Bumper stickers spotted today on a vehicle in Harrisonville, Missouri:
The full effect. Yep, that’s an NRA sticker on the upper left.
Well, no, you’re not paying for a number of people who do have insurance. Yes, there is Medicare, Medicaid, and the Veterans Administration. But since you were at an event today in support of veterans I’d say you were at least good with the VA part, right? And, since the United States has the highest per capita cost of health care in the industrialized world, are you good with all those uninsured people who get their health care when it’s the most expensive? Yes, those who do have health insurance pay for those who don’t right now – in higher insurance rates.
July 8, 2009, 7:51 pm
U.S. Health Spending Breaks From the Pack
By CATHERINE RAMPELL
Despite the fact that the United States is the only industrialized nation that does not ensure that all its citizens have health care coverage, the United States spends a (much) higher percentage of its gross domestic product on health care than its peers. It also spends (much) more per person on health care than its peers….
That’s an International Association of Firefighters (IAFF) sticker on the left. It’s rather ironic considering that the IAFF is interested in health care reform (mostly):
Healthcare Reform
As both consumers of healthcare and the nation’s primary providers of pre-hospital emergency medical care, professional fire fighters know first-hand the shortcomings of our current health care system.
The cost of health care has risen dramatically in recent years, and fire fighters have been forced to give up wage increases and other benefits in order to maintain their health care coverage. And fire fighters witness the problems of the uninsured on a daily basis, as Americans without coverage increasingly rely on the 911 emergency response system as their primary health care provider.
On March 23, 2010, President Obama signed into law the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, which is intended to expand access to health insurance and reduce the cost of health care.
The IAFF supported certain parts of the legislation, but strongly opposed provisions that sought to reduce spending on health care by taxing the value of high cost insurance plans. The IAFF succeeded in limiting the scope of the tax and delaying its implementation for several years.
[emphasis added]
As for the bumper sticker on the right? Oh, I get it.
There’s nothing new in these type of “jokes”. Yes, it’s protected by the First Amendment, which is ironic considering where the vehicle was parked today at a large public demonstration about the First Amendment.
In May, 2008:
FOX Pundit Wishes for Obama Assassination, Laughs
….Perhaps I am overly optimistic, but I do not believe there are very many people in our country–or anywhere else for that matter–who laugh or find it remotely funny when broadcast pundits stoop to the level of making jokes about killing an elected leader. It does not feel funny. It feels like someone spitting in our faces….
Two years later, evidently not.
That secession thing didn’t work out so well the last time, did it? And I’m not so sure Texas (that is a Texas bumper sticker, right?) would like to secede since they’re a leading beneficiary of federal dollars:
Texas near the top for raking in federal dollars
By BENNETT ROTH Houston Chronicle Washington Bureau
Oct. 9, 2007, 10:07AM
WASHINGTON – Texas has long viewed itself as a conservative bastion, but the Lone Star State ranked third in the nation between 2000 and last year in receipt of federal dollars, raking in aid and contracts worth more than $1.2 trillion….
Guns:
Armed Protesters Thank Obama For Allowing Guns in Parks
– By Stephanie Mencimer
| Mon Apr. 19, 2010 9:29 AM PDT
….And the greatest irony of all? This rally would not have been possible during the Bush administration. That’s because it was Democrats who helped pass, and Obama who signed, a new law that went into effect in February allowing people to carry guns in national parks….
Freedom:
March 2nd, 2009
Bush Administration Claimed Fourth Amendment Did Not Apply to NSA Spying
News Update by Kurt Opsahl
In an October 23, 2001, Office of Legal Counsel memo released today, the Bush Administration concluded that “the Fourth Amendment does not apply to domestic military operations,” including “intercepting electronic or wireless communications” by “employing surveillance methods more powerful and sophisticated than those available to law enforcement agencies.” See Authority for Use of Military Force to Combat Terrorist Activities Within the United States at pp. 4, 18, and 25 (emphasis original).
When news of this memo first surfaced in a footnote to another memo, we wondered if it meant that the Administration’s lawyers advised that the National Security Agency (a component of the military) could spy on Americans with impunity and face no Fourth Amendment claim.
Turns out that the Bush Administration did think it could spy on Americans in the U.S. without regard to the Constitution….
Where were those bumper stickers from 2001 to 2009? Just asking.
The God part probably doesn’t apply to people born in Kenya who won’t produce their Hawaiian birth certificate.
