Government Run Health Care or Jail?

According to the Joint Committee on Taxation, an individual who fails to pay the penalty for not buying health insurance will face action from the Internal Revenue Service. On top of the penalty for not buying insurance, which could be as much as $1,900 (but it's not a tax), violators could face a $25,000 fine and one year behind bars. From Politico.com.

Under questioning from Sen. John Ensign(R-Nev.), Barthold said the IRS would "take you to court and undertake normal collection proceedings."

Ensign pursued the line of questioning because he said a lot of Americans don't believe the Constitution allows the government to mandate the purchase of insurance.

"We could be subjecting those very people who conscientiously, because they believe in the U.S. Constitution, we could be subjecting them to fines or the interpretation of a judge, all the way up to imprisonment," Ensign said. "That seems to me to be a problem."

Ensign's argument, however, wasn't persuasive to the committee -- which rejected an amendment from Sen. Jim Bunning (R-Ky.) to eliminate the individual mandate.

Sen. Olympia Snowe (R-Maine) was the only Republican to vote with Democrats to preserve the mandate.

So, if you do not have a health care plan, the government is going to make you buy one, whether you want to or not. If you do not buy a heath care plan, the government will fine you up to $1,900. Not just any plan mind you, you have to buy a government approved plan. If you already have a health insurance plan, but it is not a government approved plan, you will have to purchase an approved plan or be fined. So much for "if you like your health care plan you can keep it". Liars!

In either case, if you do not do as the government commands, you will be fined, and if you refuse to pay the fine, the government will charge you with a misdemeanor and penalize you further with more fines and possible jail time. What started out as a means to help the 49 million uninsured in America has taken on a life of it's own, and is now mutated into a way for the federal government to inject itself into the lives of every American with respect to health care.

Americans will no longer have the right;

• to choose to buy health insurance or not.
• to choose the health care plan that we think is best for our needs.
• keep the plans and doctors that we already have.
• reap the rewards of youth or healthy living by virtue of the fact that payments for coverage will be far more than the actual services received.
• to choose high deductible coverage even if we can afford it.

Of course, if you choose not to give up these rights, you can go to jail, where you will have free room and board, free health care, and free cable TV, all on the tax payers dime.

Playing the Race Card to a Frazzle

"It's not about bashing Democrats, it's not about taxes, they have no idea what the Boston tea party was about, they don't know their history at all. This is about hating a black man in the White House. This is racism straight up. That is nothing but a bunch of teabagging rednecks. And there is no way around that. And you know, you can tell these type of right wingers anything and they'll believe it, except the truth. You tell them the truth and they become -- it's like showing Frankenstein's monster fire. They become confused, and angry and highly volatile."

Certainly, you remember this quote from Janeane Garofalo, the de facto leader of the 'hate America first' crowd. She was not always a left wing nut job, she grew up conservative in a conservative family. Always outspoken, in college she was expressing her conservative viewpoints when a friend said to her, "You're an a**hole!". Assuming that her friend was criticizing her political views rather than her disposition, she changed her political views. Her disposition on the other hand, has not improved much. Garofalo begins her shows by greeting her audience with, "If there's any tea baggers here, welcome, and as always, white power."

I cannot imagine any American patriot soiling his/her hard earned money on one of her shows. Garofalo can spew more hatred of America in fifteen minutes, than most liberals could hope to do in a full day. Here are a few more of her more notable quotes:

• "Our country is founded on a sham: our forefathers were slave-owning rich white guys who wanted it their way. So when I see the American flag, I go, `Oh my God, you`re insulting me.` That you can have a gay parade on Christopher Street in New York, with naked men and women on a float cheering, `We`re here, we`re queer!` -- that`s what makes my heart swell. Not the flag, but a gay naked man or woman burning the flag. I get choked up with pride."
• “When Communist U.S.S.R. was a superpower, the world was better off. The right-wing media is trying to marginalize the peace movement.”
• "These guys hate that a black guy is in the White House. But they immigrant bash, they pretend taxes and tea bags, and like I said, most of them probably couldn't tell you thing one about taxation without representation, the Boston tea party, the British imperialism, whatever the history lesson has to be. But these people, all white for the most part, unless there's some people with Stockholm syndrome there."
• “I say at this point, for different reasons, Bush and Hussein are both very threatening to world peace and to deny that is to be incredibly naive.”
  

Garofalo crawled out from under whatever rock she calls home last night to appear on the show of fellow mudslinger, Bill Maher.



Now, we are having a civil war in this country. We have been having one for a very long time, we just have not started shooting at each other yet. In this conflict I understand that the other side will use any tactic which they deem to have a reasonable chance of success, so also, will we. Yet, they have been playing the race card for several months, and any reasonable tactician would have come to the conclusion by this time, that it is not going to work. But then again, I have never accused the left of being reasonable.

Now, That's Educating!

I am not a very big fan of Conan O'Brian, but this is a good bit.



The characters of Sesame Street must be big fans of the Glenn Beck show!

H/T: Black and Right