Report Dissidents to the White House
August 5, 2009, 7:48 am
Several people have emailed me this: Apparently the White House web site is asking that you report anyone writing things on health care that don’t match the Administration position so the White House can “keep track”.
There is a lot of disinformation about health insurance reform out there, spanning from control of personal finances to end of life care. These rumors often travel just below the surface via chain emails or through casual conversation. Since we can’t keep track of all of them here at the White House, we’re asking for your help. If you get an email or see something on the web about health insurance reform that seems fishy, send it to flag@whitehouse.gov.
Wow, “disinformation.” You wonder why people ever listen to those counter-revolutionaries and aren’t satisfied with just reading Pravda.
Well, we at the global headquarters of CoyoteBlog Enterprises are certainly happy to help. I sent them this email today:
Thanks for the opportunity to report disinformation where people write things that don’t match what the President is saying on health care. Please check out this document I found on the web — a number of parts bear very little relationship, and in fact outright contradict, what the President is promising about health care reform.
The link is to a copy of the House health care reform bill. If you are so inclined, you might wish to offer similar help.
Postscript: My son, who is a big fan of dystopic novels like George Orwell’s “1984? might ask if he would get extra credit for turning in a family member.
Update #1: The White House site in question is really ridiculous. It responds to critiques of what is actually in the bill with statements like “the President has consistently said that if you like your insurance plan, your doctor, or both, you will be able to keep them.” Well duh, of course he has. But this President, even more than the average President, will say just about anything.
At this point, since the President is purposely uninvolved in the crafting of the legislation and has admitted at times that he doesn’t even know the details of what is in it, talking about his promises or preferences is irrelevant. In fact, nobody is talking about the President’s promises and intentions any more, with actual legislation on the table. They are talking about what is actually in the written bills in the House and Senate.
So the question is, what is in the actual legislation, and does it match Obama’s promises, and the current answer is clearly “no.” And will the President veto a health care bill that doesn’t follow through on his promises? Don’t make me laugh. He is going to sign any bill with “health care” in the title no matter what it says — his advisers have already made that clear by saying that the entire Presidency is riding on having some kind of bill pass that does something with health care.
By the way, in this we can see the White House strategy for passing such controversial bills. Their hope is to jump directly from the President’s “everyone is a winner and there is no cost” rhetoric directly to signed legislation. They want people focused on his promises, which are enticing, and not the reality of the actual language of the bills, which is ugly and in many ways bear no relationship to the President’s rhetoric. This worked for the stimulus and almost worked for Waxman-Markey and was tried again for health care.
coyoteblog.com |
