Five Words to define HCR in the election season

Option A: Move forward or move backward

Option B: You Can’t Trust The Republicans

Hey, can’t hurt to have multiple options.

Ultimately the campaign over the HCR bill will have wild distortions, both for the contents of the bill and the moves that Republicans can do if they win in November.

The distortions, involving death panels, abortions, and tomatoes being poisonous, are not going to stop (zombie lies live forever) and only the most honed of the Republicans will be able to pick out a part of the bill, in the actual bill, that is the most objectionable. Which would be a fun game to play provided you have safety goggles on at the time.

As for the moves that are possible for the Republicans. They will not be able to do anything whatsoever to forcibly repeal the HCR law. They might remove portions but only if Obama agrees and an amendment to current law. If you hear a person voting Republican to repeal the law in 2011, they’re a sucker of the highest magnitude.

But plain and simple, the Republicans want to move backwards on Health Care and the only unknown is how far back they want to go when they’re tossing you out into the cold.

The alternative is moving forward. The alternative is making sure that America’s health care system is not just the biggest in the world, but that it keeps working to be the best in the world. Considering the Republican record, they’d only move forward while kicking and screaming the entire way. It’s not in their nature or reputation to move forward.

Moving forward and ironing out any possible flaws beats throwing the entire law out. Think about it, throwing the entire bill out is the statement that this is a 100% bad bill which is highly unlikely. Partly because there are a lot of elements to the bill and partly because it’d take a lot of coldness to reject every single part of the bill.

Shredding the innards of the bill and keeping some organs intact wouldn’t be a repeal, just a criminal assault. The Repealwecan Republicans want to go all the way backwards (how far, 1964? 1934? who knows).

You give the Republican an inch, they take a mile. You give them 51% and 286 electoral votes and they attempt to claim a mandate to kneecap Social Security. If they get 218 House seats and 51 Senate seats, they’d probably try to overexert themselves again.

What about the last 10 years tells you that you can trust the Republican Party? What about the last 15 months tells you that these guys are not going to propose extreme leaps back in time? Paul Ryan’s plan is not off their table and they’re prepared to be candidates who will smile when they talk about medicare and elected officials who will decimate that program.

George W. Bush has been retired to his historical infamy, but the architects of his putrid presidential policy still exist and they’re still fueling the House and Senate Republicans. These people seem to think that their policies were not rejected decisively in 2006 and 2008. Conservatives are looking all around the country and their idea is “Be more conservative”. It’s the electoral equivalent of swimming towards Niagara Falls in order to get towards dry land.

In essence, what you’d get in 2011 if the Republicans have Congress (or in 2013, if the crazy sauce has been passed out and Sarah Palin is in year 1 of her 2 1/4 year Presidency) is a faith-based plan on health care.

Why is it faith-based? because you need a lot of faith to not expect a Republican plan to be a 10 pound can of bad ideas. Only ignoring their record shields one from noticing what they are very likely to do.

Two questions to ask voters this fall

1) Do you want to move forward or backwards on health care in this country?

2) Can you trust Republicans if they win Congress back?

If you want to move this country forward, the last party you want to vote for is the Republican party. If you can’t trust the Republicans to not go crazy, like they did in 1995/1996, 2005, and so on, then don’t give them power.

This is not advanced chemistry here. I hope that the message on our side is direct and on the offensive. Only one side can move forward and deliver on this topic. We know what side that is.