Culture

The Republicans have shutdown the government-so much for visiting the Statue of Liberty

The amazing irony that ObamaCare launched on the same day as the government shutdown shouldn’t be lost on anyone. In fact, trying to defund the law, or repeal it or redund it, or whatever it is that Republicans are trying to do, is just the icing on a shit cake that they’ve been whipping up for the past four years to the exclusion of everything else. Except for the anti-immigration shit cake. And the Benghazi shit cake. And the invasive vagina shit cake. My point is that if this Congress were a bakery, it would be shut down by the health department (that is, if the government itself wasn’t shut down) for peddling a product that was such a public health hazard that they themselves would be subjected to a level of shame and vitriol usually reserved for the peddlers of pink slime.

"I am actually surprised that the Tea Party buzzkills didn’t try to stop tours of Lady Liberty long ago, with the claim that ascension into the statue was a gateway activity to a life of sexual deviance."

Wait. Their approval ratings are already lower than those who sell coagulated meat parts to children. Never mind. I make this comparison because since the very beginning of the ObamaCare debate, the willful lies Republicans used to turn people against it have been staggering and divisive, and one part of the irony in all of this is that the GOP is using a healthcare bill to put the government on life support. 

What has happened already is that the “non essential” government agencies like state parks and monuments are closed. The number of New Yorkers the shutdown could affect is staggering. Estimates go from 60 thousand to 116,000 employees alone, depending who you ask. And that’s not including benefit recipients of home heating help, veteran pensions and Head Start. Every agency seems to be scrambling to see how much they have in reserves before the check delays start happening.

So if you were planning to visit The Statue Of Liberty, you are screwed. I am actually surprised that the Tea Party buzzkills didn’t try to stop tours of Lady Liberty long ago, with the claim that ascension into the statue was a gateway activity to a life of sexual deviance. Or at the very least, call her a whore for taking money in exchange for letting strangers all up in her business. In fact, when the government is back up and running they should replace her torch with a transvaginal wand. 

The drumbeat of lies leading up to the nationwide shutdown, though, was loud, frantic and everywhere. The real ugliness started with Sarah Palin’s verbal spin art that ObamaCare death panels would be created to kill Grandma. The good news is the only thing killed was her credibility. Then the insanity started escalating faster than Nancy Grace reporting from a taped-off Orlando crime scene. We were warned ObamaCare was like Nazi Germany and in the same breath that it would be paying for the healthcare of “illegal immigrants.”

Those two statements triggered one of my Cable News-induced catatonic mumblings, prompting me to think: It’s either like Nazi Germany or it’s covering immigrants, but I am pretty sure Hitler was not proposing healthcare for “outsiders.” Can you at least get the hate straight? You know it’s gotten bad when you have become so disillusioned by politicians that all you really ask of them is to pick one lie and stick with it.

And when I hear “Obama didn’t compromise,” I start crawling around on all fours hoping to find a reason to live in the fibers of the carpeting. Good Lord. ObamaCare was a bill that had many incarnations and was negotiated from single payer into the same plan proposed by the conservative Heritage Foundation. It has 161 Republican Amendments and was passed into law. A law that passed both houses of congress and was ruled constitutional by a conservative Supreme Court.

"It’s either like Nazi Germany or it’s covering immigrants, but I am pretty sure Hitler was not proposing healthcare for outsiders. Can you at least get the hate straight?"

ObamaCare is the same successful plan that the 2012 conservative Republican nominee for President basically invented and implemented in the state of Massachusetts when he was governor. That guy listened to all these shit bakers and ran his campaign vowing to repeal ObamaCare. That guy lost the election. What was that guys name again?

To hear the Republicans tell it, shout it or spew it, helping Americans will destroy America. Not high unemployment rates, not greedy banks bringing our nation to its financial knees and sucking revenue out of our economy because the Mega Rich are appalled we would ask them to be downgraded to super rich. Nope, what is destroying this country is the law giving affordable healthcare to all Americans.

This law is so bad that the Republicans had to destroy the government so it wouldn’t destroy America. Or something. Why should we be surprised? This is the same crowd whose ideas include: Gays getting married will destroy your marriage and removing access to birth control will stop abortions. Why wouldn’t they go headlong with the idea that shutting down the government will help heal it?

These are just some of the ingredients of the shit cake they continue to bake which leads me to the main ingredient and the most ironic part of all of this—the biggest whopper of them all—that ObamaCare needs to be stopped because it is A GOVERNMENT TAKE-OVER OF HEALTHCARE. Healthcare that launched on the day the government shutdown. And continues to run as the government is shut down. Healthcare that if it were run by the government would not be up and running because the government is not up and running to run it!

Why is it up and running??? BECAUSE IT IS NOT GOVERNMENT-RUN HEALTHCARE. But the Republicans say it is, so they shut down the government and put 800,000 people out of work and thousands more in peril. Because ObamaCare is a government-run healthcare plan designed to destroy America. Except that it’s not. Please join me as I return to my catatonia.