What They Hell Is Wrong With Richard Burr? Hurting Vets Isn't Enough-- Now He Wants To Spread Cancer And Heart Disease?

A couple days ago Rachel Maddow blew the whistle on the block North Carolina's obstructionist Senator Richard Burr's has on the nomination of Tammy Duckworth for a job in the Veteran's Affairs Department. Duckworth, who is universally recognized as one of the country's most forceful and effective advocates for vets when she ran the Illinois Veteran's Affairs Dept is a highly decorated officer in the National Guard who lost both legs in combat in Iraq. Maddow to Burr: "How about diligently doing the right thing right now and picking a different high horse to ride in on, ok?"

Burr, another garden variety Republican vet-hating war-monger and extremist, avoided the military because he was too busy selling lawn furniture for seventeen years and forging ties with the Big Business interests that would later finance his political career. He's on the Senate Armed Services Committee and is the ranking Repug on the Senate Veterans' Affairs Committee. The only pro-war bill he ever opposed was on May 24, 2007, not because it made emergency supplemental appropriations for our military in Iraq, but because it also included appropriations to support efforts to save New Orleans (i.e., African Americans) from the ravages of Hurricane Katrina. The bill passed 80-14 despite Burr's obstinate Jesse Helm's imitation.

Now about Burr's ongoing campaign to spread cancer and heart disease. Is that hyperbole? Not really. On Thursday the House passed the Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act 298-112, with seventy Republicans telling John Boehner he could stuff his tobacco bribery checks where the sun don't shine, crossing the aisle and voting with the Democrats. Burr, who has taken more bribes from Big Tobacco than any other member of Congress except Miss McConnell-- yes even more than notorious tobacco whores John Boehner (R-OH) and Eric Cantor (R-VA)-- has never ceased battling against legislation regulating his paymasters in the tobacco companies. He has been Congress' chief opponent to warning labels and now he's vowing to filibuster the bill the House just passed, which seeks to lower the number of deaths-- currently 400,000 per year-- related to smoking tobacco.

President Obama supports the bill and his administration issued a statement explaining why:

Cigarette smoking is the leading preventable cause of death in the United States and is a contributing factor to scores of diseases and conditions inflicting misery upon millions of our citizens. Further, tobacco use is a major factor driving the increasing costs of health care in the U.S. and accounts for over a hundred billion dollars annually in financial costs to the economy.

When the House passed the same bill in 2008, Burr had threatened a filibuster then too-- and Bush said even if the Senate passed it, he would veto it. There were 60 Senate sponsors at the time, not enough to override a veto, so they just put it off for a year. Now they'll just need to shut down Burr's filibuster-- and that takes 60 votes. Supporters have closer to 70.