Special From The Pen

How many police does it take to silence the voice of the people?

That's a question a despot might ask in a totalitarian police state. But this week the Senate Finance Committee thought it was a hilarious joke as they ejected one brave activist after another for protesting the fact that not one spokesperson for single payer health care was allowed to sit at the hearing table.

Senator Max Baucus (MT), who had preemptively declared that consideration of a single payer option was off the table, actually joked "We need more police [1:58 on video]." And the rest of the Senate panel just laughed their heads off.

Senator Chuck Grassley (IA), the ranking Republican, not to be outdone in his contempt for the people, then asked if there was "somewhere they can watch it on television [2:05 on video]," which elicited additional hearty guffaws. Yes, what a wonderful entertaining show that would be, the spectacle of the will of the people being excluded while corporate special interests, like butchers, carve up our pocketbooks and our bodies.

On the action page is an extended video where you can hear for yourself those Senators laughing at us, and you'll be just at outraged as we are. It's time for the U.S. Senate to get the message that we the people are not just a joke to be laughed off. Why is it that not ONE senator on that committee has the integrity to stand up for a even handed debate of health care issues? Why should any of them be elected to public office ever again?

“So let's see a show of hands. How many of you would like to sign up now for a commie Marxist national health care system ... like in Canada, England and other pinko Bolshevik countries like that?”

How stupid do they think the we are, to try to reduce the terms of the debate to such an ignorant level. Meet the new mass media scare label, "socialized medicine.” As opposed to like what ... the ANTI-social corporate medical insurance industry we have now, where patients have no role except to be cash cows, by design (and) never to be actually cured?

If you or anyone in your family has ever been seriously ill, and as we all will be someday, you know the medical industry will pick your bones clean of every dime you ever earned in your life, just in time to drop you into the cheapest possible pine box.

Why are members of Congress fighting so hard to keep single payer health care out of the public debate? It is because there are no fat profits in it for their special interest corporate campaign contributors, who maximize their profits in proportion to the sicker we are. They cannot compete with a low overhead efficiently run government program, just like we have now with the existing and proven Medicare system.

Instead, they will line up a bunch of corporate lobbyists and stooges to tell bald faced lies. Just like Senator Jim Bunning himself who asserted that Canada and England had tax rate of at least sixty percent to support single payer. But they don't want anyone around to call them on their willful and malicious lies.

Yes, all those who love to preach to the rest of us about the free market and competition are shown to be only interested in a rigged market and a rigged debate. Baucus may put on a face of being slightly chastened, but he still will not allow any honest testimony
on single payer.

But can beat them. This is the pivotal moment. We have been speaking out for HR 676 (Medicare for all) for years. And now 8 brave activists have been hauled away because they would not remain silent. But in doing so, in putting their own bodies on the line, they have exposed the current "debate" for the total sham it is.

We are not asking you to put your body on the line. All we are asking you to do is submit a one click action page that we have specially configured to send your message to the Senate Finance Committee as a hard copy pdf that they can't just laugh off. It will become part of the permanent record. Plus your message will go to all your regular members of Congress, plus your nearest daily local newspaper as well if that option is selected.

Go to Single Payer Action Page: http://www.peaceteam.net/action/pnum982.php

At 3:20 of the video posted on the action page above you will hear a woman loudly ask, "I wonder how many there are?" Let's show them. Let's show them there are millions and millions of us out here who will no longer be ignored, who will no longer be laughed off. Because they know we can stop them if and only if large numbers of us raise our voices now.

Let's just do it.

Following is a list of all Senators on the Finance Committee, including at least a couple who you might have considered to be "liberals". Where are their voices? Is there not a single one of them who will stand up and say, "No wait a minute, we need to hear what the single payer advocates have to say." So especially if one of these is one of your personal Senator, they especially need to hear from you now:

Max BAUCUS, MT, John D. ROCKEFELLER IV, WV, Kent CONRAD, ND, Jeff BINGAMAN, NM, John F. KERRY, MA, Blance L. LINCOLN, AR, Ron WYDEN, OR, Charles E. SCHUMER, NY, Debbie STABENOW, MI, Maria CANTWELL, WA, Bill NELSON, FL, Robert MENENDEZ, NJ, Thomas CARPER, DE, Chuck GRASSLEY, IA, Orrin G. HATCH, UT, Olympia J. SNOWE, ME, Jon KYL, AZ, Jim BUNNING, KY, Mike CRAPO, ID, Pat ROBERTS, KS, John ENSIGN, NV, Mike ENZI, WY, John CORNYN, TX,

No, we don't need more police. We need fewer Senators with plugs in their ears like Max Baucus. He and the rest of them need to hear our voices on this critical issue.