Time IS running out…

This comes to me from Americans for Prosperity:

With the crucial House health care vote most likely coming in 72 hours, I’m asking you to take a new step.

Go to NovemberIsComing.com and sign a new petition – which tells your member of Congress that if he or she votes YES on the health care takeover, you will vote NO on them in November.

Please send your message right now. 

November Ad

We’ve got to make sure in these potential final hours before the House vote that every member of Congress knows that tens of thousands of folks back home will vote NO on the Congressman if he or she votes YES on taking away our health care rights.

Every single member of the House of Representatives is up for election this November. 

They need to know that if they ram this health care takeover through – with all the dirty deals, all the big spending and new debt, all the new government bureaucracy, all the parliamentary tricks – then Americans will vote them out in November. 

This NovemberIsComing.com petition is the clearest way to send this vital message.

Let’s keep up the pressure!  We are winning with the American people. 

With the crucial House health care vote most likely coming in 72 hours, I’m asking you to take a new step.

Go to NovemberIsComing.com and sign a new petition – which tells your member of Congress that if he or she votes YES on the health care takeover, you will vote NO on them in November.

Please send your message right now. 

November Ad

We’ve got to make sure in these potential final hours before the House vote that every member of Congress knows that tens of thousands of folks back home will vote NO on the Congressman if he or she votes YES on taking away our health care rights.

Every single member of the House of Representatives is up for election this November. 

They need to know that if they ram this health care takeover through – with all the dirty deals, all the big spending and new debt, all the new government bureaucracy, all the parliamentary tricks – then Americans will vote them out in November. 

This NovemberIsComing.com petition is the clearest way to send this vital message.

Let’s keep up the pressure!  We are winning with the American people.

Yes they are, as polling continues to suggest the pro-Obamacare side is on the wrong end of public sentiment.

Of course, I know those on the Left will say it’s simply because our side is lying to the American people. But when time after time what they’ve said had been proven false, the people aren’t going to stand anymore. Perhaps they prefer the evil they know (insurance companies) to the one they also know (government.) After all, it’s a fact that government insurance denies more claims than any private insurance company, which is a complaint the Left makes about them. (Metric 12 on Page 3 here. And the source is the AMA, who’s supporting Obamacare.)

There’s also a bus trip to Washington (once again) sponsored by the local AFP chapter.

We have a bus leaving from Salisbury on Saturday Morning!! Details to follow!! We just HAVE to fill it!

Please call Ken Nichols ASAP at 410-726-2546 if you think you’d like to go with us.

You know, I find it interesting that I never hear from the Organizing For Against America knuckleheads about any of their rallies and such. It’s not the easiest site to stomach sometimes (you have to wince at the tortured logic and lack of common sense), but I do read Progressive Delmarva regularly and they don’t seem to promote that sort of activism. Perhaps they sense deep down they are on the wrong side of this.

An early morning ride

News from AFP Wicomico:

Some elected politicians still don’t get it, but more importantly there are many “on the fence” votes in Congress that need to hear from you and can be pushed to vote no on the Big Government takeover of your health care.

It seems our congressman, Frank Kratovil, may be flip flopping. To see this story click here.

Tomorrow Americans for Prosperity will be sponsoring a Bus to DC for a rally at 10 a.m. outside of the Senate offices and a visit to our Congressman all for $10, including lunch.

We need to let our voices be heard and let our Congressman that he needs to vote no again on the health care legislation

Contact Tom Cook (apatriotforever@gmail.com) to reserve your bus seat.

The bus will be leaving the Steer Inn on Racetrack Road at 5:30 in the morning, Boscov’s at 6:05 at the Mall in Salisbury, and the old K-Mart Parking lot in Cambridge on Rt. 50 at 6:35.

Truth be told, I haven’t decided yet whether to go because it makes for a long day of not being productive with other things I need to get done (probably wouldn’t be back home until 6:00 or later.) It’s a drawback of these sorts of events to have them at a time where working people can’t easily participate.

But if you are in a position where you can go it’s always worthwhile to meet with your Congressman, plus any others whose ear you may wish to bend. For all his faults voting-wise, it seems that Congressman Kratovil is willing to listen and hopefully he’s going to continue being a “no” vote on this issue.

There will be a good roster of speakers at the event, mostly from Congress – Reps. Pence, Bachmann, Price, Blackburn, Wilson, and Gingrey, along with representatives of the TEA Party Express, 60 Plus Association, National Center for Policy Analysis, and AFP.

Oh, by the way, did you answer your phone this weekend only to find an annoying Organizing For Against America volunteer on the other end? Neither did I, but that was their push according to flunkie Jeremy Bird:

The Final March for Reform is going strong — yesterday, OFA supporters made the phones ring off the hook in Congressional offices on Capitol Hill and across the country. But for every member of Congress, there are eight anti-reform lobbyists swarming Capitol Hill — and the upcoming vote is still too close to call.

So in these crucial, final days, we must make sure the voices of constituents break through the lobbyist attacks. And here’s the plan to make it happen:

As the next step in the Final March for Reform, OFA supporters like you will be gathering at volunteer phone banks across the country. We’ll be calling supportive voters in critical districts nationwide, asking them to reach out to their representatives and express their strong support for reform. A local OFA organizer will be on hand at every event, and no experience is required. (Emphasis in original.)

Gee, I can hardly wait to see what their next step is. But it looks like the people are going to speak tomorrow morning, bright and early.

Friday night videos episode 25

Bringing back the FNV franchise again after a week off, so let’s see what the extra week has given me to work with.

Lots of video on the health care debacle, as you might expect. Pollster Scott Rasmussen talks to the Washington News-Observer on the upcoming midterm elections and about how unpopular Obamacare really is:

It wasn’t too popular among this group either. My blogger friend Bob McCarty (who lives in that area) covered the counter-protest to President Obama’s health care show in St. Charles, Missouri.

If I didn’t put this on when it first came out, I sure missed out. This edition of FNV will be graced by the common sense of Rep. Mike Pence, perhaps my favorite member of Congress.

But the Democrats do reveal the facts about their health care bill.

Speaking of leading Democrats, in a couple weeks we’re going to see the third edition of the TEA Party Express, which begins in Searchlight, Nevada (Harry Reid’s hometown.) Mark Williams of TPX3 wanted to have a conversation with MSNBC’s Dylan Ratigan but you can see how the left expresses “Anger in America.”

And if you’re interested in saddling up and heading out west, they have an interesting lineup to start their tour – wonder how many will be there for the other stops?

Let’s finish the political end of FNV with something humorous. We can laugh about this now that this half of the globe is actually warming (with a corresponding cooling on the other side – funny how that works, huh?)

Now the fun part. This comes from one of my favorite regional bands and was recorded live at the Trocadero Theater in Philadelphia (unfortunately, not by me.) Hailing from Smyrna, Delaware, this is 13:1.

If you go to their website, crank out ‘No Goodbyes.’ (Feel free to do so with their other songs if you wish, too.)

With that, we put another FNV in the books. That was fun.

The final march for ruination

I have so much fun with the e-mails from Organizing For Against America. Now they’ve undertaken a week-long “Final March for Reform” with steps their minions are supposed to take in order to achieved their desired result of Obamacare.

Step 1 was yesterday, where participants were supposed to “get the facts out.” So here are some of their so-called “facts”:

As the President has made clear, Americans deserve a final up-or-down vote on health reform. And the House is now expected to hold its final vote as soon as one week from today.

Yet House Democrats are scheming to avoid this. From CongressDaily yesterday:

House Rules Chairwoman Louise Slaughter is prepping to help usher the healthcare overhaul through the House and potentially avoid a direct vote on the Senate overhaul bill, the chairwoman said Tuesday.

Slaughter is weighing preparing a rule that would consider the Senate bill passed once the House approves a corrections bill that would make changes to the Senate version.

Undaunted, Obama’s flunkie David Plouffe pressed on:

As we speak, insurance-industry lobbyists are gathering at the D.C. Ritz-Carlton to stage a last-minute blitz to block reform — even as they jack up premiums by as much as 60% for small businesses and families across the country.

You know, I doubt you can get the Ritz-Carlton or any other major venue at a moment’s notice. This meeting was set up months in advance and besides, I thought we were supposed to have this last summer anyway.

Plouffe wraps up on this class-envy, “us-versus-them” note:

We’ve put together a simple summary of the President’s proposal, a fact sheet to show friends and co-workers how the plan will specifically help them, posters to display, Facebook notes to post, and much more.

(snip)

Today, it’s time to show the insurance lobbyists that no smear campaign cooked up at a posh hotel can match the power of millions of regular citizens who are ready for change and committed to the truth.

Yep, that’s grassroots all right. You have your talking points, we have this: Nancy Pelosi wants the bill to pass so we can find out what’s in it. Seems like it’s too late then, unless they want things to be hidden.

Here’s the real truth. This bill was of the special interests, by the special interests, and for the special interests. They don’t have the votes and they know it – hence the “Slaughter solution.” OAA has presented its case and lost in the court of public opinion.

By the way, here’s the Day 2 instruction, with OAA’s Mitch Stewart the flunkie of the day:

President Obama has called for the House to vote to move health reform forward as early as next week. Your representative, Rep. Frank Kratovil, stood with the President to create as many as 3.9 million jobs with the Recovery Act, and deserves our thanks. Now, it’s important to make it clear that the voters back home stand with President Obama and want health reform.

Yes, he pointed out Kratovil’s most glaring failure to date, voting for the porkulus bill, If Frank doesn’t hew to his word and vote against Obamacare, he may as well pack now. Kratovil can run to the right all he wants with his budget proposals and crackdown on illegal immigration, but a vote for Obamacare is his political funeral. And I’m sure he knows that.

So the battle lines have been drawn, activist vs. activist. I suspect there’s more of us than there are of them, and right is on our side. If they need to resort to trickery and deceit to pass their bill, well, there may not be much we can do about that now but certainly we can defeat this in other venues too. Just ask the commonwealth of Virginia.

Obamacare reaches its climax

Well, it sounds like we’re at the tipping point for nationalizing one-sixth of our economy and the question is whether the House will pass the Senate bill or not. Forget reconciliation – there would be no need for it once the House swallows real hard and the dam is broken.

This is a sampling of some of the best action items I’ve seen in the grassroots effort to stop Obamacare. Amy Kremer, writing as part of the upcoming TEA Party Express version 3.0, had these suggestions as a daily schedule:

Wednesday, March 10th: Medical Professionals (you do not have to be a physician) visit local district offices. Be sure to wear your medical attire. Let these offices know that you are not going to sit back and let the government takeover our health care system!

Thursday, March 11th: Veterans go to local district offices. Our veterans are so special. They have a voice like no one else.  Veterans, let these offices know that you fought for her once and you are fighting for her again!

Friday, March 12th: Nationwide rallies at local district offices for 1 hour at 12 noon local. Let’s make it a special point for all of us to go during our lunch hour if at all possible.

Monday, March 15th: Make calls.  Send Faxes.  Send Emails.  You can do all of these things during the day and after business hours.

Tuesday, March 16th
:
Rally in DC and Nationwide at local district offices. Americans For Prosperity also has sent out an alert to honk at 12 noon that day while you are driving in your car.

If you can’t go to DC on March 16th, please visit your local district offices to have your voices heard and show solidarity with those in DC. Our sources from the Hill tell us that the vote is likely to happen between March 16th and March 18th. If you are able to go to DC, please RSVP here.

If you are doing a rally at your local office please RSVP here, so we can let others know. This is a team effort, and we are part of your team. Whatever you need, please let us know!

Wednesday, March 17th – Friday, March 19th: If you are in D.C., please visit your Representatives and Senators.  If you are not in D.C., please continue to visit local district offices! Make calls.  Send Faxes.  Send Emails.  The calls, faxes, and emails can all be done during the day and after business hours.

Saturday & Sunday, March 20th & 21st: Town Halls for March Madness! In August we had some amazing town halls! They really made people and lawmakers stop and think about this health care legislation. Let’s do it again! Host a town hall in your community and invite your Senator and Congressman.  More details on this next step will be available on American Grassroots Coalition within the next day or two.  Thanks for your patience. (All emphasis in original.)

Sounds like a heckuva to-do list, particularly when we have a Congressman who’s on record for opposing Obamacare anyway. But it never hurts to remind him, does it?

More on that March 16th event comes from Tim Phillips of Americans for Prosperity:

On March 16, we’re holding the “Honk Against the Health Care Takeover” event. Here’s what we’re asking you to do. At 12 Noon your time on March 16, drive to your member of Congress’s district office and join a car caravan there, circling your representative’s office while honking against the health care takeover.

Just CLICK HERE for more information and to let us know you’re on board. You’ll be able to print off your very own “Honk Against the Health Care Takeover” sign for your car when you register. Sign up tomorrow, March 10, to receive a free bumper sticker in the mail before March 16.

In addition, you can sign up to be a car caravan leader. You can pick a parking lot near your Congressman’s office and let folks know you will be there to lead them over to the district office. It will be fun to meet fellow grassroots activists and to go over in a caravan to send your message.

Here’s the bottom line. The president is in the midst of his final all-out push for his health care takeover. Yes, his campaign is dishonest and over-the-top. But, to their credit they are refusing to quit this fight. So, we’ve got to beat them in these final days before the House vote.

They’ve put everything on the line for their ideology, as flawed as it is. 

The question for us is:  will we do the same for our values, our freedoms and our nation?

Knowing what I know about Americans like us, I believe the answer will be a resounding YES. 

Again, given the fact we have Congressman on record as a likely “no” vote, I suspect our protest may be a little more subdued than others. But we’ll see.

Even Newt Gingrich chimed in, with this being the money passage from his post on Human Events:

I have even taken heat from fellow conservatives for cooperating with leading Democrats to achieve health reforms we agree on, like greater use of health information technology. In fact, there are even some specific elements of the bill — like payment reform to reward quality care — with which I agree.

However, as someone who has dedicated the last decade of his life to fixing what’s broken in America’s health care system, and has reached across party lines to do so, I regrettably have to say that this bill will do vastly more harm than good.

Here’s the rub, though. Why is it that conservatives and Republicans always have to reach across the aisle to Democrats?

You know, I’m damn tired of bipartisanship when it’s my side being sold down the river. I’ve watched this ship of state founder and draw dangerously close to the rocks ever since Ronald Reagan left office. While even Reagan couldn’t steer it in the proper direction, he at least held to the deepest part of the river and served as an anchor against the slow drift toward tyranny.

Not only is it time to kill this monstrosity of a bill, it’s long past time to reconsider why the government is in the health care market in the first place. One way or the other, entitlements left unchecked will destroy us – either we’ll drive the nation into default and bankruptcy or we’ll be dependent on government like New Orleans was as Katrina lashed the city.

We have a lot of hard decisions to make, but the first one is easy. Drive a wooden stake through the heart of Obamacare and be done with it.

Thinking about tea

It’s a beautiful morning outside, and the snow pile that lay across the street from the driveway here has finally disappeared, so it must be spring! It’s not the type of morning which makes one think about doing taxes – as it happens, I haven’t done mine yet either – but it is the kind of morning which makes me think about the Tax Day TEA Party coming up in just over a month.

Certainly I hope the weather is more like what we’re enjoying today than the miserable damp and rainy day we endured last year, but the event promises to be bigger and better in many other ways. I know organizers are looking for musical entertainment to help fill a four-hour or so program, and that’s fine.

Yet I don’t necessarily want the event to lose its impact or its message by being bogged down in entertainment. It becomes less of a protest and more of an event like the annual picnic or fireman’s carnival if the pendulum swings too far in that direction.

The thing which appealed to me as I stood on the steps of the Government Office Building last year and said my brief piece was that the people I surveyed weren’t comprised of the same old political crowd I saw at any other party meeting or candidate forum. Instead, I was looking at a crowd of real-life Howard Beales – mad as hell, and they couldn’t take it anymore. Rather than stew about it or yell at the televison news, they came despite the weather to air their own grievances and make their voice heard.

No one knew if this would be a one-shot deal; after all, the naysayers always told us you can’t fight City Hall. But one protest sparked another and with several political battles being fought the anger and frustration were easily channeled into positive directions – in particular, the continuing fight against the takeover of one-sixth of our economy by the federal government. (If Medicare is broke, do we honestly believe putting more people on a similar program will enjoy success?)

So where do TEA Parties go from here? Well, they’ve spawned a copycat movement from their polar opposites, but the Astroturf known as the Coffee Party may not have the passion that it could have had it sprung up a year or two earlier. (Let me throw a question back at those guys – where were you when President Bush was enacting policies you didn’t like?)

But as the TEA Party movement matures there’s a risk that it ossifies into that which we protested against in the first place. While some say there’s room for a third political party, for years we’ve had a third, fourth, fifth, etc. and they’ve made little to no impact. The trick is figuring out how to infiltrate one (or, even better, both) of the major parties yet keep the movement fresh. After all, there’s always the possibility we get what we want, and like a team which wins the World Series after a long losing streak, we need to learn how to stay on top once we arrive there.

The biggest lesson, though, is that things will never again be as they once were. The TEA Party isn’t going to be the new cool thing forever but tyranny has been around as long as we’ve recorded history. In a time where fifteen minutes of fame is rapidly becoming fifteen seconds and yesterday’s hero is today’s zero (witness the souring of many on Sarah Palin), even protest has to change and grow.

But it can’t lose sight of the original message, for even when we have success the fight will be to maintain those victories.

Amedori launches online petition, calls on Mikulski to oppose reconciliation

Breaking news comes to me this morning from U.S. Senate candidate Carmen Amedori’s camp.

In an effort to contrast herself with longtime incumbent Barbara Mikulski and create pressure on the Democrat to forgo a vote for reconciliation (should it become necessary), Amedori has set up an online petition:

Today, Carmen Amedori, Republican candidate for United States Senate in Maryland, launched an online petition calling on United States Senator Barbara Mikulski to vote no on reconciliation for Obamacare.

“Reconciliation is not the method to pass health care reform. This parliamentary maneuver has never been used for such a sweeping piece of legislation,” said Amedori. “The President’s plan for health care reform is seriously flawed. That’s why no one elected Republican Senator will support the legislation.”

Reconciliation has been used 19 times since 1980. 12 of those times the procedure was used to pass omnibus budget bills that had an overwhelming support in the Senate. Only on 2 occasions were the budget bills controversial enough to lack bipartisan support.

“I am launching this online effort to send a message to our Senator that Marylanders don’t want Obamacare forced down our throats and that she should vote against reconciliation,” stated Amedori. “A national mandate is not a way to make health care more affordable.”

People can join Carmen’s effort by visiting her campaign website or by friending Amedori For U.S. Senate on Facebook.

Amedori believes that a health care reform package must include tort reform, associated health plans, rules that allow people to purchase health insurance across state lines, more emphasis on health savings accounts and a method for allowing people with pre-existing conditions to purchase insurance coverage.

Amedori is a former Maryland House Delegate where she served on the Judiciary Committee and quickly rose to the position of Assistant Minority Leader. She earned a distinguished reputation for being tough on crime, a strong advocate for property rights, and a champion for small business. In 2004, Governor Robert Ehrlich honored Amedori by appointing her to the Maryland Parole Commission where she served until last year.

(snip)

Amedori believes that as the next United States Senator she can do a better job for the people of Maryland. “It is time we had a Senator focused on results rather than political gamesmanship. As a former member of the House of Delegates, I know how to make a difference. Barbara has had 24 years and now is the time for new leadership,” added Amedori.

It should be noted I edited the original release slightly, but the point remains that if the Obamacare supporters choose the reconciliation route (which I doubt, since the House passage of the Senate bill gives us legislation which wouldn’t necessarily need to be reconciled anyway) Barbara would almost surely align with her fellow Democrats as being one of the 51 votes. Certainly Mikulski would feel safe enough in her seat to do so.

The other obvious reason for having the petition is gathering contacts for other communications from her campaign, which is fine – after all, I think voters should be well-informed about all of the candidates running. Carmen is unlike the others running in that she has a legislative record, and it’s one that’s been judged to be fairly conservative by the former Maryland Accountability Project (Amedori served in the House of Delegates 1999-2004.) But each voter should study all the candidates, judging their stated principles, goals, and experience inside and out of the political realm.

Since I got the release a little bit ahead of time, I can vouch the petition is up and running and I already signed it. You should too, even if you support one of the other six candidates currently in the race.

Staying and fighting

Running for governor of your state is a task which takes a full-time effort, particularly if you’re not well-known around your state. That’s the situation Rep. Nathan Deal finds himself in as he strives to become the next governor of Georgia.

To that end, Deal had planned on resigning his House seat next week in order to concentrate on his run for statewide office. Instead, GOP leaders persuaded him to stay and made the hurdle for passing Obamacare that much higher. With a death and two earlier resignations (all Democrats who had voted for the bill previously), the nominally 435 member body was down to 432, requiring 217 votes for passage. Had Deal left as planned Nancy Pelosi’s job would have been made easier by cutting the majority number down to 216 and eliminating a sure “no” vote.

While the conventional wisdom is that the Senate and their reconciliation process is where the bill’s fate will be decided, they conveniently ignore the fact that President Obama and Democratic leaders could double-cross the House by promising them fixes to the Senate bill they’d pass – but as soon as the House passes the Senate bill (with the pro-abortion language, “Cornhusker Kickback” and “Louisiana Purchase” included) you better believe President Obama is going to find the pens to sign it.*

This is why many observers feel the whole battle over reconciliation is a red herring, a feint to distract anti-Obamacare supporters from the real important vote in the House. No wonder Frank Kratovil is making the news a lot more these days.

If the House somehow gets the Senate bill through, the game is over and we are stuck with Obamacare. Well, more precisely we are stuck with the taxes and regulations included therein – the so-called benefits don’t kick in for several years. And what entitlement have we overturned in the last seventy-five years since Social Security?

The ballgame is in the top of the ninth, and the American people need to be the ace closer who gets the save. Let’s get out and win this one!

* I’ve read past practice is that, on ceremonial bill-signings like Obamacare would surely be, the President signs his name one letter at a time with a different pen so that each of those who helped get the legislation through have a memento of the significant event. Talk about your poison pens.

Electoral toast

Update 9:30 a.m. –  A new AP story by Erica Werner quotes Kratovil spokesman Kevin Lawlor, who says that Frank won’t vote for the Obamacare bill if it’s similar to the first one. Apparently there’s not enough carrots dangling out there for him yet.

Perhaps this is wishful thinking from the Associated Press and writer Charles Babbington, but Frank Kratovil is listed as one of ten House Democrats who may be open to switching his vote on the health care bill in order to pass it. Technically the article says he’s not stated a position or is undecided, and it may well be he’s not stating.

But his vote may be the one which makes the bill sink or swim because, of the 220 votes Nancy Pelosi got to pass the bill the first time through she’s likely to be missing four due to death, resignation, and the slim chance Republican Joesph Cao would make the mistake of voting ‘yes’ again without language restricting abortion.

So Kratovil is between a rock and a hard place for sure. With it out in the open that he may be amenable to changing his vote, the White House may dangle all sorts of bribes for his support – think help for his re-election campaign or even a cushy Administration job if he loses come November. On the other hand, First District voters might see to it the latter happens if he doesn’t maintain his stance against it and he would truly earn the moniker ‘flip-flop Frank.’

Perhaps this is why Kratovil has been attempting to burnish those conservative credentials he does have like talking up fiscal conservatism and getting tough on illegal immigrants.

But that may be too little too late as First District voters may decide why have conservative-lite when they can have the real thing?

Friday night videos episode 24

After a week off to recharge the batteries, FNV is back with a good mix of politics and music once again.

Health care continues to be a sore subject in Congress. But while Democrats used the sob story to make their point yesterday, our side adds some facts to the emotion. This comes from the fine folks of Americans for Prosperity:

As I often ask, which Americans are against prosperity?

The health-care summit yesterday was a dud; then again that was the expectation from Republicans like Rep. Michele Bachmann. From the Washington News-Observer:

And the National Republican Congressional Committee added a dash of humor to the “Blair House Project”:

Yet there is other news on the conservative front as well. Last week over 70 conservative leaders got together to sign the Mount Vernon Statement. Here’s what I thought of it
but the players had their say as well. Again from WNO:

Nor have they forgotten foreign policy. Our best UN Ambassador in recent times spoke to WNO about his thoughts on the Obama relationship with the world.

If you follow me on Facebook you know what I’m usually doing Sunday nights at 9:00 – listening to Local Produce on the radio. This remake of “The Legend of Wooley Swamp” (originally done by the Charlie Daniels Band) is done by one of the co-hosts, Bob Daigle, and a couple of his friends. He definitely has an interesting YouTube channel!

The second of two music videos tonight is fresh stuff I recorded last Saturday at the Brumbley Haiti benefit. The sound quality is markedly better, and not just because Not My Own played well. Maybe I’m finally getting this video recording stuff!

That’s a wrap for another version of Friday night videos – hope you enjoyed it!

Upping the ante

Well, isn’t this conveeeeeeeeenient (spoken in a Church Lady voice).

Last week I talked about Organizing For Against America wanting 1 million volunteer hours to spread the lies about Obamacare – no surprise they got that goal, which I thought was a little weak considering there’s 13 million on the e-mail list. Here’s their breathless announcement:

In just the last 3 days, OFA volunteers like you have pledged an incredible 4,000,000 (and counting!) hours to support members of Congress and candidates who fight for real health reform.

We can prove to Congress that health reform is good policy and good politics, but we need to go as big as possible. So today we’re setting a new goal: 5 million hours pledged.

If we hit it, the country will know. We’ll be running an ad with the final tally in USA Today, the nation’s largest newspaper. And to make sure your voice is heard where it matters most, we’ll run radio ads in critical states and districts, featuring local voters announcing the pledge total from their area.

(snip)

Beginning soon, we’ll talk to voters state-by-state, district-by-district, about why it’s important to stand with those who fight for progress and reform — and reject those who stand with big insurers to protect a status quo that is devastating our economy, families, and businesses. (Emphasis in original.)

We can rewrite that last sentence to say: Beginning soon, Organizing Against America will go back to lying like a rug to promote our takeover of 1/6 of the national economy by wiping out private health insurance companies. 

That and I’ll be listening for those radio ads around here since we’re represented a Democrat who’s been reticent to join the rest of his party, believing (correctly) to do so would be political suicide.

Bet the TEA Partiers can log 10 million hours, but we’re not going to pay for an ad in USA Today to crow about the accomplishment – we’re just going to get to work.

How one man killed Obamacare

As most of America has presumably learned, Republican Scott Brown was elected to take over the “Kennedy seat” in the Senate, dispatching Democrat opponent Martha Coakley handily in Massachusetts’ recent special election. Thus ended Democrats’ filibuster-proof 60-vote majority in the Senate and prospects for ramming Obamacare through on a strictly party-line vote.

Yet had the House and Senate concurred earlier on a health care reform bill agreeable to both Brown’s election wouldn’t have mattered nearly as much. Instead, each body designed legislation to pass their own side and in the end the differences were irreconcilable. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi finally threw in the towel, saying the one chance Obamacare had – passing the Senate bill as it was in the House – couldn’t draw the required 218 votes. A main sticking point was that the Senate bill lacked the prohibition on the federal government paying directly for abortions. That provision allowed the House to pass their bill with just two votes to spare and gave it the barest bipartisan fig leaf as GOP Rep. Joseph Cao of Louisiana was the lone Republican in favor.

Undeniably, part of Brown’s appeal was the prospect of killing Obamacare by being the 41st Republican vote and denying Democrats their supermajority. In the election’s aftermath, petulant Democrats threw losing candidate Martha Coakley under the bus for running a terrible, gaffe-prone campaign and openly spoke about changing the filibuster rules to allow Democrats to maintain their hammerlock, perhaps needing just 55 votes instead of 60. Decades ago, a compromise measure lowered the limit from a 2/3 majority of 67 Senators to the current 3/5 majority.

Cooler heads prevailed, though, and now the consensus on health care reform is to deliver it in a piecemeal fashion by removing some of the most objectionable portions and focusing on areas where broad agreement exists, such as eliminating the right to deny coverage for preexisting conditions. But gone will be the ability for Democrats to fashion closed-door deals such as the one exempting union workers from a tax on so-called “Cadillac” health insurance plans.

While Republicans were pleased about picking up a Massachusetts seat for the first time in nearly 40 years, the prospects of becoming the majority party in the Senate this fall are fairly slim. Of the 36 Senate seats up for consideration (there are special elections to fill unexpired terms in Delaware and New York), 18 of the seats are Republican and 18 are held by Democrats. To even things out, the GOP would have to sweep the seats they’re defending and win half the available Democratic seats – a tall order to be sure. The prevailing conventional wisdom at the moment pegs GOP gains of 2 to 4 seats, which would leave them still significantly in the minority.

But an enhanced Republican presence in the Senate would curb the radically statist agenda thus far presented by President Obama, creating a similar effect to the 1994 midterm election which tempered President Clinton’s ambitious plans for health care reform. In order to win his own reelection, President Clinton tacked to the center and the strategy paid off in 1996.

Given what Obama has proposed and already enacted, though, moving to the center may be a little much to expect out of him. The 2012 Presidential election will likely see Obama run for a second term against two opponents: the Republican nominee and a “do-nothing” Congress which thwarted much of his ambitious agenda to remake America.

For that, we can thank Scott Brown and Massachusetts voters who hoped for a better change.

Michael Swartz, an architect and writer who lives in rural Maryland, is a Liberty Features Syndicated writer.

This latest effort for LFS cleared back on January 27th.