Alan Grayson Prays To God For The Souls Of The Teabaggers Who Are Trying To Prevent People From Getting Health Care

The vote to end debate and proceed with the vote, following Ted Cruz's sillibuster Tuesday night, was 100-0. Cruz had asked his GOP colleagues to vote no, insisting that “voting otherwise will be allowing the Majority Leader to fund Obamacare." But, in he end, even Ted Cruz (R-TX) and Mike Lee (R-UT) realized it was pointless to continue a faux-filibuster meant to prevent millions of Americans from having health coverage. Is Obamacare perfect? Of course not; it was devised by the Heritage Foundation as a conservative scheme to stave off single-payer/Medicare-for-all. But it's a decent halfway step towards the goal-- which Democrats should be aggressively pushing now. Maybe John McCain persuaded the two Tea Party crackpots to give up and vote for cloture, when he chided Cruz about his Nazi bullcrap:

"I spoke to Senator Cruz about my dissatisfaction about his use of this language and he said he only intended it to be applied to pundits and not to members of the Senate. I find that a difference without a distinction. I find that something that I think I had to respond to."

"I do not begrudge Senator Cruz or any other senator who wants to come and talk as long as they want to or as long as they can, depending on the rules of the Senate, but I do disagree strongly to allege that there are people today who are like those who, prior to world War II, didn't stand up and oppose the atrocities that were taking place in Europe."

"Because I have an open and honest disagreement with the process of not agreeing to move forward with legislation which I agree with which was passed through the House of Representatives, and comparing it to those who appeased, who were the appeasers, as Senator Cruz described them, is an inappropriate place for debate on the floor of the United States Senate."

Or maybe Cruz heard Alan Grayson's prayer for the souls of teabaggers in Tallahassee and everywhere.

What’s worse than threatening a government shutdown? Threatening a government shutdown in order to deny healthcare to millions of Americans.

And that’s exactly what the Tea Party Republicans are doing. They are not only trying to establish the reign of anarchy in America. They are doing so to make sure-- make absolutely certain-- that sick people cannot get the care that they need to stay alive.

That is so twisted.

This is the crucial point that our Congressman With Guts, Alan Grayson, made on national TV last month, when he discussed the latest efforts by the Greedy Obstructionist Party (GOP) to repeal Obamacare. Here is what he said:

Reverend Al Sharpton: Congressman Grayson, let me start with you. The [Republicans argue that the] healthcare law is “racist” because of a tanning tax? I mean, is that all they’ve got left?

Congressman Alan Grayson: Well, it’s another weapon of mass distraction. What [Obamacare] does is that it extends healthcare to the 50 million people in this country who can’t see a doctor when they’re sick, and it makes it affordable for everyone else. It does that through commonsense things like having standard contracts, like having a website that you can go to so that you can pool your buying power with others, and so on. None of this should be controversial, but it is, because the Tea Party Republicans are bent on making it that way-- by ignoring reality. All they want to do-- the fundamental principle of the Republican Party these days-- is “Let’s make absolutely certain that poor people can’t get healthcare when they’re sick.” That’s what it’s come down to. President Lincoln, one of the founders of the Republican Party, said that the principle involved here was “[malice toward none, and charity] for all.” [Lincoln’s Second Inaugural Address – Ed.] Yet they want to make sure that people who are sick can’t see a doctor. That’s how far they’ve come down. Their “principles” are making the Republican Party the largest suicide pact in history. I just hope they don’t bring us down with them...

Rev. Sharpton: Yeah, you know, Congressman, the fact is when you look at how it’s beginning to work, even Republicans [like Governor] Jan Brewer, of Arizona, who was waving her finger in the President’s face the last time she greeted him on the tarmac, [even she] is now praising the healthcare law, and acting like the most gracious hostess. When you look at Massachusetts, it already has universal health coverage, and look at how popular it is. Eighty-four percent of people in that state say they are satisfied with their healthcare coverage...

Congressman Grayson: For sure, and there are already practical results that you can point to. There are tens of millions of people who could not get health coverage and could not get healthcare because they had preexisting conditions. Now they can get that [coverage and care]. My wife is one of them. She had a stroke a few years ago. She couldn’t get any sort of private individual health coverage before [Obamacare], and now she can. That’s just one example. How about youths? … Now, up until the age of 26, they can remain on their parents’ [health insurance] policies. Over and over again, what you see is that this bill has done a lot of good, in places that have cooperated. In California, health insurance premiums are down by approximately 20 percent. What happens is that in places like Florida, where the Republican majority in Tallahassee has dragged its feet, you have these [health insurance] problems getting worse, not getting better. We have a million people in Florida who are not going to get coverage under Obamacare simply because the Republican majority in Tallahassee wouldn’t go along with it, even though it would cost the state nothing for the next three years. According to a Harvard study, roughly one thousand people, every year, will die because they don’t get this health coverage in Florida that the [federal] government would be extending to them, and we wouldn’t have to pay anything extra for. There’s going to be a lot of blood on their hands in Tallahassee, and God help them on Judgment Day.

And there it is. It’s cruel enough to threaten to shut down the Government for crass political purposes. But to threaten to shut down the Government in order to deny sick people the care that they need, that’s just... evil.

Thank goodness that someone is willing to say it-- just that way.

Please chip in to Alan Grayson's reelection fund here.





UPDATE: Corker vs Cruz

Republican clowns spent today trying to entertain Senate Democrats. Watch these crazy people: