24thState

Black Conservative Group Holds Press Conference, NAACP Sneers

A group of conservative black Republicans decided to get behind Kenneth Gladney and his suit against the SEIU this week.

The group, based around a social network at MoveOnUp.org, brought out the media and press in front of the NAACP to bring attention to the lack of attention Gladney has received from the organization.

What was the response?  The NAACP says, Gladney should have filed a complaint.

I'm curious if the NAACP waited for a complaint filed through their website before jumping on the bandwagon of the Duke Lacrosse Rape Hoax in 2006.  This national story, which the NAACP jumped into with such brilliant legal maneuvers as requesting a gag order on defendant's lawyers, turned out to be a total fabrication that ended with the DA resigining in disgrace.   Can we look back and see if there was a complaint on that case?

Michael Vick is another example.  The NAACP came out strongly in support of Vick at the time, claiming the loss of sponsors was premature when Vick was indicted.  Did Vick file a complaint with the NAACP to get that notice, or was it just a way to jump in front of the cameras.

Gladney was attacked outside a townhall in Mehlville August 6th, and the NAACP has been silent.  While leftwing bloggers work behind the scenes to discredit Gladney with talk of dark rightwing conspiracies, a criminal and civil case continues.  When the information is fully displayed before the public, will the NAACP come out in support?  As they all too often point out, the case is often fought in the court of public opinion.  In this case, they've proved once again that black men who are not sufficiently commited to the liberal cause are not their constituents. 

Health Care Reform I Would Support

One of my commenters challenged me to discuss what I would support in healthcare.  Here are fifteen points. Some are state, some are federal, but I am against new federal taxes, new federal bureaucracies, or single-payer, or other bloated government monstrosities in general.   Here are 20 commonsense ways to address healthcare I would support.

1. Allow small businesses and individuals to group together and buy insurance.
2. Allow insurers to sell across different states, preventing state mandates from driving up the cost of insurance.  Right now, you’re stuck paying for anything your state legislators decide should be covered, which is more than another state's legislators may decide should be covered.  This includes major and minor pieces, but these unfunded mandates push up the costs for all of us. 
3. Mandate the full cost of insurance be shown by employers, so people aren't suprised when they go on COBRA.  COBRA is insurance portability.  It's only wildly expensive if your employer is paying the lion's share.  Which means if you're currently paying $300 a month, and then find out COBRA will cost you $2000, it's because your employer is paying $1700 a month for you.  Those are hidden wage increases people don't count as their compensation. 
4. Remove tax deductions from insurance for employers, or add them for individuals and business owners.  Level that playing field to increase the ability to change jobs.
5. For the uninsured, increase the number of local clinics available for routine treatment.  Make it easier for Walgreen’s and Walmart to address these issues.
6. Allow for more choice of catastrophic coverage – so those with a tough economic time can go to a clinic for regular treatment, emergency rooms for real emergencies, and have catastrophic insurance in case of cancer or other types of illnesses.
7. Close the border. This is crushing border states, and now moving inward. 
8. Allow hospitals to turn away patients without insurance for non-life threatening injuries (state law not federal).
9. Work on improving Medicare and Medicaid billing  Too many doctors are not accepting Medicare for new patients, and it's a crisis that is coming.  Fix the problem on the government side. 
10. Eliminate the false distinction of the employer portion of Medicare and Social Security.  This is another wage issue, where people are paid less because employers are forced to contribute money for their employment.  Small businesses and individuals pay the combined employer and employee tax.  Every American should know the total burden is actually 15.3%.  This would raise wages, but that money would still be gone.  Let's do away with these false, hidden taxes.
11. If we must have a public option, it needs to be a “we’ll stop you from dying right now, but we’re not taking care of you permanently.” People need to learn that they have to work harder and pay for gold-plated insurance.  
12. Prevent insurance companies from dropping patients who pay their premiums on time.  Set a ceiling on the amount a premium can be raised in a year. 
13. Create a rating system on billing and complaint response for insurance companies. One of the major problems is small claims that aren't worth the time to fight.  If you fight a $10.00 charge, it will cost you more than just accepting it.  Create a Better Business Bureau type of system where companies compete to get the best rating. 
14. Make pre-existing conditions apply to all people equally (which will raise costs).  Individuals should be able to purchase as much as those working for companies (when we had a pre-existing condition, we incorporated, and the insurance was then paid by the company, which covered the whole thing).
15. Those who voluntarily choose to forgo insurance are not penalized, but they should have a waiting period before a non-life threatening illness is found when they are uninsured.
16. Children’s insurance, S-Chip, should only be provided for children under the age of 18.
17. Mandate that all federal, state, and local union and government worker benefits promised in collective bargaining be fully accounted for and paid up front based on realistic growth scenarios.  Do not allow elected officials to sign contracts pushing costs into the future when they are out of office, but keeping the taxpayer on the hook. 
18. Publish health costs for all elected and confirmed officials in a lump based on branch.  Show Congress, Cabinet Heads and President, and Supreme Court.  We want to see what it costs to keep our representatives healthy, and compare that with what the rest of us get.
19. Post final bills for all health system changes up for 2 weeks online before they are voted on, to allow the public to see them.
20. Broadcast all negotiations for healthcare changes live on C-Span, as was promised by President Obama when he ran for office.

Much of this can be accomplished in small bites, and every bit of it makes sense.  It drives the system to more transparency, more accountability, and more freedom, and away from bureaucratic decisions.  It forces people to take responsibility, but works against allowing insurance companies to take advantage of the individual.  Mostly, it brings the system into parity and eliminates the distortions that warp choices about jobs, costs, and health choices.

And while you're at it, you can slash non-essential government programs to free up room to pay down the deficit and prepare for the Medicare trainwreck heading our way.  A strong economy with a small government can handle it.  A bloated, broke economy and government can not.

Arrest Video Of Carnahan Crew Members Brian Matthews And Javonne Spitz

The original video of Javonne Spitz shows a little old lady in a pink shirt crying and asking why she is arrested. It is here at the Post Dispatch website. In that posting, Spitz admits to being an activist and being part of the Carnahan Crew in the comments. Took me a while to determine whether or not to post this, but this is the full story of Javonne Spitz and Brian Matthews, two Carnahan Crew members who spent the day trying to make problems for the healthcare protests.
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Keep in mind the standard response of Carnahan has been this was a conference on aging, and he couldn't figure out why the Tea Party was there. And yet, members of his crack volunteer army are there, snapping pictures, making a nuisance of themselves, and eventually arrested for interfering. 

TownHalls (Mellow Remix)

Yes, there is a lot of noise at the townhalls, but don't be convinced there is constant rage.  You see the explosive moments (much of which is appearing to be faked - more on that later), but you don't see the more casual side.

Here is some of the tame side. 

I have some other interesting footage, both of the Carnahan and McCaskill townhalls, but am working on raw footage to get the basic angles for what promises to be a very revealing look at how certain people get on television, and who is behind it.

More On The Button Controversy

Adam at StlActivistHub found pictures and analyzed video that corroborates a portion of Elston McCowan's story.  While the existence of the Dope Button, seen here, does not negate Elston's story, it also does not prove that he is telling the story of the assault.  It does bring the question of the credibility of David Brown to the forefront, and so to get to the heart of the matter, I called him.

My main question to David was this:  Why did you send me 6 images, when it was clear that I was asking about the Obama smoking weed badge?

David forwarded me this picture, and said he didn't believe Kenneth was selling that button.  David and another associate sold the DOPE button, and this was the subject of Javonne Spitz's photograph.  I asked David to contact Kenneth and verify whether that was true, because the board shown in the video pretty clearly has that same button.  David says if Kenneth was selling the button, then he was mistaken in his email.  Kenneth had his own board of purchased materials.  I'm not happy with that answer, but in all fairness, this was two emails traded very late at night, and I did not verify it with David before posting.  

The conversation did clear up many other small matters. 

1) One, David is not a real estate attorney, and he was not Kenneth's lawyer prior to this event.
2) David is not representing Kenneth in his civil suit, as David is a material witness. 
3) David owns a side business that sells merchandise at both conservative and liberal events.  
4) David is seen earlier in the day with another young black man who is not Kenneth.  This man is the one photographed by Javonne Spitz.
5) According to David, Elston McCowan and Perry Molens first saw David and his buttons earlier in the day while they were in line at about 6:30.  They accused David at that point of being racist for having Obama in whiteface (a parody of the Shepard Fairey Hope poster) that you see.
6) Javonne Spitz and Brian Matthews, who were lated arrested for interfering with the police, were involved with David and the second black man earlier in the day. Javonne says, "come here black man," and takes a picture of him next to the Dope button, and Brian Matthews goes to get police officers to I guess complain about them selling buttons.
7) I have significant amounts of footage of Javonne Spitz that day, acting increasingly erratic.  She was arrested for interfering, which I have on tape, but she is also part of the criminal assault case.
8) Kenneth was not an employee or contractor of David's.  He purchased buttons and flags wholesale from David to sell on his own.  David has known Kenneth for three years.
9) This was Kenneth's first time selling merchandise.  It was not David's, who had done so several times at Tea Party events this year. 
10) David was not an eyewitness to the immediate attack.  There are three specific witnesses who are, and who are currently unnamed, and those people have given information to the police.
11) The video of the event is clearly the aftermath.  David is the man in the blue shirt and shorts, standing next to the board in the foreground.  He is not, as some claimed, the man in white polo who tells Perry Molens "you're going to jail."  He picked up the board and flags and stowed them in the car directly after the melee, as they were Kenneth's merchandise.

The button controversy does not disprove Elston McCowan's statements to KMOX or to the socialist reporter. It also does not disprove anything about Gladney's statements.  Both men now agree the dispute started when Elston asked Kenneth about the buttons he was selling.

Here are some things we do know.
1) McCowan admits Perry Mullens struck Kenneth Gladney
2) McCowan maintains that Gladney, all of 140 pounds, tackled McCowan a good 240 or more to the ground and struck him repeatedly.
3) McCowan claims that Mullens tried to reason with Gladney, claiming McCowan wouldn't fight back because he was a minister.
4) The evidence for this is from a reporter for a Socialist newspaper, who already knew McCowan and Mullens
5) McCowan claims he was attacked and never responded, but in the video, he's claiming Kenneth pushed him first.
6) There is a fourth person identified who was not arrested.
7) 2 SEIU staff were arrested on suspicion of assault, one woman was arrested for hitting a citizen photographer (who also has a lawyer and is involved), and two Carnahan Crew members, identified earlier by a ShowMeProgress blogger as problem causers, were arrested (this I have on tape).  Jake Wagman was also arrested, a reporter for the Post Dispatch.
8) No conservatives, no Tea Party protestors, or any other people affiliated with the Tea Party were arrested.
9) McCowan says Gladney smacked his hand, hit him several times, then pushed him down. 

I appreciate the attention from Adam, who has now posted three blogposts based on inaccurate analysis of the video and inaccurate blog reports, but at some point, the truth will come out, and he's going to have to admit he was wrong.

In the end, this all comes down to people who were actually there, and we should be finding out the truth of that shortly. 

This is McCowan's story on the International Journal of Socialist Renewal.

"I was one of six or seven SEIU members and staff who went to the meeting on ageing that [US House of Representative member] Russ Carnahan (Democrat, St. Louis) held”, McCowan told me. “When the forum started, the Tea Party people started yelling that they wanted to talk about Obama’s healthcare proposal. So we told them to stop shouting because we could all ask questions after the speakers.

“Then the Carnahan folks then said that you could only ask a question if you had written it on one of their forms. But they hadn’t given any of the forms to either Tea Party or SEIU. So both groups left the meeting in a bad mood.”

Walking outside, McCowan saw Gladney selling buttons of Obama in blackface and Obama smoking weed. Feeling insulted, McCowan asked why a black man would be hawking material denigrating the first black president as he pointed to one of the buttons.

“When I pointed at the button, Gladney slapped my hand. So I told him not to hit me and pointed at it again and repeated my question. He smacked my hand even harder, hit me several times and pushed me down. As I went down, I grabbed him by reflex to break my fall. I hit my shoulder and something popped. I lost consciousness for a moment but soon realised that Gladney continued to hit me.

“Another SEIU guy, Perry Molens, came over and told Gladney, ‘He’s a minister and won’t fight back. He can’t see out of one eye. Stop hitting him!’. When Gladney kept on, Perry tried to get him off of me and threw a punch in the process.

“I don’t know why Gladney had an attorney on hand, but his attorney came over yelling ‘You two attacked him!’. Gladney went off to find cops and told them to arrest us. The cops wouldn’t listen to us and did what the Tea Party people told them to do. They arrested me, Perry, a newspaper reporter and three supporters of healthcare reform.”

Commenters all across the web, most aimed with bad information, are trying to state that McCowan was walking away, when he was attacked out of nowhere.  That was also McCowan's first comment to the Post Dispatch.  Now McCowan says the attack was all Gladney, and that it occurred directly at the button board, but traveled 25-30 feet to the curb as Gladney, 140 lb Gladney, attacked two large SEIU shirted men for no reason.

To believe McCowan, you have to really suspend disbelief. We'll find out soon enough  

Buttons Sold By Kenneth Gladney Could Be Key To Disproving Elston McCowan

UPDATE:  Adam at StlActivistHub has pictures from Javonne Spitz of a button that that shows Obama smoking with the word HOPE over it. That backs up the portion of McCowan's story of why he went up to Gladney.  I'm going to ask Brown why he didn't tell me that upfront, as it was clear from our emails that the buttons that were sold had the potential to corroborate or disprove McCowan's story.  It doesn't prove McCowan was the victim, but I am wondering why Brown tried to mislead me.   

Second Update:  This story is not complete.  I'm assembling what I know, and will present a full report later today. -12:23 p.m. Sunday, August 16th

Begin Original Post:

I got a press release from David Brown, the attorney (and friend) for Kenneth Gladney, claiming the story Elston McCowan is now telling has been disproven.

Brown cites the original statement by McCowan in the Post Dispatch,

"But Elston McCowan, an SEIU staffer, said Gladney was actually an instigator. McCowan accused Gladney of attacking him as he walked to his car. McCowan     said he suffered a dislocated shoulder.

"Out of nowhere, the guy just assaults me," said McCowan, 47, of St. Louis."

I heard McCowan state on KMOX with Mark Reardon on Thursday that he walked up to Gladney and asked him about what was on the board, because he saw a button with Obama in blackface, and another with him smoking weed.  As Brown pointed out, that certainly is different than McCowan walking to his car, and then Gladney assaulting him out of nowhere.  McCowan repeats this story to Don Fitz of the International Journal of Socialist Renewal.

Video of the aftermath of the event has been dissected by left-wing bloggers, who claim that Gladney can be seen trying to kick McCowan, but the video only shows a second SEIU man (also arrested) throwing Gladney roughly to the ground, and the event takes place almost 30 feet away from the board with the buttons and flags.  This shows the video is the aftermath, as both men say it started at the board. 

It would also seem that there is an easy way to tell who is lying.

I emailed Brown back at the press release address.  I have not met David and have never spoken to him. I asked him if he had the buttons, and if any of them had Obama in blackface or smoking weed.  Brown sent me six designs you see posted on this blogpost to the left, and writes,

"Attached please find the buttons that were sold that day by Kenneth."

That's a pretty clear declaration.

We now have a way to know if someone is lying.  The buttons were manufactured or purchased by Brown (that's how he knows Kenneth, who was selling them for Brown).  He sent me these six designs.  If there are two more designs on the board, or if someone has one of the buttons sold by Kenneth, or if there are pictures of the buttons, then we know that Brown is lying.

But if these are the only six buttons that Kenneth sold - if there was never any merchandise showing Obama smoking weed or in blackface - then we know that McCowan is lying, and created a story to cover his role in this.  It's a pretty clear case at that point.  McCowan has made public statements, and so has Gladney.  These contradict each other.

All we need to do is find those mysterious Obama buttons, or not, and we'll know the truth.  If you have pictures or video that show the board Kenneth was using, or if you have a picture of a button from that night, please forward them confidentially to editor@24thstate.com. 

Like many of the other people involved in the Tea Party, I have been concerned about the story.  I know one person in the video (a witness), and have video footage of the arrest of Javonne Spitz and Brian Matthews.  The story put out by SEIU keeps lumping Jake Wagman of the Post Dispatch and Javonne and Brian in with the two SEIU staff (Perry Mullins and Elston McCowan), and that's not an accurate description of what happened - it's designed to make the officers look bad, and I'll be posting that video after I speak with a lawyer about whether I can post it.  We're still waiting to hear the identity of the sixth person arrested, a woman who hit a girl filming part of the aftermath (the woman was arrested immediately by  a police officer that saw the assault according to the video).  The story is simply too outrageous, and there's a fear that it would be used to discredit the Tea Party (which was the point of all the media coverage).  But it looks like we finally will get an answer.

Someone is lying.  Now we find out who.

In a related comment concerning McCowan's credibility - On Thursday Mark Reardon brought up the fire in McCowan's van that McCowan blamed on the Slay campaign.  During the interview, McCowan claims he only said, "I wouldn't put it past him."  That was reported in the Post Dispatch. In fact, in a statement to KMOX, McCowan said,

"We probably need some type of FBI protection, because this is kind of reminiscent of the 60's,"  McCowan told KMOX News.  "We are attempting to run for office in St. Louis, a city that's rife with corruption, with police scandal."

Adam At St Louis Activist Hub Plays With Video

You know you're losing an argument when you're forced to cut video to try to prove a point.  Adam over at St Louis Activist Hub, last seen trying to analyze the video of the assault on Kenneth Gladney by Elston McCowan and claiming Gladney was the attacker, is now trying to play with video snippets and show angry white girls berating the relatives of Maxine Johnson after she was escorted from last week's townhall.

Here is Adam's take.

Here are the rest of the videos on the YouTube channel he cites, WashUPeaceCoalition (you just know they got class credit for going down to this), which shows clearly why those women were arguing with Maxine's daughter and friend. 

Here's one video, that shows the white woman saying, "The government wants you to keep your mouth shut."  Maxine's daughter thinks the girl is telling her to keep her mouth shut, but that's not what she said.  Then you see the women arguing, in what Adam charmingly refers to as Blaming the Victim.  That's a game you play, called, "Clipping the video to try and make something seem different than it was."

Maxine Johnson Lies On National Television

This YouTube video unmasks Maxine Johnson, the woman given national prominence as a victim who had her poster ripped from her at the Claire McCaskill townhall, as a liar and a race baiter.

Maxine is seen in this CNN interview claiming that she saw someone at Hillsboro college with the sign, "N-word Obama."  She doesn't say N-word, but goes for the whole enchilada at 4:05 in the recording.

Really?  She really is going to say that? Hundreds of cameras and video recorders, and press everywhere dying to get a picture of the racist white hordes that all hate Obama and are paid by the insurance companies, and not one caught a picture of this racist sign? 

Maxine Johnson is a liar and she's using her national attention to spread race-baiting words of nonsense on national television.  The reporter said nothing.  Then Maxine says at 4:34 in the video that an officer tells her that they can not guarantee her safety?  Are you kidding me?  A police officer tells Maxine Johnson that he can't guarantee her safety?

She's a fraud.  She's a liar, and she and her friends brought in three signs.  It wasn't just Rosa Parks. It was also Martin Luther King, and it was also....Barack Obama.  Maxine and her friends brought in posters that included Obama.  To claim that she was holding up a poster of Rosa Parks because she just got off Rosa Parks Highway is a crock.  She was there for Obama, not to honor Parks. 

As for police officers treating her different?

She marches in and the crowd boos the fact they have an Obama sign.  The man comes to take it away after she sits down, and she jumps up to get her sign back. The two police officers that get there separate the two, and immediately the black woman starts struggling, while the white guy is calmly led away.  As Maxine struggles, another police officer comes along and they quickly escort her outside, and then calmly take her statement.   The crowd was cheering someone who was trying to make a sign getting escorted out. 

No racism - just keeping the peace - the way they're supposed to.  It's pretty simple. When you're spoiling a fight, you usually get one.  The white guy shouldn't have taken her sign, but let's not pretend Maxine Johnson is some innocent victim.  At this point, I'm not sure which person was less credible, Maxine for lying or the CNN talking head for not stopping and saying, "wait - what?  You saw a racist Obama sign?  And the police couldn't guarantee your safety?"

It would help race relations immensely if we could at least report the facts and shun liars.

Update:  Mark Reardon questions her about the story of the sign with the n-word, and she "clarifies" it was her daughter that saw it, it was a small sign, letter size, posted to some person's shirt, so maybe that's why no one else saw it.

So let's stop for one second and think.  Does anyone who isn't trying to create racial animosity believe that no one else at that townhall saw that shirt and said anything.  I can tell you that I would have said something, because I would have immediately suspected a plant, as we saw in Detroit with the Obama with the Hitler mustache.  And if someone had reported that to a police officer, the guy would have been rushed out, just so it couldn't be on the news and embarrass the college.  The story stinks to high heaven, and unless they can show some proof, I'm going to have to go with the she's lying through her teeth, hoping to get notoriety after attempting to disrupt the townhall.  There were a lot of video cameras around her afterwards.  I have video, as do many others.  When exactly did this officer say he couldn't guarantee her safety? 

Note she wasn't removed from the auditorium for having a sign.  She was removed when officers saw what could become a physical confrontation and acted to stop it.   

The Importance Of Public Schools

The Post Dispatch has a good front page story on the changes made in the St Louis Public School System.  It's a story that sadly runs every few years, and most of us in the region probably roll our eyes and say "good luck," but we're missing the point.

We want those schools to succeed.  We need those schools to succeed.  Public schools that turn out kids who can read, write and count are the single greatest bulwark against tyranny, crime, and societal degradation.  Educated youth mean less out-of-marriage births, lower crime rates, a competent workforce, and individuals who take responsibility for their actions rather than wards of the state.

God bless homeschoolers, who are wonderful people and do amazing by their kids, but we need most people to feel the schools in their district are worth going to, and will do right by their kids. Especially in the city of St Louis, which so often is the brunt of jokes and dismissal, we need schools that work, that not only give rise to those few supremely gifted and disciplined youth who escape from rough surroundings, but also for the vast majority of children who see little before them but a life of, crime, dependency, and despair.

Good schools would reduce the tension between the black and white community, encourage integration of our workforces, and prevent populist politicians from using the poor and the uneducated as political pawns.  Those of us who work know that the best way to break down racial barriers is to spend time among people who act like us, went to the same schools, shared the same experiences, and have a difference only of skin color or cultural heritage know that it begins with a quality education.

Lord knows it's not money - we pour more down the cesspool of public education than we ever have, and the results are worse each year.  So this year, let's all say a prayer and look for ways to encourage the St Louis Public School system to work.  It's good the kids, the community, and the region. 

Missouri Progressive Bloggers Support Child Sex Slave Trafficking

Got your attention, didn't I.  The title isn't a publicity stunt - I'm actually going to use the reasoning of the progs to show how they are best buddies with the people who run Child Sex Slave rings.

I'm proposing a bill to take 50% of income of all progressive bloggers in Missouri to be used to create a multi-national fighting force that will eradicate child sex slave trafficking across the globe.  The money will be automatically deducted from any deposits into the bank accounts of said bloggers, and if they don't contribute at least $2000 a month, we're going to assess a penalty to them for not working hard enough to eradicate this scourge from the planet.

Now, we can all agree that child sex slave trafficking is horrible, and it is a crisis that must be addressed.  3000 girls a day are forced into this trade, and over the next decade, we'll see 10 million young women put into this heartbreaking industry.  We know that if young girls are educated and saved from being sex slaves, they can grow to be healthy citizens of the world who can work and provide taxes, and maybe there's an Einstein or a Mother Teresa or a Michelle Obama in there!  If we can stop all child sex slave trafficking the results will be good for the world, and it's a moral imperative.

So my bill, which takes money from the bank accounts of Missouri progressive bloggers directly, and which asseses a penalty for not working hard enough, is directly aimed at solving a problem, and we need to pass it immediately.  There are those that say my bill is not the best solution, and we should take the time to find another, more effective way that doesn't unfairly penalize progressive bloggers. To that I say we've been working on stopping child sex slavery for almost 3300 years, when the Israelites wiped out the Baal worshippers in ancient Judea. 

Those Missouri progressive bloggers who don't want this bill to pass are protecting the status quo.  They know that child sex slave traffickers make obscene profits, and while I can't prove that ShowMeProgress and FiredUp are funded by child sex slave executives, I do know that it makes no sense to allow a vocal minority to disrupt the process of ending the abuse of young girls.  Why would they stand in the way of something so important?  Why Sean Nicholson standing up for billions of dollars in profit to greedy and violent criminals?  Where is his compassion? 

So there you have it.  Progressive bloggers need to sit down and be quiet, and let us go about solving the problems of child sex slave trafficking.

This is the logic of the left on healthcare.  Progs verbally assault those of us who see a greater danger in massive government intervention in the free market portions of our healthcare system as best buddies and pals of the insurance industry.  The president and his astroturf allies accuse us of supporting the status quo, when it is the president and his astroturf allies who are working with the major companies that will find a way to benefit financially from this so-called healthcare reform.  We simply asked the representatives read the bills, show us the language, and be accountable for their votes.  For this we're called un-American, treasonous traitors funded by shadowy corporations and the GOP?

We've reached a point where the left has stopped pretending to be reasonable.  They are liars and thieves who lack the stones to sell their ideas on their own merits.  They propose a public option designed to drive us to single payer, and their only response, is "no it doesn't."

Don't fall for it.  I won't be lectured by lazy bloggers unwilling to debate the issue in public, especially when those progressive bloggers support the kidnapping and abuse of small girls in the global sex slave trade.   They should be ashamed.  And if any of them has the courage, that offer to debate is still open.  So far, none of them are willing to actually discuss the issues.  They can only snipe from the shadows, creating wild conspiracies in the face of overwhelming public anger.