Tim Huelskamp is a Republican congressman representing the 1st District of Kansas. Sometimes he tweets stupid stuff on Twitter like this gem where he posts an article about a doctor in Kansas who has stopped accepting insurance and instead charges people a money fee and just accepts payment upfront. Sounds like a good idea. No more red tape, no more high overhead and the article posted, which leads to Breitbart.com makes this seem like the best thing since sliced bread. The problem is Huelskamp uses Breitbart as a legitimate source. You can’t use Drudge or Breitbart if I can’t use Huffington Post or Think Progress. You can’t use Fox News if I can’t use MSNBC. If you actually find the article that Breitbart copied and pasted from on CNN Money, you learn that there is more to the story. Specifically, professionals worried this will negatively impact low- to middle-income people who can’t afford $40 a month to see a doctor or who can’t pay $5,000 upfront for surgery. The doctor the interview is about does recommend that people have insurance for the big money stuff like surgeries and hospital stays so he does at least preface what he does with that. What’s interesting is that the article specifically says he hired a bunch of people to deal with paperwork. Without paperwork, I’m assuming he fired all those people? Also, what he’s doing is like insurance in that you’re paying for a something each month that you may or may not use. Somehow I feel that if too many doctors start doing this, this may be the way insurance companies get them to stop. I also want to point that insurance was a complicated, convoluted beast long before Obamacare came into the picture.
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Tim Huelskamp is a Republican congressman representing the 1st District of Kansas. Sometimes he tweets stupid stuff on Twitter like this gem where he posts an article about a doctor in Kansas who has stopped accepting insurance and instead charges people a money fee and just accepts payment upfront. Sounds like a good idea. No more red tape, no more high overhead and the article posted, which leads to Breitbart.com makes this seem like the best thing since sliced bread.

The problem is Huelskamp uses Breitbart as a legitimate source. You can’t use Drudge or Breitbart if I can’t use Huffington Post or Think Progress. You can’t use Fox News if I can’t use MSNBC. If you actually find the article that Breitbart copied and pasted from on CNN Money, you learn that there is more to the story. Specifically, professionals worried this will negatively impact low- to middle-income people who can’t afford $40 a month to see a doctor or who can’t pay $5,000 upfront for surgery. The doctor the interview is about does recommend that people have insurance for the big money stuff like surgeries and hospital stays so he does at least preface what he does with that.

What’s interesting is that the article specifically says he hired a bunch of people to deal with paperwork. Without paperwork, I’m assuming he fired all those people? Also, what he’s doing is like insurance in that you’re paying for a something each month that you may or may not use. Somehow I feel that if too many doctors start doing this, this may be the way insurance companies get them to stop.

I also want to point that insurance was a complicated, convoluted beast long before Obamacare came into the picture.

Seriously, What's The Matter With Kansas?

Gun nuts, anti-abortion zealots and free-market cultists are leading the state to the brink of disaster

This is an accurate portrayal of what is going on in Kansas. Brownback ran for governor and is now running the place like how Republicans thought Obama was going to run the country. It’s quite ironic when you think about it. The only difference is that Brownback has an R behind his name.

And to the idiot commenters who post saying “this was the will of the people of Kansas,” you clearly don’t live here. The moderates were outspent and outnumbered despite some of them faithfully serving their state for decades and being well-liked by their constituents. Attempts were made to gerrymander the political boundaries so the more liberal areas of eastern Topeka, Kansas City, Lawrence and Wichita would have less of a vote. And it was made very clear that a vote for anyone other than a Brownback/Koch endorsed candidate was a vote for Satan and Hitler.

Palin and Tebow stumble relative to the size of their stage: the larger it is, the harder they fall. As Alaska’s youngest governor, Sarah Palin was tough, with a reputation for rooting out corruption and preserving her state’s natural resources. “She’s exactly who this country needs,” said John McCain when he added her to his presidential ticket. But as a national political figure, Palin began to trip left and right.

When America dug deeper, it found she lacked basic map skills and knew frighteningly little about American foreign policy for a person one heart attack away from running the country. She also wondered aloud exactly what one did in the vice-president job that she was applying for and bumbled the mechanics of policy, health care, and tax code.

Likewise, Tebow was untouchable in college: he was the first sophomore in history to win the Heisman Trophy, and he led the Florida Gators to a national championship. College football is much slower and sloppier than its professional twin; in that forum, Tebow’s valiant efforts concealed his lack of polish. In the NFL, he has nowhere to hide. Since being promoted to starting quarterback, he regularly completes less than half the passes he throws in a game. He has been accused of slow and ugly throwing mechanics (one sports writer said you could time his release with a sundial). Critics say he can’t read the field after the snap and that at 6-foot-3 and 235 pounds he is the wrong size for his position, and shouldn’t play it at all.

Tim Tebow, who reportedly just signed with the Patriots, is the Sarah Palin of football. (via newsweek)
msnbc: From PoliticsNation: Michelle Bachmann’s congressional report card doesn’t have too many legislative accomplishments so far.  Do you think she’ll rack up anything more before she departs next year? Sounds to me she was pretty much a failure while in Congress. Maybe if she had been in for longer than 8 years it would be more impressive but I guess we’ll never know…
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msnbc:

From PoliticsNation:

Michelle Bachmann’s congressional report card doesn’t have too many legislative accomplishments so far. 

Do you think she’ll rack up anything more before she departs next year?

Sounds to me she was pretty much a failure while in Congress. Maybe if she had been in for longer than 8 years it would be more impressive but I guess we’ll never know…

Tim Huelskamp is a Republican congressman representing the 1st District of Kansas. Sometimes he tweets stupid stuff on Twitter like this gem where he says Congressmen and White House staff should not be exempt from Obamacare. But his argument is mainly that the whole damn thing should just be repealed because [insert Republican talking point here].

That Republicans are calling for a full repeal is just baffling to me because that’s not really the way creating legislation works. Legislation is created and is meant to be expanded upon, it’s meant to change and grow as time moves forward—what if all legislation from the 1800s stayed exactly the same? Instead of repealing, why don’t try to fix it to make it save money, or get rid of the stupid penalty for people who choose not to take it. Instead of hurting people who are actually benefiting from it, make it better.

For those interested, the link leads here.

To view the original tweets, go here and here.

Tim Huelskamp is a Republican congressman representing the 1st District of Kansas. Sometimes he tweets stupid stuff on Twitter like this gem where he flat out lies about taxpayer funding for Planned Parenthood. Current law states that Planned Parenthood cannot use taxpayer money to pay for abortions which is why when you go to pay for your $300-1,000 abortion, you pay the full price. In fact, abortion counts for only 3% of what Planned Parenthood actually does. The rest of the time, they are educating teens and young adults about sex and how to do it safely and helping women get screenings for breast cancer. Those bastards. To see the original tweet, go here. You can follow @CongHuelskamp (and myself @tauycreek) You can also follow the Planned Parenthood Tumblr.
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Tim Huelskamp is a Republican congressman representing the 1st District of Kansas. Sometimes he tweets stupid stuff on Twitter like this gem where he flat out lies about taxpayer funding for Planned Parenthood. Current law states that Planned Parenthood cannot use taxpayer money to pay for abortions which is why when you go to pay for your $300-1,000 abortion, you pay the full price. In fact, abortion counts for only 3% of what Planned Parenthood actually does. The rest of the time, they are educating teens and young adults about sex and how to do it safely and helping women get screenings for breast cancer. Those bastards.

To see the original tweet, go here.

You can follow @CongHuelskamp (and myself @tauycreek)

You can also follow the Planned Parenthood Tumblr.

pol102:

From shortformblog:

Today In Bad Ideas: Some guy named Brad Paisley recorded a song, with LL Cool J, talking about how hard it is to be a white man who just wants to wear the Confederate flag in peace. It’s called “Accidental Racist”, and you can find the (completely problematic) lyrics here. source

Here’s the thing that you just need to understand. The Confederate flag is a symbol of the Confederacy and what it stood for, not the traditions and values (like hospitality) of the South. 

The Confederate flag was adopted only by the Confederacy. It doesn’t predate the Confederacy, and it stopped being used with the fall of the Confederacy. In fact, the flag was only rarely used in the Confederacy; it was the flag of the Army of Northern Virginia (Robert E. Lee’s army) and only later became associated with the entire confederacy. In fact, the “Confederate flag” you’re familiar with was never the official flag of the Confederacy.

The flag had a renaissance of sorts much later. Much later. The flag began appearing during WWII on units with Southern histories. The first use of the Confederate “stars and bars” on a Southern state flag was as early as 1894: no surprise, it was Mississippi. But that means that Mississippians didn’t mind revoking their heritage (the Magnolia flag, which was carried into battle during the Civil War by Mississippi regiments). Georgia’s controversial Confederate flag wasn’t introduced until 1956.

My problem with the “it’s part of our history” argument is two-fold: (1) The history of Southern states extends much further back than the Confederacy, so I’m left wondering why that pivotal (and controversial) moment has become identified as the historical juncture that should define what “the South” is about. (2) The history of the Confederacy was extremely brief: it lasted less than five years. (By contrast, the Third Reich lasted more than twice as long, giving the Nazi flag a stronger claim to historical tradition.)

So we’re left with an interesting historical juxtaposition. The Confederate flag was not widely used within the Confederacy, but is clearly identified with the Confederacy’s cause. And that flag had a boom in popularity starting in the 1950s. Coincidentally, the 1950s was the start of the modern US Civil Rights Movement. In other words, a symbol of the Confederacy (which will forever by identified with slavery) became popular in South at the same time as African-Americans began advocating for political and social equality.

Now you see why the Confederate flag is “controversial” (to say the least). It seems remarkable that people who want to defend their region’s rich cultural traditions and history (and they have many good reasons to do so, I should point out) have gravitated to a very particular symbol identified with racism. Attaching themselves to that symbol meant jettisoning historical state flags (where was the reverence for history then?) and doing so at the same time as Jim Crow and segregation was being challenged in the South.

Perhaps it’s because I’m just a “carpetbagger” (as I’m sure many of my students think), but I can’t for the life of me understand why anyone who—once confronted with the sheer historical narrative of that flag—would continue to embrace it. Waving a Confederate flag around is a clear sign that either (1) you don’t like black people very much, (2) you are in favor of violent overthrow of the US federal government, or (3) you really don’t care if people think you believe in the first two options or not. 

EDIT: And please don’t even get me started on people in northern states that embrace the Confederate flag. When I see the “stars and bars” in Indiana, I know exactly what it means.

Source: shortformblog

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