Daily Archives: September 9, 2009

Thanks (again) Dave!

“Sarah Palin is making some dough. She’s going around the world speaking. She’s got a gig over in China. She’s very excited because she thinks that China is a red state.” – David Letterman

Damn You Barack Obama, Again | Oliver Willis

Oliver Willis shoves tongue in cheek again. But seriously, we elected the right damn guy at the right damn time.

I swear man. Every time. Like, every single time. They pile on they write him off and then he does his thing and gives a great speech that hits the points just about right. They said he was throwing the public option overboard, then he put 7 paragraphs of it in the speech. They said he was going to give his liberal base the cold shoulder, then he smacked the GOP around. They said he wasn’t emotional enough, then talked about Ted Kennedy, average Americans and the moral urgency of health care reform.

Damn you Barack Obama for bringing honor back to the presidency.

Republican Hero: Joe Wilson (no, not THAT one)

Someone needs – at minimum – to take this cretin from South Carolina out behind the woodshed and teach him how we do democracy here in America.

Good Democrats sat and listened to Bush dismantle our nation’s dignity and our freedoms without resorting to Tea Party thuggish bullshit. Maybe they shouldn’t have, but if you don’t have class, then why the hell should anyone listen to you.

Face it, Republicans have no class.

In case you missed it, this prick Joe Wilson, representing South Carolina nationally as honorably as his governor Mark Sanford does (namely, NOT) screamed “You Lie!” to the President during his address tonight.

Absolutely zero respect. Absolutely inappropriate behavior.

They should censure the guy. And maybe pop him in the kidneys.

If this is what the GOP has to offer, the four or five decent human beings left in that party should leave and find some other folks to play politics with. Dick Lugar, lead the charge.

Reprehensible. The Republican Way.

The White House – Press Office – Remarks by the President to a Joint Session of Congress on Health Care

Once I find some video, I’ll link it. For now, here is the text of the speech. Good stuff.

What follows is the letter Teddy Kennedy sent to President Obama. When you look at the duplicitous Chuck Grassley’s and the loathsome Joe Wilsons of the GOP, I am more and more glad I have cast my lot with Barack Obama, the legend of the Kennedys, and folks like Sherrod Brown and Jim Webb, even with the latter’s conservative tendencies. Hell, he makes it look almost rational.

May 12, 2009

Dear Mr. President,

I wanted to write a few final words to you to express my gratitude for your repeated personal kindnesses to me – and one last time, to salute your leadership in giving our country back its future and its truth.

On a personal level, you and Michelle reached out to Vicki, to our family and me in so many different ways. You helped to make these difficult months a happy time in my life.

You also made it a time of hope for me and for our country.

When I thought of all the years, all the battles, and all the memories of my long public life, I felt confident in these closing days that while I will not be there when it happens, you will be the President who at long last signs into law the health care reform that is the great unfinished business of our society. For me, this cause stretched across decades; it has been disappointed, but never finally defeated. It was the cause of my life. And in the past year, the prospect of victory sustained me-and the work of achieving it summoned my energy and determination.

There will be struggles – there always have been – and they are already underway again. But as we moved forward in these months, I learned that you will not yield to calls to retreat – that you will stay with the cause until it is won. I saw your conviction that the time is now and witnessed your unwavering commitment and understanding that health care is a decisive issue for our future prosperity. But you have also reminded all of us that it concerns more than material things; that what we face is above all a moral issue; that at stake are not just the details of policy, but fundamental principles of social justice and the character of our country.

And so because of your vision and resolve, I came to believe that soon, very soon, affordable health coverage will be available to all, in an America where the state of a family’s health will never again depend on the amount of a family’s wealth. And while I will not see the victory, I was able to look forward and know that we will – yes, we will – fulfill the promise of health care in America as a right and not a privilege.

In closing, let me say again how proud I was to be part of your campaign- and proud as well to play a part in the early months of a new era of high purpose and achievement. I entered public life with a young President who inspired a generation and the world. It gives me great hope that as I leave, another young President inspires another generation and once more on America’s behalf inspires the entire world.

So, I wrote this to thank you one last time as a friend- and to stand with you one last time for change and the America we can become.

At the Denver Convention where you were nominated, I said the dream lives on.

And I finished this letter with unshakable faith that the dream will be fulfilled for this generation, and preserved and enlarged for generations to come.

With deep respect and abiding affection,
[Ted]