress have reported some sort of threats, leaders said. No arrests had been made as of Wednesday, but the FBI is investigating.
Lawmakers who feel they are at risk will be "getting attention from the proper authorities," said House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-Md., who denounced the threats and vandalism at a news conference. He declined to say whether any are receiving extra security. Normally only those in leadership positions have personal security guards.
The brick flung through the window of a county Democratic Party office in Rochester, N.Y., over the weekend had a note attached: "Extremism in defense of liberty is no vice," roughly quoting 1964 Republican presidential nominee Barry Goldwater.
A New York congresswoman whose office window also was smashed with a brick accused the Republican leadership of failing to denounce attacks against lawmakers. The vandalism happened at Democratic Rep. Louise Slaughter's district office in Niagara Falls early Friday, two days before the House passed the health care overhaul bill.
"It's more disturbing to me that Republican leadership has not condemned these attacks and instead appears to be fanning the flames with coded rhetoric," said Slaughter, a key supporter of the bill.
House Republican leader John Boehner of Ohio said in a statement that while many Americans are angry over the bill's passage, "violence and threats are unacceptable."
"That's not the American way," Boehner said. "We need to take that anger and channel it into positive change."
Some of the anger spilled over in a flood of obscenity and threat-filled phone and fax messages to the office of Rep. Bart Stupak, D-Mich. Stupak vowed to oppose the health care package unless given greater assurance that it would not allow federal funding of elective abortions. He voted in favor after the administration agreed.
Stupak's office released some of the messages, declining further comment.
"I hope you bleed ... (get) cancer and die," one male caller told the congressman between curses.
A fax with the title "Defecating on Stupak" carried a picture of a gallows with "Bart (SS) Stupak" on it and a noose attached. It was captioned, "All Baby Killers come to unseemly ends Either by the hand of man or by the hand of God."
The vandalism and threats surprised a researcher at a think tank that monitors extremist groups.
"I think it is astounding that we are seeing this wave of vigilantism," said Mark Potok of the Alabama-based Southern Poverty Law Center.
Hoyer said people have yelled that Democratic lawmakers should be put on firing lines and posters have appeared with the faces of lawmakers in the cross hairs of a target.
While not directly criticizing Republicans, Hoyer said that "any show of appreciation for such actions encourages such action."
Gun imagery was used in a posting on the Facebook page of Sarah Palin urging people to organize against 20 House Democrats who voted for the health care bill and whose districts went for the John McCain-Palin ticket two years ago. Palin's post featured a U.S. map with circles and cross hairs over the 20 districts.
In Virginia, someone cut a propane line leading to a grill at the Charlottesville home of U.S. Rep. Tom Perriello's brother after the address was posted online by activists angry about the health care overhaul. Perriello also said a threatening letter was sent to his brother's house. The FBI and local authorities were investigating.
Tea party activists had posted the brother's address online thinking it was the congressman's home. The post urged opponents to drop by and "express their thanks" for the Democrat's vote in favor of the sweeping health care reform.
Nigel Coleman, chairman of the Danville Tea Party, said he re-posted the comment that originated on another conservative blog, including the address, Monday on his Facebook page. The posts were taken down after the mistake was discovered.
"We've never been associated with any violence or any vandalism," he said. "We're definitely sorry that we posted the incorrect address."
Lyndsay Stauble, executive director of the Sedgwick County Democratic Party in Wichita, Kan., said a brick was hurled through the party's storefront plate glass window late Friday or early Saturday, landing in her office and gouging her wooden desk.
She said that written in marker on the brick were the slogans, "No to Obama" and "No Obamycare."
"The tone is not surprising, but the aggressiveness is," Stauble said Wednesday. "I'm not shocked that people are not reacting well to a large piece of legislation passed by a president that they don't like."
Associated Press writers David N. Goodman in Detroit, Dena Potter and Bob Lewis in Richmond, Va., Ben Dobbin in Rochester, N.Y., Mark Carlson in Phoenix and Laurie Kellman in Washington contributed to this report.

The events involved with the healthcare issue are no comparison to the formation of our nation. Anybody who compares the two is blatantly ignorant and is looking to be unlawful and an outright troublemaker. To do the things that have been done recently, the threats and intimidation to Lawmakers, is not Patriotic. If anyone reading this article is one of those individuals, do not kid yourself. You are no Patriot! You are a law breaking, ignorant malcontent looking for attention!

As for me, I believe in our Constitution and love my country. Even though I disagreed with the Bush Administration, I stood behind him as our President and would have done anything required to defend our Nation. For those of you, who are causing today’s threats, understand this; there are many more like me out here. We consider people like you a threat from within. So, before you go about trying to cause your second revolution, understand that people like me will stop you in your tracks. But, you better hope the authorities do it first. People like me will not bother to read you your rights. As far as we are concerned, you threaten this country, you have given up your rights. So, make sure you truly understand what it is to be Patriotic and do not be fooled by Tea bagging rhetoric or political conservative ploy. Instead, if you really want to do the Patriotic duty, next election, exercise the right thousands of our Armed Forces have given up their lives for, VOTE! Now THAT is Patriotic.

That’s How I See It.

Websites of reference:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Revolutionary_War
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100325/ap_on_re_us/us_health_care_threats
http://www.42explore2.com/revolt.htm
http://www.myrevolutionarywar.com/
http://www.historycentral.com/Revolt/
http://www.ushistory.org/DECLARATION/revwartimeline.htm
http://www.nps.gov/archive/cowp/Timeline.htm
http://www.usnews.com/opinion/blogs/mary-kate-cary/2010/03/25/sarah-palin-tea-party-leaders-must-condemn-healthcare-threats.html
http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/88955-dem-compares-healthcare-threats-to-fighting-in-iraq-afghanistan
http://cincinnati.com/blogs/politics/2010/03/26/comments-on-health-care-violence/
http://www.cnn.com/2010/POLITICS/03/24/congress.threats/index.html

Unsung Heroes

How Freedom of Speech Is Being Abused

In the coming months, the Supreme Court will be hearing arguments about a court case that should never even needed to be considered. That case is the abuse of Freedom of Speech, by a religious Church from the Topeka Kansas area. This church is the fundamentalist Westboro Baptist Church. The Pastor of this church is Fred Phelps Sr. A man, I feel, is a disgrace to his faith and is the poster boy to why many in today’s society are turning away from religion.

This lunatic Pastor, along with the throng of his crazies, appears at military funerals and cheers the deaths of fallen soldiers from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. In protesting, this lunatic Pastor preaches the deaths of our fallen heroes, is deserved and a punishment from God, while basing this idea solely on their own biases and prejudices towards Homosexuals and other fanatical religious beliefs. A father to a slain Veteran has sued the organization for their protesting at the funeral of his son. Albert Snyder was awarded five million dollars in damages for distress caused by these lunatic protesters. Unfortunately, a higher court overturned this decision and the Supreme Court has agreed to hear the case to render a final decision.

The following is an article by the Associated Press providing an outline of the arguments from both sides and what is at stake with this case;

http://www.newsobserver.com/2010/03/08/377423/court-to-rule-in-military-funeral.html

Court to rule in military funeral protest case
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

WASHINGTON -- The Supreme Court is getting involved in the legal fight over the anti-gay protesters who show up at military funerals with inflammatory messages like "Thank God for dead soldiers."
The court agreed Monday to consider whether the protesters' message, no matter how provocative and upsetting, is protected by the First Amendment. Members of a Kansas-based church have picketed military funerals to spread their belief that U.S. deaths in Afghanistan and Iraq are punishment for the nation's tolerance of homosexuality.

The justices will hear an appeal from the father of a Marine killed in Iraq to reinstate a $5 million verdict against the protesters, after they picketed outside his son's funeral in Maryland.

A jury in Baltimore awarded Albert Snyder damages for emotional distress and invasion of privacy, but a federal appeals court threw out the verdict. The 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said the signs contained "imaginative and hyperbolic rhetoric" protected by the First Amendment.

The funeral for Marine Lance Cpl. Matthew Snyder in Westminster, Md., was among many that have been picketed by members of the fundamentalist Westboro Baptist Church in Kansas. Westboro pastor Fred Phelps and other members have used the funeral protests to spread their belief that U.S. deaths in the Iraq war are punishment for the nation's tolerance of homosexuality. One of the signs at Snyder's funeral combined the U.S. Marine Corps motto with a slur against gay men.

Other signs carred by members of the Topeka, Kan.-based church said, "America is Doomed," "God Hates the USA/Thank God for 9/11," "Priests Rape Boys" and "Thank God for IEDs," a reference to the roadside bombs that have killed many U.S. troops in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The case will be argued in the fall.

The case is Snyder v. Phelps, 09-751.

Whether you agree with any Military conflict our troops are involved in or not. The death of a soldier is the most heroic sacrifice that can be made by the individual and his or her family. The funeral is a private and personal service that should not be abused for the right of Freedom of Speech. There is nothing political about a funeral nor is their anything commercial about it. A funeral service is the private moment where friends and family say goodbye to a loved one. It is emotional and traumatic. My only hope is that the Supreme Court will see it this way as well.

Freedom of Speech is a Constitutional Right that many have died for. But, death itself, should not be exploited for personal agenda, by using the very service that our society has agreed, is the only solemn rite of passage. I can only hope the Supreme Court will see this in the same light and make the appropriate decision of when Freedom of Speech goes on hold for a more important rite.

That’s How I See It.

The following are websites of reference:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fred_Phelps

http://en.wikinews.org/wiki/Anti-gay_church_protests_U.S._at_military_funerals

http://abcnews.go.com/US/Politics/story?id=1728788&page=1

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=132x2004136

http://liveshots.blogs.foxnews.com/2010/03/08/high-court-takes-funeral-protest-case/

http://www.newsobserver.com/2010/03/08/377423/court-to-rule-in-military-funeral.html

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x3158309

The Need for Healthcare Not Health Insurance

Why the Insurance Industry should be irrelevant on this Issue

Anyone who has read this blog is familiar with my background. Even though I write articles here, and try to add commentary on various other sites, my profession is in Manufacturing. My background originated within the Maintenance end of the industry. However, through the years, I have moved to the manufacture of finished goods. As a Manufacturing Supervisor, I am directly involved with the day to day operations of our facilities. Through the years I have seen, and been a part of, the changes in the way we build our products.

The other day, I was in a conversation with my counterpart, in the Maintenance Department. His name is Jim. He is a decent guy, down to earth and definitely has his own ways of getting things done. In our conversation, he pointed out to me, how complicated technology or innovation has actually made the way we do things today. For instance, we have a system that is run by a computer. This computer takes the data we feed it, distributes this data to the running parts of the equipment and turns the equipment on. Before the invention of the computer we would just turn a switch on. In other words, we have added another layer of activities to operate a mechanism that a simple “flip of a switch” used to handle. So now, we have an extra layer of troubleshooting, that must take place, along with additional materials and labor when, all we had was one simple switch just a few years ago.

Now I know you are asking yourself what this has to do with Healthcare and Health Insurance. I believe that Health Insurance has become that computer. Years ago, if you needed Healthcare, it was as simple as “flipping a switch” to obtain it. Once the advent of Health Insurance, we added a layer that now controls the Healthcare machine, not you or I as it used to be years ago. Please explain to me why Insurance Companies have to make a profit at the expense of the health of Americans? Oh, I understand they have to pay their bills and such but, what says they have to make a profit to the excesses they do today when their whole inception was to help in the provision of effective Healthcare to the citizenry. Not only do they feel they must make a profit but, sacrificing the lives of the average American to obtain those extra billion dollars for their executives, is now the norm? Then maybe Jim was on to something when he said technology or innovation has not made our lives easier.

I found the following article, from the Firedoglake Blog very enlightening when it comes to what is at stake for the Health Insurance Industry;

http://fdlaction.firedoglake.com/2010/03/03/health-insurance-industrys-300-billion-victory-over-the-public-option/

Health Insurance Industry’s $300 Billion Victory Over the Public Option
By: Jon Walker Wednesday March 3, 2010 9:27 am
When Blanche Lincoln (D-AR), Ben Nelson (D-NE), Mary Landrieu (D-LA), Joe Lieberman (I-CT), and the entire Republican Senate caucus stepped up to kill the public option in the Senate, it is important to remember that the health insurance industry won a victory—a victory worth $300 billion. As Jay Rockefeller (D-WV) and Tom Harkin (D-IA) now try to crush attempts to revive the public option inside a reconciliation measure, they are battling to protect that extra $300 billion that will flow to AHIP as a result. The public option was never just a “sliver” as Obama tried to claim. It was about a fundamental moral right and the role of government. But what it was also about was a huge amount of money.
The CBO projects that the relatively weak public option–the one limited just to the exchange in the House health care bill–would secure roughly one-fifth of that market, equal to around 6 million people (PDF). The CBO concluded that, as a result of those 6 million customers, the public option will take in $298 billion (PDF) in direct premiums, exchange subsidies, and risk adjustment payments from 2013-2019. However, with the public option removed, but the individual mandate remaining, that $300 billion will instead go straight to the private insurance corporations’ books. If, like I personally suspect, the CBO slightly underestimated the popularity of the public option, and it manages to secure instead roughly a third of the customers on the exchange, that would be roughly $500 billion that the public option would take from the private insurance companies.
I often hear the argument that the public option was not important because only 2% of Americans would be using it. That’s true, but it is important to remember that roughly a third are currently insured by public programs such as Medicare, Medicaid, and Tricare. Of course, of the roughly half of Americans with private insurance, the bulk of them get there coverage through employer-provided, self-funded plans. Plans in which the employer bears the risk and holds the premiums. The insurance companies are only subcontracted to provide administrative functions. That 6 million people the public option was projected to cover would be a significant share of the potential market for private insurance companies to actually cover and noticeably expand the amount of money they would have earning float revenue.
It is important to remember the sheer scope of the private insurance companies victory if they stop health care reform from having even a relatively weak public option. It will be a victory that will provide them with an extra $300 billion of our money. No doubt some of that same money will be used in the future to fight efforts to enact real health care reform.

All of us here in the United States of America need access to affordable and comprehensive Healthcare. Not Healthcare Insurance. The Health Insurance Industry started as a level that helped to enhance the healthcare access but, now is hindering it. Sadly, the political system that is admired around the world is being used and abused as a tool to obstruct, thwart and prevent the very device we are envied of.

Personally, I believe a Public Option, Single Payer or outright Medicare for all, is the only way, we as a nation, can ensure our citizenry will have the best Healthcare access in the world. Relieving American businesses, of the burden of Healthcare provision, for its employees would make our labor work force second to none in quantity, quality and affordability when competing with the Global Markets. By having one giant pool that business and the public alike, pay into, would help control costs while providing Healthcare for every American citizen. I fail to understand why American Businesses do not stand up against the Heath Insurance Industry and their Lobbyists to demand this competitive edge. But, I guess so many people are in bed together, for nothing more than the almighty dollar and political gain that caring about a human life comes second. Unless, of course, you rant about wanting your country back from a black president, (no racial intention there, right?) you cheat on your spouse while waving your Bible proclaiming pro-life as you support the death sentence. Life in the womb must be more important than outside, huh? WOW! I think I just came up with the topic for a future article. Hhmm…

That’s How I See It.