Everyone who voted for Obama should read this

FACT: If the "Healthcare for all" bill goes through as-is, private insurance will be illegal. It won't be a matter of choosing between private insurance and public aid (which is what nationalized medicine will boil down to). You will have no choice. If you have insurance now, and for some reason need to change from one company to another - say, your position at work changes and insurance changes as a result - you won't be able to get a new policy. Not an option.
Here's the article from Investor's Business Daily.

It's Not An Option

By INVESTOR'S BUSINESS DAILY | Posted Wednesday, July 15, 2009 4:20 PM PT

Congress: It didn't take long to run into an "uh-oh" moment when reading the House's "health care for all Americans" bill. Right there on Page 16 is a provision making individual private medical insurance illegal.

When we first saw the paragraph Tuesday, just after the 1,018-page document was released, we thought we surely must be misreading it. So we sought help from the House Ways and Means Committee.

It turns out we were right: The provision would indeed outlaw individual private coverage. Under the Orwellian header of "Protecting The Choice To Keep Current Coverage," the "Limitation On New Enrollment" section of the bill clearly states:

"Except as provided in this paragraph, the individual health insurance issuer offering such coverage does not enroll any individual in such coverage if the first effective date of coverage is on or after the first day" of the year the legislation becomes law.

So we can all keep our coverage, just as promised — with, of course, exceptions: Those who currently have private individual coverage won't be able to change it. Nor will those who leave a company to work for themselves be free to buy individual plans from private carriers. (...)

The article continues, but there's the meat of it.
Having had Medicaid for a year for Kittyboy and myself when he was first born, I wasn't working, and Husband only had 25 hours of employment a week, I can say from experience that private insurance is expensive but WORTH IT if you have the money.
We all know that the government goes with the lowest bidder. When the feds are picking up the tab, they decide how much they are paying. This means that if you have, say, cancer, and are on Medicaid, the government decides how much your life is worth. And what we're all going to have, eventually, is Medicaid. Even if you have the money to buy the insurance outright, the company cannot write you a new policy.

Seriously, read the article. This is insane.

Justice at Last

The wheels of Justice can move exceedingly slow sometimes in IL - George Ryan, for example. He was in office HOW long ago? And I was certain that in the case of Chicago's Own, a.k.a. The Gubernatorial Flyboy, a.k.a. Rod Blagojevich, he would be loooooong gone by the time anyone moved a finger against him. I mean, it's the Chicago political machine, know what I mean? And we all know how THAT works, puh-lease. Better chance of finding Bin Laden, right? I mean, he got elected not once, but TWICE. I can understand one mistake, but TWICE? After the FIRST four years of flying his lazy backside back and forth from Chicago because he couldn't be bothered to call U-Haul (or didn't think we down-state hicks had indoor plumbing - or like the gas station clerk from whom I once asked directions in Chicago, he didn't have a clue where Springfield WAS or that I-55 goes right there - or maybe he didn't know that Chicago's not the capital - the reasons Springfielders have posited as to why he didn't move here are multitudinous, as have been the jokes on the subject).
nd today, thank you so much, I was proved wrong. There IS justice in the world, even in Chicago. I was walking through Dollar General buying toddler-proof ornaments (the Kittyboy's broken two already), and heard something over the radio about "the governor's arrest". I thought, "What governor? What state?" and blanked on it until the next news break, when the announcer very clearly stated that OUR governor was behind bars. I actually started dancing right there in the store. I couldn't believe it. It was like Christmas morning with a Jag in the driveway. It was AWESOME.
We even watched the press conference at 11, which taught us something very interesting. Our esteemed governor has TWO very bad habits. His first is using his office for personal gain wherever humanly possible. His second is swearing like a sailor. The official running the press conference was reading excerpts from the wire-tap transcripts, and I don't think there was a single quote he was able to repeat in its entirety. "The governor then replied, 'Bleep them, if they won't bleeping do it, I don't bleeping care.'" This is how he routinely spoke to his subordinates, colleagues, and even donors? A governorship, you can buy - class, you can't.
How touching, and right before Christmas, too - one of those heartwarming moments that brings together an entire state, regardless of party affiliation. Well, except for the 13% that still supported him as of the last approval rating I heard - ah heck with them. Party hats and noisemakers for everyone!
Oh, and he's not going to resign, because this is just "politics". Yeah, in Chicago I'm sure it's politics as usual. Orange is going to look SO good on him.

On Race and Politics

Mr. President-Elect - we seriously do not care what color you are. We didn't vote against you because you're "black" (which you're not, you're biracial), we voted against you because we disagreed with you. Give us the dignity of being citizens who honestly and seriously disagree with your politics, rather than writing us off as racist rednecks who voted "white". We didn't vote white. We voted Republican. It was not a racial victory. It was a Democratic victory.
If you want to actually act presidential, start by getting over your melanin.

Counting Blessings

1. The United States Presidency carries a limit of two terms. (The Governor's office, in Illinois, has no such luck.)
2. Not even Clinton could screw up TOO badly (then again, he was easily distracted...)
3. OBAMA DID NOT WIN BY A LANDSLIDE. He got a landslide of the electoral college, but take it from someone stuck in the People's Republic of Chicago - in real terms, than means nothing. If he is as intelligent as everyone believes him to be, he will humbly take that into account and bear in mind the 46% of people he has to win over. Not 27% - that's the electoral college. I'm talking people who actually voted at polling places.
4. TERM LIMITS.
5. I can say I voted my conscience. Thanks to Illinois, my vote was NOT meaningful, but at least I did not vote for someone whose beliefs personally sicken me.
6. For the most part, we can safely ignore him and keep living our lives as we see fit. My friend Carey's Election Day post was reassuring. We may disagree on whether there ARE differences between the candidates, but she reminded me that whatever happens, we can keep making a difference. We can keep working in our own communities to create the world we want to live in - no matter WHO is in office. Thank you, Carey!

Have you thanked your election judge today?

I baked brownies for ours! It's become a tradition, I always take them something. After all, they're right across the street, they have to be up REALLY early, and they've got to spend most of the day bored out of their minds.
This morning, there was a whole row of signs at the hundred-foot mark, which there always is, because that's kind of standard. This afternoon, after we got our free Starbucks coffee for voting, all the signs were down. I thought it was weird for someone to take them when there were still a few hours left, then I saw them in the ditch. All of them. Rather ticked me off, because someone went to all the trouble of putting them up, and someone else had childishly thrown them in the ditch. So I went and grabbed out one of everybody who was running for anything, and started putting them back up on the other side of the road. It's the principle of the thing! I had them far enough over, I KNEW it had to be over a hundred feet away, and I thought the prankster might be slightly more reluctant to grab them off of what would look like private property. Then a neighbor came out to tell me she thought the minister, of all people, was the one who threw them in the ditch. I asked, didn't all the signs pretty much go with the territory of being a polling place, and she said yes! They ARE supposed to be there! So I just scooted them all over far enough they WERE on our property and not the church's, so if it was the minister, he couldn't complain. This lady even knew who all the people were, which I didn't. One guy, I forget who, his dad used to be the mayor way back when. Another one is running for office from Iraq (Recorder or Clerk or something). Pretty cool.
We're not watching a THING this evening except epidodes of TV shows we've saved up for just this night. I'll find out who won in the morning.
I dream of one day living in a world where my vote really DOES count... But for that, we would have to get rid of the electoral college system. Until then, living in the Grand Ol' PRC (People's Republic of Chicago), my vote means jack squat. But hey, I can dream.

So, I've voted!

I want a Sarahcuda t-shirt!

I also put up signs in my yard (we're right across from our polling place), because MY candidates had no signs whatsoever among the many, many other signs along the drive. For that matter, there were no signs for EITHER presidential candidate. Next year, I'm just going to assume that my favorites are under-endorsed and have signs ready the night before. Posterboard, Sharpies, and tomato stakes from my garden!

I pick my battles, because really, everything's fixable. The economy can be fixed - we've weathered worse. The environment can be fixed - even the Exxon Valdez spill was cleaned up with enough time and effort. Corrupt politicians come and go - even Blagojovich has to leave office eventually (he'll probably quit once the state's too broke to pay him).

Only thing that's not fixable is death. That can't be reversed. Forget the fact that Obama thinks anyone who is religious or hunts is just a bitter, misinformed hick (yup, I'm a bitter, misinformed hick!). He doesn't even think a baby alive outside the womb deserves to live if the mother's original INTENT was to abort it. Asked when he thought life began, he said he's not paid enough to decide that - so I guess he errs on the side of infanticide. Better dead than alive and inconveniancing someone.

So remind me why it is I can't kill people who inconvenience ME? I mean, apart from the whole "murder being wrong" thing.