When Will Alison Grimes Declare 'Game On!' Against Mitch McConnell?

by Sunnyjane

Since you asked, Mitch:  Repealing the Second Amendment, Defending Obamacare, Ending the War on Clean Energy, and Protecting the Living. There.  How's that?

In about seven months, Americans will vote to keep or replace their congresspeople, all four hundred and thirty-five of them.  There are also thirty-three gubernatorial races and thirty-three senate races to be decided on November 4. Personally, with the 2012 general election, Virginia's gubernatorial election in 2013, and this year's election, I feel like all I do is vote. 

While the University of Virginia professor and director of its Center for Politics Larry Sabato dismisses the Kentucky senate race as hardly one worth watching -- he believes there's no way McConnell can lose -- there are plenty of others who disagree. 

Waaa...I Wanna be the Senate Majority Leader!

All right, Mitch, you had your fun, now let go.  Stop it!  I said, LET GO OF THE GUN!

Perhaps Grimes is waiting to see what happens in the Republican primary election in May between McConnell and his loudest opponent, Tea Party darling Matt Bevin before she starts fighting in earnest.  Bevin has support from all the right places (pun intended), including Jim DeMint's Senate Conservative Fund.  The McConnell campaign seems less than impressed by this support: Matt Bevin now has the dubious honor of standing with a self-serving D.C. fundraising group that made its name by recruiting and promoting unelectable candidates that ensured Barack Obama a majority in the Senate.  (Ouch!)  The Bevin-McConnell kerfuffle is more than just a newbie trying to oust a long-time senator: it's a battle between the Tea Party and the establishment Conservatives.  The Tea Party  big-wigs would support a maggot-infested Twinkie if they thought it would send another Ted Cruz/Rand Paul/Mike Lee, etc., to the Senate.

McConnell also faces the likelihood of being ousted from his Minority Leader position if the GOP does not win control of the Senate.  Even if they should somehow gain control, an even bigger threat is that he would not be allowed to become Majority Leader.  That would leave a bruise.  Mitch has a lot of issues facing him this election and his campaign is going to have to navigate each one of them.

So, Alison, time to get serious.  It's not like there's nothing in Mitch's legislative record to criticize.  And giving him a poke about how he holds a gun -- KY women do it better -- ain't gonna cut it.

Running in Place -- Backwards

OK, Turtle-head, which part of "paycheck fairness" don't you understand?  The "paycheck" part or the "fairness" part?

That Sen. McConnell is a leadership-weenie is hardly worth my typing that fact.  The Tea Partiers in the Senate ignore him, and he has little following from so-called regular conservatives.  He follows before he leads.

And such was the case with the Paycheck Fairness Act when he harrumphed that  At a time when the Obama economy is already hurting women so much, this legislation would double down on job loss, all while lining the pockets of trial lawyers. It's just another Democratic idea that threatens to hurt the very people that it claims to help.  This is, of course, so much bullshit balderdash.  President Obama did win the gender gap in 2012 by eighteen percentage points, after all, and has done everything allowed by law to make women's lives easier.  The same can hardly be said for the Tea Party Republicans.

We Can't Afford to Give Those Slackers More Money!

Yeah, so $4.9 trillion for real important stuff.  But the President is trying to bankrupt the country!

After trying -- but failing, fortunately -- to add an amendment to the unemployment benefits extension that would, ahem,  boost job growth by approving the Keystone XL pipeline, reducing taxes on small businesses, and eliminating the 30-hour workweek rule in Obamacare, the Senate passed the bill on April 7 and sent it to an empty House; they decided to go on vacation until April 28.  Great work if you can get it, I suppose, to do nothing while earning $174,000 a year.  Now, has it occurred to anyone on the Hill that this could have been done last December?  No, I suppose not.  They don't give a damn anyhow.  Makes you wonder if they understand that part of their mission as elected representatives of the people is to Promote the General Welfare.

Obamacare is a Disaster, Too Expensive, and Must be Repealed!

HUH?  You're telling me Obamacare is working?  Even in KENTUCKY?

Not only is the Affordable Care Act working -- yes, even in Kentucky -- it is becoming more, well, affordable.

The Tea Party-run GOP has been all over the place on the ACA.  Ted Cruz is beginning to sound like a badly stretched 8-track tape with his We'll repeal every word of Obamacare! mantra.  This, of course, is one of the brilliant people who said two years ago that Americans don't need health insurance because that's what Emergency Rooms are for.  Now, he's joining forces with those who are pushing the idea that ERs should turn away people without health insurance, but offers no solution as to how they would obtain that health insurance.  OK, I know this makes no sense, but indulge me: we're talking about the Tea Party here.

Alison Grimes has welcomed the support of former president Bill Clinton, who told Democrats back in March that they should not run away from Obamacare in the 2014 elections.  But even though Kentucky has signed up almost four hundred thousand of its citizens for the ACA,  Grimes seems bent on taking the advice of Democratic pollster Celinda Lake, who cautions: Don’t defend Obamacare.  Say it was flawed from the beginning, and we’re going to fix it.

If Alison Grimes cannot stand in front of her supporters and stick up for a program that has allowed four hundred thousand Kentuckians to be enrolled in the ACA and Medicaid, perhaps she shouldn't be running for the U.S. Senate after all.

Maybe she's seeking counsel from the horoscope column in her local newspaper.  I dunno.

Fortunately, There is GOOD News for Grimes

Just before publishing this post, there came late-breaking news that Grimes is taking in a good amount of money -- she's topping the Turtle -- through her grassroots campaign.  Looks like Kentuckians really do hate Mitch McConnell.

End Note

  

Ted Cruz publishes facebook poll, then unwillingly creates one of the most powerful "pro-Obamacare" messages ever, as Americans tell Ted Cruz what they really think!

By Patrick

Notable political rascal Senator Ted Cruz, who himself receives luxury health insurance through Goldman Sachs, recently had a great idea for using the power of Facebook for political gain. Ted Cruz, who is famous not only for causing the $ 23 billion dollar shutdown, but also for his extremist father Rafael Cruz, on March 24 posted on facebook a simple question to his audience, writing:

"Quick poll: Obamacare was signed into law four years ago yesterday. Are you better off now than you were then? Comment with YES or NO!"

The Senator from Texas, who just recently declared that "Obamacare", the Affordable Care Act, is the "the most unpopular law in the country" and that Republicans still have a chance to repeal “every single word” of Obamacare, apparently believes his own propaganda and also seriously thinks that Americans believe what he believes.

But Ted Cruz was proven wrong.

In one of the most memorable political facebook moments ever, Ted Cruz received a clear overwhelming response from many American people, who said:

"YES."

He received more than 40.000 responses to his question, and I don't think that this number includes all the numerous, individual replies to these responses.

A look at the "top comments" reveals a general picture that Ted Cruz surely didn't expect. Yes, "Obamacare" is actually very, very popular, and many people are very thankful for this first step in helping to solve healthcare issues in the USA.

At least Cruz does not censor his facebook page like his close friend Sarah Palin has already done for years, but she might now fell compelled to give him some advice, you never know! :-)

Here are the first 49 "top comments", the screenshots were only taken a few minutes ago, for your viewing pleasure. The people have spoken, loud and clear, and Democrats should stop being insecure about the ACA. Yes, citizens want decent healthcare, and they also want Ted Cruz to shove off:

Trying to please his teabagging fans, Ted Cruz instead inspired a powerful response PRO Obamacare.

See also the earlier, very good report at "Addicting Info."

Thank you, Ted, for being so foolish, and thank you, Americans, for being so outspoken!

+++

BONUS:

In a new advert, Ted Cruz also says that he wants to "abolish the IRS."

Demagoguery at its finest.

Hail Anarchy!

WATCH:

GOP Still Obsessing Over Growing Success of the Healthcare Act

by Sunnyjane

GOP:  Curses!  This was supposed to be Obama's Katrina!

Oh yes, dear readers, the FUBAR surrounding the October 1, 2013, debut of the President's signature legislation website was gleefully panned by GOPers as the end of that dastardly Affordable Care Act.  Well, by December 1, fifty thousand uninsured Americans an hour were able to access the site, and the Republican Tea Party echo chamber became just the dark-hole vacuum from which it had originally emerged. 

Whaddaya Mean, It's Constitutional?

 
President Obama signed the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act on March 23, 2010; the Supreme Court of the United States found on June 28, 2012, that, except for mandatory expansion of Medicaid in all states, the law was constitutional.  And the Republicans still haven't gotten over it.

Mitt Romney said right after the SCOTUS decision that, if elected in November, he would repeal the law on Day One.  Now either Romney is totally ignorant of the job he wanted so badly concerning the Constraints of Presidential Powers, or he thought his idiot followers were stupid enough to believe him.  Either is a legitimate possibility.  But a president cannot simply sign some sort of repeal paper to get rid of a law he doesn't like.  It's called Separation of Powers, a little thingy the Founders stuck in the Constitution for a damn good reason: to prevent such an act without a consenting majority vote in both the House and Senate.

And the Hits Just Keep on Coming, But Miss Their Target

Lots of people hate Obamacare -- or so they think.  In Kentucky, where one in every five adults has been without healthcare insurance, a public health worker helped a man sign up for the Affordable Care Act.  The man was very pleased that he would qualify for either tax credits under KYTECT -- the Kentucky healthcare exchange chosen by their Democratic governor -- or would be eligible to join a Medicaid pool.  He said, This is better than Obamacare, I hope.   (Can you say Fox News zombie?) 

There's a lot of that going around, and Republicans are fueling it:

**It's been popular for the GOPers to warn young people against signing up for healthcare under the new act because they'd be unfairly charged more than older citizens.  DUH!  That's what any health insurance is based on.  However, that hasn't worked out very well for these, um, lawmakers.
 

**Ted Cruz tried to pull another stunt by tying defunding of the AHA to the $1.1 trillion spending bill.  That didn't work.

**California Republicans tried a dirty trick (shades of Karl Rove) by directing people looking for the AHA to go to a fake website that aimed to scare people from signing up.  Just as an example, the website told senior citizens that there probably wouldn't be enough doctors.  I don't know who they're calling senior citizens; anyone sixty-two or older usually has Medicare.  (And just as an aside, why does Medicare spend $29 million a year to pay for penis pumps?  No, seriously!)

**Marco Rubio is passing around the lie that the AHA is an insurance company bailout.

**Rand Paul says that his twenty-year-old son was forced to sign up for Medicaid.  That, my friends, is bullshit.  The Washington Post's Glenn Kessler is doing an on-going investigation on the issue, writing recently: The available evidence suggests this happened because of an error on the part of either Paul or his son, but there are enough uncertainties that a definitive conclusion cannot be reached. Paul earns the [two] Pinocchios because the process he described on television does not match up with the Kynect screen shots. 

**John Boehner -- you know him, he's supposed to be the Speaker of the House -- stated this past week that at the up-coming Republican retreat, healthcare will be on their agenda.  I think you'll see Republicans come forward with a plan to replace 'Obamacare,' a plan that will actually reduce costs for the American people and make health insurance more accessible.  Very timely, John, so very timely.

**The House passed a bill that would require Health and Human Services to provide them with weekly number on ACA instead of monthly numbers.  Ain't going to happen.

End Note:  President Obama's Up Yours to the Moralists 

 

Amen!